Articles

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 29 July 2023

A record of three French films open this week.  Not to be missed is THE BEASTS (France/Spain) which won the Cesar for Best Foreign film.

FILM REVIEWS:

AS BESTAS (THE BEASTS) (Spain/France 2022) Top 10 *****
Directed by Rodrigo Sorogoyen

Antonio (Denis Ménochet) and Olga (Marina Foïs) are a French couple who love the rural life, settled some time ago in a village in the interior of Galicia in Spain. They lead a quiet life ther , seeking closeness with nature, (Antonio says he loves the land and refuses to sign his land away to a turbine company) although their coexistence with the locals is not as idyllic as they would like.  A conflict about the modern windmills with their neighbours, the Anta brothers (Luis Zahera, Diego Anido), will cause tension to grow in the village until it reaches a point of no return.

The main problem between the couple and the brothers is the sale of the land to a turbine company.  The sale can only take place if votes go in the favour of selling the land.  The brothers want out of farming while the French couple refuse to sign.  The brothers use underhanded tactics to scare the couple, a few very nasty ones.

The script covers all the corners of the conflict.

One is a civilized discussion of conflict solving,  Antonio initiates a talk at the local bar, buying the brothers drinks.  The audience sees both sides of the story.  Antonio also tries to convince the brothers that the money obtained from the sale of the land is not enough for a settlement anywhere else.  The old adage goes that one cannot argue with idiots.  And the Anta brothers are clear idiots who are not only stupid but have no education nor common sense.  One of the brother’s slowness is attributed by the other brother from falling off a horse when younger.

The other discussion is between husband and wife, Antonio and Olga.  At night in bed, they discuss their options.  The wife offers valuable points in her arguments.  “We did not come here to fight.  The brothers will never change.  They are uncontrollable.”  But Antonio makes the valid point that they are out of options.  And money.  They have used their savings and need one good harvest at least if they decide to see their land.

Antonio has also made a complaint with the local police who do nothing to elevate the situation or help the couple.  All they say is: “We will talk to them.”

THE BEASTS is a gruelling edge of the seat thriller with things escalating from bad to worse to unbearable for the poor French couple.  Director Sorogoyen stages very intense confrontation set pieces with rising tensions and danger  The intensity of the situation is meticulously built up to a climax that will knock the audience off their seats,

THE BEASTS is not as  pleasant as JEAN DE FLORETTE neighbour farmer against neighbour farmer drama or even as pleasant as slasher/horror flick Sam Peckinpah’s THE STRAW DOGS.  The more harrowing fact is that the film is based on a true story, documented in Santoalla (2016) and re-written with fictional characters, with incidents feeling horribly raw and authentic.  The want for land brings out the worst in human beings.

Trailer:  

BILLION DOLLAR HEIST (USA 2023) ****
Directed by Daniel Gordon

BILLION DOLLAR HEIST is a documentary, well researched  that would appeal to a wide audience for a variety of reasons.  First and foremost, everyone loves a good heist movie.  The doc deals with cyber security and hacking.  Almost everyone these days has had an encounter with viruses and have heard news of cyber attacks.  Besides the topical relevance of the subject, there is the curiosity aspect that audiences have that they would like to learn more.  The element of danger and threat to the world is an urgency audiences cannot dismiss.  All these factors make BILLION DOLLAR HEIST an intriguing doc that many would not want to miss.  And most important of all, BILLION DOLLAR HEIST is a well researched, necessarily technical, well executed and totally compelling documentary.

Global, dynamic, and eye-opening, BILLION DOLLAR HEIST tells the story of the most daring cyber heist of all time, the Bangladeshi Central Bank theft. This feature documentary traces the origins of cyber-crime from basic credit card fraud to the wildly complex criminal organizations in existence today, supported by commentary and fascinating insight from highly regarded cyber security experts such as Eric Chien, Mikko Hypponen, Keith Mularski and renowned journalist, broadcaster and best-selling author of McMafia (which was adapted into a BBC / AMC series), Misha Glenny. A tale of epic proportions, BILLION DOLLAR HEIST shows how the key players on both sides of the law are embroiled in a global game of cat-and-mouse – with our money and security on the line.

Director Gordon also makes his doc more accessible by drawing in past virus attacks like the “I love You” virus.  Everyone remembers that virus and those who have had the misfortune of opening the email saying “I Love you”.   This doc serves as a firm reminder of how vulnerable computer users are.

Director Gordon is humble to list cyber attacks as the 4th largest problems of the humans race.  He lists the first three as: the Pandemic followed by weapons of mass destruction and followed by climate change.  But he demonstrates how this 4th largest treat - cyber attacks can create havoc on the world humans comfortably live in.

As the doc progresses, one eventually wonders how the doc would end.  Would the perpetrators of the heist be caught and brought to justice?  It might seem so, as the cyber experts seem to be able to trace and inform the audiences of how they entered the bankings system and steal and laundered the money.  But the doc does not end with a happy ending for the banking systems.  The cyber attackers got away with $81 million, just short of a billion.  The doc ends with a severe warning that the worst is yet to come.  One can only shudder in suspense and only time will tell how much more damage hackers can create in the future.  Everyone needs to be diligent and not open suspicious emails.  But it only takes one person to make the mistake to create total havoc around the world.  One wonders the reason these hackers would not decide to do some good instead of bad.  But such is the evil of man.

BILLION DOLLAR HEIST will be available to stream or own on August the 15th.

Trailer: 

BIRTH/REBIRTH (USA 2022) ***
Directed by Laura Moss

BIRTH/REBIRTH tells the birth or rebirth of a dead daughter.  The birth/rebirth is the result of an experiment a pathologist conducts to her success.  It is a re-telling of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein classic with a few notable differences.

Firstly it is a female re-telling.  All the characters are now female.  The doctor is still a doctor but a pathologist.  A new character, a mother is involved and the monster is also a female.  Secondly, there is more humanizing in the story.  All the characters are displayed as human beings with real emotions that matter.  Thirdly, the story takes a different direction after the ‘monster’ is created.  The monster is also not a monster but a ‘previous human being’.

Rose (Marin Ireland) is a pathologist who prefers working with corpses over social interaction. She also has an obsession — the reanimation of the dead. Celie (Judy Reyes) is a maternity nurse who has built her life around her bouncy, chatterbox six-year-old daughter, Lila (A.J. Lister). When one tragic night, Lila suddenly falls ill and dies, the two women's worlds crash into each other. They embark on a dark path of no return where they will be forced to confront how far they are willing to go to protect what they hold most dear.

Director Moss does her utmost best to make her Frankenstein tale as credible as possible. She invests the first third of the film into examining the 2 characters of her story.  She shows a diligent rather worried human being, Rose, just not a crazed experimenter.  When the two initially meet, Rose has her nose hit by the door and the following scenes show her with a bleeding nose, which causes the audience to have some sympathy for her.  Celie the mother is shown to be a caring yet desperate mother who would do anything to bring her dead daughter to life, regardless.  Her desperation into searching for her missing daughter initially also takes some screen time.  Director Moss clearly establishes the raison d’être of both women to continue the Frankenstein experiment much further.

BIRTH/REBIRTH is largely a female  picture.  The two protagonists are female, the experiment is the daughter and the director of the film is also female.  Director Moss keeps the female issues at hand, not letting them cloud the main story.  Both actresses Ireland and Reyes are totally convincing in their roles.  The interaction of the two characters, initially strangers then forced to bond together make a large part of the storyline,

BIRTH/REBIRTH is an impressive directorial debut from Laura Moss (a filmmaker from NYC whose work has screened at Tribeca, Rotterdam, and SXSW+ who has reimagined Mary Shelley’s classic horror myth Frankenstein into credible modern setting with real people with real issues.  As believable as it is, the film is more mysterious than scary with the story leading into a different ending that would also only lead to disaster.

BIRTH/REBIRTH opens Exclusively in Theatres on Friday, August 18th.

Trailer: 

HEART OF STONE (USA 2023) ***

Directed by Tom Harper

HEART OF STONE is Netflix’s original blockbuster that its to compete with this year’s action blockbusters like the new INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY and MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE DEAD RECKONING PART 1.  The film aims, according to press notes, to succeed as both an action blockbuster but one with more emotions of the story’s characters.

The heroine of the story is Rachel Stone (Gal Gadot).  Stone appears to be an inexperienced tech, on an elite MI6 unit headed up by lead agent Parker (Jamie Dornan, Kenneth Branagh’s BELFAST). What her MI6 team doesn’t know is that Stone actually works for the Charter. The Charter is an organization so secret that even other spies don’t know it exists. Former intelligence operatives and government officials from all over the world have put their previous political allegiances aside, and now use their skills and cutting edge technology for the greater good — a cross between the UN and International Rescue. Led by the Four Kings, the Charter steps in when other agencies fail to step up.When a routine mission is derailed by mysterious hacker Keya Dhawan (Alia Bhatt), Rachel’s two lives collide. As she races to protect the Charter and strives to beat the odds, her humanity might just be her biggest asset.

The heart of the Charter is the Charter’s massively powerful AI, capable of accessing any person or organization’s entire online presence and history, and then using that data to accurately predict future behaviour, anticipate decision-making, and even advise on responses.  This brings the film in line with the advances of AI.

The film opens with an elaborate covet mission that aims to take down a highly protected arms dealer.  The setting is the stunning Alps and of course the covert mission goes wrong, offering the chance to provide some awesome stunts and action packed scenes while introducing the story’s character.

HEART OF STONE delivers what it promises, an action blockbuster with Gal Gadot with more human characters and emotions.   The film opening on Friday August the 11th is worth a look.

Trailer: 

PASSAGES (France/Italy 2022) ***½

Directed by Ira Sachs

The film PASSAGES explores the explosive love triangle between an established male couple, Tomas and Martin, and Agathe, a woman who enters their lives in modern-day Paris. The couple also own a home in the French countryside. Agathe is a girl whom film director Tomas meets in a bar, right after wrapping up his latest feature, also titled Passages.

For Tomas, being with a woman is a novel and an exciting experience that he is eager to explore, despite being married to Martin.  However, when Martin starts his own affair, the mercurial Tomas refocuses his attention on his husband.

Director Sachs delves into the destructive aspects of love rather than its charitable nature, a theme that has been prevalent in his previous films.  The gay couple, Tomas and Martin, are long married, but they struggle to understand each other fully and often succumb to bursts of anger despite still loving each other.  Martin cannot comprehend Tomas' new found attraction to a woman, and Tomas, in turn, grapples with his own intense desires for the opposite sex. This disparity in their understanding of love and relationships reveals their emotional immaturity, and it becomes evident that they have reached a critical juncture in their maturity as a couple.  The love triangle involving two men and a woman, rather than three individuals of the same sex, is a fresh perspective that aligns with what Director Sachs intends to portray.

The film is based on a script co-written by Sachs himself and Mauricio Zacharias, and it feels honest and authentic, drawing from the director's emotions and experiences. The lead character, Tomas, is also a film director, mirroring Sachs' own profession.

Director Sachs skillfully captures both the explosive and intimate moments within relationships, sometimes occurring within moments of each other. When Tomas confesses to Martin that he slept with a woman for the first time, they argue and fight, with Tomas even threatening to move out of their apartment.  However, in a tender moment, Martin kisses Tomas on the lips and confesses that he still loves him.

PASSAGES boasts an exceptional cast, featuring three of Europe's leading actors - Adèle Exarchopoulos, Ben Whishaw, and Franz Rogowski.  German actor Rogowski has already won several acting awards and has been seen in films like A Hidden Life, Transit, and the recent Freaks Out, which was screened at the local Italian International Film Festival.  British actor Whishaw is unforgettable in Women Talking and as the limping man in The Lobster, while Exarchopoulos gained fame for her role in Blue is the Warmest Colour.

Director Sachs skillfully brings the tale to a logical and satisfactory conclusion, creating a cautionary yet realistic film that explores the destructive effects of love and lust.

PASSAGES, shot in both French and English,  opens on August 11 in Toronto (TIFF Bell Lightbox) and Vancouver (Vancity), followed by August 18 in Montreal and Quebec City, and will be screened throughout the spring in other Canadian cities.

Trailer: 

THE POD GENERATION (Belgium/France UK 2023) ***
Directed by Sophie Barthes

The film begins with Rachel (Emilia Clarke) waking up and getting ready for work in her futuristic looking apartment.  Instead of hearing Siri or Google , the audience hears Elena as she speaks and wishes Rachel a good morning while reminding her of her appointments and making breakfast for her.  She wakes her husband and off she goes to work.  As this is a feminist slanted film, Rachel is the soul amain bread winner of the couple, while the husband, Alvya (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a botanist does his research, as the audience see him self-pollinating fig tree as wasps are now extinct from the planet.

The pod referred to in the title of the film is a pod womb, where the mother can carry her child, instead of her natural womb.  In a not-so-distant future, AI is all the rage and nature is becoming a distant memory.  Tech giant Pegasus offers couples the opportunity to share pregnancy on a more equal footing via detachable artificial wombs, or pods. In this way, she can bear a child without the inconvenience of pregnancy.  Rachel’s company approves and supports her, as Rachel is a big contributor to the success of the company.

But at what cost? Rachel and Alvy, a New York couple, are ready to take their relationship to the next level and start a family. Rachel's work gives them a chance to fast-track to the top of the Pegasus waiting list. But Alvy, a botanist and devoted purist, has doubts. Nonetheless, his love for Rachel prompts him to take a leap of faith. And so begins the wild ride to parenthood in this brave new world with all its twists, turns, and bumps along the way.

THE POD GENERATION feels and is a feminist film in the way, being written and directed by a woman and with female issues.  Bearing a child is a strong female issue with more to discuss with regards to the concept of a sharing womb.  The company Rachel works for has more females in view than males and her supervisor who calls her into the office is female as well.  The issue discussed with her supervisor is also a female issue, one of having a child in the new future.  Besides being overburdened as a feminist film, the film touches other genres like sci-fi, romantic drama, relationships, environmental issues, social satire without really delving deep into any.  The script is repetitive in issues like the acceptance of the pod and the pod problems. 

As in many sci-fi futuristic outings, there are many scenes with decor of white and sparseness of furniture.   With this and director Barthes' creation of the pod technology, an effective creative and dystopian atmosphere is created.

 It is also strange that this UK, French and Belgium co-production has a setting in an American city - New York City.

There is a special advance screening August the 6th at the TIFF Bell Lightbox, with a virtual Q&A with director Barthes.

Trailer: 

RED, WHITE & ROYAL BLUE (USA 2023) ****

Directed by Matthew Lopez

RED, WHITE & ROYAL BLUE is a 2023 American romantic comedy film directed by Matthew Lopez who wrote the screenplay with Ted Malawer.  Based on the 2019 novel of the same name by Casey McQuiston, the film stars Taylor Zakhar Perez and Nicholas Galitzine as the son of the President of the United States and a British prince, Prince Henry respectively, who fall in love. 

Alex Claremont-Diaz (Perez) is the son of Ellen Claremont, the first female President of the United States, who is running for re-election. During a royal wedding, he has a physical altercation with Henry (Galitzine, also seen in the gay comedy HANDSOME DEVIL), a British prince. The incident is photographed and highly publicized with both parties forcing Alex and Henry to pretend to be friends with each other to prevent it from becoming a full-blown diplomatic and media crisis that would distract from Alex's mother's (Uma Thurman) election bid. The two become close over time and start falling in love.

In comedy, timing is everything.  The adage can be observed in both this film and the recent box-office hit BARBIE.  BARBIE had good ideas like Barbie world and the origin of the Barbie doll done in the style of the apes in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001 A SPACE ODYSSEY, but BARBIE was just not funny.  I did not laugh out loud even once.  Director Greta Gerwig makes good films like LADYBIRD but comedy is not her forte.  In RED, WHITE & ROYAL BLUE however, director Lopez demonstrates expert comic timing in the first scene where the huge expensive wedding cake (the cost made known to the audience, something of the order of 700,000 quid so that the crash of the cake is such anticipated as is feared). Just before the cake comes tumbling down, there are the camera shots of faces of important guests, then of Prince Henry and then Alex, just an excellent bud upon edits leading to the great comic moment.  Nothing else in the film beats the moment, but it is the one important catalyst that spurs the relationship between the two dignitaries.  Another good comic moment is used for its full tackiness, which would elicit a good laugh-out loud moment for many.  As the Prince is going down on Alex and he pulls down Alex’s trousers, the scene is cut to show the Washington monument.

Director Lopez also excels in the dramatic moments as in the confrontation scene between mother (Madame President) and Alex.  Credit is due to the film’s source material, the novel which takes the story, indeed a great love story, into many unexpected turns, taking the audience into new emotional heights.

Director Lopez skimps on the sex scenes, though they are erotic enough and done in good taste, in comparison to the recent other gay film Ira Sash’s PASSAGES, which goes all the way. The film did earn an R rating in the U.S.

Director Matthew Lopez is an American playwright and screenwriter.  His play The Inheritance, directed by Stephen Daldry, premiered at London's Young Vic in 2018, where it was called "the most important American play of the century.”  The Inheritance is the most honoured American play in a generation, sweeping the "Best Play" awards in both London and New York including the Tony Award, Olivier Award, Drama Desk Award, Evening Standard Award, London Critics Circle Award.  It is therefore of no surprise that Lopez, openly gay, directs his film with confidence and absolute flair.

RED, WHITE & BLUE has a special screening at TIFF Bell Lightbox Thursday 10th before going on streaming on Amazon Prime.

Trailer: 

STAY AWAKE (USA 2022) ***
Directed by Jamie Sisley

STAY AWAKE has a repeated disturbing scene where the mother is passing in and out of consciousness in the car as her sons are taking her to hospital.  The sons are singing songs asking their mother to guess the title (Film tunes are heard: “Everyybody’s Talkin’ of Me” from MIDNIGHT COWBOY for example) in order for her to STAY AWAKE.

The opening sequences show the love each family member has for each other.  The mother cooks for her children,  “Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” she instructs them.  The film’s initial scene has her cooking them a meal before the camera focuses on a pill, one assumes is an opioid.  The mother is overweight, which can contribute to her lack of confidence and her drug taking.  Audiences could be unsympathetic to such a woman, a drug addict and opioid user, but the purpose of the film is not to justify the use of opioids but rather to examine the effects it has on families.

The opioid addict is the mother with the two loving sons.  From the first scene, the mother character is one that everyone looks down upon.  She gets the opioid meds by pricking her finger and putting a bit of blood in her urine sample at the doctor’s.  She overdoses ever so often and has to be driven to the hospital by her sons.  Her sons have to pay for her rehab and the son’s lives are practically constrained by their mother’s addiction.   The elder son is clearly upset at her and lets her know it.  The question is why cannot she control herself and not change.  This is where the film gets deeper into the dilemma of addiction.  Or is not and the mother makes it clear that she wants to stay clean but she just cannot.  That is what addiction does to a person.  Sessions with her therapist/doctor at the rehab centre also paint an eye-opening look at the problem.  And the difficulties both the staff and patients have.

STAY AWAKE is understandably a difficult film to watch and can hardly be described as entertaining.  The film suffers during the initial 30 minutes or so with the script’s storyline dealing with addicts and their family that one has seen before in one film or another.  But the film slowly but surely invests time and care into the creation of the films three characters so that one does feel for each person, though not always on their side.

The film besides covering the mother’s addiction and strife towards recovery but also deals with the coming-of-age of each son.  The younger has a scholarship to a prestigious college and has trouble with his girlfriend.  The script is smart enough to have the mother offer solid advice, showing that the mother still can have a profound effect on her offspring.

