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Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra , and featuring a remarkable lead performance by Dwayne Johnson , the spiky and majestic "Black Adam" is one of the best DC superhero films to date. This tale of a gloomy, seemingly malevolent god who reappears in a long-occupied Middle Eastern nation rejects most of the choices that bland-ify even the good entries in the genre. For its first third, it presents its title character—a champion who challenged a despotic king thousands of years earlier—as a frightening and unknowable force with a bottomless appetite for destruction. Known by his ancient moniker Teth-Adam, his reemergence from a desert tomb proves both a miracle and a curse for people who prayed for someone to defend them against corporate-mercenary thugs who have oppressed them for decades and strip-mined their land. 

Throughout the rest of its running time, “Black Adam” leans into the inevitability of Adam’s evolution toward good-guy status, condensing the transformation of the title character in the first two “Terminator” films (there are even comic bits where people try to teach Adam sarcasm and the Geneva Conventions). "Black Adam" then stirs in dollops of a macho sentimentality that used to be common in old Hollywood dramas about loners who needed to get involved in a cause to reset their moral compasses or recognize their worth. But the sharp edge that the film brings to the early parts of its story never dulls.

Adam initially seems as much of a literal as well as a figurative force of nature as Godzilla and other beasts in Japanese  kaiju  films. It’s initially hard for the people in Adam’s path to tell if he’s good, evil, or merely indifferent to human concerns. One thing’s for sure: everyone wants Adam to help them prevent a crown forged in hell and infused with the energy of six demons from being placed atop the head of someone in Intergang, a global corporate/mercenary consortium whose interests are represented by a two-faced charmer ( Marwan Kenzari ).

Decades ago, Humphrey Bogart played a lot of cynical men who insisted they weren’t interested in causes, then changed their minds and took up arms against corruption or tyranny. Viewers still love that story, and Johnson has updated it many times during his career, most recently in “ Jungle Cruise ,” in which he played a character modeled on Bogart's riverboat captain in "The African Queen." He channels vintage primordial acting by Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger but also poet-brute performances like Anthony Quinn's strongman in " La Strada ," and infuses the totality with his unique charisma. "Black Adam" confirms that he’s studied the classics and cherry-picked bits that seem to work for him. There are even tenderhearted moments of regret and recrimination that seem inspired by 1950s moral awakening pictures like “ On the Waterfront .” 

The latter are usually triggered by three “civilian” characters who appeal to Adam’s presumed innate (though submerged) goodness. One is Adrianna Tomaz ( Sarah Shahi ), a university professor, resistance fighter, and widow of a resistance hero who was killed by the colonizers. Another is Adrianna’s cheerful and indomitable son Amon ( Bodhi Sabongui ), who zips around the bombed-out city on a skateboard that seems to have as many secondary uses as a Swiss Army Knife. And then there’s Adrianna’s brother Amir (comedian Mohammed Amer), who livens up a standard-issue earthy everyman role.

Somehow, though, the script by Adam Sztykiel , Rory Haines , and Sohrab Noshirvani resists the temptation to wallow in unearned sentiment. Nor does the movie insist, despite the evidence, that Adam and the superheroes brought into to confront him ( Aldis Hodge ’s Hawkman, Noah Centineo ’s Atom Smasher, Quintessa Swindell ’s wind-manipulating Cyclone, and Pierce Brosnan ’s dimension-hopping and clairvoyant Dr. Fate) are wonderful people who have pure motives and always mean well. In conversations about motivations and tactics, nobody is entirely right or wrong. The movie's edge comes from its determination to live in moral gray areas as long as it can. 

It also comes from the violence, which is presented as the inevitable result of the characters’ personalities, ambitions, and duties, rather than being associated with any particular code or philosophy. That framing, plus the sprays of blood and images of people being impaled, shot, and crushed, pushes the movie's PG-13 rating to the breaking point like “ Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom ” and “ Gremlins ” did with the PG rating nearly 40 years earlier. There were several walkouts at the “Black Adam” screening this writer attended, and in every case, it was somebody who brought a child under 10. 

In fairness, they may not have expected the movie to begin with a flashback that climaxes with a slave at a construction site getting gut-stabbed and thrown off a cliff, and a boy being threatened with beheading, or for the title character to obliterate an army with electrical bolts and his bare hands seconds after his first appearance. Nearly every other scene—including expository dialogue exchanges—is set against the backdrop of a chaotic city whose residents have been hardened not just by the occupation, but by the catastrophes that are unleashed whenever super-beings clash, which ties into recurring scenes and dialogue about what it means for a small country to be invaded and occupied by outsiders who set their own rules and are indifferent to daily life on the ground.

Film history buffs might note the studio that originated the project: the Warner Bros. subdivision New Line. It rose to prominence with horror films, grew by releasing auteur-driven, down-and-dirty genre pieces and dramas (including “ Menace II Society ” and “ Deep Cover ”), and got into blockbusters with the original “Lord of the Rings” trilogy. You can see that lineage reflected in many scenes and sequences of this film, which is PG-13 in fact but R in spirit. “Black Adam” immediately announces what sort of film it is by weaving in quotes from the Rolling Stones’ “Paint it Black” (the melody of which is referenced in Lorne Balfe ’s score) and musical as well as visual snippets from “The Good, The Bad and the Ugly”—key works from artists whose best work invites you to root for people who move through their worlds like threshers. 

The film’s director honed his mayhem chops in horror movies, then in R-rated thrillers in which Liam Neeson brutally dispatches adversaries. Collet-Serra makes a PG-13 film feel like an R by cutting away or jumping back from the nastiest violence, but letting us hear it (or imagine it when people watch from a great distance). He also does it by insisting, through actions as well as dialogue, that individuals, even superhuman ones, do things for multiple, often contradictory reasons. (A boy’s bedroom is filled with superhero posters and comics, and when a “good guy” and Adam fight in there, they burn and tear through DC’s most recognizable icons in a way that rhymes with scenes of the city's historic monuments being toppled or pulverized.)

Fidelity to basic film storytelling keeps "Black Adam" centered even when it's doing ten things at once. The film is packed with foreshadowings, setups, payoffs, twists, and surprises, and is filled with well-defined lead and supporting characters. One standout is Brosnan, who delivers a moving portrait of an immortal who is tired of seeing the future and thinking back on his past. Dr. Fate looks at those who can live in the present with a mixture of melancholy, wisdom, and envy. 

Another is Johnson, who has real acting chops but in recent years has often seemed to be constrained (maybe intimidated?) by his lucrative image as the people’s colossus. He’s as minimalist as one could be when playing a god. He takes a lot of his cues from the screen star that the film quotes most often, Clint Eastwood , but he also seems to have learned from action-hero performances by stars like Neeson, Toshiro Mifune , Stallone, Schwarzenegger, and Charles Bronson , who understood that the camera can detect and amplify faint tremors of emotion as long as you act with the film—not just in it, and never against it. The peak is a fleeting moment when Johnson lets us know that something deep inside Adam has changed by glancing in a different direction and softening his features. It's maybe half a second. It’s not the kind of acting that wins prizes because if it’s done well—as it is here—you feel as if it happened in your mind rather than on the screen. 

The politics and spirituality of the movie are just as committed and consistent. Even when the story flirts with Orientalism or incorporates simplistic Western heaven-and-hell imagery, “Black Adam” never loses track of what Adam represents in our world: autonomy, liberation, the possibility of redemption and renewal, and a refusal to be defined by however things have always been done. 

The result sometimes plays like the DC answer to the pop culture quake that was “ Black Panther ,” serving up a Middle Eastern-inflected version of the Marvel film’s Afro-Futurist sensibility, and letting its setting stand in for any place that was colonized. But its politics are more clearly defined and less compromised. “Black Adam” is staunchly anti-imperialist to its marrow, even equating the Avengers-like crew sent to capture and imprison Black Adam to a United Nations “intervention” force that the people of the region don’t want because it only makes things worse. The movie is anti-royalist, too, which is even more of a surprise considering that the backstory hinges on kings and lineage. 

"Black Adam" is a superlative and clever example of this sort of movie, coloring within the lines while drawing fascinating doodles on the margins. In its brash, relentless, overscaled way, Collet-Serra's film respects its audience and wants to be respected by it. "Black Adam" gives the audience everything they wanted, along with things they never expected.

Only in theaters today.

Matt Zoller Seitz

Matt Zoller Seitz is the Editor at Large of RogerEbert.com, TV critic for New York Magazine and Vulture.com, and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in criticism.

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Black Adam (2022)

Rated PG-13 for sequences of strong violence, intense action and some language.

125 minutes

Dwayne Johnson as Teth Adam / Black Adam

Aldis Hodge as Carter Hall / Hawkman

Pierce Brosnan as Kent Nelson / Doctor Fate

Noah Centineo as Al Rothstein / Atom Smasher

Sarah Shahi as Adrianna Tomaz / Isis

Marwan Kenzari as Ishmael Gregor / Sabbac

Quintessa Swindell as Maxine Hunkel / Cyclone

Bodhi Sabongui as Amon Tomaz

Viola Davis as Amanda Waller

Jennifer Holland as Emilia Harcourt

Mo Amer as Karim

• Jaume Collet-Serra

Writer (based on the characters created by)

• Bill Parker
• Adam Sztykiel
• Rory Haines
• Sohrab Noshirvani

Cinematographer

• Lawrence Sher
• Michael L. Sale
• Lorne Balfe

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Nearly 5,000 years after he was bestowed with the almighty powers of the Egyptian gods--and imprisoned just as quickly--Black Adam is freed from his earthly tomb, ready to unleash his unique... Read all Nearly 5,000 years after he was bestowed with the almighty powers of the Egyptian gods--and imprisoned just as quickly--Black Adam is freed from his earthly tomb, ready to unleash his unique form of justice on the modern world. Nearly 5,000 years after he was bestowed with the almighty powers of the Egyptian gods--and imprisoned just as quickly--Black Adam is freed from his earthly tomb, ready to unleash his unique form of justice on the modern world.

