Screens and Streams

“One of Them Days” is the first theatrical R-rated female-driven Black comedy since 2017’s “Girls Trip,” and that is a shocking statistic. Released in theaters in mid-January of this year, “One of Them Days” was a modest hit, making $49 million off a budget of $14 million. The movie’s high-concept premise, two friends/roommates have just…

Those whose familiarity with director Bong Joon Ho starts and stops with his Oscar-winning “Parasite,” his follow-up film to that 2019 breakout hit may be confused. Those with a more profound knowledge of Joon Ho’s filmography will recognize the same over-the-top sensibilities that mark his work in the sci-fi genre with movies like “Snowpiercer” and…

If you’ve seen one possessed toy horror movie, you’ve seen them all. And if you are still seeking these films out, and judging from the scores of fans of films like “Annabelle” and “Child’s Play,” there is a market. If you like your horror kills doled out with gobs of gore and twisty Rube Goldberg…

In this day and age of endless film awards shows and scores of internet Oscar prognosticators, the winners are all but a foregone conclusion by the time the Academy Awards ceremony takes place; if you even watch the show anymore, all you can hope for is perhaps one surprise win and some years that doesn’t…

Director Greg Kwedar’s film finds the humanity living within the souls of men who society has locked away If you’ve heard of the film “Sing Sing,” it’s likely due to the critical attention placed on its two lead performances, Colman Domingo, playing the real-life "Divine G," and Clarence “Divine Eye” Maclin, portraying a version of…

Award-winning Brazillian filmmaker Walter Salles does what all great filmmakers do when tackling heavy subject matter; he drills down to focus on one family amid tumult, providing the viewer a ringside seat into life under a Brazil’s brutal military dictatorship without trying to tackle every facet of the history behind a regime which lasted from…

One of the history-making stories at the 2012 London Olympic Games was the addition of women’s boxing to the competition. The United States, which had struggled for decades to win any medal in the boxing category, won the first gold medal awarded in the 75 Kg Middle Women division, thanks to 17-year-old Flint, Michigan resident…

Network television thrives on three styles of genres: police procedurals, legal procedurals, and medical procedurals. “Grey’s Anatomy” is in the midst of its 21st season. “Chicago Med” is in its 10th season, and new shows such as “Brilliant Minds,” “Doctor Odyssey,” and the comedic “St. Denis Medical” are all focused on the medical genre. Of…

The nominations for the 2025 Academy Awards came out on Thursday, Jan. 23, and any year where four of my top film picks get nominated for Best Picture and Director, I can’t complain. Out of the 10 nominees for Best Picture, I’ve seen eight, and seven of those I’ve reviewed for The Mountain Times since…

There are filmmakers who redefine the movie-going experience and those who reshape it. David Lynch did both. He remains one of the most important filmmakers and certainly one of the most unique, risk-taking, and singular visionaries to ever pick up a movie camera. When critics discuss films that push the boundaries of the medium, Lynch’s…

With home viewing becoming the preferred way to watch movies, it’s a rare delight to encounter a film that demands to be seen in a theater. Brady Corbet’s "The Brutalist" is one such film. This 215-minute epic, shot in stunning VistaVision and presented in 70mm, is a cinematic experience that makes the journey to the…

When a musical bio-pic like “A Complete Unknown” comes along, movie red flags always rise. Are we going to get another cookie-cutter, a paint-by-numbers retelling of a famous musician, lined with “magical moments” of inspiration behind the music numbers we know so well, heightened by a performance that is more mime than realistic by an…

South Korea’s limited series, “Squid Game,” became a national sensation when it debuted in the U.S. in the fall of 2021. Its combination of hyper-violence and reality show meets “The Hunger Games” proved the perfect blend of entertainment for an audience still dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic and feeling that life’s many challenges placed their…

Director Robert Eggers’ re-imagining of F.W. Murnau’s 1922 silent classic “Nosferatu,” which itself was a thinly disguised ripoff of Bram Stoker’s “Dracula,” sneaked into theaters Christmas Day, just in the nick of time to give all the Goth kids nighttime refuge from all the family holiday parties, to sink their teeth into some counter-programming. For…

As 2024 draws to a close, it would seem fitting to offer up a top-ten best-film list and maybe throw in a worst-of-the-year list, too. However, I live in Vermont, which is not a large market for the film industry, and we hardly have any theaters in the state where new films can be seen,…