The film clearly gets the audience to roof her characters, keeping the audience in suspense and on the edge of their seats whether the family will survive.

The film is available on VOD August the 15th.

Trailer: 

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 18 July 2023

FILM REVIEWS:

KOKOMO CITY (USA 2023) ***
Directed by D. Smith

KOKOMO CITY serves as a prime example of guerrilla filmmaking. After facing rejections from five directors, D. Smith took matters into her own hands, acquiring a camera and becoming the driving force behind the film. Smith impressively took on multiple roles, including producer, writer, director, composer, and cinematographer, even though she was a novice in filmmaking.

The documentary opens with a powerful account from Daniella, a transgender woman from New York City, recounting a harrowing incident involving a man she brought home for sex. The tension escalates as Daniella reveals that she was forced to defend herself with a gun. This candid and gripping narrative sets the tone for the film, showcasing its raw energy and unfiltered honesty.

The heart of the documentary revolves around the lives of four Black transgender sex workers - Daniella Carter and Dominique Silver from New York, and Koko Da Doll and Liyah Mitchell from Georgia. These resilient individuals shatter the barriers imposed by their profession, courageously sharing their experiences and struggles.

KOKOMO CITY sheds light on the challenges faced by transgender individuals, depicting the lack of respect and sensitivity they often encounter from others. Director D. Smith, herself a trans woman, brings a unique perspective to the film, having experienced firsthand the struggles in the music industry after her transition.

The film's soundtrack, curated by Smith, features a diverse range of songs, including Randy Crawford's "Street Life" and the evocative "Sissy Man Blues" by Kokomo Arnold, from whom the film derives its title.

As a minimalist documentary, KOKOMO CITY primarily consists of the four subjects sharing their experiences directly with the camera, supplemented by interviews with a few men who have interacted with them. At certain points, animated drawings are incorporated to emphasize specific points, adding a creative touch to the storytelling.

The documentary offers an intimate portrayal of black transgender sex workers, delving deep into their lives and experiences. Although the subject matter might be niche and unconventional for some viewers, it remains compelling and thought-provoking.

Tragically, one of the documentary's subjects, Koko Da Doll, was fatally shot in Atlanta in April 2023. This news adds a layer of poignancy and sadness to the film, emphasizing the harsh realities faced by the transgender community.

Despite the challenging subject matter, KOKOMO CITY has received critical acclaim and accolades. The documentary was honoured with the NEXT Innovator Award and the NEXT Audience Award at Sundance 2023, in addition to the Audience Award in the Panorama Documentary section at Berlin 2023.

KOKOMO CITY is set to open on July 28 in various cities, including Toronto (TIFF Bell Lightbox), Vancouver (Vancity), Montreal, and Quebec City, offering audiences a unique and emotionally charged cinematic experience.

Trailer: 

THE LADY OF SILENCE: THE MATAVIEJETAS MURDERS (Mexico 2023) ***

Original title: La dama del silencio: El caso de la Mataviejitas
Directed by María José Cuevas

A lady speaks in voiceover over archive photographs describing her mother, how loving she was and how she poured all her love to her and her children.  The voiceover goes on to announce that on that fateful day between 1 and 130 pm, she received a phone call from her nephew that her mother had been strangled by a telephone cable.  This is one of a series of killings targeting old women that has the police of Mexico City totally baffled.  This doc which opens for streaming on Netflix tells the story - thriller style.

The excellent clip is followed by credits that move in the style of the opening credits of Alfred Hitchcock’s NORTH BY NORTHWEST greeting the audience in the Netflix original documentary THE LADY OF SILENCE: THE MATAVIEJETAS MURDERS.

Between 1998 and 2005, a wave of murders targeting elderly women hit Mexico City, triggering the hunt for and capture of a most unlikely suspect.

The investigators break down the stages of the serial killer’s actions.  The first is the stalking in which the killer follows and finds out where the victim lives, whether she lives alone and when is the possible time to attack.  The next is the seduction phase.  The killer will then pose as someone who can offer the victim services such as a government official who can offer a senior card to access financial aid.  The third is the attack phase where the killer is in the home and strangles the old lady with anything like the cord of a telephone or tape recorder, the rope tying up the curtains or any cable lying around.  The killer would normally take a souvenir to remind him or her of the victim.

The doc should satisfy the curiosity of audiences fascinated by the motive or motives of serial killers.  The doc references a few past international serial killers, as the Mexican police seek aid from other countries in finding this serial killer, not having much experience since Mexico had no history of serial killings since the 1940’s.  There are clips of serial killers from archive footage - from Ted Bundy to Jeffery Dahmer and even France's most notorious serial killer nicknamed the monster of Montmartre who follows elderly ladies to their homes, tortured them in order to find where they hid their savings and then strangled them.

Director Cuevas also details how Mexican police also garnered the help from other countries.  There is a segment that shows the French educating and giving a course on serial killers.  He notes the difficulty of the Mexican police and how procedures in France might not apply in Mexico.  Often there is no connection between the victims and killer which makes it difficult to identify new possible cases.

Director Cuevas includes a nostalgic segment on grandmas with a clip from an old Mexican movie with old age star Sarah Garcia as a loveable granny.

THE LADY OF SILENCE: THE MATAVIEJETAS MURDERS plays like a taut suspense documentary full of cinematic pleasures that finally satisfy the audience’s curiosity on serial killers and this one’s particular capture.  The doc drags on during the last 30 minutes after the killer is caught with the doc's different focus on Mexico's judiciary system and the killer's new celebrity status.

Trailer: 

THE MURDERER (Thailand 2023) ****

Directed by Wisit Sasanatieng

THE MURDERER begins like a typical horror movie.  It is the dead of night and ominous music can be heard in the background.  A white man appears and is drenched in blood.  He hears a voice saying: “Help me, help me, please.”  followed by a scream.  The next scene that follows is a completely different one with a police investigator, a real goof of a policeman questioning suspects, the actor playing him, a well-known Thai comedian who overacts in a goofy way.  THE MURDERER is the new Netflix film opening this week that can be described as a blend of different genres - horror, comedy, suspense, romance and family drama.

The story unfolds in flashbacks as the police investigator questions various suspects in the investigating room, the two words printed large and clear so that no one would miss the purpose of the room.  There has been a mass murdered in which 7 family members have been slaughtered brutally.  The chief suspect is a white man.  It is revealed that a Thai girl who is 29, has just married a white man, a Brit and has brought him home to her family in the North of Thailand.  To set the record, this is the first film to be shot in this Thai dialect, according to the press notes.  The white man is given the term ‘ferang’ by the family.

As the film is told in flashbacks, there are titles such as 1) the arrival of the white man 2) the suspect 3) the girl 4) the fortune teller’s prediction etc.  all of which does not  really gel together.  But who cares as long as the audience is being entertained?  On the positive side, the script by Abishek J. Bajaj is rather smart with neat little unexpected plot twists and turns.   AN upcoming nasty storm is also in the background casting menace over the situation at hand.  The film also plays as a whodunit, the obvious suspect - the feared or white man being the one, but obviously too obvious to be the true killer.  Nothing is what it seems and the script is full of hilarious surprises as well.

This very silly yet brilliant blend of slasher horror and wacky comedy (from Thailand) with rarely a dull moment will definitely impress horror fans and put its Thai director on the filmmaking map.  Smart too is the reverse racism depicted in the film.  The white man, the outsider is the victim here, with all the Thai family firmly disliking and having bad thoughts about the white man.  Worse is the person in authority, the police investigator who believes the white man is guilty at the very start.

And there is good news for those that enjoy this horror romp!   Yongyoot Thongkongtoon, director of content for Netflix Thailand had announced three films and two series.  The first film was released on November 16 last year and can already be streamed on Netflix.  The LOST LOTTERIES is a madcap heist film about five losers on a mission to retrieve a lottery ticket from a mafia gang in a firecracker factory. Next is HUNGER about a woman from a family-run local noodles joint who is invited to join a top high-end restaurant and rounding up is MON RAK NAK PAK which follows a travelling cinema troupe as it goes on the road to bring the joy of live-dubbed films to local audiences.

Trailer: 

NORTH OF NORMAL (Canada 2022) ***1/2

Directed by Carly Stone

Based on Cea Sunrise Person’s 2014 memoir, director Carly Stone’s accomplished NORTH OF NORMAL recounts the author’s tumultuous, unconventional childhood.  In the 1970s, Cea’s hippie grandparents, Grandpa Dick (Robert Carlyle) and Grandma Jeanne (Janet Porter) flee the repressive climate of the United States for the untrammelled wilds of Alberta and British Columbia with Cea and her teenage mother, Michelle (Sarah Gadon), in tow.  Surrounded by permanently-stoned adults acting with little regard for any conventions (especially sexual ones), Cea lives a blissfully ignorant, near idyllic life.  This is the coming-of-age passage and story of Cea and unlike many other films of this genre, the passage takes a decade or more to journey through, not one summer or year. 

The film is stunningly shot, one assumes in northern Ontario and not in B.C. or Alberta since this film is a project of Ontario Creates.  River Price-Maenpaa and Amanda Fix who play Cea as child and teenager, deliver exuberant and credible performances in an otherwise charming and realistic film of the strength of family bonding.

NORTH OF NORMAL premiered at TIFF in 2022 and opens in theatres July the 28th.

Trailer: 

PARADISE (Germany 2023) ***
Directed by Boris Kunz, Tomas Jonsgården and Indre Juskute

The PARADISE being referred to in the new German sci-fi thriller is the near-future world where there exists a new technology that can transfer a person’s life years to another human.  With this comes a price.  Aeon is the company promising that one can “Donate your time and start a new life.”

The audience is shown how the process works by a segment at the film’s start, showing one of the company’s top salespersons by the name of Max, interviewing a prime candidate to convince him to donate his years.  He is promised 700,000 euros for taking 15 years of his life.  He is convinced by Max that he cannot make this amount of money in 15 years and that money will buy him and his family a new life - they are currently refugees.  This is quite the attractive offer one can hardly refuse.

The next scene shows Max awarded top salesperson of the year at AEON, and praised by the CEO, Sophie Thiessen who gives a speech revealing more information for the audience.  But the gist of this is that the donor gets older while the receiver younger in years.

Aeon faces trouble from activists who they deem as terrorists.  A terrorist group called  the Adam Organisation rises up, believing that Aeon is exploiting another system to allow the rich to get richer and the poor to eke out a (much shorter) living.  They target all the receivers and in an early scene, infiltrate the Aeon facility and eliminate all 15 receivers. 

The main plot of the film concerns Max and his wife.  After Max’s wife is forced to give up 40 years of her life as payment for an insurance debt involving a fire in their luxury apartment, Max desperately searches for a way to get them back.

The film also takes a slight diversion by examining the two responsible to bring Tom and his wife to justice. One is a black woman, herself a remuneration subject , looking much younger than her real age of 64, and thus totally loyal to Sophie Thiessen.  The other is a bearded investigator who is also top notch at what he does.  They embrace the motto of the company they work for: "Your life; your chance; your your choice”.   When questioned about using illegal tactics (software and devices not known to the police) to track down the company’s enemies, they justify that they just work for security; not for world peace.

PARADISE feels less like a sci-fi thriller, assuming that is what it is aimed at, because the film spends too much details to make it credible as well as a complete world.  To the latter effect, PARADISE succeeds.  The film creates a dystopian new world complete with rules and problems and examines how people on both sides - the donors and receivers, as they are called live their lives, with their conscience.  When donors are approached the interview process is also shown, to show how the donors are convinced.  The script also goes right down to the details of pricing.  It costs 700,000 euros for 15 years, thus working out to giving up 40 years of Elena’s life to pay her debt of 2.5 million euros.

PARADISE streams on Netflix beginning this week.

Trailer: 

SHRAPNEL (USA 2021)***
Directed by William Kaufman

Directed by William Kaufman and written by Chad Law and Johnny Martin Walter, SHRAPNEL is an action flick about a man protecting his family when one daughter goes missing after being kidnapped.  With his wife and other daughter in tow he tracks down the bad guys, TAKEN-style.

The film opens and plays like TAKEN where a father goes all out, no holds barred to find and rescue his ‘taken’ daughter.  Instead of showing the daughter taken, the film opens with the father finding the daughter’s car mysteriously missing in Mexico and unable to explain how the car disappeared, has to go back to the United States.

Sean, the father (Jason Patric) then teams up with her former marine partner (Cam Gigandet) and faces off against the cartel responsible.

“You promised to keep us safe.  You didn’t! Get out!”  exclaims the other daughter to the father as he tries to speak to her in her room.  He exits and closes the door.  Some drama is necessary and added to the action set pieces at times.

Patric and Gigandet are two action stars and it is good to see them both together in one film.

Gigandet joins the action only at the last third of the film.  He is the more handsome of the two and gets to deliver the funny lines to enliven the proceedings.  The magic question is whether the two will survive storming he cartel chief’s stronghold.

The film is set in the border towns around Mexico and the United States but filmed in the state of New Mexico.  It is a dry but still beautiful country, well demonstrated by the d.p. Mark Rutledge, with lots of poverty on display.

The film contains a lot s of violence and shows how far a father will go to protect his family.

Director Kaufman’s SHRAPNEL is a no-nonsense action flick that skimps on subplots like romance, redemption etc. but still touches these issues without compromising on the action.   With loud shouting, jittery and held camera and chase stunts, SHRAPNEL is a low budget effective thriller that delivers its product without any shit.

SHRAPNEL opens in theatres, on Digital and On Demand July 28, 2023.  From Saban  Films.

Trailer: 

TALK TO ME (Australia 2022) *

Directed by Danny and Michael Philippou

TALK TO ME is a 2022 Australian supernatural horror film, the hit at the Adelaide Film Festival, directed by Danny and Michael Philippou, in their feature film directorial debut.  Written by Danny Philippou and Bill Hinzman from a concept by Daley Pearson.  The concept is a n embalmed hand.  If someone holds it and says the words: ‘Talk to Me’  followed by 'Let Me In', then whatever spirit is in the hand will possess the person holding it, while a candle is also lit.

TALK TO ME opens with a young man, Cole, stumbles through a crowded house party as he attempts to locate his brother Duckett, who is injured.  While Cole is escorting him out, Duckett stabs Cole before fatally stabbing himself.  The stabbing is enough to have the audience jump out of their seats and prepares the audience for what is to come in what is a very scary jump-out-of-your seat horror possession flick.

17-year-old Mia is struggling with the second anniversary of her mother Rhea's suicide and her emotionally distant relationship with her father, Max. m She finds solace in her best friend Jade's family, consisting of Jade's mother and little brother Riley. Mia, Jade, and Riley sneak out to a party hosted by Hayley and Joss. The main attraction is a mysterious severed embalmed hand, which they use to conjure spirits by lighting a candle and saying, "Talk to me," which allows them to meet the spirit. Next, they say "I let you in" for full possession; the candle is blown out after 90 seconds to "close the door"; otherwise, the spirits will stay. Mia goes first and is possessed by a spirit that threatens Riley, although the possession exceeds the time limit.  Apparently the hand had been passed from someone else and continues to pass from one person to another,

There is nothing really new in the concept of possession from a possessed object LET THE RIGHT ONE IN and the scares like banging on one's head loudly on a desk or table.  Ari Aster did it in HEREDITARY, his first horror film.  But the rehash of material is at least well-put together  culminating in a sufficiently scary film from down-under.

UNKNOWN: COSMIC TIME MACHINE (USA 2023) ***½

Directed by Shal Gal

The best documentary features ( 4 in total) arrive on Netflix once a week, every Monday except the last one on the 31st, to entice and fascinate.  They belong to the UNKNOWN series and begin in July of 2023.  UNKNOWN is made up of four docs, with a new feature-length documentary releasing each week through July 2023, and its alternative focus makes it one of the best Netflix shows especially if one wants something a little different.

The one reviewed here is the 4th of the series entitled UNKNOWN: COSMIC TIME MACHINE.  For the cinephile who loves the space genre or astronomy and space studies, like myself, this one is a  must-see!

13.8 billion years ago, atoms and molecules of hydrogen combined together to form stars and the galaxy.

COSMIC TIME MACHINE (which isn't about actual time machines) follows NASA as it worked to make the James Webb Space Telescope, which from the news in July 2022 as the first photos from this expedition were well publicized.  The time machine element comes from the theory of light speed measured in light years.  The telescope captures an image of stars millions of light years away, a light year being the distance light travels in one year.  Light travels at 300,000,000 meters per second, so one can imagine the enormous distance traveled in a year that is made up of 365 days multiplied by 24 hours ,utilized by 60 minutes by 60 seconds.  So what is photographed has therefore happened way the past by the time the light reaches the telescope, the telescope functioning like a time machine.  This concept is briefly explained in the film.

The Cosmic Time Machine of the film title refers to the James Webb (named after the second administrator of NASA) Space Telescope (JWST) - the largest space telescope, made to conduct infrared astronomy. Its high-resolution and high-sensitivity instruments allow it to view objects too old, distant, or faint for the Hubble Space Telescope.  This enables investigations across many fields of astronomy and cosmology, such as observation of the first stars, the formation of the first galaxies, and detailed atmospheric characterization of potentially habitable exoplanets.  Webb operates in a halo orbit, circling around a point in space known as the Sun–Earth L2 Lagrange point, approximately 1,500,000 km (930,000 mi) beyond Earth's orbit around the Sun. Its actual position varies between about 250,000 and 832,000 km (155,000–517,000 mi) from L2 as it orbits, keeping it out of both Earth and Moon's shadow.

The doc can be divided into these main parts:  the design of the James Webb telescope including the difficulty of testing and probability of error (the first ;punch failed); the actual launching followed by its travel to its destination obit at L2; the first image taken, as announced by President Biden followed by the explanation of what the dots and brightness of the image represent.  It is all so elating and mesmerizing to see how everything works and how mankind is able to work together to accomplish a miraculous goal.

Amazing, mind-boggling and incredible!  With the telescope’s search for life, the way humans understand the universe will dramatically be changed.  The doc streams this week on Netflix.

Trailer: 

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 18 July 2023

FILM REVIEWS: 

BROTHER (Canada 2002) ***1/2

Directed by Clement Virgo

BROTHER is Toronto’s own director Clement vein’s latest drama after he wowed audiences in 1995 with his debut feature RUDE, proving him a reliable filmmaker.  This time around Virgo adapts David Chariandy’s award-winning 2017 novel about two brothers coming of age in 1990s Scarborough, where they reconcile their dreams and expectations with the violence that confronts them around every corner.  The film is shot in non-linear fashion often intercutting the lives of the two brothers as kids and as grownups.  The tactic works well and is never confusing at any point.

The film begins with the two brothers, Francis and Michael attempting to climb a dangerous transformer tower.  It becomes apparent soon that the elder, Francis has lost his life and one wonders whether it is due to this dangerous climb.

Lamar Johnson (TIFF ’18 Gala premiere The Hate U Give; TIFF ’18 Rising Star) and Aaron Pierre (The Underground Railroad) play the inseparable brothers Michael and Francis. 

The story is split into two time lines intercut multiple times throughout the film.  As the title implies, the story is told from Michael’s point of view with the relationship between him and his brother, Francis the focus.  

One timeline has their mother (Marsha Stephanie Blake), every night, before leaving for work, give them strict instructions to stay indoors and keep the TV off, but the two inevitably become entangled in what’s going on outside, both in person and through nightly news reports. Michael, a timid teenager, is always protected by the slightly older Francis, who, in their father’s absence, steps up to be his mentor.  The two also make an attempt to meet their absent father, who has no desire to see his children.

