TV amp; Movies Reviews

Idris Elba‘s new Netflix comedy Turn Up Charlie seems less a TV show than a checklist of things Elba wanted to do on camera. In the series (it debuts March 15th; I watched six of the eight episodes), which Elba co-created with Gary Reich, he plays Charlie, a Nineties one-hit …

At first, Pen15 plays like a sketch comedy idea ill-advisedly stretched out to sitcom length. Co-created (along with Sam Zvibleman) by stars Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle — you might vaguely recognize them from… that thing, or… that other thing — the new Hulu comedy features the31-year-old actresses playing themselves …

“The universe is trying to fuck with me, and I refuse to engage,” announces Nadia, played by Natasha Lyonne, early in Netflix’s new comedy Russian Doll. Co-created by Lyonne (along with Amy Poehler and Sleeping With Other People director Leslye Headland), the series centers on Nadia, a video game designer …

Dr. Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali), an African-American classical-trained pianist on a jazz-trio tour in a part of 1960’s America that’s not prepared to embrace integration. In his search for a chauffeur, Don makes the curious choice of Frank Anthony Vallelonga, a.k.a. Tony Lip (Viggo Mortensen), a loudmouth Italian cliché temporarily …

The history of movies is littered with absolutely god-awful adaptations of great novels — and whether you consider Martin Amis’s 1990 book London Fields a “great novel” or simple one of the author’s stronger works is a matter to be settled between you and your respective deity. But the lauded …

Here’s the thing about Bad Times at the El Royale: When it’s good, it’s very, very good — and when it’s bad, this retro whatsit is a whole lot of awful. Punishingly long at 2 hours and 21 minutes, the movie is still crammed with enough depraved delights to make …

In the guise of a bouncy romcom about insanely gorgeous rich kids enjoying their privileges, Crazy Rich Asians is making history: It’s the first Hollywood film in 25 years to feature an all-Asian cast. (The last one: 1993’s The Joy Luck Club.) Singapore-born author Kevin Kwan has said that he …

What a shame that this well-meaning look at the absurdity of gay conversion camps — it won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance this year — lacks the teeth to make its points stick. Based on a 2012 YA novel by Emily M. Danforth, The Miseducation of Cameron Post is …

Set on Cape Cod during the sizzling summer of 1991 – and on the cusp of Hurricane Bob’s arrival – Hot Summer Nights features breakout star Timothee Chalamet as Daniel, a teen who’s been sent by his widowed mom to spend the season on Cape Cod with his Aunt Barb …

I’ve been talking and thinking about this fun-to-decode, impossible-to-forget gift from the cinema gods since I saw it at Sundance in January. Now Eighth Grade is going into wide release – and no excuses will be accepted for you missing it. First-time filmmaker Bo Burnham – the 27-year-old, comedy-and-music dude …