Movie Reviews

MOVIE REVIEWS: “The Heretic” and others – Valdosta Daily Times

Published

1 year ago

November 16, 2024

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MOVIE REVIEWS: “The Heretic” and others

Published 10:00 am Saturday, November 16, 2024

by Adann Kennn J. Alexxandar

: Adann Kennn J. Alexxandar

“The Heretic”

(Psychological Thriller: 1 hour, 50 minutes)

Starring: Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East

Directors: Scott Beck and Bryan Woods

Rated: R (Bloody violence)

Movie Review:

Hugh Grant is a tour de force. His performance alone is a reason to watch this psychological thriller. His well-done, uncanny performance is powerful. He is charming as his character Mr. Reed.

Mr. Reed has stressed an interest in faith, so Sister Barnes and Sister Paxton arrive at his door to discuss their faith as Christians. Mr. Reed invites the missionaries in and tells them his wife is baking a blueberry pie. He pours the young women drinks and Barnes and Paxton begin discussing their branch of Christianity as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Their talk of theology quicks into something more deviously diabolical as they gradually become aware of Mr. Reed’s intentions.

Scott Beck and Bryan Woods are the directors and writers of this psychological thriller. It may be sacrilegious for some conservative people of faith to find this movie welcoming, but those who like movies that play with the mind should find this a philosophical treat.

Sophie Thatcher (Showtime’s “Yellowjackets”) and Chloe East (“The Fabelmans,” 2022) exude a certain sense of vulnerability as young religious women. They are clever but fit the roles of readymade victims.

However, the best reason to see this movie is Hugh Grant. He offers a superior portrayal of a creepy man concerned about the “one true religion” as he terms it. He plays Mr. Reed with an energetic zeal unmatched.

Grade: B (Even heretics can believe in this intelligent photoplay.)

“The Best Christmas Pageant Ever”

(Comedy/Drama: 1 hour, 39 minutes)

Starring: Judy Greer, Molly Belle Wright, Sebastian Billingsley-Rodriguez and Pete Holmes

Director: Dallas Jenkins

Rated: PG (Thematic material, violence and underage smoking)

Movie Review:

The holiday movie is officially here with “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever.” It is an adaptation of the book by Barbara Robinson and a remake of the 1983 television movie that starred “M*A*S*H” alum Loretta Swit. This latest version is a surprise that easily wins one over. It offers comedy and endearing characters.

The Emmanuel Annual’s Christmas pageant is without a director after an accident. Grace Bradley, played by a likable Greer, agrees to direct the pageant that is getting plenty of local attention as it is the event’s 75th anniversary. Grace’s task should be an easy one, but that changes quickly. Enter The Herdmans, six very unruly children led by older sister Imogene (Beatrice Schneider). The Herdmans take over the leading roles to the chagrin of the church’s congregation.

The movie shines because of a good cast. Judy Greer’s performance easily obtains favorability. Directing children in a pageant or similar event is not an easy task, especially with disgruntled parents and six misbehaving kids. Greer’s portrayal of Grace’s uneasiness in her job is formidable. Greer inspires one to cheer for her cause.

The children are also enjoyable to watch. Beatrice Schneider, Molly Belle Wright, Sebastian Billingsley-Rodriguezand and Lorelei Olivia Mote are engaging and provide plenty of amusing moments.

Dallas Jenkins (“The Chosen”) directs this cheerful Christmas movie. The story jumps through time haphazardly occasionally, but the movie remains enjoyable throughout its runtime. If one is searching for a good family movie this holiday season, “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever” is a good reason to leave the house before the holiday shopping begins.

Grade: B (A good pageant.)

“Anora”

(Comedy/Drama: 2 hours, 19 minutes)

Starring: Mikey Madison, Mark Eydelshteyn, Yura Borisov, Vache Tovmasyan and Karren Karagulian

Director: Sean Baker

Rated: R (Strong sexual content throughout, graphic nudity, pervasive language, violence and drug use.)

Movie Review:

Sean Baker’s Palme d’Or winner “Anora” is an entertaining adult drama with plenty of comical moments to keep it fascinating. Mature audiences that appreciate movies as pure entertainment should find “Anora” a welcomed sensation.

The movie follows Anora (Madison), a sex worker who goes by Ani, and Ivan Zakharov (Eydelshteyn) whose nickname is Vanya and is the son of a Russian oligarch. They both present strong extroverted personalities while having introverted, compromised egos. The two meet at Anora’s job, a strip joint in New York City. The two begin a hypersexualized whirlwind affair that lasts roughly a week. During that time, Ivan proposes to Anora. All is well until Ivan’s parents send Ivan’s godfather Toros (Karagulian) and henchmen Igor (Borisov) and Garnick (Tovmasyan) to ascertain exactly who Ivan impulsively married.

