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  • The Most Successful Marvel Movies Revealed — Every Movie Has a Lesson

    The Most Successful Marvel Movies Revealed — Every Movie Has a Lesson



    Following the release of Captain America: Brave New World, VegasInsider’s supercomputer has conducted an analysis to find out what have been the most and least successful movies from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, assigning points to all 35 of them based on various factors in different categories: worldwide gross, IMDb ratings, Letterboxd ratings, Metacritic score, Rotten Tomatoes score and an estimated return on investment. 

    According to the results of the analysis, two movies are tied as the #1 most successful from the Marvel Cinematic Universe: Avengers: Endgame & Spider-Man: No Way Home. 

    The supercomputer assigned 1 to 3 points based on a movie’s performance in various categories, with higher points indicating better performance: 

    • Metacritic Score: 70 to 79 – 1 point, 80 to 89 – 2 points, 90 to 100 – 3 points

    • Rotten Tomatoes Score: 70 to 79 – 1 point, 80 to 89 – 2 points, 90 to 100 – 3 points

    • IMDb Rating: 7-7.49 – 1 point, 7.5 – 7.99 – 2, points, 8+ = 3 points

    • WW Gross: 700 to 999.999 million – 1point, 1 – 1.5 billion = 2 points, 1.5 billion+ – 3 points

    • ROI: 300%+ – 1 point, 400%+ – 2 points , 500%+ – 3 points

    • Letterboxd Rating: 2.5-2.999 – 1 point, 3.0-3.499 – 2 points, 3.5+ – 3 points 

    Avengers: Endgame has a 78 Metacritic score, 94% score on Rotten Tomatoes, 8.4/10 rating on IMDb & 3.9/5 on Letterboxd. It grossed 2.799 billion dollars with an estimated ROI of 686% since it had a reported budget of 356 million dollars. In total, the supercomputer assigned Avengers: Endgame 16 points. 

    Spider-Man: No Way Home has a 71 Metacritic score, 93% score on Rotten Tomatoes, 8.2/10 rating on IMDb & 3.83/5 on Letterboxd. It grossed 1.952 billion dollars with an estimated ROI of 876% since it had a reported budget of 200 million dollars. In total, the supercomputer also assigned Spider-Man: No Way Home 16 points. 

    The rest of the top 10 most successful Marvel movies according to the supercomputer are (respectively): The Avengers, Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain America: Civil War, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Thor: Ragnarok & Spider Man: Far From Home. 

    When looking at the other end of the spectrum, 3 movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe received 0 points from the supercomputer, thus turning out to be the least successful: The Incredible Hulk, Thor: The Dark World & Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. 

    You can see the best-performing movies in the various categories that were part of the analysis highlighted below. 

    Feel free to use our data and please credit VegasInsider.com if you decide to do so. Thank you!

    WORLDWIDE GROSS 

    When it comes to the worldwide box office gross, the top 3 highest-grossing movies are:

    1. Avengers: Endgame (2019) – $2.799 billion WW gross

    2. Avengers: Infinity War (2018) – $2.052 billion WW gross

    3. Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) – $1.952 billion WW gross

    On the other hand, the 3 lowest-grossing movies are:

    1. The Marvels (2023) – $206 million WW gross

    2. The Incredible Hulk (2008) – $264 million WW gross

    3. Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) – $370 million WW gross

    In terms of worldwide box office gross, the highest-grossing movie is Avengers: Endgame (2019) with a WW gross of $2.799 billion , while the lowest-grossing movie is The Marvels (2023) with a WW gross of $206 million. 