The other timeline is set ten years later.  Francis is gone and Michael, unmoored, struggles to take care of his mother, who is now incapacitated by grief. The film slowly pieces together their tragedy, jumping back and forth through time to capture its weight, and to track how a mother’s painstaking efforts to protect her children can only extend so far.

Michael and Francis are buffed, excellent human specimens.  The film should have at least one scene showing them working out as males do not get a full muscled chiseled body so easily.

The story set in the black community of Scarborough, a suburb of Toronto, shows despair of an outer city, the crime as well as police brutality  especially towards the black community.

Director Virgo uses music to create the effective atmosphere of the period.  Francis loves music and is a talented DJ.  The dance and music scenes are well choreographed bringing the film to a soaring high.  Virgo uses the famous song written by Jacques Brel “Je ne me Quitte pas” to conclude his moving film.

BROTHER is one of the best Canadian features made in 2022.  It is one of the three (RICEBOY SLEEPS and CRIMES OF THE FUTURE) being the other two, nominated for the Best Canadian Feature by the Toronto Film Critics Association,  The film gets my vote for the esteemed and grand prize.  BROTHER opens in July 28th, 2023.

Trailer: 

A COMPASSIONATE SPY (USA 2022) ****

Directed by Steve James

Director Steve James's latest project is the spy documentary, following Ted Hall, a compassionate spy.  The reason he is said to be compassionate is revealed quite early in the film. Steve James is the director of the hit HOOP DREAMS, which earned him an Oscar nomination.

A COMPASSIONATE SPY opens with Joan Hall interviewing Ted Hall for archive purposes, as she explains. The interview introduces the subject of the doc - no nonsense added - to the audience and takes place in the year 1998 at Cambridge.

A COMPASSIONATE SPY is a gripping real-life spy story about controversial nuclear physicist Ted Hall, his wife Joan, and the explosive secret they kept over a remarkable 52-year marriage. Through a long interview with the subject and his wife, the story is told using archive footage and dramatic reenactments. The film tells the story of Manhattan Project physicist and Soviet Union spy Theodore Hall. The reenactments take a fair amount of the film’s running time and help humanize the story.

One of the film's most educational and informative points is how the Soviet Union is looked upon at the time. Most Americans think of the Russians as an enemy, especially in current times when Russia is invading Ukraine. However, at the time of WWII, it was not the case, as the doc is quick to point out and insistent to make the point loud and clear. The Soviet Union is a great nation and was not the enemy. The media during WWII was quick to highlight that the Soviet Union lost 20 million lives in their fight against the German Nazis, especially when Germany was invading Russia. It was pointed out that Russia was protecting the rest of Europe from Nazi Germany. The doc includes clips from the propaganda film MISSION TO MOSCOW, directed in 1947 by Michael Curtiz, about Ambassador Joseph Davies (played by Walter Huston) being sent to Russia to learn about the Soviet system and returning to America as an advocate of Stalinism. As noted, Ted Hall, when passing nuclear information to the Soviets, is not considered treasonous, as the Soviets were considered notably friendly but a respected nation by the United States.  However, the film shows that after the war, the Soviet Union was deemed an enemy, and Ted and his wife Joan were then investigated as spies.

Director James's film plays like a suspenseful dead-serious espionage thriller. But he includes a few light moments, like the romance, as revealed in Joan's interview.  Another uplifting point of the movie is the inclusion of the Irving Berlin song "This is the Army" played on the soundtrack. The song is played over footage of Ted complaining of his uniform while being in the army in Los Alamos, where he worked when Oppenheimer was also present.

The documentary premiered out of competition at Venice in 2022. The release of the film is timed after the opening of Christopher Nolan's blockbuster multi-million production OPPENHEIMER, about the man and his invention of the atomic bomb. A COMPASSIONATE SPY opens on August 4 in Toronto (Hot Docs Cinema) and Vancouver (Vancity)!

Trailer: 

POISONED: THE DIRTY TRUTH ABOUT OUR FOOD (USA 2023) ***
Directed by Stephanie Soechtig

“We have (America) the safest food supply in the world.”  The identical statement is uttered by more than one interviewee in the film POISONED.  It is obvious that the statement is spoken by the heads of the monitors of the food industry like the heads of the USDA (animals) and the FDA (produce).  But advocates for the dangers present in America’s food chain strongly disagree.

POISONED : The Dirty Truth about our Food is a doc on food contamination and how it affects America.  The doc covers: a few litigation cases against companies regarding food poisoning; what the authorities are doing - whether enough or just going by the book; the work done by the activists; and where America is headed. The doc attempts clearly to be an eye-opener and often uses cheap tactics to make its point.  But to the film’s credit, it is very informative and there is much to be learnt behind what is bought at the grocery store.  It also answers a few curiosity questions like:  What is the most dangerous vegetable to eat and why?  (It is romaine lettuce.)   How does America fare compared to Europe?  As expected, very badly.  In America, they test the meat of the chicken after slaughter if they are contaminated.  In Europe, the chickens are vaccinated against Salmonella, which makes more sense as it eradicates the problem from the source.  The statistics from the results also show the difference between the two processes,

The  hero of the doc is William Marler, who is featured in the major part of the film.  In 1993, Marler represented 9-year-old Brianne Kiner in litigation against Jack in the Box following an E. coli O157:H7 outbreak, securing a $15.6 million settlement.  He subsequently directed his practice toward foodborne illness, representing many more people affected by diseases such as E. coli, hepatitis A, and Salmonellosis.   He has been involved in litigation relating to most of the large foodborne illness outbreaks in the United States, representing individuals against large companies such as Chili's, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Dole, and ConAgra.  The second hero of the story is Darin Detwiler, who lost his 16-month-old son Riley to E.coli during the 1993 Jack in the Box outbreak.  He is now an educator on the subject of food contamination.  He was offered the settlement on condition that he kept quiet about the death of his son.  This only illustrates the evil companies do to cover up their bad practices.

The best part of the doc are  the practices shown on camera at the Perdue chicken plant.  The company that has a poor record for poisons safety was kind enough to allow filming.  The segment is eye-opening and is the doc’s most compelling segment.  It is interesting to note that the doc does not attack the company as it granted the filmmakers permission to film.

POISONED is based on the bestselling book “Poisoned: The True Story of the Deadly E. Coli Outbreak That Changed the Way Americans Eat”.  The doc raises more issues with the food industry and the fallout from contaminated food but only barely touches the solution to the problem.  One may argue that there might not be any possible solution.  The onus, according to the doc, is on the public.  The public is supposed to initiate the cause by pressuring their legislators to make a change in Congress.

Trailer: 

REVEILLE (Germany 2022) ***½

Directed by Michael Akkerman

REVEILLE is an anti-war German film that has so far garnered a whole slew of awards at international film festivals.  It is a carefully crafted story that goes deep into the war fighting machine showing all the innocence of youth lost amidst the violence and horrors of WWII.  The setting is the battle fought in the specific battle at Mignano Gap in Italy, 1943.  During World War II, this was the location of the German Bernhardt Line - a German Army defensive line in Italy during the Italian Campaign of World War II. The Bernhardt Line was defended by XIV Panzer Corps (XIV Panzerkorps), part of the German Tenth Army.

While Germans are generally shown in movies as the bad guys, they have been recently shed in a different light as in the multi AcademyAward winner German production (not the American one) ALL QUIET THE WESTERN FRONT where the fighting is shown from there Germans’ point of view and the excellent Best Foreign Film Oscar nominee the Danish film LAND Of MINE set after WW1, where a group of young Germans are mistreated when given the task of dismantling German mines in the north of Denmark under the command of a Dane sergeant who clearly has something against the Germans, as is every Dane in the area.

REVEILLE joins the ranks of the list of memorable anti-war films that show the Germans’ point of view.

The message in the movie is delivered amidst suffering wounded POW soldiers and the morality of their captors. The film begins with Articles of the 1929 Geneva Convention:  As soon as possible after capture, POWs shall be evacuated to depots far removed from the danger zone.  As this is not possible for the severely wounded in the film, they may be kept in the zone only if removal proves more dangerous. 

The film is at his most effective when the two different points of the soldiers are shown.  At the film’s start, an American squad is shot, wounded and captured by a German squad.  While a few Americans are killed and one badly wounded that he can hardly walk a few steps without fainting, they are taken in by the Germans.  After an order from a higher German command, a German squash is sent out to ‘recce’ a hill.  They are then ambushed by the American squad.  The audience sees two points of view - the captured Americans followed by the captured Germans.  War is shown at its futility and there are no clear winners.  Only casualties.

There are many incidents that are not black and white as to what should be done, when looked upon on principles of humanitarian reasoning.  Take the incident when the American sergeant asks one of his men: “Why are you shooting?  They surrendered.” asked the American sergeant to one of his men.  “His face was blown off.  I was doing him a favour.”

There are many incidents like the above that would ask the in REVEILLE is dividual in the audience what would he or she have done?  This is what makes this film so emotional, raw and disturbing.  There are clearly no solutions.  And immediate human instinct is often the solution carried out.  The script is based on archival documents and interviewing family members of soldiers who had survived the second world war.

REVEILLE is available VOD August 4th, 2023.

 Trailer: 

SHORETCOMINGS (USA 2023) ***
Directed by Randall Park

The first few minutes of a film often reveal to the audience the tone expected for the rest of the film. For instance, James Bond films always begin with a thrilling 10-minute action sequence, unrelated to the main story, but setting the tone for an action-packed adventure. Often, no other action set piece in the film can match the intensity of this opening sequence. In the case of the new Asian comedy/drama SHORTCOMINGS, much more can be inferred from the film's opening sequence.

The movie starts with a film within the film, where Mrs. Wong is denied the booking of her suite in a posh hotel mainly catering to white clientele. The concierge tells her that she meets most of the requirements, but he 'no likee likee.' Undeterred, Mrs. Wong leaves the concierge to speak to her husband and returns with the news that she has bought the hotel, and the email confirmation should arrive shortly. This scene is reminiscent of a moment in the popular movie "CRAZY RICH ASIANS," where Michelle Yeoh's character is denied a hotel room on a rainy evening. 

The Mrs. Wong movie is being screened at a local Asian American Film Festival attended by Ben (Justin H. Min) and his girlfriend Miko (Ally Maki), with whom he lives in a luxurious Berkeley, California apartment owned by her father. Miko is also the co-organizer of the local Asian American Film Festival. During the festival, Ben and Miko have a heated argument over the film. Ben dislikes the way the Asian American audience applauded the movie, as he believes films should better represent their culture. Miko counters with the question, "Is it wrong that they are enjoying themselves?"

Ben aspires to be the next Eric Rohmer, but instead, he manages a struggling arthouse cinema, watches Criterion Collection DVDs, and frequents diners with his best friend Alice (Sherry Cola), a queer grad student with a habit of serial dating. Ben also obsesses about unattainable blonde women, which prompts Alice to remark, "God, you're predictable." When Miko moves to New York for an internship, Ben starts to explore his desires and ambitions. However, the film encounters problems in terms of direction. It struggles to decide whether it aims to be a romantic drama that explores relationships in an Asian American setting or a crowd-pleaser like the film that Ben previously criticized.

SHORTCOMINGS ends up being a compromise of both genres but fails to excel in either.  One flaw is Ben's character; he cannot seem to make up his mind, or in other words, the script cannot decide how to portray Ben's personality consistently.  At times, Ben appears shallow and predictable, while at other times, he shows a more apologetic and thoughtful side towards Alice.  The film injects humour through Jacob Batalon and Scott Seiss's performances as dorky cinema staff, but it is Sherry Cola who steals the show as Ben's female best friend.

SHORTCOMMINGS received critical acclaim at both Sundance 2023 and Tribeca 2023 and opens across North America on August 4th.

Trailer: 

SOULCATCHER (Poland 2023) *

Directed by Daniel Markowicz

SOULCATCHER belongs to the group of Netflix international films that allows not only Americans but people all over the world to experience films from other countries.  SOULCATCHER is an action flick from Poland that is shot in Polish.  Unfortunately it is quite bad.

A military contractor hired to seize a weapon that turns people into savage killers seeks revenge when his brother falls victim to the device.  There is a confusing fight between the hero and his brother in which the latter is killed leading to the chain of events that occur.

The action sequences are lacklustre at best. many shot in the dark resulting in the audiences unable to see exactly how the fights are choreographed. If one has seen the JOHN WICK films and even the lower quality TIL DEATH DO US PART , the ones here are no way anywhere in comparison.  The performances are nothing exceptional either, not for want of trying since the performances are hampered by the lazy script.  There is nothing else in the plot that creates anticipation or any excitement.  Sitting through the whole movie is a mission in itself.

Trailer: 

STAY AWAKE (USA 2022) ***
Directed by Jamie Sisley

STAY AWAKE has a repeated disturbing scene where the mother is passing in and out of consciousness in the car as her sons are taking her to hospital.  The sons are singing songs asking their mother to guess the title (Film tunes are heard: “Everyybody’s Talkin’ of Me” from MIDNIGHT COWBOY for example) in order for her to STAY AWAKE.

The opening sequences show the love each family member has for each other.  The mother cooks for her children,  “Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” she instructs them.  The film’s initial scene has her cooking them a meal before the camera focuses on a pill, one assumes is an opioid.  The mother is overweight, which can contribute to her lack of confidence and her drug taking.  Audiences could be unsympathetic to such a woman, a drug addict and opioid user, but the purpose of the film is not to justify the use of opioids but rather to examine the effects they have on families.

The opioid addict is the mother with the two loving sons.  From the first scene, the mother character is one that everyone looks down upon.  She gets the opioid meds by pricking her finger and putting a bit of blood in her urine sample at the doctor’s.  She overdoses every so often and has to be driven to the hospital by her sons.  Her sons have to pay for her rehab and the son’s lives are practically constrained by their mother’s addiction.   The elder son is clearly upset at her and lets her know it.  The question is why cannot she control herself and not change?  This is where the film gets deeper into the dilemma of addiction.  Or is not and the mother makes it clear that she wants to stay clean but she just cannot.  That is what addiction does to a person.  Sessions with her therapist/doctor at the rehab centre also paints an eye-opening look at the problem.  And the difficulties both the staff and patients have.

STAY AWAKE is understandably a difficult film to watch and can hardly be described as entertaining.  The film suffers during the initial 30 minutes or so with the script’s storyline dealing with addicts and their family that one has seen before in one film or another.  But the film slowly but surely invests time and care into the creation of the film's three characters so that one does feel for each person, though not always on their side.

The film besides covering the mother’s addiction and strife towards recovery but also deals with the coming-of-age of each son.  The younger has a scholarship to a prestigious college and has trouble with his girlfriend.  The script is smart enough to have the mother offer solid advice, showing that the mother still can have a profound effect on her offspring.

The film clearly gets the audience to root for its characters, keeping the audience in suspense and on the edge of their seats whether the family will survive.

TIL DEATH DO US PART (USA 2023) **
Directed by Timothy Woodward Jr.

TIL DEATH DO US PART (not to be confused with the 2017 Taye Diggs film of the same title) tells the story of a runaway bride - why she abandoned the marriage and how to remain apart from all the groom and friends.

The film begins with the wedding best man (Cam Gigandet) preparing and reciting his best man speech “Love is an intense feeling of love and concern….”  a very mediocre speech and he knows it.  The film unfolds in two parallel timelines  - which makes the film quite confusing.  One timeline sees the bride (Natalie Burn) and groom (Ser’Darius Blain) on a boat with a long time married  couple (Jason Patric and Nicole Arlyn).  The other has the bride escape from the wedding and is pursued by 7 grooms (played by an assortment of good-looking and built actors) who are out to kill her.  The question of what all this is about is answered slowly but surely as the story progresses.  What the bride is trying to do is to escape ‘the organization’, something like the same existing in the John Wick franchise.  The bride and groom are part of an organization of top notch hit persons and they are contracted for life.

The film is sexy and violent.  One fight sequence in which the bride has the best man in a choke hold for several minutes is for example, uncomfortably sexy.  There are lots of arm to arm combat with the bride able to give chokeholds with her legs.

There is nothing spectacular in the script by Chad Law.  The analogy of the shark and the dolphin is one neat idea in the script.

The film’s press notes claim the film to be brimming with stylish violence and blood-soaked action, seamlessly blending the slick, kinetic thrills of John Wick with the dark, twisted revenge tale of Kill Bill.  But the film lacks the originality of the two and turns out to be a poor man’s wannabe of the two films.  Most of the fights take place in a mansion where the bride disposes of the 7 kills one by one, so there is not much variation in the action set pieces.

The is the second film starring Jason Patric and Cam Gigandet, the other being SHRAPNEL that opened last week, also a lacklustre action flick.

If lowbrow action with a bride in a bridal outfit throughout the film kicking the butts of 7 groomsmen sounds exciting then TIL DEATH DO US PART is your type of movie.  At the time of writing, the film has a 100% score on its Rotten Tomatoes rating - but take the score as a caution, as the score is based only on a few reviews.

TIL DEATH DO US PART opens in theatres August the 4th.

Trailer: 

ZOM 100: BUCKET LIST OF THE DEAD (Japan 2023) *

Directed by Yasuke Ishida

The title ZOM 100 refers to zombies and the 100 things on the protagonist’s list that he wants to do before being bitten by one.

Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead is also a Japanese manga series written by Haro Aso and illustrated by Kotaro Takata. It has been serialized in Shogakukan's seinen manga magazine Monthly Sunday Gene-X since October 2018, with its chapters collected into fourteen tankōbon volumes as of June 2023.  The film is a condensed version of the series.

In short, the film is about the protagonist caught in a zombie apocalypse in Tokyo.  He forms a bucket list.  The rest of the film has him doing them and ticking each one of them, not in order, off on his list.

The film is best described as a teen comedy, though hardly funny at all.  It runs a lengthy 2 hours and streams on Netflix, one of their more forgettable international excursions.  The other awful one streaming on Netflix is SOULCATCHER from Poland. It is a tough toss which gets the prize for the worst one opening this week.

Akira Tendo (Eiji Akaso) works at an abusive company where he suffers endless late hours, power harassment from his boss, and illogical tasks.  Akira has to do two all-nighters on his first day.  He spends his days feeling more dead than alive.  One morning, the town is overtaken by zombies and the familiar landscape is already devastated. Seeing such destruction, Akira shouts with glee that he doesn’t need to go to the office anymore. Showing his innate positivity, Akira comes up with a list of 100 things he wants to do before he becomes a zombie, including cleaning his home and camping on his balcony and sets out to complete his bucket list.

The bucket list consists of 100 things among them being:

• clean my room
• put things ninth supermarket cart without looking at the price
• ride a motorcycle
• set off fireworks display
• be a superhero and see mankind
• have drinks with a flight attendant
• f\go paragliding
• go as a trio on a road trip

As many of these items are lame, they are in reality as lamely executed as the film which is also all over the place.  There are at times scary zombie scenes, a romance, a coming-of-age passage and abuse in the workplace.

The film, though advertised as a zombie movie, is not really one.  Following the adventures of a young man just out of school getting his first job, it tells of this first dream job and first infatuation with a girl at work.  Overworked, Akira does not have the guts to quit, the silly reason given being that he had tried so hard to get the job in the first place.  “Shut up and do what you are told,” is what his supervisor tells him. .Then comes the zombie apocalypse that occurs without any reason given.  The adventures that follow the hapless hero turns\ out to be a comedy though the laughs are few and far between.  The film is amusing at best and perhaps might elicit a smile or two.

Trailer: 

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 14 July 2023

 Solid documentary CONCRETE VALLEY and solid blaxploittion comedy THEY CLONED TYRONE come with highishest recommendations.

The much anticpated OPPENHEIMER also opens and the film soars.

