Pretty Good

Wow! What a bizarre film! Unfortunately the few funny moments there were were quite overshadowed by it's completely weird and random vibe throughout.

There are better movies of two hours length. I loved the actress'performance.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Really liked 2012's 'Starlet', so 2015's 'Tangerine' was definitely going to be seen. Just in case anybody is wondering what my incentive was for seeing the films, it's for getting acquainted with director Sean Baker's work before seeing his recently released film 'The Florida Project'.Found myself liking 'Tangerine' even more. A few parts are still a little forced and written and resolved somewhat too neatly, but there is not much to criticise a film that is a little texturally richer and more intimate in detail than to 'Starlet'. Like with 'Starlet', the faults are fairly minor and are eclipsed by everything else that is done right. 'Tangerine' is most interesting for its unique visual style and using real life transgenders for actors, but despite how this sounds this is not a gimmick film and has much more to it than that.Visually, it won't appeal to all, some may find it amateurish. With me though, the shot entirely on three iPhones look was surprisingly naturalistic and added a high-voltage intensity and realism to a story that is often confrontational in manner. The music has some nice atmosphere too.Like with 'Starlet', 'Tangerine' really stands out in the writing, with a great balance of funny comedy, charming warmth, understated sweetness and touching drama. The story likewise, it really made me feel warm inside, it made me laugh, it surprised me, it charmed me and it moved me. There is some explicitness and some vulgarity, but it felt raw and any shock drama just added another layer to the drama. The Christmas fairy-tale feel that is at times adopted is not sugary, if anything it's got a lot of attitude which was surprising in a good way.Once again, Baker's direction is adroit and he paces everything beautifully. Would go as far to say that his direction is even better and more comfortable here than it is in 'Starlet', it's richer, more intimate and more detailed.'Tangerine's' acting is not quite as good as 'Starlet's', but it is still surprisingly very good. Especially from Mya Taylor who fully succeeds in making her character come over as a real-life person with strengths and flaws rather than a caricature or stereotype.Altogether, a very good film, very different to 'Starlet' but has many of what made that film as impressive as it was. 8/10 Bethany Cox

I saw this film mentioned on Film 2015, and then it was one of the newest entries in the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, it looked and sounded like a really interesting film, especially how it was made, so I had to watch it. Basically Sin-Dee Rella (Kitana Kiki Rodriguez) is a transgender prostitute who has just been released from a 28-day prison sentence, it is Christmas Eve and she meets with her fellow transgender prostitute and friend Alexandra (Mya Taylor) in a donut shop in Hollywood. During their conversation, Alexandra accidentally reveals that Sin-Dee's boyfriend and pimp Chester (James Ransone) has been cheating on her with a woman of cisgender (their gender identity corresponds with their biological sex). Sin-Dee is angry and storms out to search the neighbourhood for Chester and the woman, while Alexandra hands out flyers for her evening musical performance, she also argues with a client who refuses to pay for business, the police break up this argument. Armenian cab driver Razmik (Karren Karagulian) is regularly looking for sex workers, he picks up a prostitute, but ejects her when discovering she is not transgender, he later meets Alexandra who gives him fellatio in a car wash, he then returns home for Christmas dinner with the family. Sin-Dee finds the woman she is looking for, Dinah (Mickey O'Hagan), at a motel brothel, she drags her around town to continue searching for Chester, Dinah continually taunts her along the way, but they stop to watch Alexandra at the venue to perform her music show, no other customers have arrived, it is a mostly empty bar. Razmik leaves his family to watch Alexandra's performance, claiming he is working, but he finds out he is too late, while he searches for Sin-Dee, Razmik's mother-in-law follows him. Sin-Dee, Alexandra and Dinah go to the donut shop, Chester arrives and a confrontation takes place, he insists Dinah means nothing to him, Razmik arrives, followed by his mother-in-law, who calls his wife, Razmik's wife arrives with their infant daughter, and the arguing gets more heated, until the donut shop owner calls the police. Razmik and his family return home, Dinah walks back to the brothel, but there is no room for her, outside the donut shop Chester tells Sin-Dee he also slept with Alexandra, upset Sin-Dee leaves and tries to pick up clients, but she gets urine thrown on her verbal abuse, in the end Sin-Dee and Alexandra go to a laundry service to clean up, and they seem to make amends. Also starring Alla Tumanian as Ashken, Luiza Nersisyan as Yeva, Arsen Grigoryan as Karo, Ian Edwards as Nash, Clu Gulager as The Cherokee and Ana Foxx as Selena. Rodriguez and Taylor are fantastic as the almost mismatched two black transgender hookers striding up and down to resolve their issues, the script is full of murky and intimate subject matter, there are the odd icky and vulgar moments, but it is also very funny, the characters constantly calling each other "girl" and "bitch" for example, and it is surprisingly charming. But what makes this film really stand out, it is obviously a low-budget venture, and it was all shot with three iPhone 5s smartphones, giving the film both depth in its observation and a reality show kind of feel, it should be mentioned also that the title relates to the colour of the Los Angeles sky at sunset, overall it is a most engaging and enjoyable comedy drama. Very good!

