In Fabric movie review: retail shock therapy
A murderous dress and creepy shop clerks add up to nothing more than exhausting nonsense full of fetishizing of women and weirdness for weird’s sake alone. Consumerism is killing us, or something.
1970s
Rocketman movie review: what makes a rock star, and what unmakes him
Joyful and rowdy, self-deprecating and vulnerable, absolutely electrifying as it deconstructs the sex-drugs-and-rock’n’-roll story. Taron Egerton is chills-inducingly good. Sheer cinematic magic.
movies by or about women opening US/Can Apr 05
Taraji P. Henson costars in historical drama The Best of Enemies; more… [This post is for Patreon patrons only for the first month.]
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.
On the Basis of Sex movie review: Notorious RBG’s origin story
Coasts on the awesomeness of Ruth Bader Ginsburg in a way unadventurous if solidly crowd-pleasing. But the depiction of her incredibly supportive marriage to a feminist man is intensely satisfying.
Bohemian Rhapsody movie review: dynamite with a laser beam
Rami Malek brings warmth, humor, and a down-to-earth humanity to the larger-than-life Freddie Mercury. But it is the power of Queen’s music — the rousing good cheer, its sheer rock ’n’ roll joy — that fills up this pure brash entertainment.
Bad Times at the El Royale movie review: bad times indeed
A self-indulgent, faux-woke mashup of noir crime, black comedy, and Tarantino-esque ultraviolence. Some great performances, including a spectacular feature debut from Cynthia Erivo; shame they’re so wasted.
Jane Fonda in Five Acts documentary review: the political is her personal
An extraordinarily intimate and perceptive new biography of the legendary actor and activist. Fonda reveals insecurities and anxieties that are achingly raw and very personal, but which many women will see themselves in.
Studio 54 documentary review: inside the velvet ropes
A hugely entertaining exploration of the mythology of the legendary nightclub as something truly worth celebrating, and a towering Scorsese-esque drama of the men who invented it brought down by hubris.
Westwood: Punk, Icon, Activist documentary review: counterculture’s wise elder woman
There’s nothing fawning and plenty ironic about this essential first documentary to cover a major female fashion designer, a woman whose life is almost a perfect reflection of the trajectory of 20th-century feminism.
