mattstone137's Reviews

Drive-Away Dolls (2024)

5/10

"I'd Say the Odds are Good but the Goods are Odd."

23 February 2024

Drive Away Dolls is the latest film from Ethan Coen but the first without collaboration from brother Joel. While Joel whittled away with a stark, black and white adaptation of Macbeth starring an utterly joyless Denzel Washington, Ethan's film wouldn't feel out of place alongside a 70s B-movie double feature. Dolls is replete with cheesy transitions, awkward close-ups, obnoxious neon, vintage Coen accents, and a welcome-but-not-quite-good-enough use of Maggot Brain. It's also a mixed bag of indulgent violence, puritan degeneracy, and half-baked characterizations.

The film follows Jamie and Marian as they drive to Tallahassee, inadvertently picking up precious cargo belonging to a group of shady individuals who have killed to keep it in their possession. The film is an interesting but sometimes tedious clash of black crime farce and melodramatic lesbian dramedy, devoting infrequent time to either story for proper depth or development.

Positives first. The film is funny. Not always funny, not quite funny enough, and garishly lacking the type of transgressive abrasiveness to make the material shine...but in general, it's funny. Though the characters aren't drawn intricately, their details (both from the script and the performances) are emphasized and repeated to build adequate rapport with each other and the audience.

Dolls is also stylized, in a perplexingly cheap but modestly endearing sort of way. The gimmicky transitions and trippy, spacey moments help build vital momentum to keep the first half breezy and engaging. However, Coen's parlor tricks wane and drag when the plot thickens and the film must carry itself on the merits of its own internal logistics and validity. When that time comes, the Dolls implodes.

Again, Dolls is a grinding mishmash of crime comedy and lesbian dramedy, an interesting conceit which never works with itself to create unity or continuity. The stories of disparate, often as jarring and incongruent as the smash-cut transitions which hold them together like staples through skin. The material feels like a first draft or an untalented mockery of a Coens brothers' script. The heart, patience, and icily detached bemusement of their earlier work has been augmented into the dishearteningly ubiquitous trend of smug, self-righteously assured moral congratulation.

Every creative choice tugs and struggles against the others, but the real letdown of Dolls is its faux dedication to irreverence in its superior first half. When the plot kicks in, when our leads are finally given true agency in regards to the bigger picture, everything becomes easy.

What should be an elongated sequence of comedic tension and unpredictability quickly upends itself to give our intrepid little heroes the necessary resources for a clean, bland getaway. The tension deflates; the comedy deflates; the interest deflates; the irreverence inverts, praising Jamie and Marian as ideal ideological models. It's disappointing and honestly unexpected, but maybe Ethan's been watching South Park recently - in the end, he managed to make it gay and make it lame.

Overall, Drive Away Dolls is tough to criticize or praise too fervently because it's a film of halves. The first half is tonally breezy and characterizations (both heroes and villains) are striking but not overbearing. In the second, the tone and treatment of protagonists is eye-rolling. In the first half, the stakes are high, the style is laid back, and the journey is leisurely. In the second, the stakes are obliterated, the style is forced, and the journey feels like a ham-fisted means to an end. See it as a curious counterpoint to Joel's Macbeth, but don't go in expecting Fargo. 5/9.

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Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023)

4/10

"It's All About Bucks, Kid. The Rest is Conversation."

17 February 2023

Another season, another entry into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is the thirty-first entry into the franchise and, like at least the last twelve before it, does nothing to renew or revitalize the cinematic behemoth's trite formula. Peyton Reed is back in the director's chair, enthusiastically kowtowing to the demands of producers and ensuring there is no detectable sense of style or personal touch.

Quantumania plays like a cross between tediously scripted Saturday morning cartoon and embarrassingly generic Star Wars rip-off, evoking no sense of fun or wonder despite creative makeup, costuming, and digital landscapes. It's utterly disposable and completely forgettable, but the theater was full at 3:00 pm on a Thursday, so silver lining, it will line some cultural overlords' pockets with cash.

The film follows Scott Lang and company as they're sucked into the quantum realm, a land of mind-bending vistas and infinite possibilities. As Lang discovers the secrets of the realm and tries to protect his daughter Cassie, a new threat rises. Kang the Conqueror, one of Marvel's most powerful villains, takes advantage of the newly available Pym Particles, enacting a savage plan to nebulously do something or another. The film also introduces M. O. D. O. K, immediately butchering his characterization and badassery.

The MCU runs the gamut from inspired to miserably inept. Quantumania proudly slots into the center of the spectrum, not nearly as imaginative or well-crafted as Iron Man or Infinity War, but not as boring or portentous as Thor: The Dark World or Eternals. It squeezes so snugly into its predestined mediocrity that it's difficult to scrape up thoughts which haven't been said of any other MCU film from the last two years.

The tone is still scatterbrained due to incessant quipping, the filmic craft is still laughably corporatized, the CGI is still creative and complex though horrendously fake-looking, the villain is still stripped of all complexity or intrigue, and the heroes are still indestructible paragons of status quo ubiquity.

Specifically, Quantumania's story unfolds sluggishly before kicking into hyper-speed. There's hardly time for character introductions, let alone character growth. A few minutes' stretch sets up a story of trust, subversion, and calculation, but is quickly bolled over for an overplayed, gratingly uninspired rebellion angle. By the time our characters are situated in this strange new world, the final act has started, and quickly becomes a typically rote slog.

None of the performances elevate the film, though Paul Rudd is eminently likeable and Michael Douglas plays up to the stupidity of the material, charismatically smartassing his way through the adventure. Kathryn Newton is charming enough, Michelle Pfeiffer lends legitimacy to the inanity, and Evangeline Lilly...doesn't really have much to do, honestly.

Jonathan Majors is the disappointment of the cast, always just teetering on the verge of sobbing no matter the scene or context. Kang is an all-powerful force of destruction, but Majors plays him like he never left the set for The Last Black Man in San Francisco. He's a great actor, but not an intimidator - he may have added thirty extra pounds of muscle to transform into a daunting presence in Creed III, but he didn't here; all he has here is a cool-looking cloak.

What else is there to extrapolate after thirty previous entries? For perspective, the Bond franchise has been running for sixty years and just recently celebrated the twenty-fifth entry into its franchise, and where Bond has reasonably shifted its values, identity, and presence throughout several decades, the MCU continuously doubles down on its commitment to assembly line productions.

The true shame is that, despite the staggering volume of the genre over the last twenty years, its context and potential for alteration (fundamental or superficial) has hardly been mined. Imagine a three-hour sweeping superhero epic, a dusty superhero western, or a psychological horror of superpowered insanity, all of varying budgets, tones, moods, styles, and complexity.

Take the thought further - hire legendary filmmakers like David Lynch, Paul Thomas Anderson, Darron Aronofsky, the Coen Brothers, David Fincher, or (your favorite filmmaker). Sure, not everyone would go for the idea, but those who do would surely produce something of staggering ingenuity and creativity; the inexhaustible subtext of a superpowered world could be explored for decades, and these production companies have limitless resources to explore it.

All a pipedream. Rather than force their audiences to grow up, Marvel and DC eagerly cater to their infantilized, developmentally arrested fanbases, slapping together content like Chinese day laborers, desperate to keep the dopamine perpetually dripping. Guardians of the Galaxy 3 will be here soon, The Marvels soon after that.

Writing this review was tedious enough; I cower to think of recording thoughts for MCU film number thirty-eight, number thirty-nine, forty, forty-one, onward and onward for eternity, until the Canadians invade, the dollar collapses, or The Living Tribunal is caught in a human trafficking scheme. Either way, blessed release.

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The Whale (2022)

6/10

"Who Would Want Me to Be a Part of Their Life?"

17 February 2023

There are few filmmakers like Darron Aronofsky. His early work is sublime, his aughts work is interesting and unconventional, but his recent work has been disappointing. Noah and Mother! Are cleverly visceral and anarchic, but they're also bogged down in religious symbolism and shallow metaphor, lacking the substance of the filmmaker's greatest films. The Whale is a nice return to form, even if missing Aronofsky's trademark frenetic hysteria. Written by Samuel D. Hunter, and adapted from his play, the script is not spectacular, but it is dense, thought-provoking, and well-paced.

The film follows Charlie, a morbidly obese man who teaches English for an online college. Having recently come to terms with his own mortality, Charlie tries to reconnect with his daughter, volatile and callously apathetic Ellie. The entire story takes place within Charlie's apartment; nurse Liz and proselytizer Thomas also visit, and the film's drama is drawn from each character's unique interactions with the others.

Chamber pieces are in vogue, most likely because of the limitations presented by the pandemic. At least five films in the last three months (The Menu, Glass Onion, Skinamarink, Knock at the Cabin, and The Whale) have taken place in one primary venue. The technique is usually a mark of miniscule budgets or ambitious screenwriters, but these films (sans Skinamarink) are at least relatively expensive and reasonably conventional.

Of these five films, The Whale feels most purposeful in its use of a single location, most likely because it's adapted from a stage play, and written by a playwright. The film is an intimate story with refreshingly small but impactful stakes; it's focused and thematically dense enough to hold attention throughout, implicitly justifying its economical narrative and construction.

The Whale feels and watches like a play, for better or worse, sometimes simultaneously. Much of the early dialogue is clunkily expositional and characterizations are lean. However, there is deceptive depth to characters' conflict and relationships, leading to provocative questions posed throughout, both subtly and explicitly.

Although The Whale's plot doesn't usually unfold organically - much of its movement is spurred by someone entering or exiting a room, much like a sitcom - its scenes are impressively balanced between brevity and elongated elegance. Plotting is clunky but expedient, and the sum result has an impressive sense of internal rhythm and timing. The Whale is eventually too lumbering and overstuffed, but this is the result of an overaccumulation of sharp observations, rather than a confused, non-committal slog.

The Whale is sharp and thoughtful, but it's also abjectly miserable. It's a type of story where every character is melodramatically "broken" and searching for a new light to guide their spiritual redemption. Directors who miscalculate this type of drama churn out Noel and Simon Birch, but Aronofsky is obviously too skilled to produce such pablum.

Instead of a lighter sense of emotional misery, The Whale is dark: the apartment is dark, the script is dark, the characters are dark; any optimism springs from either regret or misplaced nostalgia. Aronofsky is often cynical, but he abandons all hope before entering The Whale's worldview, falling into cold misanthropy, even blunt nihilism. Whether or not the film's dramatic integrity is deep or focused enough to warrant such hopelessness is up to the viewer.

The general depression of the film does not overshadow its characters but springs from them. For all of The Whale's thematic probing, twisting, and questioning, there's a surprising and disappointing lack of agency to the entire affair. Charlie and friends continuously, and drearily, wallow in their own circumstances, never attempting to overcome or improve on life's knockdowns.

Admittedly, this lack of self-ownership may be the point, as all involved are either battling addictions or too young, arrogant, or naïve to broaden their perspectives, but The Whale's overwhelming feeling is one of self-pity and helplessness, both learned and innate. The film tries to abruptly reverse course in its final moments, but this mismatched contortion is not enough to wash the taste of pathetic failure out of one's mouth.

The drama of the film is solidly elevated by Aronofsky and his cast. The director restrains himself throughout, creating space and time for Hunter's dialogue to breathe. Although his technique is consistently successful, I couldn't help but wish the script allowed for greater and more frequent Aronofskyesque flourishes.

There is a point wherein The Whale seems to be lifting off, to finally be careening off its meticulously placid railing, but the attempt fizzles; in seconds, the story is back on track and its repetition resumes, as if the potential for deviation never existed. Like its story, the film's camerawork is stark and dry, a decidedly serious attempt to chisel high drama and court sophisticated audiences. Those who consider themselves highbrow will probably swoon, but I gravitate toward the raw, kinetic verve of Aronofsky's earlier work - I prefer my senses engulfed.

As mentioned, The Whale is greatly elevated by its performances, most notably Fraser's. His transformation into a 600 pound man (made possible by heavy prosthetics) is striking and absorbing, but his performance is impactful mostly because of the pain and remorse in his eyes and heart.

Fraser plays into the misery porn well, eliciting true sympathy and genuine care from the characters and audience. He's soft spoken and understands the overbearing pathos of the material, presenting vulnerabilities not typically seen from a past action hero. Aronofsky presents the material deftly, but Fraser makes it work. The rest of the cast - Sadie Sink, Ty Simpkins, Hong Chau, and Samantha Morton - play dutifully into the melodrama, portraying their corrosive sad sacks with palpable humanity.

The Whale is so stuffed with drama that it has a little something for everybody, at least those who can overlook its general misery and dour outlook. There are soulful themes of past mistakes, parental absence, and potential redemption; characters are outlined well, if not too deeply felt or particularly relatable.

The film is a nice showcase of Aronofsky's talents as a minimalist and a magnificent showcase for Fraser's maturation as an actor, but it's just too enamored with its characters' misery to give viewers the catharsis of their redemption. Fans of adult filmmaking should see it for the talent both behind and in front of the camera, but I can't pretend the average moviegoer will come away whistling and satisfied.

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Skinamarink (2022)

10/10

"Go to Sleep."

13 February 2023

Skinamarink is a micro-budget horror film made by Canadian filmmaker Kyle Edward Ball. The film is a chamber piece, taking place entirely inside of an ordinary house which is suddenly missing doors and windows. The film contains almost no dialogue nor nearly any effects. There is a digital, cheap-looking grain effect superimposed on the entire film, mimicking a 70s era camera.

Most of the film is quiet, except for a television displaying black and white cartoons in the public domain, and the shrill sounds of Legos being dumped and moved about. Skinamarink was made for under $25,000, has a barebones plot, only five total characters, and a wafer-thin story which must be researched online to truly grasp. It is also the scariest film I have ever seen and has tortured me psychologically for well over a month.

The film follows two children, Kevin and Kaylee, who awake one night to discover their father has vanished, along with every door and window in their house. During the course of the night - which may or may not actually be an eternity - the pair begin to sense the presence of a nameless, shapeless entity who exists only to watch them suffer.

Skinamarink is fundamentally divisive. The online discourse surrounding the film is split neatly into ratings of 1s and 10s; the 1s have a slight majority but both sides are each passionate about their opinions of the film and utterly confused and/or dismayed by those who think differently. The discourse - all of the love, hatred, confusion, and polarity - make sense considering the technique and circumstances of Skinarmarink's creation.

Again, the film is essentially plotless, basically requires external material for deeper readings, and is, in every sense, extremely minimal. Its pacing is glacial and its chamber drama construction bears no opportunity for variety of place, time, or dynamic narrative structure. Therefore, those not in tune with its superior sense of atmosphere, those who simply aren't instilled with the sense of dread the film is capable of conjuring, will have nothing to grab hold to at almost any point.

Discussing, analyzing, and hypothesizing on why some don't buy into the film's power is interesting, and will be explored later, but both sides must understand a fundamental truth: the feelings of either dread or boredom the film creates at any one moment will be replicated in all remaining moments. In other words, Skinamarink is a cinematic monolith; what you see when you first gaze in is all there is. Nothing more, nothing less.

