Movie Reviews
Movie Review: In ’72 Hours,’ the bachelor party has an unlikely plus-one
As a movie about getting older and still having to cater to younger demographics, the Kevin Hart comedy “72 Hours” has a meta synergy to it. Hart plays a successful New York ad executive named Joe whose campaign ideas have turned dated. His bosses no longer think he can connect with Gen Z. To reacquaint […]
Movie Review: Pickleball is the star of the sports comedy ‘The Dink’
It’s the tennis establishment versus pickleball enthusiasts at an uptight club in “The Dink,” a kind of spiritual descendant of “Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story.” The story itself is very by the books: A once promising tennis prodigy learns to get over himself and his disdain for the “lesser sport.” In one version of the […]
Movie Review: In Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Odyssey,’ an ancient epic is reborn
Getting home, and turning back the clock, has long been at the root of Christopher Nolan’s films. The astronauts of “Interstellar” painstakingly lose 23 years in space travel, almost the same length of time Odysseus is away from home in “The Odyssey”: a decade fighting the Trojan War, a decade trying to return to Ithaca. […]
Movie Review: ‘Evil Dead Burn’ goes full brutality, without humor, artistry or verve
French filmmaker Sébastien Vaniček vowed when he took charge of the sixth installment in the “Evil Dead” film series that it would be the most brutal. Mission accomplished, mon ami. Not the most artful or clever or scariest. Brutal. Vaniček has certainly delivered — a relentlessly violent, overlong, one-note, meandering grindhouse that lacks its predecessors’ […]
Bringing Your Household Back to the Mainland: Planning a Hawaii Return Move
Returning to the mainland after living in Hawaii can feel very different from relocating there in the first place. A household may have accumulated furniture, appliances, personal belongings, and everything needed for island life. Now those possessions need to make the journey in the opposite direction while the family coordinates housing, employment, travel, and a […]
Movie Review: The live-action ‘Moana’ is a lifeless carbon copy of an animated classic
Say what you will about them, but the Disney live-action remakes have at least given us a choice. Which would you rather see? A spirited, soaring, animated “Moana,” or a purposeless remake featuring Dwayne Johnson with Fabio hair? The sea is wide, my friends. Yet Moana, the Polynesian wayfaring princess, has seemingly been stuck swimming […]
Movie Review: An absurd trip to Hollywood in ‘Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass’
A little more than halfway through the extremely silly “Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass,” the main character questions the very idea behind her journey, and, by extension, the movie itself. In it, Zoey Deutch’s character Gail embarks on a “Wizard of Oz”-like journey from Kansas to Hollywood to even the score with her […]
Movie Review: Supergirl is a blast, but the movie doesn’t match her punk-rock spirit
Last year’s “Superman” ended with Iggy Pop singing “Because I’m a punk rocker, yes I am” — an ironic coda for a superlatively square hero. But it rings straightforwardly true for Superman’s cousin. Milly Alcock’s Kara Zor-El, or Supergirl, sports not a spandex suit but a Blondie T-shirt. When we meet her in Craig Gillespie’s […]
Movie Review: ‘Minions & Monsters’ is a very yellow mash note to Hollywood
Every once in a while, Hollywood gets high on its own supply and makes a love letter to moviemaking. It happened recently with Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans” and George Clooney’s “Jay Kelly.” Now it’s time for the unlikeliest of love-letter writers: canary-yellow, gibberish-speaking, overall-wearing mini-monsters. “Minions & Monsters” — the third chapter in the ongoing […]
Movie Review: Millie Bobby Brown returns as Sherlock’s sister in ‘Enola Holmes 3’
The “Enola Holmes” movies have done nothing so much as chart Millie Bobby Brown’s evolution from child actor to movie star. She was 16 when the first “Enola Holmes” debuted in 2020. As “Enola Holmes 3” arrives on Netflix, she’s 22. And all three movies have been driven by Brown’s natural charisma. The first two […]