My friend put me on to this, with no mention at all of what it was about... so totally unexpected. What I really liked about Tangerine is that it didn't pull its punches. None of the main characters are 100% hero or villain... everyone is sad/funny/cruel/kind at some point. I can't say I'd want to hang out with ANYONE in this movie... but they're all presented as complex characters, people, which is great.I can see why John Waters liked it, it does remind me a bit of his earlier films with their various crazed characters in crazed worlds... though Tangerine feels much more real and gritty than any of those Waters films, which were heavy with fantasy.Anyway, it's excellent... I hope it garners a huge following and we start getting more films like this and less superhero trash.

It's a fun and oddly comforting cliché to assume behind every arrogant windbag film critic, there's a frustrated filmmaker dying to make something worthwhile. While I doubt this is the case in most circumstances, it is partially true of yours truly. Godard, Bunuel, Spielberg; who can possibly stack up amidst such brilliant craftsmen? What on earth could I make, that would be worthy; that could enrich the lives of viewers the world?Tangerine would be the film I'd make, if not for the frustrating fact that it's already exists. Kitana Kiki Rodriguez plays the emotionally unhinged Sin-Dee, a transgendered sex worker who has just finished a short stay in prison. She meets up with her best friend and fellow prostitute Alexandra (Taylor) who amid pleasantries and wisecracks reveals Sin-Dee's pimp and boyfriend Chester (Ransone) has been sleeping with another woman. What's worse, the woman in question is cisgendered. We then follow Sin- Dee's stormy odyssey as she tracks down Chester and his new paramore. Meanwhile the more practical Alexandra meets up with her regular Razmik (Karagulian). Dinah (O'Hagan) a third prostitute holes up in a musky motel brothel. And to top everything else, it's Christmas in L.A. and the freaks are out to play.Every actor and actress in the film does wonders as earthy and authentic L.A. denizens. Even minor characters such as the LAPD officers who razz the girls on street corner feel so authentic that I wouldn't be surprised if they were real cops. The heart and soul of the film however are Rodriguez and Taylor retrospectively. In a film brimming with shrieking melodrama and gritty inner-city turmoil their sensitive portrayals and deft emotional instincts elevates Tangerines from what could have been an insincere and grossly insensitive slum travelogue.Much hubbub was made of Tangerine's kitschy film-production on the festival circuit. The movie was shot on three iPhone 5s and edited using a host of DIY techniques to make the film seem cinematic. Even as Tangerine echos the gritty aesthetic of Italian neo-realism, Director Sean Baker admits that his cinematic vision was largely cobbled together because of minuscule budget and shooting time restraints. Yet due to clever guerrilla marketing much traction, attention and interest in the project stems from its embrace of lo- fi filmmaking.If knowing the film was shot on smartphone gets butts in the seats, I applaud the producers for using that as a selling point. Whether the novelty becomes a hindrance a la The Blair Witch Project (1999) or it feels like an organic component to the mis en scene (Chronicle (2012) anyone), is up to you. I'm just happy that Duplass Brothers Productions has added a film to their growing revue that doesn't ventilate about the problems of melancholic white folk.Heart-touchingly harrowing, caustically funny and thoroughly engaging, Tangerine is an infuriatingly good movie. It's the type of film that takes all the frenetic excitement of making a micro-budget guerrilla movie and puts the audience right into the fray. First year film students will watch and feel pressed to work harder to make more, do more and be more as artists. Furthermore, this exciting and brilliant little film shines a harsh light on the lives of complex and redeemable people who are forced to live on the fringes of an increasingly hostile society. With the T part of the LGBT struggle sadly becoming more grueling, Tangerine will only become more relevant in the years to come.