ritual ( 2013 film )
full frame documentary festival, 2013 and will screen in edinburgh, scotland in june 2013 .
the wolf of wall street (2013) scene:' morning ritual' .
austin film festival, 2012 (winner of the audience award for best student short); boston science fiction film festival, 2013; texas independent film festival, 2013; lonestarcon3 film festival (screens august 2013); tri - cities international fantastic film festival (screens october 2013) .
austin film festival, 2012; fargo film festival, 2012; lone star film festival, 2012; texas independent film festival, 2013; capital city film festival, 2013; wxwc film festival (jury award winner) .
the wolf of wall street (2013) scene:' morning ritual'. - youtube
lisa summerscales (bfa' 10) lead role in the feature film ritual, sold to lionsgate films in april of 2013 for national release. release date tba .
jesse graham (mfa 2010) the odyssey experience, mccarter theater center (outreach) 6 / 2013 .
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there are no critic reviews yet for ritual. keep checking rotten tomatoes for updates !
[ bd review ] cult thriller' ritual' rambles on... - bloody disgusting
i highly recommend this film, if you can find it. a truly great film from under the radar .
[ … ] andrew robinson, ‘walter benjamin: art, aura and authenticity’, ceasefire. retrieved june 14, 2013, from urltoken [ … ]
there are no featured audience reviews yet. click the link below to see what others say about ritual !
[ … ] a. 2013. walter benjamin: art, aura and authenticity. [ online ] available from: urltoken [ assessed on 20th october [ … ]
[ … ] a. (2013) walter benjamin: art, aura and authenticity. 14 june. available at: urltoken [ accessed 10 november [ … ]
there is fantasy in it (it is fiction, after all), but there were some very exciting, realistic' pagan moments' in there for me, including a very inspiring autumn equinox ritual that’s probably the most realistic fiction film portrayal of a pagan sabbat ritual i' ve ever seen .
; kyle henry, whose film, “fourplay: tampa, ” premiered at the cannes film festival; rachel tsangari, whose film “attenberg” was greece’s official entry for a foreign language academy award; and bryan poyser, whose feature “lovers of hate” premiered at the sundance film festival .
[ … ] “walter benjamin: art, aura and authenticity. ” ceasefire magazine rss. 14 june 2013. web. 27 mar. 2015. urltoken [ … ]
student award winner (wild and scenic film festival), recipient of the kodak student scholarship award, winner of audience award (rocks with wings film festival), and screened in the pbs online film festival .
document iv (transcription), arthur lipsett, “‘free fall” proposed experimental film” [ 1963 ], national film board of canada archives, montréal .
[ … ] robinson, a. (2013). walter benjamin: art, aura and authenticity. ceasefire magazine. retrieved 8 august 2015, from urltoken [ … ]
many students who have screened at the longhorn film showcase or graduated from the department of radio - television - film have become internationally renowned filmmakers. soham mehta, who screened “fatakra” at the 2011 longhorn film showcase, later received a student academy award for the film. other recent graduates include susan youssef, who won grand prizes at both the cinema novo festival and the dubai international film festival for
“ritual” needed a richer back half and a faster track to getting there. a prolonged buildup to the discovery already revealed by the film’s own synopsis negates any tension and nothing along the way justifies the extended journey .
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ritual is not necessarily reactionary. the communion of ritual practices may be necessary for the formation of non - massified social groups, as in peterson’s account of activism as neo - sect. an example would be the use of puppets in protests. on the other hand, the ‘liberation’ of art from ritual may not free it for progressive politics. it may, instead, become a property of the society of the spectacle .
a film delivery man promises a beautiful young woman to deliver a film reel on time to a movie theater. but the the whole city seems to conspire against him .
poor character development, a thin plot and predictability make this one a forgettable film .
founded in 1999, senses of cinema is one of the first online film journals of its kind and has set the standard for professional, high quality film - related content on the internet .
tradition and ritual have mainly negative meanings for benjamin. but they could also be taken to connote the density of local knowledges, of particular lifeworlds, and of the uniqueness of each person and their personal world. in his works on flânerie and collecting, baudrillard is melancholy about the impending loss of these personalised forms of ritual and tradition .
the final cut: ritual suffers from some (probably) budget related problems but there are moments of greatness. the film has some effective scares. and keating gains our sympathies for his characters quickly, so we cheer (and fear) for them right from the start .
art was originally derived from ritual, and depended on it for its aura. the earliest works of art might have been items such as totem poles, cave paintings, and fertility dolls. (in one - way street, benjamin provides a list of differences between art and ‘fetishes’, suggesting the latter are ‘documents’ of subject - matter). in the modern age, art is ‘liberated’ from its dependence on ritual. as a result, the experiences connected with ritual and tradition are lost. the autonomy of art is also lost .
after love no stranger to stories of domestic horror like “our children” (2013), the belgian filmmaker joachim lafosse directs this fraught scenario about a couple (cédric kahn and bérénice bejo) who separate but continue living in the same apartment with their kids .
a psycobabbling story would be a more apt title, for this badly acted, bordering on silly film .
brittany farrell (with megaphone) in “whose streets? ” the film is due out aug. 11 .
