Onward REVIEW

Onward (2020)

Pixar’s movies tend to play as metaphors for the creative rise and fall of Pixar itself. When someone says “Maybe this place isn’t as adventurous as it used to be,” it’s hard not to hear an echo of the filmmakers’ voices.

 Parasite [video] POST

Parasite [video] (2019)

Bong Joon-Ho’s brilliantly constructed art-house hit is the most powerful of this year’s many takes on the theme of haves and have-nots.

 Little Women [video] POST

Little Women [video] (2019)

Is there anything new to say about Louisa May Alcott’s beloved, much-adapted classic? Thrillingly, Greta Gerwig finds that there is.

 Marriage Story [video] POST

Marriage Story [video] (2019)

Noah Baumbach tells persuasive stories about unhappy families. This is one of his most insightful.

 The Irishman [video] POST

The Irishman [video] (2019)

Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci star in Martin Scorsese’s decade-spanning gangland opus, which turns out to be a very different movie than it seems … but you have to stick with it.

 Jojo Rabbit [video] POST

Jojo Rabbit [video] (2019)

Taika Waititi has directed some cracking comedies, but can even he make Hitler funny?

 2019: The year in reviews ARTICLE

2019: The year in reviews

An exquisite art-house film about a beatified martyr. The triumphant arrival of a belated documentary of a celebrated gospel concert. A fact-based drama about an alliance of devout and unbelieving survivors of clerical sex abuse calling for justice. These are just a few of an unusually large crop of notable films that tackled religious and spiritual themes in 2019.

 Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker REVIEW

Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker (2019)

Let’s face it, they could play John Williams’ ominous “Imperial March” over scenes of Uncle Deadly from the Muppets lobbing Green Goblin pumpkin-bombs at Scrat the saber-squirrel (I mean, they literally could, legally, and you could watch it on Disney+ forever and ever), and many of us would still feel emotions stir.

 A Hidden Life REVIEW

A Hidden Life (2019)

An ecstatic, anguished three-hour cinematic hymn, Terrence Malick’s A Hidden Life sings the life and death of Blessed Franz Jägerstätter in asymmetrical binary form, in contrasting theologies — theology and anti-theology — of the body.

 The Two Popes REVIEW

The Two Popes (2019)

For a Catholic critic — or at least for this Catholic critic — a movie like The Two Popes presents a number of temptations.