December 11, 2025
jmunney
Cinema, Movie Reviews
Andy Samberg, Barry Primus, Betty Buckley, Bodhi Rae Breathnach, Bonnie Hunt, Byron Howard, Callum Turner, Chloé Zhao, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Dainton Anderson, Danny Trejo, David Freyne, David Wilmot, Don Lake, Elizabeth Olsen, Elliot Baxter, Emily Watson, Eternity, Fortune Feimster, Freya Hannan-Mills, Ginnifer Goodwin, giving thanks, Gratitude, Hamnet, Idris Elba, Jacobi Jupe, Jared Bush, Jason Bateman, Jenny Slate, Jessie Buckley, Joe Alwyn, John Early, Ke Huy Quan, Miles Teller, Nate Torrence, Noah Jupe, Olga Merediz, Olivia Lynes, Patrick Warburton, Paul Mescal, Quinta Brunson, Shakira, thankfulness, Thanskgiving, Zootopia 2
Thank you to the movies! (CREDIT (Clockwise from left): Agata Grzybowska/Focus Features;
Walt Disney Animation Studios/Screenshot; A24)
Zootopia 2
Starring: Ginnifer Goodwin, Jason Bateman, Ke Huy Quan, Andy Samberg, Fortune Feimster, Idris Elba, Patrick Warburton, Shakira, Quinta Brunson, Danny Trejo, Nate Torrence, Bonnie Hunt, Don Lake, Jenny Slate
Directors: Jared Bush and Byron Howard
Running Time: 108 Minutes
Rating: PG
Release Date: November 26, 2025 (Theaters)
Hamnet
Starring: Jessie Buckley, Paul Mescal, Emily Watson, Joe Alwyn, Jacobi Jupe, David Wilmot, Olivia Lynes, Bodhi Rae Breathnach, Freya Hannan-Mills, Dainton Anderson, Elliot Baxter, Noah Jupe
Director: Chloé Zhao
Running Time: 126 Minutes
Rating: PG-13
Release Date: November 26, 2025 (Theaters)
Eternity
Starring: Miles Teller, Elizabeth Olsen, Callum Turner, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, John Early, Olga Merediz, Betty Buckley, Barry Primus
Director: David Freyne
Running Time: 114 Minutes
Rating: PG-13
Release Date: November 26, 2025 (Theaters)
And now, I’m going to discuss my reaction to three films that came out in time for Thanksgiving but that I didn’t get around to seeing until December. Nevertheless, I shall reveal what I am thankful for regarding each of them, because it’s important to practice gratitude throughout the year.
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February 19, 2025
jmunney
Cinema, Movie Reviews
Adrien Brody, Alessandro Nivola, Antonio Saboia, Barbara Luz, Brady Corbet, Clarence Maclin, Colman Domingo, Cora Mora, Emma Laird, Felicity Jones, Fernanda Montenegro, Fernanda Torres, Flow, Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha, Gints Zilbalodis, Greg Kwedar, Guilherme Silveira, Guy Pearce, I'm Still Here, Isaach de Bankolé, Joe Alwyn, Luiza Kosovski, Maria Manoella, Marjorie Estiano, Michael Epp, Olívia Torres, Paul Raci, Raffey Cassidy, Sean San José, Selton Mello, Sing Sing, Stacy Martin, The Brutalist, Valentina Herszage, Walter Salles
CREDIT (Clockwise from Top Left): A24; Janus Films/Screenshot; Sony Pictures Classics/Screenshot; A24)
I did some awards season catch-up at the cinema in the past few weeks, and I’m going to digest all of that right now. Each of the movies in this roundup is nominated for multiple Oscars; a couple of them are even up for Best Picture. So here are some quick-hit reactions in which I answer the question: Am I glad I watched this movie during awards season?
