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Jeffrey M. Anderson
Tomatometer-approved critic
The Passion of Joan of Arc, Sherlock Jr., Chimes at Midnight, Rio Bravo, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, Cat People, Dead Ringers, Modern Times, Life and Nothing More, Eyes Wide Shut, Late Spring, Detour
San Francisco
http://www.combustiblecelluloid.com
Movies reviews only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
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The Secret Art of Human Flight (2023) |
A beautifully touching portrait of grief. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jul 13, 2024
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Night Shift (2023) |
A sturdy, entertaining late-night watch. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jul 13, 2024
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I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House (2016) |
It's an ethereal, dreamlike, malleable movie, almost in the experimental vein, unconcerned with a linear explanation of events. Ghosts are in charge here. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jul 12, 2024
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Longlegs (2024) |
A cat-and-mouse thriller in the grand tradition of great serial killer movies, this one uses familiar elements but ramps them up to nightmarish levels with its stark angles and chilling rhythms. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 12, 2024
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Lumina (2024) |
A possible contender to join the list of The Worst Movies of All Time, this sci-fi thriller seems to be earnest but is actually inept and laughable due to bad writing, acting, effects, and more. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 12, 2024
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Hit Man (2023) |
Richard Linklater's 'Hit Man' feels rather slight on a first viewing, but that hardly matters when it's so smart and so wildly entertaining. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jul 05, 2024
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MaXXXine (2024) |
The finale of an hugely effective trilogy, this frisky, fun slasher movie has extreme gore but also plenty of small gifts for cinephiles and a memorable, close-to-iconic main character. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 04, 2024
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Mother, Couch (2023) |
Starting out as an absurd comedy and moving into a surreal nightmare, this unpleasant movie is about characters who talk a lot and listen very little, making for a confusing, frustrating experience. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 04, 2024
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Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 (2024) |
Kevin Costner's three-hour Western, the first of four proposed chapters, meanders a bit and often looks more small-screen than big-screen spectacle, but if you give it a chance, it grows on you. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 04, 2024
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Daddio (2023) |
This kind of two-character drama can sometimes feel overwritten and too "stagey," but the quality and flow of the screenplay and the stars' clever, quiet performances make it work beautifully. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 04, 2024
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A Quiet Place: Day One (2024) |
It could have been a cheap cash-in that killed the mystery of the creepy sound-seeking monsters, but this prequel is instead a surprisingly riveting, intricately designed, even touching adventure. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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Blackwater Lane (2024) |
Listless and overlong and full of mostly unlikable characters, this thriller seems to have taken a perfectly decent murder plot and gutted it, exposing how utterly absurd it really is. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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The Exorcism (2024) |
A good idea for a demon-possession movie with a decent cast eventually goes downhill, with themes underexplored and characters losing their focus in favor of routine horror pyrotechnics. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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Kinds of Kindness (2024) |
Due to its slow pacing, this strange, dry, and very long comedy doesn't quite achieve the punch that its three stories could have pulled off, but it at least manages more than a few offbeat giggles. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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Reverse the Curse (2023) |
A passion project by Duchovny, this father-son dramedy resorts to some hokey moments to keep its "lie" plot afloat, but its emotions and love of baseball are genuine. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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What You Wish For (2023) |
This food-focused thriller is a tad familiar and perhaps even predictable, but it still manages to throw in enough secret ingredients to keep things simmering. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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Sometimes I Think About Dying (2023) |
Despite its deceptively gloomy title, this lovely, small wisp of a movie explores themes of loneliness, trust, and perhaps even fate with a beguilingly quiet sense of poetry and mystery. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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Victims of Sin (1950) |
This irresistible Mexican film, newly restored, takes place in the world of seedy nightclubs, arrogant crime lords, hot music, and beautiful women. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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American Fiction (2023) |
'American Fiction' works by keeping the satire sharp, but giving it a genuine humanity. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jul 03, 2024
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Inside Out 2 (2024) |
Underneath Joy's primary mission is that secondary fear of the unknown that lies ahead. And the genius of this and other Pixar movies is that it faces this fear and comes out the other side. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jun 14, 2024
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Jumanji (1995) |
Time has softened it, especially given the passing of star Robin Williams, and it's an enjoyable watch. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jun 13, 2024
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Bad Boys: Ride or Die (2024) |
This increasingly road-weary series tries to limp into more "mature" territory with its characters and their relationships, but it's has all the same old shootouts, explosions, and dumb humor. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jun 07, 2024
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In A Violent Nature (2024) |
This mesmerizing, deliberately paced horror/slasher movie may not scare traditional horror fans, but its unique rhythms and compositions ask fresh, intriguing questions about the bloody genre. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jun 04, 2024
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The Dead Don't Hurt (2023) |
Mortensen's Western has a slightly unwieldy structure, but it also has elegance and a sense of patience, and its cast gives strong, touching performances. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jun 04, 2024
