‘Christy’ Review: Sydney Sweeney’s Boxer Biopic Has Familiar Filmmaking Genes but a Captivating Central Story of Perseverance [B] TIFF
It’s easy to look at Christy, the new boxing biopic from journeyman director David Michôd, and expect the most formulaic story: a scrappy fighter from... Read More
Film Reviews
‘Dust Bunny’ Review: Bryan Fuller’s Hybrid Fantasy-Action-Horror Fable Has an Endearingly Childlike Sense of Enchantment [B] TIFF
There’s not much talking at the beginning of Dust Bunny. The opening 15 minutes of the long-awaited feature-length film from cult favorite TV writer Bryan... Read More
‘Scarlet’ Review: Mana Ashida’s Vocal Performance Highlights Mamoru Hosoda’s Animated Fantasy [B] TIFF
Minutes into Mamoru Hosoda’s Scarlet, we are thrust into a world that thematically plays with elements of his past works – films like Digimon, Summer... Read More
‘The President’s Cake’ Review: Hasan Hadi’s Layered Drama is as Entertaining as it is Compelling [A-] TIFF
There exists a spectrum of sad movies that are about kids but not for kids. On the lowest end of the spectrum, something like Spike... Read More
‘Glenrothan’ Review: A Likable Cast Can’t Elevate Brian Cox’s Bottom-of-the-Barrel Scottish Family Dramedy [D] TIFF
Estranged brothers Sandy (Brian Cox) and Donal (Alan Cumming) have neither seen nor spoken to each other in over three decades. After their mother passed... Read More
‘The Captive’ Review: Alejandro Amenábar’s Account of Cervantes as a Teller of Tales is Itself a Powerful Lesson in Storytelling [A] TIFF
After Miguel de Cervantes wrote the most famous novel of all time—El Quijote— in the early 1600s, it became so instantly popular that apocryphal sequels... Read More
‘Hedda’ Review: Tessa Thompson Seduces and Destroys in Nia DaCosta’s Sexy, Stylish Spin on a Classic [B+] TIFF
Nia DaCosta’s fun, feminist Ibsen reimagining, Hedda, opens with a quote from another playwright. Instead of referencing Ibsen himself or another literary staple of the... Read More
‘The Lost Bus’ Review: Paul Greengrass and Company are Running on Empty in Undercooked True Life Survival Drama [D] TIFF
Earlier this year, the Los Angeles metropolitan area and San Diego County faced some of the worst wildfires in the country’s history. Complete sections of... Read More
‘Train Dreams’ Review: Joel Edgerton Shines in Contemplative Drama About Life and Technological Progress [A-] TIFF
“Timeless” is a word that gets thrown around a lot, particularly by movie critics to describe films that have lasting power because they are enjoyed... Read More
‘Adulthood’ Review: Alex Winter’s Suburban Neo-Noir Dark Comedy is Dead on Arrival [C-] TIFF
Alex Winter hasn’t directed a narrative feature film since 2015’s Smosh: The Movie. In some sense, you could say we haven’t gotten a real Alex... Read More
Director Watch Podcast Ep. 131 – ‘High Life’ (Claire Denis, 2019) 
Alliance of Women Film Journalists (AWFJ): ‘One Battle After Another,’ ‘Hamnet’ Lead 
North Texas Film Critics Association (NTFCA) Nominations 
Interview: ‘Marty Supreme’ Casting Director Jennifer Venditti on Finding 1950s Faces and the Magic of Collaborating with Josh Safdie