Women Talking briefing
3 (out of 4)
Sarah Polley’s small, sensible career is altogether assured, admirable and, now with Women Talking, even trickier to pin down. She’s moved from Alzheimer’s awareness in her wise-beyond-her-years Away from Her, a fairly devastating romantic drama wrapped inside a moving, masterfully mature PSA, to Take This Waltz’s similar strains of adultery and related consequences running through the core drama. Especially contrasted to Women Talking’s dour, grey-washed palette, Waltz was as bright and saturated as can be, quietly transcending a Woody Allen romcom premise and commenting on the actuality of acting on extramarital impulses more considerably than that neurotic Jew could most of the time.
Then immediately the year after there was Stories We Tell, an extremely personal detour, a Morris-style reconstruction and exploration of one’s past, full of revelations worthy of the intense introspection so soon into one’s career. Her own biological 23-and-Me narrative is actually astounding, and the collective family memory dump is a clarifying, workmanlike comb through her mother’s history as pieced together by Polley and the rest of her relatives.
Women Talking is about as quaint and formidably academic in the way it engages theme and narrative — the barnyard boardroom conversations drone on (this could be 12 Angry Women Talking instead) and at worst come off robotic. The stiffness could just be Rooney Mara, the movie’s calm, oddly more agreeable moral center — she’s still generally great, whereas 2020s breakout Jessie Buckley does well as the movie’s asshole and literal punching bag, while Claire Foy is acutely accessed for her aggressive, bug-eyed, blisteringly emotional, righteous rage. Their respective mother’s are also finely tailored characters (Bird-like Sheila McCarthy as Mom to Buckley’s bitch and Judith Ivy as the matriarch for Foy and Mara’s characters). Ben Wishaw is the sole male presence, simping for Rooney and her rape-baby and rubbing off like the Amish version of the classic nice guy. Watching Mara lap water out of Wishaw’s hands was the least romantic moment I’ve watched I some time, and I sat through Empire of Light.
The film prudently pressed emotion forward by doing nothing more than elaborating on the relevant arguments. Otherwise the humor is too light, sometimes the film’s enactment is too literal and the more expectantly heart-tugging aspects (courtship, voice over reflection via Kate Hallett, one of the few young voices in the film) somewhat cold to the touch… It’s a brutal, harrowing story that rests at the crossroads of what matters most to the layman, with a precedent of horrible, violent discoveries going in, and unfathomable discovery (at least for those who were sheltered in the year 2010) for the aftermath — Women Talking 2 would be something: cute, funny, absolutely gritty, anything.
But this was a classic affair where the movie was what it was, leaving little to interpret or comment on — when your main stance is 'rape bad,' once we get past all their illiteracy and religious limitations, it’s just a game of weighing overdue revenge alongside turning the other cheek as the lady Mennonite assembly heads out the country. I love films with more discourse to offer than answers, but Women Talking couldn’t help but make its points many times over. Nevertheless Polley is an artist who has taken an authentic, honorable endeavor into pure feminist cinema, enriched by thorough, judicious screenwriting and a truly anti-commercial setup. Orion Pictures' weirdest comeback to critical favor is too fearless and forcefully acted to be disappointed in, even if this is an offshoot of Oscar fare people will most readily stick their nose up at. Women Talking is intimate and studiously structured, dipping into its subject's darkness just enough to let imagination make do with the rest.
Sarah Polley’s small, sensible career is altogether assured, admirable and, now with Women Talking, even trickier to pin down. She’s moved from Alzheimer’s awareness in her wise-beyond-her-years Away from Her, a fairly devastating romantic drama wrapped inside a moving, masterfully mature PSA, to Take This Waltz’s similar strains of adultery and related consequences running through the core drama. Especially contrasted to Women Talking’s dour, grey-washed palette, Waltz was as bright and saturated as can be, quietly transcending a Woody Allen romcom premise and commenting on the actuality of acting on extramarital impulses more considerably than that neurotic Jew could most of the time.
Then immediately the year after there was Stories We Tell, an extremely personal detour, a Morris-style reconstruction and exploration of one’s past, full of revelations worthy of the intense introspection so soon into one’s career. Her own biological 23-and-Me narrative is actually astounding, and the collective family memory dump is a clarifying, workmanlike comb through her mother’s history as pieced together by Polley and the rest of her relatives.
Women Talking is about as quaint and formidably academic in the way it engages theme and narrative — the barnyard boardroom conversations drone on (this could be 12 Angry Women Talking instead) and at worst come off robotic. The stiffness could just be Rooney Mara, the movie’s calm, oddly more agreeable moral center — she’s still generally great, whereas 2020s breakout Jessie Buckley does well as the movie’s asshole and literal punching bag, while Claire Foy is acutely accessed for her aggressive, bug-eyed, blisteringly emotional, righteous rage. Their respective mother’s are also finely tailored characters (Bird-like Sheila McCarthy as Mom to Buckley’s bitch and Judith Ivy as the matriarch for Foy and Mara’s characters). Ben Wishaw is the sole male presence, simping for Rooney and her rape-baby and rubbing off like the Amish version of the classic nice guy. Watching Mara lap water out of Wishaw’s hands was the least romantic moment I’ve watched I some time, and I sat through Empire of Light.
The film prudently pressed emotion forward by doing nothing more than elaborating on the relevant arguments. Otherwise the humor is too light, sometimes the film’s enactment is too literal and the more expectantly heart-tugging aspects (courtship, voice over reflection via Kate Hallett, one of the few young voices in the film) somewhat cold to the touch… It’s a brutal, harrowing story that rests at the crossroads of what matters most to the layman, with a precedent of horrible, violent discoveries going in, and unfathomable discovery (at least for those who were sheltered in the year 2010) for the aftermath — Women Talking 2 would be something: cute, funny, absolutely gritty, anything.
But this was a classic affair where the movie was what it was, leaving little to interpret or comment on — when your main stance is 'rape bad,' once we get past all their illiteracy and religious limitations, it’s just a game of weighing overdue revenge alongside turning the other cheek as the lady Mennonite assembly heads out the country. I love films with more discourse to offer than answers, but Women Talking couldn’t help but make its points many times over. Nevertheless Polley is an artist who has taken an authentic, honorable endeavor into pure feminist cinema, enriched by thorough, judicious screenwriting and a truly anti-commercial setup. Orion Pictures' weirdest comeback to critical favor is too fearless and forcefully acted to be disappointed in, even if this is an offshoot of Oscar fare people will most readily stick their nose up at. Women Talking is intimate and studiously structured, dipping into its subject's darkness just enough to let imagination make do with the rest.
The Son briefing
3 (out of 4)
The Father came out of nowhere, going from 2020’s Oscar homework to the best of the nominees and a great mindfuck in a year full of goodies: Tenet, the third World of Tomorrow, I’m Thinking of Ending Things for God’s sake. Florian Zeller, the French playwright ambitiously adapting his features in English for the screen, was quickly able to accelerate the second entry of his spiritual trilogy with an impressive cast and fresh hopes to connect with critics as he’d done so swimmingly out the gate.
From the shit reception (like 29% on RT?) I expected a real ham sandwich but was also equally ready to find out everyone’s taste is too touchy, perhaps unable to process straight, hard drama with nothing to ‘get.’ The only complaint I could see is that perhaps this movie should have talked more clearly about mental illness instead of playing out as this rich white people melodrama but, uh, the whole point of The Son is some parents are truly out of their depths, especially the one’s assuming their kids’ most troubling problems are ‘fixable.’ Outside of an “It’s Not Unusual” dance session transitioning to some staggeringly strange isolation-implicit slow-motion, there’s little in this film that stoops to banality, easy answers or Oscar moments. Zeller maps out the gulf between you thinking you understand your offspring and what the fuck is actually going on inside their head while, just as harshly, showing what it takes for a parent to not feel like they’re screwing everything sideways, how rough it really can be for Mom and Pop to move through moments that go from fantastically fulfilling to worse than death.
As a grand weepie and borderline confrontational approach to how mental maladjustment is discussed on-screen, I’m sure the cinematic generalizing and black-as-night ending will leave the fragile inarguably and understandably triggered, and more than a couple critics feeling manipulated. But the lack of internality works pretty great for both stage and screen, Zeller doing his best to articulate the unspeakable when words are required — I think some might find it a little hokey the way our titular male heir (Zen McGrath as 17-year-old Nicolas) describes his pain because IT IS hard to talk about. I know firsthand how much it takes, sometimes a single sentence describing the anxiety or depression can be as much effort as carrying on with their day.
In its most complete despair, this ‘entertainment’ is about the sheer fucking GUILT and just THE SHAME OF KNOWING JUST HOW TRULY POWERLESS YOU ARE. The Son brutally tries to find the words for the invisible ailments those who suffer neurologically struggle to name and those outside who can only hazard guesses at, it all boiling down to the dumb, daunting question, “How are you doing?” A more important communication is one of Zeller’s own — “Love will not be enough,” man. Forget debate, Florian basically states, “It’s nurture” — nature is just whatever we nurture. That dichotomous showdown now has a fresh wrinkle, the film wriggling out of its soap opera shaping and shaking the inherent staginess with the same solid editing that enhanced The Father. Still, with no psychologically stylistic angle other than the cross to bear that is teenage parenting, this film is not as cerebrally magnificent or spectacularly emotional, but it is a strong, serious movie with tearful truths to utter.
Speaking of dichotomies, Zeller’s scripts contrasts motherly warmth with fatherly casualness, bedtime sendoffs from “I love you” to a fist bump. Laura Dern’s done no wrong (oh wait, Jurassic World: Dominion, eh I forgive her, the legend), Hugh Jackman was pretty perfect for the somewhat stereotypical role — you’d think the film’s angle would be the “I HAVE A RIGHT TO REINVENT MY LIFE!” moment ad nauseum (“Yeah I’m an asshole character for leaving old used up Laura Dern for hot young Vanessa Kirby”). It’s a setup for quite the one-dimensional patriarchal role, but the character’s humanity is there to latch onto. Young McGrath was very committed too — in a cool, more than uncommon bit of time-induced practicality, they clearly let the teen age a bit just for the added effect of the all-too peachy keen fake-out happy ending epilogue. Grief-granted fantasy or no, McGrath had literally had grown up, his nose further jutting out of his face. Anthony Hopkins, as grandfather to The Son, shows up only to say “just fucking get over it?” Pretty nasty...
The ending is almost doomed in advance for characters and moviemakers… how DO you end this? You’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t… Zeller decides to have it both ways providing the innate desire for someee kind of emotional closure, yet he wants even more to impart the knowledge that nothing’s going to be ok — haha, oh no no, things are fucked from here through the rest of your life. The way The Son leaves you will piss plenty of people off probably because of how calmly young Nicolas goes through with it — but the linchpin of this story is the sheer ignorance of thinking “Wow, we did a great job, we fixed everything” and then BLAMMO — the implications are horrific, and despite whatever Lifetime movie people aside from me are seeing, The Son will stay with you, if agonizingly so. I may have put an extended hold on any procreation plans.
The Father came out of nowhere, going from 2020’s Oscar homework to the best of the nominees and a great mindfuck in a year full of goodies: Tenet, the third World of Tomorrow, I’m Thinking of Ending Things for God’s sake. Florian Zeller, the French playwright ambitiously adapting his features in English for the screen, was quickly able to accelerate the second entry of his spiritual trilogy with an impressive cast and fresh hopes to connect with critics as he’d done so swimmingly out the gate.
From the shit reception (like 29% on RT?) I expected a real ham sandwich but was also equally ready to find out everyone’s taste is too touchy, perhaps unable to process straight, hard drama with nothing to ‘get.’ The only complaint I could see is that perhaps this movie should have talked more clearly about mental illness instead of playing out as this rich white people melodrama but, uh, the whole point of The Son is some parents are truly out of their depths, especially the one’s assuming their kids’ most troubling problems are ‘fixable.’ Outside of an “It’s Not Unusual” dance session transitioning to some staggeringly strange isolation-implicit slow-motion, there’s little in this film that stoops to banality, easy answers or Oscar moments. Zeller maps out the gulf between you thinking you understand your offspring and what the fuck is actually going on inside their head while, just as harshly, showing what it takes for a parent to not feel like they’re screwing everything sideways, how rough it really can be for Mom and Pop to move through moments that go from fantastically fulfilling to worse than death.
As a grand weepie and borderline confrontational approach to how mental maladjustment is discussed on-screen, I’m sure the cinematic generalizing and black-as-night ending will leave the fragile inarguably and understandably triggered, and more than a couple critics feeling manipulated. But the lack of internality works pretty great for both stage and screen, Zeller doing his best to articulate the unspeakable when words are required — I think some might find it a little hokey the way our titular male heir (Zen McGrath as 17-year-old Nicolas) describes his pain because IT IS hard to talk about. I know firsthand how much it takes, sometimes a single sentence describing the anxiety or depression can be as much effort as carrying on with their day.
In its most complete despair, this ‘entertainment’ is about the sheer fucking GUILT and just THE SHAME OF KNOWING JUST HOW TRULY POWERLESS YOU ARE. The Son brutally tries to find the words for the invisible ailments those who suffer neurologically struggle to name and those outside who can only hazard guesses at, it all boiling down to the dumb, daunting question, “How are you doing?” A more important communication is one of Zeller’s own — “Love will not be enough,” man. Forget debate, Florian basically states, “It’s nurture” — nature is just whatever we nurture. That dichotomous showdown now has a fresh wrinkle, the film wriggling out of its soap opera shaping and shaking the inherent staginess with the same solid editing that enhanced The Father. Still, with no psychologically stylistic angle other than the cross to bear that is teenage parenting, this film is not as cerebrally magnificent or spectacularly emotional, but it is a strong, serious movie with tearful truths to utter.
Speaking of dichotomies, Zeller’s scripts contrasts motherly warmth with fatherly casualness, bedtime sendoffs from “I love you” to a fist bump. Laura Dern’s done no wrong (oh wait, Jurassic World: Dominion, eh I forgive her, the legend), Hugh Jackman was pretty perfect for the somewhat stereotypical role — you’d think the film’s angle would be the “I HAVE A RIGHT TO REINVENT MY LIFE!” moment ad nauseum (“Yeah I’m an asshole character for leaving old used up Laura Dern for hot young Vanessa Kirby”). It’s a setup for quite the one-dimensional patriarchal role, but the character’s humanity is there to latch onto. Young McGrath was very committed too — in a cool, more than uncommon bit of time-induced practicality, they clearly let the teen age a bit just for the added effect of the all-too peachy keen fake-out happy ending epilogue. Grief-granted fantasy or no, McGrath had literally had grown up, his nose further jutting out of his face. Anthony Hopkins, as grandfather to The Son, shows up only to say “just fucking get over it?” Pretty nasty...
The ending is almost doomed in advance for characters and moviemakers… how DO you end this? You’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t… Zeller decides to have it both ways providing the innate desire for someee kind of emotional closure, yet he wants even more to impart the knowledge that nothing’s going to be ok — haha, oh no no, things are fucked from here through the rest of your life. The way The Son leaves you will piss plenty of people off probably because of how calmly young Nicolas goes through with it — but the linchpin of this story is the sheer ignorance of thinking “Wow, we did a great job, we fixed everything” and then BLAMMO — the implications are horrific, and despite whatever Lifetime movie people aside from me are seeing, The Son will stay with you, if agonizingly so. I may have put an extended hold on any procreation plans.
White Noise briefing
3 (out of 4)
At last, at year’s end, following an endless cycle of swollen expectations that burst in my face, I mercifully was not let down by one of the pillars of my cinematic interest, Mr. Noah Baumbach. Rearing the shortcomings of so many trustworthy writer-directors this year (Cameron, Chazelle, Garland, Raimi, Dominik) it was so nice to have another thoughtfully crafted feature from the States’ bonafide Woody Allen, the reigning existentialist comedy king, one of the true mirrors of moviemaking, always accurately reflecting back our own selfish, socially stunted, solipsistic ticks. White Noise, despite illustrious source material, may be Baumbach’s weakest in awhile but it’s only because he’s taking substantial risks — not at all unlike his contemporaries — that actually manifest into something new, interesting and percolating with meaning, rather than allowing artistic indulgence to languidly fortify shelter up there onscreen.
I was dying to see White Noise around Thanksgiving when the Netflix production made its ceremonial round in limited release to secure any sliver of a chance at awards prestige ahead of a streaming release, as this is the third Baumbach film to primarily rely on the digital platform’s distribution. The first, 2017’s family tree fantastique The Meyerowitz Stories, is akin to White Noise in its multiple threads of genealogical history to separate and keep straight within our domestic unit, as familial notions have become a running preoccupation for Baumbach, who has been sailing through middle age for some time.
First off, for my own interest (Oh my God I’m actually compelled to read! Which reminds me I guess I should get back to Dune now that Part Two will be here in no time…) White Noise marks the filmmaker of 25 years’ first adaptation 11 features in, making an enviable COVID project/distraction of the aptly appropriate nuclear disaster satire cum romantic/pharmaceutical drama White Noise, Don Delillo’s 1985 postmodern novel. Though on first viewing I was about as far into the lit classic as I was into Frank Herbert’s epic (not far), upon completion I can eagerly say Delillo’s voice is a perfect suit to Baumbach’s own methodical, mathematically funny exchanges and devilish dissections of contemporary concerns, swapping his usual sociological satire for a largely cultural critique.
And that is hardly to say he isn’t broadening his palette optically — I’ve never seen Baumbach work with visual effects before, and you can tell green(screen) is not his best color even though he was backed by the perpetually indebted streamer who shelled out 100 MILLION DOLLARS (do I really see where that money went?) for a film they barely marketed on or offline. Baumbach may have been out of his depth for the midwest derailment sequence… Ain’t it the most creepy kind of satisfying when life reflects art congruously rather than imitatively happening in the other direction? Noah’s primary plots and topics hinge on straight reality, if a theatrically heightened one, and he’s never had much excuse for ripples of horror/thriller modes (though that “thing with the knife” in Marriage Story was good practice). Yet he handles hilarious societal panic with panache, impressively emulating the “panoramic disorder” of Delillo’s key midway climax in the second act’s Airborne Toxic Event like a classier, Mel Brooks take on War of the Worlds.
Aurally, Danny Elfman’s score was so eerily 80s I coulda sworn LCD Soundsystem was back for more of their own white noise material (as I swear I never register their invisible presence backdropping While We’re Young) but their original song contribution “new body rhumba” is so good (thematically targeted and yet up to the artist’s rambling rocker traditions) I couldn’t possibly knock Baumbach for ending with a grocery store dancing sequence during credits like Fantastic Mr Fox (one of two Wes Anderson co-writing collabs). I’d like to hope there’s an Oscar nod in store for James Murphy — c’mon, fuck Lady Gaga’s Top Gun song, seriously.
Baumbach is literally “first-rate” at superbly stark scene transitions, hard cuts with harder hilarity — few excel so deftly at getting a laugh from a simple edit. His precisely timed juxtapositions are just montage theory at its most intuitively ironic. The color spectrum is wider than Baumbach’s had reason for before and, like Meyerowitz, the writing is so dense that White Noise will, if nothing else, be rich in rewatchability, so be it if the overlapping dialogue gives the neophyte an intended headspin. I think if anyone’s gonna make a retro-dystopian lampoon — one precisely parodying the consumer culture, media saturation, all the pervasive excesses and prescribed comforts of the 80s zeitgeist, the absurdity of both personal safety and complacency in the face of all these unknown variables like disease, disaster, adultery and medicinal fuckery — it had to be ma boy Baumbach. No one else I can think of could smooth out all the novel’s disparate themes and force you to accept the lopsided structure.
Removed by nearly four decades from publications, this movie’s 80s alternate universe allows Baumbach to take seasoned, sardonic takes on the fear of death, a contrast of concern for Adam Driver’s leading man between refusing to accept an imminent ecological cataclysm and then getting riled up over passing jealousy and cuckoldry. Driver (in his fifth collaboration with Baumbach) is perfect as middle-aged, four-marriage-deep Advanced Nazism-instructing College-on-the-Hill professor Jack Gladney. Baumbach’s own wife and creative confidant stars as the impossibly topped Babette, to whom Greta Gerwig is well-suited. Their assortment of previously conceived children (all but little Wilder) is also a notable, delightfully deadpan collection of underage talent (Raffey Cassidy as Denise [Killing of a Sacred Deer] and real-life siblings Sam and May Nivola respectively as Heinrich and Steffie). Don Cheadle's tasty turn as Murray (the novel’s funniest, most observant character, the elucidating, seriously silly deep-thinker and academic associate of Jack) is good stuff for the prolific performer — he electrifies the dignified, fastidious, fundamentally odd supporting character.
But in the same way Driver has commented on Baumbach’s original screenplays as bibles of unchanging text (hopefully manipulated by good performance like Shakespeare or some sorta similarly sublime scripting), Noah’s new challenge of condensing and cutting from Don’s decadently loquacious, almost pulverizingly philosophical writing can be a tough obstacle, though, for the cinematic realm, he is pulling off tonal inconsistencies that shouldn’t even be possible. The novel’s dialogue is often so good it’s a question about what you don’t keep and, like his gold standard pictures, White Noise is packed with all I care about from the shrewd, sensible writer-director — wit and truth tautly tethered through verbal revelations and all the things the literary end of moviegoing can do to tickle (or tackle) the brain.
The fact that he’s reached for more dynamic, divergent aspirations is his choice — after Marriage Story seemed to me like his best to date (and his first true drama), this utterly different direction made wise use of COVID’s inconvenient constrictions and even more cleverly made sense of the same collective queasiness. Right now I’d say we’re in the part where we've just taken the Tron-bike turn from black billowing clouds of deadly chemicals to where already no one cares anymore, making room for a more Woody-level sets of stakes. The subtext is certainly a step above offhand references to COVID in Todd Field’s Tar or Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion, and in the indispensable ironies of mob behavior and crisis culture, this is Don’t Look Up if it was actually decent, except White Noise won’t receive a baffling Best Picture nomination. It’s so paradoxically funny at its saddest moments you could mistake it for a newfangled, form-forwarding Kaufman nightmare.
His weakest probably remains Margot (but even that is an okay flick, with a one of a kind Nicole Kidman performance) or one of those early, negligible growing pain pictures like Mr Jealousy. White Noise is one its creator's most uneven films, yet one of his finest comedies and most comprehensive cinematic experiences, another installment in a career of postmodern Americana coming to terms with itself. Stay true Baumbach, and I will remain your Baumbitch for as long as you cherish stories as vessels for veraciousness above all else. White Noise is a weird, wonderful wavelength for its maker and the modern moviegoer. This is esoteric cinema of an insistent relevance and budgetary extravagance.
At last, at year’s end, following an endless cycle of swollen expectations that burst in my face, I mercifully was not let down by one of the pillars of my cinematic interest, Mr. Noah Baumbach. Rearing the shortcomings of so many trustworthy writer-directors this year (Cameron, Chazelle, Garland, Raimi, Dominik) it was so nice to have another thoughtfully crafted feature from the States’ bonafide Woody Allen, the reigning existentialist comedy king, one of the true mirrors of moviemaking, always accurately reflecting back our own selfish, socially stunted, solipsistic ticks. White Noise, despite illustrious source material, may be Baumbach’s weakest in awhile but it’s only because he’s taking substantial risks — not at all unlike his contemporaries — that actually manifest into something new, interesting and percolating with meaning, rather than allowing artistic indulgence to languidly fortify shelter up there onscreen.
I was dying to see White Noise around Thanksgiving when the Netflix production made its ceremonial round in limited release to secure any sliver of a chance at awards prestige ahead of a streaming release, as this is the third Baumbach film to primarily rely on the digital platform’s distribution. The first, 2017’s family tree fantastique The Meyerowitz Stories, is akin to White Noise in its multiple threads of genealogical history to separate and keep straight within our domestic unit, as familial notions have become a running preoccupation for Baumbach, who has been sailing through middle age for some time.
First off, for my own interest (Oh my God I’m actually compelled to read! Which reminds me I guess I should get back to Dune now that Part Two will be here in no time…) White Noise marks the filmmaker of 25 years’ first adaptation 11 features in, making an enviable COVID project/distraction of the aptly appropriate nuclear disaster satire cum romantic/pharmaceutical drama White Noise, Don Delillo’s 1985 postmodern novel. Though on first viewing I was about as far into the lit classic as I was into Frank Herbert’s epic (not far), upon completion I can eagerly say Delillo’s voice is a perfect suit to Baumbach’s own methodical, mathematically funny exchanges and devilish dissections of contemporary concerns, swapping his usual sociological satire for a largely cultural critique.
And that is hardly to say he isn’t broadening his palette optically — I’ve never seen Baumbach work with visual effects before, and you can tell green(screen) is not his best color even though he was backed by the perpetually indebted streamer who shelled out 100 MILLION DOLLARS (do I really see where that money went?) for a film they barely marketed on or offline. Baumbach may have been out of his depth for the midwest derailment sequence… Ain’t it the most creepy kind of satisfying when life reflects art congruously rather than imitatively happening in the other direction? Noah’s primary plots and topics hinge on straight reality, if a theatrically heightened one, and he’s never had much excuse for ripples of horror/thriller modes (though that “thing with the knife” in Marriage Story was good practice). Yet he handles hilarious societal panic with panache, impressively emulating the “panoramic disorder” of Delillo’s key midway climax in the second act’s Airborne Toxic Event like a classier, Mel Brooks take on War of the Worlds.
Aurally, Danny Elfman’s score was so eerily 80s I coulda sworn LCD Soundsystem was back for more of their own white noise material (as I swear I never register their invisible presence backdropping While We’re Young) but their original song contribution “new body rhumba” is so good (thematically targeted and yet up to the artist’s rambling rocker traditions) I couldn’t possibly knock Baumbach for ending with a grocery store dancing sequence during credits like Fantastic Mr Fox (one of two Wes Anderson co-writing collabs). I’d like to hope there’s an Oscar nod in store for James Murphy — c’mon, fuck Lady Gaga’s Top Gun song, seriously.
Baumbach is literally “first-rate” at superbly stark scene transitions, hard cuts with harder hilarity — few excel so deftly at getting a laugh from a simple edit. His precisely timed juxtapositions are just montage theory at its most intuitively ironic. The color spectrum is wider than Baumbach’s had reason for before and, like Meyerowitz, the writing is so dense that White Noise will, if nothing else, be rich in rewatchability, so be it if the overlapping dialogue gives the neophyte an intended headspin. I think if anyone’s gonna make a retro-dystopian lampoon — one precisely parodying the consumer culture, media saturation, all the pervasive excesses and prescribed comforts of the 80s zeitgeist, the absurdity of both personal safety and complacency in the face of all these unknown variables like disease, disaster, adultery and medicinal fuckery — it had to be ma boy Baumbach. No one else I can think of could smooth out all the novel’s disparate themes and force you to accept the lopsided structure.
Removed by nearly four decades from publications, this movie’s 80s alternate universe allows Baumbach to take seasoned, sardonic takes on the fear of death, a contrast of concern for Adam Driver’s leading man between refusing to accept an imminent ecological cataclysm and then getting riled up over passing jealousy and cuckoldry. Driver (in his fifth collaboration with Baumbach) is perfect as middle-aged, four-marriage-deep Advanced Nazism-instructing College-on-the-Hill professor Jack Gladney. Baumbach’s own wife and creative confidant stars as the impossibly topped Babette, to whom Greta Gerwig is well-suited. Their assortment of previously conceived children (all but little Wilder) is also a notable, delightfully deadpan collection of underage talent (Raffey Cassidy as Denise [Killing of a Sacred Deer] and real-life siblings Sam and May Nivola respectively as Heinrich and Steffie). Don Cheadle's tasty turn as Murray (the novel’s funniest, most observant character, the elucidating, seriously silly deep-thinker and academic associate of Jack) is good stuff for the prolific performer — he electrifies the dignified, fastidious, fundamentally odd supporting character.
But in the same way Driver has commented on Baumbach’s original screenplays as bibles of unchanging text (hopefully manipulated by good performance like Shakespeare or some sorta similarly sublime scripting), Noah’s new challenge of condensing and cutting from Don’s decadently loquacious, almost pulverizingly philosophical writing can be a tough obstacle, though, for the cinematic realm, he is pulling off tonal inconsistencies that shouldn’t even be possible. The novel’s dialogue is often so good it’s a question about what you don’t keep and, like his gold standard pictures, White Noise is packed with all I care about from the shrewd, sensible writer-director — wit and truth tautly tethered through verbal revelations and all the things the literary end of moviegoing can do to tickle (or tackle) the brain.
The fact that he’s reached for more dynamic, divergent aspirations is his choice — after Marriage Story seemed to me like his best to date (and his first true drama), this utterly different direction made wise use of COVID’s inconvenient constrictions and even more cleverly made sense of the same collective queasiness. Right now I’d say we’re in the part where we've just taken the Tron-bike turn from black billowing clouds of deadly chemicals to where already no one cares anymore, making room for a more Woody-level sets of stakes. The subtext is certainly a step above offhand references to COVID in Todd Field’s Tar or Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion, and in the indispensable ironies of mob behavior and crisis culture, this is Don’t Look Up if it was actually decent, except White Noise won’t receive a baffling Best Picture nomination. It’s so paradoxically funny at its saddest moments you could mistake it for a newfangled, form-forwarding Kaufman nightmare.
His weakest probably remains Margot (but even that is an okay flick, with a one of a kind Nicole Kidman performance) or one of those early, negligible growing pain pictures like Mr Jealousy. White Noise is one its creator's most uneven films, yet one of his finest comedies and most comprehensive cinematic experiences, another installment in a career of postmodern Americana coming to terms with itself. Stay true Baumbach, and I will remain your Baumbitch for as long as you cherish stories as vessels for veraciousness above all else. White Noise is a weird, wonderful wavelength for its maker and the modern moviegoer. This is esoteric cinema of an insistent relevance and budgetary extravagance.
Babylon briefing
2 ½ (out of 4)
Et tu Chazelle? I’ve been looking forward to this film for awhile, thinking it was surefire gold from years out. How did the wunderkind of the past decade stumble so steeply? First Man wasn’t exactly the greatest movie ever but it was one of the strongest of its year, made excellent use of a 60 million dollar budget and was a fairly thoughtful biopic in an era that can’t help but summarize public figures with lies and sensationalism. He also made a La La Land prototype Guy and Madeline that nonetheless counts as his debut regardless of moreso functioning as the early college project gone right of his filmography.
But damn, Whiplash and La La Land suggested a new power was rising, that this French-American jazz-obsessed little auteur could advance editing, camerawork and an ethos exclusively built on the price of personal pursuits (ironic now that he’s got quite the tab to pay) to become cinema’s foremost young visionary. But considering The Northman remains the unbeaten cinematic artwork this year and Robert Eggers hasn’t even come close to a flub, he’s officially bested Damien as top of the heap for audiovisual artists to ascend in the last decade.
Despite carving out corners of relatively untapped film genre with a comedy epic of maddeningly stubborn absurdity, anger and bodily fluids, Babylon is not tremendously cinematic outside of key stretches (intentionally so to some degree), can’t quite justify its three-hour-plus runtime, is only occasionally funny and even less frequently shocking — like some of the most disappointing of this year’s potentially great films, Babylon is an elaborate showcase of nothing, its composition too dominated by grotesque, scrambled experimentation, little substance to suckle at and a faulty compass to orient its scope. This movie seems trapped at the borderline between skewering Hollywood degeneracy and championing the same stooges, or at least turning their debaucherous sins into roller coaster ridiculousness, Rothschild references or no.
But what makes me more aghast than the first five minutes of beautiful Kodak celluloid misspent on some Ace Ventura elephant shit joke and some fatcat taking piss to the face is that, amidst all the animated frivolity and period adornments, there is not the equivalent entertainment value. Maybe trimmed to a less egregious runtime, this massive, half-amazing misfire would be a film worthy of what was once Chazelle’s reputation.
Without much escapism, there is also a shortage of emotion coming from six characters with little to do with each other and about as much to do onscreen. Jovan Adepo as Sidney Palmer is about as disposable as a nonetheless commanding Li Jun Li as Lady Fay Zhu, and anyone who says maybe that’s the point is a big dummy. It’s so funny how his script forces a black man to put on his own blackface to try to make a point or whatever, but Adepo’s character ends up the token black guy of the movie anyway. Brad Pitt’s arc didn’t satisfy me, Jack Conrad’s carefree attitude set to suicide watch after his friend and partner predictably kills himself over a girl? Pitt is a legend and Babylon’s consistent bright spot, but he was much funnier speaking Italian out of turn when he was in Inglourious Basterds. Margot Robbie’s got so much life but her ragtag rough and tumble bullshit is sometimes like the same Jersey-whore-timbered Harley Quinn shtick without the makeup. I can’t wait to see that uncapped zeal explode in Barbie but here she’s hard to swallow. Jean Smart I have no qualms with but her character is just the critic archetype unaltered, given at least one grand monologue.
That just leaves Diego Calva as Manuel, our own bonafide Nick Caraway in our less than Great American Novel of a feature — even Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby brought the indulgence of the time to better life. As the unknown lead and essentially, obviously Chazelle’s self-insert, it’s so ironic that our young director is actually more reflected in Pitt's Conrad, a man falling victim to his own reputation. There’re also blink and you’ll miss moments for Olivia Wilde as Jack’s first fed up wife, Spike Jonze as a temperamental German-import director and Eric Roberts preening and passing out.
There’s the Boogie Nightsiness of Tobey Maguire’s Alfred Molina-type deep in third act, the piss-taking parables of Wolf of Wall Street’s epic excitement, The Artist’s fading star getting swept aside by changing technological tides, not to mention the sizable debt owed to All About Eve’s cyclicity — all of Chazelle’s lifted pastiche is stripped from far better material, even the ones I’m not crazy about. For three hours too many roads lead to nowhere and this Altmany/early Andersonian homage flounders in feckless frivolity and pressing pointlessness. Of course, Justin Herwitz has created a memorable, mighty score, even if I swear he’s recycling melodies from “Someone in the Crowd,” and Manny and LeRoy’s theme is just the honky-tonk version of “City of Stars.” Linus Sandgren, when allowed, is pretty spectacularly bearing witness, 35mm in hand, to Chazelle’s most elaborately staged single takes and agonizingly airtight lighting situations, every frame of a Polaroid-sort of burnished bluish — the overall effect of the cinematography, not to Sandgren’s discredit, is the look of new Paul Thomas Anderson meeting the energy of old PTA. Babylon is so beautifully shot and spectacularly composed, but Chazelle has to fill in the gaps talking bout pancake and ice cream toppings…
This was my most anticipated of the year — and from loogies to a fart joke literally forming the film’s funniest moment, at first pass I felt like a Star Wars devotee getting a first taste of The Last Jedi… am I being made fun of? Is the joke on me? Mr. Chazelle has talent to spare and this is the hardest 2 1/2 I’ll ever drop... I’ve dished out so many this year since 2022 was truly one for myriad mediocrity. But I’ll eagerly watch what’s next! However, in Hollywood’s eyes, after two pricey flops, for the sake of your career I hope you’ve got something more minimalist up your sleeve — if not you’ll go down as one of cinema’s great charlatans, the most baby-faced has-been.
I’ll still weep uncontrollably ever time I pop on La La Land. There’s some magic in Babylon, but his 2016 musical, like the best of cinema, is a breathtaking, unbroken spell from start to finish — map out your dreams a little more rigorously next time my lad, and shake off the Hollywood-honoring and low culture vs high bullshit. You can still have a black dude wailing on trumpet, that may as well be your signature.
“How are you gonna be a revolutionary when you’re such a traditionalist?” he proposed in La La Land, which I ignored when the film itself was that transcendent. Nowadays, let me know when you write yourself out of that quandary you prodigious purist. Maybe Babylon’s symphony on sailing past your prime is an instant of poetic justice. It’s admittedly a rich film — strategically repulsive then ravishing, wistful then wacky — just not full of flavors you want to mull over for awhile.
Et tu Chazelle? I’ve been looking forward to this film for awhile, thinking it was surefire gold from years out. How did the wunderkind of the past decade stumble so steeply? First Man wasn’t exactly the greatest movie ever but it was one of the strongest of its year, made excellent use of a 60 million dollar budget and was a fairly thoughtful biopic in an era that can’t help but summarize public figures with lies and sensationalism. He also made a La La Land prototype Guy and Madeline that nonetheless counts as his debut regardless of moreso functioning as the early college project gone right of his filmography.
But damn, Whiplash and La La Land suggested a new power was rising, that this French-American jazz-obsessed little auteur could advance editing, camerawork and an ethos exclusively built on the price of personal pursuits (ironic now that he’s got quite the tab to pay) to become cinema’s foremost young visionary. But considering The Northman remains the unbeaten cinematic artwork this year and Robert Eggers hasn’t even come close to a flub, he’s officially bested Damien as top of the heap for audiovisual artists to ascend in the last decade.
Despite carving out corners of relatively untapped film genre with a comedy epic of maddeningly stubborn absurdity, anger and bodily fluids, Babylon is not tremendously cinematic outside of key stretches (intentionally so to some degree), can’t quite justify its three-hour-plus runtime, is only occasionally funny and even less frequently shocking — like some of the most disappointing of this year’s potentially great films, Babylon is an elaborate showcase of nothing, its composition too dominated by grotesque, scrambled experimentation, little substance to suckle at and a faulty compass to orient its scope. This movie seems trapped at the borderline between skewering Hollywood degeneracy and championing the same stooges, or at least turning their debaucherous sins into roller coaster ridiculousness, Rothschild references or no.
But what makes me more aghast than the first five minutes of beautiful Kodak celluloid misspent on some Ace Ventura elephant shit joke and some fatcat taking piss to the face is that, amidst all the animated frivolity and period adornments, there is not the equivalent entertainment value. Maybe trimmed to a less egregious runtime, this massive, half-amazing misfire would be a film worthy of what was once Chazelle’s reputation.
Without much escapism, there is also a shortage of emotion coming from six characters with little to do with each other and about as much to do onscreen. Jovan Adepo as Sidney Palmer is about as disposable as a nonetheless commanding Li Jun Li as Lady Fay Zhu, and anyone who says maybe that’s the point is a big dummy. It’s so funny how his script forces a black man to put on his own blackface to try to make a point or whatever, but Adepo’s character ends up the token black guy of the movie anyway. Brad Pitt’s arc didn’t satisfy me, Jack Conrad’s carefree attitude set to suicide watch after his friend and partner predictably kills himself over a girl? Pitt is a legend and Babylon’s consistent bright spot, but he was much funnier speaking Italian out of turn when he was in Inglourious Basterds. Margot Robbie’s got so much life but her ragtag rough and tumble bullshit is sometimes like the same Jersey-whore-timbered Harley Quinn shtick without the makeup. I can’t wait to see that uncapped zeal explode in Barbie but here she’s hard to swallow. Jean Smart I have no qualms with but her character is just the critic archetype unaltered, given at least one grand monologue.
That just leaves Diego Calva as Manuel, our own bonafide Nick Caraway in our less than Great American Novel of a feature — even Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby brought the indulgence of the time to better life. As the unknown lead and essentially, obviously Chazelle’s self-insert, it’s so ironic that our young director is actually more reflected in Pitt's Conrad, a man falling victim to his own reputation. There’re also blink and you’ll miss moments for Olivia Wilde as Jack’s first fed up wife, Spike Jonze as a temperamental German-import director and Eric Roberts preening and passing out.
There’s the Boogie Nightsiness of Tobey Maguire’s Alfred Molina-type deep in third act, the piss-taking parables of Wolf of Wall Street’s epic excitement, The Artist’s fading star getting swept aside by changing technological tides, not to mention the sizable debt owed to All About Eve’s cyclicity — all of Chazelle’s lifted pastiche is stripped from far better material, even the ones I’m not crazy about. For three hours too many roads lead to nowhere and this Altmany/early Andersonian homage flounders in feckless frivolity and pressing pointlessness. Of course, Justin Herwitz has created a memorable, mighty score, even if I swear he’s recycling melodies from “Someone in the Crowd,” and Manny and LeRoy’s theme is just the honky-tonk version of “City of Stars.” Linus Sandgren, when allowed, is pretty spectacularly bearing witness, 35mm in hand, to Chazelle’s most elaborately staged single takes and agonizingly airtight lighting situations, every frame of a Polaroid-sort of burnished bluish — the overall effect of the cinematography, not to Sandgren’s discredit, is the look of new Paul Thomas Anderson meeting the energy of old PTA. Babylon is so beautifully shot and spectacularly composed, but Chazelle has to fill in the gaps talking bout pancake and ice cream toppings…
This was my most anticipated of the year — and from loogies to a fart joke literally forming the film’s funniest moment, at first pass I felt like a Star Wars devotee getting a first taste of The Last Jedi… am I being made fun of? Is the joke on me? Mr. Chazelle has talent to spare and this is the hardest 2 1/2 I’ll ever drop... I’ve dished out so many this year since 2022 was truly one for myriad mediocrity. But I’ll eagerly watch what’s next! However, in Hollywood’s eyes, after two pricey flops, for the sake of your career I hope you’ve got something more minimalist up your sleeve — if not you’ll go down as one of cinema’s great charlatans, the most baby-faced has-been.
I’ll still weep uncontrollably ever time I pop on La La Land. There’s some magic in Babylon, but his 2016 musical, like the best of cinema, is a breathtaking, unbroken spell from start to finish — map out your dreams a little more rigorously next time my lad, and shake off the Hollywood-honoring and low culture vs high bullshit. You can still have a black dude wailing on trumpet, that may as well be your signature.
“How are you gonna be a revolutionary when you’re such a traditionalist?” he proposed in La La Land, which I ignored when the film itself was that transcendent. Nowadays, let me know when you write yourself out of that quandary you prodigious purist. Maybe Babylon’s symphony on sailing past your prime is an instant of poetic justice. It’s admittedly a rich film — strategically repulsive then ravishing, wistful then wacky — just not full of flavors you want to mull over for awhile.
The Whale briefing
3 (out of 4)
As a singular, recognizable name in mainstream arthouse, this regular provocateur’s shade of crazy has known many coats — Darren Aronofsky is a prickly son of a gun, his movies always needling you, picking at open wounds — Pi is painful for me and I love a good mind-effer. Requiem for a Dream is once-and-done prestige moviegoing at its most distilled — the addiction drama was effective I suppose but I won’t be back to refresh my murky memory of its finer, fucked up details any time soon.
HIs longest hiatus between released pictures comes between 2000-2006 with the release of the spiritually greedy-grabbing The Fountain which was, for me, a moderately stunning, beautifully shot and earnestly acted proto-Cloud Atlas mini-epic. He peaked here with this and The Wrestler, a strangely candid drama for the mostly exaggerated auteur. The 2008 film concerned an aging, medically woeful societal outcast desperate to make amends with his estranged young daughter, his imminent road to the grave punctuating the film with shots of our protagonist mid-air, vaguely redeemed; and yeah that’s basically the blueprint for The Whale’s comically similar storyline, subbing a massive, comeback performance from Mickey Rourke for an even more gargantuan one in Brendan Fraser’s brave show of talent.
Ushering in an age more triumphant than the damn McConaissance, Fraser, while momentarily lost to obscurity outside of Mummy-lovers, turns in the rebound role of the century — the combined emotional and physical feat he leaves onscreen should make DiCaprio and Bale blush, even encourage them to step up their game. Boy those eating sequences are tough. While some of The Whale might make you sick to the stomach (especially with a large buttery popcorn in tote), Fraser’s staggering performance in tandem with his firm web of supporting players (Ty Simpkins, Sadie Sink, standout Hong Chau and a brief, potent appearance by Samantha Morton) makes the straightforward, stagey, sorrowful yet annoyingly optimistic film — only Aronofsky’s eighth — one of his most admirable. With surprisingly little awards-attraction beyond a Best Actor shoo-in (it’s really Brendan’s award to lose, unless Austin Butler or Colin Farrell can pull off some wizardry), this is a vehicle that thankfully carries its own and justifies Fraser’s extraordinarily overcommitted effort. Even with the prosthetic assistance (frankly how many morbidly obese people have acting careers on the side, other than those contracted to TLC?), this was still like a Leo performance on crack.
To continue summing up filmographies as I adore doing, Black Swan could be lumped in with the peak, the film at hand rounding out the upper echelon. So with Requiem and Pi in my back-half, joining them would be his two worst, the relatively ungodly Noah (which rock monsters and doughy-eyed teen talent couldn’t salvage) and the queasy quagmire that is his other overtly “Christian” (pagan more like) feature mother!, one of 2017’s toughest sits.
That last low streak made me ready for very possibly haphazard nonsense, but when the screenwriter is playwright Samuel D. Hunter in self-adaptation mode, not only was the movie’s boxed-in borders more conducive for character development and real, full performances, but it made Aronofsky choose to get stylized or let Fraser and co. command the screen. Darren yields, and the film’s pathos, drawn from a classic case of divorced Dad in need of redemption (ironically melting your heart while Fraser was essentially deep-frying his own) the lean story surpasses its sentimentality and severity. As long as it all adds up to something more exciting than Fences, you’re hopefully going to be just cinematic enough, and The Whale justifies its shut-in scenarios.
You’ll laugh, you’ll cry some way or another — once it hits emotionally, it hits, yet The Whale is majorly melodramatic in no detrimental sense — and you’re tummy will be a bit testy if you aren’t ready for Weight Watcher’s worst nightmare. Like Requiem, this more a tale of dependency and self-destructive behavior than anything, and in the realm of his harsher, less approachable movies, here's another I’ll be hard-pressed to check out again. Good thing the key moments are burned into my skull, mostly for better and a good chunk worse. It wasn’t Eugene O'Neill but it was a practically perfect, perspective-proliferating five-person chamber piece, with Fraser as cello.