If the film doesn't work for you, it doesn't work for you...however, if you are in tune with Skinarmarink's unique sense of primordial darkness, prepare for a viewing experience of psychological unease and childlike helplessness. Allow me to indulge in removing my critical objectivity and third-person presentation to describe my incredible fright.

Films often have no effect on me. This is true of every genre but it's particularly true of horror, which I often find boring, uncreative, and repetitive, despite my love for the potential of the genre to challenge and excite. Before Skinamarink, the only film to make me hold onto my fear after the credits was Hereditary, which took only an extra day or two to process and recover from.

It has now been one month since I saw Skinamarink on the big screen; when darkness falls and the house grows silent, when I prepare for sleep or am simply trying to quietly reflect, I am still burdened and unsettled by the feelings I experienced while watching the film. The agony started in the theater, as I buried my head into my hands, barely peeking through to see nothing but static on slivers of the screen. I missed about half of the movie in this state, debating with myself on whether to stay or leave, frequently wanting to walk out but too frightened to move.

The type, intensity, and presence of fear I felt in the theater was that of when I was just a scared little boy, shaking and quivering through trailers for films my prepubescent mind found thoroughly unpleasant. That feeling has lessened in the last month but has not entirely dissipated. Skinamarink, to my nonfictional, entirely real horror, has reignited a fear of the dark I had long since forgotten, and has left me in the trembling, contemplative state of my youth. Uniquely personal visions of horror have started to intrude, and my psyche is desperate to close a box which has long been sealed, but which this damned film has reopened.

If I could sum up my thoughts on the film in five words, before slipping back on my veil of objectivity: Skinamarink is way too effective.

Perhaps the most interesting element of the film is the audience split, the love and hate. Why are some so entranced and affected when others are bored to tears? The first and most simple theory is setting of viewership. The film was leaked after a festival (intentionally, some speculate) leading to rampant piracy. Those who watch Skinarmarink on a laptop, with headphones in, are unequivocally missing the full experience. Most notably, the imagined figures in the dark static and immaculate sound design could both be misconstrued on a smaller screen. If one even hopes to find the fear in the film, a theater is mandatory.

Alternatively, Skinamarink may frighten those who have personally lived through its setting and emulations. More than just a feeling or question of nostalgia, Skinarmarink's fear is a child's fear, a fear of the unknown, an ambiguous fear most likely felt by acolytes in their own lives, when they were children. I theorize that the tone, implications, and psychological impact of the film is most deeply felt in those able to directly visualize themselves within the film, next to Kevin and Kaylee, scared and alone in a dark house with nothing but a television and a set of Legos to distract from the horrors of the house and the world.

Viewers who stayed up late at night against their parents' wishes, who had no company but blurry media and some simple toys in a slumbering house, maybe those who were generally anxious or unnerved throughout their childhood, even those with more extreme or rare trauma, will most intensely respond to Skinamarink. To sit through the movie is to sit through those memories, and the fears they create, again.

The film's emulation of the period is not just neutrally presented, but shockingly precise and accurate. Every element is meticulously tuned for maximum fear and discomfort: there's little sound throughout (the stark sound of rustling, crashing Legos most frequently keeps me awake at night) there is no adult presence to comfort characters or the audience, there is no logical rhyme or rhythm to the editing - causing shots to linger agonizingly long on ambiguous minutia - there is no human presence outside the house, there is little light from within, and there is no explanation or exposition as to the why or how of it all. The viewer is utterly alone with the children throughout, hoping for relief, praying for release.

Skinamarink can be summarized, ironically enough, with a quote from beloved comedy The Office. As the group watches a film made by Gabe, he senses confusion and tension about the lack of story, and chimes in: "Yeah, seems like there isn't a narrative. Maybe the filmmaker realized that even narrative is comforting." Most know, in some sense, that narrative is indeed comforting. But I never knew just how comforting it was until it was gone.

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M3GAN (2022)

3/10

"Being Under Sixty lbs. and Holding M3GAN is Like Smoking Five Macanudo Cigars a Day."

9 February 2023

Back into the doldrums of January we dive. The late year avalanche of films competing for an Oscar is behind us, leaving ahead a slate of films that are too poor for studios to release during the course of the year. The very first on this docket is M3GAN (m'3 · gin) a well-trodden story of evil dolls and the kids who love them.

Written by Akela Cooper - with story by James Wan - and directed by Gerard Johnstone, the film is an immediately stale and familiar rehash of horror tropes which atrophied in the early 90s at latest. There's the thinnest layer of stale paint slathered onto the surface, but this is a film you've seen many, many, many times before.

The film follows Gemma, a corporate toy inventor with little time or empathy to spare, who must raise her niece Cady after her parents die in a car crash. To free up time and remedy Cady's loneliness, Gemma rushes production on her latest invention, M3GAN, an android capable of caring for children and emulating friendship on a fundamentally human level. Will Cady learn to reciprocate M3gan's love? Will Gemma finally get some peace and quiet around the house? Will something stupid happen to transform a potentially thought-provoking idea into generic slasher #42-14-C? Have you seen a movie before?

Everything about M3GAN is pedestrian and creaky, starting with the screenplay. The entire story, beat for beat, is tediously predictable and painstakingly formulaic in the grander scope. Each plot point is telegraphed well ahead of time and most characters are difficult to care about - M3GAN may be the most developed character in the entire affair, though she doesn't hold a candle to the personality or twisted charisma of forebearer Chucky.

Cooper, who also wrote last year's Malignant, writes a distinctly HallMarkian brand of horror. She uses trauma and tragedy as crutches, suffocating her characters in misery to either distance the remaining story from the initial context, or ignoring it altogether.

These initial moments of melodrama provide cheap hooks for audiences without offering the slightest depth or thematic context for what follows. This populist approach is regressive for a genre which has been invigorated, refreshed, and, dare I say, elevated in the last decade plus. Not every horror film needs to aspire for artistic triumph, but those which don't needn't be hackneyed, wafer-thin bores.

The most fractured crumbs of theme, such as parental responsibility, technological overload, corporate hierarchy, synthetic "friendship", and car safety, are sprinkled atop M3GAN, but never explored or extrapolated on. These insights are obvious if not reductive, and function as little more than half baked minutia to fill time between bouts of robot slashing mundanity. James Wan is credited with the story, though I'd hope he donates most royalties to Don Mancini.

Cooper's lack of style or substance is executed to a tee by Johnstone, who adds nothing of value or interest to the proceedings. The only interesting visual note is how relatively similar the non-gore sequences are to Malignant, despite different cinematographers. Perhaps James Wan stepped in to direct the lighting and tone of the film, or maybe Peter McCaffrey was desperate to emulate Michael Burgess' rampant over lighting and garish blue hues.

The cast turns in solid work all around. No one shines or transcends the dreadful material; most everyone is content play their part without flash or indulgence. Allison Williams is decently cold as a calculating and distant inventor. Brian Jordan Alvarez and Jen Van Epps are milquetoast as her concerned but ultimately unimportant friends and colleagues. Ronny Chieng hams up a humorously crazed role as the CEO a toy/tech giant. Violet McGraw is sweet and vulnerable in her portrayal of recently-orphaned Cady. And Amie Donald is effectively creepy and robotic as the murderous toy, with the wonderfully complementary voice of Jenna Davis.

Overall, there is absolutely nothing innovative or intelligent about M3GAN. The film feels simultaneously too slickly produced and horribly cheap looking, clearly averse to creative risks. The story touches on a multitude of cliches, tropes, and conventions, adding no life or subversion to any of them. Even the gore is toned down to achieve the coveted PG-13 rating. Admittedly, this is a smart move by Blumhouse; the film is clearly not built with critical acclaim in mind, so any chance to rake in the adolescent allowances is a welcome one. There may be some who see M3GAN as a great idea and wish to purchase their own in some distant future - as for me, I'd much prefer a Tammy Craps doll.

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Infinity Pool (2023)

5/10

"Do You Worry They Got the Wrong Man?"

8 February 2023

From the mind of Brandon Cronenberg, son of legendary horror director David Cronenberg, comes Infinity Pool. A follow up to his debut Possessor, Infinity Pool is a more conventional but denser observation on the power and immunity money can buy, especially in more destitute regions of the world. Like his father, Brandon fixates on the body, particularly its affinity toward corruption when introduced to empowering external stimuli. His film is a mixed bag of gory pessimism, hypersexual excess, and enigmatic motivations, lumbering and indulgent, but not without its charms.

The film follows James and Em Foster during their paradise getaway. When they meet another couple, Gabi and Alban Bauer, a spontaneous decision to leave the safety of the luxury resort sets off a series of events which tests the couple's resolve and James' sanity.

It is immediately apparent that Brandon takes after his father's unique filmic tendencies, for better and worse. His sense of atmosphere and innate tension is communicated within the first few minutes of the film, and Infinity Pool also lacks the connective tissue and plausibility which David often grasped for through his career, with infrequent success.

The most fantastical and surreal element of Infinity Pool can be taken at face value - be given some inherent leeway - because it's woven into the context of the basic premise. However, the broader reality of the film is lacking; the motivations and actions of each central character are murky, and the absence of many personal backgrounds only makes things hazier. The best comparison is Scanners; telepathy and exploding heads I can believe, but the broader plot and reality of the film quickly strains credibility.

More specific than the lack of overall plausibility, Infinity Pool's structure and progression is illogical, bordering on arbitrary. It's easier to identify what the story is missing, rather than what it provides. For example, the film lacks a consistent sense of cause and effect, reaching instead for plotting which is often unpredictable, but only because its reasoning is not grounded in any meaningful context or reality.

It's missing a foundation to develop plot because Cronenberg is more concerned with James' interior state, but his psyche is not fleshed out through dialogue or action; the film is eventful, but there is no rhyme or rhythm, forcing its audience to guess what characters are thinking at a given point, and why. The narrative issues could be overlooked if Infinity Pool boasted relatable thematic pillars or genuinely disturbing horror, but it's primarily a character study, anchored by a thin and humorless man at its center.

Infinity Pool is not Film as Metaphor, but it's frustratingly close. The metaphor here, as usual, seems to revolve around the excesses, inequality, and sadism of the rich compared to those around them. These themes are always worth exploring, but Infinity Pool does them a disservice, firstly by drawing its affluent characters as caricatures, secondly by substituting a meaningful plot for repetitive and tedious demonstrations, and thirdly by drawing comparisons to a plethora of other films with identical themes and disdain for affluence.

True, the film is better than more recent attempts - Ready or Not, Bodies Bodies Bodies, and The Invitation - but it pales to historical examples which offer far greater engagement and provocations, such as Eyes Wide Shut, Society, or Fight Club.

Despite the general implausibility of the film, Infinity Pool is an unpredictable and dense tale which is laden with thoughtful symbolism and an abundance of interpretations. The film is not exactly fun to watch (for the most part) but it is fun to reflect on what exactly Cronenberg means to say and the creative choices he makes throughout.

Again, Brandon is reflective of his father; like Dead Ringers, arguably David's best film, Infinity Pool invites complex questions about ourselves, such as our limits for pain and pleasure, our sense of being in the world, and our perception of ourselves within the natural order. How would each of us react to a literal loss of control, if we had to witness our own destruction or rebirth? Both Cronenbergs are adamant that to lose our bodies is to relinquish our sanity; whether one agrees or disagrees with this assessment, it's a pleasure to watch the festering insanity unfold.

Another irksome detail of Infinity Pool is the cloying style in which its filmed. Cronenberg opts for extreme, grating closeups throughout, purposely framed in an obtuse and increasingly misaligned manner. The style is ostensibly chosen to elicit tension, unease, or alienation, a decision which succeeds for a few opening minutes but quickly becomes tiresome and somewhat pretentious. The effect is simply overused, and the closeness deprives the viewer of detail about the surrounding world. Cutting off the characters' world unintentionally cuts off their thoughts from the viewer, further mystifying their precarious states of mind.

Despite this annoying flourish, there are many delightfully uncanny images and sequences throughout. By far the most fascinating and engaging is a hallucinatory drug experience for James, wherein he and other members of the resort engage in the sort of reckless debauchery many assume the ultra-wealthy often partake in.

The sequence is a great display of Cronenberg's potential for a singular vision, a neatly executed, rhythmic, well-paced, hyper-sensory yet thematically relevant exploration of erotic conquest. In the many ways Brandon can compared to his father, fascination with "the flesh" tops the list; Infinity Pool is uneven, but this is an extended moment of triumph.

The performances reflect the murky nature and tone of the film, as most of the cast builds their characterizations on pillars of sand. Star Alexander Skarsgard is predominantly stoic and blank looking, giving frequent nonreactions to events which often demand some sort of emotional feedback.

Mia Goth is the scream queen for a new generation, but she's unnatural as a glitzy, obscurely-accented mistress of the night; most high-society types tend to be obsessively sexualized trophies, like Anna Nicole Smith or Marylin Monroe, or nipped and tucked into dystopian emulations of the human figure, like the Kardashians. To Goth's credit, she's neither plasticized nor sculpted enough to be a natural fit for the role. I can only hope she starts a trend.

Ultimately, Infinity Pool is conceptually interesting, but weighed down by its visual sameness to other horror and its lack of narrative cohesion. It takes its sweet time and gives up no easy answers. The viewer is often left to guess, which is arguably a form of engagement, but also leaves a hollow feeling when the credits role.

Cronenberg will undoubtably have many more opportunities down the line; hopefully he learns to tighten focus, develop more complex characters, and ground his film in a version of reality we all share, rather than one which is utterly alien and unrelatable. When Brandon does leave his father's shadow, he'll find not only personal gratification, but artistic paydirt as well.

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Knock at the Cabin (2023)

4/10

"Your Premise is Flawed."

3 February 2023

Time for a return to Shyamalan. He broke into the industry with meteoric trajectory thanks to The Sixth Sense and will always be most known for the film's legendary final twist. The real twist, however, is that unbeknownst to anyone, The Sixth Sense would represent a microcosm of the talented director's entire career: a twisting, zigzagging, unpredictable dive into the horror/thriller genre, anchored by a seemingly limitless supply of always-just-untapped potential. His films are always unique, and the best - Sixth Sense, Signs, Unbreakable, and The Village (yeah, sue me) - are careful meditations on perception with hints of horror and slanted comedy.

His worst films - you know the ones - are self-indulgent, incoherent slogs which awkwardly grind against his patient, subtle eye as a visual stylist. Knock at the Cabin is not his worst film (taking that crown is nigh impossible) but may be his most predictable and least inspired. Categorizing good Shyamalan from bad is easy to do, but Knock at the Cabin is distinct in its laborious attempt to feel and act like the former while transparently being the latter.

