Review: H is for Hawk

H could also be for “Helen”. In an effort to grieve for her father’s passing, Helen MacDonald buys a hawk, and attempts to train it. Based off the memoir of the same name, H is for Hawk is directed by Philippa Lowthorpe (Swallows and Amazons, The Crown) and stars Claire Foy (First Man, The Crown),…

Review: Hamnet

Well, I definitely did cry. Agnes is considered to be the daughter of a witch to everyone except William. Will’s unorthodox personality and desire to write makes the two of them instantly connect. The joys of family and creation are theirs. But are these strong enough to weather the worst of tragedies? Hamnet is based…

Review: Marty Supreme

That was not at all what I expected. Marty Mauser is an excellent table tennis player, and he certainly knows it. But when his uncle refuses to pay for his flight to Japan for a tournament, he takes matters into his own volatile hands. A sequence of escalating chaos, formed by Marty’s own hubris, threatens…

Review: Eternity

This higher concept rom-com actually worked for me. Good job. Joan wakes up in the afterlife to find it a hotel where souls decide how to spend their eternal life. But it isn’t an easy decision to make; her lifelong husband is here, and her first husband who died in the war… and has been…

Review: One Battle After Another

A modern day classic, perhaps? The explosives expert in a modern revolutionary militia finds himself and his daughter hunted by American military police. One Battle After Another is directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. No, not the one who makes the symmetrical movies, nor the one who made the Resident Evil movies. This Anderson brought us…

Review: A Big Bold Beautiful Journey

That was quite underwhelming. Two lonely hearts at a wedding are brought together by a mysterious car rental agency. Together they go through a life-affirming journey and perhaps see different sides of themselves. Directed by Kogonada, and starring Margot Robbie and Colin Farrell, the film makes us ask the question: what is a movie title?…

Review: The Life of Chuck

Whoever said this is “The best Stephen King film ever made” is insane. At the end of the world we also say goodbye, and thank you, to Chuck. Directed by Mike Flanagan (Doctor Sleep, Hush, Gerald’s Game) comes this adaptation of a Stephen King novella. It stars Tom Hiddleston (Avengers) Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a…

Review: Tornado

A straight-forward revenge flick. Two traveling performers become involved with a gang of thieves. A young girl in a strange land must fight back against those that pursue her. Written and directed by John Maclean, a relative newcomer to the director’s chair, Tornado is everything you’d expect from a revenge movie. Starring Tim Roth, Takehiro…

Review: The Surfer

Each year we get a weird and unsettling Nic Cage movie. A father takes his son surfing at the beach he grew up with. But when the locals don’t take kindly to their appearance, the father risks everything to keep his dream alive. The Surfer is a grim but striking movie directed by Lorcan Finnegan,…

Review: The Penguin Lessons

Quirky little movie with more heart than expected. Tom Michell is a curmudgeonly English teacher in the 1970s, moving to Argentina for work at a school. But when he rescues a penguin on the beach, he’s going to have his eyes opened. The Penguin Lessons is a film based off true events, directed by Peter…