Movie reviews of Filipe Freitas

Pearl felt more confessional than disturbing, occasionally managing to give us the chills, like in a scene where Pearl chases her next prey with an axe in her hand. It’s a shame that the script doesn’t unpack more of these moments for the actress who co-wrote the script with West. Review

In her feature debut, Gaysorn Thavat knits the drama with serious and sobering observation, whereas the script by Sophie Henderson had some margin to improve. Review

Between the comic and the monstrous, the final scenes are the best. But, again, everyone seems too cool in the face of evil, a relatively frustrating glimpse of what the whole film could have been. Review

The stirring beauty of Graf’s drama comes from the genuine feelings transmitted by the leads, who, together with the editor Claudia Wolscht, contribute to the furiously cinematic outcome. Review

If you like your crime thrillers slightly smoked with fraught anxiety, then you should be able to commune with this film at a satisfactory level. Review

You will feel some suffocation among the tension and friction, and the result can be slightly disturbing in its forthrightness. Review

Overflowing with naturalistic dialogues, this touching and comical film also presents cheerfully colored images and an unremitting low pressure in the narrative that contributes to the tenderness of the outcome. Review

This fiction paints an eccentric and sensitive portrait of the family, and goes deeper than what it seems. But there’s a strong sense of deja-vu along the way, especially regarding the tone. Review

His originality here is the clarity in the filmmaking, even dealing with multiple layers and complex temporal shifts in the story. He meets his goal with an incredible eye for detail and the help of awesome leading actors. Review

Honk for Jesus has painful truths in it, but even eschewing the sort of cynical, tasteless jokes that a project of this nature would naturally attract, it would need some ingenious twists besides the obvious to succeed. What it lacks in vision, it narrowly makes up for with entertainment. Review

We are always a little off and the emotion suggested is totally fake as all the actors lack charisma. The banality of the dialogues and the unnatural hysteria is what really scared me, while its malfunctioning mechanics failed to cause anything other than a severe headache. Reduced to its miserable insignificance, Bodies Bodies Bodies is instantly forgotten. Review

Halfway through, the film spirals into a decrescendo of plot arcs that make it repetitive. Incapable of claiming an original identity, this is, nonetheless, a finely crafted picture where family values and the courage to revert an erroneous decision are present. Review

With something pertinent to say, Vengeance normally breathes pocket-sized suspense into a story that also benefits from a good sense of pacing and unusual characters. Attentive viewers will definitely extract something from this neo-noir experience. Review

Ineffectively blending different cultures to make a concoction of Japanese yakuza and manga styles, Mexican fury à-la Robert Rodriguez, an American stroke of nonsensical serendipity, and British Trainspotting-like tantrum, the film fails to drum up any kind of interest. Review

There’s absolutely nothing charming or pleasant in this bleak slow-burner, and what remains is both shocking and creepy-crawly enough to make us remember it. Review

By planning to cover too many topics, the director makes his mockery inevitably episodic, scattered, and sometimes too histrionic to fully captivate. It’s like if he had got lost in the smoke of his inspiration’s auteurism, incapable of propelling the story beyond the minimum basics. Review

Flawed as it is, with a minimal narrative and a charismatic heroine, Prey is a suitable entertainment for a Sunday afternoon, doing simpler but better than those previous spinoffs and turgid sequels such as Predator 2 (1990), Predators (2010), and The Predator (2018). Review

Portending great things for the director, Earwig is somber and quiet, a canvas exquisitely painted with the talents of cinematographer Jonathan Ricquebourg, and with something undeniably effective about its creepiest moments. Review

Peele expects us to react to disturbing energetic fields and intermittent power outages that never cause uneasiness. More audacity was expected from him. Do I recommend it? The answer is in the title. Review

A better script might have helped, but without it, this one shapes up as another manipulative nonsense that rarely dares to be smart. The characters don’t convince and the film ultimately frustrates by not knowing its own limitations. In the face of these predicaments, I’m actually upset about how little the movie even tried to escape inveterate clumsiness. Review

Despite glimpses of a hard-earned affection, Koreeda’s road movie is a soulless exercise that sinks the cast in a dry land of forced, melodramatic resolutions. Review

One can easily connect with the young women’s personal conflicts thanks to the sensitivity of the acting and a concern for realism in the direction. Even pedestrian in places and smeared with a jumble soundtrack, Girl Picture is an observant coming-of-age picture with real substance. Review

Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris is both funny and full-bodied, pleasurable and bouncing. It’s the type of cozy, uplifting film that can easily brighten someone’s day. Review

Anchoring his period drama with a killer cast, Giannoli expresses his desire to mix lyrical and satirical spark, but he draws the film out and comes nowhere near Balzac’s serial novel. A word of praise for Belgian cinematographer Christophe Beaucarne, whose refined taste for visuals is remarkable. Review