"Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom": A Lesson in Blues
With raw and unapologetic performances by Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman, stories about the hardships of Black musicians are weaved in with The Blues.

"What are you really doing here in Eugene?" In her debut short film, writer and director Cait Smith stages a historically-based retelling of Eugene, Oregon’s “Lesbian Mecca” in the 1970s. Where You Lead follows Erin (Hannah Leugers), a perplexing wanderer who stumbles upon a group of lesbians at a feminist bookstore. Posing as a “reporter for the paper,” she interviews the lesbians and begins to unravel her prejudices about love, queerness, and her personal struggles with identity.
With raw and unapologetic performances by Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman, stories about the hardships of Black musicians are weaved in with The Blues.
Renee Zellweger shines in this Judy Garland biopic, which highlights the pain and loneliness that so many famous women endure.
In addition to the cast being delightfully diverse this time around, the film was just loosely-plotted and action-packed enough to keep a casual fan like myself entertained. While I do agree that the writing of Cole left much to be desired for an original character thrust into a preconceived universe, none of the characters seemed particularly fleshed out in terms of personality; however, I think that's to be expected when you're watching a film literally inspired by a video game.
Love, Simon (2018) based on the book “Simon vs The Homo Sapiens Agenda” (by Becky Albertalli) is a teen LGBTQ+ rom-com with themes of longing to find others with similar struggles, and ultimately is a story of acceptance of identity from those around you, and most importantly, from yourself.
Few movies deal with aging (particularly aging women) with as much compassion as Relic does. Yet it’s not sickly sweet and not a soapbox rant against ageism. Relic simply is, allowing the horror to seep in quietly and carefully.