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Film Review
5 active clusters / 14 articles
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Something's off about "Animal Farm"
commentary Distributed by the studio behind "Sound of Freedom," this take on George Orwell's classic is uniquely insidious Senior Writer Published May 3, 2026 12:00PM (EDT) "Animal Farm" (Angel Studios) It may seem like years in the past at this point, but it was only three little months ago that the world got itself worked into a lather over Emerald Fennell’s “Wuthering Heights.” The crux of the outrage surrounding Fennell’s film stemmed largely from the fact that she refused to rename her relatively loose, aesthetic-minded adaptation with a title that didn’t directly reference Emily Brontë’s novel. Literary purists were incensed. “This is not our ‘Wuthering Heights’!” they cried, pouring their souls out onto the internet. But Fennell’s film was a racy, adult-oriented retelling, made for people old enough to understand the difference between source material and an adaptation that remixes the themes and events of the original story necessary to produce a fresh take. It was a movie that trusted its viewers to separate the book and Fennell’s own cinematic idea of it. It was not to be taken as gospel because the target audience would ideally have fully formed brains. The same can’t be said about the new animated
L 100% / C 0% / R 0%18 hr ago
"The Devil Wears Prada 2" weighs the cost of fighting for our passions
commentary In a legacy sequel done right, Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway warn that the demise of media affects us all Senior Writer Published May 1, 2026 12:00PM (EDT) Anne Hathaway as Andy Sachs, Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestly and Stanley Tucci as Nigel Kipling in "The Devil Wears Prada 2" (Macall Polay/20th Century Studios) “The Devil Wears Prada” was never meant to be a franchise. Despite its pivotal role in the 2006 summer blockbuster season, where it raked in enough cash and glowing word-of-mouth praise to become the 10th most successful film of the season — the only title in the top 10 with a woman at top billing — the movie’s ending didn’t exactly scream sequel. “The Devil Wears Prada” was and is the perfect example of a self-contained story, built by the studio machine but never intended to keep the apparatus running. It’s economical and clever, with deceptively intricate character writing, striking costume design, a uniquely memorable score and soundtrack, loads of witty banter, a distinctly sleek aesthetic, and it’s one of the only films that has ever made multiple montage sequences feel earned. But look past all that technical prowess, and you’ll find a remarkably introspective
L 0% / C 100% / R 0%21 hr ago
The Devil Wears Prada 2 Is Ripped Straight From the Headlines—Except When It Comes to Its Fantastical Ending
Normally, I am against content labels for media, but I might have to make an exception for The Devil Wears Prada 2. This movie should come with a trigger warning, at least for millennial journalists. The fizzy, frothy comedy is also a jewel-box encapsulation of a generation's broken dreams, told through the decline of magazine journalism. The film opens at a journalistic awards ceremony, one of those rubber chicken dinners where journalists give each other plastic trophies to honor worthy (but often little-read) work. Just as our heroine, Andy Sachs (a perky, perfectly neurotic Anne Hathaway), accepts the top honor, she receives a text. Everyone at her table has been fired as part of a corporate cost-cutting deal. Andy makes tearful remarks and goes off to mourn her job and the industry. At the same time, Andy's old nemesis, the fearsome Miranda Priestly—the formidable editor of the (former) fashion powerhouse Runway—is facing a scandal for running a puff piece about a dicey fast fashion company. Runway's owner sees Andy's speech, which has gone viral, and offers her a job as the magazine's features editor in an attempt to revitalize the publication's journalistic credibility. The setup is somewhat strained, but the
L 20% / C 60% / R 20%2 hr ago
More in Film Review
Something's off about "Animal Farm"
commentary Distributed by the studio behind "Sound of Freedom," this take on George Orwell's classic is uniquely insidious Senior Writer Published May 3, 2026 12:00PM (EDT) "Animal Farm" (Angel Studios) It may seem like years in the past at this point, but it was only three little months ago that the world got itself worked into a lather over Emerald Fennell’s “Wuthering Heights.” The crux of the outrage surrounding Fennell’s film stemmed largely from the fact that she refused to rename her relatively loose, aesthetic-minded adaptation with a title that didn’t directly reference Emily Brontë’s novel. Literary purists were incensed. “This is not our ‘Wuthering Heights’!” they cried, pouring their souls out onto the internet. But Fennell’s film was a racy, adult-oriented retelling, made for people old enough to understand the difference between source material and an adaptation that remixes the themes and events of the original story necessary to produce a fresh take. It was a movie that trusted its viewers to separate the book and Fennell’s own cinematic idea of it. It was not to be taken as gospel because the target audience would ideally have fully formed brains. The same can’t be said about the new animated
