2010s
Abbas Kiarostami’s Like Someone In Love creatively shows how the concept of love changes from person to person.
I Am Not Your Negro is a documentary based on the works of activist James Baldwin, and is overall a powerful examination of race in America.
xXx: Return of Xander Cage, the long-awaited sequel to 2002’s xXx is finally here, finally being the operative word. It’s been fifteen years, in fact, long enough for the first movie to have had endless cable TV airings, and for nearly everything about the current marketplace to change.
Prevenge is a film about revenge from the womb; it succeeds both as a satire of how pregnant women are seen and as a hilarious comedy.
The Empowerment Project is a feel-good documentary, made by women travelling the country and interviewing strong women in positions of power.
A Dog’s Purpose is a manipulative movie that, though occasionally cuddly and cute, serves little “purpose” overall.
Get the Girl is an action movie that is obsessed with the idea of an action movie, but not with actually being one.
The Daughter is a film about a family in Australia who suddenly uncover a buried secret; it is an effectively wrought, tension-filled drama.
Dark Night is based on the events of the Aurora theater shooting; with a detached aesthetic perspective, it is a compelling yet tragic film.
Lost in Florence is a breezy romantic comedy set in Florence, Italy, though don’t expect to get much of a deeper meaning than that from it.
Sleepless is a thriller that occasionally seems passable and avoids some clichés, but still doesn’t quite achieve the level it could have.
After Fire focuses on a female veteran named Valerie Sullivan, discussing how women in the military deal with trauma after coming home from war.
20th Century Women is a remarkable character study of women in the 1970s, but it falls just shy of greatness due to its lack of plot.
What happened to the art of film criticism, the kind of visceral, honest prose delivered from titans like Pauline Kael? We are witnessing its noisy death rattle and few seem to care. Moonlight, the newest film from director and co-writer Barry Jenkins, is a literal coming-of-age story, chronicling the journey of a young, gay black man, Chiron, into adulthood amidst the rougher parts of Miami.
Patriots Day is a memoir to the tragic events of the 2013 Boston Marathon Bombing, brought to screen both tactfully and honorably.