Review: Todd Haynes returns with "Dark Waters"

by Murtada Elfadl

You know you are in good hands when the actor chosen to come in and jumpstart the plot, give dimensionality to the film, or just wreck the audience hearts is Bill Camp. This is exactly who Todd Haynes chooses to do all three of these things in Dark Waters. Camp is a Virginia farmer who calls on a corporate lawyer he knows from the old neighborhood (Mark Ruffalo) to help him sue the big corporation that is killing his animals, his family and himself with the toxic waste they spill out in the water system and into the bodies of the unsuspecting.

This is just the tip of a big iceberg that Robert Bilott (Ruffalo) uncovers...

Click to read more ...

Notes on films we haven't talked much about to catch-up...

by Nathaniel R

The year sure got away from us. People are diving into "Best of Decade" lists right and left and we're still waist deep in 2019's offerings. Here are some thoughts on films we didn't properly review for some reason. "Some reason" nearly always means not enough hours in the day and the less flattering but no less true (sigh) lack of self-discipline.

A BEAUTIFUL DAY IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD (Marielle Heller)
Non movie-based spoiler alert: This film will be on my top ten list. That's the excuse I kept making when delaying writing a real review. "You'll have to talk about that later anyway, Nathaniel" Still, the silence does this movie a disservice. Everyone should go see it at the first possible opportunity. Heller is one of our greatest working directors...

Click to read more ...

Review: Charlie's Angels (2019)

Box office and reviews have been tough on the new Angels. I guess today the contrarian corner is a theme here at TFE. Tony likes it! - editor.

by Tony Ruggio

We'll start with where I'm coming from: I’m no fan of the original series. The early-Aughts adaptations were mostly forgettable save a dance or two from Cameron Diaz and Sam Rockwell. But these 2019 Angels are surprisingly fresh and fun. It’s an IP brought back from irrelevant hell and updated with verve.

About the three new Angels. Elizabeth Banks is clearly in love with Kristen Stewart, and who can blame her? Stewart is a charisma machine as the weird, spunkiest Angel of the bunch. She's so good you almost wish she took movie star roles more often. You also forget there was once a time when she got gruff for playing mopey all the time. Those days are long gone...

Click to read more ...

Noirvember / Contrarian Corner: Motherless Brooklyn

By Lynn Lee

Is Motherless Brooklyn just another high-profile Oscar hopeful turned dud-on-arrival?  The early signs for Ed Norton’s long-gestating passion project have not been encouraging, to put it mildly.  Reviews on both the festival circuit and the film’s general release and here at TFE have been tepid, the box office even more so. Its awards prospects are pretty much nil.  It’s also not the kind of movie that’s likely to find success through word of mouth or build a long-term cult following, and its chances of future critical reevaluation are uncertain at best.

All of which makes me a little sad, because I quite enjoyed the film, and think Norton deserves more credit than he’s getting for what he’s accomplished...

Click to read more ...

Review: The Good Liar

by Scott Thomson

Two Grand High thesps of the most esteemed order playing against each other in a cunning game of deceit. A surefire winning recipe, right? Maybe not.

Sir Ian McKellen and Dame Helen Mirren are most certainly having a gay old time together, practically purring in each calculated exchange with one another. It is not often enough that we get to see the screen shared by a pair of Britain’s most beloved (capital ‘A’) Actors but this is far from enough to lift The Good Liar from the escalating preposterousness that clouds the fun within. It reads like an “oh my God what if we did this thing...” kind of idea conjured by a drunken playwright after too many Merlots round Sir Ian’s pub on a Saturday evening. The result is a film perhaps best enjoyed in a similar state... 

Click to read more ...