Revive: Favorite Discoveries of April 2025

Eyimofe (Arie Esiri, Chuko Esiri, 2020)

What a successful film-watching month April turned out to be, folks! As I type this, I’ve got my Letterboxd diary pulled up, and I can’t help but think, “Not too shabby, Marta. Not too shabby.” This month saw me put new releases on the back burner (oops) and finally dive into a handful of flicks that had been gathering far too much dust on the ol’ watchlist. I also checked out some stunning restorations and boutique-label re-releases that I can’t wait to highlight below.

I should also take this chance to mention that I’ll be heading off on a long-overdue vacation at the end of May. It’s been a few years since I’ve paused all of my projects, and I’ll be honest with you: the burnout is real. When you’re in the thick of the grind, it’s easy to fall into the cycle of “just one more idea, one more milestone, one more notch on the belt of mental merit badges…” until you realize you’re not really living. So, for two weeks, I’ll be pressing pause — visiting family in Italy, reconnecting with old friends in Spain (fun fact: I lived in Barcelona for over a year), and exploring Portugal for the first time. Because I’m committed to truly unplugging, Rewind & Revive will be on hiatus until I’m back. That said, don’t worry. I’ve got one more essay to post before I head off. After that, I’m excited to return feeling refreshed and ready to dive back into sharing more cinema. It’s been a while since I’ve felt properly wide-eyed and bushy-tailed, I’ll tell you that much.

But before I get too emotional about the trials and tribs of surviving on a day-to-day level… let’s rewind and revive, shall we? Here are my favorite watches from April: a mix of streaming gems and physical media discoveries that you might just want to add to your own queue.

The Working Class Goes to Heaven (Elio Petri, 1971)

Welcome to the machine. With Elio Petri’s The Working Class Goes to Heaven, you’re dumped headfirst into its fury. Loud, restless, and blisteringly angry, it’s a film that vibrates with rage but never loses sight of how deeply structural that rage is.

April had me continuing my newfound Petri obsession, and this 1970s gem currently holds the number one spot in his filmography for me. Lulu Massa, played by an utterly feral Gian Maria Volonté, is a workaholic cog in the industrial machine. He’s a top earner, fast worker, and a pompous jerk who provokes the ire of all his fellow employees. When an on-the-job injury finally forces him to pause, his identity starts to implode. He spirals into a full-blown crisis, politically “waking up,” only to find himself even more trapped than before.

For context, Italy in the 1970s was at its industrial peak — Fiat alone employed 140,000 workers. These factories relied on enormous numbers of assembly line workers, and much of what we see in The Working Class rings true to the reality of these employees' lives. Like eternal automatons, these workers were in a constant race under horrific working conditions, of course leading to inevitable breakdowns, frenzied violence, or total disassociation. As a result, strikes emerged nationwide, not just for better wages but for better working conditions.

Riding a career high after Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion, Petri was ready to make another political statement. This time, instead of targeting state power, he focuses on the dehumanization of labor under capitalism. As he declared after completing Investigation, “The only type of cinema worth making today is political cinema … I want to hold on to communicability, which is fundamental, especially in a popular art such as cinema which is also a social occurrence for people to be together.”

Petri, co-writer Ugo Pirro, and star Volonté painstakingly researched their subject, interviewing workers (and even hiring them as extras) to bring forward the most authentic portrayal of this capitalistic hellscape. The result is messy, biting, and real.

From the first few frames — workers marching to the numbing clangs of machinery and ominous overhead shots — Petri makes his statement clear: this is war. Or hell. Or both. The factory becomes both a prison and a pressure cooker. Everything is harsh and jarring, from the score (by Ennio Morricone!) to Luigi Kuveiller’s camerawork, filled with manic cuts and handheld shots so in your face that they’re almost coming out from the screen.

What’s so devastating about Lulu’s journey is that it doesn’t offer clarity. He’s mocked by union leaders, student radicals, and infantilized by both his management and his girlfriend. As he grows increasingly alienated, he becomes more mechanical. Petri isn’t interested in comfort, nor does he excuse any of Lulu’s actions. He’s showing us what happens when you realize you’re just, well, a tool. When your entire life has been shaped by work and empty promises. What, if any, relief can you find?

This is political cinema in its most visceral form. It’s messy, contradictory, and alive. Lulu is both a victim and an aggressor. There’s one moment where he speaks with his former colleague Militina (now institutionalized), and the monologue the man gives hit me like a brick:

“You see them? You see all those over there? They were all workers, peasants, unskilled laborers, builders, policemen, land office employees, gravediggers, accountants, attendants, drivers … the rich crazies are not here, they’re hidden in private clinics … We become mad because we have too little, and they because they have too much. And so, in this hell, on this planet full of hospitals, lunatic asylums, cemeteries, factories, barracks, and buses, the brain slowly runs away. It goes on strike.”

Awareness doesn’t set Lulu free — it swallows him whole. And then… the machines start roaring again.

You can stream The Working Class Goes to Heaven on YouTube or buy the physical release via Radiance Films.

