Reviews by Jeremy Mathews

Order by: Date, A–Z

• 
  892 (2022)

  Review preview for 892

  The filmmakers are so wrapped up in the importance of the social issues, that they forget to come up with anything to say about them.

  When Brian Brown-Easley’s disability check fails to materialise from Veterans Affairs, he finds himself on the brink of homelessness and breaking his daughter’s heart. With no other options, he walks into a Wells Fargo Bank and says, "I've got a bomb".
• 
  Am I OK? (2022)

  Review preview for Am I OK?

  Stephanie Allynne and Tig Notaro are impressively attuned to the humanity of their characters.

  Lucy and Jane have been best friends for most of their lives and think they know everything there is to know about each other. But when Jane announces she's moving to London, Lucy reveals a long-held secret. As Jane tries to help Lucy, their friendship is thrown into chaos.
• 
  Atropia (2024)

  Review preview for Atropia

  While Gates has found an intriguing setting for her war satire, it’s less clear what she wants to say with it.

  When an aspiring actress in a military role-playing facility falls in love with a soldier cast as an insurgent, their unsimulated emotions threaten to derail the performance.
• 
  Babylon (2022)

  Review preview for Babylon

  Babylon is disgusting, muddled in intent, absurd in its trajectory and at times baffling in its tonal choices. And yet I would not call a moment of its 189 minutes boring.

  The rise and fall of stars against a background of 1920s Hollywood.
• 
  Between The Temples (2024)

  Review preview for Between The Temples

  Filled with awkwardness and tension, the film acts as a spotlight for all the actors.

  A cantor in a crisis of faith finds his world turned upside down when his grade school music teacher re-enters his life as his new adult bat mitzvah student.
• 
  Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets (2020)

  Review preview for Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets

  While the roaming handheld cameras bring to mind observational documentaries, the aesthetic also evokes Robert Altman through its observational style and rich tapestry of characters.

  In the shadows of the bright lights of Las Vegas, it's last call for a beloved dive bar known as the Roaring 20s. A document of real people, in an unreal situation, facing an uncertain future: America at the end of 2016.
• 
  Boys State (2020)

  Review preview for Boys State

  Perhaps Boys State's greatest achievement is that it finds a way to make all these boys relatable.

  In an unusual experiment, a thousand 17-year-old boys from Texas join together to build a representative government from the ground up.
• 
  Brian And Charles (2022)

  Review preview for Brian And Charles

  Its droll charm feels in touch with the slow, go-nowhere vibe of the Welsh countryside setting.

  A story of friendship, love, and letting go. And a 7ft tall robot that eats cabbages. A comedy shot in documentary format.
• 
  Brides (2025)

  Review preview for Brides

  This is acclaimed theatrical director Fall’s cinematic feature debut, and she proves adept at both evoking the warmth of her characters and capturing memorable images.

  Two teenage girls in search of freedom, friendship, and belonging run away from their troubled lives with a misguided plan of traveling to Syria.
• 
  Call Jane (2022)

  Review preview for Call Jane

  Nagy and her screenwriters’ disciplined refusal to pursue grandiose storylines results in a well-earned sense of community.

  Chicago, 1968: after having a life-saving secret abortion, a suburban housewife seeks to give women access to healthy and safe abortions through an underground collective of women known as "Jane".
• 
  Censor (2021)

  Review preview for Censor

  Running a tight 84 minutes, the film still feels like an epic journey into both its seedy world and its heroine’s psyche.

  When film censor Enid discovers an eerie horror that speaks directly to her sister's mysterious disappearance, she resolves to unravel the puzzle behind the film and its enigmatic director – a quest blurring the lines between fiction and reality in terrifying ways.
• 
  Clemency (2019)

  Review preview for Clemency

  Despite the raw power of its performances, the film suffers from an impulse to spell out some of its points.

  Years of carrying out death row executions have taken a toll on prison warden Bernadine Williams. As she prepares to execute another inmate, Bernadine must confront the psychological and emotional demons her job creates, ultimately connecting her to the man she is sanctioned to kill.
• 
  CODA (2021)

  Review preview for CODA

  While Heder’s screenplay relies on familiar beats, her writing and direction reveal a compassion and desire to understand each character’s feelings and emotions.

