In the predictably dystopian future of “Automata,” Earth’s ecosystem has collapsed, leaving only walled cities surrounded by radiation-blasted desert. The city inhabitants are served by a legion of robots, who are controlled by two primary protocols that prevent them from altering themselves.…
As much a barometer of contemporary political morality as a political or espionage thriller, the three films of the Worricker trilogy paint the town in various shades of gray. Bill Nighy stars as Johnny Worricker, a high-level analyst with the…
The ‘found footage’ horror film “The Taking of Deborah Logan” takes a questionable premise and quickly finds ways to make it even more regrettable. In this space, I have previously confessed my guilty-pleasure weakness for this style of herky-jerky, “cam-corder…
In the new thriller “Good People,” James Franco and Kate Hudson are Tom and Anna Wright, a young American couple living in a London flat, trying to start a family while renovating a diseased-looking inherited house. In addition to fertility difficulties, they’ve…
Bon vivant and genteel man-about-town Jerry Bruckheimer throws the considerable bulk of his cinematic hat into the occult thriller ring with the new release “Deliver Us From Evil.” Aussie Eric Bana flexes his Bronx accent as police officer Ralph Sarchie, a…
On the 40th anniversary of the most famous political scandal in American history, PBS has released the new DVD “Dick Cavett’s Watergate.” Through a combination of fortuitous timing and journalistic instinct, Dick Cavett and his talk show were an important part…
It’s in the nature of film comedy to stretch the believability of their premises to the breaking point (“Hangover” trilogy, I’m looking in your direction). And it’s in the nature of comedy audiences to be more forgiving of shoddy storytelling…
What to do, what to do. Lots of airtime to fill between “Sharknado” installments and Smackdown episodes. What can we here at SyFy do about that? Hey, look, here’s an already cancelled New Zealand TV series that’s just laying around.…
Matthew Weiner found popular and critical acclaim with his TV series “Mad Men,” creating a rich, detailed world in the life and times of Don Draper. But things are a little bumpier in the comedy-drama “Are You Here,” his feature film debut.…
More a study in isolation than an end-of-days zombie thriller, “Dead Within” confidently ignores the usual tropes of living dead horror, looking instead at the question “What’s more lethal—beasties or boredom?” Directed by Ben Wagner, “Dead Within” tells the story of a…