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 Two decades after Malcolm in the Middle ended its seven season run in 2006, the sitcom about a family of boys – named for the genius middle child, Malcolm – gets a four-episode revival in the form of Malcolm in the Middle: Life’s Still Unfair. This limited streaming mini-series brings back (nearly)… Read More TV Review: Malcolm in the Middle: Life’s Still Unfair (Disney+)
By John Corrado Elements of time travel and crime thriller collide in Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice, an enjoyable action comedy that unfolds with a sort of clever-dumb logic that requires us to just roll with it. The plot, which unfolds across one night, is filled with twists and double-crossings. The titular players… Read More Movie Review: Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice (Disney+)
By John Corrado Do you know how hard it is to be yourself? That’s the quippy answer that George Clooney’s movie star character Jay Kelly, the titular protagonist of director Noah Baumbach’s latest film, gives when someone asks him what it feels like to be accused by critics of always playing himself. Of course, Clooney… Read More Movie Review: Jay Kelly
By John Corrado Netflix has just released the official trailer for Guillermo del Toro’s Frankentstein, the director’s long-gestating passion project bringing Mary Shelley’s original novel to the screen. I was lucky enough to see this one at TIFF, and came away impressed (you can read my full review from the festival right here). The production… Read More Official Trailer for Guillermo del Toro’s Frankentstein
By John Corrado Netflix has just put out the official trailer for Jay Kelly. This is Noah Baumbach’s latest film, starring George Clooney and Adam Sandler. It premiered at Venice and Telluride, and is about to play at NYFF. I’m still pretty crushed this one didn’t play TIFF. Clooney stars as the titular Jay Kelly,… Read More Official Trailer for Noah Baumbach’s Jay Kelly
By John Corrado Swiped is director Rachel Lee Goldenberg’s glossy biopic of Whitney Wolfe (played by Lily James), a co-founder of ubiquitous dating app Tinder and the creator of Bumble. We first meet Wolfe at a Los Angeles meet-up for tech investors, trying to get financial backers for an app that connects orphanages in other… Read More Movie Review: Swiped (Disney+)
By John Corrado Netflix has just put out the first trailer for Ballad of a Small Player, the latest film from German director Edward Berger. Berger’s last two films were, of course, the Oscar heavyweights Conclave and All Quiet on the Western Front, so expectations are naturally high for this one. Colin Farrell stars as… Read More Trailer for Edward Berger’s Ballad of a Small Player
By John Corrado 20th Century Studios has just put out the first trailer and poster for Swiped. Rachel Lee Goldenberg (Unpregnant) directs this based-on-a-true-story film, which stars Lily James in the role of Whitney Wolfe Herd, founder of online dating apps Tinder and Bumble. Lofty comparisons to The Social Network might be unavoidable. Otherwise, this… Read More First Trailer for Swiped, premiering at TIFF
By John Corrado Netflix has just put out the first teaser trailer for their upcoming film Jay Kelly. This is the new movie from filmmaker Noah Baumbach, his first since the divisive, big budget White Noise in 2022. This one is poised to follow the path of Marriage Story in 2019, and put him squarely… Read More Teaser Trailer for Noah Baumbach’s Jay Kelly
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 In their thirty years of feature films, Pixar Animation Studios has been known for their innovative and imaginative storytelling. Now they’ve adapted that to a serialized format in Win or Lose, the new Disney Plus streaming series from co-creators, co-directors and co-writers Carrie Hobson and Michael Yates. It’s an ambitious gambit from… Read More Review: Win or Lose – Episodes 1-4 (Disney+)
By John Corrado The British inventor and his pantomime dog return in Aardman’s Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl, the second feature-length outing for the characters following 2005’s Oscar-winning The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. Co-directed by series creator Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham, this charming and funny new adventure for the stop-motion man and dog… Read More Movie Review: Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl (Netflix)
By John Corrado Red One, directed by Jake Kasdan (Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, Jumanji: The Next Level), is a not as bad as it could have been but still thoroughly mediocre film that takes the Santa Claus story and turns it into a bloated, big budget action fantasy. The movie (which played in theatres for a… Read More Movie Review: Red One (Prime Video)
By John Corrado Elton John: Never Too Late, the new music documentary that premiered at TIFF and is now being released on Disney Plus, follows the British rockstar on his Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour. Co-directed by R.J. Cutler and David Furnish, the film counts down to his final concert in North America at Dodger… Read More Movie Review: Elton John: Never Too Late (Disney+)
By John Corrado Dream Productions, the new Disney Plus limited series “from the world of Inside Out,” presents somewhat of a departure for Pixar. It’s not only their first stab at episodic storytelling, but also done in the style of a mockumentary. The four-part series is presented as a “behind the scenes” look at Dream Productions,… Read More Review: Dream Productions (Disney+)
By John Corrado Beatles ‘64, the new Disney Plus documentary from director David Tedeschi and producer Martin Scorsese about the Fab Four’s first visit to America, opens with footage of President John F. Kennedy. These scenes set the film up as a sort of broader time capsule of this specific era, but it also ties… Read More Movie Review: Beatles ’64 (Disney+)
By John Corrado The third entry in Pablo Larraín’s unofficial trilogy depicting the interior lives of famous women (following the one-two punch of Jackie and Spencer), Maria is the Chilean filmmaker’s portrait of the Italian opera singer Maria Callas. Larraín aims to do for Callas what he did for Jacqueline Kennedy and Princess Diana in his previous films, which boasted… Read More Movie Review: Maria
By John Corrado Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band is the latest Springsteen documentary from director Thom Zimny, and it’s an electrifying mix of concert doc and intimate snapshot of The Boss on tour. Where as Zimny’s recent portraits Western Stars and Letter to You focused on those specific albums, Road Diary expands its scope to his current world… Read More Movie Review: Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band (Disney+)
By John Corrado Netflix has released the full trailer for Emilia Pérez, French filmmaker Jacques Audiard’s mix of cartel thriller, Mexican melodrama, and flashy musical, starring the “power trio” of Zoe Saldaña, Karla Sofía Gascón and Selena Gomez (who collectively won the Best Actress prize at Cannes). I saw this film when it played at… Read More Trailer Released for Emilia Pérez
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