• Jaume Collet-Serra
• Adam Sztykiel
• Rory Haines
• Sohrab Noshirvani
• Dwayne Johnson
• Aldis Hodge
• Pierce Brosnan
• 1.8K User reviews
• 283 Critic reviews
• 41 Metascore
• 1 win & 12 nominations

• Black Adam …

• Atom Smasher …

• Adrianna Tomaz

• Skinny Teth Adam

• The Champion

• Emilia Harcourt

• Mrs. Farmer
• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Did you know

• Trivia Jordan Peele was originally offered the chance to direct the film when it was first announced in 2017, but Peele declined, saying, "I'm not a fan of superhero movies and I'd hate to take that chance away from a director who is passionate about them."
• Goofs At one point, they state the crown weighs 23 pounds. However, in several places in the movie, people are carrying/lifting it like it weighs a few ounces.

Hawkman : In this world, there are heroes and there are villains. Heroes don't kill people!

Teth-Adam : Well, I do.

• Crazy credits The Warner Bros logo is made of Kahndaq's eternium metal, and through lightning strikes it changes to the New Line Cinema logo.
• Connections Featured in The Observant Lineman: DC Fandome LIVE (2020)
• Soundtracks Bullet with Butterfly Wings Written by Billy Corgan (as William Corgan) Performed by The Smashing Pumpkins Courtesy of Virgin Records Under license from Universal Music Enteprises

User reviews 1.8K

• namob-43673
• Oct 22, 2022
• How long is Black Adam? Powered by Alexa
• October 21, 2022 (United States)
• United States
• New Zealand
• Black Adam France
• Official Facebook
• Atlanta, Georgia, USA
• Warner Bros.
• New Line Cinema
• DC Entertainment
• See more company credits at IMDbPro
• $195,000,000 (estimated)
• $168,152,111
• $67,004,323
• Oct 23, 2022
• $393,452,111

Technical specs

• Runtime 2 hours 5 minutes
• Dolby Digital
• Dolby Atmos
• IMAX 6-Track

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‘Black Adam’ Review: Dwayne Johnson Plays an All-Powerful DC Villain Who Can Be Talked Into Heroism

Set in the imaginary Middle East country of Kahndaq, this meaty, feature-length teaser reframes a fan-favorite 'Shazam!' baddie as an antihero, though his greatest battles are still to come.

By Peter Debruge

Peter Debruge

Chief Film Critic

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SPOILER ALERT: The following review contains mild spoilers for “ Black Adam .”

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After all, this summer’s “DC League of Super-Pets” wrapped with Krypto (Clark Kent’s companion, also voiced by Johnson) meeting Black Adam’s pet basenji, with whom he debates the meaning of “antihero”: “It’s basically exactly like a regular hero, except way cooler. You make up your own rules, and then you break them.” The prospect that the superegos attached to these two canines might one day collide transforms the spectacular (but otherwise pointless) one-off/origin story that is “Black Adam” into a feature-length tease. The payoff is still to come, but here, audiences are presented with the moral and emotional backstory for a future showdown.

“Black Adam” is built around the notion that Teth Adam, as he’s referred to for most of the movie, isn’t evil so much as really, really angry. The surprisingly serious-minded (but still plenty pulpy) project deprives Johnson of his greatest superpower — his sense of humor — while giving the now-straight-faced star a chance to play a character with some interesting contradictions. His instinct is to kill anyone who upsets him, and yet, he can still be reasoned with. This flexibility will prove crucial, since there’s a far more malevolent (if not especially memorable) character scheming to liberate Kahndaq, the fictional quasi-Egyptian country where the film takes place.

It’s an unusual move for DC to base an entire superhero feature in the Middle East — although it’s a homecoming of sorts for Johnson, whose film career kicked off playing the Scorpion King in “The Mummy Returns.” Doubly daring is the way “Black Adam” aligns our sympathies with the locals, who call upon an ancient hero to help overthrow the white mercenaries extracting precious Eternium from their land. In the film’s “300”-style prologue, the powerful mineral is responsible for transforming a lowly slave into a practically godlike figure — with the help of several wizards.

Flash forward to the present day. Tired of living in a state of oppression, a group of rebels led by tough gal Adrianna (Sarah Shahi) go looking for a legendary crown made of Eternium. Co-written by Adam Sztykiel, Rory Haines and Sohrab Noshirvani, “Black Adam” features a lot more action than most DC movies, cramming the exposition into a series of supercharged set-pieces — including an early “Tomb Raider”-like sequence wherein Adrianna and three accomplices explore a cave, recovering the crown and unleashing Teth Adam from his millennia-long imprisonment.

Looking thoroughly annoyed, his neck thick as a banyan tree trunk, Johnson levitates into the first of many confrontations, blasting blue lightning from his fists. Bullets bounce off his bald dome; bazookas barely slow him down. Collet-Serra has studied everything from “The Matrix” to “Zack Snyder’s Justice League,” basing his visual style on favorite tricks from more original films. Half the reason it’s so hard to take comic book movies seriously stems from lazy devices like Eternium and wizards, which “Black Adam” accepts without the slightest hesitation.

The movie is essentially “Shane” on steroids, set in the Middle East instead of the Old West, but still seen through the eyes of a young boy — Adrianna’s comic book-obsessed son Amon (Bodhi Sabongui), in this case — who idolizes a figure of questionable morality. As with “Shane,” sticking a kid in the middle of the story brings the entire project down to a middle-school-level intellect. And yet, except for the recent Batman movies, that’s how most of the DC films feel.

The most out-of-place characters here are the quartet representing the JSA. Adrianna rightly questions why Hawkman and friends should show up now, after a villainous organization called Intergang has been exploiting them for years. Black Adam may be billed as an antihero, but by the logic of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” he’s more helpful to these Kahndaq freedom fighters than the JSA. Fight scenes involving Hawkman, Atom Smasher and Cyclone pose strange challenges, considering their powers, while Doctor Fate at least gives the visual effects team some fun tricks to animate.

No one’s allowed to upstage Johnson, however — not even a bulging demon named Sabbac who appears near the end. Clearly, the film’s whole purpose is to give Black Adam a suitably grand introduction on the assumption that he’ll be pitted against a more deserving adversary soon enough.

Reviewed at Dolby screening room, Burbank, Oct. 17, 2022. MPA Rating: PG-13. Running time: 125 MIN.

• Production: A Warner Bros. release of a New Line Cinema presentation of a Seven Bucks, Flynn Picture Co. production. Producers: Beau Flynn, Hiram Garcia, Dwayne Johnson, Dany Garcia. Executive producers: Toby Emmerich, Richard Brener, Dave Neustadter, Chris Pan, Walter Hamada, Adam Schlagman, Geoff Johns, Eric McLeod, Scott Sheldon
• Crew: Director: Jaume Collet-Serra. Screenplay: Adam Sztykiel, Rory Haines & Sohrab Noshirvani, based on characters from DC created by Bill Parker, C.C. Beck. Camera: Lawrence Sher. Editors: Mike Sale, John Lee.
• With: Dwayne Johnson, Aldis Hodge, Noah Centineo, Sarah Shahi, Marwan Kenzari, Quintessa Swindell, Mohammed Amer, Bodhi Sabongui, Pierce Brosnan.

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Weekend Box Office

Weekend box office results: black adam is dwayne johnson's best opening ever, the dc superhero flick grossed $67 million – more than any other dwayne johnson headliner – but does it have enough staying power to surpass $200 million.

TAGGED AS: Box Office , movies , news

At the beginning of the fall season, it looked as if there was only going to be one film that grossed $100 million in September and October. That film finally arrived this weekend with an opening number that leaves little doubt it will reach that. On the other hand, could this week’s comic book entry be the first film this year to gross between $200-300 million? Black Adam is not going to be the only film this season to reach nine digits, though. Spoiler Alert: The other film is not Halloween Ends .

King of the Crop: Black Adam Is Dwayne Johnson’s Best Opening Ever

When Aquaman opened to $67.8 million just before Christmas in 2018, the number was reported as basically OK. Less than Wonder Woman and Justice League that came before it, James Wan’s DC film ultimately went on to gross $335.1 million ( Joker barely beat it a year later) and is still the highest-grossing film of any DC property with $1.14 billion worldwide. Black Adam has opened with an estimated $67 million. That’s a great number for Dwayne Johnson, because it’s the best number that he has put up as the top-billed talent. More than Hobbs & Shaw ($60 million), Jumanji: The Next Level ($59.2 million), and San Andreas ($54.5 million). Whatever may be thought about the movies themselves, Black Adam is the 10th film on his resume (as the star) to open to over $30 million. (Adam Sandler has 12. Tom Cruise has 11.) But is it a good number for DC and Warner Bros.?

Well if Black Adam turns out to be Aquaman then the answer would be unequivocally yes. If it turns out to be Shang-Chi that wouldn’t be such a bad number. But whatever it may be, it is likely that Johnson is going to need another $300 million or higher international haul for Black Adam to be a success. $309 million overseas was not enough for WB’s third Fantastic Beasts film, especially since it only made $95 million domestic. Black Adam , which has grossed another $73 million internationally so far, is going to need a 3.22 multiple just to reach $200 million, which has only been achieved by three films since 2020 that have opened to over $50 million ( Top Gun: Maverick , Minions: The Rise of Gru , and Shang-Chi ). Black Adam’ s 40% with critics is similar to the theatrical version of Justice League (39%) and still higher than Suicide Squad (27%) and Green Lantern (26%). Those three films had final multiples of just 2.44, 2.43 and 2.19. Man of Steel had a 56% and a 2.49. Batman v Superman a 27% and a 1.99. Both Justice League and Suicide Squad also had the B+ Cinemascore that Black Adam received. The $195 million budgeted film is the last one on Warner Bros.’ schedule for the year, and it could end on a sour note if the domestic numbers fall quickly. The only live-action film since 2007 to gross less than $27 million in its second weekend and still gross over $200 million was Jumanji: The Next Level . Keep that in mind as Black Adam enters its second frame.

