Stephen Rebello
Tomatometer-approved critic
Movies reviews only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
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Swimming Pool (2003) |
Swimming Pool is a perfectly good summer movie -- but here's hoping for something even bolder and more decisive from Ozon next time. - The Advocate
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| Posted May 27, 2022
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Bear Cub (2004) |
Whenever anything truly smart or sexy intervenes... it feels like an interruption in the bland predictability of something on NBC Thursday nights. - The Advocate
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| Posted May 27, 2022
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Yes Nurse! No Nurse! (2002) |
An amiable, gumdrop- colored, frenetically campy -- if ultimately exhausting -- musical fantasy. - The Advocate
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| Posted May 27, 2022
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Callas Forever (2002) |
Callas deserves, at the very least, a film the equal of Amadeus. This isn't it. - The Advocate
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| Posted May 27, 2022
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Proteus (2003) |
Such rich material needn't have been played as flatly, unemotionally, and clumsily as a historical pageant. We never feel any heat or passion, much less chemistry, between Brown and Sandilands as the lovers. - The Advocate
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| Posted May 04, 2022
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Straight-Jacket (2004) |
Straight-Jacket's themes -- the price of staying in the closet, the pain of being an unwitting beard, the McCarthy witch hunts that destroyed lives -- are way too rich to merely get popped like champagne bubbles in a campy comedy. - The Advocate
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| Posted Apr 20, 2022
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The Lighthouse (2019) |
The suspense and supernatural elements-especially as filmed in film-noir, 35-millimeter black-and-white-are as palpable as they are astonishing. A brilliant achievement. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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Parasite (2019) |
Ingeniously written and directed, plus faultlessly acted, this is one of the great movie experiences of this or any year. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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Marriage Story (2019) |
It's wise and emotionally battering, but it never forgets to be crazily funny and doesn't pander. Beautiful, heartbreaking stuff. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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The Irishman (2019) |
This is a magnificently wise, majestic, top-shelf work about the relentless passage of time and the fate awaiting us all, connected or not. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019) |
Star Wars ends with a whimper, not the royal farewell the franchise deserved. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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Joker (2019) |
The whole damn thing is directed with such boldness and vision that Todd Phillips (yeah, the Hangover guy) should never look back again. A big-screen must see. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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The Farewell (2019) |
This is a humane, wise treasure of a movie. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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1917 (2019) |
Mendes and Co. make it all seem fresh and vital again. This is a a movie filled with gorgeous and grotesque imagery... - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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Knives Out (2019) |
A great time at the movies and just begging for a sequel. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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Jojo Rabbit (2019) |
The cauldron-a pinch of Mel Brooks here, a bit of Ernst Lubitsch's To Be or Not to Be there-bubbles over with terrific performances. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 11, 2020
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Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (2020) |
'Birds of Prey' is a fast and irreverent spit in the eye to the pomposity of the overblown superhero genre. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 07, 2020
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Once Upon a Time... In Hollywood (2019) |
The movie is getting almost universally praised as a second coming of summer-movie fun. To this viewer, it just seemed like a letdown. Tarantino is better than this. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 29, 2019
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Transit (2018) |
Directing with deadly and terrifying brilliance worthy of Alfred Hitchcock, Christian Petzold has adapted from Anna Segher's 1944 novel of the same name and created a paranoid Kafka-like masterwork. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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High Life (2018) |
It's a chilly, somber, despairing thing, this one, but put me in the cheering section. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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Long Day's Journey Into Night (2018) |
The movie is not just a meditation on the old song lyric, How can we hang on to a dream? but also Why should we want to? Gorgeous, languid and haunting moviemaking. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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High Flying Bird (2019) |
It's all about the exploitation of race and class, and it's terrific, truth-telling entertainment. One of Soderbergh's best, ever. And that's saying something. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) |
Tom Holland helps the joyful film stand out amid the superhero glut. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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Diane (2018) |
There's not a better movie in theaters than this sometimes-surreal, surprising, marvelously wise and humane one directed by Kent Jones. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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Ash Is Purest White (2018) |
Gorgeous to look at and spectacularly well-acted. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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Booksmart (2019) |
