Clement Tyler Obropta

1 week ago | filminquiry.com | Clement Tyler Obropta

It’s official — the United Kingdom has The Penguin Lessons fever. Posters for this thing, depicting Steve Coogan mugging beside a penguin on a bench, are plastered on every bus and in every bus station and cinema lobby. I can’t go to the cinema in Scotland without seeing a trailer for the film, which stars a penguin as a lighthearted cosmic wanderer who arrives unwittingly at a young boys’ school in Argentina in the 1970s. Jonathan Pryce co-stars as the strict headmaster.

1 month ago | filminquiry.com | Clement Tyler Obropta

Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Colson Whitehead, Nickel Boys follows a young man, Elwood (Ethan Herisse), as he is unjustly arrested and imprisoned in the Nickel Academy reform school for boys. There, he meets Turner (Brandon Wilson), and together the two try to stay alive. The film illustrates a deep, buried history of racist, abusive boarding schools in America, but it’s far more than just a history lesson.

1 month ago | filminquiry.com | Clement Tyler Obropta

Most movies aren’t shot on the Orkney Islands. But The Outrun isn’t most movies. Directed by Nora Fingscheidt, who previously made The Unforgivable for Netflix and the German drama System Crasher, the film adapts Amy Liptrot’s memoir about her struggles with alcohol dependency. Saoirse Ronan plays the author in the film, here renamed to Rona, as she retreats from the energetic London nightlife scene to the Orkney Islands, where she grew up.

1 month ago | filminquiry.com | Clement Tyler Obropta

The 97th Academy Awards are an odd mix of left-field critical darlings and huge movies. The likes of Wicked and Dune: Part Two are contending with The Brutalist, Anora, and The Substance, the latter of which is probably the weirdest movie ever nominated for Best Picture. But while there’s some likable stuff about the 2025 Oscars, the 2025 Oscars snubs include critical darlings we all thought would sneak into the list of nominees. Every year, the Oscars have a major problem with inclusion.

2 months ago | filminquiry.com | Clement Tyler Obropta

Rewatching Singin’ in the Rain, arguably the greatest Hollywood musical ever made, my wife and I talked about how we wish Hollywood made more big-budget movie musicals. And the flying monkey’s paw curled, and Jon M. Chu and Universal Pictures gave us Wicked, one of the most garish, overproduced, overlong, and expensive movies ever made — musical or otherwise. Wicked — wisely not marketed with its actual title, Wicked: Part 1 — has earned many fans and admirers, including lots of critics.