Articles — Original Cin

Since 2017: Career film critics continuing the conversation

Exhuma: South Korean Ghost Story Out-Conjures The Conjuring

Exhuma: South Korean Ghost Story Out-Conjures The Conjuring

By Thom Ernst

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 21, 2024South Korean horror films, Supernatural investigators, Exhuma, Writer/director Jang Jae-hyun, Kim Go-eun, Lee Do-hyun, The Conjuring, Choi Min-sikComment

National Anthem: A Drag Rodeo Romance that Tenderly Bucks Expectations

By Chris Knight

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 18, 2024Movies about gay rodeos, Trans love stories, National Anthem, Writer/director Luke Gilford, Charlie Plummer, Robyn Lively, Eve Lindley, Rene Rosado, International Gay Rodeo AssociationComment

Original-Cin Chat: A Vampire, Alien and a Fish-Man Enter a Toronto Bar - And They're All Doug Jones

Original-Cin Chat: A Vampire, Alien and a Fish-Man Enter a Toronto Bar - And They're All Doug Jones

By John Kirk

InterviewJim SlotekJuly 18, 2024Actors specializing in playing non-humans, Doug Jones, Star Trek: Discovery, What We Do in The Shadows, The Shape of Water, Pan’s Labyrinth, Kelpian-Vulcan wedding, Baron Afanas, Tara RoslingComment

Twisters: Storm und Drag

Twisters: Storm und Drag

By Kim Hughes

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 18, 2024Twisters, Sequel, Action-adventure, Lee Isaac Chung, Daisy Edgar-Jones, Glen Powell, Anthony Ramos, Disaster moviesComment

Widow Clicquot: Fact-Based Drama About Champagne's Chief Woman (Ahem) Sparkles

Widow Clicquot: Fact-Based Drama About Champagne's Chief Woman (Ahem) Sparkles

By Kim Hughes

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 18, 2024Widow Clicquot, TIFF 23, Drama, fact-based drama, Thomas Napper, Haley Bennett, Tom Sturridge, Ben Miles, Paul RhysComment

Cora Bora: Megan Stalter Would’ve Been Funnier with a Better Script

Cora Bora: Megan Stalter Would’ve Been Funnier with a Better Script

By Liz Braun

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 16, 2024Cora Bora, Comedy, Hannah Pearl Utt, Rhianon Jone, Megan Stalter, Jojo T. Gibbs, Ayden Mayeri, Manny JacintoComment

The Dead Don't Hurt: Black Hats and Grey Morals in Viggo Mortensen's Western Revenge Tale

The Dead Don't Hurt: Black Hats and Grey Morals in Viggo Mortensen's Western Revenge Tale

By John Kirk

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 15, 2024Contemporary 'Old West' movies, The Dead Don’t Hurt, Actors directing themselves, Viggo Mortensen, Toronto International Film Festival, Vicky Krieps, Danny Huston, Garret Dillahunt, Western revenge talesComment

Original-Cin Chat: The Dead Don't Hurt's Viggo Mortensen on Why the Old West is All in the Details

Original-Cin Chat: The Dead Don't Hurt's Viggo Mortensen on Why the Old West is All in the Details

By John Kirk

InterviewJim SlotekJuly 14, 2024Contemporary 'Old West' movies, The Dead Don’t Hurt, Actors directing themselves, Viggo Mortensen, Toronto International Film Festival, Vicky Krieps, Danny Huston, Garret Dillahunt, Western revenge talesComment

Fly Me to the Moon: A Rom-Com with an Almost-Faked Moonshot and a Moral About Gullibility

Fly Me to the Moon: A Rom-Com with an Almost-Faked Moonshot and a Moral About Gullibility

By Liz Braun

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 11, 2024Moon hoax comedy, NASA rom-com, Scarlett Johansson, Channing Tatum, Woody Harrelson, Directed by Greg Berlanti, The marketing of the Apollo program, Apollo 1Comment

Touch: Memories of a Lost Love Play Out At Their Own Sweet, Icelandic Pace

Touch: Memories of a Lost Love Play Out At Their Own Sweet, Icelandic Pace

By Jim Slotek

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 10, 2024Icelandic films, Films taken from Icelandic novels, Touch, Director Baltasar Kormákur, Novelist Ólafur Jóhann Ólafsson, Egill Ólafsson, Palmi Kormákur, Kôki, Masahiro Motoki, Love stories set in multiple countriesComment

