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Irish Independent

Tomatometer-approved publication.

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Rating Title | Year Author Quote
Misery (1990) Mary MacGoris The whole piece, adroitly directed by Rob Reiner, grips like super-glue in a measured accumulation of tongue-in-cheek tension.
Posted Jan 22, 2026  Edit critic review
Babe (1995) Philip Molloy The Australian cinema has thrown up its share of oddities over the years, none more so than the likeable comedy Babe.
Posted Jan 20, 2026  Edit critic review
The American President (1995) Philip Molloy The American President does work. If Reiner brings anything to his movies it is a refined sense of what will play.
Posted Jan 20, 2026  Edit critic review
The Secret of Me (2025) Pat Stacey Depressingly, so-called corrective surgeries for intersex children still occur in most countries, and Money’s theories still appear in medical textbooks.
Posted Jan 20, 2026  Edit critic review
The Rip (2026) Ann Marie Hourihane The Rip is so bad that it is tempting to say that no one will watch it.
Posted Jan 16, 2026  Edit critic review
3.5/5
Rental Family (2025) Chris Wasser It shouldn’t work, but there isn’t another actor in the world who could take such a sappy and implausible premise and turn it into something genuinely uplifting.
Posted Jan 15, 2026  Edit critic review
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) Pat Stacey The magnitude of what Jackson and everyone else involved in The Lord of the Rings have accomplished can't be overstated. It's the trilogy to rule them all.
Posted Jan 14, 2026  Edit critic review
2/5
28 Years Later: The Bone Temple (2026) Chris Wasser Instead, screenwriter Garland and DaCosta (hired to direct a zombie film with very few zombies) prioritise this icky Jimmy nonsense. It’s an unfortunate misstep, nasty and mean-spirited, and there isn’t much O’Connell can do to help.
Posted Jan 13, 2026  Edit critic review
5/5
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002) Pat Stacey It comprehensively blows away any lingering doubts about whether Jackson could equal the achievement of "Fellowship". He hasn't just equalled it, he's surpassed it.
Posted Jan 13, 2026  Edit critic review
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) Philip Molloy [Peter Jackson] has pulled it off. While the movie honours the text, you don't feel that it has been enslaved by it. The Fellowship of the Ring has the pace and dramatic balance and visual flair of a movie.
Posted Jan 13, 2026  Edit critic review
Out of the Past (1947) Irish Independent Staff For popular entertainment of the type that sustains itself on a blend of wisecracking and sudden death, this film is about made to measure.
Posted Jan 09, 2026  Edit critic review
Alice in Wonderland (1951) Irish Independent Staff The pattern of madness is lost. It is possibly this absence of pattern that takes most away from the screen's achievement and leaves us with the impression of having experienced a restless dream rather than a quiet snooze on a summer afternoon.
Posted Jan 08, 2026  Edit critic review
The Sure Thing (1985) Mary MacGoris Love will find a way, as it's always been perfectly obvious it's going to do in this film.
Posted Jan 07, 2026  Edit critic review
Orphans (1987) Irish Independent Staff It's very convincingly acted and well directed with a fine sense of claustrophobia by Alan J. Pakula. All quite sad, basically sentimental but ultimately depressing.
Posted Jan 07, 2026  Edit critic review
The Princess Bride (1987) Irish Independent Staff It's all a bit like The Magic Flute mixed with Gilbert and Sullivan mixed with Grimm mixed with Noel Coward, and you don't have the music to bother you.
Posted Jan 07, 2026  Edit critic review
4/5
Song Sung Blue (2025) Hilary A White Jackman and Hudson are a dream combo in a story that isn’t afraid to take us to dark and difficult junctures.
Posted Jan 02, 2026  Edit critic review
5/5
Marty Supreme (2025) Hilary A White [Timothée Chalamet] is outstanding as the never-say-die anti-hero you’ll want to both cheer on and strangle, often in the space of a single scene.
