Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans
Abel Ferrara’s cult classic Bad Lieutenant (1992) might be the most wonderfully demented independent film of 1990s. The story of a New York cop, who descends into a nightmarish hell of compulsive gambling, sex, and nonstop drug abuse, Bad Lieutenant is most notable for Ferrara’s abject subject matter, religious symbolism, and stylistic excess. The script […]
The Exploding Girl
Bradley Rust Gray pushes cinematic naturalism to the brink in his intriguing second feature The Exploding Girl, where very little happens and the real interest lies almost entirely beneath the surface. Gray is mining territory that has been explored previously by films such as Andrew Bujalski’s Funny Ha Ha (2005) and Aaron’s Katz’s Quiet City […]
Best Independent Films of 2009
Most people do their “best films” lists at the end of December. That makes sense, but, in my case, it doesn’t seem to work out that way. I have too many other projects in the works, so that even maintaining the blog is a pretty challenging endeavor. But beyond that, because I’m based in Madison, […]
Beeswax
Andrew Bujalski’s much-anticipated third feature, Beeswax (2009), might appear to be about almost nothing at all, which is one of the risks of naturalism. I must confess that it took a second viewing for me to appreciate fully just how subtle and complex his new film really is. Beeswax explores the relationship between a pair […]
Loren Cass
Chris Fuller’s Gummo-inspired Loren Cass, is easily the most controversial indie film of the past year – a film so dark that it somehow makes even Antichrist seem upbeat by comparison. Originally completed in 2007, the film finally had a limited theatrical release this past summer and recently became available on DVD from Kino International. […]
Harmony and Me
It’s sometimes hard to understand why some mediocre films get all the buzz, and some great ones don’t. For the life of me, I can’t explain why Bob Byington’s Harmony and Me (2009) received its theatrical run at the Museum of Modern Art rather than a commercial theater, and to my knowledge, still hasn’t as […]
Munyurangabo
We tend to associate one strand of American independent cinema with regionalism. Jeff Nichols’s Shotgun Stories, Lance Hammer’s Ballast, Kelly Reichardt’s Wendy and Lucy, Ramin Bahrani’s Goodbye Solo, and Barry Jenkins’s Medicine for Melancholy serve as some recent examples. But a new trend rooted in globalism seems to be developing. Chris Smith made The Pool […]