FILM REVIEWS:

THE (ALMOST) LEGENDS (Mexico 2023) **
Directed by Ricardo Castro Velazquez

If Hollywood silliness like BARBIE is not enough, one can look south of the border to observe silliness in the form of two half-brothers trying to make good in an equally goofy Mexican movie  THE (ALMOST) LEGENDS.

Quite a lot happens in the film’s first 10 minutes, requiring a certain alertness to absorb all the proceedings.  Narrated by Valentin ( Guillermo Quintanilla), the super idol/singer from the unknown beachside tourist town in the northwestern Mexican state of Sinaloa, he tells of his family and his love for two things - his singing aboard a ferry and racing in a rally.  He also has two sons from his two families.  When he dies, he reveals that the story is not about him any longer but about the two sons, half brothers and also half-wits at that.  It is all goofy, cute and a little hilarious looking at Mexican humour.

The story does not really matter, but the setting is colourful enough, director Ricardo Castro Velazquez  going all out colourful.

Romeo (Benny Emmanuel) and Preciado (Harold Azuara), the two half brothers meet again to honor their dad's memory in a car rally full of adrenaline and banda music.

Not as hilarious as it should be, the film has s a lagging middle.  It also does not help that it is hard to care for two half brothers succeed when there is nothing really at stake.

THE (ALMOST) LEGENDS titled “Los (casi) ídolos de Bahía Colorada”, a Netflix original comedy debuts on Netflix this week.

Trailer:

BARBIE (USA 2023) **

Directed by Greta Gerwig

“It’s a Barbie Girl…. in a Barbie world.”  …. as the popular song goes.  If one is unfamiliar with Barbie dolls and the line of the song is all one knows, one is not smarter after leaving the new Barbie movie - entitled BARBIE, of course.  The doll pastiche fantasy plots its audience into the pink coloured Barbie world in which all girly dreams come true.  Everyone living in Barbieland is Barbie - the mayor and all the citizens,  except for Ken.  Barbie is everyone and everywhere.  Ken is just Ken.

Barbie is played with silly aplomb, cheerfulness and nativity by Margot Robbie, destined to play the titular girly heroine while Ken is played with dumb handsome innocence as pink-clad Ken,  Ken is head over heels in love with Barbie and wishes to be part of her life.  Big Barbie is just Barbie.

The character Barbie and the film BARBIE is based on a fashion doll and fictional character manufactured by American toy company Mattel, Inc. and launched on March 9, 1959. American businesswoman Ruth Handler is credited with the creation of the doll using a German doll called Bild Lilli as her inspiration  The character of Ruth Handler (Rhea Perlman) appears too, in the movie making an effect on the character of Barbie at the end.

The story of BARBIE is straightforward.  Barbie lives in her fantasy world of Barbie land when everything is Barbie-perfect.  She has a male admirer called Ken.  Ken is all dressed in pink, like the typical gay male, but Ken’s sexuality is totally dismissed and ignored in the story.  Ken exists just for Barbie and Ken wants to be in her life.  Barbie has an existential crisis - the running joke in the film.  She has to leave Barbieland to enter the real world to find out what has gone wrong with her, and she must make it right.  Not that anyone really cares.  In the process, Barbieland is about to turn into Kenland.  Heaven forbid!  Will Farell has a supporting role as the oafish CEO of Mattel, the company that owns Barbie.

Barbie has a significant impact on social values by conveying characteristics of female independence, and with her multitude of accessories, an idealized upscale life-style that can be shared with affluent friends.  This is the inspiration behind the husband and wife team Greta Gerwig and Noah Bambauch that wrote the script.  Unfortunately, they try too hard with the result of a pretentious rather than glossy look at the world of females in a male dominated world.

From the film’s confused messaging and often not only over-the-top way of reading its adult message, one can gather that the film’s target audience is not the ]girls that play with these Barbie dolls but the adults that used to play with these dolls.  Still the kids would still go see the film and be a bit confused, somewhat.  The film is to be praised for its stunning set and art decoration and its creation on a fantasy and animated looking Barbieland, all dressed in dreamy pink.  Apart from that, nothing else really is worthy of note.  The film should have been funnier for all its silliness.

Trailer: 

CONCRETE VALLEY (Canada 2022) ***½

Directed by Antoine Bourges

The film is shot in and around Thorncliffe Park.   The area is familiar to myself as my tennis club courts are right by the residential apartments.  The film consists of both interior and exterior scenes.  Director Bourges makes good use of the area in the storytelling.  For one, the film begins with the protagonist losing his path in the valley forest and the family also has a picnic outing in the valley later in the film.

A bit of the neighbourhood described should interest those watching the film. The neighbourhood (formerly containing a racetrack), just north of downtown Toronto. embodies some standard urban planning ideas of the era – high concentrations of similar housing types, strict separation of retail and residential development, and the assumption that everyone has a car. Low-rise buildings are clustered inside the enclosure created by Thorncliffe Park and Overlea, while high-rise buildings line the outside of Thorncliffe Park.  Residents on Thorncliffe Park Drive are at considerable walking distance from shops, although this problem is mitigated somewhat, even in winter, by well kept sidewalks and walkways and by frequent bus service.   Walking around, one would see many immigrants.  Though a generally safe place, there had been a shooting incident once.

In CONCRETE VALLEY, the audience is introduced to an immigrant family from Syria.   Rashid (Hussam Douhna), a doctor from Syria, struggles to adjust to his life in Canada after five years in Toronto’s Thorncliffe Park with his wife, Farah (Amani Ibrahim) and son Ammar (Abdullah Nadaf).  He tries to hold on to his old identity by working as an unlicensed doctor for his neighbours.  While Farah becomes more involved in their local community, tensions between her and Rashid begin to take their toll on their fragile marriage.  Director Bourges shows both the positives and weaknesses of his characters, not taking any sides in the couple’s quarrels.

The use of non-actors to play the major roles serve two purposes.  The first creates a certain authenticity in that the audience is not faced with cheap theatrics and acting according to the interpretation of the actor or actors.  However, if the non actor is not a doctor as in this movie, it might show.  Fortunately in this movie, it is hard to tell.  The film feels authentic and unforced, a good thing.

Director Bourges, himself an immigrant, paints a favourable picture of immigrants as hardworking and helpful in the community making positive contributions to society but not without their own personal problems.

CONCRETE VALLEY is a slow moving drama but is nevertheless captivating enough to hold interest throughout with its endearing immigrant family facing both integration and personal problems, occasionally with both mixed together.  The entire film looks much less pretentious than previous Canadian immigration films like last year’s downright awful SCARBOROUGH or this year’s recent equally bad SO MUCH TENDERNESS which looks too forceful and artificially staged.

CONCRETE VALLEY has a theatrical release across Canada beginning on July 21st, screening at TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto, with more Canada-wide dates coming soon. 

Trailer:  

DAKOTA NATION VS. UNITED STATES (USA 2023)***
Directed by  JESSE SHORT BULL & LAURA TOMASELLI  

LAKOTA NATION VS. UNITED STATES chronicles the Lakota Indians’ quest to reclaim the Black Hills, the sacred land that was stolen in violation of treaty agreements. A searing, timely portrait of resistance, the film explores the ways America has ignored its debt to Indigenous communities, and ponders what might be done today to repair the wrongs of the past.

The United States government stole the Black Hills – a mountain range in the U.S. states of South Dakota and Wyoming – from the Sioux Nation in 1876.   The U.S. calls the Lakota Indians Sioux but whatever they are called they are the Lakota Indians.  The land was pledged to the Sioux Nation in the Treaty of Fort Laramie, but a few years later the United States illegally seized the land and nullified the treaty with the Indian Appropriations Bill of 1876, without the tribe's consent. That bill "denied the Sioux all further appropriation and treaty-guaranteed annuities" until they gave up the Black Hills.  A Supreme Court case was ruled in favour of the Sioux in 1980.  As of 2011, the court's award was worth over $1 billion, but the Sioux have outstanding issues with the ruling and have not collected the funds.

The Black Hills is sacred Lakota land.  There are lots of shots of the land’s beauty with animals, fish and flowing streams and vegetation.

A lot of interviews are given by the Lakota elders who speak of the i justice to their people.  Many of them have got higher education and gone to work with the white man.  But their duty is to their people, and they often return back to their land to fight for their rights - which according to them is the right thing to do.  There is also a segment examining schools that take away the children to educate them the white man’s way.  The beliefs, practices and tradition of the Indians are taught to be bad and the children taught about Christianity and Jesus.  The funny thing is that a lot of the parents thought it ok for the children in order to succeed in their future.  “They did not know better and thought it was the best for us,” says a disgruntled Lakota who went to tone of the school.s

The film takes the occasional lighter tone with the song “Home on the Range '' ironically played when the Lakota Indians have lost their land.  Clips of old films are also shown like the comic one from THE PALEFACE with Buster Keaton.  The scene shows Keaton, the white man or paleface showing an Indian in full headdress a deed of his land with the Indian bowing at Whitman's feet.

But it is a serious doc with serious issues.  The film is told in 3 parts, the last part called “Reparation” which clearly shows there is none.  When the land is stolen, the supreme court of the noted States awards 100 million for the land which is an insult.  The Indians liken it to stealing  car and then paying peanuts for it.  They or course refuse the money and want their sacred land.

Moving, relevant and important, the doc reminds every non-native in North America that they are living on stolen land. 

DAKOTA NATION VS. UNITED STATES is available on VOD platforms July 21st, 2023.

Trailer: 

OPPENHEIMER  (USA/UK 2023) ****
Directed by Christopher Nolan

One of the most anticipated films of the year, OPPENHEIMER, is an epic biographical thriller film written and directed by Christopher Nolan. Based on the 2005 biography American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin, the film chronicles the life of J. Robert Oppenheimer, a theoretical physicist who was pivotal in developing the first nuclear weapons as part of the Manhattan Project. 

The first third of the film is filled with lots of jargon on atomic Physics including the concept of fusion (combining of atoms) and the opposite of it, fission, the splitting of atoms as  well as the usage of isotopes.  There is also the mention of the dual property of light, with its wave and particle nature.  Those versed in Physics and Science will be delighted at the script but those who are not will just have to grin and bear it.  It is great when the script gives its audience the benefit of intelligence to comprehend the facts.

Cillian Murphy delivers a magnificent performance carrying the drama fully from start to end as the troubled protagonist.  Murphy is best known for Danny Boyle’s 28 DAYS LATER and also as the creepy villain Scarecrow in the BATMAN movie.  The cast also includes a slew of cameos, many unrecognizable from their great performance as well as the make up.  The best of these performances belongs to Academy Award Winner (for Churchill) Gary Oldman who plays American President Truman.  Cameos include Kenneth Branagh, Benny Sadie, Rami Malek, Matthew Modine, Tom Conti (as Albert Einstein), Casey Affleck and Josh Hartnett among others.  Emily Blunt plays Oppenheimer’s wife, Kitty and Robert Downey plays a villain for the rest time, Lewis Strauss.  Every good story need a villain and Downey  Jr. provides a most hated conniving villain.

OPPENHEIMER is to be praised for its direction, main performance and particularly its visuals, aided by director Nolan’s re-imagination of the damaging effects of the hydrogen bomb.  The film contains many moments of jaw dropping shots in which the theatre went into complete silence.  OPPENHEIMER marks the best of adult Hollywood blockbuster movie making.  Nolan clearly does it best.

There is no segment on the images of the dropping of the bombs of the two Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki  The horrors of the bombing and fallout are shown from the imagined Oppenheimer’s point-of-view, of the American faces.  This is quite a clever and solid deviation from atom bomb films.

OPPENHEIMER runs 3 hours long and will definitely get a complaint or two despite it being a totally engrossing thriller from start to end.  This is clearly an adult thriller and drama, excellently made Nolan style, which means it gets a bit confusing in its facts (consider his last film TENET which is impossible to follow even though one might see it a half dozen times).  Warner Bros. upset with Nolan (thesis Nolan’s first film not with WB) for leaving for Universal also has BARBIE opening this week.  Forget the pink pretentious rubbish.  OPPENHEIMER is the one to go see this week.  OPPENHEIMER premiered at Le Grand Rex in Paris on July 11, 2023 and is scheduled to be theatrically released in the United Kingdom and United States on July 21, 2023, by Universal Pictures.  The film  opens everywhere, 21st of July, but best to see it in IMAX.  For the first time, sections in IMAX were shot using black-and-white analog photography.

Trailer: 

SHARKSPLOITATION (USA 2023) **

Directed by Stephen Scarlata

SHARKSPLOITATION is a documentary about films that exploit the horror films where sharks are the horrors.  It is a sub-genre, in other words, a genre of a genre.  Therefore, it is not a documentary about anything terribly important.  And as expected it is an ok watch, not very educational in terms of the importance of its subject matter and only interesting for those who have a keen interest in shark horror films.

Shudder, AMC Networks’ premium streaming service for horror, thrillers and the supernatural, releases this week on streaming, the new documentary, SHARKSPOITATION from filmmaker Stephen Scarlata.  In the wake of blockbuster classic Jaws in 1972, a new sub-genre was born. This new documentary explores the weird, wild cinematic legacy of sharks on film and the world’s undying fascination.  The film features multiple interviews including of Roger Corman, producer of SHARKTOPUSs and DINOSHARK; Joe Dante, who directed Corman’s Piranha; Carl Gottlieb, writer of all the JAWS films, Jaws 1, 2 and 3; Johannes Roberts, director of 47 METRES DOWN, and Mario Van Peebles, who starred in JAWS THE REVENGE along with marine and environmental conservation advocate Wendy Benchley, who was married to late Jaws, author Peter Benchley.  Benchley is also featured as an interviewee in one segment.

The following two paragraphs illustrate the mediocrity of the subject matter in the doc:

The doc begins with an expert explaining the two reasons behind the interest in shark horror films.  One is that the shark is a natural monster.  The second is that there is an inherent natural fear of high amounts of soft water, that underlines the fear of sharks beneath the water.

The second is the quality of dialogue said by the interviewees featured in the doc.  One has the title of horror film historian.  Is there a market for this type of education or a demand for it?  Another has the tile of doctor, and is a horror and shark expert.  There are, of course, a few famous talents such as the King of low budget horror movies, Roger Corman with a few of his products.  Joe Dante, the director of GREMLINS who also made films for Corman has his say in the doc.  Corman tells Dante that if he makes two successful films for him, he would not have to work for him any more.  Clips of JAWS rip-offs like PIRANHA, SHARKOPUS, ORCA THE KILLER WHALE (a bigger budget one with Richard Harris and Charlotte Rampling) and many others, too many to mention are also shown.  The dialogue or words spoken by those interviewed are often more than not just babbling.  Mario Van Peebles says that if you are in the water in such a situation, you are shit out of luck.  Not much quality information or even humour here.

Best to skip unless one is totally interested in shark horror as there is nothing really of urgency to be learnt here, though interesting to watch clips of old movies of forgettable low-budget generally awful shark horror films.  SHARKSPLOITATION is mildly entertaining at best!

Trailer: 

THEY CLONED TYRONE (USA 2023) ***½

Directed by Juel Taylor

Don’t let this dumb ass nigga mother fucking sounding film title THEY CLONED TYRONE fool you.  THEY CLONED TYRONE,  a Netflix original mf film is one crazed, totally off-the-wall and over-the-top comedy about pimps, drug dealers and gangstas that is an absolute blast.  Besides boasting star names like Jamie Foxx (RAY, DAY SHIFT and the upcoming STRAYS), Kiefer Sutherland and John Boyega (STAR WARS and THE WOMAN KING), it is the direction by Juel Taylor (his debut feature) and the script he co-wrote with Tony Rettenmaier that does the trick.  The screenplay was optioned from The Black List by MACROMedia.  It was conceived as a genre-busting homage to the Blaxploitation films of the 1970s,

A series of eerie events thrusts an unlikely trio made up of a pimp, his ho and a drug dealer onto the trail of a nefarious government conspiracy in this pulpy mystery caper.  The trio are:

Fontaine aka Tyrone:  He finds his clone.  Or is he the clone?  He is the Captain America and drug dealer in the conspiracy equation required to keep the peace of the hood.  He is the most serious of the three, also the one who wants to destroy the conspiracy.

Slick Charles:  He is the pimp who is proud of being the best pimp around.  However, he has trouble keeping Yo-You in control.  Slick is fast talking and is given the best, funniest and most foul mouthed dialogue in the script.  He runs around like a chicken with its head cut off.

Yo-Yo:  She is the hooker who claims she has retired and is only selling her body so that she can have enough money to go to college, hopefully in Miami.  She also is given hilarious lines.  Her name is given because no matter how much Slick tries to get rid of her, she always comes back  like a yo-yo.

Mall Security:  That is the nickname Sutherland calls his character likening his character to that like mall security - only  a very big mall consisting of all the existing clones.  He is the main villain but his character claims that he is just the guy the main villain calls when he wants a job done.

The film references other films like HOLLOW MAN (particularly Kevin Bacon) and SOPHIE’S CHOICE for the fun of it.

The dialogue and props include shops with names like “Got Dranks!” say it all.  Take these sample lines of dialogue:
“Who that?  Ugly black ass mother-fucker.” 

“Am I seeing shit?”

“Ghost of Christmas past ass nigga!” when Slick Charles sees Fointaine who has been shot dead suddenly appear.

THEY CLONED TYRONE blends in several genres - sci-fi, blaxploitation comedy, a bit of political thriller and crime drama.  But the film borders eventually on blaxploitation type goofy humour.  The film is surprisingly good comedy, if not anything else, and has attained a rotten tomatoes approval rating of 95% at the time of writing this review.  THEY CLONED TYRONE premiered at the American Black Film Festival on June 14, 2023. It began a limited theatrical release on July 14, 2023 before streaming on Netflix a week later.

Trailer: 

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 26 June 2023

AFIRE (German title: Roter Himmel) Germany 2023) ***½

Directed by Christian Petzold

German director Christian Petzold revealed that he wanted to make a series of films loosely inspired by the classical elements of water, earth, fire and air.  Starting with relatively successful and critically acclaimed UNDINE in 2020, a tale of a water nymph, fire will rise for his new movie AFIRE.

AFIRE (Voter Himmel) is a 2023 German drama film directed by Christian Petzold, starring Thomas Schubert, Paula Beer, Langston Uibel and Enno Trebs. The relationship drama focuses on four people who are trapped in their holiday home on the Baltic Sea by uncontrolled forest fires.

In a holiday home on the Baltic Sea not far from Ahrenshoop in hot, dry summer four young persons meet. There is a forest fire and slowly and unnoticeably they are enclosed by the walls of flame. Trapped they get closer, and then the desire, love and sex overtakes them.

Pardon the pun, by AFIRE as in the other Petzold films, is a slow burn.  That does not mean that the film is boring, but it is quite interesting to see how the director weaves and reveals the individual personalities and nuances, strengths and weaknesses of his 4 characters.  The news of the fire is only heard on the radio, but one knows that the fire will eventually affect the story’s 4 characters.

The main character is a sulking and pouty Leon (Thomas Schubert) who arrives at the holiday home for the sole purpose of finishing his book and meeting with his publisher.  He is tense and nervous at the response he is going to get, thus behaving oddly and way irritated.   He is more introverted than the friend Felix he is travelling with, whose home they are residing.   Leon is slightly overweight and self-conscious, never taking pff his clothes to swim or never swimming at all, despite being at a beach home.

Felix (Langston Uibel) is the opposite- extrovert, always taking off his shirt and always winning and flirting with the others.  It is soon revealed that he is gay.  Felix is preparing his portfolio at the beach home in order to enter an art school, but he is constantly distracted.

