Happiest Season (2020) - Movie Review

It’s kind of impossible to get casting that’s better than this, especially for something as traditionally over-billed as a Christmas movie. On one side, Kristen Stewart, an actress with one of the most gratifying resurgences of the last decade, and a modern gay icon. And on the other, Mackenzie Davis, half of one of the greatest gay romances in all of fiction with Black Mirror's San Junipero. They've both been in some less-than-ideal features this year already (Underwater and Seberg for Stewart, The Turning and Irresistible for Davis), but all the same, a movie with them together as a couple has just got to be good. And thankfully, it very much is.

Irresistible (2020) - Movie Review

2020 has not been a good year for political satire, at least when it comes to feature-length efforts. Admittedly, this genre has a higher degree of difficulty than most, and COVID fucking up the release schedule is likely delaying most of the good stuff while the disposable shit rises to the top, but there’s also the collective mood to account for as well. It has been a highly turbulent four years, and alongside the rising hostility across party lines, there has also been a rise in the need to vent about such things. A lot of the political cinema this year has had a heavy air of needing to get something off the filmmakers’ chests, but without the clarity needed to make it resonate when describing it to someone else. It is in this mode that Jon Stewart returns to the director’s chair with… well, I hesitate to call it the worst so far, but it is definitely the tamest, which in its own way is even worse.

The Turning (2020) - Movie Review

A film’s ending has the power to make, or break, the entire preceding story. That feeling where I think I’ve got a handle on what a given film is aiming for, only for the production to pull the rug out from under my feet, is a jarring one and something that can mess with the process of writing a review afterwards because it requires a serious amount of re-adjustment; this is part of the reason why I never really got my head around Hereditary when it came time to formally review it. But then there’s films like this, where that jarring feeling doesn’t make me think I need to re-assess what I just watched; it only solidifies that the film itself sucks.

Terminator: Dark Fate (2019) - Movie Review

One of the most common hypotheticals in the realm of time travel fiction is the Baby Hitler scenario: Travelling back in time to kill Hitler as an infant before he grows into one of history’s most notorious dictators. There are a lot of ethical dilemmas and potential consequences that spring out of this idea, but one of the lesser-discussed ones is the possibility that making the kill successfully wouldn’t solve everything. That while the very specific threat Hitler posed may be prevented, something just as bad, or worse, could take its place in human history. It is this idea that forms part of the core of today’s feature, and it makes for one of the most welcome surprises of the year.

Tully (2018) - Movie Review

The plot: Mother-of-two Marlo (Charlize Theron) and her husband Drew (Ron Livingston) are expecting their third child soon. However, the stress of taking care of the two they already have has taken its toll on Marlo. Her brother Craig (Mark Duplass) suggests that she hire a night nanny to help around the house, and soon, Tully (Mackenzie Davis) arrives at Marlo’s front door offering to help her. As the two connect, it seems that Marlo is finally getting the support she needed and things are looking up… but how long will it last?