movie reviews
Movie Review: Evil Dead Rise
4 stars out of 5I came late to the Evil Dead series. I was 14 when the original film was released, and my slightly twisted buddy Rob Mosley was obsessed with it. And yet a few decades passed before I finally gave it a chance (dear reader, I must admit I didn’t even “get” the […]
Movie Review: Beau Is Afraid
4 stars out of 5I described Ari Aster’s 2018 film Hereditary as “seriously f’ed.” And in 2019, I said his film Midsommar was “100% f’ed up.” But not until writing this review did I realize that those two movies and new release Beau Is Afraid (pretty messed up in its own right) were written and […]
Movie Review: Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.
3.5 stars out of 5Full disclosure, I never read this book, nor have I ever been an 11-year-old girl. I think I read Tales of a 4th Grade Nothing, does that count? At any rate, in hopes of gaining slightly better understanding of all the former 11-year-old girls in my life — and to support […]
Movie Review: The Quiet Girl
4.5 stars out of 5First and foremost, this is not A Quiet Place III. Though it is a pretty quiet movie. The Quiet Girl, from Ireland, was one of the 2023 Oscar nominees for Best International Feature Film. It didn’t win, but it is terrific. I’m not sure when the movie is set — late […]
Movie Review: Creed III
3.5 stars out of 5Are all the movies trying to make me feel old? Adonis Creed is Rocky’s young protégé, and now he’s retired too? Sheesh! We’ve now reached the Rocky III period in the life of Creed, where after his latest title defense, the wealthy, famous, happy-at-home champ hangs up his boxing gloves. But […]
Movie Review: Ant-Man and the Wasp—Quantumania
2 stars out of 5It was a drizzly winter day on the Jersey shore and I had hours to kill. “Oh, I’ll see a movie,” I thought. Alas, Asbury Park’s art theater isn’t open mid-week in the off-season. I had no choice but to go to the mall multiplex. This, of course, was no problem […]
Movie Review: Infinity Pool
4 stars out of 5I can imagine Mike White handing this in as a stand-alone episode of White Lotus and getting immediately fired and banned by HBO. In Infinity Pool, writer/director Brandon Cronenberg gives us his own version of an existentially bored couple at a tropic resort, but because of that last name, you can […]
Movie Review: Women Talking
3.5 stars out of 5Well, I can’t say the title didn’t give me a heads-up. There is a lot of talking. Do you know that play A Coupla White Chicks Sitting Around Talking? Like, multiply that. The more I read about the true story this is sort of based on, the more I wish this […]
Movie Review: M3GAN
3 stars out of 5Yes, I’m giving this E, uh I mean 3, stars. Like last year’s Barbarian, the filmmakers here are trying to do something a little different within the horror genre, and I appreciate that. Unfortunately, M3GAN’s filmmakers don’t try very hard. The result is pretty fun and certainly watchable, but ultimately forgettable. […]
My Highly Subjective List of the Best Movies of 2022
It’s getting to be a bit of a drag for those of who like going out to the movies to see quality releases. Forced by finances, art theaters are devoting a chunk of their screens to big dumb Hollywood dreck. And many movies lucky enough to get a big-screen debut are quickly shuttled off to […]
Jack Silbert, curator