Reminders of Him

Posted on March 12, 2026 at 12:21 pm

B-

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 sexual content, strong language, drug content, some violent content, and brief partial nudity
Profanity:	Some strong language including f-word
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol and drugs
Violence/ Scariness:	Fatal car crash, brief scuffle with a couple of punches
Diversity Issues:	Diverse characters
Date Released to Theaters:	March 13, 2026

Before it was eclipsed by the superior guide to movies by Leonard Maltin, the late Steven H. Scheuer’s 1970s Movies on TV, dismissively referred to some romantic dramas as “for the ladies.” If he was still writing, the third firm based on a popular Colleen Hoover novel, this one co-written and co-produced by Hoover, would likely merit that description, along with “weepie” and possibly “syrupy.” It’s a story of redemption, reunion, healing, and romance, glossily filmed, with talented and attractive performers, which almost makes up for the fact that it may be watchable but it is not very good.

It stars Maika Monroe, more recently known for horror films like “Longlegs,” but worth checking out her earlier romantic drama, “After Everything,” opposite pre-“Bear” Jeremy Allen White. She plays Kenna, who returns to her home town after being released early for good behavior from a seven-year prison sentence. She asks the cab driver to stop at a. makeshift roadside memorial and takes the cross, telling us “Scotty hated memorials.”

She has returned home because she wants to see the daughter who was taken from her minutes after birth, now almost six years old and being raised by her grandparents, Grace (Lauren Graham) and Patrick (Bradley Whitford).

As Kenna starts from scratch, moving into a seedy apartment building. The landlord (“Schitt’s Creek’s Jocelyn, Jennifer Robertson), insists that Kenna take a kitten. No one wants to hire a felon. But a kind-hearted assistant manager at a grocery store played by country star Laney Wilson gives her a chance as a bagger.

Kenna stops by what used to be a bookstore/cafe that she loved. It is now a bar owned by Ledger (Tariq Withers). He is drawn to her but she is not ready to make a friend. And then it turns out there is a connection. Scotty, whose memorial Kenna destroyed, was Ledger’s lifelong best friend. He is a former NFL player, now living in his childhood home, across the street from Grace, Patrick, and the daughter Kenna is desperate to see, Diem (Zoe Kosovic). Ledger is devoted to Diem and she adores him.

When Ledger finds out that Kenna is the one who was convicted of vehicular manslaughter after the car accident that killed Scotty (played in flashbacks by Rudy Pankow, who even seen briefly is able to make us understand why everyone misses Scotty so much), he is furious, and he prevents her from seeing Diem. But he is still drawn to her. As he realizes how vulnerable and devastated she is, he offers her a part-time job at the bar. They begin to warm to each other.

It’s very soapy. As often happens with an adaptation of a book with an army of fans, there are details and characters that seem barely sketched in because a film script won’t have the time to develop them that an author has in a novel and a reader has the opportunity to fill in as she pictures the story in her mind. The situations and attempts at humor are contrived and the dialogue is clunky except when it is said by Diem or by Kenna’s neighbor and fellow bagger, a spunky young woman with Down syndrome named Lady Diana (the appealing Monika Myers), when it is just sugary. It ham-handedly signals Kenna’s increasing confidence by having her start combing her hair and go from tiny cut-offs to pants. The scene with Scotty and Ledger laughing when high as teenagers is not nearly as endearing as it tries to be. The story feels like Temu Nicholas Sparks. But Monroe and Withers give strong performances, doing much more than the script to make us feel the conflicts and chemistry of Kenna and Ledger. That plus the inherent belief in the themes of second chances make it watchable, if pleasantly forgettable.

Parents should know that this film includes mature material including a fatal car crash, a guilty plea to vehicular homicide while under the influence of drugs, custody issues, alcohol and drug use, sexual references and non-explicit situations, and some strong language.

Family discussion: Was Kenna’s sentence fair? What made Ledger change his mind about her?

If you like this, try: the book by Colleen Hoover as well as “The Lucky One,” “An Unfinished Life,” “Gifted,” and “What Maisie Knew”

“Wuthering Heights”

Posted on February 11, 2026 at 2:40 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	ated R for sexual content, some violent content and language
Profanity:	Some strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking and drunkenness
Violence/ Scariness:	Some peril and violence, a hanging, medical crisis, sad deaths
Diversity Issues:	Class diversity
Date Released to Theaters:	February 13, 2026

Emerald Fennell’s new film is more of a a sexy perfume commercial than a version of the classic Emily Bronte novel. The title and character names are from the book as are the windswept moors that act as setting and metaphor. But the book is not a romance; it is a story of obsession, repression, grief, and generational trauma. This version changes some of the relationships and, significantly, backstories to center the passionate love affair between Catherine Earnshaw (Margot Robbie) and Heathcliff (Jacob Elordi).

