Week In, Week Out
Weekly collections of five mini-reviews capturing a wide range of films—old and new, obscure and iconic. A personal film journal in snapshots, offering quick, insightful takes on whatever’s been on the screen lately.
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Movies of the Week #51 (2025): Truth, Change, and the Trouble with Pablo
This week’s movies cover the uneasy mix of personal transformation and broader power structures, whether inside a courtroom, a swimming pool, or a presidential motorcade. A Few Good Men and Loving Pablo reflect the extremes of justice—one gripping and theatrical, the other flat and chaotic—while Nadia, Butterfly offers a quieter confrontation with identity beyond career.… Read more
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Movie of the Week #50 (2025): Creative Jealousy, Grief Dogs, and One Last Rambo
This week’s movies cover wounded egos, unlikely intimacy, and the quiet disappointment of diminished returns. From a tragic portrait of creative jealousy and addiction to meditations on grief, companionship, and cosmic romance, these films circle loneliness in wildly different registers. Even the seasonal fluff and late-era action sequel reflect a longing for emotional payoff that… Read more
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Movies of the Week #49 (2025): Reflections, Repetitions, and Moral Trade-Offs
This week’s movies cover the tension between reflection and repetition, each grappling with legacy—of art, of people, of institutions. Chain Reactions and Hill peer backward, dissecting influence and endurance; Twinless and The Founder wrestle with moral compromise and the messy pursuit of success; while Freakier Friday turns nostalgia into a commercial comfort zone. Across them,… Read more
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Movies of the Week #48 (2025): Tenderness, Turmoil, and a Splash of Sludge
This week’s movies cover quiet heartbreak, thorny anxieties, and the soft ache of reinvention, moving from tender family secrets to faux-Austen comfort, from unrelenting maternal dread to surprisingly wistful franchise melancholy, and finally to a scrappy cult-remake that can’t quite escape its predecessor’s shadow. Across them runs a shared tension between personal reinvention and the… Read more
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Movies of the Week #47 (2025): Ideologies, Tsunamis, and Killer Jeans
This week’s movies cover society’s harsh undercurrents, from institutionalized racism and disaster trauma to satirical takes on fashion and fear. American History X remains hauntingly relevant in its depiction of ideological seduction and violence. The Impossible echoes tragedy through a Western lens, while Summer of 69 counters with playful innocence. Scared Shitless and Slaxx attempt… Read more
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Movies of the Week #46 (2025): Lost Dads, Lucky Breaks, and Predator on a Journey
This week’s movies cover emotionally distant fathers, unlucky optimists, nostalgic icons, and a Predator with daddy issues. From Joachim Trier’s layered family drama to a documentary tribute that manages to tug heartstrings without drowning in syrup, the selection mixes sincerity with satire. There’s a clear thread of characters grappling with legacy and self-worth—whether through existential… Read more
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Movies of the Week #44 #45 (2025): Dystopia, Demons, and Diminishing Returns
This week’s movies cover generational horror, from grim dystopian allegory to slick teen slashers and franchise fatigue. The Long Walk taps into psychological dread and Vietnam-era trauma with steady direction and haunting restraint. The Fear Street trilogy spins through eras with stylized gore and a YA sensibility that rarely transcends. Meanwhile, The Conjuring: Last Rites… Read more
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Movies of the Week #43 (2025): Queer Histories, Lonely Teens, and Time-Slipping Love
This week’s movies cover identity, queerness, memory, and visibility—spanning experimental horror, impressionistic queer romance, and intimate documentaries. These five films explore inner lives and underrepresented communities, often through dreamlike or nonlinear forms. Jane Schoenbrun’s two films capture digital-age alienation and queer self-discovery with eerie minimalism and surreal flair. Fin de siglo meditates on time, love,… Read more
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Movies of the Week #41 #42 (2025): Love, Loss, and Leather
This week’s movies cover crumbling traditions, fraught relationships, and lingering discontent—whether it’s among aristocrats, friends, lovers, or sadomasochistic demons. Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale relies on familiar beats and soothing nostalgia, while The Ritual and Hellraiser (both helmed by David Bruckner) confront personal trauma through horror lenses, albeit with mixed success. Meanwhile, The Threesome and… Read more
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Movies of the Week #39 #40 (2025): Morality, Memory, and Mechanisms of Control
This week’s movies cover fractured identities and moral grey zones—from Minority Report’s faded futurism to The Guest’s synth-soaked menace, each film wrestles with perception versus truth. Major League injects levity into defiance, while Circle strips humanity to its mechanical core. Adulthood closes things out with flawed but heartfelt awkwardness, where family bonds meet guilt and… Read more
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Movies of the Week #38 (2025): Body Horror, Broken Love, and Creeping Transformations
This week’s movies cover the darker and stickier corners of horror, where love, identity, and grotesque transformation intertwine—sometimes humorously, often disturbingly. From Slither’s slimy metaphor for marital suffocation to Together’s subtle critique on codependency, relationships turn monstrous in different ways. Hellraiser and Grafted explore bodily corruption with varying success, while Tusk shows how tone can… Read more
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Movies of the Week #36 #37 (2025): From Nemo to Existential Dread
From animated oceans to ghost-infested homes, this week’s films explore how people navigate love, loss, and meaning. Finding Nemo is a heartfelt return to Pixar’s golden age, rich with emotional resonance and father-son tenderness. The Life of Chuck and On the Count of Three both flirt with mortality and memory, one quiet and poetic, the… Read more
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