“Moretz is a bit too self-possessed to sell the screenplay’s occasional pangs of doubt. The film works better as an aspirational depiction of kids resilient enough to look past the short-sighted hangups of the adults in their lives who are currently calling the shots. These characters are going to mean a lot to young people stuck in similar situations.” – North Shore Movies, 08/16/2018
“There are all kinds of ways a ‘bad’ cultural object can be redeemed. What’s amazing about Showgirls is that it ticks nearly every box: it’s been reclaimed as camp, as kitsch, a grist for the academic mill, as auteurism, as ideology, as a fun night out with friends, as everything. Maybe this resurgence is simply a case of an idea whose time has come.” – WBUR’s The ARTery, 08/15/2018
“This summer’s most brashly entertaining movie is also the most terrifying film of the year. Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman will leave your sides aching from laughter and your stomach twisted in knots. This scabrously funny film may take place four decades in the past, but it never lets you forget how the sickness it documents is still surging in the present.” – WBUR’s The ARTery, 08/10/2018
“A refreshingly unconventional biopic focusing on the part of its subject’s life nobody cares about, it’s the story of a has-been slouching toward an ignominious end. But the movie has an unexpectedly generous spirit. It plays as a gentle human comedy about life on the road with a high-maintenance former legend, like a slowed-down My Favorite Year on smack.” – WBUR’s The ARTery, 08/07/2018
“Watching it again recently I found all of Coppola’s cornball flourishes to be rather endearing, even generous. It’s a teen movie that doesn’t condescend to kids, but translates their tumultuous emotions onto a giant canvas in a larger-than-life Hollywood vernacular that went out of fashion at least twenty years before the picture was even made.” – WBUR’s The ARTery, 07/31/2018
MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – FALLOUT * * *
Starring Tom Cruise, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg and Henry Cavill. Written and directed by Christopher McQuarrie.
“The power of McKay’s pictures comes through their accumulation of detail and attention to the rhythms of day-to-day lives. My favorite shot finds José whizzing along on his bike in the rain, a garbage bag poncho blowing out behind him like a superhero’s cape. If the movie accomplishes anything it will at least make everyone who watches it a better tipper.” – WBUR’s The ARTery, 07/26/2018
