Personal Essay by Jessica Carr
After the three days were over, I was left with one question. Am I officially a horror fan now?
Read MoreTragedy Girls was one of the ten feature films screened at the 2017 Knoxville Horror Film Festival.
Ana de Armas and Ryan Gosling star in director Denis Villeneuve's Blade Runner 2049
Blade Runner 2049 (2017) by Denis Villeneuve
Review by Lydia Creech
Sequels don’t ruin the originals, but Villeneuve missed the mark on this one in every way.
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Jennifer Lawrence stars as mother in director Darren Aronofsky's new film
Alternate Take: mother! (2017) by Darren Aronofsky
Jennifer Lawrence stars as mother in director Darren Aronofsky's new film
mother! (2017) by Darren Aronofsky
Review by Paige Taylor
I've never been able to explain the intimate connection a woman has to her home, and mother! did an incredible job of illustrating that connection to me.
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Bill Skarsgård plays Pennywise the Dancing Clown in Andrés Muschietti's new adaptation of It
It (2017) by Andrés Muschietti
Review by Andrew Swafford
Mischietti’s film undoubtedly improves upon the last iteration in countless ways, but its inherited flaws run deep.
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Cinematary Canon #6: Back-to-School Films
This list features writing by Andrew Swafford, Lydia Creech, Ashley Baker, Zach Dennis, Ben Shull, Nadine Smith, and Andrea Asauje.
Click below to see the full list!
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Tom Holland stars as Peter Parker/Spider-Man in Spider-Man: Homecoming
Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) by Jon Watts
Review by Nadine Smith
Like the Wolverine of Logan, the Spider-Man of Spider-Man: Homecoming has been reconfigured as the quintessential Gig Economy superhero, refashioned from the class-conscious, check-to-check freelancer of Spider-Man 2, who resisted the crushing heel of capitalism through his disguised direct actions.
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Miami Man (Jason Momoa) and Arlen (Suki Waterhouse) start to fall for each other in Ana Lily Amirpour's cannibal love story The Bad Batch.
The Bad Batch (2017) by Ana Lily Amirpour
Review by Jessica Carr
Whether you are a huge fan of Ana Lily Amirpour’s work or not, it’s hard to describe The Bad Batch as an ordinary movie experience.
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Dave Franco and Aubrey Plaza star in director Jeff Baena's The Little Hours
The Little Hours (2017) by Jeff Baena
Review by Andrew Swafford
The Little Hours is one of the most uniquely funny films I’ve seen in a long time, and we need more high-concept, tightly scripted, esoteric comedies like it.
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Best friends, Okja and Mija (Seo-Hyeon Ahn, explore the mountains of South Korea in Bong Joon-ho's thought-provoking film Okja.
Okja (2017) by Bong Joon-ho
Review by Jessica Carr
In a film about greed, Bong Joon-ho still allows some of his characters to have redemptive qualities that help their humanity shine through.
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Paul Newman (as well as Owen Wilson and Larry the Cable Guy), stars in Pixar's Cars
Cars (2006) by John Lasseter and Joe Ranft
Retro Review by John McAmis
For the past eleven years, I have gotten a lot of flack for placing Cars in the upper echelon of Pixar’s filmography. Most people don’t like this. But I have only a undying love for this odd, clunky 2006 animated film.
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Vera Farmiga (be still, my heart) and Isabelle Fuhrman star in director Jaume Collet-Serra's Orphan
Orphan (2009) by Jaume Collet-Serra
Retro Review by Andrew Swafford
Orphan is of those rare cases where a twist adds a new layer of meaning to a movie without negating what had previously been built.
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Zoë Kravitz, Ilana Glazer, Scarlett Johansson, and Jillian Bell (and Kate McKinnon, back there) form the ensemble that drives director Lucia Aniello's Rough Night
Rough Night (2017) by Lucia Aniello
Review by Andrew Swafford
As far as ensembles go, Rough Night has a good one: Jillian Bell, Zoë Kravitz, Ilana Glazer, and Kate McKinnon all end up outshining Johansson, who plays it straight against their farcical spectrum. And it’s not just that they’re funnier than Johansson, but they’re more important by design.
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Kevin Harrison Jr. stars in director Trey Edward Shults's It Comes At Night
It Comes At Night (2017) by Trey Edward Shults
Review by Andrew Swafford
I am here to tell you, reader, that not only is It Comes at Night not a horror movie, it is hardly a movie. It is a non-movie. It is three dogs on each other’s shoulders in a trenchcoat instead of a movie.
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Gal Gadot stars in director Patty Jenkins film Wonder Woman
Wonder Woman (2017) by Patty Jenkins
Review by Paige Taylor
Have you ever sat in a theater full of people, weeping with unrestrained joy, because a superhero was just that badass? This girl has.
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Javier Bardem stars in the fifth installment in Disney's Pirates of the Carribean franchise
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017) by Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg
Review by Jordan Collier
Dead Men Tell No Tales is a baby step in the right direction, but at this point the series might be sunk.
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Nick Robinson and Amandla Stenberg have an undeniable chemistry in the charming YA adaptation Everything, Everything directed by Stella Meghie.
Everything, Everything (2017) by Stella Meghie
Review by Jessica Carr
It’s OKAY to let yourself enjoy a charming YA romance, especially if it means women like Amandla Stenberg get more lead roles.
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Michalina Olszanska stars as one of the mermaids in Agnieszka Smoczynska's The Lure.
The Lure (2017) by Agnieszka Smoczynska
Review by Lydia Creech
David Ehrlich from IndieWire called it “The Best Goth Musical About Man-Eating Mermaids Ever Made” in his review, and maybe that tagline is enough to sell you (it sold me). If not, uhm, what’s wrong with you?
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Brie Larson stars in director Ben Wheatley's Free Fire
Free Fire (2017) by Ben Wheatley
Review by Lydia Creech
Ben Wheatley populates his films with aggressively shitty, stupid people, then puts them in hermetically sealed environments and lets them be aggressively shitty and stupid to each other until there’s only one left standing. I am fine with this.
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Garance Marillier stars in the cannibal coming-of-age thriller Raw, the debut film for French director Julia Ducournau.