Beandrea JULY

Editor’s Note: This review was originally published during the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival. “John Candy: I Like Me” debuts on Prime Video Friday, October 10.
I fell in love with John Candy the moment I saw him serve up those shovel-sized pancakes in “Uncle Buck.” John Hughes wrote the part of Uncle Buck specifically for Candy, and the uncle’s affection for his nieces and nephew was true in real life too.
Now, over 30 years after Candy’s death in 1994, comes a new documentary “Joh...

“It’s easier to get away with killing a woman. Sadly, society doesn’t care as much when a woman dies.”
That’s the reality of life in Saudi Arabia, said writer-director Haifaa Al-Mansour at the post-screening Q&A of her new film “Unidentified.” The film, which premiered at Toronto International Film Festival, opens with a truck speeding off after having deposited the body of a teenage girl dressed in a school uniform on an isolated desert peak.
The peach-tinted coloring of the sand fills the f...

For his feature directing debut, Aziz Ansari merges two familiar comedy devices: the body swap and the guardian angel intervention. In Ansari’s “Good Fortune,” an entry-level angel (Keanu Reeves) comes to the aid of a down-on-his-luck gig worker, Arj (Ansari), which involves Arj swapping lives with Jeff (Seth Rogen), a wealthy venture capitalist.
The jokes land: We witness Arj, an out-of-work documentary editor who wants to make his own films, hustle for TaskRabbit-type jobs. He botches a cin...

Colonial restitution meets ritual performance in Mati Diop’s latest film.
by Beandrea July
In a scene from the latest film by French Senegalese filmmaker Mati Diop, a pair of construction workers at the presidential palace in the West African nation of Benin stand transfixed. In their hard hats, the young men find an intimate moment with one of the 26 royal treasures newly returned by France, gazing upon them through a glass enclosure as they quietly discuss. Then, the sudden presence of pala...

It’s hard to think of a dancer who reps Los Angeles harder than Storm DeBarge. So when dance industry veteran Fatima Robinson needed a choreographer to bring authentic Westside flavor to the 2022 Super Bowl halftime show, she knew exactly who could translate L.A. dance culture to the football field.
For DeBarge, a native Angeleno, the opportunity was the moment she had been working toward—as a movement artist, choreographer and director. In a show headlined by Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg, featurin...

Brian Tyree Henry has made a career of playing men under pressure—haunted, hardened and often held back by systems much bigger than they are.
“Hopefully, I’ll be in a love story sooner or later,” he jokes, “because, boy, am I tired of running for my life.”
Henry drops that line near the end of our conversation. It’s funny, yes—but also revealing of his nearly two decades in the business. It isn’t always easy to live with the effects of what it’s like to embody these complex men, I guess.
“No,...

In “Luz,” writer-director Flora Lau immerses viewers in the mystical world of a simulated reality game of the same name. Set in Chongqing, one of China’s largest cities, the film follows Ren (Sandrine Pinna), a gallerist who travels to Paris to visit her stepmother, Sabine (Isabelle Huppert). Sabine, long divorced from Ren’s father — a successful painter — has recently experienced fainting spells that have landed her in the hospital. Despite her serious health issues, she takes a laissez-fair...

The premiere of the genre-blurring feature “BLKNWS: Terms & Conditions” at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival is a drama in and of itself: just days before it was scheduled to screen, the rights-holder to the film pulled it from the festival. Then, a few days into the festival, a surprise sale of the rights to a new owner cleared the way for the film to screen after all. Neither Kahlil Joseph, the artist and filmmaker who directed the film, nor Shari Frilot, the Senior Film Programmer who introd...

The Sundance Film Festival is returning to Park City, Utah, with a slate of more than 120 independent films making their debut to an in-person crowd for the first time in two years. The festival attracts filmmakers and actors from around the globe hoping to become the next “Little Miss Sunshine” or “Get Out.”

Author Q& A with Alison Mariella Désir on her memoir "Running While Black"

A look back at “Pariah,” the coming-of-age drama from the writer-director Dee Rees on its 10th Anniversary.

Season 1: Co-created, Co-hosted, Produced, Edited and Mixed by Beandrea July

CherryPicks presents CherryPop: a podcast about women and sex onscreen. Tune in each week for our deep dives into some of the most compelling portrayals of female pleasure in film and television. Hosts Beandrea July and Meg McCarthy take listeners on a journey to celebrate feminine pleasure across a diverse and wide-ran

A Black feminist discussion of the FX miniseries MRS. AMERICA starring Cate Blanchett, Rose Byrne, Uzo Aduba, Niecy Nash, Margo Martindale, Sarah Paulson.

Featuring The Greenidge Sisters: Kaitlyn, Kerri and Kirsten.

Produced, Edited, Mixed by Beandrea July