Movie Reviews
Movie Reviews

Netflix’s “Boots” is a Trite Coming-of-Age Tale with a Hollow Corps | TV/Streaming

Basic training in the United States Marine Corps is a lonely business. So lonely, in fact, that 18-year-old Cameron Cope (Miles Heizer, “13 Reasons Why”), the central protagonist of Netflix’s new series “Boots,” frequently has conversations with his hidden queer self. Though dressed alike, Cope’s concealed persona is blunt, witty, and encouraging, while the Cameron

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Movie Reviews

What Really Matters is What You Like: “High Fidelity” at 25 | Features

When we look back at John Cusack’s expressive and bruised-heart romantic Rob Gordon in “High Fidelity” a quarter-century after the film’s release, there’s little doubt Rob was often a petulant and immature narcissist who filtered nearly every life experience only through what it meant to him. At times, it seemed like it would shock Rob

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Movie Reviews

Criterion’s “The Wes Anderson Archive” is the Blu-ray Box Set of the Year | DVD/Blu-Ray

Collectors of physical media need to get their hands on Criterion’s box set of the year, a beautiful collection of the first ten films by writer/director Wes Anderson. Criterion has released Wes Anderson films before, but this is the first time they’ve assembled them into a box set, and they’ve marked the occasion with new

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Movie Reviews

Just Be Sure You’re Right: Watching “All the President’s Men” in 2025 | Features

As idealistic as he was photogenic–my favorite Letterboxd comment in the wake of Robert Redford’s Sept. 16 death was “r.i.p … you were fine as hell”—the actor, movie star, director, and activist believed in the power of the press. Redford lived enough years, 89 of them, to see mass media in its least fraught, least

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Movie Reviews

Hulu’s “Chad Powers” Wastes Talents of Glen Powell | TV/Streaming

The new Hulu series “Chad Powers” combines the “over-the-hill athlete makes a comeback” movie and the “person wears prosthetic makeup to pretend to be somebody else” movie. It’s not a combination that has been attempted before, to my knowledge, and when you watch even one episode, you’ll understand why. Glen Powell, who also executive-produced, plays

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Movie Reviews

NYFF 2025: The 63rd New York Film Festival Centers Film and Poetry | Festivals & Awards

About midway through Kent Jones’ “Late Fame,” I heard the last thing I ever expected to hear at the New York Film Festival: the voice of Ezra Pound. The aged speaker is not identified, nor is the poem he’s reciting; if you don’t know one or both, it won’t register. The film’s protagonist, Ed Saxberger

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Movie Reviews

Fantastic Fest 2025: CAMP, Bad Haircut, Theater is Dead | Festivals & Awards

My final dispatch from the annual genre fest known as Fantastic Fest highlights three young filmmakers, a reminder of how much this event seeks to amplify new talent. It’s also a remarkable showcase for inclusivity, as the programming team seeks out and elevates the kind of voices that the Hollywood system often ignores, including LGTBQ

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Movie Reviews

Fantastic Fest 2025: Mārama, Mother of Flies, Bulk | Festivals & Awards

One of the best things about Fantastic Fest is the programming team’s willingness to import hits from other festivals. It’s actually the fest where I finally caught up with “Anora” last year, believe it or not, and some of the biggest FF films this year launched at Cannes too, including Oliver Laxe’s stunning “Sirat” and

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Movie Reviews

Marvel Animation’s “Marvel Zombies” Doesn’t Have Enough Flesh On Its Shambling Bones | TV/Streaming

One episode of the first season of Marvel Studios’ animated anthology series “What If…?” showed what would happen if zombies took over the MCU. For some unknown reason, that was adapted into a four-part miniseries spin-off, “Marvel Zombies,” which continues the narrative thread in a gorier setting. This is possibly the first and only time

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Movie Reviews

“Slow Horses” Continues to Entertain, Even in a Lesser Season | TV/Streaming

Apple TV+’s hit “Slow Horses,” based on the novels by Mick Herron, has become one of the streaming service’s most beloved shows for a reason: efficiency. In an era when so many shows drag their way through overlong seasons, all five chapters of “Slow Horses” are a lean, mean six episodes, and most of those

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