As a singular, recognizable name in mainstream arthouse, this regular provocateur’s shade of crazy has known many coats — Darren Aronofsky is a prickly son of a gun, his movies always needling you, picking at open wounds — Pi is painful for me and I love a good mind-effer. Requiem for a Dream is once-and-done prestige moviegoing at its most distilled — the addiction drama was effective I suppose but I won’t be back to refresh my murky memory of its finer, fucked up details any time soon.
HIs longest hiatus between released pictures comes between 2000-2006 with the release of the spiritually greedy-grabbing The Fountain which was, for me, a moderately stunning, beautifully shot and earnestly acted proto-Cloud Atlas mini-epic. He peaked here with this and The Wrestler, a strangely candid drama for the mostly exaggerated auteur. The 2008 film concerned an aging, medically woeful societal outcast desperate to make amends with his estranged young daughter, his imminent road to the grave punctuating the film with shots of our protagonist mid-air, vaguely redeemed; and yeah that’s basically the blueprint for The Whale’s comically similar storyline, subbing a massive, comeback performance from Mickey Rourke for an even more gargantuan one in Brendan Fraser’s brave show of talent.
Ushering in an age more triumphant than the damn McConaissance, Fraser, while momentarily lost to obscurity outside of Mummy-lovers, turns in the rebound role of the century — the combined emotional and physical feat he leaves onscreen should make DiCaprio and Bale blush, even encourage them to step up their game. Boy those eating sequences are tough. While some of The Whale might make you sick to the stomach (especially with a large buttery popcorn in tote), Fraser’s staggering performance in tandem with his firm web of supporting players (Ty Simpkins, Sadie Sink, standout Hong Chau and a brief, potent appearance by Samantha Morton) makes the straightforward, stagey, sorrowful yet annoyingly optimistic film — only Aronofsky’s eighth — one of his most admirable. With surprisingly little awards-attraction beyond a Best Actor shoo-in (it’s really Brendan’s award to lose, unless Austin Butler or Colin Farrell can pull off some wizardry), this is a vehicle that thankfully carries its own and justifies Fraser’s extraordinarily overcommitted effort. Even with the prosthetic assistance (frankly how many morbidly obese people have acting careers on the side, other than those contracted to TLC?), this was still like a Leo performance on crack.
To continue summing up filmographies as I adore doing, Black Swan could be lumped in with the peak, the film at hand rounding out the upper echelon. So with Requiem and Pi in my back-half, joining them would be his two worst, the relatively ungodly Noah (which rock monsters and doughy-eyed teen talent couldn’t salvage) and the queasy quagmire that is his other overtly “Christian” (pagan more like) feature mother!, one of 2017’s toughest sits.
That last low streak made me ready for very possibly haphazard nonsense, but when the screenwriter is playwright Samuel D. Hunter in self-adaptation mode, not only was the movie’s boxed-in borders more conducive for character development and real, full performances, but it made Aronofsky choose to get stylized or let Fraser and co. command the screen. Darren yields, and the film’s pathos, drawn from a classic case of divorced Dad in need of redemption (ironically melting your heart while Fraser was essentially deep-frying his own) the lean story surpasses its sentimentality and severity. As long as it all adds up to something more exciting than Fences, you’re hopefully going to be just cinematic enough, and The Whale justifies its shut-in scenarios.
You’ll laugh, you’ll cry some way or another — once it hits emotionally, it hits, yet The Whale is majorly melodramatic in no detrimental sense — and you’re tummy will be a bit testy if you aren’t ready for Weight Watcher’s worst nightmare. Like Requiem, this more a tale of dependency and self-destructive behavior than anything, and in the realm of his harsher, less approachable movies, here's another I’ll be hard-pressed to check out again. Good thing the key moments are burned into my skull, mostly for better and a good chunk worse. It wasn’t Eugene O'Neill but it was a practically perfect, perspective-proliferating five-person chamber piece, with Fraser as cello.
Avatar: The Way of Water briefing
2 ½ (out of 4)
Is it really out? Is this finally happening? After being originally projected to reach release as long ago as 2014, the new behemoth sequel to the lightning-strikes-twice James Cameron sensation Avatar has actually, at long last, verifiably arrived! With at least one and up to five sequels waiting in the wings depending on how well this minimum 350 million dollar investment pans out, Cameron has blithely claimed his second Avatar must become #4 or #5 of all time to break even; I’ve never been so ready to regularly check in on box office numbers, as I've been following the specialized economy of budget/return mathematics for as long as I've been into movies and would smirk up a storm should Cameron flounder. If only I was so lucky.
No, Avatar: The Way of Water did not flop. Nor was it like being waterboarded by turquoise cement like the biggest naysayers decreed, though Cameron’s showmanship can swaddle, coddle and otherwise smother. But most regrettably it wasn't the truly awe-inspiring "event of a generation" experience like masses of devotees claim witness to. Of what I can say I actively enjoyed, Cameron is a macro-lensed madman when it comes to laying out the narrative and emotional groundwork for traditionally earned spectacle, even if gained via the cheapest tricks in the book. At worst he is a few degrees north of Michael Bay or Roland Emmerich, but in the zone he’s unmatched when it comes to setting the stage and then delivering on huge, climactic consequences. Like the original film 13 years ago (which I never bothered to see in theaters before or after it ballooned into a phenomenon), this second Avatar has a monstrously entertaining early finale with 20ish minutes of gnarly interplanetary battle sequences that make you go “wowza” — despite referencing so much of his own and other works, Cameron’s concept of the disaster movie is the most magnificent portion of his entire vision of Way of Water and in the majority of his filmography otherwise.
Unfortunately the rest of his eyeful here is caught up with SAVING THE PRECIOUS WHALES! No not the real ones on earth silly, the killer space kind! I like this second act despite copying its predecessor's tribal exploration, blooming romance and reels of YouTube ambiance content. Cameron’s obsession with the ocean has never been more desert-plain and the overdue flex on his long-developed underwater filming technology can be stupendous to behold — Pandora is just as fluorescent and rave-ready below sea-level. When it gets all Planet Earth on you of course it’s agreeable to the senses, even if I’d prefer listening to the calming voice of David Attenborough rather than 73-year old Sigourney Weaver speaking through a teenager character. When it rams the same anti-military, green penis bullshit he perfected even before Avatar with his imagination-coaxing, oft-overlooked The Abyss (which literally has water aliens about to end us all by way of catastrophic tsunamis only to let us off with a warning), yeah I assure you we get it, we promise to be nicer to the environment. Maybe, Mr. Cameron, you could have spent more of your infinite resources fixing that trash vortex in the Pacific but I guess your ten-foot-tall blue people fetish had to come first. If you want a filmmaker who’s devoted to exhibiting how miraculous the natural world is and how displaced we are from it, that would be Terrence Malick — The New World perfected the Pocahontas paradigm just a few years before Cameron dumbed it way down.
Now to talk about the legacy. For many years there’s been plenty of jokes and little discussion about Avatar’s lack of cultural impact and, of course, now here comes all the retroactive manure about its “invisible influence” or whatever. I’m just sad that such brilliant technological innovations have to be time-stamped on something so intellectually forgettable — sorta like how Attack of the Clones is branded into the footnotes of film history as the first entirely digitally shot film — all that effort and money partially pissed away on Cameron’s new soft reboot of his last offering that equally wasn’t the alleged bold step forward for cinema that I believe audiences deserved to begin with. Sure, Best Visual Effects is yours, enjoy it bud. I hope your superfluous sequels in development have surer stories to save your now already repetitive “franchise.”
He does improve upon Poseidon at the end, with a nod to Titanic there as well. Still if I’m going to take two Cameron movies that set up a blockbuster franchise, I’ll take T1 and T2 any day regardless of subsequent shit. At least those movies consumed his filmmaking energy more rewardingly and for only a couple years rather than a couple decades. Has 25 years of your life been worth this pair of flicks James? I hear it all came to you in a dream, and, in all respect, the physical world you’ve rendered is thoughtfully considered. If only the conflicts, characters and subjects were worthy of such a resourceful, insatiable technical pioneer.
For those that lose themselves in Pandora’s pleasures, more power to ya. I forgot this shit was in 3D very fast. If I may take one more stab at the “genius” auteur, I’ll say that him jumping on the Marvel hate train (the one Martin Scorsese didn’t even mean to set on the rails) is quite ironic since your most recent two features have been the definition of film as theme park ride, with character and morality designed to be as broad and basic as possible so no single audience member (the reallllll avatars here!) can possibly be left out — universality so far-flung withers under the weight of all that generic crap. Although Marvel may feature far inferior VFX, their calculations for the most winsome capeshit around often have about as much worth as Aliens (yeah I said it), which I would call a blight on Cameron's career, a simpleton’s version of Ridley Scott’s horrifying masterpiece. Otherwise he hasn’t done anything without science fiction somewhere in mind other than his solid spy riff True Lies and his superior epic romantic spectacle Titanic.
Why bring back Stephen Lang? And you’re going to this length to justify his return? Resurrecting Quarritch is almost as lame as bringing Palpatine back. But who could forget everyone’s favorite hero Sam Worthington as Jake Sully. He’s back again alongside Zoë Saldaña’s Neytiri, herself steeply sidelined to make room for filler with their rascally offspring — The Way of Water even has to eventually address how many times the idiotic youth get captured. And does your giant space epic, tree-hugging message movie really boil down to a bad guy with a gun held to the head of the protagonist's child, like some police simulation? The center-stage whale is an outsider just like the second son, and has more prescence n' chops too. At some point I thought to myself, "Wow, they’re really not developing this older son at all," forgetting you need a disposable loved one to axe for cheap dramatic preening and a li'l backpocket motivation. Jack Champion as our only real human face "Spider" wasn’t great, nor was the new sex object (Bailey Bass) or Kate Winslet's Ronal.
Given such a huge hiatus for tech’s sake, I hate that when these blue guys move fast it's like one Xbox controller buttons is stuck. This resolute quest for photorealistic alien shit is oddly oxymoronic, whereas those who venture for more genuine big budget thrills that marry the practical and the digital à la Villeneuve, Nolan or many a Tom Cruise production are the actual tacticians, torch-carriers and vanguards keeping cinema’s pulse hovering above death’s domain.
Nonetheless Cameron is determined to surmount the uncanny valley, but even if I believe what I see, is it worth co-signing my consciousness to something so cerebrally bland? For all the breaths bated in anticipation for over a decade, why does The Way of Water feel close enough to a rushed sequel like the worst of them? This is only his 9th feature in a career beginning over forty years past with Piranha II: The Spawning — dismissible debuts aside, for his most indulgent, grandiose, right up his own alley kinda movie, Avatar 2 is probably his worst by a few leagues, ain't that curious?
Is it really out? Is this finally happening? After being originally projected to reach release as long ago as 2014, the new behemoth sequel to the lightning-strikes-twice James Cameron sensation Avatar has actually, at long last, verifiably arrived! With at least one and up to five sequels waiting in the wings depending on how well this minimum 350 million dollar investment pans out, Cameron has blithely claimed his second Avatar must become #4 or #5 of all time to break even; I’ve never been so ready to regularly check in on box office numbers, as I've been following the specialized economy of budget/return mathematics for as long as I've been into movies and would smirk up a storm should Cameron flounder. If only I was so lucky.
No, Avatar: The Way of Water did not flop. Nor was it like being waterboarded by turquoise cement like the biggest naysayers decreed, though Cameron’s showmanship can swaddle, coddle and otherwise smother. But most regrettably it wasn't the truly awe-inspiring "event of a generation" experience like masses of devotees claim witness to. Of what I can say I actively enjoyed, Cameron is a macro-lensed madman when it comes to laying out the narrative and emotional groundwork for traditionally earned spectacle, even if gained via the cheapest tricks in the book. At worst he is a few degrees north of Michael Bay or Roland Emmerich, but in the zone he’s unmatched when it comes to setting the stage and then delivering on huge, climactic consequences. Like the original film 13 years ago (which I never bothered to see in theaters before or after it ballooned into a phenomenon), this second Avatar has a monstrously entertaining early finale with 20ish minutes of gnarly interplanetary battle sequences that make you go “wowza” — despite referencing so much of his own and other works, Cameron’s concept of the disaster movie is the most magnificent portion of his entire vision of Way of Water and in the majority of his filmography otherwise.
Unfortunately the rest of his eyeful here is caught up with SAVING THE PRECIOUS WHALES! No not the real ones on earth silly, the killer space kind! I like this second act despite copying its predecessor's tribal exploration, blooming romance and reels of YouTube ambiance content. Cameron’s obsession with the ocean has never been more desert-plain and the overdue flex on his long-developed underwater filming technology can be stupendous to behold — Pandora is just as fluorescent and rave-ready below sea-level. When it gets all Planet Earth on you of course it’s agreeable to the senses, even if I’d prefer listening to the calming voice of David Attenborough rather than 73-year old Sigourney Weaver speaking through a teenager character. When it rams the same anti-military, green penis bullshit he perfected even before Avatar with his imagination-coaxing, oft-overlooked The Abyss (which literally has water aliens about to end us all by way of catastrophic tsunamis only to let us off with a warning), yeah I assure you we get it, we promise to be nicer to the environment. Maybe, Mr. Cameron, you could have spent more of your infinite resources fixing that trash vortex in the Pacific but I guess your ten-foot-tall blue people fetish had to come first. If you want a filmmaker who’s devoted to exhibiting how miraculous the natural world is and how displaced we are from it, that would be Terrence Malick — The New World perfected the Pocahontas paradigm just a few years before Cameron dumbed it way down.
Now to talk about the legacy. For many years there’s been plenty of jokes and little discussion about Avatar’s lack of cultural impact and, of course, now here comes all the retroactive manure about its “invisible influence” or whatever. I’m just sad that such brilliant technological innovations have to be time-stamped on something so intellectually forgettable — sorta like how Attack of the Clones is branded into the footnotes of film history as the first entirely digitally shot film — all that effort and money partially pissed away on Cameron’s new soft reboot of his last offering that equally wasn’t the alleged bold step forward for cinema that I believe audiences deserved to begin with. Sure, Best Visual Effects is yours, enjoy it bud. I hope your superfluous sequels in development have surer stories to save your now already repetitive “franchise.”
He does improve upon Poseidon at the end, with a nod to Titanic there as well. Still if I’m going to take two Cameron movies that set up a blockbuster franchise, I’ll take T1 and T2 any day regardless of subsequent shit. At least those movies consumed his filmmaking energy more rewardingly and for only a couple years rather than a couple decades. Has 25 years of your life been worth this pair of flicks James? I hear it all came to you in a dream, and, in all respect, the physical world you’ve rendered is thoughtfully considered. If only the conflicts, characters and subjects were worthy of such a resourceful, insatiable technical pioneer.
For those that lose themselves in Pandora’s pleasures, more power to ya. I forgot this shit was in 3D very fast. If I may take one more stab at the “genius” auteur, I’ll say that him jumping on the Marvel hate train (the one Martin Scorsese didn’t even mean to set on the rails) is quite ironic since your most recent two features have been the definition of film as theme park ride, with character and morality designed to be as broad and basic as possible so no single audience member (the reallllll avatars here!) can possibly be left out — universality so far-flung withers under the weight of all that generic crap. Although Marvel may feature far inferior VFX, their calculations for the most winsome capeshit around often have about as much worth as Aliens (yeah I said it), which I would call a blight on Cameron's career, a simpleton’s version of Ridley Scott’s horrifying masterpiece. Otherwise he hasn’t done anything without science fiction somewhere in mind other than his solid spy riff True Lies and his superior epic romantic spectacle Titanic.
Why bring back Stephen Lang? And you’re going to this length to justify his return? Resurrecting Quarritch is almost as lame as bringing Palpatine back. But who could forget everyone’s favorite hero Sam Worthington as Jake Sully. He’s back again alongside Zoë Saldaña’s Neytiri, herself steeply sidelined to make room for filler with their rascally offspring — The Way of Water even has to eventually address how many times the idiotic youth get captured. And does your giant space epic, tree-hugging message movie really boil down to a bad guy with a gun held to the head of the protagonist's child, like some police simulation? The center-stage whale is an outsider just like the second son, and has more prescence n' chops too. At some point I thought to myself, "Wow, they’re really not developing this older son at all," forgetting you need a disposable loved one to axe for cheap dramatic preening and a li'l backpocket motivation. Jack Champion as our only real human face "Spider" wasn’t great, nor was the new sex object (Bailey Bass) or Kate Winslet's Ronal.
Given such a huge hiatus for tech’s sake, I hate that when these blue guys move fast it's like one Xbox controller buttons is stuck. This resolute quest for photorealistic alien shit is oddly oxymoronic, whereas those who venture for more genuine big budget thrills that marry the practical and the digital à la Villeneuve, Nolan or many a Tom Cruise production are the actual tacticians, torch-carriers and vanguards keeping cinema’s pulse hovering above death’s domain.
Nonetheless Cameron is determined to surmount the uncanny valley, but even if I believe what I see, is it worth co-signing my consciousness to something so cerebrally bland? For all the breaths bated in anticipation for over a decade, why does The Way of Water feel close enough to a rushed sequel like the worst of them? This is only his 9th feature in a career beginning over forty years past with Piranha II: The Spawning — dismissible debuts aside, for his most indulgent, grandiose, right up his own alley kinda movie, Avatar 2 is probably his worst by a few leagues, ain't that curious?
Empire of Light and
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio briefings
Empire of Light
2 (out of 4)
The last time Sam Mendes was in the ring, he was the box office frontrunner — 1917, in any other timeline, probably would’ve won Best Picture by a mile over Parasite. Months ago, when I looked at the odds on the Oscars from afar as I often do in recent years, Mendes’ precedented power with critics and crowds made this a theoretical Awards heavy. Bond behind him, and now despite showing off so hard with incredible talent, Mendes’ return to earth stirred a mixed reaction from folks in its TIFF debut, and with an iffy 43% on Rotten Tomatoes he’s long been discounted as a serious Academy contender.
Which just makes Empire of Light one of the dozens of annual bypassed bait because my God, this has every prerequisite for Oscar magnetism like some propped up Weinstein production from two decades ago. 15-time Oscar nominee Roger Deakins is on the camera in his fourth collab, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross are embracing the keys in a gentler original composition, a recent Best Actress in Olivia Colman is front and center, cinema is acting as both location and wistful subject, not to mention there’s interracial romance ready for the Hollywood liberal’s penchant for some social message about inequality or something. That’s all with a British director that won big Academy honors in his comically corrosive, suburban-centric American Beauty.
With Empire, I don’t especially mind that your palette (visually and sonically) has gone full Fincher, but genuinely what went wrong? Mendes is fairly prudent and respectably competent despite some slight entries. The problem is the film wants to be this beautiful, sexy love story REALLY FAST — backdropped by an 80s moviehouse in London, the rest of the story is fruitlessly dragged out with no other buildup to this other than rushing its mismatched coupling, with an ‘accidental’ first act NYE kiss, a lovey-dovey crux shamefully unpublicized in marketing.
In its steamier intentions, I realized this movie is nothing but a saucy tabletop magazine version of Ali: Fear Eats the Soul by German legend Rainer Werner Fassbinder, an earlier case of an agreeable younger black man, an older white woman and the ramifications of their bond, even though Empire of Light isn’t really about that all. Like Amsterdam just a few months back, when movie’s aren’t really about anything, they’ll compensate by pretending to be concerned with a load of little thematic nuggets — racial disharmony, ageism, sexual coercion in the workplace, cinema dying… BUT IT’S ALSO ABOUT LIFE AND REBIRTH and how things are constantly growing and changing but, um, no — Empire acts like there’s some summation of meaning and potency, even whipping out plenty of fancy, pretentious quotes in its altogether absence of identity.
It’s a somewhat depressing setup and overall feature but also somehow a secret comedy? Even when Colman’s character is confessing to being sexually coerced by her superior (Colin Firth stumbling on set one day), it’s a funny bit scene with Toby Jones basically popping out of the corner of the screen with the punchline. The tone was crazy — it wasn’t a serious movie with a few jokes out front to ease you in, no it was mostly jokes and sex and general confusion. Empire of Light strangely succeeds more as something of an arthouse workplace comedy than this sweeping romantic drama.
Olivia Colman is a great performer, a fucking force of nature at best, but even before you find out her character has schizophrenia and looking back later, she’s just kinda awful and caricature-ish — this movie sheds no stance on mental illness in any way. And I hated Micheal Ward, sorry — can these young black performers have any personality at all? Firth could be phoning it in, or trying his best, it’s hard to tell with that guy. Only that nerdiest coworker (Tom Brooke as Neil) breathes life into the picturesque mundanity, though a little Toby J. goes a long way.
I have qualms regardless concerning Mendes, but take Revolutionary Road — it’s a step down from his better, earlier career but still a great, dramatic movie, almost exasperatingly heightened with loads to say about domestic squabbles and all those issues that have been beaten to death, still done very well. But this is some weak padding weighing down his filmography, though I wasn’t mad or dismissive — in fairness Empire is mildly sweet and tender. In his ninth feature, Mendes substantially proves all the technical aptitude in the world can’t surmount a bland story. Empire of Slight is the jumbo shrimp of prestige pictures — to top it all, it’s not the actors’ fault that I wish it had more to say about working in a movie theater.
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio
3 (out of 4)
Remember when this guy was long-set to do The Hobbit? God, del Toro has so many unrealized works (At the Mountains of Madness with Cruise, Halo, Hellboy 3, frickin Count of Monte Cristo?) that some nearby alternate timeline would probably be an altogether new filmography. I was all too pleased by Nightmare Alley last year, finding it to be an exemplary modern noir and Guillermo at the height of his powers. His Pinocchio is a long time coming, the insistence on stop-motion exacerbating the developmental delays. Fortunately Patrick McHale, one of the key creative minds behind one of the best pieces of animation this past decade, Cartoon Network’s autumnal miniseries Over the Garden Wall, helped del Toro get this across the finish line with a screenwriting assist.
What can you say other than little else could fit much closer to the monster-loving, Gothic-gravitating auteur — oh wait he’s actually going full Frankenstein??? Looking back, this story was begging for something that took the borderline horror elements of the classic 1940 Disney animated classic and advanced them to their actualized ends. In that sense, Pinocchio is incredible, becoming terrifying, tragic, hilarious, heartfelt (and unfortunately a little soppy here and there), often overlapping all those feelings at once.
Obviously there’s the all but aborted Robert Zemeckis-directed remake that was left for dead direct-to-Disney+ — I would love to attack the film but I can’t even bear to watch it, because they never should have tampered with one of their OGs — all the 90s features were asking for it, for better or worse. Del Toro’s thoughts are not on milking property but strangling your heartstrings and manifesting incredible feats of old-fashioned, startlingly tactile manually-molded animation. This is perhaps the genre’s biggest surprise, surest affirmations of the medium's artistic advantages and a real meditation on death, grief and miracles. As if Disney would ever actually leave in the child soldier camps, Italian history, mystic spirits and immortality, or Pinocchio almost getting burned at the stake.
If I may, perhaps my favorite scene of the year is Pinocchio’s first moment’s of life, featuring a hauntingly, charmingly spright musical number (yodels and all) in one of the most startlingly hilarious stretches I’ve seen in all of modern cinema, soaping up the wooden boy’s impish, innocent monstrosity and destructive potential to just genius ends. I forgot this was a musical at any moment there wasn’t singing, but in the "Everything Is New to Me" ("WHAT DO YOU CALL IT, CALL IIIITTTT????") the cute/creepy balance is perfect.
Tilda Swinton as yinyanging, sphinx-like spirit sisters, one giver of life and one steward of death, yes please! Cate Blanchett as a monkey, mkay? Christoph Waltz pegged further for villainy, yawn. And Ewan McGregor, one of my most choice performers, goes from the cricket carrying the movie on his back to the annoying, overdone, punching bag, though the narration in total is well-written. But our central two voices (David Bradley as Geppetto and Gregory Mann as both Carlo and Pinocchio) do great work, especially since they can’t be audibly spotted by observant viewers, as this movie is but the latest proof of the gap in professional ability between famous actor’s vocal performances and more genuine voice acting talent.
It’s another gorgeous notch in Del Toro’s wide wheelhouse that has covered so many genres and sides of cinema. His grotesque proclivities have reached their friendliest form, the kind that I’m sure has Tim Burton in a jealous fit watching Guillermo outdo the aesthetic synonymous with his name.
2 (out of 4)
The last time Sam Mendes was in the ring, he was the box office frontrunner — 1917, in any other timeline, probably would’ve won Best Picture by a mile over Parasite. Months ago, when I looked at the odds on the Oscars from afar as I often do in recent years, Mendes’ precedented power with critics and crowds made this a theoretical Awards heavy. Bond behind him, and now despite showing off so hard with incredible talent, Mendes’ return to earth stirred a mixed reaction from folks in its TIFF debut, and with an iffy 43% on Rotten Tomatoes he’s long been discounted as a serious Academy contender.
Which just makes Empire of Light one of the dozens of annual bypassed bait because my God, this has every prerequisite for Oscar magnetism like some propped up Weinstein production from two decades ago. 15-time Oscar nominee Roger Deakins is on the camera in his fourth collab, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross are embracing the keys in a gentler original composition, a recent Best Actress in Olivia Colman is front and center, cinema is acting as both location and wistful subject, not to mention there’s interracial romance ready for the Hollywood liberal’s penchant for some social message about inequality or something. That’s all with a British director that won big Academy honors in his comically corrosive, suburban-centric American Beauty.
With Empire, I don’t especially mind that your palette (visually and sonically) has gone full Fincher, but genuinely what went wrong? Mendes is fairly prudent and respectably competent despite some slight entries. The problem is the film wants to be this beautiful, sexy love story REALLY FAST — backdropped by an 80s moviehouse in London, the rest of the story is fruitlessly dragged out with no other buildup to this other than rushing its mismatched coupling, with an ‘accidental’ first act NYE kiss, a lovey-dovey crux shamefully unpublicized in marketing.
In its steamier intentions, I realized this movie is nothing but a saucy tabletop magazine version of Ali: Fear Eats the Soul by German legend Rainer Werner Fassbinder, an earlier case of an agreeable younger black man, an older white woman and the ramifications of their bond, even though Empire of Light isn’t really about that all. Like Amsterdam just a few months back, when movie’s aren’t really about anything, they’ll compensate by pretending to be concerned with a load of little thematic nuggets — racial disharmony, ageism, sexual coercion in the workplace, cinema dying… BUT IT’S ALSO ABOUT LIFE AND REBIRTH and how things are constantly growing and changing but, um, no — Empire acts like there’s some summation of meaning and potency, even whipping out plenty of fancy, pretentious quotes in its altogether absence of identity.
It’s a somewhat depressing setup and overall feature but also somehow a secret comedy? Even when Colman’s character is confessing to being sexually coerced by her superior (Colin Firth stumbling on set one day), it’s a funny bit scene with Toby Jones basically popping out of the corner of the screen with the punchline. The tone was crazy — it wasn’t a serious movie with a few jokes out front to ease you in, no it was mostly jokes and sex and general confusion. Empire of Light strangely succeeds more as something of an arthouse workplace comedy than this sweeping romantic drama.
Olivia Colman is a great performer, a fucking force of nature at best, but even before you find out her character has schizophrenia and looking back later, she’s just kinda awful and caricature-ish — this movie sheds no stance on mental illness in any way. And I hated Micheal Ward, sorry — can these young black performers have any personality at all? Firth could be phoning it in, or trying his best, it’s hard to tell with that guy. Only that nerdiest coworker (Tom Brooke as Neil) breathes life into the picturesque mundanity, though a little Toby J. goes a long way.
I have qualms regardless concerning Mendes, but take Revolutionary Road — it’s a step down from his better, earlier career but still a great, dramatic movie, almost exasperatingly heightened with loads to say about domestic squabbles and all those issues that have been beaten to death, still done very well. But this is some weak padding weighing down his filmography, though I wasn’t mad or dismissive — in fairness Empire is mildly sweet and tender. In his ninth feature, Mendes substantially proves all the technical aptitude in the world can’t surmount a bland story. Empire of Slight is the jumbo shrimp of prestige pictures — to top it all, it’s not the actors’ fault that I wish it had more to say about working in a movie theater.
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio
3 (out of 4)
Remember when this guy was long-set to do The Hobbit? God, del Toro has so many unrealized works (At the Mountains of Madness with Cruise, Halo, Hellboy 3, frickin Count of Monte Cristo?) that some nearby alternate timeline would probably be an altogether new filmography. I was all too pleased by Nightmare Alley last year, finding it to be an exemplary modern noir and Guillermo at the height of his powers. His Pinocchio is a long time coming, the insistence on stop-motion exacerbating the developmental delays. Fortunately Patrick McHale, one of the key creative minds behind one of the best pieces of animation this past decade, Cartoon Network’s autumnal miniseries Over the Garden Wall, helped del Toro get this across the finish line with a screenwriting assist.
What can you say other than little else could fit much closer to the monster-loving, Gothic-gravitating auteur — oh wait he’s actually going full Frankenstein??? Looking back, this story was begging for something that took the borderline horror elements of the classic 1940 Disney animated classic and advanced them to their actualized ends. In that sense, Pinocchio is incredible, becoming terrifying, tragic, hilarious, heartfelt (and unfortunately a little soppy here and there), often overlapping all those feelings at once.
Obviously there’s the all but aborted Robert Zemeckis-directed remake that was left for dead direct-to-Disney+ — I would love to attack the film but I can’t even bear to watch it, because they never should have tampered with one of their OGs — all the 90s features were asking for it, for better or worse. Del Toro’s thoughts are not on milking property but strangling your heartstrings and manifesting incredible feats of old-fashioned, startlingly tactile manually-molded animation. This is perhaps the genre’s biggest surprise, surest affirmations of the medium's artistic advantages and a real meditation on death, grief and miracles. As if Disney would ever actually leave in the child soldier camps, Italian history, mystic spirits and immortality, or Pinocchio almost getting burned at the stake.
If I may, perhaps my favorite scene of the year is Pinocchio’s first moment’s of life, featuring a hauntingly, charmingly spright musical number (yodels and all) in one of the most startlingly hilarious stretches I’ve seen in all of modern cinema, soaping up the wooden boy’s impish, innocent monstrosity and destructive potential to just genius ends. I forgot this was a musical at any moment there wasn’t singing, but in the "Everything Is New to Me" ("WHAT DO YOU CALL IT, CALL IIIITTTT????") the cute/creepy balance is perfect.
Tilda Swinton as yinyanging, sphinx-like spirit sisters, one giver of life and one steward of death, yes please! Cate Blanchett as a monkey, mkay? Christoph Waltz pegged further for villainy, yawn. And Ewan McGregor, one of my most choice performers, goes from the cricket carrying the movie on his back to the annoying, overdone, punching bag, though the narration in total is well-written. But our central two voices (David Bradley as Geppetto and Gregory Mann as both Carlo and Pinocchio) do great work, especially since they can’t be audibly spotted by observant viewers, as this movie is but the latest proof of the gap in professional ability between famous actor’s vocal performances and more genuine voice acting talent.
It’s another gorgeous notch in Del Toro’s wide wheelhouse that has covered so many genres and sides of cinema. His grotesque proclivities have reached their friendliest form, the kind that I’m sure has Tim Burton in a jealous fit watching Guillermo outdo the aesthetic synonymous with his name.
The Fabelmans and Glass Onion briefings
The Fabelmans
3 ½ (out of 4)
Until I appreciated Steven Spielberg's pure naked vulnerability as seen through The Fabelmans, I just thought he’d made another pretty good movie in a line of couldawouldshoulda been masterpieces. I realized screenwriter Tony Kushner has been the recurring theme of Spielberg’s significant accomplishments following what I’ll call his best stretch from 1998’s Saving Private Ryan to 2005 with War of the Worlds (words can’t express my adoration though I try) and Munich, the latter the first of four collaborations with Kushner including Lincoln, West Side Story and now his barely concealed repurposing of youth.
I’ll admit, of all the creatives to jerk off to their childhood, he’s more than tasteful about the whole conceit by the end, warping The Fabelmans from 30 million dollar therapy session on broken family dynamics — the emotional clay of most of his filmography — to a superior shade of the indie-movie Bildungsroman exploited by film hipsters in order to overshare their own upbringing, usually for a “modest” debut, like Lady Bird, The 400 Blows or more similarly with years behind as in Armageddon Time, Belfast, The Tree of Life, The Long Day Closes, Au Revoir Les Enfants, so on and so forth. Only Spielberg could tell his own tale and The Fabelmans' oh so obvious, full frontal film à clef is progressively winsome, earnest and unflattering, divulging his innermost self sans the indulgence.
The acting is superb all around, with the young teenage surrogate Spielberg, Gabriel LaBelle as Sam Fabelman, of an exceptional likeness to a ruddier Stevey, bearing honest chops too. Paul Dano doesn’t disappoint (how could the classic man let us down?), nor does a reliable Michelle Williams in the fair but unflattering pair of parental positions. Poor Janusz Kaminski doesn’t get to show off but is nonetheless making cinematic memory worthy of the simulated sift through a personal past, from The Greatest Show on Earth’s monumental impact on the filmmaker’s primitive imagination (little blue-eyed Mateo Zoryan Francis-DeFord as a tinier Sammy) to the final comic CBS studios meetup with John Ford, played by none other than David Lynch giving the hard, stupid, passion-progressing advice. It’s fortunately a great, ruthless little memoir rather than one of those dreaded “love letters to cinema” that I believe we’ll be receiving in the next month or so from Mr. Mendes and, more optimistically, perhaps young Chazelle as well.
Looking at the timeline objectively, it’s almost like Spielberg was waiting for his mom and dad to be out of the picture before painting them in such harsh light, and you gotta respect it. Animating the dead is harder than telling your kin you plan to leave them to your own liking in a corner of history, forever. I think it truly brave, and truly challenging, to find some way to reconcile your own childhood trauma while still giving audiences some reason to care even if they have no idea you’re actually referring to yourself. If not for resurrecting his forebears, the way he gets over half-a-century-removed revenge on his high school bullies is so crowd-pleasingingly cheeky and clever I can’t help but grin at the last 45 minutes of revisionist high school hijinks.
Every adolescent frustration is perfectly represented in identifiable fits with the folks but The Fabelmans’ pubescent actualization stands apart strongest for the average Joe when the focus is on his very early filmcraft. I wouldn’t be happy if my Dad’s best friend (Uncle Seth Rogen reuniting with Williams in the reverse adulterous state from Sarah Polley’s Take This Waltz) had a ‘thing’ with my Mom, but I too can't help but clamor for more of the shoestring budget trickery. Tangentially, the recreated home videos are no doubt the spitting image of the same artifacts.
I think this is his genuine late masterpiece, better than other Tony collabs save maybe Munich — as one of your best in twenty years, The Fabelmans has quietly stunning formal exhilaration and all the coyness of Spielberg the perpetually young filmmaker — it’s a special movie within a cherished, utterly flabbergasting filmography, and yet for all the soul-shedding, the film is neither grossly nostalgic nor is it anti-sentimentalist. The stupendously subjective take on first love, teenage angst, the advancement of obsessions and the broad imprints of early life seems like basic Academy catnip that, admirably, has no room for rosy lenses or anything besides autobiographical admissions to cement.
Glass Onion
2 ½ (out of 4)
“If you’ll indulge me I’d like to spin a little further…” Lighter, more Poirot-like and, at its best, excellent fun, Glass Onion is a very nearly a worthy successor to Knives Out, fleshing out Rian Johnson’s mischievous maintenance of his chosen genre while carving out a newly divergent story structure and targeting up-to-the-minute political divides to dig at.
The Disney-Wars-dismantler already clearly enjoys certain tropes: completely contemporary social commentary, giant, narrative-altering backstory reveals and/or non-linear shakeups, plus some cute last-minute slow-motion gags. Neither Knives or Onion aggressively set up another film, which is curiouser in this case considering Netflix spent hundreds of millions for rights to two Benoit Blanc sequels.
For the sake of popularity and for critical standing, Netflix clearly backed the right horse, but this one-week theatrical engagement gimmick is so odd — exclusivity is one thing but money is usually the more important other. Although his nudging cleverness is much less amusing when he's pridefully, purposely pointing it all out, within such a whodunit craze for domestic cinema (See How They Run, this stupid Scream revival) Johnson is somehow at the top of the pile, only just outdoing Branagh’s peddling-in-place Poirot pieces, though maybe A Haunting in Venice can scare up Kenneth’s average. Onion reads like one of Hercule’s vacations gone awry, whereas Knives felt like modern Holmes homage.
Daniel Craig is still having a ball with both the drawl and the detection, operating only a few notches away from some Leslie Nielson/Naked Gun levels of buffoonery but for mystery nerds. Instead of Ana de Armas as Blanc’s teammate in truth we have a stellar Janelle Monáe in a challenging dual role. But for the love of GOD, did we need an eat-the-rich retread after a palette overpowered by Triangle of Sadness and The Menu, each the funnier, more nuanced affair. All Glass Onion imparts is that the swap from old money to new, family to friends, still leads to parasites whether there’s blood involved or not. Edward Norton's Musk-like dumb genius tech mogul type is so on the nose, and overall this is an ensemble living out their accentuated archetypes, the roster not so illustrious as Knives Out. The whole satirically awful supporting bunch are, in the end, morally reprehensible if not by law — Onion tries to work in some redemption arc for Kate Hudson, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr. and Dave Bautista while Knives decidedly does not. The craaaaazy cameos throughout are basically expensive distractions — Yo Yo Ma, Ethan Hawke, Hugh Grant and Serena Williams, with namedrops in Jared Leto’s kombucha and Jeremy Renner’s hot sauce, gosh so silly and recognizable!
Despite functioning as baldfaced left-wing propaganda (the ‘subtext’ is about as stinky and transparent as the title would imply), even going to the point of justifying the destruction of pillars of western civilization in the name of billionaire outrage, Glass Onion impressively remains plentiful and potent in its duty to entertain. Anomalously, it's captivating enough to overcome its own exaggerated political grandstanding. Between the games and goofs and agenda-pushing, there’s really some great filmmaking that sparkles in contrast to Johnson’s base, topical humor and childish, wearily indignant preaching.
Knives Out’s fatal flaw is its time-trapped, of-the-moment back-and-forth about whatever Trump was up to when Rian was writing, and Johnson’s continued division-exacerbating devilishness in Glass Onion almost wastes the great production design and further franchise potential. Sorry, it’s just that I don’t trust anyone in Hollywood telling me “Wow these Hollywood people sure are evil” or millionaires informing me that billionaires are societies' real nemeses… unless… unless Johnson actually thinks he’s a disrupter just like Norton’s Miles Bron believes?
3 ½ (out of 4)
Until I appreciated Steven Spielberg's pure naked vulnerability as seen through The Fabelmans, I just thought he’d made another pretty good movie in a line of couldawouldshoulda been masterpieces. I realized screenwriter Tony Kushner has been the recurring theme of Spielberg’s significant accomplishments following what I’ll call his best stretch from 1998’s Saving Private Ryan to 2005 with War of the Worlds (words can’t express my adoration though I try) and Munich, the latter the first of four collaborations with Kushner including Lincoln, West Side Story and now his barely concealed repurposing of youth.
I’ll admit, of all the creatives to jerk off to their childhood, he’s more than tasteful about the whole conceit by the end, warping The Fabelmans from 30 million dollar therapy session on broken family dynamics — the emotional clay of most of his filmography — to a superior shade of the indie-movie Bildungsroman exploited by film hipsters in order to overshare their own upbringing, usually for a “modest” debut, like Lady Bird, The 400 Blows or more similarly with years behind as in Armageddon Time, Belfast, The Tree of Life, The Long Day Closes, Au Revoir Les Enfants, so on and so forth. Only Spielberg could tell his own tale and The Fabelmans' oh so obvious, full frontal film à clef is progressively winsome, earnest and unflattering, divulging his innermost self sans the indulgence.
The acting is superb all around, with the young teenage surrogate Spielberg, Gabriel LaBelle as Sam Fabelman, of an exceptional likeness to a ruddier Stevey, bearing honest chops too. Paul Dano doesn’t disappoint (how could the classic man let us down?), nor does a reliable Michelle Williams in the fair but unflattering pair of parental positions. Poor Janusz Kaminski doesn’t get to show off but is nonetheless making cinematic memory worthy of the simulated sift through a personal past, from The Greatest Show on Earth’s monumental impact on the filmmaker’s primitive imagination (little blue-eyed Mateo Zoryan Francis-DeFord as a tinier Sammy) to the final comic CBS studios meetup with John Ford, played by none other than David Lynch giving the hard, stupid, passion-progressing advice. It’s fortunately a great, ruthless little memoir rather than one of those dreaded “love letters to cinema” that I believe we’ll be receiving in the next month or so from Mr. Mendes and, more optimistically, perhaps young Chazelle as well.
Looking at the timeline objectively, it’s almost like Spielberg was waiting for his mom and dad to be out of the picture before painting them in such harsh light, and you gotta respect it. Animating the dead is harder than telling your kin you plan to leave them to your own liking in a corner of history, forever. I think it truly brave, and truly challenging, to find some way to reconcile your own childhood trauma while still giving audiences some reason to care even if they have no idea you’re actually referring to yourself. If not for resurrecting his forebears, the way he gets over half-a-century-removed revenge on his high school bullies is so crowd-pleasingingly cheeky and clever I can’t help but grin at the last 45 minutes of revisionist high school hijinks.
Every adolescent frustration is perfectly represented in identifiable fits with the folks but The Fabelmans’ pubescent actualization stands apart strongest for the average Joe when the focus is on his very early filmcraft. I wouldn’t be happy if my Dad’s best friend (Uncle Seth Rogen reuniting with Williams in the reverse adulterous state from Sarah Polley’s Take This Waltz) had a ‘thing’ with my Mom, but I too can't help but clamor for more of the shoestring budget trickery. Tangentially, the recreated home videos are no doubt the spitting image of the same artifacts.
I think this is his genuine late masterpiece, better than other Tony collabs save maybe Munich — as one of your best in twenty years, The Fabelmans has quietly stunning formal exhilaration and all the coyness of Spielberg the perpetually young filmmaker — it’s a special movie within a cherished, utterly flabbergasting filmography, and yet for all the soul-shedding, the film is neither grossly nostalgic nor is it anti-sentimentalist. The stupendously subjective take on first love, teenage angst, the advancement of obsessions and the broad imprints of early life seems like basic Academy catnip that, admirably, has no room for rosy lenses or anything besides autobiographical admissions to cement.
Glass Onion
2 ½ (out of 4)
“If you’ll indulge me I’d like to spin a little further…” Lighter, more Poirot-like and, at its best, excellent fun, Glass Onion is a very nearly a worthy successor to Knives Out, fleshing out Rian Johnson’s mischievous maintenance of his chosen genre while carving out a newly divergent story structure and targeting up-to-the-minute political divides to dig at.
The Disney-Wars-dismantler already clearly enjoys certain tropes: completely contemporary social commentary, giant, narrative-altering backstory reveals and/or non-linear shakeups, plus some cute last-minute slow-motion gags. Neither Knives or Onion aggressively set up another film, which is curiouser in this case considering Netflix spent hundreds of millions for rights to two Benoit Blanc sequels.
For the sake of popularity and for critical standing, Netflix clearly backed the right horse, but this one-week theatrical engagement gimmick is so odd — exclusivity is one thing but money is usually the more important other. Although his nudging cleverness is much less amusing when he's pridefully, purposely pointing it all out, within such a whodunit craze for domestic cinema (See How They Run, this stupid Scream revival) Johnson is somehow at the top of the pile, only just outdoing Branagh’s peddling-in-place Poirot pieces, though maybe A Haunting in Venice can scare up Kenneth’s average. Onion reads like one of Hercule’s vacations gone awry, whereas Knives felt like modern Holmes homage.
Daniel Craig is still having a ball with both the drawl and the detection, operating only a few notches away from some Leslie Nielson/Naked Gun levels of buffoonery but for mystery nerds. Instead of Ana de Armas as Blanc’s teammate in truth we have a stellar Janelle Monáe in a challenging dual role. But for the love of GOD, did we need an eat-the-rich retread after a palette overpowered by Triangle of Sadness and The Menu, each the funnier, more nuanced affair. All Glass Onion imparts is that the swap from old money to new, family to friends, still leads to parasites whether there’s blood involved or not. Edward Norton's Musk-like dumb genius tech mogul type is so on the nose, and overall this is an ensemble living out their accentuated archetypes, the roster not so illustrious as Knives Out. The whole satirically awful supporting bunch are, in the end, morally reprehensible if not by law — Onion tries to work in some redemption arc for Kate Hudson, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr. and Dave Bautista while Knives decidedly does not. The craaaaazy cameos throughout are basically expensive distractions — Yo Yo Ma, Ethan Hawke, Hugh Grant and Serena Williams, with namedrops in Jared Leto’s kombucha and Jeremy Renner’s hot sauce, gosh so silly and recognizable!
Despite functioning as baldfaced left-wing propaganda (the ‘subtext’ is about as stinky and transparent as the title would imply), even going to the point of justifying the destruction of pillars of western civilization in the name of billionaire outrage, Glass Onion impressively remains plentiful and potent in its duty to entertain. Anomalously, it's captivating enough to overcome its own exaggerated political grandstanding. Between the games and goofs and agenda-pushing, there’s really some great filmmaking that sparkles in contrast to Johnson’s base, topical humor and childish, wearily indignant preaching.
Knives Out’s fatal flaw is its time-trapped, of-the-moment back-and-forth about whatever Trump was up to when Rian was writing, and Johnson’s continued division-exacerbating devilishness in Glass Onion almost wastes the great production design and further franchise potential. Sorry, it’s just that I don’t trust anyone in Hollywood telling me “Wow these Hollywood people sure are evil” or millionaires informing me that billionaires are societies' real nemeses… unless… unless Johnson actually thinks he’s a disrupter just like Norton’s Miles Bron believes?