13 - year - old late bloomer gabe kowalski goes to desperate measures to impress a more mature classmate, shane .
yeah, kowalski !
has screened at the maryland film festival, sarasota film festival, dallas international film festival, san antonio q fest, roze filmdagen (amsterdam lgbt festival), and toronto in and out film festival. it was also a runner up for the iris prize. (10: 01 )
ah, but nothing can just be what it appears in a keating film, and ritual is where it all began. this case of domestic ‘no - chill’ gets one more profound turn of the screw, and if you somehow managed to miss the trailer for it, it’s a jaw dropper .
, at fantastic fest 2015. this earlier film offers a glimpse into the talent that would go on to make
culture crypt looks at a few fantasia film festival features shaping up to be hot topics among horror fans in 2018 .
ascent experience mount fuji — through a selection of 4, 000 photographs snapped over 150 years. the dutch artist fiona tan has built this experimental film out of those stills. screenings at film forum in new york will be free .
sky burial, a private ritual where the bodies of tibetan dead are offered to wild griffon vultures, becomes a tourist attraction as chinese modernization in tibet invigorates an ideological conflict often hidden to the outside world .
thin plotting and an unconvincing production have “ritual” far in the hole. writer / director mickey keating’s film doubles the disappointment with poor choices for scene placement. tom spends the first four and a half minutes after the opening credits just driving to the motel while listening to the radio. lovely injures herself while fleeing and spends two and a half minutes pulling an object out of her foot. “ritual” is lost about what to emphasize and when. the result is a pace that falls flat and a weak hook with little potential to captivate .
“ritual” (known elsewhere as modus anomali” is a very interesting indonesian film. i don’t remember where i heard about it, and you can search the internet for info on it, but you will come up awfully short. as for our director, joko anwar, you can search for him and come up pretty short also .
the tomatometer score — based on the opinions of hundreds of film and television critics — is a trusted measurement of critical recommendation for millions of fans. it represents the percentage of professional critic reviews that are positive for a given film or television show .
a long time ago, tom and lovely were married and everything was perfect. but that’s over. when lovely kills a man after he tries to drug and kidnap her, she calls tom for help and while cleaning up, they find a vhs tape that depicts a satanic ritual in which a woman is brutally murdered. when they’re forced to return to the scene they discover just how far this cult will go to perform their ritual .
annabelle: creation a prequel to a spinoff: “annabelle” (2014) was an offshoot of “the conjuring” (2013), and this film concerns events before “annabelle, ” with presumably no connection to “the conjuring 2” (2016). got it? “annabelle: creation” tells the story of how one evil doll came to haunt so many movies. talitha bateman, anthony lapaglia and miranda otto star. david f. sandberg (“lights out”) directs .
culture crypt is the most reliable website for genre movie reviews and the best in popular culture, specializing in independent horror film entertainment .
how i came about this film, was my mom can home with the film one day (not sure where she got it from) but once i watched it i fell in love. it is one of my favourite films. i suggest to the people who hasn' t watched it yet, you must! to me it is a wonderful film. thanks you for this wonderful review .
department of radio - television - film the university of texas at austin 2504 whitis ave. stop a0800 austin, tx 78712 - 1067
reactionaries attempt to revive the old, ritual function of art. film, for instance, is assigned the function of expressing supernatural and mythical phenomena. this view is central to critiques of special effects. benjamin thinks this attempt is ultimately untenable. the viewer of films or photographs takes the position of the cameraman. this is a standpoint which cannot be mystified .
set in a remote small town outside of the catskill mountains, the film centers on the parkers, a fairly reclusive but otherwise normal - seeming family that, as the story opens, is marked by tragedy when the matriarch dies in a tragic accident brought on by a massive rainstorm. this is horrible enough but to make things worse, it is just about time for them to go through a religious ritual that has been performed in the family for a couple of centuries and which can only be done by the woman of the house. oh yeah, the ritual in question involves cannibalism .
