Writer/director Lulu Wang has simply pulled off a miracle of moviemaking with “The Farewell.” Capturing a completely honest portrait of Asian American immigrant family life through a caring battle of cultural discourse, her film weighs Eastern hospitality and tradition against Western self-sufficiency. Her film is at once joyously celebratory and authentically melancholy, painting a specific and respectfully elegant, yet sometimes deliberately unflattering and nuanced, observance of race, family, and communication.

Continue reading Dismantling The Myth Of The Model Minority: 10 Asian American Films To See Before ‘The Farewell’ at The Playlist.

2017 might be done with us, but we’re not exactly done with it. In traditional Playlist form, it’s never quite clear if the world has moved on from the last year during the early days of January, but regardless, we seem to exhaust all possibilities examining, breaking down and parsing the previous year in film.

It might have been a shit show of a year, but movies and quality Peak TV provided us riches and escape.

Continue reading The Best Films Of 2017 You Didn’t See at The Playlist.

As we drag ourselves, bloodied and limping across the finish line of 2017, there’s little to celebrate at year’s end in the world outside the movie theater, except for Fyre Festival which is still the greatest and funniest thing ever. But inside the popcorny passageways of our local multiplexes and the hallowed halls of our local arthouses, it’s been a different story — one that may not have led to the kind of clear consensus winners of previous years (even awards season seems unusually open) but that points to a general breadth of quality that is, we believe, reflected here in our Best Films of the Year poll.

Continue reading The Best Films Of 2017 at The Playlist.

On a heath, a startled hare looks up. In its eyes are reflected the lights of a ferris wheel, in whose neon glow Armie Hammer dances to an 80s tune. A little girl with ice-cream sticky fingers runs past and nearly collides with a bottle-blonde Robert Pattinson as he dodges into a house of mirrors where a young guy in a loose t-shirt is arranging his selfie to show off his biceps.

Continue reading The Best Cinematography Of 2017 at The Playlist.

Each year, David Erlich, senior film critic at Indiewire gets out his computer and spends hours cutting together a video tribute to his favorite films of previous twelve months. You might not agree with the pics, but the celebration of the year in cinema is always a lot of fun, and once again, he delivers the goods.

“The 25 Best Films Of 2017: A Video Countdown” is powered by the tunes of Fleetwood Mac, The Psychedelic Furs, Sufjan Stevens, and more (jams you will have heard in “Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol.

Continue reading Celebrating The Films Of 2017: A Video Countdown at The Playlist.

The 2018 Film Independent Spirit Awards nominations were unveiled today, and as it always goes, there were some surprises and snubs. However, before I get too far along, here’s quick reminder about one of the official eligibility requirements for the competing movies. It will be useful information for one of the biggest snubs that people are talking about:

…we are only considering films that are made with lower budgets, ranging from microbudgets up to $20 million.

Continue reading 2018 Independent Spirit Awards Nominations: Snubs & Surprises at The Playlist.

We’re right on top of things calendar-wise, right?…

A little late to the party, but, it’s become a recurrent trend every summer for journalists to look back at the movies that were released and, well, complain. The gist of some articles would be “don’t you remember the days when they used to release great movies in the summer”? 1982 and/or 1984 are usually mentioned and, in all honesty, those were pretty great years.

Continue reading The Best Movies Of Summer 2017 at The Playlist.

While we have our eyeballs full with Venice, TIFF, NYFF, and Telluride (which kicks off this weekend), The BFI London Film Festival is no slouch at bringing the business. While they’re less concerned with World Premieres as their counterparts, each year their lineup represents the cream of the festival crop, and 2017 is no different.

Among the highlights in the first wave of programming is Lynne Ramsay‘s “You Were Never Really Here,” which notably isn’t screening at “the big three” North American festivals.

Continue reading 2017 BFI London Film Festival Lines Up ‘You Were Never Really Here,’ ‘Mudbound,’ ‘Lean On Pete,’ More at The Playlist.

The conversation continues to swirl around whether or not critics and Rotten Tomatoes scores are hurting the box office chances of terrible movies. Certainly, a brutal 18% score on the review aggregator, Sony was bracing themselves for the returns of “The Dark Tower” this weekend, but it looks like they have an unconvincing victory on their hands.

The Stephen King adaptation took the top spot at the multiplex with $19.5 million, barely edging out Christopher Nolan‘s “Dunkirk” which landed in second place with $17.6 million (the WWII film is now at $314 million worldwide).

Continue reading ‘The Dark Tower’ Earns Weak Weekend Win [Box Office] at The Playlist.

In case you haven’t been paying much attention, the summer 2017 season has been a rather strong one. Sure, we still had to content with the poorly conceived sequel here and there, but despite “The Emoji Movie” dealing such a ridiculous blow to a slate that, up until this point, had been impressive, ultimately, there were more than enough quality films to find. From “Spider-Man: Homecoming” to “A Ghost Story” to “Wonder Woman,” “War for the Planet of the Apes,” “Baby Driver” and “Dunkirk,” the summer has been one to clamor to the theaters for.

Continue reading 12 Movies To See In August at The Playlist.

John Cho has been on edges of being a big name for a while now, possessing the talents and the looks to conceivably have a huge, Hollywood career but never quite landing similar roles as say, his “Star Trek” co-stars. He’s shown throughout the years that his range is big, going from broad comedy in the “Harold & Kumar” series, to understated, leading man smoldering in short lived TV series “Selfie” to action hero as Hikaru Sulu.

Continue reading New Trailer For ‘Columbus’ Finds John Cho & Haley Lu Richardson Doing Some Soul Searching at The Playlist.

It might be overshadowed a bit by other NYC festivals like the New York Film Festival and Tribeca, but the BAMcinemaFest, which takes place in June, has consistently been pulling off some pretty great line-ups, and this year’s batch, which was announced yesterday, looks to be no exception.

As is often the case, the BAMcinématek has gathered together some of the best movies from the festival circuit in the first half of the year, plus a few world premieres (including “En el Séptimo Día” from “Breaking Bad” and “Mr.

Continue reading ‘Gemini,’ ‘Wind River,’ ‘Golden Exits’ & ‘The Big Sick’ Lead 2017 BAMcinemaFest Line Up at The Playlist.

There are films that swell in orchestral waves, others that grind like scuzzy metal, and still others that burble like melodic pop, but “Columbus,” the first feature film from Korean-American video essay pioneer Kogonada, chimes like a bell: simple, sustained and thrillingly pure. A gentle but sharply defined story, brimming with grace, compassion and performances of perfect naturalism, it is unashamedly intellectual yet deeply human. In fact, it does such a quietly grand job of relating the arcane appreciation of modernist architecture to the mysterious workings of interpersonal relationships, that it exposes the strangeness of ever thinking that intellectual investigation would be anything but the most emotive and human of endeavors.

Continue reading Supercut Superstar Kogonada’s Shimmering Debut ‘Columbus’ Overflows With Grace & Compassion [Rotterdam Review] at The Playlist.