Pop Culture Happy Hour: 'Arrival' And Pop Culture Mood-Boosters
On this week's show, we talk about one of our favorite movies in a while and we offer some music and other stuff that can give you a boost when you need one.
Movie Reviews
'Bleed For This' Captures The Grime And Grit Of A Boxer's Astonishing Comeback
Miles Teller is light-middleweight boxer Vinny "The Pazmanian Devil" Paz in this intimate biopic that leans more into kitchen-sink realism than glossy uplift.
Tom Ford Delivers Pristine But Portentous Pulp In 'Nocturnal Animals'
This bifurcated film cross-cuts between the sterile existence of a coolly patrician L.A. gallery owner and the action of her ex-husband's raw-boned novel.
In Lonergan's 'Manchester By The Sea,' Submerged Emotions Bubble To The Surface
Casey Affleck delivers a haunted, searing performance as a guilt-ridden man unexpectedly forced to look after his teenage nephew.
Teen Comedy 'The Edge Of Seventeen' Is Razor-Sharp
A sharp-tongued young woman weathers the sundry mortifications of teenage life in a film from first-time writer/director Kelly Fremon Craig.
Sci-Fi Saga 'Arrival' Asks: Can Humans Learn To Speak The Language Of Aliens?
Amy Adams plays a professor tasked with talking to eight-tentacled aliens in Denis Villeneuve's new film. Critic David Edelstein says Arrival is a strange and tantalizing puzzle.
'Arrival' Is Smart, Stylish Sci-Fi About Language, Not Laser Beams
Amy Adams plays a linguist recruited to translate the language of mysterious alien visitors in a twisty, sophisticated sci-fi thriller from director Denis Villeneuve (Prisoners, Sicario).
'The Monster:' A Mother, A Daughter And A Great Big Thing That Goes Bump In The Night
Trapped in a car in the woods, Lizzy (Ella Ballentine) and her mother (Zoe Kazan) encounter a mysterious creature in a horror movie beset by a leaden script, slow pacing and a disappointing reveal.
Paul Verhoeven's 'Elle' Is A Brutal, Elegant, Pitch-Black Comedy
Director Verhoeven gleefully courts controversy with this bitterly sardonic film about the aftermath of a woman's violent rape.
'Almost Christmas,' But Far From Original
A by-the-numbers holiday film in which a soulful performance from Danny Glover fails to buoy the proceedings above familiar family squabbles that get dutifully, and too-tidily, resolved.