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever briefing
2 ½ (out of 4)
FIRST OFF, before you get the wrong idea: RIP Chadwick Boseman. Though Hollywood quickly pigeonholed him as the go-to fill-in figure for African American biopics (Jackie Robinson in 42, James Brown in Get On Up and Thurgood Marshall in Marshall) he always had the talent to back up the predictable placement and commodified racial empowerment. I always thought the role of T’Challa failed him, asking the actor to embrace to the whole mystic, stoic, middle-distance-staring thing too often but, then again, all Marvel needed was another personality whose essence could be reduced to quipping. There was still a nobility Boseman provided — no one else sold the cross-armed gesture or war cry so well.
Ah, why not waste the entire review discussing the late thespian? Bookended by proper, touching tribute, there’s nothing wrong with Wakanda Forever when it’s recognizing Boseman’s impact. It’s just the movie inside the cine-requiem-mass is everything that sucks about writing movie reviews, when repetition leaves you going out of your way to not say exactly the same things you’ve uttered many times before, sometimes only months removed. The Black Panther sequel, not to mention the acting world at large, clearly would’ve been better for it had Boseman remained alive and healthy. Nonetheless, that's no excuse for a film creatively altered in the wake of its lead's death, or the inconvenience it causes the feature's shape, character harmonics plus the whole damn Universe. While you may be in tears within minutes, soon enough you’ll be left in some stupefied, dry-eyed confusion.
And it’s not as if the all too generous two hours and 40 minutes is spent on as much mourning as Endgame’s first act. Still this movie’s ponderous pace is employed to, I don’t know, make the Aquaman/Avatar-knockoff elements appear as more than corn and camp? But how could we not reserve some runtime for another peripheral teen super genius girl since the previous one, Letitia Wright, just filled some cavernous shoes. No comment on Dominique Thorpe but Ironheart is a shoehorned afterthought and her specific visual effects shots looking like they were last on the pile — the character introduction is some really bungled branching out for the MCU.
Otherwise, to the credit of Wakanda Forever… you know the worst moment in Avengers: Endgame, the “Let’s go ladies” bit? This was like the opposite of that. So, you’ve lost your lead, you’re sad and screwed — of course you now scope the sequel as this memorial, reverent thing, as you should… and now what? You double down on your built-in, underrepresented demographics from the preeminent company of supporting performers ready to step up. What I admire most is despite this surefire selling point, a major black female ensemble (sorry Woman King), the movie doesn’t overplay a great hand. Damn Letitia Wright does her best to carry this film on her shoulders, the sorrowful weight shared most by a powerful Angela Bassett. Lupita N’yonga was probably as sidelined as I remember her to be from the last movie. Meanwhile Michaela Coel more than pulls her weight, whereas Winston Duke does his best to compensate for the diminished male presence left by Boseman as well as Daniel Kaluuya’s absence, and come to think of it Michael B. Jordan’s surprise appearance was for the best.
Our badass, absolutely sympathetic, poorly motivated, decently backstoried exile antagonist Namor is all but exactly like Killmonger but not as interesting — his good grace is immediately detracted at even the same story moment because the villain can’t be tooooo relatable... His mistaken reasons for revenge aside, they essentially set Namor out to be a bigger figure in the third film and I guess Phase 5 of Marvel in sum, but did I really care by the end of this one? Has one of their footnotes foretelling future fuckery ever had me hype?
So yeah, spectacular beginning, made me weep; the rest is hit and miss, winning me back, losing me. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is another disappointment for (and apparently the discreet denouement of) Phase Four, feebly unable to outdo Black Widow and Eternals as the frugal favorites of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s driest spell yet. You feel Ryan Coogler’s integrity, fervor and restraint when most needed, regardless of what the final product illustrates but man, there is a jumbled, par for the damn course super-feature sandwiched by Wakanda Forever's in-memorium — the most labored rewrites directed at Boseman legacy elevate the emotions as certainly as his departure leaves the film’s predominant center aching, wanting and lesser.
FIRST OFF, before you get the wrong idea: RIP Chadwick Boseman. Though Hollywood quickly pigeonholed him as the go-to fill-in figure for African American biopics (Jackie Robinson in 42, James Brown in Get On Up and Thurgood Marshall in Marshall) he always had the talent to back up the predictable placement and commodified racial empowerment. I always thought the role of T’Challa failed him, asking the actor to embrace to the whole mystic, stoic, middle-distance-staring thing too often but, then again, all Marvel needed was another personality whose essence could be reduced to quipping. There was still a nobility Boseman provided — no one else sold the cross-armed gesture or war cry so well.
Ah, why not waste the entire review discussing the late thespian? Bookended by proper, touching tribute, there’s nothing wrong with Wakanda Forever when it’s recognizing Boseman’s impact. It’s just the movie inside the cine-requiem-mass is everything that sucks about writing movie reviews, when repetition leaves you going out of your way to not say exactly the same things you’ve uttered many times before, sometimes only months removed. The Black Panther sequel, not to mention the acting world at large, clearly would’ve been better for it had Boseman remained alive and healthy. Nonetheless, that's no excuse for a film creatively altered in the wake of its lead's death, or the inconvenience it causes the feature's shape, character harmonics plus the whole damn Universe. While you may be in tears within minutes, soon enough you’ll be left in some stupefied, dry-eyed confusion.
And it’s not as if the all too generous two hours and 40 minutes is spent on as much mourning as Endgame’s first act. Still this movie’s ponderous pace is employed to, I don’t know, make the Aquaman/Avatar-knockoff elements appear as more than corn and camp? But how could we not reserve some runtime for another peripheral teen super genius girl since the previous one, Letitia Wright, just filled some cavernous shoes. No comment on Dominique Thorpe but Ironheart is a shoehorned afterthought and her specific visual effects shots looking like they were last on the pile — the character introduction is some really bungled branching out for the MCU.
Otherwise, to the credit of Wakanda Forever… you know the worst moment in Avengers: Endgame, the “Let’s go ladies” bit? This was like the opposite of that. So, you’ve lost your lead, you’re sad and screwed — of course you now scope the sequel as this memorial, reverent thing, as you should… and now what? You double down on your built-in, underrepresented demographics from the preeminent company of supporting performers ready to step up. What I admire most is despite this surefire selling point, a major black female ensemble (sorry Woman King), the movie doesn’t overplay a great hand. Damn Letitia Wright does her best to carry this film on her shoulders, the sorrowful weight shared most by a powerful Angela Bassett. Lupita N’yonga was probably as sidelined as I remember her to be from the last movie. Meanwhile Michaela Coel more than pulls her weight, whereas Winston Duke does his best to compensate for the diminished male presence left by Boseman as well as Daniel Kaluuya’s absence, and come to think of it Michael B. Jordan’s surprise appearance was for the best.
Our badass, absolutely sympathetic, poorly motivated, decently backstoried exile antagonist Namor is all but exactly like Killmonger but not as interesting — his good grace is immediately detracted at even the same story moment because the villain can’t be tooooo relatable... His mistaken reasons for revenge aside, they essentially set Namor out to be a bigger figure in the third film and I guess Phase 5 of Marvel in sum, but did I really care by the end of this one? Has one of their footnotes foretelling future fuckery ever had me hype?
So yeah, spectacular beginning, made me weep; the rest is hit and miss, winning me back, losing me. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is another disappointment for (and apparently the discreet denouement of) Phase Four, feebly unable to outdo Black Widow and Eternals as the frugal favorites of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s driest spell yet. You feel Ryan Coogler’s integrity, fervor and restraint when most needed, regardless of what the final product illustrates but man, there is a jumbled, par for the damn course super-feature sandwiched by Wakanda Forever's in-memorium — the most labored rewrites directed at Boseman legacy elevate the emotions as certainly as his departure leaves the film’s predominant center aching, wanting and lesser.
The Banshees of Inisherin briefing
3 ½ (out of 4)
For awhile I was curious why this film had to take place in 1923, until realizing it’s the only way for the Irish Civil War backdrop to allegorically frame the tale of longtime amity gone suddenly sour. Not sure if or how those century-removed opposing sides align with Brendan Gleeson’s more island-like, intellectual musician Colm and Colin Farrell’s good-guy, normal, antonym-averse (or should I say not the best with synonyms-like) Pádraic, because I regrettably haven't retained much history in general, let alone the background of what most assume to be my native land.
Despite whatcha may assume about me heritage based on the last name and the fact that there’s been an Irish pub in my family for over 40 years, I’m mostly Scottish and German. However I’ve enjoyed becoming familiar with some popular cinema from across the Atlantic (but still have aways to go through Jim Sheridan, Neil Jordan and the like), so what the feck, I'm not Irish but technically neither is ol’ Marty McDonagh, the Britain-born son of Irish folks. Let's see how his bleak little parable finds the stupendously scrupulous writer/director behind some of our most precious, indispensable adult comedies.
I'm ashamed to admit I fell asleep the first time viewing Banshees (I become more like my Dad every day), but it’s not because the film is as dull or limited as they make Farrell’s character out to be. Though with so much time between movies (always about five years) it’s funny how quaint McDonough’s efforts wind up in the end. He made a queer spot of his time in Hollywood following his piquant, altogether unbeatable debut In Bruges (a novel, true, prime existential affair cured by dry, deep, dark wit) with the decadently off-kilter Seven Psychopaths that, along with 21 Jump Street in 2012, seemed to suggest meta-cinema could be a great postmodern twist on the form of comedy and art, before Deadpool's stooped standard seemed to nix cleverness beyond self-awareness. Then Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri was quite the original movie, full of fucked up feelings, his staple of superb exchanges and, for worse, plenty of put-downs and knees to the vagina coming from Frances McDormand’s fired-up mother to a raped and murdered teenage daughter. With her as psychopath number eight and Sam Rockwell’s racist redemption arc, it’s crazy these two scored respective Best Actress and Supporting Actor wins. But I’ll be damned, for all its barbed bullshit Billboards is an entertaining, effective, masterful trifle.
Which makes The Banshees of Inisherin something of a metaphorical homecoming since In Bruges made an odd couple of Gleeson and Farrell's displaced Irish characters and, as the film negative of Bruges, the indelible pair comfortably jump from hit-man companions in an unlikely father-son dynamic to immediately estranged best friends. There are crucial confession scenes in either film, the former for plot and here for clever comic calculations — just like In Bruges, Banshees' score is so quiet and hauntingly melancholic it ironically underlines the classic Irish gallows humor while regularly radiating mortal dread.
Like Contempt for drinking buds, there’s the repetition of splintering and sundering and the muted pain of denial. I can say that Colm is mostly right — why lose pieces of your life on triviality when you could be doing something for yourself, for future folks? Even if you have to mame your own body to get the point across, perhaps burnt bridges are better for the legacy, and maybe the soul, than today’s passing amusements. Thematically, I’ve come to similar conclusions about wasted time and feeling like too much of your energy is expended partaking in pointless prattling. But with such steep prices for ridding yourself of distractions, is the subsequent silence the worthwhile alternative to flawed friendship?
It’s a tough, tugging dynamic, and yet one that has you sympathizing with Pádraic’s pitiful state despite Colm's sadder, surer, solipsistic view, the two trapped in small village politics on the fictional, titular Irish isle. It reminds me of Before Sunrise’s two-way monologue alleyway debate summing up the concerns of limiting yourself to others whims and the loneliness of getting the time and space to do just that; logically, correct answers aren't feasible. Some of McDonagh's writing regarding the removed, philosophical discourse masterfully weighs up ideas like freaking lady justice. It all comes to a bitter mental stalemate, but a nourishing one, like the best of Richard Linklater, Aaron Sorkin or Jason Reitman:
“I suppose niceness doesn't last, but I'll tell you something that does last"
"What? And don’t say something stupid like music”
“Music lasts”
"Knew it!"
Even with no historical, metaphorical extrapolation, Banshees is another practically perfect screenplay from a sharpshooting auteur who is four for four EASILY. It’s his saddest, most sincere and artistically inclined to date, regardless of how Banshees' sober tone contrasts the sheer entertainment value more handily located in his feistier, more accessible entries. It's another tantalizingly personal project bearing extraordinary universal relevance in tonal temperament, character and ideological concerns despite all the idiosyncrasies.
Kerry Condon as Siobhán, Pádraich's sister, is amazing by the way — I don’t believe I’ve ever seen her in anything, I genuinely can’t place her bit part in Three Billboards, but I’ll be damned she may be on her way to out-of-the-blue Oscar glory for Supporting Actress. Her voice is terribly listenable, her role as FRIDAY, Tony Stark’s AI-replacement for Paul Bettany’s Jarvis, now making so much sense. She’s so funny and intimidating and full of life. Likewise for Farrell and Gleeson (and even Barry Keoghan), no notes, just admiration.
But McDonagh really proves himself as the expert of exchanges, the deputy of tight, punchy, substantive, unfalteringly excellent dialogue. His search for meaning in despair, curiosity, writer’s block, grief, understanding, redemption and now ennui plus a philosophical tiredness... all his comic and dramatic iterations transmit unfettered veracity. Inisherin also brilliantly makes you imagine or at the very least involuntarily beckon for what in the hell the central relationship was like before the film begins, and likewise how it would resume once credits role. In an exceptionally weak year, McDonagh’s world-wearied, workmanlike best tops all the oh so ordinary shite we wouldn’t bother with anyway.
For awhile I was curious why this film had to take place in 1923, until realizing it’s the only way for the Irish Civil War backdrop to allegorically frame the tale of longtime amity gone suddenly sour. Not sure if or how those century-removed opposing sides align with Brendan Gleeson’s more island-like, intellectual musician Colm and Colin Farrell’s good-guy, normal, antonym-averse (or should I say not the best with synonyms-like) Pádraic, because I regrettably haven't retained much history in general, let alone the background of what most assume to be my native land.
Despite whatcha may assume about me heritage based on the last name and the fact that there’s been an Irish pub in my family for over 40 years, I’m mostly Scottish and German. However I’ve enjoyed becoming familiar with some popular cinema from across the Atlantic (but still have aways to go through Jim Sheridan, Neil Jordan and the like), so what the feck, I'm not Irish but technically neither is ol’ Marty McDonagh, the Britain-born son of Irish folks. Let's see how his bleak little parable finds the stupendously scrupulous writer/director behind some of our most precious, indispensable adult comedies.
I'm ashamed to admit I fell asleep the first time viewing Banshees (I become more like my Dad every day), but it’s not because the film is as dull or limited as they make Farrell’s character out to be. Though with so much time between movies (always about five years) it’s funny how quaint McDonough’s efforts wind up in the end. He made a queer spot of his time in Hollywood following his piquant, altogether unbeatable debut In Bruges (a novel, true, prime existential affair cured by dry, deep, dark wit) with the decadently off-kilter Seven Psychopaths that, along with 21 Jump Street in 2012, seemed to suggest meta-cinema could be a great postmodern twist on the form of comedy and art, before Deadpool's stooped standard seemed to nix cleverness beyond self-awareness. Then Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri was quite the original movie, full of fucked up feelings, his staple of superb exchanges and, for worse, plenty of put-downs and knees to the vagina coming from Frances McDormand’s fired-up mother to a raped and murdered teenage daughter. With her as psychopath number eight and Sam Rockwell’s racist redemption arc, it’s crazy these two scored respective Best Actress and Supporting Actor wins. But I’ll be damned, for all its barbed bullshit Billboards is an entertaining, effective, masterful trifle.
Which makes The Banshees of Inisherin something of a metaphorical homecoming since In Bruges made an odd couple of Gleeson and Farrell's displaced Irish characters and, as the film negative of Bruges, the indelible pair comfortably jump from hit-man companions in an unlikely father-son dynamic to immediately estranged best friends. There are crucial confession scenes in either film, the former for plot and here for clever comic calculations — just like In Bruges, Banshees' score is so quiet and hauntingly melancholic it ironically underlines the classic Irish gallows humor while regularly radiating mortal dread.
Like Contempt for drinking buds, there’s the repetition of splintering and sundering and the muted pain of denial. I can say that Colm is mostly right — why lose pieces of your life on triviality when you could be doing something for yourself, for future folks? Even if you have to mame your own body to get the point across, perhaps burnt bridges are better for the legacy, and maybe the soul, than today’s passing amusements. Thematically, I’ve come to similar conclusions about wasted time and feeling like too much of your energy is expended partaking in pointless prattling. But with such steep prices for ridding yourself of distractions, is the subsequent silence the worthwhile alternative to flawed friendship?
It’s a tough, tugging dynamic, and yet one that has you sympathizing with Pádraic’s pitiful state despite Colm's sadder, surer, solipsistic view, the two trapped in small village politics on the fictional, titular Irish isle. It reminds me of Before Sunrise’s two-way monologue alleyway debate summing up the concerns of limiting yourself to others whims and the loneliness of getting the time and space to do just that; logically, correct answers aren't feasible. Some of McDonagh's writing regarding the removed, philosophical discourse masterfully weighs up ideas like freaking lady justice. It all comes to a bitter mental stalemate, but a nourishing one, like the best of Richard Linklater, Aaron Sorkin or Jason Reitman:
“I suppose niceness doesn't last, but I'll tell you something that does last"
"What? And don’t say something stupid like music”
“Music lasts”
"Knew it!"
Even with no historical, metaphorical extrapolation, Banshees is another practically perfect screenplay from a sharpshooting auteur who is four for four EASILY. It’s his saddest, most sincere and artistically inclined to date, regardless of how Banshees' sober tone contrasts the sheer entertainment value more handily located in his feistier, more accessible entries. It's another tantalizingly personal project bearing extraordinary universal relevance in tonal temperament, character and ideological concerns despite all the idiosyncrasies.
Kerry Condon as Siobhán, Pádraich's sister, is amazing by the way — I don’t believe I’ve ever seen her in anything, I genuinely can’t place her bit part in Three Billboards, but I’ll be damned she may be on her way to out-of-the-blue Oscar glory for Supporting Actress. Her voice is terribly listenable, her role as FRIDAY, Tony Stark’s AI-replacement for Paul Bettany’s Jarvis, now making so much sense. She’s so funny and intimidating and full of life. Likewise for Farrell and Gleeson (and even Barry Keoghan), no notes, just admiration.
But McDonagh really proves himself as the expert of exchanges, the deputy of tight, punchy, substantive, unfalteringly excellent dialogue. His search for meaning in despair, curiosity, writer’s block, grief, understanding, redemption and now ennui plus a philosophical tiredness... all his comic and dramatic iterations transmit unfettered veracity. Inisherin also brilliantly makes you imagine or at the very least involuntarily beckon for what in the hell the central relationship was like before the film begins, and likewise how it would resume once credits role. In an exceptionally weak year, McDonagh’s world-wearied, workmanlike best tops all the oh so ordinary shite we wouldn’t bother with anyway.
Tár briefing
3 (out of 4)
Of all the auteur comebacks you would assume to be unquestionable slam-dunk masterpieces (Andrew Dominik’s 11 years between Killing Them Softly and Blonde, nine years for both Baz Luhrmann from Gatsby to Elvis and Sam Raimi from Oz the Great and Powerful to a Doctor Strange sequel) Todd Field’s Tár felt so impenetrable, so long-awaited, so comprehensively difficult to appreciate I originally classified it among such aforementioned whiffs.
On first viewing I cried “Why come back after over 15 years unless you had a good reason?!?!” Whereas his uncategorizably dramatic debut In the Bedroom began inconspicuously, the gradually unfolding narrative became more terrible and powerful than you could dream of going in, Tár is just the opposite — what kicks off as a consummate character study and equally chilly psychological thriller, stocked with show-off moments for both Cate Blanchett’s insistent bravado and Field’s coy camerawork, quickly devolves to perpetual, painfully self-induced self-destruction, largely for Lydia but perhaps a touch for Todd too?
In the film’s breathtaking early high point (ramping immediate expectations dangerously high) Blanchett and Field’s symbiosis manifests in a wonderful one-take of Lydia commanding a Juilliard classroom and borderline berating a nervous pansexual Gen-Z undergrad — it’s funny how you clearly side with her prestigious character taking down some historically misguided fellow who thinks Bach is cisgendered or something, but by the end you find some latent sympathy for the one declaring “fucking bitch” and storming out.
For the next two hours prepare for what most movies cover in pure plot within 30 minutes, as this manipulative, impossibly well-to-do woman’s yin-yanging favoritism and neglect tie a noose around her sanity. I understand this film’s climactic cavity is the point, that no matter your status, past evil misdeeds can poison and undo even the most accomplished career. I’m certainly dumb for expecting some ultimate insane asylum-like turn or at least a spectacular performance sequence to bring it all home — or, to further speak for the average Joe’s enjoyment, for the interminable, insistent film to be like, 45 minutes shorter… It’s such a great setup for a substantial movie, Blanchett leading the conservatively well-acted film with an arrangement of musing, meticulous monologues and exchanges, led by tasteful, nigh invisibly controlled direction by Field — it’s hard to pull off a movie like this and not come off stilted, though if I were a true insufferable classical music connoisseur I could maybe identify even more airs.
Tár is this intimidating übermensch of culture, a dominatrix unburdened by gender who has done it all — she’s got the career, the prestige, the EGOT, yet she still crumbles. Vaguely bearing the same rise and fall narrative of many classic character pieces from Kane to Zuckerberg in The Social Network, there’s hardly any sympathy earned or rollicking ride upward to strap in for. If art is really meant to suppose questions rather than provide answers, I guess this film thoroughly mulls over the tired debate of “can the art and the artist be separated?” I suppose this was all about confirming THE DEATH OF THE AUTHOR or whatever, wrapped in a magnificently steady tragedy about some middle-aged matriarch at the apex of the classical world, contrasting the eventual suicide victim that tumbles all of Tár’s dominoes with the latest object of her desire with whom she can’t quite get a groom on, a Russian cellist playing oblivious and uninterested to Lydia’s playful side, possibly at the behest of Tar’s assistant, the almost equally ambiguous Noémie Merlant acting.
In the Bedroom is a little too Requiem-like where you’re only going to watch it once because it’s too haunting and the foreknowledge would make a second viewing that much more difficult. When you go in blind to that one you say sure! Hot Marisa Tomei, yes please. One act later you’re like OH MY GOD THIS IS DEVASTATING — it’s a real drama that GOES places. And while I’m breaking down such a tiny, towering filmography, let me just rant about Little Children for a minute: I don’t read much, but if I were to point to a great iteration of film’s ability to replicate and perhaps exceed literature’s potential of expression amidst all the objectivity and enigmatic nature of art, then it would be Field’s masterful second entry.
I’m sure some bookworm could contradict me but the narration is selective and cutting, the performances are remarkable and the thematic quality is in the eye of the beholder, truly. He makes his hardest case for empathy or at least some testy level of understanding, from sexy-ass extra-marital affairs to past pedophilia and sexual assault. In contrast Tár’s past deeds keep her at a removed moral distance, but in Field's sophomore stunner, between adultery to indecent exposure there's some uncommon leniency done upon these basic sins, forcing you to contemplate taboos to an entirely different degree. Little Children’s acting, sublime melodrama, needling black humor, and removed, almost Hawksian direction all point to an easily overlooked masterpiece. Tár, while elusively great, professionally put-together and exceptionally, attentively written, cannot match Little Children’s black comic high.
My earlier review would have me saying: “I’m just a little flabbergasted because I really expected something from the rave reviews as well as Field’s small, superb past. The film reads as a crazy, uncompromised conundrum, like some twisted, purposeless vanity project not unlike our titular figure’s own groom-tastic grandstanding. I just don’t know what to make of it, the story amounts to Blanchett as master maestro performing power move after power move, the themes boiling down to social media! and practice what you preach! and you reap what you sow! all of it more obvious than I would ideally want my “messages” coming across. But seriously, what is the ultimate takeaway Mr. Field? That women can be Weinstein’s too? There’s equality for ya.”
Whereas my current kinder perspective is closer to: “Like Antonioni, Field shoots as if the environs were more spatially significant than the characters, but this is ambient unease worthy of Blue Velvet or some similar Lynchian atmospherics… The tragedy is also ultimately earned despite her evil dealings because Lydia feels so fully realized, someone at their summit who can’t prevent their beautifully stacked house of cards from growing too excessive and collapsing. Similar to some Park Chan-wook flicks, Field bravely omits key plots moments and leaves you to figure it out for yourself, keeping you at arm’s length like some distant, impenetrable Michael Haneke film.”
Field’s movie isn’t predigested, or perhaps is the most predigested movie I’ve seen in forever — he treats you like an adult, like former Oscar favorites used to, the kind from when he started making movies just over two decades ago. There’s so much subcutaneous detail to excavate, shades of Lydia’s character to unearth (especially in the easily overlooked epilogue/conclusion), Krista’s haunting shadow looming over the entire 2 1/2 hour plus affair.
Otherwise I didn’t even notice the supplemental score by Oscar winning cellist/composer for Joker Hildur Guðnadóttir, many times I thought there was no soundtrack outside of the diagetic performances. Also there was some random electronic song at the end of your CLASSICAL MUSIC MOVIE WHAT THE FUCK???, a song called “Barbarian” by Besomorph and Jurgaz, and coincidentally it's crazy that Barbarian, the comedy-horror debut from one of the Whitest Kids You Know, has relatively the same tactful truthfulness concerning sexual coercion and consequences as this odd duck Oscar shoo-in. It was a tough one, a backwards fictional biopic, a self-fulfilling prophecy of shitty behavior, a tepid thriller and a remarkably inferential ghost story, an inflexible work of art that also might make the classical music snob into a pretentious, petty mess.
The subtlety is so fine at times it only makes it hurt how self-evident its implications really are. Tár goes from a brilliant, multifaceted dialogue on power and prowess to a never-ending free fall into comeuppance, losing its chilled, indecipherable unease to a weak second act that has to spell out what Krista’s haunting already does for us. But the way it lands that ending emotional blow still seals this as a rich, indispensable cinematic portrait for the present moment.
Of all the auteur comebacks you would assume to be unquestionable slam-dunk masterpieces (Andrew Dominik’s 11 years between Killing Them Softly and Blonde, nine years for both Baz Luhrmann from Gatsby to Elvis and Sam Raimi from Oz the Great and Powerful to a Doctor Strange sequel) Todd Field’s Tár felt so impenetrable, so long-awaited, so comprehensively difficult to appreciate I originally classified it among such aforementioned whiffs.
On first viewing I cried “Why come back after over 15 years unless you had a good reason?!?!” Whereas his uncategorizably dramatic debut In the Bedroom began inconspicuously, the gradually unfolding narrative became more terrible and powerful than you could dream of going in, Tár is just the opposite — what kicks off as a consummate character study and equally chilly psychological thriller, stocked with show-off moments for both Cate Blanchett’s insistent bravado and Field’s coy camerawork, quickly devolves to perpetual, painfully self-induced self-destruction, largely for Lydia but perhaps a touch for Todd too?
In the film’s breathtaking early high point (ramping immediate expectations dangerously high) Blanchett and Field’s symbiosis manifests in a wonderful one-take of Lydia commanding a Juilliard classroom and borderline berating a nervous pansexual Gen-Z undergrad — it’s funny how you clearly side with her prestigious character taking down some historically misguided fellow who thinks Bach is cisgendered or something, but by the end you find some latent sympathy for the one declaring “fucking bitch” and storming out.
For the next two hours prepare for what most movies cover in pure plot within 30 minutes, as this manipulative, impossibly well-to-do woman’s yin-yanging favoritism and neglect tie a noose around her sanity. I understand this film’s climactic cavity is the point, that no matter your status, past evil misdeeds can poison and undo even the most accomplished career. I’m certainly dumb for expecting some ultimate insane asylum-like turn or at least a spectacular performance sequence to bring it all home — or, to further speak for the average Joe’s enjoyment, for the interminable, insistent film to be like, 45 minutes shorter… It’s such a great setup for a substantial movie, Blanchett leading the conservatively well-acted film with an arrangement of musing, meticulous monologues and exchanges, led by tasteful, nigh invisibly controlled direction by Field — it’s hard to pull off a movie like this and not come off stilted, though if I were a true insufferable classical music connoisseur I could maybe identify even more airs.
Tár is this intimidating übermensch of culture, a dominatrix unburdened by gender who has done it all — she’s got the career, the prestige, the EGOT, yet she still crumbles. Vaguely bearing the same rise and fall narrative of many classic character pieces from Kane to Zuckerberg in The Social Network, there’s hardly any sympathy earned or rollicking ride upward to strap in for. If art is really meant to suppose questions rather than provide answers, I guess this film thoroughly mulls over the tired debate of “can the art and the artist be separated?” I suppose this was all about confirming THE DEATH OF THE AUTHOR or whatever, wrapped in a magnificently steady tragedy about some middle-aged matriarch at the apex of the classical world, contrasting the eventual suicide victim that tumbles all of Tár’s dominoes with the latest object of her desire with whom she can’t quite get a groom on, a Russian cellist playing oblivious and uninterested to Lydia’s playful side, possibly at the behest of Tar’s assistant, the almost equally ambiguous Noémie Merlant acting.
In the Bedroom is a little too Requiem-like where you’re only going to watch it once because it’s too haunting and the foreknowledge would make a second viewing that much more difficult. When you go in blind to that one you say sure! Hot Marisa Tomei, yes please. One act later you’re like OH MY GOD THIS IS DEVASTATING — it’s a real drama that GOES places. And while I’m breaking down such a tiny, towering filmography, let me just rant about Little Children for a minute: I don’t read much, but if I were to point to a great iteration of film’s ability to replicate and perhaps exceed literature’s potential of expression amidst all the objectivity and enigmatic nature of art, then it would be Field’s masterful second entry.
I’m sure some bookworm could contradict me but the narration is selective and cutting, the performances are remarkable and the thematic quality is in the eye of the beholder, truly. He makes his hardest case for empathy or at least some testy level of understanding, from sexy-ass extra-marital affairs to past pedophilia and sexual assault. In contrast Tár’s past deeds keep her at a removed moral distance, but in Field's sophomore stunner, between adultery to indecent exposure there's some uncommon leniency done upon these basic sins, forcing you to contemplate taboos to an entirely different degree. Little Children’s acting, sublime melodrama, needling black humor, and removed, almost Hawksian direction all point to an easily overlooked masterpiece. Tár, while elusively great, professionally put-together and exceptionally, attentively written, cannot match Little Children’s black comic high.
My earlier review would have me saying: “I’m just a little flabbergasted because I really expected something from the rave reviews as well as Field’s small, superb past. The film reads as a crazy, uncompromised conundrum, like some twisted, purposeless vanity project not unlike our titular figure’s own groom-tastic grandstanding. I just don’t know what to make of it, the story amounts to Blanchett as master maestro performing power move after power move, the themes boiling down to social media! and practice what you preach! and you reap what you sow! all of it more obvious than I would ideally want my “messages” coming across. But seriously, what is the ultimate takeaway Mr. Field? That women can be Weinstein’s too? There’s equality for ya.”
Whereas my current kinder perspective is closer to: “Like Antonioni, Field shoots as if the environs were more spatially significant than the characters, but this is ambient unease worthy of Blue Velvet or some similar Lynchian atmospherics… The tragedy is also ultimately earned despite her evil dealings because Lydia feels so fully realized, someone at their summit who can’t prevent their beautifully stacked house of cards from growing too excessive and collapsing. Similar to some Park Chan-wook flicks, Field bravely omits key plots moments and leaves you to figure it out for yourself, keeping you at arm’s length like some distant, impenetrable Michael Haneke film.”
Field’s movie isn’t predigested, or perhaps is the most predigested movie I’ve seen in forever — he treats you like an adult, like former Oscar favorites used to, the kind from when he started making movies just over two decades ago. There’s so much subcutaneous detail to excavate, shades of Lydia’s character to unearth (especially in the easily overlooked epilogue/conclusion), Krista’s haunting shadow looming over the entire 2 1/2 hour plus affair.
Otherwise I didn’t even notice the supplemental score by Oscar winning cellist/composer for Joker Hildur Guðnadóttir, many times I thought there was no soundtrack outside of the diagetic performances. Also there was some random electronic song at the end of your CLASSICAL MUSIC MOVIE WHAT THE FUCK???, a song called “Barbarian” by Besomorph and Jurgaz, and coincidentally it's crazy that Barbarian, the comedy-horror debut from one of the Whitest Kids You Know, has relatively the same tactful truthfulness concerning sexual coercion and consequences as this odd duck Oscar shoo-in. It was a tough one, a backwards fictional biopic, a self-fulfilling prophecy of shitty behavior, a tepid thriller and a remarkably inferential ghost story, an inflexible work of art that also might make the classical music snob into a pretentious, petty mess.
The subtlety is so fine at times it only makes it hurt how self-evident its implications really are. Tár goes from a brilliant, multifaceted dialogue on power and prowess to a never-ending free fall into comeuppance, losing its chilled, indecipherable unease to a weak second act that has to spell out what Krista’s haunting already does for us. But the way it lands that ending emotional blow still seals this as a rich, indispensable cinematic portrait for the present moment.
Black Adam briefing
1 ½ (out of 4)
Is it bad I’m only now realizing Joker and The Batman are actually separate from the DC Extended Universe? I figured after Aquaman did so well solo they just threw the whole idea of interconnection in the trash while ceremoniously maintaining the umbrella moniker. But now we’re here with a film Dwayne Johnson has been attempting to put together for something like 15 years supposedly but, other than its favorable connection to the far more sympathetic and satisfyingly silly Shazam!, this is yet another actual DCEU feature, like Birds of Prey, having a real-time identity crisis before your eyes trying to figure out what the franchise is right now.
While I always enjoy the way DC serves as the wild card foil to Marvel’s sedating sameness, my my my this movie is a mighty mess. I honestly found it to be quite bad, albeit inoffensive and admittedly ambitious. But it’s insane how Black Adam climaxes (sorry don’t care about spoilers) with The Rock literally grabbing what might as well be the devil incarnate by the horns and tearing him in half and somehow it’s all just so BORING, HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE!
The second act is nonstop garbage frenetically passing before your face, with the same shallow conflict between Teth Adam and the Justice Society on repeat, back and forth between tough words and digitally slathered, numbing, disorienting action reading like a very long Pre-Vis reel that only got 85 percent completed, all so poorly edited together I managed to miss some progress in the child’s play plotting. In theory this was an adventurous, intermittently intrepid exercise — the film in actuality comes off like a discount, second-run flick. Despite trying to do so much, Black Adam falls into every capeshit cavity since the genre became 21st century Hollywood’s B&B. It’s funny how ambition unfulfilled may as well be modesty from the start.
The beginning of the movie is also just absurdly unrelenting expository excrement. Awhile in I quickly went from “Wow this is quite the LOTR-like backstory” to “Is this prologue over yet?” It was more than enough to digest and I was hopeful all that color was worth the clunkiness — like Eternals, there may have been a shitload to set up because of all the film was aspiring to accomplish. Instead the preambles and predictable droning are meant only to stagger out the grating super-skirmishes and set up stupid revelations, like Bane/TDKR riffs where there’s a twist on the deceptively told backstory, except who cares? Ooh you got us by lying to us. Regardless of a revised history there are so many little clichés that pile on, like sympathetic hostages with faith in the main hero — “Black Adam’s gonna find you!” “I’m counting on it!” retorts the nabbers... You know just how many movies have used that same exchange template?
To run through all the stupid comparisons, Black Adam was just a dollar store knockoff of so many things and literally every character is a shadow of something better. For instance, Pierce Brosnan’s Doctor Fate is a depreciated Doctor Strange, Teth Adam/Black Adam is just dark Superman, Noah Centineo's Atom Smasher is an Ant-Man alternate and Quintessa Swindel's Cyclone feels like spicy splice of Zazie Beetz' Domino from Deadpool 2 and X-Men's Storm. Aldis Hodge's Hawkman, like Brosnan, feels too close to the competition, specifically Anthony Mackie's Falcon, like a runner-up regardless of whose comic came first. At any given moment the film wants to be Deadpool, X-Men, Thor, sometimes T2 for God’s sake, since the Rock is comically (ironically, I jest) one-note.
The only weapon DC has is their earnestness — their stuff feels more reflective of comic book customs, so there’s something noble in that I suppose. The problem is whereas you get arguable auteurs like James Wan to do some actual filmmaking like Aquaman (some cracked camp aside, a true spectacle as intended), everything else isn’t memorable enough to transcend the traditional. Black Adam’s tone is sorely scrambled, seemingly stripped back by test scores and/or producers… both the temperament and pacing are loony cuckoo poppycock, just all over the goddamn place. Despite its studio shaping, the movie still could’ve been been reduced to 80 minutes long, instead opting to give me whiplash over and over, so frequently I eventually assumed the tinkerers behind the scenes wanted to virtually erase potential memories by its end so all we’re left with is that HENRY CAVILL IS BACK BABY WOOOOOO!! DC IS SAVED!!! ***Correction… Cavill’s actually gone and Black Adam's future is already buried LMAO
It made me wish I was watching Shazam!, or perhaps the new Shazam! or really any other DC — it was almost first Suicide Squad bad, bordering on Zack Snyder's most senseless stages. Like our lead character morally mulling it all over (and over again), Black Adam literally has no idea what it wants to be and changes its mind at any moment. Just at a glance, WB’s latest silver screen shrug feels as if all the reasons why it took forever to make are no different from the rationale behind never putting the movie together in the first place.
Is it bad I’m only now realizing Joker and The Batman are actually separate from the DC Extended Universe? I figured after Aquaman did so well solo they just threw the whole idea of interconnection in the trash while ceremoniously maintaining the umbrella moniker. But now we’re here with a film Dwayne Johnson has been attempting to put together for something like 15 years supposedly but, other than its favorable connection to the far more sympathetic and satisfyingly silly Shazam!, this is yet another actual DCEU feature, like Birds of Prey, having a real-time identity crisis before your eyes trying to figure out what the franchise is right now.
While I always enjoy the way DC serves as the wild card foil to Marvel’s sedating sameness, my my my this movie is a mighty mess. I honestly found it to be quite bad, albeit inoffensive and admittedly ambitious. But it’s insane how Black Adam climaxes (sorry don’t care about spoilers) with The Rock literally grabbing what might as well be the devil incarnate by the horns and tearing him in half and somehow it’s all just so BORING, HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE!
The second act is nonstop garbage frenetically passing before your face, with the same shallow conflict between Teth Adam and the Justice Society on repeat, back and forth between tough words and digitally slathered, numbing, disorienting action reading like a very long Pre-Vis reel that only got 85 percent completed, all so poorly edited together I managed to miss some progress in the child’s play plotting. In theory this was an adventurous, intermittently intrepid exercise — the film in actuality comes off like a discount, second-run flick. Despite trying to do so much, Black Adam falls into every capeshit cavity since the genre became 21st century Hollywood’s B&B. It’s funny how ambition unfulfilled may as well be modesty from the start.
The beginning of the movie is also just absurdly unrelenting expository excrement. Awhile in I quickly went from “Wow this is quite the LOTR-like backstory” to “Is this prologue over yet?” It was more than enough to digest and I was hopeful all that color was worth the clunkiness — like Eternals, there may have been a shitload to set up because of all the film was aspiring to accomplish. Instead the preambles and predictable droning are meant only to stagger out the grating super-skirmishes and set up stupid revelations, like Bane/TDKR riffs where there’s a twist on the deceptively told backstory, except who cares? Ooh you got us by lying to us. Regardless of a revised history there are so many little clichés that pile on, like sympathetic hostages with faith in the main hero — “Black Adam’s gonna find you!” “I’m counting on it!” retorts the nabbers... You know just how many movies have used that same exchange template?
To run through all the stupid comparisons, Black Adam was just a dollar store knockoff of so many things and literally every character is a shadow of something better. For instance, Pierce Brosnan’s Doctor Fate is a depreciated Doctor Strange, Teth Adam/Black Adam is just dark Superman, Noah Centineo's Atom Smasher is an Ant-Man alternate and Quintessa Swindel's Cyclone feels like spicy splice of Zazie Beetz' Domino from Deadpool 2 and X-Men's Storm. Aldis Hodge's Hawkman, like Brosnan, feels too close to the competition, specifically Anthony Mackie's Falcon, like a runner-up regardless of whose comic came first. At any given moment the film wants to be Deadpool, X-Men, Thor, sometimes T2 for God’s sake, since the Rock is comically (ironically, I jest) one-note.
The only weapon DC has is their earnestness — their stuff feels more reflective of comic book customs, so there’s something noble in that I suppose. The problem is whereas you get arguable auteurs like James Wan to do some actual filmmaking like Aquaman (some cracked camp aside, a true spectacle as intended), everything else isn’t memorable enough to transcend the traditional. Black Adam’s tone is sorely scrambled, seemingly stripped back by test scores and/or producers… both the temperament and pacing are loony cuckoo poppycock, just all over the goddamn place. Despite its studio shaping, the movie still could’ve been been reduced to 80 minutes long, instead opting to give me whiplash over and over, so frequently I eventually assumed the tinkerers behind the scenes wanted to virtually erase potential memories by its end so all we’re left with is that HENRY CAVILL IS BACK BABY WOOOOOO!! DC IS SAVED!!! ***Correction… Cavill’s actually gone and Black Adam's future is already buried LMAO
It made me wish I was watching Shazam!, or perhaps the new Shazam! or really any other DC — it was almost first Suicide Squad bad, bordering on Zack Snyder's most senseless stages. Like our lead character morally mulling it all over (and over again), Black Adam literally has no idea what it wants to be and changes its mind at any moment. Just at a glance, WB’s latest silver screen shrug feels as if all the reasons why it took forever to make are no different from the rationale behind never putting the movie together in the first place.
Amsterdam briefing
2 (out of 4)
In spite of some form of moderate distaste for most of David O. Russell's filmography, it's clear he reached a personal stroke of fortune critically, financially and artistically in the era that dawned with 2010’s The Fighter, blossoming to even more magnetic awards attention with the one-two-punch peak of Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle about a decade ago. Though pushed with the same fervor in effort, substance and marketing, his last, 2015’s Joy, incited few returns or rave reviews.
Career-wise, I don’t really know how this guy is still outside of the Hollywood doghouse considering his regularly, infamously indecent on-set behavior dating back to at least his early breakout days in the late 90s wherein he was head-butting then-ascending George Clooney during the production of Three Kings. But admitting you groped your transgender niece and your defense is that she was into it? See, for some reason Woody Allen gets wrongfully nailed to the cross AGAIN in the wake of #metoo but no one can dig up this guy’s wiki page? I digress, O. Russell isn't Bryan Singer bad but holy shit — how did he get this 80 million dollar stillborn sensation off the ground, besides some exec's suggestion that doing the whole American Hustle thing again would equal money?
Other than a new sorta true story out to elucidate a generalized, Hollywoodized excerpt of America's 20th century past connecting corruption within law enforcement, politics and generally the powers that be, two men and a beautiful woman bound to a situation in which they must play sides against one another, plus Christian Bale's non-committal, generally awkward narration, this has absolutely nothing in common with that loose Abscam adaptation from 2013. But while the vibrancy of Hustle, its strong host of performers and the old-fashioned earnestness make that pompous parade a fun ride regardless of the half-remembered history lesson, Amsterdam is something quite similar just much more lame and confused.
His low point would have to be 2004’s I Heart Huckabees, which bears the awful promise of accessible existentialism resting only on the most painfully self-evident truths, trying to cut at social norms with stubbornly smug, obtuse, pretentious, infuriating satire, like if Kevin Smith tried to emulate Charlie Kaufman. It's really bad, but it capped off an era that, other than his flashier, chaotic-evil-Gulf-War-heist-comedy-drama Three Kings, was like any number of 90s indie filmmaker’s résumés. He got off the ground (and hopefully not anything else) with his 1994 incest-heavy sick-comedy/coming-of-age debut Spanking the Monkey and the Ben Stiller rom-com Flirting With Disaster, the latter already finding O. operating with formidably sizable casts. Post-Huckabees his palettes got significantly warmer, the editing more relentless, the camera more mobile. The Fighter matters not to me, but Silver Linings' loose bent with mental illness flies because there’s genuineness, inverted tropes and movie magic keeping you at ease, and likewise his Scorsese-lifted sleaze is forgiven in American Hustle for that film’s insistent entertainment value alone. Seven years past Joy, Amsterdam is a culmination (or perhaps compilation) of this later era that has now usurped most indication of that early, prickly, even prouder style.
O. Russell also has many actor collaborations continuing here, most obviously Bale in his third turn for David and Robert De Niro in a fourth pretty crucial supporting role in a row. Margot Robbie continues to be the beautiful, talented being that has kept her limelight aglow for a decade, though her place here looks remarkably akin to what she’ll be riffing in my most anticipated of the year, Damien Chazelle’s Babylon, an adjacently CRAAAAZY century-removed ensemble comedy from the looks of it. Jon David Washington I like enough but Bale, with his crooked back and glass eye for character, is acting laps around his co-star without trying — JDW may as well be another nameless, personality-less vessel like in Tenet. Rami Malek was the standout supporter but by the end he is so obviously pigeonholed for villainy, a shame especially on the heels of a cheesy Bond baddie role. The work of Taylor Swift, Michael Shannon, Chris Rock (jeez was his character even in the script or was it just >Chris Rock riffs about race for 15 seconds), Anya-Taylor Joy, Zoe Saldaña, Michael Myers, etc. is all just unnecessary garnish.
Sure, there are some wonderful ratatat moments and plain-as-day physical artistry. There are also continuity errors, crap dubbing and studio tampering that could make even a thick first-year film student furrow his brow. Even with mistakes reshoots should've fixed, Amsterdam is a modestly watchable mess, it's noir-like labyrinth of kinda-murder mystery mania all pretty straightforward when laid out in its entirety. When you can barely market your movie because the story is buried under so much “in over your head” intrigue, it's no wonder why Amsterdam strains so hard to be about more than a little piece of the past but also life and love and art and all this shit — it's enough to make you gag when back-end narration tries to sum up disorderly distractions like a mediocre episode of Scrubs.