    RETURN ON INVESTMENT

    The top 3 movies with the highest estimated return on investment are:

    1. Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) – 876.37%

    2. Avengers: Endgame (2019) – 686.36%

    3. Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) – 607.94%

    The 3 movies with the lowest estimated return on investment are:

    1. The Marvels (2023) – minus 6.3%

    2. The Incredible Hulk (2008) – 76.51%

    3. Black Widow (2021) – 89.88%

    At the top of the return on investment rankings is Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021), which had a budget of $200 million and went on to make an impressive $1.95 billion globally, resulting in an estimated ROI of 876.37%. Following closely behind at #2 is Avengers: Endgame (2019), which started with a massive $356 million budget and achieved a worldwide gross of $2.8 billion, leading to a 686.36% return. On the other end of the spectrum, The Marvels (2023) sits at the bottom with a negative estimated return on investment of -6.3%, as its $220 million budget resulted in a $206 million global box office gross. 

    USER RATING

    When looking at the highest-rated movies by users, on IMDb, the top 3 are:

    1. Avengers: Endgame (2019) – 8.4 IMDb rating

    2. Avengers: Infinity War (2018) – 8.4 IMDb rating

    3. Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) – 8.2 IMDb rating

    The 3 lowest-rated movies on IMDb are:

    1. The Marvels (2023) – 5.5 IMDb rating

    2. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) – 6.0 IMDb rating

    3. Captain America: Brave New World (2025) – 6.1 IMDb rating

    Meanwhile, on Letterboxd, the top 3 highest-rated movies are:

    1. Avengers: Infinity War (2018) – 3.98 Letterboxd rating

    2. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023) – 3.96 Letterboxd rating

    3. Avengers: Endgame (2019) – 3.9 Letterboxd rating

    The 3 lowest-rated movies on Letterboxd are:

    1. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) – 2.22 Letterboxd rating

    2. Thor: The Dark World (2013) – 2.24 Letterboxd rating

    3. Thor: Love and Thunder (2022) – 2.42 Letterboxd rating

    For user ratings, Avengers: Endgame (2019) and Avengers: Infinity War (2018) are the highest-rated on IMDb with a rating of 8.4, while The Marvels (2023) is the lowest-rated with an IMDb user rating of 5.5. On Letterboxd, the highest-rated movie is Avengers: Infinity War (2018) with a 3.98 score, whereas the lowest-rated is Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) with a 2.22 Letterboxd score.

    CRITIC REVIEWS

    When looking at the highest-rated movies by critics, on Rotten Tomatoes, the top 3 movies with the highest scores are:

    1. Black Panther (2018) – 96%

    2. Avengers: Endgame (2019) – 94%

    3. Iron Man (2008) – 94%

    The 3 lowest-rated movies on Rotten Tomatoes are:

    1. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) – 46%

    2. Eternals (2021) – 47%

    3. Captain America: Brave New World (2025) – 49%

    Meanwhile, on Metacritic, the top 3 highest-rated movies are:

    1. Black Panther (2018) – 88 Metacritic score

    2. Iron Man (2008) – 79 Metacritic score

    3. Avengers: Endgame (2019) – 78 Metacritic score

    The 3 lowest-rated movies on Metacritic are:

    1. Captain America: Brave New World (2025) – 42 Metacritic score 

    2. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) – 48 Metacritic score

    3. The Marvels (2023) – 50 Metacritic score

    Lastly, regarding critic reviews, Black Panther (2018) holds the highest Rotten Tomatoes score at 96%, while Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) has the lowest Rotten Tomatoes score at 46%. On Metacritic, Black Panther (2018) also leads with a score of 88, whereas Captain America: Brave New World (2025) ranks the lowest with a score of 42.

    METHODOLOGY

    • In total, 35 Marvel Cinematic Universe movies were part of the analysis, starting with Phase One’s Iron Man (2008)

    • The points were assigned in the following categories: Rotten Tomatoes score, IMDb rating, Letterboxd rating, Metacritic score, reported worldwide gross and an estimated ROI 

    • Sources of data: IMDb.com, Rottentomatoes.com, Metacritic.com, Letterboxd.com



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  • What Marielle knows by Frédéric Hambalek Mid at Best

