The Death of Stalin
Appallingly funny, frighteningly resonant
Movies
Incredibles 2
Super Delightful
Wind River
Elemental whodunit
Terminal
Terminally pointless
Ghost Stories
Ghosts aren’t real; goosebumps are
HodoBuzz Takes on Japanese Press Freedom
New bilingual TV dramedy starts Kickstarter campaign to fund release
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
How is it possible to make dinosaurs boring?
Room Laundering
The latest addition to Japan’s quirky, supernatural dramedy genre
Shinpan (The Trial)
A surrealistic double reality
Early Man
In the latest engaging claymation from Nick Park, a group of Neanderthals must defend their homeland from their arrogant, bronze-age Euro-trash neighbors … in a kind of slobs-versus-snobs soccer game. Voice talent includes Eddie Redmayne, Tom Hiddleston, Timothy Spall and Rob Brydon. It’s hard not to be charmed by anything that comes out of Park’s Aardman Animations, […]
Battle of the Sexes
A winning match
Solo: A Star Wars Story
This is what happens when you sell your franchise to Disney. Oh, there’s nothing really wrong with it as unnecessary prequels go, but it will appeal most to moviegoers who really, really needed to see more space battles and weird aliens, and were absolutely dying for the origin stories of Han Solo and Chewbacca (and […]
American Assassin
After his fiancée is gunned down by terrorists in the initially happy opening scene (saw that coming), a young man signs up for counterterrorism lessons from a former Navy Seal (a scene-stealing Michael Keaton). With its exploitative, increasingly ludicrous plot every bit as unimaginative as the title, and its seizure-inducing machismo, this ultraviolent, generic Little […]
Z for Zachariah
A woman (Margo Robbie) surviving on her own in a post-apocalyptic world seemingly devoid of other humans rescues a passing scientist (Chiwetel Ejiofor). Possibly the last two people on Earth, they have formed a tenuous bond by the time a second stranger appears (Chris Pine) and the inevitable triangle takes shape. As the story quietly […]
Winchester
The San Jose tourist attraction Winchester Mystery House is a sprawling collection of architectural oddities, built with no apparent master plan by the mad widow of the rifle maker. Of course it’s inevitably rumored to be haunted by the spirits of those killed by the gun maker’s guns. Australia’s Spierig brothers (who made the vastly […]
Brigsby Bear
And now for something unabashedly different. The 20-something James (“SNL”’s Kyle Mooney) was kidnapped as an infant and raised in a sealed desert biodome. His only connection to “reality” has been a cheesy kids’ TV show his parents produced for him as a teaching tool. When this man-child is finally rescued, he decides he cannot […]
Mom and Dad
“Family Feud” taken to a whole new level
Maze Runner: The Death Cure
Enough with the YA dystopia stuff
24 Hours to Live
Macho baloney
Mine
Like 127 hours, but without being interesting
Last Flag Flying
Slyly subversive anti-war dramedy
Wonder
Perfunctory compassion
You Were Never Really Here
Transcendent revenge thriller
Deadpool 2
Gleeful genre-bashing
Phantom Thread
A perfectionist on imperfection
Wonder Wheel
Wondering about Woody
Peter Rabbit
Paddington envy
12 Strong
An ordinary film about extraordinary soldiers
Molly’s Game
All in for this winner
Ready Player One
Quality eye candy
Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle
I put off seeing this movie, vaguely remembering its 1995 predecessor as a lame SFX extravaganza elevated to the (barely) watchable level by Robin Williams. But I’m here to tell you I had a ball. Four stereotypical US teens are sucked into the title board game and assume adult avatars, none of which remotely resembles […]
Citizen Jane: Battle for the City
In the mid-20th century, “city planners” such as Robert Moses, gleefully tore down New York City’s wonderful neighborhoods in favor of utopian housing schemes and massive expressways. The buildings would become known as “the projects,” and look how that turned out. They would’ve destroyed the rest of the city were it not for writer and […]
Red Sparrow
A Bolshoi prima ballerina breaks a leg and is (naturally) sent to a government whore school to learn how to use her wiles as weapons. While Jennifer Lawrence’s sheer star presence can make any film compulsively watchable, I’m kind of disappointed she chose to take on such a pointless, pervy actioner built on a theme […]
Darkest Hour
But Gary Oldman’s brightest
The Only Living Boy in New York
Grating coming-of-age navel gazer
Maudie
A work of art