The Movie:

At first glance, The Last Race would appear to look at the origins of auto racing in the 20th century for outsiders like myself, but when you get into the weeds of it, the story, characters and storytelling has an Errol Morris type of flavor to it (appropriate given the location), looking at a topic that few would have thought to consider, letting it flow organically and with minimal interruption, and is a nice surprise.

In Michael Dweck's feature-film debut, he looks at Riverhead Raceway, a modest race oval stretch in Long Island. Open for almost 70 years, its owners are Connie and Eddie Partridge, a couple in their 80s who have repeatedly fended off offers to sell the track so that the races can continue. The Partridges are interviewed, along with some drivers and fans of the races as they talk about what it means to them. On the other side, various land developer...Read the entire review

An excellent, socially-conscious family drama, Hirokazu Kore-eda's Shoplifters (Manbiki kazoku, or "Shoplifting Family," 2018) won the Palme d'Or at Cannes and was nominated for an Academy Award as Best Foreign Language Film, among many other prizes.

Understated with almost uncannily authentic performances, it's heart-wrenching but entirely believable and universal in its concerns. For Japanese audiences particularly, much of what happens story-wise resonates because stories like those presented in the film turn up with alarming regularity on the evening news. In short, it's one of the best Japanese features in years.

The film really deserves better treatment than this DVD-only release, which offers not a single extra feature.

In present-day Tokyo, ...Read the entire review

The Movie:

There are a lot of female comedians and comic actors working today on stage, in movies and on television, and one would imagine if they had to put together a Mount Rushmore of influences on their work, Gilda Radner would easily make the list. The Second City alum and member of Saturday Night Live's Not Ready for Prime Time players initial cast held her own and some of her male cohorts at times with characters like Roseanne Roseannadanna before moving on from the weekly grind of late night sketch comedy, ultimately to be taken from the world much too soon at the age of 42 due to ovarian cancer. Lisa D'Apolito combined with Radner's estate teamed up to make Love, Gilda, using a wealth of audio tapes, journals, pictures and home movies of Radner throughout her life.

The film also includes interviews with many of those who Radner worked with, including Martin Sho...Read the entire review

It's time to open Double Whammies, a Hooters-style sports bar featuring young women dressed in Daisy Dukes and crop-top tee-shirts, and there's a would-be heist man stuck in the air vents, the cable TV isn't working -- crucial for the customers who come in to watch sports events, and one of the waitstaff is in legal and financial hot water after running over an abusive boyfriend with her truck. Yet, the unflappable manner in which Lisa (Regina Hall) greets with each emerging crisis suggests that everything will be okay. Lisa's even keel is impressive, especially given that the bar's largely scummy owner Cubby (James LeGros) isn't likely to offer Lisa much more in the way of further promotional opportunities, especially with a competitor called Mancave building one of their corporate chain restaurants nearby. But Lisa isn't driven by the job itself: it's her crew of spirited young women, including sunny...Read the entire review

The Movie:

The first few minutes of Dust 2 Glory are intriguing and set up in its way why people go to the Baja California Peninsula to attend an off-road racing event called the Baja 1000. Hours after the 2015 race ended, a man named Lyndon Jones completed the race. Volunteers and racers were the ones left to give him a welcome and interview. Why do you ask? The 51-year-old Jones decided to get on his motorcycle, make his way down and do the race, with no replacement equipment, no support team to help him if he broke down, and a minimum of communications. He just wanted to do the race, and completed it before dying the following spring.

With that setup in mind, Dana Brown (Made), son of Bruce (of Endless Summer...Read the entire review

When those in visual effects try their hand at directing, the results are often interesting. Matthew Charles Santoro worked on the visual effects for a few big movies including 300, The Incredible Hulk and two of the X-Men movies. Higher Power is a much smaller film in comparison, said to have been made for less than one million dollars. While it likely won't be mistaken for a blockbuster, it doesn't look quite so low-budget all things considered. A gamma ray burst from an exploding star is heading towards earth, which will take out the entire planet. Most of the population is kept unaware of this, but some have been working on a way to stop it. An unnamed scientist listed as "Unknown" in the credits (Colm Feore) had come cl...Read the entire review

The Movie:

