Annabelle/ Foto: Instagram/annabellemovie Annabelle/ Foto: Instagram/annabellemovie
- Kisah horor dari boneka Annabelle akan kembali meramaikan perfilman dunia. Sekuel ketiga yang berjudul Annabelle Comes Home akan rilis pada 26 Juni 2019. Film ini juga akan menampilkan warna cerita yang baru. Selain horor, film Annabelle juga akan menampilkan sisi romansa dan komedi.Para artis pemerannya angkat bicara terkait film terbaru mereka. Di antaranya, Patrick Wilson yang berperan sebagai Ed Warren mengatakan alur cerita Annabelle akan berbeda dari sebelumnya."Kalian juga tetap bisa menonton film ini tanpa menonton film sebelumnya. Jadi saya pikir bagi penggemar film horor, saya pikir mereka tidak hanya akan mendapatkan itu, mereka bisa melihat boneka menyeramkan itu lagi, tapi lebih banyak humor, romansa, dan menyenangkan," ujar Patrick dilansir dari APTN, Selasa (25/6). Vera Farmiga yang berperan sebagai Lorraine Warren berujar, film Annabelle Comes Home ini akan memberikan cerita menyentuh hati. Hal ini yang membuat film Annabelle Comes Home menjadi berbeda dari film horor lainnya."Apa yang sudah mereka lakukan itu sangat indah, dan film ini juga sangat menyentuh, ada romansa yang begitu indah terdapat di dalamnya. Bagi saya, justru ini yang membuatnya sangat istimewa, dan berbeda dengan film horor lainnya," ujar Vera.Adegan komedi dalam film ini akan memberikan sesuatu yang berbeda dari sebelumnya. Karena humor akan membuat adegan horor menjadi semakin menegangkan. Mckenna Grace yang berperan sebagai Judy Warren juga merasa sangat tertarik dengan semua adegan di film Annabelle Homes Come. Namun yang paling menarik baginya adalah ruangan artifact."Kami mendatangkan banyak karakter baru dan hantu baru, dan saya sebagai penggemar dari sekian banyak di dunia. Hal ini sangat menarik untuk melihat hantu dari ruang artifact, karena itu yang benar-benar menjadi hal sangat menarik bagi saya, saya ingin tahu ada apa semua cerita di balik itu, karena begitu banyak di ruang artifact," kata Grace.Hal senada juga diungkapkan oleh Madison Iseman yang berperan sebagai Mary Ellen. Ia mengaku juga sangat tertarik dengan ruangan artifact di film tersebut."Kamu tahu, kita harus menggunakan banyak kabel dan hanya hal-hal praktis keren yang biasanya tidak bisa kamu lakukan. Karena kamu tahu, setan, jadi kita seperti ditarik ke lantai, dan melintasi kamar artifact, jadi ini sangat menyenangkan," kata Madison.
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TRIBUNSUMSEL.COM - 6 Film Baru yang Bakal Tayang Dibioksop Pekan ini : ada Annabelle Comes Home, Sabyan Menjemput Mimpi.
Bioskop memang menjadi tempat hiburan tersediri bagi masyarakat di Indonesia.
Apalagi, dengan perkembangan dunia film yang terus menghasilkan film-film baru yang semakin menarik.
Hal ini didukung pula, dengan lahirnya sejumlah bioskop baru untuk mengakomodir keinginan masyarakat untuk menyaksikan sejumlah film terbaru.
Dan lagi, pekan ini sejumlah film menarik dipastikan akan menghibur para pecinta film bioskop.
Tercatat, setidaknya bakal ada enam film terbaru yang bakal tayang dibioskop kesayangan kalian.
Keluarga Ki-taek beranggotakan empat orang pengangguran dengan masa depan suram menanti mereka.
Suatu hari Ki-woo anak laki-laki tertua direkomendasikan oleh sahabatnya yang merupakan seorang mahasiswa dari universitas bergengsi agar Ki-woo menjadi guru les yang dibayar mahal dan membuka secercah harapan penghasilan tetap.
Dengan penuh restu serta harapan besar dari keluarga, Ki-woo menuju ke rumah keluarga Park untuk wawancara.
Setibanya di rumah Mr. Park pemilik perusahaan IT global, Ki-woo bertemu dengan Yeon-kyo, wanita muda yang cantik di rumah itu.
WowKeren - "Annabelle Comes Home" tentunya menjadi salah satu film yang bakal memeriahkan bulan Juni. Diketahui, seri teranyar dari "Annabelle" ini bakal diputar secara global pada 26 Juni mendatang.
