|
20/100
|
Creed III
(2023)
|
Taylor Baker
|
With a rushed timeline and no real character growth, “Creed III” does nothing to differentiate itself as an entry in the broader series of both Rocky and Creed’s stories or in the boxing film subgenre.
Posted Mar 03, 2023
|
|
75/100
|
The Eight Mountains
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
“The Eight Mountains is a slow-churning naturalist tale about a city boy and mountain boy defining intimacy, friendship, and an unconditional bond.
Posted Mar 03, 2023
|
|
86/100
|
Magic Mike's Last Dance
(2023)
|
Taylor Baker
|
A classically informed reference laden musical set in a theater with a battalion of dancers is certainly not how most of us predicted the Magic Mike series of films to end, and that’s precisely what makes Soderbergh so enigmatic and engaging.
Posted Mar 03, 2023
|
|
50/100
|
L'immensità
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
L’immensità doesn’t do anything exceptionally well as a film itself, it’s through Cruz’s performance of Clara and the smaller choices and nuances of her performance that adds to what is an otherwise straightforward film.
Posted Jan 25, 2023
|
|
70/100
|
When It Melts
(2023)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Few films can straddle the intimacy of characterization so unflinchingly, and even fewer directors can do so. Let alone in a debut. When It Melts is a self assured and self contained body blow that unfolds slowly
Posted Jan 25, 2023
|
|
20/100
|
Plane
(2023)
|
Taylor Baker
|
The very few times Plane leans into being an action film–like the sledgehammer sequence–it is extremely fun, the reason it’s agonizing to watch is the awful dialogue, paper-thin characters, and intelligence-insulting cutaways
Posted Jan 13, 2023
|
|
50/100
|
The Pale Blue Eye
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
With a commanding performance by Bale, exquisite exterior cinematography wrought from natural lighting by Masanobu Takayanagi, and a committed turn by Melling as Poe, it’s unfortunate that The Pale Blue Eye is a meandering disappointment.
Posted Dec 30, 2022
|
|
82/100
|
Tori and Lokita
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne are known for their humanistic narratives and unflinching portraits of life under an unspecific but apparent line of wealth and happiness. In Tori and Lokita they once again show rather than tell
Posted Dec 30, 2022
|
|
90/100
|
Babylon
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
It’s an attentive interpretation of the history of the period, refined and emboldened by the deeply personal human reasons that people are drawn both to the cinema and to the environs of cinema-making.
Posted Dec 25, 2022
|
|
55/100
|
Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Often at these levels of extrapolation and narcissism films fall apart, so it’s a testament to Iñárritu and his team that “BARDO” never feels less than well made, even if it is insufferable most of the time.
Posted Dec 16, 2022
|
|
84/100
|
White Noise
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
White Noise is a genre-shifting idiosyncratic riff on something that’s hung over all our heads and now like the characters in the movie we have to either live with it, die, or try to forget about it.
Posted Dec 16, 2022
|
|
60/100
|
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
With the help of writer Patrick McHale, Guillermo del Toro has gently spun the beloved classic tale of a wooden boy and his quest for humanity to revolve around themes and ideas that del Toro has long been obsessed with.
Posted Dec 16, 2022
|
|
70/100
|
Avatar: The Way of Water
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
The Way of Water is an all-ages theme park ride with no height restriction. A film that’s simultaneously pushed and redefined high frame rate and 3D filmmaking.
Posted Dec 16, 2022
|
|
60/100
|
The Survivor
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
[The Survivor is] a clunky heartfelt period piece that makes up for its wonkiness with a constant thread of forward momentum, respect for the past, and an underlying sense of gratitude.
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
70/100
|
Italian Studies
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
An impulsive saturnine film that follows Vanessa Kirby as she billows around New York City for an unclear amount of time in an amnesiac fugue state. The non-linear timeline of the film accentuates the
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
78/100
|
JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Pieces of evidence like this ... and covered up eyewitness testimony leave one frustrated, but thankful to Stone for assembling an easily digestible, high quality, dummy-proof piece of journalism that ultimately provides more questions than answers.