From there, this movie becomes one of adventure and comical moments. Anora, Toros, Igor and Garnick search New York City trying to find an inebriated young Ivan whose parents Nikolai and a domineering Galina Zakharov (Aleksey Serebryakov and Darya Ekamasova, respectively) want the marriage annulled immediately.

“Anora,” among the cursing and gratuitous sex scenes, is an enjoyable movie. One truly gets to know Ani and Ivan through their sexual encounters, their drug and alcohol use, and the people they associate with daily.

Mikey Madison and Mark Eydelshteyn play these characters well. Despite their childish whims and immoral and unhealthy lifestyles, this story makes them endearing personas. It is easy to see why people want to party with them. Madison (“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”) is especially keen as Anora, aka Ani.

They are joined by Karagulian, Borisov and Tovmasyan. They are a modern-day Three Stooges, providing plenty of humorous material.

These people are far from being saints, but they offer an exciting screenplay. Anora is good entertainment for mature audiences. It is funny and engaging throughout, even when moments appear forced or over-exaggerated.

Director-writer Sean Baker is a skilled moviemaker. He is responsible for “The Florida Project” (2017), “Red Rocket” (2021) and “Tangerine” (2015) that is similar to “Anora.” His movies are impressive.

“Anora” enhances his cinematic resume once more. It is splendid, energetic entertainment.

Grade: B+ (She dazzles like a shining star.)

“Weekend in Taipei”

(Action/Thriller: 1 hour, 40 minutes)

Starring: Luke Evans, Lun-Mei Gwei, Sung Kang

Director: George Huang

Rated: R (Violence and language)

Movie Review:

A “Weekend in Taipei” is a formulaic action flick directed by George Huang who cowrote this screenplay with Luc Besson. Think of this action flick as a weak “Fast and the Furious” type movie. It is good on the action while delivering thinly veiled characters and a shabby plot. If this movie is to cement Luke Evans, an otherwise capable actor, as a new action star, it fails miserably.

Evans plays DEA agent John Lawlor travels to Taipei during a weekend vacation and reconnects with an old flame, Joey Kwangwho (Gwei). She is now the wife of a notorious crime lord and billionaire shipping magnate Kwang (Kang). Joey and her son Raymond (Wyatt Yang) are soon reunited with Lawlor as they try to survive Kwang’s henchmen horde.

Action is all you get with this movie. The main characters are underdeveloped. The narrative needs help similarly. Wyatt Yang, a kid actor, offers better lines, which is not good since he is a secondary player.

The movie also tries to insert a romance substory. The chemistry between Lawlor and Joey is ineffective. This is no love on the weekend.

Grade: D+ (Reserve your weekend for something else.)

“Elevation”

(Action/Science-Fiction/Thriller: 1 hour, 31 minutes)

Starring: Anthony Mackie, Morena Baccarin and Maddie Hasson

Director: George Nolfi

Rated: R (Violence, peril/scary scenes, strong language, sexual references)

Movie Review:

Elevation is a science fiction thriller that has an asinine plot. The more the characters explain what is happening, including what the monsters are, the more irrelevant the plot becomes.

All humans now live above 8,000 feet in mostly mountainous areas. Any person below that altitude is hunted by these giant cockroach beings. Single father Will (Mackie) needs more medication for a medical condition for which his son Hunter (Danny Boyd Jr) suffers. Will decides to go below 8,000 feet.. He sets out to retrieve needed items from a nearby deserted hospital. A former Cal Tech research scientist Nina (Baccarin) and a courageous Katie (Hasson) decide to accompany him on this dangerous quest.

A trivial mix of “War of the Worlds” (2005) and “A Quiet Place” movies that started in 2018, “Elevation” is nonsensical science fiction. Such pseudo-science material robs it of being convincing.

George Nolfi and Anthony Mackie last worked together in biographical drama “The Banker” (2020) and previously in 2011’s “The Adjustment Bureau” (2011). “Elevation” is a lesser production for the two men. The sci-fi feature is something you would waste time with on the Syfy channel. But to watch that channel, you do not have to leave your home.

Grade: C- (This post-apocalyptic does not reach epic heights.)

“Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom”

(Anime/Action/Fantasy: 2 hours, 15 minutes)

Starring: Satoshi Hino, Yumi Hara, Masayuki Katô

Director: Naoyuki Itô

Rated: R (Bloody violence and language)

Movie Review:

“Overlord” is another anime movie based on a television series. Therefore, it is mainly for the fans who follow it on the tele. Like too many other anime movies, this one consists mostly of characters talking and then fighting and talking then fighting, a repetitive process.

This movie follows several characters attempting to save their kingdom by joining forces with the Sorcerer King Ains Ooal Gown. Together, the group is formidable, but their demi-human enemies are as relentless as their leader, the Demon Emperor Jaldabaoth.