The film follows Eric, Andrew, and Wen, a family vacationing at a secluded cabin. When four strangers arrive, speaking of sacrifice and the apocalypse, the family must decide what to believe, pitting their love for one another against the seeming weight of the greater good.

The film is a chamber piece, taking place almost entirely in a single cabin with seven characters. This simple fact sinks the entire affair. Everything about Knock is thin: its premise, its visual presentation, its themes, its characters, its "lore", and its reason for being. There is not enough context, information, or explanation posited, to the characters or the audience, to justify spending nearly the entire film trapped in the cabin.

In theory, the film should be either a taut, claustrophobic snapshot of a day, or a reflective, multi-layered, extended rumination on the trolley problem, but Knock at the Cabin's central conceit and greater aspirations are so vague, and the story so resourceless, that it's little more than a repetitive, redundant, tedious bore.

The story is frustratingly narrow yet shamelessly half baked, an intriguing first draft which is simply never developed in any meaningful way. A wider scope or more conventional structure would have at least created a forward-moving, step-by-step plot and some organic character revelations; instead, the repetition and sameness of setting creates only an endless, unfocused, and unhelpful bickering match.

Shyamalan's visual decisions do his film no favors either. He evokes unfavorable memories of Mark Walberg in the Happening with incessant use of comically tight closeups and further channels his inner hack by ripping off Jonathan Demme's just-speak-directly-into-the-camera technique. The cinematography is pretty enough but does nothing to foster contemplation or raw dread. Shyamalan the drudging screenwriter is reasonably expected; Shyamalan the hopelessly floundering shot composer is new to the palate and tough to swallow.

The patience of his camera (his most admirable trait as a visual storyteller) persists, but his signature foreboding does not, and its absence only reinforces its necessity in keeping his films tense and engaging. In Shyamalan's best work, the atmosphere and surroundings hold evil seldom seen, darkened and ominous to those daring to peek in. In Knock at the Cabin the sun shine brightly, the woodsy surroundings pose no threat, and the central danger is in plain view, speaking softly, blandly, unambiguously.

The film is also hampered by its casting decisions and performances. Dave Bautista is severely miscast, attempting admirably, but failing miserably, to play a soft-spoken, everyman second grade teacher. Not since Schwarzenegger's kindergarten cop has a strongman so implausibly tried to pass as a gentle, thoughtful presence. Arnold had the advantage of displaying affection for his tykes and developing a relevant arc - Bautista has no such benefit. The other actors (Jonathan Groff, Ben Aldridge, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Dave Bautista, Rupert Grint, Abby Quinn, and Kristen Cui) are reasonably cast but equally irritating.

Knock at the Cabin is ludicrously overwrought; the entire cast chews on their lines with open mouths, furiously wheezing, panting, balling, pausing, and emphasizing each word. Despite little information being given, in any capacity, every line is the most important of the film, and each actor slowly suffocates in its unearned self-seriousness. As a nitpicky aside, Groff and Aldridge are also physically similar, making it difficult to keep straight their razor thin but opposing characterizations.

The final and most damning elements of Knock at the Cabin are its effects and attempts at visual exposition. Perhaps the most bizarrely overlooked trait of Shyamalan's films (both his best and worst) is the clunky yet vital exposition given via poorly emulated news broadcasts. As in The Happening and Signs, narratively detached news anchors are an essential source of exposition and plotting, conveniently stating the facts most pertinent to timely character concerns throughout.

These broadcasts also feature the bulk of Knock at the Cabin's effects, which are shockingly cheap and inarguably distracting. The film is supposed to be a tale of world-burning, apocalyptic terror, but can only muster one mighty tsunami wave to invoke true awe and fear. The other catastrophes are either visually incompetent or entirely, perplexingly, non-visual.

Overall, Knock at the Cabin is disappointing because it offers so little for audiences of varying expectations. Those who are excited for vintage "so bad it's good" Shyamalan will have nothing to sink their talons into (the effects are terrible but brief). Those looking for vintage "so good it's good" Shyamalan will be dismayed by the lack of atmosphere, plot, or subversion the director built his career on. Those looking for a director to mature or progress in his style or substance will grimace as he reverses sensibilities in both. This is a thin, predictable, repetitive, and maddeningly vague film which scoffs at variance of interpretation and leaves no impact. Most simply stated, Knock at the Cabin is a whole lotta' nothin'.

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Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)

3/10

"So There It Was. We Were Water People Now."

16 December 2022

Welcome back into the media cycle, James Cameron. Sometimes divisive with critics but always pushing forward, Cameron has often dragged the cinema kicking and screaming into the age of digital wizardry. His contributions to the medium have been rewarded by audiences repeatedly, adored by a burgeoning demographic in the eighties and frequently breaking box office records since releasing Titanic in 1997. But lo! Avatar: The Way of Water may buck the trend - rather than gross the GDP of Suriname, the film may only gross the GDP of Belize - a pittance.

The film follows the continuing lives of Jake Sully and Neytiri. When marines return to seek revenge and use Pandora as a second Earth, the couple must flee from their forest home and into the water of a coastal tribe. There, they must learn to adapt to their new home as Colonel Miles Quaritch, cloned and in an avatar body, searches for their whereabouts.

Avatar 2 is an impressively large and extraordinarily long film, but there is one constant which is unwaveringly distracting - the high frame rate. Talented filmmakers like Cameron, Ang Lee, and Peter Jackson, occasionally allow hubris to misguide them in their quest for innovation and cutting-edge superficialities.

To this end, all three are desperately trying to incorporate a higher frame rate into their films, which is said to make look film more "realistic," a supposition I've never understood. How does an artificially inflated frame rate, the most standardized metric in art, look more natural to viewers who are accustomed, throughout their entire lives, to the previous standard? I humbly speak for the film-going public when I answer, "it does not." Avatar 2 further innovates by switching between (perceived) twenty-four and forty-eight frames per second. Although audiences are gifted less high frame rate, the technique only further distracts, as the film schizophrenically cuts between expected motion and horribly smooth action. It's also bound to greatly confuse those who notice the difference but aren't in the loop as to why or how. If the practice, inconceivably, becomes the standard, I may never see another blockbuster. Death to high frame rates!

Any given viewer's reaction to Avatar 2 will largely depend on their opinion pertaining to the state of filmmaking currently, relating to its trajectory since the release of the previous installment. Those pining for the days of practical effects and tangible sets having nothing to look forward to, but those accustomed to CGI spectacles will be comfortably pleased.

Avatar 2's effects are not dated, bland, or indulgent; most of the CGI is beautifully textured and necessary for the film's sweeping camerawork and general scope. The problem is that the underlying failures of computer-generated imagery are stalwart: the characters and objects are weightless, and the physics remain uncanny, even if the aesthetics are often breathtaking.

In 2009, the ambition of rendering the majority of a live action film in a computer (one which looked magnitudes more convincing than even the most impressive CGI of the time) was daring enough to justify a tradeoff in verisimilitude. The first film became the highest grossing film of all time (no, not adjusted for inflation) because general audiences had never seen such expansive use of CGI outside of a Star Wars prequel.

Now...it's all they know. Viewers will see CGI landscapes and effects in at least two trailers immediately preceding the film (Quantumania and Guardians of the Galaxy 3) which are just as colorful, creative, expansive, and busy. They might be cheaper, not as luxuriously rendered or detailed, but the novelty is long dead.

Pre-armed with knowledge of the industry over a decade, and the alarming gap between the two films, it's reasonable to assume Cameron would ration considerable time, energy, and attention to his script - he has not. Motivations, character development, and structure are still laughably childish and thin; despite the 195-minute runtime, the film is largely uneventful. Obviously, Cameron's M. O. this time around is showing off the technological progress and giving audiences a 2001-esque peak into his imagined world, but it's not creative or unique enough to warrant the length or simplicity.

Filling the void when spectacle fizzles is grating "character work" mostly centering around the offspring of our previous protagonists, Jake and Neytiri. The children are seen as outsiders to the new tribe and are challenged to fit in for the sake of peace and harmony, a plotline which derivatively borrows from the first film, itself an already-tired Dances with Wolves retread.

This desolate, barren story soil could be given fresh nutrients with intriguing characters or complex dynamics; instead, Cameron bashes his audiences over the head with one of the most well-trodden and insipid themes of the modern age. It's amusing: a character from a preceding Shazam trailer mockingly references the Fast and Furious films and their shallow fixation on "family," which is followed by Avatar 2's three-hour opus to the word. There's probably some dystopian subtext to the recent fetishization of familial love, but the surface-level triteness alone signals a need for a new dead horse to brutalize.

Additionally, the dialogue is laughably blunt, a painful mix of direct verbalizations of feelings and irrelevant, throwaway banter, all articulated by way of grade-school-curriculum diction. The first fifteen minutes are also dedicated to narrated exposition, so rushed and pandering that Rise of Skywalker is blushing in the corner. If, as some have said, the first Avatar gained no cultural traction because it simply lacked a story and characters worth remembering, Avatar 2 will suffer the same relative obscurity. I hope the international grosses are worth all the monosyllables.

The performances are dutiful but unremarkable. Unlike the original, there's seldom a scene with real humans in the film, so the motion capture is forced to do the heavy lifting. Actors become voice actors, and only Zoe Saldana musters genuine feeling without being seen.

To be fair to Sam Worthington, Stephen Lang, Kate Winslet, and Cliff Curtis, the characterizations are too stiff and flat for any detailed emotion. Similarly, Jamie Flatters, Britain Dalton, Trinity Jo-Li Bliss, Jack Champion, Bailey Bass, Filip Geljo, and Duane Evans Jr. Work admirably as the scuffling youngsters.

Avatar 2 is exactly what audiences hope it won't be: a retelling of the original film in a different location, excruciatingly predictable and free of any character, thematic, or intellectual intrigue. Every story element and conservational ideal has been done before, and better.

However, this was also true of the original; it will be interesting to see if the technological promise and spectacle of the sequel are enough to lure audiences into theaters like they were a decade and change ago. Personally, the film evoked no particular emotion, but it did put me in the mood for Planet Earth. At least David Attenborough provides narration for subjects who can't already talk.

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Don't Worry Darling (I) (2022)

6/10

"Welcome to the Victory Project."

23 September 2022

After a somewhat chaotic production and tabloid-driven controversy, Warner Brothers' Don't Worry Darling has been released into theaters. Carrying the prestige of solid but glaring antecedents, the film is a calculated, patient mix of classics like Rosemary's Baby, The Stepford Wives, Brave New World, and a slew of other classic media about those trapped within their worlds and their minds.

Don't Worry Darling is directed by Olivia Wilde, her sophomore effort after the wildly popular Booksmart, and written by Katie Silberman, Carey Van Dyke, and Shane Van Dyke. Wilde's contributions are singular and focused, an impressive second effort for a relatively inexperienced filmmaker. The script, ironically, is sophomoric - messy, repetitive, and painfully reductive.

The film is set during the 1950s and follows Alice Chambers, who lives with her husband Jack in the pleasant, picturesque town of Victory. Their decadent lifestyle is paid for by the Victory Project, who oversee the town and its people, but Alice's serenity and routine are soon disrupted after she witnesses a plane crash. With her mind unravelling, she begins to sense something sinister about the town, the company, and her own place within its borders.

There's a lot to like about Don't Worry Darling. The entire production is meticulous and perfectly styled, enveloping viewers into a brilliantly suffocating atmosphere of 50s utopia. The 1950s in film (especially modern films) is often painted with a heavy and distracting gauze of irony; the overbearing aesthetics of the period usually feel purposefully synthetic, like they've been lifted straight from a brochure. Wilde sidesteps these cliches.

Don't Worry Darling's Victory is pleasant and sunny, but the film keeps a unique balance, presenting a town which feels lived in and practical. The desert sun sears residents, the fine china feels personal and authentic, and the homes look genuinely inviting. Where most filmic landscapes of the 50s never feel like more than a façade, Victory looks like an enjoyable, livable place. In short, Don't Worry Darling does for mid-century suburbia what Star Wars (and Alien) did for spaceships.

The legitimacy of the atmosphere is wonderfully complimented by Wilde's eye and Affonso Goncalves' editing. The pair are in harmony with each other and effectively synthesize tension from the flimsy script. Wilde's main tools are symmetry and visual repetition, while Goncalves uses a classical, Griffith-like accelerating tempo in his cutting structure.

The mixture of these elements (atmosphere, symmetry, and tempo) emulates the sort of high tension found within other contemporary thrillers of the mundane like We Need to Talk About Kevin. Both films have contextually ordinary realities but use filmmaking techniques to clue audiences into the abnormalities subtly boiling just beneath their manicured surfaces.

It bears repeating: the core strengths of the film are its singleness of vision and its wholly engrossing atmosphere and pacing. It's become cliched praise, but Don't Worry Darling would make delectable prestige television, straight down to its too-thin premise.

Helping construct the film's perfectly pitched tone are cinematographer Matthew Libatique and composer John Powell. Libatique emphasizes Victory's heat; every performer glows under Victory's scorching sun, shiny and tanned. The film is uber-colorful and highly saturated to evoke the gauzy, saccharine pleasures of the town. Indoors, at night, things cool off but aren't cool. Shadows fall and colors are more muted, but blacks are never overly emphasized. Every scene is visually pitched to a delicious, delirious heat.

Conversely, Powell's soundtrack uses whispers and delicate strings to poke and prod inside Alice's mind. While his soundscape does become overbearing and too forceful by film's end, the quieter, more relaxed chords are entrancing and effective. Powell uses an eclectic mix of acapella and instrumentation to keep viewers on their toes and scratching their heads, punctuating moments with a hushed cacophony and keeping a firm grip on his sonic harnesses through most of the film.

All of these cleverly conceived and passionately executed elements make Don't Worry Darling's sloppy, thin story a crushing disappointment. Most glaringly, the script is poorly structured. Its opening act conveys little information about anything or anybody, setting up early context and later revelations on a foundation of sand.

The bulk of the film is nothing but a series of teases and vagaries, so poorly connected to each other or immediate consequences that they might as well be dream sequences. Wilde does make effective use of their surreal tones and abstract qualities, but a series of paranoid fake outs does not make for a holistic or satisfying story. The story behind the story, what audiences are ultimately paying for, stretches plausibility.

Lack of substance is not the only defining quality of the script. It's also glaringly derivative, highly repetitive, insultingly reductive, and maddeningly obtuse. The writers' influences are myriad, but the key works are listed up top. As a bonus, the film also borrows 1984's iconic cover illustration. Like Jordan Peele's Us, Don't Worry Darling struggles to reconcile its subtext with its literal thrills, opting for wheel spinning and unanswerable questions in lieu of a logical or internally rigorous narrative.

Unlike Us, the subtext isn't worth the effort; the film has little to say beyond a tepid rehashing of current political dogma. For a fleeting moment, interesting questions about contemporary work life, the nature of exhaustion, and the desire to live within comfortable lies are raised, but they're quickly abandoned for an obligatory and out of place climax. On top of the stale message, the film quickly unravels after the big reveal, instantly raising plot-based questions of motivation, financing, and pointless secrecy.