then there are the cultists themselves – what is their point? we get a bunch of guys in skull masks that like to stab women with knives, but for what purpose? it doesn’t seem so much like a ritual of any type as much as a bunch of goofy guys who like to dress up and kill people. and what about that guy who was stabbed in the hotel room by lovely? he was a violent and rednecky guy in a mechanic’s shirt who picked up lovely in a bar and decided to get rough with her, but how did that play into the ritual? what was the ritual? who are these guys? what the hell is going on here ?
good teen role models in film can be hard to find. it' s nice to see a movie depict teens taking things slow .
each film selection encompasses a wide range of cinematic forms and formulas, from documentary to the avant - garde, for youth and adults .
the cultists of “ritual” are not the kindly next - door neighbors in tweed suits and everyday passersby with evil eyes that horror films of the seventies scared audiences into fearing. these are nondescript truck stop hillbillies putting knives to female throats for unexplained reasons. when confronted, these would - be demon worshippers laugh maniacally without sense and without any discernible motivation. “ritual” does not offer a backstory or a reason to be frightened, unless wearing rubber silver shamrock skeleton masks counts as fearsome .
score: a film music documentary going behind the scenes of how film scores are composed, this portrait of the craft features some of the most familiar “music by” credits in the business, including hans zimmer, john williams, danny elfman, quincy jones, rachel portman and thomas newman .
arthur lipsett’s nine - minute experimental film free fall (1964) is exemplary of what might be considered both an artistic and a spiritual project. although he may not have fully realised it, lipsett was using media as a ritual or gateway, acting as medium and prophet, and reaching into the subconscious of humanity. with his films, he created a trance - like experience for the viewer .
the ballad of narayama
is a japanese film of great beauty and elegant artifice, telling a story of startling cruelty. what a space it opens…
her love interest is portrayed by sam underwood. it appears this might be his first feature film, though he’s done a lot of television as well .
fractal film articulates the concepts of generative art with the language of cinema. it is a collaboration between video artist delphine doukhan and generative artist antoine schmitt .
be a tightly coiled thing of urgency and despair. unfortunately, the painfully slow pacing of the first half prevents the film from building any steam. when the climax arrives and the time comes for the film to really let loose, it rushes through the finish line leaving us high and dry. it' s almost as if writer / director mickey keating decided to make a film that dwells upon all the scenes that take place between the bits that would normally be in a thriller .
camera obscura suffering from post - traumatic stress disorder, a war photographer begins to see real premonitions of deaths in his pictures. it’s a horror film, naturally .
since its inception in 1974, the newark black film festival (nbff) has become known among its peers as the longest running black film festival in the united states. throughout the years, it has continued to provide a progressive public forum for hundreds of emerging writers, directors, producers, performers and film buffs who enjoy african american and african diaspora cinema. screening in the summer months, the films that are shown reflect the full diversity of the black experience in america, both past and present .
one warning for those looking for this film on places like youtube— there are some versions of the film posted, but none are complete. there are cut scenes (and from what i could find, it’s mostly the pagan / religious scenes that were cut). so you might not get full enjoyment out of the film if you seek it on such websites. it’s as of this writing available on netflix streaming wireless, and if you don’t have that you’d do better to rent it or just buy it .
they unearth a vhs tape which suggests that the dead stranger was about to make lovely the centerpiece of a satanic ritual with his cult buddies. tom and lovely decide to scram before the cult members get there but soon have to turn back when tom realizes that he forgot an incriminating bit of evidence in the room. will they run into the cult members when they get back to the motel? will the cult take kindly to the fact that the sacrificial lamb du jour took out one of their brothers? will they try to go through with the ritual anyway? what do you think ?
this sounds so cool! i haven' t even heard of this film. i' m always on the hunt for positive pagan films and literature. thanks for sharing !
lucky lucky, played by the film’s writer and director, bari king, is an undocumented immigrant who gets enmeshed in a crime web and has to fight his way out .
the wedding plan the ultra - orthodox filmmaker rama burshtein made one of the more intriguing recent splashes on the festival circuit with “fill the void” (2013), a jewish take on jane austen themes. in “the wedding plan, ” called “through the wall” at festivals, a 32 - year - old (noa koler) pre - emptively plans a wedding, giving herself a three - week deadline to find a husband .
according to benjamin, art is now gaining ‘entirely new functions’. the liberation of art from ritual frees it for connections to the practice of politics. responses to art are also increasingly collective – as in audience responses to film – the individual reaction is produced or compounded by the reaction of the entire audience. earlier artworks, even when exhibited in galleries, did not lead to an ‘organised’ mass response. (this difference is probably less relevant in the era of television) .
