La Valija de Benavidez (2016)

	Also Known As: Benavidez's Case
	Year of first release: 2016
	Director: Laura Casabe
	Actors: Norma Aleandro, Paula Brasca, Valentín Javier Diment
	Country: RA, MEX
	Genre: Drama, Fantasy
	Conditions of visioning: 30.05.2017, Cine Santander Cultural, FANTASPOA2017
Synopsis: Pablo Benavidez is an artist living in the shadow of a more talented departed father. After leaving his girlfriend he imposes on his doctor for a night, and will end up staying longer in a residence designed for artists like him.
Review: I missed this movie at the Buenos Aires Rojo Sangre Festival in 2016 because it was shown without sub-titles and I didn't trust my Spanish enough. This time I decided to go anyway and got lucky that there were English sub-titles so I could do more than vaguely follow the main topic. I found the story original and refreshing, and the movie good-looking and well-done, almost a surprise for me coming from a country whose production I am not familiar with. The atmosphere is quite bizarre, especially when the psychiatrist goes through the videos of the sessions he had with Benavidez and puts him in situations that reproduce his life traumas in order to push him to create. That is in fact the main topic of the movie and the reflexion present at every stage until the finale. As serious shot at the genre from Argentina by a female director for whom it is the second full-length feature. Unfortunately I found many situations to be out of place, like the doctor handling multimedia screens to execute his master plan. I didn't like the design of those scenes.
Rating: 5 /10

Dracula Untold (2014)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2014
	Director: Gary Shore
	Actors: Luke Evans (The Hobbit 1-3), Dominic Cooper, Sarah Gadon (Enemy, 11.22.63), Charles Dance (Game of Thrones)
	Country: USA, J
	Genre: Fantasy, Horror, Action
	Conditions of visioning: 29.05.2017, VOD, 10" tablet screen
Synopsis: After spending years fighting for the Turks, Vlad the Empalor (Evans) has returned to his home Transylvania to rule his people and leave peacefully with wife (Gadon) and son. Until a request from the invader pushes him to make an unholy pact.
Review: I was not particularly tempted to watch this re-visitation of the classic story when it went out in 2014, but this time decided to give a shot anyway. Beyond classic Dracula stories like Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula and Murnau's or Herzog's Nosferatu, I also appreciated the rather B-movie Dracula 2001 by Wes Craven and with Gerald Butler, and I won't speak too much of oddities like Scream, Blacula, Scream. Untold has the modernity of 2001 but is much more serious with its topic and sticks to the origins of the Monster, a story not often told I believe. This Count Dracula is a very decent man in fact, forced to become a Monster by his enemies. The movie focuses on his struggle to keep his people and family safe, while as you would expect the pact he made grants him strength and power but is also cursed. The atmosphere is pretty grim and dark, special effects are good and Evans is invested by the role, shadowing all other actors apart from the terrifying Master efficiently played by Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister in Game of Thrones). Influences by movies like 300 are kept in check so in the end the movie find its place and identity.
Rating: 6 /10

The Kingdom (2007)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2007
	Director: Peter Berg (Deepwater Horizon, The Rundown, Hancock, Battleship, Lone Survivor)
	Actors: Jamie Foxx (Django Unchained, Collateral), Chris Cooper (11.22.63, American Sniper), Jennifer Garner (Daredevil, Elektra), Jason Bateman (Horrible Bosses, The Hangover 1-3)
	Country: USA
	Genre: War, Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: 28.05.2017, VOD, 32" TV screen
Synopsis: When a brutal terrorist attack hits an American civil base in Saudi Arabia, FBI agent Ronald Fleury (Foxx) would do anything to be sent there and allowed to help in the investigation.
Review: The opening credits of this movie do a good job at setting/reminding the historical background between Saudi Arabia and the USA. Of course petrol is at the heart of it. This fictional 2007 movie takes place in the post-9/11 atmosphere that we all know, with a special emphasis on the strain in the relationship between two allied countries in those tense times (fifteen of the nineteen 9/11 hijackers were Saudi), seen not from the political level but from the level of low-ranking FBI officers on one side and cops on the other. That is the great idea of this movie. We get to learn and like the two main Saudi cops, while the four Americans are more easy to quickly understand: Foxx very driven (by the death of a friend), Bateman slightly out of place but in fact present to bring some comedy, Cooper for experience and Garner for the mandatory female touch in this men's world. They have to cross many cultural and political hurdles to be able to conduct any investigation on site, and we follow this slow progression (it is a very basic investigation at first) until it takes a faster pace and the movie evolves more towards a war movie in its last act which is very intense. I was bothered because I couldn't understand all dialogs (Cooper and Bateman mumble a lot) so I could have felt more involved in the story, but apart from that it is an efficient movie about terrorism, on the investigation and revenge side, not psychological or historical one. At any rate much more realistic than any White House Down (also starring Foxx by the way) even in spite of the all-guns-out last act.
Rating: 6 /10