Posted Jan 02, 2026  Edit critic review
5/5
Sentimental Value (2025) Hilary A White ...[Stellan Skarsgård's] performance here as the incorrigible, impatient movie helmsman who struggles outside the ordered hierarchy of a film set, is a delicate and vulnerable turn that will remind the world why is truly one of the greats.
Posted Dec 30, 2025  Edit critic review
Born That Way (2025) Ann Marie Hourihane The film raises serious questions about how we want people with disabilities – or maybe just people – to be treated by our authorities and our health and welfare systems.
Posted Dec 19, 2025  Edit critic review
Hook (1991) Mary MacGoris On the whole, it's a fearful farrago.
Posted Dec 19, 2025  Edit critic review
The Abyss (1989) Mary MacGoris I found The Abyss quite rivetting.
Posted Dec 10, 2025  Edit critic review
Buried Alive (2025) Pat Stacey The story of [Mick Meaney's] surreal stunt and its aftermath is told with enormous warmth, humour and poignancy in Daire Collins’s superb bilingual documentary Buried Alive...
Posted Nov 24, 2025  Edit critic review
Train Dreams (2025) Ann Marie Hourihane Train Dreams is not big and it is not clever. It’s almost as if it is an inaction movie. But it is interesting and it is straight talking, and of course the scenery, as in all Westerns, is beautiful.
Posted Nov 24, 2025  Edit critic review
2/5
Wicked: For Good (2025) Chris Wasser Chu’s misshapen sequel encounters an unfortunate narrative conundrum: how to tell its own story when a better one is playing out in the background. It can’t be done.
Posted Nov 18, 2025  Edit critic review
4/5
Kenny Dalglish (2025) Chris Wasser Academy Award-winning filmmaker Asif Kapadia (Amy, ­Senna) manages this extraordinarily moving documentary which successfully captures the spirit, generosity and talent of a proper footballing hero.
Posted Oct 30, 2025  Edit critic review
2/5
The Hand That Rocks The Cradle (2025) Pat Stacey Visually, it’s flat and bland. Dramatically, it’s inert and almost devoid of suspense.
Posted Oct 23, 2025  Edit critic review
4/5
I Swear (2025) Hilary A White Sweet, salty and substantial, this charming little jewel might reaffirm your faith in cinema as the realm of beautifully told life stories that get the balance just right.
Posted Oct 09, 2025  Edit critic review
4.5/5
Urchin (2025) Hilary A White ...writer-director Harris Dickinson has crafted something quite unique on his feature debut – a character portrait that shifts quietly between cannily observed fly-on-the-wall naturalism and bold arthouse tangents that challenge and transport the viewer.
Posted Oct 03, 2025  Edit critic review
Re-Creation (2025) Senan Molony As art, not bad – human interaction always intrigues. But Sheridan has taken a huge personal punt on this one, and dawning new DNA results may yet sink his celluloid certainty over reasonable doubt.
Posted Sep 30, 2025  Edit critic review
Boogie Nights (1997) Philip Molloy This is the rather unpromising basis for a human, funny, Altmanesque survey of life among the lower denizes of Hollywood in the 1970's.
Posted Sep 24, 2025  Edit critic review
5/5
Steve (2025) Hilary A White You’d hope that every school or institution for young people has a Steve.
Posted Sep 06, 2025  Edit critic review
4/5
Christy (2025) Hilary A White Expanded by Canty and screenwriting partner Alan O’Gorman from their 2019 short of the same name, this Galway Fleadh winner makes great use not only of the hilltop estate and its tough streets but also the unputdownable spirit of the Leesider condition.
Posted Sep 02, 2025  Edit critic review
The Thursday Murder Club (2025) Ann Marie Hourihane The heartbreaking thing is that The Thursday Murder Club is such a waste. A waste of wonderful talent. A waste of an enormous amount of money. A waste of a lot of goodwill.
Posted Aug 25, 2025  Edit critic review
Unforgivable (2025) Pat Stacey It’s a lot to pack into 105 minutes, with the result that Unforgivable, while gripping and harrowing, feels overloaded and uneven, with a rushed ending.