  As a CODA – Child of Deaf Adults – Ruby is the only hearing person in her deaf family. When the family’s fishing business is threatened, Ruby finds herself torn between pursuing her love of music and her fear of abandoning her parents.
• 
  Coexistence, My Ass! (2025)

  Review preview for Coexistence, My Ass!

  Successfully finds insight and social commentary

  Comedian Noam Shuster-Eliassi creates a personal and political one-woman show about the struggle for equality in Israel/Palestine. When the elusive coexistence she’s spent her life working toward starts sounding like a bad joke, she challenges her audiences with hard truths that are no laughing matter.
• 
  The Courier (2020)

  Review preview for The Courier

  What makes the ensuing story special, besides Cooke’s elegant direction, are the relationships between the characters.

  The true story of a British businessman unwittingly recruited into one of the greatest international conflicts in history. Forming an unlikely partnership with a Soviet officer hoping to prevent a nuclear confrontation, the two men work together to provide the crucial intelligence used to defuse the Cuban Missile Crisis.
• 
  Dìdi (2024)

  Review preview for Dìdi

  Impressively, the movie digs into enough warmth and humanity that it pulls the audience through moments of severe cringe with laughs and empathy.

  In 2008, during the last month of summer before high school begins, an impressionable 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy learns what his family can’t teach him: how to skate, how to flirt, and how to love your mom.
• 
  Devo (2024)

  Review preview for Devo

  Most impressive for distilling mountains of archival footage, with the help of the trusty talking-head interview.

  Born in response to the Kent State massacre, new wave band Devo took their concept of "de-evolution" from cult following to near–rock star status with groundbreaking 1980 hit Whip It while preaching an urgent social commentary.
• 
  The Eight Mountains (2022)

  Review preview for The Eight Mountains

  In their quietly devastating manner, Groeningen and Vandermeersch examine the fluid nature of our confusion and confidence over our place in the world.

  The Eight Mountains is the story of a friendship. Of children becoming men who try to erase the footprints of their fathers, but who, through the twists and turns they take, always end up returning home.
• 
  Emergency (2022)

  Review preview for Emergency

  It’s great to see comedy set against dark subject matter, but here the balancing act often falters.

  Ready for a night of partying, a group of Black and Latino college students must weigh the pros and cons of calling the police when faced with an unusual emergency.
• 
  Fancy Dance (2023)

  Review preview for Fancy Dance

  An emotionally engaging portrait of the struggles of life on a Native American reservation in Oklahoma

  Following her sister's disappearance, a Native American hustler kidnaps her niece from the child's white grandparents and sets out for the state powwow in hopes of keeping what is left of their family intact.
• 
  Flee (2021)

  Review preview for Flee

  By animating the whole movie, Rasmussen makes the story feel more immersive and of a whole piece.

  Amin arrived as an unaccompanied minor in Denmark from Afghanistan. Today, he is a successful academic and is getting married to his long-time boyfriend. A secret he has been hiding for 20 years threatens to ruin the life he has built.
• 
  Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! (2026)

  Review preview for Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty!

  The story sometimes lacks thrust, but when it isn’t working, something new will be on screen soon enough.

  Haru and Luis love competing in Tokyo’s ballroom dance scene, but after tragedy strikes, Haru withdraws into isolation. When friends coax her back to the studio, she develops an infatuation with the new instructor. She must face what comes next as sparks fly.
• 
  Handling The Undead (2024)

  Review preview for Handling The Undead

  Hvistendahl and her cast have a very strong sense of the emotional weight of the piece.

  On a hot summer day in Oslo, the newly dead awaken. Three families faced with loss try to figure out what this resurrection means and if their loved ones really are back.
• 
  Hive (2021)

  Review preview for Hive

  Writer/director Basholli directs with a deceptively simple handheld aesthetic, emphasising the bleak reality of the setting.

  Fahrije’s husband has been missing since the war in Kosovo. She sets up her own small business to provide for her kids, but as she fights against a patriarchal society that does not support her, she faces a crucial decision: to wait for his return, or to continue to persevere.
• 
  Honey Boy (2019)

  Review preview for Honey Boy

  This is a highly personal work that opens the door on some dark truths of Hollywood and fame, but it also doesn’t quite know what to do to elevate itself beyond a peep show into human misery.

  A child TV star and his ex-rodeo clown father face their stormy past through time and cinema.
• 
  Honk for Jesus, Save Your Soul (2022)

  Review preview for Honk for Jesus, Save Your Soul

  Despite its compelling elements, the filmmaking falls too far on the clunky side.

