OPENING
Am I Racist? (PG-13) Matt Walsh stars in Justin Folk’s documentary about DEI practices. (Opens Friday)
Ardas Sarbat De Bhalle Di (NR) Gippy Grewal writes, directs, and stars in this Indian dramedy. Also with Gurpreet Ghuggi, Jasmin Bhasin, Rana Jung Bahadur, Seema Kaushal, Ravinder Mand, Rupinder Rupi, Raghveer Boli, and Nirmal Rishi. (Opens Friday at Cinemark North East Mall)
Believer (NR) This thriller stars Lauren Lee Smith as a journalist who is assaulted by the members of a religious cult that she is writing about. Also with Ella Ballentine, Peter Mooney, Martin Roach, Ilan O’Driscoll, Jonathan Potts, and Kris Holden-Ried. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
The Buckingham Murders (NR) Kareena Kapoor stars in this British thriller as a grieving Indian homicide detective who must investigate a series of murders in London. Also with Keith Allen, Stuart Whelan, Jonathan Nyati, Ranveer Brar, Prabhleen Sandhu, and Joel Morris. (Opens Friday)
The Critic (R) Ian McKellen stars in this thriller as a 1930s London theater critic who seeks revenge on his newspaper bosses who want to fire him because of his age and his homosexuality. Also with Gemma Arterton, Mark Strong, Ben Barnes, Romola Garai, Claire Skinner, and Lesley Manville. (Opens Friday)
Crust (NR) Sean Whalen directs, stars in, and co-writes this horror-comedy as a Laundromat owner who is turned into a supervillain by a bunch of dirty socks. Also with Alan Ruck, Daniel Roebuck, Felissa Rose, Rebekah Kennedy, and Roxy Striar. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
DAN DA Dan: First Encounter (NR) The big-screen version of the Japanese manga series is about two school friends who set out to prove the existence of ghosts and aliens. (Opens Friday)
Dead Money (R) This thriller stars Emile Hirsch as a professional poker player who is caught up in the armed robbery of a home poker game. Also with Rory Culkin, India Eisley, David Keith, Peter Facinelli, Jimmy Jean-Louis, Jocelyn Hudon, Yung Bleu, Noah Segan, and Jackie Earle Haley. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
The 4:30 Movie (R) Kevin Smith’s latest comedy is about a group of teenagers in the 1980s who spend an afternoon sneaking from auditorium to auditorium at their local movie theater. Starring Siena Agudong, Austin Zajur, Kate Micucci, Jason Lee, Rachel Dratch, Jason Mewes, Jason Biggs, Jennifer Schwalbach Smith, Harley Quinn Smith, Genesis Rodriguez, Jeff Anderson, Method Man, Ken Jeong, and Justin Long. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
God’s Not Dead: In God We Trust (NR) The fourth film in the series stars David A.R. White as a pastor running for Congress. Also with Dean Cain, Isaiah Washington, Ray Wise, Samaire Armstrong, Andrea Logan, Charlene Tilton, and Scott Baio. (Opens Friday)
El Halcón (NR) This Mexican superhero film stars Guillermo Quintanilla as an ex-wrestler who must come out of retirement to protect his family. Also with Ianis Guerrero, Said Sandoval, Ana Jimena Villanueva, Oscar Lopez, and Carlos Puente. (Opens Friday)
Here After (PG-13) Connie Britton stars in this supernatural thriller as an American mother in Italy who observes radically changed behavior in her teenage daughter (Freya Hannan-Mills) after a near-death experience. Also with Giovanni Cirfiera, Tommaso Basili, Alessandro Bressanello, Andrea Bruschi, Syama Rayner, and Babetida Sadjo. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies (NR) Shattering box-office records all across Asia, this Thai comedy stars Putthipong Assaratanakul as a young man at a loose end who moves in with his Chinese grandmother (Usha Seamkhum) after she’s diagnosed with terminal cancer. While he’s doing so out of filial duty, he’s also hoping to get a chunk of her inheritance once she passes on. Writer-director Pat Bonnitipat manages to insert comedy into this story in ways that feel natural, and the chemistry between the two leads is convincing as the young man learns life lessons. You can see why the film is attracting record crowds even in China, an unprecedented feat for a Thai movie. Also with Sanya Kunakorn, Sarinrat Thomas, Pongsatorn Jongwilas, Duangporn Oapirat, Himawari Tajiri, and Tontawan Tantivejakul. (Opens Friday)
