JUDAS AND THE BLACK MESSIAH (Warners/HBO Max – February 12):  The title refers to the FBI informant Bill O’Neal (played here by LaKeith Stanfield) and the Illinois Black Panthers leader Fred Hampton (Daniel Kaluuya).  Although Hampton was only 21 years old, he was so charismatic and successful–he had put together a local coalition that […]

    The Toronto Film Festival is on its way, and SHOWBUZZDAILY will be there.  The Festival, which runs Sept 6-16, today announced the bulk of its highest-profile titles, those that will screen in the Gala and Special Presentation categories.  Here, at a first glance, are some of the most promising: GALAS ARGO:  Against the […]

  As movie bloodbaths go, NO ONE LIVES is almost–but not quite–clever enough to be worth seeing. We start with a backwoods family of petty outlaws, headed by father Hoag (Lee Tergesen) and including his wife, brother, two adult children and their significant others.  Their game is to rob tourists and brutally beat them until […]

  THE EXORCIST:  Friday 9PM on FOX – Potential DVR Alert Like Noah Hawley’s ongoing take on Fargo, the new FOX version of THE EXORCIST, created for television by Jeremy Slater (one of the unhappy group credited for the script of last year’s awful Fantastic Four reboot) wisely uses the underlying material as inspiration for […]

  Calling a season of AMERICAN HORROR STORY “grounded” is like calling a batch of moonshine smooth:  it’s still going to make your eyes water on the way down.  But creators Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk set CULT in something that resembled our real world, certainly as compared to ultra-baroque previous installments like Freak Show […]

  It was 12:45AM before Charlize Theron really had a highlight to call her own on tonight’s SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, another instance of the show bringing on a bright talent and then not having them do very much.  Although Theron had her issues with the cue cards, as many movie stars on SNL do, she’s […]

  UNFORGETTABLE:  Friday 8PM on CBS UNFORGETTABLE, the CBS procedural whose title practically begs to be a punchline, is back.  Although “back” isn’t exactly the word:  Unforgettable was famously canceled after its initial 2011-12 season, and then uncanceled to serve as filler for CBS with a 13-episode order.  7 of those episodes aired last summer, […]

  THE BALLAD OF WALLIS ISLAND (Focus/Universal – March 28):  A low-key British charmer.  A decade ago, Herb (Tom Basden) had a successful run as part of a folk duo with Nell (Carey Mulligan), which ended when they broke up both personally and professionally.  Now, Herb is still trying to establish himself as a solo […]