Tag: PÖFF

Our dirty questions
to Nikolaj Nikitin

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 12 November 2025
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to Nikolaj Nikitin
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The man at the helm of the highly successful Critics’ Picks strand at the Tallinn Black Nights shares his secrets with Jeremy Clarke, who covered every edition of the new section since its inception in 2022

Article originally published on DMovies.org

Nikolaj Nikitin (more widely and affectionately known as “Niki”) started the Critics’ Picks competitive section of the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival just three years ago, in 2022, making this year the fourth edition of the strand. Every year 10 to 12 films vie for multiple prizes; Best Film, Best Director and Special Jury Mention. These movies have been amongst the strongest that we encountered in our many years profound wide coverage of the event

Your interviewer Jeremy Clarke is a member of the prestigious London Critics’ Circle and DMovies writer since our establishment 2016. He stepped in immediately in 2022 in order to cover the section. He has reviewed every single film in every edition (you can read Jeremy’s full coverage of last year by clicking here). This year he is being exceptionally replaced by Victoria Luxford (also a member of the London Critics’s Circle), however he remains close to our heart and ready for a return next year.… Read the rest

Tags 29th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, 29th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival: Critics' Picks Competition, Critics' Picks Competition, Nikolaj Nikitin, PÖFF, PÖFF 2025, PÖFF 2025: Critics' Picks Competition, PÖFF 29, PÖFF 29: Critics' Picks Competition, PÖFF: Critics' Picks Competition, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2025, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2025: Critics' Picks Competition, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival: Critics' Picks Competition

Features Live Action Movies

The Bone Breakers
(Spaccaossa)

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 15 November 2025
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(Spaccaossa)

Director – Vincenzo Pirrotta – 2022 – Italy – 105m

***1/2

A gang of criminals in Palermo runs an insurance fraud operation involving the breaking of people’s bones – Italian film inspired by real facts premieres at the 26th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival

The scene you’re most likely to remember comes right at the start of The Bone Breakers. Inside a warehouse, bodybuilding weights are packed into a suitcase which, once sealed, is carried up some scaffolding. Below, men hold another man’s arm so that it rests on two blocks, one at each end, then the man on the scaffolding drops the case from the scaffolding onto the man below’s rested arm, painfully breaking it. You’re immediately wondering what’s going on, possibly assuming the men are gangsters and the man whose arm has been broken has upset or crossed them in some way.

However, the man is compliant and even though his fractured arm clearly causes him considerable pain afterwards, he goes along with and and doesn’t appear to bear the men who have done this any ill will. They get him to the hospital where his arm is put in a sling, then take him to another building in which he’ll live in the short term, presumably to recuperate.… Read the rest

Tags 26th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, 26th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival: Critics' Picks Competition, arm, Aurore Quattrocchi, bend the rules, bodybuilding weights, broken arm, broken limb, capitalism, capitalist, Catholic, Catholicism, Critics' Picks Competition, drug addict, fracture, insurance money, insurance scam, Italy, limb, mothers and sons, pain, Palermo, PÖFF, PÖFF 2022, PÖFF 2022: Critics' Picks Competition, PÖFF 26, PÖFF 26: Critics' Picks Competition, PÖFF: Critics' Picks Competition, recuperate, ruthless, scaffolding, Selena Caramazza, Sicily, suitcase, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2022, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2022: Critics' Picks Competition, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival: Critics' Picks Competition, try it on, Vincenzo Pirrotta, warehouse

Animation Features Live Action Movies

Diplo,
The Mighty Dinosaur
(Smok Diplodok,
original title:
Diplodocus)

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 23 June 2024
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The Mighty Dinosaur
(Smok Diplodok,
original title:
Diplodocus)
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Director – Wojtek Wawszczyk – 2024 – Poland, Czechia – 84m

****

A young diplodocus must save the comic book in which he lives from being erased by the artist who created it – out in UK cinemas on Friday, September 19th

Animation. A bookworm (English voice: Wayne Greyson; Polish voice: Tadeusz Baranowski) appears, a “respected devourer of picture stories”. His function is not exactly that of a Greek chorus, more like a comic interlude who occasionally wanders into the narrative as light relief, to leaven the whole. Not that this likeable romp, is any need of leavening, but it’s a nice touch which nicely sets the tone for the whole piece. It’s about characters in a comic book whose very existence is threatened by the originating artist’s run-in with his commercially driven but artistically clueless lady publisher.

