Movie review by Greg Carlson Considerably less accessible than his directorial debut “Ex Machina,” veteran writer Alex Garland’s “Annihilation” very loosely adapts Jeff VanderMeer’s novel into a demanding thought experiment bound to frustrate viewers counting on some of the trailer’s promise and premise. As multiple critics have pointed out, the new film owes a thematic […]

Movie review by Greg Carlson Hungarian filmmaker Ildiko Enyedi, whose 1989 debut “My Twentieth Century” won the Camera d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, achieved another career highlight recently with an Oscar nomination for her most recent feature. “On Body and Soul” has been selected to compete for Best Foreign Language Film at the 90th […]

Movie review by Greg Carlson Given the film’s somewhat odd marriage of style — the personality-driven presence of chatty neophyte documentarian Bryan Fogel — and substance — the ugly realities of the longtime Russian doping program for Olympic competitors — the inclusion of “Icarus” as one of the five Oscar-nominated nonfiction features came as something […]

Movie review by Greg Carlson Of the great designs in the history of movie monsters, there are few as satisfying as Universal’s stunning Gill-man. First envisioned by William Alland by way of Gabriel Figueroa’s Amazonian campfire story, the look of the Creature from the Black Lagoon belongs principally to Milicent Patrick. Christened “The Beauty Who […]