A woman waits for her man to come home. This could be the tagline for Priscilla, Sofia Coppola’s new movie about the failed marriage between Priscilla and Elvis Presley. Coppola’s fascinating idea is that, beneath the grandeur of Graceland, the extravagant mansion Elvis bought and is now buried in, was…

Killers of the Flower Moon begins and ends with a Native American ritual. The first is mysterious and seductive, instantly immersing us into an unfamiliar realm with its own customs. The second is unbearably sad, especially as we reflect on the real-life tragedy that haunts the three-and-a-half hours that preceded…

Is it possible that the best movies of 2023 will end up being four Netflix shorts? It’s too early to say, but it’ll be difficult for other directors to match what Wes Anderson has accomplished with his latest Roald Dahl adaptations. The four shorts, The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar…

In a post-Trump America, ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’ is more prescient as Martin Scorsese explores how far people will go for money and power — As the world anxiously awaits the arrival of Martin Scorsese’s latest epic, the three-and-a-half-hour The Killers of the Flower Moon, some enthusiastic cinephile is probably going through his entire oeuvre right now. It’s easy to log the early classics like Taxi Driver (1976) and Raging Bull (1980) on Letterboxd with…

Is Denzel Washington the best actor who has appeared in the largest number of bad movies? Bad, of course, doesn’t mean unwatchable. This is Denzel, after all. But bad isn’t good, and as someone who has bought a ticket to every one of his movies for decades, I’ve always found…

Emma Seligman’s decision to detach ‘Bottoms’ from the present day is a missed opportunity that diminishes the movie’s significance — Although the teen comedy Bottoms is entertaining, it’s a bit of drag that the 28-year-old director Emma Seligman has more to say about movies than she does about life. In true genre fashion, the story follows PJ (Rachel Sennott, who also co-wrote the script with Seligman) and Josie (Ayo Edebiri)…

In his 2019 op-ed “A Nation of Weavers,” The New York Times columnist David Brooks claims that “we’re living with the excesses of 60 years of hyperindividualism.” Brooks explains, “There’s a lot of emphasis in our culture on personal freedom, self-interest, self-expression, the idea that life is an individual journey…

To call Passages a romance would be an insult to anyone who’s ever been in love. It plays more like a horror movie, and the monster to be fearful of is that insufferable ex we all wish we never met, but during our worst moment of weakness, we fell under…

Within the first few seconds of the documentary Children of the Mist, director Ha Le Diem reclaims a part of the world in Northern Vietnam that too many white, middle-class Westerners have colonized with their Sapa mountain treks and homestay visits. Contrary to the Instagram posts you may have seen…