What saddens me most is, under the parade of 360s and blitzing edits, sometimes great cinematographers get misplaced beneath the voluptuous veneer of Russell's recent career. Here, in what is already the flop of the year, the one and only Emmanuel Lubezki is hardly noticeable under David’s direction, with little room to wield his gifts in the most ham-fisted, herky-jerky of Russell’s slick, emotionally driven, violently insistent period dramedies.
In spite of some form of moderate distaste for most of David O. Russell's filmography, it's clear he reached a personal stroke of fortune critically, financially and artistically in the era that dawned with 2010’s The Fighter, blossoming to even more magnetic awards attention with the one-two-punch peak of Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle about a decade ago. Though pushed with the same fervor in effort, substance and marketing, his last, 2015’s Joy, incited few returns or rave reviews.
Career-wise, I don’t really know how this guy is still outside of the Hollywood doghouse considering his regularly, infamously indecent on-set behavior dating back to at least his early breakout days in the late 90s wherein he was head-butting then-ascending George Clooney during the production of Three Kings. But admitting you groped your transgender niece and your defense is that she was into it? See, for some reason Woody Allen gets wrongfully nailed to the cross AGAIN in the wake of #metoo but no one can dig up this guy’s wiki page? I digress, O. Russell isn't Bryan Singer bad but holy shit — how did he get this 80 million dollar stillborn sensation off the ground, besides some exec's suggestion that doing the whole American Hustle thing again would equal money?
Other than a new sorta true story out to elucidate a generalized, Hollywoodized excerpt of America's 20th century past connecting corruption within law enforcement, politics and generally the powers that be, two men and a beautiful woman bound to a situation in which they must play sides against one another, plus Christian Bale's non-committal, generally awkward narration, this has absolutely nothing in common with that loose Abscam adaptation from 2013. But while the vibrancy of Hustle, its strong host of performers and the old-fashioned earnestness make that pompous parade a fun ride regardless of the half-remembered history lesson, Amsterdam is something quite similar just much more lame and confused.
His low point would have to be 2004’s I Heart Huckabees, which bears the awful promise of accessible existentialism resting only on the most painfully self-evident truths, trying to cut at social norms with stubbornly smug, obtuse, pretentious, infuriating satire, like if Kevin Smith tried to emulate Charlie Kaufman. It's really bad, but it capped off an era that, other than his flashier, chaotic-evil-Gulf-War-heist-comedy-drama Three Kings, was like any number of 90s indie filmmaker’s résumés. He got off the ground (and hopefully not anything else) with his 1994 incest-heavy sick-comedy/coming-of-age debut Spanking the Monkey and the Ben Stiller rom-com Flirting With Disaster, the latter already finding O. operating with formidably sizable casts. Post-Huckabees his palettes got significantly warmer, the editing more relentless, the camera more mobile. The Fighter matters not to me, but Silver Linings' loose bent with mental illness flies because there’s genuineness, inverted tropes and movie magic keeping you at ease, and likewise his Scorsese-lifted sleaze is forgiven in American Hustle for that film’s insistent entertainment value alone. Seven years past Joy, Amsterdam is a culmination (or perhaps compilation) of this later era that has now usurped most indication of that early, prickly, even prouder style.
O. Russell also has many actor collaborations continuing here, most obviously Bale in his third turn for David and Robert De Niro in a fourth pretty crucial supporting role in a row. Margot Robbie continues to be the beautiful, talented being that has kept her limelight aglow for a decade, though her place here looks remarkably akin to what she’ll be riffing in my most anticipated of the year, Damien Chazelle’s Babylon, an adjacently CRAAAAZY century-removed ensemble comedy from the looks of it. Jon David Washington I like enough but Bale, with his crooked back and glass eye for character, is acting laps around his co-star without trying — JDW may as well be another nameless, personality-less vessel like in Tenet. Rami Malek was the standout supporter but by the end he is so obviously pigeonholed for villainy, a shame especially on the heels of a cheesy Bond baddie role. The work of Taylor Swift, Michael Shannon, Chris Rock (jeez was his character even in the script or was it just >Chris Rock riffs about race for 15 seconds), Anya-Taylor Joy, Zoe Saldaña, Michael Myers, etc. is all just unnecessary garnish.
Sure, there are some wonderful ratatat moments and plain-as-day physical artistry. There are also continuity errors, crap dubbing and studio tampering that could make even a thick first-year film student furrow his brow. Even with mistakes reshoots should've fixed, Amsterdam is a modestly watchable mess, it's noir-like labyrinth of kinda-murder mystery mania all pretty straightforward when laid out in its entirety. When you can barely market your movie because the story is buried under so much “in over your head” intrigue, it's no wonder why Amsterdam strains so hard to be about more than a little piece of the past but also life and love and art and all this shit — it's enough to make you gag when back-end narration tries to sum up disorderly distractions like a mediocre episode of Scrubs.
What saddens me most is, under the parade of 360s and blitzing edits, sometimes great cinematographers get misplaced beneath the voluptuous veneer of Russell's recent career. Here, in what is already the flop of the year, the one and only Emmanuel Lubezki is hardly noticeable under David’s direction, with little room to wield his gifts in the most ham-fisted, herky-jerky of Russell’s slick, emotionally driven, violently insistent period dramedies.
Smile (feat. Barbarian) briefing
3 (out of 4)
I believe there’s no genre more prevalent, more affordable, more profitable or more important to a singular season (preferably the big one, October) than horror. Nor is there any cinematic style where audiences are collectively so willing to take a leap of faith on the unknown — therefore after many reviews delayed by my consumption of the entire catalogue of any decent filmmaker with a new movie, here we are with two modest debuts that have been the latest rewards of this spooky supply and demand.
Though Smile is the reason I’m writing, Barbarian more sweepingly renewed my allegiance to the eeks! and the acks! Without looking, and therefore without realizing it was a sort-of start for one of The Whitest Kids U' Know, I did not expect a first act of gotcha-premise horror paying off after a few early fakeout scares, all to ultimately become one of the cooler horror-comedies I’ve been witness to in many years. Yes, Barbarian I favored more than Smile because it was willing to be campier, funnier, and far more flexibly untethered to tropes. Personally I can’t even imagine sitting in a theater for all the Halloween crap. Maybe in five years when I get through Friday the 13th I’ll finally, begrudgingly, skim through the Michael Myers saga — for now get away from me with all the self-perpetuating slashers, Terrifier 2 included.
Smile has comparative restraint, more templated structure and foregone feeling, yet Lordy does it sport a nice little mythology. Yeah of course it’s a chain curse premise, like if Final Destination, The Ring, It Follows and Sinister could somehow copulate their own cinematic incest monster offspring. I doubt Smile will spawn the guilty pleasure sequels of Final Destination, become as iconic as The Ring’s impression or ascend to It Follows’ retro-future, cult classic status, but it does much better than Sinister by displacing the reminiscent twist as a plot turn to get ahead of.
Smile has finely tuned mass appeal and prickly, unsettlingly slick simplicity. When you hear this was once a short film it makes perfect sense, though the film also has more than enough gas for over 100 minutes. They did not overuse those ghastly grins, but golly gosh when the demons are cheesin’, holy fuck my skin was crawling — the scares, moreso than the film itself, are really good. You’ve seen this before, the psychological, pseudo-supernatural horror angle of “please don’t think that I’m crazy, I’M NOT CRAZY!” but I don't care, this was a slightly corny but mostly chilling, quenching, prudent, calculated modern horror movie. Let me be the DVD box asshole saying “SMILE IS THE NEW RING!” or whatever.
Despite amazing box office holds, the cinemascore is somewhat low, a silly situation since the whole reason Paramount sent this flick to theaters was due to test screenings, or perhaps the best movie marketing I’ve seen in some time. Which brings me to the important fact that HORROR IS PANDEMIC-(AND ECONOMY)-PROOF — you cannot stop this genre. I imagine if you separated all the unpublished stacks of scripts in studio exec offices, horror would handily have the majority. It’s just easier to write or at least easier to do right, and Smile was one of those movies that felt familiar but was nonetheless singularly, in its own minuscule, mitigated way, ingenious.
There've been new wrinkles in the changing ways in which we consume movies, with the one-two punch of first the emergence of all these streaming services and then the pandemic, leading to a lot of direct-to-streaming subscription-served content, like Soul for God's sake. During the theatrical resurgence of later 2021, it appeared that once there was the possibility that the 'lesser' movies already produced could be swept under the rug (ones that formerly would’ve released in theaters no matter what), new hierarchies were formed since now the wheat could actually be separated from the chaff, sparing marketing costs and public embarrassment. NOW that we exist in this post-pandemic time or something very near it, you can release a movie and really weigh up your options: Independent realm? On the circuit? Direct to HULU? Netflix but a couple theaters too for prestige cred?
REGARDLESS, Smile feels like the first movie I think I’ve ever heard of in this time where they were gonna make it a direct-to-streaming dump and said, "You know what? This is too good." Whether that was their true thought or intention in reality, IT GOT ME TO THE GODDAMN THEATER! This movie wasn’t even on my radar a few weeks ago. I believe this counter to the digital form of direct-to-DVD (I’m looking at you Robert Zemeckis’s Pinocchio) is proving there’s this quality threshold, where it’s not really about what theoretically gets asses in the seats, it's a predetermined weighing of scales, balancing and determining what’s marketable, what’s actually quality and, somehow irrelated, what's watchable or involuntarily involving.
That’s where I’m at — I wonder if we’ll get anything more like this where Disney or Warner Brothers have some project they bump up confidently, since last-minute, fake or not, it’s a rare, brilliant marketing strategy/selling point, almost like back when you had to DEMAND Paranormal Activity in 2009. All this cultural data is also conveniently coddling my hopes for film’s future, the more accepted insistence on the cultural superiority of cinema to television and possibly an advanced way to fortify theatrical moviegoing as the supreme way to experience the audiovisual medium.
I believe there’s no genre more prevalent, more affordable, more profitable or more important to a singular season (preferably the big one, October) than horror. Nor is there any cinematic style where audiences are collectively so willing to take a leap of faith on the unknown — therefore after many reviews delayed by my consumption of the entire catalogue of any decent filmmaker with a new movie, here we are with two modest debuts that have been the latest rewards of this spooky supply and demand.
Though Smile is the reason I’m writing, Barbarian more sweepingly renewed my allegiance to the eeks! and the acks! Without looking, and therefore without realizing it was a sort-of start for one of The Whitest Kids U' Know, I did not expect a first act of gotcha-premise horror paying off after a few early fakeout scares, all to ultimately become one of the cooler horror-comedies I’ve been witness to in many years. Yes, Barbarian I favored more than Smile because it was willing to be campier, funnier, and far more flexibly untethered to tropes. Personally I can’t even imagine sitting in a theater for all the Halloween crap. Maybe in five years when I get through Friday the 13th I’ll finally, begrudgingly, skim through the Michael Myers saga — for now get away from me with all the self-perpetuating slashers, Terrifier 2 included.
Smile has comparative restraint, more templated structure and foregone feeling, yet Lordy does it sport a nice little mythology. Yeah of course it’s a chain curse premise, like if Final Destination, The Ring, It Follows and Sinister could somehow copulate their own cinematic incest monster offspring. I doubt Smile will spawn the guilty pleasure sequels of Final Destination, become as iconic as The Ring’s impression or ascend to It Follows’ retro-future, cult classic status, but it does much better than Sinister by displacing the reminiscent twist as a plot turn to get ahead of.
Smile has finely tuned mass appeal and prickly, unsettlingly slick simplicity. When you hear this was once a short film it makes perfect sense, though the film also has more than enough gas for over 100 minutes. They did not overuse those ghastly grins, but golly gosh when the demons are cheesin’, holy fuck my skin was crawling — the scares, moreso than the film itself, are really good. You’ve seen this before, the psychological, pseudo-supernatural horror angle of “please don’t think that I’m crazy, I’M NOT CRAZY!” but I don't care, this was a slightly corny but mostly chilling, quenching, prudent, calculated modern horror movie. Let me be the DVD box asshole saying “SMILE IS THE NEW RING!” or whatever.
Despite amazing box office holds, the cinemascore is somewhat low, a silly situation since the whole reason Paramount sent this flick to theaters was due to test screenings, or perhaps the best movie marketing I’ve seen in some time. Which brings me to the important fact that HORROR IS PANDEMIC-(AND ECONOMY)-PROOF — you cannot stop this genre. I imagine if you separated all the unpublished stacks of scripts in studio exec offices, horror would handily have the majority. It’s just easier to write or at least easier to do right, and Smile was one of those movies that felt familiar but was nonetheless singularly, in its own minuscule, mitigated way, ingenious.
There've been new wrinkles in the changing ways in which we consume movies, with the one-two punch of first the emergence of all these streaming services and then the pandemic, leading to a lot of direct-to-streaming subscription-served content, like Soul for God's sake. During the theatrical resurgence of later 2021, it appeared that once there was the possibility that the 'lesser' movies already produced could be swept under the rug (ones that formerly would’ve released in theaters no matter what), new hierarchies were formed since now the wheat could actually be separated from the chaff, sparing marketing costs and public embarrassment. NOW that we exist in this post-pandemic time or something very near it, you can release a movie and really weigh up your options: Independent realm? On the circuit? Direct to HULU? Netflix but a couple theaters too for prestige cred?
REGARDLESS, Smile feels like the first movie I think I’ve ever heard of in this time where they were gonna make it a direct-to-streaming dump and said, "You know what? This is too good." Whether that was their true thought or intention in reality, IT GOT ME TO THE GODDAMN THEATER! This movie wasn’t even on my radar a few weeks ago. I believe this counter to the digital form of direct-to-DVD (I’m looking at you Robert Zemeckis’s Pinocchio) is proving there’s this quality threshold, where it’s not really about what theoretically gets asses in the seats, it's a predetermined weighing of scales, balancing and determining what’s marketable, what’s actually quality and, somehow irrelated, what's watchable or involuntarily involving.
That’s where I’m at — I wonder if we’ll get anything more like this where Disney or Warner Brothers have some project they bump up confidently, since last-minute, fake or not, it’s a rare, brilliant marketing strategy/selling point, almost like back when you had to DEMAND Paranormal Activity in 2009. All this cultural data is also conveniently coddling my hopes for film’s future, the more accepted insistence on the cultural superiority of cinema to television and possibly an advanced way to fortify theatrical moviegoing as the supreme way to experience the audiovisual medium.
Blonde briefing
2 (out of 4)
It’s been awhile since Marilyn Monroe’s legacy was poked at. Michelle Williams was probably a little more Glenda the Good Witch than the proto-pin-up girl in 2011’s My Week with Marilyn, so Ana de Armas’ more smoldering set of skills was the best case scenario for the return of Andrew Dominik. The patient director has not stirred since Killing Them Softly’s thematic shotgun blast, a follow-up to the modern classic The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Netflix’s first awards season gambit sported the preamble of subversive superiority even without the NC-17 rating.
Dominik is really curious to me, like Lynne Ramsay, wherein every film in the scrupulous, selective career feels like a reinvention. Identically, for only four films deep, two whole decades have passed and their respective oeuvres have overarching peculiarities but few patterns. Chopper feels like what would inspire Nicolas Winding Refn to make Bronson, an incarcerated criminal biopic/slice o' life with a thick accent and thicker facial hair all meant to be a little funny and a whole lot disturbing, succeeding because of Eric Bana’s unregistered range (Tom Hardy has crazy written all over him). But then The Assassination of Jesse James is a brilliant twofold character study, magnificently authentic Revisionist Western and evocatively literary piece of epic filmmaking. That darned fish-eye lens even works its way into Blonde, which itself (to a much, much lesser extent) is yet another remarkably off-kilter, unorthodox, just odd biographical film. Only Killing Them Softly feels like the investigation of the individual was waylaid by pummeling subject matter into the ground with his second Brad Pitt picture about American crime, politics, exploitation and such.
Blonde has taken the longest break of his to conceive, and yet it feels like the affair's still working itself out as you watch. I’ve rarely seen a film shuffle through style and rendition like a damn etchisketch or some 2000s-era iPod. You’d think even the balance, rhyme and/or reason between color and black & white would yield some dichotomy of significance, but it seems about as scattershot as the random switches in film stocks and framing (such as very select widescreen), like if Oliver Stone conducted all of production and post drunk as shit. The whole radical, 'rough cut' feel is uniquely bad.
But because it's not all too known that this is in fact an adaptation of a work of fiction inspired by Monroe's life, it's good just to mention because despite Cannes audience's clapping themselves into oblivion, PEOPLE DON'T KNOW BETTER and Blonde will be taken at face value by most Netflix-browsing NPCs, if they can stand the runtime. This is not some conspicuously covered bit of film à clef, this is pretty much pretending to be a biopic on Marilyn for the layman and not worrying about the litter of falsities getting caught up within the generally reliable history. The real story is just too close to what we see on-screen to excuse the inflammatory exaggerations.
I will admit Dominik's handful of artfully elicited expressions — the bizarre sci-fi movie soundtrack (courtesy of Nick Cave and Warren Ellis) somehow works and the one tearful reading scene is very good, featuring captivatingly unstable emotive work from de Armas. And even though the lens and stock can change breath by breath, the lighting can often be immaculate. Blonde is like our Oscar-nominated lead performance, OCCASIONALLY startlingly honest and truthful; but mostly you sit there wondering why she’s speaking with her thick Latina accent, trying not to notice how her own impossible figure just doesn’t resemble Monroe’s, more basically why the film pretends to be a biopic at all when it's trying to make some far more universal statement on male oppression. When we’re not showing her give head to JFK or get probed via camera for made-up abortion bits somehow worth an infamous MPAA rating, this movie is just a subversive, exceedingly grimmer wedge in the wheelhouse of battered, beaten and all too relied upon showbiz tropes. Sure, actors hardly get as many biopics as musicians, but under the umbrella of celebrity it's all the goddamn same.
Then there's all this shit with Arthur Miller — his and Marilyn's few minutes of matrimonial bliss are captured like some sorely miscalculated Instagram reel, the world's worst wedding video, and Blonde becomes absolutely awful for a moment. Bobby Cannavale as Joe DiMaggio and Adrien Brody as Miller are just checkpoints along the 3-hour daddy-issue dance (oh God the countless utterances of "Daddy," plus I think Brody said "Magda" about 40 times, Jesus that embarrassing Seven Year Itch stretch, the divorce, the phony fatherly narration...) for three hours of parental problems and marital melodrama as if that were all Norma Jean's actual life amounted to. Some of this was flabbergasting, and often the sadness, exploitation and ceaseless abuse the film scrambles to make light of is lost in Dominik’s insistence on switching up the orientation of the cinematic approach every couple minutes of his 160 minute epic. Like Luhrmann’s Elvis, all that time spent, all that money and makeup and fuss and I’m still no closer to understanding the King or Queen of the 50s, respectively.
Was I supposed to marvel at this film’s boldness, revel at its riskiness, find some solace in that it tried to do everything the loosey goosey biopics don’t nowadays, not only refusing to glamorize the past but refusing to admit anything but strife and darkness at all? Blonde was more or less misery porn and sometimes regular porn too. Some of it's so very well done, but I don’t know what the overall vision or aim is here Mr. Dominik — “Suffering! Evil men! Completely Random Aspect Ratios!” There's some obviously ironic desire to honestly comment on objectification, but regardless of all the craft, artifice and conviction spent, Blonde is still just a bunch of wiki page bullet points, outright fabrication and glossed-up sensationalism masquerading as something more in the dimmer public eyes that are so receptive to well-dressed lies. If they changed the names completely I could hear another side's argument in defense.
Oh, Marilyn never had an abortion? Then why go overboard with weird pro-life ads that almost have me waiting for the skip button to pop up? It's comical that Monroe is a resented persona for Jean, unless we’re talking about human life through the lens of right-wing propaganda. Her unborn children speak to her multiple times, spouting pure anti-abortion rhetoric like "It's always me," and "[Don't] do what you did last time," sorry I didn't realize I was watching Unplanned! Andrew's every achievement as cinema is undone by some artistic incompetence.
It’s been awhile since Marilyn Monroe’s legacy was poked at. Michelle Williams was probably a little more Glenda the Good Witch than the proto-pin-up girl in 2011’s My Week with Marilyn, so Ana de Armas’ more smoldering set of skills was the best case scenario for the return of Andrew Dominik. The patient director has not stirred since Killing Them Softly’s thematic shotgun blast, a follow-up to the modern classic The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Netflix’s first awards season gambit sported the preamble of subversive superiority even without the NC-17 rating.
Dominik is really curious to me, like Lynne Ramsay, wherein every film in the scrupulous, selective career feels like a reinvention. Identically, for only four films deep, two whole decades have passed and their respective oeuvres have overarching peculiarities but few patterns. Chopper feels like what would inspire Nicolas Winding Refn to make Bronson, an incarcerated criminal biopic/slice o' life with a thick accent and thicker facial hair all meant to be a little funny and a whole lot disturbing, succeeding because of Eric Bana’s unregistered range (Tom Hardy has crazy written all over him). But then The Assassination of Jesse James is a brilliant twofold character study, magnificently authentic Revisionist Western and evocatively literary piece of epic filmmaking. That darned fish-eye lens even works its way into Blonde, which itself (to a much, much lesser extent) is yet another remarkably off-kilter, unorthodox, just odd biographical film. Only Killing Them Softly feels like the investigation of the individual was waylaid by pummeling subject matter into the ground with his second Brad Pitt picture about American crime, politics, exploitation and such.
Blonde has taken the longest break of his to conceive, and yet it feels like the affair's still working itself out as you watch. I’ve rarely seen a film shuffle through style and rendition like a damn etchisketch or some 2000s-era iPod. You’d think even the balance, rhyme and/or reason between color and black & white would yield some dichotomy of significance, but it seems about as scattershot as the random switches in film stocks and framing (such as very select widescreen), like if Oliver Stone conducted all of production and post drunk as shit. The whole radical, 'rough cut' feel is uniquely bad.
But because it's not all too known that this is in fact an adaptation of a work of fiction inspired by Monroe's life, it's good just to mention because despite Cannes audience's clapping themselves into oblivion, PEOPLE DON'T KNOW BETTER and Blonde will be taken at face value by most Netflix-browsing NPCs, if they can stand the runtime. This is not some conspicuously covered bit of film à clef, this is pretty much pretending to be a biopic on Marilyn for the layman and not worrying about the litter of falsities getting caught up within the generally reliable history. The real story is just too close to what we see on-screen to excuse the inflammatory exaggerations.
I will admit Dominik's handful of artfully elicited expressions — the bizarre sci-fi movie soundtrack (courtesy of Nick Cave and Warren Ellis) somehow works and the one tearful reading scene is very good, featuring captivatingly unstable emotive work from de Armas. And even though the lens and stock can change breath by breath, the lighting can often be immaculate. Blonde is like our Oscar-nominated lead performance, OCCASIONALLY startlingly honest and truthful; but mostly you sit there wondering why she’s speaking with her thick Latina accent, trying not to notice how her own impossible figure just doesn’t resemble Monroe’s, more basically why the film pretends to be a biopic at all when it's trying to make some far more universal statement on male oppression. When we’re not showing her give head to JFK or get probed via camera for made-up abortion bits somehow worth an infamous MPAA rating, this movie is just a subversive, exceedingly grimmer wedge in the wheelhouse of battered, beaten and all too relied upon showbiz tropes. Sure, actors hardly get as many biopics as musicians, but under the umbrella of celebrity it's all the goddamn same.
Then there's all this shit with Arthur Miller — his and Marilyn's few minutes of matrimonial bliss are captured like some sorely miscalculated Instagram reel, the world's worst wedding video, and Blonde becomes absolutely awful for a moment. Bobby Cannavale as Joe DiMaggio and Adrien Brody as Miller are just checkpoints along the 3-hour daddy-issue dance (oh God the countless utterances of "Daddy," plus I think Brody said "Magda" about 40 times, Jesus that embarrassing Seven Year Itch stretch, the divorce, the phony fatherly narration...) for three hours of parental problems and marital melodrama as if that were all Norma Jean's actual life amounted to. Some of this was flabbergasting, and often the sadness, exploitation and ceaseless abuse the film scrambles to make light of is lost in Dominik’s insistence on switching up the orientation of the cinematic approach every couple minutes of his 160 minute epic. Like Luhrmann’s Elvis, all that time spent, all that money and makeup and fuss and I’m still no closer to understanding the King or Queen of the 50s, respectively.
Was I supposed to marvel at this film’s boldness, revel at its riskiness, find some solace in that it tried to do everything the loosey goosey biopics don’t nowadays, not only refusing to glamorize the past but refusing to admit anything but strife and darkness at all? Blonde was more or less misery porn and sometimes regular porn too. Some of it's so very well done, but I don’t know what the overall vision or aim is here Mr. Dominik — “Suffering! Evil men! Completely Random Aspect Ratios!” There's some obviously ironic desire to honestly comment on objectification, but regardless of all the craft, artifice and conviction spent, Blonde is still just a bunch of wiki page bullet points, outright fabrication and glossed-up sensationalism masquerading as something more in the dimmer public eyes that are so receptive to well-dressed lies. If they changed the names completely I could hear another side's argument in defense.
Oh, Marilyn never had an abortion? Then why go overboard with weird pro-life ads that almost have me waiting for the skip button to pop up? It's comical that Monroe is a resented persona for Jean, unless we’re talking about human life through the lens of right-wing propaganda. Her unborn children speak to her multiple times, spouting pure anti-abortion rhetoric like "It's always me," and "[Don't] do what you did last time," sorry I didn't realize I was watching Unplanned! Andrew's every achievement as cinema is undone by some artistic incompetence.
Don't Worry, Darling briefing
1 ½ (out of 4)
Booksmart was a keeper for about everyone but me, who wasn’t having its Superbad-but-just-bad shtick that seemed to get a pass for having queer characters and that’s about it. Those leads were pretty insufferable and the young lady's coming-of-age tale had been done better in just so many ways, recently too (Lady Bird, Edge of Seventeen, Eighth Grade if you need proof). Now Olivia Wilde is back again to do an imitation of so many other better things, but here stewed and diluted with (hopefully) enough influences for you not to take note.
It’s hard to miss The Matrix by the superficial, just plain stupid twist that is just what any nitwit will guess thirty minutes into an obvious, unimaginably one-dimensional take on The Stepford Wives, Rosemary’s Baby and the like that makes modern satires as obtuse as Sorry to Bother You look like noble upwards-punching at its most sly. This is a callous, careless crucifixion of Californian culture that then uses its unexplained microbudget sci-fi rug-pulling to all but undo any pent up mystery, suspense and thematic possibility the film could contain in whole.
I know now why Shia Labeouf had to go, and the answer is Florence Pugh. I swear she became Wilde’s sophomore lead due to needing all but everything she did in another superior influence and parallel Midsommar — specifically her precise practice in pouting (to be fair her character's trauma in Ari Aster's second would leave anyone with longstanding long-face too), that and very slowly noticing how obviously bad things are suspiciously not good. Her frown is a powerful thing, and I bet LaBeouf felt her range early and made the her-or-me ultimatum without much pondering. I like Pugh, especially in Little Women, and she even charmed as Black Widow’s replacement sister. But damn she feels typecast already with this role alone. Harry Styles doesn’t do too poorly in the Beouf’s stead, playing the desperate real-world loser boyfriend and the in-simulation (*sigh*) rising businessman with equal greasiness.
Anyway, this movie was at least a more admirable failure than Booksmart, which was the smug Bildungsroman debut that is all but a cliché for many yearning moviemakers before Wilde. Don’t Worry, Darling is concerningly dimwitted and also decently experimental for a studio movie of this size. Sure, Wilde’s measure of “action” is literally a few moments in the climax and her idea of all things surreal/dreamlike/hallucinatory is like a college midterm project spliced into a mildly arresting, painfully postmodern domestic deconstruction — at least this movie had a fascinating insistence, even if its unrelenting, unresolved string of mysteries is the only timid veil covering up its utter conceptual stupidity. Was this shit supposed to blow our puny minds like Inception or something?
On the sexual side of creepy it certainly ain't no Eyes Wide Shut and it also wasn’t a feminist psychological thriller worth its salt, horror-tinged or otherwise. The sound design was interesting, but I can’t get behind a film intrepid enough for regard but too far-fetched and half-baked to match up to actual mid-budget high concept gems, or even that ilk’s mistakable misfires. My thoughts on her first film aside, Don't Worry Darling's shift in focus was enough to allow me to have a very open mind, one that she seems to believe she has manipulated like whoever Chris Pine was impersonating with his soothsaying, blatantly megomaniacal cult leader/virtual CEO role.
If critical consensus is any reference, I'd say this film’s hollow hypnosis crosses the borders of self-parody too regularly to offset the liberal proclivity to give browny points to such egregiously pandering movies. Darling yearns to be this liberating thing, some Brave New World for vapid women, but it’s just SO DUMB, which is why they had to save the twist for as late as possible, because if they brought up the simulated living situation any sooner you would have the time to think about how little it makes sense. The baffling reveal just beckons a few dozen too many questions to be clever (OH NO NEVERMIND UHHHH THE PATRIARCHY WAS KEEPING HER DOWN ALL ALONG!). Don't Worry, Darling is a stolen stir-fry of wannabe mindfuck cinema, reduced down from all these disparate clichés of sci-fi and psychological thrillers and properly subversive, empowering styles. It had me going through the importunate intrigue but the revelation is nearly insulting to just about any level of the IQ, especially under the guise it assumes. Like The Invitation’s cult conspiracy cuckoo crap, you want to pick this film apart but you also never want to think about it again.
Don't Worry, Darling supposes some manner of significant cultural critique yet its ultimate intentions are far too banal to be worth considering on any level. "D-do you get the deeper meaning?” Wilde prods. Oh my God yeah, we fucking get it. If the backstage noise was just manufactured to drown out this film’s insipid twist, nice try I guess. I can't be the first to say but the behind-the-scenes drama serves as a far more stirring narrative than what Wilde provides on her own.
Booksmart was a keeper for about everyone but me, who wasn’t having its Superbad-but-just-bad shtick that seemed to get a pass for having queer characters and that’s about it. Those leads were pretty insufferable and the young lady's coming-of-age tale had been done better in just so many ways, recently too (Lady Bird, Edge of Seventeen, Eighth Grade if you need proof). Now Olivia Wilde is back again to do an imitation of so many other better things, but here stewed and diluted with (hopefully) enough influences for you not to take note.
It’s hard to miss The Matrix by the superficial, just plain stupid twist that is just what any nitwit will guess thirty minutes into an obvious, unimaginably one-dimensional take on The Stepford Wives, Rosemary’s Baby and the like that makes modern satires as obtuse as Sorry to Bother You look like noble upwards-punching at its most sly. This is a callous, careless crucifixion of Californian culture that then uses its unexplained microbudget sci-fi rug-pulling to all but undo any pent up mystery, suspense and thematic possibility the film could contain in whole.
I know now why Shia Labeouf had to go, and the answer is Florence Pugh. I swear she became Wilde’s sophomore lead due to needing all but everything she did in another superior influence and parallel Midsommar — specifically her precise practice in pouting (to be fair her character's trauma in Ari Aster's second would leave anyone with longstanding long-face too), that and very slowly noticing how obviously bad things are suspiciously not good. Her frown is a powerful thing, and I bet LaBeouf felt her range early and made the her-or-me ultimatum without much pondering. I like Pugh, especially in Little Women, and she even charmed as Black Widow’s replacement sister. But damn she feels typecast already with this role alone. Harry Styles doesn’t do too poorly in the Beouf’s stead, playing the desperate real-world loser boyfriend and the in-simulation (*sigh*) rising businessman with equal greasiness.
Anyway, this movie was at least a more admirable failure than Booksmart, which was the smug Bildungsroman debut that is all but a cliché for many yearning moviemakers before Wilde. Don’t Worry, Darling is concerningly dimwitted and also decently experimental for a studio movie of this size. Sure, Wilde’s measure of “action” is literally a few moments in the climax and her idea of all things surreal/dreamlike/hallucinatory is like a college midterm project spliced into a mildly arresting, painfully postmodern domestic deconstruction — at least this movie had a fascinating insistence, even if its unrelenting, unresolved string of mysteries is the only timid veil covering up its utter conceptual stupidity. Was this shit supposed to blow our puny minds like Inception or something?
On the sexual side of creepy it certainly ain't no Eyes Wide Shut and it also wasn’t a feminist psychological thriller worth its salt, horror-tinged or otherwise. The sound design was interesting, but I can’t get behind a film intrepid enough for regard but too far-fetched and half-baked to match up to actual mid-budget high concept gems, or even that ilk’s mistakable misfires. My thoughts on her first film aside, Don't Worry Darling's shift in focus was enough to allow me to have a very open mind, one that she seems to believe she has manipulated like whoever Chris Pine was impersonating with his soothsaying, blatantly megomaniacal cult leader/virtual CEO role.
If critical consensus is any reference, I'd say this film’s hollow hypnosis crosses the borders of self-parody too regularly to offset the liberal proclivity to give browny points to such egregiously pandering movies. Darling yearns to be this liberating thing, some Brave New World for vapid women, but it’s just SO DUMB, which is why they had to save the twist for as late as possible, because if they brought up the simulated living situation any sooner you would have the time to think about how little it makes sense. The baffling reveal just beckons a few dozen too many questions to be clever (OH NO NEVERMIND UHHHH THE PATRIARCHY WAS KEEPING HER DOWN ALL ALONG!). Don't Worry, Darling is a stolen stir-fry of wannabe mindfuck cinema, reduced down from all these disparate clichés of sci-fi and psychological thrillers and properly subversive, empowering styles. It had me going through the importunate intrigue but the revelation is nearly insulting to just about any level of the IQ, especially under the guise it assumes. Like The Invitation’s cult conspiracy cuckoo crap, you want to pick this film apart but you also never want to think about it again.
Don't Worry, Darling supposes some manner of significant cultural critique yet its ultimate intentions are far too banal to be worth considering on any level. "D-do you get the deeper meaning?” Wilde prods. Oh my God yeah, we fucking get it. If the backstage noise was just manufactured to drown out this film’s insipid twist, nice try I guess. I can't be the first to say but the behind-the-scenes drama serves as a far more stirring narrative than what Wilde provides on her own.
Three Thousand Years of Longing briefing
3 ½ (out of 4)
Whether he’s developing franchises with fringe classics like Mad Max’s saga or putting tap dancing penguins out there for his grandkids or something, you cannot mess with George Miller's nonconformity. The strangeness this movie seems emblematic of was, in anticipation, a wonderful toss-up — Three Thousand Years of Longing was bound to be awful or, even despite a few warts, perhaps one of the best features of the year.
Besides brilliant colors and masterful match cuts, there isn't so much to recount concerning a film about stories that is almost allergic to having its own. It’s the kind of adult fantasy movie they seldom greenlight anymore, scaling light and dark with equal fullness, the sort your Mom might love just as much as you ought to. In August, between Bullet Train and 3000 Years, I absorbed Miller’s entire filmography either for the first time or in long-delayed revisits. For me the first two Mad Max movies are standards I can’t quite get into, with Thunderdome acting as no plunging step down. Lorenzo’s Oil was a bizarrely specific real-life tale that while a gripping, Oscar-baity sort of manipulative medical drama still, at its core, defends ‘miracle cures’ and is an unassuming beacon of false hope for parents of afflicted children. I was also not so taken by horny, comedy-eschewed horror in The Witches of Eastwick, Miller’s spirited soul still pouring through the weirdly wishy-washy film more or less answered by Robert Zemeckis’ Death Becomes Her.
Despite buzzing around for nearly 45 years, the man has only spawned nine films outside of Twilight Zone movie segments and such. Of course he had a hand in the original Babe, the indicative factor making something like Happy Feet feel plausible in his filmography. Happy Feet Two is actually a half-decent sequel, with a conflict big and pressing just enough to fill 90 minutes. Mumble’s son and his little opera sequence about “MY FATHERRRRRR” is almost too funny for words, but one thing you can’t fault in Miller is his genuineness… his method reminds folks of filmmakers like Peter Jackson and Sam Raimi, those after the general movie audience who also can’t help but impose their uncompromising idiosynchrasies and penchant for the twisted, disgusting and infernal despite their principally pop sensibilities.
With Furiosa starring Anya Taylor-Joy due out by 2024, who could say Miller lost his way when I’ve ignored perhaps the linchpin of his entire career, Mad Max: Fury Road, the flaming filmographic predecessor for the movie we have here. Besides The Tree of Life, Moonlight, A Separation, and newer darlings like Parasite and Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Fury Road is the most acclaimed film of the 2010s, a vividly kinetic modern messing with the Mad Max makeup 30 years removed from Thunderdome’s crackdown.
ANYWAY, Three Thousand Years blissfully finds Miller letting originality take over his soul in order to sell this frame narrative with a lot more going on inside the 1001 Arabian Nights-lifted likening (actually A. S. Byatt's short story "The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye") than in the actual love story filling the cracks of a fantastically frivolous feature. If we’re going with details, details, details, then I will say the first two-thirds of Longing works wonderfully, even with that eerie, unexplained little man at the beginning. The visual effects look far beyond the means of a movie of this sort, the production detail is achingly attended to and the cinematography and editing are some of the sharpest in Miller’s career, creating a kaleidoscopic film phantasm capable of lulling you into sleep like it did for me on first watch and many attempted viewings afterwards. In the absolute kindest sense, 3000 Years is a lot like a cinematic lullaby, a small but seemingly bottomless storybook and beautiful bedtime story maybe up there with the likes of Princess Bride if just for the depths of difference between the shell and the substance.
Funny that even though self-described as a fairy tale interpretation of Tilda Swinton’s character’s experiences (um, aren’t the far-fetched elements embedded within and without?), this is cinema that barely begins before it ends and yet feels like an eternity you want to dissolve into in the meantime. Every part of the Djinn’s tale is wildly entertaining, voluptuously shot, its radical realities ripe with tactile titillation.
Regardless of its decrescendo once the surrounding present day story takes hold, this is still a movie moving from awe to awww without forcing you to question your sanity, the acting is that admirable. Swinton has the lighter load and yet her accent is perfect, her interpretation of a removed, romantically estranged narratologist, one imagines, spot on… Meanwhile Idris Elba is an absolute diamond, never for one second letting you believe he ISN’T the immortal wish-making lover he embodies. His saga of love lamentations through the ages is the meat on this movie’s somewhat bare bones, living in a world of mesmerizing minutiae rather than narrative novelty.
But I’ll be damned, this film is wholesome and unabashedly creative — just those montages of the genie bottle's millennia-spanning journey could get me going. Whereas Jackson has retreated to the cutting room oblivion of documentary media and Raimi wasted his nine-years-removed comeback on a movie as pathetically thought through as Doctor Strange 2, Miller gives me hope that, in spite of being a total box office blunder, more features as eccentrically pleasing as Three Thousand Years of Longing will keep me trekking to theater, allowing myself to be taken by such potentially peculiar visions.
Whether he’s developing franchises with fringe classics like Mad Max’s saga or putting tap dancing penguins out there for his grandkids or something, you cannot mess with George Miller's nonconformity. The strangeness this movie seems emblematic of was, in anticipation, a wonderful toss-up — Three Thousand Years of Longing was bound to be awful or, even despite a few warts, perhaps one of the best features of the year.
Besides brilliant colors and masterful match cuts, there isn't so much to recount concerning a film about stories that is almost allergic to having its own. It’s the kind of adult fantasy movie they seldom greenlight anymore, scaling light and dark with equal fullness, the sort your Mom might love just as much as you ought to. In August, between Bullet Train and 3000 Years, I absorbed Miller’s entire filmography either for the first time or in long-delayed revisits. For me the first two Mad Max movies are standards I can’t quite get into, with Thunderdome acting as no plunging step down. Lorenzo’s Oil was a bizarrely specific real-life tale that while a gripping, Oscar-baity sort of manipulative medical drama still, at its core, defends ‘miracle cures’ and is an unassuming beacon of false hope for parents of afflicted children. I was also not so taken by horny, comedy-eschewed horror in The Witches of Eastwick, Miller’s spirited soul still pouring through the weirdly wishy-washy film more or less answered by Robert Zemeckis’ Death Becomes Her.
Despite buzzing around for nearly 45 years, the man has only spawned nine films outside of Twilight Zone movie segments and such. Of course he had a hand in the original Babe, the indicative factor making something like Happy Feet feel plausible in his filmography. Happy Feet Two is actually a half-decent sequel, with a conflict big and pressing just enough to fill 90 minutes. Mumble’s son and his little opera sequence about “MY FATHERRRRRR” is almost too funny for words, but one thing you can’t fault in Miller is his genuineness… his method reminds folks of filmmakers like Peter Jackson and Sam Raimi, those after the general movie audience who also can’t help but impose their uncompromising idiosynchrasies and penchant for the twisted, disgusting and infernal despite their principally pop sensibilities.
With Furiosa starring Anya Taylor-Joy due out by 2024, who could say Miller lost his way when I’ve ignored perhaps the linchpin of his entire career, Mad Max: Fury Road, the flaming filmographic predecessor for the movie we have here. Besides The Tree of Life, Moonlight, A Separation, and newer darlings like Parasite and Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Fury Road is the most acclaimed film of the 2010s, a vividly kinetic modern messing with the Mad Max makeup 30 years removed from Thunderdome’s crackdown.
ANYWAY, Three Thousand Years blissfully finds Miller letting originality take over his soul in order to sell this frame narrative with a lot more going on inside the 1001 Arabian Nights-lifted likening (actually A. S. Byatt's short story "The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye") than in the actual love story filling the cracks of a fantastically frivolous feature. If we’re going with details, details, details, then I will say the first two-thirds of Longing works wonderfully, even with that eerie, unexplained little man at the beginning. The visual effects look far beyond the means of a movie of this sort, the production detail is achingly attended to and the cinematography and editing are some of the sharpest in Miller’s career, creating a kaleidoscopic film phantasm capable of lulling you into sleep like it did for me on first watch and many attempted viewings afterwards. In the absolute kindest sense, 3000 Years is a lot like a cinematic lullaby, a small but seemingly bottomless storybook and beautiful bedtime story maybe up there with the likes of Princess Bride if just for the depths of difference between the shell and the substance.
Funny that even though self-described as a fairy tale interpretation of Tilda Swinton’s character’s experiences (um, aren’t the far-fetched elements embedded within and without?), this is cinema that barely begins before it ends and yet feels like an eternity you want to dissolve into in the meantime. Every part of the Djinn’s tale is wildly entertaining, voluptuously shot, its radical realities ripe with tactile titillation.
Regardless of its decrescendo once the surrounding present day story takes hold, this is still a movie moving from awe to awww without forcing you to question your sanity, the acting is that admirable. Swinton has the lighter load and yet her accent is perfect, her interpretation of a removed, romantically estranged narratologist, one imagines, spot on… Meanwhile Idris Elba is an absolute diamond, never for one second letting you believe he ISN’T the immortal wish-making lover he embodies. His saga of love lamentations through the ages is the meat on this movie’s somewhat bare bones, living in a world of mesmerizing minutiae rather than narrative novelty.
But I’ll be damned, this film is wholesome and unabashedly creative — just those montages of the genie bottle's millennia-spanning journey could get me going. Whereas Jackson has retreated to the cutting room oblivion of documentary media and Raimi wasted his nine-years-removed comeback on a movie as pathetically thought through as Doctor Strange 2, Miller gives me hope that, in spite of being a total box office blunder, more features as eccentrically pleasing as Three Thousand Years of Longing will keep me trekking to theater, allowing myself to be taken by such potentially peculiar visions.
Bullet Train briefing
3 (out of 4)
David Leitch’s partner in directing John Wick and the modern action game at large, Chad Stahelski, has readily rocketed the schlubby reputation of brawling, dynamic dude movies to nonsensically cool places, in large part due to Eastern inspirations and Keanu Reeves mellow moxie. But Leitch has more than completed the pair of stunt savants with his own sense of neon-stewed sensations, particularly his own high point in the shiny little spy spectacle Atomic Blonde. Chad’s apex is probably John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum for my money, and both are just stylistically electrifying, only next to Cruise himself in terms of actually awesome action movie artistry. So in some way, much like Top Gun: Maverick is just an primer, a mere pregame for a seventh and eighth Impossible Mission to come, Bullet Train is like an adjacent, appetizing prelude to more unapologetic “musical of movement” mischief to come in fourth Wick, even with a separate spearhead. 2023 should be festering with top-shelf high-test horseplay.
What Leitch has for us specifically in 2022 is roughly equivalent to his biggest movie, Deadpool 2: a comedy-clustered core with altercation-diluted dressing that while real, ridiculous fun, only flies by with a select set of skirmishes because the setup and characters sustain your amusement to the finish. Bullet Train is a sunny summer surprise and nothing much else. In 2019 I had hopes too high to justify with Hobbs & Shaw for some reason, insisting Leitch would elevate the Fast & Furious franchise to a satisfactory setting of stupid like James Wan did in Furious 7. This effort, while still certainly a little underwhelming, gratifyingly becomes more blissful as the picture progresses — the goofs, while regrettably more prevalent than the creative, confined conflicts, hit because the ensemble cares to commit.
