Movie reviews of Christie Robb

Well-acted, with cinematography and sound design that keep us poised for scares, Detention does a wonderful job delivering a SpooOOooOOky season movie while also conveying a message about the price of freedom and liberty. Review

The quiet menace present in the air at the beginning of the movie grows throughout and, as in any good spy film, we’re left wondering if we put our trust in the right people and if we truly understood what just happened. Review

Although the thesis is somewhat belabored and some of the subplots don’t particularly go anywhere, The Nowhere Inn is an interesting place to find yourself. Review

The Witches of Blackwood is not a good movie and it’s not quite bad enough to be fun. Review

The cinematography, particularly the play between extreme wide shots emphasizing the characters’ vulnerability in the forbidding landscape and the close-up point of view shots giving us Blake’s limited access to snippets of the action, is wonderful. As is Arnezeder’s portrayal of Blake’s full emotional range. Review

Each of the four lead actresses, Kate Lyn Sheil, Jade Eshete, Lindsay Burdge, and Assol Abdullina, rises to the challenge and convincingly demonstrates the emotional range of her subject. Review

The nods to the original Mondo documentary from the 60s (trippy music, colorful filter effects, swingy camera movements, and the title) seem derivative, if not downright exploitative of a cult classic. The groovy nostalgia vibe doesn’t reflect life in the 2020s and the focus on southern California stereotypes doesn’t add anything that Saturday Night Live couldn’t provide. Review

The film is a rather lackluster adaptation of a classic that misses much of the original’s point. If you want to see young people executing artful feats of athleticism, dodge this flick and put on the Olympics. Review

As a nonfiction narrative looking back on all the individuals and circumstances who mixed together in 90s downtown NYC, All the Streets Are Silent is pretty fly. Review

Scharf’s style is maximalist, bright, chaotic, with amoebic-like organic forms. Heavily influenced by mascot-like pop-cultural memes from advertising, cartoons, and B-movies, there’s often something sinister lurking behind a smile. He calls attention to the nuclear in nuclear family. Review

The overall product, though, is fun with sound design and editing that are way more professional than you would expect. For an action movie with essentially no budget, it gets the job done pretty darn well. Review

Once the delight of the visual treat starts to get old, there’s not much here to hold the attention. Review

Here Are the Young Men fails to differentiate this generation’s young men from the generations proceeding them. Just more sludge in the puddle of toxic masculinity. Review

It’s a pro-life persuasive essay masquerading as a soap opera/civics lecture and it’s not particularly good at being any of those things. Review

The wooden acting, sometimes bizarre plotting, and sound design reminiscent of ASMR performed by a hot dog and a jar full of lubricant, isn’t quite terrible enough to elevate Jonathan Kaufman’s film to the level of a masterpiece of BAD MOVIEDOM like The Room. Review

It’s a scary documentary Goldberg has put together. It’s scary because of the real-life examples of abuse, vandalism, and murder, and because the film itself can be a bit simplistic. Review

It’s a hard film to watch that explores what, besides our time and labor, we are trading in exchange for a paycheck. Review

As in Les Mis, Hooper has his cast sing live, and it is Hudson’s performance of the signature song Memory that far outshines every other musical number here. It’s likely what you’ll be humming as you walk out of the theatre, and the one thing you’ll most remember about these Cats. Review

An impressive film, I anticipate great things to come from Attanasio, Morrone and Dale. Review

In the end, Nekrotronic delivers a little bit of everything, but it not enough of the right things. Review

This is definitely a film made for fans of the show, as a newbie would probably be completely lost even with the recap. But for those who spent 2011-2016 devouring the show like a warm scone fresh out of the oven, the movie is a delightfully unnecessary, but very welcome, treat. Review

The film is praiseworthy in the way it covers a civilian taking a moral stand against a corrupt state. Review

With such a breadth of information to cover, the film would have benefited from a bit less artifice and a bit more contextual information. Still, it’ll stay with you, prompting some serious thinking about the intersections of political and corporate interests and what people will do to maintain power. Review

The premise was interesting, centered around a teenage Leonardo Da Vinci who brings mechanical contraptions into being in 15th century Italy. But as we passed the 10 minute mark with no inciting incident, I realized we were in trouble. Review