Category Archives: New In Theaters

Reviews of what’s out now

New In Theaters

Say Hello to My Little Friend

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Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu

by Hope Madden

Star Wars has been around for nearly a half century. We’ve seen films, sequels, prequels, TV series, books, animation, Legos, and one epically weird Christmas special. But we haven’t seen a feature film since 2019, and we’ve never seen a feature film based on a TV show. Until now, with Jon Favreau’s Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu.

Much is still the same. Bad guys still have terrible aim, faulty weapons, and super cool monsters. Good guys have decent aim, reliable weapons but unreliable transportation, and cute and friendly beasties.

The film picks up where Season 3 left off as a sort of replacement for Season 4. And that’s kind of how it feels—not like an epic adventure, more like an extended episode. The X Files movie of the Star Wars franchise.

Mando (Pedro Pascal) and Grogu agree to save Rotta the Hutt (voiced by Jeremy Allen White) from a gladiator-style imprisonment in return for information from his aunt and uncle, “The Twins.”

Naturally, it involves star fights, surprise monster battles, a barroom brawl, and dirty dealings. But no matter the odds, the Mandalorian is noble and Grogu is cute. The CGI, though? Sketchy.

Mando’s co-pilot Zeb Orrelios (Steve Blum) looks bad, especially his face. There is one gorgeously rendered dragon snake thing, but otherwise, most of the monsters are under articulated. The action, whether hand-to-hand or in the air, feels uninspired.

There is a long break in the live-action action that’s pretty great. First, we travel with Grogu and the Anzellans—gripey little mechanics who make baby Yoda look big. And later, Grogu has an episode all his own. Both sequences let the film breathe and let the audience spend some quality time with the character we probably came for.

Otherwise, the story is capably written and told. The score is adequate and the cinematography is OK. There are questions. Why does actor Jonny Coyne go by his actual name in this movie? And why is it so sexy to hear Sigourney Weaver (as Colonel Ward) say: “Going in weapons hot”?

But narratively, no. They cover everything. And it’s fine. It’s sometimes really fun, often super cute, frequently amusing, and easily the most forgettable film in the whole Star Wars galaxy.

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A Taste Sensation

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Saccharine

by Hope Madden

Body image, binge behavior, shame, and desire fuel Natalie Erika James’s (Relic) third feature, Saccharine. From its fascinating opening sequence, you’ll be glad if you don’t buy popcorn.

That opening, scored with sensual moaning, cuts between extreme close ups of various body parts of a lithe woman on an elliptical, and extreme close ups of binge eating, but in reverse. As if the eater is removing those sloppy snacks rather than inhaling them.

Hana (Midori Francis) is the eater. She’s also the person eyeing the woman on the elliptical, Alanya (Madeleine Madden), a trainer who invites Hana to join her 12-week diet and exercise program. Profoundly self-conscious but smitten, Hana agrees.

Then she runs into old high school classmate Melissa (Annie Shapero), unrecognizable thanks to weight loss brought about by a technically illegal supplement called grey. What Melissa doesn’t know but med student Hana figures out is that the supplement is human ash.

Hana takes it anyway, loses weight, but the side effects are hardly what she bargained for. In the Ozempic era, the idea that someone might swallow pills of human ash to lose weight without regard to consequences feels right.

There’s a fetishistic quality to many of the film’s sequences. These become the sticky residue holding together a ghost story, a tale of generational and cultural identity crisis, and some serious body horror. That’s an awful lot for James to pack into her 112-minute run time. Though she doesn’t resolve everything, it’s the surprises and loose ends that are most intriguing.

Francis impresses as the fractured main character, driven and yet unable to control her binging, however hard she tries. James expertly uses the sympathetic, believable central figure to wind viewers through startling sensual indulgences punctuated by family drama.

It would feel overpacked were it not for Francis’s grounded, compelling turn, supported nicely by the film’s small ensemble (Madden, Danielle Macdonald, Showko Showfukutel). Just when it looks like the family drama horror trope has won out, James surprises again, and the film leaves you stunned and wondering.