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
70/100
|
Songs My Brothers Taught Me
(2015)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Songs My Brothers Taught Me is visually composed primarily of many of the so called Zhao flourishes or stylings, with particularly harrowing moments defining character experience but not the narrative thrust.
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
50/100
|
Eternals
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
The narrative is simultaneously too large and too small. With personal relationships defining the narrative of a cosmos spanning opera ... As far as MCU goes though this isn't a terrible direction for them to explore.
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
90/100
|
Memoria
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Memoria is both romantic and hallucinatory, sumptuously presented and emotionally engaging piece of magical realism that explores and expands the limitations of human experience.
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
85/100
|
DASHCAM
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Dashcam revels in its formal presentation which both Savage and Hardy seem to not only understand but have a talent for delivering through. Conjoining genre trope, handheld cinematography, and unyielding pacing into a fun and
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
45/100
|
Armageddon Time
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Though it is focused on abuse, violence, and unfair treatment it rarely depicts or contains anything substantial and comprehensive, only when the film wanders in and out of conversations about the Holocaust with
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
15/100
|
The Son
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Florian Zeller’s The Son is a hollow representation of tropes and conventions that have been around longer than the printing press. Overreliant on the incorrect assumption that
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
65/100
|
There There
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
There There sees Bujalski in a new situation, as an off-site director. Relying on his strong editing to create the impression that you’re between the two people in the intimate conversations he’s conjured.
Posted Nov 18, 2022
|
|
50/100
|
Women Talking
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
It’s unfortunate that something teetering so close to relevance and thoughtfulness is masked by logical foibles making one unable to take it too seriously.
Posted Oct 19, 2022
|
|
35/100
|
Raquel 1:1
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Though technical issues do permeate the film, it’s clear that Bastos is a proficient visual storyteller. One who’ll hopefully move away from primarily relying on character ambiguity and continue to hone her voice.
Posted Oct 12, 2022
|
|
50/100
|
Amsterdam
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
For all its tepidness Amsterdam does grasp at bigger ideas .... That it feels like a piecemeal film made up of dozens of other films talking points and premises is precisely what cements its unremarkability, what a pity.
Posted Oct 08, 2022
|
|
20/100
|
Catherine Called Birdy
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
In the end Catherine Called Birdy comes off as little more than a modern-day studio job from a filmmaker trying to reestablish herself half a decade removed from delivering one of the most iconic television series in the last ten years.
Posted Sep 27, 2022
|
|
96/100
|
Blonde
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
De Armas is all of us for a little bit, our scorn, our heartache, our belief, our delusion, our dreams, and our movie star.
Posted Sep 16, 2022
|
|
25/100
|
See How They Run
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Tom George showed a commendable level of control in his debut, but Chappell’s screenplay is so disheveled that no amount of sincerity from Ronan or lovable schmuck shtick from Rockwell can level it out.
Posted Sep 16, 2022
|
|
68/100
|
Medieval
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
when men are being drowned, eviscerated, hung, impaled, burnt and smashed Medieval is blunt force fun.
Posted Sep 11, 2022
|
|
55/100
|
McEnroe
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
McEnroe instead plays like a television special recapping one of the greatest tennis pros of the 80s but missing the artistry and boldness that McEnroe himself demonstrated.
Posted Sep 07, 2022
|
|
75/100
|
Three Thousand Years of Longing
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Three Thousand Years of Longing is about exactly what it says it is...and Miller adeptly navigates the eccentricities of the picture’s rules with the brash and controlled straightforwardness that only an accomplished director can provide.
Posted Sep 07, 2022
|
|
55/100
|
Beast
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Beast is a strong entry in the slew of late summer action films in recent years. With more prowess than the likes of Skyscraper, Rampage, The Dark Tower, and their ilk. Though it languishes
Posted Sep 07, 2022
|
|
72/100
|
Next Sohee
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Through riveting specificity July Jung’s Next Sohee has created a powerful criticism of South Korean institutional failings. Making it one of the best sophomore films of the year, and the indelible result of a bonafide filmmaker.
Posted Aug 07, 2022
|
|
25/100
|
Vengeance
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Vengeance reads as little more than a narcissist throwing his screenplay through the industry meat grinder to put something on the big screen courtesy of the relationships he’s fostered over the last two decades.
