Rotten Tomatoes
Cancel Movies Tv shows RT App News Showtimes
Publications list

Fiction Machine

Fiction Machine is not a Tomatometer-approved publication. Reviews from this publication only count toward the Tomatometer® when written by the following Tomatometer-approved critic(s): Grant Watson.

Prev Next
Rating Title | Year Author Quote
6/10
The Three Musketeers (1993) Grant Watson This is commercial cinema in its most generic and functional form, like the film equivalent of fast food.
Posted Jan 28, 2026  Edit critic review
8/10
Weathering With You (2019) Grant Watson If it fails to match Your Name in quality, that failure is marginal. It is still a hugely accomplished film.
Posted Jan 27, 2026  Edit critic review
7/10
Beast of War (2025) Grant Watson The concept is simple, easy to sell to an audience, and it unfolds in a brisk and efficient 83 minutes. This is a film that does precisely what it claims to do, which is an approach I will always appreciate.
Posted Jan 26, 2026  Edit critic review
10/10
28 Years Later: The Bone Temple (2026) Grant Watson There is still a final instalment to be made and released, but for now this is the best of the entire 28 Days Later franchise. If DaCosta was not already on your radar of directors to follow, she absolutely should be now.
Posted Jan 25, 2026  Edit critic review
8/10
Princess Arete (2001) Grant Watson Princess Arete found popularity in Japan upon release for its strong central character and feminist themes, which is not a surprise. It also tells a wonderful fantasy story with a rich sense of wonder and a patient, gentle delivery.
Posted Jan 22, 2026  Edit critic review
5/10
Primate (2025) Grant Watson If "chimpanzee rampage in a rich family’s backyard" sounds like it might appeal, there’s a proper chance that it might. One must not be too picky, though.
Posted Jan 21, 2026  Edit critic review
8/10
Saw IV (2007) Grant Watson Undoubtedly one of the best and most effective sequels ever produced. It takes a well-developed and familiar formula, and innovates wildly. It plays unexpected technical and narrative tricks.
Posted Jan 19, 2026  Edit critic review
4/10
Is This Thing On? (2025) Grant Watson Is This Thing On? is far from being a terrible movie, but it is important to note it is hardly a great one either. For one of Hollywood’s more enthusiastically celebrated actor-turned-directors, it a surprisingly mediocre work
Posted Jan 18, 2026  Edit critic review
10/10
The Secret Agent (2025) Grant Watson The film marks the pinnacle of a four-film journey from Mendonça Filho’s 2012 debut Neighbouring Sounds, through the drama Aquarius (2016) and the thriller Bacurau (2019), and now to this – his most mature and well-crafted work to date.
Posted Jan 16, 2026  Edit critic review
8/10
The Secret World of Arrietty (2010) Grant Watson While Miyazaki’s fingerprints may be all over the film’s aesthetic, it very much finds its own identity, pace, and tone. This is truly superb animated filmmaking.
Posted Jan 15, 2026  Edit critic review
8/10
The Tall Men (1955) Grant Watson Even by 1955 standards, Raoul Walsh’s The Tall Men feels a little bit outdated. Despite that, its high production values, lush widescreen photography, and winning performances make it one of that year’s most entertaining westerns.
Posted Jan 12, 2026  Edit critic review
7/10
Men (2022) Grant Watson I came to Men for Garland’s strong reputation, but I stayed for the eerie and effective folk horror.
Posted Jan 12, 2026  Edit critic review
3/10
Apache Woman (1955) Grant Watson Whether the result of poor talent, sloppy direction, or a sheer lack of time (likely all three), the acting in Apache Woman is regularly under-par and often actively risible.
Posted Jan 10, 2026  Edit critic review
6/10
The Extraordinary Miss Flower (2025) Grant Watson Some viewers will likely adore its creativity and joie de vivre. Others will be repelled by the artificiality. Whoever is left in-between is going to look on with bemusement.
