Villeneuve’s Dune is a gorgeous, monumental, and thrilling take on Herbert’s material, only slightly hampered by a weak finale that anticipates an intended Part Two. It’s the year 10,191. Interstellar space travel (and therefore the known universe) is dependent on a substance called Spice, which can…
The Last Duel is another win for Scott, an agreeably brutal, wickedly incisive tale that is considerably more substantive than mere Rashomon comps. Blending his lavish but gritty historical epics like Gladiator or Kingdom of Heaven with the sorta-high-concept pop feminism of G.I. Jane or Thelma…
The Many Saints of Newark is an affectionate but utterly empty and unnecessary return to the world of Tony Soprano. It always going to be a challenge, if not an impossibility, for any two-hour film to live up to the standard of a TV series…
No Time to Die is a gorgeous entry in the Bond canon, but abysmally paced and expository to a fault. After 15 years, Daniel Craig’s run as James Bond comes to an end in No Time to Die, and while it’s an ambitious (and sure…
Venom: Let There Be Carnage successfully course-corrects from the original, delivering a deeply funny and deeply human film that ranks among the best recent comic book adaptations. 2018’s Venom, like so many comic book adaptations before it, suffered from a severe case of déjà…
Dear Evan Hansen is a manipulative, unintentionally awkward musical plagued by a black hole of a lead character. Dear Evan Hansen makes a pretty strong case for the second biggest recent Broadway smash in the Hamilton world we all live in — yes, still…
Cry Macho is yet another late-career effort from Eastwood deconstructing his own legacy, neither his greatest such effort nor a throwaway piece. Just why does Clint Eastwood — who, in case you weren’t in the know, is now 91 years old and has expressed zero…
Bernard Rose’s 1992 film Candyman, freely adapted from a Clive Barker short story, is the tale of a white academic who inadvertently summons a murderous ghost, textually a manifestation of racial violence against Black men, but simultaneously a commentary on the fear of their…
Blockbuster Beat by Matt Lynch Film
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings | Destin Daniel Cretton
Shang-Chi is perfunctory origin story work boasting little characterization and an overestimation of its representational currency. The Marvel Cinematic Universe marches on undaunted with Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, which, despite its representational bona-fides, could not be a more purely generic exercise…
Reminiscence is silly, arch, and derivative, an objective failure that nonetheless manages to entertain even as it induces eye rolls. It’s kind of fashionable these days to point out how movies (especially genre movies) not based on preexisting IP or part of a franchise are…