Beyond a vast, bubbling, primeval swamp in a crater, an inventive and adventurous, male diplodocus child (English voice: Julian Wanderer; Polish voice: Mikołaj Wachowski), Diplodocus as the credits calls him, nicks snails off a frog to use as climbing suckers. A butterfly flies past. Diplodocus gets sent to his room by his essentially conservative parents (English voices: Alyson Leigh Rosenfeld, Marc Thompson; Polish voices: Monica Pikuła, Grzegorz Pawlak) for wanting a life of adventure.… Read the rest

Tags 28th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, 3D animation, adventure, Agnieska Matysiak, Alyson Leigh Rosenfeld, animation, Annecy, Annecy 2024, Arcadiusz Jakubik, artist, artwork, audition, beatbox, Bill Timoney, bookworm, Borys Szyc, CG, CG animation, comedy, comic book, crater, creativity, cute, cute character, deadline, desert wasteland, desk, diplodocus, donkey, drawing, drawing board, erase, eraser, existence, gags, Grzegorz Pawlak, Julian Wanderer, magic, Małgorzata Kożuchowskahumour, Marc Thompson, Mariusz Szczygiel, marketable, Mike Pollock, Mikołaj Wachowski, Monica Pikuła, mouse, multiverse, onions, parents and children, philosopher, Piotr Polak, plagiarise, PÖFF, PÖFF 2024, PÖFF 28, Poland, prehistory, primeval, publisher, Rachel Butera, science, spaceship, spells, sphinx, sun, swamp, Tadeusz Baranowsk, Tadeusz Baranowski, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2024, travel, Wayne Greyson, whiteness, wizard, Wojtek Wawszczyk, X; Strasburger Zona

Features Live Action Movies

I, the Song
(Dzongkha,
མོ་གི་གསང་བའི་ཞབས་ཁྲ)

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 24 November 2024
No Comments on I, the Song
(Dzongkha,
མོ་གི་གསང་བའི་ཞབས་ཁྲ)
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Director – Dechen Roder – 2024 – Bhutan, Norway, Italy, France – 112m

*****

A woman fired from her teacher’s job for appearing in an online sex video she claims is of someone else sets out to find her doppelgänger and clear her name – winner of Best Director in the Critics’ Picks Competition of the 28th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival; plays Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle at 7.30 pm, Tuesday, July 15th 2025 as part of GemArts Masala Festival

This starts off deceptively with singing children’s voices, cutting into accompanying images of a school play with the children costumed as various types of flowers. The camera moves slowly to the back of the school hall where watching teacher Nima (Tandin Bidha) is told she is urgently needed in the office of the principal (Kezang Dorjee aka Kazee), where she finds herself being fired because of the video, now widely seen online, in which she appears. She protests that the person in the video isn’t her, but the principal says he can’t have her seen on school premises with so many parents about today.

She phones her boyfriend Penjor (Dorji Wangdi), who is in the middle of a gig hosting traditional Bhutanese folk plays.… Read the rest

Tags 28th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, 28th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival: Critics' Picks Competition, acoustic guitar, Bhutan, Bhutanese folk plays, boss, boyfriend, Bumpa Wangdi, Choney Zangmo, clear your name, colour palette, conservative, court, courtroom, Critics' Picks Competition, cup of tea, Dechen Roder, die in peace, doppelgänger, Dorji Wangdi, drive, drunk, dual identity, DVD, employment, ex-boyfriend, fired, food preparation, France, Gelephu, good girl, grandmother, grandson, I the Song, Italy, Jimmie Wangyel, job, Karma Tenzin, Kazee, Kezang Dorjee, kitchen, liberated, long hair, Meta, mole, money, musician, nemo, Norway, online sex video, phone, PÖFF, PÖFF 2024, PÖFF 2024: Critics' Picks Competition, PÖFF 28, PÖFF 28: Critics' Picks Competition, PÖFF: Critics' Picks Competition, private trap, red dress, school play, sexually active, short bob, sight impairment, singing, singing children, Sonam Lhamo, stage, stairwell, sunlight, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2024, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2024: Critics' Picks Competition, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival: Critics' Picks Competition, Tandin Bidha, Tandin Bidha school principal, teacher, Tshering Dorji, upstairs flat, video, video dealer, village, WeChat, workplace

Animation Features Movies

Flow
(Straume)
(2024)

Director – Gints Zilbalodis – 2024 – Belgium, France, Latvia – Cert. U – 84m

*****

A cat must survive rising water levels as they engulf both the countryside and cities – remarkable, dialogue-free, computer animated feature is out now on 4K UHD, Blu-ray and DVD

Like his earlier Away (2019), Zilbalodis’ new CG animated movie features characters who don’t speak. The central character is a cat, and you’d be forgiven, after years of animated films about cats in which they talk, for expecting the same here, but Zilbalodis isn’t interested in anthropomorphised talking animals. He’s clearly interested in animals, and in characters, but the cat here has been derived from watching and studying cats in real life and their behaviour in the real world. There’s a long history of this in drawn animation, typified by the classic Disney films, where it was all about what you could achieve with a paper and pencil, studying from life, making drawings of characters move.

