Author: Alex Billington

"Baseball is the only game that death is jealous of. Baseball defeats time. Only baseball has the possibility of going on forever." Vertical has revealed an official trailer for an indie dramedy film called Reverse the Curse, a baseball story about a father who loves the Boston Red Sox. It's directed by David Duchovny and also adapted from Duchovny's own book titled "Bucky F*cking Dent", an ode to the bond between father and son. The film follows Ted, aka Mr. Peanut, who moves in with his father Marty when he is diagnosed with lung cancer. To keep him happy and alive, Ted enlists Marty's grief counselor Mariana and friends to fake a Red Sox winning streak using the help of a few pals. Starring David Duchovny, Logan Marshall-Green, Stephanie Beatriz, Jason Beghe, Evan Handler, Santo Fazio, Daphne Rubin-Vega, and Pamela Adlon. This initially premiered at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival last year, and it also played at the Philly & Austin Film Festivals. Reviews seem positive but the footage doesn't look promising. Catch the trailer below. Here's the first official trailer ...

"My voice is the conductor of my life." Prime Video has revealed an official trailer for the documentary film I Am: Celine Dion, a biopic doc about the beloved Canadian singer. This is yet another of these marketing doc films that tells the story of a famous celebrity, made to help promote her music. It's rated PG which means it's supposed to be inspiring for everyone. Directed by Academy Award nominee Irene Taylor, I Am: Celine Dion gives us a raw and honest behind-the-scenes look at the iconic superstar’s struggle with a life-altering illness. Serving as a love letter to her fans, this inspirational documentary highlights the music that has guided her life while also showcasing the resilience of the human spirit. Her music has incorporated genres such as pop, rock, R&B, gospel, and classical music. Her recordings have been mainly in English and French, although she has also sung in Spanish, Italian, German, Latin, Japanese, and Chinese. She cancelled performances in 2022 & 2023 because of a rare neurological disease and this film about her dealing with it. Here's the ...

"Untangle yourself from your parents... the sooner you stop relying on them, the more powerful you will be." What kind of cult is this? Vertical has revealed an official trailer for an indie thriller titled A Sacrifice, a cult drama set in Berlin. This is the latest film directed by Ridley Scott's daughter Jordan Scott, following her feature debut Cracks from back in 2009. American social psychologist Ben Monroe investigates a local cult connected to a disturbing event, while his daughter becomes entangled with a mysterious boy. While he immerses himself in his work trying to understand what is going on with this mysterious cult, his rebellious teen daughter, Mazzy, ends up embroiled with this German boy and another strange woman. Starring Eric Bana, Sadie Sink, Jonas Dassler, Sylvia Hoeks, Sophie Rois, Stephan Kampwirth, & Lara Feith. It's "inspired by" a book that was originally set in Tokyo, however they shifted the location to Berlin instead, which is a bit strange because none of this film's sotry feels like anything that would be happening in Berlin. Here's the official trailer (+ ...

You've waited an eternity for this... Warner Bros has revealed the full official trailer for the legacy sequel titled Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (originally known as Beetlejuice 2), reuniting mastermind filmmaker Tim Burton with actor Michael Keaton for a long-awaited follow-up 36 (!!) years later. Who's ready for some creepy chaos again? The first Beetlejuice movie opened in 1988 (right before Burton's Batman in 1989) and ended up as a modest success and cult favorite. The sequel continues the story with the very same family. Still haunted by Beetlejuice, Lydia's life is turned upside down when her rebellious teenage daughter, Astrid, discovers the mysterious model of the town in the attic and the portal to the Afterlife is accidentally opened. Michael Keaton returns as this miscreant Betelgeuse again, along with Winona Ryder back as Lydia, plus Jenna Ortega as Astrid, Catherine O'Hara, Monica Bellucci, Justin Theroux, Arthur Conti, Burn Gorman, and Filipe Cates; plus Willem Dafoe as a ghost detective who, in his life, was a B movie action star. There's much more exciting footage in this trailer as the teaser didn't ...

It's always an especially exhilarating experience to stumble upon a film so completely unlike anything that has been made before that it leaves you on a cinematic high after walking out of the theater. At the midway point in the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, we finally get to experience the bliss of Anora, the latest film from American filmmaker Sean Baker. Anora is his eighth feature film so far, and he was already in Cannes in 2017 with The Florida Project (in the Directors' Fortnight sidebar) and again in 2021 with Red Rocket. This might just be hist best yet. France obviously loves him, but so does everyone else - this film has received the highest marks out of any in the Main Competition from all of the critics at this year's festival. The film's title is the name of the young woman who stars in the film, a young stripper from New York City named Anora who falls for a rich Russian kid after he pays her to hook up with him. On a whirlwind trip to Las Vegas ...