    What Marielle knows by Frédéric Hambalek Mid at Best


    What Marielle Knows (Was Marielle weiß) is the sophomore feature by Frédéric Hambalek (interviewed here) and one of only two German films in the Berlinale competition. The other was Yunan. At the heart of What Marielle Knows is a seemingly ordinary suburban family thrown into chaos by an extraordinary twist. Julia (played by Julia Jentsch) and Tobias (Felix Kramer), a moderately content couple navigating the routines of professional life, discover that their 12-year-old daughter, Marielle (Laeni Geiseler), has inexplicably developed telepathic abilities following a playground altercation. Suddenly, Marielle can see and hear everything her parents do—whether at work, in the car, or behind closed bedroom doors. How will Marielle’s sudden abilities affect the family dynamics?

    Hambalek has explained that the initial inspiration for this film came a few years back when someone
    showed him a baby monitor with a built-in camera, which was a brand new thing back then. He felt something was wrong with it and asked himself what would happen if you reversed that power dynamic. What would parents do if they were somehow monitored by their kids? Another factor is how children regard their parents. Normally, they see their parents as demigods until they start growing up and gradually see their weaknesses. In this case, Marielle will get an instant crash course on all of this, breaking some of her illusions. The telepathy factor was merely a way to avoid technological distractions.

    What Marielle Knows
    Felix Kramer and Julia Jentsch in What Marielle Knows.

    What Marielle Knows about Nordic gender roles

    What Marielle Knows has been labelled a comedy, and there was plenty of laughter during the press screening. Something that surprised me and the sentiment was echoed by the director, who was surprised that the premiere audience laughed as much as they did. Substantial portions of the film follow the parents in their respective workplaces. Julia is flirting with her co-worker, Max, during illicit cigarette breaks, and their conversation is sexually charged. Meanwhile, Tobias, who works at a publishing house, sees his power (manhood?) challenged by his co-worker Sören, who does everything he can to provoke Tobias. Since the film is from 2025, the gender parts are quite obvious, not least from a Nordic perspective.

    While discussing the film after the press screening, several German colleagues stressed the German aspects of the film, not least concerning the topic of privacy. Germany is famously worried about being under surveillance and watched over. If I had a Euro for every time a person from Berlin lectured me about the perils of credit cards, I would be a very rich man. When I asked the director about this, he rejected the notion that the topics were particularly German and opined that the issue of privacy is more universal than that. The Funkloch issue aside, I agree since I felt that several characteristics of the film felt quite Nordic.

    Interview with Frédéric Hambalek
    What Marielle Knows

    The film’s locations are largely minimalistic, especially the workplaces, but also the family’s home. There are lots of open spaces, and when the space is closed, it is by a window rather than a wall. The director said that he wanted to get away from the clichés of observing through glass panes and rather stressed the intimate space created by close-ups. That is a welcome idea and shows that Hambalek is aware of the potential pitfalls of his concept. Still, my mind often wandered to recent Nordic films such as The Hypnosis and the films of Ruben Östlund.

    This might sound like a sad triangle, but Hambalek mentioned Turist (Force majeure) as a film he watched during the production, still stressing the formal differences between the films. I agree wholeheartedly with the director about those differences, but I still couldn’t shake a pronounced feeling of deja vu while watching What Marielle Knows. We don’t get to know much about the titular character since she is primarily a catalyst for the action. In several ways, the film is a treatise on the topic of the Observer effect. That will be particularly evident during the film’s latter part, in which some of the parents’ actions feel performative. It should be said that the acting in the film is uniformly excellent.

    Regarding the point of a child being able to see her parents’ true nature, I was reminded of the classic The Simpsons episode Wild Barts Can’t Be Broken, where the children of Springfield, inspired by a film that is a thinly veiled version of Village of the Damned (1960) realise that they don’t need special powers, but what they already know about their parents is enough to make them uncomfortable. Another connection between the two works is a late reveal that won’t be discussed here. Suffice it to say that What Marielle Knows didn’t bring me any new insights and that it is unfortunate that the titular character is the least explored since she is the most interesting character.



