Aardman’s beloved Wallace and Gromit return for their first adventure in 16 years. “Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl”, directed by four-time Oscar winner Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham, is a love letter to fans of the franchise. Mark Burton’s screenplay (one of the finest of the past year in cinema) is filled with clever […]
Five-time Academy Award winner John Williams is arguably the greatest film composer of all-time. A new documentary on his life and career, “Music by John Williams” (now streaming on Disney+), is one of my favorite movie experiences of 2024. It recently won the Critics Choice Documentary Award for Best Music Documentary, a well-deserved honor. Director […]
Out of the 180 new movies I’ve seen so far in 2024, “Piece by Piece” is definitely one of the 10 best. This is a documentary on the life and career of prolific music artist Pharrell Williams. And he wanted this doc to be entirely in LEGO, as he explains to Oscar winning director Morgan […]
“Transformers One” is my favorite animated film of 2024 so far. I don’t want to give away much of the story. What I will say is that it’s the origin story of these Transformers characters, including Optimus Prime (voiced by Chris Hemsworth) and Megatron (Brian Tyree Henry). They were initially friends. How do we get […]
“My Penguin Friend” is inspired by a rather unique true story. It begins with a lovely opening credits sequence featuring a map, followed by a rather dark prologue involving a father, Brazil fisherman Joao, who loses his child dies at sea. A bit too intense for the family film crowd the rest of the movie […]
Academy Award winning director Ron Howard (“A Beautiful Mind”) follows-up his powerhouse, underrated 2022 drama “Thirteen Lives” with one of the best films of 2024 so far. “Jim Henson: Idea Man” is a dynamic documentary on the life and career of the Muppets master, available on Disney+. This is a kaleidoscope of a presentation… vivacious […]
1971’s “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” and 2005’s “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” are two of my 100 favorite films of all-time. I consider both adaptations of the classic Roald Dahl story to be brilliant. Both Gene Wilder and Johnny Depp deliver powerful versions as the fascinating, multi-dimensional, dynamic chocolate-maker extraordinaire. When I learned […]
“The Hill” is a based-on-a-true story sports drama co-written by Angelo Pizzo, who wrote 1986’s “Hoosiers” and 1993’s “Rudy”. Not a bad resume for the genre. The A-list actor headlining “The Hill” is Dennis Quaid, who’s starred in more than a dozen sports films, including “The Rookie”, “The Express”, “Any Given Sunday” and “Blue Miracle”. […]
Netflix and A24 team-up for the compelling documentary, “The Deepest Breath”. The film takes a deep dive into the extreme—ly dangerous world of freediving, through the lives of two of the sport’s most iconic participants. Director Laura McGann begins by introducing us to multi-world record holder Alessia Zecchini and safety instructor/trainer Stephen Keenan using archival […]
The breathtaking, epic love story, “Weathering with You” was my favorite animated movie of 2019. Makoto Shinkai, the writer/director of that Annie nominee, as well as 2016’s acclaimed “Your Name”, returns with another triumph. “Suzume” is a spectacular anime adventure that makes you believe in the unbelievable. Bicycling to school one morning, the teen girl […]