Film Reviews
In the Heights Is a Dizzying, Vibrant Pool of Summer Joy: Review
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-06-02T18:29:28+00:00“>June 2, 2021 | 2:29pm ET The Pitch: A blistering heat wave is about to pass over the residents of Washington Heights, a Manhattan neighborhood populated chiefly by the members of New York City’s Latinx community — Cubans, Dominicans, Guatemalans, Puerto Ricans, and various other members of the Latin diaspora. Together, they live, work, and just try to get through the hot summer days while maintaining a strong sense of community that has gotten them through thick and thin. For the next three days, though, a few fated folks will be forced to make some dramatic personal decisions about their future: Will hard-working bodega owner Usnavi (Anthony Ramos) leave ...
Spiral: From the Book of Saw Gets Twisted in Its Own Formulas: Review
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-05-12T19:26:47+00:00“>May 12, 2021 | 3:26pm ET The Pitch: It’s been a decade since John Kramer, aka Jigsaw, spent years terrorizing unsuspecting citizens with a dizzying, disgusting array of homespun torture traps meant to enact karmic justice for their personal failings. Now, a copycat is on the loose, and this time he’s targeting crooked cops, with a mission to “reform the police” (more on that later) and purge it of its corruption. Hot on the case is an idealistic but disillusioned cop named Zeke Banks (Chris Rock), the son of the department’s former chief (Samuel L. Jackson), already a pariah for turning in a crooked cop several years prior. Now he and his fresh-faced ...
What Drives Us Is Dave Grohl’s Sweet Love Letter to the Road: Review
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-04-29T18:45:44+00:00“>April 29, 2021 | 2:45pm ET The Pitch: What motivates rock stars to hit the road — enduring endless hours in a cramped van with smelly bandmates and mic stands poking you in the ribs, all to play a gig that could have 10,000 people or just 10? That’s the premise Foo Fighters frontman and rock legend Dave Grohl sets out to explore in his 90-minute documentary, What Drives Us. But amid his exhaustive interviews with music contemporaries both young and old, from St. Vincent to The Edge to Ringo Starr, Grohl’s journey evolves into something bigger: a quest to examine the appeal of the touring life in all its highs and lows and the soul-feeding nature of rock st...
Tom Clancy’s Without Remorse Misfires at Every Trite Turn: Review
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-04-28T18:15:38+00:00“>April 28, 2021 | 2:15pm ET The Pitch: Here lie the life and tragic times of John Clark, aka John Kelly, aka Tom Clancy’s killer dude. Tom Clancy’s Without Remorse — the novel — is a post-Vietnam veteran thriller about a lost Navy SEAL who snaps and decides to take on drug lords and the Vietnamese after his pregnant wife dies in a car crash and his new girlfriend dies at the hands of her pimp. Yeah! That right there is what we used to call paperback intrigue, folks. Look it up at your nearest used-book store. Tom Clancy’s Without Remorse, the new Paramount-to-Amazon Prime thriller starring Michael B. Jordan, is about an elite SEAL, John Clark, whose very pregnan...
The Sluggish Stowaway Still Delivers Thrills and Chills in Space: Review
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-04-22T21:55:56+00:00“>April 22, 2021 | 5:55pm ET The Pitch: A trio of astronauts: Commander Marina (Toni Collette), Doctor Zoe (Anna Kendrick), and Biologist David (Daniel Dae Kim) find their plans for a two-year research mission to Mars derailed when they discover an unwitting stowaway named Michael (Shamier Anderson). Things go from bad to worse when the trio realize there isn’t enough oxygen on the ship to sustain four people: either one person has to die, or all of them do. In Space, No One Can Hear You Scream: The second Netflix space film in five months, Stowaway is also the second film of its kind (and overall) from director Joe Penna, who also penned the chilly survival film...
Mortal Kombat Is a High-Gloss Gore Fest That Repeatedly Delivers: Review
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-04-22T23:35:23+00:00“>April 22, 2021 | 7:35pm ET The Pitch: Hi, kids. Do you like violence? Get over here and check this out. Mortal Kombat is an ages-old tournament of death between members of the Outworld (mutants, mystics, people with fabulous costumes) and the Earthrealm (UFC fighters, mercenaries, a woman eerily resembling Marjorie Taylor Greene). Sanctioned murder to determine the fate of the world, winning tournaments so the bad guys don’t turn Earth into Mordor. The current tournament’s roster includes heroes like: Cole Young (Lewis Tan), a pit fighter from the South Side of Chicago. Liu Kang (Ludi Lin) and his behatted cousin Kung Lao (Max Huang). There’s also Jax (Mechad B...
