The performances in director Gus Van Sant’s tremendous drama are so good that the actors completely embody the characters they play. It’s not three-time Oscar nominee Joaquin Phoenix strugglng to overcome addiction from a wheelchair — it’s cartoonist John Callahan, consistently willing to blame his struggles on others. We don’t see Jonah Hill as his…

Denzel Washington comes back for his first-ever sequel, and almost matches the original with Equalizer 2. He re-teams with Antoine Fuqua, the genre director responsible for other Denzel hits like Magnificent Seven and Oscar-winner Training Day. Fuqua provides an action-packed sequel and allows Washington’s natural charisma to shine once again. Equalizer was a brutal, difficult…

Something about this sequel sings, dazzles and shines just a little brighter than the bombastic original did 10 years ago. The eclectic mix from ABBA’s lesser-known, less showy catalogue somehow brings us a film that matches — and improves on — the original in so many ways. The film follows Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) who’s preparing…

Every few years, a film comes along that’s so incredibly original, raw and insane that it shocks audiences everywhere. If you haven’t heard by now, nothing can prepare you for director Boots Riley’s Sorry To Bother You. Lakeith Stanfield — a standout performer in last year’s horror phenomenon Get Out — is Cassius Green, an…

Ant-Man has been the much-needed comic relief in the Marvel Universe since his debut in 2015. With this sequel, the franchise serves as a palate cleanser from the dark Avengers: Infinity War. Ant-Man & the Wasp picks up in the time after Captain America: Civil War and before Infinity War, with the titular hero (played…

Somewhere around the midway point of Leave No Trace, you fall in love with internally tortured Will. He’s a strong, silent man with the desire to raise his teenage daughter Tom away from the stresses and constraints of a suburban life. The two forage for food, live in a makeshift shelter and start fires without…

Now that Blumhouse’s Purge franchise has had three films, they’ve gone the all-too-safe prequel route to try to mine more money from consumers. With the First Purge, they head back to the beginning, where the Founding Fathers of America have taken control in a difficult economic climate. They decide to use Staten Island for the…

Of all the spectacular, visionary films I’ve seen, nothing has hit me in the gut quite like Upgrade. This sci-fi/horror picture comes from Blumhouse, the studio behind The Purge and Happy Death Day. But while this one has the style of those, it has the wit of the Oscar-nominated Jordan Peele-helmed Get Out, also a…

There’s a softness and sentimentality to Uncle Drew that you just don’t find in mainstream cinema these days. Normally, when a bunch of stars dress in fat suits and makeup for a comedy, we get Norbit or an awful Tyler Perry movie. Here, it’s not about hitting the low-hanging fruit. These real-life basketball legends, in…

In formidable, brooding fashion, this tense follow-up to 2015 cartel smash Sicario is almost as good as the original. In fact, in many ways, it surpasses the ambitious original, making it one of my favourite movies so far of 2018. Sicario: Day of the Soldado continues the theme of a war on drugs, and uses…