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#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘Film About a Father Who’ Review: Family Secrets by OmissionIn her new documentary, Lynne Sachs assesses her relationship with her father, Ira Sachs Sr., who fathered children with multiple women.Ira Sachs Sr., as seen in Lynne Sachs’s documentary “Film About a Father Who.”Credit…Cinema GuildJan. 14, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETLynne Sachs shot the footage that became “Film About a Father Who” from 1984 to 2019, and her ideas about what form the movie might take — along with her impressions of her father — must have changed during that time. (Even movies themselves evolved. “Film About a Father Who” mixes 8- and 16-millimeter film, home videotapes and, from the near present, digital material.)This brisk, prismatic and richly psychodramatic family portrait finds Sachs assessing her relationship with her father, Ira Sachs Sr., described at one point as the “Hugh Hefner of Park City,” the Utah skiing enclave where the Sundance Film Festival is held. The filmmaker Ira Sachs Jr., Lynne’s brother, says their father can’t “be self-consciously sad or self-consciously joyful” — he always seems simply content. In his contemporary incarnation, their dad, with a bushy white mustache and shoulder-length hair, resembles an older version of The Dude from “The Big Lebowski.”[embedded content]He comes across as genuinely warm — but also as having a huge blind spot. Sachs Sr. fathered children with multiple women, taking what the movie implies has been a casual approach to paternity. In 2016, Lynne and the others learned that they had two half-siblings in addition to the ones they already knew about.It’s suggested that the elder Ira’s mother couldn’t take the “constant flow” of new relatives. The children’s economic circumstances also varied. A younger member of the Sachs brood says it’s difficult to be around siblings who grew up better-off than she did.But Lynne, intriguingly, doesn’t render an uncomplicated verdict on her father. He’s a blank, filled in differently in each circumstance. As the title (inspired by Yvonne Rainer’s “Film About a Woman Who”) indicates, he defies being reduced to one word.Film About a Father WhoNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 14 minutes. Watch through virtual cinemas.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Bloody Hell’ Review: An Acrid Thriller Bites Off Too MuchCannibals and comedy are mixed in this deranged ride from the director Alister Grierson.Ben O’Toole in “Bloody Hell.”Credit…The Horror CollectiveJan. 14, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETBloody HellDirected by Alister GriersonAction, Horror, Mystery, ThrillerR1h 33mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.This noxious thriller makes a hero out of Rex (Ben O’Toole), a military veteran who served time after killing a woman in an attempt to halt an armed robbery. After Rex’s release from prison, he hopes to clear his mind with a trip to Finland — but his vacation is cut short when masked assailants attack him in an airport taxi and blast him with sleeping gas.Rex wakes up hanging from a basement ceiling, with one leg sawed off below the knee.He quickly deduces that he’s in a family home, an assumption that’s confirmed when Rex is briefly visited by Alia (Meg Fraser), the possibly sympathetic daughter of the house who has been forced to serve her cannibal brother.[embedded content]The situation is fit for horror, but the director Alister Grierson doesn’t settle into a tone of pure terror. Instead, he has the bound Rex start up a conversation with an imaginary version of himself — a projection who has the frame of mind to make a plan. The duo attempt to strategize their way out, and the banter between the two Rexes provides a source of deranged comedy.The problem is that Grierson’s gesture at humor only amplifies the repulsiveness of the situation — the gore of Rex’s dripping leg, the cartoon villainy of his captors. The film tries to take a maximalist approach to genres, techniques and tones, but the effect is discordant and scattershot. One minute Grierson is incorporating fantasy sequences and flashbacks, the next the movie takes a detour for romantic comedy. It’s a buffet of only sour dishes, a rank fete of foulness.Bloody HellRated R. Running time: 1 hour 33 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on Apple TV, Vudu and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘Some Kind of Heaven’ Review: Hardly an Idle RetirementThis documentary co-produced by The New York Times visits a retirement community the size of a small city.Barbara Lochiatto, a resident of The Villages, in the documentary “Some Kind of Heaven.”Credit…Magnolia PicturesJan. 14, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETSome Kind of HeavenNYT Critic’s PickDirected by Lance OppenheimDocumentary1h 21mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.“Some Kind of Heaven,” a documentary co-produced by The New York Times, pierces the bubble of The Villages, a Florida retirement community northwest of Orlando that has grown to the size of a small city. The architecture and even the local lore foster an illusion of history.Rather than present a cross-section of this 30-square-mile golf-opolis, the director, Lance Oppenheim, making his first feature, focuses on three sets of characters.Reggie and Anne, married for nearly five decades, have hit a rough patch. While Reggie embraces tai chi and says he likes using drugs that get him “to a spiritual place,” Anne laments that his “sense of reality has become even more out-there.” On their anniversary, he informs her that he has died and been reincarnated.[embedded content]For Barbara, newly widowed, life in The Villages is difficult without a partner. Dennis technically doesn’t live there at all. He sleeps in a van and hopes to meet a “nice-looking lady with some money.” (A guard who explains that The Villages isn’t functionally a gated compound cheerily greets drivers at an entrance without checking names.)Oppenheim finds no shortage of visual and situational comedy, whether it’s in a slow zoom on Dennis making a poolside move or courtroom video of Reggie ineptly defending himself before a judge. (There’s little mention of politics; “Some Kind of Heaven” had its premiere a year ago, before much of the coverage of The Villages’ significance in the 2020 presidential campaign.)But Oppenheim resists easy misanthropy, showing unexpected empathy for people who have cocooned themselves from the outside world, only to confront its headaches anyway.Some Kind of HeavenNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 21 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on Google Play, FandangoNow and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCritic’s Pick‘My Little Sister’ Review: Sibling DependencyA cancer diagnosis only strengthens the bond between adult twins in this perceptive Swiss drama.Nina Hoss in “My Little Sister.”Credit…Film MovementJan. 14, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETMy Little SisterNYT Critic’s PickDirected by Stéphanie Chuat, Véronique ReymondDrama1h 39mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.“My Little Sister,” a tender domestic drama from the Swiss writers and directors Stéphanie Chuat and Véronique Reymond, faces terminal illness with a refreshing emotional candor.Lisa (Nina Hoss), a gifted Berlin playwright, stopped writing on the day that her beloved twin brother, Sven (Lars Eidinger), a celebrated theater actor, received his leukemia diagnosis. Since then, she’s been living in artistic limbo in Switzerland, where her husband (Jens Albinus) teaches at a prestigious boarding school. But the demands of Sven’s illness, and Lisa’s inability to accept his decline, only tug her closer to her brother and further from her fracturing marriage.[embedded content]Distinguished by a modestly discreet directing style that allows the actors to shine, “My Little Sister” offers neither false uplift nor dreary realism. The photography is bright and lustrous, the tone vital and purposeful. Eidinger plays Sven entirely without self-pity, a man furiously seizing public-restroom sex as if willing his depleted body to perform. And Hoss makes Lisa a ball of anxious industry, her denial and distress keeping her in constant motion. Both siblings, more than anything, want Sven back onstage; they have always been each other’s muse.Absolving the film of any shred of sentimentality, the indispensable Marthe Keller, as the twins’ testy mother, delivers her sometimes shockingly unfiltered remarks with a pique that softens their cruelty. Small in scale and big in heart, “My Little Sister” believes unwaveringly in the palliative power of art: When medicine can’t heal you, sometimes words can fill the breach.My Little SisterNot rated. In German and French, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 39 minutes. Watch on Film Movement.