May December is a slow burn—a film that, like an intensifying flame, becomes more scorching every second you grasp it, ultimately leaving you with searing imprints.
Author Archives: Maxwell Rabb
Posted inFilm
Review: Fallen Leaves
Like Aki Kaurismäki’s other films, Fallen Leaves is brimming with subtle whimsy and piercing humor, but throughout the 81-minute runtime, he never sells it.
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Review: Dream Scenario
Dream Scenario is truly something special, a playful and clever (but not too clever) comedy from Norwegian film director Kristoffer Borgli.
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Review: The Holdovers
The Holdovers blends feel-good and sorrowful themes thoughtfully to make a rewatchable flick. But the next watch will likely be over the holidays.
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Review: Anatomy of a Fall
Justine Triet is challenging us, in a suspenseful frenzy, by interrogating what we believe “truth” really means.
Posted inArts & Culture
Writing as an act, not an artifact
In a literary world steeped in academia, Francesca Kritikos seeks the raw and unpolished. As a poet and publisher, she’s developed an aversion to overly cerebral work—writing created with the intention of locking readers out. Instead, she looks for accessible writing that evokes catharsis and self-discovery. Increasingly, she found herself struggling to find publishers interested […]
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Review: Killers of the Flower Moon
Scorcese studies evil’s facade and then peeks inside. To no one’s surprise, it’s an ugly truth.
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Review: She Came to Me
She Came to Me chugs for 102 minutes, but Rebecca Miller’s rom-com strains to pick up steam.
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Review: Dicks: The Musical
Ultimately, Dicks: The Musical’s desire for cult-classic status is its biggest downfall, because that’s not how a movie procures that title.
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In Chicago’s ‘top five,’ High Fidelity is a chart-topper
In January 2024, barring any further delays due to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, John Cusack will host an intimate screening of the long-admired film at the Auditorium Theatre.
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Review: A Haunting in Venice
A Haunting in Venice officially derails Kenneth Branagh’s rebooted Agatha Christie films.
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Review: Joyce Carol Oates: A Body in the Service of Mind
For nearly ten years, Stig Björkman endeavored to get Joyce Carol Oates on board for a documentary. At first, Oates denied his request, opting to keep her life and mind private. But eventually, the beloved American author accepted Björkman’s proposal, which, admittedly, seemed to verge on incessant prying. Joyce Carol Oates: A Body in the […]
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Review: The Mountain
On a whim, Pierre, a robotics engineer played by Thomas Salvador (also a cowriter and director), abandons his comfortable life in Paris. Before traveling to the French Alps for work, he sits sullenly in his modern apartment, deep in thought, sipping an espresso alone. Immediately, we see that Pierre is contemplative, often lost in thought, […]
Posted inArts & Culture
A new home for experimental literature
“We are identifying ‘micro-movements’ and allowing others to explain them to us,” says Jourdain Barton, a cofounder of Chicago’s TEMPER Press. Born to foster experimental writing, TEMPER emerged from such a micro-movement: a bond shared by Barton and her grad school classmates Geoffrey Billetter and Nat Holtzmann. To them, micro-movements are smaller, unidentified capsules of […]
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Review: Fremont
Packaged in unsuspecting monochrome and monotone, Babak Jalali embeds Fremont with a cunning, melancholic charm.