Sofia Coppola’s The Bling Ring draws comparisons to Harmony Korine’s Spring breakers. Both films portray American teenagers as superficial, aimless figures obsessed with celebrity culture and rap music. While Harmony Korine’s picture fully embraces the vacuity of its characters, his film featuring a subtle and fantasy-like glossy surface finely reflecting its subject, Sophia Coppola however fails at giving concrete form to this [...]

Although the title doesn’t refer to any religious belief – at least that’s what the director is saying – it is impossible to not establish a connection with the harsh journey a family has to endure in this movie: with Heli, Amat Escalante delivers the uncompromising and violent portrait of contemporary Mexico. If the film includes a few scenes that [...]

While Mexican and Brazilian cinemas have slowly been building a strong presence on the international film circuit, mostly thanks to emblematic onscreen ambassadors such as  Alfonso Cuarón, Gael Garcia Bernal and Diego Luna – to name a few – other countries are still struggling to get their productions across the border; this, of course, doesn’t mean that their movie industry [...]