Villa Amore: Movie Review

A lovely romance that gets the details right.

Sometimes Hallmark gets the little details right, and it is such a breath of fresh air when that happens. The Villa Amore filmmakers did their homework, and got all the details right – taking a real Italian initiative and turning it into as realistic a romance as possible (for the genre). You have to allow for some movie-only characters but the plot is reasonable that everything just easily falls into place.		2025 Directed by: Clare Niederpruem Screenplay by: Alexandre Coscas, Nick Hopkins, Tim James Starring: Eloise Mumford, Kevin McGarry

Don't Tell Larry: Movie Review

Dark comedy with some laughs and some extreme contrivances.

Don’t Tell Larry is an Office Space-esque dark comedy, like a cross between The Office meets Borderline. It’s not nearly as sharp as Office Space, not nearly as funny, so it does fall flat in comparison, but this is still a well made, reasonably funny dark tale about how a weird co-worker accidentally sends a pair of ambitious co-workers on a crime spree with way more dead bodies than there should be.		2025 Directed by: Greg Porper, John Schimke Screenplay by: Greg Porper, John Schimke Starring: Patty Guggenheim, Kiel Kennedy

Band on the Run: Movie Review

Indie music meets unpleasant relationship drama.

The indie music scene from 1999 meets the road trip dramedy. Band on the Run does try to liven up the tired road trip and the dysfunctional relationships found therein by pairing it with an invite to the South by Southwest Music Festival in Austin, Texas and a rivalry with another local band, but most of the movie is not the music, most of the movie is the father-son relationship which is uninteresting and not enjoyable to watch.		2025 Directed by: Jeff Hupp Screenplay by: Jeff Hupp, Colby Clayton Lemaster Starring: Matt Perl, Larry Bagby

Spark: Movie Review

A time loop stuck on uninteresting relationship dynamics.

Spark sees Aaron (Theo Germaine) hit it off with a complete stranger as part of a bizarre birthday party scavenger hunt, but then after that initial spark, he relives the same day over and over again. Stuck in a time loop, Aaron is determined to figure out why – why Trevor and why himself. Maybe it’s the increasing commonality of the genre, but the characters just keep getting weirder and weirder.		2024 Directed by: Nicholas Giuricich Screenplay by: Nicholas Giuricich Starring: Theo Germaine, Danell Leyva

Things Like This: Movie Review

A charmless, soulless, meaningless rom-com.

Is Things Like This supposed to be about how overweight gay guys can find love too? Or is it about how insufferable assholes can find love? It’s a choice to make your lead character extremely rude to strangers and friends alike and then complain that he’s single because of his appearance. His boyfriend in the opening scene says he’s breaking up with him because he’s not hot enough and then corrects himself that it’s because he’s not hot enough and has a terrible personality.		2025 Directed by: Max Talisman Screenplay by: Max Talisman Starring: Max Talisman, Joey Pollari

F Plus: Movie Review

Smart kids dream up stupid plans.

A heist movie for middle school kids, or also known as the genre where kids outsmart and out-bully the teachers. A genre that can be a lot of fun when done right, or comes across as painfully stupid when not done right, and F Plus falls on the stupid side way too often. Starting with the title, F+ is not a real grade and yet all the smartest kids in school decided it was.		2025 Directed by: Kenny Beaumont Screenplay by: Jonathan Davenport Starring: Jennifer Esposito, Wells Rappaport