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  • Interview with Frédéric Hambalek – intriguing

    Interview with Frédéric Hambalek – intriguing


    Frédéric Hambalek’s sophomore feature, What Marielle Knows (Was Marielle weiß), reviewed here, was screened in this year’s Berlinale competition as one of two German films. I was able to interview the director a few days after the premiere.

    I’ve read that you don’t think about genres. When did you realize that this story was a comedy?

    Frédéric Hambalek: I’m still surprised how much people think this is a comedy. I was extremely surprised at the premiere that people were laughing out loud. I knew that the idea had some funny aspects, and I also think that it had some awkward and dark, cringy, dramatic aspects to it. So yes, I probably think it leans a bit more comical, but I never thought this would be read as much as a comedy as they’re doing it right here in Berlinale.

    I’m interested in casting because I think the characters have such good chemistry on screen, which is very important, and they perhaps bring the comedy and the openness of it. Can you talk about that?

    FH: Casting is a bit miraculous; it has so much to do with who is available and who wants to do this. We arrived with Julia Jentsch, who plays the mother first, and I thought she would be very good in this role because she [typically] portrays very likeable characters, and this character is maybe not all that likeable. Then, I could look at people who would fit her, and Felix Kramer was interesting because he would typically play very physical characters. I don’t know if you’ve seen his film [Someday We’ll Tell Each Other Everything], but two years ago at Berlinale, he played this very sexual, male, hands-on guy.

    Marielle featured
    Laeni Geisele as the titular character in What Marielle Knows by Frédéric Hambalek.

    The DIsapproving Swede: After the screening, I talked to German critics who said this story is very German. I know that Germans are very wary of giving their data away and are worried about their privacy. Lots of things are analogue. Do you think that this is a typical German topic?

    FH. I don’t think so at all. I think it translates well to every Western society where we face issues of how open we want to be with our lives. Isn’t it in Norway where you have to show all your taxes, and everybody can see?

    TDS: It’s like that in Sweden as well. You can see anything. People check on each other before dates. I saw an ad from a company selling extra information with the headline, “Check your date before Valentine’s Day”.

    FH: That is incredibly interesting to me. I could not imagine that happening in Germany at all. It sounds a bit funny, though. I could imagine people sweating when they introduced themselves and thinking. Oh, now everybody knows I’m not that person in my presentation.

    The interview with Frédéric Hambalek goes Nordic

    TDS: So if the film felt very German to those German friends I talked to, it felt pretty Nordic to me—for instance, the environment with those minimalistic interiors. I’m wondering if you can talk about the contrast between the home and the office. As far as I’ve read, the publishing office was the only set in the film.

    FH: it was an actual office space, but we transformed it a lot. We were going for very modern places because they are open. You can see everything, they have glass walls and so on. Still, I didn’t want to push too hard on this metaphor. For example, we don’t observe through the glass in the office building, as you would do in a surveillance video. I would always say, “Let’s come up with the camera close and frame them with the camera. Use long lenses, go into a very intimate space and single them out under a very intimidatingly close lens to give the feeling of somebody observing them all the time”.

    TDS: Which camera did you use?

    We used the Alexa 35. And the more we shot, the more we used longer and longer lenses. In the end, it was like 70 or 100-millimeter lenses.

    What Marielle Knows
    Julia Jentsch and Felix Kramer in What Marielle Knows by Frédéric Hambalek.

    TDS: Thinking about the music, why the Razumovsky Quartets? Obviously, they are great pieces of music, but was there a specific reason for that choice?

    FH: I went about it very intuitively. I knew that the music should be there to give you some sense of something that is not completely real, a bit out of this world. I quickly found the first Beethoven piece, which was used in the scene with the slap in slow-mo. It was intuitive that I thought this was the right tone. It has something ironic to me, but also serious.

    TDS: So, the question that every director dreads: Do you have any influences from other directors? Maybe something that takes place in this kind of modern environment.

