Reviews for October 2nd, 2026
Duke (Aaron Holliday) has no shame about using AI to deepfake people and to mess around with them which leads to a series of interconnecting stories involving Poppy (Simran Jehani), Clinto Binto (Sean Gunn) and Lazzy (Paige Searcy) in Appofeniacs. Writer/director Chris Marrs Piliero has made an over-the-top, exhausting and convoluted thriller that also serves as a heavy-handed cautionary tale about the dangers of AI. It gets quite dark, gritty and unflinchingly violent as the plot progresses. None of it feels very fun or exciting, though.
Appofeniacssuffers from characters who remain underdeveloped, too many subplots, and clunky exposition. Subtlety, nuance, wit, profound insights, good performances, emotional depth or stylish cinematography aren't among the film's strengths which leaves very little to hook the audience other than the violence. At a running time of 1 hour and 29 minutes, Appofeniacs opens at AMC Empire and other select theaters via Magenta Light Studios
Number of times I checked my watch: 3
Bax (Connor Storrie) gets caught up in the dark underbelly of the technology-driven futuristic city that he desperately tries to find his missing sister, April (Lily Krug), at in (April X. Writer/director Michel K. Parandi and co-writer Jack Coulton have made convoluted, dull and uninspired sci-fi thriller with great production values, but it suffers from style over substance and a lack of imagination as well world-building. The performances are mediocre at best, and the bland screenplay has stilted and on-the-nose dialogue. Moreover, there's not nearly enough comic relief to counterbalance the serious plot which quickly becomes monotonous.
April X is yet another undercooked B-movie with an initially compelling concept, but, like the equally slick and disappointing In Time, the plot takes a sharp nosedive around the 30-minute mark and never recovers. At a running time of 1 hour and 31 minutes, April X opens in select theaters nationwide via Sunrise Films and Rialto Distribution.
Number of times I checked my watch: 4
In Atonement, Lou D’Alessandro (Boyd Holbrook), a US marine, seeks to reconcile with an Iraqi family who he and his unit had shot 10 years earlier killing the husband of Mariam (Hiam Abbass) in Baghdad. Michael Reid (Kenneth Branagh), a reporter for the New Yorker, arrives with him at the home of Mariam while writing an article about their reconciliation. Writer/director Reed Van Dyk has made a powerful, sobering and emotionally engrossing drama about forgiveness, introspection, grief, empathy compassion. The plot unfolds linearly with an intense first act that introduces Lou and his team of marines and Mariam's family before the tragic incident that led to her husband getting shot and killed. Michael briefly meets Lou on a rooftop to try to interview him for an article, but he doesn't want to speak to him. Ten year later, Lou changes his mind and contacts Michael out-of-the-blue while suffering from PTSD. The sensitive screenplay treats everyone including Lou as complex and flawed human beings. Both he, Mariam and her family suffer emotional pain from the tragedy for different reasons.
Boyd Holbrook and Kenneth Branagh give strong performance, but it's the always-reliable Hiam Abbas who anchors the film with her raw, nuanced and bravura performance that generously and bravely opens the window into Mariam's heart, mind and soul for the audience to peer through. Be prepared for a roller coaster ride of emotions and to bring tissues because there are more than a few scenes that will make you shed a tear. The scene when Lou finally faces Mariam and her family finally face each other to talk about their feelings head-on and experience epiphanies as well as some catharsis is one of the most heartbreaking, enlightening and captivating scenes in the film. The last scene, which won't be revealed here, ends the film on a poetic, sweet and refreshingly un-Hollywood note. Atonement hits the same emotional beats found in the equally powerful Mass(2021) which would make for a great double feature. At a running time of 1 hour and 58 minutes, it opens at Angelika Film Center via Kino Lorber.
Number of times I checked my watch: 1
A medical team, Miguel (Juan Pablo Shuk), Alli (Jessica Rothe), and Callum (Will Close), encounter a large, dangerous black snake called a boiúna while on a humanitarian mission in the Amazon in Beware Boiúna. Raúl (Jaime Newball) and his daughter, Lena (Kiana Madeira), operate the riverboat that the medical team works on. Director Mike P. Nelson and Alan B. McElroy have made a mildly engaging and harmless, but uninspired and mostly unscary creature feature that's just sporadically thrilling. It's not as lean as it could've been because there's an unnecessary subplot involving Lena accidentally killing a guy named Shawn (Jackson Bews) when he tries to sexually assault her. Too many of the action scenes take place at night with poor lighting and the ones in the daytime are choppily edited with subpar camera work that makes the kills look less intense and not very gory.The characters remain underdeveloped and forgettable, and the titular character, the snake itself, isn't seen in its entirety until the end; it makes brief appearances throughout the film, but without a precise sense of how large it actually is.
