For Agatha, Christmas triggers sadness. She yearns for freedom laced with imagination, when magical creatures were part of a game played with friends in the forest. The death of her parents after a 1978 Christmas Party still haunts Agatha. She sees similarities between her parents' unhappy marriage and her own. The Black Madonna statue from her childhood visits Agatha, escalating her anxiety and goading her towards change. The discovery of a mysterious portal offers Agatha the possibility of resolving her grief and saving her crumbling marriage.
Some people’s first introduction to Mira Nair might be as New York mayor Zohran Mamdani’s mom. But with her insightful direction of 1991’s Mississippi Masala, Nair shows how much she deserves to be known as an artist. Delivering a nuanced portrait of a romance between a Black man and an Indian woman living in the South, Nair explores the complications each character faces, giving both equal weight.
The Christmas Horror section of films is growing, and today we present a bold selection of new and old Christmas horror films to celebrate this macabre union.
This is a film that is going to leave some people bored, and some people thrilled.
The Invitation takes a creeping look at two simple premises: reuniting with forgotten friends and new-age spiritualism. Though one seems a bit scarier than the other, the film heightens social awkwardness to a macabre level that puts an uncomfortable look on when the social taboo of grief is put on public display.
If a movie about a strange and crazy day is commercially successful, why not recycle it and double the kookiness quotient? That seems to be the logic behind this followup to Freaky Friday.
The film seems like an extreme interpretation of the conspiracy theorists that exist in real life. And then, there’s the twist.
