ReelViews for PG movies

Tomorrowland is an interesting collage of moments and ideas in search of a strong narrative and a coherent ending. For a while, it doesn't matter that the plot meanders. The story seems like a jigsaw puzzle inviting us to solve it. That's the...

Tootsie works for three reasons: a sharp screenplay, good comic timing, and delightful performances. There's nothing deep or philosophical about the film. It doesn't try to solve the world's problems or uncover some great social truth. It's a ge...

Top Gun is an ‘80s testosterone fix – a celebration of machismo and a recruiting film for the U.S. Navy. Typical of Jerry Bruckheimer/Don Simpson at their peak, the movie embraces masculine tropes to create a patchwork narrative that is almost...

2016’s Trolls, an animated confection based on the toy line, was a pleasant surprise, both in terms of its appeal and its box office prowess. The latter (as much as the former) determined that there would be a sequel. At one point, distribut...

To say that TRON was ahead of its time is to understate the matter. '80s special effects aside (pioneering though they were), this movie is a tremendous predictor of things to come, not only in terms of virtual reality but with respect to the advan...

Seen in IMAX 3-D. They had 28 years, and this is the best they could come up with? It's not that TRON: Legacy is a complete failure. It's just that one has a right to expect a little more from a sequel this long in the making. The original TR...

Truman Burbank (Jim Carrey) is the star of the most popular show in the history of television. For 10,909 days, it has been on the air, using 5000 cameras to show every moment in every day of the life of one man. The public loves it -- there ...

In 2014, Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Like Father, Like Son missed the #1 spot on my annual Top 10 list by a whisker (it was one of three films that year to which I awarded four stars). A few years later, his Shoplifters topped the l...

A film like Up makes it clear that Pixar has moved beyond the point where it feels the need to pander to children. Unlike its main animation competitor, Dreamworks, Pixar allows sophisticated themes and ideas to seep into its movies. Everything d...

Seeing the newly-restored, 70 mm print of Vertigo in a theater is an experience that no fan of Hitchcock, or of cinema in general, should miss. Especially for those (like me) whose sole exposure to the film has been through faded, deterioratin...