NADJA - MIFF 2026

 

As per the MIFF guide: “The city that never sleeps suits Nadja, a Romanian migrant nepo vampire who spends her nights drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes and waxing philosophical in East Village dive bars alongside fellow ennui-afflicted New York scenesters. When her dad, Count Dracula, dies from a nasty case of stake-in-the-heart, Nadja finally has a chance to emerge from her father’s long, overbearing shadow. But before she can make a fresh start, a twist of fate romantically entangles Nadja with Lucy – an extended relative of her father’s murderer, Van Helsing.”

Being a massive David Lynch fan, and thanks to “Nadja” being released under a “David Lynch presents” moniker, I saw Michael Almereyda's film way back in the mid-90's when it originally came out. Like a huge chunk of the images in this film, my mind is fuzzy as whether I saw it on the big screen or on video, but I do remember that I found “Nadja”a difficult viewing experience. However when the new restoration of the film was announced to play at MIFF, I thought I would re-visit it and see if a second viewing would be more rewarding.

As soon as the film started I was totally swept up and mesmerised by the gorgeous monochrome images on display, entranced by a hooded Elina Lowensohn as she talks to strangers in a New York city bar. I could immediately tell that I was going to fall in love with “Nadja” hard, this time around, which is exactly what happened. I couldn't believe how unbelievably cool the film was and furthermore was stunned that my younger twenty year old self failed to see it. How could a film that was executive produced by Lynch, starring a pair of hot indie actors (in Lowensohn and Martin Donovan, who at that time were regulars in Hal Hartley's films), and was about Dracula's daughter finally breaking free and coming out of the shadows of her famous father after his sudden passing, be anything other than awesome? What was I missing here?!? How did I find this film so difficult back in the nineties? I was totally in love with the very unusual and, dare I say it, hip atmosphere of this very strange vampire tale and I couldn't have been more impressed by Jim Denault's black and white cinematography which suited the moody tone of the film perfectly. It also showcased Lowensohn's immense beauty, highlighting the hypnotic quality that suits to a tea the portrayal of this very powerful, but lonely, vampire.

Then it happens. The first image shot via the PixelVision camera, used to differentiate a kind of vampire point of view (apparently), and suddenly it all came flooding back to me. It was this exact reason I disliked “Nadja” during my first viewing, way back when, because a large chunk of the film borders on the unwatchable thanks to Almereyda's baffling decision to use the PixelVision camera for parts of his film. For those that are unaware, the PixelVision camera was actually a children's toy that used audiotape to produce a very (very) low resolution black and white image. As it's name may suggest, the image is heavily pixelated at the best of times, but projected on a huge cinema screen makes the whole thing look like it escaped from a “Minecraft” game. I honestly cannot wrap my head around how a professional filmmaker would think that using a children's toy to film part of his movie would benefit it in any way. He is effectively sabotaging his own film because these scenes look absolutely atrocious and we are not talking a shot used here and there, Michael Almereyda has shot entire scenes using this toy, destroying all the beauty and atmosphere “Nadja” had previous, in the process. I am also not convinced in the claim that those shots are from the vampire's point of view, as a lot of those shots are not from their eyes at all, as the vampires exist in the frame too. I think if Almereyda had been strict in his use of the PixelVision camera only for the vampire points of view, I would have begrudgingly accepted it, but it seems like he just decided to shoot certain scenes with it, no rhyme or reason. I will admit that it is used when Nadja hypnotises people, so I assume that is why people parrot the claim that the PixelVision shots are from the point of view of the vampires, but they are not the only moments it is used. I understand there was a massive financing issue with “Nadja” with the film's key financier dropping out late, so maybe this was a decision to cut costs, however I believe it was probably done to appeal to the hip art house crowd to give them something to rave about. I know I am going on about the PixelVision camera, but whatever the reason for its use, it was a horrible, horrible decision and I cannot understand how a director would actively contribute to destroying their own film, which is exactly what Michael Almereyda has done with “Nadja”. Rant over.