Objectification, internalized beautify standards, and the fetishistic nature of consumption drive Hana’s behavior and James’s film. Art over the post credits amplifies an aesthetic that James might have used to better effect throughout the movie. Still, Saccharine delivers something intimate and disturbing—too unsettling to be solved with Pepto Bismol.

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On a Mission from God

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Is God Is

by Hope Madden

Writer/director Aleshea Harris may be pulling from folklore and road movies, revenge flicks and historical dramas, noir and arthouse, exploitation and even horror. But the result of those inspirations is one of the most boldly original films of 2025.

Is God Is follows twins Racine (Kara Young) and Anaia (Mallori Johnson) on a “mission from God.” It’s a funny line in a film about two misfits behind the wheel of a dubious vehicle, but the twins’ holy work has nothing to do with blues music. Their God is the one who created them, their mother (Vivica A. Fox), a woman they’d believed dead. She is not dead yet, but death is coming for her, and she has one request of her daughters. They need to kill their father (Sterling K. Brown).

Too often road trip films offer little more than a thinly connected series of hijinks and antics. Harris takes advantage of that sensibility, introducing us to various oddballs and dropping us into wild situations. The filmmaker shows great affection for so many types of movies, and the way she bends these tropes and styles to the will of this narrative is fresh, unpredictable, and fascinating.

Still, there is an inevitability to the story, and to the character arcs, that haunts the twins’ destiny. However wild, however bloody, however zany, there is a broken and beating heart at the center of the story.

Violence and destiny, family trauma, classism and misogyny, and rage—Is God Is finds poetry and honesty and blood in all of it.

Young and Johnson are a remarkable yin and yang, and the ensemble impresses at every turn. Brown is characteristically undeniable, an emotional shapeshifter, both seductive and terrifying. Janelle Monáe and Erika Alexander also impress in smaller roles.

But the star of Is God Is has to be the storyteller herself. Harris’s command of the audience and of cinema deliver the summer’s most daring and satisfying adventure.

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Women Out of Love

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Two Women

by Matt Weiner

“Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.” It’s a fitting aphorism for the new Two Women, Chloé Robichaud’s remake of the original 1970 film that probes how much has really changed for women since the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 70s.

Florence (Karine Gonthier-Hyndman) and Violette (Laurence Leboeuf) have a lot in common. The two women live next to each other in a large Montreal apartment complex, share feelings of sexual frustration and a lack of desire with their current partners, and have to deal with mental health issues around new motherhood (for Violette) and depression (for Florence).

The two women bond with one another over their shared frustrations, a bond that deepens quickly when they both seek out casual affairs from relative strangers in the apartment complex. This breezy update, written by Catherine Léger, puts a modern spin on the original, with app-based encounters helping to supercharge the litany of cable guys, repairmen and delivery people who make up the anonymous casual sex for the women.

And these men (plus the occasional woman) are truly anonymous—they are credited by occupation only. This leads to some comic relief as the neighbors start to sense something going on with the revolving door of service workers going in and out of the women’s apartments. But it also adds a serious note to their sexual adventuring.

Florence and Violette reclaim these pornified archetypes for their own journeys of self-discovery, complete with intentionally awkward and turgid come-ons as the women make their desires known to the bemused workers. It helps that Gonthier-Hyndman and Leboeuf excel at giving the risqué romps emotional heft. We see both of their characters go from halting, even fumbling encounters to a fully realized confidence by the end of the film.

While the leading women are fantastic, the film is on shakier ground when it pulls back to ascribe some broader societal points about their sexual politics. Monogamy and mental health both factor into where the story winds up going, but Robichaud’s otherwise light comic touch winds up making these threads feel underbaked while also not given enough weight.

There’s a frank sweetness to the film that, along with the grounded performances, keeps the philosophical detours from ever derailing the movie’s charm, however. This is in no small part thanks to fully inhabited performances from the women’s partners, the tragicomic David (an excellent Mani Soleymanlou) and churlish Benoit (Félix Moati). We may have gone through enough waves of social change in the last 50 years to know that “having it all” is its own unrealistic myth for anyone in today’s world. But Two Women shows that, six decades on, that shouldn’t stop you from asking what you actually desire in your life, whether that’s fixing the cable or “fixing the cable.”

