Bob Trevino Likes It Rated PG-13 for brief strong language and thematic elements Rotten Tomatoes Score: 93% In Theaters In 2024, this little independent movie by filmmaker Tracie Laymon won the prestigious South by Southwest Narrative Feature Competition and Audience Awards, making her the hottest new indie filmmaker on the scene. And she just happens to be from Houston. I have to start out with a disclosure that I have been friends with Tracie for over 15 years, and while 2024 was a great year for her, she has been working hard for a very long time to get there, which makes me extremely proud of her accomplishment here. In this fictional take on true events from her own life, the story follows Lily Trevino (Barbie Ferreira), a traumatized young woman with perhaps the world’s most selfish father (French Stewart) who finds a friend online (John Leguizamo), who happens to have her father’s same name. The two lost souls come together to form a tremendous friendship that would change both of their lives for the better. Sweet but never sappy, the film had real potential to transform into a movie of the week flick, but never treads there as it really dives into Lily’s pain and insecurities, helping the audience not only understand her but truly empathize, cheering her on as she learns to stand up for herself. But it is also the plight of Bob Trevino that wins you over as you experience his pains and the giant hole in his heart that allowed the friendship to develop. Leguizamo has always been a solid contributor to the films he chooses to be in, but he’s never done anything like this, and while I’m sure his presence helped to get the film made and seen, this project should have a tremendous positive impact on his career as well. And relative newcomer Barbie Ferreira holds her own and more as her arc proves to be one worth getting behind. Holding it together is the strong personal writing and directing from Laymon, giving the movie real gravitas as you move through Lily’s journey. And while I may be a bit biased here, I’m not alone when I say that this is the best film so far in 2025, and an indie that is definitely worthy of a night out at the movies. A
The Penguin Lessons Rated PG-13 for some sexual references, thematic elements, and strong language Rotten Tomatoes Score: 74% In Theaters Another remarkable story based on true events takes place in 1970’s politically charged Argentina as a British school teach hired to teach English (Steve Coogan) finds himself the not-so-proud owner of a penguin as he cleans one up after an oil spill, and the government won’t allow him to leave it behind. So, he takes the penguin back to his school, where it starts to influence everyones’ lives. Directed by Oscar-nominee Peter Cattaneo (The Full Monty) the film earns its stripes as a feel-good comedy, but weighted down by the politics of the day (which feel relevant now), the movie does its best to transcend what could have been merely a cheesy little animal comedy into a much more broad and effective drama. It helps to have Coogan who was perfectly cast here in a role that very few actors could have realistically portrayed. And the irony of having Jonathan Pryce as the head of the college was also a nice touch as one of Pryce’s most popular roles was playing Juan Perón in Evita, and the turmoil of the timing of this story comes at the heels of Perón’s death. So, while the film is adorable and quite funny, it also has a serious touch that proves to be substantial. Overall, the movie is both enjoyable and rewarding, and while it’s hard to believe something like this could have actually happened, it’s fun to learn that not only did it happen, but it was just as impactful to those who were part of it. B+
Novocaine Rated R for strong bloody violence, language throughout and grisly images Rotten Tomatoes Score: 87% In Theaters Nathan Caine (Jack Quaid) is just a friendly, nerdy assistant bank manager with a disease that leaves him unable to feel actual pain. Since he must be extremely careful in his life choices, he spends most of his time playing video games at home when he’s not at work. But when he quickly falls in love with a new bank employee (Amber Midthunder) he begins to consider throwing caution to the wind. And when she is taken hostage by a trio of bank robbers, he goes after them with reckless abandon in order to get her back. Ever since he came on the scene with The Boys, Quaid (son of Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan), has become a very popular lovable loser. And he plays that to a T here. You immediately like him and want him to succeed in love and life, while feeling bad for his disability. But while he can die from even minor mistakes like chewing solid food (apparently he can bite his tongue off and not know it), his exploits become incredibly fun to watch as you feel the pain that he doesn’t. The filmmakers find increasingly creative ways for Nathan to hurt himself without actually hurting himself, and the worse it gets, the funnier (and cringier) it gets also. Of course there are some mental gymnastics you have to get past, like the almost complete lack of law enforcement (apparently, the San Diego police department takes off during the Christmas holiday), but those issues are handled well by Matt Walsh and Betty Gabriel, who at least make the paltry police presence entertaining. Overall, this is a really entertaining date movie with an edge that hits as a thriller, romantic comedy and pseudo horror flick due to the extremely violent images that will have you looking away much of the time. A-
