Weekend Film Reviews

Critics review the latest film releases: “The Poolman,” “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes,” “Last Stop in Yuma County,” and “Power.”

The latest film releases include The Fall Guy, I Saw the TV Glow, Evil Does Not Exist, and Mars Express. Weighing in are William Bibbiani, film critic for the Wrap and co-host of the Critically Acclaimed Network, and Monica Castillo, freelance film critic and senior film programmer at the Jacob Burns Film Center.

The latest film releases are Challengers, Uncropped, Egoist, and Alien (re-release). Weighing in are Alsondo Duralde and Dave White, film critics and co-hosts of movie podcast Linoleum Knife.

The latest film releases include Abigail, The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, We Grown Now, and The People's Joker. Weighing in are Christy Lemire, film critic for RogerEbert.com and co-host of the YouTube channel Breakfast All Day, and Shawn Edwards, film critic for FOX-TV in Kansas City and co-founder of the African American Film Critics Association.

The latest film releases include Civil War, In Flames, Sting, and Sasquatch Sunset. Weighing in are Alison Willmore, a film critic for New York Magazine and Vulture, and Witney Seibold, contributor to SlashFilm and co-host of the podcast Critically Acclaimed.

The latest film releases are La Bête, Monkey Man, Girls State, and Música. Weighing in are Amy Nicholson, host of the podcast Unspooled and film reviewer for the New York Times, and Tim Grierson, senior U.S. critic for Screen International and the author of This Is How You Make a Movie.

The latest film releases are Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, La Chimera, The Shadowless Tower, and Wicked Little Letters. Weighing in are Alonso Duralde and Dave White, film critics and co-hosts of the podcast Linoleum Knife.

The latest film releases are Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, Shirley, The American Society of Magical Negroes, and Carol Doda Topless at the Condor. Weighing in are Shawn Edwards, film critic for FOX 4 News in Kansas City, and Monica Castillo, freelance film critic and senior film programmer at the Jacob Burns Film Center.

The latest film releases include Arthur the King, One Life, The Animal Kingdom, and Little Wing. Weighing in are William Bibbiani, film critic and co-host of the podcasts Canceled Too Soon and Critically Acclaimed, and Katie Walsh, film reviewer for the Tribune News Service and the Los Angeles Times.

The latest film releases include Kung Fu Panda 4, Love Lies Bleeding, and American Dreamer. Weighing in are Christy Lemire, film critic for RogerEbert.com and co-host of the YouTube channel Breakfast All Day, and Witney Seibold, contributor to SlashFilm and co-host of the podcast Critically Acclaimed. They also predict who will take home Oscars for Best Picture and Best Actress.

The latest film releases are Dune: Part 2, Spaceman, Shayda, and Problemista. Weighing in are Alison Willmore, film critic for NY Magazine and Vulture, and Tim Grierson, Senior U.S. Critic for Screen International and the author of This Is How You Make a Movie.

The latest film releases include Drive-Away Dolls, About Dry Grasses, Perfect Days, and Io Capitano. Weighing in are Alonso Duralde and Dave White, film critics and co-hosts of the movie podcast Linoleum Knife.

The latest film releases are Bob Marley: One Love, Madame Web, Drift, and This is Me … Now. Weighing in are Shawn Edwards, film critic at Fox 4 News and co-founder of the African American Film Critics Association, and Katie Walsh, film reviewer for the Tribune News Service and the Los Angeles Times.

The latest film releases include The Taste of Things, Lisa Frankenstein, Skeletons in the Closet, and Suncoast. Weighing in are William Bibbiani, film critic and co-host of the podcast Canceled Too Soon and The Critically Acclaimed Network, and Monica Castillo, freelance film critic and senior film programmer at the Jacob Burns Film Center.

Critics review the latest film releases: “Argylle,” “How to Have Sex,” “Scrambled,” and “Orion and The Dark.”

The latest film releases include Miller's Girl, Tótem, The Breaking Ice, and The Sweet East. Weighing in are Christy Lemire and Alonso Duralde, co-hosts of the YouTube channel Breakfast All Day.

