Brian Wilson 1942-2025

We just weren't made for his times.

New Reviews: "Ballerina," "Straw" 🔒

From this week's WaPo reviews: A "John Wick" spinoff and the latest Tyler Perry melodrama

I Know He Is But What Are You?

Matt Wolf's documentary peeks behind the surface of a pop-culture icon in search of the lost boy beneath. Plus, some thoughts about the new Wes Anderson design showroom - sorry, movie - the two faces of Dubrovnik and on demand recommendations.

Tom Cruise Will Never Die

And other thoughts about "Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning." Also: "I'm Still Here" and a new "Four Seasons" come to Netflix

One Good Film: "Land Ho!" (2014)

A hot spring of a movie: It fizzes a lot, and you come out feeling better than you went in.

Pan Sauce

On the art of the negative movie review and an anniversary celebration of one of the best bad reviews ever written.

New Reviews: "Fight or Flight," "Juliet & Romeo," Henry Johnson" 🔒

One hellacious B-movie action-comedy, one parboiled Shakespeare revamp for tweenie-boppers and a late-career curio from a great American playwright.

10 Good Movies on Netflix (again)

Plus: A heads-up for the latest Movie Club screening and a Watch List bargain.

New Reviews: "Another Simple Favor," "The Surfer," "Words of War" 🔒

This week's reviews from the Washington Post, including one of the year's worst movies and a bio-drama of a hero.

"Sinners" and the Curse of Amnesia

Some belated thoughts on the year's most ambitious movie and what it asks of audiences.

Best Bets for Boston's Best Film Festival

(plus: New WaPo reviews of "On Swift Horses" and "The Legend of Ochi") I’ve been running around so much this week that I forgot to tell my local readers about this year’s edition – the 22nd – of the best little film fest in town, The

Rerun: Walter Matthau's Barbaric Yawp

It's been a busy week with all sorts of irons in the fire, movie- and life-related, so I thought I'd dust off one of the very first Watch List postings from 2021 because it was fun to write and because this guy is fun to read about.