Although it’s based on the true story of the illegitimate daughter of a Royal Navy captain and an enslaved African woman, Amma Asante’s Belle’s richest inspiration comes from a painting. A 1779 double portrait hanging at Scone Palace in Scotland, it shows a pretty blonde teenager decked out in typical…
“This is the first generation that is expected to live shorter lives than their parents,” says Katie Couric, the narrator of Fed Up. It’s an infuriating statement given both the preventability of that outcome and the institutional opposition to the solutions, the primary conflict that drives the film. For the…
Greetings from Cannes! It’s an unwritten rule – maybe it should even be a written one – that no one who is lucky enough to come to Cannes for the film festival, now in its 67th year, should, in any way, shape, or form, complain about being here. But may…
If you’ve ever loved a terrible person, Mike Leigh’s quietly sensational Cannes competition entry Mr. Turner — a biopic, of sorts, covering the last 25 years of the life of the great 19th century British painter J.M.W. Turner – is the movie for you. In his seascapes and landscapes, Turner…
My favorite instance of Kevin Spacey’s bad-assery comes not from any of his acerbic, acidic movie characters, but from his lesser-known career in live theater. Lesser-known, that is, until he started to break the fourth wall in a 2011 production of Richard III, courtesy his own London theater company, The…
The lights were dim. Gray-haired musicians in linen guayaberas filled the small stage, and the hips of every man and woman, young and old, moved to the rhythm. It was an exhilarating moment in one of Miami’s most seasoned hangouts, Little Havana’s Hoy Como Ayer. And there, right in the…
The 2014 Miami Jewish Film Festival took place months ago, but festival director Igor Shteyrenberg isn’t content to feature Jewish cinema just two weeks out of the year; he’s wants to keep it booming 24-7. The best way to do this, of course, is offer those Miami movie lovers a…
Don’t let the archaic graphics created by Bleeding Palm deceive you. There’s a well-informed wit behind the work by the group of talented minds that make up the collective. “Our stuff is pretty naive,” Ronnie Rivera admits with a laugh, “but we are capable of doing the more professional and…
Now here’s a reality show we can get behind. Spike TV will expand its popular series Tattoo Nightmares with a Miami spin-off, not-so-creatively titled Tattoo Nightmares Miami, Deadline reports. The original show follows a trio of tattoo artists who specialize in making patrons’ unfortunate ink choices, well, a little less…
He’s a sitcom producer. He’s four different cartoon characters. Oh yeah, and he’s also the best player in the NBA, helping the Heat on their way to yet another championship. LeBron James has a lot going on. But he’s still making time for Hollywood. His next project: the Judd Apatow…
At their worst, the four documentaries that have examined the tragic case of the West Memphis Three have felt like the work of master ironists. Telling the story of three Arkansas teens convicted of child murders just because two of them wore black and had an interest in the occult,…
Nicholas Stoller’s hilarious Neighbors splashes into summer with the satisfying swish-plop-hooray of a winning beer pong serve, making the director, who also wrote March’s Muppets Most Wanted, the first filmmaker in history to simultaneously have in theaters both a kiddie flick and an R-rated comedy where two men sword-fight with…
The landmark 1996 documentary that introduced audiences to the West Memphis Three, three teenagers — Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley, and, of course, Baldwin himself — wrongly convicted of murdering three 8-year-old boys. Jason Baldwin had already been in prison for several years when his friend Mojo shook him awake at…
“There is more space in the house now,” says the wife of Sigurdur “Siggi” Hjartarson. It’s her only comment regarding her husband’s decision to display his collection of hundreds of carefully preserved mammalian penises — we’re talking the whole spectrum, from a mouse to a mammoth sperm whale organ —…
Everything in the opening scenes of Jeremy Saulnier’s nerve-wracking revenge drama Blue Ruin is the color of a bruise, from the ocean to the bullet-hole-pocked 1996 Pontiac Bonneville that homeless near-mute Dwight (Macon Blair) calls home. It’s fitting. Dwight has never overcome the pain of his parents’ murder when he…
When an actor as talented as Philip Seymour Hoffman is lost, those who appreciate his work often flock to re-experience it. Three months have gone by since Hoffman’s passing, but there’s still a plethora of work by the man yet to be seen. One of those unreleased films, which has…
We’re so accustomed to younger women dating older men that we don’t even flinch anymore, but when it’s the other way around, we’re so taken aback that we even come up with a nickname for women who date younger men: cougars. Even more out of the ordinary is a same-sex…
A young filmmaker like Xavier Dolan doesn’t come often. Actor, writer, director, editor; the man seems to have a grasp on everything he’s given queer cinema so far. Even so, his three first features have had a tinge of film school student to them. But Tom à la ferme (Tom…
By the time Heath Ledger’s performance as the Joker in Christopher Nolan’s 2008 The Dark Knight was finally seen by critics and audiences, talk of a posthumous Oscar reached a fever pitch. Naturally, the inclination to compare Ledger’s work to past posthumous landmarks proved tempting, and many lists were compiled…
The chance for classics and genre flicks to come around Miami are slim, and when we do get lucky, it’s usually limited to some of the most overpriced scenarios possible. The thought of being able to step into a pretty cool place, drop less than ten bucks, and watch an…
Michelle Ehlen, director of Heterosexual Jill, playing Sunday, May 4, as part of the Miami Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, likes to mess with people’s minds – well, at least the parts of people’s minds that formulate stereotypes about gender and sexuality. Her previous film, Butch Jamie, played with gender…
When Cultist sat down for an outdoor chat with John Turturro in the garden of The Standard Hotel, the actor and director was coming down from the high of the night before. His new film, Fading Gigolo, which he directs and stars in opposite Woody Allen, just played to a…
