‘Exhibit #8’
Rent or buy it on most major platforms.
by Ruben Broekhuis promotional thriller mixes documentary and found footage conventions to tell a sinister and unpredictable story about surveillance and the dark web. The film’s narrative disruptions suggest that he and screenwriter Sarah Offringa are devoted disciples of Michael Haneke. “Funny games.”
Elias (Claudio Gabriel Magaña Torres) explains to the camera that he is making a documentary about a woman named Aisha (Nastaran Razawi Khorasani), who has been living in the Netherlands since the 1990s, when she and her brother, Adin, arrived there from Bosnia as refugees. . The little brothers were in a shelter, about to be adopted, when one day Adin mysteriously disappeared.
When Elias and Aisha arrive at the shelter with the camera rolling, blows are exchanged as the administrators question the motives of the visitors. But then — and this is where the film made me sit up straight — the camera angle changes. Later twists Explain why one of the pets I’ve found – a sheet music – has so far underlined the action. I won’t say more, to preserve the many sneaky detours of this film. A knockout finish explains most of it, but the film ends with an overly twisted coda.
An Indonesian all-girls reformatory is the setting for Jinadi Rona’s (not so) dark possession thriller, told from the perspective of young Muslim women.
Yolanda (Aghniny Haque), from Jakarta, is sent to the isolated school where the girls study the Koran under a creepy, easy-going headmaster, Jaelani (Omar Daniel) – the kind of man who keeps an exorcism kit ready in case of a demon. . resides in one of his students. To graduate, the girls must take part in a ritual in which they encounter a genie or spirit possessed by humans – an unorthodox task that ends with Yolanda and her classmates encountering hungry denizens of hell on earth.
With ‘The Pope’s Exorcist’ out now and ‘The Nun 2’ on the road, it’s a treat to watch a possession film from a religious perspective other than Christianity, especially one that takes a feminist approach to fighting demons of both supernatural and earthly origin. The cinematography, by Arfian, is a beautiful blend of lushness and eerie nature, particularly during scenes in which students battle unseen assailants.
“The Strange Case of Jacky Caillou”
Jacky Caillou (Thomas Parigi, charming) lives a quiet life in rural France with his grandmother, Gisèle (Edwige Blondiau), a healer who heals people in pain and sick sheep. One afternoon, Elsa (Lou Lambros) shows up seeking healing from a spot on her back. All is well until Gisèle dies unexpectedly and a grieving Jacky tries to heal Elsa with techniques he got from his grandmother. (Plus, she has it bad for Elsa.) But when Elsa’s body starts growing fur and the farmers wake up to slaughtered sheep, it turns out that human hands are no match for poor Elsa’s supernatural urges.
Lucas Delangle’s film is a refreshingly cool werewolf movie: It’s mystical, thoughtfully paced, innocently sexual, and only mildly scary, with a script by Delangle and Olivier Strauss that favors coming-of-age tenderness over creature terror. If you were a fan of it “Teddy”, this other strange French drama about a young werewolf, you will be charmed by this movie.
‘Family Dinner’
One of my favorite “Twilight Zone” episodes is “To serve man” about aliens who bring peace to Earth but leave behind a book that doesn’t belong on any bookshelf of human interest. A similar subversion lives within the title of Peter Hengl’s macabre slow-burn drama about a shy German teenager’s difficult entry into adulthood.
The film opens as Simi (Nina Katlein) arrives for an Easter weekend visit with her aunt Claudia (Pia Hierzegger), a wellness writer who is writing a book about ancient food cultures, and Claudia’s husband Stefan (Michael Pink). Oddities abound: Neither Claudia nor Stefan eat much, and Simi’s cousin Filipp (Alexander Sladek), when he’s not mocking Simi for being a “fat cow,” is convinced his mother wants to kill him. All of this leaves Simi wondering where her subjects belong — until she gets a diabolical answer when Easter dinner is served.
Hengl’s script it sets an eerie mood this is more walk than fight, though its thematic concerns—immortality, intimidation, body shaming—are ripe with face-smashing potential. As in the recent film “Piggy,” It’s nice to see a leading young woman who isn’t a size 2, but I’m ready for Katlein to lead a scary movie that isn’t about the horror of body shaming.
Irina (Greta Bohacek) and her younger brother, Paul (Claude Heinrich), work in a Dickensian factory atop a lush Greek island, making holy soap under the orders of their guru, the dapper Foust (Sam Luwick). The bars are used in amorous cleansing rituals that Fust believes keep his students physically clean.
When Foust asks Irina to move into the grown-up home, she — like any teenager who wants to feel grown-up — agrees, leaving Paul seething at his sister’s selfishness. When Paul’s pet pig, Stinky, is killed, it’s the final straw that sets him on a vengeful mission to reclaim not only the sister he loves, but also his dignity as a man and a worker. “No dirt, no soap,” he tells himself, like a good little Marxist.
Director Nikias Chrysos and cinematographer Yoshi Heimrath have made an unsettling and ambitiously maximalist dark comedy parable about faith and fanaticism. (It’s in German and Greek.) The story loses focus as it detours through a convoluted plot for a passion play, and farcical moments, like a glistening crotch, undercut its sinister edges. Still, if you want extra, I say dive in.
