Anna

This is so much like La Femme Nikita and The Professional that it’s practically a sequel. Kudos to Luc Besson for giving the world lots of supermodel assassins. We’re grateful. But there’s not a lot of new ground being broken here. Like Atomic Blonde, what matters here is that the supermodel assassin has the upper hand, and not the corporation. She’s less of a prostitute, I suppose. What we need next is a trained assassin that reluctantly becomes a supermodel.

Rocketman

What starts out as a kind of West Side Story/Music Man dancing-in-the-streets musical evolves into a psychedelic Ken Russell journey when Sir Elton’s life inevitably spirals down into a maelstrom of booze and pills. It checks all of the music biopic boxes. Taron Egerton and Jamie Bell are in top form, and the musical numbers are lively, but I’ll admit this didn’t MOVE me the way that it should have. I’m jaded, I think, by all the musician biopics and their tropes. It’s interesting, too, that they never touch on “Candle in the Wind” or The Lion King. Maybe that stuff’ll be in Rocketman 2.

Echo in the Canyon

A music doc that’s supposed to be about the Laurel Canyon music scene. But it’s not REALLY about that. It’s really about a certain style of mid 1960’s rock and roll, the bands who made that music, and the other bands who loved and emulated that music. Jakob son-of-Bob Dylan is the host and one of the filmmakers here. While his love of the musical style is firmly on display here, his concert during which he performs some of this music is a little off. When Dylan and his band are covering the Byrds or The Association, they don’t really nail the harmonies. Maybe it’s nit-picky, but it seems like if that’s the style you’re paying tribute to, you should try to nail those. Nevertheless, lots of good interviews and a loving tribute to that chapter of the rock and roll bible.

Booksmart

Nerds are hilarious! Look at ‘em dance! The thing about these nerds, though, is they’re not really all that nerdy. One of them is pretty, and the other one is smart and funny, but has a big ol’ chip on her shoulder for some reason. So, the super-awkward, embarrassing moments for these nerds feel contrived for the sake of the movie. The conflict doesn’t feel all that real. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t funny. It’s still plenty funny. A lot of that credit goes to the character played by Billie Lourd – “Gigi” – a mysterious, supernatural, multi-talented send-up of the “manic pixie dream girl” and a total scene-stealer.

Late Night

There’s a lot of wish fulfillment here. Not that there’s anything wrong with wish fulfillment, right? Preston Sturges made a living at it. In Mindy Kaling’s semi-autobiographical dramedy, she gets a dream job she’s not qualified for, she saves the soul of her TV hero, and manages to somehow please her parents in the process. I guess it’s important that young people watching the movie can believe that miracles can happen if you have a little pluck. There are a few jokes in this movie too, many of which work. So it’s a pleasant enough Working Girl/The Devil Wears Prada trope, which neither inspires nor offends.