The Big Picture Magazine
The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (1972) is at its 50th anniversary this year and it deserves to be celebrated. It’s one of the films that made me aware of the creative process that is filmmaking, one of the films that made me love cinema. It remains my favourite Rainer Werner Fassbinder film. Seductive […]
“Lost” masterpieces can be catnip for serious movie buffs and collectors. Now you can properly worship at the feet of kung fu action spectacular The Shaolin Plot (1977, directed by Huang Feng), a seldom-seen Hong Kong picture from the Golden Harvest production company. Celebrated martial arts actor, stuntman and filmmaker Sammo Hung worked with director […]
We often associate progress with height – look no further than the post-World War II boom in skyscrapers. In a pre-credits scene from Michelangelo Frammartino’s Il buco (The Hole, 2021), a group of Italian villagers, huddled around a staticky television outside a café, watch footage of a newsman touring one such building. “We are climbing up […]
Ana Rocha’s Listen (2020) begins quietly, with shots of clotheslines and tree branches swaying in the breeze: a rare moment of solace in an otherwise breathless family drama. Clocking in at under 80 minutes, the writer-director’s feature debut doesn’t waste any time immersing viewers in what must be one of the most gut-wrenching experiences a […]
In this final part of our Great Director Debuts podcast, Gabriel and Tom discuss Rian Johnson’s revisionist neo-noir Brick (2005) which transplants the gritty pulp fiction of 50s noir from the mean streets of LA to a valley high school… …and Dea Kulumbegashvili’s Beginning (2020), a Georgian set tale of a missionary, his wife and […]
After nearly 50 years in relative obscurity, Sergio Sollima’s hard-hitting thriller receives the special treatment it deserves as a new 4k restored print arrives courtesy of Eureka Classics. Having failed to make much of an impact upon its initial release outside of Italy—due in part to poorly managed marketing and lazy perceptions of dubbed films […]
One morning, 80-year-old Ayumu Nippori wakes up believing he is 20 years old. Seemingly disoriented, he walks around his house, calling for his mother. Two clearly very old black-and-white photographs of Nippori’s parents on a chest of drawers that are visible briefly in one of the shots are a first clue that something is wrong. […]
I’ve always believed that films should be viewed in one sitting. No pauses, stops or breaks (take that pee before the movie, dummy!). An immersive experience that demands, or, at the very least merits, your full attention for what is a relatively short period of time compared to, say reading Tolstoy’s War and Peace or […]
I recently returned from a short holiday to Spain, where – apart from reminding myself that the sun did in fact exist – I was introduced to the amazing murals of Estapona; a small resort town two hours west of Malaga on the south coast. The huge arts initiative, which invited painters from all over […]
