Matthew Simpson

I am a Rotten Tomatoes-approved, freelance film & television critic and podcast host from Vancouver, Canada! I am a co-founder of the Cascadia Film & Television Critics Association and a voting member of the International Film Society Critics, Pandora International Critics, and the Online Film & Television Association.

I maintain bylines at Exclaim!, Awesome Friday!, That Shelf, ForReel, Movies We Texted About, KeithLovesMovies, and I can be heard regularly on the Contra Zoom Podcast and The LAMBCast.

Socials

A24 Retrospective – Oasis: Supersonic | Contra Zoom

Tuesday, 29 July, 2025

Podcasts

Contra Zoom

We continue our series going through the entire catalog of ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠A24’s films⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. On this episode Dakota and Matthew are looking at 2016’s ⁠Oasis: Supersonic⁠ directed Mat Whitecross. The documentary follows the creation and rise of the Britpop band culminating in their Knebworth Festival headlining performance in front of 250,000 people in 1996. Joining…
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Redux Redux Review: A Satisfying Twist on the Multiverse | That Shelf

Monday, 28 July, 2025

Festival Coverage Reviews

Fantasia International Film Festival Fantasia International Film Festival 2025 That Shelf

How far would you go for revenge? If someone were taken from you, what would you do to the person who took them? What would exacting that revenge do to you? How much of your humanity would you sacrifice? These are the kind of questions that no one will know…
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Untamed Review: Eric Bana Leads a Competent if Slightly Predictable Summer Mystery | That Shelf

Monday, 28 July, 2025

Reviews

That Shelf

You have seen this series before. There’s no getting around the fact that Netflix’s new series Untamed employs several tropes of the mystery genre. You’ll have seen the series where an older cop with a gift for investigation lives in a remote place due to some past trauma that keeps him isolated…
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“The Well” Walks a Well Worn Path Through an Intriguing World | ForReel

Friday, 25 July, 2025

Festival Coverage Reviews

Fantasia International Film Festival Fantasia International Film Festival 2025 ForReel

Post-apocalyptic stories tend to serve as warnings that come in many forms; sometimes they are about how the apocalypse might unfold, or about the resources we will fight over, or the people who will be doing the fighting. Whether the future is filled with robots or devoid of resources, there’s…
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A Second Life Review: A Lovely Walk Through Paris | That Shelf

Friday, 25 July, 2025

Festival Coverage Reviews

That Shelf Tribeca 2025 Tribeca Film Festival

We’ve all felt depressed. It’s a fact that sometimes life will get you down, and if you let it, depression and anxiety can isolate you from having any meaningful relationships. The luckiest of us have only had fleeting experience with this, but all of us have felt it at one time…
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‘Oh, Hi!’ Goes Both Too Far and Not Far Enough | Awesome Friday!

Thursday, 24 July, 2025

Reviews

Awesome Friday!

Handcuffing someone to a bed might be fun, but if you don’t let them go, it becomes a crime, a civil matter, or both. In either case, this is the centre of the story of Oh, Hi!, the new comedy from director Sophie Brooks, co-written and starring Molly Gordon. In the…
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Strong Performances Keeps “Horsegirls” on Track | ForReel

Monday, 21 July, 2025

Festival Coverage Reviews

ForReel Tribeca 2025 Tribeca Film Festival

Horsegirls is a unique film about a young woman’s journey to find her place in the world. It hits several beats that you will see coming along the way, but it gets there with some important distinctions and directions that you perhaps won’t. Margarita (Lillian Carrier) is 22 and autistic. …
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“Superman” Revels in Goodness to Find Greatness | ForReel

Friday, 18 July, 2025

Featured Reviews

ForReel

There are those who will tell you that Superman is a difficult character to write. Because he’s so powerful, there’s no foe he cannot defeat, and no obstacle he cannot overcome. This is, of course, wrong. Superman is not a difficult character to write; he’s the easiest, since all that…
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Drop UHD Review | Movies We Texted About

Friday, 18 July, 2025

Featured Reviews

Movies We Texted About

Single-location mystery thrillers are one of the tried and true genres of stage and film. When executed well, they can be an edge-of-your-seat experience and a satisfying watch. Writer/Director Christopher Landon has a history of taking high-concept versions of setups like this and delivering a good time at the movies; Happy Death Day was…
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“Birthright” Goes Horrifyingly Wrong in All the Right Ways | ForReel

Wednesday, 16 July, 2025

Festival Coverage Reviews

ForReel Tribeca 2025 Tribeca Film Festival

There is, it is fair to say, often generational divides. One that we are living through today is between millennials (who are now in their 30s and 40s) and boomers (who are now mostly retired). Boomers grew up in a world that had ample opportunity, and a more fair distribution…
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Fantasia Festival 2025 Begins This Week! | Awesome Friday!