Longlegs: The-Devil-Made-Them-Do-It FBI Procedural Uses Nic Cage to Quick, Wicked Effect

Longlegs: The-Devil-Made-Them-Do-It FBI Procedural Uses Nic Cage to Quick, Wicked Effect

By Jim Slotek

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 9, 2024Police procedural-themed horror, Longlegs, Nicolas Cage, Satanic serial killer, Director Oswald Perkins, Maika Monroe, Demon possession, Psychic crime solving, Blair Underwood, Glam rockers T. RexComment

MaXXXine: Horrormeister Ti West and Muse Mia Goth Hit a Hollywood High With Trilogy's End

MaXXXine: Horrormeister Ti West and Muse Mia Goth Hit a Hollywood High With Trilogy's End

By Thom Ernst

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 5, 2024Indie horror films, Director Ti West, MaXXXine, Horror trilogy, Mia Goth, Serial killer The Night Stalker, Seamy side of Hollywood, Elizabeth Debicki, Michelle Monaghan, Giancarlo Esposito, Kevin BaconComment

KILL: The Name Says It All, As Bollywood Goes Full Die-Hard-On-a-Train

KILL: The Name Says It All, As Bollywood Goes Full Die-Hard-On-a-Train

By Thom Ernst

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 4, 2024Bollywood action films, KILL, Director Nikhil Nagesh Bhat, Die Hard on a train, Action star Lakshya, Raghav Juyal, Toronto International Film Festival, Midnight Madness People's Choice AwardComment

Valley of Exile: When Coping with War is 'Women's Work'

Valley of Exile: When Coping with War is 'Women's Work'

By Liz Braun

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 4, 2024Women coping with the Syrian Civil War, Valley of Exile, Writer-director Anna Fahr, Bekaa Valley, Siege of Homs, Najwa Kandakji, Joy HallakComment

Last Summer: Charged French Familial Drama Raises Fraught Questions, Dodges Answers

Last Summer: Charged French Familial Drama Raises Fraught Questions, Dodges Answers

By Kim Hughes

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 4, 2024Last Summer, TIFF 23, Catherine Breillat, Léa Drucker, Olivier Rabourdin, Samuel Kircher, French film, Erotic drama, DramaComment

Despicable Me 4: Fun Family Franchise Continues (but with Extra Subversion)

Despicable Me 4: Fun Family Franchise Continues (but with Extra Subversion)

By Chris Knight

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 4, 2024Despicable Me 4, Franchise, Animation, Kid's Movies, Chris Renaud, Steve Carell, Kristen Wiig, Joey King, Will Ferrell, Minions, GruComment

A Man of Reason: Manslaughter A'Plenty, Reason Not So Much

A Man of Reason: Manslaughter A'Plenty, Reason Not So Much

By Liz Braun

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 3, 2024South Korean action films, Action stars turned director, A Man of Reason, Jung Woo-sung, Protagonists seeking to escape crime world, Park Sung-woong, Kim Nam-gil, Park Yoo-naComment

June Zero: The Eichmann Trial and Execution in Three Takes

June Zero: The Eichmann Trial and Execution in Three Takes

By Liam Lacey

Jim SlotekJuly 2, 2024June Zero, Jake Paltrow, Tom Shoval, Noam Ovadia, Tzahi Grad, Yoav Levi, Tom Hagi, Joy Rieger, Nazi War Criminals, Holocaust, Israel, DramaComment

Horizon: An American Saga — Chapter 1: Costner’s Western Slow but Satisfying

Horizon: An American Saga — Chapter 1: Costner’s Western Slow but Satisfying

By Liz Braun

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 2, 2024Horizon: An American Saga — Chapter 1, western, Historical drama, Kevin Costner, Sienna Miller, Sam Worthington, Jena Malone, Will Patton, Owen Crow Shoe, Series, American historyComment

Freydís and Gudrid: An Original Viking Opera Hits High Notes in Drama and Romance

Freydís and Gudrid: An Original Viking Opera Hits High Notes in Drama and Romance

By Thom Ernst

ReviewJim SlotekJuly 2, 2024"Viking opera", Freydís and Gudrid, Eric the Red, Bryan Glenn Davis, Micaëla Oeste, Bray Wilkins, Raymon Geis, Kirsten Chambers, Films in black-and-white, Director, composer and screenwriter Jeffrey LeiserComment