Nadja (Paula Beer) is the unexpected girl in the beach home that Leon and Felix suddenly find.  Despite she being quite the flirt and having loud sex nightly, Nadja is a very nice person.  And a great cook.

Devid (with an ‘e’ is the rescue swimmer at the beach who is also Nadja’s lover.

With the seaside setting and the youthful characters, Petzold’s film feels very much like the French Eric Rohmer’s youth innocence youth comedies like THE GREEN RAY (Le Rayon Vert) and PAULINE AT THE BEACH (Pauline a la Plage), but only much more serious.

AFIRE won the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize at the 73rd Berlin International Film Festival, where it had its world premiere on 22 February 2023.  The film opens on July 14th, 2023 at the TIFF Bell Lightbox.

Trailer: 

BIRD BOX BARCELONA (Spain 2023) ***
Directed by Alex and John Pastor

 BIRD BOX BARCELONA is a follow-up or remake or less likely a sequel, depending on how one wants to look at it, to the highly successful 1985 Sandra Bullock dystopian vehicle BIRD BOX directed by Dane Susanne Blier, based on Josh Malerman’s 2014 source novel.   The central character follows Bullock’s Malorie as she tries to protect herself and two children from entities which cause people who look at them to kill themselves. 

Why did Netflix bother to make BIRD BOX BARCELONA?  To make more money with the cash cow.  BIRD BOX began a limited release on December 14, before streaming worldwide on Netflix on December 21, 2018. The film received mixed reviews from critics but went on to become the most-watched film on Netflix within 28 days of release, according to Netflix.  BIRD BOX BARCELONA is set in Barcelona, Spain follows a male lead and his daughter, instead and treads several differences.  The film follows the father (Sebastián) and daughter (Anna) as they join up with to try and survive a dystopian future in which no-one survives looking at entities that have invaded and roam the earth.  More religion is brought into the plot (Is God saving the world or destroying it?) and there are more expansive action set pieces that are done with CGI.  The film is in Spanish with a little English.

Both films are all right watches, not too bad and not too good either, the main flaw being there lack of a credible plot.  Incidentally, both BIRD BOX films are currently streaming on Netflix so there is a choice of watching either one, or maybe both if one has the time.  

Trailer: 

THE DEEPEST BREATH (USA 2023) ***½

Directed by Laura McGann

Dangerous sports that toy with death make intriguing stories.

Hot on the heels of current headlines following the deadly demise of OceanGate's Titan submersible, in which five people aboard were declared lost, likely in a violent, deep sea implosion comes a documentary THE DEEPEST BREATH on the dangerous sport of freediving.

Freediving, aka breath-hold diving, or skin diving is a form of underwater diving that relies on breath-holding until resurfacing rather than the use of breathing apparatus such as scuba gear.  Besides the limits of breath-hold, immersion in water and exposure to high ambient pressure also have physiological effects that limit the depths and duration possible in freediving.

Written and directed by Laura McGann THE DEEPEST BREATH is a breathtaking (sorry, had to use the pun) and emotional and educational journey into the sport that is made more poignant as it covers the intimate life of freediver Alessia Zecchini, following her goals, dreams and heartbreaks.

The doc mentions at the beginning that additional footage and archive ones as well were added to enhance the storytelling.  The beginning  segment shows Alessia doing a free diving stint only to arrive at the surface, passing out and having to be given mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.   The constant danger of the sport is clearly established.

The doc follows the subject, an Italian freediver, Alessia Zecchini.  Alessia Zecchini (born 1992) set world and Italian records in freediving. A third way through the doc, another sportsperson is introduced, sort of out of nowhere,  He is an Irishman, Stephen Keenan who later meets Alessia. forming an unbreakable bond of romance and friendship.

Alessia has an illustrious career and is still alive and breaking records all the time.  But director McGann concentrates her doc during one portion of her life, a portion that is both most devastating and exhilarating.  The main setting is the year 2017, when she began her outdoor training with international coach and safety diver Irish Stephen Keenan, who died during a training accident with Zecchini in June of that year.  In the same year she beat the AIDA world record with −104 m depth in the Vertical Blue competition on May 10 on Long Island in the Bahamas. During the last days of the competition, Natalia Molchanova's record in constant weight (CWT) of −101 m (which had been held for six years), was beaten three times. On May 6, Zecchini was the first to go down and take off the tag at −102 m; breaking the world record. Four days later, Hanako Hirose dropped to −103 m but minutes later she went on to detach the tag at −104 m, setting another world record.  Natalia was herself missing in action and died during one free diving event,

The free diving segments are stunning and are as mesmerizing as they are scary, many scenes shrouded by darkness owing to the lack of light at great ocean depths.  Also educational is the subject of lung collapse, a danger facing most divers that can often cause them to back out during a dive.

THE DEEPEST BREATH debuts on Netflix July the 19th.

Trailer: 

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - DEAD RECKONING PART 1 (USA 2023) ****

Directed by Christopher McQuarrie

In the 7th instalment of the Mission Impossible franchise, M:I. MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - DEAD RECKONING PART 1, Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) and his IMF team are confronted by a mysterious, all-powerful foe known as "The Entity", Hunt is forced to consider that nothing can matter more than his mission.

It is  matter of hunting down the two halves of a key that can open something Hunt and the others do not know what.  In the wrong hands, the world will be destroyed.  In typical M:I style - the message will self-destruct etc, and the audience is plunged into another adventure - and a solid one in this latest instalment.

Action blockbusters (JOHN WICK 4; SPIDERVERSE) have demonstrated that story is only minimal in importance to the action set pieces.  As for the latest edition to the Mission Impossible franchise, MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - DEAD RECKONING PART 1 has the best action sequences including stunts performed by Cruise himself.  The one and  most dangerous stunt is the segment involving Hunt speed diving from the top of a mountain cliff to the top of a speeding train.  Speed diving is an extremely dangerous sport and involves landing at close to 80 miles per hour.  I have skydived twice and landed around 10 miles per hour and slowly descended from heights at that.  The speed diving sequences are amazing,   Another action sequence worthy of mention is the car chase down the Spanish Steps in Rome.  The Spanish Steps have been seen in many films before from the classic Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn film ROMAN HOLIDAY.  The chase in the little Fiat 500 is both exciting and hilarious, the little car often spinning out of control as pursued by an armoured truck.

 The most impressive action sequence, not only in this film but for any action film this year is the train crash scene at the film’s climax, the setting being the Swiss Alps.  After, much scouting and trouble finding an old WWII railway bridge to blow up in Poland, the filming eventually settled to the small village of Levisham, North Yorkshire, North Yorkshire Moors Railway, for a sequence set in the Alps in Switzerland with a train going 60 miles (97 km) an hour through a bridge being blown up.   Needless to say, it is best to watch the film on IMAX.

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - DEAD RECKONING PART 1 received a nomination for Most Anticipated Film at the 6th Hollywood Critics Association Midseason Film Awards.  If part 2 is going to be anywhere close to Part 1, Part 2 would also be one of the most anticipated films to come.  So far, MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - DEAD RECKONING PART 1 gets my vote for Best Action blockbuster of 2023.

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One premiered on the Spanish Steps in Rome on June 19, 2023, and is scheduled to be theatrically released in the United States on July 12, by Paramount Pictures. It has received critical acclaim. A direct sequel, Dead Reckoning Part Two, is set to be released on June 28, 2024.

Trailer: 

MR. CAR AND THE KNIGHTS TEMPLAR (Poland 2023) **

(Polish title: Pan Samochodzik i Templariusze)

Directed by Antoni Nykowski

Poland attempts a family adventure fantasy to the likes of Ian Fleming’s CHITTY CHITTY BAND BANG, the car that flies and floats on water.  Based on the Polish novel of the same name MR. CAR AND THE KNIGHTS TEMPLAR introduces a car (very ugly compared to Chitty) that can travel the waters for its owner, Mr. car to retrieve a hidden treasure after overcoming an adversary in a fight at a lighthouse.

The voiceover touts the attraction of a hidden treasure.  Is it the riches or the mystery of the unknown?  For movies that deal with treasures, one would expect an Indiana Jones type hero and some treasure that can provide both riches and a curse if fallen into the wrong hands.   This is true in the Netflix origin Polish adventure, MR. CAR AND THE KNIGHTS TEMPLAR, which is unfortunately a poor man’s version of Indiana Jones.  The film might prove interesting if one is Polish or can speak the language, which the film is shot in.

When an art historian (cross reference Indian Jones who is an archaeologist), Mr. Tomasz, who sometimes introduced himself as Tomasz the Vagabond, was called by his friends Mr. Samochodzik finds an ancient Templar cross, he must join forces with an unlikely group of adventurers on a quest to unlock the relic's secrets.

The car of the film’s title is an unusual vehicle inherited from Tomasz’ uncle-inventor. This car, although ugly, "a cross between a canoe and a wheelbarrow", as the malicious people called it, had incredible capabilities: with a Ferrari 410 engine, it could run at a speed of 280 km per hour.  Thanks to the screw used, it served as a motor boat. In this vehicle, Mr. Tomasz went to Poland to decipher another historical mystery, to catch thieves and smugglers trying to steal valuable historic items. 

The bad guys are some Danes and a suspicious group of Polish youth who follow Tomasz’ search in the Teutonic castles and the headquarters of the Templars.  A little romance is provided by a female reporter who is at loggerheads at the film’s start but the arguments only show that the two will eventually come together.

Mr. Car has a cult status in Poland. Series of books written by Zbigniew Nienacki in the 60-70s are great adventure-treasure hunter stories and are still quite popular. The film is based on  the second in the series.  To note is that there is a series on the books made in 1971.

To find the treasure you need a lot of knowledge, cunning and... a lot of luck.  But who really cares?   Though aimed at a family audience, the film is uninteresting at most, cliched and quite a brutal watch.  The film is also a bit violent (example: a head sizzling birth under a hot lamp at the film’s start), though little blood and gore is shown.  Special effects are possible at best.

MR. CAR AND THE KNIGHTS TEMPLAR opens on Netflix this week for streaming.

QUICKSAND (Colombia 2023) **
Directed by Andres Beltran

It is 30 minutes though the movie QUICKSAND that the couple falls and is trapped into quicksand.  The rest of the film shows how they survive their ordeal while also being attacked by a vicious snake protecting her nest of eggs.

The big question is how a film can remain interesting for a full hour of its running time if the couple trapped in quicksand would, expectedly sink and die within a few minutes.  For one thing, it is impossible for a human to sink entirely into quicksand, due to the higher density of the fluid. Quicksand has a density of about 2 grams per cubic centimetre, whereas the density of the human body is only about 1 gram per cubic centimetre.  At that level of density, sinking beyond about waist height in quicksand is impossible. Even objects with a higher density than quicksand will float on it if stationary.  Continued or panicked movement, however, may cause a person to sink further in the quicksand.  In the film the couple is trapped in the quicksand.

Quicksand is a trope of adventure fiction, particularly in film, where it is typically and unrealistically depicted with a suction effect that causes people or animals that walk into it to sink until fully submerged and risk drowning. This has led to the common misconception that humans can be completely immersed and drown in quicksand; however, this is physically impossible.  In the film QUICKSAN\D, there is a scene when Sofia (Carolina Gaitan) falls and sinks head into the quicksand.  Her ex (Allan Hawk)jumps in the pull her out.  So uhh for the film’s accuracy for the truth.

The couple is then trapped in the pond.  Since this increasingly impairs movement, it can lead to a situation where other factors such as exposure (i.e. sunstroke, dehydration and hypothermia), drowning in a rising tide or otherwise aggressive animals may harm the couple.  The script uses snakes that bite Sofia’s ex.

Director Beltran has his hands full with a misguided horror project based on a script by Matt Pitts that has limited potential.  The metaphor of the couple’s troubled marriage, which is ending in divorce mired by muddy troubles akin to being trapped in quicksand without any progress is all too obvious.  Under the extreme reassurances of being tapped near death in quicksand , the couple has to pull their resources together, ousting their difference in order to survive.  It does take a genius to force where all this is leading to, least of all moving into cliched story telling.

QUICKSAND contains a few genuine scary moments, such as the impending snake attack segment.  But  the film also show the couple trapped in quicksand standing still with the head level above the fluid.  But in  truth,  a person would be at waist level if trapped in quicksand due to the density of the human body.  It is impossible for a human body to sink completely innquicksand!  There are  more things that need to be unlearned about quicksand in this sorry case of a horror movie.

QUICKSAND makes Its Exclusive Streaming Debut onm Shudder on July 14.

Trailer: 

UNKNOWN: KILLER ROBOTS (USA 2023) ***
Directed by Jesse Sweet

UNKNOWN: KILLER ROBOTS is a Netflix original documentary that touches on the topic of Artificial Intelligence form the military point of view.`

The doc opens appropriately with the introduction to A.I. and robots with a woman, Emilia Javorsky of the  Future of Life Institute touting both its practicality and dangers.  She tells of A.I. eliminating poverty and creating peace but warns of the risks that A.I. poses.

A good example of A.I. robots is given on these smart killer drones.  It is  to just a matter of going from point A to Point B.  It is more like going out to find milk.  The robot has to decide which grocery store to go to, acquire the milk and bring it back safely.  If under threat, then it has to deal with the threat accordingly.

The absurdity of a manless war just using AI robots is akin to one funny scene in John Hughes 1985 college robot comedy WEIRD SCIENCE.  In one scene, a professor in a lecture hall is delivering his lesson.  Among the seats scattered throughout students were a couple of recorders taping the lesson.  Later on in the movie, there is a scene in the same lecture hall.  The camera pans the seats and there are no students present but a whole lot of recorders.  The camera settles in front of the room where the board is.  There is no professor present but a recorder delivering the lecture.  So this absurdity, though hilarious, is quite a realistic truth.   Will war just be fought using machines?

Very interesting is the doc’s segment on drone swarms.  The drones can collectively form a swarm and hunt a target.  Like its nature counterpart, swarms of birds or insects behave collectively following simple rules  There is no leader, but the swarm behaves collectively.  The concept of drone swarming is explained where a platoon can perform the function of a battalion and a battalion can perform the function of a brigade.  The aim is to save the number of lives of men and women in warfare.  The question is how autonomous machines will change the face of warfare into the future.

The danger and possible misuse of A.I. is understandably touted in the doc.  This is a prime example of well intentions missed by the bad people.  To this extent, currently many top company CEOs like Elon Musk are asking for a pause in A.I. development.  The one major question is to prevent A.I. to make the decision of killing humans, leaving the decision to be made only but humans.  One thing that is not argued is that humans could be crazy or non-rational and do worse than A.I. that could make a better decision based on a huge number of human inputs.

UNKNOWN: KILLER ROBOTS is a satisfactorily made doc from Netflix, nothing too fancy or made with extensive research.  However, the doc is informative and educational, especially in these times when Artificial Intelligence is all the hype.  There is much to learn still from this doc and from any new information arising from the topic of A.I.  It is important to know both the potential and risks of this new technology that will very soon transform human lives.

UNKNOWN: KILLER ROBOTS opens for streaming on Netflix this week.

Trailer: 

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 21 June 2023

ELDORADO: EVERYTHING THE NAZIS HATE (Germany 2023)***1/2

Directed by Benjamin Cantu and Matt Lambert

In Berlin of the late Golden Twenties, the Eldorado is legendary a decadent and hedonistic nightclub in which gays, lesbians and trans people dance cheek to cheek with the rich and powerful. They let loose to the electrifying music of the Weintraub Syncopators, intoxicated by the smells of perfume, rouge and manly sweat. But the Eldorado is also a space of contradictions, in which some openly gay visitors come dressed in Nazi uniforms.

It is inevitable that a documentary be made about the infamous German nightclub/cabaret of paradise known as the Eldorado.  The Eldorado was the name of multiple nightclubs and performance venues in Berlin before the Nazi Era and World War II.   The name of the cabaret Eldorado has become an integral part of the popular iconography of what has come to be seen as the culture of the period in German history often referred to as the "Weimar Republic”.

`The doc is made up of both archive footage and re-enactments.  It is a very erotic doc as everything on screen looks so sexy, hot and forbidden.

Though the locales offer ostensibly queer entertainment of some kind for the pleasure (the decadence; the drag shows; the off the wall patrons; the gaiety; the fabulousness) of heterosexual, the doc however, concentrates on the LGBT+ patrons.  The doc, essentially a history lesson, and a  very colourful and gay one at that, paints not only an account of the old now defunct club but also a few of the characters that frequent the club.  It is a good mix of subjects that keep the doc intriguing, especially making it more personal with these personal stories, though the doc appears to be taking on too many subjects without any clear direction.  Even so, it is an entertaining trip into the past, into nostalgia and into the time when all these tongs were forbidden.  One also gets to appreciate the freedom one has today.

Germany’s law off Paragraph 175, which was also the subject of another documentary and title of that film, is also examined in the doc as it plays relevance to the era. Before 1933, homosexual acts were illegal in Germany under Paragraph 175 of the German Criminal Code. The law was not consistently enforced, however, nd a thriving gay culture existed in major German cities. After the Nazi takeover in 1933, the first homosexual movement's infrastructure of clubs, organizations, and publications was shut down. After the Röhm purge in 1934, persecuting homosexuals became a priority of the Nazi police state. A 1935 revision of Paragraph 175 made it easier to bring criminal charges for homosexual acts, leading to a large increase in arrests and convictions.

Ernst Röhm is one of the more interesting subjects in the doc.  Röhmwas the leader of the SA, a paraarmy that did the dirty work like violence and cleaning up behind the Nazis.  Röhm was outwardly gay and because of his allegiance to the Nazis and his power and his persona; friendship with Adolf Hitler allowed to practice his lifestyle.  He was one of the frequent patrons of the eldorado.  Other subjects examined are three trans patrons and a couple Gottfried and Lisa who carried out a different lifestyle with a third person.

ELDORADO is currently streaming on Netflix.

Trailer: 

Every Body (USA 2023) ****
Directed by Julie Cohen

This doc on intersex gendered people is an extremely educational, informative and emotional experience.  This doc gets my vote for Best Documentary for this reason.

The film begins with couples celebrating their soon to arrive babies.  Balloons bursting of blue or pink hues h=erald the arrival of a male or female child.  But the doc questions what if the baby is born neither male or female.  It is not always black and white.  0.07% of babies are born intersex - that is with both male or female genitals.  

EVERY BODY is a revelatory investigation of the lives of intersex people. The film tells the stories of three individuals who have moved from childhoods marked by shame, secrecy, and non-consensual surgeries to thriving adulthoods after each decided to set aside medical advice to keep their bodies a secret and instead came out as their authentic selves. Actor and screenwriter River Gallo (they/them), political consultant Alicia Roth Weigel (she/they), and Ph.D. student Sean Saifa Wall (he/him) are now leaders in a fast-growing global movement advocating for greater understanding of the intersex community and an end to unnecessary surgeries. “We are not going to be quiet!” the claim!  Woven into the story is a stranger-than-fiction case of medical abuse, featuring exclusive footage from the NBC News archives, which helps explain the modern-day treatment of intersex people.  

The doc eventually gets to its main business at hand i.e to deliver the message of ‘no more intersex surgery’.  This is what all the intersex people are trying to bring across.  Many are forced to undergo surgical operations initiated by theirs-rents son that they can fit into a male or female category, without their consent, being too young to decide at the time.  The parents mean well, but the children suffer.  It is clearly a human rights issue.  The best thing of course is to ban intersex surgery.  The #NoIntersexSurgery Movement is currently one that is taking the work by storm as an event in footage of demonstrations around the world including Dublin, Nigeria and Amsterdam.  The song ‘Stand by Me’ serves like an anthem to the movement.  It is encouraging to see that there seems to be positivity for the intersex people, unanimously,

          The best portion of the doc is the closing credits.  As all the credits appear on the screen, so do the intersex cast and crew from the subjects interviewed to the producer, director, casting director, director of photography and others.  It is so emotionally rewarding to see these people, yes 0.07% of the American population manage to find themselves and make a statement.  These intersex people prove that there is no black or white in terms of male or female, and that they are indeed beautiful people and very attractive at that, all being in their younger days.  Running at an hour and a half, this doc comes with my highest recommendations!

