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<p>The best film reviewers in the business give you recommendations on what to see and what to skip each week.</p>
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<p dir="ltr">There’s no outrunning it. Anyone writing a monster movie must eventually decide whether or not they’re going to show their monster. As Steven Spielberg demonstrated in <em>Jaws</em>, it’s usually more frightening to hide the face of the beast. But if the credits roll and it’s still hidden, the audience is going to be mad. In <em>Hope</em>, an alien movie set just south of the Korean DMZ, director Na Hong-Jin puts off the inevitable for more than 60 minutes as an anonymous force wreaks havoc on a sleepy harbor town. “The first hour of this movie when we don’t see the monster is incredibly intense and incredibly involving,” but “the CG doesn’t hold up” when the monster finally arrives, says <strong>William Bibbiani</strong>, film critic for The Wrap. <strong>Witney Seibold</strong>, senior writer at SlashFilm, says the visual effects looked “about 30 years old,” which made it feel like a B movie. “For me, that worked,” Seibold says. “But I could see how it could also be very, very distracting.”</p> <p dir="ltr">Bibbiani and Seibold also review <em>Practical Magic 2, The Uprising </em>and<em> Black Zombie.</em></p>
<p dir="ltr">Forget “6-7.” In 1990s Middletown, New York, a high school class figured out how to really drive the adults crazy: exposing a toxic waste scandal in their backyard. A new documentary, Teenage Wasteland, tells the true story of a group of students that stumbled onto a major scoop. To uncover the truth, they followed the money, grilled corrupt local officials and got on the wrong side of the mob. <strong>Angelica Jade Bastién</strong>, film critic for <em>New York</em> magazine, says the film makes a “beautiful argument” for “civic courage” — that “we should look at the world with curious eyes and not just swallow the mistruths or outright lies of the broken governments we live under.” <strong>Katie Walsh</strong>, film critic for the <em>Los Angeles Times</em> and the Tribune News Service, says the movie is more 1990s nostalgia trip than heart-pounding thriller. “It is really inspiring to think about how a teacher empowers them to just go out and start asking questions," she says. </p> <p dir="ltr">Bastién and Walsh also review <em>Onslaught</em>, <em>The Sun Never Sets</em>, and <em>Boorman and the Devil</em>.</p>
<p dir="ltr">After decades of unsuccessful attempts to catch Roadrunner using anvils, jet packs, and rockets strapped to roller skates, Wile E. Coyote (caninus litigious) has a new weapon in his arsenal: #BigLaw. But Mr. Coyote is now directing his ire toward the Acme Corporation, which manufactures said devices that always seem to literally blow up in his face. Shawn Edwards, film critic at Fox4 News in Kansas City, says this movie couldn’t have come out at a better time. “Is this movie about Acme, or is this movie about Amazon? I mean, you really can’t tell the difference,” Edwards says. “It’s fun, it’s lively, the animation works, and it totally pulls you into that world.”</p> <p><strong> </strong></p> <p dir="ltr">“I think it is okay, but I don’t love it,” says Tim Grierson, senior U.S. critic for Screen International. “The live-action actors, Will Forte, and the evil lawyer for the Acme Corporation who's played by John Cena, they're not quite as fun as their animated co-stars,” Grierson says. “The movie eventually becomes kind of a conspiracy/thriller thing where they try to actually prove that Acme's products are ineffective. I think that plot doesn't work so well.”</p> <p><strong> </strong></p> <p dir="ltr">Edwards and Grierson also review The Dog Stars, Idiots, Buddy, and remember actor Tim Curry, who died this week at the age of 80.</p> <p> </p>
<p dir="ltr">It’s rarely a good sign if you’ve devoted hours to a horror franchise and you still aren’t sure what it’s about. But film critic Alonso Duralde gave it a try with Insidious: Out of The Further. “I’ve seen five of the six Insidious movies, and I feel like I still couldn’t pass a pop quiz about what ‘The Further’ is and how it works,” says Duralde, the co-host of the podcast Linoleum Knife. “It is a kind of twisted purgatory for people who aren’t able to move on to whatever the next plane of existence is, and it is constantly causing trouble for the protagonists of the Insidious movies.” But Duralde’s Linoleum Knife co-host Dave White says that actually works in this latest installment’s favor. “People might wonder, ‘How do I drop into a Part 6 of something?’ The film succeeds best, I think, in the earlier acts where the confusion is part of the terror,” White says. “We don’t know why this is happening to these people, we don’t know what’s coming next, and that provides scenes of genuine fright.”</p> <p dir="ltr">Duralde and White also review It Ends, Franz, and American Doctor.</p> <p> </p>
