For as long as I can remember, I’ve heard that artificial intelligence would one day rule the world. As technology advances at an exponential rate, the fear that stems from that sentiment seems to be increasing as well. Will one day machines and A.I. completely take over our world, resulting …
Netflix has a reputation. There’s no getting around it at this point. They make three things: a bunch of good-to-great TV shows, one or two prestige movies every year, and a boatload of cheap-looking action movies made up of bits and pieces from other, better movies that somehow star A-list actors. Atlas belongs in …
Calling a TV show “underrated” can feel like simplistic praise. With the cavalcade of streaming content, viewers will always have what they call “underrated” favorites. These favorites can still lead to numerous Emmy nominations and critical praise. MAX’s television show Hacks has had thirty-two Emmy nominations and six wins. Seasons one and …
The Girl with the Needle (Pigen med Nålen) is based on such a well-known criminal case in Denmark that mentioning the name of one of the characters is a local spoiler. For the rest of us, the horror must unspool the old-fashioned way as we watch a young woman’s truly desperate …
Google a definition of the word reality, and you’ll get #1 – “the world or state of things as they actually exist” and #2 – “the state or quality of having existence or substance.” But what makes something real? What actually exists? What percentage of people have to agree something is reality for it to be so? …
The Atypical Family is a South Korean TV series that is streaming weekly on Netflix. It’s a fantasy romance and tells the story of Bok Gwi-ju (Jang Ki-yong) and his family. They used to have incredible superpowers; however, due to chronic diseases brought about by the modern world, they are starting …
Have you ever been sitting in your home, watching a nature documentary, and thought, “What this majestic vista needs is a little more murder?” Then you are A) weird and B) in luck. Writer and director Chris Nash apparently also feels that way, and he has given us In A Violent Nature, a new horror film …
There’s no doubt that Bridgerton is one of Netflix’s most successful shows and keeps on getting better with each season. The first two seasons captivated audiences with engaging storylines, richly developed characters, and sizzling physical chemistry. Both seasons garnered supremely positive audience and critical reactions and became two of the most-watched shows …
There’s nothing like a sudden death to bring a community together, and there’s nothing like a tragedy to make people realize what’s truly important. This Icelandic movie, When the Light Breaks (Ljósbrot), is about the worst 24 hours in the lives of a group of young friends because, in the course …
Bad horror movies are a dime a dozen, with their formulaic narratives and low, often limiting, budgets. 2024 alone has seen the bizarre Night Swim, an interesting idea poorly executed in Imaginary, and, more recently, Tarot, a daft concept that was more banal than spooky. To give those pictures’ credit, though, at least …
In the horrible post-apocalyptic future depicted in the Mad Max movies, where people have names like The Octoboss and Toast the Knowing, it was downright revolutionary of Mad Max’s mother to name him Max. In Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, two of the evil sidekicks are named Rictus Erectus (Nathan Jones) and, what …
Ryusuke Hamaguchi has never made the same film twice and has always approached each project he takes on with a different lens and perspective on what he did previously. It’s highly apparent just by watching his Oscar-winning feature, Drive My Car, a nearly three-hour-long, slow, and meditative drama, and his latest project, Evil …
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 …
Former Doctor Who showrunner Steven Moffat returns to the show after seven years away with Boom, an episode that feels like a compendium of his best and worst traits. His former episodes include firm fan favorites The Girl in the Fireplace and Blink, both high-concept stories that include deep emotional stakes to those involved. His time as showrunner from …
There is a phrase in pop culture that originates from an episode of Happy Days: jumping the shark. It implies a breakdown between the audience and the content, in which the audience stops being immersed in what is occurring on screen. In The Devil’s Chord, the latest Doctor Who episode, a god-like music thief …
Nostalgia, for better or worse, is a potent factor towards enjoyment. In Space Babies, Doctor Who’s first episode of a new season – the newly regenerated Doctor being played by Ncuti Gatwa – the nostalgia that was invoked for me is for one of the worst movies of all time: Baby Geniuses. Now, I know what …
Quentin Dupieux, the director of The Second Act (Le deuxième acte), who was also the writer, cinematographer, and editor of The Second Act, thanks his own brain in the credits. This is entirely what should be expected from Mr. Dupieux, whose works are – and this is meant as an extreme compliment – completely insane. He tends to work …
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 …
How do you illustrate for the screen a life lived with physical limitations? You illustrate the life of the mind. In this biopic of writer Flannery O’Connor (Maya Hawke), the inventor of the ‘southern Gothic’ genre of literature, director Ethan Hawke (also the producer, co-writer, and Ms. Hawke’s father) chose to enact sequences from …
Mark Twain once said that, “History does not repeat itself. It rhymes.” The Planet of the Apes series, now on its tenth installment, embodies this. The original 1968 Charlton Heston vehicle ended with his character Taylor in a state of despair at realizing the world of ‘damn dirty apes’ that he crash-landed on was …