    The film that made me want to be a director was 2001: A Space Odyssey, which I saw on TV when I was 13. didn’t get it, of course, and I turned it off after an hour because I was so bored. But I could not stop thinking about it. All these Kubrick films really taught me early on that the art form is very free.

    TDS: Nothing specific for this film?

    When pressed on that question, I always thought about Force Majeure by Ruben Östlund just because of how they are acting. You will write this now, but I say it anyway. And I thought, “Look at this film”. I still thought that my film would get away from it in a way. I looked at that film as a way of checking out someone who does something you might think is in the right vein. At the same time, I knew that my film would be formally different.



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  • Almost 30% of Americans are Tabletop Gamers — Every Movie Has a Lesson

    Almost 30% of Americans are Tabletop Gamers — Every Movie Has a Lesson



    Tabletop gaming is a hobby with a passionate fandom that has seen growing mainstream popularity in recent years, and it is quite popular in America.

    A new nationally representative survey from Compare the Market AU talked to more than 1,000 American adults, and 29.3% said they play or collect tabletop roleplaying games (RPGs) or wargames – or have done so in the past.

    This is slightly behind Canada where it was 31.9%, but much higher than in Australia where only 15.7% of respondents identified as a tabletop gamer.

    The hobby is more popular with the young than the old, with 60.0% of Gen Z (18–24-year-olds) being tabletop gamers. This dropped to 47.2% for millennials (25-44 years), then 22.9% of Gen X (45-64-year-olds).

    Men were twice as likely to be (or used to be) a tabletop gamer, with 40.1% of men having been a part of the hobby in some way, compared to 18.9% of women.

    According to the survey, the top 10 tabletop games for Americans were (including tied placements):

    • Dungeons & Dragons

    • Kings of War/ Star Wars X-Wing

    • Fallout: Wasteland Warfare

    • BattleTech

    • Star Wars Edge of the Empire/ Star Wars Shatterpoint

    • Cyberpunk

    • Legions Imperialis/ Marvel Crisis Protocol

    • Black Powder

    • Star Wars Legion

    • Call of Cthulhu/ Infinity/ Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game/ Saga

    The hit game Warhammer 40,000 just missed out on the top 10, being the 11th most popular game with survey respondents.

    Tabletop gaming can be an expensive hobby, and most American gamers have spent hundreds of dollars on the hobby. Over a quarter had spent $100-$199, followed by 23.2% who spent $200-$499, while 9.8% had spent $500-$999, and 8.8% of American tabletop gamers had spent more than $1,000.



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  • Interview with Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani

    Interview with Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani


    Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani presented their fourth film. Reflection in a Dead Diamond in this year’s Berlinale competition. Since it was the most exhilarating film at the festival, I was thrilled to be able to sit down with the couple to discuss this multifaceted work (pun intended).

    The Disapproving Swede: So, the project more or less started with Fabio Testi. Could you talk a bit about that?

    Bruno Forzani: It’s a long story because my mother was a big fan of Fabio Testi, and my sister would have had the name Fabio if she had been a boy. I discovered him through Italian B-movies, and I loved him. He was also in Zulawski’s L’Important, c’est d’aimer; in 2010, we watched Road to Nowhere by Monte Hellman, and Testi’s character reminded us of Sean Connery.

    Hélène Cattet: He was dressed in a white suit. It reminded us about Death in Venice, too. So we thought, “What if we mix those two antagonist universes to create something like a new universe?”

    BF: We also saw a staging of Tosca, the opera, by Christophe Honoré. He treated it like Sunset Boulevard, and that kind of treatment was an inspiration for our film. We wrote the script with Fabio Testi in mind. We managed to meet him and were fascinated by him because we saw his eyes just in front of us, which we had only seen in close-ups in movies. We began to talk about directing actors just through the eyes, and it was the first time we met an actor who was used to that.

