Katak, The Brave Beluga
The French-Canadian produced animated movie Katak, The Brave Beluga is a copycat of other family flicks. But as far as knock-offs go, this is certainly one of the better ones.
February 2023
Cocaine Bear
By: Jeff Ching Walking into Cocaine Bear, I was expecting the movie to be the latest inductee to the “so bad, it’s good” list. Something along the lines of Snakes on a Plane or the Sharknado franchise: movies that are not good, but fun to laugh at. Cocaine Bear, however, is not “so bad, it’s good” – it’s “so good, it’s umm….…the best movie of 2023 so far”. Look, it’s only late February, and I don’t expect…
Infinity Pool Uncut
In a plot that would make any vacationer anxious, and in the “not too distant future”, novelist James Foster (Alexander Skarsgård) and his wife Em (Cleopatra Coleman) are suckered into a crime that develops into an additional crime during a getaway at a luxurious resort. James, who becomes the most guilty, is given the choice to opt out of his execution if he pays a lump sum of cash for a clone to be made…
Cat Daddies
By: Trevor Chartrand Cat Daddies is a documentary about, you guessed it, men who own cats. As someone with a career in the pet industry, and as a ‘Cat Daddy’ myself, I could safely assume I’m the target audience for Hye Hoang’s movie. While I had high hopes for Cat Daddies to spin some riveting “tails” (eh? eh?!), this doc, unfortunately, is barely fur-deep.
Marlowe
By: Jolie Featherstone Marlowe, Neil Jordan’s adaptation of John Banville’s (a.k.a. Benjamin Black) novel The Black-Eyed Blonde, brings Philip Marlowe (a character created by novelist Raymond Chandler) to life in a sunny noir set in a luscious, pre-WWII Californian town where everyone is trying to climb the ladder of success – no matter the cost.
The Outwaters
“Found footage” horrors often receive a bad rap because it’s presumed that they’re “easy” movies to make: scrounge together a couple thousand dollars, a consumer video camera, some amateur actors, and a loose lore around something eerie that can guarantee jump scares. Yes, the “found footage” sub-genre is one of the more resourceful outlets for DIY filmmakers, but there’s an art to it. They may not trick audiences anymore into thinking the stories are non-fictitious…
Stars Fell Again
In Stars Fell Again, the extra-cheesy follow-up to 2021’s decidedly unfunny Stars Fell on Alabama from returning director V.W. Scheich, suffers from many of the same flaws as its predecessor — weak characterization, poor pacing, and a lead couple that’s about as interesting as a stack of wet cardboard.
Alice, Darling
Alice, Darling gives audiences just enough insight into its character driven piece for it to be emotionally moving. The emphasis is only there because I also feel like the movie is missing its first act.
Erin’s Guide to Kissing Girls
I wish I had a movie like Erin’s Guide to Kissing Girls as a kid in elementary school. Aside from its terrific LGBTQ-friendly presence, it sports such self-confidence and reassurance in its characters; all wholesomely written and directed by Julianna Notten making her feature-length debut as a filmmaker. Making as big of a splash is Elliot Stocking, who plays the titular Erin. Stocking, in a breakout acting debut, hits a sweet spot with their co-stars…
Skinamarink
I can’t quite place my finger on when audiences last received an experimental horror like Kyle Edward Ball’s Skinamarink, and I think that’s because a lot of filmmakers would be too intimidated to take a crack at it. Making a movie like Skinamarink requires a filmmaker to be brave, insane, self-aware yet purposely reject what qualifies as entertainment nowadays, and completely commit to the film’s static presentation. Ball has all of these traits, which is…