<p dir="ltr">There are a few indispensable ingredients in any stoner flick worth its weight in weed. After drug-addled antics, the most important ingredient could be the friends we made along the way. Cheech and Chong. The Dude and Walter. Harold and Kumar. Stoner comedies seem to always follow a pair of buddies – and those buddies are usually men. That’s not true of The Wrong Girls, which stars Kristen Stewart and Alia Shawkat as BFFs who get high enough to communicate with their cats. The duo “are perfect,” says <strong>Witney Seibold</strong>, senior writer for <em>SlashFilm</em>. “I am convinced that there is nothing Kristen Stewart cannot do. If she is starring as the Cheech in a Cheech and Chong comedy, and pulling it off with aplomb, then she’s kind of stretched to every corner of her talents.” Writer and director Dylan Meyer is also Kristen Stewart’s wife. “The film really has this feel of [being made by] people who know what Kristen Stewart can do, who know that Kristen Stewart at home is a gigantic goofball,” says <strong>Amy Nicholson</strong>, film critic for the <em>Los Angeles Times</em>. Only the cats, voiced by Kumail Nanjiani and Seth Rogen, harshed her buzz. “These cats are talking way too much,” Nicholson says.</p> <p dir="ltr"><strong>Seibold</strong> and <strong>Nicholson</strong> also review <em>The End of Oak Street, Union County, </em>and<em> Nimrods.</em></p>
<p dir="ltr">Anthony Bourdain swears that he used to be unlikeable. That’s hard to believe for many fans of the late celebrity chef, but he wrote frankly about that period of his life in his best-selling memoir, Kitchen Confidential. The biopic Tony looks at the year he spent in Provincetown, Massachusetts, learning how to show up to work on time and, slowly, how to cook. His brattiness is key to the success of the movie, according to <strong>William Bibbiani</strong>, film critic for the Wrap. Tony is “not all about how amazing the subject was,” he says, adding that “what makes it work is how unafraid Dominic Sessa is to be unlikeable as a character who, later in life, we would pretty much all like.” It’s unclear if Bourdain would have liked the movie, though. “Anthony Bourdain had a complicated relationship to his own celebrity, and the movie probably has a complicated relationship to that as well,” says <strong>Alissa Wilkinson</strong>, film critic for the New York Times. </p> <p dir="ltr">Bibbiani and Wilkinson also review One Night Only, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, and White Nights. </p>
<p>Gregg Araki is one of the most important directors in the New Queer Cinema, the 1990s film movement that put daring and dark LGBTQ stories onscreen and produced household names like Gus Van Sant and Todd Haynes. Araki’s movies The Living End and Doom Generation followed cynical queer teenagers as they wrestled with sex and death in an America that didn’t want or understand them. I Want Your Sex is about a new doom generation – Z, not X. Olivia Wilde plays a boundary-pushing artist who starts a kinky affair with her new employee, a recent college graduate played by Cooper Hoffman. “It’s a really funny movie,” says <strong>Alison Willmore</strong>, film critic for <em>New York</em> magazine. “Olivia Wilde leans into the most fun, diva aspects of her character.” <strong>Shawn Edwards</strong>, film critic for Fox 4 News in Kansas City, felt I Want Your Sex wanted to be “too many things” at once to work. “At only 90 minutes, it just felt way too long,” Edwards says. “The juvenile tone just hampered everything.” </p>
<p>Luis Valdez is widely known as the Godfather of Chicano theater. He directed the 1987 movie 'La Bamba' and the 1981 film 'Zoot Suit.' But Valdez also founded El Teatro Campesino, the in-house theater troupe for the United Farm Workers. His life is now the subject of a new documentary, ‘American Pachuco: The Legend of Luis Valdez.’ Film critics Dave White and Alonso Duralde call the film a “well-deserved victory lap.” The pair also review 'Her Private Hell,' 'Motor City,' and 'Sheep in the Box.'</p>
