Sammy Ko (Miya Cech) is at a major turning point in her life. The 13-year-old has been acting out since the death of her mother, and after a particularly impressive display of vandalism, her dad, Angus (Leonardo Nam), gives her an ultimatum: Sammy must complete a class at the local community college, or it’s off to Camp Sparrow Cliff for the rest of the summer. A third option presents itself to Sammy when she crosses paths with Margot (Rhea Perlman), a children’s magician who sees...

Céline Sciamma’s Petite Maman is about a sweetly witchy house in the woods where a little girl in mourning for her grandmother happens upon a playmate with the same name as her bereaved mother. The bereaved mother, Marion, has just exited stage left, too upset by the death of her own mother to deal with the house and its archives — the childhood notebooks, the shadow panther that hunts and haunts her bedroom at night. Nelly (Joséphine Sanz) and her new friend, young Marion (Gabrielle Sanz,...

TV veteran Mayim Bialik is no stranger to entertainment. The former child star is just as known for portraying the title character on the 90’s sitcom Blossom, as she is neuroscientist Amy Fowler on The Big Bang Theory. With a lifetime in “the biz” the Jeopardy host is charting new territory, writing and directing her first feature film, As They Made Us. Inspired by her own family, the film centers around Abigail (Diana Agron), a divorced mother who just can’t seem to break away from her dysfunctional family....

We’re All Going to the World’s Fair Written and directed by Jane Schoenbrun Writer/director/editor Jane Schoenbrun’s feature debut, We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, is a harrowing peek into teenage isolation and the pervasive power of the Internet.  Casey (Anna Cobb) is embarking upon the “World’s Fair Challenge,” an online horror game that triggers mysterious transformations in the player. Creepypasta-style videos featuring real YouTube content creators document graphic physical and psychological transitions, but the viewer is left wondering how much of Casey’s transformation is real and how...

What would you do if you found out that freedom was closer than you thought? Or simply a state of mind. Alice, the brainchild of debut director Krystin Ver Linden, is a revenge thriller set in the Antebellum South on a remote Georgia plantation. The film stars Emmy award winner KeKe Palmer (Akeelah and the Bee, Hustlers) as its eponymous heroine longing for her freedom and rapper-actor Common (The Chi, The Hate U Give) as the disillusioned political activist suffering from arrested development from losing...

    As a child of the 1990’s, must I even tell you how many Saturday nights in suburbia I spent watching episodes of MADtv?  Though only eight when the show premiered, it became one of my favorite programs to watch, and with hyped-up, uber funny impressions of childhood favs like Whitney and Oprah, comedic actress Debra Wilson was naturally one of my favorite ensemble members. An original cast member from the pilot episode, Wilson exited the series after eight seasons in 2003, after getting whiff of...

Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz were TV pioneers. Ball, a B-movie actress turned comedy legend, and Arnaz, a Cuban-American refugee and musician turned producer extraordinaire–fell in love with each other on a movie set, and against all odds got married and portrayed one of the first mixed race couples on TV at the time, in I Love Lucy. Mind you, this was in the ‘50s. At a time when sexism and racism was far from taboo and proudly showcased on the quilt of American culture, the...

On February 11th, Netflix released their sequel to Tall Girl, Tall Girl 2. The Tall Girl series focuses Jodi, a junior at Ruby Bridges High School, who is so close to being truly happy…if only she weren’t tall. Jodi has been bullied, harassed, and embarrassed by kids in her high school for being 6-foot-1. Though Jodi is constantly worried about her height and often gets rude comments about it, she is also white, blonde, conventionally pretty, and has two loyal friends. But even then, Jodi’s...

In the second frame of Joachim Trier’s new Norwegian film, The Worst Person in the World, which was nominated for Best International Feature and Best Original Screenplay, a table of contents appears on the black screen – “A film in 12 chapters, a prologue and an epilogue.” This dictum sets the tone for the book-like structure that follows – the chapters chart the characters’ lives, relationships, and milestones neatly. We think we know what to expect. We begin in the prologue where we meet our protagonist,...

  Right away, we learn three things: Emily (Aubrey Plaza) has a criminal record, $70,000 of student debt, and a bit of a temper. She’s stuck in the gig economy, delivering food for a catering company in Los Angeles and making endless loan payments that don’t even cover the interest on her debt. She can still get interviews for office jobs, but it’s a catch-22: tell the truth about her record and get thrown out right away, or lie and get thrown out later. When an...