Mary Elizabeth Winstead pops Yakuza skulls like bubble wrap in an action-packed, but underwhelming thriller. Kate has an elite assassin plowing through organized crime baddies in Tokyo. She’s been irreversibly poisoned, has twenty-four hours to live, and wants to deliver some serious vengeance in her waning moments. Blades, blood, and bullets fly nearly nonstop throughout

Coupon clipping leads to multimillion-dollar fraud in a funnier than expected ensemble comedy with a lot of heart. Loosely based on a true story, Queenpins has two struggling Phoenix women turning their savings addiction into big money organized crime. Kristen Bell leads a talented cast of Hollywood veterans. They elevate the written material with their

Guy Pearce searches for a wealthy mogul’s missing daughter in a city of android slaves. Zone 414 is set in a near dystopian future where humanity has perfected artificial intelligence. “Synths” are allowed to interact with mankind freely in one designated place. Zone 414 is a playground where the rich and powerful can fulfill any

Yakuza Princess goes for the jugular with visceral katana-slicing action, but unfortunately gets bogged down by sluggish pacing. Adapted from the graphic novel “Samurai Shiro” by Brazilian comic book artist Danilo Beyruth, the film has striking cinematography and intriguing characters. It takes a deep dive into Japanese organized crime, samurai culture, and sword fighting tactics.

Ben Wheatley’s low-budget, hallucinatory mishmash horror In The Earth poses promising terror, following a scientist and park ranger as they venture deep into a remote forest to check on scientific equipment while the world battles a deadly virus. An ambiguous evil force within the woods awaits, as does horror in human form. The film starts

Nia DaCosta reboots Candyman as a preachy, arthouse sermon on racial injustice and police brutality. The film is shot in an interesting way, but fails dramatically at its core purpose. Candyman offers zero scares and drags considerably in its ninety minutes runtime. The plot pays tribute to the 1992 original without capturing any of its

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is a stunning martial arts epic. Director Destin Daniel Cretton has delivered an intimate story of a family reckoning with far reaching consequences. The fight scenes are exquisitely choreographed with amazing, visionary camera work. But the truly fantastic part is that behind the excellent filmmaking, action, and

A veteran Hollywood cast and skilled direction take a convoluted B-movie plot to higher ground. The Protégé puts a brutalized orphan girl under the tutelage of a wily assassin. He becomes a father, friend, and mentor. Who teaches her to go for the jugular like a stalking tiger. The film is loaded with punishing action

Ever-growing gem of a streaming platform, Shudder, has given us some great platform-exclusive horror flicks, including recent abduction thriller The Boy Behind The Door, which is worth your look for the nail-biting suspense. More often than not, anything labelled a “Shudder Original” is pretty solid. It pains me to assert they have a rare miss.

Hugh Jackman searches for his lost love in a water-logged, yawn-inducing blend of Inception and Strange Days. Reminiscence refers to a near future technology where past memories can be experienced again in a cerebrum simulation. The story takes place in a Miami flooded by climate change and beset by class warfare. Poverty stricken drug addicts