Free Solo transcends fear to achieve perfection
Movie review: Free Solo
Alex Honnold’s bid to climb Yosemite’s El Capitan without ropes or assistance gives filmmakers Jimmy Chin and Chai Vasarhelyi a chance to explore existential fears through character, and one man’s ability to focus on the moment.
Hunter Killer: A canful of manliness
Movie Review: Hunter Killer
Gerard Butler’s ode to Cold War formula serves up sub tropes and B-movie baloney for those seeking junk and hunk comfort food.
Halloween gets all dressed up as the original but has nowhere to go
Movie review: Halloween
David Gordon Green’s ambitious reset of the Halloween franchise showcases a badass Jamie Lee Curtis as trauma survivor Laurie Strode, but for some stupid reason, fails to exploit the post-menopausal character with an axe to grind and a villain to kill.
Anthropocene: The Human Epoch-alypse
Movie review - Anthropocene: The Human Epoch
Baichwal, Burtynsky and de Pencier are back with another gorgeously lensed documentary that almost comes too close to redeeming human ugliness through photographic acts of beauty.
Goosebumps 2 almost too scary
Movie review: Goosebumps 2 - Haunted Halloween
Jack Black returns as R.L. Stine and turns Goosebumps’ Haunted Halloween into a meta horror movie for young adults, but with an evil ventriloquist dummy as the villain and a scene that compromises Mom’s goodness, even grown-ups may get the shivers.
22 July appeals to rule of law, not emotion
Movie Review: 22 July - New on Netflix
Paul Greengrass’s restrained vérité treatment of the July 22 massacre at a Norwegian kids camp lassos truth of tragedy by showing us the banal face of evil and the chilling effect of fear.
Venom pits Tom Hardy against an oily Zeitgeist
Movie Review: Venom
Ruben Fleischer’s movie about supervillain Venom fails to sink its fangs into genre, leaving Tom Hardy to wrestle a dark alien force that’s colonized his DNA. It’s a perfect metaphor for the times, but can filmmakers capitalize on the moment when they’re working in the Marvel universe?