18 hr ago
"The Devil Wears Prada 2" weighs the cost of fighting for our passions
commentary In a legacy sequel done right, Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway warn that the demise of media affects us all Senior Writer Published May 1, 2026 12:00PM (EDT) Anne Hathaway as Andy Sachs, Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestly and Stanley Tucci as Nigel Kipling in "The Devil Wears Prada 2" (Macall Polay/20th Century Studios) “The Devil Wears Prada” was never meant to be a franchise. Despite its pivotal role in the 2006 summer blockbuster season, where it raked in enough cash and glowing word-of-mouth praise to become the 10th most successful film of the season — the only title in the top 10 with a woman at top billing — the movie’s ending didn’t exactly scream sequel. “The Devil Wears Prada” was and is the perfect example of a self-contained story, built by the studio machine but never intended to keep the apparatus running. It’s economical and clever, with deceptively intricate character writing, striking costume design, a uniquely memorable score and soundtrack, loads of witty banter, a distinctly sleek aesthetic, and it’s one of the only films that has ever made multiple montage sequences feel earned. But look past all that technical prowess, and you’ll find a remarkably introspective
21 hr ago
The Devil Wears Prada 2 Is Ripped Straight From the Headlines—Except When It Comes to Its Fantastical Ending
Normally, I am against content labels for media, but I might have to make an exception for The Devil Wears Prada 2. This movie should come with a trigger warning, at least for millennial journalists. The fizzy, frothy comedy is also a jewel-box encapsulation of a generation's broken dreams, told through the decline of magazine journalism. The film opens at a journalistic awards ceremony, one of those rubber chicken dinners where journalists give each other plastic trophies to honor worthy (but often little-read) work. Just as our heroine, Andy Sachs (a perky, perfectly neurotic Anne Hathaway), accepts the top honor, she receives a text. Everyone at her table has been fired as part of a corporate cost-cutting deal. Andy makes tearful remarks and goes off to mourn her job and the industry. At the same time, Andy's old nemesis, the fearsome Miranda Priestly—the formidable editor of the (former) fashion powerhouse Runway—is facing a scandal for running a puff piece about a dicey fast fashion company. Runway's owner sees Andy's speech, which has gone viral, and offers her a job as the magazine's features editor in an attempt to revitalize the publication's journalistic credibility. The setup is somewhat strained, but the
2 hr ago
Edgar Wright's 'The Running Man' survives in 4K with razor-sharp visuals and a darker edge
Director Edgar Wright’s box-office-bombing sci-fi action thriller from late last year looks for a more successful second life in home entertainment with the 4K disc release of The Running Man (Paramount Pictures Home Entertainment, rated R, 2.39:1 aspect ratio, 133 minutes, $31.99). Adapted from Stephen King’s 1982 novel of the same name, the story takes viewers to a dystopian future in a United States ruled by an authoritarian media conglomerate. There, we meet blacklisted laborer Ben Richards (Glen Powell), who is unable to obtain medicine for his sick infant daughter. Desperation, along with his anger management issues, makes him the perfect contestant for the most lethal game show on the planet, aptly titled “The Running Man.” The competition, concocted by ratings-rabid television producer Dan Killian (Josh Brolin), requires contestants to stay alive for 30 days while five hunters track them across the country — with help from tattletale citizens — for a chance to win $1 billion. Full disclosure: I am a huge fan of the 1987 film, which featured much more cartoony characters and starred Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Richards. What helped make the original stand out were the outlandish hunters portrayed as superheroes such as Captain Freedom, Fireball
11 hr ago
'Slither' at 20: The alien worm comedy-horror that heralded James Gunn's arrival
(Image credit: Universal Pictures) The weirdest thing about "Slither" is not so much that James Gunn made it. It's more that the writer/director of this schlocky, unashamed B-movie went on to make a trio of "Guardians of the Galaxy" movies and "The Suicide Squad", before being installed as the head of DC Studios and bringing "Superman" back to the big screen. How many of Hollywood's biggest names have alien worms on their resumés?Violent, gory, and often played for laughs, "Slither" was always an outlier among the big-budget blockbusters and torture porn that dominated the mid-'00s. But, rewatching the film 20 years later (March 31 was the actual anniversary), Gunn's fingerprints are unmistakable, from the highly quotable dialogue to the quirky soundtrack lifted from the outer reaches of Gunn's eclectic music collection.Article continues below (Image credit: Universal Pictures)But screenplays were never his final goal. "I never wanted to be a screenwriter," he said in the 2017 interview included on "Slither"'s new Blu-ray re-release. "It's a really terrible occupation, because you create something that you love and then someone else does the final draft. I think of directing a film as the final draft of writing the screenplay."That said, Gunn never intended
18 hr ago