Viewing posts written by: Kim Jirik
Reviews of new films by Athina Rachel Tsangari and Jan Svankmajer, and two films about children in peril.
Reviews of Li Hongqi’s absurdist comedy, Vibeke Løkkeberg’s doco on the Israel-Palestine conflict and Takashi Miike’s crazed film of a dystopic Tokyo.
If nothing else, this year’s list confirms that we at Screen Machine are big Jesse Eisenberg fans (but then who isn’t?). It perhaps shows other continuities from our 2009 list, indicating some of the approaches and prejudices we have as film critics and spectators. We hope that the pieces we’ve written on each of the twenty films that appear here are of greater use and interest to readers than the mock-suspense of learning what finishes in which position. Returning to these films now allows us to say things about them that we couldn’t when they first appeared, and we think that these reflective pieces on the films of 2010 will offer plenty to discuss as we begin the new year.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year. The time when we willingly succumb to mass-hallucination, and for one brief shining period we believe in the enduring strength of the human spirit. Concepts like peace and goodwill no longer seem like political rhetoric, but instead compel us to regain a mythologised compassion for our fellow man. Despite the fleeting nature of this illusion, for a few weeks in December we can believe it to be so. We can also believe…