Sebelum resmi ditayangkan secara global, rupanya para bintang muda yang terlibat dalam film ini tak segan membagikan klip terbaru "Annabelle Comes Home". Klip tersebut diputar di sela penampilan mereka sebagai presenter di acara MTV Movie and TV Awards 2019.
Berbeda dari klip yang telah dirilis sebelumnya, cuplikan terbaru ini dengan jelas menampilkan teror boneka iblis Annabelle pada Judy Warren, putri pasangan demonolog Ed dan Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson dan Vera Farmiga). Meski singkat, namun klip yang dimulai pada menit ke 2.55 ini bisa dibilang berhasil menambahkan teror untuk para penggemar.
Di sisi lain, "Annabelle Comes Home" rupanya akan mengambil setting sebelum "The Conjuring". Film ini akan mengisahkan aksi menyeramkan Annabelle ketika pertama kali ia diambil dan disimpan oleh pasangan Ed dan Lorraine Warren di rumah mereka.
Menariknya lagi, kali ini Ed dan Lorraine dipastikan tak hanya menghadapi satu iblis saja. Iblis yang merasuki boneka Annabelle rupanya akan mencoba menghidupkan seluruh barang magis yang menjadi koleksi Ed dan Lorraine. Jika melihat alur cerita yang dibagikan, tentunya "Annabelle Comes Home" ini patut menjadi film horor yang paling dinantikan kehadirannya.
Selain Patrick dan Vera, film ini juga akan dibintangi oleh sejumlah aktor dan aktris lainnya. Mulai dari Madison Iseman, McKenna Grace, hingga Katie Sarife.
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WowKeren - Remake "Child's Play" tampaknya tak kapok mencari gara-gara dengan film lainnya. Usai menampilkan Chucky yang menghabisi karakter "Toy Story 4", kini poster baru "Child's Play" menunjukkan bahwa si boneka iblis telah mengganti target buruannya.
Poster baru Chucky ini menampilkan bagaimana boneka ikonik Annabelle tampak berlumuran darah dalam kotaknya. Bahkan boneka yang identik dengan seri "The Conjuring" dan "Annabelle" tersebut tampak kehilangan kepalanya, di mana pisau Chucky menancap pada bagian tersebut.
Sebelum poster terakhir ini, tim produksi "Child’s Play" telah merilis serangkaian poster di mana Chucky membunuh karakter-karakter seperti Woody, Buzz, Slinky Dog, hingga Rex dan Mr. Potato Head dari "Toy Story 4" karena kedua film ini dirilis dalam waktu yang sama. Sedangkan dalam poster kali ini, Chucky tampak berada di ruang benda-benda mistis milik keluarga Warren dan bersiap menghancurkan Annabelle.
Tentu saja poster anyar ini menunjukkan bahwa "Child's Play" siap bertarung dengan "Annabelle Comes Home" di akhir pekan kedua penayangannya. Diketahui, sebelumnya film remake ini kalah telak dari "Toy Story 4" pada pekan pembukaannya.
Di pekan perdana pemutarannya, "Child's Play" rupanya hanya mampu mengantongi USD 14 juta (sekitar Rp 199 miliar). Berbanding terbalik dengan "Toy Story 4" yang memuncaki box office dan meraup USD 188 juta (sekitar Rp 2,6 triliun).
Terlepas dari hal tersebut, remake ini akan mengambil setting waktu kekinian, sehingga sosok Chucky akan ditampilkan lebih modern lagi. Sedangkan untuk detail dan alur cerita, kabarnya film ini akan menampilkan sosok Chucky yang mengusik kehidupan sekelompok anak hingga mereka benar-benar menjadi trauma.
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CLOSE The evil doll from "The Conjuring" movies haunts young Judy Warren (Mckenna Grace) in the new horror film "Annabelle Comes Home." USA TODAY
Things go bump in the night frequently in "The Conjuring” universe, namely thanks to folks like the Crooked Man, the Nun and that creepy Annabelle – and, unfortunately for the ghostbusting couple at the heart of the movie series, they’re all hauntingly connected.
Headed up by James Wan, “The Conjuring” films have become a horror version of the Marvel Cinematic Universe with spinoffs, characters who cross over between movies, and a couple of primary do-gooders in real-life paranormal investigators Ed (Patrick Wilson) and Lorraine (Vera Farmiga).
