Isle of Dogs movie review: a breed apart, or a breed too far?
Absolutely delightful and utterly original, with its lovingly crafted stop-motion animation bursting with sweetness but also with a winking mockery. I have just a few caveats…
reviews
Ready Player One movie review: trivial pursuit*
A nightmare of nothingness, of empty, soulless wankery, that serves only to reassure male dorks that their pop-culture obsessions make them special, and will make cute girls like them.
Journeyman movie review: men and all the feels
Sensitive drama about traumatic brain injury, featuring an extraordinary performance by Paddy Considine and much brutal honesty about men’s inability to deal with their own emotions.
I Kill Giants movie review: the terrible burden of secret fears
A movie as thrillingly weird as its protagonist. We are totally enrapt by the wonder and the terror of her imagination, and the power of it to create joy and solace.
Pacific Rim: Uprising movie review: robot smash
Enormously likable characters make this feel like a big friendly rambunctious dog that you can’t help but get a kick out of, but it fundamentally misunderstands the appeal of its predecessor movie.
Crowhurst movie review: the worse things that happen at sea
A little bit psychedelic, a little bit queasy, a little bit experimental, a lot existential, this is a jarring, visceral portrait of the around-the-world sailor in over his head.
Midnight Sun movie review: Cupid’s shot in the dark
Ah, it’s another “teen falling in love while dying beautifully” romance. When it isn’t sappy and predictable, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Its young couple is perfectly charming, though.
Prodigy movie review: little girl lost
This low-budget science-fiction film has an ambition that exceeds its reach, and has nothing to surprise the self-respecting geek a movie like this one is aimed at.
Unsane movie review: is she or isn’t she?
As a piece of craft, this is a smack in the face to Hollywood’s bloated blockbusters. As a piece of pulp, it brings a sharp, smart feminist twist to familiar tropes of cinematic paranoia.
Mary Magdalene movie review: the Gospel of Mary
A fiercely feminist and proudly revisionist historical drama that offers a powerful and much-needed rebuke to modern Christianity. Enrapturingly beautiful and intensely emotional.
