Night School is interesting as a movie-going experience, insomuch as it barely resembles one, yet I was hard-pressed to leave the theater offended by that fact. There Read More

Peppermint opens with a claustrophobic white-knuckle sequence of blunt force brutality – Jennifer Garner, its headlining star, swiftly and nearly wordlessly kicking the ass of a Read More

The easiest way to process the abject failure of The Happytime Murders is to know that those Taco Bell “nacho fries” commercials are more successful conceptually than Read More

In this particular Hollywood era, one so dominated by monolithic tent poles and so fueled by familiarity as a box-office catalyst that even minor fringe hits Read More

Spike Lee’s vital importance to the history and progression of American independent cinema lies in his boldness. It’s a boldness of suppression finally set free, of Read More

The Meg is like a time capsule from 1998, the sort of patently ridiculous but nevertheless stolidly earnest wannabe late-summer tentpole that’s so mind-numbing that at least Read More

It’s a golden rarity when a film can leave you feeling simultaneously exhausted and exhilarated. Mission: Impossible – Fallout is that golden rarity. In the realm Read More

In terms of comic-based superhero franchises, all the belabored exposition is usually handled in the first installment, allowing the sequel to hit the ground running. Ant-Man Read More

I don’t know the degree to which Uncle Drewwill have universal appeal to all audiences, so therefore I don’t know the degree to which everyone will Read More

Game Night is a comedy that eventually wears you down until you give in to its charms. Its visuals are bombastic, its volume is cranked to Read More

Lest anyone assume that it was impossible for a studio like Marvel, relentlessly branded to the point that each film could be made via stencil, to Read More

Four years and three films later, Fifty Shades is no longer a “phenomenon,” but rather a sputtering franchise that shattered any illusion of being taken seriously Read More

Mere days after he assumed office as Britain’s Prime Minister, Winston Churchill was confronted with the direst of circumstances. Hitler’s Nazi forces were seizing Paris, and Read More

Elisa is voiceless. She’s a humble woman who works a lowly janitorial job in a government research facility in the 1960s. Her entire sphere is controlled Read More

Coco is a bright and wonderful trailblazer of a film, so it will seem ironic when I tell you that much of its charm is the Read More

“Lady Bird” is an invented name, the kind of self-appointed moniker we give ourselves in our would-be rebellious youth, when it seems like nothing is worse Read More

Kenneth Branagh’s Murder on the Orient Express isn’t so much a runaway train as a casual elegant glider; it doesn’t chug on a track so much Read More

Thor: Ragnarok would be the best ever entry in the Thor franchise if not for its own trailer, which encapsulates slam-bang, hyper-stylized, Led Zeppelin-scored, rainbow-colored lunacy Read More

In a still relatively young career, Yorgos Lanthimos has carved out an inimitable auteurist space. His films are instantly recognizable: brazenly bizarre concepts presented with deceptive Read More

The legendary “Battle of the Sexes” tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs was, to be sure, a circus and a spectacle. But it Read More