Don't Worry Darling is exceedingly frustrating. The film is made with clear forethought and an eye for the edit, which is depressingly refreshing in today's assembly line filmmaking mode. It's snappily paced and never boring, though its constant motion and narrative gimmicks keep the viewer at arm's length emotionally and psychologically. The story is far too thin, mostly predictable, and gratingly simplistic, in stark contrast to the film's depth of atmosphere and visual construction.

Overall, it's a solid effort which lives halfway up to its potential. I tentatively recommend it, with two words of caution: stay away from the trailer (I sorely wish I'd gone in blind) and don't expect anything too shocking. Admittedly, it's a paradox; the less you know the better, but there's not much worth spoiling.

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The Woman King (2022)

6/10

"We Are...The Dahomey!"

17 September 2022

Warning: Spoilers

The culture war is a strange and mysterious force, one which makes people act contrary to their own beliefs when presented with an opportunity to "gotcha!" their opponents. Most times, the talking points and vitriol of the war are foisted onto the peasants, the foot soldiers who take what their masters and commanders give them to heart. Occasionally the product makers must enter the trenches, to rile up their side after a gaffe and remind them who the real enemy is - the peasants in the next trench over.

This action is usually taken when the quality of the newest product is too lousy to incite the usual, wholehearted discourse, like when Sony released their Ghostbusters remake in 2016, or Marvel released Captain Marvel in 2019. Credit to the makers of The Woman King; the culture war has led them to create a film totally contrary to their beliefs, but they've made a solid effort of it, and have mostly refrained from energizing the troops.

There are two parts to this review. The first will discuss the film itself; the second will discuss the creators, the audience, and the cynicism behind making a film about the Dahomey. If you're terminally online, you may have already seen the debate raging in the background - if you haven't, I'll proudly introduce you to the historical context. First though, the film proper.

Part One.

The film follows the Dahomey tribe in 1823 Africa, who are faced with various moral and physical threats. The clear and present danger is the aggression of the Oyo tribe, who rule over Dahomey and demand sacrifices with greater frequency and brutality. On a more personal level, the film follows Nawi, a young Dahomey woman who joins the Agojie, a female sect of the Dahomey army. As Nawi bonds with her warrior sisters, she must prove her toughness and earn the respect of Nanisca, general of the Agojie.

The Woman King is a period piece filmed in Africa and sporting a plethora of expertly designed and crafted costumes and sets. The chief pleasure of the film is drinking in the many meticulous, immaculate details of the Dahomey palace where the Agojie live and train. Each piece of hair styling, jewelry, and clothing is ornately conceived and executed, creating a lavish atmosphere and presence of aesthetic novelty.

The performances are all ace too. Like many military films, the cast does an excellent job demonstrating the bond and love they have for their fellow warriors. The Agojie perform rituals, feats of strength, and even an obstacle course to prove themselves outside of real combat, demonstrating a fierce loyalty and commitment to their bond. They also sing and dance at points, showcasing an enriching, universal symbol of culture rarely seen in films about Africa and its people.

Viola Davis, Lashana Lynch, Sheila Atim, and Thuso Mbedu gracefully and organically convey a carefully maintained dynamic; they support each other and offer comfort and advice but respect the hierarchy of their roles in the army. Davis is a general, Lynch and Atim are senior warriors just under her, and Mbedu is a headstrong and nimble recruit, aching to prove herself. Mbedu's performance is particularly strong, as the film may be called The Woman King, but it's Mbedu's story; the lessons and experiences she gathers as young Nawi provide the audience with a relatable, personable anchor. John Boyega's King Ghezo is also steadfast, a contemplative and restrained monarch presiding over the turbulent kingdom.

Although The Woman King's sets and costuming feel grand, the film itself never feels particularly epic. Its scope is rather small and its filmmaking is disappointingly conventional, consisting mostly of bland medium shots and closeups. Director Gina Prince-Bythewood has an opulent world of lavish tapestries and colors to explore but opts to keep the visual dimensions square and safe. This is not a boring film but it's also not particularly engaging, never rising above a workmanlike presentation.

The story is also a bit scattered; there are several points of interest active at any given time (Nawi's integration into the Agojie, the Oyo's aggressive tribunal demands, Nansica's past demons and grudge against the Oyo general, and a pair of white slavers mixing in with it all) but many of these seem to freeze in time when not on screen. The film has blinders on, focusing intently on one threat at the expense of others, never managing to fully contextualize or balance its interconnecting threads.

Lastly, the action of the film is uneven. The choreography seems kinetic and the performers capable, but there's rarely an action sequence not spliced to hell. There's little clarity to most of the fighting, and although a spec of brutality comes across during most battles, the film's PG-13 rating heavily sanitizes the bloodlust and savagery of the warring groups. Watching the fights on set, in real time, was probably quiet a spectacle, but little of that talent and skill translate to the finished product. Certainly not the worst action in recent memory, but frustratingly tame and obfuscated.

Overall, The Woman King is worth seeing. There is immense craft on display, primarily in the gorgeous costuming and elaborate Dahomey sets. The decision to film on location (or at least, in Africa) pays off handsomely, producing a sense of genuine place - a principle which contemporary cinema has largely abandoned. The Woman King displays a culture and people rarely seen in American cinema, whose social and political dynamics make for an interesting and invigorating history lesson. Or at least, they should have made for a history lesson. But we can't have everything, can we?

Part Two.

The Woman King is a controversial film. If you watched the trailer and listened to those who made it, you probably wouldn't know why. Throughout the advertising, and dominant in the film itself, is the idea of the Agojie fighting back against the notion of slavery and all who practice it. The Agojie exist to ensure their people remain free and Africa is never chained to the greed and vileness of the white man. During the trailer's climax, Nanisca proudly proclaims them "the blade of freedom!"

This is all incredibly noble, but it's also a gigantic lie. History Vs. Hollywood sums it up better than I could: "The Kingdom of Dahomey was a bloodthirsty society bent on conquest. They conquered neighboring African states and took their citizens as slaves, selling many in the Atlantic slave trade in exchange for items like rifles, tobacco, and alcohol. Many of the slaves they sold ended up in America."

Also, "There are accounts of Dahomey warriors conducting slave raids on villages where they cut the heads off of the elderly and rip the bottom jaw bones off others. During the raids, they'd burn the villages to the ground. Those who they let live, including the children, were taken captive, and sold as slaves." One more for good measure: "Each year in Dahomey, roughly 500 slaves and criminals were mass executed in large-scale human sacrifices during the religious ceremonies of a festival known as the Annual customs of Dahomey. The 1727 Annual customs of the Dahomey ceremony reportedly saw as many as 4,000 people sacrificed."

This historical film is not only massively ahistorical but fabricated to reverse the historical truth. The filmmakers (most notably Viola Davis, who serves as producer and was instrumental in getting the film made) have taken a story of slavery, barbarism, and the stark nature of pre-modern life, and smeared modern sensibilities all over it, annihilating its complexity, moral preponderances, and its lack of convention.

Despite the overall craft and production of the film, the sweaty smudges of their fingerprints are difficult to see through. The filmmakers would've had to read about the Dahomey's vicious streak, they must have known their subjects before the cameras started rolling. They knew, and they were happy to ignore such history, narrowly focusing on girl power and licking their chops at a marketing campaign that would write itself.

Many of the film's defenders have pointed to the existence of Gods and Generals (a film which glorifies the Confederacy) as precedence of Hollywood's callousness. They fail to follow their own thread, missing the fact that Gods and Generals was lambasted by critics and audiences alike and bombed hard. While The Woman King isn't quite as disgustingly one-sided as that film, and certainly not as boring, it does represent as shrewd and calculated an attempt to violently twist history, making saviors of slavers, and villains of abolitionists.

The culture war claims another victory for transparent hypocrisy. Davis and company have made a film about a military unit with a uniquely significant percentage of women, which existed to enslave neighboring states and perpetuate the transatlantic slave trade. They have written themselves in circles, adding a myriad of fictional characters and beliefs to absolve their historical subjects of any moral responsibility. They have cooed and preached about the importance of being seen and urged moviegoers to support their own bankrupt integrity.

The only step now is to enter the trenches and rile up the troops if the film is in danger of box office failure; remind their side who the real enemy is (it certainly isn't the slavers!) and reprimand those who won't spend two and a half hours of their time being lied to. This hasn't happened yet as far as I know, though I've also been apprehensive to check. I'm recommending the film (it's well made and keeps the overt pandering to a minimum) but there's nothing wrong with skipping it. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

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The Invitation (II) (2022)

4/10

"Where are the Bride and Groom?"

3 September 2022

The whole of cinema could probably be put on a spectrum; one side would represent "director-driven, singular visions," and the other would represent "committee/studio mandated corporate prerogatives." The move from one side to the other, hundreds of thousands of films, would represent an increase or decline in cinematic quality, depending on the direction of movement. This pattern would be largely accurate through the entire history of the medium.

Sure, there would be exceptions, your Heaven's Gates, your Death to Smoochy's, your Popeyes. M. Night Shyamalan really throws the experiment on its head. But generally, the trend would hold: artistic, personal visions up top, executive-driven, committee-think drivel on bottom. The Invitation is firmly planted toward the latter end of the spectrum.

The film follows Evie, a young American woman, who discovers that her great grandfather was the servant of a wealthy British family. Upon reaching out to the family, Evie is invited to a wedding on the grounds of an old English manor, and subsequently falls for Walter, the lord of the manor. As peculiar and ghastly occurrences start to haunt the grounds, Evie must reconcile her love for Walter with the new and altogether alien surroundings.

Viewers who rarely watch movies (maybe one every two months or so) could be duped into thinking The Invitation is a meaningful or impressive project. Its direction is flat but sleek, it's cinematography is effectively moody, and its twist is exciting and shocking for those who've never seen a plot thicken. But make no mistake; The Invitation is by-the-numbers, a derivative of a derivative, shamelessly ripping off recent hits like Get Out, Ready or Not, and, less directly, Antebellum.

The film has the least intrigue, least subtlety, and most filler of any entry in the "young (oppressed group) goes to (rich place) and must violently fight back against (strawman group.)" genre, which began in earnest with Get Out. The film is made by Sony's Screen Gem division, and the company has handled the material much in the same way they've handled they're Marvel properties. That is, without care or forethought; the entire film reeks of desperation and checklist ticking.

The fundamental and persistent problem with The Invitation is its script, written by Blair Butler, who has previously penned masterstrokes Polaroid and Hell Fest. Butler's script is amateurish in every regard: the banter between Evie and her friend Grace is forced and inane, the structure drags even while puffed up by rote slasher filler, and the climax should be the most anticlimactic of the year.

There are zero surprises in The Invitation, zero laughs, and zero fun or suspense. It is, again, totally uninspired and by-the-numbers. To think of how many writers are languishing in obscurity or hardship while material like this is greenlit is sickening. Go into any office drawer in the country and you'd find a piece with more dramatic integrity.

Although the script is maddeningly unoriginal, the film as a whole is not irredeemable. Jessica M. Thompson's direction is patient and uncanny at times. The film's opening sequence is wild and unhinged, a decent preamble to the more stately and mannered events to come. The overt horror is not scary, but it is built up with attention to detail and potent tension. The soundtrack is grand if a bit grating. Aside from the last act, which is downright horrendous in every imaginable way, The Invitation is mostly just vaguely average. It's a time-killer that floats by at a reasonable pace.

The only elements which truly stand out in the film are its cinematography and set design. Cinematographer Autumn Eakin bathes the old manor in a diffused, cool blue light which emphasizes its gothic roots and creates some much-needed atmosphere. The grounds feel cold and alien, but there's also a warm comfort to the luxury of the manor, doused with warm, orange hues. There are also many costumes and sets which exude an old English charm; the prestige of the characters' history is obvious and enticing. Huge props to the location scout and wardrobe department for rising above the material.

Overall, The Invitation is uninspired, predictable, and without thrill. Its characters are caricatures, its politics are hollow, and its themes of identity and class are leaden, dragging down any fun or spooks generated by the competent craft. By far the most interesting thing about the film is just how much is revealed in the trailer, which gives away the central twist and is made mostly of scenes from the third act. If you feel compelled to watch the film, just pop the trailer on and save yourself the drive to the theater and the price of a ticket - it's all there.

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Three Thousand Years of Longing (2022)

6/10

"There is No Story About Wishing That is Not a Cautionary Tale."

26 August 2022

George Miller has had a hell of a career. Much of his film work has revolved around the Mad Max franchise, but he's done a variety of work such as Happy Feet and The Witches of Eastwick. It's an eclectic mix which has led to his most eclectic film yet, Three Thousand Years of Longing. Although it's not his best work, Three Thousand Years seems to be a deeply personal film.

There are many idiosyncratic choices throughout Three Thousand Years which mark it as a passion project; it wouldn't be surprising to learn that the film languished in development hell or lacked the proper budgeting for its globe trekking story. Whatever the case, the joy for the material is evident, alongside some extremely obtuse and unrelatable elements. It's a strange film full of strange choices, zippy enough to be enjoyed in the moment but too jumbled for satisfactory mental congealment after the fact.

The film follows Alithea, a narrative scholar who uncorks The Djinn, a mystical being who has been imprisoned multiple times over thousands of years. The Djinn recants his history to Alithea, detailing the many loves and tragedies he has catalyzed in three ancient societies. Alithea must choose her own three wishes to fulfill her soul's most inner desire and help free The Djinn for all time.

There's much to unpack and many varyingly effective elements, but Miller dooms himself from the start with an awkward and forced framing device. Although the bulk of the story is The Djinn's, the film forces Alithea's point of view early, kicking off with one of her scholarly lectures and mind-numbing narration. The perspective is ostensibly chosen to build her character, but it's so far removed from the meat of the film that the viewer is immediately jarred when the gears shift.

The crux of the Three Thousand Years takes place in flashback, until it shifts again from The Djinn's vantage to Alithea's contemporary life, which is just as unsatisfying as the opening act; firstly because The Djinn is a more interesting character in every regard, and secondly because there's no thematic or narrative foothold anchoring the audience. We're thrust in, taken out, and thrust in again without explanation or purpose. Additionally, I pray we're not slipping back into years just prior when nearly every film opened with narration. Narration can kick rocks.

Three Thousand Years opens and closes wobbly, but the majority of the film works because the narrative is taken out of Alithea's hands and placed into The Djinn's. Idris Elba's Djinn is a sympathetic and vulnerable figure. He's a perfect physical choice for the role, strong enough to give off an aura of invincibility and inherent strength, but compassionate and fragile enough to create a sense of danger and powerlessness. His deep, silky voice is also perfect, because the film is essentially a spoken word album with accompanying visuals.

Although narration should kick rocks, his perpetual monologue is necessary to keep Miller's intended pace, his dialogue isn't gratingly mystical or overwrought, and he tells his story in a controlled and relaxed manner. As far as narration goes, it's a reasonable middle ground.