Focus Features and Universal Pictures Canada will release EVERY BODY in-theatres on Friday, June 30th coinciding with Toronto’s PRIDE celebrations.

Trailer: 

INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY (USA 2023) *** ½

Direct by James Mangold

INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY premiered at Cannes to generally mixed reviews, many implying that the franchise has been used to death.  The lead Harrison Ford playing the titular hero, Indiana Jones is already past 80 and the age shows.  Indiana Jones/Ford does not hide his age as the script contains a few jokes about Indiana’s age.  The tents needed to be perfumed by Ford is needless to say, more difficult to be done.

THE DIAL OF DESTINY in the film’s title refers to the time dial invention of Greek mathematician/scientist Archimedes.  In grade school, students were taught in Physics, Archimedes Principle That states:  The apparent loss in weight a body has simmered in a liquid is equal to the weight of the liquid displaced by it.  The script has some reference to  liquid displacement in the film but it is more about time travel and the name Archimedes just used  his part living in Greece during the attack of the Romans, whether or not this is accurate.  Oh, how fond it is of Hollywood to make up and change history.

This 5th and supposedly final instalment of the Indiana Jone franchise has the similar plot of archaeologist Jones hunting down an ancient relic that holds mysterious powers.  If the relic falls into the wrong hands that will be the end of the world or maybe even the universe.  The relic in this case is Archimedes’ Dial of Destiny.

In 1944, during World War II, American archaeologist Indiana Jones and his colleague Basil Shaw (Toby Jones) are in Europe to recover artifacts stolen by the Nazis. They prevent Jürgen Voller (Mads Mikkelsen) , a Nazi scientist, from obtaining the Archimedes Dial, a device capable of time travel.  Twenty-five years later, Jones is uneasy over the fact that the U.S. government has recruited former Nazis to help beat the Soviet Union in the Space Race.  He is about to be forced into retirement from his teaching position because of his opposition to the practice. Voller, now a NASA member and ex-Nazi involved with the Apollo Moon-landing program, wishes to make the world into a better place as he sees fit by obtaining the dial, pitting him up against Jones once again.  Basil's daughter and Jones's goddaughter, Helena Shaw (Phoebe Waller-Bridge) accompanies Jones on his journey for the dial.

Ford is once again the gallant hero.  Though older, Indiana Jones gets to do all the great stunts which includes one scene of Indiana riding a horse through a busy parade and down the subway system.  Not so glorious is his and Helena’s scuttering through an under-sea cave, full of centipedes, bugs and other crawling insects.  The film can roughly be described as a series of action set-pieces, a few meticulously crafted strung together by the typical action narrative.  After a while, especially during its over 2 hour running time, these action sequences that include some typical ones like a motorbike chase and running atop a running train are a challenge to keep fresh and exciting.

INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY opens in theatres June the 30th.

Trailer: 

JOY RIDE (USA 2023) ***½

Direct by Adele Lim

Childhood best friends Audrey (Ashley Park) and Lolo Sherry Cola), accompanied by Audrey's former roommate Kat (Stephanie’s) and Lolo's cousin Deadeye Sabrina Wu), set out on a journey across China to find Audrey's birth mother.

With names like Evan Goldberg and Set  Rogen on the producer’s list, one can expect a lewd and rude comedy in JOY RIDE, the new Asian comedy that is co-written by Lim and  Cherry Chevapravatdumron and Teresa Hsiao.  Lim co-wrote the hot Singapore based Asian comedy CRAZY RICH ASIANS. 

This time the story shifts to both mainland China, showing off some stunning natural beauty as well as to Seoul in South Korea.  There is lots of clever writing that is based on Asian culture as well as some rude jokes in the countries’ native languages.  In fact the film’s funniest laugh-out loud joke occurs in one unexpected scene, in which this reviewer, who understands this bad word was the only one to laugh out loud, as the word is unknown to non-Hokkien speaking audiences.  (The word is pronounced ‘chee-bai’ which means ‘cunt’ that is shouted back by an admirer of the star Kat when she is told to f*** off.)

The lewd jokes come fast and funny, sometimes too fast for one to catch them all.  But if a joke or two is missed, there are plenty more to come around every corner.  A few are misses, but a lot are hits as well. 

Though JOY RIDE is by no means flawless, one must give credit to its director Adele Lim for an excellent effort.  She co-wrote CRAZY RICH ASIANS in 2018 and left writing on the sequel, following reports that she was offered significantly less pay byWarner Bros. than her white, male co-writer Peter Chiarelli.  Way to go, girl!  The Malaysian-born director shows great promise in her writing, providing the main storyline for JOY RIDE.

Though the story of four friends discovering themselves in a foreign country on a road trip is not really uncharted territory, there are a few unexpected surprises in the story.  Audrey has a big fight with her best childhood friend Lolo and says some very nasty words that are hard to take back.  It does not take a genius to guess thatchy will  make up, and they do it in a restaurant (cliched territory here) complete with applause from the customers.  The revelation of Audrey's birth mother and where it takes Audrey is a solid twist in the story.

The script also has some inventive humour like the thousand year shots, made of Chinese century eggs in a shot glass.  Being an ex-Singaporean growing up eating century eggs (an acquired taste), I could down many such shots, but for those who have never eaten a century egg, the thought of it is really disgusting especially when taking in the ammonia smell and its rubbery texture.  The bar scene is a hoot.  The reference to the K-pop Korean stars is also worthy of mention in the very inventive and funny k-pop musical number segment.

Though JOY RIDE runs on a familiar plot of girls on a trip like a road trip, there are sufficient inventive Asian and rude jokes to entertain and cause a laugh riot.

Trailer: 

LOVE GETS A ROOM (UK/Spain 2019) **
Directed by Rodrigo Cortés

The beginning credits emphasize the fact that what follows is a true story or at least based on true events.  The titles indicate the setting as the January of 1942 in Warsaw, Poland.  The audience is told that in a narrow ghetto 40,0000 Jews are confined by the Nazis in the middle of the city.  No one can leave or enter the perimeter, which are guarded by German troops.  Outside, the audience is informed, life goes on but inside, people die of illness, hunger and the cold.  But amidst all this, the audience is to believe that art goes on.  Inside, and cut off from the outside world by a towering wall, LOVE GETS A ROOM follows Stefcia and her fellow Jewish theatre actors as they fight to keep their passion for performing alive. 

As life in the Nazi-occupied ghetto becomes a fierce fight against cold, hunger, and epidemics, the actors, against all odds, embark on a daring mission to stage Jerzy Jurandot's play, risking their lives to create something beautiful in a world of chaos and destruction.

Written and directed by visionary filmmaker Rodrigo Cortés, the film takes the audience on an emotional journey back to the tumultuous time of World War II.  With what the press notes describe as masterful direction and outstanding performances, LOVE GETS A ROOM attempts to provide a poignant exploration of the power of love, hope, and sacrifice in the face of unimaginable adversity.

LOVE GETS A ROOM is a prime example of a film that tries too hard and relies on past films on theatre to make important points - a fact that fails as audiences are often familiar with war time theatre films, such as the famous Francois Truffaut’s 1980 masterpiece LE DERNIER METRO (THE LAST metro) being the best of the lot.  Director Cortés uses the all too often used tactic of the play mirroring the true events the actors are facing.  In the play, the main lead is torn between two overs, just as in the main story, Stefcia is torn between two lovers. She has to decide who to go with - to escape with the one who loves her who she does not love anymore, or stay with the one she loves.  And she has a little daughter to compact matters,  The worst of the film’s flaws is the use of cheap theatrics to make a point.  In the film, the flaw occurs with a German entering the theatre amidst a performance firing a rifle many times and making lots of noise and drama to make a silly point.  The German wishes to dispose of a resistance fighter that has nothing to do with the characters of the story.

LOVE GETS A ROOM is based on true events during Nazi occupied Poland and Is rich with period atmosphere.  But this well-intentioned retelling of Jewish history is marred by cheap theatrics, sappiness and cliche-ridden tricks of at theatre within a theatre setting.

LOVE GETS A ROOM  finally gets a release, finally gets a VOD release on Friday, June 30, 2023.

MATTER OUT OF PLACE (Austria 2022) ***½

Directed by Nikolaus Geyrhalter

MATTER OUT OF PLACE is a film about waste in remote areas and about people who are trying to clean up the mess.  The film captures the dispersion of garbage and is observing the endless and unending work of garbage collectors and waste managers around the world.

MATTER OUT OF PLACE, as the audience is told at the beginning of the film is any object or impact that is nonnative to its native environment.  What follows are two stunning images - one of the fjords in all its beauty and the other, a much closer look at the water all covered by junk like plastic bottles and other disgusting waste. 

Waste on the shores, waste on the mountains, waste everywhere, waste on ocean floors and deep down in the earth.  In his unique imagery consisting of minutely composed pictures, director Nikolaus Geyrhalter traces immense amounts of waste across our planet.  On his journey, director Geyrhalter illustrates the sheer endless struggle of people to gain control over the vast amounts of waste that we produce every single day.  Collecting, shredding, burning, burying – a Sisyphean task, which ostensibly solves the global problem of rubbish that is stealthily growing.

The collection can be seen in one extended segment in which a rubbish man on a three-wheeled truck collects individual rubbish bags from local neighbourhoods.  It is not long before his little truck is full of bags, some rubbish spilling onto the truck and road as they are not all properly bagged and secured.  These bags are then loaded onto a bigger lorry and these lorries queue up one by one by a huge landfill to dump out their loads.  Amidst all the goings-on, it can be observed that there are poorer people at the landfill scrummaging through the waste to see if there is anything valuable that can be exchanged for money.  One can just imagine the stench of the landfill.  (Myself, I had been to one and I could not stand the really strong God-awful smell.)

As to correcting the situation of dumped garbage, volunteers are shown bagging a beach of all the plastics and other waste, to be carried away in full trucks.  The cleaned beach after the cleanup looks much, much better.

Similar to Canadian documentary filmmaker Jennifer Baichwal of MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES and INTO THE WEEDS, director Nikolaus Geyrhalter blends stunning visual compositions of their frames in wide angled shots in a mostly calm setting.  The camera is often steady and the audience sees from a distance what is going on and for some time.  Both directors are concerned and are environmental activists through their documentaries that make a difference.

The film’s country of origin is Austria but many languages are spoken in the film including German, English, Albanian, Nepali, Swiss and German.

MATTER OUT OF PLACE opens on DVD and Digital on June the 27th.  It will also debut soon on iTunes, Vimeo-On-Demand and Amazon .Prime.     

MASCARADE (MASQUERADE) France 2021) **

Directed by Nicolas Bedos

Click on link below for review:

https://toronto-franco.com/article/21-cinema-movies/381-film-review-mascarade-masquerade

NIMONA (USA 2023) ****

Directed by Nick Bruno and Troy Quane

From Netflix, arrives a new animated feature entitled NIMONA.  NIMONA is an epic tale about finding friendship in the most surprising situations and accepting yourself and others for who they are.  According to Head of Animation Ted Ty the film took 8 years in the making.  The film is based on the National Book Award-nominated, New York Times best-selling graphic novel by ND Stevenson.

When Ballister Boldheart (Riz Ahmed), a knight in a futuristic medieval world, is framed for a crime he didn't commit, the only one who can help him prove his innocence is Nimona (Chloë Grace Moretz), a mischievous teen with a taste for mayhem — who also happens to be a shapeshifting creature Ballister had been trained to destroy.   But with the entire kingdom out to get him, Nimona is the best (or technically the only) sidekick Ballister can hope for. And as the lines between heroes, villains, and monsters start to blur, the two of them set out to wreak serious havoc — for Ballister to clear his name once and for all, and for Nimona to…just wreak serious havoc.

The knight Barrister and his white beau are reminiscent of the gay couple in Stephen Frears’ groundbreaking 1985 film MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE.  Hanif Kureishi (East Indian) and Daniel Day Lewis with his blonde hair colouring in that film is reproduced in NIMONA as Ballister’s boyfriend knight, Ambrosius (Edward Lee Yang)  also has coloured blond hair.

It is very encouraging to see how films have progressed in terms of tolerance to minorities.  In NIMONA, the key protagonist knight Ballister is gay.  The homosexuality is never questioned but taken as a given which means that being gay is accepted - no questions asked,  NIMONA is herself gay with her kinship to the female director of the Knighthood.  Ballister is also not of royalty but of the common man, the commoner never ever reaching the heights of knighthood.  Him being knighted also means himself being accepted as a hero and a protector of his Kingdom.  The film also portrays the love between knights Ballister and Ambrosius as something very precious and wonderful, enhancing a different aspect of a love story.  NIMONA, its script, story and direction are all to be complimented for being so progressive in the world’s acceptance for one another.  NIMONA has already achieved a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and the film is a strong bet to win the Oscar for Best Animated Feature next year.

The animation of the shapeshifter proved more challenging especially during the rigging process of animation, when the animators need to transform the creature whether enlarging or reducing its size.  Netflix hosted a special screening of NIMONA in Toronto at the TIFF Bell Lightbox that I attended.  The event included a Q&A with Canadian Ted Ty, Animation Director on NIMONA. Ted is Global Head of Character Animation for DNEG Animation, based at their Montréal studio. and he explained the painstaking process of animation in this respect.  The animation is also amazing as the animation of Ballister’s face looks so much like actor Liz Ahmed’s in real life.   It is the eyes that do the trick.

 Trailer: 

PRISONER’S DAUGHTER (USA 2022) **
Directed by Catherine Hardwicke

I was first amazed by actor Brian Cox way back when in 1991, the Scots Shakespearean actor played a repressed gay father in Nigel Finch’s THE LOST LANGUAGE OF CRANES.  Cox’s performances have continued to astound and he has played anything from Churchill to roles in super action hero films like X-MEN.  Cox is once again in top form in a film that unfortunately does not give the actor the chance to show his potential.  Cox still makes the movie and is the one reason to see it.

Cox comes up against Kate Benkinsale who plays his daughter in the film.    Beckinsale has a whole lot of movies in her resume including the UNDERWORLD films and art films like THE LAST DAY OF DISCO. Beckinsale hold her own when appearing with Cox, showing off her true talent in acting.

Powerhouse director Catherine Hardwicke (best known for being the director of TWILIGHT) gets to bring Cox and Beckinsale together in the indie film PRISONER’S DAUGHTER.  She devotes equal time to each character.  The story is as basic as the title implies - it is about the PRISONER’S DAUGHTER.  The father, Max has been in prison and unable to look after her daughter Maxine who is now a single mother after a bad marriage with a son, Ezra (Christopher Convery) who suffers from epileptic fits.  As the film opens. Maxine has just lost her waitressing job after her ex (Tyson Ritter) shows up at her work and punches Maxine’s supervisor.

A father fights for the love of his daughter and grandson, after serving twelve years in prison.

The main problem of PRISONER’S DAUGHTER is the cliched and predictable story with all the expected subplots that will lead, obviously, to the father’s redemption.  A lot of dialogue steers the plot points to the final redemption, that would provide the necessary ‘happy’ ending to the story.  This is not until the son, Ezra gets kidnapped by Maxine’s ex and other diversions.

Here comes the cliched plot points.  Father Max is diagnosed with terminal cancer.  He is allowed free time iut of prison before his death 5 months or so if his daughter will take him in with him at her place qhile he is under house arrest.  Max and his daughter do not get along, after he had deserted her, in the past, being too busy at his ‘questionable’ work and then in prison.  But when she needs money for her son’s seizure meds, she has no option but to take him in.  The usual stuff she imposes includes him not revealing that he is his grandad.  And to add to the melodrama, the boy is  bullied in school.  Grandad who used to be a professional boxer now teaches him the ropes.  And so on, and so on with no surprises in the story.  As expected, there will be moments when the heartstrings are tugged, and quite emotionally.

The film does contain a few charming segments like the pep talk Max gives to his grandson following which he says: “Now go apologize to your mother.”

PRISONER’S DAUGHTER opens in theatres June the 30th.

Trailer:

RUN RABBIT RUN (Australia 2023) **
Directed by Daina Reid

RUN RABBIT RUN is an Aussie psychological horror thriller that is made by the director of a few of THE HANDMAID’S TALE episodes.  The HANDMAID'S TALE's Elizabeth Moss was supposed to thus play the title role but the role went instead to Australian actress Sarah Cook.  Sarah Cook isn’t half bad as Sarah the fertility doctor and she bears the same similar befuddled unsettled pretty but could be scary look as does Moss.

RUN RABBIT RUN works as a scary suspense thriller as the story is always one step ahead of its audience.  The audience is near sure of exactly what is going on.  There are no deliberate confusing parts about who is a good thing.  The audience anticipation factor is high too and that is a good sign.  When this factor is high so are expectations.  In this respect the film fails to deliver its shocks and ends in what comes through as a rather expected and tepid climax.

Why the film is called RUN RABBIT RUN remains one of the film’s mysteries.  There is always a rabbit running around in the film.  Mia loves rabbits and she is shown carrying and hugging one at a few points in the film.  Her mother’s Sarah is not so lucky to get bitten by one.  Perhaps she deserves it and she is mean to that rabbit, asking it, in one of the film’s few humorous scenes to fuck off.

As in many horror films set in the woods or in the country, RUN RABBIT RUN has overhead shots, in fact quite a few of the cars driving along a long winding road with lots of vegetation,  The cinematography is actually quite stunning, courtesy of d.p. Bonne Elliot showcasing the beauty of the landscape of the state of Southern Australia.

The main positive point of the film is the lead Sarah Snook’s performance as the unsettled mother.  Clearly she shows her distress on screen, not knowing what to do and not knowing what is going on.  Is her daughter being possessed by the spirit of her dad sister or is her daughter going mad?  Or maybe she is going half bonkers as well.   The only other well-known actor in the film is Greta Scacchi who plans Joan, her mother in the nursing home suffering from Dementia, though she is Alice, Sarah’s missing sister.  She thinks Alice is still alive.  When Sarah and her daughter, Mia visit, Mia thinks she is Alice and all hell breaks loose.

The film suffered from a really thin plot and it shows.  Director Reid’s film is thus a slow burn and one can see her trying to fill up the film’s running time of an hour and a half.

The film also tackles the issues of single parenthood.  Sarah has to look after Mia alone.  Though her husband and his new wife want to help, Sarah keeps her trouble to herself, which is expected.

 The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival on 19 January 2023 and will be  released on Netflix on 28 June 2023.

 Trailer: 

SO MUCH TENDERNESS (Canada 2022) **
Directed by Lina Rodriguez

It is 7 and a half minutes into the film before the first line of dialogue “Does the smoke bother you?” is heard on the soundtrack as a female speaks to another seated on the passenger side of the car.   The question is asked as she waves the cigarette smoke away with her hand.  The answer would hardly matter.  There are long shots of the back of a neck and of blank faces.  Having fled Colombia after her husband was murdered, an environmental lawyer rebuilds her life in Toronto with her tempestuous daughter, only to risk losing everything when her traumatic past re-surfaces. 

