— by BEV QUESTAD — This film by new Vietnamese filmmaker Pham Thien An will have you pondering, throughout the film, about what the title might mean. “Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell” takes place in Vietnam during a lot of overcast, rainy skies. It begins with a silly big-headed sport[...]
Author Archive
Review: Facing the Wind
— by BEV QUESTAD — What do you do when your spouse changes from the vibrant intelligent man you fell in love with to someone who doesn’t always know who you are? The bottom-line question is this: What does a wife do when she has a career and her husband needs 24/7 care? Have you [&hell[...]
Review: The Old Oak
— by BEV QUESTAD — “When you eat together you stick together.” I’m musing over this old adage used in “The Old Oak” as I’m on my way to Bangladesh for the 11th time. There is a stark chasm between those who have plenty and are safe and those who are suffering with their lives[...]
Review: The Dead Don’t Hurt
— by BEV QUESTAD — This film is a tour de force in dramatization, headed up by charismatic Viggo Mortensen and inner strength phenome Vicky Krieps. The entire cast takes you inside the times and minds of people trying to survive in hardscrabble southwest America during the time of the Ci[...]
Review: Man and Witch
— by BEV QUESTAD — Talking animals, castles, hobbit-like scenery, wizards, witches and popular music are all in “Man and Witch: The Dance of a Thousand Steps,” a delightful fairytale for the 21st century. The Contented Kingdom has lost its descriptor with the invasion of the [...]
Review: Nocturnes
— by BEV QUESTAD — Turn off the lights and settle in for stereo sound and a cinematic rush. Who would have thought that a movie on a scientist’s project studying hawk moths would be such a symphony for the senses? You are led up into the eastern side of the densely forested mountains o[...]
Review: The American Question
— by BEV QUESTAD — The rest of the world has a question about America. Why the gravitation to someone like Donald Trump? Guy Seemann, an Israeli-born entrepreneur and political operative, sought out the answer to America’s great divide and extremist lean. For eight years, he interviewe[...]
Review: 500 Years
— by BEV QUESTAD — Though America is financing a genocide in Gaza and Lebanon right now, there have been other, quieter genocides with which America has been complicit in the past. By quieter, I mean less media coverage, not less tragic. “500 Years” documents one of those stories. Co[...]
Review: Borderland: The Line Within
— by BEV QUESTAD — I don’t understand the American immigration policy. I am so confused I can’t find my way to a position. Almost every other country has a border policy, so why the cry-out? Why is it even an election year trigger point? And why on earth is the projected budget for t[...]
Review: Cruise Boom
— by BEV QUESTAD — Know anyone who has gone on an Alaskan cruise this past year? The new Klondike Gold Rush (1896-189) is The Alaskan Tourist Rush. With the recent opening of a private dock in Sitka, the inhabitants say, “Welcome!” But quietly they wonder, “At what point do we lose[...]
Review: Lost Nation
— by BEV QUESTAD — Prepare to be enlightened. New York State wanted to be bigger, African-Americans were amongst the earliest settlers in Vermont, and the proponent for recognizing Vermont as America’s 14th colony was given a tempting counter offer from the British. The story begins in[...]
Review: War Game
— by BEV QUESTAD — What if the 2024 election results end with a coup attempt, but better organized than the last? My greatest shock about the Jan. 6, 2020, attack on the US Capitol Building was not that it happened, but that it was met with such a limited response. I was thinking, “Gee[...]
Review: Green Border
— by BEV QUESTAD — Excruciatingly frustrating and heartbreaking, famed Polish director Agnieszka Holland has created a courageously accurate drama based on true events that I am calling The Film of the Decade. In 2021 Alexander Grigoryevich Lukashenko, president of Belarus since 1994, le[...]
Review: Chronicles of a Wandering Saint
— by BEV QUESTAD — Perhaps Rita is the cleaning lady for the church, or perhaps she is a lady who voluntarily brings cleaning supplies to the church to clean. She badly tries to be helpful and wants a miracle. The film appears to end after 30 minutes. Credits roll and we seem to have [&h[...]