The Killer’s Game (R) Dave Bautista stars in this comic thriller as a hit man who discovers that he’s terminally ill and puts out a contract on himself. Also with Sofia Boutella, Pom Klementieff, Scott Adkins, Terry Crews, Marko Zaror, Lucy Cork, and Ben Kingsley. (Opens Friday)
Look Into My Eyes (R) Lana Wilson’s documentary profiles psychics and their clients. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
Mathu Vadalara 2 (NR) In this sequel to the 2019 comedy-thriller, Sri Simha Koduri and Satya reprise their roles as delivery boys-turned-secret agents for the Indian government. Also with Vennela Kishore, Sunil, Faria Abdullah, and Rohini. (Opens Friday)
Seeking Mavis Beacon (NR) Jazmin Jones’ documentary details the history of the 1980s software app that taught people touch typing. (Opens Friday at AMC Grapevine Mills)
Untouchable (NR) This Chinese crime thriller stars Shen Teng as a mob boss dealing with treachery within his organization. Also with Zhang Yuqi, Jack Kao, Elvira Cai, Jeremy Qu, and Huan Liu. (Opens Friday at AMC Grapevine Mills)
Will & Harper (R) Josh Greenbaum’s documentary follows Will Ferrell on a cross-country road trip with his transgender longtime friend Harper Steele. (Opens Friday at Alamo Drafthouse Denton)
Winner (PG-13) Emilia Jones (CODA) stars in this biography of Reality Winner, the NSA translator who blew the whistle on Russian interference in the 2016 American presidential election. Also with Kathryn Newton, Connie Britton, Danny Ramirez, Leah Gibson, and Zach Galifianakis. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
NOW PLAYING
AfrAId (PG-13) This isn’t M3GAN, or even Unfriended. Chris Weitz’s horror film stars John Cho and Katherine Waterston as a married couple and parents of three who install a new AI assistant in their house and then worry that it’s taking over their family. The horror scares aren’t convincing, but that would matter less if Weitz had anything trenchant to say about artificial intelligence. This is sadly not the case, and all the characters come off as idiots who act stupidly because the plot requires them to do so. This should have gone straight to streaming instead of polluting our multiplexes in the doldrums of summer. Also with Havana Rose Liu, Riki Lindhome, Lukita Maxwell, Isaac Bae, Ashley Romans, Bennett Curran, Wyatt Lindner, Keith Carradine, and David Dastmalchian.
Alien: Romulus (R) Not as good as the first two movies in the series, but better than the last two. Some years after the events of the first Alien movie, the story is about a miner (Cailee Spaeny) and her android protector (David Jonsson) who fall in with a group of young space pirates looking to ransack a space station before it self-destructs, not knowing that the aliens are waiting for them on board. The film fills in some bits of knowledge about the alien mythology, and new director Fede Álvarez (Don’t Breathe) does much to bring the franchise back to its horror roots. Unfortunately, it doesn’t point the series in any sort of new direction, although Spaeny has the emotional depth to be the heroine of any future installments. Also with Archie Renaux, Isabela Merced, Spike Fearn, and Aileen Wu.