The true “Conjuring” MVP, though? That’d be Annabelle, the macabre doll/demonic conduit who’s appeared in more films than Ed’s guitar skills. The most dangerous item in the Warrens’ room of fantastically freaky artifacts returns for her third “solo” movie “Annabelle Comes Home” (in theaters Wednesday).
Annabelle: The 'true' story of the evil doll star
'The Nun': Why there's creepy appeal in unholy horror
Summer scares: 10 horror films we're freaking out about this season
Annabelle the doll is unleashed for her third movie, "Annabelle Comes Home." (Photo: WARNER BROS.)
These fright fests – which, interestingly, lean very female in terms of protagonists and antagonists – scare up decent box office, too: Four of the six so far have topped $100 million. Of course there’s more to come, with “The Conjuring 3” (out Sept. 11, 2020) now filming and a sequel to “The Nun” in development, as is a spinoff with “Conjuring 2” creeper Crooked Man.
To mark the release of the latest, here are all the “Conjuring” movies, ranked from worst to best:
Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) is haunted by the demonic nun Valak (Bonnie Aarons) in the "Conjuring" spinoff "The Nun." (Photo: COS AELENI/WARNER BROS.)
7. ‘The Nun’ (2018)
The 1950s-set prequel is an early story of Valak (Bonnie Aarons), the demon nun that stalks Lorraine in “The Conjuring 2,” and the priest (Demian Bichir) and the young novitiate (Taissa Farmiga) who encounter her while investigating a suicide at a Romanian abbey. There are hints of religious mystery and old-school adventure, but it’s a mostly dull and arduous entry that totally wastes Aarons’ chilling villainess of the cloth.
Father Perez (Tony Amendola) has a serious doll problem to deal with in "Annabelle." (Photo: GREGORY SMITH/WARNER BROS.)
6. ‘Annabelle’ (2014)
On paper, it draws some “Rosemary's Baby” comparisons with a pregnant woman battling a malevolent force and the involvement of a devil-worshipping cult. If only it held a candle to that classic: The first “Annabelle” sics the evil doll on a young couple (Annabelle Wallis and Ward Horton) and their baby in 1967, with Father Perez (Tony Amendola) stepping in to try and exorcise the porcelain menace, yet this is a clichéd disappointment rather than good unholy terror.
Marisol Ramirez plays the malevolent title spirit of "The Curse of La Llorona." (Photo: SCOTT PATRICK GREEN)
5. ‘The Curse of La Llorona’ (2019)
Its connection to the rest of the “Conjuring” saga is glancing, with a cameo from Amendola’s Perez (and a flashback-y glimpse of Annabelle), and overall the film is a so-so tale of a widow (Linda Cardellini) and her kids beset by a supernatural entity. It’s a shame because "La Llorona" mines Mexican folklore to unleash a ghostly weeping woman in a wedding dress (Marisol Ramirez), whose terrifying look and sinister intentions rank right up there with the franchise’s best baddies (or worst, as the case may be).
Lulu Wilson stars as an orphan girl who learns that stuff goes bad when a certain doll is around in the 1950s-set "Annabelle: Creation." (Photo: WARNER BROS.)
4. ‘Annabelle: Creation’ (2017)
The possessed plaything gets an origin story here, as we go back to the ‘50s with a dose of childhood tragedy and some young scream queens (or is it princesses?). Talitha Bateman and Lulu Wilson are orphan girls who come to live in a house where Annabelle’s taken up residence, which means a lot of sleepless nights for everyone involved. “Creation” offers a few decent scares but mainly a lot of familiar tropes in a forgettable package.
Madison Iseman (from left), Katie Sarife and Mckenna Grace star as youngsters dealing with a house of horrors in "Annabelle Comes Home." (Photo: JUSTIN LUBIN)
3. ‘Annabelle Comes Home’ (2019)
Third time’s the occult charm: The doll’s new disco-era flick features the Warren family but puts the focus on young daughter Judy (Mckenna Grace). She has a bit of her mom’s innate sense for the otherworldly, which helps when the kid and her babysitters (Madison Iseman and Katie Sarife) have to survive one crazy night: Annabelle is inadvertently taken out of her case and lets loose the evils of the artifact room, including a hellhound and the frightening Ferryman. It’s the funniest of the “Conjuring” series and an ode to ‘70s and ‘80s teen horror flicks.
Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga) investigates a freaky music box in director James Wan's "The Conjuring." (Photo: MICHAEL TACKETT/WARNER BROS.)