All of Rodriguez’s films including SO MUCH TENDERNESS are slow burns and much patience is required to sit through any of her movies.  It is apparent that she is a perfectionist in the creation of every vignette in the film.  Rodriguez has made her style imprint in her filmmaking and it does not involve compelling viewing.  SO MUCH TENDERNESS gets really frustrating as it seems to be going and it is difficult to fathom what is the goal of Rodriguez’s film.  Rodriguez attempts to inject a bit of suspense in this story as in the segment where the mother faint recognizes a stranger and follows him for a while and into a subway station. 

Despite director Rodriguez ’s (who serves also as writer and producer) well intentions and diligence in depicting the immigration process and unease at settling in another country, SO MUCH TENDERNESS ends up quite a bore.

Trailer: 

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 19 June 2023

BIOSPHERE (USA 2022) **
Directed by Mel Eslyn

BIOSPHERE is the type of low budget smart-ass drama comedy typical the Duplass Brothers.   Their films include their debut feature THE PUFFY CHAIR followed by BAGHEAD and others.   Their films are an acquired taste as can be seen in BIOSPHERE’s first segment.  BIOSPHERE is directed by Mel Eslyn and stars Mark Duplass, one of the brothers.  Other brother Jay serves as executive producer.

The film opens in the not-too-distant future.   Billy (Mark Duplass) and Ray (Sterling K. Brown), lifelong best friends, brothers from another mother are seen jogging and making small talk and arguing while jogging in an enclosure, the BIOSPHERE.   They discuss, yes, of all things “The Mario Brothers”.  One has to be deemed the hero, Mario and the other the sidekick or brains or stable man behind the scenes. Luigi.  They make lively discussions if you consider these little small talk amusing.  If you think the small talk is a waste of time, and that you can do better with your time, best forget this movie, as what follows, segment after segment will likely annoy the hell out of you.  On the other hand, if you are in this kind of humour, you might be in for a treat.

It is soon revealed that Billy and Ray happen to be the last two men on earth.  Their 

survival is largely due to Ray, a brilliant scientist who designed the custom biosphere they call home, outfitting it with both creature comforts and the necessities to sustain life on a doomed planet. When the population of their fishpond—which supplies essential protein—begins waning, the men find themselves facing an ominous future. 

So the question is what is this film supposed to be?  It is a bromance or sci-fi survival parody?  Or perhaps a coming-of-age passage for two overgrown men child?  Or perhaps there is some hidden lesson amidst all that transpires.  Or maybe it all really does not matter,

Unless one is a Duplass fan, BIOSPHERE feels like a talkie in which nothing really concrete is being said.  The dialogue is not as smart as the writers Duplass and Brown think they are.  Neither is it that humorous but just as annoying as listening to two strangers arguing about nothing,  the two being stuck in a biosphere and having to survive one another makes everything the more torturous.  When one of their fish (the female) dies and there is no more mating and hence no more protein to be had (they probably should have grown soya beans and made tofu) their existence is at stake.   There is one intriguing fact about the fish changing sex to survive like the clownfish, which the film references. Clownfish carry both female and male reproductive organs. In the female-dominated clownfish community, the female is the largest fish. She mates only with the breeding male, usually the second-largest and most aggressive male in the community. The rest of the community are made up of sexually immature males. When the female dies, the breeding male will get first choice of food and begin to gain weight, eventually becoming female.

The apparent message in the whole exercise is whether man has the capacity to change under extenuating circumstances.  Maybe if one is forced to sit through these 90 minutes of male brother bonding rubbish, one might, though not really likely.  BIOSPHERE is recommended for Duplass fans.

But the film gets a below pass rating for the one reason is that it is extremely intersex racist.  Billy goes through a whole segment speaking at how embarrassed he is or unable to cope with his testicles disappearing.  The filmmakers should be sensitive towards the intersex community, and in this respect, this film is extremely racist and unforgivable.

BIOSPHERE premiered in Toronto at the Toronto International Film Festival last yer and opens in theatres and on VOD July the 7th.

TRAILER:

THE CRUSADES (USA 2023) **
Directed by Leo Milano

For many, high school is supposed to be defined by wild parties, backseat hook-ups and a devil-may-care attitude.  But, when three friends at Our Lady of the Crusades, an all-boys high school, receive earth-shattering news about an upcoming merger with their rivals, they make a pact to have one last, epic weekend before their lives turn upside down.   Along the way, however, they unknowingly make a dangerous enemy, "The Wrecking Crew", hell-bent on settling their vendetta at all costs.  While dodging the authorities, love affairs and their sadistic archrivals, the choices they make over the weekend might end up changing their lives more than they ever could have imagined.

The raucous comedy is directed by Leo Milano and co-written with the other writers, based on his own high school days.  The good looking Rudy Pankow playing Leo Grecco is assumed to be Milano’s alter-ego in the film.  Pankow is well-built, handsome and able to do silly but cool antics with his hands, something he gets to do repeatedly in the film.  Other than that, he is shown to be a smart-ass trying to hit on a  teacher and getting too smart for his own good.  Sometimes  he tries too hard to be cool as in the scene when he is biting on a toothpick during a party as if that is the coolest  thing on the planet.  It is not and quite a disgusting habit.  In the end,  Leo turns out more of an annoying egoistic personality than the self-doubting hero that would have been more appropriate in the story.  The other secondary character that appears a lot is another goof-ball played by Ryan Ashton as Jack, who almost gets beaten up in a rival fight but saved by arriving cops.

There is little to no background on each of the high school kids, which thus portray them as forgettable and cardboard personalities.  Only one scene references Pankow’s  parents but no parent is ever on show.  There is as a result, no grounding narrative with the film moving along from comedic set piece to set piece.  The actors playing the high school kids like older than high school students, looking at best like college students.  The actors playing the teachers are funnier than the students, especially the gym/weight-lifting coach Krieger (Nicholas Turturro) who has a mouth larger than muscles.  The film’s funniest scene is the one when the latter gives his ‘must-bulk-up-sissies’ speech to his gym class belittling every single one in the process.

` The film moves into serious mode during the last third.  The transition from comedy to drama is uneven and ends up quite contrived, despite director’s Milano’s good intentions for storytelling his own personal experiences.  The romantic fling between Leo and love interest does not generate much interest either..

Though the comedic set-pieces are funny enough, a few times even eliciting loud laughs, THE CRUSADES fails to ground itself as a memorable drama, which is what it intended to be.

THE CRUSADES premieres theatrically and day-and-date on VOD on July the 7th, 2023.

Trailer: 

THE OUT-LAWS (USA 2023) ***
Directed by Tyson Spindel

Owen Browning (Adam Devine) is a straight-laced bank manager about to marry the love of his life, Parker (Nina Dobrev). When his bank is held up by the infamous Ghost Bandits during his wedding week, he believes his future in-laws (Pierce Brosnan, Ellen Barkin) who just arrived in town, are the infamous Out-Laws.

As a comedy, not so much as an action comedy though the film by necessity contains some shoot-out scenes including a bank heist, the film is a hit and miss.  Watching it as a Netflix original comedy, there is less at stake and audiences will be more forgivable at the OUT-LAWS not being as funny as it should be.  THE OUT-LAWS is not as funny as Adam Sandler (Sandler is co-producer) as his MURDER MYSTERY comedies.

There are a few inspired segments like the one in which Owen dresses up in a Shrek costume while robbing a bank.  Own is silly as he is and wearing a Shrek mask i quite hilarious,

THE OUT-LAWS benefits from an apt comedic cast who manages to provide laugh-out loud humour despite many missis amidst the many hit-and- miss jokes.  The film takes a while to land on its feet and the humour in the first third just staggers along

A lot of weight of the film’s co edit success lies in the hands of Pierce Brosnan, ex-James Bond (he has starred in no fewer than 4 Bond films) and also delved into Hedy (MRS. DOUBTFIRE and this one), also demonstrating his ability to sing MAMMA MIA! HERE WE GO AGAIN, which won him some notoriety, whether good or bad.  InTHE OUT-LAWS he gets to show some dancing moves in the wedding segment at the end of the film.  Borsnan, being Irish, gets to do an Irish accent.  Ellen Barkin plays Brosnann’s wife in the OUT-LAWS, she is also Irish and has made her name in films like DINER and THE BIG EASY.  They make good comedic couple as well as one you wish you would not have to deal with.

Of the other in-laws, Richard Kidd has always proven himself apt in comedy being in the Chipmunk films and other comedies.  Kind plays illy at his best.  Julie Haggerty from AIRPLANE! is also funny at heart.

The lead character falls into the hands of comedian singer Adam Devine who is best known for his PITCH PERfECT roles and the voice in the BATMAN LEGO movie.  Divine co-produced this comedy with Adam Sandler under the Happy Madison Films banner and Devine is quite funny in his man-child role, the kind of role made famous by Sandler who has not gone into some serious roles and more serious outings.

Not as funny are Poorna Janannathan (Tunisian actress) as the chief villain, Michael Rooker as Agent Oldman or Dobrev as Owen’s fiancé.

Do not go out of the way to watch this forgettable comedy about weddings and in-laws.  Sporadically funny at parts, but a bit too much swearing and violence for the family, it still makes warm and funny entertainment in the living room, the kind Netflix infamous for putting out.  THE OUT-LAWS gets a bare pass.

Trailer: 

THE LESSON (UK/Germany 2022) ***
Directed by Alice Troughton

The film opens with a celebrated author being interviewed on stage.  “What exactly is it that drew you to tell this story?”  asks the interviewer.  What happens on screen for the next hour and 45 minutes or so answers the question.

Liam (Daryl McCormack), an aspiring and ambitious young writer, eagerly accepts a tutoring position at the family estate of his idol, renowned author J.M. Sinclair (Academy Award nominee Richard E. Grant). But soon, Liam realizes that he is ensnared in a web of family secrets, resentment, and retribution.  Sinclair, his wife Hélène (Academy Award nominee Julie Delpy), and their son Bertie (Stephen McMillan) all guard a dark past, one that threatens Liam’s future as well as their own.  As the lines between master and protégé blur, class, ambition, and betrayal become a dangerous combination in this taut noir thriller.

The synopsis above indicates that there is more than Liam’s success that forms the plot of this literary mystery heightened melodrama.  It is a melodrama hidden in the guise of a grand literary work.  There are the skeletons in the closet of the Sinclair family and the coming-of-age of not only the son Bertie but of the budding author, who at the time of hiring of the tutor is a nobody.

From the film’s title implies that there is only one lesson to be learnt or taught, Liam delivers many lessons to Bertie, each one to be approved by the mother.  The purpose of Liam’s hiring is to ensure the son , Bertie gets into Oxford by passing the so-called difficult entrance exams, which Liam is supposed to know all the insides out.  The film unravels like a play with the words, prologue followed by the different acts that are plastered on the screen.  What this one lesson is is up to the audience to figure out.

The film features rising star Daryl McCormack in the leading role of the tutor.  For those unfamiliar, this Irish born actor has already made his name in the U.K. after winning the BFTA award as Best Actor opposite Emma Thompson in the film GOOD LUCK TO YOU, RICO GRANDE.  He is unafraid to show off his good looks and shows some skin in THE LESSON when he undresses to jump in the water for a swim.  Richard E. Grant also fares well as the stiff upper lipped Sinclair..

Despite a few cliched moments in the plot points, THE LESSON moves on at a sustained and intriguing pace, making it good sort of flaky literary entertaining fare.  As they say, don’t expect too much and one should not get disappointed.

But the film arrives with high expectations.  The Lesson recently premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival where Alexandra Heller-Nicholas from AWFJ (Alliance Of Women Film Journalists) said that it was “one of the most fun and fascinating movies of the year thus far.”  The film opens in Canadian (and U.S.) theatres on July the 7th at the TIFF Bell Lightbox and other Cineplex locations.

Trailer: 

TIGER WITHIN (PLAN A) (Israel/Germany 2022) ***

Directed by Doron Paz and Yoav Paz

“Just because the war is over, it does not mean we can’t kill Jews anymore.” says a German man who, the audience assumes, has taken over the house of a returning Jew, after the German has struck the Jew’s head with the butt of his rifle.  The German’s wife and son look on.  This is the beginning scene of PLAN A.  It is clear that the earth of the audience is sought, at the injustice done on the Jews.  The voiceover can also be heard: “What if your entire family has been killed…. you parents and children.  All killed for no reason.  What would you do?”  The film obviously asks the same question to the audience of this controversial film.  This opening segment is the most effective one in the film, a scene that is revisited once more later on in the film.

PLAN A is based on a true story - the audience is informed.  PLAN A is based on the incredible true story of the “Avengers,” a group of Jewish vigilantes, men and woman, who after surviving the holocaust are vowing to avenge the death of their people by poisoning the water supplies in German cities and to kill six million Germans, one for every Jew slaughtered by the Nazis – “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”  In reality, there exists a Plan B and Plan C.

The trouble with the plan is the fallout from the poisoning.  There will be innocent people who will be poisoned and die and children. The Jews would therefore be just as guilty and not much better than the Nazis.  The plans also come into other problems, like securing the tasteless, colourless and odourless, thus undetectable poison for the water.

The film spends a lot of time on the individual characters of the story, which is not as interesting and dwarfs the main matter at hand.  One is already sympathetic to the plight of the Jews but the film keeps hammering the point, with a lot of the film’s dialogue reminding the audience of the concentration camps.  There is one good point brought out by a character in the film:  “There are so many of you prisoners in the camps, in the long lines that outnumber the Germans.  How come you Jews never go to do anything but just follow the lines to the gas chamber.”  

The film is in English and a German/Israel co-production though the film’s dialogue is often muffled.  The atmosphere and dim mood of the period piece look convincing enough.

If after viewing the film, one wishes more information on the subject after whetting the appetite, here is where it can be sought, check out:  'An eye for an eye': The Jews who sought to poison six million Germans to avenge the Holocaust - Israel News - haaretz.com.

PLAN A achieves its purpose of reminding the world of the horror of the killing of innocent Jews in the concentration camps and that the only true revenge is to show the enemy that an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth is not the way to go.

The film is available on numerous VOD platforms such as Apple TV, Prime Video (to buy/rent), GooglePlay, Vudu, Comcast, Spectrum, Cox, Verizon, DIRECTV,  Frontier, and Dish from July the 7th.

Trailer: 

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 18 June 2023

ASTEROID CITY (USA 2023) ****
Directed by Wes Anderson

American writer and director filmmaker Wes Anderson has got his loyal fans.  His films are known especially for their eccentricity, unique visuals with great attention to detail and narrative styles.  Watching just a few frames would allow fans to identify the frames belonging to an Anderson film.   With his frequent use of ensemble casts, stars appear to clamour to be in his movies.   His latest film, ASTEROID CITY once again contains themes of grief, loss of innocence, and dysfunctional families.

In 1955, students and parents from across the country gather for scholarly competition, rest, recreation, comedy, drama, and romance at a Junior Stargazer convention held in a fictional American desert town.   The American fictitious town replaces the fictitious French town in =THEB FRENCH DISPATCH, Anderson’s previous movie.  But no one is allowed to enter or leave the city by the government due to an asteroid that hit the ground in the city.  Strange events begin to unfold.  All the action takes place with a play which is narrated by its author Conrad Earp (Edward Norton) as Anderson’s camera pans sideways as in all his films but in this one across the stage revealing different acts instead.

A few of his familiar stars that normally form his ensemble of actors are noticeably missing - Luke Wilson, Owen Wilson and Bill Murray.  It would be a good guessing game to see which parts in ASTEROID CITY they would fill if they were present.

Anderson’s film is occasionally all over the place.  But this is ok as it just picks on the audience’s curiosity as to what he would try next.  He teases the audience with aliens, the universe and the meaning of life.  Is there a meaning in life?  He questions at one point in the movie before replying that maybe there isn’t one.   Just as no reason is given for the alien that looks very much like E.T. (perhaps a nod to the Spielberg classic) that arrives on Earth to steal the asteroid.  Anderson also tackles world issues like peace in the world.  Instead of fighting and being aggressive towards the alien, he says through the film’s characters that perhaps they are just curious creatures and lily harmless.  His film also floats like a colourful dream.  His actors are all decked in pastiche light water colours like light green blue and pink, looking like characters right out of an old series in 60’s television.  And you cannot wake up from a dream if you don’t fall asleep.  This line is related a couple of times in a song near the end of the movie.  For those who love Anderson, there are again lots of little eccentricities and details in the craft observable in every scene.  In this respect ASTEROID CITY is most similar to his most complex and layered last film THE FRENCH DISPATCH.  In that film, Anderson created an entire fictitious city in France similar to Paris including its entire metro system. For example, the ending credits also arrive with a little mechanical bird moving in  clockwork movements at the edge of the screen illustrating the meticulous detail Anderson puts in his films.

ASTEROID CITY is definitely Anderson at his best with his eccentric and meticulously crafted comedy that both teases and entertains with surprises around every corner.  A total delight!

ASTEROID CITY premiered at this year’s CANNES and opens in theatres this Friday June the 16th.  The film while offering pleasure to his die hard fans should also get Wenderson new converts.

Trailer: 

BLUE JEAN (UK 2022) ****
Directed by Georgia Oakley

There is an early scene at the beginning of Director Oakley's film where the protagonist, Jean, addresses her class during one of her gym classes (known as P.E. in the U.K.). She talks about the principles of fight or flight, explaining that it is a human instinct to either confront or flee from danger. Little does Jean know that she will soon face dangers herself and have to apply the same principles she taught in class - whether to fight against the system or escape from it. These dangers are both uncontrollable, as the Thatcher Government restricts the movements of the gay lifestyle (Thatcher's Conservative government is about to pass a law stigmatizing gays and lesbians, as heard on Margaret's radio), exposing her to the risk of losing her job, and controllable if she chooses to live a closeted lifestyle.

The protest was against Section 28, the Conservative government's attempt to prohibit the "promotion" of homosexuality as a "pretended family relationship." "What does this actually mean?" laughs Jean's partner, Viv at one point in the film. So what if you were a devoted teacher, like Jean, and also happened to be gay? "BLUE JEAN" is the story of Jean.

Jean (Rosy McEwen) has worked hard to compartmentalize her life, keeping her girlfriend Viv (Kerrie Hayes) separate from her family and work. Jean is a gym teacher who coaches the girls' netball team, which is a cauldron of teenage emotion and conflict.  As news   stories emerge about the impact of Section 28 - Tory ministers pontificating on moral decay, activists storming the House of Lords - Jean becomes hyper-aware of every glance directed at her.  Viv is an out and proud lesbian with assertive friends.  Pressure mounts when the arrival of a new student (Lucy Halliday) catalyzes a crisis that challenges Jean's idyllic lifestyle.

Director Oakley takes her time to tell Margaret's story, meticulously crafting the storytelling. The audience sees Margaret in close-up, colouring her hair and putting on blue jeans, as well as her interactions with family and her lover, who is her complete opposite and lives a completely open lifestyle.

Although the issues of equal rights for the gay and lesbian community might seem dated, the words of protest against the bill forbidding the promotion of homosexuality still hold relevance and serve as a reminder of the importance of equality for everyone.  The words spoken by protestors in one of the film's key scenes, as heard on TV, are powerful: "We deserve the same rights, no more, no less than any other English citizen." Another impactful segment is the confrontation outside a pub between Viv and Jean, where Viv admonishes Jean for not taking a stand.   The film is made even more powerful by strong performances, a dynamic script, and powerhouse direction.

"BLUE JEAN" premiered at Venice 2022, where it won the Giornate degli Autori People's Choice Award. It went on to receive awards at festivals such as Thessaloniki, Seville, and Belfast. The film earned 13 nominations at the British Independent Film Awards, winning four, including best debut screenwriter. "BLUE JEAN" opens on June 23 in Toronto (Bell Lightbox), perfectly timed to celebrate Toronto's Pride, and will also be shown in Vancouver and Montreal.