Netflix’s Thunder Force Isn’t Super, But It’s Alright: Review
<span class="localtime" data-ltformat="F j, Y | g:ia" data-lttime="2021-04-09T07:00:59+00:00“>April 9, 2021 | 3:00am ET The Pitch: Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone suit up for Thunder Force. It’s a chummy riff on the superhero craze, built around Lydia (McCarthy), a Chicago forklift operator who likes drinking Old Style on the job and wears her Cubs and Bears merchandise with pride. But also her old friend Emily (Octavia Spencer), a straight-A tech genius, on the cusp of an evolutionary breakthrough developing superhero steroids for (likely) high-paying consumers. The two are estranged, and as mismatch comedies sometimes begin, one thing leads to another, and soon McCarthy is an ill-mannered Superwoman and Spencer a taser-wielding Invisible Woman. Toget...
We Are the Thousand Solidifies Foo Fighters As One of Rock’s Most Inspiring Bands: Review
The Pitch: Anyone who has ever lived in a small town understands the frustration of being constantly passed over by bands in favor of larger markets and bigger venues. While most just grumble about it, there are those dedicated fans who will do whatever it takes to experience a live performance from a treasured artist. For most, that means a road trip. But for marine biologist Fabio Zaffagnini, it meant thinking out of the box in a dramatic and unprecedented way. In 2015, Zaffagnini hatched an elaborate plan to lure his favorite band—Foo Fighters—to his small Italian town of Cesena. Gathering 1,000 local musicians together to simultaneously play one of the band’s songs, Zaffagnini and his crew of enthusiastic friends recorded and released the performance on YouTube in hopes to capture the ...
Concrete Cowboy Rides Into a Summer of Predictability: Review
The Pitch: Idris Elba has the gravity and laconic cool to make a great cowboy, and clearly Netflix knows this. Before the star-studded Western The Harder They Fall arrives later this year, though, Elba is saddling up for a less traditional take on the genre. Enter Concrete Cowboy. Based on Gregory Neri’s 2009 novel Ghetto Cowboy, the coming-of-age story follows Cole (Caleb McLaughlin), a troubled teenager who’s been sent to stay with his father Harp (Elba) in North Philadelphia for the summer. Harp, as we learn, is involved with a group of Black cowpokes who ride and tend to a stable of horses in the city. Cole takes a liking to this club, but also can’t shake his loyalty to an old friend who sees drug-dealing as his ticket out of the neighborhood. This may sound mildly outlandish, but it’...
Rachel Sennott Is an Anxiety-Ridden Revelation in Shiva Baby: Review
The Pitch: A bisexual college student struggling to figure out her career path (Rachel Sennott) attends a Jewish funeral service with her parents, where she attempts to juggle well-meaning family friends, a run-in with her ex-girlfriend, and an accidental encounter with her sugar daddy. Social Anxiety on Steroids: Never have I wanted to attend a family function less than in Shiva Baby, Emma Seligman’s grand-slam of a feature directorial debut. Old flames, sugar daddies, and painfully awkward altercations with relatives are the sparks that set this 75-minute marathon of full-body-cringe rolling — and from the second Danielle sets foot into the Shiva, neither Seligman nor the torrent of stressors lets up. To create genuine anxiety and stress in an audience is no easy task, and to sustain tha...
Godzilla vs. Kong Is Punch-Drunk Fun: Review
The Pitch: Godzilla and Kong square off in battle to determine who will be the planet’s apex predator. Five years have passed since the events of Godzilla: King of the Monsters when Godzilla established himself as Earth’s alpha Titan. Presently, only Godzilla and Kong remain active, and both are continuously monitored by Monarch, the scientific organization that tracks and studies Titans. Kong now resides in a large dome on Skull Island, designed to look like his natural habitat before the island’s climate shifted into near-constant hurricanes, but also to protect him from Godzilla. Doctor Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall) oversees his daily life along with her adopted, deaf daughter Jia (Kaylee Hottle), who can communicate with Kong through sign language. Jia and Kong’s connection is unmistake...
HBO’s Tina Is a Disappointing Slog for a Vibrant Legend: Review
The Pitch: You can’t keep Tina Turner down. Born Anna Mae Bullock in Brownsville, Tennessee to a sharecropper, her mother left when she was 11 years old to escape the clutches of her abusive husband. Bullock would later visit her mother in St Louis wherein she met Ike Turner at a nightclub. From there: The pair began a tumultuous, abusive relationship on the part of Ike. Bullock, by then known as Tina Turner, became entrapped but eventually escaped, rebuilt her music career, and performed one of the most unlikely comebacks in music history. Her story is one of survival, one of resilience, and one too often defined by Ike and not under the banner of Turner. The hardest working woman in show business bids adieu and recounts her life in T. J. Martin and Daniel Lindsay’s HBO documentary — Tina...
