By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) Emerald Fennell’s Saltburn, the writer-director’s follow-up to her Oscar-winning debut Promising Young Woman, is an overly ambitious mixed bag of a film. The film’s two stars, Barry Keoghan and Jacob Elordi, are good in the leading roles as young men with palpable homoerotic tension between them, and there… Read More Review: Saltburn
By Jon Corrado ★½ (out of 4) The 33rd film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Marvels is both a sequel to 2019’s Captain Marvel and a continuation of the Disney+ series Ms. Marvel, and it’s honestly kind of a mess. Directed by Nia DaCosta (the Candyman remake), this is the weakest film yet in a… Read More Review: The Marvels
By John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) Director Madeleine Gavin’s documentary Beyond Utopia offers a compelling glimpse inside North Korea, through the eyes of those who risk their lives trying to escape the country. The real pull of Gavin’s film is the secret, handheld footage shot by defectors themselves, showing us the perilous journey that… Read More Review: Beyond Utopia
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) Awkwafina and Sandra Oh star in the female-led comedy Quiz Lady as mismatched sisters who end up on a road trip together to compete on a popular quiz show, and it’s an example of a film that is elevated by its leads. Anne (Awkwafina) has always been obsessed… Read More Review: Quiz Lady (Disney+)
By John Corrado ★★★★ (out of 4) Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla, the writer-director’s best film since Lost in Translation, is a biopic of Priscilla Presley that focuses on her relationship to Elvis, offering an unglamorous but authentic look at their troubled romance. In its own way, Priscilla also serves as the subdued, melancholic counterpart to the… Read More Review: Priscilla
By John Corrado Please note that this is a review of the Blu-ray release of Barbie. For my full thoughts on the film itself, you can read my original review right here. After becoming the highest grossing movie of the year in theatres over the summer (including getting a boost from the Barbenheimer phenomenon), Warner… Read More Blu-ray Review: Barbie
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The Persian Version, which premiered at Sundance in January, finds writer-director Maryam Keshavarz (Circumstance) dipping into her own background as an Iranian-American woman to craft an enjoyable, ambitious mother-daughter dramedy. The film centres around Leila (Layla Mohammadi), an Iranian-American aspiring filmmaker living in New York City. She has… Read More Review: The Persian Version
By John Corrado ★★ (out of 4) The latest film from New York writer-director Rebecca Miller (her first since Maggie’s Plan in 2015), She Came to Me is an absurd, operatic melodrama that takes the bones of a romantic comedy and remixes it into a sort of soap opera. The result is somewhat of an… Read More Review: She Came to Me
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Solo, which recently won the Best Canadian Film prize at TIFF, is a character drama set in Montreal’s drag scene. In her third feature, Quebec writer-director Sophie Dupuis (Family First, Underground) captivatingly explores the dynamics between the performers at a Montreal gay bar. The film centres around the… Read More Review: Solo
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The 2023 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 7th to 17th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here. The latest film from Danish director Lone Scherfig (An Education), The Movie Teller is a solid, old fashioned drama about the magic of movies. Based on… Read More #TIFF23 Review: The Movie Teller (Special Presentations)
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) The 2023 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 7th to 17th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here. Inspired by Cheryl Della Pietra’s autobiographical book of the same name, which was drawn from the author’s time working as Hunter S. Thompson’s personal assistant in… Read More #TIFF23 Review: Gonzo Girl (Discovery)
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) The 2023 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 7th to 17th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here. Anna Kendrick makes her directorial debut with Woman of the Hour (which just sold to Netflix for a cool $11 million), a based-on-a-true-story serial killer thriller… Read More #TIFF23 Review: Woman of the Hour (Special Presentations)
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) The 2023 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 7th to 17th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here. Kitty Green’s follow up to The Assistant (a #MeToo drama that was about Harvey Weinstein without actually being about Harvey Weinstein), The Royal Hotel explores similar… Read More #TIFF23 Review: The Royal Hotel (Gala Presentations)
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The 2023 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 7th to 17th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here. What happens when a vampire develops a conscience and doesn’t want to kill? This is the predicament facing Sasha (Sara Montpetit), a teenaged vampire in… Read More #TIFF23 Review: Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person (Centrepiece)
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) The 2023 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 7th to 17th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here. Tautuktavuk (What We See) is a unique hybrid film from co-directors Carol Kunnuk and Lucy Tulugarjuk born out of the COVID-19 pandemic, that unfolds with… Read More #TIFF23 Review: Tautuktavuk (What We See) (Discovery)
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The 2023 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 7th to 17th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here. In her second feature Fitting In, Canadian writer-director Molly McGlynn (Mary Goes Round) shows how to handle sensitive subject matter in an often humorous but still… Read More #TIFF23 Review: Fitting In (Centrepiece)
By John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) The 2023 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 7th to 17th, more information on tickets and showtimes can be found right here. Did the husband fall, or was he pushed? That’s the question at the centre of Palme d’Or winner Anatomy of a Fall, an absorbing courtroom… Read More #TIFF23 Review: Anatomy of a Fall (Special Presentations)
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The Canadian drama North of Normal is an adaptation of Cea Sunrise Person’s 2014 memoir of the same name, following her coming of age in the city after an unconventional upbringing in the Yukon wilderness with her free-loving teen mother (played in the film by Sarah Gadon). The… Read More Review: North of Normal
By John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) With her blonde hair and iconic figure, Barbie is one of the most recognizable toys of all time. Whether you view Mattel’s flagship doll as a beloved plaything or an impossible standard by which to judge female beauty standards, there’s little denying the impact that she has had… Read More Review: Barbie
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) The directorial debut of Tamil Canadian filmmaker V.T. Nayani, This Place (which premiered at last year’s TIFF) is a queer love story between two young women from different backgrounds that finds its strengths in being so culturally specific to Toronto. Kawenniióhstha (Devery Jacobs, who also co-wrote the screenplay… Read More Review: This Place
The Joy of Movies 