Apples boasts a rich starting premise, but too often undermines its conceptual potency with obvious punchlines and lazy sentimentality. What would society look like…
The track record of measured, believable — let alone sympathetic — portrayals of mental illness on the big screen is spotty at best, oftentimes…
On the occasion of Paul McCartney’s 80th birthday, I decided to burden myself with the unforgiving task of writing about the Beatles. After trying…
After Sherman At its most fraught, to be Black is to feel as if locked in constant battle with the external forces committed to…
Beba is a uniquely fascinating or formally gorgeous mining of personal history, one that fully immerses viewers into its subject’s headspace. “You are now…
The Other One is an overcomplicated affair, but also a hyper-stylized and thrillingly violent one, and further proof that American blockbuster cinema is lagging. Released…
Good Girl Jane Writer-director Sarah Elizabeth Mintz’s debut feature, Good Girl Jane, treads a well-worn path in its portrayal of an innocent teenage girl’s…
[NOTE: This review contains spoilers.] After having made three no-budget features with co-director Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck, Robert Machoian broke through in 2020 with The Killing…
No one is going to mistake Lightyear for a return to form for Pixar, but its littered small pleasures make for an inoffensive animated space…
Spiderhead is pure algorithm “art,” an empty bad-tech tale that delivers nothing new or exciting. You’d be forgiven for getting excited for a mid-budget, talent-driven,…
Jerry and Marge Go Large presents its larger-than-life tale with restraint and sincerity, imbuing its caper framework with the tenderness of a Christmas comedy. If…
Artist and critic Fred Camper once called Howard Hawks (and I’m paraphrasing from memory here) the “hardest to define of all the classic Hollywood…
Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers is a thorny record of exorcised interiority that finds Kendrick Lamar contending with his own ugliness and cultural…
Headful of Sugar finds Sunflower Bean leaning even further into trend-chasing and poptimist orthodoxy. When Tame Impala infused the indie music scene with its retro-futurist…
Despite a decade-long hiatus, 12th of June picks up right where Lovett’s sound left off, for better and worse. A full decade removed from…
Describing music as lulling you to sleep usually isn’t complimentary, but for the hushed, meditative world of Hypnos, it’s high praise. Hypnos is R&B singer-songwriter…
The highs on Harry’s House hit, but the record as a whole is sadly lacking in the charming crooner’s usual energy. One of the most compelling…
Kendrick Lamar Kendrick Lamar is not your savior; he’s not your messiah, not your go-to source for everyday wisdom, and he’s certainly not an…