Posted Jan 10, 2026  Edit critic review
6/10
Summer Blooms (2018) Grant Watson A film that will entertain fans of the genre while making no sort of long-term or broader impact at all. This is forgettable comfort cinema: an entertaining watch while it’s playing, but easily dismissed once done.
Posted Jan 07, 2026  Edit critic review
8/10
Caught Stealing (2025) Grant Watson One can feel the influence of Aronofsky’s personal style between the margins – when the film goes dark, it seems particularly grim – but all in all it is a well-crafted genre confection and a real crowd-pleaser.
Posted Jan 06, 2026  Edit critic review
8/10
Presence (2024) Grant Watson It is a difficult combination of elements to comfortably watch. That the two sides actually work together feels like a minor miracle, but it also feels as if this is a trick that is only going to work once.
Posted Jan 04, 2026  Edit critic review
8/10
Billy Elliot (2000) Grant Watson While the core focus on the film on uplifting themes like choosing one’s own destiny and artistic expression, its situation within the 1984 miner’s strike delivers a texture and a tone that elevates the entire film.
Posted Jan 03, 2026  Edit critic review
9/10
Titane (2021) Grant Watson It starts neck-deep in French extremity – furious energy, sex and violence, transgressive provocation – and then pivots over 108 minutes into unexpected tenderness and warmth.
Posted Jan 01, 2026  Edit critic review
6/10
Paper Marriage (2024) Grant Watson Paper Marriage is a decently made light drama, but with American cinema shifting so aggressively from mid-budget films to low and high extremes it is becoming easier and easier for these sorts of modest independents to get overlooked.
Posted Dec 30, 2025  Edit critic review
8/10
The Woman in Black (1989) Grant Watson While the rest of this 1989 made-for-TV film is an effectively played and composed period ghost story, it is in individual moments that it transcends its overall production and becomes something enormously effective.
Posted Dec 29, 2025  Edit critic review
5/10
Starve Acre (2023) Grant Watson It is cursed by a slow, somewhat tedious pace and an oblique, maddeningly vague attitude to its narrative and back story. Sometimes you can simply obfuscate too much, and any mystery you are attempting to generate is simply going to be off-putting.
Posted Dec 28, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
Insidious: The Last Key (2018) Grant Watson The film takes its sweet time in getting started, with an opening hour that tests the viewer’s patience and suffers from a distinct lack of suspense. When matters shift suddenly – and potently – it is a different matter.
Posted Dec 26, 2025  Edit critic review
8/10
The Triplets of Belleville (2003) Grant Watson 22 years after its original release it remains an absolute delight: in equal measures absurd, charming, strange, and unsettling.
Posted Dec 26, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
Insidious: Chapter 3 (2015) Grant Watson Prequels represent terrible filmmaking. Sequels create drama and suspense; prequels deliver trivia.
Posted Dec 20, 2025  Edit critic review
7/10
The Mastermind (2025) Grant Watson It is less calm than it is relaxed; indeed it seems almost laconic in both literal and visual language. It is not a film one watches so much as soaks in.
Posted Dec 20, 2025  Edit critic review
7/10
A Geisha (1953) Grant Watson Mizoguchi directs this one with a firm eye on its commercial prospects as much as he does on its social relevance.
Posted Dec 17, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
Insidious: Chapter 2 (2013) Grant Watson It is clear that Wan in particular is influenced by 1970s horror films; turns out both the good and bad have had an impact.
Posted Dec 17, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
Lullaby of Broadway (1951) Grant Watson Lullaby of Broadway is a musical of fits and starts. Parts work, parts fail, and while the overall result does not feel like old Hollywood at its best, individual elements glimmer with charm, or amusement, or simple aesthetic appeal.
Posted Dec 15, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
Insidious (2010) Grant Watson I think one of the reasons Insidious has never quite reached the popularity (or noteriety) of the other Wan-Whannel creations is the everything-but-the-kitchen-sink scattershot approach it takes to genre.
Posted Dec 15, 2025  Edit critic review
5/10
Ella McCay (2025) Grant Watson One should not be so critical as to dismiss Ella McCay as an absolute failure, although in most respects I think it does fail.