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June 20, 2024
jmunney
Cinema, Movie Reviews
Emma Stone, Hong Chau, Hunter Schafer, Jesse Plemons, Joe Alwyn, Kinds of Kindess, Mamoudou Athie, Margaret Qualley, Merah Benoit, Willem Dafoe, Yorgos Lanthimos, Yorgos Stefanakos
What a racket! (CREDIT: Searchlight Pictures)
Starring: Jesse Plemons, Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe, Margaret Qualley, Hong Chau, Joe Alwyn, Mamoudou Athie, Hunter Schafer, Yorgos Stefanakos, Merah Benoit
Director: Yorgos Lanthimos
Running Time: 165 Minutes
Rating: R for Sexual Nudity, Ritual Nudity, Limb Removal, Petty Animal Cruelty, Etc.
Release Date: June 21, 2024 (Theaters)
What’s It About?: A man tries to break free from the grasp of the controlling boss who micromanages his entire life. Another man who looks just like that man suspects that the woman claiming to be his wife returning from a disappearance isn’t who she claims to be. Members of a cultish group are on a quest to find someone with the power of resurrection. It’s an anthology! And it’s called Kinds of Kindness, but I sure didn’t detect a whole lot of kindness in these vignettes. Maybe writer/director Yorgos Lanthimos and his co-writer Efthimis Filippou have a different conception of what that word means. Anyway, this movie is a real head-scratcher, in the sense that it produces the same sensation as sticking your finger up your nose and poking around in your brain tissue.
What Made an Impression?: O R.M.F., Where Art Thou?: Most of the main Kinds of Kindness cast members have a role in each of the three segments. Their respective roles have vaguely similar personalities, though it’s not clear if that’s how they were directed or if it just happens to be that way because they’re played by the same actors. If you squint, you can probably pick up on some Cloud Atlas vibes in the sense of the same souls existing within different beings. But since each Kinds of Kindness segment appears to take place in the present day, it comes across more as just alternative realities or hypothetical do-overs. The one constant is a guy known only by the initials “R.M.F.,” who serves as the namesake for each chapter despite not doing much of anything. Although, in the last part, entitled “R.M.F. Eats a Sandwich,” he does indeed eat a sandwich, so at least one promise is kept.
In the Mood for Vexation: Good movies often teach you how to watch them, but Kinds of Kindness seems intent on doing just the opposite. That doesn’t make it a bad movie per se, but if you don’t want to get frustrated, then you’ll have to adjust your calibrations and accept that you will almost certainly get frustrated. After releasing the most accessible film of his career last year in the form of Poor Things, Lanthimos has returned to the more impenetrable territory of The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer. (I haven’t seen his earlier Greek-language flicks, but they have a similar reputation.) I wasn’t expecting a satisfying ending, and I did not get a satisfying ending. I wasn’t expecting a legible message, and I did not get a legible message. There were moments here and there that brought a smile to my face (particularly a world run by dogs set to the tune of Dio’s heavy metal banger “Rainbow in the Dark”), but otherwise, this was a, shall we say, vacation into a land that claims to be speak the languages of English and cinema, and yet it’s not any form of communication that I recognize.
Kinds of Kindness is Recommended If You Like: Constantly opening one of those fake cans of nuts that’s actually a prank snake even though you know it’s going to be the snake every time
Grade: 3.5 out of 5 Changelings
September 21, 2022
jmunney
Cinema, Movie Reviews
Andrew Scott, Archie Renaux, Bella Ramsey, Billie Piper, Catherine Called Birdy, Dean-Charles Chapman, Isis Hainsworth, Joe Alwyn, Lena Dunham, Lesley Sharp, Michael Woolfitt, Paul Kaye, Ralph Ineson, Sophie Okonedo
Look at that Birdy fly! (CREDIT: Alex Bailey/© Amazon Content Services LLC)
Starring: Bella Ramsey, Andrew Scott, Billie Piper, Joe Alwyn, Dean Charles-Chapman, Paul Kaye, Lesley Sharp, Sophie Okonedo, Ralph Ineson, Michael Woolfitt, Isis Hainsworth, Archie Renaux
Director: Lena Dunham
Running Time: 108 Minutes
Rating: PG-13 for The Power of Suggestion
Release Date: September 23, 2022 (Theaters)/October 7, 2022 (Amazon Prime Video)
What’s It About?: What was life like for a sassy, opinionated teenage girl in 1290 England? That’s what Catherine Called Birdy is here to let us know! Based on a 1994 children’s novel by Karen Cushman, it follows the always rambunctious days of the irrepressible Lady Catherine (Bella Ramsey), aka (you guessed it) “Birdy.” She’s an unmistakably independent young woman, but what does that even mean in a patriarchal medieval society? Despite her unique wants and desires as a human being in her own right, the standards of the time insist that she’s little more than a bargaining chip for marriage. She might drive her parents (Andrew “Hot Priest” Scott and Billie “Companion Rose” Piper) batty, but they do love her. Although, they’re also in quite the financial bind, so they could really use that dowry moolah from even the oldest, ugliest, most grotesque suitor. What’s a little Birdy to do?!
