A surprisingly lovely bit of counter-programming arrives ahead of the dinosaurs in the form of I’ll See You In My Dreams. Carol Petersen (the wonderful Blythe Danner), an ex-musician and teacher, has been on pause since her husband passed 20 years ago. When her dog dies (this happens onscreen, it’s not gory but brace yourself) […]
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Review: Tomorrowland
Tomorrowland opens with a classic Disney fanfare and font that are supposed to make you think it’s already a classic, or will be soon enough, but director Brad Bird (The Incredibles) and co-screenwriter Damon Lindelof (that guy, co-creator of Lost, knows from disappointing people) never quite match the hope they clearly want to inspire. At […]
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Review: Far From the Madding Crowd
Carey Mulligan is a feminist way before her time (1870s rural England) as a farm owner who can’t walk across her own damn field without getting proposed to in Far From the Madding Crowd, yet another entry from the Thomas Hardy factory. Her suitors include Matthias Schoenaerts (hot), Michael Sheen (old) and Tom Sturridge (a-hole, […]
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Review: Avengers: Age of Ultron
“Where are all the ladies?” asks Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders) in Avengers: Age of Ultron, in a winky tone that is Joss Whedon saying “Look, I get it! I am a feminist too! I did Buffy!” Except there are only eight other women with speaking roles in a credited cast of over 100, and two […]
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Review: The Age of Adaline
When you lay out the facts of The Age of Adaline, starring Blake Lively (no) as a woman who dies for two minutes via drowning until she is struck by lightning (buh), which renders her ageless for decades, with a daughter played by Ellen Burstyn (um) and an ex-love by Harrison Ford (barf), it makes […]
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Review: While We’re Young
The notably caustic Noah Baumbach, not quite as chilly as Wes Anderson or the Coens but a far cry from Richard Linklater or even Kevin Smith, changed his tune with 2012’s wonderful Frances Ha, about a 20-something trying to find herself in New York. It was co-written by and starred Greta Gerwig, Baumbach’s real-life love. […]
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Review: True Story
Clowns get serious in the crime drama True Story, starring Jonah Hill as an arrogant reporter undone by a plagiarism scandal and James Franco as the accused murderer who was using his identity while on the lam. Arriving with little fanfare (it premiered at Sundance), make no mistake that this is yet another vanity project […]
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Review: Furious 7
It’s always amusing when people—men (boys)—come out swinging before a movie’s even released about how you shouldn’t make fun of it just because it’s the sixth sequel to something dumb, like do you hate fun and driving and The Rock like a monster or what? Had star Paul Walker not died in a high-speed car […]
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Review: The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
All your favourites are back in the year’s first tentpole sequel! In the two-hour cross-canon thrill ride The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, you’ve got Iron Man chilling with Shredder at the club, Wonder Woman going #yolo with Catwoman (sexual tension: not invisible) in the country, and Thor putting his hammer to good use rebuilding […]
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Review: Focus
Will Smith gives a big speech about “focus” that feels like they tacked it on after renaming the movie then never mentions it again in Focus, the story of a suspiciously well-off con man and his intern (Margot Robbie, last seen saddled with even worse material in The Wolf of Wall Street, born the same […]
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Review: Still Alice
You are unlikely to find a finer-featured, fairer face at the movies than that of Julianne Moore’s, or one with as much empathy and intelligence behind its freckles—so ably, Linneyian warm one moment and fiercely terrifying the next (that was her screaming “You suck my dick!” at a pharmacist in Magnolia). In Still Alice, she […]
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Quiet Chaos
Another Oscar season fast approaches, adding another year to the more than 10 that have passed since Roberto Benigni’s Life is Beautiful so impressed the Academy. That film told the story of a Jewish father’s use of storytelling and humour to shield his son from the full force of life in a camp and the […]