MY SUMMER OF SUMMER MOVIES

Denzel Washington eats, prays, loves, maims, mutilates, and murders in Anton Fuqua's The Equalizer 3 (2023), a dumb and dour action thriller that is both unpleasant to watch and bad for the world.

Godard said all you need for a movie is a girl and a gun, but did he ever really consider the cinematic possibilities of a sloth with a sword? The minds behind the horror-comedy Slotherhouse did, and we thank them for it.

As Golda Meir, Helen Mirren gives a showy but shallow impersonation, in a disappointing historical biopic more emotional than illuminating.

How do you continue churning out angry White man wish-fulfillment action fantasies in your 70s? If you're Liam Neeson, you make a forgettable bomb-in-a-car thriller that doesn't actually require you to move around too much.

Though skillfully made, Neill Blomkamp's Gran Turismo squanders too much of what makes this true gamer-to-racer story unique, ending up a decent but overly familiar underdog sports movie.

Lonely senior citizens make an alien friend in Jules, Marc Turtletaub's slight, tonally mismatched, extremely odd little misfire of a film.

A qualified success, the first live-action superhero movie with a Latino lead is deliberately derivative, surprisingly charming, and stealthily political.

Funnier and more competently constructed than most mainstream human comedies, Strays is a raunchy delight in the dog days of summer.

Equal parts fascination and frustration, Ira Sachs' exploration of a destructive love-triangle provides a lot of heat but precious little illumination.

D. Smith's intensely intimate documentary Kokomo City, about Black trans sex workers, shines with humor, wisdom, and uncompromised humanity.

Though far from perfect, The Last Voyage of the Demeter is a good old-fashioned, wonderfully immersive, atmospheric monster movie with a genuine taste for blood.

Friends, I've been looking forward to Meg 2: The Trench all summer, which makes this janky, joyless, shamelessly derivative dead shark of a movie 2023's biggest disappointment by far.

That the new TMNT movie is getting positive reviews must be attributed to expectations that have been seriously lowered by every other big-screen version. To the uninitiated, this one looks great, but it doesn't have much else going for it.

With a smart screenplay and a brilliant central performance from newcomer Sophie Wilde, the Philippou Brothers' debut feature Talk to Me is the best, most genuinely disturbing horror movie of the year.

Perhaps Disney accountants can use a crystal ball to find out where $150 million went, because no film that stinks this bad should cost so much.

I've fallen dangerously behind on my 2023 movie review marathon, so I'm cheating and offering quick takes on four films I haven't had time to write about in full.

Men will literally destroy the world instead of going to therapy. That's the lesson of Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer, a small and narrowly focused psychological study dressed up like a big historical epic.

Greta Gerwig's Barbie turns out to be a far more interesting film than we had any right to expect, but not necessarily the film Barbie and her fans deserved.

Mstyslav Chernov's almost unbearably brutal documentary is vital reporting, but it is also an essential work of art, universal in its application and beautiful in its fury.

Some very good actresses board the bus for The Miracle Club, but crash headfirst into a tonal pile-up where the darkest subplots meet the silliest paddywhackery.

Hubert Davis's documentary Black Ice (2022) is a moving indictment of widespread racism in hockey, but sometimes feels like it's skating on the surface of a much larger problem.

Despite strong central performances, Vadim Perelman's Holocaust story Persian Lessons (2020) feels not just implausible, but badly misjudged.

The latest installment in the Mission: Impossible franchise is just ridiculously good: thrilling, fun, funny, and (most surprisingly) boasting an actual beating heart.

The lesson of The Lesson—a disappointingly dumb "smart" thriller—is that everybody involved should have studied harder.

First-time director Patrick Wilson sees a red door and decides to paint it a dull, forgettable grey, in a pedestrian sequel to the already lackluster Insidious franchise.

Sex-positive, drug-appreciative, diversity-embracing, and oddness-accepting, Adele Lim's Joy Ride is one of the funniest movies of the year.

The hero-detective of Alice Winocour's lovely existential noir Revoir Paris (2022) searches for (and finds) meaning in the aftermath of violence.

Julie Cohen's excellent new intersex documentary Every Body is informative and infuriating, but also empowering, entertaining, and surprisingly joyful.

Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken is a thing that exists. Of all the animated movies available this summer, Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken is inarguably…one of them.

Anton Corbjin's documentary is more than the story of the design firm behind some of music's most iconic album covers. It's also a funny and moving tribute to people, arts, and times now lost.

James Mangold's entry in the franchise is a sad reminder that larger-than-life heroes just get smaller and smaller if they don't know when to quit.

Jennifer Lawrence's attempt at an '80s-style sex comedy is slightly subversive, better than expected, and nowhere near as good as it might have been.

The real-life facts of cyclist Greg LeMond's story are dramatic enough, but the film about him could stand a little more Hollywood fakery.

What happens when you recognize a filmmaker as great, but still don't like their movies? With Asteroid City, I'm finally forced to work through my Wes Anderson issues.

Pixar used to be perfectionists about their stories. Based on the underbaked and underwhelming Elemental, they should go back to that philosophy.

Every national holiday needs its movies. Smart, funny, and socially-pointed, The Blackening is America's first great Juneteenth comedy.

Arriving in theaters during the popcorn-movie season, Celine Song's delicate, devastating debut feature is the kind of art that lasts.

A very troubled young person with extraordinary talents makes terrible decisions and causes a lot of damage. That's the story of The Flash, and it's also the story behind The Flash.

Alexandre O. Philippe’s new documentary is an entertaining but frustratingly limited exploration of cinema's "quintessential American dreamland" between The Wizard of Oz and David Lynch's films.

A strong lead performance is squandered in a frustratingly sparse, emotionally empty political thriller set in the Pinochet dictatorship.