<p>'The Odyssey' discourse has been hard to escape ever since the cast was first announced <span data-slate-fragment="JTVCJTdCJTIydHlwZSUyMiUzQSUyMnBhcmFncmFwaCUyMiUyQyUyMmNoaWxkcmVuJTIyJTNBJTVCJTdCJTIydGV4dCUyMiUzQSUyMmVhcmx5JTIwMjAyNSUyMiU3RCU1RCUyQyUyMmRhdGElMjIlM0ElN0IlN0QlMkMlMjJpc1ZvaWQlMjIlM0FmYWxzZSU3RCU1RA==">early 2025</span>. The film finally hits theaters this weekend, but does it live up to Homer’s epic poem? “If you're going to make a film about that work … it has to have such scale and it absolutely does,” says film critic Tim Grierson. Co-critic Angelica Jade Bastién adds “it's a very fascinating film that sometimes touches greatness, but it doesn't quite get there.” The pair also review 'Reading Lolita in Tehran,' 'Horsegirls' and 'Remake.'</p>
<p>'Moana' is the latest Disney movie to get the live-action treatment. Unfortunately, everything about the remake “feels artificial” for our film critics <strong>Witney Seibold </strong>and <strong>Katie Walsh</strong>. The pair also share their reviews of 'Night Nurse,' 'Evil Dead Burn,' and 'Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass.'</p>
<p dir="ltr">The Minions franchise keeps growing with its latest installment <em>Minions and Monsters</em>. The film follows the yellow friends as they try to make a monster movie with real monsters. Chaos ensues, but is it a hit? Film critics Christy Lemire and William Bibbiani share their review. Plus: <em>Enola Holmes 3</em>, <em>Young Washington</em>, and <em>Romeria</em>.</p>
<p>Johnny Knoxville and his band of misfits return to the big screen for one more round of gross and outrageous stunts in 'Jackass: Best and Last.' Film critics Alissa Wilkinson and Amy Nicholson review the fifth and last film in the series. Plus: 'Supergirl,' 'The Invite,' and 'Maddie’s Secret.'</p>
<p>Move over, Evil Emperor Zurg, Sworn Enemy of The Galactic Alliance. The latest <em>Toy Story</em> villain is an electronic tablet stealing a child's attention from her toys.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In <em>Disclosure Day, a</em> government whistleblower and a local journalist race to expose the existence of aliens and the conspiracy to cover it up. Shawn Edwards, film critic for FOX4 News in Kansas City and co-founder of the African American Film Critics Association, calls this the third act in Spielberg's “space invaders” trilogy, dating back to Close Encounters of the Third Kind and E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial. “Unlike those two previous films, Disclosure Day has much loftier ambitions, and Spielberg, who’s the master of making small stories ginormously big, doesn’t quite stick the landing,” Edwards says. “It isn’t groundbreaking, but it works for the images you see on screen.” Angelica Jade Bastién, film critic for New York Magazine, loved it. “I thought it balanced action with a spiritual and existential curiosity,” Bastién says. “I found it visually elegant, and one of the greatest aspects of the movie to me is it reawakened my belief in what a good blockbuster can do.” They also review <em>The Furious, Find Your Friends, </em>and <em>The Little Sister.</em></p> <p> </p>
<p>'Masters of the Universe' is Mattel’s latest adaptation. The company is banking on the film to be a big hit like 'Barbie,' but critics <strong>Alison Willmore</strong> and <strong>Tim Grierson</strong> say He-Man’s return is a big mess. Plus 'Scary Movie,' 'Carolina Caroline,' and 'The Currents.'</p>
<p>The new World War II movie 'Pressure' tells the true, but not well known story of a British meteorologist who tries to predict the weather ahead of D-Day and warns Eisenhower of a pending storm. Does it add anything to the World War II film canon or is it a bust? Film critics Alonso Duralde and Dave White share their review. Plus, 'Backrooms,' 'Power Ballad,' and 'The Last Viking.'</p>
<p>'The Mandolorian and Grogu' is the first 'Star Wars' film in seven years to play in theaters. Will Baby Yoda (aka Grogu) be enough to pull in audiences? Film critics Shawn Edwards and Katie Walsh review the film. Plus 'Saccharine', 'I Love Boosters,' and 'Tuner.'</p>
<p>In the new film 'Is God Is,' two sisters are sent by their mother on a mission to kill their abusive father. Film critics <strong>Witney Seibold</strong> and <strong>William Bibbiani</strong> dub the directorial debut from Aleshea Harris "bold and exciting." Plus: 'The Wizard of the Kremlin,' 'Decorado,' and 'Obsession.'</p>
<p><strong>Angelica Jade Bastién</strong> and <strong>Alissa Wilkinson</strong> review 'Billie Eilish - Hit Me Hard and Soft: The Tour (Live in 3D),' 'Sheep Detectives,' 'Maintenance Artist,' and 'Mortal Kombat 2.'</p>
<p>'The Devil Wears Prada' hit theaters 20 years ago and the sequel is finally here. Does it still capture the magic that made the first movie so iconic? Film critics Alonso Duralde and Dave White review the film along with 'Hokum,' 'The School Duel' and 'Two Pianos.'</p>
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