#VicksFlicks Terse Twitter Reviews: 5th Annual Chattanooga Film Festival

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A PRAYER BEFORE DAWN

3.5 out of 5 stars

Joe Cole is ferocious as a heroine-addicted boxer surviving inside a ruthless Thai prison. Director Sauvaire creates a viciously vivid portrayal of fighting for each breath while locked up with riveting results. Maybe made for a one-time viewing only, what we witness and endure feels authentic, every strike to the body being physically painful to watch.

THE BIG BAD FOX AND OTHER TALES…

2.5 out of 5 stars

Small kids will laugh in this family friendly animation consisting of three stories that are all whimsy, silly tellings of animals on a farm. But what keeps it from being any kind of memorable is its choice of throw away jokes and being klutzy over trying to be even mildly meaningful.

GEMINI

2.5 out of 5 stars

A Hollywood murder mystery where the actress is found dead and her assistant becomes the prime suspect. It starts out as a wonderful whodunit with a naturally gifted performance from Lola Kirke steering us from one possibility to another. However, the reveal and what follows is unspectacular with the payoff falling on the slight side of things.

 

LIFE AFTER FLASH

3 out of 5 stars

A routine but gratifying doc about Jones and what Flash Gordon did for him and how they’ll both be remembered. It has a little bit of the 1980 cult classic’s spirit, and the diehard fans can get swept up in it all over again.

RBG

4 out of 5 stars

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is a legal legend with an incredible intellect to slowly lay down the foundation to put sexual discrimination on the map and in the minds of those in the highest of power. Directors Betsy West and Julie Cohen have put together an eloquent documentary that gets insightful and personal, and you can’t help but relish in the time you get to spend with the Notorious one. It’s a dashing discovery of her perseverance, her gift of getting people to listen, and her power that should never be underestimated.

MADELINE’S MADELINE

2.5 out of 5 stars

Helena Howard is stunning in this maddening metaphor of a movie where art is imitating life. Or, is it life imitating art? Director Josephine Decker makes this expressionist art boundless, yet bonkers with each new scene. The mental illness just adds to it, making this dream a wilder, more difficult viewing experience. It’s gutsy, but too much to handle with the daring of the audience to follow a world inside a girl’s unsound mind.

GHOST STORIES

3.5 out of 5 stars

A spooky, spine-tingling anthology that twists your thoughts in a splendidly skillful manner. Its sly humor helps ease the tension, but only momentarily as the malevolent dangers take charge in every case. Directors Dyson and Nyman display horror through a new, innovative lens, while remaining disoriented and disturbing, gives us a new feel on being creeped out.

SUMMER OF ‘8

4 out of 5 stars

A group of teenage friends playing detective in search of a serial killer that could be living next door sounds like an adventure, but what’s underneath is what excites the most. Directors RKSS gave us a top-notch throwback. In it, suspense is brilliantly built upon suspicion. The childlike perspective doesn’t stop this from going to darker places. Its perturbing mood and tone is meant to make you uncomfortable. Its finesse, unpredictability, and attitude is intoxicating, a stirring stand out with a killer vibe.

TIGERS ARE NOT AFRAID

3 out of 5 stars

In the same darkly shadows as Pan’s Labyrinth, this ghost story is touching & terrifying on equal measures. The fantastical slips in and out of the treacherous reality for a street gang of kids left to fend for themselves. Haunting, hallucinatory, and violent, director Issa López shows how strong the struggle is for a society in hopes of striking down its devilish ways. It’s cogent, but comes across as a copycat of a more enchanting, well-executed tale that existed before it.

ROCK STEADY ROW

3.5 out of 5 stars

Director Trevor Stevens makes a modish mash-up of a spaghetti western and a college comedy inside a bizarro world where two fraternities are at war over stolen bicycles at a crumbling campus. Starting with a surreal spark, Stevens intends to burn the narrative down in jim-dandy fashion, and you’ll have to pedal like hell to not get caught up in it. Holding on to its sense of swagger and rebel yell that’s underneath the unreal allows the fun to never fade.

REVENGE

3 out of 5 stars

A stylish, rough revenge thriller where a woman fucks up a man’s uncivilized world. Lutz does a jaw-dropping transformation from just a pretty face to a badass survivor right before your eyes. The over-the-top violence makes this a disgusting bloodbath that this intense actioner enjoys playing in.

(Editor’s Note: For Nature Boy’s full account of the Chattanooga Film Festival, click here)

“Nature Boy” Brandon Vick is the resident film critic of the SoBros Network, and star of Brandon’s Box Office In Your Mouth. Follow him on Twitter@SirBrandonV and be sure to search #VicksFlicks for all of his latest movie reviews.

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