‘ENCANTO’ A Magical Reckoning With Generational Trauma

November 15, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Angie Cepeda, Bryon Howard, Charise Castro Smith, Diane Guerrero, Disney, Disney Animated Movies, Encanto, Jared Bush, Jessica Darrow, Lin-Manuel Miranda, María Cecilia Botero, Ravi Cabot-Conyers, Stephanie Beatriz 2 Comments

After being forced out of their Colombian homeland by political unrest, the Madrigal family is blessed with magical gifts. When they come of age, each member of the family is granted a unique power; Luisa (Jessica Darrow) has the strength of a titan; Isabela (Diane Guerrero) summons flowers to beautify anywhere and everywhere; Julieta (Angie Cepeda) heals physical ailments with her culinary treats; and Bruno (John Leguizamo) sees visions of the future. Mirabel (Stephanie Beatriz) is the only member of the Madrigal family who was not granted a magical power. The natural consequence of this is that she’s seen as a bit of a familial outsider, especially from the judgmental Abuela Alma (María Cecilia Botero) but her spirits remain high. When the family’s powers unexpectedly flicker and fade, Mirabel takes it upon herself to bring the family together and save the magic before it’s too late. Read More

Princess Diana Feels the Oppression of Royal Tradition in Masterful ‘SPENCER’

November 4, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Freddie Spry, Jack Farthing, Jack Nielen, Jacqueline Durran, Kristen Stewart, Pablo Larraín, Sally Hawkins, Sean Harris, Spencer, Stella Gonet, Steven Knight, Timothy Spall 1 Comment

Princess Diana (Kristen Stewart) is terribly lost. Putting along rolling hills under the glowering gray English skies in her Porsche, she can’t find her way to the royal Sandringham House, where she is deigned to join the Royal Family for Christmas. But her being off-course runs much deeper. Diana’s disorientation in the very town she grew up in – in the shadow of the aforementioned seat of royalty no less – speaks to a growing sense of being out of place. Following the infidelity of her husband Prince Charles (Jack Farthing), Diana is nonetheless expected to play the part of dutiful wife but it’s a role she simply cannot swallow. Read More

Clunky ‘ETERNALS’ Reveals Chloé Zhao Ill-Suited for Marvel Universe

October 28, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Chloé Zhao, Eternals, Gemma Chan, Harish Patel, Kaz Firpo, Marvel Cinematic Universe, MCU, Patrick Burleigh, Richard Madden, Ryan Firpo, Salma Hayek Leave a comment

Nomandland writer-director and Academy Award-winner Chloé Zhao is celebrated as a humanist, naturalistic storyteller. A filmmaker who sinks into the very pores of the characters and communities she crafts her movies around. Telling stories from a deep understanding of what make these people tick and the idiosyncratic customs of their way of life, Zhao champions the use of non-actors and the backdrop of mother nature to achieve a lived-in, grounded aesthetic. With Zhao’s films, you often feel as if you’ve stepped into another universe, one that’s been squirreled away on some part of our planet we just didn’t know existed. Read More

Horrifying ‘ANTLERS’ is the Bleakest American Horror Movie of the Century

October 26, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Antlers, Florian Hoffmeister, Guillermo del Toro, Horror, Javiar Navarrete, Jeremy T. Collins, Jesse Plemmons, Keri Russell, Nick Antosca, Sawyer Jones, Scott Cooper, Scott Haze 1 Comment

The American horror movie has a tradition of not crossing certain boundaries. There’s a reason that the most disturbing horror movies in the world are often born outside the borders of the United States, imported from counties like Serbia, Denmark, the Netherlands, Japan, France, and Italy. Places with brutal histories (a commonality across all countries, unfortunately) wherein their countrymen acknowledge and grapple with their homeland’s wrongdoings through the medium of film. Something the American filmmaker, and the studio systems backing them, are oftentimes less comfortable with. The American appetite is just not as well-versed in particular extremities, like accepting the horrors of its own bloody past and desperate present. Read More

The Ghosts of Showbiz Past Haunt ‘LAST NIGHT IN SOHO’

October 25, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Anya Taylor-Joy, Diana Rigg, Edgar Wright, Horror, Matt Smith, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Synnove Karlsen, Thomasin McKenzie Leave a comment

Dashed dreams and grubby hands reveal themselves to be the stuff of Edgar Wright’s nightmares in the stylish throwback Last Night in Soho. A ghostly haunter with one foot in the modern zeitgeist and one squarely in raging 1960’s London, Wright’s first foray into the horror grapples between serious social horrors and pure genre thrills, delivering a thoroughly entertaining slice of Giallo exploitation that warns of the temptation of nostalgia. Read More

