Rare Objects movie review: broken things, on the mend
It’s overstuffed and often jarring. But it’s also honest and unassuming, never insipid or sentimental, with a rough power, a generous spirit, and performances that are warm, wise, and perceptive.
based on a book
How to Blow Up a Pipeline movie review: it means the earth to them
A heist drama, incendiary and intense, with planetary stakes. These young people are desperate, with nothing to lose, and everyone older than them made them this way. Nihilism is their only optimism.
Knock at the Cabin movie review: there appears to be an apocalypse happening
There is only one thing worse than an M. Night Shyamalan movie with a twist ending. And that is one without a twist ending. Feels like a faith-based movie trying to sneak in under a disingenuous wire.
A Man Called Otto movie review: a rare misfire for Tom Hanks
With cowardly mildness, this white-bread mush misuses its star’s likability. Tom Hanks trying to be grumpy yet endearing has the opposite impact. He’s somehow less endearing than he’s been before.
Bullet Train movie review: total derailment
The cast is, on paper, terrific, but there’s nothing engaging in their bloody savagery. A misfire of a supposed action comedy, this mind-numbing mess is by turns grating, tedious, and infuriating.
Mrs Harris Goes to Paris movie review: a fashion for kindness
This 60-year-old story of pursuing a dream with resolute kindness could not feel more fresh in its knowing class clash. Lesley Manville is an absolute treasure, her command of comedic pathos supreme.
The Quiet Girl (An Cailín Ciúin) movie review: sweet summer child
One of the most beautiful movies I’ve ever seen. It is impossibly small, and emotionally immense, full of the most bittersweet of pathos that the coming-of-age genre offers. A treasure, and a gift.
Happening (L’événement) movie review: the history about to repeat itself
An intense, intimate tale of historical illegal abortion, with a central performance of focused terror; a harrowing body horror that looms again. I cannot overstate the absolute urgency of this film.
The Yellow Wallpaper movie review: gaslight but no heat
Stiflingly literal mounting of the classic feminist tale. Flat and stilted, with no cultural context and no visceral insight into its protagonist’s plight, and emptiness where there should be empathy.
The Bad Guys movie review: criminally fun
A snappy, snarky, never-ever sentimental concoction of cartoon chaos meets hip heist flick. Its breezy swagger extends to the delightful animation, organic and mellow, hot and cool at the same time.
