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Licorice Pizza (2021)::rating::5
L icorice Pizza is an eccentric, shapeless masterpiece.  It follows Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman), a precocious, entrepreneurial teenager, as he hustles his way through the San Fernando Valley, circa 1973.  As Gary bounces from one quirky, cockeyed ambition to the next, the plot bounces with him, like a balloon on a string.  The only through line…
March 10, 20220Comments
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Summer of Soul (2021)::rating::4.5
T he Harlem Cultural Festival was a massive musical happening, spread over six weeks of 1969's sweltering summer.  Tens of thousands concert-goers crammed into Harlem's Mount Morris Park to hear an all-star lineup of Black musicians, but they ended up with even more than that:  This marked a socio-political crossroads, when Black music took on…
March 7, 20220Comments
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The Batman (2022)::rating::3.5
M att Reeves' The Batman is a sweeping, three-hour elegy on just how miserable it is to be Batman.  For much of the film, Robert Pattinson's Dark Knight looks on the verge of a nervous breakdown:  Black eye makeup streaks his dour face; strands of unkempt hair drape downward in all directions, as if Bruce Wayne just…
March 4, 20220Comments
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Encanto (2021)::rating::4.5
A s a parent to a toddler, I can now assess the landscape of children's movies with a much higher degree of confidence.  My verdict:  From a story standpoint, most animated fare is designed to be disposable at best, and shamelessly lazy at worst.  The savvier filmmakers will distract you with millions of colors over…
February 24, 20220Comments
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Superbad (2007)::rating::4
T een movies centered around graduation are always bittersweet affairs.  Look beneath the flow of booze and morally flimsy sexcapades, and you'll find an undercurrent of yearning, regret, and deep anxiety.  There's a strange proto-nostalgia, as pseudo-adults desperately try and cup the sand as it slinks down the hourglass.  Few films have ever bottled that…
February 18, 20220Comments
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West Side Story (2021)::rating::4.5
A s a lifelong Spielberg aficionado, I'm honestly a little shocked it's taken him this long to tackle a musical.  His movies have always relied on elaborate, ambitious shots that are both sweepingly cinematic and mathematically precise expressions of visual lyricism.  And that's to say nothing of John Williams' booming motifs bursting from the speakers.…
February 17, 20220Comments

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