Feature: Does Rogue One work as a standalone?
Warning: This article contains spoilers for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. Reportedly earning over $220 million in its first week, Gareth Edwards’ Rogue...
Film Reviews & More
Most Recent. In Christopher Machell.
3 May 2024
Film Review: Challengers
★★★★☆ With Luca Guadagnino’s terrific Challengers, the acclaimed director of Call Me By Your Name brings us the sub-genre we never knew we needed: the erotic tennis thriller.
24 April 2024
Film Review: Abigail
★★☆☆☆ Directors Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett’s “Abigail” mashes up crime caper and monster movie, but fails to deliver fear or humor. Spoilery trailers and unoriginal characters overshadow promising elements, resulting in a dull, lifeless experience lacking creativity and wit.
17 April 2024
Film Review: Civil War
★★★★☆ In Alex Garland’s Civil War, a group of journalists embark on a road trip to interview the US President amidst a second American Civil War, while exploring media’s dehumanizing relationship with violence.
Christopher Machell
Film Review: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
★★★★★ Beleaguered prequels aside, there’s something about the Star Wars films that brings out the best in their directors: Irvin Kershner, Richard Marquand and...
DVD Review: The Man from Laramie
★★★★☆ When director Anthony Mann cast James Stewart, star of cuddly classics It’s A Wonderful Life and Harvey, he saw a darkness underneath his...
Criterion Review: The Squid and the Whale
★★★★☆ It’s curious that both of this month’s Criterion releases – The Royal Tenenbaums being the other – share so many thematic and narrative...
Criterion Review: The Royal Tenenbaums
★★★★★ Matched only by the Coen brothers and Tim Burton for inimitable style, Wes Anderson remains one of the most interesting and idiosyncratic working...
Film Review: Videophilia
★★★☆☆ Following his 2010 documentary Reminiscences, director Juan Daniel F. Molero returns for a challenging and visually impressive second feature with Videophilia (and Other...
Criterion Review: Punch-Drunk Love
★★★★★ On first viewing, 2002’s Punch-Drunk Love stands as an outlier against Paul Thomas Anderson’s other more seriously-minded work, starring, as it does, Adam...
DVD Review: Lowlife Love
★★★★☆ Acclaimed director of 2013’s The Greatful Dead, Eiji Uchida returns with Lowlife Life, an often hilarious, charming and fitfully uncomfortable look into the...
