Victorian London has been an effective setting since virtually the beginning of cinema, perhaps unsurprisingly since it was during this period that moving pictures first appeared. From the first adaptation of “The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde” to Basil Rathbone’s incarnation of “Sherlock Holmes,” from Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Lodger” to Johnny Depp’s…
Written and directed by Taylor Sheridan, the Oscar-nominated screenwriter of “Sicario” and “Hell or High Water,” Wind River is a murder mystery about the death of a young Native American women, found frozen in the snow. Part character study, part police procedural, and part political statement, it is a deeply disturbing film that contains graphic…
From “Black Christmas” through “Silent Night, Deadly Night” and onto “Krampus,” there is a fine tradition of Christmas-themed horrors running through the decades, and Red Christmas, the feature debut from writer-director Craig Anderson, fits comfortably into the canon. The Christian festival of family and giving is the perfect backdrop for an ultra-violent cautionary tale about…
There are four words that everyone should know in their respective language: Don’t mess with mama. That goes for bears (or other wild animals) and in this particular case, Halle Berry (Oscar winner, “Monster’s Ball”). Berry returns to the screen with Kidnap, an action-thriller about a blue-collar mother who does everything she can to get…
Unpleasant without being scary, and full of style sans substance, Brian Visciglia’s feature debut, Ryde, comes off as a kind of misogynist “American Psycho.” There’s a hint of Christian Bale’s Bateman in David Wachs’ pristinely chiseled psychotic, but none of Bret Easton Ellis’ satire. Wachs (“The Last Hurrah”) plays Paul, an elusive loner who one…
Never Let Go should have been jettisoned before it even got past the pitch meeting. Borrowing from an endless supply of 80s-era Cold War thrillers, Never Let Go makes the crucial mistake of combining lame acting, a nonsense script, and boring musical choices into an utterly forgettable — if unintentionally hilarious — action movie. Angela…
After a summer slew of big-budget studio films, it can be difficult to find, sit down and watch a movie with more modest origins. Yet for the second time in a row, director Christopher Di Nunzio manages to cross that threshold and craft an engaging narrative around seemingly finite resources. His latest, A Life Not…
