PETERSON REVIEWS
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‘Heist’ Energizes the One-Last-Job Cliché
The performances are universally good. Everyone has a tight handle on so-called “Mamet speak”; no one ever comes across merely as a device for the wicked games to continue.
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‘Night Moves’: It’s Hard to Be a Hero
The most interesting thing about ‘Night Moves’ is not the details of its snarled-up narrative but the psychological and emotional complications that inform it.
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‘Get Shorty’: A Loan Shark’s Hollywood Dreams
‘Get Shorty’ is such a breezy movie that even the violence has a levity.
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Simon Rex is Perfectly Cast in ‘Red Rocket’
Plus: Joel Coen’s visually inspired but inessential ‘Macbeth’ adaptation.
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Torment
On ‘The Lost Daughter’ and ‘The Humans.’
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My Favorite First-Time Watches of 2021
My favorite movies I saw in 2021 that weren’t released that year.
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The 25 Best Movies of 2021
Looking back on a great year for movies.
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‘Don’t Look Up’ Isn’t as Smart as It Thinks It Is
Adam McKay’s limitations contaminate more than just the film’s comedy.
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The Sweet-and-Sour Nostalgia of ‘Licorice Pizza’
Alana Haim hits you like a moonbeam.
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‘The Matrix Resurrections’ is Full of New Life
On Lana Wachowski’s new sequel.
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Judy Davis is Electrifying in ‘My Brilliant Career’
‘My Brilliant Career’’s ending feels like a beginning — the first stages of one’s potential finally being seen through.
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‘Nightmare Alley’ is Beautifully Hollow
Plus: ‘Drive My Car.’
OCTOBER 2026
The Theme is ‘Thrills and Chills’
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The Surprising Sensitivity of ‘The Leopard Man’
This proto-slasher from 1943 takes pains to show that its victims are more than their fates.
August 19, 2026
May 25, 2026
May 13, 2026
Strong, Stoic Types
Director-star Paul Newman’s 1971 treatment of Ken Kesey’s ‘Sometimes a Great Notion’ perceptively observes the corrosiveness of toxic masculinity.
August 7, 2026
Working Girls
‘Broken Mirrors,’ Marleen Gorris’ 1984 follow-up to her still-transcendent feminist drama ‘A Question of Silence,’ expands on its predecessor’s themes while dramatically improving on its writer-director’s aesthetic command.
July 9, 2026
Found Connections
Donna Deitch’s ‘Desert Hearts’ was a breakthrough for lesbian representation in cinema. It also achieves another rarified thing: Characters who feel like they exist outside a screenplay’s bounds.
June 30, 2026