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Black Sheep (1996) |
It received scathing reviews upon release, and it's certainly no masterpiece, but this broad slapstick comedy has a few good laughs and a sweetness that, in retrospect, makes it somewhat endearing. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jun 04, 2024
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Creep (2014) |
It was obviously inspired by other two-hander horror thrillers, but this micro-budget, no-frills wonder gets the job done spectacularly, generating suspense through human behavior and threat. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Jun 04, 2024
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The Crow (1994) |
What makes 'The Crow' work so well is its sheer intensity. It pulses with gothic energy, inky black nights and driving rain, long black hair and long black coats. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jun 04, 2024
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Under the Cherry Moon (1986) |
It's not exactly Lubitsch, to be sure, but it's an attractive and diverting comedy. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jun 04, 2024
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The Idea of You (2024) |
Winds up a genuinely heartfelt story, centered on its characters and not on its gimmick. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jun 04, 2024
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A Story of Floating Weeds (1934) |
The silent film shows a younger, more passionate, vigorous Ozu who had just established his simple style. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jun 04, 2024
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Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024) |
It's bonkers, insanely inventive, and contains at least one chase scene that rivals, and perhaps tops, anything in 'Fury Road.' It gave me the tingles. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Jun 03, 2024
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Evil Does Not Exist (2023) |
It's a movie that will be maddening to some, and boring to others, but it's also a work of great thought and skill, and a work of relevance and poetry. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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Kids (1995) |
This savagely controversial, deeply brutal movie, the debut of many notable talents, was notorious in its day and still is. 'Kids' is definitely not for "kids," but it's an unsettlingly effective cautionary tale. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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Rust Creek (2018) |
This low-budget thriller has good pacing and a fascinating character dynamic, but it's so riddled with lapses of logic and frustrating behavior that it comes totally undone before it gets going. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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Poolman (2023) |
This comedy (which is Pine's directorial debut), tries to be a love letter to L.A., and in that regard, it manages a few sweet, weird moments, but mostly it's noisy, jumpy, and ill-paced. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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Force of Nature: The Dry 2 (2024) |
Falk's return in this perfectly serviceable sequel is evenly paced and has fine outdoor cinematography; it captures a novel's texture, if relying on a few too many flashbacks. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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Tarot (2024) |
An ineffective, shameless copy of tons of other "group of friends makes a mistake and gets stalked by a killer one by one" movies, this horror tale offers nothing new, not even a decent homage. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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Chief of Station (2024) |
This generic spy thriller consists of rudimentary action and chase scenes, tons of exposition as characters explain the plot to one another, and textbook twists that lack life or spark. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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Wildcat (2023) |
Largely nonlinear, this fine depiction of a great author avoids typical biopic trappings, instead concentrating on the rhythms of the artistic process and capturing O'Connor's voice in a visual way. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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I Saw the TV Glow (2024) |
More deeply haunting than outright scary, this experimental horror movie explores identity in general—and queer identity specifically—in ways that are both tender and uncomfortable. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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The Strangers: Chapter 1 (2024) |
The third entry in a not-very-good series that began back in 2008 (and the first movie in a new trilogy), this home invasion horror movie makes no improvements and adds nothing new to the formula. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted May 18, 2024
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Iguana (1988) |
Hellman's beautifully observed direction makes the film mesmerizing. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted May 12, 2024
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Ride in the Whirlwind (1965) |
A miracle of understatement. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted May 12, 2024
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The Big Bird Cage (1972) |
Going for a slightly lighter tone than on the earlier film, Hill provides all kinds of grindhouse thrills, keeps up the pace, and imbues everything with an infectious glee. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted May 12, 2024
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Sorceress (1983) |
Though 'Sorceress' falls far below Hill's usual standards, it definitely works as a so-bad-it's-good camp classic. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted May 12, 2024
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The Man With the X-Ray Eyes (1963) |
A rather inventive little "B" movie, with ambitious, sci-fi appeal. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted May 12, 2024
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The Fall Guy (2024) |
The real secret to the movie's success is the remarkable chemistry between Gosling and Blunt... I can't even remember the last time I so full-heartedly rooted for an onscreen couple to find their romantic spark. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted May 04, 2024
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Humane (2024) |
A dystopian sci-fi story, a darkly comic skewering of American capitalism and greed, and a gory horror tale, this bloody movie doesn't always achieve a satisfying balance, but it's never boring. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Apr 29, 2024
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Cash Out (2024) |
This low-key bank heist movie has a few appealing qualities, but they're unfortunately outweighed by many more unappealing qualities, such as confusion, bewilderment, and boredom. - Common Sense Media
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| Posted Apr 29, 2024
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Dogfight (1991) |
The small, touching Dogfight mainly works because of the immense skill, presence, and chemistry of its two stars. - Combustible Celluloid
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| Posted Apr 26, 2024
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