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Faye
(2024)
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Steve Murray
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The movie could have been much deeper and smarter, but it’s enough to make you hope for some sort of comeback or at the very least a renewed appreciation of her work.
Posted Aug 02, 2024
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A Family Affair
(2024)
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Steve Murray
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Even Kathy Bates, as the down-to-earth mother of Kidman’s dead husband can’t save A Family Affair from terminal fakeness.
Posted Aug 02, 2024
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Atlas
(2024)
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Steve Murray
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Lopez’s character and the movie itself can’t quite decide if AI is a big bad evil thing or our very best buddy. So it decides to say both things in what seems less a philosophical choice and more the most inoffensive and lucrative one.
Posted Jun 28, 2024
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The Great Lillian Hall
(2024)
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Steve Murray
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Instead of an interesting study of dementia, Elisabeth Seldes Annacone’s script becomes a showcase for mother-daughter recriminations that seem even older than Chekhov’s play.
Posted Jun 28, 2024
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Hit Man
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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It’s likable enough, in a film-noir-lite way, but it’s never as thrilling, funny or romantic as it ought to be.
Posted Jun 28, 2024
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The Idea of You
(2024)
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Steve Murray
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Sure, we know miscommunications and heartache will ensue; it’s a romcom, after all. But it’s a fairly smart, well-acted one that finds its true villain in social media and its divisive, tear-everything-down energy. The movie is a not-so-guilty pleasure.
Posted May 31, 2024
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Kidnapped: The Abduction of Edgardo Mortara
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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Director Marco Bellocchio renders this story of religious extremism in a handsome production that doesn’t shy away...
Posted Feb 16, 2024
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Irena's Vow
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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I wish director Louise Archambault's film were made with more edge or insight, but its earnest uplift makes Vow a solid choice for opening-night film.
Posted Feb 16, 2024
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The Goldman Case
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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It’s a film easier to respect than to enjoy.
Posted Feb 16, 2024
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Shoshana
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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Like The Goldman Case and Kidnapped, it’s another fact-based drama that might invite some pre-viewing homework.
Posted Feb 16, 2024
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Stella: A Life
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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Directed by Kilian Riedhof, it’s a movie less to enjoy than to be haunted by.
Posted Feb 16, 2024
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Where Is Anne Frank
(2021)
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Steve Murray
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The film is an interesting experiment that doesn’t quite cohere.
Posted Feb 16, 2024
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Mike Birbiglia: The Old Man and The Pool
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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The Old Man and the Pool is a charming, charmingly brief exploration of the sort of adventures with health hiccups that arise with middle age. If you don’t find it relatable, you’re young or lucky or both.
Posted Feb 14, 2024
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Society of the Snow
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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The movie could have used more surprises of its kind. Otherwise, Society is a movie I respect more than recommend.
Posted Feb 14, 2024
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The Killer
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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It has a massive, house-leveling fight scene, but dramatically it doesn’t really develop a pulse until its final minutes.
Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Nyad
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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Like the athletes they represent, Bening and Foster are the sort of career pros you just sit back and admire as they nail their scenes.
Posted Dec 08, 2023
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May December
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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In the end, May December offers neither the campy juice you get from those ripped-from-the-headlines TV movies it mocks or the depths of a psychological art film like Ingmar Bergman’s Persona.
Posted Dec 08, 2023
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El Conde
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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Though it has moments of dark wit (a flying sequence in the second half has a wild poetry to it), El Conde reminded me that Larraín’s filmography is wobbly. His films tend to be more interesting in their concept than in the watching.
Posted Oct 03, 2023
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Being Mary Tyler Moore
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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Being Mary Tyler Moore reminds us of the subversive, sunny power of the woman who could turn the world on with her smile but was battling personal demons herself.
Posted Jul 14, 2023
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Reality
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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Satter does a decent job of establishing and maintaining a low-level hum of anxiety as Reality slowly realizes the quiet, deep danger she’s in...
Posted Jul 14, 2023
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Peter Pan & Wendy
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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The movie is an argument for leaving all the old stories alone if we’re not willing to embrace their weirdness and wrongness. Otherwise, we kill a lot of the odd magic that attracted us to begin with.
Posted Jun 02, 2023
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Hannah Gadsby: Something Special
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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After bearing personal trauma in the 2018 breakout, Gadsby proves to still be funny, with crack timing.
Posted Jun 02, 2023
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Judy Blume Forever
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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It’s a lovely, informative movie.
Posted May 01, 2023
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Ghosted
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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Ghosted is pretty much like every other copycat riff that’s been spun since that 1994 film...
Posted May 01, 2023
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Causeway
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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...it was an earnest but forgettable flick...
Posted Jan 31, 2023
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Emily the Criminal
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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Plaza’s tough but sympathetic performance keeps you hooked all the way.
