MoviesMillers

Talk To Me - Movie Review Critics Score - 8 of 10 General Audience Score - 8 of 10 When it comes to scary movies, I’m the type of person to lock myself alone in the house at night and turn off all the lights, I want the maximum scare effects that a movie can deliver. And although there’s a lot of gaps in my horror films watched list, I enjoy the genre quite a bit and I’m always on the lookout for a new movie that’ll deliver some good scares. The new Australian film acquired by A24, Talk To Me, popped up on my radar when the studio got their hands on it, no pun intended, during the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year and I started hearing good things about the film. Well, it just dropped into theaters for the summer and although the film is light on pure terror and jump scares, although I’m not easily frightened, this is certainly one of the better thriller/suspense movies that is also a well thought out and executed piece of filmmaking. It was a bit disappointing the film steered ...

Oppenheimer - Movie Review Critics Score - 9 of 10 General Audience Score - 9 of 10 Most everyone knows the Manhattan Project was an operation the United States undertook in the early 1940’s for the development and creation of the first atomic bomb. But unless you really took the time to study the project, most probably don’t know not only wasn’t the bomb developed in Manhattan, but a small town was built in rural New Mexico to operate as the headquarters for some of the top physicists and scientists in the country to work on it. One of the, if not THE top mind behind the program, was a man nicknamed “father of the atomic bomb”, J. Robert Oppenheimer, who is the focal point of the new film from director Christoper Nolan, Oppenheimer. The film follows his early days, his career for the government developing the bombs that would eventually fall on the cities of Japan and how the government eventually turned it's back on the man who's work changed the course of world history. Nola...

Barbie - Movie Review Critics Score - 8 of 10 General Audience Score - 8 of 10 For some time now, popular toys and games from the childhoods of kids from the 1970’s and 80’s have become popular movie topics. From Transformers and G.I Joe to Battleship and The Lego Movie, movie studios have been on their heels to find source material for new movie projects for the past couple decades. While the Barbie doll has appeared before in her own line of animated cartoon movies for young girls and even made a cameo in the Toy Story franchise, she now gets a full blown big screen adaptation with a new film from WB, Barbie. From Greta Gerwig, the Oscar nominated writer/director behind the Best Picture nominees Lady Bird and the 2019 version of Little Women, Gerwig now tries her hand at something a bit different. Barbie is a comedy, straight up, and although not all the elements of the film work and some of the comedy bits are absurdist and even downright goofy, it mostly succeeds in it’s efforts to...

Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny - Movie Review Critics Score - 3 of 10 General Audience Score - 7 of 10  The Indiana Jones franchise is one that children from the 1980’s, which I am one of, usually know well and is generally beloved by. I just watched Raiders Of The Lost Ark and The Last Crusade with my children this week in preparation for the new film and despite some out of focus shots and the fabulous but terribly dated claymation sequences, the films hold up incredibly well and the perceived flaws just add to their charm and character. The new entry into the Indiana Jones saga, The Dial Of Destiny, is devoid of both these characteristics, the new film which has been airbrushed and glossed over after being run through the Disney machine, which produced the film in a joint effort with Paramount, just doesn’t feel like it’s in the same series. Despite the films efforts to make the film a fun trip down nostalgia lane, most of these efforts are wasted, misguided and or squand...

Sanctuary - Movie Review Critics Score - 8 of 10 General Audience Score - 8 of 10 There’s nothing quite like a good psychological thriller, when two parties of fairly equal intellectual capacity are locked into a mental game of chess, trying to stay three, four or five moves ahead of each other. This usually works well in the good guy/bad guy dynamic, like Batman vs. The Joker or Brad Pitt’s cop vs. Kevin Spacey’s killer in Se7en, the adversary relationship is prime territory for some fantastic intrigue. But change the dynamics to a couple or sexual partners squaring off in a power struggle, throw in a heavy dose of sexual tension between the two and lock them in a hotel room and you get the new film from Neon, Sanctuary. Like Malcolm & Marie from Netflix a couple years back, Sanctuary is a complete two hander of a film and is proof that the Covid era films with minuscule casts and confined set locations/nominal production costs can still produce brilliant pieces of cinema. The exc...

You Hurt My Feelings - Movie Review Critics Score - 7 of 10 General Audience Score - 7 of 10 We tell our friends and loved ones “little white lies” to spare their feelings quite often. A common one is where the wife asks the husband, “Do I look fat?”, to which we respond, “Of course not honey, you’re beautiful.” But what about the more complicated ones. Spouse: “I finally finished my new painting, do you like it?”. Child: “After all my hard work, why didn’t I get a good grade on my project?”. One of the latest A24 films, You Hurt My Feelings, explores the lies we tell each other to not only save someone we care about from being sad or disappointed, but the line when trying to be encouraging and helping becomes enabling. When a child’s inferior work is praised endlessly, even if they worked hard on it, that can have an alternative negative effect of thinking they always produce exceptional results when another teacher or eventually an employer wouldn’t accept it. From writer/director Ni...

Past Lives - Movie Review Critics Score - 9 of 10 General Audience Score - 8 of 10 We all make decisions, some big, mostly small, every hour of our waking lives. Most will have little to no bearing on the course of our lives, but a few of those decisions have profound implications, some resulting in untold joys and happiness, others in pain and sadness, a few in longing, regret or wondering what might have been. From A24 studios comes Past Lives, a film from writer and first time director Celine Song. It is the simple, yet powerful story of our choices and the impact they can have in where our lives take us. There’s no all-star cast here, there’s no action or intense dramatic interactions, for the most part. But there is some contemplative relationship dynamics and a finale like no other I’ve seen this depicted onscreen in quite some time. Although this movie is a bit of a slow burn that a few in the general audience will get bored with, film critics and cinephiles will be shouting thi...

Asteroid City - Movie Review Critics Score - 7 of 10 General Audience Score - 6 of 10 Wes Anderson is a director that makes films that have unparalleled and unique visual styling, eclectic screenwriting and dialogue and a propensity to make films that general audiences might consider just plain weird. That weirdness has endeared many a film lover and critic to his work over the decades that he’s been creating cinema. Along comes his latest full length film from Focus Features, Asteroid City, cratering into theatres everywhere. The film tells the story of a writer, played by Edward Norton, and his fictional account of a man who visits Asteroid City with his teen son and three young daughters. The film has an absolutely star studded cast including Tom Hanks, Steve Carrell, Margot Robbie, Scarlett Johansson and a slew of others, although some are more cameo roles than actual characters in the film. While Asteroid City is one of Anderson’s more accessible films in terms of connecting with ...