film criticism by maryann johanson | celebrating 25 years: 1997–2022
Cluelessly simplistic rendering of a 1990s media injustice ignores all the context in which it happened and demonizes the one journalist who acted professionally. Fails even as a conservative screed.
Welcome to Peak Apologetics for the Bullshit of White Men, replete with many appalling messages about their endless entitlement to redemption and forgiveness. And as a bonus, it’s racist and sexist.
Clint Eastwood turns a terrorist attack into a bit of post-hoc reality “entertainment” with the stunt casting of the actual heroes as themselves in a stilted, tone-deaf piece of Christian-American propaganda.
If Jane Austen wrote a horror movie. An almost serene sinisterness infuses female-gazey carnal intrigue… but it could be even more feminist than it is.
Love it.
The ultimate anti-disaster movie. A supremely gripping and powerfully emotional film about, paradoxically, what happens when everything works as it should.
A banal, bland tribute to things no one questions as laudable (though it has to misrepresent its subject to do so). But Bradley Cooper is very good.
Director Clint Eastwood’s discomfort with his own material is enormous and obvious. Does he just not get pop music, or is he actively disdainful and suspicious of it?
A Japanese-language remake of Unforgiven? Why not? Hollywood does the same in reverse all the time.