The Whole Truth (2016)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2016
	Director: Courtney Hunt
	Actors: Keanu Reeves (The Matrix 1-3, John Wick, Man of Tai Chi), Renée Zellweger (Me, Myself and Irene), Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Jim Belushi (Red Heat), Gabriel Basso
	Country: USA
	Genre: Thriller, Drama
	Conditions of visioning: 25.05.2017, VOD, 32" TV screen
Synopsis: Mike (Basso) is on trial for the murder of his abusive father (Belushi). The lawyer of this rich family (Reeves) is working on the case with the mother (Zellweger) but the son refuses to speak to anybody.
Review: I was looking for a trial story after liking the adaptations of John Grisham's novels A Time to Kill and The Client, both from the 90's. The Whole Truth is twenty years more recent so somehow different, but the thing about trial movies is that the frame (the law) and the motives are always the same, so not so different after all. The original thing that I liked from this movie is not even directly related to the main story, but is the way that when any witness tells his truth, we see on screen what really happened, and the difference between both goes from small details (that can have big consequences) to full-scale lies. The character of Reeves explains it early on to his assistant: people are not afraid of going to jail but of being embarrassed, or lose their jobs. Thus the small lies. This vision of what goes on in a court room is well integrated to serve the main story, also quite original in itself. Keanu Reeves is not bad in this role, maybe trying to find a new career path after his goodbyes to Martial Arts with both 47 Ronin and Man of Tai Chi in 2013, and now with the bad-ass character of John Wick in the two eponymous movies. Jim Belushi and Renee Zellweger (post face-lift) are also good in secondary roles.
Rating: 6 /10

The Sentinel (2006)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2006
	Director: Clark Johnson (S.W.A.T.)
	Actors: Michael Douglas (The Game, Romancing the Stone, Ant Man), Kiefer Sutherland (Flatliners, 24 TV-series), Kim Basinger (9 1/2 weeks), Eva Longoria (Desperate Housewives TV-series)
	Country: USA
	Genre: Thriller, Polar
	Conditions of visioning: 24.05.2017, VOD, 32" TV screen
Synopsis: A Secret Service agent (Douglas) is framed as the mole in an assassination attempt on the President. He must clear his name and foil another assassination attempt while on the run from a Secret Service Protective Intelligence Division agent (Sutherland).
Review: When choosing this movie I was expecting something like In the Line of Fire or Absolute Power. The story of an aging Secret Services special agent and of a conspiracy to kill the president does sound similar, but The Sentinel is not at the level of the 90's classics with Clint Eastwood. It is a movie formatted to Michael Douglas in the leading role, close to the character played by Kim Basinger (another 90's icon) and tracked down by the young Keifer Sutherland, a bit stuck in those roles of nervous cop/agent/president (like in the 24 or Designated Survivor TV-series). Eva Longoria is there apparently only for gender balance. The relationship between the characters is in fact not badly written, almost surprising for a movie of the 2000's, and again a reminiscence of Douglas' earlier career. The conclusion of the movie and the resolution of the conflicts between the characters are a bit predictable and exaggerated at the same time, very far from the realistic one-on-one psychological and physical duel at the end of In the Line of Fire. A nice movie to watch if you are nostalgic of the 90's.
Rating: 5 /10

