Mario Dhingsa's Blog, page 2

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Births, Deaths & Marriages' (2019)

⭐⭐⭐⭐

(1hr 16mins, NZ)

📣What We Do In The Suburbs: A home video from the '90s captures the chaos of a family coping with three life-changing events over 24 hours.

👍 Bonds that won't falter:
Claustrophic, caustic, yet tremendously charming, and achingly retro-cool!
BDM is blessed with innovative direction, deadpan dialogue, and a gifted cast.
Remarkable last five minutes that teaches movies with greater budgets how to properly do closure.

👎Jilted at the altar:
Some may find the breadth of characters to be overwhelming, and the narrative at times underwhelming.
But this remains one of the best Kiwi mockumentaries since 'What We Do In The Shadows'. Ka pai!

🥇Best quote:
"You know a heart is more than just one space.
It's got four atriums.
Different parts that are all connected.
And the blood flows in and out, in constant motion;
Getting cleaned, and filled, and warmed.
And this house is like that too."

🙁Best depressing quote:
"She had a good life!"
"No she didn't!
She was born poor,
And she died poor,
And nobody took her seriously in between."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"Lonely the house now, and lonely the moorland.
The children have scattered, the old folk are gone.
Why stand I here, like a ghost or a shadow?
Tis time I was movin', tis time I went on."

Twitter: @mariodhingsa

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'The Lost Daughter' (2021)

⭐⭐⭐⭐

📣Educating Leda: A professor's memories of her motherhood painfully resurface when she crosses paths with a mobster's wife and her extended family.

👍Doll on the beach:
Confident and adept directing from Maggie Gyllenhaal result in a superb sense of foreboding and tension throughout; and perfectly captures the suffocation, depression and paradoxical loneliness of parenthood.
Hypnotic performances from Olivia Colman, Jessie Buckley, Dakota Johnson, Ed Harris and Dagmara Domińczyk.

👎Love out of reach:
Some character decisions in the third act may seem unconvincing.
The ending may not have the emotional culmination that you were hoping for.
But at the very least, this will leave you with a new appreciation for the poetry of orange peel, Ed Harris' dancing, and the beauty of Auden in Italian.

🥇Best quote:
"Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity."

🙁Best depressing quote:
"My mother was very beautiful.
And when I about 23, I felt like she hadn't shared it.
Like, in creating me, she'd separated herself;
Like pushing a plate away if the food's repulsive."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"What did it feel like?"
"It felt amazing."

Twitter: @mariodhingsa

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Boiling Point' (2021)

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

(1hr 34mins, UK)

📣Portrait of a Kitchen on Fire: A head chef tries to escape being cursed by an escalating crisis over an ill-fated evening.

👍Culinary heaven:
A film worth it's weight in Oscars, this stunning study of a spiralling madness should carry a health warning, as your heart will be under repeated stress throughout.
An exceptional cast of at least 15(!), with my personal favourites being Stephen Graham, Vinette Robinson, Ray Panthaki and Hannah Walters.

👎Table 7:
Some plot threads aren't as resolved as much as I would have liked.
And real-life food safety officers may disagree with how they're depicted.
But this is a cinematic dégustation that will leave you overwhelmed, overawed, and craving for a rebooking. Bon appétit!

🥇Best quote:
"You know, reviewing is... is like sex.
You go by what's there,
Not by what's not there."

💼Best business advice:
"Do you know how much pressure we're under?
Maybe if you spent half as much time learning how to run a restaurant,
instead of whoring your arse on social media like a budget Kardashian,
then we wouldn't be so much in the s??t that we are now."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"We just need to do it together.
Just do a big breath.
Let's do it together."

Twitter: @mariodhingsa



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#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Shiva Baby' (2020)

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

(1hr 17mins, USA)

📣Dangerous Liaisons: A young woman attends the worst funeral wake ever, as lovers old and new present her with a fate worse than death.

👍Expensive bangle:
Brilliantly crafted and exceptionally acted by its main cast of six, this comedy of errors turns ever so steadily into a nightmare as it delves into the suffocation created by gossip, the unbearableness of demeaning relatives, and the caustic nature of relationships.

👎Emotional tangle:
Hard to find faults with a film that I haven't enjoyed this consistently since 'Booksmart'!
Made for only $200,000, shot in only 16 days, and despite being (surprisingly!) rejected by Sundance, first-time director Emma Seligman astonishes with her multi-award-winning debut. Mazel tov!

Twitter: @mariodhingsa

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Last Night in Soho' (2021)

⭐⭐⭐1/2

(1hr 56mins, UK)

📣Fright Night: A student's ardour for 1960s London becomes an agony as she sinks into the forgotten life of a tragic starlet.

👍'60s revival:
Anya Taylor-Joy, Terence Stamp, and Diana Rigg (RIP) shine incredibly brightly, and Thomasin McKenzie is at her best when in the worst of torment.
Edgar Wright rewrites the cinematic style guide. LNIS is visually astonishing, from the shots to the costumes; and the score and 60s playlist are sensational!

👎Desperate survival:
Some may find the 1st act unimpressive, the 3rd act unconvincing, and the supporting characters underdeveloped; but it's all pulled off with such panache that this still remains an awe-inspiring treat for your senses throughout!

🥇Best quote:
"This is London. Someone has died in every room in every building and on every street corner in the city."

🙁Best depressing quote:
"I'm not going to prison. I've been in a prison all my life."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"Help us be free!"

Twitter: @mariodhingsa

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Night of the Kings / La Nuit des Rois' (2020)

⭐⭐⭐1/2

(1hr 33mins, Ivory Coast)

📣From Dusk till Dawn: A new inmate is promted to prison storyteller, and must spin a yarn long enough to save his life during a deadly transfer of power.

