Last January, in the before times when film festivals were still held in person, I beheld one of the most unique and powerful films I’d ever seen. Cedric Cheung-Lau’s “The Mountains Are a Dream That Calls to Me” was unlike anything I had ever seen before—or since. Filmed in Nepal, it told the profoundly simple story of a Nepalese man named Tukten (Sanjay Lama Dong) who says he is walking to a new job in the Middle East. Along his trek he meets

As we wipe our collective brow after the four-year fever that was the Trump administration, the temptation remains to call him the worst president in our history. For whatever reason, long-term amnesia has set in for the sins of previous presidencies. Lest we never forget, the new film “The Mauritanian” is here to remind us of Bush-era transgressions.

“The Mauritanian” is directed

It’s still hard to wrap my mind around the notion that a year ago I was walking the streets of Park City, interviewing filmmakers and catching the latest releases. This year, the festival, like nearly all others, has gone hybrid, with a very few in-person events as audiences and critics have enjoyed the offerings from their covid-safe couches.

Here are just a few Sundance ‘21

Bring tissues. For if you need a good ugly-cry in a still-young year that has already been filled with so much grief, “Supernova” is your movie. Which isn’t to say that this incredibly heartfelt and sad film isn’t good—far from it.

This new film from writer-director Harry Macqueen stars Colin Firth and Stanley Tucci as Sam and Tusker, longtime romantic partners in late middle age on a road trip through

The Apple TV+ series “Losing Alice” fashions an atmosphere of dread in its first moments and never lets up. Over eight episodes this Israeli import, which debuts stateside on Friday, is more about engendering a feeling within the viewer rather than setting up a who-did-what-when thriller procedural.

Not that the staples of the mystery genre aren’t present. But unlike lesser shows

Producer Regina K. Scully should have known better than to ask her Italian-American mother, Nancy, to try gluten-free pasta. Nancy glared at her daughter, responding, “What would Sophia Loren do?”

That simple retort sparked an idea for Scully, a longtime producer of hard-hitting documentaries that include “Athlete A,” “The Hunting Ground” and “The Invisible

It definitely helps to give your protagonist a certain “set of skills,” particularly if he is played by that grand master of icy revenge, Liam Neeson. Neeson, impossibly craggy yet as ruggedly handsome as ever, stars in the new film “The Marksman” as Jim, a widowered Arizona rancher with a history in the armed forces and a rather keen eye with a rifle scope—hence the title. Jim’s ranch abuts the Mexican border, and during one of his daily rounds he comes upon injured migrant Rosa