Godspeed (2016)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2016
	Director: Mong-Hong Chung
	Actors: Michael Hui, Na Dao
	Country: RC
	Genre: Polar
	Conditions of visioning: 22.04.2017, Teatro Nuovo, FEFF2017, Min Nan with English subtitles
Synopsis: No Dow (Na Dow) is a drug mule working for gangster Bao (Leon Dai). One day he takes the battered taxi owned by Xu (Hui).
Review: With Michael Hui, I expected a hilarious comedy as Chicken and duck talk discovered during the FEFF2011, but it is not at all a comedy. Even if the character of Xu becomes immediately sympathetic due to his desparation and bad luck, the movie hesitates between genres, but do not mix them really as it does not go fully in any of the touched genres, Comedy, Polar, Horror with one scene of extreme brutality. This way it looks like Hollywood movies on Mexican drug cartels with a slight touch of humour. The technical quality from Taiwan for light, picture is given but the story is quite boring. Even if I have to say that some scenes are very good (for instance the taxi driver Xu convincing No Dow for the drive, the gangster dialogue on the plastic cover on the sofa, the extreme brutal scene), there is no link in between and with me as a viewer neither.
Rating: 3 /10

The city of betrayal (2016)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2016
	Director: Miura Daisuke
	Actors: Ikematsu Sosuke, Terajima Shinobu
	Country: J
	Genre: Drama
	Conditions of visioning: 22.04.2017, Teatro Nuovo, FEFF2017, Japanese with English subtitles
Synopsis: Yuichi (Ikematsu) lives with his girlfriend but does not work and goof around lazy. Tomoko (Shinobu) is a bored housewife. Yuichi and Tomoko meet through an online dating website. Although age difference and remorse they start a passionate affair.
Review: The movie is based on two persons dating on a platform with the goal of betrayal. Not a natural betrayal due to the arrival of somebody new in one's life but because of the boredom of the relationship. The two main characters live their betrayal with sometimes a guilty conscience. But the whole movie shows that one betrays with emotions or not and that all types of people betray. In that sense, it gives a very pessimistic view where everyone in town betrays his or her partner. Well, whether it is reality or not... The acting is correct and even quite authentic. The dilemma and confusion brought that their goal to betray is well expressed in some scenes, like when they meet in the street. But in general it is quite flat.
Rating: 4 /10

Mercury is mine (2016)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2016
	Director: Jason Paul Laxamana
	Actors: Pokwang, Bret Jackson
	Country: RP
	Genre: Comedy, Drama
	Conditions of visioning: 22.04.2017, Teatro Nuovo, FEFF2017, English/Tagalog version with English subtitles
Synopsis: Carmen (Pokwang), a middle-aged cook, is about to close down her eatery at the foot of Mt. Arayat when a white American teenage boy named Mercury (Jackson) approaches her and begs for work in exchange of nothing but shelter.
Review: What is impressive in the movie is not necessarily the relationship of Carmen with the young boy, that is something that might be also natural anywhere else in the world. It is the advantage of being blond and white in the Philippines, like a touristic attraction. And moreover the auto-discrimination done by the Philippinos because of that, defining the fact that being blond and white means we can get a better job than the others, independently from the own competences. This belief is something I experienced also in other countries in Latin America and Asia.  The motherly behaviour of Carmen is sequenced nicely, from practical things (e.g. wash his clothes, give a bed) to more familiar things (e.g. sharing experiences, protecting gestures, cooking together). I like the scenes when Carmen is cooking in her eatery and makes as if it was a TV show, talking to the camera SPOILER pig head! This is sooo funny. And I like in general the cooking scenes, whn we can really see the food, unlike in Western movies, and get appetite to it. And this makes also good visuals. So, Western directors! Don't hesitate in putting real food in your movies.  The acting is quite poor especially of Bret Jackson. Some dialogues are Tagalog but most of them are in English and maybe this makes the movie loosing authenticity.
Rating: 4 /10

