Radioflash movie review: it’s got no juice
Inept post-EMP survival thriller is no more thrilling than it is plausible, and inexcusably casts its resourceful teen heroine as a victim constantly at the mercy of others and in need of rescuing.
reviews
The Cave and For Sama documentaries review: life inside a war zone
Two intimate documentaries from inside the Syrian civil war, diaries of women who stayed to fight for their nation and help their people, pay tribute to human perseverance and chide Western apathy.
Last Christmas movie review: give it your heart, get your heart stomped
Love and life are pain, the glitz and sparkle of Christmas are but a momentary reprieve from it, and everything is pretty much unrelentingly awful. But Emilia Clarke and Henry Golding are adorable!
The Good Liar movie review: mangled web
We expect a film about a con man to con us, but it’s not fun here: it’s absurd. This limp thriller might fancy itself smart, sharp, twisty, and probably feminist, but it just made me groan out loud.
Le Mans ’66 (aka Ford v Ferrari) movie review: when “circle back” meant something else in corporatespeak
A winning (if overearnest) depiction of manly friendship, with some pretty thrilling (if only technically so) racing stuff. But it doesn’t see its potential to be actually culturally significant.
Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound documentary review: why movies sound so great (even if you never noticed before)
Enlightening, thrilling masterclass in the art of cinematic sound, from every moment of groundbreaking history to the difference between sound editing and sound mixing. (Win your next Oscar pool!)
Doctor Sleep movie review: a reckoning with the ghosts of the past
A wonderfully unexpected sort of horror movie, beautiful and delicate, but unsettling, too, with an authentic plausibility to the dichotomy between the invented uncanny and the human response to it.
Terminator: Dark Fate movie review: it’s back… and we don’t know why
Fight the future. Change the future. Watch the future reset itself so that everything ends up much the same way anyway. Repeat. This time-travelling franchise is, ironically, stuck in the past.
Harriet movie review: a true American hero finally gets her due (LFF 2019)
Tubman’s heroics are excellent movie-movie fodder. This “origin story” embraces her towering legend and her profound symbolic power, finally sliding her into the epic American pop-culture narrative.
The Current War movie review: fathers of invention, in conflict
An electrifying style lights up this geek adventure of the intersections between science, culture, and capitalism in the 19th-century battle to power our world. Cumberbatch and Shannon are brilliant.