    Then, we told him we would shoot on film, and he was surprised and agreed to do the movie. It was great because Fabio synthesized the mix we wanted to do between this Euro spy genre and Death in Venice. He was in Italian Westerns, but he was in other kinds of films as well, so it was a perfect match.

    Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani
    Bruno Forzani, Hélène Cattet and Fabio Testi.

    TDS: When he got the script, his first reaction was that he didn’t understand anything, right?

    BF: Yeah, exactly, but it was the same with Monte Hellman. He did not understand the script, but he trusted him, and when we met him, he trusted us, so voila!

    How do you synthesize all these ideas and different references to build a story, even if it is a story on your own terms? Your films are mostly vibes, so how do you make a story out of this? Is it organic?

    HC: It was really technical this time because we were building the story with different layers of narration. We put one colour for each line of narration, three altogether. Then, we could organize how those layers will interweave and respond to each other. You develop different thematics and different points of view because you can see the movie from different angles. Each spectator can find a way to experience the film so that two spectators can see a different movie. We aim to be playful and create a game for the audience.

    BF: When we write the script, we are writing it technically with detailed descriptions of every detail you will see and hear in the movie. It is not typical since we live in a French-speaking culture, and the cinema world is more literate than cinematic.

    HC: We really want to tell the story using cinematographic means, not through dialogue.

    TDS: You call it storytelling. Is the story the most crucial thing, rather than the cinematic expression, or don’t you see a contrast?

    HC: There’s no contrast between the form and the content. It’s one thing. The form tells the story, not the content.

    Reflection in a Dead Diamond
    Reflection in a Dead Diamond.

    Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani about Diamond structure

    TDS: When it comes to stylistics, I thought a bit about Raoul Ruiz. You mentioned playfulness, and he had a way of toying with clichés and adding narrative layers in a complex, sometimes crystal structure.

    BF: You are not the first to say that regarding the film’s construction.

    TDS: Gilles Deleuze described Alain Resnais and other directors as having a crystalline structure, but here, we even have a diamond structure where things go through reflections and refractions.

    HC: Exactly!

    BF: Since the beginning, the word diamond was in the title. It wasn’t the same title, but we constructed the film like a diamond because there are several facets.

    HC: Yes, that’s why you can see the movie like a diamond through different prisms.

    TDS: You talked about Op art earlier. You have different art styles in all your films. Can you talk a bit more about the use of op art in this film?

    BF: The film is about illusion because you don’t know if the past of the hero is an illusion or if it’s reality. The past is represented by this horror-spy aesthetic, where you think the world was funny and very pop-like, but the heroes were violent, in fact. It is a fake representation of the world. Since the film is about illusion, the structure is an illusion, too, because of the different layers. Op art was the perfect art to approach the story visually. In fact, when we began to work on the script, we went to Nice. There was a big Op art exhibition there, which inspired us.

    TDS: You mentioned Clozuot’s La Prisionnière. Were there other films using Op art that inspired you as well?

    BF: The funny thing is that the Italian B-movies we mentioned are exploitation movies but use a lot of art and Op art. There is also Mario Caiano’s L’Occhio nel labirinto. James Bond films are another example, like The Man with the Golden Gun, where you have a kind of labyrinth, which is very Op art. It’s a very funny art form since it’s mixed with something very popular.

    TDS: A last, tangential musical question: You use a piece from Catalani’s La Wally [Ebben? Ne andrò lontana], made famous by the film Diva. Isn’t it the exact same recording as in Diva?

    BF: Yes, exactly. In this version, there is an introduction that you don’t have in the original, and I love this introduction. I discovered opera with Diva, and I love that piece.

