1st Reviews

Havoc   begins as a mixed bag, with a Tom Hardy character who never quite changes and feels like the same stoic, hungry for danger/pain hero he’s played before. The story and its setup also feels somewhat convoluted and surrounded by characters who aren’t that gripping. However, after the first act, the action sequences become so complex and outrageous in their choreography, editing, and stunts, that they elevate the entire movie, including Hardy’s presence in it. The crime lord villains feel like caricatures, and Forest Whitaker’s performance is too over-the-top with hollow writing. Jessie Mei Li plays a great partner to Hardy’s cop, as is Timothy Olyphant as a more seasoned cop rivaling Hardy’s character.  Two fight scenes, one in a nightclub and one in/outside a cabin, are so intricate, bloody, and exaggerated, and escalate so shockingly they’ll make your jaw drop and forgive many of the film’s shortcomings. However, that does take getting past a generic beginning (and blan...

Sinners is a sensational, stylish and soulful fusion of genres. This is exactly the kind of ambition and originality we need more of from major studios. Ryan Coogler hasn’t just delivered one of the best films of the year, but arguably the best of his impressive career.  There are a lot of different elements here, working in harmony to achieve something wholly unique and memorable. It’s a viciously entertaining vampire flick, but there’s so much more to it, which is what makes it truly special. This is a thematically rich story that celebrates black culture as well as an examination of oppressive hardships and cultural assimilation. It’s also a beautiful tribute to the roots of blues music, in which the music itself becomes just as alive as any of the film’s characters. There’s a scene where music transcends time that’ll be talked about for years. You can’t ignore the ambition, and although on paper it may sound like a messy mashup of genres and ideas, the end result is undeniably ...

  A great prequel isn’t so much about the what, but about the how and why that lead to the events we already know. Rogue One took a small plot hole from A New Hope and not only fixed it, but gave it meaning. Over two seasons, Andor has delivered a truly spectacular lead up to Rogue One, filled with purpose and emotional resonance, further elevating the entire original trilogy in the process.  Season one played like a series of connected arcs - four smaller stories woven into a larger narrative. Season two, by contrast, is more singular in its focus. It has the urgency of a story heading toward a known endpoint, with a clearer sense of direction and finality. While there are still some detours and character-specific side plots, everything here feels more tightly connected to the series’ inevitable conclusion. These twelve episodes work overtime to bridge the gap between Andor and   Rogue One, while never feeling forcibly tied to canon. It delivers more brilliantly detailed...

  Ryan Coogler, one of the most impactful filmmakers to come out of the last decade, creates his most original, commanding, and dazzling film, a kind many have been waiting to see for a long time. Coogler gets free reign to blend genres with unique storytelling on a larger scale than we’ve seen before. The characters leap off the page and screen with their wonderful portrayals from Michael B. Jordan, Hailee Steinfeld, Wunmi Mosaku, and Delroy Lindo, as well as a more menacing turn from Jack O’Connell. As both Smoke and Stack, Jordan plays characters who aren’t free of moral question marks but still worth rooting for, and have excellent romances with Mosaku and Steinfeld, while Lindo has brilliant moments of reflection, strength, and humor. The film portrays America in the 1930s as a place of difficulty and strive, with a system built to oppress black Americans, but in the main characters’ blues club, a dazzling, one-of-a-kind portrayal of black culture and music in a safe space of ...

  The Amateur  is well-directed, with an engaging enough visual look to keep the runtime going, as well as a strong score by Oscar winner Volker Bertelmann. However, it settles for mediocre as often as it becomes thrilling. Rami Malek is excellently cast in the role, but in earlier moments in the film, his performance still feels distant, and gets to shine more later, or sometimes the editing is to blame for not letting us sit with Charlie’s grief and pain for longer in certain scenes. Holt McCallany is especially memorable as the tough CIA Deputy Director, as is Laurence Fishburne a resourceful yet more empathetic CIA operative.  Despite the packed cast, the story itself sometimes feels muted, including a lack of true exploration of the idea that this hardly trained man is committing elaborately planned out killings that would be viewed as sadistic if the men he was killing weren’t murderous terrorists. The dialogue also sometimes falters, but the elements of the formula...

  War is hell, and every once in a while, a film comes along that drags you through that hell in a way that’ll leave you utterly shell shocked. Warfare is among the most harrowing, visceral and realistic war movies of all time. Alex Garland and Ray Mendoza have crafted a brutal recount of true events that needs to be experienced in theatres.  Set in 2006, we follow a young group of U.S. Navy Seals stationed in Iraq during a surveillance mission gone wrong. The opening scene (featuring Eric Prydz’s “Call on Me” thumping on full blast) is extremely effective in giving us one of the few moments of levity throughout the entire film. The slow mounting tension leading up to the main conflict had my heart racing and palms firmly gripping the armrest. With a bare bones narrative stripped of any excess, this movie gets right to the point by throwing us directly into these soldiers’ boots. The specifics of the mission aren’t stated. You won’t find any exposition. Warfare sets out to rea...