The movie begins with a crude joke. We hear what sounds like a sexual situation, with bedsprings squeaking and increasingly heavy breathing. And then we see that the source of the sounds is….the last strangled breaths of a man who is being hanged. The crowd is watching it as great entertainment. And a young girl (Charlotte Mellington as young Catherine) is mesmerized.

Catherine lives with her dissolute, brutish father (Martin Clunes) in an isolated, once-grand home. There are a few shabby servants and a between-classes woman named Nelly (Hong Chau), the out-of-wedlock daughter of a nobleman, who serves as Cathy’s caretaker. Mr. Earnshaw impulsively brings home a boy he rescued from being beaten. He has no name, so Catherine dubs him Heathcliff (Owen Cooper of “Adolescence” as young Heathcliff), after her late brother.

Catherine and Heathcliff have an instant, deep connection, but it is not entirely reciprocal. They are a lesser version of Buttercup and Wesley; she takes advantage of him and teases him, he is never anything but devoted and sincere, and they never have any kind of honest conversation about their feelings or prospects. She sulks and flounces. When she makes them late for dinner, he takes a beating from Mr. Earnshaw by lying that he was responsible.

The tiny population of the home that gives the book and the movie its name is all the people in this isolated area of the moors until the wealthy Edgar Linton moves five miles away with his ward, Isabella. Fennell is always superb at giving us striking, spectacular images that tell us a great deal about the characters, and the Linton home is one of Production Designer Suzie Davies’ most stunning achievements. Catherine (now played by Robbie) looks almost feral as she goes through a garden wall to enter the Linton’s exquisitely civilized space.

Soon, Heathcliff leaves and Catherine is married to Edgar. She now has magnificent jewels and a series of fabulous gowns in gorgeous settings, a sharp contrast to the wildness of the moors. Just in case we don’t get the point, Isabella makes a doll version of herself and Catherine and puts them in a dollhouse version of the Linton mansion, which itself, like an infinite regression, has a miniature version so the dolls can play with their own dollhouse. Oh, and the Catherine doll has Catherine’s own hair, taken from her hairbrush.

Fennell has some wild details, including Edgar having Catherine’s bedroom painted the color of her complexion, down to her freckle, and Catherine peeking through the floorboards to watch her servants have sex in the stable, using the horse’s bridle as a sex toy. And, again, a departure from the book, when Heathcliff returns, years later, he and Catherine have an affair. Perhaps the most significant departure is eliminating several characters and the multi-generational elements of the story. Or maybe it is when characters in a sexual relationship of domination and humiliation, and the one who is dominated end up chained like a dog and forced to communicate by barking. There’s no reason to believe these people care about each other beyond the fact that there are literally no other people around.

Pretty people in beautiful settings yearning, hurting each other, having sex — eye candy, titillation, but very superficial. At least a perfume commercial is over quickly.

Parents should know that this movie has very explicit sexual situations and references including domination and bondage, an alcoholic and abusive parent, sad deaths, strong language, drinking and smoking.

Family discussion:

If you like this, try: the book and the other movie versions, especially the one starring Sir Laurence Olivier.

The Best You Can

Posted on December 31, 2025 at 9:17 pm

B +

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for language, sexual references and some drug use
Profanity:	Strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol and marijuana
Violence/ Scariness:	Sad death, medical issues
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to DVD:	December 25, 2025

Real-life couple Kyra Sedgwick and Kevin Bacon are pure magic on screen. In fact, they are so magical, so sincere, empathetic and endearing, so precise in their attention to character and their connection to the other actors that we may feel we don’t just know them; we want them to come live with us. Their skill, their powerful chemistry, and the modest intentions of “The Best You Can” elevate this small film into something special.

We meet the two main characters as they are under great stress. Cynthia (Sedgwick) is having dinner with a colleague at an elegant restaurant, waiting for her husband Warren (Judd Hirsch) to come back from the men’s room. She is explaining to the friends that yes, she did marry a man who was much older but everything is okay, really, when he returns to the wrong table after entering the wrong rest room. She is not willing to admit to herself how serious his cognitive decline has become. She consults with a doctor friend (Ray Romano), who gently uses the term “dementia” and tells her she needs to get on with her life. “I don’t want to get on with my life,” she moans.

