Beyond the Witching Hour 

The Gates, John Burr’s new thriller film, is a disturbingly realistic portrayal of three Black twenty-somethings - Derek (Mason Gooding), Kevin (Algee Smith), and Tyon (Keith Powers), as they accidentally take a wrong turn into a gated community that’s more like a modern-day sundown town. The three friends witness a variety of crimes in their new surroundings, including an attempted homicide and an attempted rape. As they attempt to alert the authorities and do the right thing, they are thwarted at every turn by the worst horror stories of American conservatism - racist white suburbanites, reckless gun violence, corrupt police, religious mania, and a megalomaniacal pastor. 

As legal dramas go, we rarely see an African-American actor in the lead role. "The Burial" has several.

Despite this genre not being a new one, The Novice offers a fresh perspective with its study of performance anxiety

Shudder makes an incredibly atmospheric docuseries about the darker side of Hollywood mysteries.

Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" is an iconic family favorite with a multi-talented biracial lead that will remain fresh and magical for years to come.

Remakes. Reboots. Reinventions. Redundancy. It's the common practice in Hollywood of late, sometimes offering us victorious reimagining of what can be considered cinematic classics while also, more often, falling flat on their UN-imaginative faces in utter defeat and lackluster results. Admittedly, with this in mind, I went into the newest incarnation of "The War of the Roses" with typical trepidation and cautious optimism.