Daredevil: Born Again Rated TV-MA Rotten Tomatoes Score: 84% Streaming on Disney Plus Sometimes being a “film critic” comes with some amazing perks. In this case, it’s Disney allowing me to watch the entire season of Daredevil: Born Again before its release this week. Daredevil was never considered one of Marvel’s prime properties until the MCU suddenly gained interest, and thusly grabbing it away from Netflix. But rather than change it from its gritty, R-rated feel and production style, producer Kevin Feige decided to keep it as is and continue on. So, returning here are the incomparable Charlie Cox as the blind vigilante and Vincent D’Onofrio as the villain Kingpin. While D’Onofrio’s Kingpin got some play in the poorly received MCU streamer Echo, it was his return to Daredevil that has gotten all the fans excited, and rightfully so. With a first episode that will leave you breathless, we find Daredevil’s alter ego, defense attorney Matt Murdoch, laying low, and mostly staying out of trouble. But he badly wants back in when he discovers that Kingpin has somehow now become the mayor of New York City and is up to something sinister. With most of the episodes serving their own storylines while servicing the larger picture, the show is a breeze to binge at the end but will be something to look forward to if you don’t mind the weekly waits. What will have most fans excited is that Marvel has largely left Daredevil alone. It is a tough, no-nonsense vigilante thriller with undertones of our current political climate. If there is any difference, it’s that the writing has improved, with less of the cheesiness that we occasionally got previously. Since I can’t talk plot points yet due to the majority of the ten episodes coming over the next two months, I’ll just point out that you won’t be disappointed. There are some truly next-level baddies with Kingpin’s shadow casting down on the whole thing. A
Paradise: Season 1 Rated TV-MA Rotten Tomatoes Score: 82% Streaming on HULU Finishing its first season this week is the new streamer Paradise from HULU. This unique crime thriller starts hard as a secret service agent (Sterling K. Brown) assigned to the president (James Marsden) finds the president dead in his room upon taking over his morning duties. This sets off a season-long mystery to discover who the killer is, and subsequently solve the enigma of why this is all taking place in a city under a mountain after what appears to have been an extermination-level event in the outside world. This extremely creative series idea from This is Us creator Dan Fogelman doesn’t really deliver on all its promises, as its ideas far exceed its budget, but it does provide a nice end of the world thriller with some really big surprises and even bigger questions. Sterling K. Brown proves to be one heck of a choice for the lead, and he never disappoints, but the writing and directing at times can be pretty lame, and the rest of the cast isn’t at the skill level to pull it off without flaw. But it starts interesting and gets better as it goes, moving past its obvious limitations with flare. And as it has been quite the popular streamer, season 2 is already in the works. B
Love Hurts Rated R for strong/bloody violence and language throughout Rotten Tomatoes Score: 19% In Theaters Superbowl weekend is traditionally the worst weekend at the box office for the entire year, and thus any films opening this weekend are essentially studios sending their dead-on-arrival films to the graveyard. And while recently some studios have had some critical success with some of their low budget horror flicks like Heart Eyes, Love Hurts is a prime example of what the studios are trying to rid themselves of. In this uber-short (83 minutes) action flick, recent Oscar winner Ke Huy Quan (Everything Everywhere All at Once) is a lovable real estate agent who is forced back into the life he tried to escape when his brother discovers his whereabouts and a girl he allowed to survive (former Oscar winner Ariana DeBose) comes back to seek revenge. While the reviews would have you believe that this is a film completely without merit, there is some mighty good action and martial arts in this project. Almost enough to get you to like it. The fighting choreography is impressively fun, and the characters are different enough to draw interest. There are also some decent laughs here and there. What hurts here is the story, for which there isn’t much of one. From the beginning, you should be scratching your head about why a person trying to stay hidden and incognito has his name on every billboard in town. That clue alone is enough to make this tale completely nonsensical. But then the plot kicks in to help you realize that this movie is all style and no substance. The one saving grace is you’ll be watching the trailers almost as long as you’ll be watching the movie, and that brevity might be its best quality. C+
