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Reviews for December 25th, 2025



      Four childhood friends, namely, Doug (Jack Black), Griff (Paul Rudd), Kenny (Steve Zahn), and Claire (Thandiwe Newton), embark on an adventure to remake the 1997 cult classic Anaconda in Anaconda. Writer/director Tom Gormican and co-writer Kevin Etten have made a painfully unfunny, lazy and asinine satire that runs out of steam very early. It suffers from repetitive jokes and silly humor that appeals to the lowest common denominator. Very little makes sense in terms of logic which is fine, but it's a shame that there's not nearly enough imagination to make up for that lack of logic. The witty and tongue-in-cheek moments that poke fun at itself are far and few between. Even the comedic talents of Jack Black, Paul Rudd and Steve Zahn don't help to provide any much-needed laughs. Anaconda could've been as bonkers and wickedly funny as One Cut of the Dead or as witty and outrageously funny as Bowfinger, but it doesn't even come close. Please be sure to stay through the end credits for a mid-credits scene. At a running time of 1 hour and 40 minutes, Anaconda opens nationwide via Columbia Pictures.

Number of times I checked my watch: 4





 

      After their choirmaster goes off to fight in WWI, a choral society from a small town in Yorkshire convince Dr. Henry Guthrie (Ralph Fiennes) to replace him. He recruit a group of teenagers as the choir members and prepares them for a performance of Edward Elgar's "The Dream of Gerontius" in The Choral.  Director Nicholas Hytner and screenwriter Alan Bennett has made a mildly engaging and understated, but often dull, clunky, sugar-coated, undercooked and choppily edited dramedy. It's sporadically funny and witty with a solid cast, especially Ralph Fiennes who does his best to breathe life into his role. Unfortunately, the screenplay remains shallow and with too many underdeveloped subplots and not enough focus or emotional depth. It also squanders its opportunity to become an interesting character study of any of the characters, each of whom remains at a cold distance from the audience. The Choral isn't nearly as powerful as the far more poignant and captivating The Chorus from 2004. At a running time of 1 hour and 53 minutes, The Choral opens at Angelika Film Center via Sony Pictures Classics.  

Number of times I checked my watch: 3





 

       In Father Mother Sister Brother, Jeff (Adam Driver) and his sister, Emily (Mayim Bialik), visit their father (Tom Waits) who lives alone in rural New Jersey. Lillith (Vicky Krieps) and her sister, Timothea (Cate Blanchett), visit their mother in Dublin to have tea. Skye (Indya Moore) and her brother, Billy (Luka Sabbat), reunite at the Parisian apartment after their parents die in a tragic accident. Writer/director Jim Jarmusch has made three vignettes that are only connected thematically. Each of them ends just before they start to get interesting. The first vignette could have easily been expanded into a feature length film and manages to be the most touching and funny one among the three, so the others are less and less engaging. Jarmusch's attempts to connect the stories are heavy-handed, contrived and clunky at times, especially when a character repeats a line that a character in another story had said. Night on Earth is a superior Jarmusch film that also includes interconnected vignettes; this anthology feels undercooked, slight and underwhelming without allowing any of the talented ensemble cast to truly shine. It's ultimately less than the sum of its parts. At a running time of 1 hour and 50 minutes, Father Mother Sister Brother opens at Film Forum via Mubi.  

Number of times I checked my watch: 3





 

      After getting laid off from his job at a paper manufacturing company, Man-soo (Lee Byung-hun) sends his resume to a rival company and hatches a plan to kill the other employees competing with him for the position in No Other Choice. Writer/director Park Chan-wook and his co-writers, Don McKellar, Lee Kyoung-mi and Lee Ja-hye, have made a clunky, overlong and tedious dark comedy. The plot eventually loses steam and just becomes over-the-top, mean-spirited and exhausting while making it very hard to care for Man-soo. His wife, Lee Min (Son Ye-jin), seems more likable, but underdeveloped like most of the female characters. Does it sound funny to you when another woman sucks the venom out of a snakebite on Man-soon's leg while he FaceTimes his wife? concurrently? Or when the woman mistakenly tells him to raise his leg above his heart instead of lowering it below his heart? The attempts at comedy are more physical rather than any funny lines. There are also issues with the film's blend of tones because it's hard to take anything seriously when the plot seems so outrageous and preposterous almost like a satire, but with not enough bite. There have been better films that have tackled the issue of job loss in a family with more humor, wit and heart, i.e. Tokyo Sonata. Keep in mind that this won't be the film for you if you can't handle teeth porn---there's a scene involving teeth that will make you squeamish like in Bring Her Back. At a running time of 2 hours and 19 minutes, No Other Choice  opens in select theaters on December 25th, 2025 via NEON.