There may be a cut of Three Thousand Years wherein the fat is eliminated, narration is removed, and we simply watch The Djinn's story unfold in a more natural and visual style...but there may also be a cut wherein the story is unchanged, the narration is removed, and the viewer never has a prayer of figuring out what the hell is going on. Again, this version is a reasonable middle ground.

Among the chief pleasures of Three Thousand Years' high points are the unpredictability of the tales and the ever-shifting dynamics of power through the ages. Period piece politics are always fun because viewers are treated to the many elaborate and savage methods ancient monarchs used to keep power before the iron rule of law. Watching the uncertainty, paranoia, betrayal, and succession of each era unfurl is a blast, and the vignettes possess a streamlined, concise quality which the film as a whole lacks. Throwing a Djinn into the cutthroat mix doesn't hurt the intrigue either.

Miller's direction is also assured and dynamic. There are a host of camera movements, some subtle, some not, which keep the viewer engaged and alert. There are dozens of stylized scene and shot transitions which broaden the scope of the film and aid in its impressive continuity.

For all the magic, mischief, and mayhem of the tales, the affair could've become deliriously ungrounded or unconvincing, like recent MCU films, but Miller knows (perhaps better than anyone) how to establish and accentuate atmosphere among utter madness. Editor Margaret Sixel also deserves praise for allowing the film to breathe.

The atmosphere of the film is laudable, and the costume and set designs are creatively amusing, but there is a visual nag throughout. The CGI here is plentiful and terrible. It's used for cobwebs, bottles, battles, and feet, among other things, and it's distractingly amateur every time. All of Miller's practical effects bravado from Mad Max: Fury Road is totally, glaringly absent here. In a film impressively managing to keep its artifice at bay through convincing mise-en-scene, the computer effects frequently threaten to crash the illusion. Do we really need CGI cobwebs?

Three Thousand Years is enjoyable in the theater, but its charm quickly dissipates after the projector flickers off. The story is glaringly disjointed on a micro and macro scale. Because the film never establishes a tone or context, the viewer is forced to create one, orienting themselves as the plot flies by - focus is nonexistent.

Motivations are also extremely hazy; Alithea's perspective and inclinations turn on a dime, jolting the film into its third act without rhyme or reason. Even much of The Djinn's story is cobbled together and somewhat rushed. The audience is given a plethora of details, but the eye and mind aren't drawn to anything in particular. Characters are hastily introduced and abandoned within The Djinn's tales and subplots are meticulously constructed for meager payoffs.

Overall, Three Thousand Years of Longing is a unique and simple idea stretched to and beyond its limitations. The film feels both overly developed and like a first draft, connecting several threads without creating intention or meaning. It's a bizarre, frustrating tradeoff. Miller's visual finesse is refreshing, and the relatively low stakes are a relief, but the story is monstrously cluttered.

The film is uncanny, even among Miller's uncanny filmography, and its strangeness may unfortunately turn off many in the general public. That's a shame, as this type of bold vision and passion for the craft should be celebrated and supported. If you have any interest in seeing something outside the box, give it a shot, because there's honestly no telling how you'll respond - a dwindling sentiment.

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The Lost City (2022)

3/10

"I'm Certified CPR, I'm Certified CrossFit, I Have Snacks."

25 August 2022

It would be easy to say that The Lost City is exactly what one would expect, but it's more accurate to say that it's exactly what one would expect minus a little of everything. The film is conceived as a remake/rip-off of Romancing the Stone but the people in charge never bothered to develop the script past this first conceit.

The film is extraordinarily lazy and rehashed, checking off narrative boxes and filmed in the obligatorily flat, unconvincing monotone of contemporary cinema. It's a stunning return for sentimental, schmaltzy romcoms after the release Marry Me just a month ago. Is it possible the dam is just beginning to burst? Is it possible some of them will be funny?

The film follows romance novelist Loretta Sage as she's kidnapped and taken to a remote island by billionaire Abigail Fairfax, who seeks a magnificent ancient treasure. Hot on their trail is Sage's cover model Alan, out to prove he's more than just a pretty face. Along the way, the two learn about the peril and pleasures of love, professional gratification, and self-esteem.

This film is bland. Everything is weirdly sterilized and glossy, starting with the script. The above bit about not developing the script past the initial premise was not a joke. There are several promising moments in The Lost City which begin to be setup but are immediately abandoned halfway through. The only consistent source of attempted humor is the glibness of the cast, who are uniformly aloof. The only bold choice The Lost City makes is bringing a rough draft into production.

The direction is equally lazy and bare. Most of the visual landscape is flat and uninteresting, despite the film being shot almost entirely on location in the Dominican Republic. Why directors Aaron and Adam Nee decided to aim for a synthesized, glamorous veneer for a deadly jungle is anyone's guess. Smart money's on studio mandates of course, but whatever the case, the decision doesn't work. Sage and Alan's trek through the jungle looks like a comfortable camping trip, and hardly any of the cast seem to be physically exerting in the slightest. For all its faults, Romancing the Stone didn't completely ignore the "action" in action/romcom.

The cast can't come close to saving the material, but at least it looks like they're having fun. Every performer is nestled deep within their comfort zone: Sandra Bullock as a frustrated but fierce author trying to turn the tables on her captor, Channing Tatum as a meatheaded lunk trying to prove himself as a capable, responsible adult, Brad Pitt as a hunky but enigmatic savior, Daniel Radcliffe as a psychopathic but blandly polite spoiled punk, and Da'Vine Joy Randolph as a sassy, exasperated editor. They all play into the glib, spiceless material.

There's just not much to anything here. The action is lifeless and obligatory, the structure is hopelessly rote, and the few jokes consistently fall flat. The Lost City is as shallow as a kiddie pool, crassly recycling tropes and characters from other, better films and hoping no one's the wiser. It's weird to even see this type of movie in the theater. Non-vulgar romcoms have been dead for the better part of a decade, so one would think Nees and company would at least put a little effort into the resurgence. One would be wrong. See it if it's your chosen genre, but don't expect anything fresh or innovative; The Lost City picks up right where Anna Faris and Katherine Heigl left off. Abysmal.

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Morbius (2022)

2/10

"Has to Do with Spider-Man I Think."

25 August 2022

At long last the pandemic seems to be winding down. Millions dead, billions affected, but the end is quickly approaching. People the world over will hopefully be able to return to normalcy, with only memories of these last two horrible years. Cinemas might be invigorated as well, as theatergoers enjoy one of the most important benefits of going to theaters in a post-pandemic world: they won't have to sit through the insufferable trailer for Morbius anymore. The healing process can begin.

The film follows Dr. Michael Morbius as he searches to cure the vague disease he's been afflicted with since childhood. During the search, he's accidently transformed into a vampire-like creature, with sonar capabilities, superhuman strength, and the obligatory taste for human blood. He must keep this secret from the world while learning to control his power and just maybe reverse his condition, a woefully similar plot to 2005's critical darling, Fantastic Four. Morbius must also fight his arch-nemesis Spider-Man, but Sony doesn't own those rights, so they'll be skipping that for now.

The first few minutes of Morbius set the context and framing for the rest of the film. In other words, Morbius quicky lets viewers know that it's utterly worthless. Everything in and about the film is fascinatingly bland, totally incapable of leaving even the faintest imprint in the mind. The film is made by Sony Pictures, which is the only signal one needs to know the boredom they're in for when purchasing a ticket.

Even by their horrific standards, Morbius lacks a modicum of creativity, charm, wit, novelty, intrigue, engagement, interest, or integrity; it's a film made solely to retain the scraps of rights the studio has to the Spider-Man IP while setting up future disappointments within the shared universe. I'm shocked to find that "Matt Sazama" and "Burk Sharpless" are not an elaborate pseudonym for a poorly built A. I. designed to write screenplays in a manner conducive to affordability and irrelevance.

The flaws here are substantial, but accountability begins with the script. The weirdest thing about Morbius is that nothing is egregiously infuriating or miscalculated. Such problems would require boldness or calculation. Instead, the entire film is hollowed out, an empty egg, a wisp of air. No care is taken to establish anything; no effort is made to energize character interactions or structural mystery. Morbius simply begins, plays out exactly as one would expect, then ends, having never feigned a single idea, misdirection, or clever visual. It's shockingly, impressively lazy.

The same could be said for the direction. Daniel Espinosa is at the helm after directing Safe House, Child 44, and Life. It's impossible to discern how much of the blame for Morbius lies at his feet, though it's probably not much, if any. His prior films aren't world beaters, but they seem like competent and reasonably passionate affairs, nice looking celestial bodies trying to escape the black hole of derivative futility that is Morbius. It's safe to assume that even if Espinosa had greater ambitions for the film, the sheep in wolves' clothing staffing Sony Pictures would have relentlessly mutilated his vision.

The only saving grace of the film are the performances. Adria Arjona and Jared Harris are decent as Morbius' colleagues, giving the material some reasonably effective credence. Tyrese Gibson and Al Madrigal are horrendous in their short time as cops, but Matt Smith has fun with his role as the doctor's best friend. He suffers from the same condition as Morbius until he's given the same treatment, and watching his turn from feeble, black-lung-pa Zoolander to hyperconfident, charismatic ham is quite enjoyable. Even Jared Leto is somewhat engaging, playing the material straight and putting in work as a tortured, conflicted soul.

Every other facet of the film is impossibly bland and forgettable. In a time when every American studio is desperately trying to establish their own multi-film storyline, Sony Pictures is next to the most laughable and inept, respectable only next to Universal's Dark Universe miscarriage. Executives don't appear remotely competent, sometimes not even human; they're caricatures, parodies of parodies of parodies, drunkenly beholden to market research and desperate to stay hip with a target demographic they either don't understand or actively disdain. They've made the film they deserve.

There is not one single, solitary surprise, thrill, or emotional stake within Morbius. Project is corporatized into oblivion. Formula is slavishly adhered to. Characterizations washed and sterilized. Editing rushed, hopelessly confused. Signs of passion, or merit for existence, undetectable. Music - effects - focus - craftsmanship; absent. Hopes of a cinematic universe up, ticket sales down. Ask again later.

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Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022)

4/10

"You're Fantasies Can't Ever Be Quenched, Can They?"

25 August 2022

Thanks to the first Sonic film and the new Mortal Kombat, the bar for videogame movies has never been higher - we're a solid four inches off the ground now, and climbing. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 meets these meager expectations but does not surpass them, offering a fun, edge-of-your-seat thrill ride for kids and a mildly diverting but unsurprising (though swiftly paced) two hours for adults.

If you enjoyed the first, you'll enjoy the second, probably more. If you loathed the first, there's probably not much here for you. Read ahead to finetune your opinion but know that whatever judgements you've already cast on Sonic 2 are absolutely correct.

The film follows the continuing adventures of Sonic and his best friend Tom Wachowski. This time around, Tom must travel to a wedding, leaving Sonic on his own to be sucked into Dr. Robotnik's new plan. The film also introduces new characters/Sonic classics Knuckles and Tails, in addition to the fanboy favorite chaos emerald. For all its faults, this entry is far closer to the creativity and spirit of the games than the original.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is not too shabby for a kid's film. It's lighthearted but boasts some fun action set pieces, including an underwater cavern and a snowy mountaintop chase. The camera swings and zips through the scenery, giving the action a reasonably grounded feel and some reasonably high stakes during each fight. It also makes good use of Sonic's rings' teleporting abilities, trekking the globe to satisfyingly expansive effect. The film is never exceedingly boring and is self-aware enough to be colorful and energetic - it's never dull.

One of the main assets of the franchise is the strength of the IP, which possesses all the qualities just mentioned. The chief pleasures of the games were watching characters interact with each other and marveling at the diverse array of their powers and designs. The Sonic universe is surprisingly cheerful and spry; every character has something to offer, and each have a unique vantage point for the frequent chaos. There are dozens of Sonic games and maybe a full hundred characters and plot threads to choose from, meaning Paramount has ample material to mine the sequels.

Maybe the most surprisingly reassured element of the film is its structure, a well-structured structure. The film opens ordinarily and slowly unfurls, organically introducing new characters and challenges as the story develops. The journey builds patiently to a substantial but protracted climax which will wow kids and give parents déjà vu.

There are also legitimate interactions between characters, shallow as they may be, which play into the story as a whole and provide an easy-to-swallow theme (friendship is important, betraying your business partner is counterproductive) for the little ones to chew on as they leave the theater. It's a fine outline, aside from a subplot about Tom's wife's friend's wedding, which interrupts the flow and plays like filler in a film which is already too long.

Ultimately, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is a disappointment, not despite the action and nostalgia, but because of it. If the rest of the script and film had been as serviceable and fun, Sonic 2 would've been a nice little light treat, perhaps even the best videogame film ever made. But Paramount/Sega aim squarely for the under-twelve demographic, throwing the adults in the audience only some meager scraps. The script is loaded with infantile jokes, obvious twists, and grating side characters; overall it's a quippy nightmare, sown from the same, rote material as late-stage MCU products.

It's all the more disappointing that this is technically Sonic for a new generation, because there are two older generations who would love to see a slightly (slightly!) more mature version of the world's fastest hedgehog onscreen. The franchise began way back in 1991, so everyone who played the games for any period in Sonic's first ten years are all grown up. They would no-doubt enjoy seeing their childhood companion adapt to the times and offer more visceral, impactful thrills. I'm not asking for a Sonicfied version of The Dark Knight, but more than a modicum of craftsmanship or emotional weight would've been nice.

Still, the performances are vastly improved from the first film. The cast is looser and treats the material like more of the farce it is; they recognize that they are indeed not in The Dark Knight, taking the opportunity to give big, boisterous performances. This of course includes Jim Carey, who picks off right where he left off, but even James Marsden, Tika Sumpter, Idris Elba, Natasha Rothwell, and Shemar Moore ham it up, broadening the already-broad slapstick.

Overall, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 delivers a more accurate depiction of its lore and history but doesn't aim too high in terms of logic or intelligence. It's more fun than the original and a step in the right direction for a franchise with deceptively intriguing potential. Kids will eat it up and adults will stay reasonably engaged, even through the overlong climax. It's not a highpoint in any career, but it will give Sega the box office numbers they need to greenlight a third entry. Go ahead and take the kids, especially if they're already clamoring to go; it's painless enough.

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Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)

6/10

"I Got Bored One Day and Put Everything on a Bagel."

25 August 2022

One of the most intriguing facets about the brave new world of film currently being pioneered is watching history repeat itself. Specifically, watching studios become prominent markers of a film's quality, second only to the filmmakers at the helm. In the early days, audiences knew what they were getting just by looking at the opening logos: the MGM lion signified luxury, the Paramount mountain meant a foreign touch, the Universal globe predicted cheaper productions and monster movies, etc. Etc.