    YouTube video



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  • Caught by the Tides review – moving, stirring, brilliant

    Caught by the Tides review – moving, stirring, brilliant




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  • Hot Milk by Rebecca Lenkiewicz

    Hot Milk by Rebecca Lenkiewicz


    Rebecca Lenkiewicz, the director of Hot Milk, is a British playwright. She wrote Her Naked Skin in 2008, the first original play by a female writer to be produced at the Olivier Theatre at London’s Royal National Theatre. Later, she co-wrote the script for the Oscar-winning film Ida. The original script was written in English and subsequently translated by the director, Pawel Pawlikowski, into Polish. The Berlinale competition became the arena for her first feature as a director. Hot Milk is adapted from Deborah Levy’s acclaimed 2016 eponymous novel. Set against the sun-scorched backdrop of Almería, Spain, the story follows Rose (Fiona Shaw) and her daughter Sofia (Emma Mackey), who has spent her life tethered to her mother.

    The reason is that Rose is confined to a wheelchair due to a mysterious illness. The pair travel to the seaside town to consult Dr. Gomez (Vincent Perez), a shamanic physician who may hold the key to Rose’s recovery. Sofia meets the enigmatic, free-spirited traveller Ingrid (Vicky Krieps) and finds herself drawn to her. a spark that promises more than it delivers. Meanwhile, there is an apparent tension between mother and daughter that will escalate during the film, though it’s more exhausting than compelling.

    The description might sound inept or even as an attempt to take the film down, but this is basically what goes on here. Anyone sensitive to hackneyed clichés should be wary of this work since it might provoke a severe allergic reaction. This is especially true regarding the characters, who stumble through predictable arcs with little depth.

    Hot Milk
    Vicky Krieps and Emma Mackey in Hot Milk.

    Hot Milk is a Hot Mess

    Hot Milk was my first competition film, which was not a good start. The runtime is a mere 92 minutes, but the film feels way longer. The bickering between the mother and daughter quickly becomes tedious and never goes anywhere. Even though the story is set in Spain, it was actually shot in Greece. Not that it matters with the lacklustre cinematography with hardly a memorable image. The landscapes, which could have elevated the mood, are reduced to bland backdrops.

    When you start to wonder where things are going, Vicky Krieps literally rides into the film, bringing hope to Sofia and naive spectators that things will change for the better. The character’s name, Ingrid, reminded me of the other shipwreck she was in recently, Bergman Island. This is not more successful.

    Apparently, Hot Milk has been floating around for years before it found an unexpected home at this year’s Berlinale. I kept thinking about Maggie Gyllenhaal’s debut, The Lost Daughter. There are thematic similarities—mother-daughter strain, identity crises—and both films were shot in Greece. The latter was set there as well, and its setting was used with purpose. Whatever scepticism I have towards that overpraised film, it is superior in every respect to this muddled work.

    Hot Milk 2 - The Disapproving Swede
    Fiona Shaw and Emma Mackey in Hot Milk.

    Fiona Shaw attempts to breathe some life into her poorly written character, gamely wrestling with dialogue that clunks rather than sings, but the less said about the rest of the cast, the better. For instance, Vincent Perez’s Dr. Gomez feels like a caricature of mysticism. The film derails almost instantly, and a final shot that attempts to put the film back on track fails miserably. It doesn’t help that it emerges from nowhere.

    It is not easy to comprehend what flavours Mathilde Henrot and the other selection committee members detected in Hot Milk. There were some reviews that tried to be understanding, but the overwhelming majority of the audience saw this film for the hot mess that it is.

    YouTube video

    Hot Milk
    Hot Milk Featured - The Disapproving Swede

    Director:
    Rebecca Lenkiewicz

    Date Created:
    2025-04-12 22:40



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  • Director Alex Garland Talks About “Warfare” — Every Movie Has a Lesson

    Director Alex Garland Talks About “Warfare” — Every Movie Has a Lesson



    Alex Garland on the Making of Warfare 

    Alex Garland, Director 

    “Warfare is a true story that Ray Mendoza, my co-writer and co-director, had been carrying with him for a long time from the Iraq War. Everything in this film is according to first-person accounts from the people involved. I didn’t add or subtract anything in the story, nor did the studio or the cast; and honestly, that was such a liberating experience when making this movie. Warfare is about being honest about war, which I think is never a bad thing, especially right now with everything going on. I think this film is impactful, and I hope it will be a conversation starter—especially for anyone with veterans in their lives.” 