The Gorge Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, brief strong language, some suggestive material, and thematic elements No Rotten Tomatoes Score at the time of writing Streaming on Apple TV+ Two highly skilled assassins (Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy) are appointed to a one-year post as a solo guard in a tower on each side of a gorge, somewhere in a remote part of the world. They are explicitly told to not communicate with the other, but a sweet little romance begins to form right before they discover the true purpose of their jobs: keep out the deadly monsters who are trying to escape the gorge. This is certainly an interesting little straight-to-streaming project from Dr. Strange director Scott Derrickson, which provides a little bit of everything you want from a Valentine’s Day pic: romance, thrills, and horror. In that regard, the film works, for what it is. It also helps to have two great actors in the leading roles, with Sigourney Weaver thrown in for good measure. While the monsters are well-crafted, the secrets of the gorge aren’t the most compelling, but the action is fairly non-stop, overcoming any obstacles that a poorly conceived plot would provide. B-
Captain America: Brave New World Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence, action and some strong language Rotten Tomatoes Score: 49% In Theaters Other than last year’s Deadpool & Wolverine, Marvel has slowed its roll as it has attempted to give us a new meta storyline that would eventually lead to a new Avengers epic. Unfortunately, fans didn’t care much for the whole multi-verse thing (aside from making fun of it in Deadpool), and the new franchises within the franchise didn’t take as well as they had hoped. For this new Captain America movie, you might have some homework that you won’t like, or you can just go in hoping to get the gist. The quick and easy is old Captain is gone and Falcon (Anthony Mackie) now holds the shield. Watching the streaming series Falcon and Winter Soldier will give you enough background there. The painful part is that this really follows up on the heels of The Eternals as the story revolves around the celestial corpse that rose out of the Indian Ocean. America has learned to mine it and holds the first example of adamantium, a substance more powerful than vibranium. The newly-elected president (Harrison Ford) sends the new Cap to fight a few battles, but the real enemy lies within as a somewhat embedded villain (Tim Blake Nelson) discovers a way to turn soldiers against themselves, which causes an international incident, which leads to a hidden issue with the president that makes him angry – and you don’t want to see him when he’s angry. There’s a lot thrown at you here and honestly, there’s too much to catch. The story feels like it is a middle episode of a series, with poor exposition and almost no resolution. Personally, I hate it when Marvel does this. I’d rather have a complete story that can serve as a later puzzle piece, but instead we get here a piece we don’t even know what to do with. I’m sure they hope this will all make sense later, but they’ve been going this direction for a while now. For the last couple of years, we’ve gone from excellent Marvel films to uninteresting and confounding storylines that just don’t fit, and worse, ones we don’t care about. With this new Captain America, if you go for the special effects and the fights, you’ll get a few and you should be happy. The production is good, and the acting is okay given how bad most of the dialog is. But it’s definitely a turn off your brain kind of flick, which will not serve the modern MCU well. C+
Rated R for grisly images, bloody violent content and some language
Rotten Tomatoes Score:
In Theaters
From Blumhouse and writer/director Leigh Whannell (Upgrade, Invisible Man) comes this new take on the wolf man story which follows a young man (Christopher Abbott) who makes a trip home to remote Oregon to clean out his father’s house after the state declared his absence as likely death. Bringing his wife (Julia Garner) and daughter (Mathilda Firth) along with him, the trip escalates into a nightmare quickly when their moving truck crashes while trying to avoid a strange creature in the road, and that creature scratches his arm before running away. They quickly find their way to his childhood home to barricade themselves in, but unfortunately his scratch becomes infected, and he begins to evolve (or devolve) into something else. For the last several years, Blumhouse has been pumping out some very decent b movie horror flicks, and this is no different. It is effectively scary at times, with a few jump scares, but mostly a slow burn suspense as you know what is coming, but you don’t know how it will be delivered. The acting is good enough, although I expected a little more from Garner, who blew me away in Ozark. I was also thrown off by her distracting mom jeans, which had me cringing pretty hard. But overall, I liked the interesting take on the classic horror story and the production is solid. Although the film was pretty simple, its attempt at horror worked and I found my heart rate elevating many times throughout. B-