Who would've imagined that the most intense and squirm-inducing scene in the film would be the one with Alli removing botflies from Callum's back? Also, is it too much to ask for some comic relief? If you don't mind a bland and unimaginative B-horror thriller, you won't mind Beware Boiúna. Everyone else looking for a guilty pleasure like Anaconda or a gritty and shocking horror thriller like The Green Inferno will be disappointed. At a running time of 1 hour and 44 minutes, Beware Boiúna opens nationwide via Lionsgate.
Number of times I checked my watch: 3
In Big Girls Don't Cry, 14-year-old Sid (Ani Palmer) lives with her father, Leo (Noah Taylor), and older sister, Adele (Tara Canton), in New Zealand. She develops a crush on a popular girl, Lana (Beatrix Rain Wolfe), and catfishes her when she pretends to be Diggy (Poroaki Merritt-McDonald), the older brother of her best friend, Tia (Ngataitangirua Hita), after she successfully logs into his MSN account and sends flirtatious messages to Lana. Writer/director Paloma Schneideman has made a tender and engrossing coming-of-age movie. Sid doesn't have any good role models around her because her father suffers from alcoholism and has a violent temper. Like every teenager, she's emotionally immature and doesn't quite know how to navigate her complex feelings as she begins to explore sexual identity. She's also impressionable, naïve, insecure, vulnerable and shy. Fortunately, the sensitive screenplay designs enough of a window into her heart, mind and soul. It avoids clunkiness, melodrama, schmaltz and any unnecessary or underdeveloped subplots. Kudos to the filmmakers for treating her as well as the supporting characters, including her father, as human beings, warts-and-all, without asking the audience to judge them. Big Girls Don't Cry also manages to be unflinching and natural without becoming emotionally devastating. That's, in part, thanks to the natural performance by the ensemble cast and the breakthrough performance of Ani Palmer. Moreover, the pace moves leisurely without feeling too slow or too fast.Everything feels authentic, especially to the specific time that it's set back in 2006 during the initial boom of the internet and social media. Anyone who grew up around that time will find this film to be even more relatable. At a running time of 1 hour and 39 minutes, Big Girls Don't Cry opens in The Cinemas NYC before expanding to Angelika Film Center on October 9th, 2026 via Blue Fox Entertainment. It would be a great double feature with Girls Like Girl and Show Me Love.
Number of times I checked my watch: 1
Digger Rockwell (Tom Cruise), a wealthy oil tycoon, must stop a major disaster from happening when his company's drilling causes a large iceberg named Lucy to break off and head toward Europe in Digger. John Goodman plays U.S. President Compson, Michael Stuhlbarg plays the Vice President, Riz Ahmed plays a scientist who assists President Compson, and Sandra Hüller plays Digger's business partner. Writer/director Alejandro G. Iñárritu and his co-writers, Alexander Dinelaris, Nicolás Giacobone and Sabina Berman have made a zany and bonkers political satire with a great ensemble cast, but it's also exhausting, pretentious, bloated and low on laughs, razor-sharp wit and world-building. Logic gets thrown out of the window early on, and, unfortunately, doesn't get replaced by enough imagination to compensate for that. Only one scene generates much-needed laughs through irreverent humor when the U.S. President meets his staff to discuss their plans when the iceberg breaks off. Much more happens with the plot which tries to subvert the audience's expectations, but it just just convolutes an already overstuffed and anarchic plot.
The performances are over-the-top while also quite annoying. There's a single character who's not over-the-top, so it all becomes something that amounts to nothing more than a tedious cacophony. The stylish production design and cinematography are among the film's major strengths, though, and have shades of Wes Anderson and Michel Gondry. If only as much imagination and cleverness were injected into the screenplay, Digger would've been a wildly entertaining satire like Iñárritu's previous bonkers sature Bardo: False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths. Digger doesn't even come close to being as smart, funny or razor-sharp as Dr. Strangelove which it will inevitably be compared to. At an overlong running time of 2 hours and 9 minutes, Digger opens nationwide via Warner Bros. Pictures.
