Many critics claimed cinema was dead. Between the pandemic and the rise of streaming platforms, movie theaters have had several rough years. According to CNN, in 2022, thirty percent fewer people went to the movies than in 2019. Several movie theater companies, including AMC, flirted with bankruptcy. Yet in 2023, the movies came roaring back.

I wasn’t going to watch the new Mean Girls movie at first. I knew it was a remake of the recent Broadway musical, which wasn’t entirely engrossing. I’d heard about Angourie Rice’s flat singing and awkward camera angles. Honestly, I just don’t watch a lot of movies in theaters in general. But then I saw this TikTok by Glenn DeVar and knew I had to check it out myself.

Scream VI has no business being as entertaining as it is.

The second sequel from Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, known to their fans and the world as the filmmaking collective Radio Silence, came to mainstream success and acclaim with 2019’s Ready or Not, a quietly subversive and fun black comedy horror film that established many of Scream VI’s strengths, which, unfortunately, also highlight the growing weaknesses of the popular slasher film franchise after Wes Craven’s death in 2015.

After the unprecedented success of 2018’s Black Panther, any sequel would face an uphill battle in order to match the original film. While not as groundbreaking as the original film, Wakanda Forever is an adequate but bloated sequel that fulfills its many duties as a superhero film.

On December 16, 2022, after thirteen years of developing the technology needed to film motion-capture underwater, shooting the live-action mo-cap, visual effects breakthroughs, and pandemic delays, Avatar: The Way of Water finally made it to theaters. With Cameron’s fascination and propensity for powerful, water-driven narrative, does The Way of Water live up to expectations?

Continuing his review series, Conor watches the 2022 film Nope and decides whether it lives up to writer/director Jordan Peele’s Academy Award winning reputation.

Bullets fly, heads explode, and there’s a poison that makes people bleed from their eyeballs (because, why not?). An honest review of the 2022 action comedy Bullet Train and all it has to offer.

Sikumi (On The Ice) is a story about Inuit hunters. It starts with Inuqiaq hunter Apuna dog sledding and hunting seals on the icy northern tundra. However, instead of finding seals, he witnesses a murder through his binoculars.