The House with a Clock in Its Walls (PG)
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This came out in 2018, and it's based on a 1973 novel of the same name, which I don't think I had ever heard of.

In 1955, a 10-year-old boy named Lewis Barnavelt goes to live with his uncle Jonathan (Jack Black) after his parents die. He soon learns that Jonathan is a warlock, and his neighbor, Florence Zimmerman (Cate Blanchett), is a witch. And they begin teaching Lewis magic. Meanwhile, Lewis befriends a boy at school named Tarby Corrigan, who is running for class president. But he turns out not to be such a good friend. There's also a girl named Rose Rita Pottinger, who we mostly see glancing at Lewis throughout the movie, but the two don't really interact and become friends until the end of the movie. That disappointed me, I wanted her to have a bigger role, but at least she's a much better friend than Tarby was. Also, Lewis has dreams in which his mother visits him and advises him, but I was suspicious about that from the start. It eventually leads to a revelation that I definitely did not see coming, but like... only the first half of the revelation really surprised me, the second half tied in to my vague suspicions about his mother. Anyway, a year before the movie takes place, a warlock named Isaac Izard (Kyle MacLachlan) died while performing a dangerous spell. Jonathan and Florence suspect he killed his wife, Selena, as part of the spell. They don't really know what the spell was meant to do, they just know it was something really bad. And eventually, for reasons I won't go into, Isaac returns from the dead to complete the spell, the nature of which I won't spoil. So Jonathan, Florence, and Lewis have to try to stop him. And of course, it all has to do with a clock that's hidden somewhere in Isaac's house, where Jonathan and Lewis now live, hence the movie's title.

Well, Black and Blanchett do a fine job with their roles, as always. The overall story is reasonably interesting and entertaining, and at times even a bit scary (hence my putting this review in the "scary movies" section). Still, I can't help but feel it could have been a bit better. I can't really put my finger on anything specific that I didn't like about it, but... whatever. It was a decent enough movie, and I'm glad to have seen it, but I doubt I'd ever feel the need to watch it again.