Review by: Aditya Thiyag Artist: Khalid Rating: 1.5/5 Khalid’s debut mixtape is an underwhelming effort from an artist seemingly incapable of growth with a star-studded feature list and warbly, soul-hop production. Almost immediately, the tracks all start to bleed into one another, with Khalid doing nothing to elevate the identically low tempo instrumentals and continuing to harmonize with middling lyricism […]
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Review by: Aditya Thiyag Director: Steven Spielberg Rating: 3.5/5 Steven Speilberg’s 2021 adaptation of the similarly named 1957 stage musical is a slow paced visual spectacle with grand musical numbers and expert cinematography that is bogged down by frustrating writing of both the characters and the plot. The movie opens with a swooping long take over a desaturated look into […]
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Review by: Aditya Thiyag Artist: Silk Sonic Rating: 5/5 Pop king Bruno Mars and musician Anderson .Paak linked up to produce an album of the year contender. An Evening with Silk Sonic clocks in at a concise 31 minutes, but the amount of variety packed into this runtime is absurd. Segueing from love ballad to disco jam, none of the […]
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Review by: Isabelle Paley Artist: Taylor Swift Rating: 4.5/5 Taylor Swift’s re-recording of a majority of her discography is a monumental feat for her career as an artist. The rerecording of Red, the perfect fall heartbreak album, combines Swift’s 2012 lyrics with her 2021 voice. Swift merged her country roots with songs such as “Everything Has Changed” and modern pop […]
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Review by: Aditya Thiyag Director: Cary Joji Fukunaga Rating: 4.5/5 No Time To Die is a drama first and an action spectacle second. That’s what makes it a perfect conclusion to Daniel Craig’s run as James Bond. If there was one word I’d use to describe this film, it would be consequence. Every action Bond takes in this film and […]
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Review by: Aditya Thiyag Creator: Hwang Dong-hyuk Rating: 4/5 “The Blue Danube” is a German waltz composed in 1866 that’s pervaded pop culture for years on end, to the point where even Spongebob Squarepants featured an interpolation of it in a jellyfishing scene. But you’d be hard-pressed to find someone in 2021 who doesn’t associate the tune with the signaling […]
Read moreReview by: Sean Spiedel Artist: Kanye West Rating: 4/5 Easily the most anticipated album of the year, Kanye West’s Donda did not disappoint. West was first rumored to release Donda, named after West’s late mother, following a live listening party in Atlanta on June 22; however, West left his fans disappointed and delayed the album release. West then hosted another […]
Read moreReview by: Aditya Thiyag Director: Destin Cretton Rating: 3.5/5 With the Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer smashing the record for the most views on a movie trailer in 24 hours and Avengers: Endgame being the highest grossing film of all time, it’s easy to feel like Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is nothing more than filler in […]
Read moreArtist: girl in red Rating: 5/10 Review by: Della Johnson On her new record, if i could make it go quiet, Marie Ulven — better known as girl in red — is inexplicably much more aggressive than we’ve ever seen her. Having risen to fame on a platform molded with the serenation of young, queer romance, her newest songs draw […]
Read moreBy Raghav Raj In 2021, a musical year that hasn’t really had the sort of star-studded, critically adored releases that the year before it did (not yet, at least), the underground and independent music scenes have never been more important. We’re only five months into this year, but luckily, there’s been no shortage of great music from the fringes of […]
Read moreDirected by: Kari Skogland Rating: 8/10 Review by: Scott Reckers As opposed to a surface-level Marvel series where Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes just march around, beating up bad guys, the show faces its characters with tough decisions. Taking a refreshing look at systemic issues like racism and police brutality in America, the show sees Marvel taking a sharp left […]
Read moreDirected by: Florian Zeller Rating: 8/10 Review by: Raghav Raj The first thing that practically leaps off the screen in the opening moments of The Father is the sheer disarray of it all. As Olivia Colman’s character walks to her apartment, striding intently, the camera seems caught off balance by her, almost struggling to stay with her as she walks […]
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Raghav Raj | Staff Writer With Zack Snyder’s absolutely massive, 4-hour long director’s cut of the 2017 DC film Justice League in the spotlight, there’s a renewed interest in the “long movie,” a remarkably volatile cinematic experience that serves as a double edged sword for any viewers up to the task. If a filmmaker gets it wrong, you’re stuck sitting […]
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Review by: Della Johnson Artist: Lana Del Ray Rating: 8.5/10 Following what might be her most problematic year yet in the eyes of the internet, Lana Del Rey has released a quiet, gentle record, perhaps more vintage than any of her other works. Experimenting with folk (and even teetering on country with a feature from Nikki Lane), her lyrics embody […]
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Review by: Scott Reckers Director: Adam Wingard Rating 7/10 Godzilla may be the “King of the Monsters,” but Kong bows to no one. The two stars of the ‘Monsterverse’ have finally clashed together, and the promise of a visual spectacle is fulfilled. The current state of visual effects is the future we dreamed of years ago, and the fight scenes […]
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Raghav Raj | Staff Writer In an awards season flipped on its head now that COVID-19 has left most movie theaters shuttered for a year, rendering the box office almost all but irrelevant, few films have received the amount of plaudits that Chloe Zhao’s Nomadland has. And, many might argue, for good reason. Zhao’s third feature film is a visually […]
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Raghav Raj | Staff Writer The Parisian electronic music duo Daft Punk, who called it quits after nearly 30 years on February 22, looked about as larger than life as bands in this musical era usually get. Obviously, this was visible at first glance: both Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de-Homem-Christo donned metallic helmets, which were gleamingly futuristic and effortlessly iconic […]
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Review by: Della Johnson Directed by: Don Hall, Carlos Lopez Estrada Rating: 7/10 Disney’s newest princess film felt very familiar. As a strong female warrior with a sarcastic dragon sidekick, Raya certainly mirrored Mulan, the other princess to hail from an Asian country, and her consistent travel by boat lent itself a bit to Moana. Still, the movie itself fostered […]
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