The Top 10 and Beyond: Ticket to Paradise Shines,  Halloween Ends Drops Hard

Remember when Universal released Bros and its box office was disappointing and everyone started saying the big screen comedy is dead? Welcome back George Clooney and Julia Roberts, whose Ticket To Paradise exceeded some expectations to gross $16.3 million this weekend, a solid number for a comedy in the autumn season. Critics have not been thrilled with it – it garnered just a 55% on the Tomatometer, compared to The Lost City’ s generous 79% – but it’s still the gold standard for star-driven comedies this year. The average gross for an October release opening between $15-17 million (taking outlier The Ring out of the equation) is $51.2 million. So while this may not turn out to be a barnburner, a potential $50 million gross for an adult-themed comedy at this point of the year shows that the genre may be sleeping but it’s certainly not dead.

Last week, industry analysts were afire with a changed tune as to how a streaming hybrid film like Halloween Ends opening to $40 million was somehow proof that the model works. Never mind that Halloween Kills did $49 million the year before with a pandemic still declared and failed to reach $100 million when all was said and done. Unfortunately, the second weekend of Halloween Ends is one of the largest falls in box office history. From $40 million down to just $8 million, that is a 78% drop, the second-highest ever for a film released in over 3,000 theaters. That puts it right in line with the infamous Friday the 13th remake from 2009, which fell 80% from $40.5 million down to $7.9 million and finished with only $65 million. But even that film is ahead of Halloween Ends’ pace, outgrossing it $55.1 million to $54.1 million after 10 days. Even if Ends drops below 13th’ s $3.68 million third weekend, it should still get a momentary bump on Halloweend day itself, but somewhere around $65 million is where this film is headed. How many moviegoers would have ignored the buzz and paid to see it if it weren’t on Peacock? Or if there weren’t other better-hyped horror films playing?

Speaking of which, there are a pair of horror films worth better headlines than Halloween Ends , with one outgrossing it and the other just making a great headline. The former is Smile , which is only in theaters – i.e. not on Paramount Plus – and is the other autumn release headed for $100 million. In its fourth weekend it outgrossed Halloween Ends in its second with $8.3 million, bringing its total to over $84 million. That is about what Gore Verbinski’s The Ring had grossed in four weekends, though its drops were even less severe, as it had grossed $15.5 million in its fourth round. What it is doing better than is Scream 2 , which also had $85 million after 24 days but grossed $7.2 million in weekend four. That film finished with $101 million. Smile appears to be headed even higher.

The other horror story of the week is Terrifier 2 , and what a story it is. It earned $1.35 million in its first five days of release (with Indigenous People’s Day Weekend), then it lost 70 theaters the next weekend and still saw a 28% jump up to $1.03 million. This week it added 55 theaters back to its run and it nearly doubled last week’s haul with $1.9 million to run its total up to $5.2 million. That is right behind 2021’s highest-grossing-under-1000-theaters release of Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain ($5.35 million total), and it only has to reach $7.83 million to pass Brahmastra Part One: Shiva this year. That would make it the best film on that list since The Farewell grossed nearly $18 million in 2019. Assuming, of course, more theaters don’t book this little vomit- and faint-inducing phenomenon in the meantime.

In further limited release news, Ruben Ostlund’s Triangle of Sadness made it into the top ten with $600,000, bringing its total to $1.4 million in just 100 theaters. Tár made another $470,000 in 141 theaters for a total of $1.17 million. Till expanded into 104 theaters and made $376,000 for a total of $667,000 as it prepares for a wider release next week. Decision To Leave made another $296,000 in 48 theaters, and its total stands at $437,000. The Banshees of Inisherin was the big new limited winner, opening with $181,000 in four locations for the third-best per-theater average of 2022 with $45,250. Charlotte Wells’ Aftersun from A24 released this weekend in 4 theaters and grossed $66,000 for a per-theater average of $16,589.

On the Vine: Prey for the Devil Looks to Capitalize on Halloween

The end of October normally means one thing. Halloween. Not the Ends thing, but an opportunity for Daniel Stamm’s new exorcism tale, Prey For The Devil , to try and steal some business from Smile and Terrifier 2 . The film is not being screened for critics and Black Adam probably will not be sweating its release as it goes for the second straight week at the top that will likely turn into a third straight win the week after.

Full List of Box Office Results: October 21-23, 2022

• $67 million ($67 million total)
• $16.3 million ($16.3 million total)

• $8.4 million ($84.3 million total)
• $8 million ($54.2 million total)

• $4.2 million ($28.7 million total)
• $1.9 million ($62.9 million total)
• $1.895 million ($5.3 million total)
• $880,000 ($44.3 million total)
• $818,000 ($13.9 million total)
• $600,000 ($1.42 million total)

Erik Childress can be heard each week evaluating box office on  Business First AM  with Angela Miles and his  Movie Madness Podcast .

[box office figures via  Box Office Mojo ]

Thumbnail image by ©Warner Bros.

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Review: Style and great supporting players make ‘Black Adam’ forgettably entertaining

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The newest entry in the DC Extended Universe, “Black Adam,” starring Dwayne Johnson, has been hyped as a “new phase” and a “change in the hierarchy” for the embattled comic book franchise, but that doesn’t mean there hasn’t also been cause for concern. The trailers looked ponderous and gray, and though the film is directed by the auteur of many lively Liam Neeson actioners , Jaume Collet-Serra, his prior outing with Johnson, “Jungle Cruise,” left his signature verve behind. But, it seems Collet-Serra has got his groove back for “Black Adam,” or perhaps he was saving it for this film, which is far more entertaining than it has any right to be.

It helps that “Black Adam” has a distinct and dynamic visual style and tone that distinguishes itself against the Marvel “house style” we’ve become accustomed to over many, many phases of superhero flicks, which have devolved into a depressing digital sludge offset by an onslaught of cutesy, quippy dialogue. In “Black Adam,” the setting is a bustling Middle Eastern city, the cinematography and digital effects crisp and saturated, the action brutal and bruising enough to test that PG-13 rating and the quips judiciously metered out.

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Johnson plays an ancient champion from the kingdom of Kahndaq, who received his powers from the Council of Wizards (you might remember them from the DCEU movie “Shazam” ). Kahndaq is now a modern metropolis, overrun by an organized crime outfit known as Intergang. Adrianna ( Sarah Shahi ), who has been searching for a cursed crown made of “eternium,” awakens Teth-Adam (Johnson) from a 5,000-year slumber while escaping an Intergang faction. The all-powerful champion is essentially a “Dark Superman” — he flies, he has super strength, lightning shoots out of his hands, etc. After a violent clash in the desert, this supercharged Encino Man becomes the protector of Adrianna and her plucky son, Amon (Bodhi Sabongui, who steals the whole movie).

But in this universe, there need to be checks and balances on all-powerful beings, so the Justice Society is called up to rein in Teth-Adam (and also to introduce new characters for spin-off movies). Hawkman (Aldis Hodge), Doctor Fate (Pierce Brosnan), Atom Smasher (Noah Centineo) and Cyclone (Quintessa Swindell) swoop in to “promote stability” in the world and battle it out with Teth-Adam in the streets of Kahndaq. They eventually decide to team up to take on Intergang, who have occupied the country for 27 years, mining eternium and searching for the cursed crown so that their leader, Ishmael (Marwan Kenzari), can ascend the throne as some kind of hell demon king.

Screenwriters Adam Sztykiel, Rory Haines and Sohrab Noshirvani have to power through a lot of expository lore, character intros and various mumbo jumbo, so they take the tack of repeating the beats over and over again: Teth-Adam lost his son in the process of gaining his power, he’s reckoning with 5,000 years of trauma, he’s not a hero, but his damage makes him powerful. There’s also a refreshingly anticolonialist bent lurking in the story of Kahndaq overthrowing their occupiers, embodied by the rebellious Amon.

While massive global star Johnson is clearly the box office draw, dramatic roles aren’t his forte, and that’s especially clear here as he delivers a dour and dark dramatic performance that’s lacking his natural charisma. Surprisingly, he’s the weak link. Collet-Serra surrounds Johnson with a charm offensive of supporting actors, including Hodge and Brosnan, who are great, as well as Shahi, Sabongui and comedian Mohammed Amer as Adrianna’s brother Karim. The director does heroic work crafting a film around Johnson that is fast and entertaining, tossing needle drops and skateboard stunts and movie references and zombies and funny uncles and fire demons in the mix just to keep us somewhat distracted from the void that is Black Adam himself.

The whole proposition is all a bit silly, and everyone seems in on the joke except for Johnson. While the film feels cobbled together out of spare parts of other superhero movies, and it’s almost instantly forgettable, Collet-Serra manages to hold it all together out of sheer force of will and an inherent sense of style. If there’s any superhero to write about with “Black Adam,” it’s the director, and it’s a good thing to see he still has some lightning coming out of his fingers.

Katie Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic.

‘Black Adam’ Rated: PG-13, for sequences of strong violence, intense action and some language Running time: 2 hours, 4 minutes Playing: Starts Oct. 21 in general release

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‘Black Adam’ Review: Heroism, but Paint It Black

Dwayne Johnson stars in this overstuffed superhero film about an ancient figure granted god powers.

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By Maya Phillips

Behold: the proselytizing superhero film! Listen as it cautions against moral absolutism! It is not the hero movie we need but, thanks to what’s now a tradition of beloved comic book stories shazam-ed into empty Hollywood schlock, it is the hero movie we deserve.

