The murder mystery is being reinvented in the wake of Rian Johnson’s Knives Out trilogy, though that doesn’t mean every film in the genre will be worthwhile. However, you can see how Johnson’s film served as the blueprint for Anton Corbijn’s A Talent for Murder. Patricia Highsmith’s psychological thriller is refraimed within the trappings of a whodunit, though its conclusion may be
Read MoreHow far can our mistrust of one another take us? That’s the question at the center of Kevin Hamedani’s The Saviors, a paranoid comedy-thriller hybrid that enjoyed its world premiere back in March at the 2026 South by Southwest Festival and a recent showing at Sitges Film Festival. Starring Adam Scott, Danielle Deadwyler, Theo Rossi, and Nazanin Boniadi, The Saviors might
Read MoreClarissa is the eponymous character, played by a luminous Sophie Okendo, who is transplanted to modern-day Lagos in this tale of societal interaction interspersed with class dynamics, loosely based on Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway novel from 1925. Sensuous and slow-paced, Clarissa embraces the Nigerian landscape to make it a central character amongst a stellar cast. However, the subtle direction and restraint
Read MoreI have no idea what the inside of a sperm whale looks like, and I have no intention of finding out. For all I know, the squishy, claustrophobic confines in the 2026 film Whalefall could be a far cry from reality. That’s the benefit of telling a story like this. No living person has experienced it. It’s a situation that has
Read MoreAnyone who thinks image-making matters less than “the story” (whatever that means) should watch David Fincher’s The Social Network and Aaron Sorkin’s The Social Reckoning side by side. Shot by the same cinematographer, Jeff Cronenweth, it won’t be long before you realize why Fincher’s film stands the test of time as one of the most impactful masterpieces of the 2010s. But
Read MoreThe one good thing about Michael Showalter’s Verity is that it has more verve than previous adaptations of Colleen Hoover’s work. It’s not very good, but at least Showalter has fun with compositions that recall the oeuvres of Brian De Palma and Paul Verhoeven. Plenty of split-diopters and superimpositions create a quasi-campy quality as cinematographer Jim Frohna captures Lowen Ashleigh’s (Dakota
Read MoreDigger is the most interesting film to release in 2026. Not because of its quality, but because, with all its marketing, posters, and Tom Cruise hype, when I sat down to watch the film, I soon realized I knew absolutely nothing about it. Outside an AMC Dolby theater, a few of us mused about what the film might be. Austin Powers
Read MoreDirectorial choices can undoubtedly hamper a film, and no motion picture released this year proves this inextricable fact more than Paul Greengrass’ The Uprising. The film is allegedly a prequel to the legend of Robin Hood, but not really. The marketing desperately tried to convey that this was a thrilling reinterpretation of the archetypal story, but Greengrass’ style proves unsuitable for
Read MorePrimetime is the type of film that could easily have been a disaster. It’s a very difficult task to put the audience against someone who is catching child predators. Especially since Chris Hansen has done work beyond the network juggernaut To Catch a Predator to help reduce child trafficking at home and abroad. However, since the documentary Predators, there has been
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