Author

Sarah Cullen 35 posts 0 comments

Sarah Cullen is a PhD of American literature who hates all films and wants to tell you why. Her research examines representations of night time in nineteenth-century literature and she lectures in UCD. She's a regular contributor at Film Ireland and the Irish Gothic Journal. You can follow her @sfdcullen

Film

Artifical Intelligence Documentary The Brain is a Real Thinker | IFI French Film Festival

Sarah Cullen Nov 27, 2021 0

Jean-Stéphane Bron's documentary The Brain is screening as part of the IFI French Film Festival 2021. The Brain addresses the ever-nearing ethical dilemma: the fact that our advance A.I. will soon outstrip our understanding of the…

Film Review

Passing Gets An A+ | Netflix Film Review

Sarah Cullen Nov 24, 2021 0

It would, I argue, be simultaneously very dismissive and highly complimentary to describe Rebecca Hall’s Passing as a seamless translation of Nella Larsen’s novella from page to screen. That would ignore the ingenious choices made in terms…

Film

Is This Halloween? | Six Non-horror Features To Watch For the Spooky Season

Sarah Cullen Oct 29, 2021 0

Some of us don't like to be scared: there's no shame in it. Some of us are just extremely impressionable and even a film aimed at children is enough to scare us: and honestly? That's... kind of embarrassing. But no matter. Regardless of…

Film

IFI Horrorthon | We Need To Do Something Is a Fever Dream of Turmoil and Conflict

Sarah Cullen Oct 25, 2021 0

From the early reviews coming in, it looks like Sean King O’Grady’s small-budget psychological horror is already splitting audiences. That’s probably unsurprising: We Need To Do Something seems a lot less interested in following the…

Film

President Is a Bleakly Pragmatic Look At Election Fraud | IFI Documentary Review

Sarah Cullen Sep 21, 2021 0

Shot in cinéma-vérité from the get-go, director Camilla Nielsson's latest documentary signals straight away that something monumental is about to happen, regardless of the viewer’s awareness of the recent and continuing political situation…

Film Review

Italian Drama DarknessExplores The Apocalypse From A Different Angle | Dublin Feminist Film…

Sarah Cullen Aug 28, 2021 0

Emanuela Rossi’s directorial debut Darkness screened at this year’s Dublin Feminist Film Festival. Her feminist apocalyptic family drama is a nuanced exploration of control and freedom seen through the eyes of a teenaged girl, aspects…

Film

The Most Beautiful Boy In The World Reclaims Andrésen’s Voice | Documentary Review

Sarah Cullen Jul 30, 2021 0

Kristina Lindström and Kristian Petri’s documentary opens with footage of the titular beautiful boy Björn Andrésen's audition for Death in Venice, the 1971 film that catapulted him to fame. This footage alone – in which the probing camera…

Film

A Knight’s Tale At 20 | Perpetually Rocking Us

Sarah Cullen May 28, 2021 0

I guess this is the time where we decide if Brian Hegeland’s A Knight’s Tale still holds up after twenty years. Well surprise, chumps and chumpettes: it never stopped holding up. It is the quiet cousin of the…

Film

God Given Opportunity | A Hard-Hitting, Necessary Irish Short

Sarah Cullen Mar 29, 2021 0

A wandering man (Jamie McClean) finds refuge with a charismatic carpenter (Dmitry Vinokurov) when he stops to help him build his chapel – a “safe place for the little ones.” While initially unsure about the enterprise, the wandering man is…

Film Review

EAFFI 2021 | The Cloud In Her Room Explores The Ephemeral Nature Of The Tactile

Sarah Cullen Mar 23, 2021 0

In a moment of frustration, the protagonist of The Cloud In Her Room, 22-year-old Muzi (Jin Jing), takes out her frustration with her relationships by stamping on a stray plastic bottle she encounters on a Hangzhou street. This hints at the…

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