Movie Reviews
Movie Reviews

Cannes 2023 Video #1: Previewing This Year’s Highlights | Chaz at Cannes

RogerEbert.com publisher Chaz Ebert’s first video dispatch from the 2023 Cannes Film Festival, made with Scott Dummler of Mint Media Works, features an in-depth preview of this year’s highlights with contributor Isaac Feldberg. Their discussion topics include the potential impact of the current WGA strike on the festival, this year’s Competition Jury led by two-time

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Movie Reviews

The Starling Girl movie review (2023)

That sugarcoat smile is just a thin cover for the near-constant shaming and judgment suffocating Jem Starling (Eliza Scanlen) as a 17-year-old girl growing up in a fundamentalist Christian community in Kentucky. Laurel Parmet’s brilliant coming-of-age drama “The Starling Girl” captures the vulnerable teen at the moment she’s finding herself, finding love (or is that

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Movie Reviews

Crater movie review & film summary (2023)

Living in 2257, Caleb (Isaiah Russell-Bailey) is in mourning. His father (Kid Cudi) recently died on the job, leaving him an orphan in the lunar mining colony they call home. Because his parents are dead, he is granted the opportunity to travel to the paradisal planet Omega, a 75-year journey that’ll require him to be

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Movie Reviews

One Ranger movie review & film summary (2023)

The writer and director, former stuntman Jesse V. Johnson (“Avengement”), throws audiences into the middle of action. There’s a bank robbery out in a patch of Texas territory monitored by Texas Ranger Alex Tyree (Jane) that was spearheaded by a former IRA member named Declan McBride (Dean Jagger). Alex is in the process of arresting

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Movie Reviews

You Can Live Forever movie review (2023)

A tender and compassionate debut feature by writer/directors Mark Slutsky and Sarah Watts, the latter of whom grew up gay in a Jehovah’s Witness community, “You Can Live Forever” lets the romantic tension between its protagonists build slowly and naturally, in stolen glances and small touches. As Jaime and Marike circle each other, at once

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Movie Reviews

A Beautiful Moment: The Cast of Queen Charlotte on the New Bridgerton Prequel | Interviews

The original series took it as understood that there was complete diversity, and everybody was fine with that. And I love the way that this series opens up that conversation. And that scene that you have with the Queen is one of my favorites. Tell me what making that issue explicit does for this series.

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Movie Reviews

Chicago Critics Film Festival 2023 Preview: Chicago Premieres of Acclaimed Films from Around the World | Festivals & Awards

FRIDAY, MAY 5th 7PM: “BLACKBERRY” (includes Q&A with star/writer/director Matt Johnson) Johnson paces “Blackberry” like that rocket. It moves quickly without being overly stylized, clicking through dialogue and character instead of cheap tricks. We’ve seen a lot of movies about tech nostalgia lately (the far-inferior “Tetris” premiered across town at the same fest), but Johnson

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Movie Reviews

Peter Pan & Wendy movie review (2023)

The story begins with Wendy Darling (Ever Anderson) leading her younger brother John (Joshua Pickering) and kid brother Michael (Jacobi June) in a play session that includes swashbuckling sword fights, followed by a couple of nice moments between the children and their parents (Molly Parker and Alan Tudyk). Soon enough, Peter Pan (Alexander Molony) makes his entrance

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Movie Reviews

R.M.N. movie review & film summary (2023)

When the film opens, Matthias (Marin Grigore) is working in a German slaughterhouse. While out on a smoke break, he is called a “lazy gypsy” by a co-worker, who he quickly headbutts to the ground. The sudden violence says a lot about Matthias’ instincts, but it will also have interesting reflections later in the film

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Movie Reviews

32 Sounds movie review & film summary (2023)

Except for a brief section when the filmmaker asks the viewers to remove the phones—the headphone version is definitely one that veers into an audience participation mode—that’s how we hear the movie. I’m surprised that Lou Reed is never mentioned in the work—in the 1970s, he was a real proselytizer for this binaural recording method.

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