Although the trend certainly isn't as strong as it was, there are a few studios synonymous with the films they make and distribute. One such example is A24, a studio known for some of the most creative, complex, and outside-the-box fare today.

It's not that A24 films are universally beloved or hyper-consistent; they have their share of duds and usually cater to one niche or another. Rather, the studio is a prominent signifier of quality to cinephiles because the films they make and distribute never pander to a broad market or tick boxes on an executive's soulless list. The passion of the filmmakers involved is always evident, and a purposeful vision usually drives the creation of the art. This is more so true for A24 than any studio today, and is most evident in their biggest, brashest, and most successful film to date, Everything Everywhere All at Once.

The film follows Chinese immigrant Evelyn during the course of a very unusual day. While turning in paperwork for her accountant to comb through, Evelyn is suddenly thrust into an adventure concerning the multiverse, a concept involving the existence of an infinite number of universes. She must learn about all the possibilities the multiverse presents while battling a great force that threatens its existence, all while trying to connect with her teenage daughter, Joy.

It's easy to see why the film has been universally praised. There are hundreds of different effects but little CGI, resulting in a breathtakingly grounded film. Everything, Everywhere is a grandiose and complex film, a patchwork constructed and assembled with invigorating passion. Many of today's superhero films are just as visually dense, but Everything, Everywhere doesn't boast a room full of animators to yell at and whip for faster, grander results.

With respect to CGI artists, who are woefully overworked and underpaid, this film isn't just digitally synthesized - it's filmed. It's impossible to state my feelings of gratitude when a film feels like it's truly unfolding before your eyes, when it boasts a concrete foundation of verisimilitude, and Everything, Everywhere clears this benchmark with a story that seems like it never should've. It's resoundingly refreshing.

A24 deserves its praise, but the impetus for Everything, Everywhere's creative explosion comes from Daniels. Daniels (Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert) are young, but they're already blazing a path for uncanny, surreal filmmaking, demonstrated in their freshman and sophomore efforts Swiss Army Man and The Death of Dick Long. Their direction is kinetic and all-encompassing, a veritable barrage of places, characters, ideas, and impressive action that assaults the viewer unrelentingly.

One of the film's most special characteristics is the scale of its time; most of Everything, Everywhere takes place during a full day, but also, as the title suggest, transcends time and space, reaching into infinite worlds to set up several intrastory vignettes with their own structure, stakes, and pacing. Daniels do a remarkable job keeping focus and clarity despite the explosion of storylines and emotional stakes. There's a pristine clarity to everything, everywhere, all the time.

The film is chaotic and explosive, but it's the editing which truly sets it apart from other equally boisterous fare. While the overarching story moves at lightening pace, it's also allowed to breathe and steady itself, further orienting the audience during the calamity. Nothing is too stylized either, like, say, Run Lola Run; there's a nice balance of quick cutting to maintain the kineticism and longer takes to envelope the viewer into the world. Whatever editor Paul Rogers was paid to work for Daniels, it wasn't enough. Everything, Everywhere has been lauded for a smattering of reasons, but I truly think the film lives or dies by Rogers' hand - it lives.

Everything, Everywhere is the grandest, most elaborate, most painstaking film of the year, no question. It's size and quantity are easy to admire but it's not without its hiccups. Because of the film's size, scope, and genre-mashing, Daniels can't avoid giving viewers whiplash across the film's many storylines, emotional arcs, and tones; they go about eight layers deep and no moment is anything but fleeting. The lulls are brief but so are the film's many highpoints.

Giving proper credence and pacing to the material would take approximately five hours of runtime, and the film is whittled down to an explosive two and a half. Because of this problem, and not despite of it, the film feels overstuffed. There's so much to get to and so much crazy, random nonsense happening at any given time that Daniels feel like they're rushing to give everyone and everything their due.

A golden film rule for creators is "kill your darlings," which is shorthand for "delete every millisecond of material not essential to telling the story". I can't even comprehend that there were scenes deleted here, either from the film or the script prior. There's just so much of it...probably about fifteen percent too much.

Speaking of the script...it's a bit unwieldy. The story begins relatively slowly and quietly accelerates, a nice method to introduce the context and subtext of the madness before fully diving in. However, the film also lacks structure, eschewing satisfying cause and effect to instead introduce random concepts and characters throughout. The practical use of the multiverse invites a strong inclination toward randomness, but Everything, Everywhere sometimes oversteps the boundary, hurtling, at points, into the arbitrary.

In a macro sense, the viewer rarely knows where they are in the runtime or how much of story is yet to play out. This lack of sense is most clearly demonstrated during a clever gimmick in a theater, at which point Everything, Everywhere feels like it's finally winding down and will be over in the next five or ten minutes...it then goes on for another forty-five.

The performances are pleasant all around. In the spotlight are Michelle Yeoh and Stephanie Hsu as Evelyn and Joy, the mother-daughter duo at the forefront of the conflict. Each plays off the other nicely and they establish a tense but loving chemistry.

Key Huy Quan plays Eveyln's husband Waymond, a sympathetic figure who walks a fine line between put-upon and pathetic. James Hong plays Gong Gong, the patriarch of the family. Every actor also plays a plethora of other roles from other universes, staying grounded and convincing in all manner of costumes and characterizations.

Altogether, Everything Everywhere All at Once is a ridiculously large and raucous film. It maintains impressive focus on character and theme, never letting its central conflict become rote or lost in the hyper speed of the action. If it's ultimately too much of a good thing, it's still the most unique, creative, and ambitious film of the year, and the Daniels deserve significant praise for dreaming it up. I'm sure every eye will be on their next project and there will be considerable attention on this one throughout the year and into awards season. The film has been met with a startling amount of hype, but mostly delivers on every piece of praise it's received. Absolutely worth seeing in theaters.

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The Bad Guys (2022)

6/10

"We May Be Bad, But We're So Good at It."

25 August 2022

It's always interesting going into a DreamWorks film and finding out which version of the studio is screening. Will it be the innovative, highly balanced studio who made the Shrek, Kung Fu Panda, and How to Train Your Dragon franchises? Or will it be the sloppy, generic output in the vein of Shark Tale, Turbo, and Abominable? The Bad Guys falls fortunately into the former camp; it's an eye-pleasing, kinetic romp with style and charm which homages the heist genre, most frequently channeling Soderbergh's Oceans franchise in its cool, high society visage. Though not top-tier DreamWorks, the film is likeable and creative.

The film follows a gang of animal criminals led by Wolf. After a botched job, the gang is forced to undergo rehabilitation under the supervision of Professor Marmalade, a philanthropic guinea pig. Complicating matters is Wolf's own conflicted desire for genuine rehabilitation and his crew's plan to use the opportunity as cover for a new, daring heist.

The Bad Guys works best when it plays as straight-faced homage to its filmic inspirations - most notably the Oceans franchise and the early works of Quinton Tarantino. Under this guise, there's a cool, laidback, understated charm to the characters, their interactions, and their surroundings. It's a loose world, operating on close-knit relationships and whacky physics. The film is refreshing when there's no rush, no eagerness to thrust the plot forward.

For example, the film opens with a conversation between Wolf and Snake in a diner, with some impressively pitter-patter dialogue about birthdays. Once the conversation ends, our characters walk out and the camera pulls back, treating us to a small but clever revelation, synchronized with the meticulously established sense of atmosphere. This is the first "mode" of the film, and represents The Bad Guys' best impulses, in terms of engagement, intrigue, and cinematic verve.

The second mode is quickly established in the following sequence, wherein the criminal crew - Wolf, Snake, Tarantula, Shark, and Piranha - speed through the city, evading a stream of police cars. Much of the film is executed in this second mode, where action is snappier, quips come faster, and the whole world is simply less grounded.

It's still fun, and the filmmaking is brisk and purposeful, but it's also more child-oriented, abandoning adult logic for underbaked plot points and shaky motivations which kids can identify with. Walking this tightrope between the former, legitimately ambitious mode, and the latter cartoonishly chaotic one, is The Bad Guy's central struggle. Both do share many positive qualities, however.

The freshest element here is the animation style, which is CGI with a twist. Many steps were taken to make the film look and feel more two-dimensional, including simplified animation processes and removal of all superfluous detail. The result is a beautifully stylized concoction, meant to imitate Into the Spider-Verse while offering distinct flourishes of its own. The film is immaculately textured and lit, creating a natural landscape which emphasizes the more grounded sequences and balances those less grounded.

The voicecast is also phenomenal, an eclectic mix of universally beloved performers such as Sam Rockwell, Marc Maron, Awkwafina, Craig Robinson, Anthony Ramos, Zazie Beetz, and the greatly under-heralded Richard Ayoade. Each performer brings their character to life, giving structure and personality to the animation's expressive foundation. Rockwell and Maron shine in the lead roles, establishing a strong rapport; an impressive feat, considering they may have never been in the same room. The only complaint is casting Ayoade as the straight man, as he's inherently hilarious and always able to give line readings off-kilter, comedic energy.

The Bad Guys is altogether uneven but always fun, a film sporadically entertaining for adults but always entertaining for kids of all ages. It starts with a streak of ambition but quickly slips into more typical family fare, such as misunderstandings, withheld secrets, and over the top hijinks. The plot and structural are wobbly and nothing about the logistics of the world make any sense whatsoever, but it's a visually impressive film that holds attention all the way through. It could've differentiated itself further, could've pushed some boundaries out, but viewers will be pleased overall. It's worth checking out during the next family night.

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The Northman (2022)

7/10

"I will avenge you, father! I will save you, mother! I will kill you, Fjolnir!"

25 August 2022

From Robert Eggers, director of The Witch and The Lighthouse, comes The Northman, an epic tale of fury and vengeance. Eggers is a preeminent talent in bringing to life bleak, muted historical nightmares. The Northman is nightmarish, but in a way that is intimate, brutal, and soulful.

The film is based on the same story Hamlet is derived from; this makes the film rather predictable, but The Northman is that rare breed of film that is wholly dedicated to "the journey." The strength of the Northman is not about "what happens next," but watching the film unfold in its entirety, creating a finely formed and extremely memorable gestalt. It's not a surprising or even particularly emotional film, but one of tremendous engagement, verisimilitude, and cinematic integrity.

The film follows Amleth, a Nordic warrior on a quest to avenge the death of his father, King Aurvandil Raven-Warrior. After separation from his mother and village as a boy, Amleth is eventually taken into the custody of his father's killer, Fjolnir the Brotherless, and teams with a mysterious and magical slave, Olga of the Birch Forest, to exact his revenge.

The Northman is a distinctive and rare film because of the strength of Eggers' singular vision. Only Eggers could arrange these elements in such an engaging and historically potent manner. From opening to closing credits, Eggers lovingly expounds on the mysticism and texture of the period, erecting sequences of great complexity and uncanny detail.

For example, his deft touch is displayed when young Amleth becomes a man, joining his father in a primal ritual in a smokey, claustrophobic cavern. The two drop to their knees and bark at the sky, watched on by Willem Dafoe's leering Heimir. Also consider a sequence in which Amleth battles a giant, undead knight for use of his sword. These hallucinatory reveries could only be dreamt up by a confident and visionary talent. This is Egger's film.

It's also Eggers' script, cowritten with Sjorn, an internationally lauded Icelandic author. Their story can be difficult to follow at times, not least because the dialogue is often garbled and mumbled, and the plot is stretched thin, dragging in the second act. However, motivations are crystal clear and characterizations are solid and blunt, particularly for central figures.

Eggers and Sjorn work with the ancient material rather than against it, crafting a highly ambitious saga of love, betrayal, uncertainty, and loss, peppered with Nordic symbolism and mystical influences. If the climax is a bit shaky, if the whole affair is a tad overwrought, it's also convincingly stoic, often engaging, and chillingly visceral.

The Northman may also be the finest looking film of the year, totally captivating in its landscape photography and the primal ferocity of its visual palate. Cinematographer Jarin Blaschke frequently utilizes natural light, using red-hot flames to cast a fiery glow for interior scenes, and the pale blue translucence of the moon for exterior scenes. Much of the film is stark and cold, a brutal, gripping atmosphere to match the icy scorn of Amleth's quest.

Many historical films which take place around this period use their gloom, mud, and general ugliness as a pretense for visual inadequacy, but The Northman captures the despair of the time while remaining visually sumptuous and elegant. The Northman also brilliantly captures its action, using complex, meticulously timed long takes to foster total immersion. Performers in action scenes push their bodies to the limit to execute Eggers' vision.

The immaculate look and sound of the film is balanced by its illustrious cast, a dedicated ensemble who mostly maintain the period feeling and underlying insanity. Alexander Skarsgard plays Amleth with a brutal force of primal fury, while maintaining a surprisingly soft, quiet introspection.

Anya Taylor-Joy plays his love interest Olga. She looks the part of a fair beauty, but also stands out in the unwashed, underfed populace. Taylor-Joy can't quite blend into the stark surroundings, but she is believable as a tender soul who wreaks deceptive havoc from the shadows. Willem Dafoe, Ethan Hawke, and Claes Bang are engaging as rugged, barbaric presences. The only member of the cast who never feels quite right for the period is Nicole Kidman; she's too glamorous, too plastic.

Overall, The Northman is a viscerally thrilling adventure, grandly conceived and cleverly executed. It's unlike anything in theaters this year, because of both its attention to historical detail and the minimization of computer assistance in creating its grand scope.

The tonal atmosphere and period psychology Eggers achieves deserve intense celebration; The Northman deserves to be remembered for a very long time as a darker, more fantastical, more brutal version of period favorites like Braveheart and Gladiator. Its storytelling is sparse but forceful, its passion clear and invigorating. It's a film that absolutely must be seen in a theater for maximum impact, a legitimate cinematic experience.

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Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)

2/10

"Face Your Fears, Doctor Strange."

25 August 2022

The MCU is getting mighty unwieldy. Doctor Strange 2 is the twenty-seventh film in Marvel's expansive franchise, and the fabric of the universe is starting to stretch uncomfortably thin. Throughout phase 4, Marvel has made two bold assumptions; one, that audiences continue to relate to their characters, despite the fact they've been reduced to shallow, grating quip machines, and two, that mass audiences can be persuaded to watch supplemental material to understand what the hell is happening in the filmic universe. In this case, Wanda Vision, a Disney+ show, is recommended viewing. Many of Marvel's most devoted fans will be happy to consume, but average moviegoers may feel differently. Time will tell.

The film follows Doctor Strange as he fights Wanda Maximoff, who seeks to abduct America Chavez in order to teleport to a universe where Wanda's children are still alive. Throughout the journey, Strange learns the valuable lesson of letting go and trusting those around him or something along those lines.

Doctor Strange 2 is one of the worst films of the MCU thus far, for a myriad of reasons. The first and most obvious, is that any joy, wonder, novelty, or excitement relating to superheroes has long since been extinguished. Doctor Strange's parallel realities are no reality at all, in cinematic terms. Every element is flat, fake, and leaden, slavishly subvariant to digital wizardry and totally unconcerned with any human interest. The MCU is fast approaching Star Wars prequel levels of anti-verisimilitude, a disturbing proposition.