Posted Jan 31, 2023
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White Noise
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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White Noise can seem both annoyingly arch and almost adorably naïve. Viewer mileage may vary, but for me it was a hard slog.
Posted Jan 31, 2023
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All Quiet on the Western Front
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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Edward Berger’s impressively brutal film, made on a broad, old-fashioned canvas with state-of-the-art shocks.
Posted Jan 31, 2023
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The Banshees of Inisherin
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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An agonizingly slow watch, but it’s worth your patience mainly for the acting...
Posted Jan 31, 2023
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You People
(2023)
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Steve Murray
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The problem is, this comedy of discomfort too often feels like a series of position papers more than a movie.
Posted Jan 31, 2023
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Master of Light
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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There’s hard-won power when Morton instructs his young nephew to write, “I am not what has happened to me; I am what I choose to become.”
Posted Dec 05, 2022
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Spirited
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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It’s big, obnoxious and has (shudder) a lot of musical numbers delivered with outrageously enthusiastic choreography.
Posted Dec 05, 2022
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My Policeman
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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The performances are all good, though Styles doesn’t quite have the chops to pull off a couple of Tom’s more demanding emotional scenes...
Posted Dec 05, 2022
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Don't Worry Darling
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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All style and little substance, Darling has nothing you haven’t already seen...
Posted Dec 05, 2022
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The Wonder
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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The Wonder is honorable, but it’s marred by a particular error. Three times in the film, Lelio reminds us — showing the workings of a film set or having an actor address the camera directly — that the story is a manufactured one.
Posted Dec 05, 2022
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Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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This Pinocchio puzzles the existential question of what it means to be alive. The focus gives the old story an unusual, rich, autumnal slant.
Posted Dec 05, 2022
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Werewolf by Night
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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Directed without tempo, Werewolf is neither lurid nor scary nor funny nor campy enough to make an impression.
Posted Nov 08, 2022
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Hellraiser
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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The new Hellraiser is grisly meat-and-potatoes, but it still has a flavor that lets you know Bruckner is behind the camera.
Posted Nov 08, 2022
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Mr. Harrigan's Phone
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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Hancock’s film is something more bittersweet, ephemeral and ultimately disposable than that. It won’t exactly waste your time, but the main reason to watch is the ever-leonine Sutherland in his silvery late prime.
Posted Nov 08, 2022
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Rosaline
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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If you watch Rosaline, you won't hate yourself. We've just seen it all before, done fresher and better, from Shakespeare in Love to 10 Things.
Posted Nov 08, 2022
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Catherine Called Birdy
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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Adapting the film from Karen Kushman's book, Dunham presents Birdy with a rollicking style that might remind older film lovers of Tony Richardson's Oscar-winning, badly dated but still infectiously energetic Tom Jones from 1963.
Posted Nov 07, 2022
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Descendant
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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The notion of misery tourism and the much pricklier subject of reparations both arise in Descendant. This documentary does what some of the best in its genre do: raises more questions than it answers — the kinds of questions we need to be asking.
Posted Nov 07, 2022
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Lou
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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Lou proves that they’re willing to bring women of a certain age into the fold. And there’s nothing wrong with that, if the women in question are as high-value as Janney is, in even the silliest material.
Posted Oct 07, 2022
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Blonde
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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R.I.P., Marilyn — seriously. It's time to let the poor dead woman rest in peace already.
Posted Oct 07, 2022
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A Jazzman's Blues
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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An even bigger problem? Bayou and Leanne are pretty stick figures that the script tells us we should root for, yet we have no compelling reason to do so. That means the tragedy the whole film is heading for doesn’t feel, well, very tragic.
Posted Oct 07, 2022
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Prey
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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A great movie? Absolutely not. But it won’t insult your intelligence nearly as much as so many movies being churned out for streaming platforms.
Posted Sep 07, 2022
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Day Shift
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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The only consistent pleasure of Day Shift comes from Dave Franco as Seth, the finicky, suit-wearing union rep paired with the reluctant Bud. He gives the movie what little comic pulse it has.
Posted Sep 07, 2022
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The Gray Man
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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If you can remember much about it 15 minutes after watching, you'll have a stronger impression than it made on me.
Posted Sep 07, 2022
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Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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This and other MCU movies are so well made, it’s easy sometimes to ignore that they’re all just a series of gobbledygook dialogue stitching together CG-enhanced fight scenes. But these days, it’s Disney/Star Wars/Marvel’s world and we just live in it.
Posted Jul 11, 2022
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Good Luck to You, Leo Grande
(2022)
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Steve Murray
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Good Luck has worthwhile ideas to explore about sex, aging and body acceptance.
Posted Jul 11, 2022
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