”The band has been able to transcend generational turf wars for the past 60 years, and we should probably be thankful to have a movie like this available in everybody’s living rooms after such a divisive and exhausting election. To paraphrase Lester Bangs’ obituary for Elvis Presley, we may never agree on anything again the way we agreed on The Beatles.” – North Shore Movies, 11/25/2024

“Pascal barely registers onscreen at all, with a good deal of Gladiator II serving as a cautionary tale about what happens to lightweight TV actors when they come up against a bona fide movie star. It’s like every scene is being acted in lowercase letters until along comes big-D Denzel. He’s an absolute joy to watch, and the film languishes in his absence.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 11/21/2024

“Unlike the Technicolor Oz we grew up with, Chu’s is a land of hazy, low-contrast pinks and faded pastels. The whole movie looks like an Easter basket, which can be tiring on the eyes over such a long haul. Still, it’s an engaging enough half-a-movie, anchored by a sublime comic turn from Ariana Grande as a privileged brat blithely oblivious to her own awfulness.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 11/21/2024

”Such a noisy, witless puddle of CGI puke I can’t believe Ryan Reynolds isn’t in it. I suppose it will be tempting for critics to describe this movie as a lump of Christmas coal. Except that coal can actually serve a purpose, like heating people’s homes, or giving them black lung disease, both options preferable to sitting though Red One.” – North Shore Movies, 11/15/2024

”The story takes place almost entirely on Murphy’s face, swimming in the infinite sadness of those ice blue eyes. The movie is hushed and has the damp chill of Irish winters. Delicate in its observations and devoid of histrionics, Small Things Like These is pretty much exactly the opposite of the kind of project you’d expect an actor to produce after winning an Oscar.” – North Shore Movies, 11/08/2024

“It’s a classy crowd-pleaser, deftly executed with the no-frills finesse that’s been the Eastwood brand for as long as I’ve been going to the movies. Juror #2 was obviously shot on a budget, with sets that look like they went up yesterday, but it’s got the kind of clean, clear storytelling beats that have become a lost art in contemporary Hollywood.” – North Shore Movies, 11/01/2024

”You might be wondering how all these disparate elements and clashing tones could possibly work together. The answer is about as well as you think. One watches Emilia Pérez the way you’d stare at a duck-billed platypus or one of those exotic animals made up of mismatched parts that Robin Williams cited as proof that God gets stoned.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 10/31/2024

”That is one nutty Vatican. But in retrospect, the rave reviews for Conclave are hardly a surprise. Being sequestered with a bunch of cantankerous celibates who dislike each other while trying to settle on the least objectionable option for everybody will be an extremely relatable experience for anyone who has ever voted in a film critics society meeting.” – North Shore Movies, 10/25/2024

”Hagiographic in a way that starts to feel unseemly, full of self-consciously mythic shots of Bruce backlit and slowly ascending stairwells and such while friends and colleagues tell us how great he is. More than once it reminded me of those old ‘Legends of Springsteen’ sketches on The Ben Stiller Show. Surely they could have done better than this.” – North Shore Movies, 10/25/2024

”Sean Baker’s Anora is the best American film of the year so far. It’s also the funniest — a soaring, generous comedy about transactional relationships and the class divide. What starts as a Cinderella story in stiletto heels becomes a bawdy, up-all-night farce. With her crack comic timing and air raid siren of a voice, Madison is like Jean Arthur in a thong.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 10/24/2024