Film critic | Peter Howell Night Vision

Sparks fly and Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman ignite in "Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom"

Here's why Black musicians really do have reason to sing the blues in a white world.

The peace and love 1960s come to a violent end at Altamont '69 in "Gimme Shelter"

The worst Rolling Stones concert sparked the best (and most infamous) rock documentary.

David Fincher's "Mank" ably gets "Citizen Kane" — and also Hollywood's dark heart

David Fincher's "Mank" comes as a corrective of sorts to "Citizen Kane" mania.

The late, great Sean Connery on the late-career joy of working with a woman his own age

Sean Connery and Gena Rowlands enter the room like parents working a family reunion.

"Borat" sequel has secret weapon to make benefit of movie watchers

The humour is still gross, the cultural and political revelations are even nastier.

"The Trial of the Chicago 7" puts the past on the stand to galvanize the present

Aaron Sorkin psychically links Richard Nixon's paranoia with Donald Trump's megalomania.

"On the Rocks" finds Sofia Coppola coasting with a sleuthing Murray and Jones

Sofia Coppola's infidelity dramedy pairs Bill Murray with Rashida Jones.

Peter Howell's Top 10 films at TIFF 2020

At a Toronto International Film Festival where the pandemic changed almost everything, you could still count on one thing: the films.

Oscars Academy should learn from Bryan Adams "un-Canadian" debacle

A diversifying Academy could discover unintended consequences.

The bug can’t stop the buzz at TIFF 2020

For once this pandemic year, that tingling sensation isn’t the fear of COVID-19.

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Movies I can't live without

Toronto Star movie critic Peter Howell has written a book about his 25 favourite movies, with highly personal reviews from Apocalypse Now to The Wizard of Oz.

Here's a sample of his review of 2001: A Space Odyssey, his all-time favourite film:

"It was billed as The Ultimate Trip and the hyperbole was justified, then as now.

Stanley Kubrick's space opus still seems like the future, 52 years after its release and 19 years after its significant title year. It never gets old and I never tire of seeing it, even after 50-plus viewings..."