RBG begins with an audio montage of a horde of hard-right conservative commentators talking about a woman who, in their minds, is un-American and is on her way to destroy the nation. This montage is played over statues of founding fathers and other American monuments founds across Washington DC. The woman they're so scornful and afraid of is a tiny little octogenarian with a kind and quiet voice, yet a force to be reckoned with when it comes to fighting for equal rights of all Americans. Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's life is a stirring and powerful reminder that progress for the marginalized takes tenacity and an inexhaustible fighting spirit. That's why this pre-credits opening is perfect: There will always be those fighting tooth and nail to crush progress, but the promise of the American system allows those without power to fight back. Just don't expec...Read the entire review

The films of French director Arnaud Desplechin are tied together in ways I can't comprehend; there's a scene in this movie in which a filmmaker who is losing control is seen to have an attic filled with pictures and strings and connections and models, basically the artistic headspace of a mad genius, and I imagine Desplechin working in the same way. You have to be a little mad to be so talented, it's like true vision and manic production lie under a contaminated surface that artists must choose to reach through if they want to become famous. Anyway, Desplechin sees things and plots and metaphors that we don't, and he captu...Read the entire review

As the film industry reckons with inequality with regard to gender, sexuality, and race, the art itself also opens itself to more varied and sympathetic portraits that represent a full spectrum of characters and ideas. Please Stand By is a film about a character struggling with autism, and it features some compassionate performances from cast members Toni Collette, Alice Eve, and of course, Dakota Fanning, as the character in question. It's just a shame that the script, by writer Michael Golamco, isn't quite as sharp as the cast's commitment to it.

Fanning plays Wendy, who is living in a center run by a woman named Scottie (Collette), who helps patients work through the challenges presented by autism to try and form normal adult lives. Wendy has a job, working at a local Cinnabon, and takes care of a little dog named Pete. Although she clearly finds some things stressful or frustrating, she ...Read the entire review

In The Fade is a drama-thriller fromacclaimedfilmmaker Faith Akin (Head On). The film was a contender for thehighlycoveted Palme D'Or (though the equally brilliant The Square ultimatelywon). The film follows the story of the strong-willed Katja Sekerci(DianeKruger), who loses both husband Nuri Sekerci (Numan Acar) and son Rocco(RafaelSantana) during a bombing.

When Katja discovers that the bombing may havebeen done asa hate crime against her family, Katja goes up against the accusedbombers,neo-nazi's who had explosives in their possession and at theirapartment.During the lengthy court battle, Katja is brought aid with help fromthe lawyerDanilo Fava (Denis Moschitto), a close friend of her husband Nuri. ...Read the entire review

In 1982 Virginia, the Dicksons are trying to settle into their new life, having just moved into town. Jim (Rainn Wilson) has recently left his job on Air Force One to return to school, with dreams of becoming a doctor. In the meantime, Jeanne (Patricia Arquette) has become the breadwinner, scraping together what she can working for a local chicken joint. Meanwhile, Aurelie (Kira McLean) is struggling to fit in at her new school, having become the butt of everyone's jokes thanks to a disastrous perm job at the hands of a local beauty school trainee. As Jim and Jeanne begin to drift apart -- in part thanks to a mysterious and alluring neighbor, Jerry (Michael Greene), who listens to whale sounds at night and counsels families in his spare time -- Aurelie fights with a classmate, the stuck-up Kelly Keester (Kaleigh Jo Keller).

Much like Aurelie's new hairdo, Permanent is a messy, shaggy movie,...Read the entire review

The Film:

I have never seen a film quite like The Square, and perhaps that feeling is bolstered by how little I was prepared for it. I knew it was a talked-about foreign film, I heard Elizabeth Moss's name, and I saw that it was 140 minutes long, and so I guess I made a bunch of assumptions that held me back from making it a priority on my list. But what I didn't know turned out to be so much more important. I didn't know that this was Ostlund's next feature after the excellent Force Majeure, I didn't know that Moss and every other actor were merely supporting, and I didn't know that the story would be...Read the entire review

Lemon, a tiny and awkward comedy co-written by Janicza Bravo (also the director) and comedian Brett Gelman (also the star), is a perplexingly unique experience. The film follows Isaac Lachmann (Gelman), a 40-year-old acting coach/actor whose blind medical equipment merchant wife Ramona (Judy Greer) is leaving him, and whose brightest student, Alex (Michael Cera) is on the precipice of becoming the next big star. Confronted with the seemingly perpetual monotony and relative mediocrity of his existence, Isaac starts to spiral, or something like it.

