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08 Mar

SXSW 2025 Narrative Film Preview Guide

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Spring has sprung in Austin, which can mean only one thing: it’s time for the many-hyphenated SXSW Festival! A strange, wonderful, and wholly Austin intersection of music, technology, games, and of course film and television, this festival in many ways kicks off the next year’s itinerary in culture and fun. But there is so much to do down Texas’ way that it can be a bit overwhelming to know what to see and look out for. For that reason, we’ve assembled this preview for some of the films you should probably have on your radar for the festivities. Enjoy! Amazon…

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08 Mar

25 Years On, American Psycho’s Ending Is Still Misunderstood

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Late last year, it was reported that director Luca Guadagnino is developing a new film adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis’ 1991 novel, American Psycho. Ellis has cast doubts on that report by suggesting it’s more of an idea than a committed project, but the news sparked mixed reactions. Guadagnino tackling this relevant text through a modern lens seems appealing, but many argue that director Mary Harron’s 2000 American Psycho film doesn’t need a companion.  While Harron’s film has aged incredibly well, a strange cloud looms over its legacy. For 25 years, conversations about Harron’s adaptation have been dominated by a…

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07 Mar

Death of a Unicorn: Exclusive First Look at Jenna Ortega and Paul Rudd Going Medieval

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This article appears in the new issue of DEN OF GEEK magazine. You can read all of our magazine stories here. Jenna Ortega has a confession to make: she likes blood. The more of it, the better. Already she’s been covered in buckets of the substance throughout her career, which includes a bounty of genre darlings running the gamut from Scream VI to Ti West’s X. And never once in all those chillers has she tired of the red-dyed corn syrup. “Maybe if it’s cold outside and it’s like four in the morning,” Ortega begins while considering the downsides of cinematic gore. But…

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07 Mar

Kirbyvision Documentary Places Marvel’s Jack Kirby in the Pop Culture Pantheon

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Jack Kirby’s influence on comics culture is undeniable. It’s not an understatement to say that he is responsible for much, if not all, of the comics language we read when we look at superhero comics. Even now, 30 years after he passed, we still fawn over his creations, whether it’s when his characters hit the big screen (as with Fantastic Four) or when a new story with his characters are stocked in comic book shops (as with Ram V and Evan Cagle’s brilliant New Gods comic). But a new documentary announced this week seeks to place him alongside titans of…

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06 Mar

Anora and The Brutalist Win Big at an Oscars Where Indies Reign

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It began with a song that didn’t come out last year. It began with a song that didn’t come out in this century. But what a song to open the 97th annual Academy Awards: Ariana Grande threading a wilting rendition of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” The moment obviously was a nod to the other Oz-centric movie on people’s minds these days—and one that Grande was nominated for—Wicked. And to be sure, there’s powerful, internet-friendly magic in both “Rainbow” and the Wicked song that Cynthia Erivo soon joined Grande on stage to belt, “Defying Gravity.” Yet this didn’t feel only like…

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06 Mar

Scream 7: Dewey Return Is a Chance to Do Right by the Character

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Sidney Prescott is in trouble. The night after two of her classmates get murdered by a masked killer, this Neve Campbell heroine has been summoned to speak with her principal. The Woodsboro Sheriff’s department, it seems, wants to ask Sid about the murders and their similarities with her own mother’s violent end. Unnerved, Sidney enters the office looking for a familiar face. She finds one in her principal (Henry Winkler), and another in the sheriff’s hapless deputy, the older brother of her best friend Tatum (Rose McGowan). “Dewey,” she smiles while greeting him. “That’s Deputy Riley in here, Sid,” the…

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05 Mar

10 Marvel Characters We’ll Probably Never See Again in the MCU

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After 17 years, 35 movies, and numerous TV series, the Marvel Cinematic Universe remains a Goliath of the entertainment scene. We’re on the cusp of a new era, as the Fox deal will finally add the likes of the Fantastic Four and the X-Men to the MCU, meaning hundreds more characters are on the way. That’s before we get to the multiversal potential of bringing back characters from the colorful past of Marvel Movies.  It was always inevitable that some were going to get lost in the shuffle, but as Captain America: Brave New World proved by bringing back Liv…

