Movie reviews of Eric Hillis

It's hard not to come away from Nope surmising there's a director's cut on the way that will make things clearer. Review

Trachtenberg takes things back to basics – all you need is a girl and a monster after all. Prey never gets bogged down in needless "world building" exposition, and rather than setting up future instalments it happily focusses on the movie at hand. Review

The only thing older than Bullet Train's leading man are its gags, including the badly-needs-retiring shtick of two brawlers having their fight momentarily interrupted by an unsuspecting intruder. Review

With its dark themes and lengthy backstories it would seem to be inspired by the more sprawling works of Stephen King, and it plays like a more effective King adaptation than any of the actual King adaptations of recent years. Grashaw's direction is mature and unpretentious, never getting in the way of telling his often gripping story. Review

At this point shark movies have been done to death, yet keep propping up the virtual video store shelves. The Reef: Stalked offers nothing we haven't seen in its many rivals over the past few decades, and its attempts to add a social theme simply come off as clunky and misjudged. Review

Aubrey Plaza delivers a to-date career defining performance in writer/director John Patton Ford's feature debut Emily the Criminal. Review

The movie's editing is such a mess that you'll struggle to figure out the timeline. It either takes place across two days or two weeks. Review

It's easy to see why it was popular as it offers something for everyone: sex, violence, psychologically and physically tortured characters, some light comedy and even a musical number or two. That it all flows so smoothly is testament to an era of Hollywood filmmaking when such disparate elements could combine so easily for an evening's entertainment. Review

Moloch's scares are most effective when the threats are kept in the shadows and fog. When we get a proper look at the titular demon it looks a little too much like the desiccated space vampires of Tobe Hooper's much maligned Lifeforce, an unwelcome interjection of CG in an otherwise practical movie. Review

Jones' doe-eyed performance goes some way to distracting us from how nonsensical the whole affair is, and she really is a star in the making. Review

As it plays out to an obvious conclusion, The Silent Party wastes its early interrogation of the nature of revenge and begins to resemble a dozen other films of its type. Review

Joyride is an unwelcome return to the dark days when Irish movies were made not for Irish audiences but for tourists with misty-eyed misconceptions about the Emerald Isle. Stop the car, I want to get out. Review

Brian describes his creation as ending up with a blancmange when he was aiming for a sponge cake, but he claims to also enjoy blancmange. That's a fitting allegory for Brian and Charles. With a bit more polish it may have been a more satisfying sponge cake, but blancmange is good enough in this case. Review

Of course, this is an MCU movie, and no amount of Waititi's Mel Brooks influenced escapades can cover how visually bland the movie looks. Like most of these movies, it has the look of a TV with the motion smoothing setting left on. Review

Like a bad love affair, Both Sides of the Blade seduces us early on, but 90 minutes later you'll be looking for a way out of the relationship. Review

While McDonagh's worst proclivities are still on display, avoiding his latest would do a grave disservice to Fiennes, Kanater and Taghmaoui, whose rescuing of the film from their director is almost conspiratorial. Review

Thanks largely to Danielle's charming performance - going from uptight, unhappy soccer mom to embracing the California hippy lifestyle in her own awkward way – it's fun to hang out with Fiona and Freya, but that notable lack of conflict means we never quite get pulled into the drama. Review

Together, the three find kinship and comfort in each other's company. It's a shame the movie is so uncomfortable at portraying the ice hockey world it seems to have thoughtlessly chosen as a backdrop for its central drama. Review

Acknowledging the influence of the Greek Weird Wave movement through the casting of Suntan's Papadimitriou and Attenberg's Labed, Strickland has assembled a knockout cast of current European cult faves, all of whom are fully in sync with his unique brand of filmmaking. It's Mohamed however who stands out as always. Is there a more entertaining comic performer working today? Review

Dickey and Studi are two actors that have been specifically typecast, she for her rugged looks, he for his ethnicity, so it's a delight to see them play two very everyday people. They look like Americans rather than American movie stars, their faces weather beaten but beautiful, much like the land around them. Review

We're never quite sure who the real victim of the story is, or who's the antagonist, as this is a complex tale of humans trying to do their best for one another, even if it's in a manner that seems counterproductive to others. Review

Aase and Schrooten display enough chemistry to suggest that had they been gifted a better script, Revealer could have been a winning horror-comedy. Review

If you can trust the filmmaker at the wheel, Roving Woman takes you on a charming journey through that most cinematic corner of the US. Review

While Billy plays a large role in the narrative, Peace in the Valley is ultimately Ashley's story. We watch as she copes with her loss in a very human, very messy way. Review