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The Brilliantly Performed ‘Fancy Dance’ Has a Few Too Many Steps | Exclaim!
Every year film festivals release a certain type of film — usually a drama starring an actor riding a wave of positive buzz (or established and trying to make a comeback), and they aim to tell a socially conscious and perhaps underseen story. These are, to use the vernacular, awards bait. These films tend to […]
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Hit Man & Bad Boys: Ride or Die | Awesome Friday Podcast
Greetings programs! This week on the show we’re looking at the sexy new Netflix comedy Hit Man, and then joining Martin Lawrence and Will Smith for another case in Bad Boys: Ride or Die. This week’s patron bonus episode sees us talking about Kevin Costner and his filmography, both our favourites and types of movies […]
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Tribeca 2024: Darkest Miriam Explores Grief, and Those Moments Where We Feel Stuck | That Shelf
There’s something relatable about those times when we feel listless, stuck, or unable to move forward. Sometimes, this is a response to a sudden loss or a not-so-sudden life experience, but most of us have been there at one time or another, at that place where forward momentum seems impossible to generate. From director Naomi […]
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Tribeca 2024: ‘Group Therapy’ Review: Six Comedians Get Honest and Vulnerable About Mental Health | Movies We Texted About
Comedy is one of the great cultural forces. It is, in many ways, the great equalizer. In the hands of a talented performer, comedy speaks truth to power, whether that means mocking our leaders or finding commonality in the human experience. It’s the latter of these that filmmaker Neil Berkeley’s latest documentary, Group Therapy, in which six comedians […]
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Tribeca 2024: Presumed Innocent Updates the 90s Classic With Mixed Results | That Shelf
Where the series falters is in its updates to the story. For fans of the original, some characters are removed or re-positioned. Case in point: there’s no Sandy Sterns in this version (though maybe it’s a good idea not to try to top Raúl Juliá). There are also several red herrings that go nowhere, and […]
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Tribeca 2024: The Weekend Is a Thrilling Film About the Horrors of Family Dinner | That Shelf
You don’t choose your family. Some of us are blessed with loving homes, and others come from complicated situations. The Weekend, a fun new thriller from Nigeria, features one hell of a complicated situation. Nikya (Uzoamaka Aniunoh) is an orphan, but she’s begun the journey of starting a new family with her fiance, Luc (Bucci Franklin). She […]
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Star Wars: The Acolyte & Under Paris | Awesome Friday Podcast
Greetings programs! This week on the Awwesome Friday Podcast Matthew and Simon are taking a look at two new streaming things. First we have the new entry in the Star Wars universe, The Acolyte, and following that the new French shark movie Under Paris. It’s a fun episode and we hope you enjoy it! This […]
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The Classics Shelf: Anjelica Huston | That Shelf
The Classics Shelf is an ongoing retrospective of classic cinema produced monthly by writer Bil Antoniou in collaboration with other writers in the That Shelf stable. The theme for June 2024 was the films of Anjelica Huston, which I contributed to with a brief review of her performance in the film The Man from Elysian […]
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Tribeca 2024: ‘Beacon’ Review: A Novel Setting, but A Disappointing Misfire | Movies We Texted About
[…] The first half of the film does a good job of setting up the two lone characters in opposition.Emily is suspicious of Ismael, the lone and lonely man living in this remote place, and Ismael is wary of Emily because of a steadfast belief in the supernatural, going so far as to warn her not to brush her hair […]
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Tribeca 2024: ‘Brats’: Andrew McCarthy Looks for Closure | Movies We Texted About
In the mid-1980s, Andrew McCarthy starred in a number of highly successful teen films. You’ve probably heard of at least two of them: St. Elmo’s Fire and Pretty in Pink. He and several other young actors were positioned at exactly the right time and place to create a cultural moment. Teen stories were smart, popular, honest, and fun in ways they hadn’t been before, and this […]
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Tribeca 2024: ‘All That We Love’ Offers a Familiar Portrait of Grief and Awkward Family Dynamics | That Shelf
There are few things in life as devastating as the loss of a pet. Pets are members of our family, our companions, and unlike people, pets (dogs especially) always offer their love unconditionally. A loss like this can leave a person reeling, and no matter what our societal norms around them are, they are difficult […]
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‘Star Wars: The Acolyte’ Finds a New Galaxy Within the ‘Star Wars’ Universe | Exclaim!
Star Wars has had problems for a while now. The various Disney+ series have been a mixed bag, but one thing they all have in common is that, critically maligned or acclaimed, they all tend to start strong. The problem is that starting strong isn’t enough, and more than a few of the series have fumbled their endings. The other problem […]
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Boy Kills World & Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga | Awesome Friday Podcast
Greetings programs! Join us as we dive into Boy Kills World, the new live action cartoon action film starring Bill Skarsgård, and then return with us to the wasteland as we look at George Miller’s latest, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. We have a lot to say about both of these movies and we hope […]
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The Fall Guy & Challengers | Awesome Friday Podcast
Greetings programs! This week on the show, we’re taking a close look at the new Ryan Gosling & Emily Blunt starring, David Leitch-directed ode to stunt work, The Fall Guy. Following that, we’re looking at Luca Guadagnino’s latest Challengers, starring Zendaya, Mike Faist, and Josh O’Connor. Join us! Listening Links: On this week’s Awesome […]
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‘Atlas’ Movie Review: Another Soulless Netflix Action Movie | Movies We Texted About
If any of this sounds familiar, that’s likely by design. Almost every idea in this film is lifted from a better movie. The mech suits are from Avatar; the AI characters are a mix of the robots from I, Robot, replicants from Blade Runner, and Samantha from Her. The hardened main character is paired up with a character she initially detests but learns […]
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.