We first see Stan (Bacon), a retired cop now doing the night shift at a private security company, in extremis. He is getting a prostate exam. And the doctor’s report is not good. He needs to see a urologist. He also has a very strained relationship with his daughter, an aspiring singer who self-medicates some mental instability with drugs. “I’m not on drugs,” she tells him. “I do drugs.”

Stan and Cynthia meet when he is on duty. Someone has broken into her house. She thinks he is the intruder, so she whacks him. And it turns out, she is a urologist. She wants to make up to him for hitting him on the head, so she offers to treat him.

They develop a friendly relationship via text. It says a lot about the extraordinary charisma and skill of Sedgwick and Bacon that they make the near-impossible meet not-cute and extended scenes of texting work. Whenever the screenplay lets them down, with references to television shows no one under 65 will recognize, much less understand, that they give these moments so much heart and so much charm.

The movie also benefits enormously from some of the supporting characters, not just Romano and Hirsch but also Brittany O’Grady (“White Lotus”) as Stan’s troubled daughter (be sure to watch the credits to hear her sing) and Meera Rohit Kumbhani as a home health aide with endless patience and sympathy.

Writer/director Michael J. Weithorn also has patience and sympathy for his characters, and with Bacon and Sedgwick, who also co-produced, he has produced a film that reminds us that, with some help, the best we can has a lot to offer.

Parents should know that this film has very strong language, sexual references, some crude, and a non-explicit situation, drinking and drug use.

Family discussion: What was the purpose of Stan’s story? What did Stan and Cynthia have in common?

If you like this, try: “I’ll Be Right There” with Edie Falco and “Suze” with Michaela Watkins

Song Sung Blue

Posted on December 24, 2025 at 9:27 am

A-

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for Rated PG-13 for thematic material, some strong language, some sexual material and brief drug use
Profanity:	Strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Pharmaseutical abuse, character is a recovering alcoholic
Violence/ Scariness:	Offscreen serious injury and recovery
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	December 24, 2025

First there was Neil Diamond, one of the foremost singer-songwriters of the 1970s-90s. And then there was a Milwaukee couple billed as Lightning and Thunder who described their act not as a Neil Diamond tribute act, but a Neil Diamond experience. (“Experience” in this case meaning a fog machine and a leaf blower to blow back their hair.) Then there was a documentary named “Song Sung Blue” about Lightning and Thunder (real names, Mike and Claire Sardina, about the success of their act but also about their setbacks and challenges, about the music and about their love story. And now, like the infinite regression of the girl on the ketchup bottle we have two huge Hollywood stars, very slightly dimming their imperishable glamour to star in a feature film of the same name, and it is one of the most purely enjoyable films of the year, with heartfelt performances and joyous music.

Jackman plays Mike, a divorced Vietnam veteran in recovery from alcoholism who has a teenage daughter. He is passionate about performing (a character astutely observes that a recovering alcoholic will find something else to be addicted to and his is music), and he is very specific about what he wants to do. His stage name is Lightning.

He first sees Claire (Hudson), a divorced mother of a teenage daughter and a younger son, when she is performing in a curly black wig as Patsy Cline. Back at her house, they start singing together and it is instant magic. Their chemistry as performers and as a romantic couple shines from the screen. Soon they get married (at the Wisconsin State Fair) and blend their families. One particularly nice scene is when the two teenage girls get together and form their own instant connection over their family upheavals and some weed.

There are some setbacks along the way, including a mistake in booking that has them performing their first gig not, as they thought, for a motor home convention but for a motorcycle club gathering. But soon, with the help of friends, their crowd-pleasing appearances lead to an enthusiastic local following. Those friends include characters played by Jim Belushi, as the gentle, very sincere tour bus driver who signs on to book their gigs, Michael Imperioli as a devoted friend and Buddy Holly impersonator who is thirty years older than Holly ever got to be, and Fisher Stevens as a dentist so on board he gets Lightning a replacement tooth with a bolt of lightning on it. All three give endearingly open-hearted performances. Lightning and Thunder sing the Neil Diamond songs like they are brand new, with superb musicality. We can see that they are most alive when they are on stage.

“I just want to sing and be happy and feel loved!” Claire tells her daughter. “I will be Neil Diamond, but I’ll also be me,” Mike promises. “He’s…artistic,” says Mike’s daughter to Claire’s daughter, meaningfully. “Most alcoholics trade one addiction for another. Music is that for Dad.” Those comments, along with impeccable work by production designer Clay A. Griffith and costume designer Ernesto Martinez tell us what we need to know about Mike and Claire. But writer/director Craig Brewer is also telling us a deeper story about the healing power of performing music to lift the spirits, bring people together, create a sense of meaning and purpose, and just make us feel good.

