“The Holdovers”
Maybe Alexander Payne’s best work yet. I loved the atmosphere of the movie, how believably cold it felt. The dynamic relationship between the three leads flowed and evolved in very believable ways, and the handle on tonal shifts really worked well.
4/5

“The Taste of Things”
Foooood. Food. Also there’s a certain comfort to seeing an in-progress romance of 20 years that isn’t waning or in conflict. A sort of cozy familiarity. Also food. So much food, and all of it looks great.
4/5

“Kim’s Video”
A nice little puff piece documentary about a New York video store that leads to some heartbreaking moments for any physical media enthusiast and an unexpected heist movie.
3.5/5

“The Marvels”
It was fun. The swapping gimmick made for some neat action sequences and effectively nerfed the potentially OP main character in a way that gave action scenes the ability to exist without her just mowing everyone down or resorting to ridiculous power scaling.
3/5

“All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt”
Beautiful movie in terms of content and look. Maybe my favorite individual shot from any movie I’ve seen this year comes from this movie. The almost stream of consciousness flow of the movie makes for a unique and compelling watch.
4.5/5

“The Teacher’s Lounge”
German movie about conflict at a school. The low stakes actually make it more tense because it makes it more relatable. Amazing lead performance as well as a great cast of kids.
4.5/5

“Four Souls of Coyote”
Great animation, entertaining presentation of a creation story from Native American cultures, the main story is so good that it makes the flat ending all the more disappointing. Not much build and the conclusion is very abrupt, but the movie is still well worth a watch.
3.5/5

“Thunder”
Interesting Swiss drama, what starts as a potential mystery gives way to a surprising, almost coming of age story involving lead Lilith Garasmug and some of the boys in the village. Really nice cinematography and performances bolster things when the pace dips, solid movie overall.
3/5

“American Dreamer”
Fun and almost dark comedy, mostly carried by its cast (especially star Peter Dinklage) and solid direction. It doesn’t quite get off the ground as far as the story goes, it’s kind of unfocused and a lot of the moments don’t stick, but the cast is very watchable.
2.5/5

“Killers of the Flower Moon”
Great movie, but there was an even better movie that could have been made that focused more on Lily Gladstone’s character. She gives an absolutely star making performance here. Also has an all time great and very pointed director cameo. 4.5/5

Saw a bunch of movies around the time I was gonna start this up, gonna spend the day catching up posting about what I saw, mostly stuff from SLIFF.