It sounds like a Nicholas Sparks novel: Two star-crossed lovers in their mid-20s meet on a beautiful Greek island. She becomes the muse that jump-starts his singing career. They grow apart and eventually go their separate ways but remain on each other’s mind for the rest of their lives. At t… Read more

Last year Alfonso Cuarón’ gave us a glimpse of Mexico City’s past with “Roma” centered around a live-in maid named Cleo. This year Lila Avilés brings us into the present with a story about a single mom named Eve (Gabriela Cartol), who works as a chambermaid at Mexico City’s luxurious Hotel P… Read more

Ari Aster burst onto the scene last year with “Hereditary” a cryptic supernatural thriller reminiscent of horror films from the late 60s-early 70s known for building tension and delivering shocks. Read more

There is a scene in “Annabelle Comes Home” where a haunted typewriter in The Warren’s Occult Museum begins to type “Miss Me?” after everyone’s favorite demonically possessed doll Annabelle is unleashed from her protective glass box. Read more

Jessie Buckley is a revelation as an aspiring country singer living in Glasgow who dreams of making it to Nashville. The Irish-born actress, who delivered a knockout performance in last year’s “Beast,” is also a classically trained musician and runner up on the BBC talent show “I’d Do Anything.” Read more

Academy Award-winning director Denys Arcand (“The Barbarian Invasions”) once again explores society’s downfall in a tale about greed, corruption, and extravagance. Read more

Out of all the films I’ve screened so far this year, Joe Talbot’s “The Last Black Man in San Francisco” made the biggest impact. It brought the wow factor. At times, I felt like I was watching a mesmerizing play as the characters, dialogue, and plot complemented each other forming a visual p… Read more

Jim Jarmusch covered vampires in 2014 with “Only Lovers Left Alive” and now after drawing inspiration from George A. Romero, the indie king sets his sights on zombies, ghouls, the undead. Read more

If someone on the street offered you an all-expense paid trip to Egypt would you take them up on the offer? Entrepreneur Tarek Mounib, a Canadian Egyptian and practicing Muslim, had an epiphany one day while riding the rails in Switzerland. Read more

In the ’70s, fashion designer Halston was a force to be reckoned with. Born Roy Halston Frowick in Des Moines, Iowa, he began his career making hats, eventually becoming the head milliner at Bergdorf Goodman. Read more

Imagine if one of your favorite artists passed away, doesn’t matter what medium, and all their work was bought up by one individual and sealed away. Let’s use Prince as an example. If someone purchased his archives, songs, notes, guitars, etc., and sealed it all away from fans and family it … Read more

John Lithgow and Blythe Danner are a pleasure to watch in Noble Jones’ charming film about two seniors who find love as Lithgow’s character would say, “on the wrong side of 60.” At a time when monsters, maniacs and Marvel rule the box office, “The Tomorrow Man” is a refreshing film that move… Read more

To take a cue from Paul Mazursky’s 1969 film, writer-director Olivier Assayas’ French film could have easily been titled “Léonard & Valerie & Alain & Selena” as infidelity in the literary world becomes the matter at hand for this talk-heavy feature from the director behind “Perso… Read more

If you want peace, prepare for war — or as they say in Latin, “Si vis pacem, para bellum.” That phrase sums up the third installment of the John Wick series featuring Keanu Reeves as the excommunicated assassin with a $14 million bounty on his head. Read more

Two solid performances drive Edward Zwick’s “Trial by Fire” with Jack O’Connell as Cameron Todd Willingham, a Corsicana, Texas, man who was wrongly executed in 2004 for murdering his three young children by arson, and Laura Dern as poet and schoolteacher Elizabeth Gilbert who met Willingham … Read more

Writer Shirley Jackson is best known for her fifth novel “The Haunting of Hill House” which was turned into a feature film by Robert Wise in 1963 and then again in 1999 with Jan de Bont at the helm. “We Have Always Lived in the Castle” is based on Jackson’s 1962 novel and final work which ma… Read more

At times, the bleak seaside village in “Dogman” resembles a post-apocalyptic wasteland from George Miller’s world, but instead of a rugged former cop named Max, we’re stuck with a scrawny dog groomer named Marcello (Marcello Fonte) in what could be alternatively titled, “Mad Marcello: Furbal… Read more

The title of African writer-director Wanuri Kahiu’s sixth film “Rafiki” is Swahili for “Friend” but in her native Kenya, the word is also used to describe or introduce the partner of someone in a same-sex relationship because of the state’s strict anti-gay stance. The LGBTQ community has no … Read more

Writer-director Bi Gan follows his enthralling debut, 2015’s “Kaili Blues,” with a mesmerizing film-noir that uses color and the shroud of nightfall to guide the audience down a path filled with mystery and romance. “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” is both a cinematic and technological achiev… Read more

Some of the funniest scenes in “Wine Country” happen during the Napa Valley wine tasting tour as six friends, played by SNL alumnae Rachel Dratch, Maya Rudolph, Ana Gasteyer, Paula Pell, Emily Spivey, and Amy Poehler, reunite to celebrate a 50th birthday. These ladies could care less about C… Read more

Julie Kavanagh’s 2011 biography, “Rudolf Nureyev: The Life,” serves as the basis for Ralph Fiennes third film as director, “The White Crow,” featuring the acting debut of 22-year-old Ukrainian-born Oleg Ivenko as the original Lord of the Dance. Read more

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Like many people in South Texas, I grew up hearing stories of The Weeping Woman aka La Llorona who drowned her kids and now haunted the Guadalupe River.  The body of water was modified depending on where you lived when you heard the story, but the essence of the Mexican folktale remained the… Read more

Elisabeth Moss imbues the spirit of Courtney Love as a ’90s punk rocker on the bottom end of a downward spiral in Alex Ross Perry’s tale of self-destruction. “Her Smell” echoes the days when female rock bands Elastica and The Breeders ruled the airwaves in this unflinching behind-the-scenes … Read more

Forget what you know about poet Emily Dickinson. She was not a lonely recluse confined to her bedroom. Yes, she never married but that was only because she was in love with her brother’s wife Susan (the two were lovers since their youth) and while only 11 of her 1,800 poems were published du… Read more

“Mary Magdalene” is not your typical religious epic. In fact, I wouldn’t use the word “epic” to describe the sophomore film from “Lion” director Garth Davis. The story of one of the most mysterious and misunderstood women in history is a subdued retelling of the Christ story from the female … Read more

British director Neil Marshall is responsible for two of my favorite horror films, 2002’s “Dog Soldiers” and 2006’s “The Descent.” So, when he became attached to the new “Hellboy” reboot I felt somewhat relieved after mourning the possibility of a trilogy helmed by Guillermo del Toro with Ro… Read more

There are two horror films opening this weekend. One of them features pets the other one is scary. You won’t find any zombie cats in Emma Tammi’s directorial debut “The Wind” but you will find plenty of chills. Set along the 19th-century American frontier, the film explores Western folklore … Read more

The latest incarnation of Stephen King’s 1983 novel “Pet Sematary” from directors Kevin Kölsch and Dennis Widmyer (“Starry Eyes”) looks fantastic and the resourceful Jason Clarke delivers a solid performance as the family matriarch, but the storyline by Jeff Buhler and Matt Greenberg is such… Read more

Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon will look you straight in the eye and tell you without hesitation that he’s responsible for getting Donald Trump elected.  Love him or loathe him, Bannon is without a doubt one of the most intriguing and charismatic political figures of the la… Read more