"This isn't my first time in Beverly Hills..." Ready for a good time in Beverly Hills? Netflix has dropped the full official trailer for Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F, the long-awaited next new sequel in the Beverly Hills Cop franchise – which last ended decades ago in 1994 with Beverly Hills Cop III directed by John Landis. This smashing new follow-up (BHC4!) picks up right where things left off with Axel Foley as he returns to his old stomping grounds in SoCal for more mayhem. When his daughter is threatened, he is drawn back to the many opulent environs of Beverly Hills to investigate the untimely demise of a long-time confidant. She & Foley team up with a new partner to turn up the heat & uncover a conspiracy. Eddie Murphy is back as Foley for the fourth time, after first taking on the role in the 1984 comedy classic. The new cast also includes Joseph Gordon-Levitt as his new partner, Taylour Paige, Judge Reinhold, John Ashton, Bronson Pinchot, Paul Reiser, and Kevin Bacon. This all-out comedy sequel is landing on ...

The story of a cat and his friends. Flow is an animated film made by the Latvian filmmaker named Gints Zilbalodis, his second feature after making Away (in 2019) which was a fable about loneliness. He's also known for many other animated short films that debuted online before he started moving into making these features. Whereas Away is about loneliness, Flow is about friendship, companionship, and loyalty. The title is once again a literal title because the story is about how we meet and befriend different people as life flows along, taking us to unknown destinations and through many trials & tribulations. Much like Away, the story is a metaphor for life as a human being, this time told through an adventure featuring different animals in a strange world. It's entirely dialogue free and features Zilbalodis' distinct cel-shading animation style, more rudimentary than Pixar or DreamWorks or Sony but still animated with heaps of emotion and compassion. Flow is about a super cute, but stubborn, lonely, solitary black cat. The film is set in a sprawling imagined world, beginning in a ...

From the strange and wicked and peculiar mind of Greek mastermind Yorgos Lanthimos comes another disquieting new film that will disturb even more people. Only a few months after premiering Poor Things at the 2023 Venice Film Festival (here's my review of that one), Lanthimos is back on the festival circuit with his next film titled Kinds of Kindness. It's nearly three hours in total and instead being of one, long film it's three different stories cut together into a triptych feature that plays more like a mashup of funky "Black Mirror" ideas than something more straightforward. As expected with Lanthimos, it's proper mindfuckery of the highest order. Three weird stories that most probably won't enjoy watching because they're so strange and unsettling and don't follow the typical cinematic narratives most are familiar with. In fact, I'd say Kinds of Kindness is Yorgos Lanthimos's Twilight Zone. Sort of? Maybe? Many bizarre things happening in each of the stories that may or may not involve the supernatural. Or they are just about a bunch of crazy people. Kinds of Kindness is the ...

"Why are humans so obsessed with recreating themselves?" GKids Films has revealed a new official trailer for the 4K re-release of the sci-fi anime classic Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence, a highly regarded sequel to the seminal anime Ghost in the Shell (1995). This is one of the only animated movies to ever premiere in the Main Competition at the Cannes Film Festival, screening there in 2004 after first opening in Japan. In the year 2032, Batô, a cyborg detective for the anti-terrorist unit Public Security Section 9, investigates the case of a female robot – created solely for sexual pleasure – who slaughtered her owner. Acclaimed director Mamoru Oshii pushes further into the world and concepts first developed in his groundbreaking GITS. With its thought-provoking speculations on artificial intelligence, which have only become more relevant in our present world, Innocence celebrates its 20th anniversary returning to cinemas in a lustrous 4K restoration. With the voices of Akio Ōtsuka, Atsuko Tanaka, Kōichi Yamadera, & Tamio Ōki. I'm a HUGE fan of this, especially because it has a doggie ...

"With this crayon nothing can stop me!" Except for Zachary Levi? Sony has revealed the second trailer for the Harold and the Purple Crayon movie, arriving in theaters in August this summer. Harold and the Purple Crayon is the first film adaptation of the beloved children’s classic book series by Crockett Johnson that has captivated young readers for decades. "This summer, enter a world where anything you draw comes to life." Inside of his book, adventurous Harold can make anything come to life simply by drawing it. After he grows up and draws himself off the book's pages and into the physical world, Harold discovers that he has a lot to learn about real life. Directed by Carlos Saldanha and produced by John Davis, the live-action hybrid family adventure-comedy stars Zachary Levi as Harold, Lil Rel Howery, Benjamin Bottani, Jemaine Clement, Tanya Reynolds, with Alfred Molina and Zooey Deschanel. This looks a bit too cheesy and ridiculous to actually work, but maybe kids will enjoy it? Or maybe not? What exactly is he going to draw with this crayon? From ...