Better Man
Rated R for nudity, drug use, pervasive language, sexual content and some violent content
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 88%
In Theaters
Every year, I run out of time when trying to watch every single film that needs to be seen before I vote for awards and write my end of year favorites list. And thus, I always have films that would have or could have made my list or ballot but get left out. This year, I would count Better Man among these. The film is based on the life of mega pop-star Robbie Williams. Who is Robbie Williams you may ask? Good question. He is big everywhere except the U.S., and he is especially huge in the UK. And I mean huge. Look him up. In this brilliant film by writer/director Michael Gracey (The Greatest Showman, Rocketman), Robbie chose to have his character played by a chimpanzee since he considers himself to be not quite fully evolved as a human. It was also a smart way to have his voice give life to the character without having to have him act in the film. Honestly, audiences didn’t know how to take this, and thus they didn’t. It opened this last weekend and literally made about a million dollars. That’s it. But those who did watch it enjoyed it. I loved it so much I had to watch it again the next day, and now I can’t get the songs out of my head. Songs that probably every Brit knows by heart, but which I have never heard before last week. The film is an exciting musical adventure, and the chimp thing works incredibly well. When you get into the film, not only is it not distracting, but it turns into a powerful and moving picture that will be hard for you to shake. I fear that theaters might have dropped it like a hot potato due to its lack of performance, but I have no doubt that you’ll be able to watch at home in no time, which I highly encourage. This is really a special little film that most folks will find absolutely mesmerizing and eye-opening. A
I will be the first to admit that my prediction of 2024 was completely off, in a very good way. With the writers and actors strikes last year, I thought there would be a huge effect on the quality and amount of films we would see this year. But alas, I was wrong, and we were fed a cornucopia of fantastic movies all year long, with many big surprises along the way. One thing we did see, though, was a different kind of film experience in many cases, with low budget yet high quality pics with actors, writers and directors we’ve never heard of. Anora, for example, is leading the Oscar race in many of the top categories, and yet very few people are familiar with its director or any of its cast. Other films, such as The Brutalist and Conclave, both of which are major competitors for Best Picture this year, have relatively new directors who we will definitely hear from again. Many films on my list will strike a chord with readers, but there are a few that you might not have heard of, but that you definitely need to check out when given the chance.
1) Dune: Part Two (Streaming on MAX). I’ve spoken to many people who just couldn’t get into Dune: Part One, and thusly never game Part Two a chance. What a shame. While I loved the first one, I also knew that it was only the first act of a larger vision. Part two is much less of a sequel and much more the continuation and finale of the original book. Telling the continued journey of Paul Atreides (Timothee Chalamet) and his rise to power within the Dune universe, the film proves to be absorbing, thrilling, and extremely powerful. So many filmmakers have been trying to bring Dune to the big screen for decades but all we’ve gotten until now is the lousy 80’s David Lynch version, which, unfortunately caused several generations to give up on the idea that we would have a film to live up to its potential. But Denis Villeneuve’s vision and masterful storytelling ability gave us not only the best picture of the year, but also one of the greatest sci-fi flicks of the twenty-first century.
2) Wicked (In Theaters Now, Available for Home Purchase on December 31). I fully expected to like Wicked when I walked into the theater to see it the first time, but I didn’t expect to love it. Having seen the stage production a dozen times or so, I knew the story had potential, but I also knew that it could easily be mishandled and moreover difficult to adapt as a film. But then Jon Chu (In the Heights) got his hands on it, and along with its fantastic production team and perfect casting, the movie absolutely blew me away. Chu couldn’t have gotten a better pair of leads than Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande who have both proven themselves musically, but had very little in the way of a film resume. But the gamble paid off and the potential has been fully realized in this incredibly cinematic retelling of the stage show. Luckily, we will only have to wait less than a year to see the conclusion when “Wicked: For Good” will surely have us singing in our seats once again.