👍Raconteur's paradise:
Exhilarating, enchanting, claustrophic and ferocious!
Exceptionally strong performances of the desperate and dangerous.
Marvellously scored, with some stunning cinematography and costume design.

👎Moonlight sacrifice:
Not a film to watch if you've skipped your gym membership.
Some may find sections of the second act a little superfluous as the scale of the tales continually stretches; and the ending may not be satisfying to everyone; but this is a powerfully told prison drama that would be almost unlawful to miss!

🥇Best quote:
"When your world is built of golden walls,
you don't chase after dreams."

🙁Best depressing quote:
"Every man lies to himself,
until he's faced with his own death."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"Money can buy you anything,
but you can't pay someone to be sick in your place."

Twitter: @mariodhingsa

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Riders of Justice / Retfærdighedens Ryttere' (2020)

⭐⭐⭐⭐1/2

(1hr 56mins, Denmark)

📣Another Round (of Bullets): A widowed soldier and a crash survivor join forces to discover if a deadly train accident was deliberate.

👍 Grieving better:
Thrilling, tragic, horrific and hilarious!
Writer-director Anders Thomas Jensen excels at showing the burden of bereavement, the reality of rage, the fallibility of heroes, and the fractured nature of masculinity.
(Also, best barn ever.)

👎Gang vendetta:
Some of the story beats might be a bit predictable, and some supporting cast may initially appear like man-children.
But don't be fooled! ROJ is an impressive character study with stunning set-pieces, beautifully black humour, is incredibly well-acted all round, and has an ending that will linger long after you've left the film.

🥇Best quote:
"What is the point of learning to assemble a rifle?
If I wanted to assemble stuff, I'd have gone to IKEA!"

🙁Best depressing quote:
"Unless you die at a young age, you will end up burying most of the people you love."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"Does it hurt?"
"No. I should have listened to you."

Twitter: @mariodhingsa

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Dr Terror's House of Horrors' (1965)

⭐⭐⭐⭐

(1hr 38mins, UK)

📣Strangers on a Train: Proof that six men and a deck of tarot cards will never produce a positive outcome.

👍Mysterious stranger:
This has it all! Werewolves, killer vines, vampires, voodoo gods, and maiming most foul!
Part X-Files anthology, part cream of mid-1960's horror!
Tremendous supporting cast! My favourite's Michael Gough (Batman's Alfred) as a celebrated painter violently colliding with Christopher Lee's caustic art critic (pre-'Ratatouille').

👎Infernal danger:
Some details may be a little too fantastical (How does a plant know what a phone is?).
The ending may leave some unsatisfied.
Peter Cushing's eyebrows may give you the evil eye.
But the real terror haunting me would be if you missed this blood-red horror dynamite!

🥇Best quote:
"There is within each of us a twin destiny:
The natural and the supernatural.
The strange, the weird, the unknown, the terrifying, the mysterious.
At one time or another during our lives we may, any one of us, encounter it!"

🙁Best depressing quote:
"I must attend these exhibitions, whether the artist in question is a genius or a charlatan."
"I wonder why then you never give me advice on how to improve my work?"
"My dear sir, the only advice that I could possibly offer you, would be: give up."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"Come on, I'm game!"
"You are not afraid?"
"Well, if it's going to happen to me anyway, what's there to be afraid of?"

Twitter: @mariodhingsa

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Saint Maud' (2019)

⭐⭐⭐⭐

(1hr 24mins, UK)

📣The Pilgrim's Progress (to Hell): A lonely nurse tries surrendering her sorrow to a higher calling, but her attempts to save a dying patient test the limits of faith and sanity.

👍Heavenly muse:
Fervently acted, tightly directed, and tremendously tense.
Suddenly Carrie's mother seems merely 'a tad on the preachy side' after witnessing this.
Also displays the real horrors of mental illness, PTSD, rape, self-harm, nursing over-exhaustion, and healthcare collapse.

👎Needles in shoes:
Some may find a loss of momentum in the second act, but this is a staggering piece of cinema by first-time director Rose Glass, and you'd be wasting your pain if you missed this horror gem!

🥇Best quote:
"Never waste your pain."

🙁Best depressing quote:
"You have no idea how dull it is to be dying."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"No more darkness…
I'm so happy…
No worries in sight."

Twitter: @mariodhingsa

#SilverScreenBlack reviews: 'Byzantium' (2012)

⭐⭐⭐⭐1/2

(1hr 21mins)

📣The Girl with All the Gifts: A vampire mother & daughter struggle to find shelter from a vengeful brotherhood, and sanity from each other.

👍Blood-soaked ode:
In the film's own words, this is "dark, passionate, violent, sick, and brilliant!"
It excels at exposing the multiple layers of misogyny.
And shows the horror and wreckage of keeping great secrets, and never being freed even if you confide them, for no one could possibly believe you.

👎Brethren's code:
The film's ending might be a little too neat for some.
But this film is everything you'd want from a vampire film and so much more!
The most haunting reflection is that 'Twilight' has a film saga and 'Byzantium' doesn't...

🥇Best quote:
"How can you be two centuries old? By what miracle of science?!"
"You see, that's the tricky thing.
Because it's only over time that I can provide it.
Forty years from now, when you're pruning roses from your wheelchair, I'll stroll by your garden gate, and nothing will have changed.
I am sixteen forever,
And you'll realise this,
And it will hurt your heart."

🙁Best depressing quote:
"My story can never be told.
I write it over and over.
Then I throw the pages to the wind.
Maybe the birds can read it."

💉Best vaccine quote:
"Shall I tell you what it was like for me?
It was wonderful!
I had eyes that cut through lies.
I had lungs that breathed eternity."

Twitter: @mariodhingsa