2. ‘The Conjuring’ (2013)
When the first “Conjuring” hit, it was like a breath of cold, musty, goosebump-inducing air – in a good way! The Warrens are called to a cursed Rhode Island farmhouse to dig into the supernatural goings-on that are creating a regular nightmare for the resident family. Wan does wonders with camera angles, panning shots, sound effects and other old-school techniques to create an unnerving atmosphere, balanced by the uplifting, grounded personalities of Ed and especially Lorraine.
Ed Warren (Patrick Wilson, right) tries to helped the possessed Janet (Madison Wolfe) in "The Conjuring 2." (Photo: WARNER BROS.)
1. ‘The Conjuring 2’ (2016)
Both main “Conjuring” movies are quite good – especially compared to the spinoffs – but No. 2 rules by tapping a religious vein similar to the original “The Exorcist.” The sequel mines two real Warren cases, the infamous Amityville Horror and the Enfield Poltergeist, and the latter gives rise to the main plot of a possessed 11-year-old girl (Madison Wolfe). Freakier than the first film, “The Conjuring 2” turns “This Old Man” into a whistled theme of impending doom as one of its many ghoulish delights.
Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/entertainthis/2019/06/25/ranking-the-conjuring-movies-from-worst-best/1548658001/
TRIBUNKALTENG.COM - Sosok Hantu Baru di Film Annabelle 3 Tak Kalah Seram, Sang Pengganggu dari Mitos Yunani Kuno , bukan hantu Valak .
Ya, teryata ada kejutan di film Annabelle 3 . Selain si Boneka Horor, ada hantu barunya lho.
Tak lama lagi, Film Annabelle 3 dengan judul resmi Annabelle Comes Home akan tayang pada akhir Juni mendatang.
Film Annabelle 3 memunculkan pertanyaan beru di kalangan penggemar.
Akankah muncul hantu baru yang 'nebeng' lewat Annabelle 3 nantinya?
• Ramalan Zodiak Besok Rabu 26 Juni 2019 : Pisces Jangan Kaku Dong, Taurus Jauhi Emosi, Libra Cuti
• Segera Tayang di Bioskop: Film Annabelle 3, Annabelle Comes Home Dilabeli Rating R, Apa Itu?
• Sosok Hantu Baru di Film Annabelle 3, Bukan Valak Tapi Sang Pengganggu dari Mitos Yunani Kuno
• Zodiak Cinta Rabu 26 Juni 2019 : Pisces Tidak Tegas, Ujian Kesabaran Gemini, Tahan Dirimu Leo
• Gisel Pamer Kemesraan dengan Wijin, Postingan Mantan Gading Marten Disorot
• Istri Dijajakan Layani Hubungan Seks Bertiga, Suami Pasang Tarif Rp 3 Juta
Sebagai informasi, semesta dari film The Conjuring memang telah melahirkan hantu-hantu ikonik yang akhirnya memiliki filmnya sendiri termasuk boneka Annabelle ini.
Ada lagi sosok Valak yang muncul pertama kali di film The Conjuring 2 yang akhirnya dibuatkan film mandirinya yakni The Nun pada 2018 silam.
Tetapi bisakah film terbaru Annabelle 3 ini akan mendapatkan spin-off sendiri lewat hantu yang muncul?
Melansir dari laman movieweb.com yang tayang pada 4 Juni 2019, hal tersebut mungkin saja terjad.
Tetapi itu semua tergantung pada bagaimana penonton merespons sosok yang sekarang yang dikenalkan sebagai The Ferryman.
Annabelle Comes Home - "The Artifact Room" Featurette
The most evil and cursed objects are held within this locked room in the home of demonologists Lorraine and Ed Warren. Come take a peek inside, won't you?
Tales of spooky occurrences on the sets of horror movies like “The Exorcist” and “Poltergeist” have circulated for years, and it looks like “The Conjuring” franchise is following in their footsteps in that regard. The cast of “Annabelle Comes Home” shared their unnerving stories from set at the film’s premiere on Thursday night at the Regency Village Theatre in Westwood, Calif., but “Conjuring” veteran Patrick Wilson is not afraid of ghosts… or Annabelle dolls.
“That’s because it’s their first movie,” Wilson cracked to Variety on the red carpet when asked if he’d had any freak occurrences on set like his co-stars. The actor has starred as Ed Warren in the horror franchise since 2013 and says he’s pretty immune to the creepiness, usually finding himself trying to talk sense into everyone else.