What Made an Impression?: There’s something mystical about watching a story set in a time before mass telecommunication. Since there’s no video evidence of the era, any picture of centuries ago is a mere approximation. But this wasn’t exactly a problem for the people when they were alive in 1290. In fact, I would go so far as to say that nobody ever thought about that sort of thing, unless they were unusually philosophically inclined. Certainly, Birdy and her family and friends don’t concern themselves with such thoughts; instead, they mostly just go about their routines and live their lives as they are wont to do. So the fact that we get to have a peek into those lives arrives like a mysterious gift from the universe, even if it is all fully fictional.
On a more quotidian level, I also appreciate that Catherine Called Birdy is family-friendly without feeling like it’s holding back. There are several moments where it feels frighteningly possible that things could turn bloody and/or abusive. And while we’re spared the worst details, we’re not spared the vicarious experience of what it’s like to be a teenage girl at a time when that meant you were basically property. Ramsey boils it all together with a spirited, feral performance that should hook in plenty of viewers.
Catherine Called Birdy is Recommended If You Like: Rolling around on hills, Occasional swordplay, The scene with Dennis the Peasant from Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Grade: 3.5 out of 5 Dowries
October 29, 2019
jmunney
Cinema, Movie Reviews
Clarke Peters, Cynthia Erivo, Harriet, Harriet Tubman, Janelle Monáe, Jennifer Nettles, Joe Alwyn, Kasi Lemmons, Leslie Odom Jr., Vanessa Bell Calloway, Zackary Momoh
CREDIT: Glen Wilson/Focus Features
Starring: Cynthia Erivo, Leslie Odom Jr., Joe Alwyn, Janelle Monáe, Jennifer Nettles, Vanessa Bell Calloway, Clarke Peters, Zackary Momoh
Director: Kasi Lemmons
Running Time: 125 Minutes
Rating: PG-13 for A Bevy of Insults and a Few Scenes of Brutal Violence
Release Date: November 1, 2019
As I began to watch Harriet Tubman biopic Harriet, the thought “Shouldn’t I be watching this in school?” passed through my mind. That is by no means an insult, but rather, it is an illustration of how my own experience (and the experience of many American schoolchildren) has primed me to feel towards a movie like this one. Tubman is an important figure in American history, so a film about her is a useful tool for history teachers to keep their students’ attention. In that sense, Harriet does not need to be a masterpiece (though bonus points if it is), it just needs to be historically accurate, or at least true to the spirit of its subject. On that count, I recommend Harriet to any teacher whose curriculum covers the era of abolition.
For everyone else who is not watching this movie in a classroom setting, you might still be excited because it has taken more than a hundred years for Tubman’s story to finally get the full-blown feature film treatment (though Ruby Dee and Cicely Tyson played her in earlier TV versions). Although, that excitement might be tempered by the difficulty of having to endure yet another movie viscerally showing the brutal treatment of the enslaved (as well as free black Americans). But I think the best way to appreciate Harriet is as a story of a person who does her job very well, i.e., the sort of character that Tom Hanks often plays. Cynthia Erivo proves that a woman and a person of color is just as capable of this role (not that any proof was necessary, given the historical record).