Number of times I checked my watch: 3
An evil ghost terrorizes Labuhan Angsana prison after following Dimas (Endy Arfian), a reporter charged with killing his boss, inside it in Ghost in the Cell. He and the other prisoners must fight for their lives as the ghost possesses them and kills them one by one. Writer/director Joko Anwar has made an outrageously funny and bonkers slice of sci-fi horror with just the right blend of comedy, horror and action. It's gory, violent and gritty, but also wildly entertaining and full of surprises. Who would've imagined watching a dance routine in the middle of a sci-fi horror film?
If you like dark, offbeat humor and a genre film that isn't afraid to be unconventional, unpredictable and over-the-top, Ghost in the Cell will satisfy you as a guilty pleasure. It might even end up a cult classic like One Cut of the Dead. At a running time of 1 hour and 46 minutes, Ghost in the Cell opens in select theaters via Well Go USA.
Number of times I checked my watch: 1
In The Influencer Project, Chiara King (playing a fictionalized version of herself), a content creator, travels to Copenhagen with a documentary crew to film what the daily life of a social media influencer looks like. Soon enough, she deals with a mysterious online stalker who terrorizes her. Writer/director Mike Nybroe and his co-writers, Lars Andreas Pedersen and Anders Jon Petersen have made a gripping, well-edited and provocative psychological thriller with Hitchcockian suspense that will keep you guessing until the very end. This is the kind of film that would be best enjoyed if you go into it knowing as little as possible about the plot so as not to ruin any of its surprises, twists and turns. There are more than a few scenes that will have you terrified not because of what you see, but because of what you don't see.
The filmmakers wisely trust the power of the audience's imagination as a tool to generate palpable fear. Moreover, they handle exposition very effectively which is no easy task. The audience knows just as much as Chiara does, so they're shocked when she's shocked and scared when she's scared which means that it's easier to connect with her on an emotional level. Not everything makes logical sense by the time the end credits roll, but, to be fair suspension of disbelief necessary in most psychological thrillers. There's just enough internal logic to keep audience engaged and geniunely scared while wondering if something like that could happen to themselves on social media. At a running time of 1 hour and 35 minutes, The Influencer Project opens nationwide via Inaugural Entertainment and Variance Films. It would be an great double feature with Unfriended.
Number of times I checked my watch: 1
Archie (Brett Dier), a stand-up comedian based in Los Angeles, begins a relationship with Hannah (Conor Leslie), a baker based in Portland, but they encounter their personal struggles get in the way of their relationship in In Spite of Ourselves. She has been reluctant to get surgery to deal with the hearing loss in her right ear while he struggles with his career, his sick father, Frank (Glenn Morshower), and so much stress that it causes erectile dysfunction when he and Hanna first try to have sex. Writer/director Josh Loeb has made a heartfelt, honest and charming romantic dramedy. The screenplay doesn't chart new territory or have any big surprises for that matter, but it doesn't have to, either. What ultimately matters is that the characters feel real and that you want them to end up together. Both Archie and Hannah are flawed and lack emotional maturity to some degree. They're not teenagers, but they're nonetheless having a tough time with their relationship and how their individual issues affect it. Relationships aren't easy and, at some point, the "honeymoon phase" of dating ends and reality begins to kick in. In Spite of Ourselves charts all of those moments in Archie and Hanna's relationship beginning with their "meet cute" moment at the bakery when he visits Portland for work. In Spite of Ourselves avoids the common pitfalls of romcom dramas such as cheesiness, contrivance or anything maudlin. It's sweet without being cloying and true-to-life without being an unflinchingly "slice-of-life." There are no villains, even Hannah's boss, Jake (Ethan Ingle), who comes across as a selfish jerk. Moreover, the humor is light and witty without leading to tonal unevenness.
Fortunately, Brett Dier and Conor Leslie give convincingly moving performances and have palpable chemistry together. That must-needed chemistry helps the audience to want Archie to end up with Hannah and for them to make their relationship work. In Spite of Ourselves isn't mumblecore like Funny Ha Ha, and it's not Before Sunrise or When Harry Met Sally... ether, so as long as you're aware of that and distance it from those classics, it's cut above your average romantic dramedy. At a running time of 1 hour and 37 minutes, In Spite of Ourselves opens at Quad Cinema.
