Johnel: Your Friendly Neighborhood Movie Goer

Movie review for new Universal Pictures film "Knock At The Cabin". Written by M. Night Shyamalan , Steve Desmond & Michael Sherman. Directed by M. Night Shyamalan. Based on the national bestseller The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay. Starring: Dave Bautista, Jonathan Groff, Ben Aldridge, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Kristen Cui, Abby Quinn and Rupert Grint. Synopsis While vacationing at a...

Movie Review of new A24 film "Close". Written by Lukas Dhont & Angelo Tijssens. Directed by Lukas Dhont. Starring: Eden Dambrine, Gustav De Waele, Émilie Dequenne and Léa Drucker. Limited release in theaters as of December 2nd, 2022 and wide release as of January 20th, 2023. Synopsis Leo and Remi are two thirteen-year-old best friends, whose seemingly unbreakable bond is suddenly, tragically t...

Movie review on new Screen Gems film, distributed by Sony Pictures, "Missing". Written and directed by Nicholas D. Johnson & Will Merrick. Starring: Storm Reid, Joaquim de Almeida, Ken Leung, Amy Landecker, with Daniel Henney and Nia Long. Released world wide in theaters January 20th, 2023. Synopsis From the minds behind Searching comes Missing , a thrilling roller-coaster mystery that makes y...

Movie review on new Lionsgate film "Plane". Written by Charles Cumming & J.P. Davis. Directed by Jean-Francois Richet. Starring: Gerard Butler, Mike Colter, Yoson An, Daniella Pineda, Paul Ben-Victor, Remi Adeleke, Joey Slotnick, Evan Dane Taylor, Claro de los Reyes and Tony Goldwyn. Released in theaters world wide January 13th, 2023. Synopsis In the white-knuckle action movie PLANE, pilot Bro...

Movie review on new Universal Pictures & Blumhouse film "M3gan". Written by Akela Cooper and directed by Gerard Johnstone. Starring: Allison Williams, Violet McGraw, Ronny Chieng, Brian Jordan Alvarez, Jen Van Epps, Lori Dungey, Stephane Garneau-Monten. Released in theaters January 6th, 2023. Synopsis M3GAN is a marvel of artificial intelligence, a life-like doll programmed to be a child’s gre...

Movie review on new A24 film "When You Finish Saving The World". Written and directed by Jesse Eisenberg. Starring: Julianne Moore, Finn Wolfhard, Alisha Boe, Jay O. Sanders, Billy Bryk, Eleonore Hendricks. Limited release as of January 20th, 2023. Synopsis Evelyn has devoted herself to helping people in hard times, but she struggles to connect with her son Ziggy, an aspiring internet star oblivio...

Movie review for new NEON Rated Korean Drama "Broker". Written & Directed by Japanese auteur Hirokazu Kore-eda. Starring: Song Kang Ho, Gang Dong Won, Doona Bae, Lee Ji Eun, Lee Joo Young. In limited release as of December 26th, 2022. Synopsis The film follows two brokers who sell orphaned infants, circumventing the bureaucracy of legal adoption, to affluent couples who can’t have children of...

Movie Review on new Dreamworks Animation (Universal Pictures) film "Puss In Boots: The Last Wish". Released in theaters December 21st, 2022. Available on digital as of January 6th, 2023. Synopsis This holiday season, everyone’s favorite leche-loving, swashbuckling, fear-defying feline returns. For the first time in more than a decade, DreamWorks Animation presents a new adventure in the Shrek univ...

Breaking down the films I'm most anticipating this coming year based on a list made by the good people at the wrap.

Year in review of all the films I watched in theaters during 2022.

Movie review on A24 film "Marcel The Shell With Shoes On". Written by Dean Fleischer-Camp , Jenny Slate , Nick Paley & directed by Dean Fleischer-Camp. Released wide on July 22nd 2022. Synopsis Marcel is an adorable one-inch-tall shell who ekes out a colorful existence with his grandmother Connie and their pet lint, Alan. Once part of a sprawling community of shells, they now live alone as the...

Movie review on Sony Pictures Classics film "Living". Written by Kazuo Ishiguro and directed by Oliver Hermanus. In limited release as of December 23rd, 2022. Synopsis The story of an ordinary man, reduced by years of oppressive office routine to a shadow existence, who at the eleventh hour makes a supreme effort to turn his dull life into something wonderful.

Movie review on new Paramount Pictures film "Babylon". Written & directed by Damien Chazelle . Starring: Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie, Diego Calva, Jean Smart, Jovan Adepo, Li Jun Li & Flea (Red Hot Chilli Peppers). Synopsis Babylon is an original epic set in 1920s Los Angeles. A tale of outsized ambition and outrageous excess, it traces the rise and fall of multiple characters during an era o...

