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Catherine Bray
Tomatometer-approved critic
Movies reviews only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
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Land of Bad (2024) |
We’re in the “try anything once” phase of Russell Crowe’s career, and he’s wearing it well. - Guardian
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| Posted May 01, 2024
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Lassie: A New Adventure (2023) |
Perhaps it’s time for Lassie to explore a Daniel Craig-era pivot to a slightly more sophisticated offering. - Guardian
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| Posted Apr 30, 2024
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Ordinary Angels (2024) |
Taken on its own terms as an old-fashioned character drama and showcase for Ritchson as a dramatic actor (he’s genuinely really good), it does the job it set out to do. - Guardian
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| Posted Apr 23, 2024
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Boy Kills World (2023) |
Skarsgård is a treat in the role; the character is deaf and mute, so his performance approaches something of a lethal Buster Keaton. - Guardian
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| Posted Apr 23, 2024
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Bobcat Moretti (2022) |
As is unfortunately sometimes the case, hard work and passion don’t always translate into works of genius. - Guardian
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| Posted Apr 08, 2024
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The First Omen (2024) |
For veteran viewers who’ve seen it all before, it’s not exactly the Second Coming. But novice nunsploitation audiences might find this habit-forming: a stylish enough entry-level initiation. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Apr 05, 2024
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YOLO (2024) |
As a document of a physical transformation, the film delivers. As a comedy or romance, not so much. - Guardian
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| Posted Apr 05, 2024
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Lost Ladies (2023) |
If you can get with the larky premise, Kiran Rao’s tale of mixed-up newlyweds makes for a gently probing comedy of manners. - Guardian
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| Posted Apr 01, 2024
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An Egg Rescue (2021) |
Overall there’s the distinct sense that someone fed a bunch of better movies into an AI program and this is the result, but unfortunately humans will have to take the rap for this one. - Guardian
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| Posted Mar 25, 2024
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Swatantrya Veer Savarkar (2024) |
It all adds up to a funny mixture of hagiography and limp film-making, albeit built around a fine central performance. - Guardian
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| Posted Mar 23, 2024
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Mamifera (2024) |
What the film does so well is to bring nuance to Lola’s situation. - Variety
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| Posted Mar 20, 2024
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Brightwood (2022) |
This is intelligent, scrappy film-making that should lead to bigger things for both cast and crew. - Guardian
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| Posted Mar 18, 2024
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Lovely, Dark, and Deep (2023) |
Georgina Campbell is well cast in the lead role... she achieves a balance between vulnerability and strength that means you’re rooting for her to survive, but she’s not an invincible badass. - Guardian
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| Posted Mar 18, 2024
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Yodha (2024) |
Directors Sagar Ambre and Pushkar Ojha fully commit to the bit: there are camera zooms and dramatic musical stings that wouldn’t be out of place in an action-comedy like Hot Fuzz. - Guardian
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| Posted Mar 16, 2024
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Madame Web (2024) |
But where the dialogue needed wit and spark, it has the kind of will-this-do one-liners ("Hope the spiders were worth it, Mom!") and tired backstories you get when the characters are too flat to flesh out with rounded personalities. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Mar 15, 2024
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Mean Girls (2024) |
Sharp, funny and strongest when it stands on its own two perfectly manicured feet, this snappy musical successfully updates the original Mean Girls template for a fresh audience. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Mar 15, 2024
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Sam Bahadur (2023) |
Whether he’s standing up to politicians, boxing a rival or charming his future wife, the guy can do no wrong, and the charming Vicky Kaushal is well-cast in the role. - Guardian
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| Posted Dec 04, 2023
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Journey to Bethlehem (2023) |
If you feel the need to watch a faith film, you could do far, far worse than this one, a decently staged musical treatment of the nativity that feels like a Christian version of a live action Disney movie. - Guardian
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| Posted Nov 30, 2023
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Napoleon (2023) |
This is a historical epic which is constantly on the lookout for subtle ways to undercut historical epics. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Nov 15, 2023
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Silent Roar (2023) |
There’s an airy lightness of touch to all this, which belies how often we’ve seen some of the film’s themes of self-discovery and teenage identity before. - Variety
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| Posted Aug 19, 2023
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Two Tickets to Greece (2022) |
This is fundamentally a relaxing trip for an audience — ideal for women of a similar age to the main characters who might fancy treating themselves to a trip to the Greek islands without actually having to get on a flight. - Variety
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| Posted Jul 14, 2023
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Guy Ritchie's The Covenant (2023) |
[Gyllenhaal 's] energy is perfect for the relatively sober-minded The Covenant — and allows space for Dar Salim to shine, in a more substantial lead than the majority of his Hollywood roles have afforded him so far. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Jun 07, 2023
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Tiger Stripes (2023) |
This latest addition to the monstrous feminine canon is a supple and engaging film that claws at your heart. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 02, 2023
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Vincent Must Die (2023) |
Could you taser a child if they went for your jugular? These are the kinds of questions you’ll find yourself asking as you watch this film, which immediately helps it to stand out from the vast majority of cinema. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 02, 2023
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Killers of the Flower Moon (2023) |
It’s an honest reflection of how the world works: too many of the people at the top of almost every society, community and industry are a second-rate cast of sub-par talents, while the rightful inheritors of the world are slowly poisoned by mediocrity. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 02, 2023
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Asteroid City (2023) |
The graphic design flourishes, the compositional symmetry, the twinkly score, the arch camerawork, the retro clothing, the monogrammed everything… what does it all add up to? For thousands of people, the answer is: pure heaven. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 02, 2023
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Chicken for Linda! (2023) |
