The Year of Eva Victor
If there is anything right and just in this world, it better be. I skipped skiing this morning to make sure I had time to promptly and properly sing her praises after being blown away last night at the world premiere of her debut feature film here at Sundance.
The tagline is cryptic (maybe a little too cryptic for those who need a trigger warning), and I had zero familiarity with Victor. The only reason I…
110 films from 1964 are more popular on Letterboxd than this film—Mai Zetterling’s stunning but largely ignored directorial debut. Less than 2000 people have reviewed it here. Only 813 people have logged it on IMDb. Facts so inconceivable and utterly depressing that I struggle to come up with words for this review…and life in general. It’s a man’s world. And it’s exhausting. And Zetterling’s effort to speak through film about that reality has largely been met with silence.
It’s not…
Over my head I see trouble in the air;
there must be a God somewhere.
The very first documentary made by an African-American woman (Madeline Anderson) opens with this traditional spiritual playing over footage of the crowds gathering for and against a 1960 civil rights march in Montgomery Alabama. It’s utterly chilling as you see cops calmly unreeling the water hoses that later would be used to forcefully dispel the peaceful protesters.
“Nightmares are not the sole property of Southern…
Fun facts learned from this short doc that both serves as a reunion for its co-stars as well as a “making of” featurette:
• They mispronounced Agnes Varda’s last name “Varga” at Cannes. (This film ensured that would be the last time anyone would make that mistake.)
• Varda expressly describes the perspective shift as “feminist”
• Baldung Grien’s paintings of a skeletal demon tormenting a young woman served as an inspiration for Varda (she even posted photos of them…
On my last birthday card, you wrote, "I’d wish you a happy birthday, but cis-white men don't need any more happiness."
For every little gem like this that made me chuckle, there’s unfortunately a line that’s utterly unoriginal like “I just really wish that time would just stop for a second so I could enjoy it for a little bit longer.” While pretending to be a bit radical, the film actually leans heavily into sentimentality and traditionalism.
Not gonna lie,…
The way your head works is God's own private mystery.
Sailor (Nic Cage) says this to his girlfriend, Lula (Laura Dern), but I’d say it to Lynch himself. What strange, strange worlds and characters he creates.
At least with this film, it’s clear he’s leading with heart and humor, and he’s letting us in on the joke. Seeing this in a packed theater on Cult Movie Night ensured laughter in all the right places as we joined Sailor and Lulu…
