“William Goldman reports that when Peter Sellers was asked if he’d do anything in his life differently, he responded with "I would do everything exactly the same except I wouldn't see The Magus." His advice should be ignored by anyone with 90-odd minutes to spare for a luscious, acid-trip sixties progenitor of Shutter Island crossed with Mamma Mia.”

“Perhaps only a seasoned yet relatively unknown Pixar artist, with no feature film directing experience but a wealth of personal memories, could make a Disney film about a pasta eating competition in 1950s Italy into a charming childhood homage, rather than an exercise in eye rolling.”

“Based on the RL Stine teen horror books beloved by a generation, the film version is expertly tailored to the taste of audiences seeking 90s comfort without 90s values, with a liberal measure (in all senses of the word) of small-town lesbian angst and ethnic diversity alongside the traditional blood-spattered cheerleading outfits and hordes of the undead.”

“Despite the tonal imbalance of heavier themes with the film's predictably fluffy aspects, and its formulaic reliance on saucer-eyed sidekicks and utterly unmemorable songs, the sheer novelty of a Disney movie wading into two of the most cancellable topics of the present decade.”

“The heavy breathing of screenwriter Michael Cristopher pervades The Witches of Eastwick, an adaptation of the John Updike novel which comes with the sweaty handprints of eighties Hollywood plastered all over it.”