Megalopolis Movie Review

‘Megalopolis’ Review: Baffling, Bad, Brilliant, and Achingly Sincere

Francis Ford Coppola’s first feature film in 13 years was always going to generate excitement, but Megalopolis – since its divisive Cannes premiere and disastrous marketing campaign with AI-generated quotes (the fault of US distributor Lionsgate, not Coppola) – is almost a sensation. Add in a star-studded cast, some of …

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Timestalker Movie Review

‘Timestalker’ Review: Delightfully Off-kilter Time-hopping British Comedy

Timestalker, the sophomore directorial feature of writer-director Alice Lowe, takes the Shakespearean adage “The course of true love never did run smooth” to its most extreme and fantastical conclusion. Lowe plays Agnes, a woman who lives an ordinary life with only a nagging, unplaceable inkling that something is missing. More …

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Lollipop Movie Review

‘Lollipop’ Review: Life-affirming Drama Propelled by Strong Performances

The title of writer-director Daisy-May Hudson’s latest feature, Lollipop, hearkens to a sticky-sweet childhood candy and its colorful, innocent connotations. Yet this film opens with a collect phone call playing over the BFI funding title card, notifying the recipient that it is from a British prison and how to decline …

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Smiles and Kisses You Documentary Review

*smiles and kisses you* Documentary Review (Edinburgh)

The documentary genre is well acquainted with the strangest facets of the human experience, but *smiles and kisses you* – the sophomore documentary feature from director Brian Carberry – broaches an unorthodox relationship with an almost reckless candor. The film follows Chris, a 36-year-old gas station cashier in rural North …

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Gala and Kiwi Movie Review

Gala & Kiwi Review: Enthralling Two-hander Deals Too Many Twists (Edinburgh)

Stories of young adulthood’s unique growing pains are familiar fodder for feature films, and writer, director, and film editor Axel Cheb Terrab’s first feature Gala & Kiwi is a startling, rough-around-the-edges look at a friendship gone awry in these turbulent years. This time of life immediately after leaving one’s family …

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Steppenwolf Movie Review

‘Steppenwolf’ Review: Brutally Nihilist Work is Not Without Beauty (Edinburgh)

After opening with a quote from Herman Hesse’s famous novel of social and spiritual isolation, Steppenwolf – the latest from director Adilkhan Yerzhanov – moves away from the German-Swiss author’s work that shares its name into another interpretation of “a wolf of the steppes.” This takes the form of an …

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Sing Sing Movie Review

‘Sing Sing’ Movie Review – An Excellent Drama (Edinburgh)

Greg Kwedar’s Sing Sing opens from the wings of a theatre. The camera moves hazily through sparkling streamers hanging from the stage ceiling before emerging on John “Divine G” Whitfield (Colman Domingo) performing a monologue from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Rapturous applause breaks out, and the entire cast joins …

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The Outrun Movie Review

‘The Outrun’ Movie Review: Rote Evocation of Astonishing Memoir

Amy Liptrot’s breathtakingly poignant and unsparing memoir The Outrun has been acclaimed by critics and adored by readers across the world since its 2016 publication. Eight years later, the book loses none of its effect – the description of a very personal journey through familial mental illness, addiction, substance abuse, …

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The Bohemian Movie Review

‘The Bohemian’ Movie Review: A Musical Biopic at its Most Sumptuous

Not much is known about Josef Mysliveček – the 18th-century composer at the center of writer and director Petr Václav’s lavish historical biopic The Bohemian – in the English-speaking musical world. It is known he was on good terms with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart as the two composers vied for recognition …

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Hit Man Movie Review

‘Hit Man’ Cements Glen Powell’s Movie Star Status

In Hit Man, Richard Linklater’s latest film, the beloved director teams up with his star Glen Powell to write a script loosely based on a stranger-than-fiction news feature by legendary Texas Monthly reporter Skip Hollandsworth. It should be stressed that the real story, while remarkably gripping, does not go quite …

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Sugar Series Review - Apple TV+