Which brings us to “Black Adam,” a dull, listless superhero movie that hits all the expected touchstones of the genre under the guise of a transgressive new antihero story.

We begin with a briskly delivered tragic back story involving a magical demon crown, a gaggle of wizards and a people’s rebellion in an ancient land called Kahndaq. We then skip forward 5,000 years to modern-day Kahndaq, a poor yet futuristic country that, for generations, has been under siege by various mercenary groups. Adrianna (Sarah Shahi), an Indiana Jones-esque Kahndaqi professor turned artifact hunter, is searching for the aforementioned diadem of doom, with help from her bumbling brother, Karim (Mohammed Amer), and hero-obsessed son, Amon (Bodhi Sabongui).

Adrianna summons Black Adam (Dwayne Johnson), the champion of ancient Kahndaq who was granted god powers by the same sorcerer who — surprise! — transformed the teenage Billy Batson into the red-spandex-wearing capester Shazam (Zachary Levi) in that 2019 DC action-comedy .

But Black Adam has some rage issues and an inconvenient habit of zapping baddies to death with his lightning powers, so of course, according to the rules of superhero franchises, a superteam must unite to confront him: Cyclone (Quintessa Swindell), a meek genius in colorful threads who can manipulate the wind; Atom Smasher (Noah Centineo), a rookie hero who’s just trying his best; Doctor Fate (Pierce Brosnan), a Doctor Strange type in a knight helmet; and Hawkman (Aldis Hodge), the leader of this so-called Justice Society of America (not to be confused with the Justice League of America).

Afflicted by the all-too-common Overstuffed Hero Movie Syndrome, “Black Adam,” directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, flies past exposition and speeds through character introductions and back stories — for those who even get back stories — leaving us with a hero epic that fails to build emotional stakes or vivify its characters enough to make us care.

At least we’re promised gritty no-holds-barred action, right? Think again: That promise is mercilessly broken with an orgy of crude special effects set to an intrusive, tonally idiosyncratic score including the Stones’ “Paint It, Black.” (Because he’s Black Adam, get it?)

And if you thought the time of action movies using slow-motion as a crutch was over, “Black Adam” has bad news for you. Even fight scenes with resurrected hell demons and villains torn in half like sheets of loose-leaf are rendered yawn-worthy and downright juvenile.

It doesn’t help that our antihero is as exciting as, well, a flying rock in a cape. Johnson floats through scenes with his furiously furrowed brow and an expression stubbornly frozen between consternation and confusion. He, and the film, can capture neither the seriousness nor the humor it aspires to; Johnson attempts to cover up his signature lighthearted comedic delivery with a stony deadpan that sucks all levity from each scene he’s in.

Centineo and Amer are saddled with the responsibility to provide comic relief as goofy sidekick types, but both hit the same flat notes. Adam’s comedic beats, on the other hand, are limited to his lunkheaded responses to the other characters’ coaching on proper hero etiquette (“Catchphrase, then kill,” he repeats densely after Amon).

The hero tips are essential to the film’s pontificating about justice and its lumbering setup of Adam as the alternate hero for an age that requires more nuanced codes of integrity and more aggressive action. Heroes like Superman and Aquaman are out being saviors, but they have conveniently overlooked Kahndaq, Amon says to Adam, suggesting that even the world’s finest do-gooders can be selective and unfair when it comes to fighting evil.

“There are only heroes and villains,” says Hawkman, a character who, despite Hodge’s solid performance, is unbelievably saddled with this reductive mind-set; that way, the movie can remake the same point it spends two hours repeating. “The world doesn’t need a white knight; sometimes it needs something darker,” Doctor Fate says, presenting the film’s thesis — which, by the way, was more eloquently expressed 14 years ago in “The Dark Knight.”

If, as the credits roll for “Black Adam,” you’re still stuck wondering what defines a bad hero or a good antihero, know that at least the film clarifies one thing: What makes a bad hero movie.

Black Adam Rated PG-13 for bad guys meeting violent, untimely ends. Running time: 2 hours 4 minutes. In theaters.

Maya Phillips is a critic at large. She is the author of the poetry collection “Erou” and “NERD: Adventures in Fandom From This Universe to the Multiverse,” forthcoming from Atria Books. More about Maya Phillips

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Black Adam review: New superheroes and villains rise, but the slog remains the same

The DCEU expands with its B team, promoted to an underwhelming movie of its own.

Senior Editor, Movies

Being steeped in comics lore is a very different thing than being emotionally invested in a movie. Suffice to say, there are people — many people — who have been anticipating a Black Adam spinoff for years. But apart from a fleeting end-credits scene which we won't spoil here, none of the film's DC Comics-derived characters, major or minor, will be recognizable to nonfans. The fact that they haven't gotten franchises of their own speaks not to unearthed gold but the restless, insatiable appetite of today's superhero industrial complex (a phrase actually uttered in Black Adam 's dialogue), now moving onto the crumbs. It's a bit like wandering into another family's heated domestic argument already in progress.

If you just go with it, though, you'll get a pre-chewed experience that's vaguely familiar and generic, but with a subversive zag or two that shouldn't be discounted. Black Adam (now in theaters) begins with a breathless, boy-narrated rush through thousands of years of history sketching the fictional Middle Eastern country of Kahndaq; before your eyes glaze over, the takeaways are: oppressed slaves, glowing blue crown of power, a hero will rise, etc. Today's Kahndaq — sun-blasted, overcrowded, specked with military checkpoints and British-accented soldiers — indicates the anti-colonialist movie that Black Adam sometimes gestures at (as forcefully as a multimillion-dollar product from a global media conglomerate can).

When that hero does rise, floating ominously above the city, he's Teth-Adam ( Dwayne Johnson ), immortal, accidentally freed from his prison tomb, and not hip to today's morality, never mind its wokeness. Johnson has gone on record about his longtime obsession with the character, yet, in a paradox more interesting than the movie itself, he's distinctly unsuited for the role, despite his build. As an actor, the Rock has been not merely serviceable but terrific in parts that lean on his speed and slyness. ( Michael Bay , of all people, got something subtle out of him in 2013's underrated Pain & Gain .) "Glower!" you'll yell at the screen, but Johnson's not the glowering type.

The viciousness feels unearned; Black Adam bends over backward to link its antihero to Clint Eastwood's iconic Man with No Name, but apart from a few flashes of PG-13 gore (signature-free Spanish director Jaume Collet-Serra grasps for the vibe of Terminator 2: Judgment Day ), the film is unusually toothless. It doesn't help that the plot brings on a whole host of nobodies — Doctor Fate! ( Pierce Brosnan ), Cyclone! ( Quintessa Swindell ), Atom Smasher! ( Noah Centineo ), Hawkman! ( Aldis Hodge ) — all of them bent on trying to take down the one mildly interesting presence in the film. Black Adam is what happens when artists say they want to go dark but don't really have the stomach for it. Cue scenes of humorless mid-air wrestling, shake vigorously, wait for the sequel. Grade: C+

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• Black Adam star Quintessa Swindell is a breath of fresh air as the powerful Cyclone
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“Black Adam,” Reviewed: Dwayne Johnson Emerges from a Tomb and Finds Nothing

By Richard Brody

There’s nothing so wrong with “Black Adam” that it should be avoided, but nothing—besides the appealing presence of Dwayne Johnson—that makes it worth rushing out to see. The movie’s many small flaws—and even its few small virtues—arise from its one big problem, namely, its positioning in the DC corporate-cinematic empire. It isn’t worse than many of the big-budget C.G.I. superhero spectacles that have more or less taken over studio filmmaking, but it accumulates the genre’s—and the business’s—bad habits into a single two-hour-plus package, and only hints at the format’s occasional pleasures. “Black Adam” feels like a place-filler for a movie that’s remaining to be made, but, in its bare and shrugged-off sufficiency, it does one positive thing that, if nothing else, at least accounts for its success: for all the churning action and elaborately jerry-rigged plot, there’s little to distract from the movie’s pedestal-like display of Johnson, its real-life superhero.

It begins with an immense backstory of mumbo-jumbo, set in 2600 B.C.E., in a fictitious Middle Eastern or North African land called Kahndaq, where a tyrant named Ahk-Ton (Marwan Kenzari) enslaves his subjects to dig for a mineral called Eternium with which he’ll forge a superpowered crown. One young subject, however, rebels and exhorts his countrymen to revolt; he is endowed with his own superheroic power that’s summoned with the word “shazam,” and, in the resulting melee, Akh-Ton is killed and his palace is blown to rubble. Flash forward to present-day Kahndaq: it’s occupied by a paramilitary crime ring called Intergang, and a trio of dissidents led by an archeologist named Adrianna (Sarah Shahi), and helped by her teen-age son, Amon (Bodhi Sabongui), are searching, among remote subterranean ruins, for the crown in the hope of its aiding their resistance. When Intergang follows and attacks them there, she summons (“Shazam!”) the hero of 2600 B.C.E., Teth-Adam (Dwayne Johnson), from his four thousand-plus of years in an underground tomb. He emerges and lays waste to the assailants.

But this seemingly invulnerable liberator, who catches R.P.G.s and hurls blue thunderbolts, is viewed with suspicion by the American agent Amanda Waller (Viola Davis, reprising this role from the two recent Suicide Squad movies). In order to stop him, she unites the so-called Justice Society—Carter Hall, a.k.a. Hawkman (Aldis Hodge), who’s endowed with wings and a beak; Kent Nelson, a.k.a. Doctor Fate (Pierce Brosnan), who, by means of his golden helmet, can see the future; Maxine Hunkel, a.k.a. Cyclone (Quintessa Swindell), who swirls up devastating green windstorms; and Al Rothstein, a.k.a. Atom Smasher (Noah Centineo), who can expand to the size of a city walkup, or taller. (Al’s uncle gets a seconds-long cameo, and it’s one of the movie’s few highlights: Henry Winkler.)

