#REVIEW: “THE BRUTALIST”
Review by David Baldwin for Mr. Will Wong
“Like just how good could THE BRUTALIST be?”
That was the question I had echoing in my brain during TIFF this past September when the Film had its North American premiere and a seat (not to mention a vacancy in my schedule) for the 3 hour and 35-minute epic was hard to come by. I unfortunately decided to wait to see what had all the critics buzzing.
Flash-forward to this week where the Film just scored 10 nominations from the Academy ...
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#REVIEW: “HARD TRUTHS”
Review by Amanda Gilmore for Mr. Will Wong
Writer-Director Mike Leigh and Actress Marianne Jean-Baptiste team-up again after 28 years to tell this story about empathy and compassion.
Hard Truths follows Pansy (Jean-Baptiste), an angry and depressed woman, who lashes out at everyone and everything. Her husband Curtley (David Webber) and son Moses (Twain Barrett) get the brunt of her angry on a daily basis. To distance themselves from her hurtful criticisms, they flee the house or ...
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#REVIEW: “WOLF MAN”
Review by Amanda Gilmore for Mr. Will Wong
Following the success of The Invisible Man in 2020, Writer-Director Leigh Whannell is reviving another beloved monster.
After receiving confirmation of his father’s passing, Blake (Christopher Abbott), a kind father and husband, must travel back to his secluded childhood home deep in the forests of Oregon. His wife Charlotte (Julia Garner) and their daughter Ginger (Matilda Firth) accompany him in packing his father’s belongings. ...
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#REVIEW: “THE LAST SHOWGIRL”
By Mr. Will Wong
After a successful festival circuit run and some recent awards season momentum, Gia Coppola's THE LAST SHOWGIRL is poised to deliver upon its promise. This portrait of an aging Showgirl who must come to terms with what's next after the revue she's been performing in for 30 years, closes abruptly.
The Drama centers around Shelley (Pamela Anderson), who has seen a Showgirl's last lavish days in Las Vegas, seeing a yesteryear that possessed much prestige and glamour. Times ...
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#REVIEW: “YOUNG WERTHER”
Review by Amanda Gilmore for Mr. Will Wong
This Adaptation of the 1774 epistolary Novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, titled The Sorrows of Young Werther, puts Toronto on full display.
Young Werther tells the same story as the 18th-century novel. Werther (Douglas Booth) is a charming Writer who stumbles across the love of his life, Charlotte (Alison Pill). However, there’s one big problem: Charlotte’s engaged. Despite this, Werther turns his world upside down in a desperate and ...
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#REVIEW: “THE ROOM NEXT DOOR”
Review by Amanda Gilmore for Mr. Will Wong
Ingrid (Julianne Moore) and Martha (Tilda Swinton) were close friends in their youth when they worked at the same magazine. However, as they grew-up and developed their own careers, they naturally grew apart. When Ingrid runs into an old colleague from the magazine, she asks about Martha. She learns Martha has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. This leads the two to meet again in this extreme, tender situation after years of being out of ...
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#REVIEW: “MUFASA: THE LION KING”
Review by Amanda Gilmore for Mr. Will Wong
Picking up a few years following 2019's The Lion King, Simba (Donald Glover) leaves the Pride Lands to go on a mysterious mission to bring Nala (Beyoncé) back. Simba leaves their young daughter, Kiara (Blue Ivy Carter), in the care of Pumbaa (Seth Rogen) and Timon (Billy Eichner). Thankfully for the rambunctious warthog and meerkat, Rafiki (John Kani) comes with a story to keep Kiara — and them — invested. Here, we are taken into Mufasa’s ...
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#REVIEW: “NOSFERATU”
Review by Nicholas Porteous for Mr. Will Wong
Dracula!!! Ever heard of him? Robert Eggers' Nosferatu might make you wish you never had. His reinvention of the classic, hall of fame monster is arguably the most flat-out foreboding, hair-raising, (and least charming!) version ever put to film.
It's 1838 as winter descends on Victorian England. I had no idea Nosferatu was a Christmas movie. Ellen Hunter (Lily-Rose Depp) teeters on the brink of madness, haunted by visions of an obsessive ...
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#REVIEW: “KRAVEN THE HUNTER”
Review by Justin Waldman for Mr. Will Wong
All things, whether good or bad, must come to an end and with J.C. Chandor’s Kraven the Hunter (that was postponed for roughly 18 months) the Sony Pictures-MCU experiment is finally over, and somehow single individuals are in dismay. What started this year with a meme about a mother in the Amazon, slowly became the perfect allegory for all of the Sony Pictures-Marvel movies – a web is something a spider creates to trap its prey, but without a ...
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#REVIEW: “THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE WAR OF ROHIRRIM”
Review by Nicholas Porteous for Mr. Will Wong
Long before The Two Towers, there was another battle of good and evil waged at Helm's Deep. Cut to princess Hera (Gaia Wise) at the top of a hill, gazing out at the majesty of Middle-earth. Our anonymous narrator notes that after her time, no one sang songs of her. A compelling riddle: if no one felt like writing a song about her, why make a feature film? Did she change her name? Was her story cut short? The answer, I'm afraid, is nowhere near ...
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