  In the aftermath of a huge scandal, Trinitie Childs, the first lady of a prominent Southern Baptist megachurch, attempts to help her pastor husband, Lee-Curtis Childs, rebuild their congregation.
• 
  Human Factors (2021)

  Review preview for Human Factors

  Added together, the elements create a compelling urgency by making the who, why and when of its movements unpredictable yet emotionally honest.

  A mysterious house break in exposes the agony of an exemplary middle class family.
• 
  If I Had Legs I'd Kick You (2025)

  Review preview for If I Had Legs I'd Kick You

  Rose Byrne anchors the whole damn thing with a performance that gives the sense of wobbling for eternity on a tightrope without ever quite falling off.

  With her life crashing down around her, Linda attempts to navigate her child’s mysterious illness, her absent husband, a missing person, and an increasingly hostile relationship with her therapist.
• 
  The Incomer (2026)

  Review preview for The Incomer

  Grounded in whimsy and wonder but willing to embrace a dark edge

  On a remote Scottish isle, siblings Isla and Sandy hunt birds and talk to mythical beings while fighting off outsiders. Their lives change when Daniel, an awkward official, arrives to relocate them.
• 
  The Inventor: Out For Blood In Silicon Valley (2019)

  Review preview for The Inventor: Out For Blood In Silicon Valley

  The film’s visuals are at their best when contrasting truth and lies.

  With a magical new invention that promised to revolutionize blood testing, Elizabeth Holmes became the world's youngest self-made billionaire, heralded as the next Steve Jobs. Then, overnight, her $10-billion-dollar company dissolved. The rise and fall of Theranos is a window into the psychology of fraud.
• 
  In The Earth (2021)

  Review preview for In The Earth

  In the Earth begins as an unassuming creep-show about a scientist venturing out into a dangerous woods, but has far greater ambitions than a mere slasher or monster movie.

  As a disastrous virus grips the planet, a scientist and a park scout venture deep into the forest for a routine equipment run. Through the night, their journey becomes a terrifying voyage through the heart of darkness as the forest comes to life around them.
• 
  In The Summers (2024)

  Review preview for In The Summers

  The characters speak naturally about the things in their life, and the film trusts us to piece together the essential information.

  On a journey that spans across the formative years of their lives, two sisters navigate their loving but volatile father during their yearly summer visits to his home in Las Cruces, New Mexico.
• 
  I Saw the TV Glow (2024)

  Review preview for I Saw the TV Glow

  It tells what could be a goofy story, about awkward teenagers obsessed with a TV series called The Pink Opaque, but portrays it as an ominous, nightmarish mindfuck.

  Teenager Owen is just trying to make it through life in the suburbs when his classmate introduces him to a mysterious late-night TV show - a vision of a supernatural world beneath their own. In the pale glow of the television, Owen’s view of reality begins to crack.
• 
  Jawline (2019)

  Review preview for Jawline

  There’s plenty of judgement to be passed, especially by cranky old writers like myself, but Mandelup does an admirable job of presenting her subjects on their own terms.

  The film follows 16-year-old Austyn Tester, a rising star in the live-broadcast ecosystem who built his following on wide-eyed optimism and teen girl lust, as he tries to escape a dead-end life in rural Tennessee.
• 
  Judas And The Black Messiah (2021)

  Review preview for Judas And The Black Messiah

  Plemons’s performance captures the unease and guilt Mitchell feels, while reminding us that the agent is also putting on a performance during his meetings with O’Neal.

  The story of FBI informant William O’Neal, who infiltrated the Illinois Black Panther party when J Edgar Hoover feared charismatic leader Chairman Fred Hampton would emerge as a Black Messiah.
• 
  Knock Down The House (2019)

  Review preview for Knock Down The House

  The documentary is clearly on the side of candidates, which is fine, but it could also benefit from a bit more scepticism and empathy for its auxiliary subjects.

  Four young Democratic candidates take on established incumbents in the US 2018 election.
• 
  Kokomo City (2023)

  Review preview for Kokomo City

  It’s thrilling to watch a filmmaker like Smith throw a wrench in the gears and deliver an unapologetic ode to outcasts that’s every bit as punk rock as its subjects.

  Four Black transgender sex workers explore the dichotomy between the Black community and themselves, while confronting issues long avoided.
• 
  Lady (2026)

  Review preview for Lady

  While the film has political and sociological themes, it ultimately succeeds because it’s about the true spirit of the people.

