To celebrate the Australian premiere at the Melbourne International Film Festival of NEVER GET BUSTED!, the utterly compelling documentary about narco-officer turned activist Barry Cooper, I talked with co-director David Anthony Ngo about this true American original, who subjects either "love, hate or have never met."

To celebrate the release of SHE RIDES SHOTGUN, a new crime thriller, I talked with the author and co-screenwriter Jordan Harper about the joy of watching his work remixed by director Nick Rowland, co-screenwriters Ben Collins & Luke Piotrowski and stars Taron Egerton and Ana Sophia Heger.

Larry “Doc” Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix), a private investigator with a permanent glaze of marijuana and melancholy, opens the door to a ghost—Shasta Fay Hepworth (Katherine Waterston), barefoot, brown-skinned, backlit like a memory. She’s his former lover, and she arrives bearing a story soaked in paranoia: her current boyfriend, real estate tycoon Mickey Wolfmann (Eric Roberts), may be the target of a plot involving his wife, her sidepiece guru, and the baroque inner workings of Los Angeles capital.

Ryan Gosling’s Lost River is less a film than a haunted tableau — the half-submerged memory of a forgotten VHS found in a house that should have been condemned: frayed, half-erased, pulsing with beauty and dread.

To celebrate the release of SPIT, a new Australian crime comedy, I talked with star David Wenham and director Jonathan Teplitzky about the first time they read GETTIN' SQUARE, their attraction to the familiarity of the character, de ja vu making SPIT, and a cheeky PUBLIC ENEMIES story for good measure.

Regrettably, we do have to go out with a CGI monstrosity, but at least we can finish with a fond look back at the Top 10 Carols.

Will Ferrell and Ryan Reynolds sing and dance their way through a [record scratch] direct sequel to A Christmas Carol?

Sexual assault. In A Christmas Carol. Go figure.

Matthew McConaughey stars in a solemn and faithful tribute to the abiding spirit of Charles Dickens.

Look, let’s just hold our noses and get through it, OK?

Kelsey Grammar stars in a musical you really wish wasn’t.

A Christmas Carol goes Hallmark.

A Christmas Carol heads to the Canadian Old West to distinctly mixed results.

Pretty good movie!

Blackhat was released on January 15, 2015 (123 minutes) – the Theatrical Cut. This cut of the film had a last minute, last-minute restructuring of the original timeline of the film. Information on why these changes were made and the various versions of the films released over the years can be found here. The Director’s Cut (122 minutes) premiered at a special screening in February 2016, had a limited broadcast run in 2017, and will be released on home video for the first time on November 28, 2023. This is Mann’s preferred version of the film and restores the structure to its original chronology along with other changes.

In which we pay tribute to the proud tradition of TV sitcom Christmas Carol episodes with one of the loosest riffs there could be.

Bill Murray as Scrooge! What could go wrong?