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The film is as pretentious as all Get Out, but Florence Pugh is a phenomenal actress and bombshell beauty to boot. The supporting cast, especially Harry Styles, is nothing to scoff at either. Olivia Wilde being the exception. Her performance is as trite as the weaker moments of the story, but her direction is surprisingly engrossing. Occasionally overbearing and distracting, but engrossing nonetheless. Though not nearly as clever or righteous as Ms. Wilde seems to think, given that The Stepford Wives and The Matrix happened, Don't Worry Darling is a tight and considerate two-hour slow burn as entertaining as it is preachy.

Grade: B-

Jeepers Creepers 4 makes Jeepers Creepers 3 look like Jeepers Creepers. I would rather the Creeper eat my eyes and brain than watch this "sequel" again. Jeepers Creepers: Reborn is easily the worst movie I have ever seen in the theater, as well as one of the worst things I have ever seen in my life... and I once saw a homeless man cough up blood and die while defecating on a sidewalk. And at least that was scary. The only horrific element of JC4 is the abundance of revolting CGI, which would take one out of the story assuming there was any semblance of plot to be found. Alas, the glaring lack of budget is still outshined by the embarrassing lack of imagination. Also, there is no evidence to suggest that anyone involved in the making of this horror hound, as in dog, has so much as seen the trailers for the other three installments, let alone the films themselves. Talk about DOA. They should have titled this one "Jeepers Creepers: Stillborn."

Grade: F.

Just because a movie ends on a downer, that doesn't make it Empire. As much as it pains my fanboy heart, I cannot in good conscience condone, let alone recommend Clerk III, which is a devastating disappointment of Jedi proportions. The at first cute and harmless third installment quickly mutates into a banal, uneven, tone-deaf, manipulative, memory-tarnishing boondoggle, which culminates with an ending so egregious it borders on sacrilege. However, while the movie is 99.9% gratuitous nostalgia, this return to the Quick Stop is, at the very least, no cash-grab. Kevin Smith's intentions are pure and his fondness for his characters and where he comes from is immense, but he seems to be in a weird place in his life philosophically. The once self-proclaimed "Fatman" has been grappling with mortality ever since his massive "widow-maker" heart attack in 2018, and it appears existentialism has gotten the better of him. While Red State (2011) and Tusk (2014) were clearly made by a seasoned auteur who still has worthwhile stories to tell from a fresh perspective, Smith has no business revisiting his golden years these days, especially when he is depreciating his legacy. Much like the job would be great if it wasn't for the customers, Smith would be great if it wasn't for the midlife crisis.

Grade: C-

This bullet train makes too many stops in between fight scenes. Fight scenes that feel all too familiar, much like the rest of this exercise in style. Style being something the film has in spades, but spades do not amount to Smokin' Aces. While Aaron Taylor-Johnson effervescently chews the scenery like he is auditioning for a Guy Ritchie movie, and Brad Pitt is amusing despite his one-note character bordering on lame, the story is sluggish and bloated with lazy exposition and lukewarm action. Had director David Leitch (Deadpool 2) taken a smaller, as in less expensive, approach and embraced the fundamentals of an exploitation actioner, Bullet Train could have been a wonderfully ferocious little cult film. Unfortunately, while this one is begging so endearingly to be liked, style is no substitute for excitement.

Grade: C.

It is nostalgic and sentimental but also fresh. The vivid characters of Trainspotting are just as we remember them but twenty years older as well. They have all the same traits that distinguish them, only now there is the addition of two decades worth of baggage. These men are tormented by their youthful indiscretions. Their antics and poor choices are no longer endearingly cute but unbearably tragic. Fortunately, Renton and the gang find some semblance of redemption, they just have to go to hell and back to find it. This is T2. A sequel that chooses forgiveness because life is just too much.

Grade: B+

Writer-director Richard Bates Jr.'s latest indie is both his least interesting and most enjoyable. At just under eighty minutes with credits, King Knight is an unabashedly modest effort, but at just under eighty minutes with credits (déjà vu,) it is also a cute little movie about contemporary witches whose coven leader attends his high school reunion. Think The Craft meets Romy and Michele's High School Reunion with several seriously inspired moments of psychedelic cinematography... Also, Aubrey Plaza makes a cameo as a pine cone (just saying.)

Grade: B-

All student and no body. We are talking zero substance. An unfortunate Harley Quinn Smith to plot ratio. Had writer-director Lee Ann Kurr done her homework on a genre she clearly knows little about and underestimates, this Gen Z slasher, which is curiously devoid of sharp objects, might not be missing the most important element of a horror flick... horror.

Grade: D-

Everyone praises Argento's "animal trilogy," but this little giallo gem itself deserves more recognition. It might be modest and rough around the edges tonally, but it is directed with so much enthusiasm that it is impossible not to get sucked in, especially by the stunning cinematography.