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: Feb. 28, 2020
Wide (United States)
The Invisible Man
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Limited (United States)
Blood on Her Name
Shelagh Rowan-Legg @ ScreenAnarchy
- Excerpt: Blood on Her Name shows not only how most of us could never cope with a terrible crime, but how those already under the thumb of the system can likely never escape it.
Burden
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ Spirituality & Practice
- Excerpt: True story about a black Christian minister who practices love, forgiveness, and reconciliation by befriending a Ku Klux Klan member.
Burden
Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
- Excerpt: If only Heckler hadn’t weighted Mike’s attraction to Judy over the Reverend’s hard won influence, he could have made an end run on the oft-lamented ‘white savior movie’ with his black hero, but while the film has its flaws, it works more often than not, buoyed by good performances.
Disappearance at Clifton Hill
Shelagh Rowan-Legg @ ScreenAnarchy
- Excerpt: Disappearance at Clifton Hill gives us a good thriller that (like most good thrillers) asks more questions that it answers, and shows us characters both stuck in place, going in circles, and struggling to get out.
Disappearance at Clifton Hill
Gregory J. Smalley @ 366 Weird Movies
- Excerpt: Full of psychological unease rather than jump scares, Clifton Hill plays well within its budget. Superior writing elevates it from merely a ‘modest thriller’ to a ‘modest-but-clever thriller.’
Greed
- Excerpt: The film takes occasional stabs at comic grotesquerie, but it’s brought back to earth by an insistent docudrama seriousness.
Greed
Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
- Excerpt: Winterbottom encouraged improvisation and Coogan, who has shown a scary affinity for portraying obnoxious gits (albeit highly entertaining one), summons Trump and his ilk… Call it “The Trip to the Roman Empire: The Road to Global Ruin.”
Guns Akimbo
- Excerpt: It takes a flick like Guns Akimbo to make you stop and appreciate the craftsmanship and nuance of a motion picture like Crank.
2020 Films In Theaters Now In Select Areas
Birds of Prey
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Call of the Wild
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Downhill
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Lodge
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Night Clerk
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Brahms: The Boy II
Mark Hobin @ Fast Film Reviews
- Excerpt: No spoilers, but this review contains a more creative plot twist than the movie itself.
Brahms: The Boy II
- Excerpt: Clearly, naughty Brahms from 2016’s The Boy needed more of a supernatural spanking than he does a needless follow-up in a dull and creepy cornball sequel…the belabored subpar chills that aimlessly wallow in manufactured weirdness and waste.
Emma
Charlie Juhl @ Citizen Charlie
- Excerpt: Director Autumn de Wilde reminds us Emma is the original Mean Girl; the ur-Regina George, queen bee of The Plastics. Yet, listening to the approving murmurs of the ladies in attendance at the screening, Emma can do no wrong.
Emma
Rene Sanchez @ Cine Sin Fronteras [Spanish]
First Cow
Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
- Excerpt: Cowriter (with novelist Jon Raymond)/director Kelly Reichardt returns to the Pacific Northwest for a simple tale of friendship rooted in the compromised beginnings of American capitalism.
Horror Noire
Glenn Dunks @ The Film Experience
- Excerpt: How great it is then to see two new documentaries Scream, Queen! My Nightmare on Elm Street and Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror focusing on these elements and offering glimpses into the complicated realm of what it is like to be a viewer and a creator in these spaces…
Impractical Jokers: The Movie
- Excerpt: Ultimately, this cruel impractical joke is on all of us…is about as amusing as sitting on a whoppie cushion filled with chocolate filling.
The Last Thing He Wanted
Rene Sanchez @ Cine Sin Fronteras [Spanish]
Like a Boss
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: This instantly forgettable fluff lazily relies on too many unfunny slapstick and grossout tangents. But real humor blossoms in the terrific performances and in a fast, funny, and surprising feminism.
The Man Who Was Sherlock Holmes
- Excerpt: The screenplay by Robert A Stemmie and Karl Hartl both plays the game—assumes Holmes and Watson are real persons living in the real world, or at least sets the story in a world where the characters believe that—and acknowledges that they are fictional creations.
Olympic Dreams
Charlie Juhl @ Citizen Charlie
- Excerpt: This Olympic setting does not require machine guns, hostages, and explosions – far from it – but Olympic Dreams is a case of background eclipsing plot and characters.
Onward
Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
- Excerpt: Pixar has been known for its incredible world building, but “Onward’s” world is Tolkien lite by way of Dreamworks’ dragons with a lead character who could easily slip into a Keebler elf commercial…
El Plan
Diego Salgado @ Guía del Ocio [Spanish]
Premature
Premature
Charlie Juhl @ Citizen Charlie
- Excerpt: Zora Howard is hypnotic to watch in Rashaad Ernesto Green’s exploration of a first deep-dive relationship. The Harlem setting and real-world atmosphere spark Premature’s earnest tone and establishes an authenticity not usually felt in the romantic drama genre.
Scream, Queen!
Glenn Dunks @ The Film Experience
- Excerpt: How great it is then to see two new documentaries Scream, Queen! My Nightmare on Elm Street and Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror focusing on these elements and offering glimpses into the complicated realm of what it is like to be a viewer and a creator in these spaces…
Seberg
- Excerpt: …ambitious but thoroughly disjointed psychological thriller biopic . Both Stewart and her vulnerable inspiration Jean Seberg deserved a better deep dive than this tiptoe through the surfacing waves of despair and disillusionment.
Standing Up, Falling Down
Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
- Excerpt: This dramedy falters by presenting too many awkward scenes that don’t seem real. But Billy Crystal’s fine lived-in performance makes the movie a must-see for his fans.
Vitch
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Reviews
- Excerpt: It took some three years to make this well-executed and uniquely personal investigative journalism film.
Young Ahmed
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ Spirituality & Practice
- Excerpt: An intense and sobering portrait of both sides of the spiritual practice of zeal.
2019 Films
Jojo Rabbit
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Citizen K
Josh Taylor @ www.forgetfulfilmcritic.com
- Excerpt: The thread of personal metamorphosis that Gibney tracks in Citizen K is what makes it such a dynamic and thought-provoking film.
Domino
Diego Salgado @ Guia del Ocio [Spanish]
Kill the Monsters
- Excerpt: ‘What we’re doing [threesome] is the right idea’
2018 Films
I Do Not Care If We Go Down in History as Barbarians
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Reviews
- Excerpt: A brilliantly conceived film.
