In 2018, social media fragility and the internalization of fears keep people trapped, much like the subjects of George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968) are trapped as they sift through media information while the unthinkable threatens their safety. Even though Night of the Living...

An interest in sex is common ground for most people, but not for me. There’s no onscreen depiction of sex that arouses me. It’s foreign at best and horrifying at worst. Why? Because I’m asexual. Let’s clear a few things up first. No, being asexual is not the same thing as being celibate,...

A Star Is Born has changed from the story of an actress (1937) to the story of a musical actress (1954), then a rock star (1976), and now a pop diva. One thing that hasn’t changed, though, is the casting of a gay icon and a hot leading man in the central roles. Since that formula works, we’re...

A Star Is Born, the story of a romance between a fading male celebrity and a rising female artist so good it’s been told four times already, is in theaters now. Based on the incredible buzz the film has been getting from critics on the festival circuit, Warner Bros. smells Oscar gold as well as...

Because of her outlandish costumery and made-up name, it's easy to dismiss Lady Gaga as a gimmicky pop star. What we discover in the sturdy, old-fashioned A Star Is Born (if we hadn't already) is that she has a strong, beautiful singing voice and a natural presence as an actor. Her co-star,...

The title of Private Life, starring Paul Giamatti and Kathryn Hahn as an upscale Manhattan couple trying to have a baby, is ironic. There are fertility issues for both of them — he’s 47; she’s 41 (they're both four years older than that in real life) — so they’re trying IVF, adoption,...

Iron Man, Captain America, and the others in the Marvel Cinematic Universe would probably like to make it clear that Venom isn't part of their program (though it's better than at least one of the Thor movies). The Spider-Man villain, seen briefly in Spider-Man 3 played by Topher Grace, gets a...

The Horror Corner took a week off to enjoy the amazing Fantastic Fest, where there were lots of horrors afoot, and I don't just mean Eric D. Snider wearing a wacky wrestling singlet for three days. (He lost a bet!) Several of these horror films will be hitting VOD services and/or Netflix some time...

(Screened at the 2018 Fantasia Festival; now available on VOD and Blu-ray.) I never saw Tales from the Hood, but if Tales from the Hood 2 is any indication, I must go back and watch it posthaste -- though I wonder if the racial climate of 1995 could have inspired as much righteous anger and...

The rare slasher film that's not a sequel to or remake of a previous one, Hell Fest exploits the premise of a traveling Halloween carnival being infiltrated by an actual masked killer who avoids detection by blending in with the hired scarers. Directed by Gregory Plotkin (Paranormal Activity: The...

After last year's bumpy edition of Fantastic Fest, roiled by revelations that its founder had continued working with employees and associates who'd been credibly accused of sexual assault, this year's raucous genre celebration felt almost normal — well, "normal" for an event that includes a...

The premise of Night School, an overlong, under-funny comedy starring Kevin Hart, is that a 35-year-old high school dropout named Teddy Walker has to get his GED in order to get a job. That scenario, while not inherently funny, allows for innumerable complications that could make it funny, but none...

Smallfoot is a light animated adventure set in a remote Himalayan village occupied by yetis, aka Abominable Snowmen (and Snowwomen), who have lived in isolation for generations. Though they have a complex societal hierarchy, the yetis are in many ways a primitive race. Their sacred stones tell...

(Screened at Fantastic Fest; now streaming on Netflix) Continuing the Wind River cycle of movies about outsiders going to cold, sad Indian reservations to investigate tragedies, here's Hold the Dark, another brutally chilling drama from Green Room director Jeremy Saulnier. Adapted by...

David Lowery's last movie, A Ghost Story, was about a ghost but wasn't a horror film. His new one, The Old Man & the Gun, is about a career bank robber but isn't a heist thriller. Lowery keeps you on your toes if you're a judge-a-movie-by-its-title kind of person, and he upends expectations...