Andy Garcia

Rating: 3.5/5.0

CHICAGO – Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com appears on “The Morning Mess” with Dan Baker on WBGR-FM (Monroe, Wisconsin) on May 11th, reviewing “Book Club: The Next Chapter,” the sequel to the popular first film from 2018. In theaters on May 12th.

Rating: 3.0/5.0

CHICAGO – Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com appears on The Eddie Volkman Show on WSSR-FM (Star 96.7 Joliet, Illinois) on May 7th, 2021, reviewing the new release “Wrath of Man,” opening in theaters on May 7th, 2021.

Rating: 3.5/5.0

CHICAGO – I give in. “Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again,” the sequel to the much derided “Mamma Mia,” is a bubbly, frothy here-come-the-good-times musical that fits summer like a glove. The flashback format will also answer all the burning questions that were left unanswered from the first film, and the cast includes Cher!

Rating: 3.0/5.0

CHICAGO – The use of science fiction for all kind of stories is one of the hottest go-to genres for Hollywood today. “Passengers” is a love story, and adds the visual glory of modern special effects…but the soapy tale of a star-crossed (literally) couple is problematic and cliché ridden, and breaks at the end with heroics that are shoehorned into the rest of the scenario.

Rating: 4.5/5.0

CHICAGO – When journalists were heroes and exposed those in power for their sins, movies were made like “All the President’s Men.” Gary Webb of the San Jose Mercury News was one of those journalist heroes during the 1990s, but he wasn’t celebrated in his time. The indictments, induced paranoia and outright lies against him are distinctly chronicled in the luminary “Kill the Messenger.”

Rating: 3.0/5.0

CHICAGO – The premise is sound, but the new film “Let’s Be Cops” refuses to do something original with the premise of a couple of regular Joes pretending to be Johnny Law. The same stale jokes and inevitable need for heroic action climax overwhelms the mild amusement of it all.

Rating: 3.0/5.0

CHICAGO – Since the world has been clamoring for a film about high school seniors touring a liberal arts college, “At Middleton” fills the bill, and throws in a symbolic midlife liaison between characters portrayed by Andy Garcia and Vera Farmiga, tripping across their own “life campus.”

Rating: 3.0/5.0

CHICAGO – “For Greater Glory” attempts to bring back the David Lean style epic – even recruiting Peter O’Toole from “Lawrence of Arabia” to participate – in the story of a Mexican religious war in the 1920s. While a sincere effort, it can’t match the story to the epic history. The cast includes Andy Garcia, Eva Longoria and Bruce Greenwood.

Rating: 1.5/5.0

CHICAGO – “5 Days of War” is a stark reminder of the atrocities that can occur when a B-movie director tries to tackle serious material. The Russo-Georgian War of 2008 was largely ignored by the U.S. government and media, so it was only a matter of time until filmmakers attempted to raise belated awareness about the devastation.

Rating: 3.0/5.0

CHICAGO – A blue collar worker father who has a secret Marlon Brando obsession (gasp!), a son with an improbable fetish and a daughter who quits college to…strip, this is a normal day-in-the-life in the new film “City Island.”