Mark Jenkins
Mark Jenkins's reviews only count toward the Tomatometer when
published at the following Tomatometer-approved publication(s):
Washington Post,
Orlando Weekly,
NPR.org,
NPR
| Publications: | Washington Post, Orlando Weekly, NPR.org, NPR |
Movie Reviews Only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
|---|---|---|---|
| 27% | Mortal Engines (2018) |
Mortal Engines marshals billions of pixels and barely an iota of inspiration.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Dec 13, 2018
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| 2/4 | 81% | Ben is Back (2018) |
The tight time frame gives the movie a welcome urgency, but it doesn't prevent its second half from becoming lurid and melodramatic.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Dec 11, 2018
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| 80% | Never Look Away (2018) |
Never Look Away is philosophically vexing. But it's a good story well-told, and never grows tiresome despite its three-hour running time.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Nov 29, 2018
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| 82% | Green Book (2018) |
A well-meaning but glib and shallow ode to interracial healing.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Nov 21, 2018
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| 40% | The Girl in the Spider's Web (2018) |
If this twinning gambit is more playful than profound, it suits a movie that's both narratively and conceptually repetitive.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Nov 8, 2018
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| 2.5/4 | 81% | Boy Erased (2018) |
It's well-meaning and finely crafted, yet short on surprises, either narrative or emotional.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Nov 6, 2018
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| 89% | A Private War (2018) |
Amel maintains an effective balance between explicating the business of journalism, simulating the horrors of armed conflict, and conveying the effect both are having on Colvin's body and soul.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Nov 1, 2018
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| 94% | Life and Nothing More (La Vida y Nada Más) (2018) |
Unsweetened by any score and unwilling to supply an emotional payoff, the film sometimes plays more like anthropology than cinema.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Oct 25, 2018
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| 2.5/4 | 88% | What They Had (2018) |
What works best here comes between the movie's heavy opening and its lightweight conclusion.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Oct 23, 2018
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| 2.5/4 | 68% | The Happy Prince (2018) |
"The Happy Prince" conveys the declining Wilde's pain, despair and self-pity, but also the writer's defiant banter.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Oct 15, 2018
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| 89% | The Kindergarten Teacher (2018) |
Colangelo's best move was to cast Gyllenhaal, who captures Lisa's conflicted emotions in subtle gestures and expressions, never overplaying.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Oct 11, 2018
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| 3/4 | 79% | 22 July (2018) |
Greengrass previously excelled at depicting events that overwhelmed individuals; in "22 July," he demonstrates how one deluded zealot can shake an entire country.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Oct 9, 2018
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| 83% | Monsters and Men (2018) |
Monsters and Men offers neither unalloyed despair nor implausible hope. It's about the way people of color live now, moving through the streets with passion, purpose and one eye on the rear-view mirror.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Sep 27, 2018
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| 66% | Lizzie (2018) |
The movie's handsome appearance is complemented by assured performances.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Sep 14, 2018
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| 96% | Bisbee '17 (2018) |
Like many arty contemporary documentaries, Bisbee '17 is rather theatrical. But that's reasonable in this case...‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Sep 6, 2018
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| 2.5/4 | 92% | Searching (2018) |
[A] clever but silicon-chip-thin movie...‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Aug 29, 2018
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| 93% | Support the Girls (2018) |
A sometimes winning but fatally underwritten workplace comedy.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Aug 23, 2018
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| 82% | Juliet, Naked (2018) |
What beguiles, aside from the winning performances, are the movie's generous spirit, shifting tone, and wealth of quickly sketched yet sufficiently realized supporting characters.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Aug 16, 2018
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| 91% | Nico, 1988 (2018) |
[Dyrholm] plays Nico as perplexing and intriguing, ethereal yet earthy. She manages to make the viewer understand why some people wanted to be around the singer, even though she was demanding, exasperating and untrustworthy - in short, a junkie.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Aug 1, 2018
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| 89% | Far From the Tree (2018) |
The movie plays more like a sketch than a full study. The odd thing is that it's a sketch for a larger work that already exists.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Jul 19, 2018
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| 92% | Sorry to Bother You (2018) |
Sorry to Bother You takes too long to get to a payoff that's impressively brash but too surreal to function as satire. Yet tightening and focusing the movie's script probably wouldn't have helped.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Jul 5, 2018
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| 71% | Damsel (2018) |
Damsel goes for rueful smiles, not uproarious laughs.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Jun 21, 2018
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| 57% | Hotel Artemis (2018) |
The movie's premise is enjoyable, even if stitched together from a pile of dystopian hand-me-downs, and the comic moments are sharp. What fails is the pacing and, ultimately, the plot.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Jun 7, 2018
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| 88% | American Animals (2018) |
Stuffed with references to classic crime flicks, American Animals is British writer-director Bart Layton's clever and assured bid to rival Stanley Kubrick and Quentin Tarantino.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted May 31, 2018
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| 2/4 | 86% | Upgrade (2018) |
Although writer-director Leigh Whannell's themes are as predictable as his premise, the action scenes are efficient and effective.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted May 30, 2018
