829 Best Film & TV Releases Translated Into Danish (Page 26)

Ron’s Gone Wrong has some lofty goals: it’s a bold attempt to talk about how social media addiction, consumerism, and technology at large has taken over kids’ lives in a way that’s not just unhealthy, but that’s actively leaving them lonelier. And if anything can be applauded about writer and director Sarah Smith’s film, it’s in the way it wants to tackle all of this head on. Only in this world, swap the iPhones and tablets for “B-bots”—cute little AIs proudly labeled “your best friend out of the box!” They follow you everywhere, learn everything about you, and use that info to help you make new friends via other kids’ B-bots. It’s the tech solution to friendship! ...And a handy little metaphor for the way tech once designed to bring us together has mutated into something else entirely. Continue Reading →

Since seeing Red Rocket, I haven’t been able to stop listening to “Bye Bye Bye.” The hum of the song’s wonky strings overlays the opening shot. As the camera zooms out from a jarring close-up of a bus seat, the synthetic beat kicks in, revealing Mikey Saber (Simon Rex), battered and bruised. NSYNC’s upbeat, indignant track lends a pulsing momentum to the opening montage as Mr. Saber disembarks from his steel chariot and starts the long walk to his ex-wife Lexi’s (Bree Elrod) domicile. “I know that I can take no more, it ain’t no lie,” indeed.   Continue Reading →

The Electrical Life of Louis Wain is an alternatively madcap and melancholic retelling of the artistic and personal life of the peculiar Louis Wain by making a lot of noise but not saying much. Biographical films have to tread a very difficult line. They must tell their central characters’ life and accomplishments while humanizing them through their rituals and quirks. And they must do this all without turning the movie idealization or fetishization of such things. Narratively, what Louis Wain gets right is that focusing on the man as a deeply troubled individual and melds his artistic work along with the afflictions that he suffered. What it gets wrong is its inability to dig deeper into Louis Wain beyond his whimsies and mannerisms and the surrounding greater Victorian English culture.  Continue Reading →

With the release of The Rise of Skywalker and the upcoming Ghostbusters: Afterlife, the term “fan service” has come to mean going to extremes in order to please fickle audiences of a TV series or film franchise. Though framed as an acknowledgment and appreciation of fan support, it feels forced and phony, an Easter egg hunt where a plot should be. While David Gordon Green and Danny McBride’s 2018 reboot of Halloween was far from a perfect film, they were determined to make it their own, rather than continuing the same interminable, by then thoroughly ridiculous storyline. Its sequel, Halloween Kills, however, feels like whatever Green and McBride were originally trying to do was shoved aside in favor of winks and nods at the “true” fans of the series. The body count is much, much bigger, and almost laughably gory, but if you’re looking for any kind of coherent plot and characters not doing anything but the stupidest things imaginable, look elsewhere. Continue Reading →

R.L. Stine is best known for those iconic Goosebumps books, but those aren’t the only stories he’s written over the years. That used to be easy to forget about, but the entertainment landscape of 2021 has reaffirmed this longstanding truth. Thanks to titles like Stranger Things popularizing youth-friendly horror in modern pop culture, a series of recent adaptations of Stine’s other works (which fit into that mold nicely) has reminded us all of just how many different projects Stine has written for over the years. Continue Reading →

Next year will mark, improbably, 25 years since Diana, Princess of Wales was killed in a horrific car accident while being chased down by aggressive photographers. Like Marilyn Monroe, another unlucky blonde who was mercilessly hounded by the press before dying too young, Diana’s image has only become more indelible in the years following her death. Also like Marilyn, lots of money has been made exploiting her, in endless bullshit attempts to tell her “true” story. Musician/lyricists David Bryan and Joe DiPietro cash in on her too with the Broadway musical Diana, filmed and presented on Netflix for our viewing “pleasure.” The producers of Dear Evan Hansen owe Bryan and DiPietro a great deal of gratitude, because Evan Hansen is no longer the worst musical of 2021. Continue Reading →

When I first heard the announcement of a new adaptation of Frank Herbert’s magnum opus Dune, I think I might have groaned and said, “God, not again.” Even with the cult followings that Lynch’s now-disowned 1984 version and SyFy’s plodding 2000 miniseries have amassed, there has yet to be a version that had the kind of mass appeal that gets butts in seats.  Continue Reading →

The ultimate representation both of making it, and of giving up, the soul-crushing blandness and hidden darkness of suburbia is a well drawn from many, many times. HOAs and smiling politely through block parties and feigning interest in rose bushes, moving to the suburbs is frequently painted as the end of adventure and creativity. What happens when the couple that moves to their shiny new house to start shiny new lives aren’t just leaving the city but also a trail of bodies behind? Can a relationship work when you’re not just newlyweds and new parents but are also trying your darndest not to murder any more people or each other? Continue Reading →

KinoKultur is a thematic exploration of the queer, camp, weird, and radical releases Kino Lorber has to offer. Pretty Peggy Johns (Sian Barbara Allen) wants to do her best for the environment. Yet while she rides her bicycle, bell-bottoms billowing, through the California hills to Elliot Mansion in Scream, Pretty Peggy (1973), the most ecological thing she does is star in the film, which is assembled entirely from recycled plots and recycled stars. Scream, Pretty Peggy and The Screaming Woman are two new-to-Blu-ray TV-movie thrillers from the early 1970s starring dames of Classical Hollywood. Each is a knowing hodgepodge of different Hollywood horror tropes that, instead of languishing in “hagsploitation” hell, allows its special guest star to shine. Continue Reading →

