Film Reviews

A series of films about how humans have been colonized by the machines we have built. Although we don't realize it, the way we see everything in the world today is through the eyes of the computers.

After a failed bank robbery, two heavily armed men hold the Los Angeles Police Department at bay for 44 minutes.

Irish rebels launch an uprising against the British occupation of Ireland in the 1920s. One of the rebellion's leaders and a beautiful aristocratic Englishwoman meet and, despite the enormous class, cultural, political and social differences between them, fall in love.

Daffy Duck and Speedy Gonzales find a treasure map that leads them to a wishing well, which for a penny will grant any wish (through old cartoon footage). Daffy sets up a resort around the well and various Looney Tunes characters have their dreams come true. Meanwhile, Yosemite Sam and the Tasmanian Devil hunt for the varmints who stole their treasure map!

The Golden Ball is a wonderful children's film that tells of a young boy's dream of being a soccer player. Whenever a match is broadcast live in the village of Makono, Bandian and his brother keep their ears to the transistor radio, spinning a picture of the game from the announcer's commentary much as they fantasize themselves on the field. A gift of a real soccer ball, which Bandian paints gold, like a magical object involves him in a series of adventures which bring him in reach of his dream, but which also require him to make difficult choices.

A naive traveler in Laredo gets involved in a poker game between the richest men in the area, jeopardizing all the money he has saved for the purpose of settling with his wife and child in San Antonio.

In 1947, four German judges who served on the bench during the Nazi regime face a military tribunal to answer charges of crimes against humanity. Chief Justice Haywood hears evidence and testimony not only from lead defendant Ernst Janning and his defense attorney Hans Rolfe, but also from the widow of a Nazi general, an idealistic U.S. Army captain and reluctant witness Irene Wallner.

Director Louis Feuillade won fame and critical acclaim with his early crime serials, Fantômas (1913-14) and Les Vampires (1915). These episodic films were hugely popular, but they also brought Feuillade a fair amount of criticism from the bourgeois establishment, who accused him of glorifying crime and making heroes of criminals. Feuillade’s well-meaning response to this brow-beating was another serial, the 12-part epic entitled Judex. The Plot: When his family is ruined by the unscrupulous banker Favraux, Jacques de Tremeuse resolves to bring him to justice. Adopting a disguise and the name Judex, he captures the crooked banker and takes him to his secret lair. Learning of Favraux’s dishonest ways, his daughter Jacqueline gives away his wealth when she learns of his death. This infuriates a pair of ruthless crooks, Diana Monti and Moralés, who immediately swear to take revenge on Jacqueline, and her protector, Judex.

Two years after choosing not to kill the man who killed his son, former police sergeant Leo Barnes has become head of security for Senator Charlene Roan, the front runner in the next Presidential election due to her vow to eliminate the Purge. On the night of what should be the final Purge, a betrayal from within the government forces Barnes and Roan out onto the street where they must fight to survive the night.

Casey Jones is the story of a quirky young man with an irresistible propensity for violence. A lifelong outcast, Casey learned at a young age to channel his brutal urges into sports, but after being kicked off the local hockey team for excessive force during practice, Casey moves back in with his worrisome mother to seek solace at his boyhood home. His retreat is soon interrupted though when a vicious gang of street punks, the Purple Dragons, savagely beat him with pipes for attempting to remove their graffiti. After narrowly escaping the encounter with his life, Casey vows to single-handedly rid his neighborhood of crime. Armed with a golf bag loaded with clubs and sporting a fearful hockey mask, Casey stalks the alleyways by night, mercilessly trouncing any delinquents unlucky enough to cross his path. The misguided crusader soon goes off the deep end, and an unlikely ally from the sewers is forced to intervene before the vigilante annihilates every criminal in the city.

A young man and his girlfriend move into the man's old mansion home, where he becomes possessed by a need to control ancient demons.

An animated short film based on the 1877 short story written by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It chronicles the experiences of a man who decides that there is nothing to live for in the world, and is therefore determined to commit suicide. A chance encounter with a young girl changes his mind.

A withdrawn young man, Leland Fitzgerald is imprisoned for the murder of a mentally disabled boy, who also happened to be the brother of his girlfriend, Becky. As the community struggles to deal with the killing, Pearl Madison, a teacher at the prison, decides to write about Leland's case. Meanwhile, others affected by the murder, including Becky and her sister, Julie, must contend with their own problems.

A psychological thriller about how an elite SAS unit's position is revealed by the British Prime Minister to ensure an arms deal goes ahead and to secure his re-election.

In his debut as his libidinous alter ego João de Deus, Monteiro stars as a meticulous and melancholy bachelor living in a rambling boarding house and feverishly obsessed with his landlady’s daughter. A ribald yet wonderfully delicate comedy, Memories of the Yellow House traces the indecisive, dangerous ripening of erotic fantasy as João’s voyeuristic rituals push him to further, unexpected extremes. The rich mellowing of Monteiro’s political address is embodied in the figure of the boarding house whose sanctimonious and narcissistic landlady is both a loose metaphor for the repressive, reactionary tendencies of postwar Portuguese society and an affectionately comic figure.