Pretty Lethal 2026 * * * Stars

LETHAL WEAPONRY

A group of ballet dancers and their coach have their bus break down in the middle of nowhere. Where do they go after being stranded? Well they head to a traveling lodge, encountering a sadistic, former ballet prodigy who plans to make their life a living hell. That's the gist of 2026's Pretty Lethal, a horror thriller where you want the protagonists to triumph and the bad guys to veritably get theirs. Said evil ballet prodigy is played effectively by veteran actress Uma Thurman. "We need to get out of here." Uh, ya think?

So yeah, Pretty Lethal is extremely bloody and pulpy, a modus operandi that's so violent its violence nearly veers into camp. I mean when you watch "Lethal" you have to take your mind back to the early 2000s, where Eli Roth, Rob Zombie, and even the late Tobe Hooper kind of ruled the roost. The only things missing are Malcolm McDowell wearing a wig, some evil kid yelling "pancakes!", and various cannibals chilling in rural Texas. "Inside every ballerina's heart beats the blood of a warrior." Oh fo sho. Fo...sho! 

Exaggerated style and carnival-esque directors aside, Pretty Lethal has its villains with nearly nil motives, its sitting, target leads not the most likable females in the room, and its plot rather cut and dried, a sort of excuse to roll out the old grindhouse at the dead of night (pun intended). Oh well. With "Lethal" it's the action that truly counts here, sanguinary action with fight scenes that use artistic dancing as a form of nasty birds in flight. As the five pro hoofer personas try to escape the rather glorified hostel they're in (that would be Hungary's Teremok Inn), Pretty Lethal shows its audience the result of danseuses on pure adrenaline, getting their high-powered, Jet Li on. "Pretty" girl rock.  

Written by Jesse Burleson

The Rise of the Red Hot Chili Peppers: Our Brother, Hillel 2026 * * * 1/2 Stars

"PEOPLE, KEEP ON LEARNIN"

Members of the Red Hot Chili Peppers talk about the beginnings and origins of the band and their beloved guitar player who died tragically nearly 40 years ago, right before they made it really big. So basically we have a vehicle here that doesn't drown in total self-conceit. "We were a trio of best friends in high school." You don't say Flea. You don't say.

So OK, I think The Rise of the Red Hot Chili Peppers: Our Brother Hillel is one of the best documentaries I've seen in the last five years. I mean it doesn't bend to normal tropes, taking one portion of the Chili Peppers Behind the Music chunk and stretching it out to a never-dull 93 minutes. Rock on brothers! Yeah VH1 is fun to watch but the early 2000s were dated as all get-out. "Our Brother Hillel" is more modern-day in terms of its polish and cinematic professionalism. "It was red-hot." Uh, hint hint. 

Directed by Ben Feldman (a near rookie), projecting the usual archives and animation, distributed by Netflix (naturally), and showing raw concert footage that would give you some serious whiplash (yikes!), The Rise of the Red Hot Chili Peppers: Our Brother Hillel is an unflinching and fervent docu, not necessarily praising the Peppers boys but paying tribute to their fallen, influential axeman Hillel Slovak who perished from a heroin overdose circa 1988 (see first paragraph). 

Singer Anthony Kiedis, Hillel's bro (James Slovak), and bassist Flea (whose real name is Michael Balzary), well they wax on profusely about Slovak, spewing profanities, being vulnerable, and shedding non-crocodile tears. I mean "Our Brother Hillel" is massively without filter, and it's quite refreshing witnessing this on screen as opposed to a flick about rock heroes where everyone but them is being interviewed to um, anatomize. Give "rise" to.  

Written by Jesse Burleson

Project Hail Mary 2026 * * Stars

4TH AND I'M THINKING MORE THAN 10

2026's Project Hail Mary is like a cinematic jigsaw puzzle with missing pieces that still need attention. I mean its narrative structure is so fragmented you'd think helmers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were trying to get their veritable, Christopher Nolan on. "Hail Mary's" lead (Ryan Gosling as Ryland Grace), well he pulls you through somehow, being charismatic and unconventional as only the Ry dog can. So OK, that begs the question, do we really need another astronaut flick starring London, Ontario's favorite son? I guess. Uh, maybe.