a feature - length experimental film starring comprised of a series of counter - cultural vignettes that examine the conflicting values of divergent generations and challenge societal attitudes... see full summary »
the wound a factory worker from queenstown, south africa, takes a boy from johannesburg under his wing as part of a xhosa initiation ritual. when the movie showed at this year’s new directors / new films festival, a. o. scott called it “affecting and suspenseful even as it hits a few predictable beats. ”
what follows is basically a build up to the titular ritual. turns out the guy bleeding on the floor is in a cult that gets off on wearing skull masks and stabbing women with a sacrificial dagger. black cloaks, candles, the whole thing. tom and lovely learn this by watching a vhs tape they find in the guy’s car. why they’re still at the fucking motel at this point is beyond me. the bulk of the film takes place there, and after a while it simply begins to meander .
starring lisa summerscales (web series “destroy the alpha gammas”), dean cates (tv’s freshman) and derek phillips (tv’s “friday night lights”), ritual tells the tale of a young woman and her estranged husband, who become entangled with a horrifying cult and find themselves swept into a world of kidnapping, violence and satanic rituals .
one of the reasons i was surprised that i’d never heard of this film, and that so few others have ever heard of it, is that the supporting cast draws from some pretty strong talent .
is a relationship drama tucked into a occult sacrifice horror / thriller. its director, mickey keating, has become something of a horror media darling (nailed it !) since the premiere of his film ,
i have to admit, it was the supporting adult cast and pagan themes that i enjoyed about this film more than mamet’s performance or mamet and underwood’s character' s relationship. but i’ll get to that .
this bare bones game of hide - and - seek is everything going on in the story department. to redeem itself as a horror movie worth watching, all the movie has left in its empty bag of tricks is to perhaps create creepy atmosphere or to establish a setpiece worth mentioning. while “ritual” gives it a go, it accomplishes neither of these things .
jesús after committing an assault, a teenager (nicolás durán) in santiago is forced to confront his father (alejandro goic) in a film inspired by a real - life hate crime in chile in 2012 .
blends fantasy, mystery, and historical fiction to explore universal perceptions of time, maturation, and death. the film is told entirely in the endangered language of tewa (less than 500 native speakers remain) .
so, here we are, folks…one of the first things i wanted to accomplish for the new year, was to finish this examination of mickey keating’s body of work, and ye gods, i have stuck a fork in the sumbitch! i didn’t quite do what i intended, which was to watch all of his movies in chronological order. but i have seen them all, and because of that, going back to the very beginning of his film career with ritual, his freshman effort…well, it’s been interesting to see how his skills and confidence have grown since then .
there are a few moments that go on a bit too long toward the end, like “branches on the arrow peak revelation” and “north star ordination”, but overall, illumination ritual is the band at its poetic best, riding the quiet night wind to a restful conclusion. the appleseed cast combines the chaos of the shore with the underlying calm beauty of the waves .
dean demetri martin, a former fixture of “the daily show, ” directed, wrote and stars in this film, playing an illustrator who, after his mother’s death, works through a complicated relationship with his father (kevin kline). from last year’s tribeca film festival, mike hale wrote in the new york times that mr. martin “delivers a winning combination of winsomeness and rue. ” gillian jacobs and mary steenburgen also star .
tom is frantically summoned to a seedy south texas motel room by his estranged wife lovely, who has gotten herself into quite a jam by murdering the room’s occupant. tom learns that the dead man belonged to a mysterious cult and lovely was on tap to be their next ritual murder. now the other cultists are after the couple to finish what the dead man started .
a platter spinning 50’s soundtrack and beach blanket bingo wardrobe attempt injecting style, but “ritual” never pulls together a cohesive fantasy with enough chills to deliver a slick satanic sensibility. the rambling approach to devil - worshipping themes on display here has nothing on the post - “rosemary’s baby” heyday of cinema where grainy kodak stock gave an uncomfortably sinister tinge to black robes and shaved heads .
while he and lovely discuss what to do, tom unknowingly drops his engraved lighter near the bed. tom searches the man’s car in the parking lot and finds a video camera. he brings it back to the motel room and plays the tape on the tv. from the tape, tom and lovely learn that the man was a cult member involved in ritual human sacrifice .
without reading a story summary beforehand, the title of the movie and the cover art featuring a skull and candles are enough of an indication that “ritual” features a cult dealing in human sacrifice. by using nearly half of the runtime to give this same information to the two protagonists, the script cannot help but underwhelm while spending forty minutes simply booting its premise off the ground .
part crime caper gone awry, part survival horror film, this 1970s set thriller depicts a harrowing fight for survival after a pair of wannabe crooks botch a bank heist and flee into the... see full summary »
in this romantic drama featured at the cannes film festival, a couple, sophia and daniel, find their passionate romance taking a shocking turn when they visit the bulgarian seaside. as they... see full summary »
hearing is believing the star of this documentary is rachel flowers, who was born prematurely and went blind, but learned to play music and grew into a vibrant performer. the film follows two years in her family’s life .