To be quite honest, Bravo and Gelman's concept, a riff on the widely-popular "arrested development manchild" story in which the manchild doesn't actually have any great revelations or breakthroughs, is not necessarily what came to mind watching the film. It's certainly clear that Isaac is a loser: a big "get" in his acting career involves being the ...Read the entire review

In September 2017, at the age of 91 and with 201 credits to his name (the final film still to be released), legendary character actor Harry Dean Stanton passed away. Throughout his career, Stanton managed to end up in any number of classics big and small: as one of the blue-collar workers in Alien, as Molly Ringwald's sweetly wounded father in Pretty in Pink, as a coke-snorting loose cannon in Alex Cox's cult classic Repo Man, as a wistful and heartbroken ex-lover in Paris, Texas, and even popping up in a cameo as a security guard in Marvel's first billion-dollar smash, The Avengers. As his final feat, he managed to go out in 2017 with some of his best work, reprising his role as trailer park manager Carl Rodd in his good friend David Lynch's miraculous and terrifying continuation of "Twin Peaks," and in one of his first starring roles in years, as the title...Read the entire review

The director of this movie has one of the coolest names in the industry, a perfect moniker for a filmmaker. And he can even go by his initials, DGD, which sounds just as awesome. Luckily, his second feature, and the first to have a real chance at being seen by national audiences, is as hip as his nombre, at least in a unique, indie way, which fits as well. Person to Person is a New York City adventure, a day in the life of various residents that reflects quite accurately, if over-dramatically, the troubles we can all get ourselves into by just living, by simply existing in a world that never delivers exactly what you would expect...Read the entire review

The Film:

The Movie:

Like a few other people, the ‘90s films Swing Kids and Swingers introduced me to the world and machinations of swing dancing. But little did I know that the swing community has been sustaining itself nicely since then past the wave of nostalgia, as the Susan Glatzer documentary Alive and Kicking shows us.

Glatzer herself is a swing enthusiast of almost two decades, so she has a familiarity with and passion for her subject, and she is comprehensive in her approach to it, looking at it from its origins in the early 20th century to its rise through the years, and the various substyles of swing dancing that exist (the film focuses primarily on the Lindy Hop, for the record). Interviews with some of those who have made an impact on the dan...Read the entire review

In 10 Words or Less
Story of pain, heartbreak and really fast drumming

Reviewer's Bias*
Loves: Good documentaries, finding new music
Likes: Japanese fandom
Dislikes: Speed metal
Hates: The ‘80s glam metal look

The Movie
For all of X Japan's worldwide fame, like most Americans, before watching We Are X, I had basically no knowledge of the band. My only interaction with them took place at New York ComicCon, on the eve of the major Madison Square Garden concert that's central to the film. I had been offered the opportunity to interview their leader, Yoshiki, but passed, having nothing to really talk to him about. Walking around the show floor, I noticed a huge crowd around a stage. I asked someo...Read the entire review

I Am Not Your Negro expresses the writings of an expert who has been gone for thirty years. Writer-director Raoul Peck had full access to all of Baldwin's work, as well as choice film and videotape records of the author's speaking appearances on television. Baldwin's ideas have been organized into a thesis about everything concerning the racial divide in America. The movie has no outside-voice narration. Actor Samuel L. Jackson instead imitates Baldwin's voice, turning his writings into a first person account. It works wonderfully. When what Baldwin says disturbs, it's only because it's a painful truth.

A well-organized selection of images illustrates Baldwin's words. Along with the expected visuals from the Civil Rights movement, we get a wide variety of appropriate news images from history, placing events in their wider cultural co...Read the entire review

THE FILM:

Christopher Smith may not be a household name, but he has directed several impressive genre films, including Triangle, Severance and Black Death. His latest, Detour, stars Tye Sheridan, Stephen Moyer and Bel Powley, and is a sneakily effective neo-noir thriller. Sheridan's quiet law studen...Read the entire review

