Knock at the Cabin
A twist is, by definition, an unexpected story beat. Anyone watching an M. Night Shyamalan film is likely expecting one—so does that very expectation untangle the twist? Or is twistlessness twisty...
View ArticleBaby Ruby
Making her feature debut after years of service as a playwright, writer-director Bess Wohl has no idea what to do with the premise of Baby Ruby beyond turning it into a bit of empty entertainment that...
View ArticleLet It Be Morning
No matter how you choose to tread it, the creative path through contemporary conflict is always going to be a dangerous one. Filmmakers situating their work in areas of partisan political friction have...
View ArticleRediscover: The Bostonians
It’s a curse that befalls every great director: the synonymization of their name with whatever specific style audiences have supposedly come to expect from them. Typically, it’s a lazy reduction of...
View ArticleGodland
Nature can be bleak and beautiful. While the fates of the film’s characters are foregrounded in austere conditions, the viewer is treated to majestic scenery throughout Godland, the third feature from...
View ArticleFull Time
Everyday working-class struggle has always been a diverse boon for drama from the pre-Code late shifts of Wellman’s Night Nurse to recent works like Support the Girls and the films of the Dardennes....
View ArticleThe Outwaters
The Outwaters is refreshingly old-school, both in terms of thrills and ambition. It is a found footage horror film, a subgenre that is so heavily saturated that there are multiple offshoots of the...
View ArticleHoly Hell! School of Rock Turns 20
Twenty years removed from its release, School of Rock seems more and more to be an objective good in the universe. Here is a motion picture that works, not only as a tribute to the power of a...
View ArticleOeuvre: Scorsese: The Lady by the Sea
Martin Scorsese’s movies have been called a lot of things, but small isn’t often one of them. Even his most intimate non-fiction work – like the family portrait Italianamerican or his storytime...
View ArticleMagic Mike’s Last Dance
If there’s one word that could describe Steven Soderbergh’s vast directorial oeuvre, if would be “unclassifiable.” Over the course of his 30+ year career, Soderbergh has gone from indie stalwart (Sex,...
View ArticleSharper
As far as crafting a game goes, at least screenwriters Brian Gatewood and Alessandro Tanaka begin Sharper with exactly the right character to act as an entryway into its twisted story. Tom (Justice...
View ArticleHuesera: The Bone Woman
Pregnancy as body horror and looming motherhood as psychological unease have been a rich vein for the genre for decades, from Alice Lowe’s Prevenge and Jennifer Kent’s The Babadook to Cronenberg’s The...
View ArticleThe Blue Caftan
The second feature from Moroccan writer-director Maryam Touzani, whose two films have been the Moroccan Academy Award submissions for best picture of their respective years. The Blue Caftan film...
View ArticleConsecration
What is so scary about nuns, anyway? Many are timid or demure, and they lead quiet lives of religious servitude, often serving their communities along the way. Maybe it’s their outsider status that...
View ArticleFrom the Vaults of Streaming Hell: The Apology
On Christmas Day, many folks have a preferred movie they like to watch. The more traditional options are Miracle on 34th Street or It’s a Wonderful Life, while slightly more irreverent viewers may opt...
View ArticleDaughter
Except for brief scenes at the beginning and end, Daughter takes place entirely within the confines of what looks like a normal suburban ranch home. Look a little closer, however, and you’ll see the...
View ArticleMarlowe
To depict Philip Marlowe is to have a conversation with film history. The famous private detective has been portrayed by Humphrey Bogart, Elliott Gould, Robert Mitchum, James Caan, and countless...
View ArticleOeuvre: Scorsese: No Direction Home: Bob Dylan
Scorsese does Dylan. That’s all the pitch that No Direction Home: Bob Dylan needs. Arguably the greatest US-American filmmaker profiling, for more than three hours, arguably the greatest US-American...
View ArticleAnt-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is, at its best, a travelogue of a failed family vacation. Early into the picture, Cassie Lang (Kathryn Newton) inadvertently drags her loved ones – parents Scott Lang...
View ArticleOf an Age
You Won’t Be Alone, Goran Stolevski’s debut film, was one of the most unfairly ignored features for “Best of 2022” accolades. Telling the story of a witch trying to understand what it means to be human...
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