It is funny how the PixelVision scenes totally disrupted my feelings and enjoyment of “Nadja”, and a film that I was thinking of giving four stars, started plummeting in my eyes. The more it went along, the more it continued to annoy me, and by the film's end I had had enough of it, and what I once felt was a genuinely cool flick morphed into “faux” cool, pandering to it's hip art house audience. If I was being honest though, “Nadja” has issues right from the get-go, as I do not know what Peter Fonda (as Van Helsing) is doing in the film, but I wouldn't call it acting. His performance is all over the place, and often times very silly, but it holds no gravitas in what should be a very important character within the film. The story does legitimately lose steam also past the midway point and the scenes in Transylvania are not convincing at all.

The biggest positive of “Nadja” is Elina Lowensohn who is perfectly cast as the titular character, with her performance having enough mystery, melancholy and the hint of the unusual to be truly memorable. She is outstanding here, and the camera absolutely loves her too. It was also so great to just see David Lynch once more in his brief cameo as a morgue attendant. The funny thing about his cameo scene, it has a completely different feel and atmosphere to the rest of “Nadja” and if it came out that Lynch himself directed that one scene, it would not surprise me; it all has to do with the use of ambient sound in this scene, which Lynch is a master at.

Overall, the new 4K restoration of Michael Almereyda's “Nadja” is an absolute stunner, perfectly highlighting Jim Denault's gorgeous black and white cinematography and Elina Lowensohn's naturally beautiful facial features. The film begins brilliantly, as I found myself watching the coolest vampire film of the nineties, before Almereyda sabotages his own film by his decision to shoot parts of it using a children's toy camera produced by Fisher Price. It is a baffling choice and one “Nadja” cannot recover from as it totally takes the viewer out of the film, and by its end, it becomes tedious to sit through.

2.5 Stars.

 

GHOST IN THE CELL - MIFF 2026

 

As per the MIFF guide: “The newest inmate to join cell block C of Labuan Angsana prison is Dimas, a weedy journalist doing time for the brutal murder of his editor. Suspiciously soon after Dimas’s arrival, prisoners start getting picked off one by one, their bodies found gruesomely maimed and arranged into macabre sculptures that would make Hannibal Lecter proud. The prisoners panic, pointing the finger at Dimas, but one clairvoyant inmate is adamant that there’s a sinister supernatural entity behind the killings. He warns the others that they’d better keep their auras clean through art, prayer and dance, lest they become the ghost’s next victim.”

The absolute biggest surprise at MIFF so far (for me at least) has to be Joko Anwar's ridiculously silly and extremely bloody horror / comedy “Ghost in the Cell”, which against all odds, I thought was outstanding in all regards. I have been a fan of Indonesian director Joko Anwar for a long time now, seeing ten of his twelve features, so when his latest was announced as part of MIFF's “Night Shift” strand, I immediately booked a ticket to see it. However, the only way I could fit it in to my schedule was by seeing an 11:30pm session....strike one....which was my third film from 6:30pm that night.....strike two....and then I realised that “Ghost in the Cell” was actually a horror / comedy and not a straight horror like I originally thought.....strike three and you are OUT!!! Honestly, I feared that going into a late-night session, already exhausted, to watch a genre film that are traditionally hard to pull off successfully, that it was going to be a disaster screening, but I couldn't have been more wrong. “Ghost in the Cell” was absolutely fantastic and is Joko Anwar's best film yet.

Let me be clear about this: there is no way in hell “Ghost in the Cell” should work anywhere near as well as it does; in fact it shouldn't work at all! Somehow Joko Anwar has combined some of the most graphic and bloody set pieces of his career, with some of the most broad, goofy and outright silly comedy going around, adding a dash of martial arts mayhem to it, to create one of the most entertaining films I have seen in a long while. I was actually laughing out loud through a lot of this while also wincing at some of the very graphic damage done to the human body here. So how does “Ghost in the Cell” actually work? Beats me! Actually, I think all the credit has to go to writer / director / editor Joko Anwar here. I was so impressed by his direction and his stunning energetic camera work. The film had a “big” feel to it that I do not normally associate with Anwar and his films. Whilst they can have outrageous things happen within them, normally Anwar's films (particularly his horror ones) move at a slow pace, relying more on atmosphere than anything else. “Ghost in the Cell”, on the other hand, moves at a clip and never slows down until it's ending.