Have you ever spoken to a friend who was tangentially involved in a big event? They know the players, they saw some of it go down, but they’re missing pieces of information. They lack the perspective of someone directly involved and the insights that come with that. That’s the experience of watching The Eyes of Tammy Faye. Continue Reading →

As Shakespeare famously opined: What’s in a name? Based on the religious nature of the character’s names in Valdimar Jóhannson’s debut film, Lamb, there must be something allegorical about the movie’s plot. Yet, as compelling as Lamb is, in the final analysis, its religious symbolism amounts to little. Continue Reading →

The Addams Family characters have existed since 1938 and yet they’ve never felt as tired as they do in The Addams Family 2. A “kooky and spooky” family once known for subverting the norms is now the star of a movie that couldn’t be more ordinary. If you’ve seen one subpar computer-animated kids film from the last 15 years, you’ve probably seen all the worst bathroom and slapstick gags The Addams Family 2 has to offer. Here’s a feature that can’t be called a success unless it’s intended goal was to make one yearn for the sophistication of Hotel Transylvania 2. Continue Reading →

(This is part of our ongoing NYFF coverage.) Continue Reading →

Writing about Doom Patrol Season 3 is a surprisingly tricky task. After all, how many times can one stress that its budget aesthetics are a distinct part of its charm? How many times can you praise its willful strangeness, its willingness to embrace the bizarre without ignoring the need for characterization? How many times can a critic declare, “yes, still very good.”? Continue Reading →

To speak of No Time to Die is to speak of what came before it. Of course, that sounds obvious in theory; the Daniel Craig era of 007 comes to an end here. They lightly tied into each other until Spectre drunkenly tried and failed at deepening the mythology. While the quality of the films varied, at least they were all distinct. It's been fifteen years and five movies -- now it all comes to a head, the stakes ostensibly high and the emotions primed to be deeper. And yet, against all odds, Cary Joji Fukunaga's offering to the franchise is derivative enough of its most recent predecessors to fumble conceptually and concretely. Continue Reading →

Mia Hansen-Løve's latest wrestles with the creative and romantic frustrations between men and women, with Ingmar Bergman watching mindfully overhead. (This review is part of our coverage of the 2021 New York Film Festival.) It's an unwritten rule of film festivals that there have to be at least a few films in the program dealing with either the history of cinema or the filmmaking process. Bergman Island, the latest from Mia Hansen-Løve, covers both of those bases. It's a quietly beguiling look at a pair of filmmakers as they go about generating their latest projects, literally standing in the looming shadow of one of filmmaking's most towering figures.  Continue Reading →

In the opening scene of Benedetta, a young girl stops along the road to pray to a shrine of the Virgin Mary. A group of bandits ambushes her and her family, nobles who are well-off but by no means excessively affluent. Benedetta curses the thieves as they snatch her mother’s gold necklace, promising that the Holy Mother will haunt them for the rest of their days. Suddenly, a small bird flies from a nearby tree and shits in the eye of the bandit leader. The men laugh and toss the jewelry back to Benedetta’s mother, preferring not to risk it. Still, we’re left wondering – was this divine intervention? Or just a case of well-timed bird poop?   Continue Reading →

Foundation is big. It is glossy. It is grand in scale and epic in tone. Worlds upon worlds, filled with trillions of people, hang in the balance. Well-dressed futuristic figures in smartly-appointed rooms give high-minded speeches at one another, debating the fate of civilization as it unspools over millennia. Continue Reading →

Tea Lindeberg and star Flora Ofelia Hoffman Lindhal craft a stupendous study of a young woman's struggle with her faith amidst horror. Perhaps the best film at TIFF was one of the first made available to audiences. A hidden gem from Denmark, Tea Lindeberg’s As in Heaven spins a stupendous picture from a quiet premise. The story of a young girl from a devout Christian farming family in Denmark set to break generations of tradition by going to school instead of shackling herself to her family’s land, As in Heaven is as wrenching as it is extraordinary. It’s a bleak picture to be sure, but it’s a powerful look at the ways religion and tradition starkly contrast with a slowly but surely changing world. Lise (Flora Ofelia Hoffman Lindhal) is an ethereal figure, bright and luminating with hope. That hope is quickly dashed by her father’s unhappiness – if not unwillingness – to send her to school. Moreover, Lise’s mother is about to have another child, growing their large family still further. Lise does housework and helps to entertain/wrangle her assorted younger siblings. She also has her eyes on a dashing tall young man who works on the farm named Jens Peter (Albert Rudbeck Lindhardt). As in Heaven’s genre-blending filmmaking offers a bleak, compelling, blood-soaked version of a Bergman-esque religious parable. Continue Reading →

Jeffrey Schwarz’s documentary on a never-was musical adaptation of Sunset Boulevard and its would-be makers is insightful if a bit scattered. (This review is part of our 2021 coverage of Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film Festival) “After Salome, we’ll make another picture, and another picture” and then a musical, and then a musical based on writing the musical, and then a picture about writing the musical and the musical based on writing the musical! Maybe it’s not something Norma Desmond could’ve dreamed of, but Gloria Swanson certainly would have approved. Continue Reading →

The third season of Laurie Nunn’s raunchy, teen dramedy Sex Education kicks off with a montage of the characters engaging in all sorts of sexual activities—some with their partners, some with their secret lovers, and some with themselves. For a show that’s always had a positive attitude when it comes to sex, it’s a fitting choice. However, Sex Education has never been just about hormones and horniness. Since its first season, the show has also proven to be a charming, often heartfelt look at adolescence. In season three, it remains committed to that approach.  Continue Reading →