Number of times I checked my watch: 3





 

      12-year-old Ben (Everett Blunck) encounters bullies including Jake (Kayo Martin) at an all-boys water polo summer camp in The Plague. Joel Edgerton plays their coach and mentor. Writer/director Charlie Polinger has woven one of the most original, profound and poignant coming-of-age movies in years. You'd never guess that this marks his directorial debut because he trusts the audience's emotions, patience, imagination and intelligence which is quite rare these days. The plot remains lean and focused without too much exposition yet it's also quite complex and more than just the sum of its parts. The titular plague can be seen as a metaphor for any kind of game that narcissistic bullies play with their victims to make them doubt their own reality. Ben wonders whether the "plague" is real or not. He's playing his bully's game. The only way to win any narcissist's game is not to play the game at all. Polinger does an impeccable job of getting inside the heart, mind and soul of Ben from start to finish while putting the audience at a sense of unease. When Ben's nervous, the audience feels that way too. The same can be said when he's scared, sad, confused or happy. Most importantly, you can feel Ben's emotional pain and how he struggles to process his emotions. Everett Blunck and Kayo Martin both give breakthrough performances as does Kenny Rasmussen as Eli, a young boy who's being bullied. There's a scene between Ben and Eli talking in a sauna that's quite powerful, and another powerful scene with Ben and his coach which will bring tears to your eyes.

      To say that The Plague is a roller coaster ride of emotions would be accurate. It's concurrently funny, scary, suspenseful, heartbreaking and enlightening. Everything from the poetic and exquisite cinematography, which channels Kubrick at times, to the creepy music score to the well-chosen songs add style that becomes part of the film's substance. Moreover, the dialogue feels natural without any stiltedness. Anyone who remembers their childhood as they approached their teen years will be able to relate. Anyone who's ever been a bully, been bullied or witnessed bullying will be able to relate, too. The real question is whether or not the audience who watch this film will learn any valuable life lessons like being true to oneself, being accountable for one's actions and the consequences of one's actions and displaying empathy as well as introspection. Those are very important lessons that even some adults struggle to grasp and to apply to their own lives, but there's always hope. As Pablo Neruda once wisely observed in a poem, "They can cut all of the flowers, but they can't stop the spring from coming."  At a running time of 1 hour and 35 minutes, The Plague is one of the best films of the year, and would be an interesting double feature with Young Hearts, Playground, Runt and Ghost World. It opens at IFC Center via Independent Film Company before expanding nationwide on January 2nd, 2026.  

Number of times I checked my watch: 1







      The Testament of Ann Lee tells the story of Ann Lee (Amanda Seyfried), who formed a religious movement called the Shakers with song and dance during the 18th Century. Writer/director Mona Fastvold and co-writer Brady Corbet have made a beautifully shot and poetic, but tedious, overlong and heavy-handed drama with shades of Terrence Malick. It's not an easy film to sit through because it's both unflinching and also monotonous without enough character depth when it comes to the supporting characters like William (Lewis Pullman), Ann's brother, and Mary (Thomasin McKenzie), one of Mary's followers, or Pastor Reuben Wright (Tim Blake Nelson). The narration, like in the recent Train Dreams, feels unnecessary and distracting, so both that film and The Testament of Ann Lee suffer that flaw. Its main strength is the bravura performance by Amanda Seyfried who gives one of the best performances of her career. She's the film's heart and soul, and manages to breathe life into her role while rising above the mediocre screenplay. At a lengthy running time of 2 hours and 17 minutes, The Testament of Ann Lee opens at Angelika Film Center via Searchlight Pictures.

Number of times I checked my watch: 3