Kong: Skull Island movie review: ape-ocalypse now
Boiled down to its bonkers essence, Skull Island is a Vietnam war movie with monsters, a retro analog vibe, and a dash of both Moby-Dick and The X-Files.
2017 theatrical releases
The Last Laugh documentary review: punching Nazis (with comedy)
Analyzing jokes can ruin humor, but not here. This is a provocative, hilarious, and important discussion of comedy taboos, who gets to transgress them, and why.
Viceroy’s House movie review: are we condemned to repeat this?
Snappy, snappish historical drama about the partition of India rings with sly humor, dry cynicism, and a smack of relevance for today’s divisive politics.
Logan movie review: wounded Wolverine, dangerous beast
The X-Men series — the entire superhero genre — has never seen a film like Logan before: raw, rageful, tormented, human. Best of the series yet.
A Cure for Wellness movie review: it ails me
Ominous signs and psychological detours get tossed out and tossed away on the path to ridiculous gothic nonsense that takes itself far too seriously.
Oscar Nominated Animated Shorts (89th Academy Awards) review
My pick: “Pearl,” blending new VR tech with old-fashioned characters and emotions, demonstrating storytelling possibilities that are beginning to open up.
The Great Wall movie review: not to be torn down
Plain pure fun. At its best, it’s Lord of the Rings meets Aliens, with incredible imaginative grandeur and genuinely breathtaking 3D depth.
XX movie review: women filmmakers bring a feminine bent to horror
My anger that women filmmakers doing a horror anthology is seen as a novelty almost overshadows my disappointment that these short films aren’t very scary.
Fifty Shades Darker movie review: where is the fantasy?
Thank god this insult of a movie doesn’t try to fool us into believing that the controlling Christian Grey is appealing. That would be even more horrific…
Prevenge movie review: baby bump off
Fresh feminist horror of a very welcome taboo-smashing kind. Nasty, hilarious, outraged and outrageous, and as poignant as it is blackly funny.
