The Good Liar movie review: mangled web
We expect a film about a con man to con us, but it’s not fun here: it’s absurd. This limp thriller might fancy itself smart, sharp, twisty, and probably feminist, but it just made me groan out loud.
based on a book
Doctor Sleep movie review: a reckoning with the ghosts of the past
A wonderfully unexpected sort of horror movie, beautiful and delicate, but unsettling, too, with an authentic plausibility to the dichotomy between the invented uncanny and the human response to it.
Official Secrets movie review: blow all the whistles
Not a spy thriller but a story of emotional and intellectual suspense wrangling with matters of patriotism and of conscience, and of just how far journalism’s watchdog role can and should take it.
It: Chapter Two movie review: it doesn’t float
A bigger misfire than its predecessor, and a waste of a great cast. Unsupportably overlong, with a feel-good self-care denouement that’s almost dangerous. The only terrifying thing here is the tedium.
Blinded by the Light movie review: bend it like The Boss
Seriously adorkable teen is saved, in 1987, by the rock poetry of Bruce Springsteen. The Boss is still relevant today, as is, alas, the harsh political and economic setting of Thatcher’s Britain.
A Dog’s Journey movie review: Does the Dog Die? The Movie
Pure rerun of A Dog’s Purpose: Pooch Bailey returns again and again (again) in different bodies to love and serve his humans. A sappy tail, pleasantly daydreamy. I’m not crying you’re crying.
Bel Canto movie review: Stockholm syndrome, a love story
This tonal misfire never hits the notes of drama and romance it aims for with its ickily problematic terrorist-hostage relationships. Facile and uncomfortably implausible, emotionally and practically.
The Silence movie review: I have only the faintest of muted praise
Not a knockoff of that other quiet horror flick, though this familiar monster movie works hard to convince otherwise. But the terrific cast makes it worth a look, at least for Netflix subscribers.
Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché documentary review: the movie pioneer you’ve never heard of
Not only a portrait of the woman who made more than a thousand of the very first films, but a mystery detective story about how the achievements of a trailblazing woman were erased, and found again.
Pet Sematary (2019) movie review: bad things happen when you leave the city
A lazy adaptation of the Stephen King novel, manipulatively cheap when it isn’t provoking eye-rolls at its genre banalities. Why can’t someone find the right role for the charismatic Jason Clarke?