3) Emilia Perez (Streaming on Netflix). Netflix took a huge gamble with this daring musical about a Mexican cartel head (Karla Sofia Gascon) who hires a defense attorney (Zoe Saldana) to arrange a sex change operation for him so that he can disappear from his current world and maybe have a chance to live his authentic life. Along with Selena Gomez playing the cartel leader’s wife who thinks her husband is dead, the film is entirely original, uncomfortable and completely crazy. Directed by French auteur Jacques Audiard (A Prophet), the movie is perfectly executed in style and substance and will leave you surprised and shocked until the very end.
4) Anora (Available for Home Purchase). Writer/director Sean Baker (The Florida Project) tells the story here of a young exotic dancer (Mikey Madison) who decides to escort for the wealthy son of a Russian oligarch. But when the young couple decides to get married, the family is none too happy and move in to set the situation straight. I went into this one thinking it would be a violent and possibly scary romance with a lot of sexual content. I was right about the sex, but completely wrong about the tone, which takes an unexpected turn that puts it more in the dark comedy arena than the crime drama expected. I just loved everything about this film, including its cast which I’ve never seen before, and its riveting dialog. Baker is perhaps the best new filmmaker in Hollywood and he very well could be walking away with an Oscar or two this season.
5) The Wild Robot (Available for Home Purchase). Christopher Sanders (How to Train Your Dragon, Lilo & Stitch) brings this magical tale to the big screen about a robot (voiced by Lupita Nyong’o) who is lost in a crash in the Canadian wilderness and forced to rewrite its programing in order to communicate with the local wildlife living in the harsh conditions. As the robot adapts to its new surroundings, the story develops into a beautiful tale of acceptance and perseverance. The production itself is also a site to behold, with some of the best animation we have seen in years and a potentially Oscar-winning score by Kris Bowers.
6) A Real Pain (Available for Home Purchase on December 31). Zombieland’s Jessie Eisenberg takes on the roles of screenwriter, director and star of this terrific little indie about two cousins (he and Kieran Culkin) who travel to Poland to see the homeland of their grandmother who had just died and left them the money for the trip. Full of great comedy and moving drama, the film takes us on a powerful and memorable journey through Poland while delivering two fantastic and authentic performances. Culkin is expected to win for best supporting actor this year and you will quickly see why the second he comes on screen. You would never want to travel with the guy, but you won’t be able to take your eyes off of him and his poorly-conceived but well-intentioned actions.
7) Sing Sing (Coming Soon for Home Purchase). I wasn’t sure what to think about this experimental drama when I first started watching. The story follows an inmate at the Sing Sing prison (Coleman Domingo) who is the star actor in a drama troupe made up of prisoners for the purpose of rehabilitation through acting. Most audiences know Domingo, but the other actors are all unknown and you almost get the sense that they are actually inmates. And then you check the interwebs and find out that that’s because they actually used former inmates from this actual program in their cast. It’s a remarkable story that will have you completely engaged and leave you with empathy for these men using this medium to try to put their lives back together again.
8) Saturday Night (Streaming Free on Peacock and Available for Home Purchase). I’ve always loved Saturday Night Live since I used to stay up late and watch (unbeknownst to my parents) in the late seventies until today as I watch and laugh my way through every new episode. This new movie from Jason Reitman explores the hours that led up to the very first episode where Lorne Michaels (played here by Gabriel LaBelle from The Fablemans) puts everything on the line to give America The Not Ready for Primetime Players in all their glory. It is a frenetic and disorganized mess of a story that comes off as too crazy to be made up. It also happens to be the funniest film of the year, with witty dialog and hilarious physical comedy. As the icing on the cake, make sure to watch the very first episode of SNL after your’e done to see how it all turns out!
9) My Old Ass (Streaming on Amazon Prime). Maisy Stella plays Elliott, a young girl about to head off to college who just happens to do shrooms with her friends on a camping trip, only to find that she hallucinates a discussion with her older self (played by Aubrey Plaza) who gives her all kinds of advice, chiefly to stay away from a boy she hasn’t even met yet. But then she meets him and her life is forever changed. This little 90 minute comedy will have you laughing and crying in equal parts as you enjoy the conversations one can have with one’s self. It’s just a lovable little Indie that I can’t recommend highly enough.
