Angelica Jade Bastién
Tomatometer-approved critic
Movies reviews only
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John Wick: Chapter 4 (2023) |
Chapter 4 is blissfully entertaining, full of pratfalls and acting turns that lead to the audience swelling with oohs, aahs, and yelps. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Mar 23, 2023
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Return to Seoul (2022) |
[Chou] grounds his story in the contours and illuminations of lead Park Ji-Min’s features and expressions in a debut performance so piercing it makes the entire film move like a breathing poem. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Feb 17, 2023
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Eve's Bayou (1997) |
What stays with me after all these years are the images of its female characters in liminal states, on the edge of awakenings: Roz’s beautiful façade cracking under the pressure of her husband’s impropriety... - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Jan 10, 2023
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Babylon (2022) |
Babylon is a film too busy writing an elegy for the still-breathing body of film as a medium to capture the true beauty and complications of being alive. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Dec 21, 2022
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Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022) |
Regrettably, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever tries to do so many things that it comes across as threadbare and pallid — less a failure of imagination and more of circumstance, time, and narrative constraints. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Nov 09, 2022
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Men (2022) |
Despite all the broken bones, the graphic deaths, and the copious amounts of blood, the driving idea behind Men is not bold enough to feel frightening. Instead, it’s remarkably tepid. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted May 18, 2022
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Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022) |
The ideas that hold a gleam of potential are shot down by the film’s rank ugliness, its incessant pace of exposition, the utter slog of the first hour, and the insistence on special effects that render the horrifying as textureless. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted May 04, 2022
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Ambulance (2022) |
This is exactly the kind of ridiculousness I can get behind. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Apr 12, 2022
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The Lost City (2022) |
The Lost City isn’t terrible, just aggressively mediocre. It is the kind of movie you put on in the background after coming across it on TBS while you fold laundry on a Sunday afternoon. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Mar 23, 2022
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The Worst Person in the World (2021) |
The story quietly washes over you until you realize you’re drowning in waves of acute emotions. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Feb 03, 2022
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The Matrix Resurrections (2021) |
Teetering between a meta-reckoning with the legacy of the first trilogy and a sincere blooming of a whole new story that feels boldly romantic, Lana Wachowski's first feature solo is a thrilling triumph. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Dec 22, 2021
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C'mon C'mon (2021) |
A tremendous showing from Joaquin Phoenix, operating at a register he's rarely found before. It's a career best for him - lovely, empathetic, humane. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Nov 24, 2021
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Eternals (2021) |
With Eternals, Marvel proves itself to be nothing more than a staid, lumbering black hole. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Nov 05, 2021
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Candyman (2021) |
This Candyman misunderstands the allure of the original and has nothing meaningful to say about the contemporary ideas it observes with all the scrutiny of someone rushing through a Starbucks order on their way to work. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Aug 25, 2021
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Gunpowder Milkshake (2021) |
Gunpowder Milkshake, Netflix's latest in a long line of glossy, forgettable fare, is a flagrant reminder that execution is everything. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Aug 04, 2021
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Cruella (2021) |
That Cruella is an atrocity with neither purpose nor soul shouldn't come as a surprise. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted May 31, 2021
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Those Who Wish Me Dead (2021) |
A lean, engrossing, action-packed shot of adrenaline that is striking in its aesthetic decisions and boasts some exceedingly fun turns from its actors. Most important, it proves once more why Jolie is a star. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted May 14, 2021
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Mortal Kombat (2021) |
Another paltry reminder that Hollywood has abandoned the sincere pleasure action films provide: pointing a camera at a person in motion to showcase their beauty and savagery. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Apr 30, 2021
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Malcolm & Marie (2021) |
I'm not sure any two actors could save the film from its own overwrought script and grand self-importance. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Feb 05, 2021
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Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (2020) |
Ma Rainey has the weight of Hollywood power players behind it, but it seems incapable or uninterested in taking advantage of the delights of what film can do. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Dec 23, 2020
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Wonder Woman 1984 (2020) |
The disappointing sequel highlights not only the dire state of the live-action superhero genre in film, but the dire state of Hollywood filmmaking as a whole. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Dec 15, 2020
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I'm Your Woman (2020) |
It could have easily been a vacuous parade of period grit glossed up for our age. But it's not. It's something more slippery and compelling: the simply rendered story of a woman trying to stand on her own. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Dec 07, 2020
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Kindred (2020) |
Its co-writer/director has pulled off a rare feat: He's created a work that interrogates grief with a sociopolitical undercurrent without losing sight of the fact that this is a horror film in the first place. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Nov 14, 2020
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Bad Hair (2020) |
A banal, sepulchral tour through the failures of the Black male imagination supported by an industry that bleeds Black folks for inspiration but doesn't care for their very humanity either. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Oct 30, 2020
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Rebecca (2020) |