That’s where the movie’s philosophical dimension comes in. Teth-Adam is an angry man, still seething over what happened in ancient Kahndaq, and his mores are atavistic, with no compunctions about the use of violence, the practice of killing, the collateral damage of mass destruction. (He also sees a TV set for the first time—which, with primeval wisdom, he blasts to smithereens.) But the Justice Society protests: they believe, as Hawkman says, in “due process,” and they warn him to lay off the “extrajudicial killings.” Try as they might, they can’t rein the invulnerable fighter in by force, but, when he himself recognizes the danger posed by his rage, he allows himself to be reëntombed—and gagged—in order not to utter the magic word again. Then a brutal revenant from early Kahndaq seeks—with the aid of smoldering, ancient zombies—to restore Akh-Ton’s dynasty, and the Justice Society needs Teth-Adam back.

In contrast to the 2019 movie “ Shazam !,” which treats its premise with an apt silliness that yields an unusually amiable superhero comedy, “Black Adam,” sparked by its historical backstory and its enduring implications in current-day political conflict, has a thudding earnestness that its specifics belie. Thus, Davis and Hodge offer performances of grand severity (Davis’s diction alone could smash concrete) that belong to the Shakespearean movie in which neither has yet been cast. Brosnan coasts charmingly in a role that offers him nothing but elegant manners; Swindell and Centineo are part of a Y.A. romance that’s itself entombed in anticipation of a sequel. As for Johnson, he has the star power and the physical prowess to hold attention with minimal fuss, but the role itself, with its tragic implications and mighty gestures, is rote and empty. (I’m still waiting for Johnson to find his way into another movie that offers him as exuberant a showcase as did “ Pain and Gain ”; his talent is far greater than most of his vehicles, no pun intended.) Teth-Adam’s struggles with himself, the weight of his memories, the rise of self-awareness, even the simple fact of his encounters with a new world (trivialized in a single line of dialogue) turn the hero into a mere plaything of the rickety plot, which appears to add its byways as part of a just-so story crafted to yield a franchise.

If the wry details that glitter on the movie’s surface—such as Amon’s effort to teach Teth-Adam the proper use of a catchphrase, or Teth-Adam’s introduction to the concept of sarcasm—stand out in memory, it’s because the substance that it attaches to dries up and blows away like the ashes of half the universe at the end of “Avengers: Infinity War.” What “Black Adam” lacks is the sense of a point of view; even the Russo brothers’ armchair-army bluster in Marvel epics suggests a greater sense of personality, of personal commitment and aesthetic attitude, than the synthetic enormity of “Black Adam.” Jaume Collet-Serra, the movie’s director, comes off as a skillful coördinator whose connection to the very essence of superheroes, their fantastic natures and outsized powers, seems merely technical, a problem to be solved rather than a realm of limitless possibilities.

Those limitless possibilities are part of the reason that superhero movies aptly wore out their critical welcomes very quickly. As ultra-high-budget tentpole productions meant for international consumption, these films have production demands that tend to dominate the imagination of direction, with only a few notable exceptions, such as “ Ant-Man ,” “ Black Panther ,” and “ Man of Steel ” (or, for that matter, brief exceptional interludes within unexceptional films, such as “ Doctor Strange ”). There’s something morally deadening and aesthetically depressing about the bottomless toy chest of C.G.I. being reduced to the toolbox of cinematic bureaucracy.

It’s no less numbing to find material meant for children retconned for adults—and, in the process, for most of the naïve delight to be leached out, and for any serious concerns to be shoehorned in and then waved away with dazzle and noise. With no discernible artistic perspective, “Black Adam” offers a moral realm that draws no lines, a personal one of simplistic stakes, a political one that suggests any interpretation, an audiovisual one that rehashes long-familiar tropes and repackages overused devices for a commercial experiment that might as well wear its import as its title. When I was in Paris in 1983, Jerry Lewis—yes, they really did love him there—had a new movie in theatres. In the U.S., it was originally titled “Smorgasbord” (and later reissued as “ Cracking Up ”); in France, they adored him so that they released it as “T’es fou Jerry”—“You’re Crazy, Jerry.” “Black Adam” could be retitled “You’re a Superhero, Dwayne”—it’s the marketing team’s PowerPoint presentation extended to feature length. ♦

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​​Dwayne Johnson's Black Adam has Rotten Tomatoes score revealed as first reviews land

It's not looking great...

The Rock's long-awaited debut in the Worlds of DC has promised to establish a new hierarchy in the Multiverse, opening up the legacy of the Justice Society of America on the big screen for the first time.

The film pits the JSA – Aldis Hodge's Hawkman, Quintessa Swindell's Cyclone, Pierce Brosnan's Doctor Fate and Noah Centineo's Atom Smasher – against the ancient god Black Adam as they try to show him how to become a hero for the people of Kahndaq.

Related: Black Adam producer reveals Doctor Strange 2 similarity in DC movie

In Digital Spy 's own review , we found Black Adam to be an "entertaining throwback" that has the potential to kick off a new era for the beleaguered DC Universe after nearly a decade of false starts .

" Black Adam might not totally change the hierarchy of power in the DC universe, but it could prove to be an entertaining platform to build on – assuming that past mistakes aren't repeated," our review read.

Others felt conflicted about the film, though often not outright negative.

" Black Adam is a competent movie. (I hope that quote gets on a movie poster. 'Competent!') And a lot of plot complaints get overlooked when the lead of the movie is noticeably having a good time. Which is weird because we all know how much Dwayne Johnson wanted to play Black Adam, then comes out and gives us this deadly serious take on the character. Yeah, I get he’s the “bad guy,” but also (a) not really and (b) aren’t the bad guys supposed to be having the most fun?"

"A superhero movie in which a likely presidential candidate shows how satisfying it is to wield overwhelming force when nobody’s strong enough to challenge you, Jaume Collet-Serra’s Black Adam will, for most viewers, just be another fine-not-great night of spandex mayhem and franchises hoping to be born."

The Guardian

"With his imposing bulk and gift for deadpan humour, Dwayne Johnson makes a charismatic DC hero – but sadly, he’s in a class of his own."

"Like a lot of its ilk, Black Adam tosses out too many new characters without adequate development. Hodge and especially Brosnan are most effective at giving audiences rousing new heroes, even though we don't get a chance to know them well. Then there’s Black Adam himself, who at least earns somewhat of a character arc. While the film’s definitely going for a Man with No Name bent – a Clint Eastwood movie even plays on a TV before Johnson’s antihero blasts it – results are mixed."

"The film’s whole purpose is to give Black Adam a suitably grand introduction on the assumption that he’ll be pitted against a more deserving adversary soon enough."

Black Adam is released in cinemas on October 21.

Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) [DVD] [2020]

Wonder Woman 1984 [DVD] [2020]

Zack Snyder's Justice League [DVD] [2021]

Joker [DVD] [2019]

Shazam! DVD [2019]

Aquaman [Blu-ray] [2018]

DC 5 Film Collection [DVD] [2018]

Wonder Woman [Blu-ray + Digital Download] [2017] [Region Free]

Justice League [4k Ultra HD + Blu-ray + Digital Download] [2017]

The Dark Knight Trilogy [Blu-ray] [2013] [Region Free]

The Superman 5 Film Collection 1978-2006 [Blu-ray] [1978] [Region Free]

Superman Animated Movie Collection [DVD] [2013]

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice – Ultimate Edition

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He has worked previously as both a reporter and sub editor for the brand, prior to taking on the position of Night News Editor in 2016. 

Over more than a decade, he has interviewed a wide-ranging group of public figures, from comedian Steve Coogan to icons from the Star Trek universe, cast members from the Marvel Cinematic Universe and reality stars from numerous Real Housewives cities and the Below Deck franchise. As a US contributor to Digital Spy, Justin has also been on the ground to cover major pop culture events like the Star Wars Celebration and the D23 Expo.

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‘black adam’ review: dwayne johnson’s charisma carries a morally muddy superhero flick.

The star brings Shazam's maybe-nemesis to the screen in director Jaume Collet-Serra's DC debut, costarring Aldis Hodge and Pierce Brosnan.

By John DeFore

John DeFore

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Politics be damned, the first thing most comics buffs will notice is that, though we’ve prayed DC would move on, there are more than echoes of the Snyderverse here. In the very first sequence, we get slo-mo and flying globules of blood that could almost be outtakes from 300 . Conspicuous slo-mo plagues the film, and rumor-mongers will already know of stronger ties to Zack Snyder’s films.

Identification with the macho side of DC’s mythology might explain why, of the many superpowered costars here, the expected one is absent. The Shazam of David F. Sandberg’s surprisingly charming 2019 film would be welcome, shifting the focus away from revved-up egos and ancient grievances, but no: Don’t expect Zachary Levi’s boy-turned-hero to show up.

Millennia later, a Kahndaq scholar named Adrianna (Sarah Shahi) hunts for the king’s Eternium crown in a forgotten tomb. She finds it, and unwittingly revives the long-dead champion, just as her expedition is ambushed by Intergang, the crew of mercenaries that has terrorized Kahndaq for decades. Violence ensues.

Johnson’s resurrected warrior, Teth Adam, gets most of his briefing on the modern world from Adrianna’s son Amon (Bodhi Sabongui). Mother and son have secretly been working against Intergang, and possessing the magic crown only makes them bigger targets. But Teth Adam cares little about their troubles, and chides the boy for not knowing violence is the answer to such problems.

Others take a greater interest. In America, Hawkman ( Aldis Hodge ) enlists Doctor Fate ( Pierce Brosnan ) and some less famous heroes to go retrieve the crown and lock it up. They zip around the globe in a jet whose detachable cockpit would make any billionaire owner of phallic rockets envious, and proceed to behave (to Adrianna’s eyes, at least) like enforcers of a paternalistic Western power structure.

