Monthly Archives: June 2018

There’s a high tone sheen to the new “Superfly,” a gloss of drug-trade affluence that we haven’t seen in a movie since “Scarface.” Designer clothes, fur-trimmed pimpwear, mansions, supercars. exotic firearms and elaborate hairstyles highlight a remake that’s a shiny … Continue reading →

All this “Conjuring/Annabelle universe” stuff. Warner Brothers getting deeper into that Lionsgate/Screen Gems/Summit/Blumhouse horror money is more what this is about. What we’ve got here is your basic haunted convent, with scary ghost nuns. Taissa Farmiga and Demian Bichir are … Continue reading →

Live action, with CGI elephant flying, a remake that relies on generations  of Disney kids growing up weeping to a genuine animated masterpiece. Michael Keaton, Eva Green, Colin Farrell, Danny DeVito, Oscar winner Alan Arkin, all in the cast of … Continue reading →

“Straight Into a Storm” is a tuneful, affable rockumentary about Providence, Rhode Island rockers Deer Tick, a band that celebrated its tenth anniversary with a rowdy New Year’s Eve show that mimicked many of the hundreds of concerts that preceded … Continue reading →

In “Incredibles 2,” the villain is named “The Screenslaver,” a monster straight out of the American Id, as relevant as each day’s latest panic-stricken headlines. Screenslaver has identified our weakness  — “screens,” that we “don’t talk. You watch talk shows. … Continue reading →

I’ve made my fondness for Ruth Wilson (TV’s “The Affair”) and the omnipresent Domhnall Gleeson all too clear all too often in this space. Now, they’re paired up in a period piece set “between the wars,” with Charlotte Rampling and … Continue reading →

There’s emotional satisfaction in hating. It helps one cope with the Curse of Relative Deprivation. “Why am I here while this rich, no-talent so-and-so is out living a better version of my life?” You know. That. And Max, the hero … Continue reading →

Life would be tough enough for Mallory, a pale freckled redhead in boarding school in Bangkok. She crossed the Russian Mean Girl at school, the sort who cracks her knuckles after bloodying Mallory’s nose, hits her with “Hey, Snitch, I swear to … Continue reading →

It’s hard to know what to make of “Path of Blood.” The documentary begins with Islamic fanatics and narration underscoring efforts to create, or recreate “a global Muslim empire,” of making war on “the Crusaders.” That would be us. And … Continue reading →

What do the stars of the “Universal Soldier” film series have in common with “Brokeback Mountain” cowboys? Jean-Claude Van Damme, the onetime “Muscles from Brussels,” and Dolph Lundgren, the “Siberian (Stockholm, actually) Express,” just can’t quit each other. They reunite yet … Continue reading →