OPENING THIS WEEK
THE FIRST PURGE
The latest film in the Purge horror franchise — in which America has one day a year when all crime is legal, and the goal for many people is simply to survive it — takes us back to the beginning of this bizarre tradition. It begins as a social experiment to keep crime down, but blossoms into a revolution against the oppressor class. Happy Fourth of July! Opens Tuesday, July 3. Rated R. 97 minutes. Regal Stadium 14. (Not reviewed)
THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ANDRÉ
Born in the American South during the Jim Crow era, legendary fashion editor André Leon Talley used education and an innate sense of style to infiltrate the upper echelons of the world of haute couture. He went on to work at Women’s Wear Daily, W, Interview, and the fashion bible, Vogue. In many ways, his is a classic American success story. Raised by his grandmother — a cleaning woman — in Durham, North Carolina, he transcended his working-class roots and racial barriers to become one of the most respected voices in fashion. The civil rights movement, racial and sexual identity, body image: his glow-up story has the potential to be about so much more than clothes. Filmmaker Kate Novack gives us glimpses of those universal themes, and a whiff of the bitterness and melancholy that emanates from the faded star. But the film feels aimed at too narrow an audience. Fashion fanatics will enjoy seeing clips of a young, thin, dandified Talley riding around Paris in a taxi with iconic designer Karl Lagerfeld. But lesser-informed moviegoers could easily leave the theater still unclear what the editor-at-large actually did for a living. Rated PG-13. 133 minutes. Center for Contemporary Arts. (Phaedra Haywood)
HEARTS BEAT LOUD
Rated PG-13. 97 minutes. Center for Contemporary Arts. See review, Page 48.
ON THE SEVENTH DAY
Brooklyn is now famous for gentrification, luxury condos, and coffee shops, but it still contains a some pockets of New York City’s old ideals as an immigrant city, wherein countless people strive to create new lives for themselves and their families. This movie centers on the Sunset Park neighborhood, and a group of recent Mexican immigrants who share a small apartment, work odd jobs where they can find them, and play in a local soccer league. José (Fernando Cardona) is the film’s protagonist; he’s a reliable restaurant deliveryman who is about to bring his pregnant wife to America from Mexico. He’s also the soccer team’s best player, and when he is asked to work the same day as the championship game, he must decide if he should play and risk losing his job, or work and risk letting his friends down. The acting is a little rough around the edges at times, but filmmaker Jim McKay has a poet’s eye for conveying a sense of place, and this unassuming character study harkens back to Italian neorealism in compelling and compulsively watchable ways. Not rated. 92 minutes. In Spanish with subtitles. Jean Cocteau Cinema. (Robert Ker)
SICARIO: DAY OF THE SOLDADO
This sequel to the 2015 indie hit turns the spotlight from Emily Blunt’s heroine Kate Macer (who does not appear at all) to Benicio del Toro’s ruthless Alejandro Gillick. The setting is once more the drug war on the border between the United States and Mexico, and with the cartels beginning to sneak terrorists into America, federal agent Matt Graver (Josh Brolin, reprising his role) enlists Alejandro to serve as the ultraviolent wild card. Alejandro kidnaps the daughter (Isabela Moner) of a drug lord to escalate tension between the cartels, and the job Sicario
doesn’t go as planned. Rated R. 122 minutes. Some screenings at Regal Stadium 14 are dubbed in Spanish. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Not reviewed) UNCLE DREW Boston Celtics guard Kyrie Irving dons several pounds of prosthetic makeup to play Uncle Drew, the septuagenarian with mad skills, in this adaptation of his popular Pepsi ads. Lil Rel Howery plays Dax, a young man who loses his entire team to a rival while attempting to win a street ball tournament in New York City’s Rucker Park. He seeks out hoops legend Uncle Drew, who recruits his old team (Shaquille O’Neal, Chris Webber, Reggie Miller, Nate Robinson, and Lisa Leslie), now all senior citizens, to make a comeback and win the big one. Rated PG-13. 103 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Not reviewed)