(The script does little to help non-DC-scholars here, briefly alluding to nanobots and relics and the Justice Society of America as if other movies had introduced them already. With so many new characters in what is basically a two-hour fight scene, there’s no place for much exposition.)

Johnson creates a magnetic antihero, volatile and antisocial. He doesn’t fly so much as stalk the sky; he swats opponents like the bundles of weightless CG pixels they are. And this passion project serves the character well, setting him up for adventures one hopes will be less predictable than this one.

And maybe, while Teth Adam slowly assembles a coherent moral worldview over the course of many movies, America can grow out of its appalling tendency to elect celebrities with no experience in making governments work. Sadly, that’ll take more than wizards and magic rocks.

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10 biggest movies missing from rotten tomatoes' best films of all-time.

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10 Harsh Realities Of Rewatching The Matrix, 25 Years Later

10 good brad pitt movies with really divided rotten tomatoes scores, 10 harsh realities of rewatching blade runner, 42 years later.

• Shawshank Redemption, Forrest Gump, and Matrix were absent; iconic films that impacted audiences and were recognized at the Oscars.
• Fight Club, Inception, and Seven were also notably missing; these exceptional films showcase deep stories and powerful performances.
• Jurassic Park, Blade Runner, and 2001: A Space Odyssey lacked acknowledgment; timeless classics that revolutionized cinema and storytelling.

Rotten Tomatoes is a reliable resource for getting a consensus of how good or bad a film is, but there are some remarkable absences from their best of all-time list. Rotten Tomatoes is a community-driven site that gathers together reviews from across the web. Official entertainment journalists and critics have their reviews collected and added together, along with reviews from the public.

Together, these points of information help the site to create a percentage score for both the critics and the audience, with anything above 50% being categorized as 'Fresh,' and anything below marked 'Rotten.' Across the site, countless films have been reviewed and scores added up, which have been used to make a list of the 300 best movies of all-time (via Rotten Tomatoes ). However, despite the comprehensive ranking and scales on the site, there are some glaring omissions of movies which are commonly held up as some of the best movies of all time.

10 The Shawshank Redemption

First on the list is one that is included on most lists, The Shashank Redemption . The film is adapted from a story by Stephen King, and directed by Frank Darabont , who also adapted the screenplay. The film features some outstanding talent with Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman in major roles as two of the inmates at the Shawshank State Penitentiary.

Admittedly, there are some very uncomfortable scenes featured in the movie, but these are featured in a way that makes them additive and essential for the film as a whole, and the movie is not meant to be a comfortable experience. The film was also nominated for a total of seven Oscars due to the wide array of things it did absolutely perfectly, from the adaptation, to the casting and beyond. It makes no sense for this film to not be included on the top 300 list at RT.

The Shawshank Redemption: 10 Differences Between The Book & The Film

The Shawshank Redemption was actually a Stephen King book before it was a movie, and here are the big differences from page to screen.

9 Forrest Gump

A movie that offers up a very different tone, but arguably remains just as culturally effective and impactful, Forrest Gump is nowhere to be seen on the list. This film, directed by Robert Zemeckis, and starring Tom Hanks , tells a powerful story of a boy who grows up to be a man who, by most accounts, should not be special. However, through his persistence and determination, he is able to become someone that is incredibly important.

This film was not only nominated for 13 Oscars at the Academy Awards, but it won six of the categories where it was nominated. The film remains an incredible story of hope, and it features some of the most quotable lines of any film. Despite being released 30 years ago in 1994, the film remains iconic and popular to this day, just not on RT's list.

8 Fight Club

David Fincher climbed to new heights because of his talents as a director during the 90s, and in 1999, he released one of his greatest contributions to cinema of all time. Fight Club is a movie which adapts the original novel by Chuck Palahniuk to great effect. The story follows Brad Pitt and Edward Norton as two men who live life in directly opposite ways. However, as Norton's character begins to lose faith in the system, he emulates Tyler Durden (Pitt) more and more.

The film features incredible twists and thought-provoking ideas from the start, with many people studying the film and gleaming their own meanings from the incredible story. The film also stars Helena Bonham Carter and Meat Loaf in supporting roles. The movie is a spectacular piece of film, which was nominated for an Oscar, and should be acknowledged along with other films that are frequently labeled the best of all time.

Fight Club Ending Explained (In Detail)

Fight Club ends with one of cinema's most iconic twists, but even decades later, there's more to the somewhat ambiguous ending than meets the eye.

7 Inception

Christopher Nolan is one of the most spectacular filmmakers currently working in Hollywood, and every film he makes appears to be an award magnet. However, one of his greatest masterpieces came in 2010, Inception, taking home four Oscar wins, and still failing to make it onto the top 300 list at RT. When also considering the incredible talent involved in the film, it boggles the mind almost as much as the film's mind-bending narrative how it could be excluded.

The story follows a group of people who have a particular set of skills for incepting ideas into the minds of others without them knowing. While Cillian Murphy serves as the mark in the film, Leonardo DiCaprio leads a team which includes Tom Hardy, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Elliot Page, and Michael Caine as the father-in-law to Cobb (DiCaprio). The talent here is overwhelming, not to mention the spectacular story and visuals, which all combine to make this one of the best films ever made.

6 The Matrix

Surprisingly, The Matrix , the film which rang in the millennium in 1999 and introduced several new words into the common vernacular, is also missing from the list. The Wachowski's made their masterpiece and may well have been unaware of the cultural impact their movie would have. However, the rest of the world immediately saw the film's potential, and it has since been included on many of the most prominent best films of all time lists.

The movie stars Keanu Reeves , Hugo Weaving, Carrie-Anne Moss, and Laurence Fishburne among an incredible cast. It also won four Oscars out of a possible four. The film was groundbreaking when it first appeared, and in the world today, where AI is rapidly developing and the idea of simulations and virtual reality draws ever nearer, the movie remains extremely prescient. However, it was not featured in RT's top 300.

The Matrix is rightly considered one of the most influential sci-fi action movies of all time, but some aspects of the film haven't held up.

5 Avengers: Infinity War

Perhaps the only film on this list that could arguably be excluded due to a recency bias, but regardless, the 2018 box office hit, Avengers: Infinity War , deserves a spot for the spectacular ending alone. The film may be a part of the MCU, which is bound to divide crowds who value or disavow comic book movies, but Infinity War changed the narrative for superhero movies. Joe and Anthony Russo did not give into the loud voices that suggest every hero movie should end with good triumphing over evil, and instead offered a bold and daring finale for their story.

Of course, this would only be topped by the second part and the concluding chapter of The Infinity Saga, as far as Thanos is concerned, in Endgame . Both movies amassed well over $2 billion, with Endgame claiming the number 1 spot as the highest earning film of all time briefly. These movies clearly made an impression on a significant percentage of the population on Earth, but remain absent from the RT list.

Another incredible movie from David Fincher , Seven , this time bringing together Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman as detectives on the tail of a religious murderer. The story is deep, compelling, and thrilling throughout, and it doesn't shy away from including uncomfortable and gruesome details. However, the film's greatest strength perhaps comes from the way it concludes, and the message that it leaves long after the screen fades to black.

Seven did not perform as well as some other films, only having received one nomination at the Academy Awards, but it did win over audiences. The film is frequently listed as one of the all-time greatest movies, but it is glaringly absent from RT's list. Despite this, it is still well worth watching for anyone who has yet to see it for the dark, deliciously complex story it reveals.

Brad Pitt has a lot of universally loved movies under his belt, but some of his best movies left critics and audiences on Rotten Tomatoes divided.

3 Jurassic Park

Jurassic Park may not be the first movie that springs to mind when considering the best movies of all time, but it is nonetheless a worthy entry when taken into consideration. Despite the film being aimed at families, it is a deep and dark narrative about the god complex of man, and the dangers that can come from running before they can walk. When people uncover a way to bring real dinosaurs back from extinction, growing them and giving them a place to roam, they fail to take the necessary precautions to protect the modern world from a former Apex Predator.

Directed by Steven Spielberg, the film became an instant classic and went on to inspire several sequels and a franchise. The original film was also the recipient of three Oscars, and it featured graphics that remain fairly believable to this day thanks to the use of machines, and practical effects in combination with CGI. The movie is a clear candidate for one of the all time best slots, or at least somewhere in the top 300, but it is nowhere to be seen.

2 Blade Runner

From one visionary director to the next, the classic film, Blade Runner from 1982 is the next one that needs to be highlighted here. Ridley Scott, as a visionary sci-fi director , took the building blocks of a story by Philip K. Dick and adapted it into something similar, but much more suited to the big screen. Then, he cast Hollywood's favorite sly hero of the decade, Harrison Ford, to play the lead.

The film had everything right, and featured an outstanding script, twists and turns, and deep philosophical questions. While the film was only nominated for two Oscars, it remains one of the most widely celebrated and beloved films of the 80s, and the franchise it gave birth to continues to thrive to this day. Despite some disputes about how real the main protagonist may or may not be, the film really deserves to be considered for a top 300 space on RT's list.

Ridley Scott's Blade Runner is a hugely influential sci-fi masterpiece. But rewatching it today, 42 years after its release, it's not all roses.

1 2001: A Space Odyssey

Finally, another one of the most visionary directors of recent decades has also been snubbed by the RT list, considering the exclusion of his masterpiece, 2001: A Space Odyssey . The film, directed by Stanley Kubrick, was one of the most imaginative and visually stimulating pictures of all time when it came out in 1968, and it remains so to this day because of the creativity and style which pour out of every moment. The film won an Oscar, and continues to inspire and influence filmmakers to this day, with recent overt references in movies like Barbie in 2023.