For anyone who leaned too hard into academic success in high school at the expense of carousing, partying, being cool and rocking out, the hilarious, joyously filthy Booksmart cuts deep. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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Amazing Grace (2018) |
Soul-stirring and absolutely unmissable. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jul 08, 2019
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Rocketman (2019) |
The movie soars with its honest portrayal of Sir Elton, anchored by a show-stopping, where-did-that-come-from lead performance from Egerto. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jun 04, 2019
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The Beach Bum (2019) |
The movie has its pleasures, aside from the cinematography and some of McConaughey's fearlessly all-in performance. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Apr 05, 2019
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Us (2019) |
How fantastic is it, in our predigested, everything-dumbed-down era, to be able to leave the theater baffled, debating interpretations and occasionally throwing nervous glances over our shoulders. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Mar 26, 2019
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Triple Frontier (2019) |
The well-made but frustrating Triple Frontier, which takes its title from the intersection of the borders of Brazil, Peru and Colombia, has almost everything going for it but depth, focus and gravitas. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Mar 15, 2019
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Alita: Battle Angel (2019) |
What's the point of blowing somewhere around $200 million on boldly innovative sound and vision when it is built upon a script that just thuds along? - Playboy Online
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| Posted Mar 08, 2019
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Fighting With My Family (2019) |
Thanks to a smart script, charming performances and captivating story, the film is a delight - Playboy Online
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| Posted Mar 08, 2019
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Captain Marvel (2019) |
Captain Marvel isn't a pain to sit through...but such a venerable character long overdue on the big screen, the talents involved in putting her there and Marvel's rabidly faithful international audience deserved much better. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Mar 08, 2019
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Cold Pursuit (2019) |
The darkly comedic thrills keep coming in a film that is more fun than it needs to be. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Feb 08, 2019
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Serenity (2019) |
Everyone in front of and behind the camera has done such good work in the past that maybe we should consider Serenity a bold but wacky misstep. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Jan 26, 2019
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Won't You Be My Neighbor? (2018) |
Morgan Neville has made an emotional, humanistic, fair-and-balanced documentary. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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Sorry to Bother You (2018) |
Wildly visually explosive and supremely confident... - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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Shoplifters (2018) |
It's a new landmark in humanist cinema. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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Roma (2018) |
Director Alfonso Cuaron has made a full-on masterpiece with this heartbreaking, semi-autobiographical knockout. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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Leave No Trace (2018) |
America isn't broken-it's shattered. Every frame, every moment, every performance in director Debra Granik's quietly devastating and haunting survival saga tells us so. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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The Rider (2017) |
The S.D. cowboy and broncobuster, no longer able to do the job that gave his life shape and purpose, gets saved by what he learns from his devotion to the beauty, stillness, mystery and wildness of horses. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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First Reformed (2017) |
Screenwriter-director Paul Schrader returns to greatness with this lacerating, austere portrait of a crisis of faith. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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Cold War (2018) |
This is a masterful, romantic movie filled with stunning imagery, gorgeous use of folk music and jazz and you won't find a false moment in the entire running time. Probably a classic-to-be, certainly first-class moviemaking. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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The Favourite (2018) |
Uproarious, down-and-dirty, obscene and completely on its own weird and wicked wavelength... - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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Bumblebee (2018) |
We're abuzz about the franchise having transformed into a leaner, character-driven and altogether delightful one... - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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Vice (2018) |
Christian Bale is something else again. A deeply introspective, often unknowable chameleon of an actor, he creates a scarily accurate portrait of a canny, callous beast. He is the reason to see what is, in the end, a deadpan, savage tragedy of errors. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 21, 2018
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The Mule (2018) |
Clint Eastwood is as compelling as ever, and the movie offers ample helpings of heart and levity. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 14, 2018
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Vox Lux (2018) |
Vox Lux doesn't bother to answer any of the questions, just tosses them at us like Molotov cocktails. No matter. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Dec 08, 2018
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Widows (2018) |
Viola Davis thrills in this taut ride that doesn't stick to genre convention. - Playboy Online
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| Posted Nov 30, 2018
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