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Admirably Relentless

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Steal This Story, Please!

by Rachel Willis

Documentarians Carl Dean and Tia Lessin open their riveting documentary, Steal This Story, Please! with P. Wells Griffith III running from Amy Goodman’s pointed questions about the Trump administration’s position on climate change. She is dogged and unforgiving in her pursuit of Griffith as he flees.

Amy Goodman is the storied host of Democracy Now! and it’s wonderful to see focus turned to her intrepid 30-year career.

For those unfamiliar with Goodman or Democracy Now!, a quick series of on-screen text brings the viewer up-to-speed on why Goodman and her show are so unique in the current media landscape.

Beginning with Goodman’s desire to work for the Phil Donahue show, Steal This Story, Please! recounts Goodman’s work in independent journalism. The film artfully moves from the professional to the personal, past and present, as it dives deep into Goodman’s approach to reporting.

The film highlights how important independent news reporting is, especially as governments not only demonize the free press, but allow conglomerates to buy up media outlets en masse. Goodman’s work at the forefront of independent journalism was as important when she started as it is now.

Covering the myriad stories Goodman has done shows how relevant and important her work has been in tackling injustice around the world. While some of her reports maybe have faded from collective memory, this documentary serves as a reminder of how much journalism influences the public to demand change.

Dogged reporting moves the needle. Good journalism strengthens and saves democracies. We need journalists like Amy Goodman now more than ever if we’re going to strengthen and support not only American democracy, but democracy worldwide. Let’s hope Goodman’s work, along with this documentary, will inspire a new generation of independent, relentless journalists.

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Crushed

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Obsession

by Hope Madden & George Wolf

Obsession is a film about consent.

Filmmaker Curry Barker made waves in 2024 with his free YouTube feature Milk & Serial, which you should watch if you have not. Made on a shoestring, the spare chiller is immensely impressive. His second feature shows what he can do with just a little bit more budget.

Barker writes a fresh and relevant take on the “deadly wish” fable. Sad boy Bear (Michael Johnston) can’t bring himself to confess his feelings for co-worker Nikki (Inde Navarrette). He’s so desperate after one cringy missed chance that he breaks open a One Wish Willow he’d purchased as a joke and—without reading any of the warnings printed all over the box—wishes that she would love him more than anyone else on earth.

And she does.

The themes Barker mines are incredibly of-the-moment. Bear wants what he wants, but he wants it to be true. It isn’t, but that’s not good enough. Make it be true. But you can’t make something be true if it isn’t true, no matter how sad the boy is who wants it. Male entitlement masquerading as loneliness leads to violently self-centered behavior. Barker’s story, however jump-scary or genre friendly it becomes, never forgets this central, relevant concept.

Navarrette is especially impressive, able to carve out a recognizable, realistic character quickly so you notice the changes. Johnston, also excellent, naturally unveils the selfish center of the “nice guy.”

Solid support work from Cooper Tomlinson and Megan Lawless root the fantasy in believable reality. The performances and dialog feel very authentic for this generation, and Barker settles us in to this familiar premise before making his pivot at just the right moment.

The third act not only ups the horror quotient, it draws Bear’s bargain with the sinister edges it deserves and begins a march toward a violent and satisfying payoff.

Barker has a bigger, more expansive canvas here, but his storytelling instincts remain impressively hungry. The film is atmospheric but never overstuffed, with a small group of well defined central characters delivering a clear, concise message of prices to be paid.

Reality can carry a sobering bias. Obsession is bloody reminder that no amount of spin can change the dangers that come from making desperate, narcissistic bargains with the future.

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To Sheep With Anger

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The Sheep Detectives

by George Wolf

I was expecting to enjoy The Sheep Detectives. And I did, but for reasons I hadn’t prepared for.

