Simultaneous spoof, homage, one-upping, and debasement of James Bond, delivered with gory, self-conscious glee by the inimitable Matthew Vaughn (Kick-Ass, X-Men: First Class) at his Matthew Vaughniest, working once again from a graphic novel by Mark Millar. Yes, there are British spies who dress nattily and imbibe impeccably, but they …
Writer-director Andrea Berloff, working from a graphic novel by Ollie Masters, knows the story she wants to tell: one of sisters doing it for themselves and sticking it to the Man. And she has the tools to tell it in stars Melissa McCarthy, Tiffany Haddish, and Elisabeth Moss. She even …
At one point in Terrence Malick’s heady huffing of the sour stink of success, his protagonist (a skull-faced Christian Bale) muses, “So much love inside us that never gets out.” So many words, too — like nearly every line of any importance here, the observation remains unspoken. It’s probably for …
Writer-director Rian Johnson sure is having fun these days. They let him into the Star Wars sandbox, and he built a monument to feminine genius that enraged a measurable portion of the fanbase and still managed to make over a billion dollars. (Sure, it was half of what J.J. abrams …
The latest Kong borrows at least a couple of pages from the script of the latest Godzilla (unsurprising, since Max Borenstein co-wrote both) — notably, the jacking up of the big ape’s size to truly gargantuan (though he does seem to grow and shrink a bit according to the demands …
Not quite a coda to Sebastian Junger's and Tim Heatherington's gripping you-are-there 2010 Afghanistan war documentary Restrepo — more of a commentary track, or a series of annotations. Here, the live-fire footage at outpost Restrepo in the ever-active Korengal Valley is heavily intercut with soldier talk, either in repose or …
File under "Lost in Translation." Or maybe just "lost." Antisocial, aging Tokyo office lady Kumiko (29 and not even dating!) lives alone with her bunny Bunzo and her newly found VHS copy of the Coen Brothers' Fargo, a film that famously starts with the claim, "This is a true story" …
Well, it worked for Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. To finish out its trilogy about a pudgy, Type-B panda (Jack Black) with a battle-ready, Type-A destiny, Dreamworks adds a long-absent father (Bryan Cranston) and amps up Part 1’s storyline. In Indiana Jones, the Ark of the Covenant got replaced …
Well, it worked for Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. To finish out its trilogy about a pudgy, Type-B panda (Jack Black) with a battle-ready, Type-A destiny, Dreamworks adds a long-absent father (Bryan Cranston) and amps up Part 1’s storyline. In Indiana Jones, the Ark of the Covenant got replaced …
Once you get past the temporary insanity of the premise — escaped killer takes mother and son prisoner in their own home and quickly becomes the lover she craves and the father he needs — the weird sincerity of the performances from Josh Brolin, Kate Winslet, and Gattlin Griffith may …
Miss Shepherd, the titular lady — played without a trace of self-regard or emotional grasping by Maggie Smith — does not have much of a life. It’s hard to get much going when you live in a van, harder still when you’re old and slightly daft and imprisoned by your …
Director William Oldroyd’s elegantly executed debut feature Lady Macbeth may prove to be the sort of quiet breakout for star Florence Pugh that Martha Marcy May Marlene was for Elizabeth Olsen (as opposed to the more explosive entrance that Jennifer Lawrence made in Winter’s Bone. Pugh’s Katherine, like Olsen’s Martha, …
Don Argott's documentary tells two interconnected stories, but it started out to tell just one. The idea was to travel with the metal band Lamb of God on the world tour in support of their album Resolution, interviewing fans about their (often intense) connection to the band — and by …
Writer-director Martin Zandlivet’s terse, tense, and terrific post-WWII film establishes two of its three strengths immediately. First, star Roland Møller as Danish sergeant Carl Rasmussen, his eyes radiating barely controlled emotion from their deep and hooded recesses as he drives his Jeep alongside a column of defeated German soldiers. Second, …
A conventional documentary (talking heads, old photos, period footage and news reports), but a near-perfect example of the form. The subject is the 1975 evacuation of Americans and their South Vietnamese compatriots from Saigon as the North Vietnamese army closed in on the city. By hook or by crook; by …