It’s Aaron Taylor-Johnson truly excelling here at buoyancy and brutality — he’s so good even if his cockneyed lines are the principle reason this feels like a Guy Ritchie affair buried under Japanese fetishizing. But Brad Pitt has once again been accessed for his comedic breadth, something the Coen’s tapped in Burn After Reading, as well as Tarantino for both Inglorious Basterds and, most wonderfully, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. He’s got serious star power still illuminating within him, and while his character’s everyman-ness tries to keep the film on a dimmer wavelength (as if the audience was only comprised of his stoner side character from True Romance), it’s too hard to resist this grab-man schlemiel spouting platitudes from therapy while in over his head amidst some kind of Christie-like live action anime. But when the film makes the rare excuse to be abrasive and purposely base, I can’t stand it: we do not need character title cards like some Suicide Squad situation, nor such wobbly, wavering wafts of tonal indecisiveness. But once the rocky start and schizophrenic use of flashbacks cease for a blitz of action-mystery-comedy hijinks, Bullet Train becomes the late summer blast I needed and optimistically foresaw.
Otherwise, all are great — Brian Tyree Henry, Andrew Koji (Snake Eyes), Hiroyuki Sanada, Joey King as the diabolical leading villain, surprise bit parts for Logan Lerman, Zazie Beetz, Michael Shannon, Channing Tatum, Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds for a split second. Leitch finds the right time and place to be a Hollywood showboat, while the agreeably thick interweb of character courses makes the plot one to follow fully and one that follows through.
Plus, it’s sad to point out but it really is just pleasing to see a theatrical exclusive that, while still not wholly original, is not based on previous visual media, or exists simply as a spinoff, reboot, sequel or remake. Top Gun has ruled the summer and I would say still does, but Bullet Train is quite the wild-eyed, wild card cocktail of popcorn entertainment comedown craziness. It’s a film that makes sense of its ridiculousness and locates prudence especially when it presses your disbelief. When the story, scope and individual fates are admirably unpredictable, even with a Deadpool sequel for contrast there’s reason enough to forgive the film’s occasional smarminess and childish use of an R-rating.
It made me laugh, it had some nice 'n' neat choreography, it bothered to have an interesting reveal and featured special effects that didn’t always scream soundstage garbage. I feel like I never see Columbia Pictures anymore (although Where the Crawdads Sing is quite the female-skewed sleeper hit) and often Sony is truly the odd duckling of the original six majors (otherwise Disney, WB, Universal, Paramount and what used to be Fox). Very remotely it makes Bullet Train feel at once old school and refreshingly new, congealing its most stubborn elements into a colorful collection of thrills and jollies that could more than possibly make you forget everything and lose yourself in lucid, non-linear lunacy.
The bisexual lighting wasn’t even overused and the acting was never truly ironic even if the movie fails to capitalize on all the possible ways this could’ve gone from funny, feckless diversion to hilarious, hard-hitting cult classic. Nevertheless, parting potty humor aside this is some potent, sometimes outstanding escapism made easy.
David Leitch’s partner in directing John Wick and the modern action game at large, Chad Stahelski, has readily rocketed the schlubby reputation of brawling, dynamic dude movies to nonsensically cool places, in large part due to Eastern inspirations and Keanu Reeves mellow moxie. But Leitch has more than completed the pair of stunt savants with his own sense of neon-stewed sensations, particularly his own high point in the shiny little spy spectacle Atomic Blonde. Chad’s apex is probably John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum for my money, and both are just stylistically electrifying, only next to Cruise himself in terms of actually awesome action movie artistry. So in some way, much like Top Gun: Maverick is just an primer, a mere pregame for a seventh and eighth Impossible Mission to come, Bullet Train is like an adjacent, appetizing prelude to more unapologetic “musical of movement” mischief to come in fourth Wick, even with a separate spearhead. 2023 should be festering with top-shelf high-test horseplay.
What Leitch has for us specifically in 2022 is roughly equivalent to his biggest movie, Deadpool 2: a comedy-clustered core with altercation-diluted dressing that while real, ridiculous fun, only flies by with a select set of skirmishes because the setup and characters sustain your amusement to the finish. Bullet Train is a sunny summer surprise and nothing much else. In 2019 I had hopes too high to justify with Hobbs & Shaw for some reason, insisting Leitch would elevate the Fast & Furious franchise to a satisfactory setting of stupid like James Wan did in Furious 7. This effort, while still certainly a little underwhelming, gratifyingly becomes more blissful as the picture progresses — the goofs, while regrettably more prevalent than the creative, confined conflicts, hit because the ensemble cares to commit.
It’s Aaron Taylor-Johnson truly excelling here at buoyancy and brutality — he’s so good even if his cockneyed lines are the principle reason this feels like a Guy Ritchie affair buried under Japanese fetishizing. But Brad Pitt has once again been accessed for his comedic breadth, something the Coen’s tapped in Burn After Reading, as well as Tarantino for both Inglorious Basterds and, most wonderfully, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. He’s got serious star power still illuminating within him, and while his character’s everyman-ness tries to keep the film on a dimmer wavelength (as if the audience was only comprised of his stoner side character from True Romance), it’s too hard to resist this grab-man schlemiel spouting platitudes from therapy while in over his head amidst some kind of Christie-like live action anime. But when the film makes the rare excuse to be abrasive and purposely base, I can’t stand it: we do not need character title cards like some Suicide Squad situation, nor such wobbly, wavering wafts of tonal indecisiveness. But once the rocky start and schizophrenic use of flashbacks cease for a blitz of action-mystery-comedy hijinks, Bullet Train becomes the late summer blast I needed and optimistically foresaw.
Otherwise, all are great — Brian Tyree Henry, Andrew Koji (Snake Eyes), Hiroyuki Sanada, Joey King as the diabolical leading villain, surprise bit parts for Logan Lerman, Zazie Beetz, Michael Shannon, Channing Tatum, Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds for a split second. Leitch finds the right time and place to be a Hollywood showboat, while the agreeably thick interweb of character courses makes the plot one to follow fully and one that follows through.
Plus, it’s sad to point out but it really is just pleasing to see a theatrical exclusive that, while still not wholly original, is not based on previous visual media, or exists simply as a spinoff, reboot, sequel or remake. Top Gun has ruled the summer and I would say still does, but Bullet Train is quite the wild-eyed, wild card cocktail of popcorn entertainment comedown craziness. It’s a film that makes sense of its ridiculousness and locates prudence especially when it presses your disbelief. When the story, scope and individual fates are admirably unpredictable, even with a Deadpool sequel for contrast there’s reason enough to forgive the film’s occasional smarminess and childish use of an R-rating.
It made me laugh, it had some nice 'n' neat choreography, it bothered to have an interesting reveal and featured special effects that didn’t always scream soundstage garbage. I feel like I never see Columbia Pictures anymore (although Where the Crawdads Sing is quite the female-skewed sleeper hit) and often Sony is truly the odd duckling of the original six majors (otherwise Disney, WB, Universal, Paramount and what used to be Fox). Very remotely it makes Bullet Train feel at once old school and refreshingly new, congealing its most stubborn elements into a colorful collection of thrills and jollies that could more than possibly make you forget everything and lose yourself in lucid, non-linear lunacy.
The bisexual lighting wasn’t even overused and the acting was never truly ironic even if the movie fails to capitalize on all the possible ways this could’ve gone from funny, feckless diversion to hilarious, hard-hitting cult classic. Nevertheless, parting potty humor aside this is some potent, sometimes outstanding escapism made easy.
Nope briefing
3 (out of 4)
“Ummm it’s actually about how Hollywood chews you up and spits you out!” Damn you asinine, forum-browsing pseuds love reaching.
I genuinely don’t understand why his thriller’s are so absurdly deconstructed and picked apart for every last symbolic or thematic detail, but seriously who has more of a golden boy status in Hollywood than Jordan Peele? The man can already entertain like it’s secondhand and treat your brain to something of substance like he’s being graded, sometimes so sensibly he can have half of Twitter salivating over the simplest Easter eggs. I wish this movie hit me head on like his phenomenally bold, already modern classic debut Get Out or his unchained, admirably ambiguous high concept juggernaut Us, which while more divisive in audience reception was a real, raw, wriggling slice of untested filmmaking.
But self-coined social thrillers and hardcore Hitchcockian nightmares have given way to an unveiled obsession with alien invasion in addition to selectively cribbing from the flavors of Signs, War of the Worlds and a host of Universal’s misunderstood monster movies for its roots. Speaking of the mostly sorry studio, even if Peele fouled up big time this would be a far superior monster movie to a third Jurassic World. I couldn't fault the man, as he genuinely is his own master of suspense and directorial control, never letting exposition get in the way of internal intelligence nor allowing tried tricks of the trade to trip up his articulations of opulent originality. In many ways I am slightly let down by the film’s narrative scope and build — as with Get Out, the first two acts of slowly unraveled secrets keep each feature bright and distinct on the Hollywood landscape, yet the Bigfoot-photo-fishing antics of this and the straight horror hack-down of his debut find each film climaxing with bravado but not necessarily rounding out a totally sound story.
With a touch more restraint, Nope could’ve been a Neo Western of equal parts Jaws and Alien retreads — but Peele blows his load a little too often for intrigue and imagination, all at the third act’s expense. Still, this is a thoughtful, fastidious fella who resists fakeouts and jump scares while pacing out his ideas with deliberate patience, trust and respect for audiences, which is why I'm lost as to why he chose to eviscerate his best chances at mystery and his favored ambiguity for Nope. The way our presumed flying saucer passes in and out of clouds is so odd, maneuvering through the film's guarded, secretive phase all too briskly. Our alien turns into an actual piece of spectacle but Peele seems slightly unable to justify it — in the end Nope ironically doesn’t feel too mesmerizing, awe-inducing or otherwise wowing.
Still, there's that truly scary, scream-worthy digestion sequence within a blowup castle of terror following the actual Jupiter show (those folks definitely got "abominable filth" cast upon them) plus the stormy second act blood-pour. My quibbles only become more rare thanks to Peele's peerlessness, so when all's said Nope is another exciting, well-told, well-conceived movie if far from a new mark made on black culture, regardless of the opening Lumière-lampooning historical reference. It’s curious that a movie about exhibition and how fucked up it is to use live animals in service of it, ya know, does exactly that. But whatever, anti-extravaganza sentiments aside, what further holds the film back is some scattered plot craters — Us can get away with all that metaphorical, allegorical screwiness but Nope presumes to take place in the real world where, were there really potential to score photographic evidence of aliens, is this how it would go down?
Daniel Kaluuya is perhaps doing too little to exactly be the De Niro to Peele’s Marty (pretty brash parallel for your third flick eh?), but he’s every bit as good as in Get Out and the rest of his career. Keke Palmer is the show-stealer, as well as the tech guy/prime comic relief Brandon Perea playing Angel. Steven Yuen as Jupe has moments and a key connection to the film’s greater parts (basically don’t fuck with creatures big or small you dirty, leering humans) but he is underused to this eye.
Its concepts are either crypic or hit you on the head, and compared to his preceding features there aren’t a lot of subcutaneous details to unearth or much room for interpretation — my biggest problem is the theme (animal cruelty, subsisting spectacle) IS the topic. I would’ve been happier with a less is more approach but Nope remains a solid little creature-feature sci-fi horror-thriller think-piece. Regardless of certain flaws it's another winner by a thoughtful, quickly standardizing genre tactician, and everything you could ask for in a summer that could be reduced, at least thus far, to Top Gun: Maverick and maybe one subjective guilty pleasure, if we're being nice.
It’s just what we need and yet (maybe it’s his own reputation surpassing him but) this movie was missing something, some story wrinkle for the home stretch, a little less CGI… Still, a film where I could just spend time with the characters and not even begin to be concerned about when the Area 51 crap starts kicking in? That’s how you know you’re just good at what you do.
“Ummm it’s actually about how Hollywood chews you up and spits you out!” Damn you asinine, forum-browsing pseuds love reaching.
I genuinely don’t understand why his thriller’s are so absurdly deconstructed and picked apart for every last symbolic or thematic detail, but seriously who has more of a golden boy status in Hollywood than Jordan Peele? The man can already entertain like it’s secondhand and treat your brain to something of substance like he’s being graded, sometimes so sensibly he can have half of Twitter salivating over the simplest Easter eggs. I wish this movie hit me head on like his phenomenally bold, already modern classic debut Get Out or his unchained, admirably ambiguous high concept juggernaut Us, which while more divisive in audience reception was a real, raw, wriggling slice of untested filmmaking.
But self-coined social thrillers and hardcore Hitchcockian nightmares have given way to an unveiled obsession with alien invasion in addition to selectively cribbing from the flavors of Signs, War of the Worlds and a host of Universal’s misunderstood monster movies for its roots. Speaking of the mostly sorry studio, even if Peele fouled up big time this would be a far superior monster movie to a third Jurassic World. I couldn't fault the man, as he genuinely is his own master of suspense and directorial control, never letting exposition get in the way of internal intelligence nor allowing tried tricks of the trade to trip up his articulations of opulent originality. In many ways I am slightly let down by the film’s narrative scope and build — as with Get Out, the first two acts of slowly unraveled secrets keep each feature bright and distinct on the Hollywood landscape, yet the Bigfoot-photo-fishing antics of this and the straight horror hack-down of his debut find each film climaxing with bravado but not necessarily rounding out a totally sound story.
With a touch more restraint, Nope could’ve been a Neo Western of equal parts Jaws and Alien retreads — but Peele blows his load a little too often for intrigue and imagination, all at the third act’s expense. Still, this is a thoughtful, fastidious fella who resists fakeouts and jump scares while pacing out his ideas with deliberate patience, trust and respect for audiences, which is why I'm lost as to why he chose to eviscerate his best chances at mystery and his favored ambiguity for Nope. The way our presumed flying saucer passes in and out of clouds is so odd, maneuvering through the film's guarded, secretive phase all too briskly. Our alien turns into an actual piece of spectacle but Peele seems slightly unable to justify it — in the end Nope ironically doesn’t feel too mesmerizing, awe-inducing or otherwise wowing.
Still, there's that truly scary, scream-worthy digestion sequence within a blowup castle of terror following the actual Jupiter show (those folks definitely got "abominable filth" cast upon them) plus the stormy second act blood-pour. My quibbles only become more rare thanks to Peele's peerlessness, so when all's said Nope is another exciting, well-told, well-conceived movie if far from a new mark made on black culture, regardless of the opening Lumière-lampooning historical reference. It’s curious that a movie about exhibition and how fucked up it is to use live animals in service of it, ya know, does exactly that. But whatever, anti-extravaganza sentiments aside, what further holds the film back is some scattered plot craters — Us can get away with all that metaphorical, allegorical screwiness but Nope presumes to take place in the real world where, were there really potential to score photographic evidence of aliens, is this how it would go down?
Daniel Kaluuya is perhaps doing too little to exactly be the De Niro to Peele’s Marty (pretty brash parallel for your third flick eh?), but he’s every bit as good as in Get Out and the rest of his career. Keke Palmer is the show-stealer, as well as the tech guy/prime comic relief Brandon Perea playing Angel. Steven Yuen as Jupe has moments and a key connection to the film’s greater parts (basically don’t fuck with creatures big or small you dirty, leering humans) but he is underused to this eye.
Its concepts are either crypic or hit you on the head, and compared to his preceding features there aren’t a lot of subcutaneous details to unearth or much room for interpretation — my biggest problem is the theme (animal cruelty, subsisting spectacle) IS the topic. I would’ve been happier with a less is more approach but Nope remains a solid little creature-feature sci-fi horror-thriller think-piece. Regardless of certain flaws it's another winner by a thoughtful, quickly standardizing genre tactician, and everything you could ask for in a summer that could be reduced, at least thus far, to Top Gun: Maverick and maybe one subjective guilty pleasure, if we're being nice.
It’s just what we need and yet (maybe it’s his own reputation surpassing him but) this movie was missing something, some story wrinkle for the home stretch, a little less CGI… Still, a film where I could just spend time with the characters and not even begin to be concerned about when the Area 51 crap starts kicking in? That’s how you know you’re just good at what you do.
Thor: Love and Thunder briefing
2 ½ (out of 4)
Of those who come close enough to qualify as the nearly oxymoronic “auteurs of Marvel” — which (ignoring Sam Raimi’s recent fail, Jon Favreau’s lack of overarching vision and Shane Black, whose overarching vision boils down to CHRISTMAS) includes Ryan Coogler, Chloe Zhao, Joss Whedon and James Gunn — Taika Waititi seemed to resist the readymade bullshit pretty substantially, cruising on a more whimsical wavelength contrary to the dramatic pull other indie-director-cum-Marvelcucks. His personality might get the best of his intentions (the mugging, the disdain for haters, all that Twitter-teasing garbage and generally just appearing not to give a shit) but I’ll admit that in spite of Jojo Rabbit’s dangerous abandon and overrated status (Best Original Screenplay? Really?), Boy, What We Do in the Shadows and Hunt for the Wilderpeople confirmed his fractal, fun-loving talent pretty plainly before he excelled on a grander stage with Thor: Ragnarok.
With no Planet Hulk storyline intertwined, no Anthony Hopkins’ Odin nor Tom Hiddleston’s ridiculously beloved Loki (easily the most popular of the six shows Disney+ released), Love and Thunder doesn’t quite have its predecessor’s salience, nor does it move the MCU along to better tomorrows like how Ragnorok’s parting directly linked up to Infinity War’s inciting moments. However this fourth Thor flick does, flippantly, give a good deal of the goofiest, most comedy-inclined MCU a run for its money. Plenty of jokes fall flat, a few repeated gags are not worth it, yet Thor For is so surpassingly buoyant even regulars seem to think this is MCU funny fodder gone too far… but I believe this is not nearly as egregiously, gratingly forced as any of the Holland Spider-Mans or Guardians flicks, even as it surely hits the LOL button with some irritating insistence. That’s just Waititi for ya: irreverence, but at least more specific rather than broadly brash.
Christian Bale felt like a classic Phase Three villain back when they figured their shit out — a committed performance of a sympathetic and yet augmented, absurd villain. Chris Hemsworth is still money somehow — Whedon unlocked his foil role well in Avengers and despite Branagh and The Dark World’s relative seriousness, his stupid shtick, from the proto-fish-out-of-water days, are all about finding the guy behind the god, even when it was about Portal or whatever. Russell Crowe as fat Zeus overstays his welcome, but he’s a fairly fun addition to it all (the first stinger with Hercules ain’t worth anything to me though). Ruefully Tessa Thompson is just deadweight, pretty pointless, pretty there; Kat Dennings and Stellan Skarsgård have cameos that I suppose were dictated… wait they weren’t even in Ragnarok were they? Nope and they may as well have been cast aside once more.
I thought Natalie Portman had had enough, throwing it away after 2013, besides getting paid for possibly the most expensive cameo ever in Endgame? Instead of loathing her return it felt like one last hurrah — she made me not regret her role as a huge crux of this flick. It was lightly moving that Waititi felt the need to correct what had previously been a bungled romance, giving Jane Foster some shading and footing slightly higher than stock love interest, though her ridiculous new superhero pains are pretty dumb. I also enjoy Taika knowingly taking it to Thor’s original bestie’s from the first two features whom no one but nerds ever gave a crap about. Love and Thunder can be cute when projecting Thor's relationship with Jane onto Mjolnir and Stormbreaker in an actually sustainable recurring bit. Waititi’s own Korg lines aren’t that good or anything but another in the line of directorial cameos is ok for me, especially after all the ways Favreau’s Happy hasn’t saved the day.
Altogether it was pointless and overdrawn like a lot of Phase Four but at the same time it was the right mode of episodic that the MCU benefits from in the offseason — sans all the overreaching, universe-ballooning bullshit, I do enjoy when one of these late-game bad boys is self-contained and unconcerned by the bigger picture. Love and Thunder is relatively pretty fair-minded when it comes to divying out the drama and the levity — it was decent fluff. Every Thor movie has something going for it, even The Dark World, and Love and Thunder is just screwing around in an inert phase, painlessly passing the time. It is lackluster in many regards, one being way too much Guns N' Roses, not just in sound but in reference; this soundtrack is like using too much oil while sautéing, just a slathered pop soundtrack of pure overkill to make it all go down easier.
Still, past any of-the-moment leniency there’s a certain level of insufferable that the MCU taps into when the theatrical, theme-park ride wears off and you judge it as a part of cinema, and boy does the perception whither in regard to the fourth Thor. Half-written jokes and unfinished visuals make for quite the disposable affair. At best Waititi emphasizes the genre's cartoon qualities with moving panels plush with playful psychedelia and jocular abandon. At worst this is like a punishing SNL sketch.
Of those who come close enough to qualify as the nearly oxymoronic “auteurs of Marvel” — which (ignoring Sam Raimi’s recent fail, Jon Favreau’s lack of overarching vision and Shane Black, whose overarching vision boils down to CHRISTMAS) includes Ryan Coogler, Chloe Zhao, Joss Whedon and James Gunn — Taika Waititi seemed to resist the readymade bullshit pretty substantially, cruising on a more whimsical wavelength contrary to the dramatic pull other indie-director-cum-Marvelcucks. His personality might get the best of his intentions (the mugging, the disdain for haters, all that Twitter-teasing garbage and generally just appearing not to give a shit) but I’ll admit that in spite of Jojo Rabbit’s dangerous abandon and overrated status (Best Original Screenplay? Really?), Boy, What We Do in the Shadows and Hunt for the Wilderpeople confirmed his fractal, fun-loving talent pretty plainly before he excelled on a grander stage with Thor: Ragnarok.
With no Planet Hulk storyline intertwined, no Anthony Hopkins’ Odin nor Tom Hiddleston’s ridiculously beloved Loki (easily the most popular of the six shows Disney+ released), Love and Thunder doesn’t quite have its predecessor’s salience, nor does it move the MCU along to better tomorrows like how Ragnorok’s parting directly linked up to Infinity War’s inciting moments. However this fourth Thor flick does, flippantly, give a good deal of the goofiest, most comedy-inclined MCU a run for its money. Plenty of jokes fall flat, a few repeated gags are not worth it, yet Thor For is so surpassingly buoyant even regulars seem to think this is MCU funny fodder gone too far… but I believe this is not nearly as egregiously, gratingly forced as any of the Holland Spider-Mans or Guardians flicks, even as it surely hits the LOL button with some irritating insistence. That’s just Waititi for ya: irreverence, but at least more specific rather than broadly brash.
Christian Bale felt like a classic Phase Three villain back when they figured their shit out — a committed performance of a sympathetic and yet augmented, absurd villain. Chris Hemsworth is still money somehow — Whedon unlocked his foil role well in Avengers and despite Branagh and The Dark World’s relative seriousness, his stupid shtick, from the proto-fish-out-of-water days, are all about finding the guy behind the god, even when it was about Portal or whatever. Russell Crowe as fat Zeus overstays his welcome, but he’s a fairly fun addition to it all (the first stinger with Hercules ain’t worth anything to me though). Ruefully Tessa Thompson is just deadweight, pretty pointless, pretty there; Kat Dennings and Stellan Skarsgård have cameos that I suppose were dictated… wait they weren’t even in Ragnarok were they? Nope and they may as well have been cast aside once more.
I thought Natalie Portman had had enough, throwing it away after 2013, besides getting paid for possibly the most expensive cameo ever in Endgame? Instead of loathing her return it felt like one last hurrah — she made me not regret her role as a huge crux of this flick. It was lightly moving that Waititi felt the need to correct what had previously been a bungled romance, giving Jane Foster some shading and footing slightly higher than stock love interest, though her ridiculous new superhero pains are pretty dumb. I also enjoy Taika knowingly taking it to Thor’s original bestie’s from the first two features whom no one but nerds ever gave a crap about. Love and Thunder can be cute when projecting Thor's relationship with Jane onto Mjolnir and Stormbreaker in an actually sustainable recurring bit. Waititi’s own Korg lines aren’t that good or anything but another in the line of directorial cameos is ok for me, especially after all the ways Favreau’s Happy hasn’t saved the day.
Altogether it was pointless and overdrawn like a lot of Phase Four but at the same time it was the right mode of episodic that the MCU benefits from in the offseason — sans all the overreaching, universe-ballooning bullshit, I do enjoy when one of these late-game bad boys is self-contained and unconcerned by the bigger picture. Love and Thunder is relatively pretty fair-minded when it comes to divying out the drama and the levity — it was decent fluff. Every Thor movie has something going for it, even The Dark World, and Love and Thunder is just screwing around in an inert phase, painlessly passing the time. It is lackluster in many regards, one being way too much Guns N' Roses, not just in sound but in reference; this soundtrack is like using too much oil while sautéing, just a slathered pop soundtrack of pure overkill to make it all go down easier.
Still, past any of-the-moment leniency there’s a certain level of insufferable that the MCU taps into when the theatrical, theme-park ride wears off and you judge it as a part of cinema, and boy does the perception whither in regard to the fourth Thor. Half-written jokes and unfinished visuals make for quite the disposable affair. At best Waititi emphasizes the genre's cartoon qualities with moving panels plush with playful psychedelia and jocular abandon. At worst this is like a punishing SNL sketch.
Flux Gourmet briefing
2 (out of 4)
Peter Strickland remains the most original British director of recent years, becoming a more finessed cinematic troublemaker with each passing picture. And yet what was an ascent into unimaginable weirdness has come up just dry, directionless and witless all around. Whether you make note of the shriveled, undeveloped cultural critiques, basic social observations or just a concept unfulfilled, Flux Gourmet is an auteur feature committed to “technique without vision,” the film’s reflexive self-chaste.
After a supporting turn last time, Gwendoline Christie has upstaged the coven crazy (Fatma Mohamed, appearing in all of Strickland’s work) who so enchantingly, absurdly elevated In Fabric, Peter’s just plain mystifying masterpiece, wherein washing machine mechanics make for quite the percolating, sedating trance. The presence of the Yorgos Lanthimos’ muse/partner Ariane Labed (looking like K Stew from a few years back) made me think of the dark comic depths of a misfired modern Greek movie, say The Killing of a Sacred Deer, and yet Flux Gourmet wasn’t worthy of Strickland or Lanthimos. Even with decently written dialogue, it was just squirming within its impassive aimlessness, resolved to be intermittently odd, jamming in cliché skewerings of the bourgeoisie and solipsistic artists over and over.
The world of Flux is very fascinating, in rituals, orgies and even the foundational premise of a music/performance art trio who remix and reverb kitchen sounds to their ambient, artistic liking. It all sounds quirky, cool, quaint and subversive like all his films have been to some degree, specifically the elliptical, similarly sound-recording-centered Berberian Sound Studio — Toby Jones smashing watermelons day in and day out seemed to invoke at least some inspiration behind this acoustic culinary cinematic experience. Following his debut came his subtextually double-edged psychosexual romance The Duke of Burgundy, the perfect stepping stone to the bizarre, barbaric B-movie horror brilliance of In Fabric.
But Flux Gourmet is ironically inert, undeveloped and punctuated by a docufiction framework where the narrative is half-driven by a man with unassuagable flatulence, his authorship compelled to keep reminding everyone that, beyond the prestige palate-playtime, our observer is always on the verge of ripping stinkers. I don’t know what to make of this. Then the musicians under scrutiny are only so interesting. Next to Mohamed and Labed, young Asa Butterfield is the third wheel of the crew, limited by millennial malaise and a sexual chemistry with Christie’s producer-level showrunner of the remote, eclectic performance venue. We even get an recurring tick in Gwendoline's characters receiving head two movies straight.
Here the man's sharpshooting, ticklingly strange humor doesn’t disarm, it disengages. Never has Strickland leaned into his own staged insanity so much, but this is not the feast of freakiness that you might hope. Interludes with mimed skits, not to mention the actual loony performances… there’s just little to address other than its prods at overcommitted artists that act like they’re God’s chosen people. If Strickland’s skills saw Gourmet through to its spiciest, or even bitterest ends, then there would be less reason to align him with the culturally consumed, egomaniacal assholes he seemingly wants to see on a spit. This is satire at its most airy and outlandish.
Peter Strickland remains the most original British director of recent years, becoming a more finessed cinematic troublemaker with each passing picture. And yet what was an ascent into unimaginable weirdness has come up just dry, directionless and witless all around. Whether you make note of the shriveled, undeveloped cultural critiques, basic social observations or just a concept unfulfilled, Flux Gourmet is an auteur feature committed to “technique without vision,” the film’s reflexive self-chaste.
After a supporting turn last time, Gwendoline Christie has upstaged the coven crazy (Fatma Mohamed, appearing in all of Strickland’s work) who so enchantingly, absurdly elevated In Fabric, Peter’s just plain mystifying masterpiece, wherein washing machine mechanics make for quite the percolating, sedating trance. The presence of the Yorgos Lanthimos’ muse/partner Ariane Labed (looking like K Stew from a few years back) made me think of the dark comic depths of a misfired modern Greek movie, say The Killing of a Sacred Deer, and yet Flux Gourmet wasn’t worthy of Strickland or Lanthimos. Even with decently written dialogue, it was just squirming within its impassive aimlessness, resolved to be intermittently odd, jamming in cliché skewerings of the bourgeoisie and solipsistic artists over and over.
The world of Flux is very fascinating, in rituals, orgies and even the foundational premise of a music/performance art trio who remix and reverb kitchen sounds to their ambient, artistic liking. It all sounds quirky, cool, quaint and subversive like all his films have been to some degree, specifically the elliptical, similarly sound-recording-centered Berberian Sound Studio — Toby Jones smashing watermelons day in and day out seemed to invoke at least some inspiration behind this acoustic culinary cinematic experience. Following his debut came his subtextually double-edged psychosexual romance The Duke of Burgundy, the perfect stepping stone to the bizarre, barbaric B-movie horror brilliance of In Fabric.
But Flux Gourmet is ironically inert, undeveloped and punctuated by a docufiction framework where the narrative is half-driven by a man with unassuagable flatulence, his authorship compelled to keep reminding everyone that, beyond the prestige palate-playtime, our observer is always on the verge of ripping stinkers. I don’t know what to make of this. Then the musicians under scrutiny are only so interesting. Next to Mohamed and Labed, young Asa Butterfield is the third wheel of the crew, limited by millennial malaise and a sexual chemistry with Christie’s producer-level showrunner of the remote, eclectic performance venue. We even get an recurring tick in Gwendoline's characters receiving head two movies straight.
Here the man's sharpshooting, ticklingly strange humor doesn’t disarm, it disengages. Never has Strickland leaned into his own staged insanity so much, but this is not the feast of freakiness that you might hope. Interludes with mimed skits, not to mention the actual loony performances… there’s just little to address other than its prods at overcommitted artists that act like they’re God’s chosen people. If Strickland’s skills saw Gourmet through to its spiciest, or even bitterest ends, then there would be less reason to align him with the culturally consumed, egomaniacal assholes he seemingly wants to see on a spit. This is satire at its most airy and outlandish.
Elvis briefing
2 ½ (out of 4)
Contentedly caught between a sleek, sugary, fleeting Luhrmann-splosion and a grand, grotesque formal exercise of the tired, telegraphed textbook of dramatic biopics — particularly the musical icons that draw in the spanning generations affected by a more grandfatherly fandom — 2022's Elvis frequently flirts with flat-out failure and stunning, stupendous sensory showmanship. Maybe that’s more than appropriate veneration for a man more known for a wiggling, wobbling lower half and a voice that can be imitated (poorly) by anyone, rather than fusing blues with country.
But some Vegas-prowling impersonator would hardly convince enough to amount to an iconic film performance of The King, or equal the caliber Presley himself greatly desired to leave us all with during his stint in cinema. In Luhrmann’s world, the rock'n'roll rocketeer's movie career flies by (in one decadent, delirious montage) like it never mattered, although they make sure to include the regret rather than his string of noted little cinematic accomplishments (Jailhouse Rock, Michael Curtiz’s King Creole, Don Siegel’s Flaming Star) as he maxed out the pretty boy limits of his James Dean emulation.
Before Baz and Austin Butler there was the even longer John Carpenter/Kurt Russell 1979 TV film. God, next to a full Luhrmann experience (oh sweet Jesus no, there’s a four hour cut?? I'll OD) Carpenter's cobbled bio comes off like a snoozing, quaint affair. Yet, outside of Luhrmann basking in the 1956-58 glory and losing his mind, the television take's primary devotion is reserved strictly for the women in Presley’s life, his mother and his wife Priscilla (soon to be the victim of a Sofia Coppola/A24 biopic-ing!). Carpenter fills in a huge hunk of the Elvis psyche rather than ironically having the omnipresent COLONEL pull the strings so much he yanks away a larger share of the screen time from Butler’s magnificent masquerade.
This movie wants to see Presley as the bushel-basket-covered, unceremoniously unaware marionette, who could’ve been EVEN GREATER than, ya know, one of the seminal figures of the 20th century, had he been afforded enough freedom to spread those bluesin', rockabillin' wings of his. His cage is at the behest of his personal puppet master played by Tom Hanks, who is just too much to handle inside the fats suits, buried in aged makeup and dishing out an absolutely distracting accent. All the overbearing profiteering and exploitation overshadows any autonomy that would make Elvis less fantasia than factual, but we're dealing with the director who never met an anachronism he didn't like.
This movie is somehow weirder in imposing its contemporary influences than Moulin Rouge’s jukebox jubilee or Jay Z/Lana Del Ray cuts in The Great Gatsby. Looking back, the “so exciting, so delighting” flash of Moulin is grating my cheese nowadays, whereas my former indifference to his 2013 Fitzgerald adaptation has given way to an appreciation of his persistent, postmodern, pop-culture-punctuated flavor. Gatsby and Australia are both in the running for tops, the latter the Aussie director’s most earnest, noteworthy effort, saying fuck it and hurling one of the medium's modern Hail Mary's in one of the last epic roadshow romances — its flaws are even more negligible than the usual oddities. But really, considering a relatively modest underdog tale and traditionally pleasing, piquant nature, Strictly Ballroom may be Luhrmann’s splashy, early peak, yet to be usurped.
But despite such a gaudy oeuvre, Elvis is a bit of Luhrmann letdown that, while as sweaty and overexerted as the man with the golden drawl himself, doesn’t really accomplish anything exceptional. R+J and Rouge are very ostentatious, very in your face-ious. Elvis not so boldly tries to pretend it’s not your grandaddy’s biopic or whatever but it has ALL of the things — oh God the addiction, oh God the women, oh God the censorship, oh God the artistic struggle, oh God the double-edged sword of fame... While brazenly sold as a radical reinvention of the music biopic's slavish, overdone formulaic qualities, this is nonetheless another amalgamation of the standard set of clichés and variations on the same sort of sensational tragedy and bullet point biography, including a framing wrinkle and unreliable narrator for excusable inaccuracy to boot.
Aside from Luhrmann's own formidable little habits, the other category Elvis needed to rise above was the treacherous trenches of biopic tropes. There's loads more craft here than in Bohemian Rhapsody's listless lies and nostalgia bait, and it's the polar opposite of the removed register of Gus Van Sant’s understated quasi-Cobain flick Last Days. But otherwise Elvis is lesser than its picture show peers. Rocketman was a far better singular ode, honest with little showboating; Paul Dano's part as Brian Wilson alone imbue some greatness in Love and Mercy. Let me just mention Get On Up (well done, RIP Chadwick Boseman), for one of this film genus's finer customary examples as well as Respect, which while generic ended on a high note and, most importantly, cranked the waterworks to full blast... There are still some real moments of performance rebelliousness Luhrmann seems to have been siphoned from the strength of Straight Outta Compton.
At best Presley’s film by biopic proportions is like an alright Oliver Stone movie, sorta The Doors' pleasing but superficial glean sold by a definitively star-making role (for Val Kilmer 30 years back and now Butler) that nonetheless struggles to exceed dramatized dress-up. Elvis regrettably doesn’t escape the Walk Hard: Dewey Cox syndrome of cookie-cutter crudeness. Except, lamentably, this one isn't as emotional as the genre's methodical, melodramatic manipulation is known to be — curiously the paucity of pathos restrains Elvis from excellence.
Contentedly caught between a sleek, sugary, fleeting Luhrmann-splosion and a grand, grotesque formal exercise of the tired, telegraphed textbook of dramatic biopics — particularly the musical icons that draw in the spanning generations affected by a more grandfatherly fandom — 2022's Elvis frequently flirts with flat-out failure and stunning, stupendous sensory showmanship. Maybe that’s more than appropriate veneration for a man more known for a wiggling, wobbling lower half and a voice that can be imitated (poorly) by anyone, rather than fusing blues with country.
But some Vegas-prowling impersonator would hardly convince enough to amount to an iconic film performance of The King, or equal the caliber Presley himself greatly desired to leave us all with during his stint in cinema. In Luhrmann’s world, the rock'n'roll rocketeer's movie career flies by (in one decadent, delirious montage) like it never mattered, although they make sure to include the regret rather than his string of noted little cinematic accomplishments (Jailhouse Rock, Michael Curtiz’s King Creole, Don Siegel’s Flaming Star) as he maxed out the pretty boy limits of his James Dean emulation.
Before Baz and Austin Butler there was the even longer John Carpenter/Kurt Russell 1979 TV film. God, next to a full Luhrmann experience (oh sweet Jesus no, there’s a four hour cut?? I'll OD) Carpenter's cobbled bio comes off like a snoozing, quaint affair. Yet, outside of Luhrmann basking in the 1956-58 glory and losing his mind, the television take's primary devotion is reserved strictly for the women in Presley’s life, his mother and his wife Priscilla (soon to be the victim of a Sofia Coppola/A24 biopic-ing!). Carpenter fills in a huge hunk of the Elvis psyche rather than ironically having the omnipresent COLONEL pull the strings so much he yanks away a larger share of the screen time from Butler’s magnificent masquerade.
This movie wants to see Presley as the bushel-basket-covered, unceremoniously unaware marionette, who could’ve been EVEN GREATER than, ya know, one of the seminal figures of the 20th century, had he been afforded enough freedom to spread those bluesin', rockabillin' wings of his. His cage is at the behest of his personal puppet master played by Tom Hanks, who is just too much to handle inside the fats suits, buried in aged makeup and dishing out an absolutely distracting accent. All the overbearing profiteering and exploitation overshadows any autonomy that would make Elvis less fantasia than factual, but we're dealing with the director who never met an anachronism he didn't like.
This movie is somehow weirder in imposing its contemporary influences than Moulin Rouge’s jukebox jubilee or Jay Z/Lana Del Ray cuts in The Great Gatsby. Looking back, the “so exciting, so delighting” flash of Moulin is grating my cheese nowadays, whereas my former indifference to his 2013 Fitzgerald adaptation has given way to an appreciation of his persistent, postmodern, pop-culture-punctuated flavor. Gatsby and Australia are both in the running for tops, the latter the Aussie director’s most earnest, noteworthy effort, saying fuck it and hurling one of the medium's modern Hail Mary's in one of the last epic roadshow romances — its flaws are even more negligible than the usual oddities. But really, considering a relatively modest underdog tale and traditionally pleasing, piquant nature, Strictly Ballroom may be Luhrmann’s splashy, early peak, yet to be usurped.
But despite such a gaudy oeuvre, Elvis is a bit of Luhrmann letdown that, while as sweaty and overexerted as the man with the golden drawl himself, doesn’t really accomplish anything exceptional. R+J and Rouge are very ostentatious, very in your face-ious. Elvis not so boldly tries to pretend it’s not your grandaddy’s biopic or whatever but it has ALL of the things — oh God the addiction, oh God the women, oh God the censorship, oh God the artistic struggle, oh God the double-edged sword of fame... While brazenly sold as a radical reinvention of the music biopic's slavish, overdone formulaic qualities, this is nonetheless another amalgamation of the standard set of clichés and variations on the same sort of sensational tragedy and bullet point biography, including a framing wrinkle and unreliable narrator for excusable inaccuracy to boot.
Aside from Luhrmann's own formidable little habits, the other category Elvis needed to rise above was the treacherous trenches of biopic tropes. There's loads more craft here than in Bohemian Rhapsody's listless lies and nostalgia bait, and it's the polar opposite of the removed register of Gus Van Sant’s understated quasi-Cobain flick Last Days. But otherwise Elvis is lesser than its picture show peers. Rocketman was a far better singular ode, honest with little showboating; Paul Dano's part as Brian Wilson alone imbue some greatness in Love and Mercy. Let me just mention Get On Up (well done, RIP Chadwick Boseman), for one of this film genus's finer customary examples as well as Respect, which while generic ended on a high note and, most importantly, cranked the waterworks to full blast... There are still some real moments of performance rebelliousness Luhrmann seems to have been siphoned from the strength of Straight Outta Compton.
At best Presley’s film by biopic proportions is like an alright Oliver Stone movie, sorta The Doors' pleasing but superficial glean sold by a definitively star-making role (for Val Kilmer 30 years back and now Butler) that nonetheless struggles to exceed dramatized dress-up. Elvis regrettably doesn’t escape the Walk Hard: Dewey Cox syndrome of cookie-cutter crudeness. Except, lamentably, this one isn't as emotional as the genre's methodical, melodramatic manipulation is known to be — curiously the paucity of pathos restrains Elvis from excellence.
Lightyear briefing
2 (out of 4)
Here’s how my scrapped Turning Red review ended, before the towel was thrown:
“The Turning of the Red was not nearly the trainwreck trailers led me to believe, nor did it have me singing praises for another original Pixar creation. It’s par for the course now that their batting average has fallen so low, to mix sporting metaphors — Lightyear looks like it will be dragging down that median like nothing else. God, I’d rather have a deadly serious Western with Woody than pretend to believe in Star Command — wasn’t the opening scene in Toy Story 2 enough?”
My expectations were more than appropriate and there is little else to comment about the 26th Pixar animated feature. This is their least compellingly transfixing or emotionally evocative yarn since the Cars sequels — even Good Dinosaur has a few highlights. This movie is Pixar as marketing tool at its most egregious, not to mention easily the biggest offender of Disney’s plain-as-day political scorekeeping and agenda-peddling. Haha it’s not easy to say exactly but I doubt Andy’s favorite B-movie Star Wars ripoff from 1995 would have featured a montage of two women of color having a baby, and been about Buzz Lightyear’s primary goal to preserve that woke timeline in spite of the former, earlier (obviously more toxic) version of himself, all while settling for, uh, literally settling on one planet rather than venture to infinity and very possibly beyond. I promise I don’t even really mind the whole black lesbian inserted pride month shit, who honestly cares besides China — but holy crap I thought “my panda my choice” was ridiculously on the nose for Turning Red and that happened only a few months ago (and unfortunately couldn’t forestall Roe v Wade's own overturning). These films used to feel universal and now they feel forcefully reshaped by demographic research.
But really who couldn’t smell this Disney-dictated Pixar fare from long distance? When you have to justify your movie’s existence and fill in your framework with pre-titles spelling out that this is the film inspiring the Buzz toy within the Toy Story universe, what follows will come off cash-grabby no matter what you give us — golly I remember way back when thinking Toy Story 3 was excessive, then it was great and I liked 4 even more if you can believe it. Yet strong sequels did not give me faith to believe Lightyear would be the return to cinemas their name deserved, even when COVID-era Pixar has been overall well-to-do.
But the spinoff is largely uninspired. The misspent Interstellar-lite premise suggests Buzz never processes or even seems to notice the passing age piling up from his string of failed lightspeed jumps (four years of dilation a pop) and is somehow surprised when his primary companion is ultimately dead after one attempt too many. Calm it down Buzz, maybe there is more planning or research you can do every time you come back rather than treat this stranded-in-space scenario pre-colonization the same way you restart a videogame?
Chris Evans did fine even if he's upstaged by a mean bit of merchandizing in a talking robot kitten. Buzz was a remnant of some military space opera homage and they double down on that in Toy Story 2 when Zurg is revealed to be Lightyear’s father like Vader to Luke, but Lightyear serves you a helping of subversion with some kind of comic book revisionism in the Pixar equivalent of MCU's Mandarin switcheroo. Oh my God it’s not Buzz’s dad, it’s an older version of him from the future, pfft and then they want to fool us into thinking he’s not the bad guy when he’s technically been the bad guy since Act 2? That ‘twist’ was the only trick up the ranger suit and the rest of it was a very standard CG-animated adventure only additionally, helplessly convoluted. I may have wandered into a closed captioned screening but still couldn’t shape any sense of the story amongst the peddling-in-place plot-excess.
But most disappointingly, I did not cry. Maybe that’s truly what makes Lightyear a lesser Pixar affair more than anything, for this movie had no path to payed-out pathos, which is practically always your money-back guarantee for the brand, even on their off days. Lightyear is a fresh, honking blemish on Pixar’s ledger, and they were doing well for awhile — Onward was probably the worst of their COVID-affected fare, Turning Red is eons more creative, Soul can be called a new masterpiece (an easy Top 10er for the studio) and Luca was a solid, Coco-comparable way of telling non-American stories.
Toy Story 3 opened with a Wild West train chase sequence in Lone Ranger fashion, and I still think some Sheriff Woody Spaghetti Western would get me much giddier. But since we’re stuck with generic sci-fi action man, they could’ve done a lot with the tropes and expectations instead of aiming for depressing seriousness, then rushing an anticipated Zurg movie.
I just wonder if the studio is even trying anymore, with one original project Elemental slated next. There are myriad worlds you could be treading and you’re doing this shit instead, a Buzz Lightyear movie. Sadder still is even within the limits of this DOA enterprise there was more potential. It had that Finding Dory/Monster U veil where you feel them reaching (primarily for your wallet) — hey, I like money too. This flick will be forgotten before year's end.
For once, even though I mistakenly paid for the subtitled screening of Lightyear totally alone, more than ever I could’ve watched this Pix-flick on TV (unlike the cinema fantastique of Soul) and this sad evidence of our cultural crumbling (or collapse, depending on how pessimistic you are) suggests we're at the end of a rope, let alone an era. It really is stupid that I had to pay for this movie but the shining silver lining is Lightyear's box office failure, which I’m all but certain has served as a dire lesson to the Mouse about plucking the lowest hanging fruit.