The latest film releases are I.S.S., The End We Start From, The Kitchen, and Founder’s Day. Weighing in are Katie Walsh, film reviewer for the Tribune News Service, the Los Angeles Times, and The Wrap; and William Bibbiani, film critic and co-host of the podcast Canceled Too Soon and The Critically Acclaimed Network.

The latest film releases are Mean Girls, The Beekeeper, The Settlers, and The Book of Clarence. Weighing in are Shawn Edwards, film critic at Fox 4 News and co-founder of the African American Film Critics Association, and Alison Willmore, film critic for New York Magazine and Vulture.

The latest film releases include Night Swim, Occupied City, All of Us Strangers, and Good Grief. Weighing in are Witney Seibold, contributor to SlashFilm and co-host of the podcast Critically Acclaimed, and Amy Nicholson, host of the podcast Unspooled and film reviewer for the New York Times.

The latest film releases are Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, The Iron Claw, Ferrari, and The Color Purple. Weighing in are William Bibbiani, film critic and co-host of the Critically Acclaimed Network, and Shawn Edwards, a journalist for FOX 4 News in Kansas City.

The latest film releases are The Zone of Interest, American Fiction, Wonka, and Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget. Weighing in are Tim Grierson, senior U.S. critic for Screen International and the author of This Is How You Make a Movie, and Alison Willmore, film critic for NY Magazine and Vulture.

The latest film releases are Poor Things, The Boy and the Heron, Origin, and Waitress. Weighing in are Christy Lemire, film critic for RogerEbert.com and co-host of the YouTube channel “Breakfast All Day,” and Alonso Duralde, co-host of “Breakfast All Day.”

The newest film releases include Godzilla Minus One, Eileen, Silent Night, and Candy Cane Lane. Weighing in are Katie Walsh, film reviewer for the Tribune News Service and the Los Angeles Times, and Witney Seibold, contributor to SlashFilm and co-host of the podcast Critically Acclaimed.

The latest film releases include Napoleon, Wish, Maestro, American Symphony, and Good Burger 2. Weighing in are William Bibbiani, film critic and co-host of the Critically Acclaimed Network, and Shawn Edwards, journalist for FOX 4 News in Kansas City, Missouri.

The latest film releases include The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, Next Goal Wins, Fallen Leaves, May December, and Saltburn. Weighing in are Tim Grierson, senior U.S. critic for Screen International and the author of This Is How You Make a Movie, and Amy Nicholson, host of the podcast Unspooled and film reviewer for The New York Times.

Critics review the latest film releases: “The Marvels,” “Dream Scenario,” “It’s a Wonderful Knife,” “A Still Small Voice.”

The latest film releases include Priscilla, The Killer, What Happens Later, and Rustin. Weighing in are Christy Lemire, film critic for RogerEbert.com and co-host of the YouTube channel “Breakfast All Day,” and Alonso Duralde, film critic and co-host of movie podcast Linoleum Knife.

The latest film releases are Five Nights at Freddy's, Pain Hustlers, The Holdovers, and Fingernails. Weighing in are Amy Nicholson, host of the podcast Unspooled and film reviewer for the New York Times, and Shawn Edwards, film critic at Fox 4 News and co-founder of the African American Film Critics Association.

The latest film releases are Killers of the Flower Moon, The Persian Version, More Than Ever, and Divinity. Weighing in are Witney Seibold, contributor to SlashFilm and co-host of the podcast “Critically Acclaimed,” and Carlos Aguilar, film reviewer for the Los Angeles Times and AV Club.

The latest film releases include Anatomy of a Fall, My Love Affair with Marriage, Silver Dollar Road, and The Mission. Weighing in are Katie Walsh, film reviewer for the Tribune News Service and the Los Angeles Times, and Shawn Edwards, film critic for FOX-TV in Kansas City.

The latest film releases include The Exorcist: Believer, Cat Person, The Royal Hotel, and Dicks: The Musical. Weighing in are Tim Grierson, senior U.S. critic for Screen Daily, and Allison Willmore, film critic at New York Magazine and Vulture.

The latest film releases include The Creator, Saw X, Fair Play, and Dumb Money. Weighing in are Christy Lemire, film critic for RogerEbert.com and co-host of the YouTube channel “Breakfast All Day, and Amy Nicholson, host of the podcast Unspooled and film reviewer for The New York Times.

