Finding Emily movie review: call waiting
A smart, funny switched-up Cinderella for the social-media era with lots to say about modern dating and gender relations that is caustic, optimistic, and exasperated all at once. Instant comfort movie.
written by women
Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma movie review: no such thing as “just a movie”
A blood-gushing, cheerfully horny phantasmagorical black comedy fueled by writer-director Jane Schoenbrun’s unique understanding of fandom and the intense relationships we can have with pop culture.
Final Destination: Bloodlines review: the curse of fatal death
The dorm-room philosophy of the 25-year-old series is still pondering how wild it is that we all die, how fragile our meatbag bodies are. Now with gory dismemberments and squishy impalements in IMAX!
The Brutalist movie review: red, white, and brutal
Stark and unsentimental, as stubborn and as challenging as its protagonist, and as monumental as his works. Adrien Brody’s performance is extraordinary, full of flinty anger and palpable melancholy.
Nightbitch movie review: live, bark, love
Replaces the novel’s rage with gentle comedy, biting its tongue and undercutting its protagonist. Still, mundane truths about women’s realities that rarely get public airings are on welcome display.
Your Monster movie review: embrace the beast
Sure, the humor may be bitter, the horror may be audacious, and the overriding genre may be “anti-romance.” But this hugely original, grimly delightful howl of feminine rage is actually kinda sweet.
Lee movie review: the things she saw, and the way she saw them
It barely scratches the surface of the enormous audacity of WWII photographer Lee Miller, but still this is an important movie. It’s also joyous filmmaking, with terrific performances all around.
Madame Web movie review: absurdly tangled
A travesty of corporate cynicism. Its desperation to ride Spider-Man’s coattails is pathetic, but its convoluted, coincidence-laden nonsense is duller than you’d imagine: it’s not even so bad it’s fun.
Cat Person movie review: her too
The cringe of modern relationships stinks up this antiromance. Its bald truths, all but ignored in pop culture, about how women navigate romantic and sexual relationships with men, demand to be heard.
My Animal movie review: out of the wilderness (and into a bigger one)
A mysterious, mournful film about proscribed teenaged-girlhood and feral female sexuality. There’s nothing entirely original here, but what it has to say, it says with enormous confidence and panache.
