Film
Affleck’s ‘Animals’ is a dog
⭐⭐ Rating: 1.5 out of 4. Ben Affleck made it in Hollywood as an actor and Oscar-winning screenwriter, then proved to be a more-than-reliable filmmaker, with credits including “Gone Baby Gone,” “The Town” and the true-story espionage thriller “Argo” (2012), which won the Oscar for Best Picture. Unfortunately, that’s not the case for “Animals,” the […]
Rachel Morrison on grief, loss and her new movie
One of the most powerful women in filmmaking is Cambridge-bred Rachel Morrison, the Oscar-nominated cinematographer whose movies include “The Black Panther” and “Mudbound.” Morrison has moved to the director’s chair, making her debut in 2024 with the female boxing biopic “The Fire Inside.” Cambridge Day caught up with her as her new movie, “Love of […]
‘Reckoning’ fails to exact a toll
“The Social Reckoning” ⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 2.5 out of 4. When Aaron Sorkin wrote the screenplay to “The Social Network” in 2010, the idea of a glossy biopic about a time-wasting website felt somewhat ridiculous. Nearly two decades into our social media-dominated hellscape, no one is laughing. Read more Digital billboard trucks with October 7 reminders […]
‘Verity’is lifeless on page and on screen
“Verity” ⭐⭐ Rating: 1.5 out of 4. The movie version of “Verity,” Colleen Hoover’s hackneyed page lift of Daphne du Maurier’s great 1938 Gothic psycho thriller “Rebecca,” has an all-star cast that may not be enough to give the romance novelist a fourth box office success. Read more Community, developers have mixed response to new […]
A survival thriller and a crime drama
“Heart of the Beast” ⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 2.5 out of 4. The vast wilds of Alaska are where James Belmont (Brad Pitt) goes to tamp down the PTSD he suffered as a former special ops sergeant, as well as heal the war scars of his loyal German Shepherd Odin, who served with Belmont during multiple Middle […]
Catching predators in the name of fame
“Primetime” ⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 3 out of 4. Documentarian Lance Oppenheim (“Ren Faire,” “Spermworld”) steps into the narrative feature-scape with this lurid submersion into the early years of online predation, where chatrooms were used as Venus flytraps to snare underage targets and goad them into real-life meetups. The scummy underbelly, as Oppenheim depicts it in “Primetime,” […]
9/25 is now Dolly Parton Day, featuring her greatest film
Last month the world said goodbye to Dolly Parton, a woman with as valid a claim as any to the title of Most Beloved Public Figure on Earth (she blew away the competition in a survey in March). In addition to her seven-decade recording career, her expansive humanitarian work, and her renowned decency as a […]
Intensity in survival and horror
“The Weight” ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 3.5 out of 4. In The Weight,” a muscular, Depression-era survival drama, Ethan Hawke again looms large in small, gritty fare. Hawke brings a lean, tightly wound intensity to a man carrying more than his body— or perhaps his soul — can bear. It’s another powerful performance, after a deserved Oscar […]
Cemetery screenings that don’t scare
On Tuesday and Wednesday, the programmers of the Coolidge Corner Theatre cross the river for the latest installment of Cemetery Cinema, an annual series of double features projected on the beautiful grounds of Mt. Auburn Cemetery. While graveyard screenings are often associated with horror movies, the folks at the Coolidge take a more thoughtful approach, […]
“Marie Antoinette and friends: Three films by Sofia Coppola”
If the words “Hollywood royalty” apply to anyone, it’s Sofia Coppola. Her father is Francis Ford Coppola, director of such American classics as “The Godfather” (1972) and “Apocalypse Now” (1979); her mother, Eleanor, was an acclaimed documentarian; and her family tree includes such thespians as Talia Shire, Jason Schwartzman, and Nicolas Cage. Unlike some Hollywood […]