Movie review on new Sony Pictures film "Whitney Houston:I Wanna Dance With Somebody". Directed by Kasi Lemmons & written by Anthony McCarten. Starring: Naomi Ackie, Stanley Tucci, Ashton Sanders, Tamara Tunie, Nafessa Williams, and Clarke Peters. Released in theaters December 23rd, 2022. Synopsis A powerful and triumphant celebration of the incomparable Whitney Houston. The film is a no-holds-...

Movie review of new Apple Original Films title "Emancipation". Directed by Antoine Fuqua and written by William N. Collage. Limited release in theaters from December 2nd - December 9th. Streaming on Apple TV+ starting on December 9th, 2022. Synopsis "Emancipation" tells the story of Peter (Will Smith), a man who escapes from slavery, relying on his wits, unwavering faith and deep love for his fami...

Movie review on new 20th Century Studios film "Avatar: The Way of Water". Directed by James Cameron. Produced by John Landau & James Cameron. Starring: Zoe Saldaña, Sam Worthington, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang, Cliff Curtis, Joel David Moore, CCH Pounder, Edie Falco, Jemaine Clement & Kate Winslet. Released in theaters on December 16th, 2022. Synopsis Set more than a decade after the ev...

Movie review for new Marvel Studios film Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. Written & directed by Ryan Coogler. Movie released nation wide in theaters November 11th, 2022. Synopsis Queen Ramonda (Angela Bassett), Shuri (Letitia Wright), M'Baku (Winston Duke), Okoye (Danai Gurira) and the Dora Milaje (including Florence Kasumba) fight to protect their nation from intervening world powers in the wa...

Movie review about new Universal Pictures film "The Fabelmans". Written & directed by Steven Spielberg. Released in theaters November 23rd, 2022. Synopsis “Movies are dreams that you never forget.” A deeply personal portrait of 20th Century American childhood, Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans is a coming-of-age story about a young man’s discovery of a shattering family secret and an exploratio...

Review of Korean language film "Decision to Leave" distributed by MUBI. Directed by Park Chan-Wook. Released in theaters September 9th 2022. Synopsis From a mountain peak in South Korea, a man plummets to his death. Did he jump, or was he pushed? When detective Hae-joon arrives on the scene, he begins to suspect the dead man's wife Seo-rae. But as he digs deeper into the investigation, he finds hi...

Movie review on new A24 film "The Inspection". Written & directed by Elegance Bratton. Released in theaters November 18, 2022. Synopsis In Elegance Bratton's deeply moving film inspired by his own story, a young, gay Black man, rejected by his mother and with few options for his future, decides to join the Marines, doing whatever it takes to succeed in a system that would cast him aside. But e...

Movie review on new Netflix film "Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery". Written and Directed by Rian Johnson. n theaters from 11/23/2022 - 11/30/2022. Premiers on Netflix 12/23/2022. Synopsis Benoit Blanc returns to peel back the layers in a new Rian Johnson whodunit. This fresh adventure finds the intrepid detective at a lavish private estate on a Greek island, but how and why he comes to be there...

Movie review on new Sony Pictures film "Devotion". Directed by JD Dillard. Based on a book by the same name written by Adam Makos. Starring: Jonathan Majors, Glen Powell, Christina Jackson, Thomas Sadoski, and Joe Jonas. Opened nation wide November 23rd, 2022. SYNOPSIS An aerial war epic based on the bestselling book of the same name, tells the harrowing true story of two elite US Navy fighter pil...

Movie review about new Sony Pictures Classics film "The Son". Directed by Florian Zeller. Starring: Hugh Jackman, Laura Dern, Vanessa Kirby, Zen McGrath, and Anthony Hopkins. Currently playing in theaters in NY & LA. Open nation wide January 20th, 2023. SYNOPSIS A cautionary tale that follows a family as it struggles to reunite after falling apart. THE SON centers on Peter (Hugh Jackman), whos...

Movie review of new Korean film "Hunt". Written and directed by Emmy winning actor Lee Jung-jae. Released in theaters on December 2nd 2022. Synopsis After a high-ranking North Korean official requests asylum, KCIA Foreign Unit chief Park Pyong-ho (LEE Jung Jae) and Domestic Unit chief Kim Jung-do (JUNG Woo Sung) are tasked with uncovering a North Korean spy, known as Donglim, who is deeply embedde...

Movie review of new Searchlight Pictures film "Empire of Light". Written and Directed by Sam Mendes Synopsis Set in an English coastal town in the early 1980s, EMPIRE OF LIGHT is a compelling and poignant drama about the power of human connection during turbulent times, from Academy Award® winning director Sam Mendes. EMPIRE OF LIGHT features a stellar cast led by Academy Award winner Olivia Colma...