‘Malcolm & Marie’: A Promising Premise With Disappointing Results
Sam Levinson's latest film can't keep up with the excellence of its performances.

Ryan Richmond is an eccentric teenager living with his mother, father, sister and brother in the Holiday Inn they own in Sunnyvale, Arizona, the prune capital of the world. Is it any wonder that he wants to go to Saudi Arabaia for college and leave Sunnyvale far, far behind? He spends his days at school with his sex-obsessed best friend Dan Forrester and lusts after Lisa Winston, the sexy lounge singer who his parents have hired to perform at the Holiday Inn. Stuck without a date for his brother's wedding to a senator's daughter, Ryan goes to a computer dating service, which asks him such questions as "Can you breathe foreign substances?" Soon, Ryan is told that he may be an alien stuck on Earth along with thousands of others. Soon, Charles and Edna Pinsky show up and tell him that he may an alien prince meant to lead his brethren home. And that's when things get out of control...
Sam Levinson's latest film can't keep up with the excellence of its performances.
The Roses is a wickedly sharp marital warfare comedy that transforms domestic dysfunction into high art. Olivia Colman and Benedict Cumberbatch deliver powerhouse performances as a couple whose fairy-tale romance implodes when his architectural career collapses just as her culinary empire takes off. What makes Jay Roach's remake so devastatingly effective is its refusal to pick sides—both spouses are equally sympathetic and monstrous, wielding Tony McNamara's razor-sharp dialogue like weapons forged from shared intimacies. It's a film that dares you to laugh at relationship wreckage while forcing you to confront the uncomfortable truth that the line between passionate love and mutual destruction is terrifyingly thin.
At 2:17 a.m., every child in a third-grade class wakes up, leaves their home, and disappears into the darkness—except one. The next day, teacher Justine Gandy discovers that Alex Lily is the only student left, while the rest have vanished without a trace. Did Justine have something to do with it, or is a far more sinister force stalking the town, targeting not just children, but anyone in its path?
If you were to watch it on streaming when you have nothing to do, it’s still probably a giant waste of time, but you could do far worse. Paying $18 for a movie ticket and who knows how much for concessions turns this from an exercise in boredom to an exercise in frustration.
In the spirit of Halloween, here's a list of body horror films which can be interpreted as trans allegories.
The story of the singer's career in her Sweetener World Tour is told in this featured documentary film.