Portside

With a solid premise about working-class vampire hunters, Day Shift had real potential — but there’s no escaping the Netflix curse.

Critics are fawning over Good Luck to You, Leo Grande for its “brave” sex positivity. But the crowd-pleasing comedy is actually anxiously prescriptive, and it relies on an angelic and selfless sex worker to teach a middle-aged woman how to love her body.

David Cronenberg’s latest film, Crimes of the Future, is a return to the “body horror” genre. It brings back the gross-out gore that first made his career in the 1970s — but without the thrills.

The Northman is about a glowering, muscle-bound man-mountain named Prince Amleth (Alexander Skarsgård, son of Stellan) who as a boy witnesses the killing of his father, King Aurvandill (Ethan Hawke), and the abduction of his mother, Queen Gudrún (Nicole Kidman), by the king’s betraying half-bastard brother Fjölnir (Claes Bang). Amleth vows revenge.

The Afterparty is just one of several new comedies about stressed-out millennials finding themselves trapped in a murder mystery. So what is it about this generation that makes them all want to star in an Agatha Christie story?

Minari is a gentle, universal story about a resilient South Korean family trying to make it in 1980s America. You should watch it.

John Carpenter’s movies provide visions of societies falling apart. No wonder his work is resonating now more than ever.

Ellen DeGeneres’s reputation as the kindest celebrity in America has finally been shattered. But it’s not just her “mean streak” that’s the problem — it’s that she’s an exploitative boss, who cheated her employees at the height of the pandemic.

Movies about class and inequality have made it into the global mainstream recently and are picking up major prizes. The genre-busting, edge-of-your-seat Brazilian film Bacurau is the latest. You've gotta see it.

The Great shares a broadly similar style and subject with The Favorite, though it is neither as dark nor as committed to factual accuracy. The series shows the grotesque royal court life of Empress Catherine II of Russia, aka Catherine the Great.