I don’t know what cell phone plan David Oyelowo is using in “Don’t Let Go,” but it’s a doozy.
Probably best known for his starring turn as Martin Luther King Jr. in “Selma,” Oyelowo here plays Jack, an LAPD detective who has a particularly close relationship with his adorable, precocious teenage niece, Ashley (Storm Reid).
The traditional vow, “Till death do us part” gains a new urgency for Grace (Samara Weaving), a bride who discovers how perilous a wedding night can be in “Ready or Not.”
A disposable, yet entertaining little movie that never quite manages the blend of slasher and satire it aspires to, “Ready or Not” does feature an admirable performance by Weaving (niece of Hugo) and enough twists to keep you interested (if not always amused or terrified).
When a movie starring a two-time Oscar winner, directed by a multiple Oscar nominee and based on a best-seller opens in mid-August, well, something’s wrong.
And something is.
“The Kitchen” is about three women who can handle the heat and still want out of the kitchen. They want to move into The Kitchen, as in Hell’s Kitchen, that peculiar slice of Manhattan in the 40s and 50s stretching from 8thAvenue west.
As offbeat and unique as its star, “The Farewell” offers a lot of the shaggy-dog weirdness of a Jim Jarmusch film.
Said star, Awkwafina (born Nora Lum), is an actress and rapper who made her movie breakthrough last summer with the one-two punch of “Ocean’s 8” and “Crazy Rich Asians.”
You can’t say he didn’t warn us up front.
After all, Quentin Tarantino calls his newest film “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood” which is, of course, not only an homage to Sergio Leone (“Once Upon a Time in the West,” Once Upon a Time in America”), but also the traditional way to start a fairy tale.
“The sea is always trying to kill you,” says Tracy Edwards at the beginning of the documentary, “Maiden,” about the first ever all-female crew to compete in the Whitbread round-the-world sailing race.
If nothing else, “Midsommar” may make you re-think that Scandinavian vacation you’ve been considering.
As anyone who saw last year’s shocking “Hereditary” knows, filmmaker Ari Aster doesn’t fool around. “Midsommar” is a horror movie and a half.
“The Fall of the American Empire” does only one thing well: fall apart.
Gracelessly. Stupidly. And without a shred of self-awareness.
The Canadian director Denys Arcand, who may be one of the most pompous and annoying filmmakers in the northern hemisphere, has concocted a cretinous crime caper that seems strung together from bits and pieces of every ‘70s cop show ever made.
I believe in “Yesterday.”
I didn’t think I would. I’d seen the trailers and it sounded like a clever but one-gimmick movie. However, while it doesn’t do everything right, “Yesterday” sometimes takes your breath away. Not bad for a mid-summer non-superhero movie
Indeed, the dead don’t die in Jim Jarmusch’s aptly-titled, “The Dead Don’t Die.”
Neither does the director’s trademark deadpan, which has somehow managed to keep him afloat with movie cultists since his debut movie, “Stranger Than Paradise,” which premiered at the New York Film Festival in 1984.
“The Souvenir” is a portrait of the artist as a young doormat.Set in London in the ‘80s (i.e., no computers, cellphones, but the occasional IRA attack at Harrods), the movie features Tilda Swinton, looking as close to ordinary as you’ve ever seen her, and her real-life daughter, Honor Swinton Byrne, here cast as her movie daughter, Julie.
Imagine Shakespeare, not in love, but up to his ears in inducements from AARP.That’s the framework, more or less, for Kenneth Branagh’s “All Is True,” a look at the Bard in retirement.The year is 1613. His beloved Globe Theatre has burned to the ground and the playwright takes that as a sign it’s time to move back to the country and retire in the…um…loving?…bosom of his family.
“The White Crow” is so-so which, given what it’s trying to do, is almost a rave. Some geniuses seem replicable on film. I’ve bought versions of Orson Welles, Marilyn Monroe. And Elvis. But I’m not so sure how I’d do with a Brando or a Hepburn (Katharine or Audrey). Or a Rudolph Nureyev.
A much better title for the squishily disappointing new bio-flick, “Tolkien” would be “Bored of the Rings.”Oh, how I wish I’d made that up myself, but it’s stolen from a National Lampoon parody that came out around 1970 when the author’s “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy was at the height of its popularity on college campuses.
“I don’t want a lawyer,” protests Judi Dench in the first scene of “Red Joan.” “I haven’t done anything wrong.”Oh, but she has. She’s done this movie.
A fictionalized account of the life of British spy, Melita Norwood – here called Joan Stanley – played in old age, by Dench and played in full bloom of her espionage career by Sophie Cookson.
There isn’t enough Loki. In fact, there is maybe, at most, 45 seconds of Loki.
“Avengers: Endgame” is, in every way, Loki deficient. Otherwise, it’s a pretty darn good movie.
“The Chaperone” is a rigged shell game. It lures you in with Louise Brooks, the charismatic silent-film legend best known for “Pandora’s Box,” and proceeds to tell you this tedious fictional tale about the woman who accompanied Brooks from Wichita to New York where the incipient Ultimate Jazz Baby found – what else? –fame and fortune.At least the movie can claim truth in advertising. It is, after all, called “The Chaperone.”
In a way “The Best of Enemies” could be likened to a made-for-TV version of “The Green Book.” But even if that’s meant as a compliment from a flat-out fan of the recent Oscar winner (which I am), it’s still a bit demeaning. Though the movies share a Civil Rights theme and a first-they-bicker-then-they bond plot, “The Best of Enemies” has its own distinct voice. That’s due, for the most part, to its pair of high-powered stars, Taraji P. Henson and Sam Rockwell.
How good is Julianne Moore?So good that even when she’s sitting with her back to the camera, you can’t take your eyes off her.That’s how she’s introduced in Sebastian Lelio’s quietly moving and intelligent “Gloria Bell,” a remake of his 2013 Chilean film. We’re at a seemingly mythical singles bar catering to the middle-aged. Gloria, who’s been divorced for over a decade, goes there often. She likes the drinks, she likes the music and she likes – loves– to dance. If she meets a guy there, well, that’s okay, too.
