Michael Phillips

Growing up in Rockford, cinematographer and director Bing Liu spent a lot of his teenage years skateboarding and filming his friends doing the same. “Minding the Gap” is the result,...

“The Happytime Murders” is a one-joke movie, minus one joke. The year may cough up a worse film, but probably not a more joyless, witless one, raunchy or otherwise. This...

It’s all you need to know, really. The 54th Chicago International Film Festival (Oct. 10-21) will feature the new Michael Shannon movie — the warm, well-regarded Sundance premiere “What They...

An unusually good adaptation of an unusually good novel, “The Wife” is a wizard of strategy, building an underground arsenal of resentments, evasions and fireworks for an 11th-hour confrontation that...

The new film version of “Papillon,” based on Henri Charriere’s 1969 bestseller and its 1973 sequel, “Banco,” is rather better than the previous screen adaptation starring Steve McQueen (mouth closed)...

If the phrase “Noir City” requires some geographical context, here are three sentences for you. Noir City is a burg of dark alleys and long shadows. It’s located in a...

The entwined reputations of Kim Novak and “Vertigo” have risen dramatically in the eyes of the worldwide critical establishment over the last 60 years. The most recent Sight & Sound...

So now the Oscars have turned into George C. Scott in “The Hustler.” Remember George C. Scott in “The Hustler”? He played the gambler and manager who screamed at Paul...

Have sharks jumped the Fonzie? Seems like it’s always Shark Week around here, and “here” means everywhere. Think of how long it has been since the first “Jaws” (1975). A...