Look at Walter Stackhouse (Patrick Wilson), and some would see an innocent man. Walter is a successful architect and aspiring author of short crime fiction, and he has a beautiful wife, Clara (Jessica Biel), who is drifting away from him. It's not his fault, as he tries to keep the flame alive, but Clara resists, spiraling into jealousy over a pretty acquaintance, Ellie (Haley Bennett), and frequently makes trips away from Walter to tend to her mother. One night, following an argument with Walter about Ellie, she attempts to kill herself. Walter successfully gets her to the hospital in time to save her life, but when she's rested up and returns home, she hasn't changed: she's still paranoid, and still cold. Meanwhile, Walter has been reading about a local murder case involving a bookstore owner, Marty Kimmel (Eddie Marsan) and the brutal killing of his wife. Walter suspects Marty may have engineered an...Read the entire review

The Movie:

OK, stop me if you've heard this before: a figure of some authority with supernatural, nay, unbelievable levels of pain tolerance, fight the evils of crime for the good of themselves or the proverbial American people. Based on a comic book and played by a male who is recognizable in both film and television audiences, the story includes action, violence, humor and maybe a light dusting of love. I was talking about Officer Downe, what were you talking about?

Joe Casey adapts his comic book of the same name and Shawn Crahan, founder of the band Slipknot, directs. The officer in question is played by Kim Coates (Sons of Anarchy), a Los Angeles cop who is resurrected repeatedly to fight crime, whether it's nuns with shotguns or kung-fu fighters with overdubbed English to boot. The thinking is a...Read the entire review

The Movie:

Written and directed by Nicholas Pesce, The Eyes Of My Mother takes place almost entirely at a remote farm. Here we meet a young girl named Francisca (Olivia Bond) who lives there with her mother (Diana Agostini), a former surgeon in her native Portugal, and father (Paul Nazak). One day when her father is away at work, a strange man named Charlie (Will Brill) approaches Francisca. Her mother quickly rushes over to see what's going on, understandably suspicious. She tries to send him on his way but he insists that she let him in to use the bathroom. The mother obliges but this proves to be the mistake she knew it was all along. A few minutes later the father has come home but the mother has been brutally murdered in the bathroom.

Francisca grows up (and is then played by Kika Magalhaes) and as her father gets older she tends to him as best she can. She also tends to ...Read the entire review

The Movie:

You may not know the name Danny Fields but he has been instrumental in some of history's most impactful bands of the last half of the 20th century, signing, managing or being involved with bands like The Ramones, Iggy and the Stooges, the Velvet Underground and the Doors, to name a few. The New York-based music executive is the subject of a documentary covering some of his exploits, titled Danny Says.

Written and directed by Brendan Toller, the film follows in some of the same vein of music documentaries like We Are Twisted Fucking Sister, where it looks at the subject and provides interviews with them and any influential figures in their life as they try and show how the subject got to where they are. However, the film includes ample interviews with Fields at various p...Read the entire review

The Movie:

If there is a shortlist of documentary directors whose films I would rush to see, I think these days it would be Werner Herzog, with Alex Gibney as a close second. His subjects are occasional lighter topics like The Armstrong Lie on the championship-winning cyclist fueled by performance enhancing drugs, but also, Going Clear on the secrecy and popularity of Scientology. But he manages to cover more serious topics as well, such as the one in Zero Days.

Gibney's film covers the events before and after the launch of the Stuxnet computer worm, a virus presumed to have been created by both the American and Israeli intelligence and technological communities in the hopes of incapa...Read the entire review

The Movie:

In terms of rewriting the rules of revenge exploitation films or dark comedies, 2014's Norwegian violent crime drama In Order of Disappearance doesn't really offer anything new, except for maybe a pretty amusing running gag where the name and religion of each character appears on screen right after they're killed. It's such a straightforward bloody revenge story about a father who vows to kill every criminal who was responsible for his son's death, that it didn't surprise me one bit that a remake with Liam Neeson is in the works. Hell, it would have been surprising if a remake with Neeson WASN'T in the works.

As far as effortless stoicism and economically doled out undeniable old man charisma is concerned, Stellan Skarsgard is the Scandinavian go-to counterpart to Neeson, so it makes perfect sense for him to be cast as the revenge-driven protagonist. He plays Nil...Read the entire review

Ira Sachs' last film was 2014's Love is Strange, a New York romance with a twist; the couple in the spotlight was a pair of old, gay men. That didn't stop it from being an excellent film; on the contrary, it was refreshing to see that a love story can feel just as natural focused on two men instead of a man and a woman, two older characters instead of Hollywood's 'it couple' of the hour. In many ways that was the point of the movie; that love happens where it happens, that the more we understand the more we become used to it the more we don't question or judge. Sachs made...Read the entire review