Why you can trust GamesRadar+
Having won two awards (Best Director at Sundance and Cannes' Un Certain Regarde 1999), plus much critical praise in the States, you'd expect helmer Eric Mendelsohn's Judy Berlin to be the very model of a successful indie film - and you'd be right - except that, disappointingly, it's a well-used model, and there's no mould-breaking happening here.
We're presented with a solid, beautifully shot look at how a solar eclipse affects the lives of several disenfranchised suburbanites, but nothing here feels fresh. Especially annoying is Mendelsohn's resorting to irony and self-reference, which makes you wish he'd get on with it and cut the "you-should-make-a-film-of-this-story" dialogue.
Still, to his credit, he's bagged a wonderful cast. Sopranos regular Edie Falco shines as the live-wire Berlin, giving the movie some much needed heart, and a diverting comedy performance from the late Madeline Khan makes this enjoyable, if nothing special.
James White is a freelance journalist who has been covering film and TV for over two decades. In that time, James has written for a wide variety of publications including Total Film and SFX. He has also worked for BAFTA and on ODEON's in-cinema magazine.
Diablo 4 dev is sending 666 buckets of literal bugs to "meat their maker" at a charity for hungry birds
The cult vampire third-person shooter that nearly bankrupted the small studio that made it is getting a film adaptation from the Transformers producer
Fallout mod site says it's like players are downloading Skyrim "twice every second" after Amazon TV series drives fans back to the open-world RPGs