It starts right from the beginning as Anwar sets the atmosphere of his film via an excellent pre-credits sequence that ends in a graphic murder scene that sees the victim presented as an art piece hanging over his office ceiling fan. From this you immediately understand that “Ghost in the Cell” is going to be a very bloody film, and all the kills within the film have been put together in a very impressive and original fashion. This opening scene is played totally straight though, giving no indication to just how funny “Ghost in the Cell” will end up being. It isn't until we reach the titular jail that the humour shows itself, as we are introduced to a large group of bumbling thieves and scammers. Anwar has done a brilliant job of defining each member of this group and making them real characters rather than horror fodder for the violent vengeful ghost. Although there are a large number of characters in the jail, they are all easy to remember who they are and which gang their allegiance stands.

One of the plot contrivances in “Ghost in the Cell” has to do with Six, who suffers from severe migraines but which also give him the ability to see the colour of a person's aura. This comes to be incredibly handy when the gang work out that the ghost haunting their cells is attracted to (and then kills) people who have a negative aura about them, which shows up to Six as either a red or brown colour. The inmates quickly learn that praying or participating in the arts can cool their aura and keep them safe from the ghost. This leads to some very funny situations when our happy-go-lucky group attempt to pray, only to find the prayer room full, and are then forced to join a dance class led by a campy dance teacher. Further hilarity ensues when massive brawls break out in the jail and mid-fight our heroes have to revert to dance moves, instead of throwing punches, in an attempt to cool their aura and protect themselves from the ghost. Again, it should not work but it is so, so very funny.

Joko Anwar finds laughs everywhere during “Ghost in the Cell” even via the slapstick and pratfall variety, with gang members jumping from the first floor railings to join in on the brawl, only to land flat on their face knocking themselves out, or a very funny moment when a group of inmates are running from the jail spotlight and freezing in weird positions as the light passes them, like in the children's game “what's the time Mr. Wolf?”. There is also a brilliant visual gag during a shower scene where the camera slowly pans across the naked, athletic men lined up in a row washing themselves, music swooning to their attractiveness, before a not so athletic man enters the frame, the music stops, the camera re-positions itself with only the hot guys in the frame, the music begins to swoon once more, until once more ugly men walk into the frame, and the camera gives up. I could not stop laughing, it was so silly, but brilliantly done.

Each time the ghost kills someone, they pull apart the victims body and display it like an art instillation piece (there is a reason for this, by the way) and while these are incredibly brutal and more than a little macabre, they are also strangely beautiful too, and you can tell that a lot of thought and design has gone into each murder sculpture (even if doesn't make sense that the ghost could achieve all of that in just a few seconds). While I may be proven wrong here, I believe “Ghost in the Cell” is Joko Anwar's most bloody film to date, and like the comedy, he goes all out with it, using practical effects for the majority of the violence, although there is some CGI enhancement used too (although these moments are less effective).

As if “Ghost in the Cell” isn't fully packed to the brim with horror, comedy and action, Anwar has also added a healthy dose of social commentary to his film too, in particular about how corrupt a country Indonesia is and how hard it is for the little man to get anywhere in life there. He is particularly scathing towards corrupt politicians and government officials who still seem to live a life of luxury and wield considerable power even when incarcerated for their crimes. The social commentary is never forced into the film, but is actually crucial to the plot, as is Anwar's call to arms over the importance of free and critical journalism within his country. Wow! This film has everything!

Overall, I found “Ghost in the Cell” to be a massive but pleasant surprise, and well worth the lack of sleep an 11:30pm session brings. It is a brilliant mix of outrageous gore, very silly comedy, and biting social commentary about the political corruption of Indonesia. Joko Anwar's direction and camera work are sublime (seriously, it reminded me of Spielberg at times) in what is his best film to date. Again, there is no way this film should work, with all of its contrasting elements, but I was blown away by how entertaining and enjoyable “Ghost in the Cell” turned out to be.

4 Stars.

MAD RUSH - MIFF 2026

 

As per the MIFF guide: “Madisha’s morning couldn’t get any worse: a rootless Gen Z already struggling to find her purpose in life, she’s just learned that her housemate is ditching her and is still reeling from having lost her most recent job under cloudy circumstances. So when she gets a call advising her of fraudulent activity on her bank account and urgently requesting that she withdraw all of her money in cash, Madisha is sent on a panicked odyssey through the Melbourne CBD – a pursuit that leads her to ominous alleyways, busy street corners, an alcohol-soaked house party and, perhaps, the fledgling desire to take charge of her own life.”

