Hitherto undiscovered depths of cringe are plumped in Tom Tykwer’s misguided and offensive familial drama Das Licht (The Light), opening Berlinale 2025.
Das Licht. Bitte Nicht.
Tag: Film
Move the Berlinale To Charlottenburg
The Berlinale is in a vibe crisis. Here’s how moving the festival to Charlottenburg would make it fun again.
Blind Love. Tunnel Vision.
References to Alfred Hitchock and Edward Yang does the paper-thin queer Taiwanese love story Blind Love no favours.
Screen Rotterdam
Rotterdam Film Festival has more films in its 2025 edition than days in the year. We tried to hold its offerings, like collecting water in a sieve.
Strandzha. Between the Borderlines.
The woods straddling Bulgaria and Turkey are imbued with multivalent meanings in Pepe Hristova’s Strandzha, playing in Harbour at IFFR.
Gay Men’s Book Club. Jubilee for Normal People.
The end of identity politics is discussed with nuance and heart in Matthew Lax’s simple yet effective mid-length documentary Gay Men’s Book Club.
No Mercy, or We Need More Fog Machines
The 1986 Richard Gere star vehicle No Mercy shows that all a movie needs is a girl and a gun. And lots of fog machines.
There, There. A Tender Depiction of Care.
With a documentary-like aesthetic and profound use of the mundane, Heather Young’s sophomore film There, There reasserts her singular voice.
The Other One Explores the Glass Children Phenomenon
Marie-Magdalena Kochová’s debut feature acutely captures the Glass Children phenomenon: being overshadowed by your sibling with more complex needs.
Losing It at The Opera!
An EU-funded cousin of Megalopolis, The Opera! is a baffling and bad film that astounds with its incredibly basic classical music choices.