The Guard (Ireland)

Commensing the 65th annual Edinburgh International Film Festival, The Guard received high appraisal for its portrayal of a comedic heist. Actor Brendan Gleeson plays a small-town Irish policeman with an upfront attitude. He teams up with a tense FBI Agent, actor Don Cheadle, to interrogate several members of a drug-smuggling circle. Their two distinct personalites clash throughout the investigation, creating many laugh-out-loud moments. Writer and director, John McDonagh, perfectly entertwines drug-trafficking with blackmail and murder to create a comical masterpiece. The script brings to life a typical “good vs. evil” plot, and McDonagh adds an imaginative flare. This film is bound to humor audiences around the globe. – Casey Tampkin/Copy Editor •

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A Dangerous Method (UK)

The forbidden love triangle among a doctor, friend and patient is brought to life in A Dangerous Method. Set in the early days of psychoanalysis, the renowned Dr. Carl Jung, played by Michael Fassbender, and Sigmund Freud, played by Viggo Mortensen, fight over matters of professional ethics regarding physco-sexual issues. Jung meets the mysterious, hysterical, beautiful patient Sabina Spielrein, perfectly portrayed by Kiera Knightley, in a Russian mental hospital. Jung works with Spielrein to help cure her “hysteria”. Throughout the film, ugliness becomes beauty and beauty becomes divine. Jung and Freud share a special bond that heightens through their candid conversations about dreams and theories. – Alison Roth/Editor-in-Chief •

In theaters November 23

Circumstance (Iran)

Circumstance is a coming-of-age story about two teenagers from a well-off family in Iran. Two siblings, a brother and a sister, explore the boundraries of society in present day Tehran,. Atafeh is a young Iranian girl who experiments with a lebsian relationship between her best friend. Meanwhile, her brother Mehran is also testing the waters by aligning himself with the thuggish morality police of the Islamic Revolution. The siblings’ two worlds soon collide and as Atafeh fights her brother’s fundamentalism, their conflict begins to deform the family dynamic. The film offers a rare glimpse inside a strict culture, which shows that even though it may be a closed society, it entertwines cosmopolitan life and current everyday problems. – Alison Roth/Editor-In-Chief  •

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