2020’s

[6] Florence Pugh (Midsommar, Little Women) stars as a 1950s happy housewife living in an experimental desert paradise where the women cook and clean by day, host parties by night, and have sex with their husbands in-between. But she has a hard time shaking certain dreams and memories, especially after witnessing one of her fellow happy housewives commit violent suicide. Much to the consternation of …

[4] Michelle Pfeiffer and Lucas Hedges play a rich mother and son who are forced to leave their fancy New York home for a friend’s apartment in Paris when they discover their bank account is nearly empty. Once there, Pfeiffer’s character plans to kill herself when their last dollar is spent, while Hedges’ character pines for the gal he left behind in the Big Apple. …

[6] Steven Spielberg tackles his autobiography with this story of his youth and adolescence, discovering his love of film while coping with his parents’ untenable marriage. As Spielberg’s stand-in, Sam Fabelman, Gabrielle LaBelle is a disappointingly empty vessel, lacking the charisma or screen presence to carry us through this tale. Michelle Williams leaves a much bigger impression with her performance as Sam/Spielberg’s mother, a carefree …

[8] [This review contains spoilers.] Cate Blanchett stars as a fictional celebrated conductor whose life begins to unravel after an alleged affair with a music student comes to light. Her character, Lydia Tár, breaks the glass ceiling in the rarified world of classical music. Her accomplishments — including an Oscar, Emmy, Tony, and Grammy — are all the more newsworthy because she is a woman …

[7] Kenneth Branagh directs and stars as Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot in this most recent iteration of Death on the Nile. Poirot is on vacation in Egypt when he’s asked to join a wealthy socialite’s honeymoon party down the river Nile in the late 1930s. When the socialite (Wonder Woman‘s Gal Gadot) is discovered dead, Poirot is back on the case. Was it her husband …

[7] In Bruges co-stars Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson are reunited with writer/director Martin McDonagh (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri) for this intimate tragicomedy set on a rocky island off the west coast of Ireland in the 1920s. Farrell’s character is a well-liked dullard who discovers one day that his life-long best friend (Gleeson) wants nothing more to do with him. Farrell is naturally upset, …

[6] Jim Parsons (The Big Bang Theory) and Ben Aldridge star in this gay twist on Love Story, based on the autobiographical book by Michael Ausiello. Parsons is the shy, awkward guy and Aldridge plays the cool, outgoing one. Somehow, their unlikely friendship blossoms in New York City over several years. But as the title suggests, tragedy strikes when Aldridge’s character is diagnosed with terminal …

[4] Two New York men with commitment issues attempt a relationship, but their own insecurities threaten to prevent anything long-term from developing. Yes, Bros is a big studio gay rom-com, a rarity that would have been cause for celebration thirty years ago. Today, not so much. The film is written by Billy Eichner and Nicholas Stoller (Neighbors, Forgetting Sarah Marshall), with Stoller also directing and …

[7] Writer/director Ti West (Sacrament, The Innkeepers) and actor Mia Goth reteam for this prequel spin-off of the year’s earlier X, expanding on the backstory of X‘s aged villain (Goth) by showing us how she became such a broken and dangerous person long, long ago. Where X was more of an outright slasher/horror piece, Pearl is very much a character study and a showcase for …

[8] Barbarian is about the worst Airbnb rental in the history of the universe. Writer/director Zach Cregger builds suspense from the get-go, with co-stars Georgina Campbell and Bill Skarsgård giving convincing performances as strangers double-booked at a house in the middle of a highly sketchy Detroit neighborhood. They agree to share the house, but then strange things start happening. A secret door is discovered in …

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