These days, the medium has moved on, and unless one is being purist and working with pencil and paper for the sake of making drawn animation the way it was made roughly a century ago (and there’s nothing whatsoever wrong with doing that), you would use computers as Zilbalodis does.… Read the rest

Animation Features Live Action Movies

Mars Express
(Mars Express)

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 9 November 2023
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(Mars Express)
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Director – Jérémie Périn – 2023 – France – Cert. 15 – 85m

*****

In the 23rd Century, a private investigator and her resurrected robot assistant go to Mars to investigate the murder of a cybernetics student – out in UK cinemas on Friday, June 13th from the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival

The difference between humans and machines is one of the great themes of science fiction from Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, 1982) to Ghost in the Shell (Mamoru Oshii, 1995). Mars Express takes its name from an Earth-Mars shuttle which, following a bravura action / chase sequence early on, not unlike the one at the start of Ghost in the Shell, is used by private investigator Aline Ruby (voice: Léa Drucker from Custody, Xavier Legrand, 2017) and her assistant Carlos Rivera (voice: Daniel Njo Lobé) to transport a captured suspect from Earth to Mars where, it transpires on arrival, the relevant paperwork to detain their prisoner has been wiped from their on-person devices and internet-accessible office, meaning they are forced to release their prisoner. The narrative is littered with cleverly thought out ideas like this.

The setting is the 23rd Century and mostly Mars, where the pair are hired to search for a second year cybernetics student who has gone missing.… Read the rest

Animation Documentary Features Live Action Movies Top Ten

Top Ten Movies (and more, excluding re-releases) 2024

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 3 January 2025
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All films received either a theatrical or an online release in the UK between 01/01/24 and 31/12/24.

Prior to 2020, I’d never included online releases (well, maybe the odd one or two as a special case) but that year saw the film distribution business turned upside down by COVID-19. The movie business is still changing, and the dust hasn’t yet settled.

This version excludes re-releases (My Neighbour Totoro and Seven Samurai would top everything here). In addition to re-releases, this version also excludes films seen in festivals which haven’t had any other UK release in 2024. For that even longer list, click here.

Beyond the first 25 titles, there may be numerous errors (missing links to reviews where I wrote one, year of release, country, and maybe more). All this will be fixed in time, but I wanted to get something online in the holidays.

Finally, last year’s list is here.

Top Ten Movies (and more, excluding re-releases) 2024

Please click on titles to see reviews.

The numbering will mostly be added later when I’ve watched more of the outstanding 2022 titles, and they have stopped moving around. So, currently, positions in this list should be taken with a pinch of salt (and my notes that they might need to move position up or down ignored.… Read the rest

Tags 2024, Annecy, Belgium, Bhutan, Brazil, Canada, Croatia, Czechia, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, India, Iran, Italy, Japan, JPF Touring Programe, Kenya, LEAFF, LFF, LKFF, Luxembourg, Norway, Pakistan, PÖFF, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Tibet, Top Ten Movies, UK, US, world premiere

Animation Documentary Features Live Action Movies Top Ten

Top Ten Movies
(and more)
2024

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 3 January 2025
No Comments on Top Ten Movies
(and more)
2024
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All films received either a theatrical or an online release in the UK between 01/01/24 and 31/12/24.

This version includes re-releases, but those aren’t numbered. It’s hard to imagine movies improving on Miyazaki’s My Neighbour Totoro or Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai.

In addition to re-releases, this version also includes films seen in festivals which haven’t had any other UK release in 2024.

The star ratings may occasionally differ from the star rating I gave a particular film at the time of review.

Beyond the first 25 numbered titles, there may be numerous errors (missing links to reviews where I wrote one, year of release, country, and maybe more). All this will be fixed in time, but I wanted to get something online.

Finally, last year’s list is here.

Top Ten Movies (and more) 2024

Please click on titles to see reviews.

The numbering will mostly be added later when I’ve watched more of the outstanding 2024 titles, and they have stopped moving around. So, currently, positions in this list should be taken with a pinch of salt.

*****

My Neighbour Totoro reissue (Japan, 1988)

Seven Samurai restoration (Japan, 1954)

1. The Old Man and the Land (UK, 2023)

2. Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl (UK, 2024)

3.… Read the rest