The film doesn’t offer the most incisive social commentary, but as a document of our contemporary political moment, its force is undeniable.
Fox’s Blu-ray may be the reference disc of the year so far, with unimpeachable audio and video and a host of strong extras to boot.
Sony’s Blu-ray does right by the film’s aesthetic wonders and includes a plethora of kid- and adult-friendly extras that dig into the complexity of the animation.
Mahershala Ali, still fresh off his prior win in this category, performs utter miracles with the role of jazz pianist Dr. Don Shirley.
The film’s action boasts some of the most sturdy, coherent direction to mark a giant-scale blockbuster in some time.
With its fine-tuned comic timing and feeling of constant action, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is downright invigorating.
Peter Farrelly respects the severity of the characters’ social context while ensuring that Green Book never steps outside its protagonists’ relationship.
Roxanne Roxanne’s actors allow writer-director Michael Larnell’s familiar material to sing.
Moonlight’s unlikely success hopefully implies that the world has yet to slide entirely down a rabbit hole of unbridled bigotry.
Mahershala Ali’s performance self-effacingly articulates the humanity of a man that so many in our country would like to pretend is non-existent.
Taraji P. Henson triumphantly articulates the pained dignity of Katherine Johnson’s pent-up frustration.
Above all else, Marvel’s Luke Cage is about what, if any, qualifications there are for being a hero.
What tends to right Moonlight, even when Jenkins’s style drifts into indulgence, is the strength of its actors.
The acting in Moonlight elevates the clichés of Barry Jenkins’s script into something approaching lived truth.
It’s less notable for its originality than for how dynamically it blends a few styles that ultimately prove incompatible.
After its bracing opening, the film begins to indulge the worst impulses of well-meaning liberal cinema.
The show’s writing feels wrapped up in hitting plot points and story beats rather than seeking out moments of violent personal revelation.
As a metaphor for the way we respond to the media, the film succeeds most when it revels in ambiguity.
The film sacrifices emotional specificity to often-purple marriages of sight and sound.