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (PG-13) Oddly comforting. Among many reprising their roles from Tim Burton’s 1988 film, Winona Ryder plays the grown-up Lydia Deetz who’s back in Connecticut to go through her deceased father’s things when her teenage daughter (Jenna Ortega) gets dragged into the afterlife, and Lydia has to enlist Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton) to get her back. There are even more subplots that cause this movie to run all over the place, although tight plotting was never what we went to Burton’s movies for. None of the actors in this heavyweight cast seem to quite bring their best, either, but the macabre comedy bits hit at an agreeable pace, especially with the waiting room for dead people and a flashback that parodies Mario Bava’s 1960s horror movies. It’s enough to make this return trip to Burton’s old stomping grounds worth taking. Also with Catherine O’Hara, Justin Theroux, Monica Bellucci, Arthur Conti, Santiago Cabrera, Amy Nuttall, Danny DeVito, and Willem Dafoe.
Between the Temples (R) The Jewish comedy of the season would have been better sticking closer to its premise. Jason Schwartzman stars as a recently widowed rabbi and cantor who has lost his ability to sing. Pulling him out of his professional crisis is his old music teacher (Carol Kane), who wants his help preparing for her bat mitzvah. The comic chemistry between the two leads is more than watchable, and Schwartzman’s turn as a guy who’s always about to burst into tears is more effective than his similar performance in Asteroid City. I just wish first-time filmmaker Nathan Silver wouldn’t get sidetracked with drug-trip sequences, shaky camerawork, and detours into some uninteresting supporting characters. The talent behind the camera could be really good with some seasoning. Also with Dolly de Leon, Madeline Weinstein, Caroline Aaron, Pauline Chalamet, Matthew Shear, Lindsay Burdge, and Robert Smigel.
Blink Twice (R) The scariest villain in this year’s movies is here, the more terrifying for being so ordinary. Naomi Ackie and Alia Shawkat play waitresses who are invited by a tech billionaire (Channing Tatum) to his private island. The place seems like paradise until someone disappears and all the other guests swear that she was never there. Zoë Kravitz makes her directing debut and scatters clues well throughout the early going to lay the groundwork for the M. Night Shyamalan-like plot twist. Tatum is the wrong actor to portray someone who’s hiding sinister underneath his charm, but that’s a minor flaw in the face of the twist. This is a rare horror film that becomes more horrifying once you know everything that’s going on, and it’s the sort of evil that will make you want to curl up in a ball. Also with Christian Slater, Adria Arjona, Haley Joel Osment, Simon Rex, Levon Hawke, Liz Caribel, Trew Mullen, María Elena Olivares, Cris Costa, Kyle MacLachlan, and Geena Davis.
City of Dreams (R) This movie so wants to be the defining epic about the border crisis, and it is so not. Ari Lopez portrays a near-mute Mexican boy who’s lured north of the border with the promise of a soccer camp in L.A. and then forced to work as a sweatshop laborer. Writer-director Mohit Ramchandani executes some nifty extended tracking shots in his first feature filmmaking effort, but that matters little when the storytelling is so crude and sadistic, subjecting the protagonist to torture after torture to bring home the point that undocumented immigrants are exploited the hell out of. He has no faith in the audience’s intelligence or sensitivity, so his movie is something only callous blockheads are going to enjoy. Also with Jason Patric, Paulina Gaitan, Renata Vaca, Samm Levine, Andrés Delgado, Francisco Denis, Adina Eady, Alfredo Castro, and Diego Calva.
Coraline (PG) This animated adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s subtly terrifying 2002 novel is about a bored, frustrated 11-year-old girl (voiced by Dakota Fanning) who discovers a secret world with cooler versions of her parents (voiced by Teri Hatcher and John Hodgman) who turn out to be monsters who want to sew buttons over her eyes. The stop-motion animation by Henry Selick (The Nightmare Before Christmas) is just glorious in the film’s middle section, presenting Coraline and us with a fantasy world that’s just a little bit too shiny and perfect to be believable. The film could have been scarier, but it’s still intense stuff, with bounteous amounts of imagination, wit, and beauty to go with its amazing hand-crafted technique. Additional voices by Keith David, Ian McShane, Robert Bailey Jr., Dawn French, and Jennifer Saunders.
