The first twenty minutes of Oliver Pearn’s On the Line is pretty swell. With its simple title cards, sepia coloring, and sixties setting, the film looks like a long-lost Hitchcock… Continue reading "On the Line (Pearn, 2023)"
The Mission uses the story of John Chau, an American missionary killed trying to make contact with an isolated people group, to examine the broader cultural conflict between religious evangelism… Continue reading "The Mission (McBaine and Moss, 2023)"
In an interview (see link below), director Raoul Peck said that he wanted to make a film in Silver Dolalrs Road that a Black audience could watch and feel “at… Continue reading "Silver Dollar Road (Peck, 2023)"
One of the biggest red flags I look for when approached to cover an “inspirational” or “Christian” film is a marketing campaign that calls on Christians to recruit viewers. Reminiscent… Continue reading "What Rhymes with Reason (Roberts, 2023)"
I find minority reports one of the more difficult kinds of movie reviews to write. On the one hand, I have scoffed at colleagues on social media who sometimes treat… Continue reading "The Creator (Edwards, 2023)"
Nathan-ism is a near-miss of a documentary that has a promising subject and appears to stumble across an important and unexpected angle, but it is ultimately unable to put the… Continue reading "Nathan-ism (Golod, 2023)"
I was surprised by how much I enjoyed A Haunting in Venice. Perhaps I should not have been. Yes, the trailer played up the Halloween connection and made it look… Continue reading "A Haunting in Venice (Branagh, 2023)"
Freedom’s Path is a relentlessly, oppressively well-intentioned movie that struggles mightily to live up to the importance of its subject matter. William (Gerran Howell) is a Union deserter. Kitch (RJ… Continue reading "Freedom’s Path (Smith, 2023)"
The complaint that a film has no likable characters or no one that the viewer can relate to is one of those critical tropes that is irritating when someone else… Continue reading "Madeleine Collins (Barraud, 2021)"
Susie Wallis (Kiersey Clemons) is sorta like a Black Veronica Mars with braces. And if that reference now dates me, let me add that I mean it as a compliment.… Continue reading "Susie Searches (Kargman, 2022)"