The latest film releases include “Flora and Son,” “Invisible Beauty,” and “The Origin of Evil.” Plus, “Stop Making Sense” is re-released in 4K IMAX. Hear reviews from Alonso Duralde and Dave White, film critics and co-hosts of movie podcast Linoleum Knife.

The latest film releases include “A Haunting In Venice,” “Cassandro,” “Rotting In The Sun,” and “A Million Miles Away.” Hear from Katie Walsh, film reviewer for the Tribune News Service and the Los Angeles Times; and Witney Seibold, contributor to SlashFilm and co-host of the podcast “Critically Acclaimed.”

The latest film releases are “Scrapper,” “El Conde,” “The Nun II,” and “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3.” Weighing in are Christy Lemire, film critic for RogerEbert.com and co-host of the YouTube channel “Breakfast All Day,” and William Bibbiani, film critic for the Wrap and co-host of the Critically Acclaimed Network.

The latest film releases include “The Equalizer 3,” “Goldfish,” “The Good Mother,” “Nandor Fodor and the Talking Mongoose.” Weighing in are Katie Walsh, film reviewer for the Tribune News Service, the Los Angeles Times, and The Wrap; and Shawn Edwards, film critic for FOX-TV in Kansas City.

This week’s film releases include “Gran Turismo,” “Retribution,” “Golda,” and “Bottoms.” KCRW gets reviews from Amy Nicholson, host of the podcast Unspooled and film reviewer for The New York Times; and William Bibbiani, film critic for The Wrap and co-host of the Critically Acclaimed Network of podcasts.

It's not your ordinary lamb, but then "Lamb" isn't your ordinary Icelandic indie film. It's a debut feature, by Valdimar Jóhannsson, that's extraordinarily well made, seriously strange and stars the superb Noomi Rapace, who was the fierce Goth hacker Lisbeth Salandar in the original Swedish version of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo."

It's been 15 years since we first saw him, and were startled by him, as James Bond in "Casino Royale" (which turned out to be one of the best Bonds ever.) Now Daniel Craig is playing Bond for the last time in "No Time To Die," which is very long, very uneven and, from time to time, greatly affecting.

What if the man who says "I'm Your Man" isn't a man? Maria Schrader's German-language sci-fi romance explores the shifting ground between hormones and silicon.

The 48th annual Telluride Film Festival took place actually, rather than virtually, at its accustomed site almost 10,000 feet up in the Colorado Rockies. Last year the festival went dark during the pandemic. This year it was an exuberant reminder, as always, that the movie medium is alive and, against heavy odds, well.

In the movie world the word "sequel" is usually a synonym for letdown. Not so with the new "Candyman," which calls itself a "spiritual sequel" to the 1992 slasher classic. The director, Nia DaCosta, and her colleagues--she wrote the screenplay with Jordan Peele and Win Rosenfeld--have transformed the material by rethinking what it said about race in America in the first place.

"Reminiscence," a futurist debut feature by Lisa Joy, the co-creator of "Westworld," may be best remembered for its stunning images of Miami at a time of catastrophic climate change, when rising sea levels have engulfed much of the city. The immensely complicated plot, on the other hand, is mostly mind-numbing.

Matt Damon is an Oklahoma oil-patch worker who travels to France to help his daughter, imprisoned in Marseille for a murder she claims she didn't commit. The film is a fictional reworking of the case of Amanda Knox, an American woman acquitted in 2015 of the charge of having killed her flatmate. The director and co-writer was Tom McCarthy, who did the investigative procedural "Spotlight."

Vacationers in a tropical resort age mysteriously in "Old," an inexplicably silly horror/slasher/sci-fi feature by M. Night Shyamalan.

"Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain" captures the sweep of the chef-turned-TV-celebrity's life in captivating detail. It also struggles with the mystery of why, at what seemed to be the peak of his career, Bourdain committed suicide three years ago in his room in a French hotel.

Value "Black Widow," the latest addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, for what it is (a surprisingly intimate portrait of two sisters and their strange family, plus several elegant action sequences) rather than discounting it for what it isn't (another of Marvel's adventures in which cosmic forces are at work.)

