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: Dec. 20, 2019
Wide (United States)
Cats
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Expanding (United States)
Bombshell
Jared Mobarak @ JaredMobarak.com
- Excerpt: While everyone else plays his/her caricature broadly, [Robbie] renders hers empathetic. The filmmakers bit off more than they could chew and are fortunate it mostly works.
2019 Films In Theaters Now In Select Areas
1917
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Abominable
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Dark Waters
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Farewell
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Ford v Ferrari
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
A Hidden Life
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Honey Boy
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Irishman
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Jojo Rabbit
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Jumanji: The Next Level
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Knives Out
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Long Day’s Journey Into Night
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Marriage Story
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Playmobil: The Movie
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Report
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Richard Jewell
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Uncut Gems
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Waves
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Where’d You Go, Bernadette
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6 Underground
Marco Albanese @ [Italian]
6 Underground
Benjamin Kramer @ The Voracious Filmgoer
- Excerpt: It’s cranked up and spat out at the audience in balletic brutality and eye-popping intensity
6 Underground
Brent McKnight @ Giant Freakin Robot
- Excerpt: Bonkers action, frenetic camera work and editing, raging excess, off-the-rails violence, questionable morality, puffed-up chest-thumping; if Bay was cocaine, it would be the pure shit before it gets stepped on.
American Woman
Jared Mobarak @ JaredMobarak.com
- Excerpt: How do we grow in spite of [tragedy]? Each step [forward] proves to be a nuanced transformation thanks to Scott’s quiet direction and Miller’s stunning lead performance.
Atlantics
Jared Mobarak @ JaredMobarak.com
- Excerpt: [Its] straightforward narrative [goes] off the deep-end into a two-pronged, darkly beautiful, supernatural haunting. Things get a little shaky, but [Diop] sticks the landing.
Black Christmas
Herman Dhaliwal @ Cinema Sanctum
- Excerpt: Black Christmas isn’t perfect, but it’s fairly tight and tense, and it has a lot to say with its timely themes.
Black Christmas
Shelagh Rowan-Legg @ ScreenAnarchy
Black Christmas
Cunningham
- Excerpt: This colorful but remote-feeling documentary functions almost as though it were taking orders from the late Merce Cunningham.
The Feeling of Being Watched
Jared Mobarak @ JaredMobarak.com
- Excerpt: The Feeling of Being Watched is like an introductory handbook: one that peels back the layers on our government’s activities to show how they willfully complicate our methods of keeping them in check.
Frankie
Paulo Portugal @ Insider [Portuguese]
Frankie
Jonathan Richards @ santafenewmexican.com
- Excerpt: There are worse ways to spend a chilly evening than among the lush beaches, woods, and hills of Sintra, in the company of the great Isabelle Huppert. But there’s an alchemy to the talk in a Rohmer movie that isn’t captured here.
Klimt & Schiele – Eros e Psique
Paulo Portugal @ Insider [Portuguese]
Little Women
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: A very welcome feminist interpretation of Alcott’s beloved novel, layered in sly, winking awareness of Hollywood clichés and the cultural pressures on women. Alive and electric, an absolute treasure.
Made in Bangladesh
Paulo Portugal @ Insider [Portuguese]
Midnight Family
- Excerpt: …a compelling composite of the fragility and durability of the working wonders that strive to take one step forward in the name of progress only to step three steps backwards as the trying times dictate the rhythm of progression.
Midnight Family
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Reviews
- Excerpt: It’s a disheartening look at such a backward ambulance system, but it makes for an exciting film.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Jared Mobarak @ JaredMobarak.com
- Excerpt: This is a once in a lifetime love that frustration and resentment can risk destroying in hindsight as long as the memory of what was shared becomes permanent in their hearts.
Promare
Jared Mobarak @ JaredMobarak.com
- Excerpt: [The] results arrive as though by the seat of the filmmakers’ pants. This artistic choice maintains a desire to always have at least one more surprise up their sleeves.
What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael
MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
- Excerpt: A terrific portrait of the legendary critic, as objective as she was proudly subjective. Pulls no punches on her complicated life and work but rightly hails how she revolutionized thinking about film.
What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael
- Excerpt: What would Kael think of this film? Probably that it was too conventional, just a mix of talking heads and archival clips, and not as lively as her own prose.