Here’s how my scrapped Turning Red review ended, before the towel was thrown:
“The Turning of the Red was not nearly the trainwreck trailers led me to believe, nor did it have me singing praises for another original Pixar creation. It’s par for the course now that their batting average has fallen so low, to mix sporting metaphors — Lightyear looks like it will be dragging down that median like nothing else. God, I’d rather have a deadly serious Western with Woody than pretend to believe in Star Command — wasn’t the opening scene in Toy Story 2 enough?”
My expectations were more than appropriate and there is little else to comment about the 26th Pixar animated feature. This is their least compellingly transfixing or emotionally evocative yarn since the Cars sequels — even Good Dinosaur has a few highlights. This movie is Pixar as marketing tool at its most egregious, not to mention easily the biggest offender of Disney’s plain-as-day political scorekeeping and agenda-peddling. Haha it’s not easy to say exactly but I doubt Andy’s favorite B-movie Star Wars ripoff from 1995 would have featured a montage of two women of color having a baby, and been about Buzz Lightyear’s primary goal to preserve that woke timeline in spite of the former, earlier (obviously more toxic) version of himself, all while settling for, uh, literally settling on one planet rather than venture to infinity and very possibly beyond. I promise I don’t even really mind the whole black lesbian inserted pride month shit, who honestly cares besides China — but holy crap I thought “my panda my choice” was ridiculously on the nose for Turning Red and that happened only a few months ago (and unfortunately couldn’t forestall Roe v Wade's own overturning). These films used to feel universal and now they feel forcefully reshaped by demographic research.
But really who couldn’t smell this Disney-dictated Pixar fare from long distance? When you have to justify your movie’s existence and fill in your framework with pre-titles spelling out that this is the film inspiring the Buzz toy within the Toy Story universe, what follows will come off cash-grabby no matter what you give us — golly I remember way back when thinking Toy Story 3 was excessive, then it was great and I liked 4 even more if you can believe it. Yet strong sequels did not give me faith to believe Lightyear would be the return to cinemas their name deserved, even when COVID-era Pixar has been overall well-to-do.
But the spinoff is largely uninspired. The misspent Interstellar-lite premise suggests Buzz never processes or even seems to notice the passing age piling up from his string of failed lightspeed jumps (four years of dilation a pop) and is somehow surprised when his primary companion is ultimately dead after one attempt too many. Calm it down Buzz, maybe there is more planning or research you can do every time you come back rather than treat this stranded-in-space scenario pre-colonization the same way you restart a videogame?
Chris Evans did fine even if he's upstaged by a mean bit of merchandizing in a talking robot kitten. Buzz was a remnant of some military space opera homage and they double down on that in Toy Story 2 when Zurg is revealed to be Lightyear’s father like Vader to Luke, but Lightyear serves you a helping of subversion with some kind of comic book revisionism in the Pixar equivalent of MCU's Mandarin switcheroo. Oh my God it’s not Buzz’s dad, it’s an older version of him from the future, pfft and then they want to fool us into thinking he’s not the bad guy when he’s technically been the bad guy since Act 2? That ‘twist’ was the only trick up the ranger suit and the rest of it was a very standard CG-animated adventure only additionally, helplessly convoluted. I may have wandered into a closed captioned screening but still couldn’t shape any sense of the story amongst the peddling-in-place plot-excess.
But most disappointingly, I did not cry. Maybe that’s truly what makes Lightyear a lesser Pixar affair more than anything, for this movie had no path to payed-out pathos, which is practically always your money-back guarantee for the brand, even on their off days. Lightyear is a fresh, honking blemish on Pixar’s ledger, and they were doing well for awhile — Onward was probably the worst of their COVID-affected fare, Turning Red is eons more creative, Soul can be called a new masterpiece (an easy Top 10er for the studio) and Luca was a solid, Coco-comparable way of telling non-American stories.
Toy Story 3 opened with a Wild West train chase sequence in Lone Ranger fashion, and I still think some Sheriff Woody Spaghetti Western would get me much giddier. But since we’re stuck with generic sci-fi action man, they could’ve done a lot with the tropes and expectations instead of aiming for depressing seriousness, then rushing an anticipated Zurg movie.
I just wonder if the studio is even trying anymore, with one original project Elemental slated next. There are myriad worlds you could be treading and you’re doing this shit instead, a Buzz Lightyear movie. Sadder still is even within the limits of this DOA enterprise there was more potential. It had that Finding Dory/Monster U veil where you feel them reaching (primarily for your wallet) — hey, I like money too. This flick will be forgotten before year's end.
For once, even though I mistakenly paid for the subtitled screening of Lightyear totally alone, more than ever I could’ve watched this Pix-flick on TV (unlike the cinema fantastique of Soul) and this sad evidence of our cultural crumbling (or collapse, depending on how pessimistic you are) suggests we're at the end of a rope, let alone an era. It really is stupid that I had to pay for this movie but the shining silver lining is Lightyear's box office failure, which I’m all but certain has served as a dire lesson to the Mouse about plucking the lowest hanging fruit.
Jurassic World: Dominion briefing
1 ½ (out of 4)
I cannot say this fruitless franchise has done much but muck about in the dirt since the industry-shifting blockbuster original was unearthed, inspiring the current generation’s Dino-obsessions while spurring the appetite of digital/technological envelope-pushers and those who marvel at their labors.
The subsequent spell of half-hearted, uninteresting, desperate, shabbily written sequels never once rose above, “eh, that was okay I guess.” Frankly, for me the last one (the fifth in the Jurassic Park series and second World) experimented with the reckless stupidity, tone and structure, even if it was largely lifted from the skeletal remains of The Lost World. Fallen Kingdom was campy, crazy, eventually Gothic and despite functioning as sequel setup, it’s now looking more like the peak of this paltry, just-formed trio. People probably prefer the first Jurassic World to either sequel, but that movie’s hollow wash, self-aware soullessness and ignorance of/disdain for wonderment just grinds my gears more than it entertains my inner child.
But right now I would take that stale soft reboot roller coaster experience over this catastrophically miscalculated quote unquote all-ages adventure movie, which awkwardly squeezes together two scarcely serviceable B-stories (a meandering mystery for the returning OG characters and a tired globe-trotting rescue mission for the newer cast) that listlessly battle for your attention until an awkward generational sandwich occurs nearly two hours in with a few scenes to spare. Director Colin Trevorrow nearly helming Rise of Skywalker finally makes a lot of sense — he J.J. Abramed himself by returning to a sequel trilogy sensation for necessary course-correction after the middle installment's mixed reception, only to make things worse in the end. Both behemoth franchises pleased a lot of people back in 2015 but on equal levels they were just the guileless groundwork for late 2010s idea-starved regurgitative rule of law. But even before recently, how many times has a threequel done little more than illustrate in full scope how low the depths of laziness lie, and how prevailing diminishing returns can be?
Jurassic World Dominion, disastrously, features nothing remotely awe-inspiring. I’ll gladly admit The Lost World has that bus/cliff sequence, Jurassic World has little in-between instances that make you go “wow!”; even the third one has those pterodactyl cages and, well, I already, rather privately, think Fallen Kingdom is decent fun altogether. But this was basically a huge hulking mound of Dino dung masquerading as a titillating summer escape. The best part of this Cretaceous crap was when it ripped off The Bourne Ultimatum — remember that sick foot-chase in Tangier? Now imagine dinosaurs instead of Damon. The only other situation that came theoretically close to thrilling was maybe Claire’s (still Bryce Dallas Howard) parachuting ejection from an aircraft, but the green screen lets you down faster than gravity. All the new sensations are short-lived, stupid and… pathetic seems to be a key word — this underwhelming, unbearably uninspired undertaking barely deserves to call itself a blockbuster. It wasn’t abhorred but its not even worth checking out for shits nor giggles, not sucking in an “oh my God this is sooo ridiculous” kinda way, it was simply boring, bloated and filled in with flatulent fan service. Some of the dialogue was SO bad, SO cliché, SO utterly underwritten it was almost amazing to hear.
But now for the worst offense of all — the WHOLE REASON for this stupid trilogy was to get to the moment where WORLDS COLLIDE, which is what the last movie expended its existence setting up. In hindsight Fallen Kingdom apparently was the best we were ever gonna get: a sad handful of misleading money shots. Until release, Dominion was not a groan-worthy weekend on my summer 2022 calendar because I was all but ASSURED the film would let loose on insane spectacle and brawny blockbuster beefiness based on the tantalizing trailers and the corner it was all shades painted into by its predecessor. Somehow an inciting blip of expository news footage is all you get, quickly clueing you in that this movie will be glossing over the goods. Why oh why would Trevorrow resist the ridiculousness of Dino-wars but still think the straight sci-fi foolishness — principally the pilfered plot of Guillermo del Toro’s Mimic — of this movie’s curdled content qualifies as Crichton-honoring plausibility?
Even as an admitted B-movie, the action is too brief, terribly edited, making up not sequences but rather moments manufactured for TV spots. What happened to that sneak peek that preceded F9 last year, you know with the cool, chaotic drive-in movie theater set piece? Yeah, see that’s the sort of pulpy, scary, stimulating tone I and everyone else hoped for and EXPECTED from the first act of Dominion AT MINIMUM. Every World movie has promised more than it delivered though, but this betrayal stings because there were elements for a real diversion at your disposal between the cumulative cast and the crescendoing premise, and both are squandered completely. Like reel one of a movie just got stretched out into an entire film, Dominion is a pretty dumb setup for a movie already but without any narrative progression it just keeps never starting and never being over.
They’ve got Jeff Goldblum who you just know was paid like eight figures to sit their and fill in a few madlibs on a couple different sets, and while a little 'blum goes a long way, he and the ensemble were just bad. Seeing Sam Neill and Laura Dern’s abysmal romantic angle, *gags* truly nauseating — maybe for Neill it was a tasty paycheck, he doesn’t look as pained as he was in III, but still, just God-awful. Of course I don’t dislike the original cast but they’re forced to do and say the most embarrassing shit. Chris Pratt remains broadly charming, Howard has gone from corporate goon to Dino rights activist to motherly action lady (I have no reaction) and I still like the youngin' who plays Maisie (Isabella Sermon) — her role as the offspring of a mother giving birth to her own clone… I don’t know what to make of it since the twist meant absolutely nothing at the end of the day, but it’s something. DeWanda Wise was just an inserted diversity hire; I don’t relish pointing out these things but it's really like someone at Universal went “AH! Too many white people! Quick! We gotta autocorrect!” Once you get to those legacy moments with Pratt’s character meeting Neill’s, it makes me wonder how in God's name this creatively dead-end, popularity-primed IP could be exploited further.
I found it disagreeable, probably the worst one ever, because even III has the edge of less CG, whereas nothing here comes close to fooling you for a moment. Jurassic World Dominion is really a dispiriting, completely disjointed, oversized waste of time. You can take a pee break anywhere in here and not miss a beat of this grotesque, muddled, sour schlock.
I cannot say this fruitless franchise has done much but muck about in the dirt since the industry-shifting blockbuster original was unearthed, inspiring the current generation’s Dino-obsessions while spurring the appetite of digital/technological envelope-pushers and those who marvel at their labors.
The subsequent spell of half-hearted, uninteresting, desperate, shabbily written sequels never once rose above, “eh, that was okay I guess.” Frankly, for me the last one (the fifth in the Jurassic Park series and second World) experimented with the reckless stupidity, tone and structure, even if it was largely lifted from the skeletal remains of The Lost World. Fallen Kingdom was campy, crazy, eventually Gothic and despite functioning as sequel setup, it’s now looking more like the peak of this paltry, just-formed trio. People probably prefer the first Jurassic World to either sequel, but that movie’s hollow wash, self-aware soullessness and ignorance of/disdain for wonderment just grinds my gears more than it entertains my inner child.
But right now I would take that stale soft reboot roller coaster experience over this catastrophically miscalculated quote unquote all-ages adventure movie, which awkwardly squeezes together two scarcely serviceable B-stories (a meandering mystery for the returning OG characters and a tired globe-trotting rescue mission for the newer cast) that listlessly battle for your attention until an awkward generational sandwich occurs nearly two hours in with a few scenes to spare. Director Colin Trevorrow nearly helming Rise of Skywalker finally makes a lot of sense — he J.J. Abramed himself by returning to a sequel trilogy sensation for necessary course-correction after the middle installment's mixed reception, only to make things worse in the end. Both behemoth franchises pleased a lot of people back in 2015 but on equal levels they were just the guileless groundwork for late 2010s idea-starved regurgitative rule of law. But even before recently, how many times has a threequel done little more than illustrate in full scope how low the depths of laziness lie, and how prevailing diminishing returns can be?
Jurassic World Dominion, disastrously, features nothing remotely awe-inspiring. I’ll gladly admit The Lost World has that bus/cliff sequence, Jurassic World has little in-between instances that make you go “wow!”; even the third one has those pterodactyl cages and, well, I already, rather privately, think Fallen Kingdom is decent fun altogether. But this was basically a huge hulking mound of Dino dung masquerading as a titillating summer escape. The best part of this Cretaceous crap was when it ripped off The Bourne Ultimatum — remember that sick foot-chase in Tangier? Now imagine dinosaurs instead of Damon. The only other situation that came theoretically close to thrilling was maybe Claire’s (still Bryce Dallas Howard) parachuting ejection from an aircraft, but the green screen lets you down faster than gravity. All the new sensations are short-lived, stupid and… pathetic seems to be a key word — this underwhelming, unbearably uninspired undertaking barely deserves to call itself a blockbuster. It wasn’t abhorred but its not even worth checking out for shits nor giggles, not sucking in an “oh my God this is sooo ridiculous” kinda way, it was simply boring, bloated and filled in with flatulent fan service. Some of the dialogue was SO bad, SO cliché, SO utterly underwritten it was almost amazing to hear.
But now for the worst offense of all — the WHOLE REASON for this stupid trilogy was to get to the moment where WORLDS COLLIDE, which is what the last movie expended its existence setting up. In hindsight Fallen Kingdom apparently was the best we were ever gonna get: a sad handful of misleading money shots. Until release, Dominion was not a groan-worthy weekend on my summer 2022 calendar because I was all but ASSURED the film would let loose on insane spectacle and brawny blockbuster beefiness based on the tantalizing trailers and the corner it was all shades painted into by its predecessor. Somehow an inciting blip of expository news footage is all you get, quickly clueing you in that this movie will be glossing over the goods. Why oh why would Trevorrow resist the ridiculousness of Dino-wars but still think the straight sci-fi foolishness — principally the pilfered plot of Guillermo del Toro’s Mimic — of this movie’s curdled content qualifies as Crichton-honoring plausibility?
Even as an admitted B-movie, the action is too brief, terribly edited, making up not sequences but rather moments manufactured for TV spots. What happened to that sneak peek that preceded F9 last year, you know with the cool, chaotic drive-in movie theater set piece? Yeah, see that’s the sort of pulpy, scary, stimulating tone I and everyone else hoped for and EXPECTED from the first act of Dominion AT MINIMUM. Every World movie has promised more than it delivered though, but this betrayal stings because there were elements for a real diversion at your disposal between the cumulative cast and the crescendoing premise, and both are squandered completely. Like reel one of a movie just got stretched out into an entire film, Dominion is a pretty dumb setup for a movie already but without any narrative progression it just keeps never starting and never being over.
They’ve got Jeff Goldblum who you just know was paid like eight figures to sit their and fill in a few madlibs on a couple different sets, and while a little 'blum goes a long way, he and the ensemble were just bad. Seeing Sam Neill and Laura Dern’s abysmal romantic angle, *gags* truly nauseating — maybe for Neill it was a tasty paycheck, he doesn’t look as pained as he was in III, but still, just God-awful. Of course I don’t dislike the original cast but they’re forced to do and say the most embarrassing shit. Chris Pratt remains broadly charming, Howard has gone from corporate goon to Dino rights activist to motherly action lady (I have no reaction) and I still like the youngin' who plays Maisie (Isabella Sermon) — her role as the offspring of a mother giving birth to her own clone… I don’t know what to make of it since the twist meant absolutely nothing at the end of the day, but it’s something. DeWanda Wise was just an inserted diversity hire; I don’t relish pointing out these things but it's really like someone at Universal went “AH! Too many white people! Quick! We gotta autocorrect!” Once you get to those legacy moments with Pratt’s character meeting Neill’s, it makes me wonder how in God's name this creatively dead-end, popularity-primed IP could be exploited further.
I found it disagreeable, probably the worst one ever, because even III has the edge of less CG, whereas nothing here comes close to fooling you for a moment. Jurassic World Dominion is really a dispiriting, completely disjointed, oversized waste of time. You can take a pee break anywhere in here and not miss a beat of this grotesque, muddled, sour schlock.
Top Gun: Maverick briefing
3 (out of 4)
Take my breath away Mr. Cruise. The actual last action hero refuses to be banished to obscurity like so many before him — Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Willis, Van Damme, you literally name them — but that doesn’t mean Tom isn’t motivated to prove himself time and time again rather than coast on a well-worn reputation. Regardless of whatever hype this movie has going in as basic boomer catnip, a bigger return to theatrical summer moviegoing or a just a reconciliation with the lost Bruckheimer-backed form of brash, larger-than-life blockbusters, Top Gun: Maverick is, at least, one of Cruise’s finest non-Mission movies in a long time, nearly up there with Edge of Tomorrow and easily exceeding director Joseph Kosinski’s other Cruise collab Oblivion.
With a now repeated history of successfully, inconspicuously revitalizing and improving upon Gen X nostalgia with superior sequels to their 80s counterparts (TRON: Legacy), backing the chancy Cruise post-apocalyptic sci-fi influence-splicer and making the “American hero” fare (always bordering on meatheaded and teetering on hammy) potent in the commendable, near-devastating firefighter biography Only the Brave, Kosinski’s career seems to have culminated in Maverick. He keeps his shots clean, cuts minimal and naturally lets simple drama creep in and stick. His summer 2022 is stacked too as he's doubled up with another action film Spiderhead due on Netflix in a few weeks.
Kosinski's practice means Top Gun: Maverick exceeds most any expectations — well, save the idea that 36-year-removed follow-up could somehow outdo the 1986 original’s stellar soundtrack soaring high on danger zones and balls of fire. That Berlin song written by Giorgio Moroder is a hell of a better sound barrier than OneRepublic and Lady Gaga.
But otherwise this really is Mission: Impossible 6 and a half — Top Gun Nation, whatever you wanna call it. There’s more than a good deal of the legacyquel goods occurring in the hour of the movie that both precedes the film’s truly impressive sustained climax and the initial stonework/super-speed sequence. All the beach games, hook-up sequences — mercifully with much less silhouetted tonguing — training stints and straight edge vs. dangerous cocky asshole dynamics could’ve been boiled down to montages entirely and it almost is. If this film had put its downtime to use making something of its fresh crop of Top Gun figures — Miles Teller, Glen Powell, Monica Barbara, Lewis Pullman — rather than bring the beautifully advancing (for my money one of the most beautiful actresses of all time) Jennifer Connelly in to replace the love interest void left by the sadly too-poorly-aged-for-producer’s-tastes Kelly McGillis, just to reinforce the fact that Maverick (TOM CRUISE WHO ARE WE KIDDING) still got that sex appeal baby, maybe this movie’s prescribed sentimental beats would’ve hit me hard enough for a six-minute standing ovation, the audible praise Cannes spent on Cruise just recently. I’ll save that equal enthusiasm and then some for the beginning of the end of Mission: Impossible next summer in Dead Reckoning Part One.
I’m blind on much of Tony Scott’s career — Days of Thunder is the same problems and potency masked with racing in place of Naval aviation — but outside of its needle drops, iconic quotability and Cruise’s 24-year young cockiness, the original Gun would’ve been forgotten regardless of the box office receipts. Obviously with such a relatively low bar, this late sequel has no choice but to burst through a weak precedent, though I'm grateful the showmanship has something worth showing and that final stretch of the film is one of the sharpest blockbuster bonanzas we’ve seen in such a long time. Continued clichés be damned, it’s not worth diminishing this film’s technical craft — if you shot more footage than all of Lord of the Rings combined and had years of COVID to edit, you better be looking pretty good. However some of the original’s Achilles' heel (godDAMN it’s tough to orient an audience to the geography of aerial combat) is still here, though Maverick nevertheless comprises far more visual clarity even if it’s just about as fervidly corny. The film doesn’t overstay its welcome even if it's almost as if all the cuts to photographs of the late Goose (Nick Bradshaw) and some reconciliation with poor Val Kilmer’s Iceman were just primer for a sweepingly ‘emotional’ ending that, while punchy, didn’t earn much of anything on its own by borrowing from the consequences of its former half.
Still, my Lord, this is a well-formulated crowd-pleaser — what a relief since it’s been a long way to the screen since shooting began way back in 2018. Had fate been in our favor Top Gun: Maverick would be a memory and we’d be in the thick of a two-part Mission: Impossible finale. This film is but a Cruise apértif for myself, and I hate to treat it as such; but since Christopher McQuarrie started story-doctoring all of Cruise’s projects just before his directorial debut Jack Reacher, it's hard not to feel like the best is yet to come (and babe, won’t it be fine).
Take my breath away Mr. Cruise. The actual last action hero refuses to be banished to obscurity like so many before him — Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Willis, Van Damme, you literally name them — but that doesn’t mean Tom isn’t motivated to prove himself time and time again rather than coast on a well-worn reputation. Regardless of whatever hype this movie has going in as basic boomer catnip, a bigger return to theatrical summer moviegoing or a just a reconciliation with the lost Bruckheimer-backed form of brash, larger-than-life blockbusters, Top Gun: Maverick is, at least, one of Cruise’s finest non-Mission movies in a long time, nearly up there with Edge of Tomorrow and easily exceeding director Joseph Kosinski’s other Cruise collab Oblivion.
With a now repeated history of successfully, inconspicuously revitalizing and improving upon Gen X nostalgia with superior sequels to their 80s counterparts (TRON: Legacy), backing the chancy Cruise post-apocalyptic sci-fi influence-splicer and making the “American hero” fare (always bordering on meatheaded and teetering on hammy) potent in the commendable, near-devastating firefighter biography Only the Brave, Kosinski’s career seems to have culminated in Maverick. He keeps his shots clean, cuts minimal and naturally lets simple drama creep in and stick. His summer 2022 is stacked too as he's doubled up with another action film Spiderhead due on Netflix in a few weeks.
Kosinski's practice means Top Gun: Maverick exceeds most any expectations — well, save the idea that 36-year-removed follow-up could somehow outdo the 1986 original’s stellar soundtrack soaring high on danger zones and balls of fire. That Berlin song written by Giorgio Moroder is a hell of a better sound barrier than OneRepublic and Lady Gaga.
But otherwise this really is Mission: Impossible 6 and a half — Top Gun Nation, whatever you wanna call it. There’s more than a good deal of the legacyquel goods occurring in the hour of the movie that both precedes the film’s truly impressive sustained climax and the initial stonework/super-speed sequence. All the beach games, hook-up sequences — mercifully with much less silhouetted tonguing — training stints and straight edge vs. dangerous cocky asshole dynamics could’ve been boiled down to montages entirely and it almost is. If this film had put its downtime to use making something of its fresh crop of Top Gun figures — Miles Teller, Glen Powell, Monica Barbara, Lewis Pullman — rather than bring the beautifully advancing (for my money one of the most beautiful actresses of all time) Jennifer Connelly in to replace the love interest void left by the sadly too-poorly-aged-for-producer’s-tastes Kelly McGillis, just to reinforce the fact that Maverick (TOM CRUISE WHO ARE WE KIDDING) still got that sex appeal baby, maybe this movie’s prescribed sentimental beats would’ve hit me hard enough for a six-minute standing ovation, the audible praise Cannes spent on Cruise just recently. I’ll save that equal enthusiasm and then some for the beginning of the end of Mission: Impossible next summer in Dead Reckoning Part One.
I’m blind on much of Tony Scott’s career — Days of Thunder is the same problems and potency masked with racing in place of Naval aviation — but outside of its needle drops, iconic quotability and Cruise’s 24-year young cockiness, the original Gun would’ve been forgotten regardless of the box office receipts. Obviously with such a relatively low bar, this late sequel has no choice but to burst through a weak precedent, though I'm grateful the showmanship has something worth showing and that final stretch of the film is one of the sharpest blockbuster bonanzas we’ve seen in such a long time. Continued clichés be damned, it’s not worth diminishing this film’s technical craft — if you shot more footage than all of Lord of the Rings combined and had years of COVID to edit, you better be looking pretty good. However some of the original’s Achilles' heel (godDAMN it’s tough to orient an audience to the geography of aerial combat) is still here, though Maverick nevertheless comprises far more visual clarity even if it’s just about as fervidly corny. The film doesn’t overstay its welcome even if it's almost as if all the cuts to photographs of the late Goose (Nick Bradshaw) and some reconciliation with poor Val Kilmer’s Iceman were just primer for a sweepingly ‘emotional’ ending that, while punchy, didn’t earn much of anything on its own by borrowing from the consequences of its former half.
Still, my Lord, this is a well-formulated crowd-pleaser — what a relief since it’s been a long way to the screen since shooting began way back in 2018. Had fate been in our favor Top Gun: Maverick would be a memory and we’d be in the thick of a two-part Mission: Impossible finale. This film is but a Cruise apértif for myself, and I hate to treat it as such; but since Christopher McQuarrie started story-doctoring all of Cruise’s projects just before his directorial debut Jack Reacher, it's hard not to feel like the best is yet to come (and babe, won’t it be fine).
Men briefing
2 (out of 4)
Alex Garland is a reliable talent — or so I THOUGHT — one proven over several mediums from novels (The Beach didn’t exactly make for a great movie though, did it?) to screenplays to feature films. He has a trio of each, at least he does now with the release of Men, his third feature following two analogously female-led genre pictures: Ex Machina’s cold calculus of humanism through androids (nobly carrying on a tradition of that introspective, ironically human thematic geyser gushing in 2001: A Space Odyssey, Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell and Spielberg’s A.I.) and 2018’s adaptation of the psych-sci-fi stunner Annihilation.
Swapping out near-future horror for a straighter psychological kind, folk horror supposedly (inexplicably) — at least until the most batshit, violating, unappetizingly surreal, absolutely “what in God’s name were you thinking?” third act ever to grace these eyeballs — Men is most self-evidently about the myriad ways the dominant gender exacts its specific shades of shittiness on femalekind, until it isn’t about anything at all. What advances for about an hour with your typical post-traumatic vacation gone awry with Jessie Buckley — the new queen of psychological shitstorms and significant-other-disintegrations following what I’ll politely call the best damn movie of the 2020s so far, Charlie Kaufman’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things, as well as Maggie Gyllenhaal’s debut The Lost Daughter — is this regrettable, “experimental,” left-field turn on a straightaway to cuckoo town.
Garland’s third movie obviously doesn’t hold a candle to Kaufman’s third, nor his A24 brother Robert Eggers’ The Northman, which similarly and far more successively marries the simple and the strange. Here the fine premise of a woman grieving the nearly ex-husband she may or may not have driven to suicide only to find her getaway retreat infested with different penis-bearers with the same face is a Twilight-Zone-eat-your-heart-out setup that plays out respectfully enough even when the film is literally nuking you with its themes as if interpretation were an inconvenience. I'm sure Alex thinks his inserted Green Man motif was seamless.
I guess he was saving it up for a finale so nightmarish (literally and critically) it may as well come with its own separate MPAA rating, hell it’s own separate movie. The stark shift to an extended semi-dream sequence tries to toy with what’s real and what’s, I don’t know, symbolic or some oppressively pretentious shit — it’s so aggressively, arrogantly, aimlessly unpleasant it makes me want to reconsider that perhaps all of Garland’s previous proven prosperity has been hackery hoisted up by dumb luck.
Rory Kinnear (mostly known as M’s right hand man from all the Craig Bond movies since Quantum of Solace), bless his soul, does commit completely — with subtlety too, of which the film is in short supply — to at least eight different characters such as a British caricature landlord, a naked loon, a cop, a creepy child, a villainous vicar, plus a bartender and two barflies. His gravitas enhances Garland’s brutally blunt script and keeps your attention while he jumps clear off the bloody deep end, scrapping any and all filmmaking (or general) logic. Even Buckley's natural Irish accent doesn't convince enough, let alone her attempts to drag this wannabe feminist horror show to its intently torturous, meaningful mark.
That said, Garland retains his power of atmosphere, shockingly memorable violence and striking compositions, courtesy of his cinematographic partner in crime Rob Hardy (Mission: Impossible — Fallout). But like many of the most frustrating films I’ve come across, a well-tailored mess is still a mess, and usually all the more exasperating as a result. Maybe he should leave the dread of unconquerable grief to Ari Aster (whose next project Disappointment Blvd. is shaping up to be a doozy, a self-described “nightmare horror comedy”) and get back to whatever side of the near-future suits him best.
Men is at best a short film pumped with extra stuff (lingering shots of dandelions, non-linear flashbacks as well as a recognizable host of scary story clichés). His earlier directional efforts were compellingly compact but not so intellectually alienating or skimpy in storytelling — Annihilation’s final reel is no picnic but it is a sumptuous psychotropic reward for all the prior painterly escalation. It also made some modicum of sense.
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised by another third act 180, since his two Danny Boyle scripts — the dynamic, sometimes dimwitted director’s pairs of sci-fi affairs 28 Days Later and Sunshine, both led by Cillian Murphy — also morphed into entirely divergent films before the conclusion. Still, Men left me utterly dumbfounded and unconcerned with revisiting the putrid affair to see if I happened to “miss anything.” I thought perhaps based on reception that the plebs got filtered, but I sympathize with any rando who wandered into this one unprepared — frankly nothing can ready you for this film’s final thirty or forty minutes. It’s enough to self-induce post-traumatic stress — WOAH DUDE maybe that’s what he was going for??
I got nothing further to say other than “what the fuck man, seriously? Do you stand by this? I know A24 allows free rein but holy shit Alex, have you no decency? No sense of pride?” I feel for the animator who spent months working out that quintuple birthing sequence, oops I spoiled the meat of this film’s flabbergasting, senseless sandwich.
I thought I was missing out with Devs, the closest thing to something “new” I would’ve watched on television in an age, besides maybe Paolo Sorrentino’s The Young Pope. Men seems to have found Mr. Garland’s creative breaking point — maybe its madness came off better in print.
Alex Garland is a reliable talent — or so I THOUGHT — one proven over several mediums from novels (The Beach didn’t exactly make for a great movie though, did it?) to screenplays to feature films. He has a trio of each, at least he does now with the release of Men, his third feature following two analogously female-led genre pictures: Ex Machina’s cold calculus of humanism through androids (nobly carrying on a tradition of that introspective, ironically human thematic geyser gushing in 2001: A Space Odyssey, Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell and Spielberg’s A.I.) and 2018’s adaptation of the psych-sci-fi stunner Annihilation.
Swapping out near-future horror for a straighter psychological kind, folk horror supposedly (inexplicably) — at least until the most batshit, violating, unappetizingly surreal, absolutely “what in God’s name were you thinking?” third act ever to grace these eyeballs — Men is most self-evidently about the myriad ways the dominant gender exacts its specific shades of shittiness on femalekind, until it isn’t about anything at all. What advances for about an hour with your typical post-traumatic vacation gone awry with Jessie Buckley — the new queen of psychological shitstorms and significant-other-disintegrations following what I’ll politely call the best damn movie of the 2020s so far, Charlie Kaufman’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things, as well as Maggie Gyllenhaal’s debut The Lost Daughter — is this regrettable, “experimental,” left-field turn on a straightaway to cuckoo town.
Garland’s third movie obviously doesn’t hold a candle to Kaufman’s third, nor his A24 brother Robert Eggers’ The Northman, which similarly and far more successively marries the simple and the strange. Here the fine premise of a woman grieving the nearly ex-husband she may or may not have driven to suicide only to find her getaway retreat infested with different penis-bearers with the same face is a Twilight-Zone-eat-your-heart-out setup that plays out respectfully enough even when the film is literally nuking you with its themes as if interpretation were an inconvenience. I'm sure Alex thinks his inserted Green Man motif was seamless.
I guess he was saving it up for a finale so nightmarish (literally and critically) it may as well come with its own separate MPAA rating, hell it’s own separate movie. The stark shift to an extended semi-dream sequence tries to toy with what’s real and what’s, I don’t know, symbolic or some oppressively pretentious shit — it’s so aggressively, arrogantly, aimlessly unpleasant it makes me want to reconsider that perhaps all of Garland’s previous proven prosperity has been hackery hoisted up by dumb luck.
Rory Kinnear (mostly known as M’s right hand man from all the Craig Bond movies since Quantum of Solace), bless his soul, does commit completely — with subtlety too, of which the film is in short supply — to at least eight different characters such as a British caricature landlord, a naked loon, a cop, a creepy child, a villainous vicar, plus a bartender and two barflies. His gravitas enhances Garland’s brutally blunt script and keeps your attention while he jumps clear off the bloody deep end, scrapping any and all filmmaking (or general) logic. Even Buckley's natural Irish accent doesn't convince enough, let alone her attempts to drag this wannabe feminist horror show to its intently torturous, meaningful mark.
That said, Garland retains his power of atmosphere, shockingly memorable violence and striking compositions, courtesy of his cinematographic partner in crime Rob Hardy (Mission: Impossible — Fallout). But like many of the most frustrating films I’ve come across, a well-tailored mess is still a mess, and usually all the more exasperating as a result. Maybe he should leave the dread of unconquerable grief to Ari Aster (whose next project Disappointment Blvd. is shaping up to be a doozy, a self-described “nightmare horror comedy”) and get back to whatever side of the near-future suits him best.
Men is at best a short film pumped with extra stuff (lingering shots of dandelions, non-linear flashbacks as well as a recognizable host of scary story clichés). His earlier directional efforts were compellingly compact but not so intellectually alienating or skimpy in storytelling — Annihilation’s final reel is no picnic but it is a sumptuous psychotropic reward for all the prior painterly escalation. It also made some modicum of sense.
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised by another third act 180, since his two Danny Boyle scripts — the dynamic, sometimes dimwitted director’s pairs of sci-fi affairs 28 Days Later and Sunshine, both led by Cillian Murphy — also morphed into entirely divergent films before the conclusion. Still, Men left me utterly dumbfounded and unconcerned with revisiting the putrid affair to see if I happened to “miss anything.” I thought perhaps based on reception that the plebs got filtered, but I sympathize with any rando who wandered into this one unprepared — frankly nothing can ready you for this film’s final thirty or forty minutes. It’s enough to self-induce post-traumatic stress — WOAH DUDE maybe that’s what he was going for??
I got nothing further to say other than “what the fuck man, seriously? Do you stand by this? I know A24 allows free rein but holy shit Alex, have you no decency? No sense of pride?” I feel for the animator who spent months working out that quintuple birthing sequence, oops I spoiled the meat of this film’s flabbergasting, senseless sandwich.
I thought I was missing out with Devs, the closest thing to something “new” I would’ve watched on television in an age, besides maybe Paolo Sorrentino’s The Young Pope. Men seems to have found Mr. Garland’s creative breaking point — maybe its madness came off better in print.
Doctor Strange in
the Multiverse of Madness briefing
2 ½ (out of 4)
Even before there was a real talent steering the ship, the sequel to Doctor Strange seemed preordained for superhero superiority — to my shock, somehow Sam Raimi’s first film in nearly a decade is less valuable as heightened, dangerous kids fare than his preceding effort, the unexpected delight Oz the Great and Powerful.
From afar I had enough hope set on Multiverse of Madness to make it through an onslaught of marked Marvel meandering. But as this keystone of Phase 4 drew nearer, my skepticism and suspicions began ballooning. How could this sequel justify how much of our time Disney has wasted lately — to those who actually sat through one or several of the five “canon” shows they pumped out over the last year or so: how? Then the good Dr. made my lingering goodwill disappear like *THAT* with just another superfluous chapter (28 so far and counting! Hail Satan!) that ironically decides not to daringly deviate from the status quo and usual programming.
All I can say after so much of the same is that we just fall on one side or the other of “that was fine,” getting surprised when the pre-perceived duds are decent and disappointed when the one’s we’ve singled out are cut from the same cloth of OK. Obviously my expectations got the better of me, a sad personal reality because Multiverse of Madness checks a lot of boxes that would theoretically make it upper-crust capeshit. Danny Elfman has a knack for an outdated orchestral sound easily rising above Marvel’s infamously invisible, unimaginative scoring. The classic composer is but another prerequisite of Raimi’s host of mirthful proclivities: an extremely active camera, a committed campiness that winks and elbows you when it wants and not because it has to, the overt old-fashioned horror tinge and a Bruce Campbell cameo for the hell of it. Like the boldest Marvel “voices” à la Chloe Zhao and Take Waititi, you do sort of see what constitutes as a real film by a substantive filmmaker, in between the linings of fan-service fat.
This Doctor Strange, as it was spoiled for me to my utter indifference, teases trifles around the corner like always. But rather than reserve the passages meant for flexing their recently acquired property for post-credits, here they’re plopped right in the middle of the action, showboating other versions of the Fantastic Four's Reed Richards (John Krasinski), Captain Marvel (as Lashana Lynch), Captain America (as Haley Atwell) and some guy with a voice so loud it’ll chew you out of existence (Anson Mount as Black Bolt) — they all perish pathetically in the wake of Scarlett Witch (now officially all witchy and stuff) and her second act slaughter. Point is, this excerpt is like Rick and Morty's Council of Ricks episode plus some Comic Con exclusive sneak peak, the sum of which is far from titillating — you think Raimi would’ve voluntarily wasted his time with Professor X popping up? It wasn’t altogether awful it just made me wonder “Why is this distraction here, interrupting absolutely everything?”
Speaking of which, in the year of multiversal mania, the sleeper hit sensation Everything Everywhere All at Once likewise kind of felt like a Rick and Morty episode, only stretched out with humor almost as belabored as a Seth MacFarlane joke. That movie, overrated to high heaven by all accounts critically, in word of mouth and the evidence from my recent memory, served up fast food philosophy and the sort of aural, well-choreographed and emotionally ambitious nonsense that made Swiss Army Man a similarly tiresome, pretentious, one-joke nevertheless ingeniously elaborate film. Doctor Strange doesn’t have any mainstream nihilism/existentialism for you but on first viewing (hey I watched Everything twice as well) it did actually make me cry (unlike the supposedly potent “healing” of EEAAO) for one instant because Elizabeth Olsen is a phenomenal performer who outruns completely contradictory character development.
Our preestablished antagonist is mildly well-motivated but, despite Olsen’s exceptional acting, the writing behind Scarlett Witch (TM) is all over the place to justify the scary stuff — she’s once again the antihero we need to redeem, sent back to Age of Ultron confusion, now with infinite power to go with that originally spotty accent. Wanda claims she doesn’t want to hurt anyone, not even the parallel version of herself she’s more than aware she’ll have to murder in order to be the mommy she yearns to be. Funny enough I have not mentioned Benedict Cumberbatch as Mister Doctor once because his character is just not that interesting, at least divorced from an ensemble like in Infinity War where his specifics shine. The script compensates with young Xotchitl Gomez (walking plot device/multiverse hop-scotcher) who serves as the bare minimum emotional backbone since Strange/Cumberbatch just doesn’t wrangle your sympathy.
But while I got my psychedelic jollies in a few key, very creative bits (musical duels, passing through a dozen realities in less than a minute, its equivalent moment to the bit in Guardians 2 where Rocket quickly bounces throughout the cosmos) Multiverse of Madness was remarkably lacking in the original’s hippie dippie trippiness. The rest of the film had me waiting for the sorta-shapeless affair to actually get mad or surge into a Raimi rumpus. For all the stops the premise (and TITLE you mismarketing clowns) promises it will pull out and all the breathing room that the scatterbrained Phase 4 has allowed thanks to the most permeating brand recognition in current existence, there’s nothing too bewildering or startling in Doctor Strange’s sophomore serving. Eh, except for that meme-tastic final shot.
I can understand all the generally underwhelming reception now, and it's because despite this film’s continued focus on the otherwordly, it just wasn't as inviting, delirious or awe-inspiring as 2016’s original. The romance is flat, the internal logic is pure poppycock and Cumberbatch just isn’t the guy who can carry a post-origin story situation solo — Wong (Benedict Wong) is doing much better at holding his own. Not even a cliffhanger in the form of Charlize Theron can make me excited for future foolishness.
My main two or third eye didn’t see much to write home about — for Marvel it was rather serious but even for Raimi’s tonal-tightrope-traversing it was nearly joyless, which is vexing because although the film finds a way to needlessly tease Fantastic Four and X-Men with gnarly, albeit meaningless deaths, none of that IP will really be part of the fun until after another dry spell of supposed escapism — I don’t think I can feign anticipation for Ant Man 3 or Captain Marvel 2 waiting for the MCU to rebound back to a former dignity.
Right now I’m feeling lukewarm, and I really wish I could say this brushes against Marvel’s best like I find its predecessor does. In these more fantastical features of infinite possibilities, variety is not an issue but inventiveness certainly is. This film’s story is weak (I couldn’t recite the plot if my many lives depended on it) and the implicitly sprawling scope reveals itself to be scrimp and ill-defined — worse still, Raimi’s own tactile touch is often seen but seldom felt.
Even before there was a real talent steering the ship, the sequel to Doctor Strange seemed preordained for superhero superiority — to my shock, somehow Sam Raimi’s first film in nearly a decade is less valuable as heightened, dangerous kids fare than his preceding effort, the unexpected delight Oz the Great and Powerful.
From afar I had enough hope set on Multiverse of Madness to make it through an onslaught of marked Marvel meandering. But as this keystone of Phase 4 drew nearer, my skepticism and suspicions began ballooning. How could this sequel justify how much of our time Disney has wasted lately — to those who actually sat through one or several of the five “canon” shows they pumped out over the last year or so: how? Then the good Dr. made my lingering goodwill disappear like *THAT* with just another superfluous chapter (28 so far and counting! Hail Satan!) that ironically decides not to daringly deviate from the status quo and usual programming.
All I can say after so much of the same is that we just fall on one side or the other of “that was fine,” getting surprised when the pre-perceived duds are decent and disappointed when the one’s we’ve singled out are cut from the same cloth of OK. Obviously my expectations got the better of me, a sad personal reality because Multiverse of Madness checks a lot of boxes that would theoretically make it upper-crust capeshit. Danny Elfman has a knack for an outdated orchestral sound easily rising above Marvel’s infamously invisible, unimaginative scoring. The classic composer is but another prerequisite of Raimi’s host of mirthful proclivities: an extremely active camera, a committed campiness that winks and elbows you when it wants and not because it has to, the overt old-fashioned horror tinge and a Bruce Campbell cameo for the hell of it. Like the boldest Marvel “voices” à la Chloe Zhao and Take Waititi, you do sort of see what constitutes as a real film by a substantive filmmaker, in between the linings of fan-service fat.
This Doctor Strange, as it was spoiled for me to my utter indifference, teases trifles around the corner like always. But rather than reserve the passages meant for flexing their recently acquired property for post-credits, here they’re plopped right in the middle of the action, showboating other versions of the Fantastic Four's Reed Richards (John Krasinski), Captain Marvel (as Lashana Lynch), Captain America (as Haley Atwell) and some guy with a voice so loud it’ll chew you out of existence (Anson Mount as Black Bolt) — they all perish pathetically in the wake of Scarlett Witch (now officially all witchy and stuff) and her second act slaughter. Point is, this excerpt is like Rick and Morty's Council of Ricks episode plus some Comic Con exclusive sneak peak, the sum of which is far from titillating — you think Raimi would’ve voluntarily wasted his time with Professor X popping up? It wasn’t altogether awful it just made me wonder “Why is this distraction here, interrupting absolutely everything?”
Speaking of which, in the year of multiversal mania, the sleeper hit sensation Everything Everywhere All at Once likewise kind of felt like a Rick and Morty episode, only stretched out with humor almost as belabored as a Seth MacFarlane joke. That movie, overrated to high heaven by all accounts critically, in word of mouth and the evidence from my recent memory, served up fast food philosophy and the sort of aural, well-choreographed and emotionally ambitious nonsense that made Swiss Army Man a similarly tiresome, pretentious, one-joke nevertheless ingeniously elaborate film. Doctor Strange doesn’t have any mainstream nihilism/existentialism for you but on first viewing (hey I watched Everything twice as well) it did actually make me cry (unlike the supposedly potent “healing” of EEAAO) for one instant because Elizabeth Olsen is a phenomenal performer who outruns completely contradictory character development.
Our preestablished antagonist is mildly well-motivated but, despite Olsen’s exceptional acting, the writing behind Scarlett Witch (TM) is all over the place to justify the scary stuff — she’s once again the antihero we need to redeem, sent back to Age of Ultron confusion, now with infinite power to go with that originally spotty accent. Wanda claims she doesn’t want to hurt anyone, not even the parallel version of herself she’s more than aware she’ll have to murder in order to be the mommy she yearns to be. Funny enough I have not mentioned Benedict Cumberbatch as Mister Doctor once because his character is just not that interesting, at least divorced from an ensemble like in Infinity War where his specifics shine. The script compensates with young Xotchitl Gomez (walking plot device/multiverse hop-scotcher) who serves as the bare minimum emotional backbone since Strange/Cumberbatch just doesn’t wrangle your sympathy.
But while I got my psychedelic jollies in a few key, very creative bits (musical duels, passing through a dozen realities in less than a minute, its equivalent moment to the bit in Guardians 2 where Rocket quickly bounces throughout the cosmos) Multiverse of Madness was remarkably lacking in the original’s hippie dippie trippiness. The rest of the film had me waiting for the sorta-shapeless affair to actually get mad or surge into a Raimi rumpus. For all the stops the premise (and TITLE you mismarketing clowns) promises it will pull out and all the breathing room that the scatterbrained Phase 4 has allowed thanks to the most permeating brand recognition in current existence, there’s nothing too bewildering or startling in Doctor Strange’s sophomore serving. Eh, except for that meme-tastic final shot.
