Vince Mancini

Never before has a streaming release so capably evoked “Summer blockbuster.”

Happytime Murders isn’t the funniest or the smartest movie I’ve ever seen, but I forgive it because it isn’t trying that hard. At least, joke-wise. There’s something beautiful about the level of craft that goes into just one puppet, that in many cases ends up appearing in a single, one-off joke about pubic lice.

7 Prisoners refuses to cheat, almost to a fault. (It’s art, you’re allowed to cheat a little). That makes it slightly disappointing in the end, but not enough to undo what an adroit snapshot it is of the way exploitation thwarts organization and dulls its opposition.

It’s silly without being stupid, smart without being dull, and broad without being corny. It’s a hell of a feature debut for Mimi Cave and a solid sophomore effort for Lauryn Kahn.

As a storytelling exercise, Birds of Prey is mostly pretty bad, but aside from a sneaky wit and committed Margot Robbie, what it does have going for it is consistently spectacular stunts.

Where gangster and mafioso stories so often seem epic, taking the shape of classic rise-and-fall narratives, Arkansas is elusive and ephemeral. Its characters struggle to survive against a universe that doesn’t really care about them. It’s not the most escapist quarantine content, but there’s a simple beauty to it.

Something about Mortal Kombat‘s total lack of pretense towards nutritional value is weirdly refreshing.

The humor is stylized but sharply-structured, slightly shticky but well-timed and mostly gentle in tone.

Onward is a perfectly fine movie made up of elements of Guardians of the Galaxy, Zootopia, Coco, Wall E, and assorted other Disney products that it doesn’t employ quite as well. Your kids probably won’t notice, but you will.

Greed is solidly entertaining throughout, but its attempt to mix comedy, tragedy, reality, absurdity, exposé, and mockumentary… is maybe biting off a little more than it can chew.

First Reformed is bleak and bone dry, a little self-indulgent, and it screams neither “fun” nor “production values.” It is the opposite of a “romp.” But damned if it doesn’t stay with you.

It Chapter 2 is like this rumbling ball of smooshed together fiction tropes — kids on bikes! bullies vs outcasts! conquering your fears! scary clowns! bad guys who drool! — that rapidly disintegrates as it speeds toward an ending. It’s the disintegration that makes it interesting (well, that and the competent staging and acting).

Searching has a big performance and a big gimmick, and it’s hard to say which is the bigger discovery.

Mostly, everything in it seems designed to build and maintain suspense that carries us from scene to scene, a task it more than accomplishes.

It’s a wild concept, that offers both big laughs and big cringe in almost equal measure. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a film vacillate so wildly between borderline unwatchable and irresistibly watchable.

Exploitation has always been Bay’s foremost skill, and in this era when movies have begun to seem chintzy and distinctly unglorious, Bay’s talents as a hype man and product pornographer seem oddly refreshing. If anyone was going to make a mid-budget action movie feel like the biggest, coolest, sexiest thing in the world, it was Michael Bay.

Halloween is tasteful and clever and understands its source material enough to appeal to leave the superfans cheering (I should know, I sat next to one). But I couldn’t help thinking that it sells the original better than it sells itself. Which is just fine.

1917 is a movie’s movie, more showpiece than insight, a kind of flashy sizzle reel of The Great War’s horrors. It will rattle your speakers but probably not your soul. Nothing wrong with that, but better to know going in.

Some of the men’s fancies are beautifully visualized (including what I will describe only as an extremely vaginal apparition), but they remain just that — fancies. It’s never clear that what’s happening in the men’s wizened heads alters the world outside it.

It’s silly, thoroughly disposable, and a breezy 90 minutes long. What else could you ask for?

M3GAN is a pretty pitch-perfect satire, of both parenting in the age of predatory technology, and of the tech industry itself. Both of which tend to pit convenience and luxury against mental health and a right to privacy.

Crazy Rich Asians is just really easy to watch. It’s formulaic, but doesn’t cheat; has insanely low stakes, but transparently so. It’s a kitschy pop song done very well.

It’s snappy, looks pretty, and moves along affably enough.

I Free Pretty is surprisingly resonant for a high concept light comedy, offering all the catharsis of watching someone truly discover herself and own it, as well as the awkwardness and pain of watching someone needlessly tear herself down and self-sabotage.

It’s A-actors in a B-movie shot by competent craftsmen. Amazing what holding the camera steady can do, isn’t it? Simple pleasures delivered simply — there’s nothing wrong with that.

To say that I was mildly disappointed in Jackass Forever is true. To say that I spent the entire movie screaming, stomping my feet, covering my face with my hands, and squealing with joy, and would’ve happily sat through another 90 minutes of it is also true.

Extremely Wicked‘s portrayal yawns with a sense of incompleteness.

Hand of God is a charming, frequently funny coming-of-age tale shot so exquisitely that it would make any Italian-American angry at his ancestors.