“Ensuring I won’t get my shopping done until the last possible moment, this week The Brattle Theatre has three days of double features reeking of whiskey, cigarettes and mistletoe. If you prefer your holiday tidings laced with arias of profanity, inventive torture sequences and comically brutal gunfights, Santa’s got a lot of presents under the tree this year.” – WBUR’s The ARTery, 12/20/2016
“The movie spends so much time fellating its bogus hero, were it about an actual person Patriots Day would seem like a North Korean propaganda film. But instead it’s just the tasteless delusions of a vain movie star recreating his hometown’s most horrifying moments so he can dress up and play policeman. Everyone involved should be ashamed.” – North Shore Movies, 12/20/2016
ROGUE ONE: A STAR WARS STORY * * 1 / 2
Starring Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Ben Mendelsohn, Alan Tudyk and Forest Whitaker. Screenplay by Chris Weitz and Tony Gilroy. Directed by Gareth Edwards.
LA LA LAND * *
Starring Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, John Legend, Rosemarie DeWitt and J.K. Simmons. Written and directed by Damien Chazelle.
1. Manchester By The Sea 2. Silence 3. Paterson 4. Certain Women 5. Elle 6. The Nice Guys 7. De Palma 8. Mountains May Depart 9. The Handmaiden 10. Cafe Society
Honorable Mentions: A Bigger Splash, Cameraperson, Cemetery Of Splendor, Cosmos, Dog Eat Dog, The Fits, Green Room, Hail, Caesar!, Hell Or High Water, I Am Not Your Negro, Krisha, Right Now, Wrong Then, Sully, Toni Erdmann, White Girl – BOFCA. 12/09/2016
JACKIE * * *
Starring Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard, Greta Gerwig, Billy Crudup and John Hurt. Screenplay by Noah Oppenheim. Directed by Pablo Larrain.
“Huppert stars in two films so oddly similar in surface specifics and yet so wildly divergent in tone it’s an almost show-offy display of her talents to have Things To Come and Elle playing across the hall from one another at area arthouses. Suddenly the grande dame of European kink cinema is becoming this year’s Oscar season It Girl.” – WBUR’s The ARTery, 12/06/2016
LION * 1 / 2
Starring Dev Patel, Rooney Mara, Sunny Pawar, David Wenham and Nicole Kidman. Screenplay by Luke Davies. Directed by Garth Davis.
ALLIED * * *
Starring Brad Pitt, Marion Cotillard, Lizzy Caplan, Simon McBurney and Jared Harris. Screenplay by Steven Knight. Directed by Robert Zemeckis.
RULES DON’T APPLY * *
Starring Warren Beatty, Lily Collins, Alden Ehrenreich, Matthew Broderick and Annette Bening. Written for the screen and directed by Warren Beatty.
SPLICED PERSONALITY 