Deadpool & Wolverine (R) The partnership of Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman has been teased for so long, it would have been easy for the thing to disappoint. Fortunately, Jackman’s eternally grumpy Wolverine and Reynolds’ Deadpool with his psychological need to make a joke out of everything is comedy gold. Deadpool has to save his world from annihilation, so he teams up with the worst version of Wolverine and goes to The Void, a funny dystopia where superheroes past are banished because their storylines never got resolved. It may not add up to great art, but it is very funny. Also with Emma Corrin, Morena Baccarin, Karan Soni, Matthew Macfadyen, Leslie Uggams, Brianna Hildebrand, Dafne Keen, Tyler Mane, Ray Park, Aaron Stanford, Henry Cavill, Jon Favreau, Jennifer Garner, Wesley Snipes, Channing Tatum, and Chris Evans. Voices by Stefan Kapicic, Nathan Fillion, Blake Lively, and Matthew McConaughey.
Despicable Me 4 (PG) Where other long-running movie franchises run out of ideas, this fourth installment has so many ideas that they get in each other’s way. When a cockroach-obsessed French supervillain (voiced by Will Ferrell) busts out of prison and vows revenge on Gru (voiced by Steve Carell), our bald baddie and his family have to go into hiding and pretend to be normies in the suburbs. This would be enough plot for a movie, but this chapter piles on a new baby for Gru, a honey badger, and some of the minions gaining X-Men powers. It’s so much that even Ferrell gets lost in the shuffle, and the only part that works at all is when he and Carell duet on “Everybody Wants to Rule the World.” This could have worked if it had been broken down into episodes of an animated TV show, but on the big screen, it’s exhausting. Additional voices by Kristen Wiig, Miranda Cosgrove, Dana Gaier, Joey King, Sofía Vergara, Madison Polan, Chris Renaud, Laraine Newman, Chloe Fineman, Pierre Coffin, Steve Coogan, and Stephen Colbert.
The Forge (PG) While other Christian movies are getting better, the ones by the Kendrick brothers are getting worse. Aspen Kennedy plays a young Black man in Charlotte who goes to work for a fitness equipment manufacturer and winds up learning lessons about manhood and Jesus Christ from the company’s CEO (Cameron Arnett). The lack of pace and dramatic tension in this thing makes you wonder whether the filmmakers have ever seen a movie before, and the acting is too embarrassing even to trash in this space. Whatever lessons this movie is trying to teach about what makes a boy into a man, they get lost amid this movie’s amateur theatrics. Also with Priscilla C. Shirer, Selah Avery, T.C. Stallings, Ben VanderMey, Tommy Woodward, and Karen Abercrombie.
The Front Room (R) Kids, always meet your prospective in-laws before getting married. Brandy Norwood portrays a Black professor who meets her husband’s stepmother (Kathryn Hunter) for the first time when the old lady offers to give the family her entire fortune in exchange for moving in. Stepmom turns out to be incontinent, racist as hell, and a religious maniac who fakes seizures for attention. Hunter makes this part into a memorable monster, but Brandy also winds up distinguishing herself as a woman who’s falling apart under the strain of her first child. The film is really about that, and it’s a good example of a type of movie that we don’t have enough of. Brandy has come a long way from her teen pop years, too. Also with Andrew Burnap and Neal Huff.
The Honest Candidate (NR) This Mexican political satire stars Adrian Uribe as a presidential candidate who’s cursed to only tell the truth just before the country’s elections. Also with Teresa Ruiz, Coral de la Vega, Tiaré Scanda, Mariana Seoane, Daniel Tovar, and Luisa Huertas.