Number of times I checked my watch: 1
The Last First: Winter K2 is an emotionally devastating and provocative documentary about the winter summit of K2 in 2021. 60 mountaineers attempted the climb, 10 succeeded to reach the summit, and 5 died. Director Amir Bar-Lev uses footage captured by the mountaineers to provide the audience with a glimpse of what their experiences were like as they faced the elements during the first winter summit of K2. It doesn't look like they had a pleasant experience at all especially in the painfully cold temperatures that put their lives at risk. One of the mountaineers talks about how 6 people were sleeping in a tent that only up to 3 people could sleep there comfortably. The Last First: Winter K2 concurrently shows the audience some of the mountaineers' pain and suffering, so perhaps that's intentional to compel the audience to think critically whether or not that crosses a line.
Audiences expecting a biodoc about any of the climbers will be disappointed; it mostly focuses on their ascent on K2 and the aftermath. Moreover, this isn't the kind of doc that makes mountain climbing look glamorous or inspirational nor does it try to because, instead, it questions whether or not it's worth the cost of having mountaineers die, how mistakes were made during the summit, and whether or not it's fair to exploit their pain and suffering. At a running time of 1 hour and 38 minutes, The Last First: Winter K2 opens at IFC Center via Apple Original Films.
Number of times I checked my watch: 1
Caden (Dylan Friedman), a 12-year-old basketball prodigy, moves in with his estranged mother, Lexi (Jaime Pressly), after the death of his father, Darren (Michael Rapaport), in Last Shot. He joins a basketball team while coping with his grief. Baron Davis plays his basketball coach, and Johnny Simmons plays Lexi's boyfriend. Director Andy Palmer and screenwriter Todd M. Friedman have made a heartfelt and mildly engaging, but by-the-numbers, uninspired and sugar-coated sports drama. This is the kind of film where you can hear the wheels of the screenplay turning every step of the way and where everything gets telegraphed from the very beginning. Case in point: Lexi doesn't warm up to Caden's love of basketball at first and seems preoccupied with her career, so take a wild guess whether or not she comes around during the third act.
The performances are fine, but not exceptional, and the ending feels uplifting, although it doesn't thoroughly earn that uplift with the somewhat shallow and contrived screenplay. At a running time of 1 hour and 45 minutes, Last Shot opens in select theaters via Hemlock Circle Productions.
Number of times I checked my watch: 2
NAZA is an eye-opening, enraging and chilling documentary about how the Israeli military, IDF, kills innocent Palestians civilians and considers them to be "collateral damage" a.k.a. NAZA. So, if a soldier bombs an apartment building in Gaza and 5 innocent Palestians die as a result, they would refer to that as "NAZA + 5." Co-directors Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor interview 24 members of the Israeli intelligence and military on rooftops in Tel Aviv while digitally altering their faces and voices to protect their identity. That digital altering speaks volumes because it implies that their lives and livelihood would be at stake if they get caught speaking out. Yuval asks them tough questions and they give answers that are very revealing and even disturbing at times, particularly when one of the soldiers admits that he heard the sounds of Palestinian children before bombing their apartment and killing them and their family. To be fair, though, NAZA is a less visceral experience with concrete evidence than No Other Land; it's mostly just testimonies.
That said, the footage of a father desperately searching for his child through the rubble after the IDF bombed his building and then seeing the images of dead children's legs sticking out from under the rubble will break your heart. There's one issue with the film's English translation: when Yuval asks one of the subjects in Hebrew if he understands the consequences of his actions, the Hebrew word for "consequences" isn't translated. It's an important word and an even more important concept, so to omit it from the English translation makes the documentary slightly less powerful for audiences who don't know Hebrew. At a running time of 1 hour and 17 minutes, NAZA opens September 30th, 2026 at IFC Center.
Number of times I checked my watch: 1
Jim (Andrew McCarthy) interrogates Apollo (Drew Van Acker), an astronaut whose spaceship crashed and left him as sole survivor in Orion. Apollo suffers from amnesia, so Jim tries to help him remember who he is and what happened that caused the crash. Director Jaco Bouwer and screenwriter Anne Vithayathil have made an intriguing and gripping sci-fi suspense thriller. Kudos to the filmmakers for trusting the audience's intelligence and imagination. The plot seems simple and remains lean and focused, but it also becomes increasingly complex as the dynamics between Jim and Apollo evolves throughout the film. Should Apollo trust Jim? Should Jim trust Apollo? Should the audience trust Jim or Apollo? The screenplay incorporates exposition very effectively which is no easy task. In other words, there's no over-explaining, and the audience feels confused at times, but not to the extent of becoming disengaged by the plot because, by the end, it makes more sense in hindsight. You might be tempted to rewatch Orion after the third act that has some twists and turns.