10) The Substance (Steaming on MUBI and Available for Home Purchase or Rental). Demi Moore has reentered the scene in this stunning horror film about a once-famous actress who is desperate to find her younger self again. Upon a recommendation, she enlists the help of a secret company that sells a compound called The Substance, which promises the fountain of youth. After taking the drug, a younger version of herself pops out of her body (in the form of actress Margaret Qualley) with one rule to follow, she must switch between her young and old body every other week. This thing is dark and there is an extreme amount of nudity, so I wouldn’t recommend to most audiences, but if you are a little deranged like me, you will love it. It’s also getting a lot of Oscar buzz given it is the best film directed by a woman this year, and there is still a lot of love for Demi out there.
The Next 10: Conclave, Flow, Hit Man, Will & Harper, A Complete Unknown, Heretic, Alien: Romulus, Monkey Man, Civil War, Thelma
The Worst:
1) Joker: Folie a Deux. The first one I hated due to its glorification of senseless violence. This one I hated because it was just plain stupid. It almost feels like they made a bad movie on purpose.
2) Megalopolis. We’ve seen Francis Ford Coppola make some magnificent art. But this is a vision he should have wiped from his mind instead of spending hundreds of millions of his own money on making it.
3) Argyle. An incredible cast and typically talented director (along with a reported $200 Million dollar budget) couldn’t save this ridiculous miscalculation about a writer who discovers that she is a secret agent.
4) Jackpot! Director Paul Feig (Bridesmaids, Spy) butchers this story about what happens if winning the lottery requires that you stay alive long enough to claim the prize.
5) Longlegs. I have no clue how this cheesy horror flick attempting to be Silence of the Lambs got so many great reviews, as it feels more like one of the worst of Nicholas Cage’s more recent duds than one of his surprising successes.
This epic historical drama tells the story of a Jewish immigrant (Adrien Brody) who survives the holocaust and comes to America, in the hopes that his wife (Felicity Jones) might someday be able to join him to live out their lives in safety and hope. But life is hard for him as he has gone from being one of Budapest’s most noted architects to a traumatized day laborer in Pennsylvania. But when an opportunity comes along to surprise a rich businessman (Guy Pearce) with a renovated library in his home, his talent is discovered and he is given the opportunity to design and create a massive project. There is a lot to like here in this movie and at times it comes off like The Godfather with a There Will Be Blood vibe. Writer/director Brady Corbet (Vox Lox) paints a rough but beautiful portrait of the immigrant experience, filled with the good, the bad, the lonely, the desperate and a host of other emotions that would have been natural in a character such as this. And Adrien Brody is the perfect actor to play the part. Tough and delicate at the same time, he moves through the film in a way that has us cheering for him while dreading his demons as he struggles through his journey. The performances of the supporting cast, especially those from Pearce and Jones, are top of the line and all three should be favorites for awards nominations and possible wins. Unfortunately, the film has some major flaws that detract from its ability to be consistent. My biggest problem is the movie has some very graphic sexual scenes that really distract from the focus of the film. These scenes frustrated me and took me out of the project, rather than the intended purpose of making the story clearer. After all, I would only assume that Corbet would say these moments were the focus of the film and the nature of the flawed characters. I had no problem with the frank sexual nature of other films this year such as Anora or The Substance, but here, I couldn’t help but think to myself “why is this even necessary?” Also of note is a really hefty runtime, that could have been compressed. At over three-and-a-half hours, the film does seem a little long at times. I did love that he included an intermission, but a shave and haircut would have taken away that need. I also thought the style of the epilogue was odd and completely out of place in such a project. Maybe on a secondary viewing it might make sense, but here it had me scratching my head. While it won’t top my list of films this year, it is already being touted as a potential Oscar winner. Time will tell. This film shows a lot of promise, but some strange and out of place choices from its creator causes it to get in its own way. B+
Rated PG-13 for brief suggestive material, thematic elements and some strong language
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 95%
In Theaters