The film was also one of the first to explore the idea of artificial intelligence developing sentience and turning on humans, in a time before computers were even available in a size that didn't require an entire room to function. Kubrick was a visionary, and his work spoke for itself, and accordingly, most lists of the best films feature this as one of the all-time greats. However, Rotten Tomatoes appears to have mysteriously left it out of the top 300.

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More From Forbes

Matt damon movie bust debuts big on netflix u.s. top 10 movies chart.

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BERLIN, GERMANY - FEBRUARY 15: Matt Damon poses at the "Small Things Like These" photocall during ... [+] the 74th Berlinale International Film Festival Berlin at Grand Hyatt Hotel on February 15, 2024 in Berlin, Germany. (Photo by Stephane Cardinale - Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images)

Netflix viewers are into a Matt Damon and Pedro Pascal movie that’s new on the streaming platform.

The big-budget monster movie The Great Wall joined Netflix’s movie lineup on May 1. According to Netflix’s U.S. Top 10 Movies chart for the week of April 29 to May 5, The Great Wall debuted at No. 4 on the list.

Unlike the streamer’s Top 10 Global Movies chart , Netflix doesn’t release viewing data for its top U.S. movies list, so it’s uncertain how many viewers streamed the film and how many streaming hours it accumulated. The Great Wall did not chart on Netflix’s list of top movies globally.

In the film—which is set in ancient China—Damon and Pedro Pascal play mercenaries who join thousands of Chinese soldiers to battle monsters that are heading toward the Great Wall.

The Great Wall was first released in theaters on February 27, 2017. According to the box officer tracker The Numbers , the film earned an underwhelming $45.1 million at the domestic box office during its theatrical run.

The Great Wall had a better reception overseas, though, with a take of $289.3 million, which along with its domestic tally ended up with a worldwide box office gross of $334.4 million.

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However, The Hollywood Reporter noted in 2017, since the production budget of The Great Wall was $150 million and had a “conservatively estimated” $80 million marketing cost, the film ended up losing money once the final theatrical revenue was tallied. After all, when a film makes X amount of money in theaters, a percentage of that revenue also goes to the theatrical venues playing the picture.

As such, THR reported that The Great Wall was at the time expected to lose $75 million once all the numbers were counted.

How Did ‘The Great Wall’ Measure Up To Other Films On The US Chart?

According to Netflix, the Glen Powell and Sydney Sweeney romantic comedy Anyone But You topped the U.S. chart in its second release on the streamer, while the Robert Downey Jr. and Robert Duvall drama The Judge was No. 2.

The Netflix original comedy Unfrosted —starring Jerry Seinfeld, Melissa McCarthy and Jim Gaffigan—debuted at No. 3 on the U.S. chart, while the controversial Jenna Ortega psychological thriller Miller’s Girl debuted at No. 5.

Unlike The Great Wall , another big-budget box office dud —2021’s The Matrix Resurrections starring Keanu Reeves—did not make the Netflix U.S. Top 10 Movies chart.

The Great Wall upon its release was bashed by Rotten Tomatoes critics with a 35% “rotten” rating based on 238 reviews. The movie also earned a 42% positive Audience Score based on 10,000-plus ratings.

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John Krasinski's IF Gets Concerning Early Reviews at Rotten Tomatoes

Despite its star-studded voice cast, John Krasinski's animated/live-action film, IF, receives lukewarm reviews upon its release.

Though John Krasinski's IF seems poised for a big opening weekend, critics don't seem to be fans of the newly-released live-action/animated movie. Despite its star-studded cast, the film's critical reception leaves much to be desired.

Per Rotten Tomatoes , IF , the latest directorial effort by Krasinski, has a 52% critical rating on the popular review aggregator website from over 100 reviews. Despite its heartwarming premise wrapped around the power of imaginary friends, critics expressed dissatisfaction with the script and character depth. The Popcorn Muncher's Tom Beasley called Krasinski's screenplay "an onslaught of platitudes, like it was written by an AI model fed exclusively with fortune cookies and horoscopes." Meanwhile, SlashFilm's Ethan Anderton said IF "isn't able to deliver enough depth" for its main characters.

A Quiet Place: Day One Director Reveals How John Krasinski Picked Him For the Job

Chris Bumblay of JoBlo's Movie Network said IF is "too childish for adults, but also too slow and dramatic for kids." Additionally, Blu-ray.com's Brian Orndorf admitted "It’s hard to understand what Krasinski is going for with this endeavor." The Detroit News' Adam Graham also went in on IF 's script, saying "This undercooked family comedy weeper from writer-director John Krasinski seems stuck in script development mode, like no one knew what to do with it past its title."

Audiences Are More Appreciative of IF

Though critics haven't been kind to IF , Krasinski's movie has been an early hit with audiences, boasting an 87% Rotten Tomatoes score. IF is also set for a huge opening weekend , with the film expected to topple the $40 million mark domestically following its first three days in cinemas across North America.

John Krasinski and Rainn Wilson Have Unplanned The Office Mini Reunion

IF chronicles Bea (Cailey Fleming), a young girl who can see imaginary friends and ends up teaming with her neighbor who can also see IFs, Cal (Ryan Reynolds), to reunite them with the children who abandoned them. Krasinski portrays Bea's father and the imaginary friend, Marshmallow Man, while his fellow The Office alum, Steve Carell , plays another IF, Blue. The cast also features Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Emily Blunt, George Clooney, Bradley Cooper, Keegan-Michael Key, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon and the late Louis Gossett Jr. in one of his final performances.

Krasinski is renowned for helming the A Quiet Place film franchise. IF , which premiered in France on May 8, cost $110 million to make.

IF is now showing in theaters.

Source: Rotten Tomatoes

A young girl who goes through a difficult experience begins to see everyone's imaginary friends who have been left behind as their real-life friends have grown up.

Netflix just added a disturbing AI movie that feels exactly like ‘Black Mirror’ — and it's 88% on Rotten Tomatoes

Artificial intelligence is a particularly huge topic of conversation right now . The very notion of this simulation taking over the world one day is scary enough, but imagine if it could control your mind through a computer chip implant. Well, the movie “Upgrade” captures this type of body horror perfectly, and it’s just been added to Netflix . 

“Upgrade” is a cyberpunk action thriller movie that keeps your attention for one hour and forty minutes. I can guarantee the whole time you’ll be glued to the screen, shocked and slightly disturbed about how technology can dominate humans in such a frightening way. Logan Marshall-Green, known for other projects like “The Invitation” and “Prometheus”, plays a traumatized and paralyzed man who has no choice but to rely on AI.  

Curious to learn more about the sinister intentions behind AI? Let’s delve into some basic plot details and whether you should stream “Upgrade” on Netflix. 

What is ‘Upgrade about?

“Upgrade” follows a paralyzed man named Grey Trace (Logan Marshall-Green), who now uses a wheelchair after being brutally mugged after his self-driving car malfunctions. The muggers also killed his wife Asha (Melanie Vallejo) after the accident, leaving him with immense trauma and depression. However, a billionaire inventor offers Grey a computer chip implant that will essentially “cure” him. 

“Upgrade” feels like an 80s movie with modern filmmaking methods.

Now, able to walk with superhuman strength, Grey has the chance to hunt down the attackers and destroy them by himself. “Upgrade” is a violent action-packed revenge movie that will have you sweating and wincing at times, but it also reveals how this near-future driven by technology is incredibly dangerous. 

This intense thriller was directed and written by Leigh Whannell, who also worked on some of James Wan’s movies like “Saw”, “Insidious”, and “The Invisible Man”. You can clearly see the horror elements weaved into the cinematography and setting throughout, which makes “Upgrade” feel like an 80s movie with modern filmmaking methods.

Critics and audiences enjoyed this futuristic thriller 

Critics and audiences have praised this movie for its dark action and believable performances. Right now, “Upgrade” has 88% on Rotten Tomatoes , proving that it's one to watch if you need something entertaining and thrilling at the same time. 

In terms of reviews, many critics compared this movie to the science-fiction series “Black Mirror” . If you haven’t seen or heard of this show, each episode focuses on a different story about the unease of technology and how it can affect society in frightening ways. Matt Brunson from Film Frenzy said: “With its emphasis on technology, slightly futuristic setting, and fondness for disturbing developments, Upgrade feels like an episode of Black Mirror that somehow managed to break free from its Netflix surroundings and emerge unscathed on the big screen.”

Adam Graham from Detroit News also agreed with the “Black Mirror” vibes by saying: “Part Black Mirror, part Ex-Machina and part Hardcore Henry, Upgrade is a cuckoo science fiction horror pastiche that's smarter than it looks.” 

Village Voice’s Alan Scherstuhl believes Upgrade offers “memorable, legible fights, a compelling bombed-out retro-apocalyptic look and a mystery that seems obvious at the start but then keeps twisting.”

Not everyone is going to enjoy this AI body horror though. Nigel Andrews from Financial Times thought the movie was “fun for an hour, then a self-drive speed ride to nowhere very much.”

‘Upgrade’ is worth a watch on Netflix

You should absolutely stream “Upgrade” on Netflix if you enjoy futuristic movies with gory violence and fun action sequences. Marshall-Green does a great job playing a desperate man who will do anything to seek revenge. Plus, a good revenge movie is always satisfying to watch. 

Who knows, this movie could even encourage you to binge-watch “Black Mirror”. Netflix is bringing back “Black Mirror” in 2025 with six new episodes , so it’s definitely worth watching if you’re into creepy science-fiction thrillers. Just don’t let “Upgrade” give you nightmares about how intelligent AI might get in the future… 

Want more? Check out one of the best disturbing dramas on Netflix or watch the top psychological thrillers you probably haven’t seen before . 

Stream “Upgrade” on Netflix now.

