Little movie review: small and slight indeed
Bullying tech CEO is cursed to revert to powerless kid-dom. The limp, desperate comedy that follows never figures out who its audience is and is often unintentionally obnoxious and disturbing.
teen
Shazam! movie review: unmarvelous
Nothing matters in this literal adolescent-male power fantasy, a cheesy mishmash of nonsense and low stakes. Anyone who needs at least a bit of meat in their superhero tales will be disappointed.
The Crossing (Guo Chun Tian) movie review: smuggler’s blahs
This uninvolving coming-of-age crime drama tries to dazzle with visual tricksiness, but it cannot make up for its teen protagonist who is mere metaphorical symbol, and a bystander in her own story.
Five Feet Apart movie review: love/sick teen romance
Beautiful teens fall in love while dying prettily in this year’s tragic young romance, one that medical necessity renders refreshingly chaste. Best bit: Star Haley Lu Richardson is genuinely charming.
Children of the Snow Land documentary review: an epic journey… to and from school
An unexpected, beautiful movie about the character and mettle it takes just to go to school when you come from one of the poorest and most remote places on the planet. A profoundly moving journey.
Oscar Nominated Documentary Shorts 2019 (91st Academy Awards) review
My pick: Marshall Curry’s “A Night at the Garden,” presenting footage from a 1939 “pro-America” rally in New York City, a chilling reminder of the unpleasant cycles of American history.
Fighting with My Family movie review: real fake
Genuinely heartwarming, totally cheerworthy, bursting with warm and generous performances, and just a whole damn lotta fun. (And I hate professional wrestling.) Florence Pugh absolutely rocks it.
Alita: Battle Angel movie review: ‘Rollerblade Runner’ with a Strong Female Character(TM)
Devoid of personality and soul, this hellish Frankenstein monster of processed entertainment product wallows in a stew of borrowed ideas and imagery and does absolutely nothing fresh with them.
If Beale Street Could Talk movie review: a velvet fist of love and strength
A beautiful story about ugliness, about dignity in the face of hatred, told via delicate yet steely performances that imbue it with a power at once tender and infuriating. Totally enrapturing.
Bumblebee movie review: floats like a butterfly…
Nostalgic yet not mindlessly retro, a heartfelt girl-and-her-alien-robot-car action-adventure dramedy that hits all the right notes. Hailee Steinfeld is terrific, and there’s nary a whiff of Michael Bay.
