With a pair of acclaimed, modestly budgeted efforts under his belt — 2016’s mesmerizing folk horror The Witch and 2019’s fever dream of paranoia, The Lighthouse…
Author: Brent Hankins
Brent Hankins
Brent Hankins has been blogging and writing film reviews online since 2011. He joined the Phoenix Film Critics Society in 2013, and was a founding member of the Phoenix Critics Circle the following year, where he currently serves as President. Brent also hosted the weekly Drinks and Discourse podcast for nearly 5 years, and is currently the editor-in-chief at The Lamplight Review. He resides in Tempe, AZ with his wife and son.
There’s probably nothing I could say about Everything Everywhere All at Once that hasn’t already been said by someone else, and the vast majority of those…
If you’ve been looking for a slice of superhero action that doesn’t require a near-encyclopedic knowledge of dozens of interconnected films and television shows, then Marvel’s…
Deep Water is the sort of sexy thriller that has all but disappeared from cinema screens in recent years, unabashedly flaunting its sexiness in much the…
The Thief CollectorDirected by Allison Otto How does a prized painting get stolen from the University of Arizona’s Museum of Art in broad daylight, disappear without…
Diamond Hands: The Legend of WallStreetBetsDirected by Zack Canepari and Drea Cooper Diamond Hands: The Legend of WallStreetBets explores the complete chaos that ensued when a…
Sci-fi shoot ’em up series Halo has long been the flagship franchise of Microsoft’s Xbox console line. The first installment, released in 2001, is widely credited…
After a last-minute cancellation in 2020 and an all-digital offering last year, the SXSW Film Festival is returning to in-person programming for the 2022 event, with…
Gotham City’s crime-fighting costumed vigilante has been a cinematic mainstay for more than three decades, beginning with Michael Keaton’s iconic portrayal in 1989’s Batman and its…
Jackass Forever is a movie that probably shouldn’t even exist. The last feature-length film starring Johnny Knoxville and his merry band of injury prone pals was…
We’re in the home stretch of the 2022 Sundance Film Festival, and although we were fortunate enough to screen 19 films over the course of five…
Sundance 2022 is beginning to wind down: praise is being lavished, deals are being made, and the festival is closer to the end than the beginning.…
With the chaos of Sundance 2022’s opening weekend now behind us and the dust beginning to settle, we’re taking a break from screenings to catch up…
Emergency stars Donald Elise Watkins and RJ Cyler as two best friends with a singular mission: to become the first Black students at their university to…
When You Finish Saving the World finds Jesse Eisenberg stepping behind the camera for the first time, adapting his acclaimed audio drama into a feature length…
After last year’s hybrid offering, which featured digital screenings and satellite theaters across the country, the Sundance Film Festival had planned to return to Park City…
Belle, the latest offering from Japanese director Mamoru Hosoda, posits a world where a social media platform known as “U” has become the preferred choice of…
Members of the Portland Critics Association are pleased to announce the winners of their first annual awards, honoring the best films, filmmakers, actors and other achievements…
Members of the Portland Critics Association are pleased to announce the nominees for our annual awards, honoring the best films, filmmakers, actors and other achievements of…
West Side Story wasn’t exactly crying out for a remake. Indeed, the 1961 Oscar winner from Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins holds up remarkably well more…
Nearly two decades after becoming the first Black woman to win the Oscar for Best Actress, Halle Berry takes on arguably her biggest challenge yet, stepping…
Allow me to open this review of Red Notice by saying that I’m a huge fan of Dwayne Johnson, and I often find myself able to…
Much in the way Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood hearkened back to the Los Angeles of yesteryear, director Edgar Wright’s new psychological thriller Last…
Denis Villeneuve’s most ambitious project to date finds the director shepherding Frank Herbert’s impossibly dense sci-fi novel Dune to the big screen. It’s a daunting task,…
Adam Randall’s Night Teeth, premiering this week on Netflix, offers a sleek and stylish riff on vampire mythology, treading familiar ground but giving the mostly by-the-numbers…
Quentin Tarantino’s revisionist World War II revenge fantasy Inglourious Basterds makes the leap to 4K Ultra HD with a new home video release from Universal. Boasting…
When it comes to staging eye-popping historical action, few are as adept as Ridley Scott. Simply uttering the legendary director’s name will conjure images of the…
Director Michael Showalter is best known for comedic efforts like Wet Hot American Summer and The Big Sick, so you’d be forgiven for assuming he might…
“I think without humor, I would die,” says Alison Pill. “And that’s not hyperbolic.” It’s the morning after her latest film, All My Puny Sorrows, premiered…
Opening to rave reviews in 2016, Broadway smash Dear Evan Hansen was nominated for nine Tony Awards, taking home the statue in six of those categories,…
After an all-digital rendition due to the COVID-19 pandemic last year, the Toronto International Film Festival returned for its 46th edition this month, offering a hybrid…
Just three years after Gustav Möller’s taut low-budget Danish thriller The Guilty, Antoine Fuqua helms this glossy American remake, leveraging his action sensibilities to squeeze a…
Michael McGowan’s adaptation of Miriam Toews’ acclaimed novel All My Puny Sorrows seeks to explore mental illness and injuries both physical and emotional through its depiction…
Screening at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival as part of the Contemporary World Cinema lineup, Blaine Thurier’s Kicking Blood puts a unique spin on vampire…