Mass Hysteria
Don’t count out Mass Hysteria as just another holiday comedy. What appears to be a silly, seasonal National Lampoon-copycat at first turns out to be a pretty funny and original horror-comedy worthy of an annual watch around Halloween.
Comedy
The War with Grandpa
The only type of comedy worse than an unfunny one is a mean-spirited one. The War with Grandpa is so mean that I was frequently taken out of the film to feel bad for the characters.
Save Yourselves!
Movie goers who are quick to nitpick cellphone tropes in horror movies should have a ball with Save Yourselves!, a sharp sci-fi comedy about aging millennials for aging millennials.
On the Rocks
A story of possible infidelity gets an anti-Hollywood spin in Sofia Coppola’s sophisticated dramedy On the Rocks.
Eternal Beauty
Eternal Beauty is ostensibly the second film to be released in recent months in which a character diagnosed with schizophrenia struggles with the broad issues of love, family, and life. Unlike Luke Eve’s heavily saccharine I Met a Girl, where a man with schizophrenia travels across Australia to find a girl who may or may not exist, Eternal Beauty’s narrative is much more complex, even confounding, and precisely what endpoint it is seeking is vague.
The King of Staten Island
The King of Staten Island is another win for director Judd Apatow, who last left movie goers with his career-best work in Trainwreck. It appears, though, that the filmmaker was preparing for The King of Staten Island with Trainwreck. Just as he gave comedienne Amy Schumer a platform to expand on her own stand-up about her self-consciousness with the opposite sex, he gives SNL comic Pete Davidson this movie to explore his upbringing in this,…
The Argument
The Argument, a comedy of manners from director Robert Schwartzman (The Unicorn) and screenwriter Zac Stanford (The Chumscrubber), proves that sometimes a movie has to sink low in order to come out on top.
Uncle Peckerhead
The first hurdle of any music-centric film is often the most difficult to clear: the music itself. It’s difficult to get the audience to root for the heroes if their band’s sound is cringe-inducing. Or, even worse, if it’s just plain boring.
Never Be Done: The Richard Glen Lett Story
Never Be Done: The Richard Glen Lett Story is a fantastic example of true documentary filmmaking.
Bill & Ted Face the Music
The much awaited and presumably final instalment in the Bill & Ted series, Bill & Ted Face the Music, pulls off the impossible feat of being a faithful and charming sequel to cult classics. For that, the production should be very proud of their efforts and patience. However, the movie itself is neither “excellent” or “bogus”. It’s just, sort of, “chill”.