Movies

Movies

“Does anybody have a map?” Dear Evan Hansen struggles to bring stage to screen

Content warning: Dear Evan Hansen discusses suicide Well, like it or not it is here: the long-awaited film adaptation of the smash-hit Broadway musical Dear Evan Hansen. Theater fans may... Read more

By September 30, 2021

Movies

Malignant‘s brashness and audacity make it a twist-filled delight

As the lights came up at the end of Malignant (2021), James Wan’s demented new horror extravaganza, my friends and I took the opportunity during the credits to howl with... Read more

By September 21, 2021

Movies

The Suicide Squad combines the absurdity of comics with heartwarming characters

To some degree, superhero stories are inherently silly. Whether from the basic concepts behind beloved heroes and villains or the general absurdity of scenarios presented in their weekly adventures, each... Read more

By September 13, 2021

Movies

Director Ben Sharrock on how the refugee crisis keeps asylum seekers in Limbo

On the secluded Scottish Uists, Syrian refugee Omar (Amir El-Masry) awaits an update for his pending asylum application. Each day, in an almost Sisyphean display, he traverses the windswept island... Read more

By May 13, 2021

Movies

Nomadland‘s story of wanderers hits close to home

A story of perpetual travelers and their time on the road seems like it should hold few lessons in a year most spent confined to their homes. Yet Chloé Zhao’s... Read more

By March 22, 2021

Movies

Minari studies the American dream through a Korean lens

“Minari is wonderful, minari is wonderful.” So goes the song that seven-year-old David (Alan S. Kim) sings as his grandmother, Soon-ja (Youn Yuh-jung), tends to the Korean herb from which... Read more

By February 19, 2021

Movies

Darius Marder makes hearing audiences the minority with Sound of Metal

Sound of Metal, the debut feature film from writer/director Darius Marder, is a sensory experience. It follows Ruben (Riz Ahmed), a drummer in a punk-metal duo with his long-term girlfriend... Read more

By January 8, 2021

Movies

Promising Young Woman tackles complicated topics while maintaining a sense of humor

Content warning: This film discusses issues surrounding sexual assault  The opening shot sequence to Emerald Fennell’s directorial debut Promising Young Woman (2020) says it all. As the names of cast... Read more

By December 31, 2020

Movies

The Climb: The tragic love story between two friends

In 2017, two best friends, Michael Angelo Covino and Kyle Marvin released their short film, The Climb, to the masses at Sundance Film Festival. The 8-minute film, shot in one... Read more

By November 23, 2020

Leisure

The Welcome to the Blumhouse campaign serves as little more than a collection of entertaining and diverse but unremarkable horror films

If you like tacky horror movies, Amazon Prime is the site to stream this Halloween. Its set of films from the horror collection Welcome to the Blumhouse (2020) went live... Read more

By October 30, 2020

Movies

Kajillionaire is weird in the best way

Kajllionaire (2020) is first and foremost a weird movie. Most elements of the film—from the quirky characters paranoid of every rumble or quake to the puzzling visuals of pink foam... Read more

By October 27, 2020

Leisure

Amidst a Black horror renaissance, Antebellum is a blunder

(CW: spoilers, mentions of racial violence and sexual assault) Antebellum (2020) begins with an undeniably stylistic long take. The camera follows a few soldiers, winding along the grounds of a... Read more

By October 26, 2020

Movies

All In: The Fight for Democracy makes its message clear—Young people, vote

In the 2018 Georgia gubernatorial race, former Georgia House of Representatives member Stacey Abrams could have become the first Black female governor in American history. While the election ended in... Read more

By October 24, 2020

Movies

Tenet is hard to see, and even harder to review

Movies are back! Well, they are according to this instantly iconic clip of Tom Cruise going to the theater to see Christopher Nolan’s newest film, Tenet (2020). The bizarre video... Read more

By September 18, 2020

Movies

Chemical Hearts trivializes mental illness with its doomed love story

Chemical Hearts (2020) may be a romance, but it was never supposed to be a love story. Based on Kyrstal Sutherland’s novel Our Chemical Hearts, the film follows the doomed... Read more

By September 16, 2020

Movies

Irresistible offers political commentary for 2019, in 2020

As the 2020 election draws closer, ads humanizing wealthy politicians start to fill television screens once more. Inboxes are cluttered with donation requests, and campaign speeches hitting just the right... Read more

By August 28, 2020

Movies

The Hunt Doesn’t Live Up to the Controversy

Back in July of 2019 the first trailer for The Hunt (2020) dropped online, showing a group of rich, snobby (liberal) elites hunting a bunch of regular (conservative) people, and... Read more

By April 12, 2020

Movies

Kelly Reichardt Pioneers a New American Western with First Cow

First Cow opens with a huge, rusty barge floating down the Columbia River at a glacial pace. Between the vessel’s entrance from the left of the screen and eventual exit... Read more

By April 1, 2020

Movies

Wendy’s Escape to Neverland is Joyful and Sincere

“Peter means something different to every person. We all have an idea of what that story means and who he is. And it has so much to do with how... Read more

By March 25, 2020

Movies

Onward Takes Viewers on a Personal, if Uneven, Quest

Pixar’s new fantasy adventure flick Onward (2020) is surprisingly poignant. “It’s probably the most personal film we’ve ever made at Pixar,” Kelsey Mann, the studio’s Head of Story, said in... Read more

By March 18, 2020