The Samurai and the Prisoner shares a unique commonality with Rian Johnson‘s recent work. Like Knives Out, it shares themes with the overall story. The film directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Cure, Pulse) sees the prolific filmmaker lean into the charm of a detective mystery like an Agatha Christie novel, only here it’s through the lens of a period war drama set
Read MoreThe prison film has been done to death. It’s no surprise why. For those who have avoided brushes with the law to the extent of incarceration, there’s a certain morbid curiosity about the lives of those in lock-up. From Oz to The Shawshank Redemption and everything in between, stories from behind bars have been wrung dry for all their worth. Or
Read MoreAfter only eight weeks, House of the Dragon season 3 has officially ended. Sunday night’s brutal episode capped off a season that, at times, felt like being hit by a freight train. The weight of the crown was put on full display this season, providing the audience with a consistently riveting pace and devastating impact. The third season features shocking betrayals,
Read MoreAlan Ritchson’s Jack Reacher continues to surprise viewers with his adventures as the world around him becomes more complicated with every season; the same is true for Reacher season 4. Whenever he walks into a town, a city, a diner, a police station, or even a subway, he almost immediately gets pulled into a new avalanche of action and violence. [Warning:
Read MoreThere’s something uniquely terrifying about reaching a point in adulthood and realizing that the life you’re living looks nothing like the one you imagined. Careers stall, relationships change, and the dreams that once seemed inevitable slowly become increasingly difficult to reach. Smile… The Worst Is Yet to Come taps into those anxieties with a surprisingly honest examination of marriage, disappointment, and
Read MoreNo Rest for the Wicked is an unusually haunting title at Fantasia International Film Festival. One that speaks to the challenges of same-sex relationships through the lens of a supernatural story. The setting is far in the past, but its core themes remain true. The act of love can be treated like a curse by the family members of the LGBTQ+
Read MoreFantasia International Film Festival 2026 kicks off this week, and we are back once again to cover the biggest movies from the lineup. Last year brought many great titles, such as Rewrite, Foreigner, and more. The event also featured Sundance darlings like Undertone and Lurker. This year is another stacked lineup with films like Her Private Hell, Corpus, and more Sundance
Read MoreIt’s rare to find a remake of an international film that’s better than its original text, but this is what Olivia Wilde does with The Invite. The film adapts Cesc Gay’s The People Upstairs for an American audience, which was also remade in Italy, Switzerland, France, and South Korea. Wilde, along with screenwriters Will McCormack and Rashida Jones, elevates the original film’s
Read MoreThe Death of Robin Hood is a difficult pill to swallow. For most of us, the idea of Robin Hood evokes spectacle and adventure. He is the archery equivalent of King Arthur, supplying action, adventure, and a sense of nobleism. With a filmmaker like Michael Sarnoski, the director of Pig, one of the most sincere films about empathy, one might expect
Read MoreThe path from documentarian to fiction filmmaker isn’t as smooth as one thinks (see, as a recent example, Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi’s Nyad), but Daniel Roher makes it look easy with the incredibly controlled Tuner. From winning an Academy Award in 2023 for his portrait of the late Russian dissident Alexei Navalny to making a documentary that attempts to
Read MoreCarolina Caroline is a good example of the type of film that knows the influences it’s built on and uses them to full advantage. Crime thrillers, both old and new, in one way or another, have deep roots in 1967’s Bonnie and Clyde, which revolutionized how we view the intertwining of sharply impactful thrills and biting commentary in American cinema. In
Read MoreJohn Carney can’t necessarily be described as “one-trick pony,” even if he makes virtually the same film over and over again. The Irish filmmaker has carved a niche in music-driven dramedies ever since 2007’s Once. That niche became mainstream following his best film, Sing Street, which is widely regarded as one of 2016’s best. If you think he’s run out of
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