Tubman escapes to freedom on her own, safely travelling about a hundred miles by foot despite her illiteracy and the relentlessness of her slave master. She then goes on to help secure the freedom of hundreds of more slaves while pretty much matter-of-factly never losing any of her cargo, stunning her fellow conductors on the Underground Railroad with her success rate. But as the steady, burrowingly intense eyes on Erivo’s face tell you, this is just what she does. Slavery had to end at some point, and Harriet Tubman was as up for the job as she needed to be.
Harriet is Recommended If You Like: Glory, Sully, Bridge of Spies
Grade: 3 out of 5 Rescue Missions
December 6, 2018
jmunney
Cinema, Movie Reviews
David Tennant, Guy Pearce, Jack Lowden, Joe Alwyn, Josie Rourke, Margot Robbie, Mary Queen of Scots, Saoirse Ronan
CREDIT: CREDIT: Liam Daniel/Focus Features
This review was originally published on News Cult in December 2018.
Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Margot Robbie, Jack Lowden, Joe Alwyn, David Tennant, Guy Pearce
Director: Josie Rourke
Running Time: 125 Minutes
Rating: R for A Surprisingly Horny Approach to the Material and the Violent Retribution That Results
Release Date: December 7, 2018 (Limited)
If you’re an anglophile who loves tracking all historical matters of royal succession, then you ought to add Mary Queen of Scots to your to-watch list. But if you’re more ambivalent on the subject, this film is likely to instead get you frustrated and shout at the 16th century to move ahead hundreds of years when questions of leadership have less to do with the intricacies of bloodlines. Of course, 21st century politics has its own problems, but Mary Queen of Scots feels obsessed with the minutiae of what was specific to a bygone era. There is some intriguing conflict to be had, as Mary (Saoirse Ronan) and her cousin Elizabeth (Margot Robbie) both apparently have legitimate claims to the English throne. The internal psychological drama and external tension of impatient courts and citizenry are present, but the same points keep getting pounded over and over.
Part of the problem is the film’s lopsided structure. It makes sense that the title is what it is and not “Mary & Elizabeth,” as this is at least two-thirds Mary’s story, if not more. Perhaps there is an element of correcting the historical record, or the cinematic historical world, as Elizabeth’s story has hitherto been told more often than Mary’s. But if that’s the case, then you might as well go whole hog into Mary’s realm and render Elizabeth more or less heard but not seen. As it stands, though, it makes me wonder, “Why can’t they both be queen?” Alas, for the sake of the narrative (and historical accuracy), that’s probably too pat and conflict-free. But it’s almost all worth it for the scene when Mary and Elizabeth finally meet in person. Ridiculous measures are taken to keep this meeting “secret,” thus fulfilling a promise to really examine the nonsense inherent to this state of affairs. It’s all silly, and should be treated as such, instead of resorting to beheadings.
Mary Queen of Scots is Recommended If You Like: Any and all royal British period piece
Grade: 3 out of 5 Heirs
November 21, 2018
jmunney
Cinema, Movie Reviews
Emma Stone, Joe Alwyn, Nicholas Hoult, Olivia Colman, Rachel Weisz, The Favourite, Yorgos Lanthimos
CREDIT: Yorgos Lanthimos/Twentieth Century Fox
This review was originally published on News Cult in November 2018.
Starring: Olivia Colman, Emma Stone, Rachel Weisz, Nicholas Hoult, Joe Alwyn
Director: Yorgos Lanthimos
Running Time: 120 Minutes
Rating: R for A Very Sexual Royal England
Release Date: November 23, 2018
The hype for The Favourite indicates that it is not your typical period royal court drama, which is to be expected, given that it is directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, the Greek auteur behind such clinically chilling visions as The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer. And while The Favourite is certainly an oddity within the genre, that does not mean it is totally anachronistic. Lanthimos’ version is probably not an exact reflection of how the people within the orbit of the British Queen Anne spoke and behaved some 300+ years ago, but it does not seem impossible that they could have acted that way. People use certain four-letter words that are seldom heard from movie characters with the poofiest wigs and dresses, but these are words that have been around for centuries and surely some people were using them back then. Besides, The Favourite is not especially concerned with historical accuracy; the story behind it all is just inspiration for Lanthimos to craft his own devilishly compelling tale.