    About Warfare 

    Written and directed by Alex Garland and Ray Mendoza, Warfare is a raw and intimate look at the realities of the Iraq War, built entirely from the firsthand recollections of those who lived it. The film refuses to dramatize or sensationalize, opting instead for emotional truth and brutal honesty in its portrayal of modern warfare. It’s a timely and deeply human story that resonates in today’s global climate. 

    About Alex Garland 

    Alex Garland is one of the most acclaimed creative voices in modern cinema. He began his career as a novelist with The Beach (1996) before pivoting to screenwriting with iconic films like 28 Days Later and Sunshine. Garland made his directorial debut with the Oscar-nominated Ex Machina, and went on to direct Annihilation, Men, Civil War (2024), and now Warfare (2025). Known for blending cerebral storytelling with visual intensity, Garland continues to challenge and captivate audiences. 

    About JustWatch 

    JustWatch is the world’s largest streaming guide, serving over 60 million monthly users across 140 countries. It aggregates movies, TV series, and sports from hundreds of platforms—including Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, Disney+, Apple TV+, and Hulu—helping users easily find where to stream them legally.

    JustWatch is headquartered in Berlin, Germany, with offices in New York, Los Angeles, Paris, Munich, and London. It employs more than 200 people. 



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  • Living Stones by Jakob Ladányi Jancsó

    Living Stones by Jakob Ladányi Jancsó


    Living Stones (Elö kövek) is the latest short by Jakob Ladányi Jancsó. It had its world premiere during the 2025 Berlinale Shorts. Béla Tarr was the executive producer, and the director has participated in several of his workshops. The storyline concerns a troubled young woman, Natasa (Lilla Kizlinger), who undergoes therapy at an unorthodox rehabilitation centre in the countryside. She has extended sessions with therapist Georg (Árpád Schilling). One of the methods employed by the institution is horse therapy. Initially, she is reluctant to give away more than bits and pieces of her past and dreams to him, but the introduction to equine treatment seems to be a breakthrough that could make her trust Georg.

    Even though the film is set in a community with several cases, we are basically given a two-hander. We spend virtually the whole duration of the film with Georg and Natasa. Gradually, there are signs that the relationship between therapist and patient becomes fuzzy. Living Stones is the director’s graduation film from Free SZFE, which is a breakout from the state-run SFZE. For formal reasons, he graduated from the Vienna Film Academy. The details are discussed in my interview with Jakov Ladányi. Initially, he was a psychology student. A fact that is not surprising when watching the film. The brief runtime notwithstanding, the director manages to dig deep into the characters, especially Natasa.

    Elö Kövek Living Stones Lilla Kizlinger
    Lilla Kizlinger in Living Stones.

    The cinematic aspects of Living Stones

    The profound portrait of the character is due to the precise writing by the director, together with Anna Emília Szűcs. Zsófia Ruttkay, known from György Palfi’s films, was the dramaturg of the piece. However, the cinematic depiction is, at least, equally important. The cinematography by Ádám Fillenz primarily consists of long shots, which give the actors ample space but also create a tense and claustrophobic atmosphere. Something that is also aided by the use of colour and the score by Petra Szászi. Treading further into the film would risk getting into spoiler territory. Suffice it to say that Living Stones is a supreme achievement, which hopefully will be screened in festivals all over the world.

    YouTube video

    Living Stones by Jakob Ladányi Jancsó – Disapproving Swede strong
    Elo Kovek cast and crew e1744142092377 - The Disapproving Swede

    Director:
    Jakob Ladányi Jancsó

    Date Created:
    2025-04-12 04:01

    Pros

    • Great acting
    • Cinematography
    • Script

    Cons

    • It could have been longer.



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  • Can we make greening the film industry sexy?

    Can we make greening the film industry sexy?




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