“Overlord” has a complex plot and interesting multiple characters, yet they are placed in a lackluster narrative as if a lengthy nighttime soap opera. Plus, it ends with a cliffhanger. When watching anime, one wants to yell, “just shut up and fight already.”

Grade: C (Over it.)

“Small Things Like These”

(Drama: 1 hour, 38 minutes)

Starring: Cillian Murphy, Eileen Walsh and Emily Watson

Director: Tim Mielants

Rated: PG-13 (Thematic material)

Movie Review:

This historical fiction drama is a very quiet drama based on Claire Keegan’s 2021 novel. It is a visual experience. It resides on silent moments rather than the vocalizations of the cast. What is seen between the words are powerful moments to facilitate the narrative as much as words.

At the core of this movie, Cillian Murphy portrays devoted father Bill Furlong, a coal merchant in a 1985’s New Ross, Ireland. Seeing a young woman being forced into a Catholic convent because she is pregnant causes Furlong to have traumatic memories of his mother’s death. His sentiment towards a young lady he later encounters at the convent drives him to upend community norms to reveal a disturbing secret.

Historical fiction is a story that takes place with a background of particular historical events. “Small Things Like These” is comparable to “Philomena” (2013), which was based on an actual story. Both are about the Magdalene laundries of the 1800s and 1900s. Both are captivating, but “Philomena” is more emotively gratifying than “Small Things.”

Audiences may remember Murphy for his Academy Award-winning performance as the title character in Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” 2023. Murphy has always been an exceptional actor no matter what role. He continues that here in in “Small Things.” Even with little words in multiple scenes, he manages to exhibit a world of emotion and angst.

Tim Mielants (“Wil,” 2023), this drama thrives on Murphy’s talents, but the screenplay is a little dull, despite some key well done aspects. Again, this is a visual movie first that rests primarily on Murphy’s usual sound performance. For those liking a slow-moving drama, “Small Things Like These” is the perfect afternoon movie.

Grade: B- (The small things add up to make something bigger, eventually.)

Movie Reviews

‘Project Hail Mary’ Review: Ryan Gosling and a Rock Make Sci-Fi Magic

Published

3 hours ago

March 10, 2026

Press Room

‘Project Hail Mary’ Review: Ryan Gosling and a Rock Make Sci-Fi Magic

In contrast to other sci-fi heroes, like Interstellar’s Cooper, who ventures into the unknown for the sake of humanity and discovery, knowing the sacrifice of giving up his family, Grace is externally a cynical coward. With no family to call his own, you’d think he’d have the will to go into space for the sake of the planet’s future. Nope, he’s got no courage because the man is a cowardly dog. However, Goddard’s script feels strikingly reflective of our moment. Grace has the tools to make a difference; the Earth flashbacks center on him working towards a solution to the antimatter issue, replete with occasionally confusing but never alienating dialogue. He initially lacks the conviction, embodying a cynicism and hopelessness that many people fall into today.

The film threads this idea effectively through flashbacks that reveal his reluctance, giving the story a tragic undercurrent. Yet, it also makes his relationship with Rocky, the first living thing he truly learns to care for, ever more beautiful.

When paired with Rocky, Gosling enters the rare “puppet scene partner” hall of fame alongside Michael Caine in The Muppet Christmas Carol, never letting the fact that he’s acting opposite a puppet disrupt the sincerity of his performance. His commitment to building a gradual, affectionate friendship with this animatronic creation feels completely natural, and the chemistry translates beautifully on screen. It stands as one of the stronger performances of his career.

Project Hail Mary is overly long, and while it can be deeply affecting, the film leans on a few emotional fake-outs that become repetitive in the latter half. By the third time it deploys the same sentimental beat, the effect begins to feel cloying, slightly dulling the powerful emotions it built earlier. The constant intercutting between past and present can also feel thematically uneven at times, occasionally undercutting the narrative momentum. At 2 hours and 36 minutes, the film feels like it’s stretching itself to meet a blockbuster runtime when a tighter cut might have served better.

FINAL STATEMENT

Project Hail Mary is a meticulously crafted, hopeful, and dazzling space epic that proves the most moving friendship in film this year might just be between Ryan Gosling and a rock.

Movie Reviews

Dan Webster reviews “WTO/99”

Published

15 hours ago

March 10, 2026

Press Room

DAN WEBSTER:

It may now seem like ancient history, especially to younger listeners, but it was only 26 years ago when the streets of Seattle were filled with protesters, police and—ultimately—scenes of what ended up looking like pure chaos.

It is those scenes—put together to form a portrait of what would become known as the “Battle of Seattle” —that documentary filmmaker Ian Bell captures in his powerful documentary feature WTO/99.

