Because of embargoes (those happy little restrictions on when critics can post reviews, good or bad), a lot of our critics aren’t able to share links with you until release day. Here are some last-minute reviews for this weekend’s upcoming films. We’ve kept in all the reviews posted yesterday as well so you can have more help in deciding what to see (if you haven’t already).
Our critics have been hard at work reviewing the latest films. Here is a look at what’s coming out this weekend (in select cities, check your local listings) and what else may be in theaters right now.
Opening: September 26-28, 2014
Wide (United States)
The Boxtrolls
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Equalizer
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Limited (United States)
Believe Me
[New Today] James Jay Edwards @ FilmFracture
- Excerpt: ‘Believe Me’ Entertains, Informs, And Enlightens, Without Anyone Realizing It
[New Today] MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: Not your typical Christian film: it dares to question the money-making machine that is evangelicalism. But it doesn’t dare question Christianity itself.
Lilting
[New Today] Nicholas Bell @ IONCINEMA.com
The Little Bedroom
[New Today] Nicholas Bell @ IONCINEMA.com
Pride
[New Today] Nicholas Bell @ IONCINEMA.com
The Song
Mike McGranaghan @ The Aisle Seat
- Excerpt: Press materials for The Song describe it as “the sexiest faith-based movie ever.” While that’s technically true, it’s also an incredibly low bar to clear.
The Two Faces of January
[New Today] Roderick Heath @ This Island Rod
- Excerpt: This remains too much in thrall to its own classiness and literate poise.
[New Today] Stacia Kissick Jones @ She Blogged By Night
2014 Films In Theaters Now In Select Areas
As Above / So Below
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Bad Words
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Begin Again
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Boyhood
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Coherence
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Congress
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Deliver Us from Evil
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Drop
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Frank
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Frontera
Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
- Excerpt: If the road to hell is paved with good intentions, there should be a nice straight stretch of highway somewhere near the southern border marked with a sign saying “Adopted by Frontera.”
The Giver
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
God’s Pocket
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Gone Girl
[New Today] Tony Dayoub @ Cinema Viewfinder
- Excerpt: Among director David Fincher’s movies, GONE GIRL might end up ranking as well executed a puzzle film as THE GAME.
Goodbye to Language
[New Today] Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
- Excerpt: The elder filmmaker’s take on our world of separations and alienation.
Donald Levit @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
Grand Piano
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Hector and the Search for Happiness
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
- Excerpt: A snappy and satisfying adult parable about a therapist’s quest to find the meaning of life.
[New Today] Sarah Gopaul @ Digital Journal
- Excerpt: ‘Hector and the Search for Happiness’ is a yuppie’s humorous escape from life’s responsibilities in the guise of a research trip to investigate an abstract idea.
[New Today] Ben Kendrick @ Screen Rant
- Excerpt: ‘Hector and the Search for Happiness’ includes laughs and relatable drama but struggles to find successful balance between engaging journeys and thought-provoking destinations.
[New Today] Tom Santilli @ Examiner.com
- Excerpt: I had little patience for Hector and the Search for Happiness and its manipulations, despite liking Simon Pegg, Rosamund Pike and having been drawn in by the film’s first 20 minutes or so.
Honeymoon
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Horses of God
Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
- Excerpt: Moroccan director Nabil Ayouch uses the 2003 terror bombings in Casablanca to build an affecting, persuasive blueprint for the making of a fanatic.
Housebound
I Origins
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Ida
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
If I Stay
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Interior. Leather Bar.
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Jackpot
Jealousy
Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
- Excerpt: Jealousy is not really very much about jealousy. There’s a bit of the green-eyed monster, but more than that it’s about relationships, and how they bloom and fade.
Jimi: All is By My Side
Chris Barsanti @ Film Journal International
- Excerpt: John Ridley’s fractured and narrowcast, unauthorized Jimi Hendrix biopic (read: no Hendrix compositions) wrongly assumes that André Benjamin’s intuitive inhabiting of the musician’s skittish soul will entice audiences as much as it does the women around him.
[New Today] Nicholas Bell @ IONCINEMA.com
[New Today] Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
- Excerpt: A quirky and appealing glimpse into the life and guitar virtuosity of Jimi Hendrix.
