Comedy, as they say, is hard—striking the target just right and knowing when to push a joke or let it speak for itself. If a movie comedy is constantly pushing, chances are the joke isn’t that funny to begin with. Such is Ethan Coen’s…
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The Unseen, a thriller about a young man tormented by supernatural entities and an overachieving father, has as much on its mind about malevolent family dynamics as it does those lurking in the otherworld. In a Chicago-set production from a screenplay by actress-producer Jennifer…
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My first priority after seeing France’s handsome The Taste of Things, a cuisine as art and love saga featuring the double act of a regal Benoit Magimel and Juliette Binoche, was a direct dash brunch at Chicago’s finest French restaurant. In a recipe combining…
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The eternally successful horror film genre has proven more profitable than perhaps any other given its dependably low investment, high-yield returns and passionate fanbase, always up for their next good scare. And while such scare pictures of late have taken a turn toward high…
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The space-set thriller I.S.S. is a modestly effective U.S.-Russia face-off in which a handful of scientists are forced to confront national versus personal loyalties while a war between their respective countries wages on Earth. Set aboard the orbiting International Space Station laboratory 248 miles…
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A well-meaning educator finds herself in the crosshairs of suspicion in the tightly coiled dramatic thriller The Teachers’ Lounge, a morality play indicting the swift spoils of cancel culture and the discarding of objective truth in a rush to judgment. It also has something…
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Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest is an austere exercise with a single idea—that evil deeds can be compartmentalized while their perpetrators lead otherwise innocuously guilt-free lives—stretched out for 106 minutes. Deploying a theme applicable to many of history’s villains, Glazer’s glacial treatise on…
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Jessica Chastain and Peter Sarsgaard superbly navigate challenging psychological terrain in a tough, hopeful picture.…
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Ferrari, Michael Mann’s moment-in-time biopic starring Adam Driver as an aging Enzo Ferrari in the 1957 crosshairs of heated personal and business dramas, is a sum of its parts picture enlivened by a thrilling recreation of the thousand-mile Mille Miglia car race, worth seeing…
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With The Boys in the Boat, George Clooney’s ninth directorial outing, the actor turned filmmaker has crafted a handsome, appealingly traditional throw-back movie with a reverence for both historical context and bygone true life sports movies done well a few decades ago. A late…
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