Some Thoughts on 'Velvet Buzzsaw'

Why do art-world satires drive me crazy?

What's Jake Gyllenhaal's worst performance?

And what does Velvet Buzzsaw have to do with the Los Angeles punk scene of the early 1980s?

I answer these questions, and more, in my latest MEL column.

The Grierson & Leitch Podcast: Sundance, Soderbergh, 'Velvet Buzzsaw' and 'Inherit the Wind'

I'm back from Sundance, and it's time for this week's podcast. I do a brief recap of the festival, and then we review Velvet Buzzsaw, which I saw there. For a change of pace, we also introduce a new feature, where we go long on a particular filmmaker's oeuvre. Our first victim: Steven Soderbergh. Finally, we look back at the Oscar-nominated Inherit the Wind in our Reboot segment. You can hear the whole thing down below.

'Press Play With Madeleine Brand': 'Justice League,' 'Mudbound' and Denzel Washington

I saw Roman J. Israel, Esq. back in Toronto, but the movie has been trimmed and reedited for its release. So I gave it a second look to be on Press Play with my good buddy Christy Lemire. We talked about that, as well as Justice League, Mudbound and Wonder. You can hear the whole thing here.

Toronto 2017: 'Roman J. Israel, Esq.' Review

Never ceases to amaze me how quick festival buzz spreads and then shifts. The first folks who saw Roman J. Israel, Esq. reported back that it was a fiasco. But when I caught up to it, I didn't find a fiasco at all. In fact, I think it contains one of Denzel Washington's gutsier recent performances. He plays an idealistic, deeply odd Los Angeles lawyer who goes through a moral crisis. I wish it worked better, but Roman is a noble failure. My review is up at Screen International.