Lost Girls movie review: and still unfound
Based-on-fact drama puts the focus where it rarely is onscreen: on women who are victims of male violence. Yet a terrific central performance and an abundance of empathy cannot overcome its clichés.
girls/women
My Darling Vivian documentary review: from ardent lover to cold hard Cash (SXSW 2020)
Nascent celebrity culture and the myth of the artist’s muse are skewered by the tale of Johnny Cash’s first wife, Vivian Liberto, told by her daughters and a trove of vintage photos and love letters.
Saint Frances movie review: there will be blood — deal with it
Taboo-busting laugh-until-you-cry tale dares to speak of oft-unspoken matters of women’s lives. So very necessary to open up the range of women’s experiences seen as baseline. I love this movie.
Swallow movie review: leaves a sour taste
Half a century ago, this would have been radical. Today, it’s banal. The slick postwar aesthetic is emblematic of a male filmmaker’s understanding of women that exists only through dated stereotypes.
Military Wives movie review: tired choir dramedy needs to change the tune
So aggressively precisely what you think it is that there’s almost no point in seeing it. Flattens a true story into generic pap that isn’t even that successfully, authentically feel-good, either.
The Photograph movie review: love as a balancing act
It’s meet-melancholy in an elegant, female-gazey romantic drama audaciously mingling past and present. A swanky celebration of confident, complex women and the bittersweetness of adult relationships.
The Lodge movie review: stuck in miserably mushy snow
This exasperating movie is so obnoxious it could be deliberately trolling us. Wants to have its ambiguous cake and eat it, too, smothered in a gloomy frosting. *extremely pinches nose in despair*
Like a Boss movie review: it doesn’t quite fall down on the job
This instantly forgettable fluff lazily relies on too many unfunny slapstick and grossout tangents. But real humor blossoms in the terrific performances and in a fast, funny, and surprising feminism.
Seberg movie review: inept tribute to a troubled movie star
French New Wave icon Jean Seberg plays an unwitting game of cat-and-mouse with the FBI in a strangled blend of biopic and paranoid thriller. Not even always fascinating Kristen Stewart can save this.
A Simple Wedding movie review: spoiler, it’s not so simple
Charming culture-clash rom-com is full of life, celebrating human universals of family and love, and embracing differences that make the world so interesting. Smart and spritely, feminist and funny.