“I’ll give you a quick synopsis how it works out: Vera [Farmiga, who stars as Lorraine Warren] usually comes in and says ‘Oh my God, this happened to me’ and I then have some very realistic explanation for it,” he explained. “[But] she doesn’t buy my practical nature… I don’t get freaked out.”
Related Film Review: 'Annabelle Comes Home' Patrick Wilson Is The Only Member of The 'Aquaman' Cast Who Knew Who Aquaman Was
Contrary to what Wilson might think, some of these stories sure sound creepy.
“One time there was a cross on the side of the door. Madison [Iseman] and I, we slammed the door and Jesus flies off the cross. Just Jesus [flew off], not the cross,” actress Katie Sarife shared. “[Another time] I was trying to get into character and I went into a dark hallway by myself — not a good idea. I would be seeing shadows moving behind me.”
For her part, Iseman recalled her car sensor going off after midnight even though there was nothing nearby to set it off.
“I got in my car and tried to play music, but I didn’t have service — which was weird because I always do. So I started driving and in the middle of the road, at one in the morning, it started beeping, so I started praying and my music turned on,” Iseman said, adding that the lights also flickered on and off in her dressing room during filming.
In fact, several of the young cast members are firm believers in the curse of the Annabelle doll, even looking over their shoulders to keep tabs on the creepy toy who made a somewhat unwelcome guest appearance on the red carpet. Michael Cimino and Mckenna Grace both claimed they experienced mysterious nosebleeds while filming.
“All the lights turned off,” Grace remembered. “[We were asking] ‘Annabelle, are you here?’ When the lights turned on, my nose was bleeding really bad. There was blood pouring out of my nose and we were freaking out. As soon as I stepped off of the stage and outside, it just stopped.”
Actress Samara Lee revealed that writer-director Gary Dauberman was the most susceptible to scares on set, though he’s a veteran of the horror genre after writing all three “Annabelle” films, as well as the screenplays for “It” and the upcoming “It Chapter Two.” Dauberman spoke to Variety about the highly anticipated sequel to the killer clown reboot, admitting that distilling Stephen King’s behemoth “It” novel into shorter screenplays was challenging.
“What is the thing that you love that you have to lose?” Dauberman asked rhetorically, saying he invoked the old writing maxim, “you have to kill your darlings.”
But adaptation complicates that mantra. “They’re not my darlings. They’re Stephen King’s,” he opined, crediting the “It” films director Andy Muschietti for rising to the occasion in deciding which of King’s “darlings” to kill.
Another highly anticipated adaption that had the carpet buzzing was HBO’s upcoming “Watchmen” series. Wilson played Nite Owl in the 2009 “Watchmen” film and told Variety he’s so excited about the new series that had to stop watching the trailer midway — lest he catch any whiff of a spoiler.
“I saw the teaser and saw a bunch of people in Rorschach masks [and said] ‘I gotta stop,’” he said. (The “Watchmen” teaser features what seems to be a cult paying homage to the original character Rorschach, who wears a mask resembling the eponymous psychological test.)
“I want to stay away. I don’t want to know anything. I want to be surprised,” Wilson continued, adding “I’m thrilled to see it.”
The actor also gave high praise to the 1986-87 Alan Moore comic book, which serves as the source material, when asked if “Watchmen” is the “Citizen Kane” of the genre. Nite Owl’s verdict: “I think it is.”
“Annabelle Comes Home” hits theaters June 26.
In our present day, it feels like we’re sitting on the edge of too many abysses to count. Confining our perspective to the world of film, it’s arguable that the streaming apocalypse has arrived. Consumers are already fed up with the glut of services offering a library of films at low, low prices that, in sum, add up to the price of the premium cable package we thought we’d escaped. We’re still months away from the launch of Disney+, which now looks not so much like the herald of the apocalypse as a behemoth that will arrive in its wake to rule over the vestiges of the internet’s cine-civilization.
And there’s a different ongoing streaming apocalypse, at least according to the defenders of the movies as a unique medium. The year opened with cinema’s old guard attempting to forestall the effects of streaming’s rise on the rest of the film industry: Most visibly, Steven Spielberg attempted to cajole the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences into disqualifying Netflix-produced films from competing for Oscars. And is streaming also to blame for this summer season’s dismal box-office numbers? Perhaps in part. In any case, the cracks in the Hollywood fortifications are showing. For years, prognosticators have predicted the unsustainability of the “tent pole” model of film production, but the outcome is that everything is coming up Disney: Even Fox is Disney now, or soon will be.