What seemed like a silly showcase for sleuthing sheep in a droll knockoff of the whodunnit formula also turns out to be warm, human and downright touching.

Shepherd George Hardy (Hugh Jackman) tends his flock with loving care in the quaint English village of Denbrook. He also reads the animals mystery stories in the evening. So when George turns up dead and the bumbling Officer Derry (Nicholas Braun) is ready to rule “heart attack,” woolly suspicions erupt.

This was murder! And the sheep are going follow the lead of their “night stories” to guide these dimwitted humans toward the evidence that will root out the guilty party.

Director Kyle Balda (Minions, Despicable Me 3) and writer Craig Mazin adapt Leonie Swann’s novel “Three Bags Full” with tenderness, wit, and a big assist from pristine production design and the CGI department’s wonderfully rendered talking animals.

Mazin’s resume runs the gamut from the Chernobyl series to The Hangover franchise, so the warm fuzzies here are another welcome surprise. The humor is more amusing than LOL, but the stellar cast of bodies (including Emma Thompson, Hong Chau, and Molly Gordon) and voices (Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Sir Patrick Stewart, Regina Hall and Bryan Cranston) work together in landing every opportunity for mirth, mystery and meaning.

The film’s foray into darker themes earns the PG-rating, but there is fertile ground here for all-ages family bonding over lessons on kindness, belonging, and loss. You might come for the funny talking sheep, but you can expect to be thoroughly delighted by the mix of Knives Out and Charlotte’s Web that was hiding in plain sight.

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Toasty!

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Mortal Kombat II

by Hope Madden

I went into 2021’s Mortal Kombat with the lowest possible expectations. Maybe that’s why I liked it so much. It was dumb. So dumb! But director Simon McQuoid made excellent use of that R rating, there were some real laughs thanks to one character, and more than enough goretastic violence to make up for a lot.  

We lost Hiroyuki Sanada in the first installment, though, which left the franchise with no actors. Who can act, I mean. So, McQuoid, returning for Mortal Kombat II, relies on the ever-reliable Karl Urban to punch things up.

Urban is Johnny F. Cage, washed up 90s action hero (tipped hair and all!). And he’s not interested when the elder gods come calling. Tournament to the death? Dude, he’s got stunt guys for that!

There’s also a necromancer, which means more returning cast than you might expect. This is sometimes a really good thing.

And there’s not that much plot to slog through between the lightning bolts and blood spatter. What’s there involves a subjugated princess (Adeline Rudolph), a very big dude bent on inter-realm domination (Martyn Ford), a Thunder God who oversees warriors of the Earthrealm (Tadanobu Asano), said warriors (Jessica McNamee, Mehcad Brooks, Ludi Lin, Lewis Tan), a washed-up action hero, an amulet, very toothy people, and a bunch of battles to the death.

Less time is spent this go-round on the super meaningful weighty drama of each back story, leaving more time for bloody fisticuffs and what not. These fight sequences lack a lot of the zest for violence and fatalities of McQuoid’s first film, but the Cage foolishness helps to pull the film back from its several brinks of tediousness.

It’s a full 2-hour runtime, just like last time, which is still wildly unnecessary. But casting the fool as the hero helps engagement, especially when the necromancer (Reggie Herriman) starts bringing back the fun guys.

Is Mortal Kombat II as dumb as the first? Almost. Is it as fun? Not quite. But as a bloody, lightningy time waster, it’s A-OK. B-OK. It’s B-OK.

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Fashion Comeback

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The Devil Wears Prada 2

by Hope Madden

It has been 20 years since Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) learned how to dress. And now, after two decades of award-winning investigative work, she’s back at Runway Magazine thanks to the death of journalism.

What makes her think print magazines aren’t also mortally wounded?

The Devil Wears Prada 2 is essentially a mash note to all things analog. Can Andy and the gang save this fashion icon through sheer determination, journalistic integrity and fashion sense?