Jailbreak (2017)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2017
	Director: Jimmy Henderson
	Actors: Jean-Paul Ly, Sisowath Siriwudd, Céline Tran, Dara Phang, Tharoth Sam, Dara Ou, Savin Philipp
	Country: K
	Genre: Action
	Conditions of visioning: 21.04.2017, Teatro Nuovo, FEFF2017, Khmer/French/English version with English subtitles
Synopsis: A police task force (Phang, Sam, Our) supported by the new trainer Inspector Ly (Ly) brings the leader of Butterfly gangster organisation named Playboy (Philipp) to jail. In exchange of reduced sentence, he intends to reveal the name of his boss. But Madame (Tran) plans to get rid of him and asks one prisoner Bolo (Siriwudd) to kill him in prison. When the task force delivers Playboy in his cell, the prison turns into a mutiny and all want to get out alive.
Review: The movie is the type of movie that do not get good critics. A full action movie with non-stop fights. I felt like in a video game. Introduction scene to present the team, the mission and then it blows up. As in a video game, the weapons are coming out from everywhere, like hidden below a bed. And the prisoners use everything they find as a weapon, wood laths from the bed including visible huge nails, machete, rifles, fusil. As in video games time to time there is a big boss to fight against. And most of the time it is up to Jean-Paul Ly to show us his martial art. As bad boss, there is a huge cannibale, a crazy black guy and Madame for a woman battle. Not in the mud, but still in jail. Also something that sounds all the time strange in the movie. The prison seems to be a labyrinth while it should just be a prison. But this element is again like in a video game. The few scenes that try to give some romantic do not work at all and are not coming often enough to become then funny. The acting is ok. The fights are really good and the closed environment give something like helplessness to the fighters. They cannot flee the fight! It is nice to listen the French accent of Jean-Paul Ly and Céline Tran. And actually it brings a lot in the movie as it opens doors to further interpretation and possibly sequels or re-use of these characters in other situations. And I am pretty sure that Céline Tran would inspire some friends of mine. For the first evening of the FEFF, I liked a lot the introduction music as it sets the atmosphere of action video games and adds motivation to watch manz other Asian movies.

Rating: 5 /10

Alien: Covenant (2017)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2017
	Director: Ridley Scott (Alien, Blade Runner)
	Actors: Michael Fassbender (Inglorious Basterds, Prometheus), Katherine Waterston, Billy Crudup
	Country: USA
	Genre: Horror, SF
	Conditions of visioning: 22.05.2017, Costanera CinePrime
Synopsis: The colonist ship Covenant suffers from an accident on his trip to a far-away planet. During reparations they receive a signal from a nearby planet that they decide to go and investigate.
Review: I can understand that hard-core fans of the Alien movies feel betrayed by this prequel Covenant as they did already by Prometheus which story took place ten years before. Indeed those two movies do not anymore depict the survival of a strong character (Ripley = Sigourney Weaver) facing one or a horde of Aliens. The key to appreciate them is to take some distance to the franchise, like I think Ridley Scott did in the past twenty years. To that respect the title and poster are largely misleading, contrarily to the previous movie. I was rather frustrated by Prometheus because of insipid characters (including the one played by Noomi Rapace absent from this one) and a too open ending (I have just down-graded the movie from 7 to 6/10), but I appreciated that it tried to tackle a topic much greater than a simple closed-quarters horror movie: the origin of the Aliens and our own. Thus I was very satisfied to finally see the continuation of that story arc after five years of patience. Here again the Aliens apparitions are anecdotic (what most probably disappointed the fans, you should definitely not expect a Horror movie) and Scott rather focuses on topics dear to him: faith (through the character of Oram), love, creation, survival, spiritual search... Most of those are carried by the two synthetic characters played by a brilliant Michael Fassbender. Androids have always been remarkable in the saga, remember Ian Holm playing the malfunctioning Ash in the first movie, and Lance Henriksen the cult Bishop in James Cameron's Aliens. But David and Walter and another kind, created by Mr Weyland himself, and the dialog they have together at the middle of the movie is its stronger scene for me, and Ridley Scott obviously enjoyed the challenge of shooting it and duplicating the one actor. One could reproach the movie some inconsistencies in its story, the reaction of its characters or the science but the saga has never been renowned for that, but rather for showing us less and letting us imagine more. I like how Scott does not over-explain things, a default often too present in recent movies. At the end of the projection I was not left excited or thrilled by the Alien attacks, but rather pensive about our place in the Universe and how Covenant deals with it.
Rating: 7 /10