“ritual” starts out with a man buried alive in the ground in a desolate forest. he wakes up, disoriented and confused. he checks his cell phone, no contacts are listed. no previous calls. he checks his wallet, and he finds an id card and a family picture featuring two children. he wanders through the woods, and finds a cabin. outside of the cabin is a suv truck. inside the cabin, he finds a snuff film with a pregnant girl being killed by an obscured man. who is she? who is he? where are the children? what has happened here ?
i liked the story and the cast. i am drawn to zosia' s looks: the first time i saw the film i came upon it at about 20 minutes in: the first shot of zosia i was captivated .
wiccansage, i had not heard of this film before reading your hub, and i' m so glad you wrote about it! i didn' t know studios ever made realistic movies about pagans - so refreshing to hear .
dawson city: frozen time in the silent era, the gold rush town of dawson city in the yukon was the last stop on the film - shipping circuit. the creative solutions used to dispose of flammable nitrate stock resulted in the inadvertent preservation of 500 films — forgotten reels were excavated in the 1970s. bill morrison (the found - footage collage “decasia”) uses those clips to tell a story that interweaves film history and a sociological history of dawson .
all in all, anyone who likes films with an earthy / magical theme, anyone who likes the teen romance fantasy genre, and anyone who likes seeing pagans depicted in film might enjoy this movie and should give it a try .
i have heard rumors of a possible sequel featuring the parents / grandmother, when the teen goes off to college. i don' t know if it' s true (small film company) but i would jump on that !
i would tell you more about the plot, but it would ruin the entire movie. there are so many twists and turns in anwar’s film that it literally feels like you are gong a mile a minute. the pacing of this movie is brilliant, as it never seems like it is dragging. however, if you are a person (like my wife) that cannot stand it when a movie gives you zero clues, and has a grand finale, you will be irritated. personally, i like it when a film doesn’t show its cards until the final act. you spend the whole film guessing and wondering where the story is going. it’s an old trick, but it is also very effective .
sadly there are still people who will ask me or my family if our religion is like something out of charmed… it’s nice to have a film where i can point to a scene and say, “no, it’s more like that. ”
amelia does was consulting producer for the documentary film remembering arthur, author of the biography do not look away: the life of arthur lipsett, and is contributing editor for an anthology of essays about lipsett’s films to be published in 2014 .
to anyone and everyone who has that ex, or that ‘slightly estranged’ former significant other, who take pride in the fact that you’re ‘still friends’ with them…some of us ain’t got it like that, for good fucking reasons, too. and ritual’s unhappy couple, tom (dean cates in his first role for keating), and lovely, (lisa marie summerscales), are here to show you why .
enigmatic lawrence, ks rockers the appleseed cast are one of the few emo bands that grew into something more by pushing their music into new arenas — their music matured as they did. now with a more post - rock lean, the appleseed cast have been forging songs out of complex guitar riffs, technical drum work, and atmospheric effects. their newest album, illumination ritual, fully embraces that grandiosity .
the man is tom, played by dean cates. as the film picks up some time later, we learn that he and lovely are now estranged marrieds. the honeymoon was over after that first beach stalking, i guess. upon receiving a frantic call from lovely, he drives to the motel she phoned from. within the first ten minutes, keating struggles to keep “ritual” progressing at a suitable pace. an inexplicably lengthy driving scene leads to an equally painful conversation through the motel room door as he persuades her to let him in. why this hesitation on her part in the first place, i haven’t a clue. didn’t she call him ?
i can' t deny that there is a certain quirk to keating' s work. i suspect he would work wonders with a pitch black comedy but here his instincts seem to go against the brutish energy that this film deserves. he is so fixated on building atmosphere and indulging his directorial flourishes that he forgets to include any sort of meaningful payoff. it' s a shame too because a tighter focus on pacing and a more developed second half could have turned this film around .
