After years of dunking on festival president Lucrecia Martel and her jury of clown cinephiles for awarding Joker (2019) the highest honour of the Venice Film Festival, it was inevitable that I would finally attend the fascist Italian gala for a round of Joker-inspired hijinks. Inevitably, with the sequel selected in the official competition at the festival, I had to commit to my five-year-long bit of becoming the JokerTM.

Thus, through a very helpful source, I managed to acquire some…

Sometime in mid-February, nearly an entire year ago, I found myself wearing a blazer, a cartoonish tie and black dress pants; ready to attend a film premiere. The streets of Berlin were radiant with red hues; the illustrious carpet welcoming its stars through the dark winter night. I took my seat, where I prepared myself for another competition entry at the Berlinale. Already familiarised with the filmmaker's oeuvre, I was greatly looking forward to Johnson's third feature in his promising…

I've always been more of a fan of Ozon's Be Gay, Do Crime entries in his filmography over his more traditional hetero-normative dramas. Criminal Lovers unabashedly continues the iconoclast's ruminations on sexuality and coming of age with a macabre spin. Whereas its examination of Queer identity is simultaneously surprising and fresh, the motives which turn the lives of the titular protagonists upside down unfortunately fall short. There's a brief attempt to rationalise the character's criminality during a minute-long dream sequence…