TV Updates Watch Watchmen for Regina King (at first) A groundbreaking graphic novel in the 1980s, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen remains today one of the most influential pieces of 20th century speculative fiction. A deconstruction of superhero comics and the geopolitics of the Cold War, Watchmen is a kind of adaptation holy grail. Its rich iconography and By Sarah • Oct 22, 2019 12:52 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews TROS trailer 2 The final trailer for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker dropped last night, and I have a very serious question: What if the movie doesn’t live up to this trailer? This is a GREAT trailer. It’s hitting all the right notes—thrilling, mysterious, nostalgic (Carrie!), exciting, gorgeous visuals. By Sarah • Oct 22, 2019 09:12 am
TV Updates Mid-life Crisis Crown The Crown season three is dropping at an interesting time. Peter Morgan, Netflix, everyone involved with The Crown could not have known that, of course, but as it happens, The Crown arrives at an existential crisis at the same moment that the British royal family is knee-deep in another kind By Sarah • Oct 21, 2019 01:28 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Lupita Nyong’o in a zom-com Five years after the apogee of zombies in pop culture, Little Monsters arrives from Australia, a zombie comedy (zom-com) with little in the way of either zombies or comedy. Lupita Nyong’o does what she can with her natural luminous presence, but she cannot rescue an entire movie from the By Sarah • Oct 18, 2019 03:29 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson: Farts and Loneliness in The Lighthouse I saw The Lighthouse at TIFF, and five weeks later, I am still not sure I actually like this film. I admire it, and I haven’t stopped thinking about it, but did I enjoy it? Does enjoyment even matter when a film is so specifically evocative and provoking? “Like” By Sarah • Oct 18, 2019 01:56 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Paul Dano > Jonah Hill There was a report circulating for the last month that Jonah Hill was in talks for a villainous role in The Batman, with everyone guessing who he could be playing and how much he would get paid (the Penguin and $10 million were betting favorites). But yesterday, Hill passed on By Sarah • Oct 17, 2019 03:34 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews The Addams Family doesn’t understand Wednesday The latest cinematic outing for the first family of weird is the animated The Addams Family, an attempt to rebrand the Addamses for the new millennium, or possibly just an exercise in brand management, as the whole thing feels like it exists solely to renew an IP license. The Addams By Sarah • Oct 16, 2019 03:00 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Jungle Cruise is just The Mummy (the good one) The first trailer for Jungle Cruise, starring Emily Blunt and Dwayne Johnson, has arrived and I do not have time for this half-dressed bullsh-t, do not try to fool me, I know The Mummy (the good one) when I see it. This is just The Mummy (the good one) dressed By Sarah • Oct 15, 2019 03:02 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Dolittle’s majestic racist dog Despite being one of the world’s biggest movie stars, outside of Marvel, Robert Downey. Jr. hasn’t had a lot of luck. His cold streak does not look set to end any time soon as his first post-Endgame role is playing Dr. Dolittle in a movie called, simply, Dolittle. By Sarah • Oct 15, 2019 02:05 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Day drink with Charlie’s Angels When the first trailer for Elizabeth Banks’s reboot (of a reboot) of Charlie’s Angels was released, I said, “I hope the next one gives us more of the Angels interacting.” Well guess what? It does! A new trailer has arrived and it focuses more on the trio of By Sarah • Oct 11, 2019 12:48 pm
Martin Scorsese Martin Scorsese vs. Marvel Sometimes a thing happens and I think, Please, please can we just let that slide? We don’t have to get worked up about everything, and some things really, truly, are not that important. Sometimes it’s okay to not have an opinion, or to let others have a different By Sarah • Oct 09, 2019 09:44 am
Movie Reviews and Previews A Spendy Christmas Carol Apple TV+ has not yet launched, but they are the winners of a bidding war over a musical adaptation of A Christmas Carol, starring Ryan Reynolds and Will Ferrell. The exact number is not known, but when have we ever heard a reasonable number for a streaming deal? They probably By Sarah • Oct 09, 2019 08:57 am
Movie Reviews and Previews Joker is an inevitable hit It’s official, Joker is a hit, setting a new October opening weekend record with a $96 million opening weekend. This is more than Justice League ($93.8 million). Joker is a hit, Justice League is a flop, and the difference lies mostly in their budgets and a little bit By Sarah • Oct 07, 2019 03:41 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Leave room for 1917 1917 is a World War I movie directed by Sam Mendes. I keep getting this confused with Peter Jackson’s colorized documentary about World War I, They Shall Not Grow Old. I don’t know why, they don’t really look anything alike beyond the surface similarities of setting, but By Sarah • Oct 04, 2019 04:13 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Taika Waititi and Ryan Reynolds have never met New York Comic-Con has begun, starting the hype train for projects that weren’t ready in time for San Diego Comic-Con. This includes Free Guy, the mostly-under-the-radar action comedy Ryan Reynolds shot over the summer with Night at the Museum and Stranger Things director Shawn Levy. (Free Guy is written By Sarah • Oct 04, 2019 02:26 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Clint Eastwood’s annual late entry It’s practically a rite of passage in Oscar season at this point: Clint Eastwood showing up late with a movie no one realized he had finished already. (He works fast because he gets everything in one take, even if that one take is sh-t, it’s the take, move By Sarah • Oct 03, 2019 03:29 pm
