Film Reviews by Richard Phillips
Petition: The Court of the Complainants—a potent Chinese documentary about injustice and state repression
By Richard Phillips, January 25, 2012
Petition explores the plight of poverty-stricken workers and farmers involved in stubborn and ultimately tragic appeals for “justice” from China’s Stalinist bureaucracy.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 6: Douglas Sirk’s elegant imitations of life
By Richard Phillips, August 4, 2011
Sirk’s best work reveals an exceptional artist and one whose visually-rich and socially-incisive observations still have a timeless quality.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 5: A classic novel intelligently reworked, a light comedy and some less impressive efforts
By Richard Phillips, August 1, 2011
A new version of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre and three other features looking for a niche somewhere between commercial and independent cinema.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 4: A conversation with Shelly Kraicer about Chinese independent cinema
By Richard Phillips, July 30, 2011
Beijing resident and film festival programmer Shelly Kraicer discusses developments in the Chinese independent cinema.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 3: Global warming, village life, and other documentaries
By Richard Phillips, July 28, 2011
A diverse range of subjects were examined in the more than thirty documentaries screened at this year’s festival.
Sydney Film Festival: Filmmaker Ivan Sen speaks to WSWS
By Richard Phillips, July 26, 2011
Writer/director Ivan Sen spoke with the World Socialist Web Site about Toomelah, his latest feature, during the Sydney film festival.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 2: An eclectic selection with a few valuable moments
By Richard Phillips, July 26, 2011
Festival competition movies varied widely in their range of cinematic styles and artistic sensitivity.
“A screenwriter writes with his eyes”
Suso Cecchi d’Amico (1914–2010): a seminal figure in Italian cinema
By Richard Phillips, September 27, 2010
D’Amico wrote over 110 scripts during her extraordinary six-decade career, including several that became genuine movie masterpieces.
Welcome from France: A compassionate exposure of anti-immigrant measures
By Richard Phillips, April 17, 2010
Welcome, the ironically titled latest feature by French director Philippe Lioret, is an intelligent antidote to the ongoing drum-beat of government and media dehumanisation of undocumented immigrants in France and internationally.
An interview with Philippe Lioret, director of Welcome
By Richard Phillips, April 17, 2010
French filmmaker Philippe Lioret speaks about his latest movie, which explores the human impact of increasingly repressive French immigration laws on undocumented refugees and French citizens.
Balibo: A war crime exposed
By Richard Phillips, August 17, 2009
Balibo tells how five young reporters working for Australian television were murdered in East Timor by the Indonesian military in the lead-up to the invasion of the tiny country in 1975.
Sydney Film Festival 2009—Part 5
Several movies well worth revisiting
By Richard Phillips, July 17, 2009
This is the last in a series of articles on the 56th Sydney Film Festival. Parts 1, 2, 3 and 4 were posted on July 9, 10, 13 and 14 respectively.
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