By John Corrado The 2026 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 23rd to May 3rd in Toronto In the slice-of-life documentary On My Own Terms, director Tadeusz Chudy follows teenaged half-siblings Pawel and Julka, who are living together at an orphanage in Poland. Pawel is a promising young boxer, whose coach sees a lot… Read More HotDocs26 Review: On My Own Terms
By John Corrado The 2026 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 23rd to May 3rd in Toronto When Mahsa Amini was arrested by the morality police in Iran for violating the country’s mandatory hijab laws, and later died in custody, her death sparked the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement when activists would risk and in… Read More #HotDocs26 Review: A War on Women
By John Corrado The 2026 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 23rd to May 3rd in Toronto The world is facing a loneliness epidemic, with people starved for connection but struggling to meet each other in real life. Dating apps are filling that void, but come with their own set of challenges; these apps… Read More #HotDocs26 Review: Love Apptually
By John Corrado The 2026 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 23rd to May 3rd in Toronto In their documentary Gimme Truth, co-directors Simon Ennis and Brad Abrahams explore modern conspiracy theories, by introducing us to a variety of subjects who believe in them. Their views range from vaccine skeptics to 9/11 truthers. These… Read More #HotDocs26 Review: Gimme Truth
By John Corrado The 2026 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 23rd to May 3rd in Toronto In her documentary Black Zombie, director Maya Annik Bedward ties the modern zombie lore we see in horror movies and TV shows back to the history of Haiti and the ancient spiritual practice of Vodou. Bedward traces… Read More #HotDocs26 Review: Black Zombie
By John Corrado The 2026 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 23rd to May 3rd in Toronto The documentary Nekai Walks opens with a beat-by-beat account of the night that Nekai Foster got shot in the head in Toronto’s Jane and Finch neighbourhood. It was summer, and he was walking home from playing basketball,… Read More #HotDocs26 Review: Nekai Walks
By John Corrado New releases for the week of April 24th, 2026. Theatrical Releases: Michael (Wide Release): The long-hyped Michael Jackson biopic from director Antoine Fuqua is finally arriving in theatres. It’s got a surprisingly low Rotten Tomatoes score (only 40% at the time of this writing), but I found it to be entertaining as… Read More New This Week (04/24/2026): Michael, Mother Mary, I Swear, & More!
By John Corrado Titled after the Polish word for “eruption,” as in “volcanic,” Erupcja is an indie movie travelogue set in Poland, that provides a scrappy portrait of modern friendship and relationships, starring none other than pop star Charli XCX. The story follows Charli XCX’s Bethany, a British woman who is on vacation in Warsaw… Read More Movie Review: Erupcja
By John Corrado The tagline for Mother Mary, the latest film from writer-director David Lowery, is “this is not a ghost story.” It’s a bit of a misnomer, because Mother Mary arguably is one. But it does cleverly differentiate this bold effort from Lowery’s low-key, experimental 2017 film A Ghost Story, an understated gem which… Read More Movie Review: Mother Mary
By John Corrado Here we have it, folks. The first trailer has officially been released for Coyote vs. ACME, the live-action and animation hybrid Looney Tunes film that got cancelled by Warner Bros. as a tax write off, before being sold to Ketchup Entertainment. The fact that this film is being released at all is… Read More First Trailer for Coyote vs. ACME!
By John Corrado Orangutan is the latest Earth Day release from Disneynature, a tradition that now stretches back over fifteen years. This one follows Indah, a 9-year-old orangutan (we are told that makes her a teenager in human years) in the jungles of Southeast Asia, living with her mother Diann and new baby brother Bimo.… Read More Movie Review: Disneynature’s Orangutan (Disney+)
By John Corrado Amidst the modern biopic boom, the Michael Jackson biopic has finally arrived. Directed by Antoine Fuqua (The Equalizer trilogy, Training Day), and starring the late King of Pop’s real life nephew Jaafar Jackson, who is uncanny as his uncle, Michael is about the rise of Michael Jackson, and really only the rise.… Read More Movie Review: Michael
By John Corrado Director Gore Verbinski’s sci-fi time travel action comedy Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die is one of the better movies of the year so far, and it’s now being given a physical media release this week. Sam Rockwell stars in the film as a man claiming to be from the future, who… Read More Blu-ray Review: Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die
By John Corrado New releases for the week of April 17th, 2026. Theatrical Releases: Lorne (Limited Release): This latest celebrity documentary from filmmaker Morgan Neville (Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, 20 Feet from Stardom) is a portrait of Lorne Michaels, the elusive creator of Saturday Night Live. I really enjoyed this one. It works as… Read More New This Week (04/17/2026): Lorne, Mile End Kicks, & More!
By John Corrado In Mile End Kicks, the very enjoyable sophomore feature from former Toronto film critic Chandler Levack following her excellent directorial debut I Like Movies, we follow a young music critic trying to figure things out in her early twenties. In many ways, Mike End Kicks plays like a companion piece to I… Read More Movie Review: Mile End Kicks
By John Corrado 20th Century Studios has just released our first trailer (and poster) for The Dog Stars, the latest film from director Ridley Scott (following his sequel Gladiator II). This one is adapted from a book by Peter Heller, and is a post-apocalyptic survival story starring Jacob Elordi, Guy Pearce, Margaret Qualley and Allison… Read More First Trailer for Ridley Scott’s The Dog Stars
By John Corrado Disney has just released the final trailer (and poster) for Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu, following their CinemaCon presentation in Las Vegas. This feature-length theatrical spinoff from the Disney+ streaming series finds star Pedro Pascal reprising his role, and seems to be sold on the enduring appeal of Grogu – “Baby… Read More Final Trailer for Disney’s Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu
By John Corrado Universal Pictures has just put out the first trailer for Focker-in-Law, which was first unveiled tonight at CinemaCon in Las Vegas. This is the sequel to popular comedies Meet the Parents, Meet the Fockers and Little Fockers, and it’s written and directed by John Hamburg, who co-wrote the previous three. This fourth… Read More First Trailer for Focker-in-Law
By John Corrado As a documentary filmmaker, Morgan Neville has focused on a variety of celebrity subjects, from Mister Rogers in Won’t You Be My Neighbor? to Anthony Bourdain in Roadrunner. And, in his Oscar-winning 20 Feet from Stardom, he brought backup singers into the spotlight. The subject of Neville’s latest film is another behind the… Read More Movie Review: Lorne
By John Corrado New releases for the week of April 10th, 2026. Theatrical Releases: Exit 8 (Limited Releases): This Japanese video game adaptation follows a man (Kazunari Ninomiya) who ends up trapped in an endless loop in a subway tunnel following his daily commute. I reviewed this one during TIFF last year, and found it… Read More New This Week (04/10/2026): Exit 8, Hamlet, & More!
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