I can understand all the generally underwhelming reception now, and it's because despite this film’s continued focus on the otherwordly, it just wasn't as inviting, delirious or awe-inspiring as 2016’s original. The romance is flat, the internal logic is pure poppycock and Cumberbatch just isn’t the guy who can carry a post-origin story situation solo — Wong (Benedict Wong) is doing much better at holding his own. Not even a cliffhanger in the form of Charlize Theron can make me excited for future foolishness.
My main two or third eye didn’t see much to write home about — for Marvel it was rather serious but even for Raimi’s tonal-tightrope-traversing it was nearly joyless, which is vexing because although the film finds a way to needlessly tease Fantastic Four and X-Men with gnarly, albeit meaningless deaths, none of that IP will really be part of the fun until after another dry spell of supposed escapism — I don’t think I can feign anticipation for Ant Man 3 or Captain Marvel 2 waiting for the MCU to rebound back to a former dignity.
Right now I’m feeling lukewarm, and I really wish I could say this brushes against Marvel’s best like I find its predecessor does. In these more fantastical features of infinite possibilities, variety is not an issue but inventiveness certainly is. This film’s story is weak (I couldn’t recite the plot if my many lives depended on it) and the implicitly sprawling scope reveals itself to be scrimp and ill-defined — worse still, Raimi’s own tactile touch is often seen but seldom felt.
The Northman briefing
3 ½ (out of 4)
Is it too early to call Robert Eggers a savant or some similar expression of ecstatic exaltation? He’s certainly, at the very least, one of the best filmmakers to break through this past decade, and probably A24’s poster child since they kick-started the latest wave of indiestream filmmaking less than 10 years ago. And such status goes beyond his developing directorial trademark of a flatulent nature — Eggers might already be up there with Ozu in terms of making farts art.
Any crudeness aside, this is the kind of review I could get real flowery about or just say it was great and move on. The major concerns in Eggers’ world have moved through repressed Puritans, plastered, erotically charged seaman and now getting positively swole while you pillage and plot God-willed murder on the side. The Northman follows up what I would now call his masterpiece, The Lighthouse, which itself was the only slightly superior sophomore sister to 2015’s The Witch, a debut so shockingly strong it all but cemented his cult immediately for most audiences in February of 2016. Priding himself on threadbare production design borne out of his experience in theatrical departments, his absurdly authentic historical accuracy reaches into the vocabulary and dialect of Ol' English, sailor talk and loud Norse ramblings (this film alone hosts three vocalizations), ironically evening out the Hyde to his Jekyll, which is a bold, bursting intuition for mysticism, mystery and spiritual strangeness, enough so to make proud many great gonzo filmmakers — Werner Herzog, Ken Russell, even Terrence Malick. Eggers continues to be a committed class act of exacting expressionism and experimentation.
A little less Macbeth or Hamlet and more the straightest, coldest, the most brutal, hardcore, riveting revenge tale you could ask for, within every eight minutes of The Northman lies something sick-nasty. I think only Panos Cosmotos’ profusely psychedelic Mandy matches/exceeds the pure, deliberate, unfaltering, bloodthirsty righteousness, though Eggers' third symphony deserves a place next to Kill Bill, maybe Django too (holy crap Tarantino likes his revenge fantasies) and In the Bedroom’s delicate iciness. The Northman makes the likes of Gladiator and The Revenant seem downright basic and disposable, and considering the viking genre is so skimp to begin with, let’s just say it takes the crown there too.
But despite the gates of Valhalla and Anya Taylor-Joy’s advanced witchcraft, Eggers' respect for actual antiquity can truly makes you reflect on your own footing within time — all of our modern problems are too complex, often boiling down to numbers and deadlines and less on the likes of blood, honor, nobility and all the other traditions that legend and myth can make feel so out of grasp. As we snuggle up in Dolby cinema to witness the restlessly recreated horrors of casual murder, decapitation and torture, Eggers makes you at least feel lucky to not be orphaned, stranded, cast out, at least as much as his average hero(ine). Robert paints the past so particularly and painfully he makes you wonder how humanity has made it this far and yet, at least with The Northman, also prods you to ponder if we’ve also lost something elemental, necessary, big and undiscovered in this exponentially fractured, debilitatingly complex, unrecoverably advanced reality of ours.
Of course, The Witch and The Lighthouse offer no hope to the mysteries lying between the superficial and supernatural, but this film, even at its most horrifically gruesome and just plain fucked up passages, still guides you through a toil-filled journey of completion, fulfillment and fiery justice. And though I've been giddily positing praise, despite the sprawling commitment to the epic format thanks to a curiously generous budget, The Northman doesn’t exactly reinvent the wheel, and the literal story will underwhelm the average Joseph like his past two have. But that’s why Eggers is so profoundly different from his peers — he's a rare classic man set against a sea of mistakable moderns. I can’t imagine him doing anything other than thriving should he have been active anywhere between 1925 and 1975. He’s an old filmmaking soul that manages to locate the real magic of movies with the simplest, subtlest illusions. His body of work thus far is virtuosic in that you know every frame was obsessed over, every take was momentous.
Here he’s got some slow whips and a few impossible crane shots, but honestly it’s the landscapes and locations that take your breath away while the distinct feats of choreography can please the patient action addict — the gore-gravitating cinephile with have their red cup runneth over. Furthermore the strength of his script's stone-set, weighty words not only help you buy into the story but also the reality, a consistency since the outset. Otherwise, visions of mystical family trees and the eternal afterlife of the Valhal as well as crazy ass cameos by Björk, Willem Dafoe and Brendan Gleeson (in brief but brilliant parts) are the glinting pieces to this puzzle ascending the film to obvious realms of dark, intoxicating dreams. Ripe with Eggers' proven, potent portraiture, properly staged actor grandstands and eerily generous editing (plus that natural period-posited scoring), The Northman has plenty of time for the basic blocks of foundational film surrealism, only to breathe its own life into the tricks of the trade.
Ethan Hawke is the one factor (along with the opposing child actor Oscar Novak too) that makes the first leg of the film a little shaky, stagey and stiff, but from there on it's an utterly consummate experience and I honestly expected nothing less. I was also ready for Nicole Kidman’s big scene (and role overall) to be a bit generic but OH GEEZ her moral reveal is more effed up than a lot of the other effed up ish in the film thanks to a touch of incest and a dollop of pure feminine evil. Taylor-Joy is in this more than I would have guessed, and she's possibly even better than she was in The Witch, in a fine reuniting between her and Eggers, and not just because of that closer ass shot. But damn, it's Alexander Skarsgård as both everyman and manly man knocking it out of the park emotionally and physically when I expected him to be easy weak-link material despite pretty perfect casting. He's truly, terrifyingly feral for a good deal of screen time, which I’m sure had him looking back on the days of The Legend of Tarzan and saying, "Nice, I think I made it." Meanwhile Claes Bang's dutiful villain/evil uncle role is pulled off well enough.
Despite his bizarro, both clear and cloudy view of the past, the classical foundation his efforts are built on would leave David Lean and Ingmar Bergman pleased as punch, and I don’t say that without knowing what I mean; I'd rather compare him to the greats than simply say this was The Green Knight if it were a masterwork. The Northman is 2022’s early, staggering, intimidating high-water mark. Maybe it was too early to take on Nosferatu after his debut, but by now Eggers has more than established he’s ready, and he's barely begun. It’s gotta be poetry that a man so enrapt by myth possesses scary, borderline Godly talent.
Is it too early to call Robert Eggers a savant or some similar expression of ecstatic exaltation? He’s certainly, at the very least, one of the best filmmakers to break through this past decade, and probably A24’s poster child since they kick-started the latest wave of indiestream filmmaking less than 10 years ago. And such status goes beyond his developing directorial trademark of a flatulent nature — Eggers might already be up there with Ozu in terms of making farts art.
Any crudeness aside, this is the kind of review I could get real flowery about or just say it was great and move on. The major concerns in Eggers’ world have moved through repressed Puritans, plastered, erotically charged seaman and now getting positively swole while you pillage and plot God-willed murder on the side. The Northman follows up what I would now call his masterpiece, The Lighthouse, which itself was the only slightly superior sophomore sister to 2015’s The Witch, a debut so shockingly strong it all but cemented his cult immediately for most audiences in February of 2016. Priding himself on threadbare production design borne out of his experience in theatrical departments, his absurdly authentic historical accuracy reaches into the vocabulary and dialect of Ol' English, sailor talk and loud Norse ramblings (this film alone hosts three vocalizations), ironically evening out the Hyde to his Jekyll, which is a bold, bursting intuition for mysticism, mystery and spiritual strangeness, enough so to make proud many great gonzo filmmakers — Werner Herzog, Ken Russell, even Terrence Malick. Eggers continues to be a committed class act of exacting expressionism and experimentation.
A little less Macbeth or Hamlet and more the straightest, coldest, the most brutal, hardcore, riveting revenge tale you could ask for, within every eight minutes of The Northman lies something sick-nasty. I think only Panos Cosmotos’ profusely psychedelic Mandy matches/exceeds the pure, deliberate, unfaltering, bloodthirsty righteousness, though Eggers' third symphony deserves a place next to Kill Bill, maybe Django too (holy crap Tarantino likes his revenge fantasies) and In the Bedroom’s delicate iciness. The Northman makes the likes of Gladiator and The Revenant seem downright basic and disposable, and considering the viking genre is so skimp to begin with, let’s just say it takes the crown there too.
But despite the gates of Valhalla and Anya Taylor-Joy’s advanced witchcraft, Eggers' respect for actual antiquity can truly makes you reflect on your own footing within time — all of our modern problems are too complex, often boiling down to numbers and deadlines and less on the likes of blood, honor, nobility and all the other traditions that legend and myth can make feel so out of grasp. As we snuggle up in Dolby cinema to witness the restlessly recreated horrors of casual murder, decapitation and torture, Eggers makes you at least feel lucky to not be orphaned, stranded, cast out, at least as much as his average hero(ine). Robert paints the past so particularly and painfully he makes you wonder how humanity has made it this far and yet, at least with The Northman, also prods you to ponder if we’ve also lost something elemental, necessary, big and undiscovered in this exponentially fractured, debilitatingly complex, unrecoverably advanced reality of ours.
Of course, The Witch and The Lighthouse offer no hope to the mysteries lying between the superficial and supernatural, but this film, even at its most horrifically gruesome and just plain fucked up passages, still guides you through a toil-filled journey of completion, fulfillment and fiery justice. And though I've been giddily positing praise, despite the sprawling commitment to the epic format thanks to a curiously generous budget, The Northman doesn’t exactly reinvent the wheel, and the literal story will underwhelm the average Joseph like his past two have. But that’s why Eggers is so profoundly different from his peers — he's a rare classic man set against a sea of mistakable moderns. I can’t imagine him doing anything other than thriving should he have been active anywhere between 1925 and 1975. He’s an old filmmaking soul that manages to locate the real magic of movies with the simplest, subtlest illusions. His body of work thus far is virtuosic in that you know every frame was obsessed over, every take was momentous.
Here he’s got some slow whips and a few impossible crane shots, but honestly it’s the landscapes and locations that take your breath away while the distinct feats of choreography can please the patient action addict — the gore-gravitating cinephile with have their red cup runneth over. Furthermore the strength of his script's stone-set, weighty words not only help you buy into the story but also the reality, a consistency since the outset. Otherwise, visions of mystical family trees and the eternal afterlife of the Valhal as well as crazy ass cameos by Björk, Willem Dafoe and Brendan Gleeson (in brief but brilliant parts) are the glinting pieces to this puzzle ascending the film to obvious realms of dark, intoxicating dreams. Ripe with Eggers' proven, potent portraiture, properly staged actor grandstands and eerily generous editing (plus that natural period-posited scoring), The Northman has plenty of time for the basic blocks of foundational film surrealism, only to breathe its own life into the tricks of the trade.
Ethan Hawke is the one factor (along with the opposing child actor Oscar Novak too) that makes the first leg of the film a little shaky, stagey and stiff, but from there on it's an utterly consummate experience and I honestly expected nothing less. I was also ready for Nicole Kidman’s big scene (and role overall) to be a bit generic but OH GEEZ her moral reveal is more effed up than a lot of the other effed up ish in the film thanks to a touch of incest and a dollop of pure feminine evil. Taylor-Joy is in this more than I would have guessed, and she's possibly even better than she was in The Witch, in a fine reuniting between her and Eggers, and not just because of that closer ass shot. But damn, it's Alexander Skarsgård as both everyman and manly man knocking it out of the park emotionally and physically when I expected him to be easy weak-link material despite pretty perfect casting. He's truly, terrifyingly feral for a good deal of screen time, which I’m sure had him looking back on the days of The Legend of Tarzan and saying, "Nice, I think I made it." Meanwhile Claes Bang's dutiful villain/evil uncle role is pulled off well enough.
Despite his bizarro, both clear and cloudy view of the past, the classical foundation his efforts are built on would leave David Lean and Ingmar Bergman pleased as punch, and I don’t say that without knowing what I mean; I'd rather compare him to the greats than simply say this was The Green Knight if it were a masterwork. The Northman is 2022’s early, staggering, intimidating high-water mark. Maybe it was too early to take on Nosferatu after his debut, but by now Eggers has more than established he’s ready, and he's barely begun. It’s gotta be poetry that a man so enrapt by myth possesses scary, borderline Godly talent.
Fantastic Beasts:
The Secrets of Dumbledore briefing
1 (out of 4)
Pottermania is now, what, Wizarding World Wallowing? Let me not be cute and coy and get right down to it — this has to be the most fruitless, utterly lackluster prequel series to ever come to be, worse than a bloated Hobbit trilogy, those early, exceedingly unique Star Wars episodes (to be nice) and not worth comparing to predecessor pileups with decent movies and entertainment value to their credit (really all I’m asking for, i.e. Planet of the Apes, Star Trek, X-Men…). Like the worst of this sort, the tame Beasts franchise has the Phantom Menace/Battle of the Armies futility and feebleness coursing through every feature, their uselessness multiplying each iteration — it’s little more than generic crap spread really thin. Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore is mediocrity in its purest form, literally watching a franchise and fandom go nowhere but downhill at light speed.
Speaking of X-Men, the newly refurbished Dumbledore/Grindelwald dynamic is the Professor X/Magneto relationship to a tee, but this threequel is Apocalypse-level lame. Only it’s so much worse with Harry Potter because those movies were events every time, all eight goddamn pictures — that’s what stings, since the cinematic adaptations were huge from day one and you got your money’s worth without fail. These Fantastic Beasts movies are not prime, pop culture-penetrating all-ages spectacles, they are tepid time-wasters through and through.
Besides the fact that there are no revealed secrets to speak of coming from Jude Law’s second stab at Dumbledore — NONE unless the secret was “oh by the way Creedence (Ezra Miller), your connection to me is that you’re my nephew”? Wowza, the twist is an addendum on the previous twist; that’s really it, a little more info. This story, much like those before it, would be worth a bored skim of some fanfic site — the cinematic qualities reaped from the proto-Potter stuff are comically slight.
Here the titular wizarding legend is met with homoerotic wand-waving opposition by Mads Mikkelsen in place of Johnny Depp, whose schedule has been full trying to redeem his name opposite the Dark Lord Amber Heard. They didn’t have time to get rid of Miller sadly but don’t worry, this movie only cares about the bare bones of his character’s existence even though he’s been so “crucial” to the “scope” of this “storyline” since the word go — Creedence may have no point but thank God we had this three movie arc for Remus Dumbledore to tell him, “I didn’t forget about you” — jeez you’re hitting me right in the feels, man.
I’ll get to how much J. K. Rowling has a disdain for screenwriting standards in favor of immediately resolved conflicts and serial-style, low-stakes messing about. At least her old yarns had a grasp on personalities and how interplay and, oh I don’t know CHARACTERIZATION can really overcome even the dumbest inconsistencies of magic's loosey goosey rules. Fantastic Beasts movies have characters that you remember (maybe half of them) but there is no camaraderie to speak of or anything that properly posits the fantasy world as one where you project yourself. That said, Dan Fogler is still the one aspect capable of tricking you into having some sort of fun. Though his character has been the most endearing by a landslide, Fogler's Jacob Kowalski is only the everyman we need because everyone else is worthless — save, this time, for Jessica Williams’ new face as Lally Hicks, putting on an era-exact sort of diction (the accent makes her more unrecognizable than any costume/makeup do-up) that constitutes more effort than the rest of the disposable supporting cast combined, winning you over after coming off terribly at first. Eddie Redmayne’s Newt Scamander is still borderline autistic, the actor channeling the same half-cocked remnant of his Oscar-winning performance as Stephen Hawking. Katherine Waterston is barely present to my absolute chagrin. It’s a real talent Rowling possesses where she can make you nostalgic for a romance from the first film that wasn’t anything special to begin with — KEEP LOWERING MY STANDARDS YOU TRANSPARENT TRANSPHOBE.
Mikkelsen was better than Depp despite being slightly typecast, and if you’ve seen the last movie it barely needs elaboration why, as much as I enjoy Johnny’s antics — Law is still just hot, sexy, smoldering Dumbledore, ooh boy. But ultimately not a single character matters, not one. Newt’s brother Theseus (Callum Turner) sucks and his already moot role has been reduced to spouting off trailer-ready lines, although didn’t his fianceé die just before the events of this movie? Did Newt’s “long-loyal” assistant Bunty (Victoria Yeates) appear in the earlier ones? Oh yeah gosh she was in there (once and forgotten) being weird and horny. Yufus Kama (William Nadylam) sucks too, functioning as an utterly useless stock-filler for two flicks straight. The irony is despite such a web of figures, this movie had to put in work in the first act to re-establish things because who is going to remember the specifics of this tripe since it’s been four years and these movies are forgettable as, well, someone you passed on the street four years ago?
The progressive irony of it all is the acting isn’t that bad, we’re dealing with verified performances just about all the way through, it’s just the material. J. K., bluntly put, doesn’t know how to write a sensible script. There’s no character development and that’s the intrinisic problem — if your plots are so worthless and flimsy, give me something relatable from our ensemble. Outside of highlight moments of the first (now looking pretty decent) Fantastic feature, these films are not particularly fun — The Secrets of Dumbledore, like the series in sum, feigns excitement in the faintest, most shoestring sense possible.
Caught between the Lucas-lifted prequel politics and meandering fan fiction (the oil and water of this utterly foolish, scantly structured set of films), this flick’s promised beast is a Qilin, a Chinese-rooted mythological concept meant to what, turn an actual election process into a mystical monarchic ceremony? The new Trump parallels are obvious as hell — the 2018 one did some of the same but Secrets has the magical Mueller report and an ultimate evil scheme involving election fraud and seizing power deceptively, GET IT. The climax felt like the final minutes of a kid’s show, with the bad man humiliatingly exposed in front of a very rapt, mob-mentality-resistant public. The last movie saw Grindelwald like a cult-curating Trumpish figure but after his infiltration of MACUSA, his capture, escape, follower-amassing and now completely public disgracing, how is he going to be a threat for future films? Oh wait he won’t, seeing as there’s almost no way this 200 million dollar abortion recoups its money thanks to the steady dismantling of the brand and public interest one step at a time.
Anyway, I haven’t even gotten around the fact that this central creature can be exploited to reveal the future, so Dumbledore and his band of half-assed adventurers must simply fuck around for 90 minutes to fill the movie's runtime IN ORDER TO CONFUSE GRINDLEWALD, even though we never know what our villain expects and the “heroes” constantly put themselves in needless danger. I’ve never seen a storyteller so conspicuously admit their concept of plot and narrative will be on autopilot for the majority of the inflight movie, ESPECIALLY after they’ve proven they don’t know how to write well for the screen in the least twice already. All this film did was convince me that this “series” is mostly comprised by RANDOM BULLSHIT NONSENSE. It was honestly embarrassing in that regard realizing the film was giving itself a pass, a mulligan to not have a real tale to tell.
This is an enormous feat in frittering, from the actually acceptable cast to the considerable effort in production design — broadly exploring European magical cultures is about the only pro I can say for the flick other than James Newton Howard still scoring these guys, although not memorably so. The Wizarding World backstory is not rich enough for what these movie proffer, and it never was — this film looks okay enough despite the desaturation surrounding Potter since the David Yates era began. Clearly Yates carries some talent as he was taking the lead for Half-Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows Part 1, but the fact that the man is still slaving away like Rowling has dirt on him or something gives me pause. But I’m most curious about how much Steve Kloves, the screenwriter of all Potter films save for my least favorite Order of the Phoenix, had in trying to correct the indulgent breadth of Rowling’s latest solo screenplay, seeing as it's been her sole duty for these prequels thus far.
There’s just no passion or vibrancy or anything that doesn’t feel overinflated, manipulative and overcompensating for barren ideas. This film is nearly two and a half hours and, if it is indeed the humpday of the series (the third of a prospective five unholy parts), it takes us past the halfway point of the new saga where we’ve covered absolutely no ground, but the film wants so desperately to convince you otherwise. There’s no way, should we reach that prospective fifth film (unlikelier than ever given the toxicity of both Miller and Rowling’s real life personas and those shrinking box office returns, minimizing as fast as the Fantastic Beasts part of the titles), that we’ll think “Ah, it was all leading to this” — there’s no way. There’s no corner to paint themselves in since there was never anywhere to go to begin with. This time, despite all the rebranding due to Depp and Rowling’s blights on WB’s money grubbing, I still naively thought there might be a payoff to films as bad as Grindelwald because they were nothing but setup.
But alas, here I am still waiting for this shit to get good. If they trick me again it’ll be because I am among the most susceptible to the Potter property thanks to my generational placement. Eh, since this one is doing poorly enough they might just try to wrap things up here just in case, despite proposing that the real conflict is just ahead WE SWEAR. The Secrets of Dumbledore, like the entire bloody Fantastic Beasts series, is simply a consequence-free, purposeless waste of time. I probably placed more effort in this review than Rowling did on her story-sketching.
Pottermania is now, what, Wizarding World Wallowing? Let me not be cute and coy and get right down to it — this has to be the most fruitless, utterly lackluster prequel series to ever come to be, worse than a bloated Hobbit trilogy, those early, exceedingly unique Star Wars episodes (to be nice) and not worth comparing to predecessor pileups with decent movies and entertainment value to their credit (really all I’m asking for, i.e. Planet of the Apes, Star Trek, X-Men…). Like the worst of this sort, the tame Beasts franchise has the Phantom Menace/Battle of the Armies futility and feebleness coursing through every feature, their uselessness multiplying each iteration — it’s little more than generic crap spread really thin. Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore is mediocrity in its purest form, literally watching a franchise and fandom go nowhere but downhill at light speed.
Speaking of X-Men, the newly refurbished Dumbledore/Grindelwald dynamic is the Professor X/Magneto relationship to a tee, but this threequel is Apocalypse-level lame. Only it’s so much worse with Harry Potter because those movies were events every time, all eight goddamn pictures — that’s what stings, since the cinematic adaptations were huge from day one and you got your money’s worth without fail. These Fantastic Beasts movies are not prime, pop culture-penetrating all-ages spectacles, they are tepid time-wasters through and through.
Besides the fact that there are no revealed secrets to speak of coming from Jude Law’s second stab at Dumbledore — NONE unless the secret was “oh by the way Creedence (Ezra Miller), your connection to me is that you’re my nephew”? Wowza, the twist is an addendum on the previous twist; that’s really it, a little more info. This story, much like those before it, would be worth a bored skim of some fanfic site — the cinematic qualities reaped from the proto-Potter stuff are comically slight.
Here the titular wizarding legend is met with homoerotic wand-waving opposition by Mads Mikkelsen in place of Johnny Depp, whose schedule has been full trying to redeem his name opposite the Dark Lord Amber Heard. They didn’t have time to get rid of Miller sadly but don’t worry, this movie only cares about the bare bones of his character’s existence even though he’s been so “crucial” to the “scope” of this “storyline” since the word go — Creedence may have no point but thank God we had this three movie arc for Remus Dumbledore to tell him, “I didn’t forget about you” — jeez you’re hitting me right in the feels, man.
I’ll get to how much J. K. Rowling has a disdain for screenwriting standards in favor of immediately resolved conflicts and serial-style, low-stakes messing about. At least her old yarns had a grasp on personalities and how interplay and, oh I don’t know CHARACTERIZATION can really overcome even the dumbest inconsistencies of magic's loosey goosey rules. Fantastic Beasts movies have characters that you remember (maybe half of them) but there is no camaraderie to speak of or anything that properly posits the fantasy world as one where you project yourself. That said, Dan Fogler is still the one aspect capable of tricking you into having some sort of fun. Though his character has been the most endearing by a landslide, Fogler's Jacob Kowalski is only the everyman we need because everyone else is worthless — save, this time, for Jessica Williams’ new face as Lally Hicks, putting on an era-exact sort of diction (the accent makes her more unrecognizable than any costume/makeup do-up) that constitutes more effort than the rest of the disposable supporting cast combined, winning you over after coming off terribly at first. Eddie Redmayne’s Newt Scamander is still borderline autistic, the actor channeling the same half-cocked remnant of his Oscar-winning performance as Stephen Hawking. Katherine Waterston is barely present to my absolute chagrin. It’s a real talent Rowling possesses where she can make you nostalgic for a romance from the first film that wasn’t anything special to begin with — KEEP LOWERING MY STANDARDS YOU TRANSPARENT TRANSPHOBE.
Mikkelsen was better than Depp despite being slightly typecast, and if you’ve seen the last movie it barely needs elaboration why, as much as I enjoy Johnny’s antics — Law is still just hot, sexy, smoldering Dumbledore, ooh boy. But ultimately not a single character matters, not one. Newt’s brother Theseus (Callum Turner) sucks and his already moot role has been reduced to spouting off trailer-ready lines, although didn’t his fianceé die just before the events of this movie? Did Newt’s “long-loyal” assistant Bunty (Victoria Yeates) appear in the earlier ones? Oh yeah gosh she was in there (once and forgotten) being weird and horny. Yufus Kama (William Nadylam) sucks too, functioning as an utterly useless stock-filler for two flicks straight. The irony is despite such a web of figures, this movie had to put in work in the first act to re-establish things because who is going to remember the specifics of this tripe since it’s been four years and these movies are forgettable as, well, someone you passed on the street four years ago?
The progressive irony of it all is the acting isn’t that bad, we’re dealing with verified performances just about all the way through, it’s just the material. J. K., bluntly put, doesn’t know how to write a sensible script. There’s no character development and that’s the intrinisic problem — if your plots are so worthless and flimsy, give me something relatable from our ensemble. Outside of highlight moments of the first (now looking pretty decent) Fantastic feature, these films are not particularly fun — The Secrets of Dumbledore, like the series in sum, feigns excitement in the faintest, most shoestring sense possible.
Caught between the Lucas-lifted prequel politics and meandering fan fiction (the oil and water of this utterly foolish, scantly structured set of films), this flick’s promised beast is a Qilin, a Chinese-rooted mythological concept meant to what, turn an actual election process into a mystical monarchic ceremony? The new Trump parallels are obvious as hell — the 2018 one did some of the same but Secrets has the magical Mueller report and an ultimate evil scheme involving election fraud and seizing power deceptively, GET IT. The climax felt like the final minutes of a kid’s show, with the bad man humiliatingly exposed in front of a very rapt, mob-mentality-resistant public. The last movie saw Grindelwald like a cult-curating Trumpish figure but after his infiltration of MACUSA, his capture, escape, follower-amassing and now completely public disgracing, how is he going to be a threat for future films? Oh wait he won’t, seeing as there’s almost no way this 200 million dollar abortion recoups its money thanks to the steady dismantling of the brand and public interest one step at a time.
Anyway, I haven’t even gotten around the fact that this central creature can be exploited to reveal the future, so Dumbledore and his band of half-assed adventurers must simply fuck around for 90 minutes to fill the movie's runtime IN ORDER TO CONFUSE GRINDLEWALD, even though we never know what our villain expects and the “heroes” constantly put themselves in needless danger. I’ve never seen a storyteller so conspicuously admit their concept of plot and narrative will be on autopilot for the majority of the inflight movie, ESPECIALLY after they’ve proven they don’t know how to write well for the screen in the least twice already. All this film did was convince me that this “series” is mostly comprised by RANDOM BULLSHIT NONSENSE. It was honestly embarrassing in that regard realizing the film was giving itself a pass, a mulligan to not have a real tale to tell.
This is an enormous feat in frittering, from the actually acceptable cast to the considerable effort in production design — broadly exploring European magical cultures is about the only pro I can say for the flick other than James Newton Howard still scoring these guys, although not memorably so. The Wizarding World backstory is not rich enough for what these movie proffer, and it never was — this film looks okay enough despite the desaturation surrounding Potter since the David Yates era began. Clearly Yates carries some talent as he was taking the lead for Half-Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows Part 1, but the fact that the man is still slaving away like Rowling has dirt on him or something gives me pause. But I’m most curious about how much Steve Kloves, the screenwriter of all Potter films save for my least favorite Order of the Phoenix, had in trying to correct the indulgent breadth of Rowling’s latest solo screenplay, seeing as it's been her sole duty for these prequels thus far.
There’s just no passion or vibrancy or anything that doesn’t feel overinflated, manipulative and overcompensating for barren ideas. This film is nearly two and a half hours and, if it is indeed the humpday of the series (the third of a prospective five unholy parts), it takes us past the halfway point of the new saga where we’ve covered absolutely no ground, but the film wants so desperately to convince you otherwise. There’s no way, should we reach that prospective fifth film (unlikelier than ever given the toxicity of both Miller and Rowling’s real life personas and those shrinking box office returns, minimizing as fast as the Fantastic Beasts part of the titles), that we’ll think “Ah, it was all leading to this” — there’s no way. There’s no corner to paint themselves in since there was never anywhere to go to begin with. This time, despite all the rebranding due to Depp and Rowling’s blights on WB’s money grubbing, I still naively thought there might be a payoff to films as bad as Grindelwald because they were nothing but setup.
But alas, here I am still waiting for this shit to get good. If they trick me again it’ll be because I am among the most susceptible to the Potter property thanks to my generational placement. Eh, since this one is doing poorly enough they might just try to wrap things up here just in case, despite proposing that the real conflict is just ahead WE SWEAR. The Secrets of Dumbledore, like the entire bloody Fantastic Beasts series, is simply a consequence-free, purposeless waste of time. I probably placed more effort in this review than Rowling did on her story-sketching.
Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood
and The Bubble briefings
Apollo 10 ½: A Space Age Childhood
3 ½ (out of 4)
So my favorite film is Richard Linklater’s 2001 feature Waking Life — it just is okay? For me it fulfills the function of film as a medium of technological transcendence and artistic, narrative and cerebral freedom. 2006’s A Scanner Darkly sports a wonderful ensemble within a great cult classic adaptation of Phillip K Dick, and both are some Linklater’s best — the rotoscoping post-production polishing was more the cherry on top than anything, although the artistic implementation in either case is ingenious and indispensable.
All this to say, after Linklater's last, Where’d You Go, Bernadette, was such a creative dip for the free-minded, easy-taking filmmaker, I hoped he would return to his usual cinematic stomping ground with renewed vigor. Apollo 10 1/2 seems to round out a roto-trio with the glowing gloss now manufactured with memory in mind — this outline of the young imagination is, to my relief, a coming-of-age consideration worthy of Boyhood, Dazed and Confused and Everybody Want’s Some!! (and let’s not forget Me and Orson Welles). The latest auteur-Netflix pairing is more than worthy of his miraculous, occasionally messy filmography, at least much moreso than Bad News Bears and Fast Food Nation, duds surrounded by modern classics like Darkly, Before Sunset and School of Rock.
Even though this is the film equivalent of catching yourself ranting about something personal, all that means is the Link is back and joyously singing his preferred tunes in congregation with some frequent collaborators. Returning to the foray is Bill Wise (the boat-car driver/convenience store cashier in Waking Life) here as the father figure looming above the titular season of youth. He’s so consistently funny I hope Judd Apatow felt some shame for his recent crimes. Jack Black is off-screen set on Stand By Me mode, in lockstep with the film’s attitude which obviously tries to recreate the memory reel of early adolescence with the same glaze so well-matched to the elongated lucid dream state of Waking Life and addiction-addled aura of A Scanner Darkly.
Apollo 10 1/2 is the weakest of the spiritual trilogy, and doesn’t quite find Linklater illustrating early youth any better than he did in the immediate passages of Boyhood. It does, however, catch him operating with usual agreeable, freeing, plotless contentment while dropping his more philosophically pontificating propensities for the curiosities of time and place. Like PTA in Licorice Pizza or Tarantino in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, sometimes cultural context matters so much more than the specifics of story. The way Linklater casually strings you along with what you assume is brief color and backdrop following the childlike setup to the tale of a boy plucked by NASA to help in a dry run of the moon landing, only to eat up 45 minutes of runtime shooting the breeze by illustrating the zeitgeist of Houston in 1969 through 10-year-old eyes, is his classic naval-gazing perspective altered to historical concerns. The assumed spaceflight fantasies almost get in the way of Linklater revealing what few corners of his soul have yet to see the light.
Nevertheless, I have no problem with Linklater getting utterly, unabashedly nostalgic and comfortably contented to share his perspective of the 60s. Whereas Boyhood was created based on a time he never grew up in and made a point to keep it that way (as someone just a year off from Mason’s age, they frickin' nailed it), this really is his most directly autobiographical film since he floated around aimlessly in his underseen debut It’s Impossible to Learn to Plow by Reading Books, and already one of the most revealing reflections of the era’s obsession with the space race and man-made miracles. It also has disgusting little alleyways that make you remember how rough and unpredictable childhood really is — there are fortunately limits to Linklater’s sighs of recollection.
The animation is solid (by which I mean absolutely liquid), though after the more ambitious technical hurdles of Scanner Darkly I almost resent how smoothly this film works its photo album of news, local culture and cosmic fantasies into the fray without a hitch. The abnormal aspects of that Dick adaptation keep the movie fresh in every frame but Apollo 10 1/2 is almost too triflingly tranquilizing to take as seriously as the earlier rotoscoping renditions — fluffy for Linklater is practically plush. Though I should emphasize this is nevertheless a rich, restless film that doesn’t trick you or end up with Richard’s head up his ass.
It’s semi-shapeless but also perfectly unconcerned with the rules and regulations of big movies. Apollo 10 1/2 is authentic and anachronism-free, mesmerizingly, mirthfully magnifying a mundane short film super-sized by one’s own story within the wide-eyed whirlwind of perhaps the most prosperous passage of modern times.
The Bubble
1 ½ (out of 4)
I figured someone as selective as Judd Apatow might actually take the time to ensure there’s even a sliver of purpose to the latest movie he’s taking time to create and deem worthy of mass consumption. Sadly this meta-satire stretch of tasteless turnaround laziness is like one of those Meet the Spartans-tier “comedies” where by the time the “topical” inserted references reach your eyes and earholes come release date, they all feel so preposterously, pathetically dated in their prepackaging.
Did Apatow really think the pains of filming during COVID meshed with the laziest parody of Jurassic Park (and dumb big-budget movie franchises on the whole) would really be the tonic viewers need two years into the plague? I bet Colin Trevorrow — who I believe is getting the shaft with Fred Armisen’s indie-director turned yes-man stooge director character — will churn out a more compellingly escapist distraction (the presumably ridonkulously indulgent Jurassic World: Dominion) than the worst comedy by far from a man who prides himself on a sort of sophisticated immaturity. Unseating the stale "star"-vehicle Trainwreck and This Is 40's compulsive pointlessness, The Bubble is one of the most ironically awful films I’ve seen in some time — at least Don’t Look Up’s smarmy contemporary-culture-skewering was timely and the skeleton of something good — this film is as narcissistic and shameless as the Hollywood types it makes fun of.
I honestly hope Karen Gillen, Keegan-Michael Key and David Duchovney have a long talk with their managers. Why should a film about an interminable shoot be the same victim of Apatow’s appetite for dragging things out so recklessly? This movie straight up had no ideas, no story, no direction and few laughs you don’t regret. The OK visual effects only pass because of the behind-the-scenes nature of their presence, the bits are bad (like a drug session with the ultimate purpose of highlighting how annoying feminists are) and even Beck cameos can’t make me forgiving. It’s like This Is the End went an Adam Sandler route, and all we felt was our time waste away scene by scene while we begrudgingly sit prisoner to celebrities hanging out — the ultimate documentary punchline that makes this fictional sixth film in the Cliff Beasts series some modern Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now reveal of DVD-extra disharmony only makes me think of what Christopher Guest (the unspoken king of mockumentaries) in his prime would do with a COVID-related premise. But even the smallest fruits of your dumbest hobbies cultivated over quarantining are more worthwhile than Apatow’s cutting-edge cluelessness.
The film’s quiet Netflix release — especially next to Linklater’s far more niche alternative — makes me believe even the company partially responsible for our diminishing cultural standards (aside from courting Scorsese, Fincher, Baumbach, Linklater and a few other artists) thought they had a turkey on their hands, which speaks volumes.
3 ½ (out of 4)
So my favorite film is Richard Linklater’s 2001 feature Waking Life — it just is okay? For me it fulfills the function of film as a medium of technological transcendence and artistic, narrative and cerebral freedom. 2006’s A Scanner Darkly sports a wonderful ensemble within a great cult classic adaptation of Phillip K Dick, and both are some Linklater’s best — the rotoscoping post-production polishing was more the cherry on top than anything, although the artistic implementation in either case is ingenious and indispensable.
All this to say, after Linklater's last, Where’d You Go, Bernadette, was such a creative dip for the free-minded, easy-taking filmmaker, I hoped he would return to his usual cinematic stomping ground with renewed vigor. Apollo 10 1/2 seems to round out a roto-trio with the glowing gloss now manufactured with memory in mind — this outline of the young imagination is, to my relief, a coming-of-age consideration worthy of Boyhood, Dazed and Confused and Everybody Want’s Some!! (and let’s not forget Me and Orson Welles). The latest auteur-Netflix pairing is more than worthy of his miraculous, occasionally messy filmography, at least much moreso than Bad News Bears and Fast Food Nation, duds surrounded by modern classics like Darkly, Before Sunset and School of Rock.
Even though this is the film equivalent of catching yourself ranting about something personal, all that means is the Link is back and joyously singing his preferred tunes in congregation with some frequent collaborators. Returning to the foray is Bill Wise (the boat-car driver/convenience store cashier in Waking Life) here as the father figure looming above the titular season of youth. He’s so consistently funny I hope Judd Apatow felt some shame for his recent crimes. Jack Black is off-screen set on Stand By Me mode, in lockstep with the film’s attitude which obviously tries to recreate the memory reel of early adolescence with the same glaze so well-matched to the elongated lucid dream state of Waking Life and addiction-addled aura of A Scanner Darkly.
Apollo 10 1/2 is the weakest of the spiritual trilogy, and doesn’t quite find Linklater illustrating early youth any better than he did in the immediate passages of Boyhood. It does, however, catch him operating with usual agreeable, freeing, plotless contentment while dropping his more philosophically pontificating propensities for the curiosities of time and place. Like PTA in Licorice Pizza or Tarantino in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, sometimes cultural context matters so much more than the specifics of story. The way Linklater casually strings you along with what you assume is brief color and backdrop following the childlike setup to the tale of a boy plucked by NASA to help in a dry run of the moon landing, only to eat up 45 minutes of runtime shooting the breeze by illustrating the zeitgeist of Houston in 1969 through 10-year-old eyes, is his classic naval-gazing perspective altered to historical concerns. The assumed spaceflight fantasies almost get in the way of Linklater revealing what few corners of his soul have yet to see the light.
Nevertheless, I have no problem with Linklater getting utterly, unabashedly nostalgic and comfortably contented to share his perspective of the 60s. Whereas Boyhood was created based on a time he never grew up in and made a point to keep it that way (as someone just a year off from Mason’s age, they frickin' nailed it), this really is his most directly autobiographical film since he floated around aimlessly in his underseen debut It’s Impossible to Learn to Plow by Reading Books, and already one of the most revealing reflections of the era’s obsession with the space race and man-made miracles. It also has disgusting little alleyways that make you remember how rough and unpredictable childhood really is — there are fortunately limits to Linklater’s sighs of recollection.
The animation is solid (by which I mean absolutely liquid), though after the more ambitious technical hurdles of Scanner Darkly I almost resent how smoothly this film works its photo album of news, local culture and cosmic fantasies into the fray without a hitch. The abnormal aspects of that Dick adaptation keep the movie fresh in every frame but Apollo 10 1/2 is almost too triflingly tranquilizing to take as seriously as the earlier rotoscoping renditions — fluffy for Linklater is practically plush. Though I should emphasize this is nevertheless a rich, restless film that doesn’t trick you or end up with Richard’s head up his ass.
It’s semi-shapeless but also perfectly unconcerned with the rules and regulations of big movies. Apollo 10 1/2 is authentic and anachronism-free, mesmerizingly, mirthfully magnifying a mundane short film super-sized by one’s own story within the wide-eyed whirlwind of perhaps the most prosperous passage of modern times.
The Bubble
1 ½ (out of 4)
I figured someone as selective as Judd Apatow might actually take the time to ensure there’s even a sliver of purpose to the latest movie he’s taking time to create and deem worthy of mass consumption. Sadly this meta-satire stretch of tasteless turnaround laziness is like one of those Meet the Spartans-tier “comedies” where by the time the “topical” inserted references reach your eyes and earholes come release date, they all feel so preposterously, pathetically dated in their prepackaging.
Did Apatow really think the pains of filming during COVID meshed with the laziest parody of Jurassic Park (and dumb big-budget movie franchises on the whole) would really be the tonic viewers need two years into the plague? I bet Colin Trevorrow — who I believe is getting the shaft with Fred Armisen’s indie-director turned yes-man stooge director character — will churn out a more compellingly escapist distraction (the presumably ridonkulously indulgent Jurassic World: Dominion) than the worst comedy by far from a man who prides himself on a sort of sophisticated immaturity. Unseating the stale "star"-vehicle Trainwreck and This Is 40's compulsive pointlessness, The Bubble is one of the most ironically awful films I’ve seen in some time — at least Don’t Look Up’s smarmy contemporary-culture-skewering was timely and the skeleton of something good — this film is as narcissistic and shameless as the Hollywood types it makes fun of.
I honestly hope Karen Gillen, Keegan-Michael Key and David Duchovney have a long talk with their managers. Why should a film about an interminable shoot be the same victim of Apatow’s appetite for dragging things out so recklessly? This movie straight up had no ideas, no story, no direction and few laughs you don’t regret. The OK visual effects only pass because of the behind-the-scenes nature of their presence, the bits are bad (like a drug session with the ultimate purpose of highlighting how annoying feminists are) and even Beck cameos can’t make me forgiving. It’s like This Is the End went an Adam Sandler route, and all we felt was our time waste away scene by scene while we begrudgingly sit prisoner to celebrities hanging out — the ultimate documentary punchline that makes this fictional sixth film in the Cliff Beasts series some modern Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now reveal of DVD-extra disharmony only makes me think of what Christopher Guest (the unspoken king of mockumentaries) in his prime would do with a COVID-related premise. But even the smallest fruits of your dumbest hobbies cultivated over quarantining are more worthwhile than Apatow’s cutting-edge cluelessness.
The film’s quiet Netflix release — especially next to Linklater’s far more niche alternative — makes me believe even the company partially responsible for our diminishing cultural standards (aside from courting Scorsese, Fincher, Baumbach, Linklater and a few other artists) thought they had a turkey on their hands, which speaks volumes.
The Batman briefing
2 ½ (out of 4)
Dananananananana nananananananana BAAATMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN
No film composer yet has been bold enough to just reach for the classics, not Danny Elfman, not Hans Zimmer and not Michael Giaccino. Like Zimmer before him, two blared notes seem sufficient enough for Michael to illustrate the dark knight’s aura — whereas Zimmer whipped out those whooshing wing-flaps and almost an electronic tinge to complement a bulked up brass section, Giaccino logically goes Gothic with a piano-primed, very traditionally symphonic backdrop.
What was once destined to be a Ben-Affleck-directed-and-starring Batflick gradually mutated into this blank ledger. Since Batfleck’s last rounds, WB has been priding themselves on their DC reinvention (virtually free of interconnections) with bold wild-card/toss-up movies like Shazam!, Aquaman and Joker, all of which have paid off for them at least in the ways that matter most to studios (ahem MONEY). Another hard reset in a world of stand-alone figures (nevertheless one that wants to branch out into spin-off TV shows, yuck!) can go so many ways — Batman has seldom been lended a clean slate. Generally disregarding the 1989 inception to the real film franchise, Batman Begins is the only honest origin story we ever got and Christopher Nolan’s trilogy remains the first thing you think of when it comes to serious superheroes. After the less than legendary finish to The Dark Knight trilogy in Rises as well as Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and the tale of two Justice Leagues, the crusading caper really deserved another shot at reassessment and redemption.
Though I wanted to believe this would be “the best Batman film since The Dark Knight” by default, the film continually cooks up ways to underwhelm. I can't say The Batman disappoints though, as I appreciate this movie way more than I like it — the acting is committed, the action is sparing and the direction is clearly labored over. Likewise it appears we’re all supposedly pleased with this new take on Gotham? Denoted by deep oranges and reds (not unlike director Matt Reeves’ antithetically warm winter vampire remake Let Me In), the seedy, briefly neon-drenched, metropolitan, famously fictional star on the map has more character ingrained in it than any since the similarly autumnal look of Gotham in the back-half of Batman Begins — other than that it has been the backlots and matte paintings of Tim Burton’s world, stretches of cityscapes, metal and concrete for Nolan, with some rave-night flavors in between courtesy of Joel Schumacher. While the aesthetics are where The Batman beats out its counterparts, despite the minimalism Reeves’ practical, textured rendition isn’t quite distinct enough to erase Nolan’s and Wally Pfister’s most pleasing hues. Nonetheless the look and sound are most parts genuinely great — Reeves doesn’t show off, keeping his angles and artistic choices tight and tasteful even though you catch him fooling around with that focus whenever the chance arises — at least atmospherically, we have a winner.
