Audrey Kupferberg

Godland has an intriguing title. According to imdb.com, its original Danish title, Vanskabte Land, translates to something like wretched or godforsaken land. This Danish/Icelandic production introduces viewers to a straight-forward story of a young Danish priest whose mission it is to travel to a remote island in Iceland and build a church for the rural community there before winter sets in. A 2022 release that played in theaters in the U.S. this past summer, Godland has garnered many festival awards and critical praise. Currently, it is available for home viewing on disc through Janus Films and The Criterion Collection and also can be streamed.

Oppenheimer has been playing at theaters successfully for the past few months. Now it is available for home viewings on streaming sources and on disc. When it first opened on the big screen, there was an ad campaign: See Barbie and Oppenheimer on the same day! That campaign worked to some extent. Both films, totaling 5 hours of screentime, are mega hits, and people did screen them both in one back-aching marathon of a day!

Pygmalion recently played at the Old Vic in London. It proved to be a very interesting take on the play, which in so many ways has become an old warhorse of the theater. Olivier Award winner Bertie Carvel, whom many detective show lovers will recognize as the title character in Dalgliesh, played Henry Higgins. I had expectations of a Higgins who would share some small bit of Adam Dalgliesh’s personality. Urbane, sophisticated, good-looking, somewhat hesitant in the company of women…

French filmmaker Mia Hansen-Love continues to win nominations and awards for her movies. All Is Forgiven, Father of My Children, Things to Come, and her most acclaimed work, Bergman’s Island are films that bring together cinematic style with relatable subjects.

One of Britain’s most imaginative filmmakers, Michael Powell, along with his sometime partner Emeric Pressburger, is being tributed throughout the UK till the end of 2023. Pinning down a single style or a top film for Powell would be a challenge. He worked in realism, fantasy, many genres. Among his most famous films are The Red Shoes, One of Our Aircraft Is Missing (aka Stairway to Heaven), The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, and Black Narcissus.

Martin Scorsese has been producing and directing films for more than sixty years. Several of his best-known feature films established new, grisly standards for urban violence. Mean Streets. Taxi Driver. Raging Bull. Goodfellas. Gangs of New York. When my friend, London-based film maven Roy Chacko, suggested we see Scorsese’s new film, Killers of the Flower Moon, I flinched. Would it be too violent for my taste?

Past Lives is a film that deserves attention. Written and directed by Celine Song, a relative newcomer to filmmaking and playwrighting, she demonstrates great promise and ability with her debut feature film. Past Lives currently is playing in theaters and streaming on Prime Video. Critics are pleased and thrilled. Same for audiences.

With so much talk about the various technologies used in presenting films these days, it’s easy to think that the earliest forms of film appeared in the dark ages. But motion pictures have only been part of our popular culture for about 130 years. Before the turn of the 20th century, moving images on 35mm nitrocellulose film stock were pleasing audiences. Actualities, an early term for documentary films, and all genres of fictional films from comedies to melodramas to explicit stag films to home movies…. They all are part of our visual histories as far back as Victorian times.

Mrs. Sidhu is not Miss Marple and Max Arnold is not Endeavour Morse. The unique personalities of current TV detectives keep viewers intrigued. No spoilers.

Most of us know Miriam Margolyes as Professor Sprout in the Harry Potter movies. Some recognize her as Aunt Prudence Stanley in Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries or as Sister Mildred in Call the Midwife. In script-free real life, Margolyes is an octogenarian who refers to herself as a Jewish lesbian.