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| Saoirse Ronan & Beanie Feldstein (r) star in Lady Bird |
From our friend, Arch Campbell...
Lady Bird - 4 Stars. Greta Gerwig directs a spot-on mother/daughter battle, during a young woman's high school senior year. Saoirse Ronan and Laurie Metcalf deliver award-worthy performances.
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri - 4 stars. Caustic, often shock comedy, starring Frances McDormand as a woman at war with the town police over the unsolved murder of her daughter.
Mudbound - 3½ Stars. Epic drama of poor, white farmers and poor, black sharecroppers in the post-WWII South.
Blade Runner 2049 - 3 Stars. Sequel to the classic runs long, but packs in the special effects around a thick & juicy plot.
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| Arch Campbell with Will Ferrell & Zach Galifianakis (r) |
It - 3 Stars. Stephen King thriller delivers.
American Made - 3 Stars. Tom Cruise is winning, in the memoir of a bored pilot who goes to work for the CIA.
LBJ - 3 Stars. Woody Harrelson creates a sympathetic portrait of the formidable politician, assuming power after the Kennedy assassination, and passing the 1964 Civil Rights Bill. Rob Reiner directs.
Wonder - 3 Stars. Family-friendly story of a 5th grader, born with facial deformities, trading home schooling for private school. Jacob Tremblay makes this story winning, with Julia Robert and Owen Wilson as his parents. Told from different points of view, it avoids sentimentality, remaining both funny and real.
Murder on the Orient Express - 2½ Stars. Hammy but loving remake of the 1974 Agatha Christie classic.
Last Flag Flying - 2½ Stars. Bryan Cranston, Laurence Fishburne and Steve Carell as Vietnam vets, who help Carell bury his son killed on duty in Iraq.
Justice League - 2 Stars. Charismatic Gal Gadot returns as Wonder Woman, and joins Batman and several others in another of the usual formula plots to save the world.
Thor: Ragnarok - 2 Stars. The latest chapter in Marvel's Thor franchise mixes comedy and action in an overlong, sometimes confusing package.
Loving Vincent - 2 Stars. Beautifully animates Van Gogh's masterpieces, but sets them to a back engineered hokey story.
A Bad Moms Christmas - 2 Stars. Mila Kunis and friends vow to prevent holiday hassle. Follows the formula set by 'The Hangover" and "Bridesmaids."
Victoria & Abdul - 2 Stars. Judi Dench (as Queen Victoria) grows fond of an Indian commoner, shocking her royal household. Lightweight stuff.
The Disaster Artist - 1 Star. Irritating story behind the making of the poorly made, privately financed film "The Room," now celebrated at midnight showings. With James Franco at his most icky.
Visit Arch's website for his (unrivaled) take on movies. He remains the only other (we're not self-hating) critic, whose opinion we admire and respect.