But if streaming is indeed facilitating the long-delayed collapse of the tent-pole model, then more power to it. The year so far has been disappointing from the perspective of box-office returns, and it has been downright dreadful in terms of the so-called blockbusters themselves—another summer of sequels, side-quels, and soft reboots that has made it difficult to recall a time when big-budget superhero flicks like Dark Phoenix felt like cultural events.
That said, it’s worth noting that streaming isn’t simply killing the box office, but offering an alternative to a moribund institution, as the best chance to see many of this year’s best films, for those outside the country’s major markets, will be on streaming services. Whatever the outcome of the streaming wars, we should hope that when the dust clears, there’s still a digital home for films like the ones on our list. Pat Brown
3 Faces (Jafar Panahi)
Jafar Panahi works references into his film to some of the compositions, landscapes, and boundary-pushing plays of fiction and documentary evidenced in Abbas Kiarostami’s cinema. But instead of mere replication, 3 Faces filters these elements through Panahi’s own unique sensibilities. Rather than letting the mysteries in his film stand, or prolonging its ambiguities, Panahi prefers to signify potential plot directions and formal strategies and then promptly pivot away from them at the moment they outlast their usefulness. This isn’t the mark of a lesser filmmaker, but merely one who recognizes that his own strengths lie in his intuitiveness, his wit, and his humor. Sam C. Mac
Ash Is Purest White (Jia Zhang-ke)
The political dimensions of Jia Zhang-ke’s films hve led to a strained relationship with state censors in the past—and so the director’s appointment this year as a representative of China’s 13th National People’s Congress, and the larger indication that he was working to gain the favor of the state, created some worries about the integrity of his films going forward. But thankfully, the clever, subversive, and hugely ambitious Ash Is Purest White assuages those concerns. The film serves as a considered retrospection, and a coherent transition between Jia’s neorealist early films and his more recent populist melodramas. It’s a quixotic and profound statement on the spatial and temporal dissonances that inform life in 21st-century China. Mac
The Beach Bum (Harmony Korine)
Despite its lax, vignette-like quality, The Beach Bum is perhaps Harmony Korine’s most straightforward film to date, even while its form fully embraces its inherently circuitous, nonsensical subject matter. Indeed, the way Moondog (Matthew McConaughey) buoyantly moves from locale to locale, Korine’s semi-elliptical style, and a tendency for events to just happen lend the film a chronic haziness where even life-threatening occurrences are treated with a cheery dementia. At one point, a character loses a limb, but it’s “just a flesh wound”—something to quickly move on from and to the next toke. Not for nothing has Korine likened the film’s structure to pot smoke. Its dreamy, associative style is pitched to its characters’ almost random inclinations, while mirroring the spatiotemporal dilation of a high. Peter Goldberg
Birds of Passage (Cristina Gallego and Ciro Guerra)
A narcotrafficking origin story embedded inside an ethnographic study of a vanishing culture, Cristina Gallego and Ciro Guerra’s Birds of Passage starts and ends in the harsh Guajira desert peninsula that sticks into the Caribbean Sea from northern Colombia. Showing the same fascination with the interstices of Western and native cultures that Guerro and Jacques Toulemonde Vidal brought to Embrace of the Serpent, the story initially takes a back seat to an examination of ritual and belief. While the basics of the narrative are familiar from other stories about how Colombia tore itself apart serving America’s drug culture, the film stands apart for Gallego and Guerra’s studied focus on the drip-drip-drip of traditions falling before encroaching modernity as a family grows in wealth and shrinks in awareness. Also, their arresting visual sense power the story in the eeriest of ways, from the sweeping vistas of desert and sky to the surreal appearance of a glistening white mansion where an ancient village once stood. Chris Barsanti
Black Mother (Khalik Allah)
Black Mother finds Khalik Allah doubling down on his established aesthetic to bold, hypnotic ends. This essayistic documentary is organized into “trimesters,” chapter headings marked by the growing stomach of a naked woman, and it drifts between digital, Super 8, and Bolex footage as Allah tours the home country of his mother, beginning with a remarkably cogent examination of Jamaican political and religious history through the voices of those the director encounters on the street, before sprawling into more existential terrain, chiefly the feedback loop between humans and the environment. Allah is attracted to loud, confident voices, and the ways in which they hold forth about poverty, sex work, spirituality, and food is crucial to the filmmaker’s vision of the proud, angry beating heart of a nation. Christopher Gray
