2010’s

[7] Steve McQueen (Shame, 12 Years a Slave) brings Lynda La Plante’s novel to the screen. Widows is about a woman who rallies the girlfriends and wives of her deceased husband’s gang of robbers, all of whom died in a botched robbery with her husband, to execute plans for what would have been their next heist. They all need to do this because their dead lovers …

[8] Rami Malek stars as Freddie Mercury in Bryan Singer’s (X-Men, Valkyrie) biopic about the formation and explosive success of rock group Queen. The film centers primarily around Mercury — his estranged relationship with his family, his homosexuality, his drug use, and eventual battle with AIDs — but without ignoring the other members of the band, played by Gwilym Lee, Ben Hardy, and Joseph Mazzello …

[8] A father tries to save his son from drug addiction in this true story based on the lives and writings of David Sheff and Nic Sheff. Beautiful Boy opens on the father, played by Steve Carell (Little Miss Sunshine), waiting up all night for his son to return home. Two days pass while Carell phones local hospitals and police, getting more desperate by the …

[7] Jamie Lee Curtis returns to the franchise that launched her career in Halloween (same title, 40 years apart). This new film ignores every single sequel in the franchise and serves as a direct follow-up to John Carpenter’s original 1978 film. And it’s just as well, because the Halloween ‘franchise’ is shaky at best. Curtis’ teenaged babysitter from ’78 is now a gun-toting grandma whose …

[8] I very much enjoyed Drew Goddard’s previous work on Cloverfield and The Cabin in the Woods, and I’m a big fan of single-location ensemble stories, so I was excited to see what Goddard had in store with Bad Times at the El Royale. Bad Times features about seven characters — the titular hotel’s front desk boy and six guests — who each have a …

[8] Director/co-star Bradley Cooper decided it was time for a fourth version of A Star is Born (previous versions were released in 1937, 1954, and 1976). I haven’t yet seen any of those versions, so I’m coming into this one without the burden of comparison. I was expecting a romance movie with a lot of singing. So I was expecting to hate the movie, honestly. …

[1] When I heard Shane Black (Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, screenwriter behind Lethal Weapon) was directing and Fred Dekker (The Monster Squad) was cowriting, I thought The Predator would have the right ingredients for a successful relaunch. I don’t know to what extent studio interference played a part, but if I were Black or Dekker I would have had my name removed from this film …

[5] When the puppet cast of an old TV show start getting murdered one by one, a puppet policeman (voiced and performed by Bill Barretta) and his estranged partner (Melissa McCarthy) work together to find the killer. The first twenty minutes of The Happytime Murders are all right, as we’re plunked down into this alternate reality where puppets live side-by-side with humans and do all …

[7] Lee Daniels (Precious, The Butler) directs this moody piece about a college dropout who helps his older brother investigate the murder of a police officer. The convicted killer’s girlfriend joins the investigation to help prove his innocence. Zac Efron and Matthew McConnaughey play the brothers and Nicole Kidman plays the girlfriend — each of them showing range and abilities you haven’t seen from them …

[7] Director Justin Kurzel tells the true story of Australia’s most notorious serial killer through the eyes of his teenaged accomplice. Teenager Jamie (Lucas Pittaway) falls in with his mother’s new boyfriend, John Bunting (Daniel Henshall). Bunting becomes a father figure to Jamie and preys on the boy’s feelings of insecurity, transforming him into his own private henchman. First, they scare a molester out of …

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