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9 new to Prime Video movies with 90% or higher on Rotten Tomatoes

Prime Video is getting a tidal wave of must-watch movies this month

I write about the new movies arriving on the best streaming services every single month, and I’ve rarely seen a slate as impressive as Prime Video in May 2024. 

It’s hard to know where to start when highlighting the best new Prime Video movies this month. There are so many must-watch flicks to talk about I could create multiple lists. Arguably the biggest new addition is “American Fiction” , a 2023 drama starring Jeffrey Wright that was a major player during awards season and took home an Oscar. 

“American Fiction” is just the tip of the iceberg. There are loads more options across practically every genre. Plus, all of the picks on this list scored 90% or higher on the review site Rotten Tomatoes, indicating that professional critics really liked these movies. 

So, let’s dive into the best new to Prime Video movies to watch this month...

'American Fiction' (2023) 

“American Fiction” is an awards-caliber satirical comedy that takes aim at the rampant exploitation of Black stories in our society. Based on the 2001 novel “Erasure” by American novelist Percival Everett, Jeffrey Wright plays Thelonious “Monk” Ellison, a writer living in L.A. who is deeply frustrated with the commercial success of so-called “Black” books that are filled with stereotypes. To assuage his irritation, he writes a novel mocking the literary tropes used in these novels, and much to his surprise — and annoyance — it becomes an instant bestseller. 

But Monk’s newfound success, and praise from his peers, don’t bring him happiness. Instead, he feels only more discontent. While grappling with the monster book he created, he’s also attempting to look after his mother who has Alzheimer’s disease, handle a family tragedy and steer his troubled brother , Cliff (Sterling K. Brown) onto the right path. “American Fiction” is a masterful blend of comedy and drama with some of the best performances of the whole year.

Rotten Tomatoes score:  93% Stream it on  Prime Video from May 14

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'BlacKkKlansman' (2018)

“BlacKkKlansman” is such an outrageous movie that you might assume it’s a work of fiction, but this Spike Lee joint is actually based on a true story. It sees Ron Stallworth (John David Washington), the first Black officer in the Colorado Springs Police Department, undertake a dangerous undercover mission within the Ku Klux Klan. Aided by a co-worker, Flip Zimmerman (Adam Diver), to act as a surrogate when Stallworth is required to show his face, he eventually rises to the rank of branch leader within the infamous hate group. 

While the movie is set in the 1970s, “BlacKkKlansman” has plenty to say about modern-day America, and the haunting ending includes footage from the 2017 riots in Charlottesville, Virginia making Lee’s point extremely clear. Remarkably, despite its serious subject matter and vitally important themes, the movie remains very funny throughout. The performances from Washington and Driver are also stellar.

Rotten Tomatoes score:  96% Stream it on  Prime Video from May 14

'Call Me By Your Name' (2018) 

Luca Guadagnino’s “Challengers” has given “Dune Part Two” a run for its money as my favorite movie of 2024 so far, but the movie that put the Italian director on the map was 2018’s “Call Me by Your Name.” This tender romantic drama is set in picturesque Northern Italy and sees a 17-year-old named Elio (Timothée Chalamet) begin a passionate affair over a blissful summer with his father’s graduate student assistant, Oliver (Armie Hammer). 

The heat of their romance burns bright through the sticky summer season, but as the autumn beckons, their relationship may prove to be just a fleeting moment in time, one to savor but impossible to keep hold of forever. Nominated for a slew of Oscar awards including Best Picture and Best Actor for Chalamet, the film took hold Best Adapted Screenplay in the end. Labeled a “power portrait of first love” in Rotten Tomatoes’ critical census, “Call Me By Your Name” will have you shedding melancholy tears, and put you off eating peaches (don’t ask…)

Rotten Tomatoes score:  94% Stream it on  Prime Video now

'Creed' (2015)

A franchise rarely delivers its knockout punch seven moves in, but that’s exactly what happened in the case of "Creed." This is a new spin on the "Rocky" series but exists within the same canon and features Sylvester Stallone in his iconic role as the underdog champ. "Creed" is a riveting sports drama that quickens the pulse and is so absorbing that you’ll probably be leaping from your sofa seat in excitement during the movie’s well-crafted final bout. 

Michael B. Jordan plays Adonis "Donnie" Johnson, the illegitimate youngest son of former heavyweight champion Apollo Creed, and all he wants is his shot at proving that he’s worthy of the Creed name. In steps Rocky Balboa, also a previous world champion, to train Donnie, and the duo’s bond rapidly develops both inside and outside the ring. Rocky and this next generation of Creed learn to rely on each other as the latter prepares for his shot at glory.

Rotten Tomatoes score:  95% Stream it on  Prime Video from May 16

'Pearl' (2022)

The middle chapter of Ti West’s X trilogy that is set to conclude with “MaXXine” later this summer, “Pearl” is technically a prequel to 2022’s “X” but it can be enjoyed by newcomers as well (although, I strongly recommend you watch both movies, as they’re equally excellent). Mia Goth plays the eponymous Pearl, a young woman living on her parent’s Texas ranch in 1918. Her husband is serving in World War I, but Pearl isn’t dreaming of his return, instead, she’s obsessed with a fantasy of becoming a Hollywood movie star. 

When Pearl gets the chance to audition for a touring dance troupe, she believes it could be her shot at stardom, but her ultra-conservative ma and pa (Tandi Wright and Matthew Sunderland) aren’t so keen to support their daughter’s acting ambitions. Pearl decides that she’ll need to take matters into her own hands to achieve her dream. This unnerving psychological horror movie works in large part because of the remarkable leading performance from Mia Goth, with one scene, in particular, a real showcase of her undeniable skills.

Rotten Tomatoes score:  93% Stream it on  Prime Video from May 16

'Schindler's List' (1994)

Among Steven Spielberg’s most celebrated movies of all time — which is really saying something when we’re talking about a director with as many masterpieces as Spielberg — “Schindler’s List” is a harrowing and haunting historical epic that focuses on the heroic work of Oskar Schindler during World War II. The tycoon worked tirelessly to save more than a thousand innocent Jewish people from a terrible fate at the hands of the German forces, and to this day his efforts stand as a testament to the power for good in all of us. 

Liam Neeson plays the titular role and does an excellent job bringing both sides of Schindler to life. The businessman starts as a vain and greedy industrialist but as the horrors of the Holocaust come to light, he becomes an inspirational figure. Along with help from his wife, Emilie Schindler (Caroline Goodall), he was able to keep hundreds of refugees safe from the SS forces. Neeson isn’t the only actor who shines; Ralph Fiennes is fearsome as German officer Amon Göth, and Ben Kingsley is excellent as Schindler's accountant, Itzhak Stern.

Rotten Tomatoes score:  98% Stream it on  Prime Video now

'Whiplash' (2014)

Netflix’s loss is Prime Video’s gain as “Whiplash” left the big red streaming service last month and has now made its current home on Amazon’s platform. This electrifying movie turns 10 this year but remains as pulsating and memorizing as ever. This intense drama centers on Andrew Neiman (Miles Teller), an ambitious young jazz drummer at the prestigious Shaffer Conservatory. Drafted into the school’s top Studio Band, Andrew thinks he’s on the fast track to fulfilling his musical potential but soon finds himself locked into a battle with the band’s cruel instructor, Terence Fletcher (J.K. Simmons).

Fletcher is alarmingly determined to push his students to their limits and isn’t afraid to deploy psychological, and even physical, abuse to extract the best from his pupils. As Andrew becomes increasingly obsessed with earning Fletcher’s seemingly unobtainable approval, he crosses dangerous lines into obsessive territory. Directed by Damien Chazelle, “Whiplash” is more exhilarating than many action movies, and it’s all set within the surprisingly claustrophobic confines of a music academy. It’s a masterpiece of modern cinema. Rotten Tomatoes score:  94% Stream it on  Prime Video now

'Airplane!' (1980)

"Airplane!" is one of those classic comedies that aside from a few cringe-worthy moments (like the seriously questionable "jive" scenes) still holds up today. This disaster film parody draws inspiration from the "Airport" series and "Zero Hour!," a '50s box office dud that "Airplane!" lifts its story beats, central characters and even some bits of dialogue from wholesale. It also pokes fun at leading blockbusters at the time ("Airplane!" hit theaters in 1980) like " Jaws " and "Saturday Night Fever."

The film proved to be a turning point for Leslie Nielsen's career, catapulting him from a dramatic actor into a comedy icon overnight. His character of Dr. Rumack stole the show for his impeccable deadpan delivery and straight-man persona as the chaos onboard grows ever more absurd. He went on to star in "The Naked Gun" franchise as Lt. Frank Drebin, a no-nonsense cop forever getting caught up in ridiculous situations. Just whatever you do, don't call him Shirley. 

Rotten Tomatoes score: 97% Stream it on Prime Video now

'12 Angry Men' (1957)

It's rare to see a film get a 100% "fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes — a unanimous first-ballot hall of famer in baseball may be the only feat rarer. But if any film was going to have universal acclaim, Sidney Lumet's "12 Angry Men" would be on the shortlist. 

Starring Henry Fonda, this film is often considered the best courtroom drama of all time. The movie centers around the jury deliberation for a case involving an 18-year-old boy accused of killing his abusive father. Many of the jury, in addition to Fonda stars Lee J. Cobb, Ed Begley, E. G. Marshall, and Jack Warden, wish to return a guilty verdict but cannot if there is a reasonable doubt. Don't miss this Best Picture nominee while it's available to watch for free.

Rotten Tomatoes score:  100%  Stream it on  Prime Video  now

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Rory is an Entertainment Editor at Tom’s Guide based in the UK. He covers a wide range of topics but with a particular focus on gaming and streaming. When he’s not reviewing the latest games, searching for hidden gems on Netflix, or writing hot takes on new gaming hardware, TV shows and movies, he can be found attending music festivals and getting far too emotionally invested in his favorite football team. 

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