Free Solo follows climber Alex Honnold as he prepares mentally and physically to climb a 3,000-foot rock wall... without a rope. Free Solo is about obsession. The subject at the center of the film, Alex Honnold, is obsessed with free soloing, a sport where a climber traverses a mountain without any ropes or harnesses. Just their…
The 1971 southern gothic tale The Beguiled has been reimagined with a sharp, witty tone that delivers some darkly funny laughs. Some of the greatest facets of a southern gothic tale — equivocal gender roles, a decaying setting, social alienation — all appear in both adaptations of Thomas P. Cullinan’s novel A Painted Devil, renamed The Beguiled.…
Hereditary may be slow-burn, but it burns bright and intense. With some of the most unsettling horror images and setpieces, it is one of the best horror movies in recent memory. When horror is done right, terrifying, heart-stopping horror, it grabs every one of your senses and makes you hyper-aware of all of them. It…
Train to Busan is a heart-pounding, armrest-gripping, teeth clenching zombie flick that breathes new life into the genre. Just when the zombie genre seemed on its way out, then along rolls in Train to Busan. This South Korean production breathes a new life into the genre without straying too far out of its confines. The rules set in…
Hilarious and poignant, Lady Bird announces Greta Gerwig as one of the most exciting new filmmakers and solidifies Soarsie Ronan as a major star The vast number of themes Greta Gerwig tackles in her directorial debut Lady Bird would lead you to believe that it's an overstuffed, melodramatic dramedy that tries to say something without making a point. However, it's…
Logan Lucky makes an attempt at recreating the charm of Soderbergh's earlier heist movies, but ultimately misses the mark. Logan Lucky is being touted as a red state Ocean’s Eleven, which is a lofty comparison considering the latter movie is considered THE heist movie of the 21st century. However, if any director is going to pull…
The Blackcoat's Daughter, Oz Perkins' debut film, is a tense and twisting psychological thriller that keeps you guessing until the very end. Director Oz Perkins, son of actor Anthony Perkins (yes, Norman Bates), seems to have really been inspired by his father’s most famous role. What makes Psycho such an enduring horror classic is the pervasive slow…
mother! is a cinematic experience like no other and features Jennifer Lawrence's best role to date and a story that's as crazy as they can get. There's a point about halfway through Darren Aronofsky's mother! where you're still in the dark on what the film is about, a bit confused, and ultimately weirded out by the film. But…
Subverting genre tropes, Stronger is a humanist story about triumph over adversity with stellar performances by Jake Gyllenhaal and Tatiana Maslany. Jeff Bauman's story feels like one that Hollywood would consume into its "based on a true story" formula and spit out an emotionally manipulative story of triumph over adversity. Stronger is not one of those movies. That's because…
Wind River finds screenwriter Taylor Sheridan taking the director's chair with thrilling results and stellar performances from Elizabeth Olsen and Jeremy Renner. Wind River opens with a terrifying shot of a woman running barefoot through the snowy and isolated landscape of Wyoming. She falls to her knees. We never see who or what is chasing her.…