The most reasonable way to think of The Favourite is as a showcase for its three lead actresses (who get a little bit of help along the way from a few dudes), who have rarely, if ever, been better. Olivia Colman is Anne, hobbled by gout and occasional indecisiveness, perhaps more than a little manipulative in how she courts favor, but breathtakingly formidable once she has made up her mind. Rachel Weisz is Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, close advisor (and much more) to the queen. She prides herself on being ten strategic steps ahead of everyone else, which is her greatest strength, even when it appears to be her downfall. Her wits allow her to get out of any sticky situation, up to and including kidnapping by a brothel. And Emma Stone is Abigail, Rachel’s cousin and new arrival to the court. She initially appears to be so unfailingly kind that it makes her a little stupid, but ultimately it is clear that she is a full-fledged ingratiator. Stone has never before immersed herself in such a dark persona. If Lanthimos has done his job right, and I think he has, your loyalties will constantly switch along with the characters to the point that you just want to applaud everyone.
The Favourite is Recommended If You Like: Amadeus, All About Eve, Persona
Grade: 4 out of 5 Powdered Wigs
November 1, 2018
jmunney
Cinema, Movie Reviews
Boy Erased, Flea, Garrard Conley, Joe Alwyn, Joel Edgerton, Lucas Hedges, Nicole Kidman, Russell Crowe, Troye Sivan, Xavier Dolan
CREDIT: Focus Features
This review was originally posted on News Cult in November 2018.
Starring: Lucas Hedges, Nicole Kidman, Russell Crowe, Joel Edgerton, Troye Sivan, Xavier Dolan, Joe Alwyn, Flea
Director: Joel Edgerton
Running Time: 114 Minutes
Rating: R for Intense, Sexuality-Focused Material
Release Date: November 2, 2018 (Limited)
Boy Erased demonstrates the dangers of putting the unqualified in charge, or pretending that it is possible to be qualified for something that nobody can possibly have experience with. With the suspensefully assured hand of director Joel Edgerton, it plays like a horror film in which the villain is the storm of forces that try to convince you of something that you know in your core not to be true. The setting is a gay conversion therapy program, which is basically the epitome of trauma born out of the most distorted of good intentions. Every story I have ever heard about gay conversion suggests that those involved with running them are either gay themselves or relatives of gay people. Boy Erased very much underscores how terrifying a curriculum designed upon internalized homophobia is.
The film is based on Garrard Conley’s memoir of the same name, with Lucas Hedges playing Jared Eamons, an adapted version of Conley. This isn’t the first gay conversion gay conversion-focused film this year, with The Miseducation of Cameron Post having arrived a few months earlier. Boy Erased manages to make a stronger impression thanks to heavier dramatic stakes. Whereas Cameron Post‘s protagonists were so strong-willed that they just ignored the program, Jared actually cares about satisfying the people who want him to go through with it. That especially includes his Baptist preacher father Marshall (Russell Crowe) and his fiercely protective mother Nancy (Nicole Kidman). But at a certain point, he realizes that the so-called adult experts do not know what they are talking about if what they are asking him to do is ripping apart his soul. That means he must push back against head therapist Victor (Edgerton), a man who is frighteningly skilled at hiding internal conflict, and instead listen to the people who only offer him unconditional, recognizable love. It all leads to reconciliation scenes that you hope never have to be necessary for anybody but are all the more fulfilling for how genuine they are.
Boy Erased is Recommended If You Like: Heart-wrenching true stories, Familial reconciliation, Dramas that are secretly horror movies
Grade: 4 out of 5 White Dress Shirts
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