#film-criticism

#film-criticism

The Smashing Machine, which Safdie both wrote and directed, portrays Mark (the character, as distinguished from the real-life Kerr) from the time of his first bout in the Ultimate Fighting Championship, in 1997, to 2000. The period begins with victories and growing fame-though his achievements are shadowed and threatened by substance-abuse issues and conflict with his girlfriend, Dawn Staples (Emily Blunt)-and peters out with his climactic defeat in a big-money tournament that owes its high financial stakes to his earlier success.

The otherworldly beauty and consuming, tattoo-strewn look of Angelina Jolie hasn't always allowed for a great deal of versatility as an actor, a difficult face to seamlessly slot into most stories. The star hasn't seemed to be all that interested in acting for a while anyway (since 2012, she has physically appeared on screen just seven times) and has preferred to spend time behind the camera and focusing on both her family and her philanthropic pursuits.

If nothing else, "Franz" gets the handwriting right. Sure, praising someone's calligraphy is the quintessential backhanded compliment, but when it comes to Kafka, the penmanship is important. The Czech literary titan was famous for preferring to write longhand, even after the explosion of the typewriter. His manuscripts are displayed in museums across the world, having attained an almost mythical status. Agnieszka Holland's feverish new biopic on Kafka often finds itself pouring over his desk or sneaking glimpses of his love letters.

While I'm not about to declare painter and filmmaker Julian Schnabel's career as jettisoned to artistic purgatorio, especially after the radiance and wonder of artist-driven portraits like "Basquiat" and "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" and pieces of "At Eternity's Gate," his decade-in-the-kiln " In the Hand of Dante," which itself spans 70 decades from 14th-century Florence to almost-present-day Venice and New York, is epically miscalculated despite sequences and stretches of grandeur.

"You need to rewatch it to get it" can be either a promise or a threat. It's satisfying to let a movie pull one over on you, then study how all the pieces were put into place; there's a good reason was constantly credited with " revitalizing " the whodunnit. But when setting up the board gets in the way of character and story, all the rewatches and explainers in the world won't pump blood through a stone heart.

Hard on the heels of The Substance comes another film about a dodgy Los Angeles experimental clinic and showbiz obsession only this medical outfit, Somnium, is a shonky mind-fixing operation a la Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Wannabe actor Gemma (Chloe Levine) lands a sleep-sitting job at the firm, watching over patients in pods who are hoping to improve their lives by having helpful dreams injected into their subconsciouses.

Then, in the mid-twentieth century, a group of young French critics issued a cri du coeur that gave rise to the figure of the auteur: visionary filmmakers ranging from Jean-Luc Godard to Martin Scorsese and Wes Anderson. In the final installment of this year's Critics at Large interview series, Vinson Cunningham talks with the staff writer Richard Brody about the origins of auteur theory, and about the lengths to which directors have gone for artistic freedom in the decades since.

Amazon Prime's latest movie could so easily have been a modern take on H.G. Wells' all-time classic novel, employing found footage and gonzo documentary-style reporting to revive the spirit of Orson Welles' notorious 1938 radio production of the story.

Ari Aster confirmed he was approached to direct a Morbius project, questioning if it was Mobius or Morbius, indicating a humorous skepticism about the material.

In "Jurassic World: Rebirth," the overuse of product placement transforms the experience into a mere commercial venture, overshadowing the narrative and entertainment value.

It should be impossible to make a bad movie about scary dinosaurs. According to reviews for Jurassic World Rebirth, they have done just that for the fourth time in a row.

Roger's writing was a celebration of life itself, showing his love for both his birthday and the art of storytelling, reflecting joy and gratitude.

"As I screened dozens of movies this year in Cannes, I've been reminded of what my late husband, Roger Ebert, said is the most noble thing movies can do: make us feel empathy for others."