Chris Ellis’s Typical Vibe
Signature vibe

Highest-ranked title
Highest-ranked title
Chris Ellis has 11 titles in the CriticCrunch catalog across a career spanning the 1990s through the 2010s. 1 ranks in the Top 10%, led by October Sky.
Recurring themes

The true story of Homer Hickam, a coal miner's son who was inspired by the first Sputnik launch to take up rocketry against his father's wishes.
Dir. Joe Johnston · With Jake Gyllenhaal, Chris Cooper, Chris Owen

A Pennsylvania band scores a hit in 1964 and rides the star-making machinery as long as it can, with lots of help from its manager. But behind the scenes, the group’s sudden fame tests their strength, their maturity and responsibility, and their ability to resist the temptations that money and notoriety always make possible.
Dir. Tom Hanks · With Tom Hanks, Tom Everett Scott, Liv Tyler

Following the unexplained suicide of his wife Liza, website designer Wilson Joel turns to huffing gasoline fumes and remote control gaming while avoiding an inevitable conflict with his mother-in-law.
Dir. Todd Louiso · With Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jack Kehler, Sarah Koskoff

Claire is under the grip of a mysterious new cult called Faults. Desperate to be reunited with their daughter, Claire's parents recruit one of the world's foremost experts on mind control, Ansel Roth.
Dir. Riley Stearns · With Leland Orser, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Chris Ellis

Childlike Englishman, Mr. Bean, is an incompetent watchman at the Royal National Gallery. After the museum's board of directors' attempt to have him fired is blocked by the chairman, who has taken a liking to Bean, they send him to Los Angeles to act as their ambassador for the unveiling of a historic painting to humiliate him. Fooled, Mr. Bean must now successfully unveil the painting or risk his and a hapless Los Angeles curator's termination.
Dir. Mel Smith · With Rowan Atkinson, Peter MacNicol, Pamela Reed
In a politically-divided United States, a man struggles to make it through the Thanksgiving holiday without destroying his family.
Dir. Ike Barinholtz · With Ike Barinholtz, Tiffany Haddish, Billy Magnussen
At the height of Hitler's infamous U-boat war, the crew of the U.S.S. Swordfish were heading home after months at sea. They never made it. Now prisoners of war aboard U-boat 429, a small group of American survivors will find their loyalties put to the ultimate test when they're forced to join their German captors to fight for their very lives.
Dir. Tony Giglio · With William H. Macy, Til Schweiger, Scott Caan
Dorian and Angus chase down their womanizing stepfather with a helicopter, frightening him to death. In his effort to cover their tracks, Dorian begins investigating his stepfather's mistress, Sally. She works at a fast-food drive-through, she's pregnant and Dorian quickly falls in love with her. Unfortunately, his scheming mother wants Sally dead. And Sally isn't sure she wants Dorian to be her child's father and also his brother.
Dir. Dean Parisot · With Drew Barrymore, Catherine O'Hara, Luke Wilson

A young woman recuperating at her father's run-down home after a tragic accident soon encounters a terrifying presence with a connection to her long-deceased mother.
Dir. Kevin Greutert · With Sarah Snook, Mark Webber, Joelle Carter

An unsettling look at reality television, where a disturbing game show has its contestants ending their lives for the public's enjoyment.
Dir. Giancarlo Esposito · With Josh Duhamel, Famke Janssen, Giancarlo Esposito
FBI agent Joel Campbell, burnt-out and shell-shocked after years spent chasing serial killers, flees L.A. to begin a new life for himself in Chicago. But five months later, Joel's best laid plans are abruptly cut short when his new hometown becomes the setting for some particularly gruesome murders--murders that could only have been committed by one man: David Allen Griffin. One of Joel's most elusive and cunning nemeses, Griffin has followed his former pursuer to Chicago in order to play a sadistic game of cat and mouse. Taunting Joel with photographs of his intended victims and leaving his crime scenes meticulously free of clues in order to keep the police at bay, Griffin derives as much pleasure out of watching Joel react to every movement as watching his victims die. But when Griffin moves into Joel's inner circle, Joel must quickly find some way to stop him before someone close to him becomes the next one to die.
Dir. Joe Charbanic · With James Spader, Keanu Reeves, Marisa Tomei