Letterboxd — Your life in film

Simple, tense, contemplative. Gorgeous build. Redford is better than he's been in over two decades. A wonder that this got made.

Takes a while to find its rhythm, but it wins you over. Nic Cage rules even as a voice actor.

The funniest of the three, the most hurtful of the three. It has a lovely slow build and an incredible 14-minute long take. The final half hour... I've been there. Anyone in a long relationship has been there. Not convinced, after the first viewing, that the tone of the film's ending feels earned, but so many lovely and sad moments throughout.

Jesse: Do you believe in, like... ghosts or spirits?
Celine: Uhm, no.
Jesse: No?
Celine: No.
Jesse: Ok, what about reincarnation?
Celine: Not at all.

Sunrise used to be my favorite. Now this is. Their body language is endlessly compelling, and the hour before they address Jesse's ring holds incredible suspense. The ending might be my favorite ending of any film of the last decade.

Jesse: "Do you believe in reincarnation?"
Celine: "Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting."

We've got sequels coming out of our ears, but somehow we can't get a Cruise/McQuarrie Jack Reacher. A goddamn shame. Every film needs an old coot played by Robert Duvall.

Breezy enough, with plenty of good one-liners, but never has an army of robots earned such a ho-hum. Most of it is instantly forgettable, sadly. Highs: the Whiplash intro in Monaco and Rockwell hamming through his weapons explanation. Low: the wildly embarrassing drunken party fight.

Abrams is unlikely to ever top the first ten minutes here.

Unrepentantly silly, and I have no interest in defending it against those who call it stupid. However, it's sleek, fast-paced, funny, large in scale, and Quinto and Cumberbatch are great fun. A perfectly enjoyable diversion at the summer multiplex.

Better than anything to date with Tyler Perry's name attached. Charming throughout and intermittently very funny. Tina Gordon Chism is 3-for-3 in my book, and it's a shame this bombed, as I can't wait to see what she does next. Craig Robinson's a great shaggy dog lead, S. Epatha Merkerson is surprisingly great at broad comedy, and Malcolm Barrett steals each scene he's in.

The visual storytelling is exceptional, the world-building is exceptional, and McConaughey has never been better. Flashes of images and scenes keep popping into my brain days later, and some relationships (especially the father/son and the boy/older girl) felt so achingly real. The film worked so well for the first 110ish minutes, in fact, that the tidy ending in contrast feels like a bit of a letdown. No matter: the pluses far outshine the minuses.