By John Corrado Director Thomas von Steinaecker’s documentary Radical Dreamer: Werner Herzog offers an enjoyable overview of the iconic German filmmaker’s career, known both for his accent and bold, inquisitive filmmaking style. The documentary chronologically explores Herzog’s early films as part of the New German Cinema movement, which gave way to his reputation as a… Read More Review: Werner Herzog: Radical Dreamer
By John Corrado The title of Memory, the latest film from Mexican writer-director Michel Franco, takes on a few different meanings throughout the course of this tender, stripped down character drama. It refers to repressed memories and the lingering impacts of childhood trauma that Sylvia (Jessica Chastain) carries with her every day, as well as… Read More Review: Memory
By John Corrado Ava DuVernay’s Origin is an ambitious film that aims to adapt Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson’s bestselling non-fiction book Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents for the screen. It serves as both an exploration of the ideas within Wilkerson’s book, and a dramatization of Isabel’s experiences while writing it. DuVernay’s film finds… Read More Review: Origin
By John Corrado It’s been twenty years since Tina Fey released her high school satire Mean Girls in 2004, and now we have a new version of the modern teen classic being released in theatres. Directed by Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. (taking over for Mark Waters who directed the 2004 film), the 2024… Read More Review: Mean Girls
By John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) The latest work from writer-director Andrew Haigh, whose 2011 breakout film Weekend remains an essential piece of queer cinema, All of Us Strangers is a tender, dreamlike meditation on grief and loneliness. Working from the 1987 Japanese novel Strangers by Taichi Yamada, Haigh’s film is a ghost story… Read More Review: All of Us Strangers
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) When Paul King stepped away from directing the third Paddington movie to direct a Willy Wonka origin story, after helming the critically acclaimed first two movies about the bear from Peru, it seemed like a curious move. But the moral of Wonka is that we never should have… Read More Review: Wonka
By John Corrado ★★★★ (out of 4) Watching Killers of the Flower Moon, the absorbing latest work from master filmmaker Martin Scorsese, it’s impossible not to think about legacy, and the types of stories that he is choosing to tell in the twilight of his career. It’s obviously hard to confront the feeling that each… Read More Review: Killers of the Flower Moon
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Director Blitz Bazawule’s The Color Purple is a big screen adaptation of the Broadway musical that serves as a glitzy reimagining of Alice Walker’s 1982 novel and Steven Spielberg’s 1985 film of the same. Produced by Spielberg and Oprah Winfrey (who was Oscar-nominated for her breakout role as… Read More Review: The Color Purple
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) Director Michael Mann returns with Ferrari, a biopic of Italian automaker Enzo Ferrari, that focuses more on his relationships and personal life. The film is set in 1957, a decade after Enzo (a silver-haired Adam Driver) opened the factory with his wife Laura Ferrari (Penelope Cruz) in post-War… Read More Review: Ferrari
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) George Clooney’s latest film as a director, The Boys in the Boat is a familiar but mostly enjoyable underdog sports movie that serves as another they don’t make ’em like they used to effort from the actor turned filmmaker, following his coming-of-age drama The Tender Bar. Adapted from… Read More Review: The Boys in the Boat
By John Corrado ★★★★ (out of 4) Poor Things is the latest from Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos following his break into more “mainstream” filmmaking with his Oscar-winning The Favourite, and it’s a weird and wonderful take on the Frankenstein story. Adapting Scottish writer Alasdair Gray’s 1992 novel of the same name for the screen, Lanthimos… Read More Review: Poor Things
By John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) The latest from Japanese master Hayao Miyazaki, The Boy and the Heron (which had its North American premiere as the opening night film at TIFF) is an enchanting, gorgeously animated fantasy about life and death. The film is Miyazaki’s first since The Wind Rises a decade ago, which… Read More Review: The Boy and the Heron
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The sophomore feature from director William Oldroyd (Lady MacBeth), Eileen is a solid little psychological thriller that is all about building a sense of atmosphere to slowly suffocate us, before revealing the story’s true intentions. Adapted from Ottessa Moshfegh‘s 2015 novel of the same name, the story is… Read More Review: Eileen
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Following his 2018 directorial debut A Star is Born, Bradley Cooper now turns his attention to the life of New York composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein in the biopic Maestro, casting himself in the leading role. The film spans decades in the life of Bernstein from the 1940s… Read More Review: Maestro
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 John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) It’s the 100th anniversary of Walt Disney Animation Studios this year, and what better way to celebrate this milestone than with Wish, a charming new musical fairy tale that harkens back to Classic Disney. The film (which opens with a storybook and those four magical words “once upon… Read More Review: Wish
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The title of director Todd Haynes’s new elevated melodrama May December refers to the extreme age gap between Gracie Atherton (Julianne Moore) and her husband Joe Yoo (Charles Melton). Their relationship began when he was twelve and she was 36, and sent her to jail for years amid a flurry… Read More Review: May December
By Jon Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) Built around the pun in its title, It’s a Wonderful Knife is an ode to Frank Capra’s perennial classic It’s a Wonderful Life, except done in the style of a Christmas slasher comedy. The film is set in the town of Angel Falls, and follows a teen girl… Read More Review: It’s a Wonderful Knife
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Eight years after the release of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 in 2015, director Francis Lawrence returns to this franchise with The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, an adaptation of author Suzanne Collins’ 2020 prequel novel of the same name. The story is… Read More Review: The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes
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
The Joy of Movies 