‘Free Solo’ review: Scaling the sheer face of lunacy
“Free Solo” will be widely available soon enough, streaming on student ID-sized screens or laptops or whatever else you own. I can’t think of a worse documentary to confine to...
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‘Halloween’ review: It takes a granny (Jamie Lee Curtis) to get tough on Michael Myers
At this point in 2018, a movie featuring three generations of victimized women squaring off against a predatory male is destined to find an audience. Nostalgia and catharsis; splatter and...
‘Beautiful Boy’ review: Steve Carell and Timothee Chalamet ground a pair of addiction memoirs
The words cannot be easy to hear as an addict, or as the parent of an addict. “Relapse is a part of recovery,” a clinic worker says to a distraught...
‘Bad Times at the El Royale’ review: No-tell motel guests hunt for mystery money and Chris Hemsworth’s abs seek a follower
Some filmmakers make movies about the world; others make movies about other movies, or the puzzle being assembled before our eyes. Drew Goddard belongs to the second category, and he’s...
‘The Hate U Give’ review: A Starr is born, thanks to Amandla Stenberg and a YA adaptation that speaks to our time
It’s seriously satisfying to watch a screen version of a young-adult best-seller that knows what it’s doing, and gets so much right. Just as Angie Thomas’ debut novel “The Hate...
‘First Man’ review: Ryan Gosling trades la la land for wishing on the moon
There’s enough going on in director Damien Chazelle’s tense, distinctive Neil Armstrong biopic, “First Man,” to leave the climactic, inspired Apollo 11 moon landing sequence aside for a few paragraphs....
The films (and real-life marriage with Chicago ties) that led to the new ‘Star Is Born’
Scene, interior: Hollywood’s Brown Derby restaurant. The year: 1932. Outside, the Depression nears its lowest ebb. Inside, amid the cigarette smoke and lecherous glances, the banter hums with possibility. “What’s...
Why ‘Tootsie’ struggles to make itself into a musical in 2018
It’s a legendary show business wisecrack. In 1961, comedy writer Larry Gelbart, a satiric genius and master of comic construction, found himself floundering in Philadelphia, writing and rewriting the book...
Chicago film fest primer: 10 films to see
At press time, this year’s Chicago International Film Festival plans to screen 123 features across 12 days, which is three fewer days and 23 fewer movies than last year. I’m...
Mimi Plauche: The Chicago International Film Festival director comes into focus
Even among future film festival artistic directors, it’s novel for a preteen to encounter a revival of a three-hour Ingmar Bergman picture (“Fanny and Alexander”), or a seriously traumatizing Vietnam...