Here are some reviews of films coming out at the theater this week as well as others that may be in theaters or newly on home video.
Opening: Jul. 27-29, 2018
Wide (United States)
Mission: Impossible – Fallout
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Teen Titans Go! To the Movies
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Limited (United States)
Blindspotting
Hot Summer Nights
Herman Dhaliwal @ Cinema Sanctum
- Excerpt: It’s definitely a hollow pastiche of a number of gritty teen movies, but in a way, it feels appropriate given the small town “have you heard about so-and-so doing this-and-that” vibe that the film has. Elijah Bynum makes a stylish and promising directorial debut.
Puzzle
Kathy Gibson @ Access Bollywood
Courtney Howard @ FreshFiction.tv
- Excerpt: What conducts most of the energy is the warmth, charm and radiance generated by the two leads. They even sell the false notes with honesty, humanity, heart and sincerity.
Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood
Glenn Dunks @ The Film Experience
- Excerpt: Scotty is the documentary version of a gossipy brunch with daiquiris and mimosas aplenty… What the film doesn’t do, and which I really wish it had, is actually use Bowers’ story to interrogate the ethical and societal issues that his story raises.
2018 Films In Theaters Now In Select Areas
14 Cameras
- Excerpt: 14 cameras is at its strongest when depicting the conflicts that Gerald’s behaviour, which quickly extends to stealing from his tenants and messing with their stuff, provokes between them.
93Queen
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: An enormously entertaining portrait of Hasidic women who started their own all-female EMS team in Brooklyn. Eye-opening and stereotype-shattering.
- Excerpt: It’s rough at the edges, but it still makes for compelling viewing because the charged nature of the situation an the force of will thereby required to get it off the ground.
Ant-Man and the Wasp
Mark Hobin @ Fast Film Reviews
- Excerpt: The specific components fade from memory but I remembered the comedy. This is a very funny movie.
Courtney Howard @ FreshFiction.tv
- Excerpt: Ant-Man And The Wasp surpasses the original by miles, functioning best when it embraces its sheer absurdity and loopy lunacy.
- Excerpt: In spite of needless overplotting, “Ant-Man and the Wasp” is still a fair amount of high-spirited fun, carrying over the goodwill of its predecessor.
Diego Salgado @ Guiadelocio [Spanish]
Apostasy
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: A scathing critique of inhumanity in the name of religion — in this case, Jehovah’s Witnesses — made all the more chilling by its drab colorlessness and mute suffocation.
Avengers: Infinity War
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
Blockers
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: While the teen sex comedy Blockers brings on the typical roller-coaster of raunchiness, it somehow registers devilishly with an offbeat, uproarious take on the trials and tribulations of stress-induced parenting and safeguarding the so-called virtues of impressionable daughters from predatory prom dates.
Boundaries
Courtney Howard @ FreshFiction.tv
- Excerpt: Though this road-trip dramcom has sincere sentiments, adorable dogs, and understated performances from an impeccable cast, a few road blocks threaten to ruin the journey.
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: Mildly wacky road-trip shenanigans meet mildly uncomfortable family dramedy. The saving grace? The cast is a joy to spend time with.
Breaking In
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: Experiencing cabin fever in the generic home invasion thriller Breaking In is the least of the problems. And although the beautiful and gritty Union busts some chops in this uneven vanity vehicle meant to showcase a sense of motherly/female empowerment, the audience will feel none of this as Union and her on-screen offspring toil in this recycled, hysterical house of hokum.
Buffalo Boys
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
Cam
- Excerpt: Screenwriter Isa Mazzei is a former camgirl herself and it shows in the film’s focus on the business side of proceedings, but director Daniel Goldhaber extends her work in a much stranger direction.
The Catcher Was a Spy
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: This spy film looks great. Costumes, sets and atmospheric cinematography help create a “you are there” feel to most scenes.
The Citizen
Josh Brunsting @ Criterion Cast
Cold Skin
Josh Brunsting @ Criterion Cast
The Con Is On
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: Talent galore signed up for this misguided comedy. Too bad these fine actors fail to make us laugh.
Custody
Courtney Howard @ FreshFiction.tv
- Excerpt: Custody embodies the essence of harrowing drama in its pure, distilled, un-contrived form.
Damsel
Courtney Howard @ FreshFiction.tv
- Excerpt: On the whole, this is a film finely attuned to the now.
Death Wish
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: … the relentlessly soured Death Wish, with its exaggerated and ridiculous gun play, and voluminous body counts, feels more like a prolonged death sentence of tedium than anything else.
Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot
Diego Salgado @ Guiadelocio [Spanish]
Eating Animals
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: The philosophical and the sentimental trump the practical in this exposé of factory farming that, while effective in showing us the horrors, offers only simplistic solutions.