. the film starring rafe spall, arsher ali, robert james - collier & sam troughton follows four old college friends hiking through the scandinavian wilderness into the ancient forests of norse legend where something evil is stalking their every step. joe barton (
fractal film is designed to be shown as a gallery installation in a dark room on a large projection hd screen with seats and quality sound, in a cinema - like atmosphere. the duration is infinite, the audience comes and leaves freely .
hi there! i enjoyed your review very much. i watched with my husband recently and was excited to be able to say to him ,
isn' t it neat to think there are actual families like that out there ?
in the pagan sense, of course. he was like ,
are there ?
i was pleased to see you second that some of the ritual and daily life is realistic in the film. reminded me of my pagan and wiccan friends in college! i' m a christian but i recognize that many of my traditions are tied to these older ways and it was always a pleasure to be invited to celebrations like mabon .
the themes and messages in the movie, about all things being connected, about man being not in nature, but part of nature. the scenery and surroundings were often breathtaking. i think it’s a feel - good film—but then, i’m pagan. in my research i’ve found a few reviews by christians who were highly disturbed at seeing paganism portrayed in a positive light in a film advertised as a teen romance; so i guess ‘feel good’ depends on your point of view of what feels good .
harmonium a prizewinner at cannes, koji fukada’s film captures the ripple effects on one family after the father (kanji furutachi) invites an acquaintance (tadanobu asano), a recent ex - convict, to work with him in the garage next to his home .
after dark films’ new release ritual opens with a warning of extreme violence, then lets us know that we have 30 seconds to leave before it starts. aw, c’mon. already i wanna turn it off. i hate gimmicks like that. gaspar noé pulled that shit in i stand alone and i didn’t buy it back then. it’s like the filmmakers are rubbing how “extreme” they’re trying to be in the audience’s face instead of just going for it .
maggie greenwald directed the film, another person with whom i’m not that familiar. she’s done much more for tv, which is probably why the last keepers sometimes has the feel of a made - for - tv movie you might see on channels like hallmark or lifetime .
the loss of distance between meaning and its deployment in immediate propaganda may produce a flattened world in which revolutionary possibilities become invisible. if the audience absorbs the work of art, but the audience is itself trapped in mythologies and alienated subjectivity, then the revolutionary power of art is truncated. the absorption of art becomes tautological, and the lines of flight available are correspondingly reduced. authors sympathetic to benjamin’s analysis might see in this a reproduction of ritual aspects of art .
“every year, this celebration of student films features young filmmakers who go on to national and international prominence, ” said paul stekler, chair of the department of radio - television - film and the wofford denius chair in entertainment studies. “our filmmakers have screened at venice, sundance, toronto, dubai and other major festivals where they have received critical acclaim. they got started in screenings right here in austin. i encourage everyone to come out and see the filmmakers who’ll find similar success in the future and continue to fuel the film industry in texas. ”
quick random thought: what if the video camera had already been in the room, and our leads called the cops immediately like rational individuals, only to discover that the officer on duty was one of the bad guys? that would have gotten the ball rolling much sooner, and perhaps saved “ritual” from being more than just a moderately entertaining time - passer. but, that’s backseat screenwriting, a nasty habit of yours truly. pity i have to do it at all .
all - in - all, ritual is mickey keating’s least successful picture, which is not a swipe at the man or his talents, considering he made three more after it, each one better than the last. it’s not a waste of time, since it gives you a look at the maiden voyage of an emerging, burgeoning filmmaker, but bear in mind that i can’t in good conscience give it more than two - and - a - half out of five stars .
lemon this year’s designated sundance squirm comedy stars brett gelman (who wrote the script with his wife, the film’s director, janicza bravo) as a 40 - year - old drama teacher who alienates everyone around him. judy greer, michael cera and gillian jacobs endure his disagreeable behavior .
wild ill at ease with civilized life, ania (lilith stangenberg) forges what becomes an increasingly close and physical bond with a wolf. if festival reviews are any indication, the film is poised somewhere between a tall tale and a provocative social commentary. nicolette krebitz wrote and directed .
the aura of the actor, and of the character portrayed by the actor, vanishes because the camera is substituted for the audience. in place of the aura, film studios build up a cult of the star as a constructed image. this is not a true aura, but the ‘phony spell of a commodity’. what’s more, art is no longer semblance. it fuses with reality. benjamin’s example here is that filmmakers will sometimes actually startle an actor, so as to get the startled reaction on film. there are also echoes here with the feminist critique of pornography .
moscow never sleeps an irish filmmaker, johnny o’reilly, pays tribute to his adopted city of moscow with this ensemble film. the trailer at least paints a much sunnier view of the city than russian imports usually do. aleksey serebryakov (the protagonist of “leviathan”) is in the large cast .
