film criticism by maryann johanson | since 1997
This true origin story of a literal social-justice warrior is earnest, passionate… and exhausting. We need to keep telling these stories, yet each is but another tiny drop of water in a rough ocean.
The beautiful performances and raw intimacy are definitely worth your time, but its wispy good intentions ultimately dissipate into thin air.
There isn’t an authentic human motivation or emotion to be found here. The bar has been raised too high on comic-book movies for us to accept junk like this.
Thoughtful performances and grim visual elegance aren’t enough to save this portrait of abuse and control twisted into banal evil from becoming too banal to have much bite.
A surprisingly pleasant dramatization of the true story told through the eyes of the TV news reporter who broke the story and the Greenpeace activist who worked tirelessly to embarrass the powers that be into helping free three whales stuck in Alaskan ice…
Lest we forget, the slide into a fascism in America didn’t begin with George W. Bush: it was well underway in the 1990s, when our police went paramilitary in the “war on drugs” and new federal incentives for local communities to get drug convictions — however they could — led to a huge increase in … more…
Take a break from work: watch a trailer… Can I just say: I love Tim Blake Nelson. He’s always amazing without every being showy about it — he just sneaks up on you and makes sure you can never, ever forget how amazing he is. American Violet opens in the U.S. on April 17; no … more…
