Problemista
*Normally we don’t feature solo reviews on emails, but Jord started Problemista, his power went out, and he couldn’t muster the energy to finish it, so that tells you where his head’s at on this one.
As A24 fans, the trailers for Problemista had us intrigued early on this year, and since we missed its brief time in theaters, we were pumped to to finally be able to stream this. But after watching, we were less pumped. The biggest issue we had was that it was surprisingly boring. I had a hard time staying engaged for was not even a very long movie - 98 minutes. That said, Julio Torres is fun to watch, and as this was his directorial debut, there were many elements of his comedy and style and that give me great hope for his future. There’s a kind of Wes Anderson style story-telling to this movie but in very much Julio’s own voice that I did enjoy. For her part, Tilda Swinton brings a dynamic-ness to an otherwise one-note character that helped a bit, but her character was so intolerable that it made the boringness of the movie less interesting. Can’t recommend this one, but do keep an eye out for Julio Torres’ future work.
-Z