Zerograd (Karen Shakhnazarov, 1988)

Kafka takes a wrong turn into Soviet absurdism, Buñuel pours a drink, and Kaurismäki quietly shrugs in the background. It shouldn’t work, but my god, does it ever. Karen Shakhnazarov’s Zerograd unfolds as a mix of all that: a surreal, bureaucratic maze of a film that left me disoriented in the best way possible. Shout-out to fellow Substack cinephile Jericho of Symbiotic Reviews for this recommendation.

We follow Alexei Varakin (Leonid Filatov), a Moscow engineer who arrives in a nameless provincial town to solve a simple factory issue. Instead… here’s a brief sliver of what he walks into: a naked secretary nobody bats an eye at, a cake shaped like his own head (that’s promptly sliced), and a museum where history is essentially fabrication. Yes, siree, this is my kind of fever dream.

Zerograd operates on dream logic, yet everything is played with straight-faced conviction. Or, at least, for everyone but Varakin, which only makes all of it more unsettling. Bureaucracy becomes so dehumanizing and numbing that even the shocking becomes banal. When he’s served his head-cake, it becomes an on-the-nose metaphor for consumption: of identity, of self.

The town won’t let Varakin leave for utterly ridiculous reasons. But does he ever even try? Even the movie’s opener — a long shot of a train leaving the station — sets the tone for the descent ahead, representing both escape and entrapment.

The museum sequence, in particular, is the film’s jaw-dropper. We see a spinning diorama of Soviet history populated by “wax figures” that are (I’m pretty sure) real people. Every corner reveals a distortion of the past, and then you start to realize… that's the point. Oh, how history can be rewritten. How lies can be told with such bold-faced conviction. When a system starts believing its own illusions, how can you know what’s real anymore?

There’s something hypnotic about Shakhnazarov’s rhythm: long static shots that stretch past comfort. The result is a comedy that somehow curdles into quiet horror. Varakin seemingly swaps resistance for resignation. What’s the point of arguing in a world such as this one?

P.S. For my Tarkovsky fans, you’ll be delighted to know that Eduard Artemyev composed the score for Zerograd.

You can stream Zerograd on Kanopy or YouTube.

Teorema (Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1968)

When we shed every carefully constructed symbol that defines us, what is left? A critique of the system with the potential for redemption becomes a chaotic unraveling when the truth is too difficult to bear. Liberation. Damnation. Only the untainted receive transcendence.

I’ll admit it — it was the gimmicky tagline that first sold me on Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Teorema: “There are only 923 words spoken in Teorema — but it says everything!” Enticing, right? The concept for the film is deceptively simple: A stranger, only known as “The Visitor” ( played to poker-faced perfection by Terence Stamp), shows up at an upper-class Italian household — we never know why — and quietly entrances each family member. Once he abruptly leaves, we watch the fraying of the wealthy.

I certainly don’t feel qualified to “review” Pasolini’s Teorema (heck, even Roger Ebert didn’t feel ready!), but a verbal vomit of the colossal number of notes I took feels acceptable. Teorema is dripping in symbolism, and I’m confident that repeated watches will help me uncover more. And yet… Pasolini offers us no answers, just glimpses. The visitor is precisely that: a vessel, a cipher, a mirror held up to reveal the emptiness of wealth and comfort.

Opposites define Teorema. The lush lawn the characters recline upon is manicured, artificial — bourgeois perfection. In contrast, we see recurring images of Mount Etna: wild, untamed, a primal truth. While Lucia (Silvana Mangano), the upper-class wife, fades into pallor and greys, the housemaid Emilia (Laura Betti) grows increasingly vibrant. Her very body transforms. Unity within the earth. A spiritual rebirth.

The visitor is not a manipulator. He seduces no one. He reflects. As he connects with each member of this household, they begin to unravel. Spiritually. Sexually. Psychologically. The shedding begins: of repression, of materiality, of identity itself.

I’m still not sure what Teorema means exactly. It almost feels like a film that resists concrete interpretation. Perhaps the answer lies in the title itself — a theorem, a proposition destined to remain abstract.

You can stream Teorema on the Criterion Channel or Apple TV.

Eyimofe (This Is My Desire) (Arie Esiri, Chuko Esiri, 2020)

“This is my desire,” Eyimofe declares. Yet, here, what does this desire lead to? Wounds, maybe, or worse, no changes at all. Arie and Chuko Esiri’s 2020 drama is split into two parallel stories. In the first, we meet Mofe (Jude Akuwudike), a printing shop technician, while in the second, we’re introduced to hairdresser Rosa (Temi Ami-Williams) and her teenage sister, Grace (Cynthia Ebijie). These Lagosians yearn to leave Nigeria — a Sisyphean task that quietly batters them with systems wholly indifferent to their struggle.

Eyimofe could have been a film about a journey. Instead, it’s a story where the journey cannot become actualized. But the Esiri brothers never resort to loud tragedy. What we witness is the quiet brutality of daily life — the kind where you’re stuck in a bureaucratic maze, where you’re chased by the weight of family burdens, and where there is a maddening price for everything.

