Almost There: Class of 2022

by Cláudio Alves 

The Oscar nominations have been announced, and, while some celebrate, others commiserate. The word snub is getting its yearly workout, though it's easy to see why it's on the tip of everybody's tongue. This was a hard-to-predict year full of volatile lineups, not to mention a couple of dark horses crashing the party after most had considered them over. Grassroots campaigns won out while the precursors' importance keeps dwindling, and first-time nominees are more numerous than they've been in decades. Amid the chaos, it's time to fulfill an annual tradition here at The Film Experience, honoring those performances that probably came close to Oscar gold but missed the ballot at the last moment. Without further ado, let's give a warm welcome to the Almost There class of 2022…

Click to read more ...

Review: Adam Sandler's SAG-nominated ‘Hustle’

By Abe Friedtanzer

Twenty long years ago, popular comedian Adam Sandler was in serious awards conversation for the first time for his dramatic collaboration with Paul Thomas Anderson in Punch-Drunk Love. Three years ago, a handful of prominent citations and an Independent Spirit Award for Uncut Gems looked like it might finally help him breakthrough to a first Oscar nomination (it did not). Now, Sandler is somewhat unexpectedly making an awards play (sports reference?) again thanks to a surprise SAG nomination for his basketball drama Hustle, which is streaming on Netflix.

Sandler stars as Stanley Sugerman, a scout for the Philadelphia 76ers who becomes tired of missing his daughter’s birthdays each year while he’s traveling throughout Europe or somewhere else in search of the next great talent...

Click to read more ...

An Awards Night in New York

by Murtada Elfadl

Award events where the winners have already been announced have a particular way about them. The speeches are mostly prepared before, and the winners  - or their publicists and the people behind their movies - have a say in who gets to present them with the award. Last night the New York Film Critics Circle presented their 2019 awards and here are some of the presenter / winner pairings and why perhaps they’ve been chosen.

Yahya Abdul Mateen / Lupita Nyong’o…. He played her dad in flashbacks in Us

Claire Denis / Mati Diop …. Diop was in Denis’ 35 Shots of Rum...

Click to read more ...

Julia Fox in 'Uncut Gems'

by Murtada Elfadl

A star is born about an hour into Uncut Gems. The lead character, an obnoxious can’t-quit gambler (Adam Sandler) catches his mistress (Julia Fox) in the bathroom of 1 Oak Club in New York with The Weeknd. (Yes the Canadian popstar has a small role as himself.) What follows is a dragged-out funny intense loud lovers fight that starts in the club and spills into West 17th Street as Sandler and Fox scream barbs at each other and continue to fight to the bemusement of onlookers. She begs him to understand “Nothing happened, we were just doing coke.” He throws the ultimate final insult to end the fight “Go fuck The Weeknd.” Or so he thinks. That’s when Fox throws her whole body against the hood of the cab he’s trying to escape in, determined to continue the fight. That’s when we knew it; here’s an actress who will have a long career...

Click to read more ...

Review: Uncut Gems

by Chris Feil

In recent years, director duo Josh and Benny Safdie are cornering a market all their own of thriller of toxic neons and fatal consequence, after the deeply grim exploits of Heaven Knows What and Good Time. Nobody makes films quite in the way that the Safdies are making them right now, even if their particular brand of originality swims in back alley, off-putting aggressiveness. This round, their Uncut Gems is a dose of high anxiety filmmaking that’s partly Shakespearean tragedy of hubris and part underbelly crime saga in another unexamined pocket of New York City life.

Their best and most subversively accessible, it’s something enervating, infuriating, and compulsively watchable, all centered on a complex protagonist that also embodies all of the film’s contradictory qualities. That man is diamond dealer Howard Ratner, arrogantly betting off his assets and dwindling goodwill in the hopes of one massive payout, brought to exhilarating life by a possessed Adam Sandler.

Click to read more ...