“Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace” still haunts my DVD cabinet, 20 years later…

May of 1999 was a heady time for me. I was 32, and getting married in a month. My bachelor days were melting away into a new chapter of my life. I was going from an apartment to a house. As my fiancee (present-day wife) and I were planning the details of our life together,…

Alex Garland’s “Annihilation” creates something new from borrowed DNA…

Writer/director Alex Garland (“Ex Machina”) has a new science fiction movie in cinemas now that will probably not be a giant crowdpleaser/moneymaker, but it is also one of the most thought-provoking, intelligent and genuinely interesting movies I’ve seen since “Blade Runner 2049.”  And it’s not a sequel or a prequel, nor is it based on…