Visually, Chicken For Linda! is a vivid Fauvist dreamscape, but with down-to-earth verité sound design making the most of naturalistic performances by the voice-cast, two contrasting approaches which brush up against each other nicely - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 02, 2023
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La Chimera (2023) |
Josh O’Connor is on rumpled form playing a man who always looks like he’s not had enough sleep, ambling about with the heavy gait of a guy doing a permanent walk of shame. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 02, 2023
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Evil Dead Rise (2023) |
Evil Dead Rise is a wonderful horror movie and a fantastic example of doing nothing new in a way that feels satisfyingly original. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 02, 2023
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All to Play For (2023) |
What could feel like a cop-out plays as a humane strategy in an era where mothers, and indeed all kinds of people, are supposed to be sorted neatly into heroes and villains, where viewing and responding to art takes on the tone of a moral assessment. - Little White Lies
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| Posted May 25, 2023
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Anatomy of a Fall (2023) |
Filmmakers and scriptwriters will sometimes turn to “ambiguity” as a catch-all excuse for muddy or tepid writing, but to write uncertainty in a way that keeps the viewer tense as a coiled spring throughout a hefty two and half hour runtime is a rare gift. - Little White Lies
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| Posted May 23, 2023
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Bread and Roses (2023) |
Tackles an urgent and timely topic through a committed on-the-ground perspective. - Variety
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| Posted May 21, 2023
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The (Ex)perience of Love (2023) |
It’s perhaps not a film that would sustain a vastly longer running time, but at just 89 minutes, this is a sweet and whimsical comedy that knows how not to out-stay its welcome. - Variety
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| Posted May 21, 2023
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The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed (2023) |
Taken as a whole, the film paints a brilliantly sardonic portrait of Ann’s life, but so many individual scenes could play as stand-alone short films. - Variety
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| Posted May 20, 2023
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The Sweet East (2023) |
Festival reviews just love to hype a breakout performance, to the extent that one worries about becoming the little critic that cried breakout. But here goes: Talia Ryder, lead actor in “The Sweet East,” is a star. - Variety
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| Posted May 18, 2023
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Anselm (2023) |
A tour de force 3D 6K portrait of the artist Anselm Kiefer, both rich in ideas and breathtaking in technical execution. - Variety
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| Posted May 17, 2023
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Seven Kings Must Die (2023) |
Where “Seven Kings Must Die” is most interesting... is in its approach to religion, sexuality and culture. - Variety
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| Posted Apr 14, 2023
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The Pope's Exorcist (2023) |
It’s not just the demonic possession victims whose eyes will be rolling back in their skulls – none of this should work, really, and yet the film just about gets away with it, proving the Lord truly does move in mysterious ways. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Apr 10, 2023
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Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre (2023) |
Riper than the ripest of ripe Brie, this crime caper provides a ridiculous vehicle for the talents of pretty much everyone involved, all of whom appear to be having a splendid time. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Apr 06, 2023
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The Innocent (2022) |
This film is a slightly slipperier customer than a topline summary would suggest, with tonal shifts that shouldn’t work, but somehow do. - Variety
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| Posted Apr 06, 2023
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Emily the Criminal (2022) |
As neatly set-up as the world of the film is, it wouldn’t work half as well without Aubrey Plaza’s brilliantly specific lead performance, portraying Emily as an emotionally shut-down woman on the edge. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Jan 25, 2023
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Holy Spider (2022) |
A frustrating but fascinating film, made by an evidently talented filmmaker, which never quite manages to resolve the tensions between its apparent moral purpose and the formal flair with which it depicts events it purports to condemn. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Jan 17, 2023
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The Good Nurse (2022) |
A tense true crime thriller that avoids schlock horror tropes in favour of a welcome focus on the environment that allowed one of America’s worst serial killers to operate freely for years. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Oct 26, 2022
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Blonde (2022) |
There’s a fine line between depicting the way Marilyn Monroe was underestimated, and joining in with that assessment. Blonde doesn’t always wind up the right side of that line, but has spectacular visual fireworks to spare. - Empire Magazine
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| Posted Sep 08, 2022
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The Eternal Daughter (2022) |
There are as many potential ways to approach a parent-child relationship onscreen as there are parent-child relationships on the planet, but Hogg may have just discovered a new one. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Sep 06, 2022
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Lamb (2021) |
The ancient Icelandic bones of the rural territory that the characters inhabit give a robust foundation to a fantastical tale, keeping the story earth-bound, despite its fairytale qualities. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 01, 2022
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Nightmare Alley (2021) |
[Blanchett] is so fatale that at times she’s barely femme, and more of a kind of super-charged avatar for duplicity, with shades of Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity, Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon and Ann Savage in Detour all in the mix. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 01, 2022
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Parallel Mothers (2021) |
A perfect storm of melodramatic plot elements, complex emotional reactions, and wild deceptions, it requires on the part of its director a simultaneous iron grip on tone, together with a certain paradoxical lightness of touch. - Film of the Week
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| Posted Jun 01, 2022
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The Duke (2020) |
It’s an old-school British caper in the Ealing Studios tradition, modestly but glowingly crafted and beautifully acted by old pros — and you leave it both buoyant and a little sad. Making that feel easy is hard. - Film of the Week
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| Posted May 31, 2022
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Don't Look Now (1973) |
Don’t Look Now, the story of a couple holidaying in a moody, almost gothic version of Venice, will be fifty years old next year, but in some ways it is so far ahead of its time that it still feels like we’ve yet to catch up to it. - Film of the Week
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| Posted May 31, 2022
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