Category Archives: Reviews, previews, profiles and movie news

Preview, Shailene is “Adrift” in this survival at sea true story drama

Love Shailene. Love sailboats. Love sailboat “Amazing true tales of the sea.” “Adrift” is one of those “I’m not the SAILOR here” stories about a couple at sea, the sailing buff guy (Sam Claflin) gets badly hurt, and Shailene Woodley … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: “Love, Simon” even if he comes out like it’s 1999

  It gets better, the saying and the TV public service announcement campaign told us. Years ago. And it has. The occasional giant step backward notwithstanding, we’re a long way from “The Hangover” (2009) and its “Paging Dr. Faggot” jokes. … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Rich white girls are the scariest “Thoroughbreds”

Is there a more frightening creature in the movies than a bored, amoral teenage girl? Give the pale princess endless cash and endless free time and problems that seem to visit only the super-rich (in the movies) and you just … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Pray for rational plotting in “The Strangers: Prey at Night”

Death comes to the trailer park in “The Strangers: Prey at Night,” a pitiless sequel to the slasher hit “The Strangers” of a decade ago. Christina Hendricks (“Mad Men”) and Martin Henderson (“Grey’s Anatomy”) are the parents who take their … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Aliens invade and urgency is lost in translation in Japan’s “Before We Vanish”

Aliens invade — well, three of them do — Japan, and they’re here for our mental “concepts” in “Before We Vanish,” a peculiarly Japanese take on Pod People, what makes us human and the complacency that comes with that knowledge. … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: “Tomb Raider” reboot never answers the question, “Um, why?”

  Alicia Vikander makes us feel Lara Croft’s pain, with every grunt, whimper, yelp and gasp of exertion she makes as the “Tomb Raider.” Yes, the Oscar winner is a Swedish slip of a thing, and having her stand next … Continue reading →

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Netflixable? “Big Bear” is cut-rate “Hangover” filmed just outside LA

The rules for this bachelor party are simple. “Number one, ‘Get drunk.’ Rule number two, ‘Stay drunk…’” Mustaches are optional. The whooping and chest thumping, bailing out of AA “because I need a break…I’m gonna go to that meeting Monday … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: “Keep the Change” is an unorthodox rom-com that’s “on the spectrum”

“A baby doesn’t know how rich its parents are,” Dustin Hoffman famously said in defense of the most expensive flop of his career, the comedy “Ishtar.” That aphorism could cover pretty much any movie you sit down to watch. We … Continue reading →

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Netflixable? Jake Johnson’s a gambler looking for the elusive “happy ending” in “Win it All”

Mumblecore comedy meets the fateful, fatal romance of gambling in “Win it All,” an engaging wallow in the land of the losers starring Jake Johnson. It’s a low-rent travelogue reminiscent of every hot-streak-goes-bust picture ever made, the ones that emphasize … Continue reading →

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Netflixable? Leto attends Yakuza Tattoo U. as “The Outsider”

Of all the things one can imagine actor Jared Leto as — hearthrob, “Mr. Nobody,” emaciated transgender junkie with AIDS — “made man” in the Japanese mob would have to be low on the list. But as delicate as he … Continue reading →

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