Review: A Tragic Day Recounted Impressively in Hotel Mumbai
Taking a similar approach as 22 July earlier this year (minus the courtroom drama of that film), Hotel Mumbai perilously walks us through the tense and bloody day in 2008 when […]
Steve Prokopy is chief film critic for the Chicago-based arts outlet Third Coast Review. For nearly 20 years, he was the Chicago editor for Ain’t It Cool News, where he contributed film reviews and filmmaker/actor interviews under the name “Capone.” Currently, he’s a frequent contributor at /Film (SlashFilm.com) and Backstory Magazine. He is also the public relations director for Chicago's independently owned Music Box Theatre, and holds the position of Vice President for the Chicago Film Critics Association. In addition, he is a programmer for the Chicago Critics Film Festival, which has been one of the city's most anticipated festivals since 2013.
Review: Originality and Confidence Mark a Strong Debut Feature in Starfish
A mix of genres that include science fiction, horror and a deeply personal psychological drama, Starfish, the feature film debut from writer/director A.T. White, is a confident, emotion-driven work that […]
Review: Tim Burton’s Vision Crash Lands in Live-Action Remake of Dumbo
The latest in what is going to be a long line of Disney animated properties being made into live-action remakes, Dumbo is depressing. I thought long and hard about it, and […]
Review: Time is of the Essence in Fast-Paced The Hummingbird Project
The last year or so has been a hell of a time for actor Alexander Skarsgård, who seems to average a movie every other month, including the Netflix original Hold […]
Review: Strong Actors Get Lost in a Contrived The Aftermath
For reasons I’ll never quite understand, a small section of the British film industry has been obsessed for roughly 70 years with telling love stories that take place during and […]
Review: The Mustang Heralds a Promising New Filmmaking Voice
It will never cease to amaze me when a first-time feature director unleashes something as confident and sure-handed as Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre’s The Mustang, which joins an unexpected series of […]
Review: Jordan Peele’s Us Revels in an Ambiguity with Bite
There’s a line spoken early in Us, the sophomore feature from writer/director Jordan Peele (Get Out) that is important but doesn’t give anything away about the film’s true nature. It’s […]
Review: Coming Of Age with Resilience in Giant Little Ones
In this unexpectedly satisfying sophomore work from writer/director Keith Behrman (2002’s Flowers & Garnet), Giant Little Ones is the story of two fairly popular high school boys—Franky (Josh Wiggins) and […]
Review: Manipulative Five Feet Apart Hits New Low for Teen Romances
I have to admit, I was genuinely shocked when I learned that this romantic-drama about a pair of teenagers, both with cystic fibrosis (CF), wasn’t based on a novel by […]
Review: Animated Wonder Park Lacks Both Director, Inspiration
For a film that attempts to celebrate creativity and the power of imagination, the animated film Wonder Park is about as uninspired as you can get. This is the sort […]
Review: The Kid Feels Like a Familiar, Special Western
The tendency of most modern Westerns is to go about as dark as you can, but few in recent memory go quite as morose as The Kid, the sophomore effort from […]
Review: As An Endurance Test, Climax May Not Be Worth the Payoff
For a filmmaker who has made a career out of emphasizing fever-dream-like visuals, Gaspar Noé (Irreversible, Enter the Void, Love) may have topped himself with his latest, Climax. This film […]