The performances are solid, the pace moves at just the right speed, and the production design looks quite impressive without going overboard in terms of visual style. The filmmakers ultimately succeed in finding just the right amount of Spectacle within the film's many Truths while keeping the audience at the edge of their seats. If you prefer a sci-fi movie that's cerebral and that doesn't rely on visual effects, corny humor (I'm looking at you, Project Hail Mary), or action scenes to engage the audience, Orion will be just the film for you. At a running time of 1 hour and 34 minutes, Orion opens in select theaters via Blue Harbor Entertainment.
Number of times I checked my watch: 1
The Trial of Alec Baldwin is a heartfelt, but unremarkable and by-the-numbers documentary about Alec Baldwin's legal battles after being charged with involuntary manslaughter for fatally shooting cinematographer Halyna Hutchins while on the set of Rust. Director Rory Kennedy provides a brief glimpse of Baldwin's family life and some backstory about his relationship with his father, whom he got his quick-temperedness from. Alec does show some signs of introspection, but how introspective is he truly? That's up for the audience to discern because Kennedy doesn't judge him or even discern that. She asks him basic, broad and safe questions like about how the manslaughter charges made him feel instead of more provocative questions which would have probably made the film much more profound and illuminating.
If you're already familiar with Alec Baldwin's career, his trial and the aftermath, there's nothing new, revealing or insightful that's found here. That said, it's great to hear that Alec has made a commitment to rebuild his life. He deserves to be truly happy and to find equanimity. Hopefully he's a good enough gardener of his soul, so-to-speak, to embrace and implement the wisdom behind Pablo Neruda's poem so that the garden of his soul can fully flourish: "They can cut all of the flowers, but they can't stop the spring from coming." At a running time of 1 hour and 51 minutes, The Trial of Alec Baldwin opens at Village East by Angelika via Abramorama.
Number of times I checked my watch: 2
Lowen (Dakota Johnson), a writer, gets more than she bargained for when she arrives at the lakeside mansion of Verity (Anne Hathaway), a bestselling author who's paralyzed after a car accident, to ghostwrite her book series in Verity. Josh Hartnett plays Verity's husband, Jeremy, who invites Lowen to the mansion. Director Michael Showalter and screenwriter Nick Antosca have made a dull, clunky and unintentionally funny psychological thriller based on the book by Colleen Hoover. The plot takes too long to get to the meat of the story as it begins with a lengthy expositional third act before Lowen suspects that Verity might be pretending to be paralyzed. She finds a flash drive with Verity's autobiography where she admits to drowning one of her children, Harper, by intentionally tipping over the canoe and drowning him. Crew (Brady Wagner), Verity's other son, makes it clear that something's up because he tells Lowen bluntly that Verity told him not to answer any of her questions before he self-harms himself by biting a kitchen knife. The suspense wanes shortly after that because there are no surprises and everything that happens can be easily foreseen. Of course, Lowen and Jeremy have an affair, and she inexplicably forgives even though he admits to lying to her about something pretty major that won't be spoiled here. Why should she trust him? He seems unlikable, she seems unlikable and the same can be said about Verity, so there's no one to root for. It doesn't help that all three of them remain underwritten characters who are essentially plot devices saddled with stilted, on-the-nose dialogue.
Unfortunately, neither Dakota Johnson, Anne Hathaway nor Josh Hartnett give performances that manage to breathe life into their roles, so the film's emotional beats don't land strongly. The most interesting character with the best performance, so-to-speak, is the mansion itself that looks creepy on the outside while the production design on the inside provides an equally creepy and foreboding atmosphere. The editing feels choppy, the sex scenes are poorly shot and there are pacing issues. By the end, too many plot holes pile up before the unsatisfying ending. Verity feels more like a bland and dumb made-for-TV movie on Skinemax like Scorned rather than a smart and gripping Hitchcockian or DePalmaesque suspense thriller. At a running time of 1 hour and 57 minutes, Verity opens nationwide via Amazon MGM Studios.
Number of times I checked my watch: 3
