Club Kid could easily fall into the trap of being labeled a Big Daddy ripoff. The film involves an immature young man with no clear direction in life who abruptly inherits a kid. He then finds maturity through caring for someone else. The third act even shares some similar scenarios as the Adam Sandler movie. However, despite its familiar story beats,
Read MoreDavid Leitch has a pacing problem. That much is clear if you watch all of his solo directorial efforts, no matter how great they look or how well-mounted his conception of action choreography is. His latest, How to Rob a Bank, might be his dullest film, even if it contains his most hyperstimulating images yet. How to Rob a Bank is,
Read MoreThere’s a scene in Noah Segan’s The Only Living Pickpocket in New York that perfectly captures the layers of John Turturro’s slick, calculating street thief, Harry Lehman. It might be the best demonstration of the veteran actor’s skills as someone who has never gotten the flowers he’s always deserved. The heartbreaking story in The Only Living Pickpocket in New York Turturro’s Lehman dances to
Read MoreSome films are better in concept than the ultimate execution—where you can see potential squandered in real time while watching. Behemoth! fulfills much of what you’d want from delving into the psyche of a character who’s a passenger within the effervescent swaying of his life through the beauty of its diegetic film scoring. But eventually, Behemoth! becomes lost within its ambitiously
Read MoreWriter-director James Gray (Ad Astra, The Lost City of Z) lends his distinct visual style to the dreary and somber atmosphere of his new film Paper Tiger. Aged, muted colors and dim, scattered lighting fill the screen, channeling the visual aesthetic of classic ’70s crime thrillers. The cinematography here rejects the crisp, polished imagery of modern filmmaking in favor of a
Read MoreTo make a movie like Gentle Monster requires a great deal of sensitivity to the material you’re treating on screen. The subject writer/director Marie Kreutzer is dealing with is incredibly heavy and could easily veer into exploitative territory if you don’t know how to handle such a story. Once the elephant in the room is revealed, Kreutzer can easily go one
Read More‘Twas just a year ago, in 2025, when Chloé Zhao’s Hamnet’s tale of family grief for William Shakespeare triggered the collective outpouring of tears amongst cinema audiences. Now Andrew Scott is threatening to evoke similar reactions with his tour de force, poignant, and powerful performance in Elsinore. Andrew Scott plays Ian Charleson, a real-life theatre actor performing as Hamlet, in the
Read MoreBeing called a coward, or “lâche,” as the French equivalent, is probably one of the greatest insults that one soldier could volley towards another during a World War I setting. Within Lukas Dhont’s third film, Coward, this slur carries added significance by equally describing those men who risked everything during a failed escape attempt in a bid to avoid the horrors of
Read MoreAs flawed as Jennifer Peedom’s narrative feature debut, Tenzing, might be, something undeniable about her filmmaking instantly makes me keen to explore her earlier mountain-related documentaries, Mountain and Sherpa. The way in which she visualizes Tenzing Norgay’s (Genden Phuntsok) connection with Mount Everest, or, as he calls it, Chomolungma, is so emotive (almost reaching spiritual awareness). It immediately positions the audience
Read More