Anyway let's get back to the movie as a whole shall we. Project Hail Mary is a bit of a chore to sit through and it probably needed to trim about 15-20 minutes from ye olde runtime. Gosling talking to an alien rock that looks and walks like a tarantula for a good hour. Random flashbacks that turn into random flash-forwards. Techspeak concerning astrophage and global cooling, stuff only hardcore AI eccentrics could understand. Yeah "Hail Mary" has a few moments of awe and wonderment but it's also a painful reminder of why high schoolers skip class occasionally because teach decides to roll out a scientific filmstrip on a Tuesday. Yikes!

All in all, Project Hail Mary is about junior high professor Ryland Grace (Gosling) being tapped by the government to save Earth and the sun from a deadly medium threatening mankind as we know it. He must get on a spacecraft with other chance crew members and travel light years away. 

The direction by Lord and Miller is claustrophobic and effective and the editing, well it's feverish at times, possibly to entertain in fits and starts. The problem with "Hail Mary" is that it sort of keeps the viewer at a distance, wandering and dawdling when it could instead take to the air (pun intended). I mean Project Hail Mary is literally like Interstellar without the sadness and danger. Oh and don't get me started on its comparisons to something more emotive like E.T. Project "x out." 

Written by Jesse Burleson

War Machine 2026 * * * Stars

WAR MONGER

"Keep your eyes open." Uh yeah, especially when you've got to deal with some extraterrestrial killing apparatus with nasty rays coming out of it. Yikes! Oh and said apparatus is totally untraversable and a real pain in the dairy air. Double yikes!

Anyway 2026's War Machine does involve war and the machine in question, well it's designed to get the viewer to get their veritable War of the Worlds on. Unrelenting bustle, bloody barbarity, special ops, brute military swag, D. Quaid in his golden years. It's like "Machine's" director (Patrick Hughes) saw every action horror flick from the late 80s and decided to throw the term "dated" out the window. "Whatever that thing is, it's hunting us." Have nose will hunt my brother. Have nose will for sure hunt.

So yeah, as a flick about some soldiers hellbent on becoming US Army Rangers only to discover that their final stage involves dealing with an alien life force that looks like something straight out of an H. G. Wells novel, War Machine is akin to stuff like Predator and Tigerland and Independence Day and all things Julien Leclercq oh my! So basically it's a boot camp movie, or a mishmash-of-genres movie, or a streaming slickster, or a total cinematic mutt. Hey, the boys at Relativity Media called and well, they want their freaking concessions back. Natch!

Starring Alan Ritchson, Dennis Quaid (mentioned earlier), and Stephan James and distributed by good old Netflix (shocker), War Machine is entertaining to a fault. I mean it sneaks up on you, announcing itself as one type of vehicle only to turn the tables and get all celestial on the low. I dug the fast cut, lightning-quick editing, the never-tedious pacing, and the complete whisking from one action set piece to the next. Yup, no "rage against this machine." 

Written by Jesse Burleson

Queen of Chess 2026 * * 1/2 Stars

"CHECK" THE TECHNIQUE

Queen of Chess is a true events documentary that takes place in the post-Cold War decade 90s. And yeah, it's made even more truer by the fact that the actual subject is the one being interviewed most of the time. I mean there are a few people that I didn't know from Adam putting their two cents in (via accounts) but it's main lead Chess player Judit Polgar getting the veritable spotlight. "In the beginning everybody underestimated me." Uh, too bad for those critical dolts. They're too busy playing checkers. Natch. 

Anyway at 93 minutes of running time, "Queen" is shot in chronological order only to produce a sort of neutered, Marty Supreme-style ending, complete with a final endgame and a totally vanquished dream. It's edited feverishly with microfilm reader remnants and careful emends, trying to mask the fact that we're watching an almost paint-drying effect that to people like me who have no clue as to what we're seeing, looks like a couple of small, wooden sculptures moving from one freaking box to the next.  A Chess prodigy (Polgar mentioned earlier) challenges the greatest player in her field (past champion Garry Kasparov), wins the match, and becomes the GOAT of all things female checkmate. "When I was five years old, I started my Chess training." You don't say Judit. You don't say. 

Timothee Chalamet vehicles, slow burn castling-s, and girly Bobby Fischer grandmasters aside, Queen of Chess is well done yet fairly predictable, with the usual archives, a few nifty draw reenactments, a couple of unknown Chess mongers being grilled, and some of the most sluggish cue card narration I've heard in many a moon. I mean I wouldn't say it's a lousy docu but it's far from indelible. Yup, you could leave the room you're watching it from and come back literally non-staggered. "Queen B-minus."

