After Marvel Studios fumbled the production of Bassam Tariq’s vision for Blade with Mahershala Ali, the director and actor both left the long-gestating MCU project to do Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother. The action movie then used Ali’s training for Eric Brooks to instead put him in a tormented character study about a single Muslim father trying to do right
Read MoreThe metaphor is heard loud and clear in Cristian Mungiu’s Fjord, this year’s Palme d’Or-winning picture, as the evangelical, conservative Gheorghiu family moves into a highly progressive (and liberal) neighborhood in Norway. If you didn’t click it because you didn’t meet Mungiu’s latest at its terms, it’s an apt parallel for the return of conservatism, which has become more prominent around
Read MoreThere isn’t a better way to open the 51st edition of the Toronto International Film Festival than with a special screening of Na Hong-jin’s Hope. This is the South Korean genre artist’s first feature in ten years, following the masterful The Wailing in 2016. It’s been a while, which made the prospect of a Cannes premiere all the more special for
Read MoreAfter an incredible feature directorial debut with The Inspection, Elegance Bratton returns with a more politically charged drama by recounting the unlikely alliance between the FBI and the mob in By Any Means. While this partnership has never been officially confirmed by the bureau, historical records indicate that the agency hired notorious mob enforcer Gregory Scarpa Sr. (Mark Wahlberg) to perform
Read MoreWhat you need to know about Macon Blair’s Idiots is simple: this movie is very dumb. The film follows two idiots, Mark (Dave Franco) and Davis (O’Shea Jackson Jr.), as they are tasked with a very simple assignment: transport a troubled teenager to a rehabilitation facility. The two individuals recently lost their respective jobs and have now found a gig that
Read MoreA scholar of the Cannon Group, French genre auteur Jean-François Richet is no stranger to big, goofy actioners. His last movie, Plane, was mocked for its title but lauded as an effective and downright nasty vehicle that would’ve made a killing if it had been released in the 1980s and starred Chuck Norris instead of Gerard Butler. Richet has now reached
Read MoreAs unnecessary as spinoffs can get, Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi might present itself as a series devoid of interest. I mean, the spinoff of two short films presented in the first and third seasons of Star Wars’ anime compendium Visions seems like one hell of a stretch to do an entire eight-episode series over. That said, The Ninth
Read MoreThe first forty-five minutes or so of Jacob Chase’s Insidious: Out of the Further are excellent. In that section, there are two incredible setpieces that genuinely had me on the edge of my seat. One is a Backrooms-inspired liminal horror that sees its protagonist, Gemma (Amelia Eve), trapped in a never-ending, claustrophobic hallway with creepy-looking creatures that do little more than
Read MoreRom-coms on the big screen are back! And by that, we mean films that star two of the most alluring and infectiously charming actors working today but are devoid of romance, comedy, and, most importantly, interest. Oh, and they’re also strangely reactionary and definitely feel like a byproduct of the Trump 2.0 era than what the masses would call “proper escapism.”
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