In a world where the social fallout from militant and extremist religious groups is often reduced to sound bites and headlines from overseas, it is all too easy for the West to overlook the daily lives of residents in war-torn regions in favour of more glamourized news. In Timbuktu, director Abderrahmane[Read More…]
Film and TV
Oscar Shorts 2015
Even the more informed moviegoers among the masses will often reach the short film portion of their Academy Awards ballots and have no idea where to start in terms of picking the two winners. The critical buzz that accompanies Oscar season largely ignores these compressed works—and the Tribune is here[Read More…]
California dreamin’: Kevin Costner discusses new sports flick
In the farming town of McFarland, California, Jim White decided to start a cross-country team with boys who seemed to be able to run forever. These teenagers were not your typical, promising athletes; they were the sons of poor immigrant farmers—some even lacked the means to buy running shoes—helping their[Read More…]
Dark creatures and light humour in What We Do in the Shadows
Comedy, in a lot of ways, is the most subjective genre in any medium. Something that one person finds hilarious could fall completely flat for another—and both would be correct in their opinions because comedy comes from the realm of visceral, indescribable feelings, and gut reactions. Even more subjective is[Read More…]
Ann Arbor Film Festival Tour stops in Montreal for nine-film showcase
"Even though it is abbreviated, these three days represent what is happening in contemporary moving picture culture,” said David Dinnell at the opening of the 52nd Ann Arbor Film Festival Tour in Montreal. “Even just tonight contains most of the field’s genres,” he continued. “The nine pieces from six countries[Read More…]
Serpent’s Lullaby adds eerie beauty to Medusa myth
Serpent’s Lullaby, a 2014 short film that has been garnering buzz on the festival circuit and recently made its Canadian premiere in Toronto, is a deeply disturbing and undeniably fascinating take on the myth of Medusa in a modern setting. Its eerie motifs—arguably on par with those of American Horror[Read More…]
Waiting for August a tender portrait, but not much else
Waiting for August, directed by Teodora Ana Mihai, tells the story of 15-year-old Georgiana and her six siblings, who live together in a Romanian housing project. The pack of children must adjust to life when their mother goes to Italy to find work and Georgiana takes on the role of[Read More…]
Still Alice avoids tropes, commits to stark realism
At its most basic level, Still Alice is a film about a woman with a disease. Look deeper and you’ll find a story about a woman not only fighting against a disease, but fighting to find who she really is. Deeper still, and it’s a story about love reframing itself[Read More…]
Pop Rhetoric: Oscar backlash misses the mark
The 2015 Oscar nominations were announced recently, and with them came the inevitable hand-wringing that always accompanies news regarding the awards. Many critics cried racism, and the news was generally treated by denizens of the internet as symptomatic of the gross racial inequalities that continue to plague North America and[Read More…]
The peculiar ethics of The Bachelor
In light of both the show’s season premiere just two weeks ago and former Bachelorette Andi Dorfman’s recent split from her reality TV lover, Josh Murray, I think it’s time that the Tribune take a deep, fleshy bite out of one of the most peculiar, borderline tragic, and simultaneously popular[Read More…]