Written by Jesse Burleson

Scream 7 2026 * * 1/2 Stars

"I'LL BE RIGHT BACK"

A one-word title for a movie (plus a number), gory as all get-out, relentless, made for an audience that is so hard-up for horror they'll fork out $10-$15 bones just about any day of the week. Yeah I'm talking about Scream 7, that's right, the 7th installment in the already distance-running franchise of 30 years. So come on, how many of these things does Dimension plan on putting out? And uh, should Sidney Prescott seriously consider not having possession of a phone (cell, landline, or otherwise)? "Hello Sidney." Oh boy, here we go again. 

So yeah, the Scream franchise does the AI thing now with "7", digging up the corpse of actor Matthew Lillard so he can play an artificial intelligence version of old jag Stu Macher. Other than the AI shtick and the addition of mobile security cameras to track offender monger Ghostface, Scream 7 is just like every other Scream flick, lots of nasty kills, a big whodunit at the end, and characters who make substandard decisions like they wanna get offed. "I wanna be a fighter, like you." That's the spirit teenage daughter of Mrs. Prescott (now Mrs. Evans). You go girl!

Starring Neve Campbell, Joel McHale, Lillard (mentioned earlier), and Isabel May and featuring a better-than-usual score from maestro veteran Marco Beltrami (he was Wes Craven's musical, right-hand man back in the day), Scream 7 is about the Ghostface slayer setting his sights on Sid's daughter (as the main target) while butchering everyone else in his or her's path. 

Solid direction from the screenwriter of 1996's Scream (Kevin Williamson who rarely helms movies), more cruor than any Scream vehicle that has ever existed, and a window to the next bit make "7" entertaining and cinematically malnourished at the same time. Heck, they can keep churning out these pics forever. I mean Scream 11 could be in outer space like Friday the 13th's Jason X. Oh and Sidney could show up in a walker a la Scream 19, brandishing a sawed-off shotgun while blasting Ghostface right between the good old corneas. Yikes! "Scream aim fire." 

Written by Jesse Burleson

Firebreak 2026 * * 1/2 Stars

FLAME THROWDOWN

A one-word title for a movie, vexing, poorly dubbed, Syfy channel-like, made for the weary, beaming streaming crowd. Yeah I'm talking about 2025's Firebreak. a pseudo thriller that's more about Hitchcockian panics and suppositions than uncontrolled towering infernos. So OK, are the main characters intolerant or just plain paranoiac? And where's the plot buildup? And um, why does it take forever for the combustion and/or burning to reach ye olde denizens of Segovia, Spain. "Is it snowing?" Uh no, that ain't vapor my young Padawan.

So yeah, there aren't many fire clips in Firebreak, probably because the special effects are just you know, ho-hum. Basically this flick is like watching Alex Garland's Annihilation from 8 years back, less trippy yet more signal, less about the flames yet more about the onus probandi. 

You want a cast of unknowns yelling at each other while trees and shrub steadily go up in smoke all around them? Yup, Firebreak can sort of be your ticket. And do you want those same actors constantly howling the words "where is she?" and "we've got to get out of here" enough times to warrant a freaking drinking game? Me neither, don't think so.

Starring Belen Cuesta, Diana Gomez, and Enric Auquer and distributed by Netflix (I've been saying that a lot these days), Firebreak is about a widowed family who visits their forestry, summer home only to plan on selling it after the death of a recent member. As said family is getting said home ready for buyers, a wildfire breaks out and a 7-year-old child goes missing. Conflict and chaos ensue with the mystery of the disappearing girl being the dramatic center and the wildfire in question being merely the backdrop. A couple of flashbacks here, a violent shindy there, a whole lot of diegesis discontent everywhere. Near "backfire". 

Written by Jesse Burleson

The Investigation of Lucy Letby 2026 * * * Stars

CODE RED

"We need to speak to you." Yeah you do. We're talking about Lucy Letby, the nurse who's about to be detained for some unspeakable crimes. Add some bodycam footage and a crying mother and well, you've got a pretty staggering way of opening a non-fictional, true events movie.

So yeah, my latest review is the nearly closed bookend, The Investigation of Lucy Letby, a documentary that causes the viewer to have an almost flip-flopped opinion. I mean did Lucy murder these infants or didn't she? And why is the girl so darn unforthcoming? And uh, what's up with the "no comment" shenanigans? "The only person who knows truly why is Lucy Letby herself." Uh-huh. 