Separated from Justice League junk, I’m all for so much else this film offers: sparse action in an epic structure, marginally less unintentional humor than TDKR (though that film is leagues more memorable and entertaining), characters ultimately taking the forefront over blockbuster bonanzas, a plot hopelessly convoluted enough (in tandem with rough and tactile settings) to consider comparing to true detective noir. Just the competent crime show aspect could have had me salivating — there’s enough voyeurism here to make Hitchcock’s corpse twitch — but then the style and story are deeply indebted to David Fincher’s Zodiac, probably the best digitally shot film of modern times.
In sum The Batman is up my back alley like you wouldn’t believe and yet this film was a big Riddler-esque question mark on the horizon since it was announced RPatz was RBatz back in early 2019. Whereas Fincher's fiction (minute in Zodiac and major in Se7en) was elevated by some truth, Paul Dano’s game of riddles is less recreation and more a chore. I swear other than not wearing tights, Robert Pattinson’s B-Man answers every quandary so fast you can only think of Adam West-level comic camp — however if not for our lead actor’s devotion and the choice to feature some narration via a BatDiary (another evocation of noir’s influence) the sprinkle of listless attempts at broad humor would feel even more pointless within this long, funereal, very, very serious movie. “They think I’m hiding in the shadows but I AM the shadows”… wow. Even Nolan at his most self-destructively somber had the knack to level it all out with regular levity or at least double down in staging sensational set pieces. The Batman does deliver to a modest extent — the third act gets big but resists getting too dumb (that weird green Bat-adrenaline though…) and is thrifty and thrilling as a result. That center car chase might have been a moneymaker if not for some scattershot editing superseding the sublime efficiency.
I couldn’t fault the movie for much else besides silly plot/story mechanics ("Falconi’s my Dad!" or "Falconi's my Dad’s hitman!?"). The central drama stems from too many familial revelations like some soap opera or, cinematically speaking, like some crappy Fantastic Beasts movie. I get that with all the speed bumps of getting us accustomed to a fresh iteration of the brand you have strike us all across the face with emotion, but honestly this Batman is a little too emo (like some SNL sketch at times), a little too caught in the middle and prone to doom, gloom and stupidity to be identifiable. Maybe something about the structure — which is more like a (mini)series of events in a television show than a three-act thingamajig — let the air out of my enjoyment. Reeves seems to have cherry-picked all the things he likes about the Bat for one big pot; with TDK you feel like you’ve just digested an amazing season of television on fast forward, but the film at hand doesn’t feel complete enough to justify the patience and prudence.
But really The Batman was sliding by not on a fresh, fearless auteur like Nolan (or some lunatic like dear Zack Snyder) but rather an IP that I suppose needed an overdue reboot as well as acting talent that would substantially bring something to the table. Pattinson, while a recent golden boy of arthouse, can’t do much because you hardly ever see him out of the mask — he’s Bruce Wayne all of eight minutes I swear and admittedly stronger under the suit. Christian Bale had the balance, George Clooney and Val Kilmer can screw as far as I’m concerned, Michael Keaton was more the recluse like this new Batfellow and West was just having fun. Zoë Kravitz is a sensible Catwoman, though like Anne Hathaway in Rises, her separate story is desperate filler with flabby connective tissue to the rest of the story — I could never say she’s as fearless as Michelle Pfeifer in Batman Returns. I love Paul Dano but damn, this was ham city for him — his interrogation scene is surreal performance art. Andy Serkis is a “new age” Alfred that works well enough — Jeremy Irons was obviously misspent in BvS and Justice League, so Michael Caine has to take the crown in this regard over the doofus from the 90s era (Michael Gough).
What surprised me most is how this film hammers down the detective angle even more than The Dark Knight’s towering precedent, which leads me to the fact that Jim Gordon (an always excelling Jeffrey Wright) is practically second bill playing Watson to Batman’s Holmes — he’s all in here but Gary Oldman still has my heart. Meanwhile the tease of Penguin (Colin Farrell under a day’s worth of prosthetics and powder) was a benign bait and switch which generously favored an impossibly sleazy, insanely good John Turturro as Carmine Falconi to be the more prominent secondary villain as we wait for Farrell’s “wah wah” to emerge from the wings in the sequel. Farrell spouted less gross sexual innuendo than Danny Devito’s perverted puffin turned politician, so hopefully better baddies await.
Which brings me to a fundamental problem: how this flick wants to take everything you’ve enjoyed about Batman and set it up as the first part in a trilogy. I can’t fault this altogether since Nolan did roughly the same thing to start, but Begins feels complete regardless of the sequel tease out the door, whereas even past this film’s awful, clearly last-minute corporate-insert Joker scene WB felt the need to prick us with (God thank the editor that, if nothing else, cut the longer, hopelessly edgy scene released online), The Batman feels like a Force Awakens situation of “eh, let’s just set the stage with what already works and do the hard part later.” This movie is more handsome, less derivative and presumably less soulless — all I’m saying is Episode 7 felt like it had places to go too.
But Nolan’s films are owed so much here — Batman keeping up with a madman who puts forth ethical puzzles (through snuff films no less) and bending his own morals in the process? That’s clearly Heath Ledger’s Joker, except I feel Batman’s desperation in 2008, whereas here we just keep up and watch out for those cute letters. The ultimate doomsday, social revolution aspect of Riddler’s final phase is also very reminiscent of Bane’s strangely convoluted plans in Rises.
There’s not so much technical fault to be found, only expectations laid and certain narrative promises to fulfill to make this individual film worth the weight. For WB’s latest era of individualized super-fare, this path continues to be the wise way to go — I dig making each movie count in spite of crossover rigmarole and Easter egg excess. It’s just The Batman reminds me of better movies... The Dark Knight was worth comparing to crime classics like Heat because it IS a classic — 2022’s affair is at best worth comparing to The Dark Knight because it’s about Batman.
Dananananananana nananananananana BAAATMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN
No film composer yet has been bold enough to just reach for the classics, not Danny Elfman, not Hans Zimmer and not Michael Giaccino. Like Zimmer before him, two blared notes seem sufficient enough for Michael to illustrate the dark knight’s aura — whereas Zimmer whipped out those whooshing wing-flaps and almost an electronic tinge to complement a bulked up brass section, Giaccino logically goes Gothic with a piano-primed, very traditionally symphonic backdrop.
What was once destined to be a Ben-Affleck-directed-and-starring Batflick gradually mutated into this blank ledger. Since Batfleck’s last rounds, WB has been priding themselves on their DC reinvention (virtually free of interconnections) with bold wild-card/toss-up movies like Shazam!, Aquaman and Joker, all of which have paid off for them at least in the ways that matter most to studios (ahem MONEY). Another hard reset in a world of stand-alone figures (nevertheless one that wants to branch out into spin-off TV shows, yuck!) can go so many ways — Batman has seldom been lended a clean slate. Generally disregarding the 1989 inception to the real film franchise, Batman Begins is the only honest origin story we ever got and Christopher Nolan’s trilogy remains the first thing you think of when it comes to serious superheroes. After the less than legendary finish to The Dark Knight trilogy in Rises as well as Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and the tale of two Justice Leagues, the crusading caper really deserved another shot at reassessment and redemption.
Though I wanted to believe this would be “the best Batman film since The Dark Knight” by default, the film continually cooks up ways to underwhelm. I can't say The Batman disappoints though, as I appreciate this movie way more than I like it — the acting is committed, the action is sparing and the direction is clearly labored over. Likewise it appears we’re all supposedly pleased with this new take on Gotham? Denoted by deep oranges and reds (not unlike director Matt Reeves’ antithetically warm winter vampire remake Let Me In), the seedy, briefly neon-drenched, metropolitan, famously fictional star on the map has more character ingrained in it than any since the similarly autumnal look of Gotham in the back-half of Batman Begins — other than that it has been the backlots and matte paintings of Tim Burton’s world, stretches of cityscapes, metal and concrete for Nolan, with some rave-night flavors in between courtesy of Joel Schumacher. While the aesthetics are where The Batman beats out its counterparts, despite the minimalism Reeves’ practical, textured rendition isn’t quite distinct enough to erase Nolan’s and Wally Pfister’s most pleasing hues. Nonetheless the look and sound are most parts genuinely great — Reeves doesn’t show off, keeping his angles and artistic choices tight and tasteful even though you catch him fooling around with that focus whenever the chance arises — at least atmospherically, we have a winner.
Separated from Justice League junk, I’m all for so much else this film offers: sparse action in an epic structure, marginally less unintentional humor than TDKR (though that film is leagues more memorable and entertaining), characters ultimately taking the forefront over blockbuster bonanzas, a plot hopelessly convoluted enough (in tandem with rough and tactile settings) to consider comparing to true detective noir. Just the competent crime show aspect could have had me salivating — there’s enough voyeurism here to make Hitchcock’s corpse twitch — but then the style and story are deeply indebted to David Fincher’s Zodiac, probably the best digitally shot film of modern times.
In sum The Batman is up my back alley like you wouldn’t believe and yet this film was a big Riddler-esque question mark on the horizon since it was announced RPatz was RBatz back in early 2019. Whereas Fincher's fiction (minute in Zodiac and major in Se7en) was elevated by some truth, Paul Dano’s game of riddles is less recreation and more a chore. I swear other than not wearing tights, Robert Pattinson’s B-Man answers every quandary so fast you can only think of Adam West-level comic camp — however if not for our lead actor’s devotion and the choice to feature some narration via a BatDiary (another evocation of noir’s influence) the sprinkle of listless attempts at broad humor would feel even more pointless within this long, funereal, very, very serious movie. “They think I’m hiding in the shadows but I AM the shadows”… wow. Even Nolan at his most self-destructively somber had the knack to level it all out with regular levity or at least double down in staging sensational set pieces. The Batman does deliver to a modest extent — the third act gets big but resists getting too dumb (that weird green Bat-adrenaline though…) and is thrifty and thrilling as a result. That center car chase might have been a moneymaker if not for some scattershot editing superseding the sublime efficiency.
I couldn’t fault the movie for much else besides silly plot/story mechanics ("Falconi’s my Dad!" or "Falconi's my Dad’s hitman!?"). The central drama stems from too many familial revelations like some soap opera or, cinematically speaking, like some crappy Fantastic Beasts movie. I get that with all the speed bumps of getting us accustomed to a fresh iteration of the brand you have strike us all across the face with emotion, but honestly this Batman is a little too emo (like some SNL sketch at times), a little too caught in the middle and prone to doom, gloom and stupidity to be identifiable. Maybe something about the structure — which is more like a (mini)series of events in a television show than a three-act thingamajig — let the air out of my enjoyment. Reeves seems to have cherry-picked all the things he likes about the Bat for one big pot; with TDK you feel like you’ve just digested an amazing season of television on fast forward, but the film at hand doesn’t feel complete enough to justify the patience and prudence.
But really The Batman was sliding by not on a fresh, fearless auteur like Nolan (or some lunatic like dear Zack Snyder) but rather an IP that I suppose needed an overdue reboot as well as acting talent that would substantially bring something to the table. Pattinson, while a recent golden boy of arthouse, can’t do much because you hardly ever see him out of the mask — he’s Bruce Wayne all of eight minutes I swear and admittedly stronger under the suit. Christian Bale had the balance, George Clooney and Val Kilmer can screw as far as I’m concerned, Michael Keaton was more the recluse like this new Batfellow and West was just having fun. Zoë Kravitz is a sensible Catwoman, though like Anne Hathaway in Rises, her separate story is desperate filler with flabby connective tissue to the rest of the story — I could never say she’s as fearless as Michelle Pfeifer in Batman Returns. I love Paul Dano but damn, this was ham city for him — his interrogation scene is surreal performance art. Andy Serkis is a “new age” Alfred that works well enough — Jeremy Irons was obviously misspent in BvS and Justice League, so Michael Caine has to take the crown in this regard over the doofus from the 90s era (Michael Gough).
What surprised me most is how this film hammers down the detective angle even more than The Dark Knight’s towering precedent, which leads me to the fact that Jim Gordon (an always excelling Jeffrey Wright) is practically second bill playing Watson to Batman’s Holmes — he’s all in here but Gary Oldman still has my heart. Meanwhile the tease of Penguin (Colin Farrell under a day’s worth of prosthetics and powder) was a benign bait and switch which generously favored an impossibly sleazy, insanely good John Turturro as Carmine Falconi to be the more prominent secondary villain as we wait for Farrell’s “wah wah” to emerge from the wings in the sequel. Farrell spouted less gross sexual innuendo than Danny Devito’s perverted puffin turned politician, so hopefully better baddies await.
Which brings me to a fundamental problem: how this flick wants to take everything you’ve enjoyed about Batman and set it up as the first part in a trilogy. I can’t fault this altogether since Nolan did roughly the same thing to start, but Begins feels complete regardless of the sequel tease out the door, whereas even past this film’s awful, clearly last-minute corporate-insert Joker scene WB felt the need to prick us with (God thank the editor that, if nothing else, cut the longer, hopelessly edgy scene released online), The Batman feels like a Force Awakens situation of “eh, let’s just set the stage with what already works and do the hard part later.” This movie is more handsome, less derivative and presumably less soulless — all I’m saying is Episode 7 felt like it had places to go too.
But Nolan’s films are owed so much here — Batman keeping up with a madman who puts forth ethical puzzles (through snuff films no less) and bending his own morals in the process? That’s clearly Heath Ledger’s Joker, except I feel Batman’s desperation in 2008, whereas here we just keep up and watch out for those cute letters. The ultimate doomsday, social revolution aspect of Riddler’s final phase is also very reminiscent of Bane’s strangely convoluted plans in Rises.
There’s not so much technical fault to be found, only expectations laid and certain narrative promises to fulfill to make this individual film worth the weight. For WB’s latest era of individualized super-fare, this path continues to be the wise way to go — I dig making each movie count in spite of crossover rigmarole and Easter egg excess. It’s just The Batman reminds me of better movies... The Dark Knight was worth comparing to crime classics like Heat because it IS a classic — 2022’s affair is at best worth comparing to The Dark Knight because it’s about Batman.
Death on the Nile and Dog briefings
Death on the Nile
2 ½ (out of 4)
I’m convinced Kenneth Branagh was coerced into directing Artemis Fowl so he could secure a second Poirot flick, though maybe the timing of Disney’s 20th Century Fox acquisition throws that theory off. I personally can’t believe Fox shelled out 90 million for something so modestly marketable, but then again that’s why they don’t really exist anymore.
Considering his one-from-the-heart one-off Belfast won People’s Choice at TIFF, the British legend has simply been bouncing between the commercial and the creative like some repeat of Ron Howard 2000s career. After a legacy built on cinematic scaffolding for Shakespeare’s unsullied voice, it was a real peek inside Branagh’s soul to see him construct so personal a feature just a few months ago. But as far as Agatha Christie mysteries go, Death on the Nile is perhaps a touch more diverting than the somewhat deflated essence of 2017’s Murder on the Orient Express, and for such mild-mannered, tempered fare (at least relative to today’s tastes), my God that mustache could carry an entire franchise. A third Poirot script is apparently already put together — I won’t protest since riding on the quality of Christie’s systematic storytelling could be a worse bet.
But it must be said — this film only really has TWO ACTS! There’s the lead, buried a bit: the titular killing doesn’t occur for nearly seventy precious minutes. It takes so long to get to the boat murder that there’s no time for anything other than to be subsequently sent down the setlist of skeptical interviews — with enough character and color and guessing games you might doze off during one side or the other of Death on the Nile, even when Branagh is busting blood vessels behind the camera to make sure you don’t. Once again, another Hercule mind marathon forces you to absorb all these details you’re incapable of retaining simultaneously (especially submitting to excess exposition via that fake French affect), all to form an identical series of new suspicions with every question: “OH MY GOD! YOU have a motive AND YOU HAVE A MOTIVE!” But at least the germ of the killings isn’t some off-screen past event linking every suspect together by the end, is it AGATHA?
Not to entirely discredit Orient Express, which has wonderful production value, restrained VFX and sumptuous 65mm cinematography, some of the only of its kind in recent years — it also has an ensemble to be murdered by whereas Death has one you can live with. Ironies aside, in Nile’s court there are solid hints and herrings, a twist that made sense… in sum the sequel is sensibly structured and easy to appreciate. Whereas Murder dissolves from a respectably adult night out to inevitable dissatisfaction, Nile at least flows somewhere worth sailing.
The film’s formidable-enough casting call features younger talent and fewer huge names, far off from Orient’s star-studded serving but still something of a cast — Armie Hammer and Gal Gadot take the foreground at their limited best, with Annette Benning, Letitia Wright and a shockingly subdued, almost unrecognizable Russell Brand for the highlights. I knew Hammer’s crying scene was phony but that’s the trickery of movies with deceptive twists, the acting could just be bad or bad in the name of purposeful deceit — eh, at least there’s an excuse for why he shortly sucks. I swore I was watching Samara Weaving (Aussie blonde bombshell #2 beside Margot Robbie), thinking she was even better than in Ready or Not, but it’s actually Emma Mackey — never heard of her but she was very capable and very attractive, showing Hammer how good fake acting can be. In the end I’m oh so glad Gadot was the victim, because the future Cleopatra really can’t emote for shit.
The vessel in Nile is subject to appalling green-screening given the generous budget. Some of it was shot plainly, some garish, and I believe Branagh is conscious either way — even with an obvious 360 degreee boat set, he keeps the conspicuous CGI to a minimum, doing a fine job behind and before the camera. Yet, in spite of Branagh’s vibrant directorial talent and that of the fastidious detective, his two of a pair movies are gasping for air — usually I would commend bringing outmoded entertainment to the new generation but somehow all the flashy, long-take camerawork, modern Hollywood extravagance, big stars and gorgeous film stocks feel like a grotesque overcompensation for archaic style, like trying to appeal to the youth with a hoodie and a skateboard. It could be an exaggeration but Murder and Death strain to entertain and to establish their contemporary relevance. God bless Branagh, I doubt he could do a better job with either but like shaping Shakespeare to your particular liking, some stories are better bound to the page. It’s not some beefed up Guy Ritchie/Sherlock Holmes affair but Branagh’s efforts to dazzle you with operatic filmmaking refuse to let Christie’s vacuums of detail speak for themselves.
He does his best to expedite and envelope you in (rather than take you aside with) exposition and, now that I'm thinking about it, why did our crazy killers go through with their schemes when they're aware the world’s single best detective was in company? Otherwise the film tried to give Poirot some new dimensions, featuring an ambitious intro with an entire backstory and everything. Like before, Death on the Nile is just ok, though as far as whodunnits go, I’ll watch it five times over before I revisit a Scream sequel — Nile even possesses a better, similar spin on the diluted dual-killer twist.
On a loosely related note, Dead Again — Branagh’s helluva Hitchcock knockoff sophomore feature — should be recommended at the end of the day… and looking ahead I hope that Bee Gees movie is OK?
Dog
3 (out of 4)
Channing Tatum seems to know his limits better than Master Wayne, and the beauty king is also aware of how his appealing bankability can sustain just about any audience through something so old-fashioned, military-minded and fully feel-good. Believe me you already know every damn thing that happens in Dog — maybe not the kidnapping sequence where horse tranquilizer delirium gives way to edible lollipops and bonding bro-time — but this road trip/veteran salute is also jingoism-free and comedy-drama equilibrium exemplified. Tatum’s directorial debut (it counts if he’s co-captain right?) alongside Reid Carolin is sound and straight as an arrow, landing its emotional blows and trailer-primed comic excerpts in due, earned time.
It’s funny and sweet concerning the compassion of companionship while also reverent and realistic about the wounds of war. Dog is so much more sustaining than the Lifetime channel-like, Marley and Me mush it might register as from a distance — there’s not much to say other than the film pays respect to the service of our countrymen and the demons they’re unable to shake off, while also making mirthful use of the near-buddy comedy composition. Maybe Tatum was tired of playing second fiddle to Jonah Hill and wanted to be the straight man to a fellow handsome creature that’s capable of killing you. The modest feature posits a decent time at the movies while it quietly, with dignity, moves you to tears. Some select silliness and hiccups in editing do not detract from Dog’s deceptive dramatic strength and mounting pathos.
This is the sort of road movie as familiar as your own face and yet miraculously surpasses the sum of its predictable parts. Tatum and that Army Ranger dog are probably the best on-screen couple since who knows when — Owen Wilson and JLo, let alone Tatum and Sandra Bullock in their Romancing the Stone-update, wish they sustained such heart-humming humanity.
2 ½ (out of 4)
I’m convinced Kenneth Branagh was coerced into directing Artemis Fowl so he could secure a second Poirot flick, though maybe the timing of Disney’s 20th Century Fox acquisition throws that theory off. I personally can’t believe Fox shelled out 90 million for something so modestly marketable, but then again that’s why they don’t really exist anymore.
Considering his one-from-the-heart one-off Belfast won People’s Choice at TIFF, the British legend has simply been bouncing between the commercial and the creative like some repeat of Ron Howard 2000s career. After a legacy built on cinematic scaffolding for Shakespeare’s unsullied voice, it was a real peek inside Branagh’s soul to see him construct so personal a feature just a few months ago. But as far as Agatha Christie mysteries go, Death on the Nile is perhaps a touch more diverting than the somewhat deflated essence of 2017’s Murder on the Orient Express, and for such mild-mannered, tempered fare (at least relative to today’s tastes), my God that mustache could carry an entire franchise. A third Poirot script is apparently already put together — I won’t protest since riding on the quality of Christie’s systematic storytelling could be a worse bet.
But it must be said — this film only really has TWO ACTS! There’s the lead, buried a bit: the titular killing doesn’t occur for nearly seventy precious minutes. It takes so long to get to the boat murder that there’s no time for anything other than to be subsequently sent down the setlist of skeptical interviews — with enough character and color and guessing games you might doze off during one side or the other of Death on the Nile, even when Branagh is busting blood vessels behind the camera to make sure you don’t. Once again, another Hercule mind marathon forces you to absorb all these details you’re incapable of retaining simultaneously (especially submitting to excess exposition via that fake French affect), all to form an identical series of new suspicions with every question: “OH MY GOD! YOU have a motive AND YOU HAVE A MOTIVE!” But at least the germ of the killings isn’t some off-screen past event linking every suspect together by the end, is it AGATHA?
Not to entirely discredit Orient Express, which has wonderful production value, restrained VFX and sumptuous 65mm cinematography, some of the only of its kind in recent years — it also has an ensemble to be murdered by whereas Death has one you can live with. Ironies aside, in Nile’s court there are solid hints and herrings, a twist that made sense… in sum the sequel is sensibly structured and easy to appreciate. Whereas Murder dissolves from a respectably adult night out to inevitable dissatisfaction, Nile at least flows somewhere worth sailing.
The film’s formidable-enough casting call features younger talent and fewer huge names, far off from Orient’s star-studded serving but still something of a cast — Armie Hammer and Gal Gadot take the foreground at their limited best, with Annette Benning, Letitia Wright and a shockingly subdued, almost unrecognizable Russell Brand for the highlights. I knew Hammer’s crying scene was phony but that’s the trickery of movies with deceptive twists, the acting could just be bad or bad in the name of purposeful deceit — eh, at least there’s an excuse for why he shortly sucks. I swore I was watching Samara Weaving (Aussie blonde bombshell #2 beside Margot Robbie), thinking she was even better than in Ready or Not, but it’s actually Emma Mackey — never heard of her but she was very capable and very attractive, showing Hammer how good fake acting can be. In the end I’m oh so glad Gadot was the victim, because the future Cleopatra really can’t emote for shit.
The vessel in Nile is subject to appalling green-screening given the generous budget. Some of it was shot plainly, some garish, and I believe Branagh is conscious either way — even with an obvious 360 degreee boat set, he keeps the conspicuous CGI to a minimum, doing a fine job behind and before the camera. Yet, in spite of Branagh’s vibrant directorial talent and that of the fastidious detective, his two of a pair movies are gasping for air — usually I would commend bringing outmoded entertainment to the new generation but somehow all the flashy, long-take camerawork, modern Hollywood extravagance, big stars and gorgeous film stocks feel like a grotesque overcompensation for archaic style, like trying to appeal to the youth with a hoodie and a skateboard. It could be an exaggeration but Murder and Death strain to entertain and to establish their contemporary relevance. God bless Branagh, I doubt he could do a better job with either but like shaping Shakespeare to your particular liking, some stories are better bound to the page. It’s not some beefed up Guy Ritchie/Sherlock Holmes affair but Branagh’s efforts to dazzle you with operatic filmmaking refuse to let Christie’s vacuums of detail speak for themselves.
He does his best to expedite and envelope you in (rather than take you aside with) exposition and, now that I'm thinking about it, why did our crazy killers go through with their schemes when they're aware the world’s single best detective was in company? Otherwise the film tried to give Poirot some new dimensions, featuring an ambitious intro with an entire backstory and everything. Like before, Death on the Nile is just ok, though as far as whodunnits go, I’ll watch it five times over before I revisit a Scream sequel — Nile even possesses a better, similar spin on the diluted dual-killer twist.
On a loosely related note, Dead Again — Branagh’s helluva Hitchcock knockoff sophomore feature — should be recommended at the end of the day… and looking ahead I hope that Bee Gees movie is OK?
Dog
3 (out of 4)
Channing Tatum seems to know his limits better than Master Wayne, and the beauty king is also aware of how his appealing bankability can sustain just about any audience through something so old-fashioned, military-minded and fully feel-good. Believe me you already know every damn thing that happens in Dog — maybe not the kidnapping sequence where horse tranquilizer delirium gives way to edible lollipops and bonding bro-time — but this road trip/veteran salute is also jingoism-free and comedy-drama equilibrium exemplified. Tatum’s directorial debut (it counts if he’s co-captain right?) alongside Reid Carolin is sound and straight as an arrow, landing its emotional blows and trailer-primed comic excerpts in due, earned time.
It’s funny and sweet concerning the compassion of companionship while also reverent and realistic about the wounds of war. Dog is so much more sustaining than the Lifetime channel-like, Marley and Me mush it might register as from a distance — there’s not much to say other than the film pays respect to the service of our countrymen and the demons they’re unable to shake off, while also making mirthful use of the near-buddy comedy composition. Maybe Tatum was tired of playing second fiddle to Jonah Hill and wanted to be the straight man to a fellow handsome creature that’s capable of killing you. The modest feature posits a decent time at the movies while it quietly, with dignity, moves you to tears. Some select silliness and hiccups in editing do not detract from Dog’s deceptive dramatic strength and mounting pathos.
This is the sort of road movie as familiar as your own face and yet miraculously surpasses the sum of its predictable parts. Tatum and that Army Ranger dog are probably the best on-screen couple since who knows when — Owen Wilson and JLo, let alone Tatum and Sandra Bullock in their Romancing the Stone-update, wish they sustained such heart-humming humanity.
Moonfall briefing
1 ½ (out of 4)
Maybe the “master of disaster” is good for another guilty pleasure, right? That’s what my foolishly optimistic brain was thinking months ago. Then I realized Roland Emmerich only has one film that really fits the bill and that’s The Day After Tomorrow — the 10-year old me’s idea of a perfect feature film.
Emmerich said he had ended his affair with the genre made of spectacular suffering awhile ago (a few times at least, right?) and we shouldn’t have believed him for a second. I guess we’ll just have to be grateful since the Shakespeare exposé biopics and pandering LGBTQ+ fare haven’t been the most advantageous alternatives. If some sorry studio is willing to give him enough money to concoct some globe-leveling sensory overload and mental depletion rife with cacophony and doom, let it be — Moonfall at least finds Emmerich in his mode, where he belongs.
But in the cold light of day, the Emmerich cinematic escape is always better in theory than practice — like some supremely washed up Wolfgang Petersen, his tendencies are, at best, somewhat respectably old-fashioned, like the lowest Spielberg-knockoff you can find, complete with broken home bullshit and all. But then he’ll lean into Michael Bay gauges of pressingly of-the-moment idiocy populated with strict stereotypes, albeit free of so much color contrast, low angles and casual sexism/homophobia. Just look at Emmerich's last forgettable film, Midway, which was essentially Bay’s Pearl Harbor, just swap a memorable middle act for at least a lot less romantic indigestion.
The director’s last decade has been tumultuous despite a career working out some of the biggest dumb modern day mother-nature-as-monster fare of the last 25 years like The Day After Tomorrow (nature’s tryna kill us? Comfy!) and what was supposed to be his final earth-ender, the part-crazy fun, part-TV special tediousness of 2012. Whether trying to rewrite Shakespeare’s history with Anonymous, having his weak-ass White House Down mogged by Olympus Has Fallen only to follow up with Stonewall’s gay movie for straights and then a slick and stupid Independence Day legacyquel, Emmerich doesn’t seem to really know what he’s all about as a director. Nevertheless, given its emptiness at this stage in a career and the evolution of cinematic appetites, Moonfall seems to be an admittance of his tendency for apocalyptic blockbusters and preference for Hollywood hackery. ‘Moon terror’ is an upgrade from Resurgence’s moon milk, I guess.
As middle of the road disaster fare goes, Moonfall is not as insultingly idiotic as his worst (have I not brought up that I watched 10,000 BC specifically for this Godforsaken review?) or as poorly filmed and flaccid as 2012’s in-between moments — it’s also his most forgettable, fundamentally fake film, which is saying a lot when you consider his last decade of efforts were barely worth discarding (or recapping). Moonfall had me hoping for a good time because Emmerich’s breed of standalone catastrophe event pictures is now somehow a blue moon event — a film bearing a budget of about 150 million with no outside IP connections isn't nothing, although the halfwit screenwriters or producers couldn’t let you leave the theater without trying to set up another wearisome, unwanted franchise in the fumbling final lines. It’s probably the last of its kind since people would apparently rather watch Spider-Man: No Way Home for the 6th time or see some Jackass sequel than something original, regardless of the price tag or a premise as stupendously simpleminded as the moon’s orbit set on a collision course with earth.
I wish there was something to say about Moonfall without comparison, but it literally wouldn’t have feet to stand on without Emmerich’s résumé of world-ending simulations. Halle Berry and Patrick Wilson can’t be accused of overcommitment though Lean on Pete’s young star Charlie Plummer does his ineffectual best in a B-plot alongside a similarly neutered Michael Peña. The subplots are as diminishing as ever and even the Mission to Mars-mirroring "future humans are the real aliens" muck can’t expand the mind at the same time it shrinks the intellect. Frankly Moonfall isn’t even worth judging on its own merits no matter how easy it goes down.
Dear Lord, this one is mercilessly mediocre — despite all the sci-fi shenanigans, it’s utterly redundant even while working in alien communicae and moon conspiracies into the fray. Moonfall is painless and just about as joyless.
Maybe the “master of disaster” is good for another guilty pleasure, right? That’s what my foolishly optimistic brain was thinking months ago. Then I realized Roland Emmerich only has one film that really fits the bill and that’s The Day After Tomorrow — the 10-year old me’s idea of a perfect feature film.
Emmerich said he had ended his affair with the genre made of spectacular suffering awhile ago (a few times at least, right?) and we shouldn’t have believed him for a second. I guess we’ll just have to be grateful since the Shakespeare exposé biopics and pandering LGBTQ+ fare haven’t been the most advantageous alternatives. If some sorry studio is willing to give him enough money to concoct some globe-leveling sensory overload and mental depletion rife with cacophony and doom, let it be — Moonfall at least finds Emmerich in his mode, where he belongs.
But in the cold light of day, the Emmerich cinematic escape is always better in theory than practice — like some supremely washed up Wolfgang Petersen, his tendencies are, at best, somewhat respectably old-fashioned, like the lowest Spielberg-knockoff you can find, complete with broken home bullshit and all. But then he’ll lean into Michael Bay gauges of pressingly of-the-moment idiocy populated with strict stereotypes, albeit free of so much color contrast, low angles and casual sexism/homophobia. Just look at Emmerich's last forgettable film, Midway, which was essentially Bay’s Pearl Harbor, just swap a memorable middle act for at least a lot less romantic indigestion.
The director’s last decade has been tumultuous despite a career working out some of the biggest dumb modern day mother-nature-as-monster fare of the last 25 years like The Day After Tomorrow (nature’s tryna kill us? Comfy!) and what was supposed to be his final earth-ender, the part-crazy fun, part-TV special tediousness of 2012. Whether trying to rewrite Shakespeare’s history with Anonymous, having his weak-ass White House Down mogged by Olympus Has Fallen only to follow up with Stonewall’s gay movie for straights and then a slick and stupid Independence Day legacyquel, Emmerich doesn’t seem to really know what he’s all about as a director. Nevertheless, given its emptiness at this stage in a career and the evolution of cinematic appetites, Moonfall seems to be an admittance of his tendency for apocalyptic blockbusters and preference for Hollywood hackery. ‘Moon terror’ is an upgrade from Resurgence’s moon milk, I guess.
As middle of the road disaster fare goes, Moonfall is not as insultingly idiotic as his worst (have I not brought up that I watched 10,000 BC specifically for this Godforsaken review?) or as poorly filmed and flaccid as 2012’s in-between moments — it’s also his most forgettable, fundamentally fake film, which is saying a lot when you consider his last decade of efforts were barely worth discarding (or recapping). Moonfall had me hoping for a good time because Emmerich’s breed of standalone catastrophe event pictures is now somehow a blue moon event — a film bearing a budget of about 150 million with no outside IP connections isn't nothing, although the halfwit screenwriters or producers couldn’t let you leave the theater without trying to set up another wearisome, unwanted franchise in the fumbling final lines. It’s probably the last of its kind since people would apparently rather watch Spider-Man: No Way Home for the 6th time or see some Jackass sequel than something original, regardless of the price tag or a premise as stupendously simpleminded as the moon’s orbit set on a collision course with earth.
I wish there was something to say about Moonfall without comparison, but it literally wouldn’t have feet to stand on without Emmerich’s résumé of world-ending simulations. Halle Berry and Patrick Wilson can’t be accused of overcommitment though Lean on Pete’s young star Charlie Plummer does his ineffectual best in a B-plot alongside a similarly neutered Michael Peña. The subplots are as diminishing as ever and even the Mission to Mars-mirroring "future humans are the real aliens" muck can’t expand the mind at the same time it shrinks the intellect. Frankly Moonfall isn’t even worth judging on its own merits no matter how easy it goes down.
Dear Lord, this one is mercilessly mediocre — despite all the sci-fi shenanigans, it’s utterly redundant even while working in alien communicae and moon conspiracies into the fray. Moonfall is painless and just about as joyless.
Scream (2022) briefing
1 ½ (out of 4)
Wasn’t I just bitching about horror movie sequel titles? Oh yeah Candyman (2021), what a treat… anyway I’ll be referring to this new, meticulously mediocre slasher franchise-filler as Scream 5 and leave it at that.
So Michael Myers has an enigmatic, symbolic quality to him; Jason Voorhees is like a supernatural fishman/Creature From the Black Lagoon type; Wes Craven’s own homemade Freddy Krueger is in your dreams, fit for bottomless sequel-serving ends. I’ve never felt the need to see Saw (as much as I enjoy some James Wan) so I can’t call Ghostface the last truly iconic slasher figure but, regardless, what made the idea of the Killah interesting was the fact that the commonly emblematic mask was just a thing you don — the culprit was always anonymous for 90% of every film.
The costume keeps returning yet those underneath have only become less and less worth the fuss. Scream never really served any purpose as a saga because after the original they failed to ever make it genuinely intriguing who was underneath. There’s just not much to carry on about post-1996 — past the first, you never once have the thought to check back to see if the logic adds up upon rewatch since all four follow-ups manage to cheat in some way, and boy, does Scream 5 cheat all the damn time. Even though this one doesn’t have the same screenwriter Kevin Williamson who did all but 2000’s 3, nor Craven himself, obviously, since his death in 2015, it may as well have been the regular crew since we’re dealing with the same hackey smarminess where one nerd character obligatorily redefines the “rules” of contemporary horror for a new audience, it all adding up to a fresh coat of shallow, self-aware self-sucking. The first Scream is genius, a cunning classic of both horror and 90s twisteroos up there with Fight Club and The Sixth Sense, wherein the reveal is amazing until you watch the movie with the back-knowledge, and then are merely deftly entertained.
Then each sequel was a disposably fun ride in the moment but deeply derivative and hardly half-trying — Scream 5, unexceptionally, was mediocre and thanks to consistently crappy quality (a firmer rule than that of slasher sequel tropes) I had no hope to spare for this one. There’s some new angle aiming at 'elevated horror' that has become an A24 niche these past several years. But the whole critique of Scream 5 is so flimsy and the motivations, damn, if you thought the old ones were dumb this one just makes no goddamn sense. How lame to set its satirical sights on its own obsessive followers, or fanboys at large: “HOW COULD FANDOM BE TOXIC IT’S ABOUT LOVE” the revealed killer shouts, hitting those topical themes over your head like a freaking falling piano.
Do I have to care about the eleventh time Sydney Prescott gets stabbed in the last reel? “OH GOSH I WONDER IF SHE’LL PULL THROUGH!” What’s really disappointing at this point in the Screamiverse is, despite a few teases at the scenario of one of the original leading trio (Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox and David Arquette) ultimately ending up behind the mask, they’ve always chickened out. Maybe it’s too soap-opera-similar but I would forgive all the wasted celluloid to actually see Arquette’s Dewey or Cox’s Gail Weathers or Campbell’s Prescott in the reveal. If they pulled it off it could be amazing, but they don’t have the balls. In the steadily loosening definition of ‘cultural commentary,’ these films don’t retain the gusto to get ridiculous enough — they’re all just a little too generic to be as subversive as they're supposed to be.
Paramount trusts only their new crop of 20-somethings to act as the arsenal of red herrings with a boring killer to spare and stop there. The slew of zoomer youngbloods are as readily disposable and undeveloped as the millennial members of the last round. Outside of kills and crass ‘clever’ comedy, these flicks are all about the misdirection and it pains me because the blind alleys are so easy to set up — SO EASY.
While I’m irate I just want to mention how much I absolutely hate how Ghostface gets beaten up at least once every movie in mid-film skirmishes with surviving victims only for the eventually revealed killers to show their untarnished, smug faces in the reveal AND beforehand. It’s just one more cheat that, if addressed, would interrupt the conceit of existing as And Then There Were None for smoothbrains. This virtual non-franchise is just a fun excuse for fourth-wall-whomping whodunits — it’s fodder for horror hipsters and the Clue crowd, which is fine because the meta-mysteries are the only reason the series is even worth mentioning. But ever since the best moment of the sequels (the very first, the wonderful cold open of 2) the games don’t add up to much and self-referentiality for it’s own sake is a tiresome façade for actual ingenuity — Scream sequels may as well be little shorts at this point, like TV episodes (NO NOT THE MTV KIND) or edgy Nancy Drew novels. Rather than pretend to be new and fresh every time why not give an earnest effort?
I will say I liked the main girl mostly because she’s Melissa Barrera, the fine as shit love interest from In the Heights. Her in-film boyfriend Jack Quaid is OK, his character's turn only fooling me because (surprise Sydney!) the movie feebly manipulates. They could’ve just had cameos for the veterans, though it doesn’t surprise me that the primary Screamers are still cloying for exposure and a fatter paycheck; past the trilogy it’s kind of comical how little the former lead characters have to show their faces on-screen. Each sequel has served up alternative ensemble players, but none have been agreeable on whole other than maybe 3, which has more interesting suspects like Patrick Warburton and Patrick Dempsey... as I'm defending the black sheep of the franchise and as much I love sorting the specifics of my opinions I couldn’t tell you the best of the sequels since they all whimper out some way or another. By the way, in the case of 5, killing off Dewey meant absolutely NOTHING other than guaranteeing the next feature film will be even more unwatchable.
Scream 6 is already set for next year and I feel like slapping hands to face and letting out a big belt. Cox is already on board, the desperate scary movie slut. Campbell wised up and declined. Ugh Hayden Panettiere is back, plus Samara Weaving and goddamn Henry Czerny are in on it?? Just end the suffering, please.
Wasn’t I just bitching about horror movie sequel titles? Oh yeah Candyman (2021), what a treat… anyway I’ll be referring to this new, meticulously mediocre slasher franchise-filler as Scream 5 and leave it at that.
So Michael Myers has an enigmatic, symbolic quality to him; Jason Voorhees is like a supernatural fishman/Creature From the Black Lagoon type; Wes Craven’s own homemade Freddy Krueger is in your dreams, fit for bottomless sequel-serving ends. I’ve never felt the need to see Saw (as much as I enjoy some James Wan) so I can’t call Ghostface the last truly iconic slasher figure but, regardless, what made the idea of the Killah interesting was the fact that the commonly emblematic mask was just a thing you don — the culprit was always anonymous for 90% of every film.
The costume keeps returning yet those underneath have only become less and less worth the fuss. Scream never really served any purpose as a saga because after the original they failed to ever make it genuinely intriguing who was underneath. There’s just not much to carry on about post-1996 — past the first, you never once have the thought to check back to see if the logic adds up upon rewatch since all four follow-ups manage to cheat in some way, and boy, does Scream 5 cheat all the damn time. Even though this one doesn’t have the same screenwriter Kevin Williamson who did all but 2000’s 3, nor Craven himself, obviously, since his death in 2015, it may as well have been the regular crew since we’re dealing with the same hackey smarminess where one nerd character obligatorily redefines the “rules” of contemporary horror for a new audience, it all adding up to a fresh coat of shallow, self-aware self-sucking. The first Scream is genius, a cunning classic of both horror and 90s twisteroos up there with Fight Club and The Sixth Sense, wherein the reveal is amazing until you watch the movie with the back-knowledge, and then are merely deftly entertained.
Then each sequel was a disposably fun ride in the moment but deeply derivative and hardly half-trying — Scream 5, unexceptionally, was mediocre and thanks to consistently crappy quality (a firmer rule than that of slasher sequel tropes) I had no hope to spare for this one. There’s some new angle aiming at 'elevated horror' that has become an A24 niche these past several years. But the whole critique of Scream 5 is so flimsy and the motivations, damn, if you thought the old ones were dumb this one just makes no goddamn sense. How lame to set its satirical sights on its own obsessive followers, or fanboys at large: “HOW COULD FANDOM BE TOXIC IT’S ABOUT LOVE” the revealed killer shouts, hitting those topical themes over your head like a freaking falling piano.
Do I have to care about the eleventh time Sydney Prescott gets stabbed in the last reel? “OH GOSH I WONDER IF SHE’LL PULL THROUGH!” What’s really disappointing at this point in the Screamiverse is, despite a few teases at the scenario of one of the original leading trio (Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox and David Arquette) ultimately ending up behind the mask, they’ve always chickened out. Maybe it’s too soap-opera-similar but I would forgive all the wasted celluloid to actually see Arquette’s Dewey or Cox’s Gail Weathers or Campbell’s Prescott in the reveal. If they pulled it off it could be amazing, but they don’t have the balls. In the steadily loosening definition of ‘cultural commentary,’ these films don’t retain the gusto to get ridiculous enough — they’re all just a little too generic to be as subversive as they're supposed to be.
Paramount trusts only their new crop of 20-somethings to act as the arsenal of red herrings with a boring killer to spare and stop there. The slew of zoomer youngbloods are as readily disposable and undeveloped as the millennial members of the last round. Outside of kills and crass ‘clever’ comedy, these flicks are all about the misdirection and it pains me because the blind alleys are so easy to set up — SO EASY.
While I’m irate I just want to mention how much I absolutely hate how Ghostface gets beaten up at least once every movie in mid-film skirmishes with surviving victims only for the eventually revealed killers to show their untarnished, smug faces in the reveal AND beforehand. It’s just one more cheat that, if addressed, would interrupt the conceit of existing as And Then There Were None for smoothbrains. This virtual non-franchise is just a fun excuse for fourth-wall-whomping whodunits — it’s fodder for horror hipsters and the Clue crowd, which is fine because the meta-mysteries are the only reason the series is even worth mentioning. But ever since the best moment of the sequels (the very first, the wonderful cold open of 2) the games don’t add up to much and self-referentiality for it’s own sake is a tiresome façade for actual ingenuity — Scream sequels may as well be little shorts at this point, like TV episodes (NO NOT THE MTV KIND) or edgy Nancy Drew novels. Rather than pretend to be new and fresh every time why not give an earnest effort?
I will say I liked the main girl mostly because she’s Melissa Barrera, the fine as shit love interest from In the Heights. Her in-film boyfriend Jack Quaid is OK, his character's turn only fooling me because (surprise Sydney!) the movie feebly manipulates. They could’ve just had cameos for the veterans, though it doesn’t surprise me that the primary Screamers are still cloying for exposure and a fatter paycheck; past the trilogy it’s kind of comical how little the former lead characters have to show their faces on-screen. Each sequel has served up alternative ensemble players, but none have been agreeable on whole other than maybe 3, which has more interesting suspects like Patrick Warburton and Patrick Dempsey... as I'm defending the black sheep of the franchise and as much I love sorting the specifics of my opinions I couldn’t tell you the best of the sequels since they all whimper out some way or another. By the way, in the case of 5, killing off Dewey meant absolutely NOTHING other than guaranteeing the next feature film will be even more unwatchable.
Scream 6 is already set for next year and I feel like slapping hands to face and letting out a big belt. Cox is already on board, the desperate scary movie slut. Campbell wised up and declined. Ugh Hayden Panettiere is back, plus Samara Weaving and goddamn Henry Czerny are in on it?? Just end the suffering, please.