Ben Nicholson - The Film Verdict

Pepe

Posted by Ben Nicholson | Feb 20, 2024 | 2026 Oscars, Berlinale 2024, Festivals |

Nelson Carlos De Los Santos Arias’s fanciful exploration of the inner life of one of Pablo Escobar’s cocaine hippos, Pepe, is an idiosyncratic affair as piercing and beguiling as it is confounding.

Circle

Posted by Ben Nicholson | Feb 19, 2024 | Berlinale 2024, Festivals, Verdict Shorts |

A young girl draws a circle on the ground and people are drawn to stand within its borders in Joung Yumi’s typically mannered and strangely engrossing monochrome animation.

Meanwhile on Earth

Posted by Ben Nicholson | Feb 18, 2024 | Festivals, Berlinale 2024 |

Jeremy Clapin follows I Lost My Body with Meanwhile on Earth, another high-concept exploration of loss occupied by expressive ethical wrangling and intangible alien lifeforms.

Muna

Posted by Ben Nicholson | Feb 16, 2024 | Berlinale 2024, Festivals, Verdict Shorts |

A teenager navigates the social pressures of school and the expectations of family in Muna, a thoughtful coming-of-age drama about personal desires and dislocated grief.

Stero

Posted by Ben Nicholson | Feb 3, 2024 | Festivals, Rotterdam 2024, Verdict Shorts |

Language is an instrument of oppression and a tool to combat it in Tevin Kimathi and Millan Tarus’ charming tale of childhood resistance, Stero.

Author: Ben Nicholson

Pepe

Circle

Meanwhile on Earth

Muna

Stero