The action master, who last directed an episode of "Fast and Furious" in 2013, is back with "F9: The Fast Saga," an action spectacular in which cars not only fly--that's so old-school--but go into orbit.

Retired? Not on your life, or hers. This indefatigable entertainment icon has recently finished a role in Steven Spielberg's new screen version of "West Side Story" (she won an Oscar for her work in the 1961 version.) Now she's the subject of a new documentary in which she looks back on her life, and forward to whatever the next gig may be.

Before Lin-Manuel Miranda brought his astonishing "Hamilton" to Broadway he created "In the Heights," a Broadway musical set in a Latino, mostly Dominican neighborhood of Washington Heights, in Upper Manhattan near the George Washington Bridge. Thirteen years after its opening, the show has finally made it to the screen in a production that's just what is needed to bring movie audiences back into the fold.

"The Conjuring" films have conjured billions of box-office dollars since the first one in 2013. But now, with the latest installment called "The Devil Made Me Do It," there's a sense of paranormal events winding down, which is a very normal fate for a blockbuster franchise.

"A Quiet Place II" picks up where the original--the very original original--left off. The post-apocalyptic world is still beset by blind monsters who listen for the tiniest sound, then turn the hapless human who made it into lunch.

You could say "The Dry," a fine Australian thriller, is partly about global warming. It's been almost a year without rain when Aaron Falk, a federal cop played by Eric Bana, drives northwest from Melbourne through parched lands to a funeral in the small town he left 20 years ago. The drought has changed everyone's life, Aaron's best friend seems to have killed his wife and son before taking his own life and Aaron himself remains under suspicion in the town for his girlfriend's death all those many years ago.

Usually the simplest part of reviewing a movie is designating its genre. The most straightforward description of “Riders of Justice,” in Danish with English subtitles, is a drama with intense action elements and darkly comic overtones. But a more accurate description is that it’s a deliciously absurdist, fundamentally serious, even philosophical enterprise that uses a superheated revenge plot to address our common need for making sense out of life.

Billy Crystal plays a comedy writer with dementia in "Here Today," and Tiffany Haddish is a singer and street performer who becomes his guardian angel, but the mirth is forced and the energy false.

The hero of "Moffie" is a closeted gay conscript in the South Africa of 1981. In addition to the killing arts, he and his fellow draftees are trained in racism and homophobia.

Versus films are a genre unto themselves. Now we have "Godzilla vs. Kong," an addition to the genre that isn't proud so much as inevitable. Or unavoidable.

In "Nobody," the star of "Better Call Saul" plays a placid suburbanite who discovers the pleasures of revenge.

"The Courier," a Cold War spy thriller starring Benedict Cumberbatch, is earnest to a fault. Meaning it's unaccountably dull, even though Cumberbatch gives another of his strong performances, this time in the role of Greville Wynne, a British civilian recruited by MI6 and the CIA to travel to the Soviet Union and make covert contact with a Soviet intelligence officer who wants to help the West avoid a nuclear war.

Working from the Nico Walker novel about the horrors of war and opioid addiction, Anthony Russo and Joe Russo have made a screen version that elevates, for better or the gritty source material into the epic journey of a troubled soul.

In "The Truffle Hunters," a new documentary by Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw, Italian men in their 60s, 70s and 80s do as they've done for decades--search the forests of the Alba region for precious white truffles. Their lives are happy and their health is fine, but their work is increasingly endangered.

"The United States vs. Billie Holiday" chronicles the U.S. government's war on Billie Holiday in the late 1940s, when the Bureau of Narcotics saw in the peerless, heroin-addicted singer a chance to racialize its so-called war on drugs.

In Chloé Zhao's gorgeous "Nomadland," a woman in her 60s, played with gusto and intimations of grief by Frances McDormand, joins a transient population of older and just plain old Americans driving their vans and RV's around the American West in search of companionship, and gig work where they can find it.

In Shaka King's remarkable "Judas and the Black Messiah," Fred Hampton and the Chicago Black Panthers struggle against racism in the late 1960's, unaware that the FBI has planted an informant in their midst.

"Little Fish" finished shooting many months before Covid-19 hit, but it gets some things right and other things very right, even though the virus in the movie attacks your memory instead of taking your life.