Letby, well she's a mystery, an enigma just like the docu itself. I would say you can't really see the wheels turning in her head so she's like a female Keyser Soze and/or a good old Anton Chigurh type from No Country for Old Men. She is matched only by Detectives Paul Hughes and Simon Blackwell, dudes who are relentless in proving Lucy's culpability. An interrogation here, a double arrest there, a push for Letby's life sentence. It's only in "Investigation's" last act do we realize that maybe it's you know, the hospital's fault and not Lucy's. "But when you delve deeper, things were not so straightforward." Yikes. 

Usual Suspects characters and private dicks aside, The Investigation of Lucy Letby is directed by Dominic Sivyer, he of Rebel Nun and Masked Scammer fame. Sivyer shoots "Investigation" in the traditional Netflix style, streamlined and clean and sterile in its gape. With not-so-long-ago archives, interviews, and a 92-minute running time without an actual coda, The Investigation of Lucy Letby is a riddle wrapped inside a conundrum, begging for you to think about it long after the credits roll. "Depth probe." 

Written by Jesse Burleson

Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart 2026 * * * Stars

SEIZED 

A sensitive documentary that might be only suited for the most mature of audiences. Yeah I'm talking about 2026's Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart, one of those 90-minute, streaming pics that unfolds like pure fiction even though it's solely based on true events and communique. I mean why has it taken almost 25 years to tell Smart's story? And what's up with the weird behavior of some of her relatives via media coverage? And why did the abductors wear white robes and tunics? "This case captivated the nation." You ain't kidding boss. You really ain't kidding.

So OK, there's a grainy yet streamlined look to "Kidnapped", with helmer Benedict Sanderson shooting everything chronologically until the big vouchsafe halfway through. Basically with Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart you're looking at early 2000s archives intertwined with present-day interviews mainly from the Smart kin or the Salt Lake City rozzers. You want a solid episode of 48 Hours with production values and Utah locales that ascend? Yup, you'll get that with "Kidnapped". You want a docu that plays it safe, embracing the tactful and/or the kid-glove strands? Not here chief. Surely not here. 

Distributed by Netflix, with scenes of very spectral reenactments (yikes), Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart is about well, Elizabeth Smart, a 14-year-old girl who was abducted from her home circa 2002 with only her younger sister as a witness. Her kidnappers were a couple of Bible-thumpers, abusing Smart and keeping her captive for nine months until a chance rescue by the authorities comes about. "Kidnapped", well it's eerie and startling stuff, with haunting music by Mat Davidson and tenebrous direction by Sanderson (mentioned earlier). If it weren't for the audience knowing some good things to come out of Smart's upshot later on, Kidnapped: Elizabeth Smart might have been too difficult to keep a weather eye on. "Atrial capture". 

Written by Jesse Burleson

Miracle: The Boys of '80 2026 * * * 1/2 Stars

POWERED PLAY

The U.S. Olympic team goes into Lake Placid circa 1980 and wins the gold medal, beating the heavily favored Soviet Union and those sneaky blokes from Finland. Basically it's considered the greatest sports moment of the 20th century. "I realize now why it became so much bigger than just a hockey game." Oh fo sho. Fo sho. 

So OK, I think 2026's Miracle: The Boys of  '80 is the best flick of the year (so far). After viewing it recently, I also consider it to be stronger in value than the non-docu, 2004 made-for-the-big-screen version starring good old Snake Plissken (that would Kurt Russell). I mean I'm not saying '04's Miracle is bad, it just seems to omit certain particulars that only the actual players (now in their 70s) can attest to. "We weren't superstars, we were the boy next door, lunch pail, hard hat group of guys." You tell 'em left winger Mike Eruzione. You tell 'em bro. 

Directed by two dudes (Max Gershberg, Jacob Rogal), distributed by Netflix (who else), and clocking in at a running time of 108 minutes, Miracle: The Boys of '80 is well, a quaint, time machine of a documentary, going back 45 years as it guns it stealthy to 88 (hint hint). Essex County, New York literally looks the same, Placid's Main Street is still kicking it in all its twee glory. 

"Boys of '80", yeah it tells its story chronologically and cleanly, how US hockey was H-E-double-hockey-sticks until the late Herb Brooks came along and gathered a bunch of amateurs ready to shock the world. Guys like Jim Craig (goalie), Mark Johnson (center), and Ken Morrow (defense) return to the scene of the crime, looking grizzled yet happy as they enter the Olympic Fieldhouse decades later to reflect. Miracle: The Boys of '80, well it intertwines between present-day interviews and strong print, grainy archives, giving the viewer a hint of teary-eyed wistfulness. "Miracle work it." 

Written by Jesse Burleson