Popular reviews

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  Review by 24framesofnick ★★★★ 2

  Did not expect this from Marvel a nice surprise!

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  Review by sakana1 ★★★½ 5

  This feels quite old-fashioned, albeit in the best way possible. Many of the scenes are very stagey (I still can't quite believe it wasn't based on a play), most of the characters are two-dimensional types (the mouthy, unreliable wife; the husband who isn't as honest as he seems; the cop who is a little more clever than everyone gives him credit for), and it's set against a backdrop of New York theater, a reality which makes it impossible not to think of All About Eve as the story kicks into gear.

  But it's so much fun! Yes, the characters are two-dimensional, but how much does it really matter when Ginger Rogers is having the time of her life as a…

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  Review by Richard Chandler ★★★½

  “You’re not afraid you’ll be charged with frivolity?”

  A psychotic home wrecker masquerading as an aspiring scribe (Peggy Ann Garner) sows chaos in the life of a gullible Broadway playwright (Van Heflin) and his coterie. Powered by a phenomenal Ginger Rogers supporting turn and interspersed with gorgeous Technicolor exteriors of mid-50’s Manhattan, writer/director/producer Nunnally Johnson’s Black Widow is admittedly little more than a tacky All About Eve knockoff reimagined as a lurid noir/whodunnit. But who really needs much more than that? Not me as it turns out.

  In my New York movies ranked list.

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  Review by Sara Clements ★★★½

  less crusty dudes and more ginger and gene pls and thanks!!

  you know those movies where you want the killer to be a certain person and clink clink bitch turns out it was who you wanted?? love that shit

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  Review by kylie ★★★★½

  Sick and Tired of my mom guessing who the murderer is 5 minutes into a film

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  Review by Zoë 🐝 ★★★★

  Park Avenue Agatha Christie...but make it Vincente Minnelli.

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  Review by ✨Angelica Jade Bastién🔮 ★★½ 1

  While I appreciate the dynamics of color and Cinemascope being used this is more melodrama than noir as it has been dubbed in Criterion Channel’s Fox Noir package. It feels like it’s ripping ideas from All About Eve in certain respects about Broadway actresses and aging and desire. A fun watch with some intriguing parts but doesn’t quite rise to the level of the ideas aching to be explored.

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  Review by eely ★★½

  gene tierney sits on the same couch looking perplexed the entire film and somehow still steals the show. get that paycheck girlie you deserve it.

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  Review by Sally Jane Black

  I really liked how often people walked in a room and took off their hats all at the same time. That's the sort of choreographed gesture we don't see anymore. If this were made ten years later, it'd be much seedier.

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  Review by J ★★★

  Criterion Channel - Fox Noir #5

  When an act of benevolence is twisted into the demands of a murder inquiry, there spins under its slanderous conjectures these threads of lies waiting to entrap and devour its prey. Aspiring writer Nancy Ordway strikes up a conversation with married Broadway producer Peter Denver at a party. Believing himself genuinely helpful in lending his flat for her writing—while his equally famous wife attends to her sick mother in another state—their innocent relationship becomes a hive of gossip and hearsay. What sprinkles it with malignant speculations is when they found Ordway hanged in his bathroom one afternoon. In her death only begins the telling of concocted stories, disentangling of intersecting romantic affairs, wrongful accusations,…

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  Review by Channing Pomeroy ★★★ 3

  If you want to double the number of potential murder suspects for your audience to consider, don’t name the movie Black Widow

  Along with Niagara 1953, Black Widow, is a key exhibit in the argument about whether a film noir can be in color? Some say this is simply murder mystery, others claim Peggy Ann Garner’s fatale manipulations twist this from whodunit into noir.

  Regardless, it’s still is an enjoyable B-thriller stretched out in lovely but unnecessary CinemaScope with some engaging performances. Aside from Garner, Ginger Rogers and George Raft are clearly having a blast getting a chance to play for the other team this time.

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  Review by Wes Edwards ★★ 6

  A potboiler that never boils, Black Widow is an instantly forgettable 1954 B-movie.

  It's a murder mystery set among the elites of Broadway--the great actress Carlotta Marin (Ginger Rogers) and her rival Iris Denver (Gene Tierney). They are frenemies, to use a more contemporary word, and neighbors in a swanky building overlooking Central Park. Iris is married to Peter Denver (Van Heflin), the producer of Carlotta’s latest star vehicle. Carlotta's husband Brian Mullen (Reginald Gardiner) is a weakling, who is afraid of upsetting the diva. There ought to be plenty of juicy over-the-top dialogue in a setup like that, even before the murderous doings get going. Alas, no. This is fairly dull and tiresome all the way through.

  The trouble…