Photo: Apple TV+ This review was originally published on October 11, 2024 out of the New York Film Festival. We are recirculating it now that Blitz is streaming on Apple TV+. There’s no such thing as a typical Steve McQueen movie. Ever since he started making features with his 2008 Irish hunger-strike drama Hunger, …
Photo: 20th Century Studios This review was originally published on August 16, 2024. We are recirculating timed to Alien: Romulus’s streaming debut on Hulu and Disney+. “You have symphonies in you, brother,” whispered Michael Fassbender’s haughty über-android David to his lowly double Walter in Ridley Scott’s Alien: Covenant (2017), trying to awaken in this …
Alien: Romulus Gets the Job Done, But at What Cost? Read More »
Photo: Walt Disney Studios/Everett Collection This article was originally published on August 15, 2024. We are recirculating it timed to Alien: Romulus’s streaming debut on Hulu and Disney+. Spoilers ahead for the plot and ending of the film. Seven movies into the Alien series — nine if you count the Alien vs. Predator movies, …
The Ending of Alien: Romulus Is an Abomination By Design Read More »
Illustration: Brian Lutz By James Acaster’s calculations, he gets heckled more than the average comedian. In his new HBO special Hecklers Welcome, out November 23, he recalls being heckled so relentlessly during his international stand-up tour in 2019 — often before he could even get to his first punch line onstage — that he was miserable …
Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photo: Sarah Stier/Getty Images Last Friday as I was dropping my car off for some brake work, I overheard some of the mechanics talking about whether anyone planned to watch the Mike Tyson–Jake Paul fight on Netflix that evening. “Yeah, might as well,” someone said. “It doesn’t cost anything.” Obviously, Netflix isn’t …
Netflix’s Live-TV Strategy Remains a Work in Progress Read More »
Photo-Illustration: Vulture and Courtesy of the Studios This article originally ran on January 11, 2020. It has been updated with additional films, including Steve McQueen’s new World War II-set movie Blitz. Speaking to Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune in 1973, François Truffaut made an observation that’s cast a shadow over war movies ever …
Photo: Aidan Monaghan/Paramount Pictures Spoilers follow for Gladiator II, released in theaters on November 22. Gladiator II muffles Paul Mescal and his character, Lucius Verus, in a very heterosexual plot, with every element meant to amp up his obsessed-with-the-Roman-Empire trauma. His wife gets fridged in the opening minutes. His beautiful mother abandoned him as …
Photo: Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty Images Ariana Grande and Ethan Slater’s relationship has been, since its inception, a point of controversy. We can’t definitively say what the timeline was, but, to many online, it sure looked like Slater left his wife, who had recently given birth, for Grande while filming Wicked, in which he …
Sorry, But Ariana Grande and Ethan Slater Have Chemistry in Wicked Read More »
Photo: Universal Pictures Wicked’s full-scale assault of a marketing campaign wants you to believe that the movie is simply a female-friendship story between a pink witch and a green witch, set at a girl-power Hogwarts, featuring “Defying Gravity” and some other, less famous songs, as well, all taking place before The Wizard of Oz. …
The ‘Wicked’ Movie Made One Huge Improvement to the Stage Show Read More »
Photo: Paramount Spoilers follow for Gladiator II, released in theaters on November 22. There are spectacles of all sorts in Gladiator II, Ridley Scott’s sequel to his 2000 Best Picture winner. Sharks and baboons with a taste for human flesh chomping through fighters. Paul Mescal sans shirt, with a chest as beefy as it …
Denzel Washington Should Always Have a Little Shawl Read More »
