Foster Boy
Foster Boy is an astonishing, infuriating and frequently demoralizing tale undone by a general lack of precision. Jay Paul Deratany’s screenplay is technically based in truth, in that the domestic and...
View ArticleRevisit: Idiocracy
Viewed amid the smoldering trash heap of 2020, Mike Judge’s notion that American stupidity would take half a millennium to ruin the country seems quaint. Released in 2006, Idiocracy satirizes the...
View ArticlePublic Trust
Capitalism is voracious in its single-minded pursuit of profit, particularly the late capitalism of the 21st century. There is a reason Marx likened capital to a vampire whose thirst could not be...
View ArticleEnola Holmes
The charming and zippy detective caper Enola Holmes, directed by Harry Bradbeer, displays its most potent ingredient right off the bat: Millie Bobby Brown, in the title role, looking straight through...
View ArticleHoly Hell! X-Men Turns 20
There was a time not that long ago when Marvel Comics movies didn’t dominate the cultural landscape. Quite the contrary, in fact. When even attempted, they were straight-to-home-video embarrassments...
View ArticleOeuvre: Hayao Miyazaki: The Wind Rises
Hayao Miyazaki’s final film before retirement, The Wind Rises, both continues his usual thematic interests while simultaneously diverging from his customary worldbuilding and narrative structures. The...
View ArticleOn the Rocks
Sofia Coppola was one of the most celebrated directors around the turn of the century, captivating cinemagoers with the tragic mystery of The Virgin Suicides (1999), the doomed romance of Lost in...
View ArticlePossessor
To say that Brandon Cronenberg’s Possessor is obsessed with the color red is an understatement. It’s beyond infatuated with it, painting its frames with gory bursts of blood, vibrant crimson costuming...
View Article2067
Writer-director Seth Larney gives humanity a frighteningly plausible progression toward extinction in the opening scene of 2067. It’s the kind of scene one expects in a movie like this, in which the...
View ArticleSave Yourselves!
Amid the commotion of our increasingly virtual existence, in which connectivity seems nearly as essential as running water, the prospect of unplugging for a week offers both rejuvenation and risk....
View ArticleDeath of Me
There are so many attempts to frighten, shock and/or disgust the audience in Death of Me that it’s quite the achievement on the part of director Darren Lynn Bousman that precisely none of those...
View Article12 Hour Shift
With her new film, 12 Hour Shift, writer-director Brea Grant is going for the sort of gory dark comedy that has become increasingly popular. The subgenre, perhaps born out of the 1970 cult hit The...
View ArticleRevisit: Popeye
Bet your quarantine bingo card didn’t include staying up late discussing morality as applied to different adaptations of E. C. Segar’s Popeye. But this seemingly long outdated but perennial figure, a...
View ArticleWelcome to the Blumhouse: Black Box & The Lie
“Welcome to the Blumhouse” is a new series of eight films that are being intermittently released by Blumhouse Television and Amazon Studios, and first up to the plate is Black Box and The Lie. If these...
View ArticleThe Curse of Audrey Earnshaw
In a curious move, The Curse of Audrey Earnshaw leans heavily upon an opening scrawl to provide its surrounding context. The details are truly compelling, briefly chronicling the formation and decisive...
View ArticleHalloween Party
Inspired by the Creepypasta obsession of millennials yet revamped for the rapid-meme-sharing Gen Z, this generationally bipolar movie follows college students dealing with a Halloween party invitation...
View ArticleHoly Hell! Rules of Engagement Turns 20
Before the miniature renaissance director William Friedkin garnered for himself in the new millennium with films like the experimental Bug and Killer Joe, he took one of his last cracks at a big,...
View ArticleOeuvre: David Cronenberg: Stereo
First films are often dicey propositions, especially when those debuts sit at the start of a long, illustrious career full of far superior material. Often the seeds of greatness are there, but for...
View ArticleThe War with Grandpa
Originally scheduled to be released in 2018 yet pushed due to obvious complications surrounding The Weinstein Company, The War with Grandpa is something that should’ve stayed on the shelf. As it comes...
View ArticleThe Forty-Year-Old Version
“Write what you know!” As often as that maxim is bandied about as an honest suggestion, a genuine bit of good-faith advice, it’s used as an artistic crutch, a shield against meaningful creative...
View Article