Wednesday, 16 July, 2025

Festival Coverage

Awesome Friday! Fantasia International Film Festival Fantasia International Film Festival 2025

You know, Fantasia is one of my favourite film festivals. Good news, everyone! The Fantasia Film Festival is back for another year. One of Canada’s premier film festivals, and one of the biggest genre film festivals on the continent. This year’s lineup looks great, but here are five films I’m…
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“Inside” Is a Compelling Prison Redemption Story | ForReel

Sunday, 13 July, 2025

Festival Coverage Reviews

ForReel Tribeca 2025 Tribeca Film Festival

Each of the men in this story exemplifies a part of these themes, both shared and individual. Warren (Pearce) is a scruffy older man serving time for violence he committed in the past. His parole is coming up, but he’s indebted to other inmates who will get what they’re owed…
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Smoke Review: Arson Investigation Drama Is Rainy Day Viewing | That Shelf

Wednesday, 18 June, 2025

Featured Festival Coverage Reviews

That Shelf Tribeca 2025 Tribeca Film Festival

The saying goes that where there is smoke, there is fire—a simple adage, and one that proves itself time and time again. When we’re talking about actors, where there’s smoke, there’s often Taron Egerton. This is not a perfect metaphor, but the point is that Egerton is on fire. He has…
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The 2025 Canadian Screen Awards | Contra Zoom

Tuesday, 10 June, 2025

Awards Coverage Podcasts

Contra Zoom

The 2025 Canadian Screen Awards were handed out from May 30-June 1st and the television portion was hosted by Lisa Gilroy. Universal Language and The Apprentice were the big winners. We look at ten categories and discuss the winners and Dakota, Matthew and Jeff pick our own favourites. Real talk:…
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Predator: Killer of Killers Gets the Formula Right | Awesome Friday!

Monday, 9 June, 2025

Reviews

Awesome Friday!

The Predator franchise is the platonic ideal of an action horror franchise. There are highly skilled people in the world, and there’s a whole race of monsters that hunts those people for sport. The setup is simple, allowing it to serve as a framework for various kinds of stories. At…
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Re-Animator 40th Anniversary UHD | Movies We Texted About

Saturday, 7 June, 2025

Reviews

Movies We Texted About

Ignite Films was kind enough to send me a copy of their new 40th Anniversary release of the 80s horror classic Re-Animator, and I got to write about it for Movies We Texted About! The 1980s were perhaps the best decade for high-concept, low-budget, effects-driven horror films. There are many…
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Mission: Impossible – Ranked | Contra Zoom

Tuesday, 3 June, 2025

Featured Podcasts

Contra Zoom

Your mission, should you choose to accept it is to listen to Dakota and Matthew rank the Mission: Impossible films to celebrate the release of the 8th entry (and possibly last film in the series?) , The Final Reckoning. Joining the show is former co-host Rachel Ho the film editor…
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‘Stick’ Has Even More Heart Than Laughs | Exclaim!

Friday, 30 May, 2025

Reviews

Exclaim!

If Apple TV+ sitcoms have a through line, it’s that they aren’t actually at their best when they’re funny. That’s not to say that they aren’t funny — they definitely are — but rather that the laughs seem to come almost secondary to heart. Ted Lasso is probably the best example of this, a…
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Andor, Season Two | Austin B Media Podcast

Sunday, 25 May, 2025

Podcast Guest Spots

Austin B Media Podcast

I sat down with my friend Austin Belzer on his podcast to talk about Andor season 2. The full conversation is nearly 90 minutes but we cover a lot of territory as we discuss one of the best Star Wars projects maybe ever. Listening Links And consider subscribing to Austin’s…
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Final Destination: Bloodlines | The LAMBCast

Tuesday, 20 May, 2025

Podcast Guest Spots

The LAMBCast

We try to keep our promises here on the Lambcast. A Month ago, we talked about the “Final Destination” Franchise and we agreed to come back to talk about the new entry when it dropped in May. Everyone technically has returned, although Richard had to cheat a little to do…
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