Eighth Grade
Mark Hobin @ Fast Film Reviews
- Excerpt: Let’s face it. This isn’t just eighth grade, this is the human experience and it speaks to everyone.
Stephen Silver @ Broad Street Review
- Excerpt: Bo Burnham’s Eighth Grade belongs to a tradition of hyperrealistic, unglamorous, uncomfortable, female-focused coming-of-age movies.
The First Purge
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: This shrewd sci-fi horror franchise is as sharp as ever as it reaches yet further down into the unpleasant flipside of the American myth. A rare prequel that doesn’t feel superfluous.
Hanagatami
Josh Brunsting @ Criterion Cast
Hearts Beat Loud
Mark Hobin @ Fast Film Reviews
- Excerpt: Hearts Beat Loud is a heartwarming story about a family’s ties to music. What really elevates the dialogue is the chemistry between Nick Offerman as the father and Kiersey Clemmons as his daughter.
Hereditary
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
Hostiles
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: Rosamund Pike, Christian Bale and Wes Studi deliver memorable performances in this terrific Western with a powerful message.
Incredibles 2
- Excerpt: …no time has passed in terms of where the story continues, and “Incredibles 2” is just as cleverly conceived, consistently funny, fleet-footed and joyful.
Insidious: The Last Key
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
Jim Gaffigan: Noble Ape
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: Gaffigan’s unique self-deprecating delivery enhances his sometimes “unthinkable” material and helps him win the hearts of viewers.
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
Mark Hobin @ Fast Film Reviews
- Excerpt: I suppose I could consume enough alcoholic beverages to artificially dumb down my brain to enjoy this flick. However, I don’t want to die of alcohol poisoning.
- Excerpt: “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom” is the wackiest in the series, but as a full-throttle ride, it still provides the brand of rip-roaring, danger-filled thrills that the “Jurassic” series—and summer moviegoing in general—is all about.
Knuckleball
- Excerpt: It’s essentially a simple premise but the delivery is a thing of beauty.
Leave No Trace
Courtney Howard @ SassyMamaInLA.com
- Excerpt: In a year full of films that explore the precious nature of father-daughter dynamics, Granik’s feature is a standout.
Lifechanger
- Excerpt: The whole thing is beautifully shot in far higher resolution than most viewers are likely to get the benefit of.
Love, Simon
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
Lust Stories
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: Four terrific actresses bring four fascinating women to life on screen. Kudos to Radhika Apte, Bhumi Pednekar, Manisha Koirala, and Vicky Kaushal!
Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again
Glenn Dunks @ Flicks
Matthew Lucas @ From the Front Row
- Excerpt: It isn’t until Cher’s arrival on the island that the film becomes the kooky, campy free-for-all that it always should have been. One has to commend director Ol Parker for attempting to keep the film grounded in something resembling real emotion, but it is only when he lets the film veer into spectacularly gaudy musical mayhem in its final 15 minutes that it really begins to soar.
- Excerpt: Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again is considerably better than a 10-years-later sequel to a screen adaptation of a Broadway jukebox musical ought to be.
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: Full of love and life and song, ‘Mamma Mia! 2’ ends up being a great movie musical — one that emphasizes family, friendship and fun.
The Man Who Killed Hitler and Then the Bigfoot
- Excerpt: There are the makings of a great film here but too much time is spent telling the story and not enough showing it.
Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: Epic yet intimate, this is a visually gorgeous and emotionally lush fantasy drama about love and hope set in a violent but beautifully realized invented world.
Mary Shelley
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: Romance, imagination, misery, feminism and love of writing combine in this intriguing biopic starring Elle Fanning, who gives the performance of her career in the title role.
Ocean’s 8
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: Breezy fun that sticks a shiv into Hollywood’s — and the larger culture’s — disdain for women. Wonderfully subtle comic performances from a great cast having a ball make for a perfectly suitable light diversion from the world right now.
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: Bullock’s Ocean and her on-screen cohorts collectively seem to have a bouncy blast, but the summertime showcase does not offer much in the way of originality…can only muster up a spotty heist blockbuster that can’t creatively match the shine of the diamond necklace Debbie Ocean and her sticky finger associates want to abscond so strategically.
Our House
- Excerpt: Director Anthony Scott Burns delivers some real chills but it’s the positive aspect of the film, the sense that there’s still room for joy in these difficult lives, that makes them so potent.
Overboard
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: Mawkish and manipulative, the sinkable Overboard is no more than a big drip that besmirches the memory of the original…does nothing to add new or reinvent and really just further cements the production to nothing more than a dandy of a dud retread.
