TIFF24: Flow dir. Gints Zilbalodis

Animated films have taken us to a variety of places and let us encounter all manner of characters, and they make us feel, which says something incredible about the fact that they started out as sketches or lines of code in a computer. Flow does something we don’t often see in animated films, its characters,…

The X-Files (2018) – Plus One, and The Lost Art of Forehead Sweat

Series creator Chris Carter pens Plus One, which first aired on 17 January, 2018. Mulder (David Duchovny) and Scully (Gillian Anderson) get pulled into a weird one, when they hear about a rash of phenomenon relating to the appearance of doppelgängers, and they all seem to relate to a pair of twins, Chuck and Judy…

Saving Private Ryan (1998) – Steven Spielberg

I was stunned when I first saw Saving Private Ryan on opening day, 24 July, 1998. I had never seen war depicted so realistically, so heart-breaking, graphic, and impactful. I held onto the names of Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks like a mantra through the film, to guide me through it, to make everything be…

A Wind in the Door (1973) – Madeline L’Engle

This week, I dove into the second adventure of the Murry children first begun in the childhood classic (which I had never read) A Wrinkle in Time. I was curious to see where both characters and story would go as the adventure continues, so I devoured the book eagerly. This story feels both larger and…