Tag: Movie

Tremblay, Roberts and Wilson kindly deliver in ‘Wonder’

Jeff Mitchell

“Wonder” – Be kind. Auggie (Jacob Tremblay) walks with his parents – Isabel (Julia Roberts) and Nate (Owen Wilson) – towards Beecher Prep for his first day of middle school, and he is terrified.  Sure, middle school can be terrifying for just about any kid.  Think back to your years during that preadolescent and adolescent brew of confusion mixed with caste systems of rumors, doubt and Darwinism that distract from the primary tasks at hand: reading, writing and arithmetic. His future schoolwork does not concern him, but the potentially toxic…

Leo and Qualley shine during a dim view of the ‘Novitiate’

Jeff Mitchell

“Novitiate” – Cathleen (Margaret Qualley) is 17 years old and in love.  She is in love with God.  Conversely, her mom, Nora (Julianne Nicholson), never embraced religion and does not quite understand her daughter’s love and faith.  Soon, everything that Nora knows – her own faith in a sense – becomes severely tested.  Cathleen joins a convent, Sisters of Beloved Rose, to become a nun, and Nora believes that she is too young to make this decision. Faith and coming-of-age rise as the two primary themes in writer/director Margaret Betts’s…

‘The Square’ marvelously carries bizarre and hilarious edges

Jeff Mitchell

“The Square” – Do you enjoy modern art?   Modern art can offer fascinating trips into extraordinary visions, kooky madness, fashionable imagery turned on its head, and much more.  Walk into a modern art museum, and one might find neon orange cubes that turn purple and then back to their original color every 30 seconds or so.  In another room, one could spot repeated portraits of Sophia Loren layered with newspaper and paraded on the walls, and the adjacent corridor may house an oil painting splashed by one thousand hues and…