‘Sugar’ Series Review: A Bold Swing, A Big Miss

The sun-soaked seediness of LA is immediately apparent in Sugar, Mark Protosevich’s neo-noir crime drama. Sugar follows Colin Farrell’s eponymous private detective hired for one case, which quickly spirals into a wider network of rich girls gone wrong, drugs, questionable law enforcement, polaroids, self-destruction, and other such Hollywood crime and its visual signifiers.   John Sugar: A Golden-Hearted Detective …

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Franklin Series Review

‘Franklin’ Review: Michael Douglas is pitch perfect in middling drama

AppleTV+ seems to be carving out a nice niche for itself in prestige period miniseries that combine the holy trinity of the genre: star-studded casts, rich production design, and a topic of historical importance delivered with a glossy respect. Franklin, created by Kirk Ellis – perhaps previously best known for creating HBO’s magnificent miniseries John Adams – fits the …

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Manhunt Series Review

‘Manhunt’ Series Review: Cast Thrills in Gripping Historical Drama

It is likely that 99% of the audience for Manhunt will push play on the first episode knowing roughly how the events play out. Monica Beletsky’s seven-part adaptation uses James L. Swanson’s book of the same name as a rough starting point to chronicle the 12-day search for John Wilkes Booth and his co-conspirators after the …

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The Outside Circle Movie Review

‘The Outside Circle: A Movie of the Modern West’ Review

The so-called Wild West is having a fashionable moment: Beyonce’s newly released Cowboy Carter, Almodovar’s Strange Way of Life, Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon – even Barbie’s iconic outfit for the real world in Gerwig’s film – show that cultural collective fascination with the fashion and mindset of the Old West are far from exhausted. The Outside Circle: A Movie of …

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Drive Away Dolls Move Review Banner

‘Drive-Away Dolls’ Movie Review: A Lightweight Labor of Love

Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke’s Drive-Away Dolls – directed by Coen, written by the pair, and edited by Cooke – has been a long time in the making but arrives at a strange juncture in the Coen extended family’s careers. When Joel and Ethan Coen announced a temporary split and solo projects after decades of operating as the Coen Brothers, all eyes …

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Coup! Movie Review

‘Coup!’ Review: A Covid Conscious Satire (Glasgow Film Festival)

Punctuation can speak volumes. The latest feature from writer-director duo Austin Stark and Joseph Schuman – Coup! – joins the ranks of Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge! and Richard Linklater’s Everybody Wants Some!! in adding an exclamation point to a punch title, immediately suggesting a zany, irreverent take on social paranoia during the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic. As the world recovers from war …

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Tummy Monster Interview - Ciaran Lyrons Lorn Macdonald and Michael Akinsulire at the Glasgow Film Festival

‘Tummy Monster’ Interview with Director Ciaran Lyons and Actors Lorn Macdonald & Michael Akinsulire

Some of film history’s most iconic works take place across one eventful day or night. Tummy Monster easily fits this model, taking place in one location over a night that goes from ordinary to extraordinary with alarming speed. Tattoo artist Tales (Lorn Macdonald) is just about to close up shop …

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Selman Nacar's Hesitation Wound - review

‘Hesitation Wound’ Review: The Clash of the Human and the Corporate

Twenty-four hours in one lawyer’s chaotic personal and professional life comes to a head in Selman Nacar’s sophomore feature. Hesitation Wound (Tereddüt Çizgisi) clocks in under 90 minutes, but the fullness of its action and the richness of its moral dilemmas, characterizations, and performances gives it the weight of many longer features.  Canan …

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Restore Point Movie Review - Glasgow Film Festival

‘Restore Point’ Review: A Sleek Sci-Fi Thriller at Glasgow

The year is 2041, and death before one’s time does not necessarily mean the end of one’s life in Robert Hloz’s sleek sci-fi thriller. Restore Point takes its title from this new technology, managed in a central database in a nondescript metropolis of tarnished chrome (perhaps Prague in the future, though signs of its …

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‘Falling Into Place’ Review: Mental Health Aware Romantic Drama

Love stories often rely on two characters being in the right place at the right time. Falling Into Place – a melancholic slow-burn love story from writer/director Aylin Tezel – follows in the timeless vein of the recent phenomena Normal People and One Day: the meeting of its characters may feel like destiny, but trials of time, …

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