Author Archive
 

 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “The Wonder” & “What’s Love Got To Do With It?”

  THE WONDER (Netflix – November 16):  In the time of Ireland’s Great Famine, 11-year-old Anna (Kila Lord Cassidy) claims to have survived for 4 months without eating even one bite of food.  Is she a miracle,...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

Toronto Film Festival Review: “The Greatest Beer Run Ever”

  THE GREATEST BEER RUN EVER (Apple – September 30):  Peter Farrelly’s Green Book was one of the clearest beneficiaries of winning Toronto’s People Choice Award, vaulting from being entirely under the aw...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “Women Talking” & “Saint Omer”

  WOMEN TALKING (UA/MGM/Amazon – December 9):  In an insular Mennonite community, the woman have always believed what the men told them, that when they awake to discover evidence of sexual assault and thereafter som...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “Empire of Light” & “Triangle of Sadness”

  EMPIRE OF LIGHT (Searchlight/Disney – December 9):  Sam Mendes takes the first solo screenwriting credit of his long career on Empire of Light, a personal film inspired by his youth and his mother.  The story is ...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “The Banshees of Inisherin” & “The Son”

  THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN (Searchlight/Disney – October 21):  After a sojourn in America with 3 Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri and Seven Psychopaths, Martin McDonagh returns to Ireland with the comic tragedy ...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

Behind the US/Worldwide Weekend Box Office – 9.18.2022

  OPENINGS:  THE WOMAN KING (TriStar/Sony) launched at the higher end of expectations with $19M, boosted by strong reviews (94% on Rotten Tomatoes) and enthusiastic audience response as measured by exit polls.  In the cu...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “Glass Onion” & “Pearl”

  GLASS ONION (Netflix – November 4 in theaters, December 23 online):  After Rian Johnson’s Knives Out broke through to become one of the increasingly few non-IP-based mainstream hits in the market ($311.6M wo...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “The Whale” & “Chevalier”

  THE WHALE (A24 – December 9):  The fall film festivals usher in awards season, and no performance this year screams “Oscar bait” more than Brendan Fraser’s in Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale.�...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “The Good Nurse” & “My Policeman”

  THE GOOD NURSE (Netflix – Oct. 26):  An unusually serious thriller about a serial killer.  Tobias Lindholm’s film, from a script by Krysty Wilson-Cairns (who wrote 1917 and  Last Night In Soho) and based o...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

SHOWBUZZDAILY’s Thursday 9.15.2022 Top 150 Cable Originals & Network Finals UPDATED

  BROADCAST FINALS ABC:  The season finale of PRESS YOUR LUCK was steady at 0.43, and the season finale of GENERATION GAP gained 0.02 to 0.32.  An episode of TRUTH & LIES was at 0.21. CBS:  After reruns at 0.29/0.23...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “The Fabelmans” & “The Eternal Daughter”

  THE FABELMANS (Universal – November 11):  Like all superheroes, Steven Spielberg has an origin story, and he tells it in The Fabelmans, whose world premiere was far and away the signature event of this year’...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “Causeway” & “The Menu”

  CAUSEWAY (Apple – November 4):  After a decade as one of Hollywood’s biggest stars, there was reason to wonder whether the Jennifer Lawrence who first came to prominence with the Sundance movie Winter’...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

SHOWBUZZDAILY’s Tuesday 9.13.2022 Top 150 Cable Originals & Network Finals UPDATED

  BROADCAST FINALS ABC:  THE BACHELORETTE rose 0.18 to 0.89, followed by a rerun CELEBRITY FAMILY FEUD at 0.24. CBS:  Reruns at 0.37/0.31/0.31. NBC:  AMERICA’S GOT TALENT gained 0.06 to 0.79, and PASSWORD was at 0...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “Bros” & “Butcher’s Crossing”

  BROS (Universal – Sept. 30):  Notwithstanding its occasional meta self-deprecation, it’s clear that Nicholas Stoller and Billy Eichner (both writer/producers and respectively director and star) want Bros to ...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

Toronto Film Festival Reviews: “The Woman King” & “Prisoner’s Daughter”

  THE WOMAN KING (Tri-Star/Sony – Sept. 16):  Gina Prince-Bythewood’s The Woman King feels something like what would happen if the Themyscira Island Amazonian sequences of Wonder Woman were feature length.  D...
by Mitch Salem