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05 Mar

The Next James Bond Movie Will Be Defined By Its Villain

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Since we learned that Amazon MGM Studios has acquired the creative rights to James Bond, the online mood regarding the franchise’s future has seemed grim. If you’ve ever followed the history of beloved cultural institutions being acquired by corporate behemoths, you’ll understand the sudden jumps to the worst possible conclusions. Even the Bond tribute at the 97th annual Academy Awards felt like an in memoriam package for a series that is not technically dead yet.  What Bond fans across the world are really feeling right now is uncertainty. When will the next Bond movie be released? Will that movie be…

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05 Mar

Mickey 17 Review: See Robert Pattinson Die, Repeat, and Make You Laugh

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In Mickey 17, Robert Pattinson plays a frozen meat-sickle. Those are not my words; they’re Pattinson’s inside of the first 60 seconds of the movie, and they’re delivered to the audience with a nasally, conversational voiceover that sounds adrift somewhere between Steve Buscemi and Marisa Tomei in My Cousin Vinny. Absolutely everything about this performance and the movie it exists within is a choice. They’re big ones too. Not all of them are necessarily the right call, and more than a few lead to creative dead-ends or cul-de-sacs. But pretty much from the jump, as you hear Pattinson wheeze in…

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04 Mar

Why the Kitchen Is the Most Important Room in a Sci-Fi Spaceship

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A science fiction spaceship is a lot like a house party. When I see one, the first thing I want to know is what’s going on in the kitchen. Interior designers are the unsung heroes of sci-fi worldbuilding, and a bit of carefully dressed set can do the work of a dozen dramatic exposition-filled voiceovers or lengthy opening text crawls. And this is nowhere more evident than the kitchen. Take a look at your own kitchen. What appliances have you got? A kitchen-bound time traveler could quickly determine when they are with a look at your microwave and fridge. A…

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03 Mar

Sherlock Holmes Actors Ranked From Passable to Perfect

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Picking a favourite Sherlock Holmes might seem elementary, but, when you consider just how many fantastic actors have donned the deerstalker over the years, you’re faced with a conundrum fiendish enough to daunt the master detective himself. Rathbone, Cumberbatch, Brett, Plummer…it was never going to be straightforward, was it? So, in the spirit of the great man himself, we’ll scrutinise the evidence, draw the complex threads together, and present a solution: our very own ranking of the Sherlocks. As with all mysteries, there’s a twist. Sherlock Holmes and Dr John Watson aren’t merely a detective duo; they’re the detective duo.…

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02 Mar

The Power of Anora Comes from Its Last 10 Minutes and Final Scene

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Anyone who decided to catch up with Anora because of Oscar buzz might find themselves confused early on. The movie begins as a Cinderella story with a sex worker in the princess role and the son of a Russian oligarch as the prince, and then switches to a broad farce that veers between slapstick comedy and genuine menace. Why, a first-time viewer might reasonably wonder, do people consider this one of the best movies of 2024? The answer comes at the very bitter end. After a frantic and exhausting 138 minutes, Anora slows to an intimate close. The sudden shift…

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01 Mar

Kathleen Kennedy’s Legacy Is More Than Just Star Wars

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Kathleen Kennedy is reportedly stepping away from Lucasfilm at the end of the year. While the news isn’t official, multiple industry trades have confirmed the story  after it was broken by Puck News’ Matt Belloni earlier today, with Variety noting that she is planning to fully retire when her contract concludes at the end of 2025. If so, it will mark the conclusion of an extraordinary career that earned a place in film history larger than the admittedly checkered previous decade of Disney-produced Star Wars films, television series, and other assorted media. It also feels prudent to make this point…