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| 40% | Mary Shelley (2018) |
Viewers may initially find Fanning's American-girl presence jarring, but she holds her own - and her accent. By the movie's end, her performance has come to seem as authentic as anything else in this perfumed account.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted May 24, 2018
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| 93% | Beast (2018) |
Pearce has some mildly wicked fun with his scenario, winking as he stages such routine thriller-flick maneuvers as having the lights suddenly cut out.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted May 10, 2018
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| 3/4 | 83% | Disobedience (2018) |
What warmth there is - and it is considerable - radiates from its three lead performers and a script that treats each of the central characters as neither hero nor villain.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted May 1, 2018
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| 55% | Mrs. Hyde (Madame Hyde) (2018) |
Mrs. Hyde has its keen moments, but it lacks a thesis. If it were a term paper, any conscientious teacher would send it back for a rewrite.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Apr 26, 2018
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| 54% | Godard Mon Amour (Le redoutable) (2018) |
Perhaps Hazanavicius thought he'd follow his subject's example and simply jump-cut from happy to sad. Godard had the verve to get away with it, but Godard Mon Amour doesn't.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Apr 19, 2018
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| 81% | Beirut (2018) |
It's hardly a stretch for Hamm to play a man who's clever, disenchanted, and charismatically dissolute. But he does it as surely as he ever has, and Pike is more convincing as a Yank than she was a German in 7 Days in Entebbe.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Apr 12, 2018
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| 90% | Lean on Pete (2018) |
As its scenario goes from sad to worse...the movie seems to aspire only to bumming everybody out.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Apr 5, 2018
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| 2.5/4 | 50% | The Miracle Season (2018) |
It's no champion, but it's still a reasonably good cry.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Apr 5, 2018
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| 2.5/4 | 100% | Lives Well Lived (2018) |
Their stories are eventful and moving, and well supported by archival photos and footage.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Apr 4, 2018
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| 69% | Finding Your Feet (2018) |
Whether it's inspired, perverse, or just lazy to make over-60 actors prance through familiar rom-com routines, Staunton, Spall, and Imrie are up to the task.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Mar 29, 2018
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| 2.5/4 | 100% | Keep the Change (2018) |
What distinguishes it are Israel's empathetic characterizations - she's known Polansky for 15 years - and the winning performances, not only by the leads but also by the supporting players.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Mar 21, 2018
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| 24% | 7 Days in Entebbe (2018) |
Even a tight timeline can't keep the movie on track.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Mar 15, 2018
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| 2.5/4 | 92% | Love, Simon (2018) |
The movie is well-made and likable, without any major missteps. It's also just a little bland.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Mar 15, 2018
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| 96% | November (2018) |
The movie's central story, a tortured-love triangle, is slight. But the context is fascinating and the visual style bewitching.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Feb 22, 2018
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| 70% | Double Lover (L'amant double) (2018) |
It does rely on certain Gallic attitudes toward women that don't travel well. Louis' psychiatric method could reasonably be described as sexual assault, and the notion that Chloe might be "hysterical" is at best archaic.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Feb 15, 2018
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| 2/4 | 33% | The Monkey King 3 (2018) |
Much of "The Monkey King 3" is devoted to philosophical musing and romantic mooning, the latter cued to a drippy ballad.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Feb 15, 2018
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| 64% | Peter Rabbit (2018) |
Peter Rabbit is sometimes crass, but more often simply dull.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Feb 8, 2018
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| 76% | Before We Vanish (Sanpo suru shinryakusha) (2018) |
Although a tighter cut of the 130-minute Before We Vanish would likely be an improvement, it might lose this version's intriguing asides.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Feb 1, 2018
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| 88% | A Ciambra (2018) |
While A Ciambra is not a happy story, its vigor and authenticity deliver a sort of joy.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Jan 25, 2018
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| 84% | The Final Year (2018) |
Gradually documentarian Greg Barker's look at Barack Obama's foreign policy team comes into focus, thanks in large part to the counterpoint played by the Trump campaign.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Jan 18, 2018
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| 83% | Lover For A Day (L'amant d'un jour) (2018) |
Despite its neo-new-wave style, Lover for a Day is neither offhand nor autobiographical.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Jan 11, 2018
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| 77% | In the Land of Pomegranates (2018) |
If watching it is frustrating, so is the larger process of seeking understanding, or at least a nonviolent mutual tolerance.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Jan 4, 2018
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| 76% | In the Fade (Aus dem Nichts) (2017) |
In the Fade boasts an assured sense of style and a meticulously constructed script. Moments that initially appear to be asides turn out to be essential, and the final scenes of the first two chapters are vivid and startling.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Dec 28, 2017
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| 79% | The Ballad of Lefty Brown (2017) |
Jared Moshe, the writer and director of The Ballad of Lefty Brown, is a fan of classic Westerns and he's made a movie that should please fellow aficionados.‐ NPR
Read More | Posted Dec 14, 2017
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| 2/4 | 33% | The Thousand Faces of Dunjia (2017) |
The story is motley and not very involving, and the anything-goes CGI undermines the battle sequences.‐ Washington Post
Read More | Posted Dec 14, 2017
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