The leads set the tone for this unfortunate waste of time, heralding a series of issues that reflect poorly not only on this ugly retread but on much of Hollywood's recent output as a whole. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Oct 19, 2020
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Antebellum (2020) |
Antebellum ends up being a noxious tour of historic violence against Black folks in service of a story that has nothing novel to say about the obliterating function of whiteness and anti-Black racism. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Sep 14, 2020
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Relic (2020) |
When it comes to the dimensions of horror within the film, Relic is lacking. It instills dread from the very beginning, but the promise of this mood is never fully realized. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Jul 10, 2020
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Lemonade (2016) |
Ultimately, Lemonade cements Beyoncé as an essential voice -- not just an entertainer. - Thrillist
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| Posted Jun 29, 2020
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Miss Juneteenth (2020) |
Miss Juneteenth isn't trying to make grand proclamations about what it means to be Black in America today. The film is too smart for such grandstanding. Instead, it revels in watching Black folks just be. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Jun 19, 2020
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Losing Ground (1982) |
There are moments in Losing Ground that are so rich in mood, texture, and longing I can't catch my breath. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Jun 06, 2020
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The High Note (2020) |
The film is too afraid to look at thorny topics, like the class divide between Maggie and Grace, or the fight that Grace has to pitch every day to maintain her professional standing. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted May 29, 2020
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On the Record (2020) |
Despite its faults, On the Record is a necessary social document. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted May 29, 2020
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The Lovebirds (2020) |
This is a film designed to be watched while performing a menial task - folding the laundry or washing dishes. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted May 23, 2020
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The Photograph (2020) |
The Photograph is a sincerely beguiling film, even for its faults. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Feb 14, 2020
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Black Christmas (2019) |
Takal and Wolfe distinguish their film with an in-your-face fury aimed at contemporary campus culture's negligent approach to sexual assault and the ways in which women are forced to deal in its aftermath. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Dec 16, 2019
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Doctor Sleep (2019) |
Doctor Sleep could probably never fully stand on its own, and perhaps it's not meant to. It's a horror film with messy pleasures if you're able to meet it on its own level. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Nov 07, 2019
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Harriet (2019) |
Harriet never feels like a fully formed human being with all the doubts and desires that come with that distinction. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Nov 03, 2019
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Maleficent: Mistress of Evil (2019) |
A haphazard mess on nearly every level, only able to work in fits and starts. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Oct 16, 2019
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It: Chapter Two (2019) |
The various ghouls that besiege the grown-up Loser's Club, all visions of Pennywise, are silly, textureless creations. With them, suspense is in short supply. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Sep 05, 2019
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Don't Let Go (2019) |
Don't Let Go is a slog. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Aug 29, 2019
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Ready or Not (2019) |
At its best, the movie is a vicious, richly funny, and artfully brutal tale that places Weaving's performance as its gravitational center. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Aug 22, 2019
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The Kitchen (2019) |
I half-expected every scene to end with a freeze-frame high five or the women yelling "girl power." - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Aug 14, 2019
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Skin (2018) |
The failure of the film to fully grapple with how Babs's anger pulses through the lives of the women in his orbit undercuts the tremendous work that Bell accomplishes onscreen. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Jul 26, 2019
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Crawl (2019) |
Crawl is a great example of a simple story exceedingly well-told. It's a bloody adventure full of teeth-gnawing turns of fortune, mordant wit, vicious gator kills, and surprising tenderness - that clocks in at a blessedly fleet 87 minutes. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Jul 13, 2019
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Late Night (2019) |
There was space in this film for a rich weaving together of ambition, anxiety, and humor, but it never came to be. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Jun 07, 2019
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Ma (2019) |
The true horror of the film should be in its racial landscape, but Taylor doesn't paint a clear enough picture. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted May 31, 2019
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Nappily Ever After (2018) |
Unfortunately, instead of coming across as a warm throwback, Nappily Ever After is a romantic comedy saddled with a reductive understanding of black womanhood without enough cast chemistry or beauty to distract us. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Sep 24, 2018
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I, Tonya (2017) |
[Margot] Robbie's screen presence makes her seem, at first blush, more suited to play Kerrigan. But just a few minutes into I, Tonya, I found myself captivated by the anger and blunt physicality that define Robbie's performance. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Jan 08, 2018
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Marshall (2017) |
In ignoring the lived reality of colorism, Marshall creates a circumscribed version of blackness that's easy for white audiences to consume, lacks any sort of challenging narrative, and bypasses the more fascinating wrinkles in its characters' lives. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Oct 19, 2017
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Blade Runner 2049 (2017) |
Watching Ford and Gosling onscreen together suggests an evolution of masculinity within the films, one that exists along a continuum of noir leading men, from those failing to hide their tenderhearted nature to the solemn figures who make stoicism an art. - New York Magazine/Vulture
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| Posted Oct 11, 2017
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