This inspirational sports flick follows the true story of Claressa Shields (Ryan Destiny), who fought against all odds to become one of the greatest female boxers of all time. As a little girl, she demanded to be coached by Jason Crutchfield (Brian Tyree Henry), in a male-only gym located in Flint, Michigan. Moving up the ranks, she was able to qualify for the Olympics, becoming the first American woman to win a gold medal in boxing. Many will already know much about this fighter before going in, and this film exists to both to tell her story but also to celebrate it. Written by Oscar-winning screenwriter Barry Jenkins (Moonlight), the film is only slightly formulaic but goes against the grain by exploring what happens after victory as much as what it takes to get there. This proves to be a smart way to tell Claressa’s story as it gives more than just your standard journey to getting the gold. It also shows the good, the bad and the indifferent of what can happen after success. Directed by noted cinematographer Rachel Morrison (Mudbound, Dope) the film has also has an exciting feel and pace that proves to be extremely entertaining. Acting-wise, Henry is fantastic as coach Crutchfield and manages to elevate everyone around him as the pair work together for their common goal. In a holiday season without a lot of family-friendly non-musical fare, this is a welcome addition that should play well, although it’s lack of star-power might hurt it’s chances of competing in a crowded field. Hopefully, it won’t get lost in the shuffle enough to find a willing audience to give it a chance, as it is a sports pic that will having your cheering and leave you feeling upbeat as you walk out of the theater. A-
Nosferatu
Rated R for graphic nudity, bloody violent content, and some sexual content
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 87%
In Theaters
For the ultimate of Christmas experiences, try this graphic horror pic by famed dark filmmaker Robert Eggers (The Northman, The Lighthouse) which retells the 1922 German silent film of the same title. Having never seen the silent film, I was completely unaware that this tale was a near copy of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, only with the characters renamed and with slight story differences throughout. But here it is not the story that is most important but the style, and Eggars creates a wickedly disturbing canvas for this particular story. As with all his films, this one is extremely violent and odd, which desires for you to be enthralled yet disgusted. Cinematically, the film is so macabre that it is almost beautiful, with terrific production and many great performances. Unfortunately, I was very put off by the look of Count Orlok, whose image was more confounding that horrifying. Bill Skarsgård does a decent enough job playing him, but I wanted to look away every time he came on screen, more out of repulsion than fear. I also wish that that there was a more compelling romantic narrative here, like there was in Dracula. If you’re going to copy anything from Bram Stoker, that would be a major replication to include. By the end, I could appreciate what Eggers had done, but I couldn’t find a way to really like it, and I absolutely wanted to. B-
From famed anime director Kenji Kamiyama comes this prequel to Lord of the Rings that is set 183 years before the events that occurred in the trilogy. Telling the story of the legendary king of Rohan, Helm Hammerhead, the movie attempts to give us a nice lead up to saga we all know so well. When Helm accidentally kills the father of a young man who wants to marry his daughter, the son seeks revenge, holding the citizens of Rohan trapped in what will later be known as Helm’s Deep. Left to protect her people, the daughter, Héra, must summon the strength and wit to either lead or be left to die. While I’m not sure if Executive Producers Fran Walsh and Peter Jackson (and original filmmakers of the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit trilogies) lent their talents to the making of this project, the fact that they are even listed as creatives here definitely throws credibility to it. So, I went in expecting a good story, decent animation and solid production, and I got just that. The film is a well-crafted drama that seems enough like canon to engage and keep your attention. Action-packed and full of tension, the script is focused and tight, with very little foreshadowing of events to come, but at least giving us a primer on where they might have come from. I rather liked the ambition of the project and its ability to entertain from the start. And while I’m not the biggest fan of this style of animation, its art is not lost on me, and the medium seems appropriate enough to help its audience follow the tale without distraction. While it is animated, it most certainly is a film designed for older teens and young adults, and will carry little interest for kids, unless they are already fans of the franchise. This might take a little away from the box office, but at least it never panders in order to try to broaden its audience. It knows what it is and plows ahead full speed without apology. B
