Dann Gire
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Viola Davis' Oscar-worthy performance royally rules ambitious, sanitized crowd-pleaser 'Woman King'Sep 15, 2022 6:00 am - “The Woman King” - ★ ★ ½ Let's first acknowledge that actress Viola Davis rocks the planet in any movie she makes. She pumps her dramatic characters with humanity, creat...
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Wonky 'Honk': Excellent performances by Hall, Brown lighten middling satire on disgraced megachurch televangelistsSep 01, 2022 6:00 am - “Honk For Jesus. Save Your Soul.” - ★ ★ ★ Can there possibly be an easier target for a savage satirical comedy than sexually disgraced megachurch televangelists? “The E...
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A vengeful lion eradicates humans in the delightfully cheesy, derivative thriller 'Beast'Aug 18, 2022 11:00 am - “Beast” - ★ ★ ½ What? You missed Stephen King's 1983 movie “Cujo” with a rabid St. Bernard menacing a parent and child trapped in a car? And you forgot the scary kitche...
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Flourishes of cinematic brilliance fight superficiality, numbing gore in blackly comic 'Bullet Train'Aug 04, 2022 6:00 am - “Bullet Train” - ★ ★ ½ Imagine that Quentin Tarantino and Guy Ritchie conspired to create a blackly comic Grand Guignol version of a classic 1970s disaster film set abo...
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Pets rule, humans drool in energized animated superhero parody 'DC League of Super-Pets'Jul 28, 2022 6:00 am - “DC League of Super-Pets” - ★ ★ ★ ½ In the energized animated comedy “DC League of Super-Pets,” Superman's canine buddy Krypto pulls off the biggest rescue of his 67-ye...
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Preposterous narrative twist ruins promising father-daughter drama 'Don't Make Me Go'Jul 18, 2022 6:00 am - “Don't Make Me Go” - ★ ½ “Don't Make Me Go” possesses a wonderfully provocative title that could apply to both its principal characters. California teen Wally Park (Mia ...
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Harsh survival tale 'Where the Crawdads Sing' compromised by voice-overs, inauthentic detailsJul 14, 2022 6:00 am - “Where the Crawdads Sing” - ★ ★ ½ Olivia Newman's “Where the Crawdads Sing” supplies a superb example of what happens when filmmakers try to create an excellent adaptat...
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Supernatural 'Black Phone' dials up jump-scares in derivative child serial killer thrillerJun 23, 2022 6:00 am - “The Black Phone” - ★ ★ ½ Two young actors, Mason Thames and Madeleine McGraw, deliver performances so immersive and realistically polished that they pick up a lot of t...
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Comic romance a 'Real Smooth' parable for the power of kindnessJun 16, 2022 6:00 am - “Cha Cha Real Smooth” - ★ ★ ★ Parts of Cooper Raiff's comically amiable “Cha Cha Real Smooth” sound like a grad student's first attempt at writing stage play juvenilia ...
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Thrill-a-minute 'Jurassic World: Dominion' also believes in the basic goodness of the common personJun 08, 2022 2:00 pm - “Jurassic World: Dominion” - ★ ★ ★ This thrill-a-minute, PG-13-rated, summer popcorn action/horror picture had me at “Wait ... you made a promise to a dinosaur?” Profes...