Inside Out 2 (PG) This sequel does not reach the heights of the original Pixar animated film, but it does have some rewarding points. Riley (voiced by Kensington Tallman) turns 13, and puberty brings on a host of new emotions led by Anxiety (voiced by Maya Hawke). When Riley gets invited to a hockey skills camp, Anxiety leads a coup against Joy (voiced by Amy Poehler) and the other four emotions, literally bottling them up so that Riley can impress the right people. Even with Hawke missing some of the comic potential in the role, Anxiety is still the best thing about the film, drafting an army of storyboard artists to draft every scenario that could derail Riley and inducing a panic attack in her that will feel horribly familiar to anxiety sufferers. The jokes don’t land as consistently as in the original, nor are the emotions in the story as piercing, but the mindscape remains a nice place to be. Additional voices by Phyllis Smith, Lewis Black, Liza Lapira, Tony Hale, Ayo Edebiri, Adèle Exarchopoulos, Paul Walter Hauser, Lilimar, Yvette Nicole Brown, Ron Funches, James Austin Johnson, Paula Pell, June Squibb, John Ratzenberger, Diane Lane, and Kyle MacLachlan.
It Ends With Us (PG-13) Blake Lively’s performance is the best thing about this too-cozy movie about cycles of abuse. She portrays a small-town Mainer who flees her abusive dad to set up a flower shop in Boston, only to repeat the cycle by falling in love with a neurosurgeon (Justin Baldoni) who hits her. Baldoni also doubles as the director here, and while he starts off well, he becomes bogged down as he tries to toggle between the present day and flashbacks to the teenage protagonist (Isabela Ferrer) and her first love (Alex Neustaedter). Based on Colleen Hoover’s best-selling novel, this movie takes forever to get to the subject and then eagerly waves a magic wand to make everyone into some endlessly forgiving saint. Hate to say this, but a movie about domestic abuse really needs to be harder-hitting. Also with Jenny Slate, Brandon Sklenar, Hasan Minhaj, Amy Morton, Robert Clohessy, Robyn Lively, and Kevin McKidd.
1992 (R) The plot of this action-thriller is pretty decent, but the execution turns it bad when it could have been terrific. Tyrese Gibson stars as an ex-convict who is trying to raise his teenage son (Christopher A’mmanuel) when the L.A. riots happen. He takes his son to the metalworks factory where he works in maintenance, just at the same time as a group of thieves try to take advantage of the chaos to rob the factory of $10 million worth in platinum bullion. It is more than a workable premise, but director Ariel Vromen (The Ice Man) takes this at a leaden pace, and Tyrese is a wooden presence in the lead. At 96 minutes, this movie still feels like it lasts an eternity. Also with Scott Eastwood, Clé Bennett, Dylan Arnold, Michael Beasley, Ori Pfeffer, Oleg Taktarov, and the late Ray Liotta.
Reagan (PG-13) Weird, very weird. This biography of the movie star-turned-40th president of the United States applies a ton of CGI de-aging to Dennis Quaid and to Penelope Ann Miller as Nancy Reagan. That’s not nearly as bizarre as the framing story of a retired KGB agent (Jon Voight) in the present day telling the story of Reagan’s ascent to power. In addition to whitewashing the president’s record on civil rights, AIDS, and propping up dictatorships abroad, the movie also casts hideous studio boss Jack Warner (Kevin Dillon) as a hero of anti-communism. Other than about a thousand dead spots, this movie’s cavalier approach to history is a ton of fun. Also with Mena Suvari, C. Thomas Howell, Justin Chatwin, Amanda Righetti, Xander Berkeley, Lesley-Anne Down, Jennifer O’Neill, Robert Davi, Mark Moses, Nick Searcy, Scott Stapp, and Kevin Sorbo.
Saripodhaa Sanivaaram (NR) Also titled Surya’s Saturday, this Indian action thriller stars Nani as a man who seeks vigilante justice against a police inspector (S.J. Suryah) who brutalizes civilians for fun. Also with Priyanka Mohan, Abhirami, Aditi Balan, P. Sai Kumar, Murali Sharma, Ajay Ghosh, Subhaleka Sudhakar, and Harsha Vardhan.
