NYFF: Isabelle Huppert as "Mrs. Hyde"

by Jason Adams

Isabelle Huppert walks out and stands in front of her classroom in Serge Bozon's Mrs. Hyde and she seems to disappear into the wall - the chalk on the chalkboard has more color than she does. She's paste in sensible shoes. We first meet her being harangued publicly by her students, and in a slow painful succession of scenes she's humiliated by everyone she comes into contact with. This is no Huppert Dragon Lady, then.

And then, voila, she's struck by lightning. And given what we drag into the movie theater with us, given this film's title, we think to ourselves, "Cue the dragon!"

So the most interesting thing about Mrs. Hyde is simultaneously its most frustrating thing - it's as if Bozon took it as a challenge to deny us what we came to this movie for.

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Box Office: Golden Circle and Gold Prospecting

by Nathaniel R

Weekend Box Office (Sept 22nd-24th)
W I D E 800+ screens	L I M I T E D excluding prev. wide
1.🔺 KINGSMAN: THE GOLDEN CIRCLE  $39 new	1.🔺 STRONGER $1.7 on 574 screens new REVIEW
2. IT $30 (cum. $266.3) REVIEW | 5 TAKEAWAYS	2.🔺 BRAD'S STATUS $1 on 453 screens (cum. $1.1) REVIEW
3.🔺 LEGO NINJAGO MOVIE $21.2 new	3.🔺 BATTLE OF THE SEXES $525k on 4 screens new
4. AMERICAN ASSASSIN $6.2 (cum. $26.1)	4. 🔺 VICTORIA AND ABDUL $152k on 4 screens new

Kingsman: The Golden Circle got off to a fast start with its all star cast and Looney Tunes broad violence (only I guess people die unlike Wile E. Coyote) while It continues to power on determined to be the biggest horror hit of all time right now trailing only The Sixth Sense (if you don't adjust for inflation) and that and The Exorcist (if you adjust for inflation).

Meanwhile since Fall has officially begun, so too has the Oscar-hopeful release cycle (FINALLY). All four of them that opened this weekend are off to great starts...

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TIFF Horror x3

by Chris Feil

Amid screening global cinema and the odd Oscar contender or two, I was able to cram in some horror films to my TIFF lineup. The festival is so large that it doesn’t just limit its horror entries into the genre-centric Midnight Madness program. My sampling was not only a mini European tour, but also a trip through different genre tropes: the French extremity of Revenge, a gothic ghost story with The Lodgers, and a surprising psychological chiller with Thelma.

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Review: Darren Aronofsky's "mother!"

This review contains mild spoilers from the first half of the film since everything is essentially a spoiler given the cryptic promotions. The review was previously published in Nathaniel's column at Towleroad. 

“Baby?” is the first line spoken in Darren Aronofsky’s new film mother!  but not its first image. The film begins with a defiant girl burning in a house consumed by fire. Javier Bardem collects a gem from the ashes. He places it on a shelf with other less brilliant but similar gems and we watch as the house restores itself from blackened ash. What to make of this rebirth… or is it a timelapse reversal of the destruction? Are we seeing the future or the past?

Cut to Jennifer Lawrence, waking up suddenly in bed. Where is her husband?

Baby?

While Lawrence is the star she’s a cypher-like presence in this particular film (new for her) a mostly passive figure to whom the action happens... We learn very little about her marriage besides the fact that he is a writer and she spends her time restoring their massive home.

Then a knock on the door…

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Scary doll in frilly dress rules box office

Today, in honor of creepy Annabelle from The Conjuring franchise earning the #1 spot with her prequel Annabelle: Creation, we break with our usual box office format. This week's box office will be represented entirely by dolls. Which of these movies have you seen?

01 NEW $35 million

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