Writer. Film Scholar. Journalist. Editor.
During the first lockdown, I made a horror/fantastique short film. In KINSHIP, a Zoom call between a mother with dementia and her daughter is not what it seems. Kinship was made with no budget. I wanted to see if I could make a film in these restricted circumstances. In the strange atmosphere of lockdown I... Continue Reading →
Despite living only to the age of 39, Marie-Louise Iribe was a dynamic film pioneer who crammed multiple achievements into her short life, as an actor as well as director and producer. Ambitious and cultured, she formed her own production company, directed two features and was one of the few women directors who made the... Continue Reading →
Three months ago I was as normal as anybody. I had a decent job, a nice home, a pretty girlfriend. I liked drinking beer, watching films and playing video games. ‘Grow up,’ my girlfriend would say, as girlfriends do. If only I’d listened… To her, and to Jack too. But no, I wouldn’t stop, I... Continue Reading →
Lucile Hadžihalilovic explains how she created her oneiric exploration of birth and matter in an elusive, disquieting female world. Evolution, Lucile Hadžihalilovic’s masterful follow-up to her 2004 debut Innocence revolves around a little boy living on an island peopled only by women and other young boys. After a disturbing discovery while swimming in the sea,... Continue Reading →
Acclaimed for their animated short films, the Brothers Quay released their first feature-length live action film, Institute Benjamenta, or This Dream People Call Human Life, in 1995. A menacing, oneiric tale inspired by the work of Swiss writer Robert Walser, it follows new student Jakob as he enters a strange school for servants run by... Continue Reading →
Despite being one of the most accomplished, intelligent and adventurous filmmakers to come out of Japan in recent years, Kiyoshi Kurosawa has inexplicably been ignored in this country. With the overrated Ring spawning a seemingly unquenchable thirst for anything that more or less fitted the ‘J-horror’ label, it looked like Kurosawa came to maturity just... Continue Reading →
Virginie Sélavy 