Movie Reviews

By Bob Garver             The latest edition of Disney’s trend of remaking its animated classics in live action or “realistic” CGI is “Lilo & Stitch.” I remember seeing the 2002 original with my mom, both of us huge Disney fans, and we agreed that the studio’s magic from its mostly-90’s “Renaissance” era was long gone.…

By Bob Garver “Thunderbolts*” certainly scared off the competition in its second weekend at the domestic box office. This sometimes happens the weekend after the opening of a huge blockbuster. Other studios will know that they can’t compete against the powerhouse, so they hold off on releasing anything that they think has the potential to…

By Bob Garver “Thunderbolts*,” the latest offering from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, seems like awfully familiar territory. In the film, a group of assassins, criminals, and burnouts band together to form a ragtag group of do-gooders looking for redemption. There are definitely shades of the MCU’s “Guardians of the Galaxy” in play. Or how about…

By Bob Garver               “The Accountant” was a midsized hit from 2016 that until recently had a reputation as a wannabe franchise-starter that never got a follow-up. I watched the first movie for research last weekend, and I would have guessed that the reason the film went so long without a sequel was that…

By Bob Garver              If “A Minecraft Movie” is the commercial hit that 2025 needed, then “Sinners” is the creative hit it needed. Writer/director Ryan Coogler has delivered a film that starts off as a compelling-enough 1930’s period piece before wildly shifting into supernatural territory. But the later developments don’t devalue the efforts made…

By Bob Garver             After a mere two weekends, “A Minecraft Movie” has claimed the top spot of the 2025 domestic box office. It’s not shocking that this franchise piece beat out January fare, but since then we’ve had an MCU entry and this movie just blew right past it. And I have to ask:…

By Bob Garver               Jason Statham has a new movie out. He plays with a guy who used to work in a violent profession, but he’s sworn to leave that life behind. But now some bad people have messed with his employer (the only people to help him out when he was at a…

By Bob Garver               Disney’s “Snow White” is the latest live-action remake of one of the studio’s animated classics. In this case, it’s perhaps the biggest “classic” of all, as 1937’s “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” was the first full-length animated feature in American history, and in 2008 was named the greatest animated…

2025 has been a great year for Hollywood so far. Not only have the first couple of months shown impressive blockbusters, but the movies coming out soon in March also promise a great box office performance. Movie lovers are already speculating about which films will take the topmost spots, among which the thrillers coming out…

By Bob Garver “Novocaine” stars Jack Quaid as Nathan Caine, a man with a condition that makes him unable to feel pain. This is an action movie, and it sounds like a man who can’t feel pain would fit right into the role of action hero, right? Actually, no. Caine’s condition is just terribly inconvenient…

By Bob Garver               “Mickey 17” is the kind of movie where you just have to trust the filmmaker to take you on a ride. Fortunately, it’s a filmmaker who has proven trustworthy with such rides in the past. Six years ago, writer/director Bong Joon-ho released “Parasite,” another movie that didn’t really telegraph its…

By Bob Garver   This week, I’m going to do what I usually do and review the biggest as-yet-unreviewed movie at the weekend box office with “Last Breath.” However, I’m also going to take a detour and review the film that just won Best Picture at the Academy Awards in “Anora.” My rationale is that…

By Bob Garver “The Monkey” is a movie on the sillier end of the horror spectrum. It’s so silly that the catalyst for the many, many deaths that occur throughout its runtime is a literal toy. Granted, it’s a toy that I’ve never known anyone to actually like, and come to think of it, I…

By Bob Garver The Marvel Cinematic Universe at large got to take a break in 2024. Sure, “Deadpool & Wolverine” was one of the biggest hits of the year, but that was more about Disney showing off its newly-acquired 20th Century Fox toys than advancing the lore of its bread-and-butter franchise. But “Captain America: Brave…

By Bob Garver   For whatever reason, the studios decided that what America wanted this Valentine’s season wasn’t romantic comedies or sweeping dramas, but violent R-rated fare with varying degrees of love and relationship theming. Frankly none of these movies are going to be big commercial hits, with “Dog Man” still ruling the box office…

By Bob Garver All January long, I’ve been mentioning (okay, “whining”) that the month is a dead zone for new movie releases. So it makes sense that the biggest release of the month would be one that opened on the very last day (Friday the 31st) before making most of its money in February. With…

By Bob Garver               I notice that I’ve given a “C” rating to every movie I’ve reviewed in 2025. That’s four straight times I’ve basically said that the movie, while not worth writing off entirely, isn’t worth recommending. I even split the review last weekend and gave out two “C” ratings. Director Mel Gibson’s…

By Bob Garver   Since two new releases made about $11 million each at the domestic box office this past weekend, and since I don’t have much to say about either movie, I’ve decided to throw them both a quick review.   “Wolf Man”               January horror movies are a special breed. The studio…

By Bob Garver It’s an odd choice to do a sequel to the 2018 heist movie “Den of Thieves” in 2025. The first film made less than $50 million at the domestic box office and to my knowledge doesn’t have much of a cult following. I didn’t see that film at the time, but I…

By Bob Garver               Robert Eggers is one of those directors that always puts out exactly the movie he wants. I’m not saying that as a comment on his professionalism or his attitude, I’m saying that because he clearly has the ability to shut down naysayers. If he didn’t, we’d never get the archaic…

By Bob Garver               The “Sonic the Hedgehog” movie franchise has had quite the history. In 2019, jokes about the poorly-received first trailer were everywhere in pop culture. Paramount, to its credit, took the vitriol as constructive criticism and spent months redesigning the main character to have a more palatable appearance. When the upgraded…

In between the blockbusters of the Thanksgiving season and the blockbusters of the Christmas season comes “Kraven the Hunter,” a movie that was never going to be a blockbuster in any season. Sergei “Kraven” Kravinoff (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) is another one of those Spider-Man villains that’s getting his own movie because Sony still has a piece…

By Bob Garver “Gladiator II” has some awfully big sandals to fill, both commercially and creatively. Its predecessor, 2000’s “Gladiator,” made $187 million at the domestic box office. The new film has thus far made an estimated $132 million after three weekends of release. With a lot of money up for grabs in the upcoming…

By Bob Garver               2016’s “Moana” is probably my favorite animated Disney movie of the modern era. I have plenty of nice things to say about “Frozen,” “Zootopia,” “Encanto,” and several others, but “Moana,” with its timelessly-relatable main character, sharp physical comedy, and multiple memorable songs, puts it just a coir above the competition.…

By Bob Garver           It was in the spring of 2004 that I first saw Idina Menzel and Kristen Chenoweth perform the showstopping “Defying Gravity” from the Broadway blockbuster “Wicked” at the Tony Awards. Since that moment was over 20 years ago, it means that I have waited literal decades for a big-screen version…