“I’m alone, and nobody can fix it.” So prison warden Bernadine Williams describes carrying out executions. But she could be speaking for every character in Clemency, a film from writer/director Chinonye Chukwu. Loneliness and despair escort all on the walk toward death, Chukwu seems to say.

Filmmakers who tackle themes of social inequality sometimes allow agendas to run roughshod over storytelling. Producer Anthony Mackie and director George Nolfi take a more engaging approach in The Banker, delivering a teachable moment about racial injustice while keeping drama front and center. 

The film owes much of its watchability to an intriguing main character and top-notch performances from Mackie and Samuel L. Jackson. Strong language and a split focus are drawbacks.

The coronavirus pandemic has forced Hollywood studios to do what much of its audience already has: Turn their attention from the big screen to the small.

More schools in the United States are closed than open as states try to stop the spread of the new coronavirus. Students and their families face challenges and uncertainty not only about how they will learn, but also how to provide for the needs that schools meet for meals, special education, and disability accommodations.

Brielle Landman, a 10th grader at Champion Christian School in Champion, Pa., said her ADHD makes it difficult to keep to a schedule on her own.

In November 2015, just months after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Obergefell decision legalized same-sex marriage nationwide, Mormons took a hard stand for traditional families. Barely more than four years later, the flagship university of the Latter-day Saints relaxed its honor code barring all homosexual conduct.

It’s not a pretty sight: “Redneck KKK Museum” spelled out in big letters across a marquee. The year is 1996, and the Klan of Laurens, S.C., has refurbished a theater to display its pointed hoods, lynching photos, and other hateful memorabilia. The scene opens Burden, a new film based on an actual confrontation between a Klansman and a pastor. 

The gritty film landed a major prize at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival but has trouble pinpointing the real source of redemption. 

A giant water bug grabs a frog and injects it with enzymes that liquefy the hapless croaker’s innards. The aqueous insect then slurps dry its prey—an “amphibian-flavored Capri Sun”—casting the carcass away. A scene to teach the survival of the fittest? No, Isaiah 11. 

Dr. Gordon Wilson, narrating the spectacular new nature documentary The Riot and the Dance: Water (written by N.D. Wilson), yearns for the day the lion will lie down with the lamb. With a splash of wry humor, deep theology fills the deep Water.