Good superhero films are still being made, but the promise of grounding their action or substance in any sort of reality, a principle early films like Iron Man and the Dark Knight trilogy staunchly adhered to, is totally ignored. This is wistful sentiment, and I apologize for the overwrought remembrance, but Doctor Strange 2 has put me in a mood of longing. It's always fascinating to see how splendid even the rustiest junk looks after looking upon something covered in sickening slime.

The visual landscape is not the only ungrounded element. The story and dialogue are preposterous and maddeningly contrived; heroes run around with little plan or purpose and seem laughably incompetent while doing so. Our villain, who is a purportedly all-powerful being capable of slaughtering legions en masse, can't manage to hold onto a teenage girl for more than a minute. And, as mentioned, her emotional stakes and arc can't be fully comprehended without supplemental material, which is A++ storytelling. Secondary characters, ostensibly capable, wise, and vigilant, are also arrogant enough to wave away the threat of what they know to be extremely powerful and ancient evil.

Perhaps the most disappointing feature of Doctor Strange 2 is the involvement of Sam Raimi. To be fair, it's difficult for even the most seasoned, stylistic directors to make their mark on MCU films. Because these films are made on an assembly line, the only practical method for directors to stamp their style is to slip a piece of flair on one belt here, drop a subtle hint of creativity on another belt there, carefully move around the factory, and augment the product in a manner unnoticeable to the floor manager.

Raimi does exactly this, slipping in a semblance of his style over the course of Doctor Strange 2 while staying far out focus. The craftsmanship and attention to detail of the film is a far cry from Raimi's original Spider-Man trilogy, which is a great shame considering he was instrumental in introducing Marvel to mainstream audiences, when the MCU was just a glimmer in Kevin Feige's eye. To see just how bland filmmaking has become since the not-exactly-stellar period of the early aughts is disheartening.

The film is terrible, but the cast does a commendable job of playing the material with a straight face. Cumberbatch, McAdams, Olsen, and Wong look adequately invested in the nonsensical mayhem surrounding them. There are some interesting cameos as well, cleverly cast and hinting at future MCU properties in a not-totally-whorish way. The lowlight of the cast is Xochitl Gomez, who can't quite pull off a punky, rebellious presence fighting to hold back deeper tragedy. Her unconvincing performance can be forgiven, considering she's surrounded by A-list talent and acting predominantly against green backdrops.

Altogether, Doctor Strange 2 is a miserable time at the theater. It's among the worst of the MCU's twenty-seven film lineup, firmly better than only Thor 2 and Eternals. It's a chaotic mess of loud, dumb action, baffling character decisions and motivations, and emotional stakes which can only be properly understood by watching a show on Disney+. It's the type of film that audaciously reminds audiences that they're living through the most bland, soulless, corporatized time in cinematic history. I didn't like it.

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The Phantom of the Open (2021)

4/10

"I Didn't Choose Golf, It More Chose Me."

25 August 2022

The Phantom of the Open, from young British actor and filmmaker Craig Roberts, is a biopic which aims to rouse audiences by reminding them about the indominable human spirit. Unfortunately, the indomitableness of the human spirit is quite well known already, resulting in a film which falls short of rousing and somewhere into grating territory.

The tone is curious too, because the premise of the film promises farcical antics and frequent irreverence, but Phantom mostly delivers the opposite. It insists on overbearing sentimentality with a thick saccharine glaze, a film which tries to box an unconventional man into a formulaic and mopey film. What could've been a more mature, restrained Happy Gilmore with British sensibilities is instead a turgid wade through familial dynamics and a ham-fisted message about never giving up on one's dreams.

The film follows Maurice Flitcroft, a chain-smoking crane operator from Barrow-in-Furness, a small English town where hope is fleeting, and dreams are routinely laid to rest. When Flitcroft stumbles upon a telecast of the 1974 World Match Play Championships, he's inspired to take up golfing. Within two years he applies for the 1976 British Open, marking himself as a professional despite having only just taken up the game and having undertaken no formal training. Phantom follows Flitcroft's ambitions, from his first encounter with the game to the many attempts he makes trying to re-enter into The Open.

Although there is a fair amount of golfing in this film about a man most known for golf, it is frequently overshadowed and overtaken by Flitcroft's relationship with his wife and three sons. The family works through their own dynamics, usually as Flitcroft golfs in the background. The major events of his life, those which pertained to The Open and his time and experience with the game, are skimmed over or rushed through in order to take the viewer back to his home, where more important themes lie, waiting to pounce.

The Phantom of the Open is rooted firmly in the wrong genre, an overriding and insurmountable problem. Flitcroft's adventures at one of the stuffiest and most polite sporting events in the world needs a rambunctious and irreverent hand at the pen. The entire film could've and should've revolved around the greens, taking time to build up true villains and some light but meaningful stakes.

Days could've been elongated, giving viewers an in-depth presentation and context of exactly what happened during that fateful qualifying round, and why it was most unorthodox. A truly bold vision may have framed the film in chapters, giving each of Flitcroft's attempts their own spotlight. Drawn out, real-time comedies are ambitious, but golf is ripe for such a structure.

Instead of this theoretical, the film is a dully conventional look at Flitcroft's life, pausing occasionally to watch a practice montage or two. Phantom of the Open is not a sports movie at all, but a biopic, with all of the narrative trappings and predictability of a biopic. But there's a core issue with centering a film around Maurice Flitcroft's life - Maurice Flitcroft is not interesting. At least, not in The Phantom of the Open.

Audiences are treated to clips of the real Flitcroft as the credits roll, who seems highly humorous and aware, totally in on the joke and playing up his central part in the shenanigans. The film should've been more like the man. The film's man should've been more like the man! Phantom's Flitcroft is a far cry from his brief media portrayal: he's naïve, aloof, dull, and rather dim-witted, full of childlike optimism and a bottomless pit of mind-numbing platitudes. He's cartoonishly dense and shockingly free of any real personality. Not only did the filmmakers make a damning choice in constructing Phantom like a conventional biopic, but they doubled down on their mistake by centering it around a caricature who would've fit more snugly in a lighter picture. It's doubly unfortunate.

The film has many flaws, but the cast is not among them. Mark Rylance, Sally Hawkins, Ian Porter, Jake Davies, Christian Lees, and Jonah Lees all garner sympathy and play into the period well. The drama is tepid, but the people are not, bringing a much needed life and energy to the proceedings. Honestly, every character but Flitcroft strikes the right emotional balance, and many of their problems and characterizations are more engaging and relatable than his. You could pluck Flitcroft out of his own film and it would probably be more interesting as a heavier, morose drama. Triply unfortunate.

It's hard to gauge whether the film's incongruent tone should be placed at Roberts' feet. He boasts many directorial flourishes in this film, zipping and swinging his camera when appropriate and paying great attention to period detail. There are two daydreaming sequences, each cleverly assembling and navigating the interior mind in a lighthearted and concise manner.

Under Roberts' guidance, no one can doubt the film's visual tenacity; he seems like a capable and imaginative director, but it's a shame he never thought to liven the mood or create a more spontaneous, rambunctious vision. The same could be said for editor Jonathan Amos.

Ultimately, The Phantom of the Open will please those expecting (or just in the mood for) a spottily charming but overwrought family drama by way of golfer biopic. Anyone expecting Old Man Happy will most likely find the connective tissue and core of the film rote and predictable, rather than rousing or heartwarming. The film has its moments, but the final product simply can't sustain its own seriousness or thin story. It focuses everywhere but where it should - on the loony antics and good-natured chaos created by one of golfer's stranger and looser practitioners.

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Bodies Bodies Bodies (2022)

5/10

"So How Do You Play?"

14 August 2022

From acclaimed studio A24 this week comes Bodies Bodies Bodies. The film boasts a slate of fresh talent, such as sophomore director Halina Reijn and freshmen screenwriters Sarah DeLappe and Kristen Roupenian. This is a modestly successful first effort, though the trio's inexperience is demonstrated through the film's lack of focus and mishmash of tones, themes, motivations, and moods.

Bodies is scatterbrained, herkily jerking from premise to premise and firing off at satirical targets like a tommy gun. It's far less annoying than its marketing materials suggest, although the trailer does succinctly convey the film's smugness and self-satisfied demeanor. It's loud, obnoxious, and quasi-edgy, but not particularly transgressive, with just enough intrigue driven by its thin whodunnit plot. I'm still not sure if I liked it.

The film follows a group of rich 20-somethings as they party hard during a hurricane. The party soon takes a violent turn, however, when one of them is found dead in the rain. As tensions rise and fingers are pointed, the sheltered twits must band together or perish while they bicker, backstab, and reveal where loyalties truly lie.

Bodies is fundamentally undefined. It's a satire posing as a whodunnit with a quirky sprinkling of gory slasher, but what's being satirized, and why bodies need to be slashed at all, is a bit murky. Characterizations and motivations are also fuzzy.

Viewers are thrust into the house party as a stranger to the group alongside newcomer Bee, which presents an avenue for conventional exposition, but Bee is told basically nothing about group dynamics, so neither are we. DeLappe and Roupenian opt to exposit when the madness has already begun, which feels rather contrived and, again, unfocused. Is the film about the group or the terror? I don't know.

To reiterate: the murkiness of the film extends past theme and into genre and general intentions. How should the viewer react when the deaths begin? Should we be laughing? Crying? The characters aren't so annoying - so irredeemable - that I was happy to see them die, but they also aren't relatable, and the audience is kept at arm's length throughout.

They're essentially a group of entitled kids drowning in their own hedonism...they're not evil, not vicious or sadistic, just pampered airheads, aimless young adults. Watching Bodies is like watching a humorless Zoolander, if instead of getting caught up in a freak gasoline fight accident, the models went to a secluded house and were brutally axed off. Am I supposed to hate them simply because of their inheritance? Their age? I don't know.

What about theme? What is Bodies really about? The film is too disjointed for a satisfactory answer; the first act is melodramatic, setting up the jealousies and tensions of the group, the second act is where much of the madness happens, and the third act is an airing of grievances, only tenuously relating to character traits which have been established thus far.

Each act suggests a different film than the others; it's less that Bodies lacks a coherent theme, more that it has upwards of seven. It's about class, technology, friendship, attention spans, sex, dating, paranoia, gratification, clout, and our collective desire to see Pete Davidson comically die onscreen. It's about too much, which makes it about nothing.

Despite the film's unfocused nature and its inherent shallowness, it's a reasonably easy watch minute to minute. The direction is confidant and steady, the cinematography is colorful and focused enough to please the mind and lead the eye. Much of the film takes place in the dark, lit primarily by phone lights and crackle sticks.

There are several relatively long takes which create satisfactory immersion and deftly define time and space. For the many problems with the script, Reijn knows how to create and hold tension, and cinematographer Jasper Wolf (who also worked on Monos, the best-looking film of 2019) smartly leans into the enigma of the premise. The sound design is also masterful, emphasizing the scope of the house and the more minute details of the girls' squeaks and nature's squalls.

The whodunnit elements are also clever and intriguing. While the final answer is the most likely, and could come off as obvious to some, there's never a clear indication of where the mystery is going or how it will all shake out. The film's amorphousness actually plays to its advantage in terms of the mystery; it rarely knows where it's going or why, so how could the audience? Waiting for details to emerge and consequences to be doled out is film's most entertaining gambit.

The performances deserve mild praise too. Every actor is given ample stimulus to react to, but they must also overcome the underbaked characterizations. Everyone here plays their rich, entitled brats convincingly, though it's possible that each is already spectacularly wealthy for their age in real life. It's difficult to label any actor or character as anything but sufficiently horny, as no one is given much to do except shrilly or coolly react to the chaos. Shockingly, Pete Davidson is the standout; he's the only actor in tune with the material, self-aware enough to come across as something other than blandly peppy or forcefully endearing.

Overall, Bodies Bodies Bodies falls short of the A24 seal of quality. It's definitely watchable, and sporadically entertaining, but it lacks concentration, both visually and structurally. It's as unfocused, shrill, and aloof as the rich airheads it mocks, and it's tough to know if they're even being mocked to begin with.

The what and how are relatively unique, but the why is tough to pin down. It's also never particularly funny. Sure, the film may know what's wrong with the world today, but it stumbles beyond this surface-level acknowledgement. Watch it for the fresh names and faces, but don't expect too much in the way of transgressive humor or emotional catharsis.

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Fall (I) (2022)

4/10

"We Gotta' Climb Some Things...We Gotta' Jump Offa' Stuff...We Gotta' Ride."

13 August 2022

The doldrums of the cinematic year are upon us. August and September are the unfortunate months when wide-release films are too small for the preceding summer but also weren't made to chum the Oscar waters, like films in the approaching winter. Many gems exist in this precarious space of course, and the categorial limbo can lead to unexpected pleasures or surprisingly creative fare, but those are largely exceptions which prove the rule.

More often released during the doldrums are films like Fall, which exists in another space of films: those too well-made for the January dumping grounds, but not too well-made that they leave any impression or memorable impact. Made in part by industry behemoth Buzzfeed Studios, Fall is solidly structured but grasps for substance, resulting in a film which is mildly diverting but a seriously frustrating waste of potential.

The film follows Becky fifty-one weeks (yes, fifty-one weeks exactly) after her husband's death. Hoping to revitalize her belief in life, Becky's friend Hunter invites her to climb one of the tallest structures in the United States, the B67 radio tower. The two quickly find themselves stranded two-thousand feet above the Earth, testing their resolves, their wits, and their wills to survive.

Fall might've been a contender if it wasn't for the small matter of its god-awful script. Granted, filling ninety minutes with crackling dialogue and textured, fully realized characters is quite the challenge when the majority of your film takes place in one location (without human support to help bounce around or bolster ideas) but it can be done. Two films of a similar nature, The Descent and 127 Hours, manage to garner sympathy and interest for their stuck souls.

Additionally, a simply average, competent but frill-less script would've sufficed, but Fall's script is several tiers below average: it's a cloying, overwrought, strangely sentimental, utterly unbelievable black hole, free of intrigue or charisma. Every relationship and line of dialogue is baffling, every character a wonkily assembled pastiche of dimwitted platitudes. No human element feels remotely grounded or convincing - it's all worthless.

Fall was most likely reverse-engineered around the B67 tower, but even then, there's not much engineering outside of this thin concept. It's hard to imagine more than three or four hours' thought were given to character creation, motivations, or development, both before the women's crisis and during.

The absence of the latter consideration, the time actually spent on the tower, is what truly dooms the film; if Becky and Hunter were given something of substance to discuss or pontificate upon, then Fall could've worked as a standard but enjoyable thriller. But they aren't, so it doesn't. It cannot be overstated: this screenplay is sub-Hallmark levels of hollow nothingness. Dialogue and character interactions may as well have been lorem ipsum.