‘THE FRENCH DISPATCH’ Is An Inaccessible Patchwork of Withering Pretension

October 19, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Adrien Brody, Alexandre Desplat, Anjelica Huston, Benicio Del Toro, Bill Murray, Bob Balaban, Christoph Waltz, Edward Norton, Elisabeth Moss, Frances McDormand, Henry Winkler, Hugo Guinness, Jason Schwartzman, Jeffrey Wright, Léa Seydoux, Liev Schreiber, Mathieu Amalric, Owen Wilson, Roman Coppola, Rupert Friend, Saoirse Ronan, Tilda Swinton, Timothée Chalamet, Willem Dafoe 2 Comments

Structured like a New Yorker zine and just as wryly smug and pandering to the self-proclaimed intelligentsia, The French Dispatch is an ego-driven misfire for visionary director Wes Anderson who has done little more than projectile vomit his signature quirk on the screen in thick gobs, forgetting to actually make a movie along the way. Read More

Sweat and Tears: Villeneuve’s Breathtaking Space Opera Epic ‘DUNE’ Rules

October 18, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Dave Bautista, Denis Villeneuve, Dune, Jacqueline West, Jaiver Bardem, Jason Momoa, Josh Brolin, Oscar Isaac, Patrice Vermette, Rebecca Ferguson, Stellan Skarsgård, Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya 4 Comments

Behold! Denis Villeneuve has adapted Frank Herbert’s iconic 1965 science-fiction novel Dune with all the might and majesty of a true maestro. A verifiable fireworks-show of audio-visual brawn and storytelling prowess, Dune as translated by Villeneuve is a rare cinematic treat that implodes on the screen, sucking audiences into a dizzying vortex of feuding empires, space zen, and chosen-one heroics, resulting in one of the most electrifying science-fiction space operas of this generation and one of the very best films of the year. The only knock against it – and it is a reasonably-sized knock – is that this first film in the planned (but not yet green-lit) two-parter only encompasses half the total story, leaving viewers desperate for a conclusion that may or may not come to fruition. Read More

Loose Slasher Sequel ‘HALLOWEEN KILLS’ Defines Overkill

October 13, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Andi Matichak, Anthony Michael Hall, Danny McBride, Dylan Arnold, Jamie Lee Curtis, Judy Greer, Kyle Richards, Nancy Stephens, Robert Longstreet, Scott Teems, Thomas Mann, Will Patton 1 Comment

David Gordon Green’s 2018 rendition of Halloween, a sequel/reboot that revitalized Michael Myers for the arthouse horror generation, did almost everything right. His reimagining of the franchise, in a sequel that stemmed directly from John Carpenter’s 1978 original while actively dismissing the string of disappointing sequels and Rob Zombie’s grizzled remakes from the canon, leaned into the portions of the story that made Myers such a lasting horror icon. There was actual character development present here, an understanding of what made this character so deeply unsettling, plenty of tension-filled kills, and a good lick of irreverent humor to be found in the proceedings. If Halloween is The Shape perfected, Halloween Kills is what happens when complacency sets in almost immediately and the franchise begins to flatline well before its expiration date. Read More

Vile Men Are Always the Heroes of Their Own Story in Medieval Court Drama ‘THE LAST DUEL’

October 12, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Adam Driver, Alex Lawther, Ben Affleck, Jodie Comer, Matt Damon, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Ridley Scott, The Last Duel 2 Comments

The Middle Ages, a vast period of cultural and intellectual bankruptcy. A thousand years of decline spent spilling blood in the soil over God, king, and country. The hoi polloi, excited by the rage of religious fervor, cheered for bread and circus and no circus promised more drama than a duel to the death. This is where we find ourselves at the start of Ridley Scott’s latest sword and sandal epic, The Last Duel, with two men, each believing God and the truth is by their side, equipping plates of armor and squeezing into chainmail, squires readying their steads, prepared to square off in an arena until one man claims the other’s last breath. All to prove that their truth is the truth. There’s no better way to prove veracity than by bloodletting – under God’s benevolent eye. Read More

Lonely Icelandic Parents Pull the Wool Over Their Own Eyes in Bizarre Creature Feature ‘LAMB’

October 6, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged A24, Björn Hlynur Haraldsson, Eli Arenson, Hilmir Snær Guðnason, Lamb, Noomi Rapace, Sjón, Valdimar Jóhannsson, Þórarinn Guðnason 1 Comment

First-time director Valdimar Jóhannsson has created something strikingly odd with his auspicious debut feature, Lamb, a part-creature feature, part-ruminant relationship drama about a pair of grieving parents who adopt a half-lamb, half-human baby. At times darkly funny – the human-lamb hybrid child has that effect – but played throughout as deadpan serious by its minimalist cast (led by the always impressive Noomi Rapace of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo acclaim), Lamb is a thought-provoking curio that begs questions about humankind’s need to command the natural world and their own lesser urges – and their inability to do so. Jóhannsson’s vision is strange but singular, adopted in kind by the exact studio that genre-defying fare like this ought to be adopted by, A24, though I remain unconvinced that it necessarily adds up to the kind of menacing profundity intended. Read More