  In the sprawling African metropolis of Lagos, a fiercely independent young cab driver meets a band of radiantly reckless sex workers whose sisterhood pulls her into danger and joy, setting her on a journey toward her own transformation.
• 
  Land (2021)

  Review preview for Land

  The setup may call to mind other films about women starting life anew in beautiful exotic locales — let’s say Tuscany for example. However, Land puts forth a quieter and darker tone.

  The poignant story of one woman’s search, in the aftermath of an unfathomable event, for meaning in the vast and harsh American wilderness.
• 
  Late Night (2019)

  Review preview for Late Night

  Memo to filmmakers: If you’re looking for a failsafe plan to make a delightful film, try showcasing the breadth of Emma Thompson’s talents.

  A late-night talk show host’s world is turned upside down when she hires her only female staff writer. Originally intended to smooth over diversity concerns, her decision has unexpectedly hilarious consequences as the two women separated by culture and generation are united by their love of a biting punchline.
• 
  Lurker (2025)

  Review preview for Lurker

  In line with his economic storytelling, Russell has a gift for conveying little details through subtle performance notes where other filmmakers might telegraph intent.

  A retail employee infiltrates the inner circle of an artist on the verge of stardom. As he gets closer to the budding music star, access and proximity become a matter of life and death.
• 
  Mass (2021)

  Review preview for Mass

  Kranz, best known for his acting career, certainly didn’t pick an easy project for his debut behind the camera, but his work proves exceptional.

  Years after a tragic shooting, the parents of both the victim and the perpetrator meet face-to-face.
• 
  Midwives (2022)

  Review preview for Midwives

  While it’s important to bring attention to the wider-spread government actions against the minority group, the film’s truly valuable observations are of how the prejudice impacts normal life.

  Two midwives work side-by-side in a makeshift clinic in Myanmar.
• 
  The Moment (2026)

  Review preview for The Moment

  The Moment’s biggest misstep is making Charli’s defining feature indecisive flightiness.

  A rising pop star navigates the complexities of fame and industry pressure while preparing for her arena tour debut.
• 
  Mother Schmuckers (2021)

  Review preview for Mother Schmuckers

  It’s shock comedy with no sense of impact or context, because before you can let the shock set in, the movie is running full steam ahead toward another disgusting episode.

  Issachar & Zabulon, two brothers in their twenties, are supremely stupid and never bored, as madness is part of their daily lives. When they lose their mother's beloved dog, they have 24 hours to find it – or she will kick them out.
• 
  Mutt (2023)

  Review preview for Mutt

  Confident enough in its characters to tell its story without sensationalism or stylistic overcompensation.

  Over the course of a single hectic day in New York City, three people from Feña's past are thrust back into his life. Having lost touch since transitioning from female to male, he navigates the new dynamics of old relationships while tackling the day-to-day challenges of living life in between.
• 
  Navalny (2022)

  Review preview for Navalny

  And so we get a very engaging, often suspenseful movie in Navalny, a record of the dangers that come with pissing off an authoritarian regime.

  Profile of the Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in the wake of survival of an assassination attempt.
• 
  The Nest (2020)

  Review preview for The Nest

  The screenplay and direction deftly let the audience put together the pieces, making the discrepancies plain to see without hitting us over the head with their existence.

  Charismatic entrepreneur, Rory, relocates his family to England with dreams of profiting from booming 1980s London. But as his wife, Allison, struggles to adapt, and the promise of a lucrative new beginning starts to unravel, the couple have to face the unwelcome truths lying beneath the surface of their marriage.
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  Never Rarely Sometimes Always (2020)

  Review preview for Never Rarely Sometimes Always

  It is a portrait of loneliness and alienation, yes, but also of resourcefulness, resilience and unity.

  Faced with an unintended pregnancy and a lack of local support, Autumn and her cousin Skylar embark on a brave, fraught journey across state lines to New York City.
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  Nothing Compares (2022)

  Review preview for Nothing Compares

  Finds a strong propulsive narrative with an emotional core.

  The story of Sinéad O'Connor's phenomenal rise to worldwide fame and subsequent exile from the pop mainstream. Focusing on Sinéad's prophetic words and deeds from 1987 to 1993, the film reflects on the legacy of this fearless trailblazer through a contemporary feminist lens.