Yorgos Lanthimos’ Nimic is a 12-minute short film that somehow manages to feel longer than The Irishman and about as fulfilling as a cold toast breakfast at a grief counseling seminar. It’s a masterclass in doing absolutely everything a filmmaker can to alienate, confuse, and anesthetize their audience—without ever committing to a story, a point, … Read More “Nimic (2019): A Short Film, A Long Waste of Time, and Zero Pulse” »
Welcome to Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Killing of a Sacred Deer, a movie that asks the question: “What if Greek tragedy was rebooted as a Kubrick knockoff starring people who sound like they’ve been drugged by their own blood pressure medication?” Strap in. Or don’t. The movie sure doesn’t care. This film is cold. Not emotionally … Read More “The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017): Revenge Served Cold, with a Side of Lobotomy” »
Before The Lobster made dead-eyed dystopia sexy and The Favourite taught us that powdered wigs pair nicely with passive aggression, Yorgos Lanthimos directed Alps—a movie so emotionally detached it feels like it was filmed in a morgue and written by a committee of sociopaths learning about human behavior via IKEA manuals. Alps asks a very … Read More “Alps (2011): A Grief Counseling Service Run by Sad Robots with Brain Damage” »
Let’s be honest: we’ve all seen a bad student film. The kind where the director insists that silence is profound, wide shots are holy, and plot is bourgeoisie. Kinetta, the cinematic debut of Greece’s deadpan emperor Yorgos Lanthimos, is one of those films—except it had the audacity to get distributed. In 2005, Lanthimos hadn’t yet … Read More “Kinetta (2005): Yorgos Lanthimos’ First Pancake—And It’s Still Raw in the Middle” »
There’s a scene early in It Comes at Night where a man is blindfolded, led through the woods, and interrogated in a grim, post-apocalyptic whisper. It’s tense, atmospheric, and drenched in dread. You lean forward, heart racing, ready for the nightmare to begin. And then… it never really does. Because in Trey Edward Shults’s high-minded … Read More ““It Comes at Night” (2017) – And By ‘It,’ We Mean ‘Disappointment’” »
Trey Edward Shults’ Waves is not so much a film as it is a cinematic anxiety disorder. It opens with the camera spinning like it’s on bath salts, then spends two hours slamming your head into a locker of generational trauma, teenage hormones, and emotional manipulation—all wrapped in enough Instagram filters to make even Terrence … Read More “Waves (2019): A Two-Hour Panic Attack Drenched in Neon and Pretension” »
Let’s get one thing out of the way: Krisha was originally released in 2015. But in the year 2025, A24 decided to re-release it in gloriously remastered HD—because nothing says “celebrating cinema” like forcing a new generation to relive the emotional equivalent of being trapped in a Thanksgiving dinner hosted by a recovering hurricane in … Read More “Krisha (2025 Re-Release): A Family Dinner So Tense It Deserves a Warning Label” »
Alex Garland’s Civil War is a jarring, propulsive, uncomfortable gut-punch of a film masquerading as an action movie but really functioning as a grimly poetic obituary for whatever scraps of unity America had left. It’s the kind of film that doesn’t just want to entertain you—it wants to run a drone strike through your naiveté, … Read More ““Civil War” (2024) – Apocalypse Now, with Selfies” »
Alex Garland’s Annihilation is a film about transformation, self-destruction, and the kind of science fiction that’s supposed to be “deep,” but mostly feels like being stuck in a philosophy major’s fever dream after they’ve watched Stalker, The Tree of Life, and an episode of Planet Earth—all while microdosing mushrooms. It wants to be cerebral, mysterious, … Read More ““Annihilation” (2018) – A Slow, Moody, Shimmering Nap” »
Alex Garland’s Men is one of those films that walks into the room with its collar popped, smoking an unfiltered cigarette labeled “METAPHOR,” and mutters, “You probably won’t get this.” It’s the kind of horror movie that wants to be deep, provocative, and symbolic—but ends up feeling like a drunk art student screaming “THE PATRIARCHY!” … Read More “Men (2022): Alex Garland’s Misfire of Biblical Proportions” »