the woman who left ten years ago, the filipino director lav diaz was a forbidding figure, even among extreme cinephiles. at film festivals they would ask one another in hushed tones whether they really planned to see his nine - hour “death in the land of encantos. ” lately, mr. diaz seems to have widened his appeal, earning acclaim for his dostoyevsky - inspired “norte, the end of history” and for this new drama, which won the golden lion at the venice film festival in 2016. at nearly four hours, it is also one of mr. diaz’s shortest films .
awakening the zodiac shane west and leslie bibb play a couple who find a 40 - year - old film reel that they believe was shot by the zodiac killer in california. they try to sleuth him out. this displeases the zodiac killer, who is probably a member of aarp by now .
the art - sleaze film about the decadent rites of american college kids stars former disney sweethearts selena gomez and vanessa hudgens alongside
pretty little liars'
ashley benson and korine' s wife, rachel, as broke coeds who stick up a chicken shack to fund the spring break of their dreams .
the survivalist a standout at the 2015 tribeca film festival, stephen fingleton’s debut feature is a terse portrait of life in a postapocalyptic wood. martin mccann is the title character, who lives alone and fends off all comers until two women (mia goth and olwen fouéré) turn up at his doorstep .
while trying to reconcile after an argument, jordan (leonardo dicaprio) is teased by his wife naomi (margot robbie).' the wolf of wall street'; a film by martin scorsese. starring: leonardo dicaprio, jonah hill, kyle chandler, margot robbie, cristin milioti & matthew mcconaughey .
afterimage the polish director andrzej wajda, who died at 90 in october, grappled one last time with his country’s history in his final film, a portrait of the painter wladyslaw strzeminski (boguslaw linda), who pushed back against the postwar communist regime’s mandates for art and sacrificed his career as a result .
the traditional work of art is experienced mainly through distanced contemplation. in declining bourgeois society, this became an asocial stance. in contrast, modern cultural forms such as photographs, tv shows and film do not lend themselves to contemplation. they are imperative, challenging and agitating the viewer, putting up signposts .
writer / director mickey keating made an interesting choice for the end of the film. i won’t spoil it, but i will mention that the head cult guy turns and smiles into the camera. don’t involve me in this, brah! breaking the fourth wall doesn’t work unless your ferris bueller or michael haneke !
but, anyone who has read my hubs knows my niche here. i' m not a film or book critic; i' m a pagan writer who occasionally reviews books and films that touch on pagan spiritual themes. i guess i am a ‘pagan fiction buff’ - - that is, i like to check out movies and books that have something to do with paganism, witchcraft and wicca (the more it claims to be a realistic portrayal, the better) - - and i know there are more pagans out there who love to see positive pagan depictions in film, so i thought i’d get the word out .
lipsett, likewise, was striving to induce an experience through which the viewer might be transported into an altered state of perception, reception or being. his notes for the production of free fall reveal a clear desire to use the film medium to transcend the viewer’s everyday state of mind. he described free fall as
unlocked in an espionage thriller from michael apted, noomi rapace plays a c. i. a. agent who is on the run and working to stop a terrorist attack in london. orlando bloom, michael douglas, toni collette and john malkovich are also in the film, but who knows whose side they’re on ?
manifesto those who can’t get enough of cate blanchett will find her here playing 13 roles. the words the characters recite are drawn from more than 50 manifestoes — most of them artistic declarations from the 20th century. the film was shown in installation form at the park avenue armory in december and january before heading to sundance .
in transit a founding figure of the direct - cinema movement, albert maysles died in 2015, shortly before this film’s premiere. his last feature observes the passengers on amtrak’s empire builder route, which connects chicago and the pacific northwest. mr. maysles directed with lynn true, nelson walker, ben wu and david usui .
a family man a cutthroat headhunter (gerard butler) who’s competing with a colleague (alison brie) for a promotion finds his ambitions threatened when his son receives a cancer diagnosis. not to be confused with the brett ratner film “the family man, ” this drama also stars gretchen mol, willem dafoe and alfred molina .
what. .? i' m sorry it just seems like it was a magically brilliant idea that ended up so not magically brilliant after all. in fact the movie would have been half as good if it were played in reverse. i give the movie a 4 out of 10 and only because of the opening blessing scene, the autumn equinox ritual scene, even the scene where rhea is magically place the dead tree stumps into place, and because of the three adult characters and their decent acting. that' s it; the end .
vincent - n - roxxy in an update of old noir themes, “vincent - n - roxxy” casts emile hirsch and zoë kravitz as a couple whom circumstances bring together and send on the lam. romance follows to some degree, but word from last year’s tribeca film festival suggests that violence dominates. zoey deutch co - stars .