Hathaway’s co-stars return: Emily Blunt as the irascible Emily, Stanley Tucci as the warm yet caustic Nigel, and Meryl Streep as the formidable Miranda Priestly. Also returning: impeccable costuming, gorgeous locations and glamour. And quips, acerbic remarks, and fish-out-of-water humor. Amanda Priestly flying coach?! Bon dieu!

Yes, Miranda’s lost a bit of her bite. She’s even hanging up her own coat now, thanks to the ever-present HR checklist (a fairly funny gag during staff meetings). No, the real villain in TDWP2 is the soulless maw of progress, personified by the CEO’s son (B.J. Novak) and Emily’s billionaire boyfriend (Justin Theroux). And fast fashion.

While Blunt, Tucci and Streep slip easily back into the old skin, it’s tough to believe Hathaway’s Andy, after years of global investigative journalism, hasn’t developed a thicker skin. Indeed, Andy’s well-intentioned naivete causes as many problems this go-round as it did in 2006.

But that’s the point, right? Update context to the degree necessary but play the hits. Returning director David Frankel and screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna understand the assignment.

The stakes never feel as high as they should, the resolution is a telegraphed fantasy, and it’s less fun seeing Miranda Priestly brought down a peg than you’d expect. But Streep looks amazing, and she gives Miranda’s third act the bittersweet vulnerability it deserves. She has too few scenes with Tucci if only because the two are so effortlessly perfect onscreen together. Still, his eye-rolling snarky nurturing is as charming as ever.

Blunt is again the butt of the joke and, again, she shoulders the comedic weight with aplomb.

The Devil Wears Prada 2 ends up being a jacket that doesn’t fit quite as well as it did years ago, but it’s comfortable and it still looks pretty good.  

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Serkis Circus

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Animal Farm

by George Wolf

You may have questions going into the newly realized Animal Farm. And it’s a good bet you’ll have more coming out.

Who is this for exactly? What’s with these changes? Did someone think Orwell didn’t get the point across? And just…why?

For his part, director Andy Serkis has addressed some of these concerns in the weeks leading up to the film’s release. Serkis has stressed that he worked closely with Orwell’s estate, striving to update the classic tale with modern themes and a nod toward understanding “the contradictions within its author.”

That is an ambitious goal, to say the least, and one that Serkis, screenwriter Nicholas Stoller and a star-studded voice cast can’t completely bring to market.

The first major adjustment is adding the character of Lucky (voiced by Gatan Matarazzo), a young pig that serves as a moral compass for younger viewers. Lucky is easily influenced by boss hog Napoleon (Seth Rogen) as the farm rules of equality and fairness are twisted and broken.

Lucky is key to Napoleon’s plan of exploitation, and to making hard working animals like Boxer (Woody Harrelson) believe Napoleon has their best interests at heart. So why is he cozying up to the cyber truck driving tycoon Frieda Pilkington (Glenn Close) and Mr. Whymper the banker (Steve Buscemi)?

Well, some animals are more equal than others. That’s always been the rule!

The fart jokes and obvious humor are a bit jarring for such cherished material, but make it clear Serkis is aiming to give younger audiences a primer in Orwell’s belief that absolute power corrupts absolutely. It’s best to keep that in mind when the movie delivers a new, hope-filled ending that’s a few pastures away from Orwell’s bleak reveal.

To adults who revere that original cautionary tale, much of this overhaul may feel like a blasphemous Chicken Run rebellion. These animals have to decide for themselves that they’ve been hoodwinked, don’t they? So isn’t Lucky’s hand-holding a bit contradictory? And as well meaning as this might be, why risk diluting the power of Orwell that will come when the kids are old enough to grasp it?

After a series of examples both pro and anti-capitalism, the end credits montage cements the message that the enemies are the absolutely corrupt of any ilk. And history has shown they can be overcome.

Some of it works, yes. But honestly, it’s just impossible to come at it with the fresh eyes and clear heads of the ones it appears to be meant for. Do I respect what this Serkis circus is trying to do? Yes.

Do I wish he did it with an original story not named Animal Farm?

Also yes.