Because of embargoes, 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: Aug. 14-16, 2015
Wide (United States)
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Straight Outta Compton
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Limited (United States)
Mistress America
David Bax @ Battleship Pretension
- Excerpt: Along with the soaring Frances Ha, Mistress America is evidence that Gerwig the actor is at her best when interpreting the words of Gerwig the screenwriter. She plays Brooke to perfection, making her delusions of having been wronged or of opening a restaurant pitiably transparent while always keeping her charismatic and magnetic enough to buy that Tracy would be in her thrall.
People Places Things
[New Today] Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies
- Excerpt: People Places Things is an unexpected pleasure.
[New Today] Kristin Dreyer Kramer @ NightsAndWeekends.com
2015 Films In Theaters Now In Select Areas
10,000 KM
Josh Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: While 10,000 Km is by no means an enjoyable experience, the amazing naturalism of Natalia Tena and David Verdaguer’s performances transform Marques-Marcet’s film into an intriguing experience.
Absolutely Anything
[New Today] Stefan Pape @ HeyUGuys
Advantageous
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: Serving as a feminist diatribe, of sorts, Advantageous showcases the horrors of a masculinized world driven by marketing, profit and beauty.
Air
Amnesiac
[New Today] James Jay Edwards @ FilmFracture
[New Today] Mark Harris @ About.com
Amy
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Best of Enemies
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Big Sky
Kenji Fujishima @ Slant Magazine
Kristin Dreyer Kramer @ NightsAndWeekends.com
Brothers
[New Today] Kathy Gibson @ Access Bollywood
Child 44
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Cop Car
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Counting
Jordan M. Smith @ IONCINEMA.com
Dark Places
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Diary of a Teenage Girl
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Divergent Series: Insurgent
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Eden
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The End of the Tour
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Extinction
[New Today] Mark Harris @ About.com
Fantastic Four
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Five Star
Josh Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: The toned-down and thoughtful approach of Five Star establishes a nuanced perspective of the mundanities of life as a gangster. Miller follows up Welcome to Pine Hill with yet another naturally positive portrayal of a black gang member that impressively shatters cinematic stereotypes.
Gemma Bovery
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Gift
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Guidance
- Excerpt: There’s a little bit of a bad teacher in everyone, but Mills’ saucy substitute is no rotten apple.
Hard to Be a God
Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
- Excerpt: It’s a film buff’s film, a cult-classic-to-be. It’s Orson Welles conceived in Hieronymus Bosch, dragged through a Pasolini latrine and stomped on by Werner Herzog hobnail boots.
Homme Less
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: Thomas Wirthensohn’s Homme Less will certainly alter most people’s preconceptions about homelessness.
Horse Money
Josh Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Infinitely Polar Bear
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Irrational Man
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Jellyfish Eyes
Josh Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Jurassic World
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet
[New Today] Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies
- Excerpt: One can easily imagine a theater filled with baffled adults and suddenly tired or antsy children.
Listen to Me Marlon
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Look of Silence
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Love at First Fight
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Meru
- Excerpt: Jimmy Chin, Conrad Anker, and Renan Ozturk climbed Meru, base to peak, and that’s a mind-blowing example of mental, emotional, and athletic excellence. But a great film would explore the driving force behind that excellence, the moment-to-moment elemental challenges it poses, and the very real repercussions, external as well as internal, of pursuing it.
[New Today] Donald Jay Levit @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
[New Today] Ron Wilkinson @ Monsters and Critics
- Excerpt: A must see for climbing buffs and anyone fascinated by the strength and resilience of the human body and spirit.
Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Mr. Holmes
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Paolo Coelho’s Best Story
Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
- Excerpt: Daniel Augusto’s messy biopic samples three periods of the Brazilian author’s career, and flits about between them like a writer with adult ADD, without providing much insight
Paper Towns
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Phoenix
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Pixels
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Prince
- Excerpt: …de Jong’s work boasts a naked sentimentality that Refn’s roundly lacks, and for all of its stylistic flourishes, Prince ultimately reads as anti-Refn.
Ricki and the Flash
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Self/less
[New Reviews Today] For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Shaun the Sheep Movie
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Sneakerheadz
Josh Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Soaked in Bleach
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: This is a documentary that will most likely re-enliven the debates surrounding Cobain’s death; it will also provide Love’s enemies with all the more reason to despise her. For Love’s fan base, however, Soaked in Bleach will be nothing short of sheer heresy.
The Stanford Prison Experiment
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Stray Dog
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: Whether it is his natural personality or his trust in Granik, Hall’s life appears to be an open book. Granik adopts a purely observational perspective and Hall is unabashedly himself in front of the camera.
Tangerine
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Terminator Genisys
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
To the Fore
- Excerpt: Dante Lam returns to sports-based drama after the success of 2013’s Unbeatable, which scored US$5.7m at the Hong Kong box office (and US$18.5m in China) to become the year’s most successful homegrown offering. Throwing his net wider than the MMA cages of that film, To The Fore follows a trio of professional cyclists as they ascend into the sport’s top tier.
Tom at the Farm
[New Today] Aaron Pinkston @ Battleship Prentension
- Excerpt: Tom at the Farm film sits somewhere between a satisfying genre exercise and the complete vision of its filmmaker, sullying the idea of what could be if both are working at their highest level.
Trainwreck
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
The Tribe
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Two Step
Nicholas Bell @ Ioncinema
Josh Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: Two Step is a contemplation on laziness and the American dream of getting rich quick.
Unexpected
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: Unexpected perceptively illustrates the contrasts and similarities of unplanned pregnancies across Sam and Jasmine’s polarized races, classes and ages.
Unfriended
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
Welcome to Me
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
When Marnie Was There
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
White God
For member reviews of this film, follow this link
2015 Films (Coming Soon)
Ardor
Don Simpson @ Smells Like Screen Spirit
- Excerpt: Pablo Fendrik’s Ardor slyly inserts elements of magic realism into a highly referential Neo-Western, yet the purposefully cryptic characterization of Kai really convolutes the story.
The Price of Fame
Alan Mattli @ Facing the Bitter Truth [German]
- Excerpt: It may not hit all the right notes but Xavier Beavois’ dramedy about the abduction of Charlie Chaplin’s coffin is still an amusing, bittersweet look at the immigrant experience.
Seashore
The Sound of Trees
- Excerpt: The Sound of Trees creeps up on you and leaves roots that hold strong.
