Moana
After the mammoth success of Frozen three years ago, Disney’s eagerness for lightning to strike twice has garnered them an Oscar in the interim, even while failing to mimic the Snow Queen’s merchandise...
View ArticleEvolution
Peril lurks in even the most picturesque of frames in Lucile Hadžihalilović’s French-language sophomore feature Evolution, as gorgeous shots of swaying sea anemone evoke the unforgiving power for the...
View ArticleAlways Shine
Sophia Takal’s tense, beautiful Always Shine tells the story of Anna (Mackenzie Davis of Halt and Catch Fire) and Beth (Caitlin FitzGerald of Masters of Sex), best friends and competing actresses who...
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Revisit: The Squid and the Whale
The Squid and the Whale, a portrait of a family in the wake of the parents’ divorce, is a terrific dark comedy about struggling against the ties that bind. Over a black screen bearing the movie’s...
View ArticleOld Stone
Chinese-Canadian filmmaker Johnny Ma’s debut Old Stone gives away several of its major plot points in the first three minutes. Opening on the present, we see taxi driver Lao Shi (Chen Gang) tailing a...
View ArticleBobby Sands: 66 Days
Bobby Sands: 66 Days is a straightforward historical documentary exploring the hunger strike he embarked upon that ultimately led to his death. It is an engaging and even-handed film buoyed by several...
View ArticleHoly Hell! That Thing You Do! Turns 20
By 1996, Tom Hanks had cemented a career as a leading man whose films raked in both the cash and the awards. So, what happens after a star conquers the acting world? Direct, of course! Hanks directed a...
View ArticleOeuvre: Soderbergh: Side Effects
When Side Effects was released, it’s fair to say the film was overshadowed by Steven Soderbergh’s announcement that he intended to retire from directing. As with most retirement announcements,...
View ArticleManchester by the Sea
New England’s stark landscapes, especially in winter, have been used before to reflect the bleak interior lives of a film’s characters. In Todd Field’s masterful In the Bedroom, a small town in Maine...
View ArticleA Winter Rose
Some movies give you that “oh no” feeling within the first five minutes. Riz Story’s illogical A Winter Rose is one of them. The film’s eponymous character, a singer-songwriter played by Kimberly...
View ArticleJackie
As America braces to inaugurate its first reality-TV president, Pablo Larraín’s Jackie looks back to the tragic end of the first administration to fully embrace the medium of television. Specifically,...
View ArticleThings to Come
Paul Verhoeven’s recent Elle finds Isabelle Huppert fighting back against a shadowy tormentor, whose brutal bullying, conducted through a campaign of sexual assault and stalker intimidation, acts as an...
View ArticleHoly Hell! Alien 3 Turns 20
Alien 3 is an infamous object. It’s mostly known as the peculiar punchline to the long and notorious joke that was the film’s production. Stuck in proverbial development hell for years, the film...
View ArticleThe Eyes of My Mother
The Eyes of My Mother is a movie full of sick obsessions—with religion, with parents and, most unsettlingly, with the inside of the human body. The story centers on a young woman, Francisca (Kika...
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Office Christmas Party
Whether it’s a bachelor party in Vegas, a frat house in suburbia or the apocalypse striking James Franco’s mansion, the party-comedy formula promises viewers montage-laden debauchery gone awry,...
View ArticleMiss Sloane
Given the current state of American politics, the idea of watching a two-hour movie with a lobbyist as its protagonist sounds about as enticing as smashing all the fingers on your dominant hand with a...
View ArticleFrom the Vaults of Streaming Hell: The Masked Saint
For such a fascinating industry, the world of professional wrestling has birthed precious few seminal films. The Masked Saint doesn’t do much in the way of changing that, but it does use the...
View ArticleLa La Land
As a musical, the individual pieces of La La Land are somewhat middling. The songs themselves aren’t particularly stellar, the choreography of the dance routines is serviceable and the vocal...
View ArticleOeuvre: Soderbergh: Behind the Candelabra
In comparison to Steven Soderbergh’s work on the likes of Erin Brockovich or Contagion, a look at the rocky romance between Liberace and lover Scott Thorson might seem like an odd change of course....
View ArticleSlash
Though Slash, writer-director Clay Liford’s new film about a sexually questioning teen’s foray into “slash-fiction” (which is fanfiction featuring same-sex couplings), is elevated by its unique subject...
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