Pardon The Obvious Pun, But Lady Bird Absolutely Soars

I love it when an opening scene of a movie just perfectly encapsulates what kind of movie you're about to watch. You only get one shot at a first impression after all and when a feature film is able to come out of the gate swinging with a few minutes of footage that sums up the identity of what's to come so concisely, well, it's a real treat to experience. Lady Bird has this kind of opening sequence, one that depicts our lead character, Christine "Lady Bird" McPherson (Saoirse Ronan) and her mom Marion McPherson (Laurie Metcalf) driving home from a visit to a nearby college. We get a chance to see these two united in being captivated by an audiobook recording of John Steinbeck's classic novel The Grapes of Wrath but once that's done, it isn't long before friction emerges between the two of them.

Loving Vincent Paints An Intriguing Portrait of An Iconic Painter

 

Hand-drawn animations woefully low presence on the American film scene has seen a mild form of a reprieve this year thanks to The Red Turtle, Your Name. and now the Vincent Van Gogh tribute Loving Vincent, which is brought to life entirely by watercolor paintings that have been created by around 115 painters. Yep, the entire film is rendered through the distinctive art style that Van Gogh was famous for. Interestingly, Vincent Van Gogh is already dead when Loving Vincent gets its story started which takes place shortly after the iconic painters demise and has Van Gogh's mailman, Postman Roulin (Chris O'Dowd) entrusting his son Armand Roulin (Douglas Booth) to return the letter to Vincent's brother.

Brooklyn Review

Saoirse Ronan has been steadily climbing her way up the Hollywood ladder for ages now, her breakthrough role in Peter Jacksons only smaller scale 21st century directorial effort The Lovely Bones leading her to be a memorable presence in Joe Wrights excellent 2011 feature Hanna. Since then, she starred in the major though long forgotten box office and critical dud The Host and had a supporting turn in one of last years best motion pictures, The Grand Budapest Hotel. And now, she stars in the 2015 critical darling Brooklyn, and if her astounding lead turn here is any indication, we have not seen the last of her and thank God for that.