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01 Mar

One of the Best Oscar Nominated Documentaries Is Streaming Now on Disney+

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When most people sign up for a Disney+ subscription, they’re probably thinking about catching up with Disney Channel Originals they loved as kids or watching the latest Marvel movie at home. For most, Disney+ means access to endless streams of frothy entertainment, with social issues presented in the form of cartoon allegories like Zootopia. The documentaries that get pushed to the front page tend to be self-mythologizing stories such as the behind-the-scenes Marvel Disassembled series or beautiful nature pictures. Most of those nature films come via National Geographic, an underappreciated wing of the Disney+ service. In addition to showing the…

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01 Mar

Star Wars: Shawn Levy and Ryan Gosling Have Opportunity to Ignore the Skywalker Saga

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“Rey Skywalker.” With those two words, the final words spoken in the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, many fans threw up their hands in disgust. Honestly, no part of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker worked beyond clunky fan service that, ironically, only further alienated viewers. But even by those standards, Rey’s nonsense turn to adopt the Skywalker name made the universe feel smaller, reducing a vast a galaxy into just supporting players in the lives of two bloodlines and family dynasties. Given the sour taste that Rise of Skywalker left in the fandom’s mouths, news of a new film by…

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28 Feb

Gene Hackman Redefined Leading Men and Made Movies Better

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Legendary actor Gene Hackman has passed away at the age of 95. While the circumstances of his death are still being investigated (he, his wife, Betsy Arakawa, and their dog were found dead in their New Mexico home), those details can only help us understand this loss rather than truly process it. The great Gene Hackman is gone. Of course, it’s been quite a while since we’ve seen Gene Hackman grace a screen of any size. Aside from some interviews and public appearances (and an accidental cameo on an episode of Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives), Hackman’s last movie was the…

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28 Feb

 Oscars 2025: Demi Moore Could End the Academy’s Bias Against Horror

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It was a career highlight that “blew people away,” wrote Today. Her big moment “jolted awake” and stunned audiences, enthused the LA Times. And it was an “emotional career revelation,” as per The Independent. Such were the heaps of praise showered onto Demi Moore—albeit not for her genuinely amazing career highlight in Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance. The performance itself was indeed a stunning tour de force where Moore personified the pressures felt by millions of women, be they entertainment legends or otherwise. In the film, Moore’s Elisabeth Sparkle is a former Oscar winner and movie star reduced to destroying her…

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27 Feb

The Star Wars Movie Slate Is in Even More Trouble Now

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For better or for worse, Kathleen Kennedy is often the one ultimately held responsible for the highs and lows of this era of Star Wars. The sequel trilogy she shepherded introduced a new generation to a galaxy far, far away while still giving longtime fans a (mostly) fulfilling end to this saga. And yet in the nearly six years since that saga ended with Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker, Lucasfilm has struggled to figure out its next chapter on the big screen. With Kathleen Kennedy’s rumored exit from Lucasfilm, it doesn’t seem likely that these struggles will…

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27 Feb

The Actor Who Should Win the Oscar: An Appreciation of Colman Domingo

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For decades some critics have argued the Oscars award the most acting, not the best acting. The claim is demonstrable, too, as seen by Joaquin Phoenix‘s subtle work in The Master or You Were Never Really Here going looked over, but his big showy take in Joker gaining recognition. See, yet again, Jessica Chastain’s win for an over-the-top turn in The Eyes of Tammy Faye after putting in incredible work in The Tree of Life and Take Shelter. And, to be fair, at one point in Sing Sing, Colman Domingo does give what you might expect from a typically Oscar-nomianted…

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26 Feb

James Bond Needed a Change, But Amazon Isn’t It

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Have the bad guys finally won? After decades of taking down megalomaniacs with designs on the world, James Bond appears to have been bested by a bald man with far too much power. No, not Blofeld. Jeff Bezos, whose company Amazon just secured all creative rights to the James Bond franchise. Okay, that might be a bit hyperbolic, but Amazon’s takeover does feel like the final battle lost on the pop culture landscape. Imperfect as it has been, the James Bond franchise was among the last to be run by actual people who cared deeply about maintaining the series’ integrity…

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