Sutton Hoo, in the English countryside in Suffolk, was the site of one of the most spectacular archaeological finds of the 20th century. Now that discovery has been dramatized--affectingly, and quite accurately--in a Netflix film called "The Dig."

Flawlessly acted by Dakota Johnson, Casey Affleck and Jason Segel, and beautifully directed by Gabriela Cowperthwaite, this movie about friendship and cancer--in that order--is funny and affecting in equal measure.

That's how the hero of "The White Tiger" views his native India. The way you'll view the film is with rapt attention and great delight. It's really terrific.

A documentary called "The Reason I Jump" is a stirring new addition to the movie genre--best exemplified by "The Miracle Worker"--about disabled people who can't express what they're thinking or feeling.

"Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" stars Viola Davis as the great blues singer of the title and Chadwick Boseman, brilliant in his final performance as the cornetist in a quartet that accompanies her. "White folk don't understand the blues," Ma says at one point. Their understanding will be enhanced by this powerful, ultimately shattering film version of the 1982 August Wilson play.

Are you willing to watch 130 minutes of unfounded self-delight for four minutes of terrific song and dance? Then "The Prom" is the film for you. The cast includes Meryl Streep, James Corden and Nicole Kidman, but there's little they can do to save this Netflix music from its own excesses.

The subject is love--between Eva Green's astronaut mother and her 7-year-old daughter, played affectingly by Zélie Boulant--and extremely well-founded separation anxiety, since Mom is soon to blast off for a one-year tour aboard the International Space Station.

Frederick Wiseman's documentary feature, "City Hall," is the latest in a remarkable string of 43 films about cultural and political institutions. It's more than four hours long, but fascinating at almost every point along the way, a testament to the ideal of civic governance and the complex pleasures of city life.

"The Witches," Robert Zemeckis's remake of the 1990 version of the dark Roald Dahl novel, transfers the action from Norway and the United Kingdom to Alabama in the late 1960s. That's a good idea with one substantial reservation. Remaking a cult classic turns out to be a digital-effects extravaganza and too much of a good thing.

In striking ways Aaron Sorkin's "The Trial of the Chicago 7 " is a docudrama for our time. It's about the riots that surrounded the 1968 Democratic convention, which took place during the Vietnam war, and the 1969 trial of anti war demonstrators charged with inciting violence in the streets around the convention. But docudramas have their own way of mixing truth with invention, and this one is no exception.

Garrett Bradley's "Time," a gorgeous documentary that skips back and forth over the course of two decades, is a Black filmmaker's lyrical tribute to a Black family trying to hold itself together while it's beset by barely imaginable pressures.

Bill Murray and Rashida Jones star in Sofia Coppola's "On the Rocks," a film about her marriage and their relationship, both of which are fraught and funny.

Millie Bobby Brown was only 12 when she first played Eleven, the mysterious girl with psychokinetic powers, on the TV series "Stranger Things." Now she's all of 16 and starring as Sherlock Holmes's kid sister in "Enola Holmes." The mystery this time is how she carries the whole movie with nary a false note.

After cancelling this year's Telluride Film Festival because of the pandemic, the festival set up shop for one night at a pop-up drive-in next to the Rose Bowl. Only one film was shown, but it was special, and beautiful--Chloé Zhao's "Nomadland."

A Netflix documentary, "The Social Dilemma," examines the myriad ways social media platforms hold our attention while they mine our minds for data and pollute them with news that ranges from trivial through questionable to flat-out counterfeit.

Charlie Kaufman's "I'm Thinking of Ending It All" defies description but doesn't defeat it. The Netflix film starts with two people in a car on a road trip, then goes off on a trip of its own to explore matters of identity, relationships, projection (not the multiplex kind) and nothing less than the nature of reality. It can be exasperating, but also beautiful, a work of emotional impressionism with moments of rueful grace and startling images that evoke yearning.

A new documentary, "Robin's Wish," deals with the disease that took his life, but also celebrates his life, and his courage as his inner self came undone.

"Desert One," a superb documentary by Barbara Kopple, examines the 1980 special forces mission launched secretly by President Jimmy Carter in an attempt to end the Iran hostage crisis.