“Mad Rush” is a brand new micro-budget thriller, shot in and around Melbourne, that sees Madisha running around the streets of Victoria's capital city in a race against time to save all the money she owns from a targeted scam. I have mentioned before how I love films where you feel the pressure of time passing and after watching the trailer for “Mad Rush” I thought it would be just like that, however the finished result is a little different. Whilst it does have manic race the clock moments within, it also gives Madisha time to stop and breathe too. That said, director Maddelin McKenna and editor Geri Docherty do an excellent job of keeping the pace up for the majority of the film, so you can fully share in the anxiety Madisha is feeling. They were also smart at paring the film right back to it's bare essentials and keeping the running time to a brisk 76 minutes; there is no extra fat on “Mad Rush”, which is to its benefit.

The thing that impressed me the most about “Mad Rush” was even though it had a micro-budget, what ended up on screen looked very professional and much more expensive than it obviously was. Thanks to Bonita Carzino elegant and crisp cinematography and again, Docherty's rapid editing, “Mad Rush” presents and exhausting fast paced Melbourne where everyday folk are doing all they can just to keep their heads above water during these tough economic times. Being from Melbourne myself, I must admit I had a fun time looking at all the streets and locations Madisha passed to try and work out exactly where she was in the city.

The rise of scammers is scary and something that I cannot stand because the thought of anonymous people, hiding behind their phones or computers, doing everything they can to fleece vulnerable people of their hard earned money, it just makes me sick and you have to wonder how these people are able to sleep at night. That said, I also think that some people set themselves up to be easy targets for scammers by simply trusting people they do not know or not protecting themselves properly over the phone or internet. Personally, I never answer my phone if it is a number I do not know, nor will I call a number back unless they leave a legitimate voice message asking me to do so. I also refuse to click on any link that has been emailed or texted to me. These are the very basics in protecting yourself. The scam in “Mad Rush” is much more intricate and involved, and if I had any negative regarding this its that it should have been obvious early that she was being scammed. I understand that they are preying on her love for her friends and family, and pressuring her and not giving her time to stop and think, but that in and of itself should have been enough to set Madisha's spidey sense off. The other issue I had with this part of the film is that it is very hard to hear exactly what the scammers are saying over the phone to Madisha, what instructions they are giving her. I am not sure if this was a deliberate choice from director Maddelin McKenna or if the sound design was a little off, but it personally took me out of the film a bit as I strained to listen, which bothered me.

Outside of the thriller aspects of “Mad Rush”, there are also a few scenes where Madisha gets to breathe for a bit and try to work out what the hell is actually going on. During these scenes she crosses paths with a number of people, some she knows and some of them strangers, and for me, these small scenes are the absolute highlight of “Mad Rush” and what elevates this little film into something special, because these moments feel so true and human. Towards the end of “Mad Rush”, Madisha takes refuge in an old church and ends up talking to the cleaners of said church, who happen to be husband and wife. The couple check on Madisha to see if she is okay which begins a very natural conversation between the three of them, which is also something of a turning point for Madisha as she begins to discover her true worth and what she needs to re-calibrate her life to get back on track. It is such a wonderful scene, that is also quite funny, as the husband is a bit of a goofball, but again, it felt so genuine. There is also a similarly great moment in an Uber where Madisha gets to chatting to the driver about his own life and what he wanted when coming to Australia. The casting of these small roles are top notch, in fact all of the minor roles and background people have been chosen so well, giving “Mad Rush” a true sense of reality, which can be hard to capture in a movie.

The lead role of Madisha is played by newcomer Senuri Chandrani and while she is serviceable in the role, and has these big beautiful expressive eyes, at times I felt her portrayal was a little too aloof, particularly for the high stress environment she found herself in. This will sound like a funny thing to critique but I did like the fact that she looked like she knew how to run during the scenes that involved her to do so. It is amazing how many times you see people running in films that look like a baby giraffe finding it's legs, and it is a quirky pet peeve of mine, which thankfully is not an issue in “Mad Rush”.

Overall, “Mad Rush” is an excellent, fast paced scammer thriller that succeeds in producing the thrills, while looking so much richer than it obviously cost to make. This is all thanks to Maddelin McKenna's energetic direction, Bonita Carzino's slick cinematography and Geri Docherty's precise editing. While it has a couple of minor flaws, at the end of the day, this is a micro-budgeted film that is well worth seeing.

3.5 Stars.