Stree 2 (NR) Yet more proof that Indian horror movies are incompatible with Western tastes. After exorcising the demon from the original movie, the hero (Rajkummar Rao) of this sequel has to bring her back in order to stop the evil spirit who is abducting women from his village. There’s an interesting undercurrent here with the victims being all modern women who want to leave for the big city and the demon being a female avenger against male predators, but the scares simply don’t work for audiences brought up on Hollywood fare, and the attempts at comedy are truly groan-worthy. I will say this: The visual of the heroes fleeing down a country road on motorcycles pursued by a flaming severed head is pretty metal. Also with Shraddha Kapoor, Pankaj Tripathi, Aparshakti Khurana, Abhishek Banerjee, Atul Srivastava, Anya Singh, Tamannaah Bhatia, Varun Dhawan, and Akshay Kumar.
Twisters (PG-13) An agreeable sequel to the 1996 blockbuster. Daisy Edgar-Jones plays a meteorologist from Oklahoma who’s coaxed back home years after a tragedy in the field to kill tornadoes with an ex-colleague (Anthony Ramos) and a YouTube influencer (Glen Powell). From such a splendidly stupid premise, the movie wades hip-deep into so much weather jargon that it becomes so much noise for those of us who don’t have meteorology degrees. Fortunately, director Lee Isaac Chung (Minari) keeps the narrative from dragging. Powell is no slouch here, but you may be surprised to find Edgar-Jones carrying this movie effortlessly, conveying her character’s guilt without harshing the fun popcorn vibe that the movie is going for. The country music-laden soundtrack helps this movie lift off, too. Also with Maura Tierney, Sasha Lane, Katy O’Brian, Brandon Perea, Kiernan Shipka, Nik Dodani, Tunde Adebimpe, Harry Hadden-Paton, Daryl McCormack, David Born, David Corenswet, and James Paxton.
You Gotta Believe (PG) The filmmaking team of Ty Roberts and Lane Garrison (12 Mighty Orphans) reunites for this baseball drama about the real-life Texas team that made the final of the Little League World Series. Starring Luke Wilson, Molly Parker, Sarah Gadon, Lew Temple, Patrick Renna, and Greg Kinnear.
DALLAS EXCLUSIVES
Don’t Turn Out the Lights (R) Andy Fickman (She’s the Man) writes and directs this horror film about a group of friends who must fight for their lives while traveling to a music festival. Starring Jarrett Austin Brown, John Bucy, Bella DeLong, Jasper Cole, and Crystal Lake Evans.
Great Absence (NR) This Japanese drama stars Tatsuya Fuji as a father trying to re-connect with his long-estranged son. Also with Mirai Moriyama, Yoko Maki, and Hideko Hara.
His Three Daughters (R) The latest film by Azazel Jacobs (French Exit) stars Natasha Lyonne, Carrie Coon, and Elizabeth Olsen as estranged sisters who have to reunite to care for their ailing father (Jay O. Sanders). Also with Jovan Adepo.
I’ll Be Right There (NR) Edie Falco stars in this comedy as a woman with a compulsive need to take care of everyone in her life. Also with Bradley Whitford, Charlie Tahan, Kayli Carter, Michael Beach, Jeannie Berlin, Sepideh Moafi, and Michael Rapaport.
A New York Story (NR) Fiona Robert writes, directs, and stars in this comedy as a young woman whose social clique threatens to ostracize her over her romantic choices. Also with Sophie Robert, Paul Karmiryan, Richard Ellis, Logan Miller, Noelle Miller, Carolyn Farina, and Whit Stillman.
Red Rooms (NR) This Canadian thriller stars Juliette Gariépy as a fashion model who becomes increasingly obsessed with a serial killer’s murder trial. Also with Laurie Babin, Elisabeth Locas, Maxwell McCabe-Lokos, Natalie Tannous, Pierre Chagnon, and Guy Thauvette.
