Swallows and Amazons movie review: a free-range kiddie adventure
Behold a time before helicopter parenting, when children roamed free, ate cake for dinner, and played with fire. A delightfully old-fashioned treat.
historical
Pete’s Dragon movie review: big friendly dragon
More like a pleasant walk in a redwood forest with a boy and his dragon than a rollicking adventure, but its serenity and warm heart are infectious.
The Legend of Tarzan and Free State of Jones movies review: enough with the white saviors
Filtering other people’s stories through the eyes of white men is tedious and offensive, and it feels like a desperate hedge against fresh perspectives.
Ice Age: Collision Course movie review: where is a mass extinction when you need one?
The Ice Age flicks are the cinematic equivalent of drive-through nuggets of reconstituted chicken slurry served by a bored teenager in a cardboard hat.
The BFG movie review: that sense of wonder where it all went wrong
Fantasy meandering twists into something more action-oriented, and there’s little magic in it. This is not what we expect from a master cinematic fantasist.
Raiders!: The Story of the Greatest Fan Film Ever Made documentary review: it belongs in a cinema!
Thoroughly hilarious, surprisingly poignant portrait of fandom, friendship, and the filmmaking odyssey that consumed the teenage years of three movie lovers.
The Conjuring 2 movie review: haunting only in its disjointed bulkiness
“Less Ed and Lorraine” and “more cheese and cardboard” is precisely the last direction a sequel to the classy original should have gone in. Yet here we are.
Holding the Man movie review: grand romance, no qualifiers needed
Told with a lovely romantic sweep and full of raw, honest emotion, this is a gay love story that’s also just a great love story, full stop. Yay.
The Nice Guys movie review: not-so-nice comic noir
Two fun characters played by two great actors with fantastic chemistry together go in search of a movie, and — spoiler! — never quite find it.
Gods of Egypt movie review: those whom the gods wish to punish, they force to watch this movie
Hilariously, casting white Westerners as mortals and deities of the ancient Nile is the least offensive thing about this crime against goofball cinema.