Khoobsurat
Kathy Gibson @ Access Bollywood
A Life in Dirty Movies
Mike McGranaghan @ The Aisle Seat
Love Is Strange
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Lucy
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Magic in the Moonlight
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Maze Runner
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
A Most Wanted Man
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
My Old Lady
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Pump
Chris Barsanti @ Film Journal International
- Excerpt: Thought-provoking documentary about the lunacy of only fueling cars with gasoline loses credibility the more it turns into a single-minded broadside.
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
- Excerpt: A snappy, creative, and optimistic social issue documentary on the end of the oil era and the start of a new era of alternative fuel.
The Railway Man
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Signal
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Skeleton Twins
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Snowpiercer
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Starred Up
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Stop the Pounding Heart
Carson Lund @ In Review Online
- Excerpt: Like a significant portion of low-budget, serious-minded independent work taking place today, Stop the Pounding Heart falls squarely in the trend of on-location, non-actor-employing, process-oriented hybrid filmmaking. Thankfully, though, it bares no disingenuous traces of bandwagon-hopping.
They Came Together
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
This Is Where I Leave You
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Tracks
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Trip to Italy
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Tusk
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Two Night Stand
[New Today] Nicholas Bell @ IONCINEMA.com
Very Good Girls
A Walk Among the Tombstones
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Zero Theorem
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
2013 Films In Theaters Now In Select Areas
Girl Rising
2014 Films (Coming Soon)
’71
[New Today] Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
- Excerpt: A riveting film about a British solder adrift in 1971 Belfast, a dangerous war zone filled with zealous partisans of all types.
Above All Else
- Excerpt: Above All Else shows just how close big business is willing to threaten the lives of individuals as it forges ahead in the name of “progress.”
The Circle
Alan Mattli @ Facing the Bitter Truth [German]
- Excerpt: Mixing documentary and feature film is a boldly original, refreshingly un-Swiss move, but while ‘The Circle’ works perfectly fine during its journalistic passages, its scripted scenes are hamstrung by a cast of disappointingly underperforming actors.
Good People
Hill of Freedom
[New Today] Donald Levit @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
Human Capital
- Excerpt: An inventively structured, compelling study of two families irrevocably brought together. A string of impressive performances and a unique approach to storytelling ensures this is a film worth catching.
David William Upton @ So So Gay
- Excerpt: Human Capital is a valuable idea running through narrative structures that are simply too tired, and that here, unsupported by limp fades as events repeat themselves, don’t particularly benefit the story. It doesn’t need to wind itself up because the society being depicted is tangled and twisted enough as it is.
The Hypnotist
Maps to the Stars
- Excerpt: Cronenberg’s latest, Maps to the Stars, doubles down on the dysfunction with its tragicomic take on the intersecting fortunes of two Tinseltown dynasties and the hidden histories of violence that continue to haunt them.
Metro Manila
Stacia Kissick Jones @ Next Projection
The New Girlfriend
- Excerpt: It’s great to see Ozon return to the insidious playfulness that’s marked some of his greatest achievements. The New Girlfriend is creepy, weird, and a lot of fun.
Of Horses and Men
Alan Mattli @ The Zurich English Student
- Excerpt: Just what one is supposed to gain from seeing Of Horses and Men remains obscure up to the not-so-bitter end. Even though it may motivate hopeful close readings, it is nowhere near interesting, arresting, or indeed astute enough to sustain such efforts for a very long time.
Rio, I Love You
João Marcos Flores @ Cineviews [Portuguese]
Saturday Night
Stephen Saito @ The Moveable Fest
- Excerpt: After long being in limbo, James Franco’s unvarnished look at the week leading up to an “SNL” taping sees the light of day & it was worth the wait.
Sea Fog
Stephen Saito @ The Moveable Fest
- Excerpt: Bong Joon Ho’s collaborator on “Memories of Murder” steps into the spotlight with this suspense-filled high-seas thriller.
Seymour: An Introduction
[New Today] Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
- Excerpt: A cogent and exquisite documentary about Seymour Bernstein, a classical pianist who has spent the last 30 years of his life passing on his wisdom and counsel to his students.
The Wisdom to Survive: Climate Change, Capitalism & Community
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
- Excerpt: By far, the best and most inspiring, enlightening, and creative social issue documentary on climate change.
