Review: “The Mastermind”

He looks at the art, but he isn’t really looking at it. As he slowly slopes around the museum galleries, one of his young sons chattering animatedly in the otherwise silent place as the guard snoozes in his chair nearby, it’s clear from his furtive glances that he’s searching for something. Eventually, he sets his […]

Review: “Showing Up”

Lizzy (Michelle Williams) is an artist on the verge of a breakthrough—or a breakdown. Either path seems completely viable throughout Showing Up, writer and director Kelly Reichardt’s low-key yet incisive character study of a working modern artist. By day, Lizzy does administrative work for the Portland art school of which her mother Jean (Maryann Plunkett) […]

Review: “First Cow”

In her 2010 western “Meek’s Cutoff,” director Kelly Reichardt explored a group of pioneers trying to survive on the frontier in 19th century Oregon. Reichardt returns to that time and place with her new drama, “First Cow,” which she also co-wrote along with frequent collaborator Jonathan Raymond (who also penned the novel The Half Life […]