in his later years, lipsett leaned towards what some would call performance art. this was, however, no act for lipsett. taping his fingers into mudras, making sculpture - films, murals and assemblages, dancing spontaneously, and “filming” with no film in the camera were some of the ways he expressed himself, and dealt with his feelings, fears and pain. descending into mental illness after leaving the national film board of canada (nfbc), he did not show his work publicly. the once oscar - nominated lipsett lived in a state of poverty and unemployment which demoralised him for the last decade - and - a - half of his life .
isn’t overly graphic or gory at all. the score got under my skin more than anything my eyeballs took in. anyway, i disregarded the warning and watched the whole thing, which turned out to be a tedious attempt at slow - burn horror. by the time the creepy parts kicked in, the film’s just treading water .
king arthur: legend of the sword after two revisionist takes on sherlock holmes, the director guy ritchie aims to show off the hipper side of king arthur, a character whose last major reboot was in a 2004 antoine fuqua film. an irreverent charlie hunnam plays the title role; jude law is the pretender to arthur’s rightful throne .
final thoughts: ritual is an odd little thriller that hardly ever thrills. the protracted setup gives way to a rushed climax that turns into a showcase for director mickey keating' s grab bag of tonally mismatched (though sometimes interesting) ideas. there is a kernel of a good idea present here but the execution frustratingly misses the mark. with that said, there is just enough ambition on display here to separate it from the countless hack jobs that litter the genre. those flashes of vision coupled with the bold soundtrack push this just over the line into rent it territory .
if only his script had found a groove much sooner. cates and summerscales are both fine actors, but not magicians. their bitter arguing over relationship woes earlier on is not only monotonous thematic filibustering, but mind - boggling to boot. is a crime scene you’re planning to flee really the time and place to have a domestic spat? for fear of being too hard on “ritual” (because there is a lot to admire), i won’t even touch the pointless discussion that occurs between two of the cultists and slams on the venture’s brakes once more before the credits roll .
realive the spanish director mateo gil (who has collaborated with alejandro amenábar on scripts for films like “open your eyes”) wrote and directed this science - fiction film about a man (tom hughes) with a terminal disease who is cryogenically frozen and then awakened in 2084 after 60 years of limbo. charlotte le bon and oona chaplin co - star .
the layover stranded at the st. louis airport after a flight diversion, two friends (alexandra daddario and kate upton) vie for the affections of the same man (matt barr). william h. macy, who is also in the film, directs this comedy from a script by david hornsby (“it’s always sunny in philadelphia”) and lance krall .
the commune you wouldn’t know it from the high - society recriminations in his dogma 95 landmark, “the celebration, ” but the danish director thomas vinterberg was raised in a commune. although this 1970s - set film isn’t a memoir, it draws on that experience. trine dyrholm and ulrich thomsen play a couple who decide to start their own group - living arrangement .
diary of a wimpy kid: the long haul the wimpy kid grew up, so hollywood found a new one. in the fourth film based on jeff kinney’s popular books, greg (now jason ian drucker) goes on a family road trip. alicia silverstone and tom everett scott, also on their first outings in the wimpy - verse, play his parents .
the exception a nazi soldier (jai courtney) assigned to look after the exiled kaiser wilhelm ii (christopher plummer) has an affair with a maid (lily james) who is both jewish and a spy. eddie marsan (as himmler) and janet mcteer add to the intrigue. the director is david leveaux, a multiple tony nominee making his first film .
dunkirk christopher nolan trades the cerebral for the visceral with this epic - scale restaging of the 1940 military actions in dunkirk, france, which ended with the evacuation of more than 300, 000 allied troops from the french port town but endured as a kind of rallying cry for the british. the cast includes kenneth branagh, cillian murphy, mark rylance, tom hardy, fionn whitehead and, in his film acting debut, harry styles, formerly of one direction. mr. nolan, perhaps hollywood’s most outspoken advocate for the continued use of celluloid, shot the movie in a mixture of 70 - millimeter imax and 65 - millimeter, the gold standards for movies designed to be seen big. it will show in select theaters on film.
ritual is a 2013 american horror film written and directed by mickey keating . it stars lisa summerscales and dean cates as a married couple who must deal with a murderous cult . it was released in the united states on december 31 , 2013 . 
ritual is a 2013 american horror film written and directed by mickey keating. it stars lisa summerscales and dean cates as a married couple who must deal with a murderous cult. it was released in the united states on december 31, 2013.
ritual is a 2013 american horror film written and directed by mickey keating. it stars lisa summerscales and dean cates as a married couple who must deal with a murderous cult. it was released in the united states on december 31, 2013.