”Mortensen shuffles the chronology in initially confusing, continually frustrating ways. I assume he’s attempting to deconstruct certain tropes regarding rape and revenge in Hollywood movies, but in trying to take apart the story’s engine he’s removed it altogether. These are all well-played scenes, and they sit there inert because there’s nothing driving them into each other.” – North Shore Movies, 05/31/2024

”As the narrative screws start to tighten, I couldn’t help imagining what Steven Soderbergh might have made from this material. Still, Linklater has always been one of our most affable auteurs, and Hit Man is nothing if not likable. There’s a real warmth to the picture that makes you want to share it with friends. Too bad most folks will have to watch it at home alone.” – North Shore Movies, 05/24/2024

”Miller’s hotly anticipated prequel is a much stranger, more sorrowful picture than its predecessor, replacing Fury Road’s high-octane excitement with moodier meditations on scarcity and loss at the end of the world. It’s a very good, sometimes shatteringly powerful film that has the misfortune of following one of the greatest movies ever made.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 05/23/2024

”One of those post-Apatow comedies in which likable television personalities stand around ad-libbing and pulling faces over a promising premise that hasn’t been fleshed out into a story. Without looking it up, I’m guessing Babes probably premiered to easy-lay raves and some sort of ridiculous ovation at SXSW. I’m honestly shocked Kumail Nanjiani isn’t in it.” – North Shore Movies, 05/17/2024

”Granted, it’s still an exploitation picture. But it’s an uncommonly thoughtful and haunting one, bumping up against the limitations of the genre in fascinating ways. Too somber and meditative to thrill its target audience while a little too cheap and skanky to be the moody meditation Hornisher is shooting for, it’s curiously affecting all the same.” – North Shore Movies, 05/09/2024

”There’s something intentionally disjointed about the filmmaking. The camera angles are slightly obtuse and ambient sounds are mixed distractingly loud. Hamaguchi deliberately uses such disorienting cinematic devices to evoke the disharmony and inevitable imbalances in man’s relationship to nature. His scenic shots of the forest are hardly soothing.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 05/08/2024

”Sometimes we just want to watch movie stars being charming. The Fall Guy understands this well enough that you’re inclined to give the rest of the messy movie a pass. Still, a shorter, cheaper version probably would have worked a whole lot better. It’s easy to imagine a 105-minute incarnation directed by John Badham being a mid-summer programmer back in 1988.” – North Shore Movies, 05/02/2024

”Lee’s novel became a sensation on TikTok, probably because it keys into some of the weirdest mental health issues infecting our youth-obsessed culture. Alas, the movie has been carefully engineered to avoid or at least gloss over most of these matters in favor of an excessively pleasant wish fulfillment fantasy buoyed by the chemistry between its two leads.” – North Shore Movies, 05/02/2024

“Challengers may not be a great movie, but it’s the kind I wish we saw more of: unabashedly lusty even if that means being a bit ridiculous sometimes. One floridly melodramatic encounter between Tashi and Patrick in an alley is punctuated by squalls of litter and stray newspapers whipping through the air, as if a twister had been stirred up by their roiling passions.” – WBUR’s Arts & Culture, 04/25/2024

”There’s a lot of blather in this talky Tarantino knock-off, which feels like a script that’s been sitting in somebody’s desk drawer since the late 1990s that’s been dusted off and hastily updated with only the most annoying contemporary horror trends. It’s the worst of both worlds, really, which is too bad because the idea behind the movie is admittedly juicy.” – North Shore Movies, 04/19/2024