First there was the reduction of available discs to rent via services like Netflix, then streaming rights for entertainment jumped from one streamer to another. To make matters even harder for consumers, some services straight up started deleting their films… Read More ›
mystery
It may be wise to find another group of “Righteous Thieves” for your next heist.
There’s something about a good confidence film. They’re not always A-List-led romps like Ocean’s Eleven (2001) or explorations of morality like Rififi (1955). Sometimes, they’re a mixture of both, keeping the audience on their toes the entire time like Confidence… Read More ›
“Hypnotic” spirals a tad too much.
“…a thrill ride in the Hitchcock sense..” – Director Robert Rodriquez. Remaking Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo (1958) is an unofficial right-of-passage for many auteur directors, and after 21 years of trying, Robert Rodriquez has finally made his. Hypnotic seems to view… Read More ›
“Unwelcome” Blu-ray Giveaway
After originally being slated for release in 2021, director Jon Wright’s horror/thriller Unwelcome finally hit theaters in March of 2023. If you prefer to get your scares in the privacy of your own home, rejoice as Unwelcome is hitting shelves on… Read More ›
Open Dialogue with “Florida Man” actors Edgar Ramírez and Abbey Lee.
In this edition of Meet Me at the Movies: Open Dialogue, Thomas Manning sits down with Edgar Ramírez and Abbey Lee to discuss the new Netflix limited series Florida Man. They discuss their previous personal experiences with the state of… Read More ›
Radiance Films adds director Luigi Comencini’s murder mystery comedy “The Sunday Woman (La donna della domenica)” to their burgeoning collection of restorations.
Comedy is tragedy plus time. – Author Mark Twain Though Edgar Allen Poe’s 1841 story The Murders in the Rue Morgue is widely considered the first detective story, there’s a long standing relationship between murder and storytelling. Whether in dramatics… Read More ›
Warner Bros. Pictures’s presents a first-time 4K UHD restoration of John Huston’s classic noir “The Maltese Falcon.”
Beginning as a character in a serial, Dashiell Hammett’s hard-boiled detective Sam Spade has appeared in the original 1930 tale The Maltese Falcon, two films of the same name, several short stories, and several short films. Of the characterizations, the… Read More ›
“Last Stop Larrimah:” A cozy true crime doc for scandal junkies. [SXSW]
Last Stop Larrimah grabbed my attention right away from the description. It’s a stranger-than-fiction true crime documentary about the goings-on in Larrimah, a remote Australian town with only 10 residents. There were 11 until Paddy Moriarty went missing on December… Read More ›
Synapse Films offers up Dario Argento’s “Phenomena” in a special edition 2-Disc 4K UHD edition.
When it comes to Dario Argento, the highs are high and the lows are cavernous pits leading straight to hell. The Italian filmmaker, known for helping further define the later era of the giallo film, has made some of the… Read More ›
Director Kei Ishikawa’s dramatic thriller “A Man (ある男)” explores the value of self and identity. [Santa Barbara International Film Festival]
Who are you? Stop for a moment. Read not a line further, and think on that. Are you one thing or are you many? Are you your thoughts and fears? Your anxieties or successes? Your actions? Are you your present… Read More ›
Although there have been “Sharper” thrillers, this one from A24 still makes for an engaging, entertaining watch.
Every thriller about confidence men (or women) usually has two questions poised against it: How is this film going to stay one step ahead of me, as the audience? Or, How is this film going to attempt to insult my… Read More ›
“Death Knot” Blu-ray Giveaway
In the cold of winter, more and more horror films are being released for audiences. Whether it’s as a means of making the terror more chilling or to offer a different kind of disquiet when nature is resetting is up… Read More ›
Conspiracy theory doc “A 92 Year Old Hollywood Mystery Exposed” is easily answered.
Movies can be anything, especially in context and length, and simply have to just be a moving picture at a minimum of 24 frames a minute. Conspiracies can be the same thing. They can be about any subject matter and… Read More ›
With “Glass Onion,” it’s not a Rian Johnson whodunit, it’s a Rian Johnson hediditagain.
2019’s surprise of the holiday season was writer/director Rian Johnson’s Knives Out, a whodunit that takes all the hallmarks of the great mystery writers and gave it his own spin. First, there’s the rich family where motive is everywhere and… Read More ›
“The Visitor” Digital Code Giveaway
Produced by Blumhouse, Paramount Pictures, and Epix and released toward the start of October, Justin P. Lange’s The Visitor seeks to unsettle through a tale of stolen identity and psychological thrills. Just before it comes available via Epix, the kind folks… Read More ›
Meta-murder mystery “See How They Run” releasing on home video is one puzzle you’ll be glad to solve.
“Well, now that you’ve seen our film you are an accomplice to murder. And so we ask you to remember that it’s very much within your interests not to tell a soul outside of this theater who dunit.” It’s with… Read More ›
Jordan Peele’s third film, sci-fi thriller “Nope,” simultaneously works as a smart survival film and as an exploration of humanity’s darker tendencies.
Jordan Peele: writer, actor, producer, director. Even before his debut directorial film, Get Out (2017), audiences had a solid sense of Peele’s creativity from any of the projects he played any part in. Now, however, with his third film in… Read More ›
Noah Baumbach’s “White Noise” is so boldly unconventional, it makes this white whale of an adaptation feel somehow even more tremendous. [Film Fest 919]
Three years ago, Film Fest 919 opened the 2019 festival with Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story, and I was taken. It was a much more muted affair for the Frances Ha and While We’re Young filmmaker, known for his quirkier approach… Read More ›
The world of “The Witch” explodes with the discovery of “The Other One.”
Writer/director Park Hoon-jung’s The Witch: Subversion is a remarkable sci-fi thriller, taking the coming-of-age tropes we know and blending them together with supernatural-like covert forces, culminating in an adventure that feels familiar and wholly unique. Just before the film ends,… Read More ›
Director Rian Johnson’s “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” maintains the magic of the absurdist mystery in this setting outing. [Film Fest 919]
Three years ago, Rian Johnson’s humble follow-up to …let’s just say, polarizing… Star Wars: The Last Jedi came out in the form of Knives Out. Unlike said film set in a galaxy far far away, the consensus on Knives Out… Read More ›