Lagos comes to life on stunning, 16mm film, where even side characters feel fleshed out. The city thrums, unrelenting — but everywhere, something is broken and needs fixing. Each problem seemingly requires an instant solution. As our characters are continuously forced to fight, they somehow do it with dignity. With grace. A soft tenderness to be found, even encased in steel.

Eyimofe unfurls with a neorealist slant, presenting reality without judgment. By the time we reach the epilogue, the film folds in on itself and envelops you. When your desire comes with a price just out of reach… what then? Maybe it was hope you were looking for all along.

Stream Eyimofe on the Criterion Channel, Prime Video, or Apple TV.

Short Night of Glass Dolls (Aldo Lado, 1971)

I was a massive fan of Celluloid Dreams’ release of The Case of the Bloody Iris last June, so you can only imagine my excitement when another giallo was announced: Aldo Lado’s Short Night of Glass Dolls (1971). While I expected another solid entry into the genre, what I wasn’t expecting was a Kafkaesque descent into hell. Elements of Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut came to mind, as did glimmers of Brian Yuzna’s Society. Still, Lado’s film is its own beast, dressed in brutalist architecture and with an icy Morricone score that always kept me on my toes.

Short Night of Glass Dolls isn’t your stereotypical giallo, and if that’s what you’re expecting, brace yourself. Yes, it opens with a corpse, but wouldn’t you know it… the body is still warm. Inside? Gregory Moore (Jean Sorel), a man fully conscious but paralyzed, unable to move or speak. From there, he mentally retraces his “final” days, and we’re drawn into a web of conspiracies, disappearances, secret societies, and sinister clubs — all set against the cold pavement of Prague.

Visually, Lado’s film also diverges from what we’ve come to expect from the genre. Gone is the garish color and blood-red stylization. Instead, it’s washed-out and clinical, much like the trap our protagonist finds himself in. Don’t be fooled by the restraint, though. Cinematographer Giuseppe Ruzzolini floats us through hazy flashbacks with dreamlike calm, while Lado jolts us back to the morgue in sharp bursts to remind us of Moore’s reality. And as we pass through one chandelier-drenched room after another (there are many), we’re eventually plunged into a final act that is gloriously depraved.

Alongside Sorel, the supporting cast is stacked: Barbara Bach (a Bond girl and, fun fact, married to Ringo Starr since 1981!) plays Moore’s vanished girlfriend, Mira; Mario Adorf (who I loved in Weak Spot and The Bird with the Crystal Plumage) brings his usual charming yet erratically unbothered energy; and Bergman regular Ingrid Thulin steals every scene as the absolute icon Jessica — she has a new headscarf in each appearance, each more glamorous than the last.

I recommend snagging the new 4K restoration from Celluloid Dreams. They’ve done a beautiful job with the transfer, and the bonus materials are a treasure trove, including a 64-page booklet and numerous interviews. Next for me is digging into the uncorrected 35mm “Grindhouse” cut included on another disc, presented as a loving “archival oddity.”

You can buy the Celluloid Dreams release of Short Night of Glass Dolls via MVD Shop or directly from their website.

Long Kiss Goodnight (Renny Harlin, 1996)

Indeed, dear reader, nestled between Petri's Marxist rage and Pasolini's spiritual rebirths was a snowy ‘90s action flick I checked out… for the first time. Renny Harlin’s The Long Kiss Goodnight is a deliriously entertaining time — the perfect kind of movie to reset with after you’ve been punishing rewarding your brain with esoteric “high-brow” cinema. Apparently, I’m the last millennial on the planet to have watched this, and it’s thanks to Arrow Video’s recent 4K UHD limited edition release that it was put on my radar. I'm delighted to have snagged a copy.

The Long Kiss Goodnight sees Geena Davis pulling double duty, flipping between suburban mom and stone-cold assassin. As we learn at the start, she remembers nothing beyond the last eight years of her life, during which she has now settled into domestic bliss. However, after a dicey situation, her memories slowly start to return, and she teams up with a private investigator, Mitch Henessey (Samuel L. Jackson), to uncover the truth about her past.

Shane Black’s razor-sharp script is the biggest standout here: Davis and Jackson shine together, with countless back-and-forth banter and endlessly quotable quips. Sure, it’s bonkers and nonsensical sometimes, but that’s part of the charm. This is pure genre pulp soaked in practical stunts (shot in a frigid Toronto winter, no less — thanks, Arrow, for those stacked interviews and visual essays).

Beneath all the chaos lies a surprising thoughtfulness, such as the tension between domesticity and violence (the fact that the first two antagonist-ridden “incidents” occur in the kitchen, of all places? Come on). The Long Kiss Goodnight flirts with ideas of feminine duality and the roles women are cast into… and then blows them to pieces.

It may overstay its welcome, yes, but if you’re looking to shut your brain off? There’s no better way than with ‘90s action — with a capital A.

You can buy The Long Kiss Goodnight via Arrow Video or MVD Shop.

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And that’s all from me today, folks! As always, you can keep up with everything I’m watching over on Letterboxd ☻