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘The Marksman’ Review: In Need of a MissionLiam Neeson plays the reluctant protector of an undocumented Mexican boy in this dusty drama.Liam Neeson in “The Marksman.”Credit…Open Road Films/Briarcliff EntertainmentJan. 14, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETThe MarksmanDirected by Robert LorenzAction, ThrillerPG-131h 48mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.The plot of “The Marksman,” a melancholy road movie starring Liam Neeson, could fit on a bullet casing, but a list of its clichés would require substantially more space.As would a tally of its improbabilities. Neeson plays Jim Hanson, a widowed Arizona rancher whose cattle are being eaten by coyotes and whose property is being devoured by the bank. All the usual good-guy signifiers are present: the U.S. Marines tattoo on his forearm, the Silver Star in his drawer, the American flag flapping on his porch. Gazing wistfully at the hill where his dead wife’s ashes have been scattered, Jim is a lonely warrior in need of nothing so much as a mission.[embedded content]Along it comes in the diminutive form of Miguel (Jacob Perez), 11, and his dying mother (Teresa Ruiz), undocumented immigrants fleeing Mexico with money stolen from a drug cartel. One reluctant promise and several rounds of gunfire later, Jim and his rickety pickup truck are transporting Miguel to his Chicago relatives, a posse of deadeyed cartel goons on their tail. Luckily, Jim’s repeated use of a credit card — despite a bag full of cash under his dash — is making their pursuit much easier.Slow and simple and minimally violent, “The Marksman,” directed by Robert Lorenz, cares more about bonding than brutality. Predictable to a fault, the movie coasts pleasurably on Neeson’s seasoned, sad-sweet charisma — an asset that’s been tragically imprisoned in mopey-loner roles and generic action thrillers. That melted-caramel brogue should be flirting with Diane Lane or Debra Winger, not teaching children how to use guns.The MarksmanRated PG-13 for the shooting of several bad men and one very good dog. Running time: 1 hour 47 minutes. In theaters. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Hunted’ Review: Catch Me if You CanRiffing on “Little Red Riding Hood,” this sadistic chase movie sends a young woman and two attackers into the deep, dark woods.Lucie Debay in “Hunted.”Credit…ShudderJan. 14, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETHuntedDirected by Vincent ParonnaudAction, Thriller1h 27mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.Adding a fairy-tale cast to a generic horror setup is of no benefit to “Hunted,” Vincent Paronnaud’s unpleasant merger of slasher movie and survival thriller.Claiming kinship with the fable of Little Red Riding Hood, the story introduces Eve (Lucie Debay), who will serve as both victim and heroine. Recently arrived in an unfamiliar town to manage a construction project, Eve — rather obviously sporting a crimson, hooded jacket — ducks her demanding boss and heads to a bar. When a skeevy, stubbled stranger (Arieh Worthalter) guides her from dance floor to waiting car, her reckless acquiescence to his wolfish charm is baffling. Until we factor in her bellyful of mojitos.[embedded content]The situation rapidly deteriorates as Eve’s nameless acquaintance and his submissive accomplice (Ciaran O’Brien) dump her in the trunk and head into the forest, where she promptly escapes. A foul video recording of a previous abduction energizes abuser number one, while a dose of Viagra promises to restore the other’s flagging resolve. Mounting injuries and oddball encounters accompany their lengthy and increasingly absurd pursuit; yet as Eve’s behavior grows more feral — and Debay’s physical exertions more breathtaking — “Hunted” fails to shake off its greasy grindhouse stink.Swerving from surrealism to sadism, “Hunted” sees no upside to establishing characters before weaponizing them. By recognizing the bestial in both sexes, the movie may recall Neil Jordan’s 1985 film, “The Company of Wolves” (based on Angela Carter’s sublime short story of the same name). Unisex violence, however, isn’t necessarily more satisfying: Sometimes, it’s just more sickening.HuntedNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 27 minutes. Watch on Shudder.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘American Skin’ Review: Out for JusticeIn Nate Parker’s film, a father takes matters into his own hands to hold a police officer to account for shooting down his son.Nate Parker, right, with Milauna Jackson in “American Skin.”Credit…Vertical EntertainmentJan. 14, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETAmerican SkinDirected by Nate ParkerDramaR1h 29mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.Nate Parker’s “American Skin” opens with a traffic stop, captured on body cams. The driver, Lincoln (played by Parker), watches helplessly as his teenage son, Kijani (Tony Espinosa), is shot down by a police officer. The incident plants the seed for what becomes a kind of vigilante courtroom drama.A year after the shooting, a student filmmaker, Jordin (Shane Paul McGhie), undertakes a documentary about Lincoln and his loss. He interviews Lincoln and chronicles the aftermath when Kijani’s killer goes free. Then Lincoln, a soft-spoken Marine veteran, takes Jordin and his small crew on a car ride that unexpectedly turns into a mission to kidnap a police captain.[embedded content]Lincoln goes on to take an entire police station hostage at gunpoint, with help from friends, all filmed by Jordin’s team. He launches an ad hoc trial of the freed cop, Randall (Beau Knapp), appointing jurors from the jail’s orange-suited prisoners and others who happen to be present. The stage is set for the airing of grievances, prejudices and outrage. (The improvised court setting may feel fraught for another reason: Parker’s 2016 debut feature as director, “The Birth of a Nation,” foundered after new controversy surrounding rape charges he faced and was acquitted of in 2001.)The screenplay’s ample chances for grandstanding don’t serve any actor well for long. The button-pushing dialogue during the trial sounds like agree-or-disagree statements from a poll of racial attitudes. Instead of lending immediacy, the padded-out documentary conceit only spotlights the stiltedness, and Parker falls short of building credible drama out of urgent issues.American SkinRated R. Running time: 1 hour 29 minutes. Rent or buy on Apple TV, Google Play and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Locked Down’ Review: In Quarantine, Misery Hates CompanyAnne Hathaway and Chiwetel Ejiofor play a couple sheltering in their London brownstone over the early weeks of the pandemic in this irritating heist comedy.Anne Hathaway and Chiwetel Ejiofor in “Locked Down.”Credit…Susan Allnutt/HBO MaxJan. 14, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETLocked DownDirected by Doug LimanComedy, Crime, RomanceR1h 58mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.A London couple endures the most mundane of Covid-19 miseries in “Locked Down,” a desultory comedy set in the early weeks of the pandemic.The story centers on Linda (Anne Hathaway) and Paxton (Chiwetel Ejiofor), longtime romantic partners who suffer the trials, nay, the tortures of a life in lockdown: Zoom calls, pajama pants, cigarettes indoors. Linda whines about feeling listless; Paxton, in a marathon of poor taste, calls neighbors “fellow inmates” and jokes about suicide. Despite cohabitating, the couple has recently split up, and they avoid each other by working and sleeping in separate, lavish bedrooms in their multistory brownstone.The film, directed by Doug Liman (“Mr. & Mrs. Smith”) and streaming on HBO Max, perks up halfway through, once Linda and Paxton each receive a work assignment to retrieve a 3 million pound diamond from Harrods for a wealthy client. The ordinarily law-abiding pair find themselves at a crossroads. Should they risk it all to pocket the diamond, sell it for cash and free their minds from bourgeois malaise?[embedded content]Shot in the fall under pandemic protocols, “Locked Down” has a charming low-fi quality. Many sequences unfold on screens, as Linda and Paxton chat with colleagues or vent to friends over video calls. Ben Kingsley, as Paxton’s manager, and Ben Stiller, as Linda’s boss, appear only virtually, and Liman succeeds in milking the actors’ remote comic timing.But mostly, the film already feels like a relic. Its pandemic jokes — toilet paper hoarders, Zoom freezes — wore thin by summer. We’re meant to identify with Linda and Paxton, to laugh knowingly as the pair descend into isolation-induced hysteria. Instead, the film evokes the era of the cursed “Imagine” video, when celebrities deemed the coronavirus a great equalizer while groaning about going stir-crazy at their villas. Like that Instagram misfire, the best that “Locked Down” has to offer, at least while we remain in the throes of a deadly crisis, is a window into a luxurious space to quarantine.Locked DownRated R. Running time 1 hour 58 minutes. Watch on HBO Max.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More