Watch top tv movies and read movie analysis now? The darkness is all-consuming, as is despair over a lost past and future, and a purgatorial present, in Vitalina Varela, Pedro Costa’s aesthetically ravishing true tale of its protagonist, a Cape Verde resident who returns to Portugal mere days after her estranged husband’s death. Vitalina wanders through this dilapidated and gloomy environment, which Costa shoots almost exclusively at night, the better to conjure a sense of ghosts navigating a dreamscape of sorrow, suffering and disconnection. Each of the director’s images is more ravishing than the next, and their beauty – along with an enveloping soundscape of squeaking beds, sheets blowing in the wind, and rain pattering on crumbling roofs – is enchanting. Presenting its story through fractured plotting and dreamy monologues, the Portuguese master’s latest is a series of tableaus of lovelorn grief concerning not only Vitalina but also an aged priest in spiritual crisis and another young man poised to endure his own tragedy. The film’s formal grandeur – its compositional precision, and painterly interplay of light and dark – is overwhelming, as is the majestic presence of Vitalina herself.
The second feature to go out under the aegis of Barack and Michelle Obama as part of their Higher Ground series for Netflix, it’s an inspirational civil-rights documentary that sounds as if it’s going to be Good for You rather than good but turns out to be both. Directed by Nicole Newnham and Jim LeBrecht (who was born with spina bifida and appears onscreen), the film begins in 1971 in the Catskills’ Camp Jened, where teen and 20-something “cripples” (a word then used) are elated by the freedom to shed their defenses and feel at home. Their camp experience lays the foundation for a seminal demonstration in which disabled people (among them the commanding Judy Heumann) occupy HEW headquarters for more than a week. It’s both a profile of people determined not to be invisible — merely getting to the point where they could make themselves seen required a psychological revolution — and a rousing celebration of the activist counterculture that inspired and sustained them.
Deepfake technology gets a stunning workout in Welcome to Chechnya, as documentarian David France uses the face-transforming device to mask the identities of his subjects: a group of LGBTQ+ activists intent on smuggling gay men and women out of their native Chechnya before the government can kidnap, torture and murder them. That the Russian-controlled state is on a genocidal mission to “cleanse the blood” of the nation by exterminating its homosexual population is a terrifying reality brought to light by France, who details the efforts of these brave souls to use subterfuge to sneak at-risk individuals to safer European enclaves. At the center of his tale is Maxim Lapunov, whose release from a Chechnyan torture chamber—and resultant knowledge of the government’s monstrous activities—turns him into the state’s Enemy Number One. Lapunov’s courageous desire to legally strike back at the system is one of many threads exposing the fascistic new Final Solution being perpetrated by Putin-backed Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. A cry for help and a call to arms, it’s nothing short of straight-up horrifying. Find even more info on Popcorn Tales.
Whenever we start any discussion of the best media players and how great they are, the name VLC automatically comes at the top. But, why is it so? What’s the reason behind its massive popularity? VLC Media Player is a free and open-source media player that’s available for all popular platforms. Created by the VideoLAN project, VLC Media Player is known to support a vast number of audio and video compression methods and file formats. Over the years, VLC has earned the reputation of being the “play everything” video player. VLC is one of the best PC media players due to its fast and simple nature that doesn’t involve any painstaking steps. The software also features different customization options that can help you improve your viewing experience and change the look of the player. It’s also often used a streaming media player. This amazing Windows Media Player alternative also receives frequent updates and has a large user community. It runs on all Windows versions, from Windows 10 to Windows XP SP3. From time-to-time, this free movie player keeps receiving new features and updates. You can also check out our dedicated article on VLC tricks.
The systemic culture of indifference and cruelty that often forms around a powerful serial abuser gets put under the microscope in this studiously observed New York office drama, which draws inspiration from the behavior of Harvey Weinstein while intentionally blurring some of the details. We never learn the name of the tyrannical boss in the story and the exact nature of his crimes are never fully revealed; instead, Julia Garner’s assistant Jane, a Northwestern grad fresh off a handful of internships, provides our entryway into the narrative. The movie tracks her duties, tasks, and indignities over the course of a single day: She makes copies, coordinates air travel, picks up lunch orders, answers phone calls, and cleans suspicious stains off the couch. At one point, a young woman from Idaho appears at the reception desk, claims to have been flown in to start as a new assistant, and gets whisked away to a room in an expensive hotel. Jane raises the issue with an HR rep, played with smarmy menace by Succession’s Matthew Macfadyen, but her concerns are quickly battered away and turned against her. Rejecting cheap catharsis and dramatic twists, The Assistant builds its claustrophobic world through a steady accumulation of information. While some of the writing can feel too imprecise and opaque by design, Garner, who consistently steals scenes on Netflix’s Ozark, invests every hushed phone call and carefully worded email with real trepidation. She locates the terror in the drudgery of the work. Read more information at https://www.popcorntales.com/.