If only Oscar-winning Taiwanese film master Ang Lee would get past his obsession with digital gimmicks and return to the soulful humanism he lavished on classics like Eat Drink Man Woman, The Ice Storm and Brokeback Mountain. Unfortunately, he has instead given us Gemini Man, a substandard action movie any …
Read More »'Abominable' Review: How to Train Your Yeti
The first major co-production between DreamWorks and China’s Pearl Studio, Abominable — a warm and fuzzy animated guide book they could have titled How to Train Your Yeti — is good family fun as far it goes. It also could have gone further. The Chinese setting and characters are welcome …
Read More »'The Great Hack' Review: From Data-Rights Fights to Democracy R.I.P.
Like most people, you’d probably never heard the name “Cambridge Analytica,” or were even aware of the company’s existence before March of 2018, when the New York Times and the Guardian began reporting on the firm’s harvesting of private Facebook user information. Unless, of course, you were a member of …
Read More »Jesse Eisenberg Steps Into the Dojo in 'The Art of Self-Defense'
From the second that geek supreme Jesse Eisenberg signs up for a karate class to end his fear of bullies, The Art of Self-Defense sets itself up as the 90-pound weakling destined to live forever in the shadow of Fight Club. The good news is that writer-director Riley Stearns gets …
Read More »'Big Little Lies' Season 2: Star Power and Shared Secrets Sustain This Sequel
In this TV spring of “Are we sure a second season’s a good idea?”, Big Little Lies may be the most dubious entry on paper. Barry came back with questions about whether it could balance its tone (which it didn’t always do well) and Killing Eve with questSions about whether …
Read More »'Dogman' Review: Revenge, Served Italian and Off the Leash
The angry canine is bearing its teeth, barking loudly and ready to bite. Marcello (Marcello Fonte), however, isn’t the least bit phased. A dog groomer who plies his trade in a small beachside town in Southern Italy, he has the ability to calm the angriest of hounds; despite the quaint …
Read More »'Teen Spirit' Review: Smells Like Elle Fanning's Chance to Shine
Some singers start young, before they have a clue about how the music business can chew up their talent and package it for mass consumption. Take Violet, the 17-year-old dreamer played with shy loveliness and a tough core by the luminous Elle Fanning. Violet lives in a tight squeeze on …
Read More »'Twilight Zone' Reboot Fails to Find a New Dimension
Jordan Peele is very much the man of the moment in pop culture. His latest movie, Us, is turning out to be as big a phenomenon as his Oscar-winning debut film, Get Out. Both have attracted audiences in droves to original, non-franchise concepts, which the movie industry keeps claiming isn’t …
Read More »'The Brink' Review: Portrait of a Political Charlatan in Winter
There he is, the ruddy-faced man in repose, the alt-right hero and shaggy boogeyman of the left known as Steve Bannon, drinking some sort of goopy green smoothie. His nephew has prepared it for him, and the former Trumpian campaign advisor/ally/exiled frenemy is making a face. It tastes horrible, but …
Read More »'Love, Gilda' Review: Gilda Radner Doc Is a Clips Montage With Benefits
It’s the Gilda Radner grin that really gets you — always radiant, sometimes childishly goofy, occasionally maniacal. You see it a lot in Love, Gilda, the documentary on the late Saturday Night Live star. There it is, in snapshots of her as chubby kid in Detroit and as a teenager …
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