Posted Dec 10, 2025  Edit critic review
8/10
Strange Harvest (2024) Grant Watson Ortiz’s master stroke is in how he uses the factual television format to tell a horror story that is clearly supernatural in content.
Posted Dec 10, 2025  Edit critic review
10/10
Limbo (1999) Grant Watson This is a phenomenally written drama. It is intelligent, patient, thoughtful, and effective.
Posted Dec 08, 2025  Edit critic review
4/10
The Conjuring: Last Rites (2025) Grant Watson This is a deeply mediocre effort with which to end things.
Posted Dec 06, 2025  Edit critic review
5/10
Night People (1954) Grant Watson Fans of star Gregory Peck or Cold War thrillers might get a small thrill from 1954’s Night People, but truth be told this is not a very good movie.
Posted Dec 03, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
Blumhouse's Truth or Dare (2018) Grant Watson It does not represent great entertainment, but it is enjoyable more often than it is not. As such it comes with my very modest recommendation.
Posted Dec 02, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
The Tunnel (2011) Grant Watson Is it good? The answer is a qualified ‘yes’, and really depends on a second question: how much do you already enjoy found footage horror?
Posted Dec 01, 2025  Edit critic review
8/10
To Sleep So as to Dream (1986) Grant Watson A jaw-dropping exercise in nostalgia, post-modernist reflection, and cinema history.
Posted Nov 30, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
Jōhatsu: Into Thin Air (2024) Grant Watson This a documentary that both illuminates human behaviour but also showcases what seems ultimately inexplicable.
Posted Nov 28, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
People Will Talk (1951) Grant Watson A somewhat perfunctory story is enlivened by a strong cast and a sharp screenplay in Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s 1951 romantic comedy-drama People Will Talk. Based on a German play by Curt Goetz, it is a bright little gem for fans of classic Hollywood.
Posted Nov 27, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
The Incorrigible (1963) Grant Watson This is an effective but relatively standard Japanese melodrama of the time: well shot and performed, but somewhat unimaginative.
Posted Nov 24, 2025  Edit critic review
5/10
Predator: Badlands (2025) Grant Watson In effect, we’re talking about something very in the middle in terms of quality. That feels entirely appropriate: this is competent filmmaking, but ultimately it is a very average movie.
Posted Nov 22, 2025  Edit critic review
8/10
Sham (2025) Grant Watson For fans of Miike’s legendarily confronting genre works – internationally he still remains best known for Audition (1999) – it might disappoint. For fans of courtroom debate and Rashomon-like uncertainty, it is pretty effective stuff.
Posted Nov 19, 2025  Edit critic review
8/10
Weapons (2025) Grant Watson While the characters are absorbing and the central mystery very evocative, it is also the case that – for its first hour at least – Weapons drags terribly, and tests one’s patience.
Posted Nov 19, 2025  Edit critic review
5/10
No Parking (2025) Grant Watson Enjoyable to an extent, this new feature feels both derivative and under-developed.
Posted Nov 15, 2025  Edit critic review
6/10
Between the White Key and the Black Key (2023) Grant Watson Even without fulfilling its bold promise – honestly, I don’t think there has been a biographical film like this before – it still brings much to recommend, and much to enjoy.
Posted Nov 07, 2025  Edit critic review
9/10
Dead Poets Society (1989) Grant Watson One of Weir’s great gifts as a filmmaker is how he draws performances out of actors.
Posted Oct 28, 2025  Edit critic review
5/10
John Candy: I Like Me (2025) Grant Watson There are only so many times a film can tell you the same three things before you are craving for an end.
Posted Oct 27, 2025  Edit critic review
4/10
Central Intelligence (2016) Grant Watson Unfortunately the film falls very flat. The jokes feel tired and it struggles to make an impact.
Posted Oct 23, 2025  Edit critic review
7/10
Love and Death (1975) Grant Watson It is a fun Allen film all told, giving his original comic sensibilities one of their final hurrahs, while pointing to a more interesting and sophisticated writer/director in the future.
Posted Oct 22, 2025  Edit critic review
Prev Next