Selected to screen at 2024 CAAMFest, Lina Suh constructs what is easily one of the best films of the year. “Meeting You, Meeting Me” is a wonderful chamber piece about two kindred spirits that meet under the most unlikely circumstances. So much of “Meeting You, Meeting Me” is based on whether or not the pair of stars Annika Foster and Sam Yim can spark any kind of chemistry, and lo and behold they have it. “Meeting You , Meeting Me” felt very much in the tradition of masterpieces like “Before Sunset” where circumstances put two people together who didn’t know they needed they each other.
Tag Archives: Arthouse
Satu – The Year of the Rabbit (2024)
So much credit goes to Joshua Trigg, an ace filmmaker who has delivered one of the most affecting and engaging dramas of the year. “Satu – Year of the Rabbit” is a powerhouse drama packed to the brim with beauty, sadness, and grief, and pairs two people together, both of whom are in search of something. In the tradition of films like “Harry and Tonto,” Joshua Trigg’s film is about two wandering spirits that find a purpose in the middle of the amazing countryside of Laos. This is where “Satu” also acts as something of a travelogue akin to 1991’s “The Inland Sea,” acting as a means of conveying the richness, and vast scope of their home.
Blue Velvet (1986): The Criterion Collection [4K UHD/Blu-Ray]
Now Available from Criterion Collection.
My first experience with David Lynch was with “Mulholland Dr.,” a film that is far and away breath taking but also difficult to decode. After trying to find an explanation for it someone told me that it was only one of his easiest to access. But I like to think that it’s “Blue Velvet.” Lynch’s 1986 Neo Noir is a nightmarish fever dream in to the American dream. Lynch paints a portrait of two mirror worlds, one with the perfect Norman Rockwellian picket fences and women with babies on their shoulders. The other America is a bleak and violent Wonderland where deviants and criminals lurk in every corner waiting to prey on the weak.
She Is Conann (2023)
Conann’s life is both dreamlike and nightmarish, followed by Rainer, she is seen through it from childhood to adulthood, from slave to queen.
Geographies of Public Sex [LA&M Film Fetish Forum]
Playing at the LA&M Film Fetish Forum Saturday, March 16th at 7pm EST; It Will Be Co-Presented by Henry Hanson of Full Spectrum Features.
“Geographies of Public Sex” is a series of eight short films curated by Henry Hanson, most of which revolve around the Gay experience and accounts of the gay lifestyle. It’s a mixed bag, admittedly, but an interesting gallery of shorts, nevertheless. 2021’s “Trade Center” from Adam Baran is the best of the bunch; it’s a fascinating documentary about cruising in the seventies and eighties, and the amount of sites in New York City where men could have sex with one another any time of the day.
Suncoast (2024)
Now Streaming on Hulu.
Laura Chinn’s “Suncoast” feels like it comes from a very deep and personal place. It’s a movie about loss, and grief, and trying to find a way to live again when a big piece of you has been taken out of your life. Suffice to say “Suncoast” is one of the first great films of 2024 and an excellent drama I’d place right alongside gems like “Ladybird” and “The Perks of Being a Wallflower.” Chinn manages to evoke so many core emotions about coming to terms with death and how tough it can be to move and move forward after happiness has disappeared. How do you begin? Where do you begin? And most of all, when can you begin?
May December (2023)
Director Todd Haynes’ dissection of the groomer and predator relationship really is a movie that deserved so much more notice in 2023. Haynes’ approach to tackling a real criminal case notorious in the nineties is a fascinating platform to stage a complex drama and darkly comic film about stunted growth and Hollywood exploitation. Haynes’ film peels away at so many layers and how relationships tend to be somewhat glorified and sensationalized, especially in the realm of what occurs in “May December.” For those involved in this kind of dynamic, the whole interplay between the partners is somewhat spur of the moment, but the long-term effects amount to much more psychological baggage that the movie only skims the surface on.