Paddington 2
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: Happiness is a film like this!
People’s Republic of Desire
- Excerpt: The screen may be smaller, but the rules are much the same as they always were.
Proud Mary
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: There are many variables transpiring in the gritty, yet grating, urban crime flick Proud Mary that want desperately to embrace themes of unconventional motherly instincts and clichéd street-wise mayhem. Unfortunately star Taraji P. Henson (who also has an executive producing credit for this lopsided actioner), her labored foray into the criminal action-packed genre feels rather generic in its pseudo-throbbing urgency.
Rampage
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: Aimless and cheaply roguish, Rampage sputters along in eye-rolling CGI excess and transparent action sets. In short, meant to sensationalize and capitalize on the giant monster film resurgence, Rampage instead plays out with the imaginative thud of a skyscraper brick crashing on a cement sidewalk.
Relaxer
Josh Brunsting @ Criterion Cast
Rokuroku: The Promise of the Witch
- Excerpt: For most of its length, RokuRoku feels like an anthology film, a series of bizarre incidents in which puny humans come up against supernatural foes, but if you pay attention you’ll begin to notice that all these tales are linked.
Siberia
Diego Salgado @ Guía del Ocio [Spanish]
Skyscraper
Courtney Howard @ SassyMamaInLA.com
- Excerpt: It’s an engaging, explosive thrill riot meant to be seen on the big screen – and it’ll induce many a palm to sweat.
- Excerpt: Its greatest ambition is to thrill, and “Skyscraper” quite skillfully delivers on that count in spades.
Diego Salgado @ Guiadelocio [Spanish]
Sorry to Bother You
Mark Hobin @ Fast Film Reviews
- Excerpt: Despite a chaotic fantasy that careens wildly from political satire into science fiction, this movie remains fun and witty in a lively way that boldly announces its presence. Its freewheeling bonkers mentality is simply too audacious to ignore.
Sunday’s Illness
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: Both main characters slowly draw us into their worlds and make us care about what happens to them. We beg to know them better as each frame of the film teases us along.
Super Troopers 2
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: Hence, without question, there is again no notable arresting development for the empty gags perpetrated in this latest asinine policing puff piece. For the rest of us, this fruitless farce will be as appetizing as getting sprayed in the face with mace while jaywalking.
Tag
- Excerpt: Blessed with a likable cast, but “Tag” is underwritten and rarely ever as funny as it thinks it’s being.
Traffik
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: The main jam to Traffik — if you will — rests on the flimsy film’s lazy-eyed script, transparent direction and staged cheap thrills that would not plant goosebumps on a life-long coward in the confines of a dark closet.
Uncle Drew
The Vanished
- Excerpt: The charismatic Kim Sang-Kyung tends to dominate scenes even when playing a downbeat character, but Kim Kang-woo is impressive in the quieter role of the troubled Park
Westwood: Punk, Icon, Activist
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: There’s nothing fawning and plenty ironic about this essential first documentary to cover a major female fashion designer, a woman whose life is almost a perfect reflection of the trajectory of 20th-century feminism.
Whitney
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: Deeply moving, truly tragic; a biography with a keenly journalistic but hugely sympathetic eye. Powerful compassion and a get-up-and-dance deployment of Houston’s music may well bring her a new generation of fans.
Wildling
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: It’s refreshing to see so many important themes dealt with in a horror film. Coming-of-age, self-identity, family, bullying, love and compassion all receive attention this very engrossing movie.
Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
Mark Hobin @ Fast Film Reviews
- Excerpt: Mister Rogers was goodness personified and that’s the uplifting feeling you’ll get when exiting the theater.
Courtney Howard @ FreshFiction.tv
- Excerpt: Once the tears start flowing, and assuredly they will, they won’t stop.
A Wrinkle in Time
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
2017 Films In Theaters Now In Select Areas
Before I Fall
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
The Boss Baby
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
Claire’s Camera
Diego Salgado @ Guiadelocio [Spanish]
Cuernavaca
- Excerpt: Puente is superb.
Dunkirk
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
Far from the Tree
- Excerpt: Rachel Drezin treads a careful line between the risk of appropriating other people’s struggles and the importance of giving a voice to parents, of understanding that they can struggle too.
Ingrid Goes West
Frank Ochieng @ The Critical Critics
- Excerpt: Director/co-writer Matt Spicer intriguingly meshes together a sharply insightful confection of deranged, alienated millennium-era feminine empowerment tweaked with disturbing, quirky overtones. The skillful and sardonically executed dramedy Ingrid Goes West is a smart, satirical and blistering commentary on youthful loneliness tied in the murky web of social media deception and obsession.
Okja
Bavner Donaldo @ Cinejour [Indonesian]
