‘THE MENU’ Deliciously Satirizes the Cult of Kitchen

November 17, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Acturo Castro, Anya Taylor-Joy, Hong Chau, Janet McTeer, John Leguizamo, Mark Mylod, Mark St. Cyr, Nicolas Hoult, Out in Theaters, Ralph Fiennes, Reviews, Rob Yang, Seth Reiss, The Menu, Will Tracy 1 Comment

A Taste of Honey

Margot Mills (Anya Taylor-Joy) is not supposed to be dining out at Hawthorne. After all, a table at Hawthorne is amongst the most difficult reservations to land on the planet, held solely for the affluent, celebrities, and those with their own gravitational sphere of influence. From the moment she arrives at the esteemed remote island restaurant, Margot is out of place against the other diners. Esteemed critics, minor celebrities, finance bros – the usual suspects have gathered to taste the creations of Chef Slowik (Ralph Fiennes). And then there’s Margot. The worst part? She doesn’t even really like the food. Read More

‘HALLOWEEN ENDS’ Simultaneously a Weird and Rote Send-Off to a Killer Icon

October 13, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Andi Matichak, Chris Bernier, Danny McBride, David Gordon Green, Halloween, Halloween Ends, Horror, Jaime Lee Curtis, Out in Theaters, Paul Brad Logan, Reviews, Rohan Campbell 14 Comments

Evil Goes Viral

Even if Halloween Ends is a messy, weird, convoluted, predictable, and only quasi-satisfying conclusion to the 40-plus year Michael Myers saga, you have to give it credit for actually trying something new. For much of director David Gordon Green’s trilogy-capper and alleged conclusion to the franchise (at least for now), Mike Myers is MIA. He’s gone. Not involved. For the vast majority of the film, he exists moreso as the lingering idea of the nature of evil than as an actual hulking killer. Instead the focus is on an entirely new character, Corey (Rohan Campbell), a hapless teen who gets roped into a night of babysitting. One prank gone wrong later, Corey accidents kills his charge. Read More

‘THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN’ Examines the Tragic Hilarity of a Country at War With Itself

October 6, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Barry Keoghan, Ben Davis, Brendan Gleeson, Colin Farrell, Kerry Condon, Martin McDonagh, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Sheila Flitton, The Banshees of Inisherin Leave a comment

A Very Civil War

The year is 1923. In Inisherin, a small, remote island off the east coast of Ireland, the days are filled with an almost apocalyptic ennui. From across the bitter cold of the Atlantic, the report of gunfire and cannons signal the ongoing Irish Civil War. Ireland’s Civil War came on the heels of their War of Independence from Great Britain. And claimed even more lives. It pit brothers and friends against one another, forcing allies who had fought alongside each other just the year prior against England at each other’s throats. The war was deeply personal and subsequently bitter and bloody. Read More

‘SMILE’ Curses Audience With a Bloody Good Time

September 29, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Horror, Jessie T User, Kal Penn, Kevin Keppy, Kyle Gallner, Laura Hasn't Slept, Out in Theaters, Parker Finn, Reviews, Robin Weigert, Smile, Sosie Bacon 2 Comments

Grin and Bear It

For those who have experienced it, trauma becomes a dormant passenger. Quietly lurking, but always there behind the curtain. A pile of kindling awaiting a match. In Parker Finn’s supernatural-psychological horror movie Smile, trauma manifests as a suicide curse. When a therapist’s patients brutally kills herself in front of her, Dr. Rose Cotter (Sosie Bacon) becomes the latest victim in a trauma cycle where a compulsion to commit suicide is passed on like a baton. In the world of Smile, if you watch someone kill themselves in spectacularly horrific fashion, you become doomed to die next.

‘BARBARIAN’ Is Part ‘DON’T BREATHE’, Part ‘WRONG TURN’ and it Rules

September 7, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Barbarian, Georgina Campbell, Horror, Reviews, Zach Cregger 3 Comments

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Between 2016’s Don’t Breathe and Barbarian, there’s an emergent sub-genre of horror: Detroit Dystopia. Both films put the urban wreckage of the city’s broken ecosystem under the spotlight to set the scene for unspeakable horrors. Barbarian, if not directly inspired by Fede Alvarez’s 2016 horror hit, shares a lot of the same DNA and influences. Both take place in Detroit’s most rundown neighborhoods – an almost post-civilization shadowland marked by abandoned, graffiti-stained houses, a lack of discernible social services, and the roving few who’ve never left. In the ruin of a once flourishing industrial neighborhood lurks a gaping hole. And in that absence sadism festers. Their tunnels run deep. Read More

