“Wolfs doesn’t feel like a real movie while you’re watching it. It’s more like an uncanny simulacrum of something. A friend said he’d assumed the trailer was an elaborate Nespresso ad, and there is a sort of SuperBowl commercial vibe to the picture, though it put me more in mind of a fake movie parody in a Hollywood satire that isn’t particularly funny.” – North Shore Movies, 09/26/2024

“A movie about images that won’t stop over-explaining itself in words. Everything that’s clearly visible onscreen is also reiterated through declamatory dialogue and a voice-over narration so stilted and on the nose it makes Blade Runner sound like Days Of Heaven. There’s nary a moment in Lee when the pictures are allowed to speak for themselves.” – North Shore Movies, 09/26/2024

”Taking place in a slightly nicer, less sweary version of one of those upstate New York towns you’d find in a Richard Russo novel. I’ll Be Right There is an easy and not unamusing sit. But given the talent involved one wishes there might have been a bit more friction. Conflicts are softened with pillow shots of catalog scenery and adult contemporary music montages.” – North Shore Movies, 09/26/2024

“It’s impossible not to be charmed by Lyonne’s female Peter Falk routine. This is her most Cassavetes-esque showcase yet, whiplashing between funny and sad mid-sentence. Coon plays the hardass we all know will eventually soften, yet it’s a testament to her performance that the moment she did was when I finally stopped choking back the tears and let them roll.” – North Shore Movies, 09/20/2024

”Fargeat’s film is sickening in a productive way, using outré body horror techniques to address the cruelty of contemporary beauty standards and the self-loathing that festers in our appearance-obsessed age. It can be a little stupid sometimes and at 140 minutes it’s egregiously overlong, but The Substance is about something, and it’s alive.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 09/19/2024

“The movie isn’t much interested in exploring its central gimmick — I’m not sure if I should be annoyed or grateful that it doesn’t try to explain how these two are able to text each other — mostly content to be a treacly teen romance between a dull young man with no faults and an irritating girl with poor priorities. It’s like Peggy Sue Got Married without the wisdom.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 09/19/2024

“The gulf between intention and ability has seldom been wider than in Kevin Smith’s attempt to fashion his own Fabelmans-esque origin story. You’d reckon it would be impossible for someone to do something 15 times without learning anything, but it beggars belief how much worse Smith has gotten at the basics of camera blocking and shot composition.” – North Shore Movies, 09/13/2024

”There’s a handcrafted quality to the images and effects. Even the stuff that’s CGI is designed to look practical, with smooth computer animation given janky little quivers to seem more like traditional stop-motion. The movie feels like a person made it, which is a rare thing to say about a blockbuster sequel these days. It’s also light on its feet, which is even rarer.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 09/05/2024

“A children’s film for the adult diaper set, Reagan is an almost pitiably incompetent movie with production values that look like it should be playing on basic cable between catheter ads and commercials for Gold Bond medicated powder. It’s a defensive safe space for Fox News viewers to get their rocks off remembering a romanticized past that never was.” – North Shore Movies, 08/30/2024

”One of those enervating exercises in IP regurgitation that only exists because somebody owned the rights and felt like getting paid. I suppose it’s unfair for any actor to get stuck following Brandon Lee in this role, but Skarsgård looks especially silly in his Jared Leto Juggalo Joker tattoos. Maybe not every fondly remembered film needs to be a franchise?” – North Shore Movies, 08/23/2024