June 15, 2025 12:53 pm

Roger Ebert Reviews

Female Filmmakers in Focus: Mika Gustafson and Alexander Öhrstrand

Set in a nondescript working-class suburb of Sweden, “Paradise is Burning” focuses on three sisters whose mother is terminally absent. When the school begins to suspect their mother has taken off (again) a meeting with social services looms. This ticking clock adds tension as the eldest girl Laura (Bianca Delbravo) searches for someone to stand […]

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Fight or Flight: Jeremy Saulnier on Rebel Ridge

A ferociously satisfying update of “First Blood” with a rustic Southern setting, “Rebel Ridge” furthers writer-director Jeremy Saulnier’s pattern of trapping his protagonists in tight spots and making them fight their way out, even as it recalibrates the grisly survivalism of “Blue Ruin” and “Green Room,” along with the atmospheric tension of his Alaska-set “Hold

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Telluride Film Festival 2024: Nickel Boys, The Piano Lesson, September 5

There is always an abundant amount of suspense when it comes to the Telluride Film Festival (TFF) lineup; it is kept secret until the Thursday before the festival. This year, for its 51st edition, TFF’s programming has a heavy emphasis on exposing and exploring some of the extreme realities we’re experiencing politically and socially. Telluride’s

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Short Films in Focus: Young People, Old People and Nothing In Between

Parida Tantiwasadakran’s “Young People, Old People and Nothing In Between” centers on the friendship between a 7-year-old named Juice (Deedee Piamwiriyaku) with ADHD and her friend, an elderly woman named Grandma Lovely (Suwinya Kungsadan), who is slowly descending into dementia. With such a wide age gap between them and a limited understanding of everything that

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Let The Dead Sleep: On “Alien Romulus” and Digital Resurrection

SPOILERS FOR ALIEN ROMULUS: Fede Alvarez’s “Alien Romulus,” the latest entry in the “Alien” franchise, is a sturdily constructed movie with two thoughtfully written lead characters at its center. One is Rain (Cailee Spaeny), an orphaned miner who joins a reckless scheme to break into a decommissioned space station, steal lifeforms that are still in

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Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival 2024: Highlights of a Joyous Event

There are few Black film festivals as celebrated or talked about as The Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival, the finest film festival of the summer. The 22nd annual MVAAFF took place on the tiny island outside at the local high school Performing Arts Center. This is one of the country’s most decadent film fests,

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Venice Film Festival 2024: Babygirl, The Order, The Brutalist, I’m Still Here

After a screening of “Babygirl,” the Nicole Kidman showpiece about dominance and submission in the workplace that shook up the Biennale on Friday, a colleague insisted that, despite its issues, it wasn’t “a dismissible film.” And feeling my oats, I replied, “Just watch me.” But having had some time to turn it over, I’ve decided

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