POMO

It was clear that Garland wasn’t going to make a blockbuster out of this. However, it wasn’t clear what his masterful balancing between reality and dimensions beyond human perception would bring to a film that is supposed to stand solely on raw realism. Civil War contains grand scenes with tanks and helicopters, but without a cinematographic concept of the kind that Alfonso Cuarón employed in Children of Men and which would be needed here. At its core, Civil War is merely an intimate road movie spanning a broken America as it follows a team of three seasoned journalists and their novice colleague, whose innocence stands in contrast to their experience and professional detachment. Our question of why such a young girl would be doing such work is immediately answered for us: “I’ve never been so scared in my entire life. And I've never felt more alive.” ___ Civil War avoids sentiment and the dark tone of the story is lightened by the use of American pop oldies, but it lacks the artistic optics that we like Garland for in the first place. The film should me made up entirely of terrifying scenes, but it contains only one, which reflects the one-dimensional thinking of America’s redneck population and features a standout performance by Jesse Plemons. The director amplifies the rawness not with dark instrumental music, but with the intense sound of gunfire. And even though the film is compelling and engaging thanks to its characters, it lacks refined and unexpected conflicts, as well as an intellectual reach that would go beyond warning us about Donald Trump. And the climax is literally ridiculous.

Sensational. The narrative was clearly inspired by the Oscar-winning Free Solo. But that film was about the world’s best professional climber and was made by the world’s best professional outdoor director. Skywalkers is an enthusiast’s project about a pair of young adventurers, with a lot of selfie videos taken with mobile phones and drones – including some that are packed to the gills with adrenaline. Seeing it on the big screen means experiencing it with them. A hell of an adrenalin rush! However, what makes the film a sensation is the intertwining of their potentially lethal hobby, in which they find the meaning of life, with the romantic relationship that develops between them thanks to their shared passion and, through absolute trust in and support for each other, helps them to achieve the impossible. And the setting of their Instagram story in the period from the beginning of the pandemic to the Russian invasion of Ukraine (which they disagree with). A great, powerfully emotional love letter. [Miami Film Festival]

Better to have a short life in freedom than a long non-life under a communist dictatorship. A powerful true story of young Cubans who chose freedom in the 1990s. The film gets its joyful spirit in an isolated treatment home, where its characters live after deciding to shorten their own lives by deliberately injecting HIV. Because they can live as they please there. However, the introduction in the city is more interesting – rawer, more dramatic, packed with restlessness and rebellious energy. Clichés and mild kitsch pop up in the constellation of characters in the treatment home. But the ending works well. This group deserved to have their story made into a film. Blockbuster-makers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are aiming to make inroads into independent cinema. [Miami FF]

Contemplation of life and death by talking to Death, embodied by a digital bird – sometimes small enough to fit in your ear and sometimes as big as a movie monster. And that’s just the beginning. The initial wonder of “what kind of film is this?" gradually subsides, giving rise to a predictable allegory of saying goodbye to a loved one and coming to terms with their loss. But why did the film’s creator choose such a naïve and childishly literal path? Similar to the flop Three Thousand Years of Longing, Tuesday is a bizarre, fantastical film that viewers may or may not like, as they see fit. [Miami FF]

The first half of Fallen Fruit presents the protagonist in his youthful fumbling as he comes out of a breakup, with no desire to work and no idea what the future holds. The film itself is slightly boring and just as fumbling, with feeble dialogue, the parameters of a student film and one WTF narrative misstep (two complete strangers catch a brief glimpse of each other through the window of a passing car and then text each other a few hours later). As a hurricane approaches, however, the protagonist’s parents join in the presentation of his day-to-day life, characters seen earlier in the film add more meaningful contours to the causes of his loneliness, and Fallen Fruit turns out to be an honest portrait of a young man living in Miami, a city whose exotic identity is aptly expressed with the wow effect that it initially provides, which conceals its darker, less hospitable side. [Miami Film Festival]

Stop! Or My Grandma Will Shoot! An endearing “action” comedy with a heart and an excellent June Squibb. The 94-year-old actress turns in an admirable performance as she combines a variety of humorous gestures with sensitive dramatic moments. The interplay between the characters comprising her family and the bad guys is formulaic yet effectively written, with a surprising choice cast in the role of the main villain. When it comes to comedies about the elderly, however, I personally prefer more sarcastic, culturally distinctive European films, such as A Man Called Ove. [Miami Film Festival]

This documentary is shocking in its depiction of the conditions in which American authorities allow anyone to keep an animal in captivity, including Lolita, a well-known killer whale held for decades at the Miami SeaQuarium. It’s as if there are no laws against animal cruelty, or no one is enforcing them. The film follows a group of Native Americans from the orca’s territory of origin as they strive to secure her freedom. They explain their spiritual connection to the killer whale and the importance of returning her to her native waters, where she can still encounter her mother again after fifty years. Don’t expect a story like My Octopus Teacher and the emotions that it evoked, as Resident Orca is purely a television-style documentary featuring interviews with people involved in the issue. Its power lies in the question of whether the orca will be freed and in the unexpected outcome of the story. [Miami Film Festival]

Here and now I understand what kind of actor we lost in Heath Ledger. A masterfully written and directed “unconventional western romance” set in incredible exterior compositions, while also being viscerally and powerfully intimate, with hidden emotions and the tragic nature of happiness long held just out of reach. Ang Lee guides the lead and supporting actors in the images and editing compositions as if he is painting a picture. In the atmosphere of the rough American retro-rural setting, he composes a perfectly focused mosaic of quiet desires and dreams, into which the tones of Santaolalla’s subtly complementary music hesitantly bring the cold mountain wind and the dust of the prairie. Every scene is a demonstration of filmmaking precision in constructing characters and telling a story covering twenty years in the lives of two people who could neither live together nor live without each other. And the lives of the people around them, affected by the resulting sad events. ___ Brokeback Mountain devastated me with the minimalist conclusion to the story in the most dignified form of cinematic art – without a trace of kitsch or tear-jerking by any means other than a softly spoken offscreen ending of the story that connects so powerfully with the preceding events that it’s heartbreaking. When they are done right, like Brokeback Mountain and Call Me By Your Name, these sad gay romances have, in the characters’ suffering over their social differences and difficult lot in life, a much more dramatic foundation than conventional hetero relationship films. Another probable reason for that is because it is so much easier to find a new girlfriend when things didn’t work out with the last one than it is to find a strong connection with someone from a group that makes up only two percent of the population. Perhaps it is something like a movie fan coming across a film that’s so well directed only once in a few years.

Dynamic, lively, emotive and technically brilliant. The plot is formulaic and the dialogue is ridiculously straightforward, but all of that is overcome by the fact that this is a true story that we wouldn’t believe if it hadn’t actually happened (!). The incorporation of gaming elements into the real world is done so tastefully and skilfully that it make Gran Turismo the best and, mainly, most meaningful film adaptation of a video game so far. Therefore, let’s not compare it to the more mature and thoughtful, but diametrically different racing dramas Rush and Ford v Ferrari.

A quiet drama about a woman coping with painful losses by closing herself off in a remote mountain cabin with no electricity, no running water and no indoor toilet. And then along comes a bear. And winter will be tough. However, this is not a survival thriller; a kind, caring hunter plays a bigger role than the bear... An intimate, rather undistinguished film with which the famous (and great) actress Robin Wright tried her hand at directing.