In "Boys State," a documentary streaming on Apple TV+, 1,000 or so high school juniors come together in Texas for a week-long program in which they build their own state government and run for governor in mock elections. How they go about it inevitably reflects the state of participatory politics in supposedly adult America. It is not a pretty picture.

Ron Howard's "Rebuilding Paradise," a fine National Geographic documentary, reconstructs the 2018 wildfire that destroyed the town of Paradise in the foothills of Northern California. The film also has something to say, however indirectly, about our own rebuilding effort, once the pandemic is behind us, and about even greater challenges to come.

"Radioactive," a biopic that starts to be about Marie Curie, can't resist a cause-and-effect survey of radiation that extends as far afield as Hiroshima, the Nevada Proving Ground and Chernobyl. But Rosamund Pike's vivid performance as the peerless scientist and two-time Nobel Prize winner comes close to redeeming the whole production.

A Netflix documentary, "Father Soldier Son," spans almost a decade as it tracks a former platoon sergeant, gravely wounded in Afghanistan, and the two young sons who adore him.

"Greyhound," with Tom Hanks as a destroyer captain during the Battle of the Atlantic in World War II, brings an action adventure to home screens. But it also reminds us how much we've lost with the closing of theaters and their huge screens.

"The Audition" stars the great German actress Nina Hoss as a violin teacher determined to turn a tender young student into a virtuoso.

"Babyteeth" is a debut feature from Australia, and what a debut: Shannon Murphy, who's never done a full-length film before, directed from a screenplay by Rita Kalnejais. The genre is familiar, a lovely young girl with a disease that may kill her, but that's where the familiarity ends and a wonderfully unpredictable tragicomedy begins. The girl, Milla, is played by Eliza Scanlen, who was so radiant as Beth in Greta Gerwig's "Little Women." Toby Wallace is remarkable as Moses, the whacked-out love of Milla's life.

Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods," streaming on Netflix, is sprawling, enthralling and essential viewing. It comes on as an action adventure--a group of black Vietnam vets go back to Vietnam to find the remains of their squad leader and the gold bullion he helped them bury. But it's really about black lives--how much they matter, what blacks have endured in America's past and where they belong in its turbulent present.

"Shirley," a free-form fictional biopic about the writer Shirley Jackson, has two main settings: Bennington, Vermont, where, in the 1960s, her husband teaches English at Bennington College, and the turbulent landscape of Shirley's inner life, where she struggles with the same demons that populate her stories and books.

Can the theatrical experience survive? Movie theaters will reopen sometime soon, though not all of them, but the streaming revolution was changing viewing habits long before the pandemic, and has only gained force, and converts, since the coronavirus struck. Balancing the gains and losses is hard for a child of the movie palaces.

Every few years since they joined forces to do "The Trip" in 2010, the English funnymen Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon have done another installment--"The Trip To Italy" followed by "The Trip To Spain." The latest and final one, "The Trip To Greece," follows their formula of visiting photogenic spots, eating fancy meals and talking funny talk that includes spot-on celebrity impressions. After this there'll be no one to do Michael Caine except Michael Caine.

In less than four minutes, on Super 8 film, Spike Lee has captured the pain and surreal stillness of New York's pandemic moment.

"Saint Frances" is a feature debut for its director, Alex Thompson, and its writer, Kelly O'Sullivan, who also co-stars with a remarkable child actor named Ramona Edith Williams. They play, respectively, Bridget, a nanny, and Frances, the kid who changes the nanny's life. "Mary Poppins" it is not.

"Deerskin" is a tale of murderous obsession and a deerskin jacket, though not in that order. The star is Jean Dujardin, who won an Oscar in 2012 for his buoyantly funny portrayal of George Valentin, a silent-film actor on the way down. Once again he's playing a Georges, with an 's' but without the buoyancy.

"Circus of Books," a new Netflix documentary, centers on an old West Hollywood landmark, the porn shop on the corner of La Jolla and Santa Monica Boulevard. But the center of the center is about prejudice, and how it can arise in the unlikeliest places.

In "Selah and the Spades," Tayarisha Poe's impressive debut feature, a tyrannical teen rules the prep-school roost.