Reviews

When it comes to films with a heavy focus on artists and art in general, it is difficult to not be a little apprehensive. It can often be a slippery slope leading into shallow self-indulgence…

Title pun aside, it was only a matter of time before Hollywood remade Ruben Östland’s Force Majeure. The premise is just too good to pass up, being both a high-concept, attention-grabbing jumping-off point for marketing…

The Assistant, Kitty Green’s first fictionalized film, is a master class in subtlety and illustrates just how powerless young women are when faced with powerful, abusive people. Julia Garner plays Jane, a quiet but talented…

Capitalizing off the CGI technology available to it during this age of digital filmmaking, Jeff Fowler’s Sonic the Hedgehog (2020) could have been a dream come true for younger fans of Sega as well as…

I had a funny experience when I caught up with Netflix’s Miss Americana, the Taylor Swift documentary which captures her political awakening while also recapping her career and work leading up to the release of…

Sometimes, a tragedy happens that is so beyond the scale of my comprehension, that I cannot fully engage in it. It can be hard to watch relentless news coverage or read emotional articles about senseless…

Like my fellow ordained Dudeist Ministers out there, I’ve seen The Big Lebowski countless times. It’s a film that not only became increasingly entertaining after each consecutive viewing, but its underlying message also became of great philosophical and spiritual…

Elijah Wood will most likely be remembered as Frodo Baggins, the kind-hearted and heroic hobbit who struggled through the corrupting powers of Sauron’s Ring. But his acting career besides his middle-earth ventures should be not…

After my first experience at Sundance last year, I arrived this year at the festival cognizant of the hyperbolic reactions that come with the environment. (Or, at the very least, I did my best. I’m…

Similar to its leading lady, Cathy Yan’s Birds of Prey (2020) was dealt a shit hand. David Ayer’s Suicide Squad (2016) is a music video masquerading as a feature film, a two-hour movie trailer full of undeliverable promises. And…

Oz Perkins is a talented filmmaker. His previous directorial outings range from good (I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives in the House) to great (The Blackcoat’s Daughter). When I heard he was making a…

In September of 2018, Christine Blasey Ford became the central figure of the nation of America when she testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee and leveled credible accusations of sexual assault against Supreme Court nominee…

The infamous Victorian Bushranger, Edward ‘Ned’ Kelly is arguably Australia’s most controversial historical figure. A 19th-century outlaw, thief, and murderer that in equal measure has been both condemned as a villain and mythologized as a…

There are precious few films that announce their brilliance in their opening moments. Minari is one of those films — and I’m positive that this isn’t the “Sundance high” talking that frequently comes with reactions…

The literature of H.P. Lovecraft has had a significant influence on cinema, though surprisingly, there haven’t been many straight adaptations of his stories. Instead, many films are loosely based or inspired by his work. The…

Floria Sigismondi’s new horror flick, The Turning, which is based on Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, had a lot of potential to be a refreshing addition to the genre, which is why it…

3 years ago, in 2016, Makoto Shinkai’s Your Name shook both the Japanese box office and the U.S. box office. The film was universally lauded and broke Japanese box office records. Seriously, if you have…

When I saw Disturbing the Peace on a list of upcoming movies, I thought it was going to be an adaptation of Richard Yates’ titular novel. The ending of the novel was particularly haunting. I always…

Guy Ritchie has had quite an interesting career. Making a name for himself in the late 90s and early 00s with the critical and financial success of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, movie-goers were…

The Death and Life of John F. Donovan is one of those movies that was made, and sat around for a bit. It made the rounds on the festival circuit in 2018 and 2019, but…

Bad Boys 2 may be the best bad movie ever made. Not in the same sense as ironic classics The Room and Plan 9 from Outer Space, which offer nothing but laughs at pure incompetence and…

In the ashes of the Soviet Union, Russia was looking for a makeover, ditching socialism in exchange for capitalism. It was supposed to signify a rebirth of sorts, a turning of the page for a…

Ah, January, a time when every critic wonders why they even bother. I often think that studios think something similar as they release bottom-of-the-barrel material with a lazy shrug that says, “well, at least we…

Underwater, starring Kristen Stewart and a handful of “oh I’ve seen them in something“‘s isn’t a groundbreaking film.  The inspirations it draws from Alien and a slew of other creature features are easy to spot. Originality…

The last bit of text before the credits come over the screen in Just Mercy reads “For every 9 people who have been executed in the U.S., one person on death row has been proven…

Dear Hollywood, Please stop with the reimaginings, reboots, retellings, sequels, prequels, or any other “quel” involving beloved franchises. If you feel the need to go back to any well that was thought to be empty,…

“Women, they have minds, and they have souls, as well as just hearts. And they’ve got ambition, and they’ve got talent, as well as just beauty. I’m so sick of people saying that love is…

This may be the last article I am allowed to write here after this statement, but I enjoyed Cats. For me, this film was crammed right in the middle of a musical weekend that consisted…

For as long as I can remember, I always wanted to go to space. To be outside our reach. To see the world from this outsider perspective. To feel the presence of our population and…

Sadly, sexual assault and sexual harassment in the workplace have been the norm for years now. Especially by powerful men who use sex as a tool against female subordinates or women who lack power. In…

I love Star Wars. I am 24 years old, and I grew up watching the original trilogy on VHS, and the Prequel Trilogy in theaters. I have been a fan of these films for literally…

Uncut Gems feels like it is partially plucked from my dream journal. It has so many things that I love or am captivated by, from a New York-based crime story to a great Adam Sandler…

We should bar every critic from calling 1917 a “cinematic achievement”, a “technical achievement”, or any derivation of the two. It’s an overused phrase in film discourse as it is, but 1917 has only made…

Sexual assault inflicted upon women in the United States of America is a national epidemic. The Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) reports that 23.1% of undergraduate female students aged 18-24 experience rape or…

After an incredible run writing and producing television, Lena Waithe is taking her extraordinary talent to film with her first full-length feature script, Queen & Slim. As is custom for Waithe, she takes an unconventional…

When Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood went off the air in 2001, it was the end of an era. Fred Rogers died two years later, leaving a gap in our cultural landscape that will never be filled.…

The poster of Knives Out is enough to make any cineaste salivate. An ensemble cast featuring the likes of Jamie Lee Curtis, Don Johnson, Michael Shannon, Toni Collette, and Christopher Plummer? Not to mention also…

Walt Disney detested the idea of sequels. This is why, despite their profitability, there were no official Disney animated sequels produced until after his death. But even after his death, sequels weren’t something that Disney…

Over the years, coming-of-age films have taught me one overarching idea: rebellious teens gotta rebel. It’s a timeless idea baked into coming-of-age tales from every generation in which a young adult begins to form their…

Fast race cars? Check. Two wonderful lead performances? Check. Thrilling cinematography? Check. James Mangold’s latest film, Ford v Ferrari (labeled Le Mans ’66 in some European territories — which I believe to be the superior…