Mandler’s background before shooting his narrative feature debut was in music videos and commercials, but the ADD-style filmmaking he uses for Monster suggests he’s not ready to fully command a two-hour movie.
The film is equal parts lovely and frightening as it explores romantic bliss, destructive capitalism, and the significance of the subconscious state we all spend a third of our lives experiencing.
The meaningful topics of female sexual expression, repression, and desire for acceptance that “To the Stars” portrays are relevant, but it’s a shame they’re not more poignant and persuasive.
Talking head interviews from his victims, business and works partners, and friends mesh together with archival photos, videos, and audio recordings of Weinstein for a compulsively watchable, yet not definitive, look at the man whose predatory behavior spearheaded the #MeToo movement.
This is a hearty, four-course meal for film fans, which, once again, demonstrates that the study of a film can be just as invigorating an experience as the actual film itself.
What Western Stars best achieves, a universal notion that will hook fans and non-fans alike, is the shared sense of community displayed in the infectious love shown for playing vital and moving music.
Ultimately, the lack of risk-taking not only makes for a pedantic experience but ironically serves Tubman very poorly, never allowing for Erivo’s performance or the spirit of the subject to ever feel truly free.
Berman ultimately turns his incredible meta-story into an ode to documentary filmmaking. And its exhilarating stuff because you have absolutely no clue where this movie is going to take you next. Berman’s doc keeps pulling the rug from under you, and it’s a high-wire act of reinvention that rewards the viewer at every step.
Although Miller invests heart and soul into the performance, maybe even career-best work from the actress, and the rest of the cast, especially Hendricks, are excellent, Ingelsby’s screenplay foolishly decides to lay its interests on Deb’s terrible taste in men rather than her daughter’s disappearance.
In a film that is so disinterested to conforming to accustomed mainstream movie audiences taste and rhythms, and is committed to its sometimes difficult choices, the bold and exacting Beanpole sometimes feels damn-near radical.