Claire is badly injured in a freak accident. Mike has heart problems. But they love each other and the audiences love them. And then they get a call from Eddie Vedder, who wants them to open for Pearl Jam when they play at a huge music festival in Wisconsin. (A terrific performance by John Beckwith as a slightly laconic but enormously decent Vedder and be sure to check out the footage of that real-life performance.)

Thanks to Brewer, the movie never condescends to Mike, Claire, or their friends. It takes the same joy in their performances that their fans do. Jackson is excellent as Mike and Hudson is a revelation here, never better, with a perfect Wisconsin broad A, exquisite harmonies, and so much joy on stage we cannot help but bask in it. As Claire recovering from her injury, depressed and knocked out on painkillers, she is raw and heartbreakingly vulnerable. We know she cannot give up the music, and seeing her back on stage, reconnecting with the pure joy of the music and the audience, connects us with all of that and with the love story, too.

Parents should know that this film has strong language, a recovering alcoholic, a serious injury and painkillers, and a teen pregnancy.

Family discussion: What’s the best Neil Diamond song? Were you surprised that Eddie Vedder invited Mike and Claire to open for Pearl Jam? If you were in the audience, how would you have responded?

If you like this, try: The documentary of the same name and of course the music of Neil Diamond

Rental Family

Posted on November 20, 2025 at 8:54 pm

A-

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated Rated PG-13 for thematic elements, some strong language, and suggestive material
Profanity:	Some strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol
Violence/ Scariness:	Sad death, family conflicts
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	November 21, 2025

“Rental Family” written and directed by a Japanese woman who goes by the mononym Hikiri, is one of the most heartwarming and humane films of the year, with wise and touching insights into the connections that make life meaningful and the fear of being hurt that holds us back from trusting each other. It is a festival favorite, with audience awards that include a narrative feature award at the Middleburg Film Festival.

Brendan Fraser plays Phillip, an American actor who is adrift in Japan, still living there years after his most popular role in a toothpaste commercial. His most recent role was a tree. He lives in a tiny apartment, eating take-out dinner and looking at the neighbors in the high rise across the street, “Rear Window”-style and has occasional encounters with a sex worker, to have some semblance of human contact.

His agent calls him with an offer. All he knows about the part he is to play is “sad American.” He discovers that it is not the kind of performance he is used to. He is a fake mourner at a fake funeral the fake corpse has purchased to see if the affection and respect he might get after his death is enough to make him want to continue to live.

In the US, if someone is having suicidal thoughts, we would expect them to see a psychotherapist or other counselor. But in Japan, where cognitive therapy and other psychological resources are not as accepted or available, an alternative has served the same purpose: “rental” family members to do what their customers wish they could get from the people in their lives. It’s not as different as we might think, especially in the emerging opportunities of parasocial and AI “relationships.”

Just as a therapist can sometimes be a stand-in for characters who create conflicts in the life of a patient, the rental family can be a way of accessing the support or even the conversations that a struggling person wishes for.

At first, Phillip turns down an offer to join a rental family company. But the money is good and it is kind of an acting job. His first “role” is fiancé to a young woman who needs a Caucasian man from North America she will call Brian to go through a wedding ceremony with her so she does not have to tell her parents the real reason she is moving to Canada. Then he has to pretend to be the father of a young girl who needs both parents to apply to a special school.

Each of his jobs begins to open up a part of him that he did not realize he had closed off. The sympathetic sex worker (who makes a delightful surprise appearance in another context later on), is only half teasing when she tells him they have the same job, paid intimacy. Phillip cannot help first being interested, then concerned, then invested, and then committed to the people he is being paid by. This is ideal casting for Fraser, uncomfortably large among the much smaller Japanese, his deep, expressive eyes showing us the way he slips from closely observing for “yes, and” improv-style purposes to finding depths of compassion and connection. His scenes with the little girl are endearingly natural, and the look on his face when the initially hostile and wary child falls asleep with her head on his shoulder is infinitely moving. This is a lovely tribute to the people who pretend to be part of someone’s family and an even lovelier one to the people who take the risk of letting themselves truly connect.

Parents should know that this film includes a sad death, some strong language, a non-explicit sexual situation with a sex worker, drinking, and smoking.

Family discussion: Which job was the most difficult for Phillip and why? What do people get from renting someone to be their family or friend?

If you like this, try: the Japanese film “Departures” and “Local Hero”