By John Corrado The 2025 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 24th to May 4th in Toronto The title of #skoden refers to an Indigenous phrase that is the shorthand of “let’s go, then” said with an Indigenous accent. The saying became immortalized as a meme through a viral image of a Blackfoot man… Read More #HotDocs25 Review: #skoden
By John Corrado One of the upcoming summer films I’m most intrigued by is Weapons, writer-director Zach Cregger’s highly anticipated follow-up to his memorable breakout film Barbarian. This one is a missing person thriller heavily inspired by Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia, with its intersecting storylines. Warner Bros. has just released the first trailer for the… Read More First Trailer for Zach Cregger’s Weapons
By John Corrado The 2025 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 24th to May 4th in Toronto In their documentary Marriage Cops, co-directors Shashwati Talukdar and Cheryl Hess take us inside a police station in northern India, where a team of female officers provide marriage counselling to couples experiencing marital problems. It’s a way… Read More #HotDocs25 Review: Marriage Cops
By John Corrado The 2025 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 24th to May 4th in Toronto Shot on luminous 16mm film, Agatha’s Almanac is a portrait of Agatha Bock, a subject who, in her mid-eighties, is proudly carrying on the traditions of rural farm living in southern Manitoba. The film is directed by… Read More #HotDocs25 Review: Agatha’s Almanac
By John Corrado The 2025 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 24th to May 4th in Toronto Ai Weiwei’s Turandot looks at the Chinese artist and activist’s modern re-staging of Puccini’s opera at the Teatro dell’Opera in Rome. The film opens with the quote “everything is art, everything is politics,” before dramatic footage from… Read More #HotDocs25 Review: Ai Weiwei’s Turandot
By John Corrado New releases for the week of April 25th, 2025. Theatrical Releases: The Accountant 2 (Wide Release): This long-awaited sequel to the 2016 action thriller finds director Gavin O’Connor returning, and Ben Affleck reprising his role as autistic accountant Christian Wolff. Jon Bernthal is also back as the brother. I was a pretty… Read More New This Week (04/25/2025): The Accountant 2, The Legend of Ochi, & More!
By John Corrado The 2025 Hot Docs Film Festival runs from April 24th to May 4th in Toronto Director Noam Gonick’s documentary Parade: Queer Acts of Love & Resistance, which opens this year’s Hot Docs Film Festival, looks at the history of gay rights in Canada, and the origins of our country’s first Pride Parades as… Read More #HotDocs25 Review: Parade: Queer Acts of Love & Resistance
By John Corrado Disneynature’s Earth Day releases have been an annual tradition since 2009, when the studio released Earth. The films have since shifted away from being theatrical releases and migrated to being released direct to streaming on Disney Plus, but the tradition remains largely the same. In Sea Lions of the Galapagos, the latest… Read More Movie Review: Sea Lions of the Galapagos (Disney+)
By John Corrado New releases for the week of April 18th, 2025. Theatrical Releases: Sinners (Wide Release): Ryan Coogler (Black Panther, Creed) directs this period piece vampire movie, starring Michael B. Jordan in a dual role. Reviews have been stellar for the film, which was shot on 65mm film by cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw. I’ve… Read More New This Week (04/18/2025): Sinners, The Wedding Banquet, & More!
By John Corrado A contemporary remake of the 1993 Ang Lee film of the same name, The Wedding Banquet is a queer crowdpleaser that could best be described as a modern screwball comedy. This updated version focuses on two same-sex couples, instead of just one, and moves the setting to Seattle. But the basic setup… Read More Movie Review: The Wedding Banquet
By John Corrado Disney has just released the new trailer for Marvel’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps. This is the highly anticipated reboot that officially brings Marvel’s “First Family” into the fold of the MCU. And it looks fun. I’m mainly interested to see Marvel playing around in the Space Age 1960s. Pedro Pascal stars… Read More New Trailer for The Fantastic Four: Four Steps
By John Corrado Distributor NEON has just released the new official trailer for TIFF People’s Choice Award winner The Life of Chuck. This trailer reveals more of director Mike Flanagan’s Stephen King adaptation, including glimpses of Tom Hiddleston’s titular Chuck. The dance sequence is wisely being kept hidden, but is hinted at. We also hear… Read More Official Trailer for The Life of Chuck
By John Corrado A24 has released the first teaser trailer for writer-director Ari Aster’s Eddington. This is the latest film from Aster, following his acclaimed horror films Hereditary and Midsommar and the highly divisive “nightmare comedy” Beau is Afraid in 2023. This one finds Aster re-teaming with Beau star Joaquin Phoenix, and is described as… Read More Teaser Trailer for Ari Aster’s Eddington
By John Corrado New releases for the week of April 11th, 2025. Theatrical Releases: Warefare (Wide Release): Director Alex Garland delivered one of the better movies of last year with his speculative Civil War, and now he returns to A24 to co-direct – with real life Iraq War veteran Ray Mendoza – this fact-based portrait… Read More New This Week (04/11/2025): Warfare, Sacramento, & More!
By John Corrado Actor Michael Angarano directs and stars in Sacramento, a dramedy about masculinity and fatherhood that hits a lot of the expected beats, but still has enough of a scrappy charm to it. Angarano stars as Rickey, an immature man-child in LA who has recently lost his father, when he comes crashing back… Read More Movie Review: Sacramento
By John Corrado The new trailer has just dropped for Paramount’s Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, starring Tom Cruise in what is said to be his final mission as Ethan Hunt. Everybody should already be sold on this movie. The Mission: Impossible series has turned into one of our most reliable blockbuster franchises, with… Read More New Trailer for Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning
By John Corrado Focus Features has just unveiled the first trailer for Wes Anderson’s The Phoenician Scheme, the filmmaker’s first film since 2023’s underrated Asteroid City. This one is touted as being an espionage thriller, but the trailer reveals that it will still be very much in line with Anderson’s usual artistic style. We get… Read More First Trailer for Wes Anderson’s The Phoenician Scheme
By John Corrado Disney has just released the first trailer for Tron: Ares, the long-awaited follow up to the 2010 legacy sequel Tron: Legacy. This one concerns a computer program, Ares, getting loose in the real world. A sequel to the groundbreaking 1982 film Tron, Tron: Legacy was a visually dazzling experience with an awesome… Read More First Trailer for Disney’s Tron: Ares
By John Corrado New releases for the week of April 4th, 2025. Theatrical Releases: A Minecraft Movie (Wide Release): The biggest of this week’s new releases is this adaptation of the immensely popular online game. The cast includes Jack Black, Jason Momoa and Jennifer Coolidge. It’s directed by Jared Hess, of Napoleon Dynamite and Nacho… Read More New This Week (04/04/2025): A Minecraft Movie, The Ballad of Wallis Island, & More!
By John Corrado The Luckiest Man in America is the based-on-a-true-story tale of Michael Larson (played by Paul Walter Hauser), an ice cream truck driver from Ohio who had an incredible winning streak on the game show Press Your Luck in the 1980s. Like other contemporary films about live TV from a similar era such… Read More Movie Review: The Luckiest Man in America
The Joy of Movies 