Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse movie review: be prepared… to throw it in the campfire
One of the most sexist movies I’ve ever seen. Male juvenile fantasy at its most tired, its most obvious, its most banal, and its most infuriating.
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Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials movie review: apocalyptic pile-on
The only slightly original element of the first film — the Maze — is gone, and now we’re in not simply a generic afterscape but every sci-fi afterscape.
The Second Mother movie review: cleaning house
Sharply observant and always surprising; mixes dry humor, aching drama, and stinging social commentary in its clashes between classes and generations.
The Visit movie review: grandma’s house (of horrors?)
Over the river and through the woods to yet another banal, anticlimactic attempt at storytelling from M. Night Shyamalan. And this time, it’s found-footage.
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl movie review: sick of it
The Manic Pixie Dream Girl gets sick, but she can still inspire a man to better himself, while also adding a dash of repugnant narcissism to the subgenre.
Barely Lethal movie review: hidden in plain sight
Charming and funny, a wonderfully sweet and silly mashup of spy stuff and high-school comedies, like if John Hughes made a James Bond movie.
Ten Thousand Saints movie review: exhausted urban elegy
An achingly perfect evocation of New York’s East Village in the 1980s and an amazing cast cannot make this tale of adolescent anxiety catch fire.
Paper Towns and Mistress America movies review: girls’ stories are their own (and not yours, boys)
Want to debunk the myth and the mystery of the manic pixie dream girl? There’s a wrong way to do that… and an oh-so marvelously right way.
52 Tuesdays movie rating: green light
Compassionate Australian drama about a teenaged girl’s sexual awakening that is complicated by her mother’s transgender transition to manhood.
Max movie review: all dogs go to war
Jingoistic propaganda and heart-tugging cornball melodrama about a dog with PTSD. It’s how we are Enduring Freedom. God bless America.