‘THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING’ and the Problem of Story Telling as Storytelling

August 23, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged George Miller, Idris Elba, Reviews, Three Thousand Years of Longing, Tilda Swinton 1 Comment

All You Need Is Love

First and foremost, Three Thousand Years of Longing is a story about stories. The history of stories, the way in which we tell stories, and the generational impact of those stories. How stories make us feel, make us yearn, make us swoon, make us fundamentally who we are. How stories become passed down from generation to generation and find themselves colored by those telling them. Where is the intersection of truth and stories? And how much can we expect our narrators to be bastions of truth? Further, the film probes how the stories we tell ourselves and others about who we are become self-fulfilling prophecies. Essentially – how autobiography can trap their tellers, ensnaring them within a cycle of lying about who or what they truly are. It’s a shame then that the least successful aspect of this particular yarn is the way that it unspools its story. Read More

‘BEAST’ a Shaggy Summer Slasher With Sharp Claws

August 18, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Baltasar Kormákur, Beast, Idris Elba, Iyana Halley, Leah Jeffries, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Ryan Engle., Sharlto Copley 1 Comment

Be Prepared

Idris Elba is Dr. Nate Samuels, a man visiting his late wife’s African homeland with his two teenage daughters in the predictable, playful creature feature Beast. The Savannah-set B-movie from director Baltasar Kormákur (Everest, 2 Guns) is a lean, mean summer slasher, all tightly-coiled, knuckle-headed muscle and razor-sharp claws lacking any more brain cells than absolutely required. A vengeful lion hunting humans for sport attacks the good doctor, his daughters Meredith (Iyana Halley) and Norah (Leah Jeffries), and their anti-poacher family friend Martin (Sharlto Copley) while the group is on safari. They must lean on their wits to outsmart the beast and come out of the bush in one piece.

‘THIRTEEN LIVES’ Explores the Depths of Human Ingenuity and Bravery in Workmanlike Retelling

July 26, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Colin Farrell, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Ron Howard, Thirteen Lives, Viggo Mortensen 2 Comments

It Takes a Village

Thirteen Lives, Ron Howard’s dramatic retelling of the 2018 Tham Luang cave rescue, takes an understatement approach to heroics, swerving away from the dramatic fanfare and teary-eyed grace notes of a typical Hollywood feature and relying instead on something more workmanlike, cut-and-dry, and almost minimalist. The true story that inspires Thirteen Lives has already been brilliantly told in National Geographic’s 2021 documentary The Rescue and Howard largely offers an unfussy translation of those events, without a lot else. In some senses, it could be argued that this feature film is an unnecessary addition to the story as it doesn’t provide any significant new wrinkles to the story as told by documentarians Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi. But Howard’s ability to turn historical drama into nail-biting cinema makes this a worthwhile venture nonetheless, even for those acquainted with the details.
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‘MARCEL THE SHELL WITH SHOES ON’ A Delightful and Subtly Profound Mediation on Life (As a Shell)

June 23, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged A24, Dean Fleischer-Camp, Jenny Slate, Marcel The Shell With Shoes On, Out in Theaters, Reviews 3 Comments

Compared to What?

In 2010, the world met Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, a tiny anthropomorphic shell fitted with even tinier pink shoes, a sole googly eye, and a can-do attitude. The short film featuring Marcel was an endearing mockumentary about the trials and tribulations of a single shell’s life. The eponymous character did things like drag a piece of lint around on a hair like a dog while saying, “A lint is a shell’s best friend.” The short garnered 11-million views on YouTube and a legitimate cult following. The enthusiastic shell with many a quotable one-liner became a household name and the original short eventually begat a few short sequels, a couple spin-off storybooks, and, well over a decade later, an actual movie. Read More

‘TOP GUN: MAVERICK’ Offers Peak Blockbuster Thrills, Exceeding Original On Every Front

May 24, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Claudio Miranda, Ed Harris, Jennifer Connelly, Jon Hamm, Joseph Kosinski, Justin Marks, Lorne Balfe, Miles Teller, Peter Craig, Reviews, tom cruise, Top Gun: Maverick 3 Comments

Cruise. Control.

A legacy sequel that could have easily been nothing more than unnecessary nostalgia bait, Top Gun: Maverick is instead a tour de force blockbuster that reminds us of the joys of watching movies at the theater. After two years of wondering what the future of in-person cinema would look like in a post-Covid era, the high-flying feature from director Joseph Kosinski (Oblivion, Only the Brave) recalls the aspirational magic of the theatrical experience by looking back at what came before while also graciously paving the path forward. Read More