film festivals | The Last Movie Guy

The Whale (2022)

Posted on 15 Days Ago by Hugo Pagan Soto

Darren Aronofsky’s universe is one of the most interesting. The New York filmmaker has always challenged the audience with his proposals. The Whale (2022) is his most recent film and with it, he reaffirms the previous approach, after causing a sensation at the Venice and Toronto film festivals, the film began its commercial circuit. All eyes have focused on its protagonist Brendan Fraser and specialized critics have not stopped insinuating that Fraser has conceived the best role of his career. Aronofsky has faded into the background while the shadow of his Whale seems to overshadow him.

To Leslie (2022)

Posted on 24 Days Ago by Hugo Pagan Soto

Finding the stories is the easy part. The difficult thing is to tell them in such a way that they become relevant. Michael Morris’s debut feature To Leslie (2022) does just the latter. The family drama of his story transcends by the way it is told and by the precision with which the narrative rhythm is carried out. When we approach the film, we can feel that what it is going to tell us is too familiar, that there is room to fall into the trite, but Morris’s hand is firm, and he relies on a magnificent cast to make his bet a winner.

All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)

Posted on February 16 by Hugo Pagan Soto

Why don’t you ever tell us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are as anxious as ours, and that we have the same fear of death, the same end, and the same agony?
Erich Maria Remarque

Perhaps Erich Maria Remarque would have wished he had never had the experiences that inspired his transcendental novel. All Quiet on the Western Front marked a turning point in the world of literature and its adaptation for the cinema in 1930 by Lewis Milestone paved the way for anti-war films. Director Delbert Mann also adapted Remarque’s play into a television movie in 1972. Now it’s Edward Berger’s turn, almost a hundred years after the first adaptation hit the big screen.

Triangle of Sadness (2022)

Posted on February 7 by Hugo Pagan Soto

Just like that family sitting peacefully having their breakfast with the French Alps in the background when suddenly an avalanche shakes their world and changes it forever, that’s how Ruben Östlund shook me with his Force Majeure (2014). From that moment it has been an obligatory task to follow in the footsteps of the Swede. Triangle of Sadness is his sixth feature film. With the sharpness that characterizes him, he delivers an irreverent comedy that takes advantage of every minute to compose a social critique.

The Beasts (2022)

Posted on December 16 by Hugo Pagan Soto

“In order to defend their lives in freedom, the aloitadores immobilize the beast’s hand to hand to shave and brand them.”

When the lens opens to take us out of the blackness of the titles, a wild and poetic sequence introduces us to the world of The Beasts (2022). Man against the beast in an ancient dance fueled by pure testosterone. Force prevails over reason; dominance is established, and territory is marked as conquered. Director Rodrigo Sorogoyen (May God Save Us, The Candidate) uses metaphor to introduce his subject. In slow motion we see that wild horse being tamed and the lens closing on its muzzle, which beats exhausted, as an inevitable foreshadowing of what is to come.