Dark Waters: The Truth About Teflon

Imagine Erin Brokovitch without cleavage. Imagine she's Mark Ruffalo and she has a law degree.
Now you have a pretty good idea what Dark Waters is about.

You've got your greedy corporation that puts $ above lives. You have your tenacious truth-finder determined to bring them to justice.

You've got the odds all stacked against him, David & Goliath-like.

So the story is predictable. Who cares. When Ruffalo is on screen, you have to believe.

The Movie Slut did and she encourages you to test these dark waters.

The Irishman: 210 minutes with the mob

Who's the real Irishman? Jimmy Hoffa (Al Pacino) or Frank Sheeran, (Robert De Niro)?

The critics are piling on the accolades.

Director Martin Scorsese is a genius, they say. De Niro is incomparable.

While the Movie Slut agrees, she still found this flick a dud.

Problem No. 1: When it opens Frank Sheeran (DeNiro) is a young truck driver. Trouble is, De Niro is in his mid-70s and no effort was made to whittle off the years. And then, De Niro an Irishman?

So now MS is confused. She thinks the Irishman must be Jimmy Hoffa when he turns up nearly an hour into this three and a half hour slog. But no, the Irishman of the title is not the Teamster boss. Strange as it seems, it is Sheeran.

Meanwhile Sheeran moves up the wiseguy ladder— becomes a hit man. Which brings us to Problem No. 2. We're to believe he learned the fine art of offing folks without guilt while serving in World War II.

Turns out Sheeran was a real character but chances are he was far less charismatic than Robert DeNiro, our antihero.

MS does have one positive thought regarding The Irishman. Hopefully it will be the last Mob movie. She can't be the only one who's had it with these hooligans.

It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

Maybe you've already seen the documentary, "Won't you be my Neighbor," and think you've had enough Mr. Rogers to last for a lifetime.

Well, think again.

"It's a Beautiful Day," starring Tom Hanks, is not another Rogers doc. It's based on a touching real story about Esquire journalist Tom Junod's relationship with the saintly children's TV star. It began when Junod, known for his hard-hitting profiles, was assigned to write a feature on Rogers. A troubled and cynical young man, he expected (and hoped) to uncover some dark truths about the man who some called the "child whisperer."

As loyal readers know, the Movie Slut won't give away any more of the plot. She will say, however, that you should find some more room in your life for another Mr. Rogers' flick.

Knives Out: More fun than popping bubble wrap

A creepy old mansion.
A dead body.
An assortment of relatives with motives and opportunities.
A supercilious detective.
More twists and turns than an alpine pass.
Daniel Craig, Jamie Lee Curtis, Don Johnson, Toni Collette, Michael Shannon, Chris Evans, Christopher Plummer.

If you need another reason to see this Agatha Christie meets Frank Columbo murder mystery the Movie Slut will give you this. Finally, a play fair whodunnit hits the multiplex, which means it actually all adds up before the closing credits  roll.

The Good Liar: Not good enough

Even the dream team of Helen Mirren and Ian McKellen couldn't make a winner of this mediocre battle-of-the-sexes movie.

Gal meets guy on an Internet dating site so a bit of obfuscation is expected on both their parts. Soon it becomes apparent that he's not at all what he presents to her. And what about her? Are we to believe she's a gullible, vulnerable widow? Of course not. But what is she?

To the movie's credit, the truth is revealed at the end. Too bad some clues weren't sprinkled throughout the film that would have elicited an Aha moment. Instead the tacked on ending made the Movie Slut scream " No fair."

Still The Good Liar, isn't all bad. It does have Mirren and McKellen. Enough reason to buy a ticket, especially on $6 Tuesday.

Ford v Ferrari: Where's the Vroom?

The Movie Slut tried. She wanted to love this flick about a lowly American car company building a race car to beat the highfalutin Italian sports car manufacturer. Who doesn't love an underdog?

She wanted  to gush about Matt Damon's performance as Carroll Shelby, the race car driver-turned-automotive-designer and Christian Bale as the hot-headed, rogue race car driver— the duo that defied all odds to win at Le Mans in 1966.