The new Transformers movie is slightly better than the last one, which is sort of like having a slightly better case of the clap. It's an improvement, to be sure, but still best avoided altogether.

Across the Spider-Verse is a masterpiece: nearly overwhelming in its creative stimulation of the senses, but with a real emotional and narrative method to the madness.

My Summer of Summer Movies gets underway with a derivative (but reasonably effective) monster-under-the-bed movie from director Rob Savage.

Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis' infuriating and empowering new documentary about Ferguson is essential viewing for every American.

Steven Soderbergh is back—but have we really missed him?

No. Just no.

Like the rest of its dishonorable and disposable ilk, Annabelle: Creation is just a fairly efficient machine for generating meaningless jump-scares.

Luis Prieto's KIDNAP, starring Halle Berry, is a cheap and ugly grindhouse film for the soccer-mom set.

Amanda Lipitz's documentary is a rare and inspiring celebration of the love, beauty, and optimism of disadvantaged black communities.

Nikolaj Arcel's quick and pointless adaptation of Stephen King's sprawling epic is a tepid, paint-by-numbers picture.

Simplistic, reductive, and perversely exculpatory, Kathryn Bigelow's DETROIT is well-executed torture-porn that irresponsibly exploits the destruction of black bodies.

Holly Hunter is always good, but Katherine Dieckmann's road-trip movie drives her down some frustratingly contrived roads.

I do not seem to have the appropriate catalog of symbols on my app to adequately express my feelings about The Emoji Movie.

Charlize Theron can do no wrong, but Atomic Blonde needed to either be a whole lot smarter, or a whole lot stupider, to be any fun at all.

Funny, fearless, and full of genuine feeling, Girls Trip is the best American comedy of the summer.

Simultaneously awful and glorious—but always beautiful—Luc Besson's buddy-cop space opera is a goofy, gonzo, candy-colored cornucopia of silliness.

Elsa Dorfman is likable and interesting, but Errol Morris's documentary both overstays its welcome and under-explores its subject.

Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk masterfully captures a key moment of human triumph, but it is not a film that's remotely interested in human beings.

Someone should have wished for a better movie.

Oliver Hirschbiegel's latest film is an imperfect but intriguing exploration of a forgotten resistance hero.

The motion-capture in the latest Apes film is a stunning work of art. Now if only the screenplay could match it…

Nick Hamm's painfully contrived, preposterous film reduces the complexities of the Irish Troubles down to an unconvincing marital spat.

Like its subject—embodied in a fantastic performance by Sally Hawkins—Aisling Walsh's film finds joy and color in unexpected places.

The latest entry in the animated franchise is crowded, uneven, and deeply silly. But it has enough cleverness, humor, and heart to make it worthwhile.

Great comedies pose important questions. So, coincidentally, does this one.

The iconic hero's introduction to the Marvel Cinematic Universe is light to the point of flimsiness, sacrificing both narrative power and emotional depth.

João Pedro Rodrigues' beautiful but increasingly frustrating film is a slow descent into surreality and obscure religious metaphor.

An unconvincing love story married to a silly spy thriller, David Leveaux's The Exception is a forgettable costume drama.

Sophia Coppola's beautiful but shallow remake leaches all life out of a tale that once teemed with repressed emotion and kinky Southern Gothic melodrama.

Based on the real experiences of Kumail Nanjiani and his wife, Michael Showalter's film is a smart, grounded comedy about funny people dealing with serious situations.

Edgar Wright has channeled his pop-music, pop-culture obsessions into the perfect summer movie.

Zoe Lister-Jones' feature debut is a harmless enough ditty, but it's a little too shallow and slight to be a truly great love song.

A good director and an excellent cast can't quite rise above a script that lacks the sophistication, subtlety, and insight needed to do its premise justice.

I'm sorry. It's my fault. I just didn't understand how far the bar had been lowered.

It's only taken Sam Elliott 50 years to become an exciting new movie star.

Reducing Tupac Shakur's legend to a series of sensationalistic incidents, All Eyez on Me is a denigrating takedown clothed as a tribute.

Colin Trevorrow's new movie is horrible in unique, unfathomable, nearly unprecedented ways.

Tired, tedious, and tame, Lucia Aniello's Rough Night (2017) lacks the courage of its pretended coarseness.

Johannes Roberts' murky, oxygen-deprived shark movie is dead in the water.

Once, Pixar made a movie about talking cars, and it made a lot of money. So, they made another one. Now, they've made a third one.

Heart-warming and soul-crushing in almost equal measures, Ken Loach's new film is a furious, funny, unfailingly humane masterpiece.

Existing at a curious nexus of buddy-comedy and crime-thriller, writer-director Ned Crowley's dark debut feature is uneven but promising.

Trey Edward Shults both explores and exploits our fears of the unknown, in a stark, harrowing, disturbingly intimate horror film.

Roger Michell's adaptation of du Maurier's novel is a stately exercise in indecision, and something of a cinematic Rorschach test.

Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite and star Kate Mara bring remarkable restraint, sensitivity, and authenticity to a feel-good story about a soldier and her dog.

I don't expect The Mummy to be the worst movie I see all year, but it's a banal mediocrity that bodes ill for Universal's interconnected "monster" franchise.

Comedian Demitri Martin's feature debut is not a completely insufferable movie, but it is a completely insubstantial one.

Sarah Adina Smith's ambitious second feature is a provocative, harrowing, and haunting film, if a slightly too-perfect vehicle for star Rami Malek.

Not since the Blitz has Winston Churchill been forced to suffer through this kind of bombing.

Every generation needs to learn potty humor, slapstick, and a total disregard for authority. Thankfully, Captain Underpants is here to lead the way.

Rest easy, well-wishers—and suck it, haters—Wonder Woman is a major triumph.