Movie Reviews

In Brief: The Thief (1952) is your basic McCarthy-era, Red Scare stuff, with traitor-scientist (Ray Milland) selling our atomic secrets to the enemy. There is, however, a gimmick: It has no dialogue. No, it's not a silent movie, but nobody ever says anything. Yes, that's as forced, fake and finally tedious as it sounds, but…

In Brief: François Truffaut's sixth and final film of his Antoine Doinel series — which began with Truffaut's first film, The 400 Blows (1959) — is mostly a pure delight and a fine conclusion to the series. The only problem with Love on the Run (1979) — which catches up with the 30-something Antoine for the first…

The Story: A musician tasked with organizing a folk music ensemble in Soviet-era Poland falls in love with a young singer, but his efforts to start a new life with her in the West are beset by problems on all sides. The Lowdown: A mesmerizing meditation on the vicissitudes of fate, juxtaposing a very human romance against utterly…

The Story: When a bullied teen pulls Excalibur from the stone, he learns his true identity and must recruit his own Knights of the Round Table. The Lowdown: A smart and kid-friendly retelling of the King Arthur legend from the director of Attack the Block should be an easy sell, but see it soon because it's…

The Story: A war hero-turned-beach-bum must choose between saving his child and ex from an abusive jerk or catching a really big fish. The Lowdown: A film every bit as good as its premise would suggest — which is to say, not very good at all.

In Brief: The very unusual and surprisingly powerful Oscar-nominated animated biographical film (2007) about the extraordinary — and yet perfectly relatable — life of an Iranian girl. Though playful in tone, it's a narrative that goes much deeper than one might expect. It's a film that should be seen — and one that benefits from a…

In Brief: Martin Scorsese's masterful and beautiful film about a young boy living within the walls of a Paris train station turns out to be a great deal more than a fantasy for children (though it is that, too). It's also a movie about the movies, their history and their sheer magic. There’s a tendency to…

The Story: Three superhumans are set on a collision course by a mysterious psychologist with ulterior motives. The Lowdown: An unnecessary and ill-conceived effort to create a shared Shyamalaniverse that fails to live up to the prior films in a poorly planned trilogy.

In Brief: John Huston’s The List of Adrian Messenger (1963) is a thoroughly enjoyable murder mystery in the classic style. The film features a solid performance from George C. Scott as the detective, Jacques Roux as his makeshift Watson and a touch of old Hollywood from the presence of Clive Brook and Herbert Marshall. The mystery,…

In Brief: South Korean writer/director Kwak Jae-young delivers an odd amalgam of romance, comedy, melodrama and cinematic homage with 2001's My Sassy Girl, a film that works better than its bifurcated story structure would suggest. Adapted from novelist Kim Ho-sik's source work, itself based on the author's internet anecdotes of a dysfunctional real-world relationship, My Sassy…

The Story: A young black father-to-be is a accused of a crime he didn't commit, casting a pall over generations of his family. The Lowdown: A must-see film that does laudable justice to its source material even as it seems to be overshadowed by its writer/director's prior success.

The Story: An aging Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy face the decline of their cultural influence as they embrace the irreplaceability of their friendship. The Lowdown: A film that captures the appeal of its subject even as it elucidates the sorrows of their waning years, making a poignant statement of irreplaceable virtues put inevitably out to pasture.

The Story: The maid of a wealthy family finds herself in a tight spot when her boyfriend abandons her and the master of the house pulls up stakes. The Lowdown: An aesthetically beautiful work with a weak script that draws too heavily on its influences and digresses too often into pretension.

The Story: A young Ruth Bader Ginsburg overcomes sexism in her personal and professional life to leave her mark on early gender discrimination legislation. The Lowdown: An overly polished and slavishly devoted biopic that contributes little to its subject's legacy that a recent documentary didn't already cover.  

The Story: A lost dog spends years traveling hundreds of miles to return to her owner. The Lowdown: Perhaps too intense for younger audiences, but at least you get to watch a cute dog run around for two hours.

The Story: A wealthy quadriplegic man hires an unqualified ex-con as his personal nurse so that he can reconnect with the outside world. The Lowdown: A tepid remake of a profitable but mediocre French film that only exists to fill a feel-good niche in the January cine schedule.

The Story: A mother spends a harrowing Christmas Eve searching for her son after he unexpectedly returns home from a sober living facility. The Lowdown: A clumsy, meandering film that will test your patience long before it has a chance to break your heart.

The Story: A brilliant scientist brings his wife and children back to life by uploading their consciousnesses into new bodies. The Lowdown: If anyone out there is looking for a movie that combines I, Robot with Upstream Color, you just hit the jackpot.

In Brief: Only in the world of a Wim Wenders film would an angel express the desire to go home and read a Philip Marlowe mystery as one of the reasons he’d like to be human. But because that desire is expressed in a Wim Wenders film, it seems completely reasonable. And if that makes sense…

In Brief:  Do you like musicals? Do you like Hollywood? Do you like Hollywood musicals? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then director Robert Z. Leonard's Ziegfeld Girl (1941) may well be for you — all others need not apply. Its star-studded cast, featuring the likes of Judy Garland, Hedy Lamarr and…

The Story: Six strangers are thrown together in a twisted take on the strip-mall staple of the escape room, only here the goal isn't team building but survival. The Lowdown: In the wake of bloated awards-season bookings, this creepy cheapie offers up a welcome dose of low-brow escapism.