Tag Archives: movie-review

Classic Film Review: The Sexual Sensory Overload of “Black Narcissus” (1947)

Posted on February 6, 2025 by Roger Moore

Long regarded as “the most beautiful film ever shot in color,” Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s “Black Narcissus” remains a feast for the eyes, one unspoiled by the knowlege that most every dazzling image put on the screen was manipulated, … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Whatever you do, Don’t Give “Jade” a Blade

Posted on February 4, 2025 by Roger Moore

“Cool” is the lifeblood of an indie thriller. Park your tale in a novel “cool” setting. Serve up a “cool” heist/scheme/plot, preferably with epic brawls, chases or shootouts. Cast a cool heavy. But even if you ignore or narrowly miss … Continue reading →

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Netflixable? A Disabled Child, a Mom Determined to Save Him — “Lucca’s World”

Posted on February 3, 2025 by Roger Moore

A guilt-ridden journalist tries everything, grasping at any “miracle treatments” straw, in an effort to save her disabled-at-birth son in “Lucca’s World,” an engrossing Around the World with Netflix weeper from Mexico. Based on the non-fiction book by Bárbara Anderson, … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Meet your compliant and cuddly new AI robotic “Companion”

Posted on January 31, 2025 by Roger Moore

“Companion” is a horrific and caustically cautionary sci-fi thriller about how the digitized alternatives to dating might go wrong. Very wrong. Signing on an impressive cast, writer-director Drew Hancock takes a big, roundhouse swing at “coupling” in a distracted, instant … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Combat at Its most Cliched — “Valiant One”

Posted on January 31, 2025 by Roger Moore

The bar was raised on combat films decades ago. Corny, tactically sloppy flag-wavers no longer cut the mustard. And thanks to the most documentary filmed in history — Iraq and Afghanistan — it’s not just the feature films that made … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Liam and Colm, Ciarán and Kerry “In the Land of Saints and Sinners”

Posted on January 30, 2025 by Roger Moore

“In the Land of Saints and Sinners” is an embarrassment of riches, a forlorn thriller cast with many of the greatest Irish character actors of their generation and featuring the cream of the next generation of Irish leading ladies. Of … Continue reading →

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Classic Film Review: Sam Fuller’s Red Scare Noir, “Pickup on South Street” (1953)

Posted on January 29, 2025 by Roger Moore

The movies used to sentimentalize mobsters, especially during “the Wars” — WWII and the Cold one that followed. They might be cutthroats, thieves, lowlife grifters and rummies. But when it came to fascists and commies, flesh and blood threats to … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: K-Stew and Steven Yeun as the AI future of “humanity” and romance — “Love Me”

Posted on January 27, 2025 by Roger Moore

“Love Me” is an experiment in sci-fi romance that goes wrong. The pitch? Billions of years after the end of humanity, a smart buoy in the icy wasteland of Earth’s seas thaws out and makes contact with “The Messenger,” a … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: House isn’t a home when it’s haunted by a ghostly “Presence”

Posted on January 24, 2025 by Roger Moore

It’s just a haunted house story, just a movie with objects that move and things that go bump in the night. Well, mostly in broad daylight. “Presence” is a “A Ghost Story” filmed like a “Paranormal Activity” installment. And it’s … Continue reading →

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Movie Review: Teacher helps a Troubled Student “Brave the Dark” of his Past

Posted on January 22, 2025 by Roger Moore

“Brave the Dark” is a earnest do-good/feel-good story of the “One Great Teacher Makes a Difference” genre. Released by Angel Studios, which brought us “Bonhoeffer,” “Sound of Freedom” and “Homestead,” where “earnest” is their brand, it’s a low-stakes, dramatically flat … Continue reading →

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