So, the script is worthless, but the question can still be posed: "is it possible to make an unexciting film which takes place a mile above the ground?" 2019's The Aeronauts tells us "yes," but Fall doesn't cop out on its high concept like that film does. Most of the film does take place on the radio tower, and there is an inherent tension throughout, mostly created from director Scott Mann's steady workmanship. Even before Becky and Hunter begin their ascent there's an air of unease and apprehension, which climaxes early in the film. The excitement is restrained, but it does keep the viewer's focus and sporadically manages to overcome the lousy script.

Once the crisis has started, Mann and his crew keep the tension at an adequate, though not heart-pounding level, convincingly maintaining the illusion of height throughout. The visage slips every so often, and the digital elements are glaringly fake or flat in a few shots (mostly when looking straight down) but the perception of danger is constant and impressive. The possibility of a sudden slip, a moment of lowered attention and instant death, is not substantive enough to spin gold from rust, but it is a noble attempt.

Grace Caroline Currey plays Becky and Virginia Gardner plays Hunter. They're likeable enough, frequently bubbly, and try to make do with the bland dialogue and characterizations they're given. Currey in particular is responsible for the emotional weight of the film, and she plays into it convincingly, physically demonstrating Becky's worsening spirit and internal anguish with a subtle, intricate grace. Credit should also be paid to the B67, which is very tall.

Aside from the main thrust of the story, there are some quirky externalities, some which work, some which don't. One of the more baffling story choices involves two men the women see early on in their struggle. Fall's soundtrack is supercharged, with screeching strings playing up the predicament, first to great effect but offering diminishing returns. It's also cloyingly sentimental at times, which deflates tension. The cinematography, shot by MacGregor, is plain but effective, painting the sky and the Earth below in broad strokes.

Overall, Fall is difficult to hate but impossible to love. Mann comes tantalizingly close to creating something from nothing, but he can't quite overcome the staggering lack of substance of the script, which he helped cowrite with Jonathan Frank. The film will most likely be forgotten shortly after leaving theaters, mostly because of a lack of thematic intent or character interest. If you've seen the poster or trailer and are tantalized by the premise, give it a try, but set expectations low and try to keep any acrophobia in check.

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Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

7/10

"Strong Enough to Have it All...Too Weak to Take It."

10 August 2022

Spider-Man: No Way Home is the last in the latest kinetic but emotion-free Spider-Man trilogy. Fortunately, No Way Home bucks the trend of the last two films, providing legitimate thrills alongside legitimate emotion. The film is reasonably contemplative and satisfying, with sterilized but large-scale action and some interesting nostalgia thrown in for good measure. In fact, and shockingly, the nostalgia of the film is given more than a passing glance; it's the bedrock of the film, which makes it far more engaging and less cheaply manipulative than many recent releases.

The film follows Peter Parker as he battles the forces of outside universes and applies for college admission. It features Doctor Strange, who helps kick the plot into gear when he brings Spider-Man's old foes, including Alfred Molina's Doctor Octopus, Willem Dafoe's Green Goblin, and Jamie Foxx's Electro, into the Holland-led franchise. With the help of his friends and some old allies, Peter Parker attempts to "cure" his foes of their villainy before sending them back to their original universes.

The film opens wobbly but once the action is underway, it rarely lets up. There are many surprising and grounded moments spread throughout the film which add the aforementioned emotional weight, coupled with a surprisingly small, personal scope. The film may involve multiple universes, but it's firmly fixed on Parker and his personal growth. The stakes are elevated to a fever pitch before all hell breaks loose and the real fun starts. Overall, it's a nicely structured story, excluding the rushed, exposition-heavy first fifteen minutes.

No Way Home is rather enigmatic; the film is not radically different from many films in the MCU, but it's personal story and grounded emotional stakes make it work far better than most. It's filmed in the typical Marvel assembly-line style and more concerned with a handful of unique and effective moments, rather than a broad, overarching storyline. It has some banter, but the quipping feels more organic and spontaneous than many of the James Gunn style shenanigans of late. It is undoubtably a product of its studio (Marvel, not Sony, the film's not a piece of crap) but differs in small, meaningful ways.

The most unique and interesting idea in the film is bringing back past characters, from franchises that have long since ended. As impressive as setting up a multi-film villain like Thanos was, it doesn't match the audacity of bringing back characters and actors from ten to twenty years ago.

It's more impressive still to incorporate them seamlessly into a new story, totally disconnected from their own but feeling intrinsically related. This trick could have easily gone wrong, and it's my guess that it will go wrong, when another, lazier, less competent studio tries it in the near future. But No Way Home gets it right; it feels fresh, meticulous, and groundbreaking.

To reiterate: this is not a rote idea or a minor accomplishment of easy execution. Popular culture is in a crisis, depressingly oversaturated with cheap nostalgia and once-popular IP struggling to make a new imprint. That No Way Home has managed to bring back literally the same characters from its franchise's heyday, from two different canonical timeliness no less, and merge them into a snappy, novel, holistic, and mass-audience-pleasing film is miraculous. In some ways, No Way Home one-ups the logistical achievement of Infinity War, though, to be fair, that film had many, many more plates to juggle and a gargantuan scope to hold together.

Despite this achievement of seamless integration, the film's cinematic technique and technical construction are average and uninspired. This is still the MCU (or MCU adjacent) which means there's little time or patience for texture, atmosphere, or clarity to the action. The mise-en-scene is perfunctory, which is expected but still disappointing when contrasted with the emotional weight of its story.

The film's most important asset, by far, is the long and deeply established connection to its characters. The viewer's familiarity with the Spider-Man films, all of them, is paramount, because it gives context to the characters' smooth dynamic and fizzed onscreen chemistry. No Way Home utilizes nostalgia and familiarity with more passion and understanding than most films, but the next step must be a unique directorial vision, leeway for future films' central artists. Maybe Sam Raimi will deliver just that with Doctor Strange 2. Here's hoping.

All of the film's performances are up to expectations, but there are a few standouts. Marissa Tomei and Tom Holland carry their weight, Alfred Molina is warm and cold in the right moments, and Toby Maguire and Andrew Garfield have unexpectedly masterful chemistry with each other and Holland, both comedically and emotionally.

The greatest joy of the film, however, is Willem Dafoe, who reprises his role as The Green Goblin with unbridled gusto. He is totally unhinged, gleefully maniacal, and altogether one the most menacing villains in superhero film history. How he's kept such an edge at sixty-six years of age is an absolute marvel, and it is a fantastic joy to watch.

Spider-Man: No Way Home is a highly entertaining and satisfactorily fresh popcorn flick. It almost transcends its comic book origins, though its loyalty to the Marvel filmmaking mode hamstrings its aspirations for the upper echelon of action cinema. Those aspirations are basically irrelevant though; No Way Home has shattered pandemic-era box office numbers and is among the highest grossing films ever, only a few weeks into its release. It will most likely be heralded as one of the greatest MCU films ever and one of the greatest superhero films of all time. If by some remote chance you haven't already seen it, you should. It's great fun all around.

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Red Rocket (2021)

7/10

"You May Hate Me, But It Ain't No Lie, Baby, Bye, Bye, Bye."

10 August 2022

Red Rocket flew under the radar. This is not a huge surprise, since it's a well-crafted, smaller film made for adults and a bit graphic, but it's a shame most people don't know what they're missing out on. Critics have mostly given it its due, though it's officially been categorically snubbed from the Academy Awards, which is, again, a real shame. It's one of the best films of the year, made by the meteoric Sean Baker, who previously dove into uncharted waters with his conceptually beautiful Tangerine, and his tearjerker The Florida Project. He's working in a different mode here, having made a comedy about and surrounded by grime, sleaze, and careful, charismatic manipulation. It's Red Rocket and it's a hoot.

The film follows Mikey, a down-on-his-luck pornstar who returns to his hometown of Texas City, Texas. There he becomes embroiled in the lives of many of his old acquaintances and intimates, including his ex-wife Lexi, her mother Lil, old friend Lonnie, and young sexpot Strawberry. Mikey navigates his newfound poverty as he plans his big industry comeback, mostly through subtle manipulation and other predatory behavior.

The film starts wobbly, putting in the legwork of character foundations right off the bat. As it progresses, the characters become more fleshed out, until, by the credits, the audience has a connection of sorts to each one. It's a fantastic, patient build. Overall, the enjoyment of Red Rocket greatly depends on what one thinks of Mikey, played superbly by Simon Rex, a real life ex-pornstar. Rex is uber charismatic and lowdown, but not irredeemable. The balance makes for a delightfully filthy black comedy - sunny but sleazy, with its central figure tightly in control.

Rex is the smartest, most ambitious character in the film, maneuvering the denizens of Texas City like chess pieces around himself. He's vapid and unethical, willing to lie and cheat at a moment's notice, but he also possesses an oddly ironclad work ethic, and is amply rewarded for his warped perseverance. Each relationship he nurtures, with Lexi, Lil, Lonnie, and Strawberry, nets him something in return, and he proves himself adept at running at the first sign of domestic instability. He may actually be psychopathic, an apex predator disguised as a junky, low-brow degenerate. Mikey's modus operandi is what makes the film so much goddamn fun; it's irreverent and cynical, usually uncomfortable, and often hilarious.

Red Rocket is a film about specifically trashy and unambitious figures, but it doesn't wallow in despair or pity. It also denigrates no one, which is a small miracle. The film shoves no one down but holds no one on a pedestal; they simply are, living as fully fleshed out and complicated beings. The plot is relatively thin, but the major events are spaced out perfectly, creating a sense of growing danger and finality as the film progresses. The structure is designed to keep interest and engagement, even when threads come to an abrupt halt, and it works. This is how character studies should be done.

In addition, each element of the film works in harmony, forming a holistic, perfect gestalt. Everything feels authentic: the setting, characters, events, timeframe, pacing, atmosphere, and, especially and most importantly, the performances. Even a hefty dose of NSYNC's Bye, Bye, Bye somehow meshes perfectly into place, which is completely illogical, almost impossible. It's an artificial layer of pop nonsense which brilliantly contrasts the seedy underbelly of the rural landscape. Baker is in total command of the material.

The film is great all around, but it's highlighted by the pitch perfect performances. Everyone melts seamlessly into their roles, a striking testament to Baker's skills considering most of the cast is inexperienced or nonprofessional. The cast transcend themselves, working through the fantastic material to feel like natural, organic people. Bree Elrod and Brenda Deiss, the latter of which tragically passed not two months after the film's release, could easily pass for a real-life mother-daughter tandem.

Time again to praise Simon Rex. He's in nearly every scene but keeps the energy and charm flowing, singlehandedly ensuring the material works. He's too charismatic to be written off or vehemently loathed. If Rex were less likeable, the film would simply be less likeable; if he were more likeable, the film loses its edge. But he plays it flawlessly, maintaining an emotional, psychological balancing act that's enthralling to watch unfold throughout.

Equally important is Suzanna Son, who gives Strawberry lustful, naïve, and, sensual qualities. Son must also balance her performance, which she does admirably; too frightened or unassuming and their relationship becomes concerning (sure, it's already queasy, but not enough to ruin the fun) but too fun-loving or wild and the film becomes a weird, totally male-centric power fantasy. Rex and Son split the upright, allowing the film to achieve perfect tonal harmony.

In many ways, Baker is fully in his comfort zone here because the film is about the underbelly of society and their general plight. Red Rocket deviates tonally from his past films, however. It's a biting, acidly funny film revolving around one of the most breathtaking, monstrously ambitious characters of the year. The film's lack of Oscar nominations and struggle to break even at the box office is an absolute shame, even when balanced by the critical praise it received. There are so few films made squarely for adults that aren't reductive, cartoonishly simple misery porn, and Red Rocket is part of this rare, dignified breed.

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8MM (1999)

6/10

"Who Cares About Some Dead Girl?"

10 August 2022

Darkness on screen is always refreshing; gritty films showcasing the seedy underbelly of the human condition are fascinating, firstly because Hollywood rarely peddles in such content, and secondly because the sense of doom and despair usually seems genuine and unsanitized. It's a crapshoot if a comedy, or even lighter drama, will feature forced and market-focused sentimentality, and it's always tough to watch millionaires talk down to the masses, even behind roles. But a great dark film doesn't make compromises, it eats away at the heart of its characters relentlessly, it doesn't cut emotional corners. 8MM doesn't quite live up to this ideal, but it gets close enough for a somber, sobering time.

The film follows Nick Welles, played by Nic Cage, a private detective who's hired to determine if a "snuff film" found in a recently deceased millionaire's vault is authentic. The journey takes him all over the country and into the heart of darkness, as each person he meets chips away at his views on professionalism, empathy, and morality.

The film is written by Andrew Kevin Walker, writer of Seven, and the same cynicism and calculated indifference to humanity is all over it. Joel Schumacher directs, bringing his usual competence and patient eye, though the film may have suffered under his contemporary, action-focused sensibilities; he's no David Fincher, and the film is too briskly paced and blandly lit to reach the heights meant for its characters and moral dilemmas. The cast is standout, however; Catherine Keener, Joaquin Phoenix, James Gandolfini, and Peter Stormare round out the cast. Cage is unusually reserved and contemplative, but Stormare is the true standout, playing a psychopath with chilling assurance.

As mentioned, it's a dark film, but it only manages to live up to its darkness in fits and starts. The subject matter is quite grotesque and the people present in the film are uniformly degenerate, save for Welles. In more capable hands, this could've been a better Seven, or a sleazebag version of Oldboy, or an urban and specific Apocalypse Now. Cage's descent into his own psychological underground is intriguing, engaging substance, but it's left unsubstantiated. 8MM settles for a more routine, by-the-numbers approach, which it suffers for to a minor degree.

Still, it's an entertaining and diverting film, with a mystery just easy enough to solve and a feeling of torment just felt enough to be hooked by. The perspective and villains are also fairly novel, even for a film like this. The twists give way to explanations, which give way to torture, and, in the end, there's really no grand purpose to it all.

Some men become numb to the evil they do, which makes them more heinous than any motivated antagonist, and 8MM boasts such men. Additionally, and more importantly, the treatment of the victim is staggeringly honest. There's almost no warmth for her, except from her mother and, eventually, Welles. The empathy is sparse but it's intensely felt.

8MM has an odd reputation. It's despised by most critics, who level charges of callous exploitation on it. This is an odd criticism, as the film is mostly quite restrained in its vulgarity; it's not nearly as graphic as it could be, isn't really languid at all with its violence or nudity. Its world and characters are exploitive, but Schumacher isn't. Still, the reputation remains.

The film is not heralded in Schumacher's or Cage's filmography, and it failed to break even in the US box office, though this isn't particularly surprising given its bleakness and general lack of hope. It's rare to see a film so rebuffed and spat upon by the critical community simply for failing to live up to expectations, and 8MM honestly doesn't deserve this treatment. It's not a masterpiece, but it is engaging, twisted, and brutally cold. If that's your sort of thing.

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