Audrey Diwan delivers an affecting, necessary abortion drama — May 3rd, 20202, will be a day that will be long remembered in American history, unjustifiably celebrated by some, justifiably vilified by many, for the leak of a pending U.S. Supreme Court decision by a reactionary, right-wing majority. That decision will be overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that…

Oscar winner Colin Firth stars as a little-known British intelligence officer and unsung war hero. — There’s a ghoulish moment in the John Madden-directed Operation Mincemeat, a fictionalized dramatization of Ben Macintyre’s 2010 non-fiction book of the same name, where two government functionaries and nominal spies attempt to prop up a decaying, putrefying, green-hued corpse to take a passable passport photograph. It comically fails Weekend at…

Finland delivers the next great body-horror folktale. — There’s a monster at the center of Finnish director Hanna Bergholm’s uniquely unnerving debut feature, Hatching (Pahanhautoja), and it’s not the brilliantly realized animatronic, avian monster that magically emerges from a gigantic egg, wreaking gruesome havoc wherever it goes. The title of “monster” belongs to a nameless maternal character (Sophia…

Paramount+’s latest addition to the Star Trek universe delivers a thoughtful and thrilling sci-fi adventure. — Note: Paramount+ made the first episodes of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds available for review. In 2005, a rapidly dwindling fanbase said their goodbyes to the Star Trek programming that ran for the better part of two decades, beginning with Star Trek: The Next Generation and continuing through Star Trek…

Marvel’s 28th feature film in 14 years doesn’t disappoint. — It’s been six years, two presidential elections, and one worldwide pandemic since Stephen Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch), onetime surgeon and full-time Master of the Mystical Arts, headlined his own solo adventure in the appropriately named Doctor Strange, the 14th film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s (MCU) ever-expanding, Disney-owned franchise. Since then…

Classic Hollywood musical gets a much-needed refresh on 4K/Blu-Ray — Sometime in the later half of the previous century, an attendee of a Roman Catholic elementary school started his typical day with a mix of prayers, allegiances to the American flag, and Broadway/musical show tunes. It was certainly unusual, a one-time, one-year occurrence dictated by a show tunes-obsessed elementary school…

Rager survival horror delivers surface-level diversions — We can thank the back-to-back releases of 28 Days Later and the Dawn of the Dead remake (2002/3 and 2004, respectively) for revivifying the long-dormant zombie/undead sub-genre, including the long-running/never-ending AMC series, The Walking Dead (an incredibly lucrative, semi-nostalgic return to George A. Romero’s shambling, cannibalistic ghouls and a post-apocalyptic…

A haunted house/supernatural thriller that puts the “slow” in “slow-burn” — There’s a key, nay fundamental, lesson at the center of writer-director Brendan Muldowney’s (Pilgrimage, Love Eternal, Savage) latest feature-length film, The Cellar: Always do your due diligence when purchasing a county manor somewhere in the wilds of Northern Ireland or the Republic of Ireland (“20 minutes from somewhere by car”)…

Disney+’s latest streaming series brings a little-known Marvel character to the small screen. — Imagine if Bruce Wayne, orphaned son of Thomas and Martha, billionaire brooder, disinterested corporate CEO, and his alter ego, (the) Batman, the gadget-obsessed, costumed vigilante, instead worked days at a London museum’s gift shop, suffered from dissociate identity disorder (DID), and wore a white costume and cape, not so random…