Andra Day delivers an astonishing breakout performance as the complicated subject of “The United States vs. Billie Holiday,” in a movie that often feels like it’s unworthy of both the actress and the persona she adopts so seamlessly. From the first moments of this maddeningly uneven film, Day channels her complicated, contradictory protagonist with closely […]
Review
Opioid-epidemic drama ‘Crisis’ misses the mark
“Crisis,” an attempted thriller about the opioid epidemic, unfortunately doesn’t bring the experience home. The movie is a multiple-narrative look at the misuse of the likes of fentanyl, oxycodone and heroin that, according to HHS, afflicted more than 1.6 million Americans in 2019. It’s a raging epidemic exacting a dreadful human toll, but “Crisis” doesn’t […]
Art review: Portland Museum of Art’s 2020 exhibit is probably as good as virtual gets
There are still some things missing from the experience, compared to in-person, but there are others gained from the online presentation of ‘Untitled, 2020.’
‘The Vigil’ a efficiently creepy horror film rooted in Jewish lore
Horror films often offer catharsis, but rarely are they also as deeply sorrowful as Keith Thomas’ “The Vigil,” a horror film based in Jewish faith and culture. Dave Davis stars as Yakov, a young man in Brooklyn struggling to establish a secular life, having left the Orthodox Jewish community after a traumatic experience. One night, […]
In India, the complicated truth behind the killing of two teenagers
What Sonia Faleiro learns while investigating the deaths of ‘The Good Girls’ who are the subject of her new book “reveals as much about the failings of India’s law enforcement, media and politics” as about their murder.
The first comprehensive guide to Maine’s birdlife in some 70 years gets everything right
Peter Vickery did not live to see his life’s work published, but ‘Birds of Maine’ – engaging, gorgeous and packed with information – is a great testament to a great ornithologist.
’17 Blocks’ opens a remarkable documentary window into the life of a family in Washington, D.C.
A companion piece to a documentary called “Time,” the film uses nearly two decades of footage to chronicle the challenges encountered by a 9-year-old boy’s family in Washington, D.C.
Art review: Maine Jewish Museum reopens with exemplars of art and craft
The first exhibition at its renovated Congress Street home features 10 artists and makers.
Forced by poverty to retreat to the Maine woods, a spirited young girl comes into her own
In ‘Echo Mountain,’ the remarkable Ellie gains new skills and undertanding.
A Georgetown professor trades her classroom for a police beat
Assigned to a D.C. police district with the highest concentration of Black residents, poverty and reported crime, Rosa Brooks tells stories of Black citizens with few choices, their Black victims and the police who are caught in the middle.