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Spoilers: This review contains “non-specific” spoilers. Some readers may feel this reveals too much about the ending.For roughly two-thirds of its running length, Bad Samaritan shows potential as a nicely twisty thriller replete with Hitch...

2003’s Bad Santa was a milestone in feel-bad black comedy. Directed by Terry Zwigoff, written by Glenn Ficarra & John Requa, and co-executive produced by the Coen Brothers, it was a holiday movie unlike any previous holiday movie. Although ...

More than twenty years after the deaths of director Akira Kurosawa and actor Toshiro Mifune, the names remain entwined. For nearly two decades, the pair combined to make some of the best Japanese movies to hit the world stage. And, although Ku...

Bad Teacher takes a delicious premise and leaves a sour aftertaste. Despite the promise of something nasty and cutting, the film turns out to be as edgy as a dull razor with limp "raunchy" comedy and an unwillingness to push envelopes. The concept ...

There was a time back in the 1990s when everyone wanted to be Tarantino. As we learned at the time, however, there’s only one Tarantino and all the attempts to mimic his style and approach felt like third generation VHS dubs. Now, some 25 ye...

There's no debating that Bad Words contains some big, politically incorrect laughs. The movie isn't awash in them but there are enough to keep the chuckles coming. The film's problem is that, despite obvious aspirations to be more than just a profa...

The title may make it sound like a horror film but The Bag Man is actually a neo-noir thriller. The movie is relentlessly dark with the majority of it transpiring in and around a seedy motel at night. Despite the participation of a couple of well-kno...

Those wacky Coens are at it again. And those serious Coens. And those loquacious Coens. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, a paean to pre-revisionist Westerns, allows the Oscar-winning brothers to try out nearly every weapon in their considerable ...

The Ballad of Narayama, a 1958 Japanese film from director Keisuke Kinoshita, is revered in some critical circles because of its extreme stylization – using the art of kabuki theater to form a template for the exploration of Shichiro Fukazaw...

Banana Split, the directorial debut of cinematographer Benjamin Kasulke, is a romantic comedy with a twist. Here, the central relationship is one of platonic friendship rather than physical attraction. (Although one could make a case that ther...