External reviews
5910
in total
published by Austin Chronicle
(click to remove filters)
-
Annabelle Comes Home
A review by Marc Savlov for Austin Chronicle2019-06-24
Neither the worst nor the best of the Conjuring franchise, Annabelle Comes Home is only as creepy as it needs to be and no more. Keep your expectations low and you might just enjoy it.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Child's Play
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-06-20
Worst of all, its mix of horror and comedy never walks the tightrope of shrieking absurdism that the originals did at their peak (and it's easy to forget that they started as a straight horror franchise). Instead, it ends up with the off-putting meanspiritedness of late-era Charles Band, the king of 2000s straight-to-video exploitation.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
The Gangster, the Cop, the Devil
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-06-20
A wily, hard-hitting slab of old-school action badassery.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Toy Story 4
A review by Kimberley Jones for Austin Chronicle2019-06-19
Twenty-four years ago, the original Toy Story broke ground as the first-ever entirely computer animated feature film. What’s more astonishing now is how all those ones and zeroes are harnessed to produce something so utterly lifelike.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Pavarotti
A review by Steve Davis for Austin Chronicle2019-06-18
This love letter dedicated to opera’s biggest rock star, the larger-than-life Luciano Pavarotti, achieves something most documentaries about the deceased rarely do: It brings a man back to glorious life.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Men in Black: International
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-06-12
Few actors are as good at playing confident idiots as Chris Hemsworth. Few actresses are also as good at playing sick-of-your-shit heroines as Tessa Thompson. Thanks to "Thor: Ragnarok," we know these two actors possess delightful onscreen chemistry and can bounce their way through an action scene with the best of them. Shockingly, it takes every bit of this talent and this charisma to keep Men in Black: International from being an outright disaster.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Shaft
A review by Steve Davis for Austin Chronicle2019-06-12
Times sure have changed since the old Shaft made women swoon by simply treating them like sh*t. As for the new Shaft, is he still a bad mutha? Shut your mouth.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
American Woman
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-06-12
American Woman lives in the quiet spaces of Deb's life. Always suitably understated, it remembers that loss doesn't always swallow a life, but it always leaves a void.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-06-12
Where Rolling Thunder Revue works best is when it's clear in its ambiguity.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
The Dead Don't Die
A review by Marc Savlov for Austin Chronicle2019-06-12
The Dead Don’t Die feels like something of a minor comic note in the director’s curriculum vitae, but it’s not without its pleasures. And like Romero’s genre classic, social commentary, satirical and otherwise, abounds.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Nothing Stays The Same: The Story of The Saxon Pub
A review by Richard Whittaker for Austin Chronicle2019-06-06
When Nothing Stays the Same is best is when it's about what it takes to survive, rather than indulging in handwringing: the flexibility, the raw business savvy melded with artistic vision that makes for great booking, and innovations like early evening residencies.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Late Night
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-06-05
Thompson and Kaling spark, while still leaving space for the rest of the cast to deliver blissful, blistering one-liners (I, Tonya's Hauser predictably steals the show there as the dopey gag writer Mancuso) and moments of true pathos (most especially from Lithgow as Katherine's ever-supportive husband).Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
The Secret Life of Pets 2
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-06-05
Rather than building to a full, fun film, each subplot seems like the pilot to a spin-off animated TV show. No film has felt so desperate to make the jump to the small screen since the best-forgotten "Barnyard: The Original Party Animals," but then The Secret Life of Pets 2 never disguises what it is.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Dark Phoenix
A review by Richard Whittaker for Austin Chronicle2019-06-04
There are flashes of what made the franchise work. Turner, after stumbling through the part in the rocky terrain of X-Men: Apocalypse, finally gets to grapple with the emotional complexities of a woman whose gifts are the most constant curse.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Rocketman
A review by Steve Davis for Austin Chronicle2019-06-03
As in the Mercury biopic, an unexpected performance by a relatively untried actor in the central role anchors Rocketman.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Ma
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-05-29
There are times when Spencer’s character feels less subversive and more like a gonzo Annie Wilkes from Misery; it’s clear that the filmmakers understand how to write Sue Ann in opposition to tropes, less clear that they know how to turn that into something meaningful.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Godzilla: King of the Monsters
A review by Marc Savlov for Austin Chronicle2019-05-29
Much of the film’s fun is overrun by a combination of overlong exposition, ham-fisted dialogue, and some genuinely confusing editing. You’re never quite sure at any given point where, exactly, the human characters are, what exactly they’re doing, or what the f**k that sudden, off-putting plot twist that just happened means.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
All Is True
A review by Marjorie Baumgarten for Austin Chronicle2019-05-29
Some of the interplay between Branagh and Dench as a refamiliarizing couple is also delightful. However, apart from fleeting pleasures, All Is True is mostly a goodie bag stuffed for Shakespeare completists.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
The Souvenir
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-05-29
That Swinton Byrne's performance is so open, so immediate, so caught up in emotional truths rather than performative beats, makes this one of the year's most unique and memorable roles.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle -
Brightburn
A review for Austin Chronicle2019-05-24
It may be an elevator pitch stretched to 90 minutes, and never aspires to more than that, but it's a fine and distinct funhouse ride designed to elicit cackles, then be forgotten about by the next ride.Read entire review on Austin Chronicle