Posted Jul 28, 2025  Edit critic review
4/5
Mrs. Robinson (2024) Pat Stacey Looking at the wan line-up of candidates and would-be candidates for this year’s presidential election, you realise how exceptionally lucky we were, and still are, to have [Mary Robinson].
Posted Jul 24, 2025  Edit critic review
The Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025) Chris Wasser There are no real character traits, no personalities and no obvious chemistry or spark between our key players. Marvel has been bland before, but rarely this lethargic and, indeed, uninterested in its own cartoon mythology.
Posted Jul 22, 2025  Edit critic review
My Mom Jayne (2025) Pat Stacey How [Mariska Hargitay] coped with [life changes] makes for an exceptionally moving story of forgiveness, reconciliation, understanding, healing and in the end, the strength of family, both immediate and extended. It’s a lovely film.
Posted Jul 15, 2025  Edit critic review
The Trouble with Mr Doodle (2024) Pat Stacey With its stop-motion animations of doodles and chorus of squeaky, babbling voices (a reflection of Cox’s mental turmoil), the film also sometimes feels like stepping inside a migraine.
Posted Jul 09, 2025  Edit critic review
2/5
Superman (2025) Chris Wasser Corenswet looks the part, but the film around him is too distracted to tell Clark’s story.
Posted Jul 08, 2025  Edit critic review
Jurassic Park (1993) Philip Molloy Spielberg has distilled all the elements of the book into a familiar formula that, through his transcendant prowess as a filmmaker, he manages to make work.
Posted Jul 01, 2025  Edit critic review
1/5
M3GAN 2.0 (2025) Chris Wasser A crowded, convoluted farce, M3gan 2.0 lacks the depth and discipline of its predecessor and borrows shamelessly from a certain James Cameron classic (you know the one).
Posted Jun 26, 2025  Edit critic review
2/5
28 Years Later (2025) Hilary A White Boyle and Garland are obviously entitled to add a smirk or two, but they can have no complaints if the muddled tone flies over the heads of audience members.
Posted Jun 18, 2025  Edit critic review
4/5
How to Train Your Dragon (2025) Hilary A White Tart enough for adults, bold enough for young ones, and tempering elaborate action sequences with succinct passages of character development, you could do a lot worse than bring your own small monsters to this.
Posted Jun 11, 2025  Edit critic review
Re-Creation (2025) Emma Collins Re-Creation is a thought-provoking film that revisits one of Ireland’s most painful unresolved tragedies through a striking blend of drama and documentary.
Posted Jun 11, 2025  Edit critic review
Housewife of the Year (2024) Pat Stacey Vivid and moving as their recollections are, there’s a remarkable lack of bitterness here. The Housewife of the Year show may have been a symbol of a repressive society, but some of them look back on it with a certain degree of affection.
Posted Jun 02, 2025  Edit critic review
4/5
Burkitt (2024) Pat Stacey The documentary is generously illustrated with the images created by both the filmmaker and his subject.
Posted May 22, 2025  Edit critic review
3/5
Lilo & Stitch (2025) Chris Wasser A little less copying and a few more original ideas would be nice. Still, only a grump could deny its heart, and there is some fun to be had with Lilo and her disobedient companion. Neither a classic nor a catastrophe.
Posted May 20, 2025  Edit critic review
3/5
Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning (2025) Chris Wasser Always a pleasure, never a bore, Cruise is as ­dedicated here as he was in the 1996 original.
Posted May 14, 2025  Edit critic review
A Deadly American Marriage (2025) Ann Marie Hourihane This film adds little to our perceptions of the case, but it does show the true cost to children of adult violence.
Posted May 09, 2025  Edit critic review
Britain and the Blitz (2025) Pat Stacey ...what makes Ella Wright’s film so fresh and powerful lies in how images are married to sound effects and snatches of speech.
Posted May 06, 2025  Edit critic review
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