Alas. That was not to be.

Sure it was a box office success and critics raved as if it were Citizen Kane meets Casablanca. And yes, you should see it. After all, the MS stands alone in her condemnation. Still she saw the movie as nothing more than a paint-by-numbers flick, replete with a cute kid, obnoxious villain, predictable setbacks, and some offensive Italian bashing for bad measure.

MS wishes she could say the flick lost her when Henry Ford II called Enzo Ferrari a "greasy" W-word. (Rhymes with hop on pop). But it lost her long before that.

Parasite: Meet the Haves & Have-Nots

You might think of this flick as Upstairs Downstairs: the South Korean edition.

The Kims, a wealthy, clueless family are the upstairs denizens. They live in an exquisite, spacious home surrounded by sumptuous gardens. The Parks, who occupy a basement apartment with an assortment of creepy crawly things, have mastered the fine art of the con.

Lest you need reminding of the hazards of extreme wealth inequality, remember 1789 and 1917, the French and Russian Revolutions, respectively. What happen in this film... well, the Movie Slut never gives it away.

At times hilarious, at times frightening, this movie is unlike any the MS has seen before. She wonders what Charles Dickens, an author who took on wealth disparity, would make of it. His rich folks are always greedy, evil characters, while the poor are hapless innocents.

Parasite, which begs the question "who's living off of whom?" turns all that on its head.

Motherless Brooklyn: A masterpiece

Four cheers for Edward Norton. He stars in, directed, produced, and adapted (from the eponymous novel) this gem of a flick. It takes place in the 1950s. Norton is Lionel Essrog, a gumshoe with issues. He has Tourette's Syndrome, a condition that compels him to make embarrassing noises and gestures. It restricts his life and impedes his work.

But when his friend, mentor, and boss is murdered, Lionel lets nothing stop him from tracking down and exposing the killer.

How much did the Movie Slut love this movie?
Let's just say she can't wait to see it again. And again. And again.

Pain and Glory: More glory than pain

Disclaimer: Pedro Almodovar is the Movie Slut's fave filmmaker. He had her at Women on the Verge, 1988, and High Heels, 1991. You might call him the Spanish Woody Allen. Or not.

In his latest film, Almodovar departs from his usual subject—women—to focus on a man. Salvador Mallo (Antonio Baneras) is an aging and infirm film director, looking back on his life and ahead to...? We learn of his triumphs and regrets, his great love and foolish mistakes.

As always Almodovar's characters are rich, his settings brilliant and beautiful, his actors, top notch. Penelope Cruz pays Mallo's mother  in flashbacks. 

There's little doubt that autobiographical elements pervade this new Almodovar masterpiece.

Jojo Rabbit: A hopin' good tale

The absurdity of war. The horrors of war. The inanity and hazards of hateful ideologies.

It's all here in this quirky flick about an 11-year-old boy (Jojo) living in Nazi Germany whose imaginary friend is none other than the fuhrer himself.

We soon learn that it's only the naive and unworldly, like Jojo, who believe the fuhrer is playing with a full deck. Certainly not his mother, a wonderfully quirky Scarlett Johansson, or the Nazi in charge of Jojo's indoctrination camp, a terrifically quirky Sam Rockwell.

The plot thickens when Jojo learns that his mother is hiding a Jewish girl in the attic and Jojo realizes the stereotypes about Jews are a load of bunk.

The Movie Slut loved this flick, but if quirky doesn't leave you perky, you should skip this one.

Western Stars: The boss is at the multiplex

Bruce (one name will suffice) is an American treasure. Even the Movie Slut who likes her music more edgy, admits that. So why did he compromise himself with this infomercial of a flick?

Western Stars is little more than a filming of his latest album of the same name. It's interspersed with tantalizing tidbits about Springsteen's demons and challenges, which we're told are fleshed out in his memoir, Born to Run. Does that make the movie a double infomercial?

Having said that, the music is fine and the boss is engaging. If you're a fan, by all means, see it.