Arts & Culture

Skyscraper is a family-bonding adventure film starring Dwayne Johnson, Neve Campbell and two elementary-aged children who are as good at appearing darling (in the early scenes) as they are at playacting the role of traumatized hostages (in the later scenes)

Shock and Awe is a 90-minute liberal told-you-so, a polemic that, like a long Rachel Maddow segment, is more cheery than thunderous, even as it names the names that must be named

… The plot’s developments at times could seem tenuous, but I found them totally daring and confident, as though Riley knew the rules of every screenwriting guide and the demand for “realism,” and he said, “Nah, I’m good,” because he had bigger points to make …

The film even confronts its own audience in some ways, as it goes from a tale of three people learning more about their identities, to one about the very nature of human identity itself …

… There’s an urgency and an anger this time around that helps paper over some of the story’s messiness, as well as some of the awkward drama of trying to explain where this whole crazy Purge idea actually came from