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Adam Kempenaar

Tomatometer-approved critic
Publications:
Location:

Chicago, IL

Reviews

Movies TV Shows
28 Years Later: The Bone Temple (2026) 92% 3.5/5 EDIT “...burdened by its gateway role – advancing old threads and establishing new ones – but DaCosta’s direction, Garland’s ideas, and sharp character work keep it compelling.” – Filmspotting Jan 25, 2026 Full Review Marty Supreme (2025) 93% 4.5/5 EDIT “Safdie transforms a sports saga into a biting portrait of ambition, class, and identity. [It’s] a relentless odyssey of purpose and survival, where every hustle feels like a defiant claim to value in a world eager to deny it.” – Filmspotting Jan 25, 2026 Full Review Train Dreams (2025) 95% 4/5 EDIT “Bentley renders Idaho and this way of life around the turn of the 20th century in such a mystical and mysterious way, it almost seems like science fiction.” – Filmspotting Nov 26, 2025 Full Review Wicked: For Good (2025) 66% 2/5 EDIT “For Good begins as a welcome improvement on part one – until a house-sized twist and a forced march to sync with the wonderful "Wizard of Oz" send the story spiraling into chaos.” – Filmspotting Nov 26, 2025 Full Review Nouvelle Vague (2025) 91% 4.5/5 EDIT “[Linklater] channels the French New Wave’s restless energy, revealing how Godard’s audacity and artistic uncertainty spark a collision of cinema’s past, present, and future.” – Filmspotting Nov 21, 2025 Full Review The Running Man (2025) 62% 2.5/5 EDIT “Wright juggles dystopian thrills, satire, sentiment, and slapstick, but never nails any of them. The result is a genre mashup that feels more muddled than masterful.” – Filmspotting Nov 21, 2025 Full Review The Mastermind (2025) 90% 3.5/5 EDIT “…a quiet evisceration of entitlement.” – Filmspotting Nov 14, 2025 Full Review It Was Just an Accident (2025) 97% 4.5/5 EDIT “…one of the films of the year.” – Filmspotting Nov 14, 2025 Full Review Die My Love (2025) 74% 2.5/5 EDIT “Its narrative never catches up to its elusive, occasionally unsettling imagery.” – Filmspotting Nov 14, 2025 Full Review Bugonia (2025) 88% 2.5/5 EDIT “That point may be that human beings are intolerable, insignificant, and unnecessary. I guess I prefer my misanthropy more clever and less insincere.” – Filmspotting Nov 14, 2025 Full Review Peter Hujar's Day (2025) 92% 4/5 EDIT “Peter Hujar’s Day doesn’t ask big questions – it creates an ephemeral, meditative space that invites them.” – Filmspotting Nov 7, 2025 Full Review Christy (2025) 67% 3/5 EDIT “Like Christy herself, the movie’s redemption comes in the second half when the boxer’s focus turns to reclaiming her identity rather than winning in the ring.” – Filmspotting Nov 7, 2025 Full Review Frankenstein (2025) 85% 2.5/5 EDIT “...[del Toro's] affection for this monster is so overwhelming that it softens the edges of his vision, simplifying the complex, volatile dynamic between creator and creation that should drive the film’s emotional and dramatic core.” – Filmspotting Nov 7, 2025 Full Review Back to the Future (1985) 92% 4.5/5 EDIT “40 years later, Future is as fun as ever, but Marty’s anxiety – and having to confront seeing himself reflected in his father – reveals a sneakily resonant story of self-doubt and self-discovery.” – Filmspotting Oct 31, 2025 Full Review A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE (2025) 75% 2.5/5 EDIT “...gripping with real-world urgency and its ticking-clock premise, but struggles to justify its repetitive structure, offering diminishing returns and a frustratingly hollow ending.” – Filmspotting Oct 31, 2025 Full Review Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere (2025) 61% 2.5/5 EDIT “...can't evoke the magnitude of Springsteen’s interiority, straining to literalize the mysteries and anxieties that Nebraska already mined.” – Filmspotting Oct 31, 2025 Full Review Blue Moon (2025) 90% 4.5/5 EDIT “...a lyrical showcase for Hawke, whose performance is confrontational yet tender and self-effacing.” – Filmspotting Oct 31, 2025 Full Review The Smashing Machine (2025) 70% 2.5/5 EDIT “The Smashing Machine mirrors the original doc so closely, it’s more reenactment than reinterpretation.” – Filmspotting Oct 10, 2025 Full Review Predators (2025) 97% 4/5 EDIT “...a documentary that dares to question everything, including itself.” – Filmspotting Oct 3, 2025 Full Review One Battle After Another (2025) 94% 4.5/5 EDIT “A beautifully choreographed fever dream of resistance and reckoning, blending absurdist satire with a poignant meditation on parental legacy.” – Filmspotting Oct 3, 2025 Full Review A Big Bold Beautiful Journey (2025) 36% 4/5 EDIT “Kogonada consistently invites his characters to rediscover the familiar with fresh eyes.” – Filmspotting Sep 27, 2025 Full Review Spinal Tap II: The End Continues (2025) 65% 3.5/5 EDIT “This reunion could’ve all been cringe-worthy, but Spinal Tap was never exactly about dignity, was it? Still, there are sufficient laughs and a wistful, honest reckoning with aging... It’s stupidly sincere. Or sincerely stupid. Take your pick.” – Filmspotting Sep 25, 2025 Full Review Dog Day Afternoon (1975) 96% 5/5 EDIT “Antiheroes tend to have swagger and carry a certain mystique. Pacino dismantles that entirely in Dog Day Afternoon. His Sonny is frazzled and flailing and painfully human — not someone to idolize, and not a martyr.” – Filmspotting Aug 22, 2025 Full Review It's Never Over, Jeff Buckley (2025) 98% 4/5 EDIT “Berg approaches Buckley’s life with the same intense empathy that Buckley himself approached his art. ” – Filmspotting Aug 15, 2025 Full Review Weapons (2025) 93% 3.5/5 EDIT “Cregger explores the way pain consumes and controls us, how it can be weaponized, and the collateral damage it causes.” – Filmspotting Aug 15, 2025 Full Review
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