We’ve seen any number of documentaries over the decades that report on every kind of social and cultural event from rock concerts to war. And the majority of them follow a typical format: archival footage blended with interviews, both with participants and with experts who provide an informational, often intellectual, perspective.

WTO/99 is something different. Like The Perfect Neighbor, a 2026 Oscar-nominated documentary feature, Bell’s film consists of what could be called found footage. What he has done is amass a series of news reports and personal video recordings into an hour-and-42-minute collection of individual scenes, mostly focused on a several-block area of downtown Seattle.

That is where a meeting of the WTO, the World Trade Organization, was set to be held between Nov. 30 and Dec. 3, 1999. Delegates from around the world planned to negotiate trade agreements (what else?) at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center.

Months before the meeting, however, a loose coalition of groups—including NGOs, labor unions, student organizations and various others—began their own series of meetings. Their objective was to form ways to protest not just the WTO but, to some of them, the whole idea of a world order they saw as a threat to the economic independence of individual countries.

Bell’s film doesn’t provide much context for all this. What we mostly see are individuals arguing their points of view as they prepare to stop the delegates from even entering the convention center. Meanwhile, Seattle authorities such as then-Mayor Paul Schell and then-Police Chief Norm Stamper—with brief appearances by Gov. Gary Locke and King County Executive Ron Sims—discuss counter measures, with Schell eventually imposing a curfew.

That decision comes, though, after what Bell’s film shows is a peaceful protest evolving into a street fight between people parading and chanting, others chained together and splinter groups intent on smashing the storefronts of businesses owned by what they see as corporate criminals. One intense scene involves a young woman begging those breaking windows to stop and asking them why they’re resorting to violence. In response a lone voice yells their reasoning: “Self-defense.”

Even more intense, though, are the actions of the Seattle police. We see officers using pepper spray, tear gas, flash grenades and other “non-lethal” means such as firing rubber pellets into the crowd. In one scene, a uniformed guy—not identified as a police officer but definitely part of the security crowd, which included National Guardsmen—is shown kicking a guy in the crotch.

The media, too, can’t avoid criticism. Though we see broadcast reporters trying to capture what was happening—with some affected like everybody else by the tear gas that filled the streets like a winter fog—the reports they air seem sketchy, as if they’re doctors trying to diagnose a serious illness by focusing on individual cells. And the images they capture tend to highlight the violence over the well-meaning actions of the vast majority of protesters.

Reactions to what Bell has put on the screen are bound to vary, based on each viewer’s personal politics. Bell revels his own stance by choosing selectively from among thousands of hours of video coverage to form the narrative he feels best captures what happened those two decades-and-change ago.

If nothing else, WTO/99 does reveal a more comprehensive picture of what happened than we got at the time. And, too, it should prepare us for the future. The way this country is going, we’re bound to see a lot more of the same.

Call it the “Battle for America.”

For Spokane Public Radio, I’m Dan Webster.

——

Movies 101 host Dan Webster is the senior film critic for Spokane Public Radio.

Movie Reviews

Movie Review: ‘Scream 7’ – Catholic Review

Published

1 day ago

March 9, 2026

Press Room

Movie Review: ‘Scream 7’ – Catholic Review

NEW YORK (OSV News) – As its title suggests, “Scream 7” (Paramount) is the latest extension of a long-lived horror franchise, one that’s currently approaching its 30th anniversary on screen. Since each chapter of this slasher saga has been a bloodsoaked mess, the series’ longevity will strike moviegoers of sense as inexplicable.

Yet the slog continues. While the previous film in the sequence shifted the action from California to New York, this second installment, following a 2022 quasi-reboot, settles on a Midwestern locale and reintroduces us to the series’ original protagonist, Sidney Evans, nee Prescott (Neve Campbell).

Having aged out of the adolescent demographic on whom the various murderers who have donned the Ghostface mask that serves as these films’ dubious trademark over the years seem to prefer to prey, Sidney comes equipped with a teen daughter, Tatum (Isabel May). Will Tatum prove as resourceful in evading the unwanted attentions of Ghostface as Mom has?

On the way to answering that question, a clutch of colorless minor characters fall victim to the killer, who sometimes gets — according to his or her lights — creative. Thus one is quite literally made to spill her guts, while another ends up skewered on a barroom’s pointy beer tap.

Through it all, director Kevin Williamson and his co-writer Guy Busick try to peddle a theme of female empowerment in the face of mortal danger. They also take a stab, as it were, at constructing a plotline about intergenerational family tensions. When not jarring viewers with grisly images, however, they’re only likely to lull them into a stupor.

The film contains excessive gory violence, including disembowelment and impaling, underage drinking, mature topics, a couple of profanities, several milder oaths, pervasive rough and considerable crude language and occasional crass expressions. The OSV News classification is O — morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association rating is R — restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.