Posted Jul 30, 2022
|
|
80/100
|
Eyes Wide Shut
(1999)
|
Taylor Baker
|
A film detailing how unsexual sex is and how sexy almost having sex is.
Posted Jul 24, 2022
|
|
74/100
|
Top Gun: Maverick
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
One of the rare films where every discussion leaving the theater is about how much fun you just had, instead of an analysis of its quotients.
Posted Jul 24, 2022
|
|
40/100
|
The Black Phone
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
in cinema when an entire plot hinges on a magical doodad and some psychic abilities the complete and total avoidance of their interrogation discombobulates the world and superimposes a sense of falseness to its entirety.
Posted Jul 24, 2022
|
|
85/100
|
Marcel the Shell with Shoes On
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Sincerity and craftsmanship of this form are uncommon, and Marcel will undoubtedly become a cult classic character and gem in A24’s crown for decades to come.
Posted Jul 24, 2022
|
|
40/100
|
The Forgiven
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
It’s the rare moral tale where you’re the same as when you began. Which is perhaps one of the hallmarks of a bad film, when you’ve begun to forget it as soon as it ends.
Posted Jul 24, 2022
|
|
40/100
|
Where the Crawdads Sing
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
[Daisy Edgar-Jones] fails to steal scenes she’s central to though she does provide a consistent strength as a central roleplayer ... this project would likely turn out similar no matter who’d helmed it.
Posted Jul 24, 2022
|
|
45/100
|
Nope
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
In a world of regurgitated franchise reboots Nope certainly stands above the status quo, but when you’re this heavily invested in retooling and commentating on what came before it’s hard to see Nope as anything more than an echo.
Posted Jul 24, 2022
|
|
58/100
|
The Integrity of Joseph Chambers
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
This control and focus from the performer, director, and Oscar Ignacio Jiménez the cinematographer work to conjure a sense of comfort for the viewer as we witness tightly controlled images. Equal respect and attention should be paid to the sound design
Posted Jun 24, 2022
|
|
70/100
|
Elvis
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Luhrmann eschews the stripped-down plodding and formulaic approach that many historical biopics follow and focuses instead on what he does best, his ability to excite and entice. With frenetic and pulsating almost religious moments, he utilizes pop-like
Posted Jun 23, 2022
|
|
60/100
|
Good Luck to You, Leo Grande
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Sophie Hyde’s well-lit modern interiors look crisp enough to be engaging without overwhelming the foreground where we’re frequently viewing our half-clothed characters sharing their innermost secrets, though not their names.
Posted Jun 23, 2022
|
|
80/100
|
Crimes of the Future
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Self-critical, satirical, imbalanced, and gory, Cronenberg again uses Mortensen’s body as the primary vehicle for a film. Building his world out from and around the removal of newly grown and newly discovered organs that grow inside of Mortensen’s Saul
Posted Jun 23, 2022
|
|
20/100
|
Gone in the Night
(2022)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Gone in the Night is an ugly derivative amalgamation of boring directorial choices with a cast of established names who have nothing to do. The screenplay is a one-note riff on the basic foundation of Eli Horowitz’s previous notable creation the podcast
Posted Jun 23, 2022
|
|
60/100
|
Voice of Silence
(2020)
|
Taylor Baker
|
These twists on what are otherwise dark circumstances keep Voice of Silence balanced on the edge of the genres it’s playing in and allow moments like hands rising from the ground, death from a
Posted May 15, 2022
|
|
76/100
|
The Good Boss
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Fernando León de Aranoa’s The Good Boss pairs star power against workers rights, nepotism against sex, and desire against human rights, it’s undoubtedly the best satire I’ve seen this year and a great display of Spanish cinema.
Posted May 15, 2022
|
|
90/100
|
Vortex
(2021)
|
Taylor Baker
|
Vortex robs itself of a simple formal examination by its very spirit of duality, keeping you strained between two side by side frames, where despite your best efforts you’ll find yourself focusing on Lui or Elle and sometimes Stéphane and in those
Posted May 15, 2022
|
