My 2024 SXSW coverage begins here with one of the most anticipated films of the festival. As first-time action director and action star, Dev Patel has rocket fuel in his veins. Colliding formal, kinetic grit with adrenaline-fueled passion, Monkey Man is an action movie that delivers in spite of its dim spirituality and flat politics: a whirlwind of bloodletting, throat punches, and kicks to the teeth. Minor spoilers ahead…

David Fincher’s The Killer — a deceptively layered hitman yarn — closes out this year’s New York Film Festival. With a minimalist veneer that belies its toothy takedown of capitalism, hustle culture, and our deteriorating gig economy, Fincher’s latest mines new tensions from the disciplined loner trope. Many will mistake The Killer’s stripped-down trappings for a minor work, but it’s every bit as incisive and wrinkled as Fight Club or The Social Network.

With Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One, Tom Cruise’s crusade for analog supremacy finally becomes text and the results are unbelievable - the last movie star, fighting God and gravity in one of the best action movies ever made. Barreling through sequence after exhilarating sequence of some of the most nerve-jangling stuntwork you’ve ever seen, Ethan Hunt and his IMF team return to face their most dangerous foe yet to reach an immutable truth: there is nothing like walking into, and out of, a Mission: Impossible movie. Minor spoilers ahead…

John Wick has always been the action franchise of the decade, but Chad Stahelski’s Chapter 4 is next level: the type of exhilarating, metal-as-hell ballet of bullets that blows the doors off action filmmaking. There hasn’t been a take-your-breath-away feast for genre fans like this since Mad Max: Fury Road or The Raid. Minor spoilers ahead…

Action maestro David Leitch (John Wick, Deadpool, Atomic Blonde) returns with Bullet Train, a mile-a-minute, star-studded bloodbath. It’s a bombastic actioner that coasts by on kinetic fisticuffs and spectacular carnage, but not even Brad Pitt’s charisma nor Leitch’s eye for brutal violence can save it from its hollow Tarantino pastiche and its excruciatingly unfunny attempts at cleverness. Minor spoilers ahead…

Tom Cruise — just like Pete “Maverick” Mitchell — battles obsolescence with tropes and cheese in Joseph Kosinski’s Top Gun: Maverick, but his absolute commitment to analog spectacle is exhilarating; real actors in real planes equals real fun, and it’s unlike anything you’ve seen. Leaving its predecessor in the dust with visceral, aerial daring, Top Gun: Maverick puts you right in the cockpit of one of the year’s best action films. Minor spoilers ahead…

Everyone is yelling, everything is exploding, and nothing makes any sense in Michael Bay’s breakneck heist actioner, Ambulance. And that’s exactly why it’s delightful. Detonating what should be a crackling thriller into a deranged, maximalist odyssey, Bay’s latest exercise in spectacle finds a stolen ambulance full of cash careening through Los Angeles. Blockbuster filmmaking where every decision is extra for no reason other than to pull some more exhilaration from your lungs, Ambulance hits with the force of a hundred exploding suns, eventually leaving you sated — and exhausted. Minor spoilers ahead…

Nicolas Cage plays Nicolas Cage in Tom Gormican’s The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent. Plumbing the shallower end of the “meta” pool for an irreverent, sweet-natured action comedy, the film explores the multitudes within the celebrated actor’s storied career. Cage delivers crowd-pleasing laughs — working best when sharing the screen with Pedro Pascal — that reminds audiences that he’s always been a movie star. Minor spoilers ahead…

Another entry in this year’s Midnight Madness slate, Congolese filmmaker Jean Luc Herbulot’s Saloum is a confident genre mashup. Part Spaghetti Western, part crime thriller, part folk horror, the film packs a potent cocktail of tones within its brisk 84-minute runtime. With tinges of Robert Rodriguez and John Carpenter, coupled with a crackling performance from Yann Gael, Saloum is a lean, breakneck journey into the terrifying unknown and the wildest surprise at TIFF this year. Minor spoilers ahead…

My 2021 Fantasia Festival coverage begins here! Hong Kong action maestro Benny Chan’s final film, Raging Fire, kicks things off with an injection of adrenaline. The tale of two men on opposite sides of the law barreling towards a bloody, knives-out confrontation, Chan’s swan song is a throwback to old-school action cinema - even its rote story and sleepy lead performance can’t stop the barrage of brutal, steel-fisted violence. Minor spoilers ahead…

Taking a blood-soaked buzzsaw to his signature pretensions, Zack Snyder delivers his best film since 2004’s Dawn of the Dead. Yes, it’s bloated, and yes, it features the filmmaker’s penchant for stylized pop-video aesthetics, but Army of the Dead is clear and fun where it matters. Snyder’s construction of a new zombie mythos - coupled with bombastic action - is nothing short of delightful. Minor spoilers ahead…

English filmmaker Guy Ritchie goes back to basics with the ruthless and bloody Wrath of Man. Stripping the film of his typical panache save for a few hallmark favorites, including Jason Statham in premium ass-kicking mode, Ritchie delivers a no-frills tale of revenge that’s just a little less than the sum of its parts. Minor spoilers ahead…

Mortal Kombat seemingly wastes no time giving us what we want. Simon McQuoid’s directorial debut, which adapts the immensely violent and popular video game franchise into a rebooted universe, shaves the fluff and cuts straight to the bone, but with its flimsy storytelling, paper-thin characters, and sloppy pacing, this new iteration loses its way quickly. Too self-serious and without Paul W.S. Anderson’s cheeky irreverence and cult sensibilities, Mortal Kombat is as empty as most video game adaptations; even its primary selling point - its mindless, sanguine action - is mostly a disappointment. Minor spoilers ahead…

Gina Prince-Bythewood (Love & Basketball, Beyond the Lights) switches up genres with a blockbuster adaptation of Greg Rucka’s comic book, The Old Guard. A tale of immortal warriors inducting a new member into their ranks, Netflix’s The Old Guard suffers from a thin plot and a largely forgettable villain, but the film’s quieter moments shine, tied together with great performances from Charlize Theron and Kiki Layne. Minor spoilers ahead…