Barry Jenkins’ The Underground Railroad is one of the great cinematic events of the young 2020s decade. It is Jenkins’ fourth film, and since his breakthrough with Moonlight in 2016, he is one of cinema's great auteurs during this past six year stretch The Underground Railroad is the largely the story of Cora (played by Thuso Mbedu) and her harrowing exodus from slavery, state by state (with a few asides, the chapters are broken out by state). The entire running time is a whopping 9 hours and 53 minutes- an epic, an opus. Jenkins opens foreshadowing a slow-motion falling

There is a case to be made that Tom Ripley is cinema’s greatest single character. Unlike say Michael or Vito Corleone, connected with one trilogy, one filmmaker, and a few actors – Patricia Highsmith’s Ripley (she also wrote the novel for Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train and the source material for 2015’s Carol) has been played several times, in several countries,  from several directors and with actors as wide-ranging as Alain Delon, Dennis Hopper, Matt Damon, and here, in Liliana Cavani’s Ripley’s Game (2002), John Malkovich. Some of the best critics (Ebert, Jeffrey Anderson, https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-ripleys-game-2002, and https://www.combustiblecelluloid.com/2004/ripleys.shtml) seem to

By and large  the first 60-90 minutes are pretty mediocre but the final hour (whenever Adam Driver and Daisy Ridley finally connected) is superb. Chief amongst the elements I want to praise is the use of the color red. Again, I wish Johnson had just done it throughout the entire film—- Snoke’s throne room, his guards, that long scene where he’s killed, and the salt mine sequences are just saturated in the color and I can’t help but think of Zhang Yimou Hero (2002). Now, the great Chinese auteur did it for the entire running time and Johnson does

J. J. Abrams infuses an unmistakable energy in The Force Awakens that most action/adventure films hope for, but never achieve. The talented ensemble is to be applauded (they succeed in exchanging both poignant moments and  catchy, genre one-liners) but so is the editing. This is a 138-minute running time that soars by. This is Abrams second “Star”- franchise he brought back to life with 2009’s Star Trek Certainly, the arc of the narrative reuses much of the formula from the 1977 classic original. Most of it works like a charm- but in a few areas (Starkiller Base vs. Death

The Woman in the Window should be better than it is. Joe Wright is one of the stronger directors of the last fifteen years or so (from 2005's Pride and Prejudice as the starting point), ditto for Amy Adams as an actor. And the cast and crew (Tracy Letts writing, Danny Elfman score) assembled to support them here are extremely capable; Julianne Moore is here, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Anthony Mackie, Brian Tyree Henry, and Wright even quickly calls in the favor from Gary Oldman (Wright directed Oldman to the Best Actor win in 2017 with The Darkest Hour). Oldman

Short stories and novellas (I think technically under 40,000 words this is where Hemingway’s work here falls) often make the best films—less plot for an auteur to try to cover. That does not really work out here in John Sturges’ 1958 film. You cannot call the film a failure (it is in the archives after all)- but it does not sniff the accomplishment of Hemingway’s work (Pulitzer prize winning). Some location shooting (Cuba, Bahamas) in the opening especially but overall, the film suffers from an abundance of rear projection studio shooting when on the boat. Reteams Sturges (this is

A very impressive piece of cinema from Hungarian director Kornél Mundruczó After a date “September” title and landscape shot (a New York bridge beginning to be built) the film opens with a long take, Mundruczó’s camera drifting around a construction job site as we’re introduced to Sean, played by Shia LaBeouf, building said bridge The first few scenes after that, Mundruczó and screenwriter Kata Wéber are unveiling the relationship between the young couple (Sean and Martha- played by Vanessa Kirby) and Martha’s mother played by Ellen Burstyn- the fractures in their relationships as they discuss a car purchase. After

Soderbergh’s 17th archiveable film at the time I’m writing this- that’s incredible. And he took several years off with his brief hiatus/retirement/sabbatical. He seems destined to hit 25+ archiveable films which is extremely rare in the more modern era. Of course, Scorsese and Woody (both with debuts in the 1960’s) hit that (or rather Scorsese will with his next one) but Soderbergh is from the Gen X class of auteurs- his debut was in 1989. On top of the prolific output- Soderbergh serves as also his own editor and cinematographer (under aliases) here for Let Them All Talk as

Blake Edwards and Peter Sellers were two enormously capable comedic minds. They came together often in the 1960s (this is the third and final archiveable film between the duo)- but this is the only time they collaborated outside of the wildly successful (and hilarious) Pink Panther films. Sellers here plays Hrundi V. Bakshi- an Indian man.  Certainly, this would not happen in casting today, but it was not outside of the norm in the 1960s and Sellers often played characters from different races and nationalities (in Strangelove he plays an American and a German). In The Pink Panther and

Disney’s take on the folk story (finally published in the 17th century but around long before) could easily slide into the late 1930s and early 1940s artistically fertile animation period—it is that well done. The film starts with the opening of the book (certainly common in the era) and the still drawing (stunning) establishing shots and landscapes. It is an enchanting and leisurely 74-minutes. There’s 10-15 minutes on the literal cat and mouse game, nearly that with the melodic morning routine. It is a simple, universal story (easily handed down orally from generation to generation) of goodness overcoming evil.

Technically, it is the first George Lucas directed film to land in the archives since the 1977 original Star Wars It is markedly better than the previous prequels- Phantom Menace in 1999 and Clones in 2002. It is darker, comparisons to Empire are right in terms of the foreboding doom and bleaker tone. The “best since Empire” stuff may be correct as well—but that is no great compliment necessarily either. Lucas still makes the mistake of investing so much time and energy in plot and CGI- two things that do not usually translate to great cinema. This is not