Trailer: 

KING OF CLONES (UK 2023) ***

Directed by Aditya Thayl

From human cloning research to a scandalous downfall, KING OF CLONES follows the life and work of Korea's most notorious scientist, Hwang Woo-suk.

Cloning is described in ‘wikipedia’ as the artificial cloning of organisms, sometimes known as reproductive cloning, is often accomplished via somatic-cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), a cloning method in which a viable embryo is created from a somatic cell and an egg cell.   But in the doc, cloning is actually explained in simpler terms.  But the doc, a Netflix documentary, is not so much interested in the science of cloning, but rather one of the biggest clone scientists in the world, Dr. Hwang, nicknamed KING OF CLONES in this intriguing and fascinating documentary.  Imagine someone paralyzed being able to walk again or a deceased man cured from his illness.  Hwang has an interesting story to tell in itself, he appears too, on the cover of TIME, one issue with the heading “Fallen Idol”, the magazine running story of how cloning specialist became a scientific outcast.  Good intentions are no excuse for bad behaviour - the doc teaches while being humorous at the same time.  The doc begins with Dr. Hwang entring a Research facility in Abu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Singapore filmmaker Aditya Thayl examines the ground-breaking research in stem cells of veterinarian Hwang Woo-suk and his rise to astronomical fame for his two published research articles where he claimed that he created human embryonic stem cells by cloning.  However, as quickly as he received fame, he was equally quickly called out for his sketchy methods of research, and his research was eventually proven to be fraudulent, with myriad ethical violations to boot.

Other subjects in the film include a Brit Dr. Allen Tinson, ex worker from a Safari Tourist Place now living in the UAE as a camel specialist.  He shares his thoughts on cloning as Dr. Hwandg was supposedly cloning racing and show camels for the wealthy Arabs.  And the wealthy Hungarian who wanted a clone for his dead French Bulldog.

The doc does not shy away from the cloning controversy.  When the famous sheep, Dolly was cloned there followed massive protests but these eventually died down until the subject of primate or human cloning came up.

KING OF CLONES, as it is more a doc on Dr. Hwang, does not answer every question on the subject but still provides interesting subject matter on one of the most controversial scientific researches of all time.

HERE. IS. BETTER (USA 2023) ***
Directed by Jack Youngelson

The new documentary HERE. IS. BETTER. shedding light on PTSD - what it is, the sufferers, the treatment and its impact on the United States, is an award-winning  documentary film with unprecedented access inside therapy sessions of men and women Veterans battling post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The film interweaves these inspiring stories of men and women Veterans overcoming the debilitating effects of PTSD with treatments that can work, bringing hope to millions.

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is defined as a mental and behavioural disorder that can develop because of exposure to a traumatic event, such as sexual assault, warfare, traffic collisions, child abuse, domestic violence, or other threats on a person's life.  Symptoms may include disturbing thoughts, feelings, or dreams related to the events, mental or physical distress to trauma-related cues, attempts to avoid trauma-related cues, alterations in the way a person thinks and feels, and an increase in the fight-or-flight response.

As the doc informs at the start some 30 millions Americans suffer from  PTSD.  Most of the subjects examined and interviewed are sufferers resulting from military duty - most of them from as little as a single tour of duty.  

The first two subjects, identified in the film only by their first names are Jason and Teresa.  The former is a military officer and the second an operations officer, both contacting PTSD after just one line of duty in Afghanistan.  Teresa was in denial and her behaviour so awful.  She was screaming at her children, never offering positive support for them and even not allowing them to play.  Her husband gives her an ultimatum to undergo treatment or he would leave her to take the children with him.  Two others, John and Tabatha are also examined to offer a more general look at the disease in order to come to some common ground.

The doc explains avenues of treatment.  Prevention may be possible when counselling is targeted at those with early symptoms but is not effective when provided to all trauma-exposed individuals whether or not symptoms are present. The main treatments for people with PTSD are counselling (psychotherapy) and medication.  Antidepressants of the SSRI or SNRI type are the first-line medications used for PTSD and are moderately beneficial for about half of people.  Benefits from medication are less than those seen with counselling.  It is not known whether using medications and counselling together has greater benefit than either method separately.  Medications, other than some SSRIs or SNRIs, do not have enough evidence to support their use and, in the case of benzodiazepines, may worsen outcomes.

The most interesting of the subjects is Jason, who actually ran for the U.S. Senate, even running at one time for the President of the United States, under the Democrats, covering his PTSD with work, work and work.  After realizing and being diagnosed, he stepped down from politics in order to help others.  Jason is a diligent, intelligent, and very handsome man supported by his wife.  It is also admirable that many subjects are so willing to go through their personal trauma on camera.  

The doc ends on a positive note on therapies like CPT, PE and EMDR being the most effective in their treatment of PTSD.  The doc shows a few treatments in session.  Though largely informative, director Youngelson gets often too preachy with his good intentions with his doc gearing too predictably to a ‘happy ending’.

HERE. IS. BETTER. will be released with a VOD release on all major platforms in the US and Canada to follow on June 27,  timed to National PTSD Awareness Day.

Trailer: 

NO HARD FEELINGS (USA 2023) ***
Direct by Gene Stupnitsky

Director Gene Stupnitsky is best remembered from his last hit, the 2019 coming-of-age boys comedy GOOD BOYS, a $20 million production that grossed $111 million and earned Stupnotsky a  more ambitious project, graduating from coming-of-age to sex comedy NO HARD FEELINGS.  NO HARD FEELINGS is basically a Jennifer Lawrence (Oscar Winner for SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK; THE HUNGER GAMES) project where she gets to play comedy, and play it successfully.

The film's plot came from a real Craigslist ad sent to Stupnitsky by producers Provissiero and Odenkirk, with the former telling Lawrence about the story over dinner with her in mind for the role.

Maddie (Jennifer Lawrence), a young woman working as an Uber drive in Montauk, New York, is facing bankruptcy after her car is repossessed.  She accepts an unusual Craigslist posting in which her new employers are parents (Matthew Bodderick and Maura Benanti) who have noticed that their introverted 19-year-old son Percy (Andrew Barth Feldman) is showing no interest in dating or having sex.  In exchange for a Buick Regal, Maddie agrees to become their son's "girlfriend," "date his brains out," and help him to join adult life before going off to college.

NO HARD FEELINGS takes a while to land on its footing.  For the first third or so, the comedy looks desperate, clinging at every bit of possibility for laughs, which unfortunately falls flat ever so often.  The meeting of Maddie of her employers, she getting there awkwardly in roller blades is hardly funny.  The banter between Maddie and her friends are amusing at most.  It is when the film gets a bit serious that it starts working its charm - partly because the audience might not have believed it possible.  The story and comedy after the first third actually works quite well.  One need not have to believe that a pre-university college freshman (Princeton in this case) can fall in love with a down-to-earth 30-year old older woman.  But these are two underdogs, out of luck and desperate to get their lives together.  So, when they do get together, one cannot help but root for these two.  The romance works more like a solid friendship, maybe with a happy ending afterwards, though the story never pushes it.  They try once or twice without success, not for want of trying. but whether they consummate their love is never the issue.  One wants the two to be together, even as friends and even with sex.

The film has a few really charming moments that will win one’s heart.  One is the scene in the restaurant where Percy plays the piano and sings “Maneater”.  It is a song sung by the actor himself, that wins not only the heart of Maddie but of the audience as well.

In the summer of super action hero blockbusters many costing over $200 million introduction, this modest though little expensive $45 million comes as a nice surprise and without any CGI effects and explosions.  Don’t expect much and one will not get disappointed.  This is forgettable fluff with a few messages about life tossed in here and there, without being too preachy or superficial. NO HARD FEELINGS opens in theatres June the 23rd.

Trailer: 

SUBTRACTION (Iran/France 2022) ***½

Directed by Mani Haghighi

SUBTRACTION is a neat little Hitchcockian-type suspense thriller from Iran and France by Canadian/Iranian film director Manu Hagihi.  The film is shot in Farsi.

When Farzaneh (Taraneh Alidoosti) spots a man on a city bus (in Teheran) who looks an awful lot like her husband, Jalal (Navid Mohammadzadeh), she follows him to an unfamiliar building.  There, she sees the residents greet him as if they know him and watches from the street as he enters an apartment to meet with another woman.  This is a story on doppelgangers (doubles).  Three months pregnant and barely present in her job as a driving instructor, Farzaneh is convinced she’s caught Jalal in an affair. When they discuss it, he is adamant about his alibi, reminding her that he was miles away at the time. Farzaneh begins to fall apart, but she swears she saw him, and, unable to let go, she continues to pull on the thread before making an unsettling discovery about the man on the bus.  The tailing of her husband feels very much like James Stewart following Kim Novak at length in Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece VERTIGO.  There is also a spiral staircase shot similar to the one at the end of VERTIGO.

The film is called SUBTRACTION because of some logical reasoning of the Universe, doppelgangers cannot exist as if, if they do, they would create controversy similar to ‘the butterfly effect’.  This requires one of the doubles to be eliminated or subtracted. Nothing else will be mentioned about the plot in this review to prevent the enjoyment of this mystery thriller.

Director Haghighi organizes the film into three parts  The first and perhaps most intriguing is the trailing and discovery of the doppelgängers.  This takes about a third of the movie.  The second is the revelation in which all the doubles meet,  Farzaneh meets her double and Jamal meets his.  The third is what happens after the meeting.

The film is a bit confusing at first as the audience needs to remember who is who and not get confused one from another.  The makeups and personalities of each character the wife and husband are made to be distinctly different - Jalil not as suave as his double but of a better temperament.  The same can be said of the wives.  Their hairstyles are different.  Once the audience is able to distinguish one from the other -yes, it takes a while and a bit of effort - the film runs smoothly.

To suit the atmosphere of a psychological thriller about characters who are confronted by their more cruel, alternative selves,  many scenes are battered by rain as if the water can wash away one’s sins.  The film is  accompanied by a tense score and good use of cinematography (by Morteza Najafi) often in the darkness of night.

SUBTRACTION is an original and fascinating film in which one must believe the existence of doppelgängers as a given.  Not questioning this logic, everything else is credible with the result of an intense suspenseful and emotional story.  The culture of Iran is also on full display, especially on the country’s acceptance of retribution and forgiveness.

SUBTRACTION, the new Iranian thriller by Canadian-Iranian director Mani Haghighi, which comes to TIFF Bell Lightbox, Vancity and select Canadian theatres on June 23.

Trailer: 

UNWELCOME (Ireland 2021) ***½
Directed by Jon Wright

A modern horror creature feature, UNWELCOME shows us just how far anyone will go to protect those we love.  Londoners Maya and Jamie are looking for a way out of their urban nightmare ( a home invasion) to raise their new unborn child.  When they inherit a house in rural Ireland, they jump at the chance to flee from the dangers of city living.   Little do they know is that there are also dangers in the rural areas of Ireland.  Yet, this new home holds primeval secrets -- at the bottom of their garden is an ancient gnarled wood, where a supernatural presence lurks.  Founded in ancient Celtic folklore the woods hide the malevolent, murderous goblins, known as 'Redcaps' named so for soaking their caps in the blood of their victims.  Engaging a local family company to do some building repairs, the young couple quickly realize they got more than they bargained for with 'Daddy' and his adult children who are little more than low-level criminals.  Recognizing their newfound safety is under threat, Maya finds herself turning to the woods -- and the bloodthirsty creatures within it -- to ensure the safety of her unborn child.

UNWELCOME is a cross between Sam Peckinpah’s classic THE STRAW DOGS and Joe Dante’s GREMLINS.  As in THE STRAW DOGS,  the new visitors to the village are UNWELCOME.  They face intimidation and then death.  In UNWELCOME, the lead villain who insists on being called “Daddy” is played by Irish actor Colm Meaney who is as mean as they come.   Best known for the role of the patriarch in Stephen Frears’ classic film THE SNAPPER shown on TV in the U.K. and theatrically outside, Meany plays a different kind of father, one that would not be afraid of kicking the life out of bis backward son yet take out anyone else who would harm his family.

Way back when Joe Dante had not made his name in Hollywood and Steven Spielberg gave him a chance at his directing of GREMLINS, Dante was told to tone down the horror film a notch so that GREMLINS was suitable as family fare.  UNWELCOME  is the GREMLINS Dante would have made without the Spielberg restrictions.  UNWELCOME is violent, gritty and definitely not for the family, but it is deliciously wicked entertainment, actually more fun than horror, where violence and gore are dished out with unrestrained relish.  These ‘gremlins’, the Redcaps little people in Ireland are not the nice leprechauns that would lead human beings to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow  These little devils are able to break into a house and with little knives dispense with their victims.  But the little people, as they are called in the film, are the good guys.  Having been fed by the protagonists, they protect them from the villainous intruders.

The film is shot in beautiful Ireland and there are panoramic shots of the fields in this stunning country at the film’s start before the horror begins.  Lots of Irish stuff referenced too like the leprechauns and drinking, in the film.

UNWELCOME is available for streaming on the horror  network Shudder on the 23rd of June.

Trailer: 

Details

Written by: Gilbert Seah

Parent Category: Articles

Category: Movie Reviews

Published: 04 June 2023

THE BLACKENING (USA 2022) ***
Directed by Tim Story

In the typical slasher horror flick, the token minority member like the single black in an almost all white group is the first one to be killed off.  This premise cannot happen in the horror flick THE BLACKENING because the entire group that is invited to the cabin in the woods is all black.  Who is the first one to go then?  As the poster says: “We all can’t die first!”  

The only black guest with the white father?  

The BLACKENING centres around a group of Black friends who reunite for a Juneteenth weekend getaway only to find themselves trapped in a remote cabin with a twisted killer. Forced to play by his rules, the friends soon realize this ain’t no motherf****** game.

THE BLACKENING refers to the board game (quite racist being complete with the head of “Sambo” with the big black lips) in the cabin’s game room that forces the guests to play a deadly game of  'answer the question correctly' or die.  This horror comedy knows all the horror cliches and parodies them hilariously and to great effect.  Running just around 90 minutes before it runs out of steam, THE BLACKENING is more fun than horror though a few of the guests do get brutally done in.

THE BLACKENING, which premiered in the Midnight Madness Section at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival opens in theatres across Canada on June the 16th, 2023.

Trailer: 

 ELELMENTAL (USA 2023) *

Directed by Peter Sohn

ELEMENTAL (USA 2023) ***1/2
Directed by Peter Sohn

ELEMENTAL the film is so titled because the film deals with the elements of fire and water being two different beings.  The female is fire and the male water.  It is a love story where two totally different elements defy all logic and odds to find love with each other,=.

The animation is of course amazing.  It was once considered impossible to animate water as it is so fluid, especially with stop animation and the same also goes for fire.  But in this age of computer simulation and the advent of Pixar, anything is possible.  ELEMENTAL is helmed by first time director, Disney brought up animation prodigy Peter Sohn who has made this project his love child and it shows.

Director Peter Sohn was personally here in Toronto promoting his film a few months back before his film was completed speaking about his film and the difficult work and meticulous care taken by his crew involved in the process of animating this film.  To better appreciate the film, a bit of Sohn’s background should be stated, as he explained during his talk promoting the film.

Peter Sohn, who previously directed the feature film THE GOOD DINOSAUR (2015) and the short film PARTLY CLOUDY (2009), pitched the concept to Pixar to develop Elemental based on the idea of whether fire and water could ever connect or not.  Sohn also says the idea for the film was inspired by his experiences as the son of immigrants in New York City in the 1970s.  He stated: "My parents emigrated from Korea in the early 1970s and built a bustling grocery store in the Bronx." He also stated:  "We were among many families who ventured to a new land with hopes and dreams — all of us mixing into one big salad bowl of cultures, languages, and beautiful little neighbourhoods.  That's what led me to ELEMENTAL.

In the film, it is also revealed that Ember was born in Elemental City, but grew up in a fire town, since the neighbourhoods are sort of split up in different ways.  Sohn stated: "I am quite emotional about getting the characters and the story out for sure." He also stated: "This movie is about thanking your parents and understanding their sacrifices. My parents both passed away during the making of this thing. And so, it is hugely emotional, and I'm still processing a lot of it.  The emotional tread in ELEMENTAL is quite powerful.  In the promo screening I attended, the audience cheered when Ember and Wade kissed for the very first time.

Kudos to Pixar and Disney for investing an ethnic romantic story about teenagers in ELEMENTAL instead of some super action hero movie like the awful SPIDER-VERSE.   It is included in the story saving mankind, in this case from folding due to the damage of a dam.  The only fault of the film is the predictable storyline that is a trap all romantic films can never seem to escape.

ELEMENTAL opens in theatres June the 16th.  The wonderful animation should be seen in theatres on the big screen.

Trailer: 

THE FLASH (USA 2023) ****
Directed by Andy Muschietti

Barry Allen / The Flash (Ezra Miller) travels back in time to prevent his mother's death, which traps him in an alternate reality without metahumans. Barry enlists the help of his younger self, an older Batman (Michael Keaton) and the Kryptonian castaway Supergirl (Sasha Calle) in order to save this world from the restored General Zod (Michael Shannon) and return to his universe.

THE FLASH is a film that contains many other d.c. characters like Batman, General Zod, Supergirl as well as Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot).  They arrive at different parts of the story as welcome surprises.

One plus of the film is that the script written by Christina Hudson explains every incident that occurs in the story.  The going through the walls into the building by the Flash is explained by the vibrating molecules.   The term ‘the butterfly effect’, part of chaos theory, which states that there are limitations to predictions even in small discrete systems is used in the story.  Small differences in starting conditions can, over time, make a big difference in the way that a complex system of interrelated phenomena evolves. In the story, Barry’s mother sent the father to the supermarket to get a can of tomatoes she had forgotten.  The Flash goes back in time to put a can of tomatoes in her mother’s cart when she was shopping, this not forgetting the can and not sending father to get tomatoes and be at home thus thwarting her death in the home invasion.  But not all went as planned.

Unlike the terrible SPIDER-VERSE with the reason for the multiverse never fully explained in the film’s weak narrative, the presence of alternative universes in THE FLASH makes more sense in its time travel narrative.  Travelling through time but to the wrong time, Barry enters a universe in which two Barrys exist.  The two Barrys are played by the same actor Ezra Miller sporting different haircuts, Miller delivering a knockout performance.

There is major talent involved in the making of this $200 million dollar production.  First and foremost is the film’s director, Argentinian Andy Muschietti, this his fourth film after his successful MAMA and his Hollywood hits IT and IT CHAPTER 2.  The other is the film’s star Ezra Miller who made it big with his masterpiece performance as at the teen son shooter in Lynne Ramsey’s WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN.  Miller is a major force to be reckoned with, who can also be seen currently playing the young Salvador Dali in DALILAND.  Special mention should also be given to actress Maribel Verdú who plays Barry’s mother.  She is able to deliver a heartwarming performance of a caring human being.

THE FLASH is one of the most exciting super action hero movies recently.  Warner Bros. has finally got it right after their disastrous BATMAN V. SUPERMAN, THE BATMAN and other duds.  If there is an Academy Award for Best SuperHero Action Film of the year (there might very well add one owing to the currently large number of this genre films opening every year), THE FLASH would be the clear winner.

THE FLASH has had a very troubled production for a number of reasons including the changing of different directors and the Pandemic.  The $200-$220 million production finally opens widely in theatres on June the 9th and is well worth the wait.

Trailer: 

PERSIAN LESSONS (Russia/Germany/Belarus 2020) ***½

Directed by Vadim Perelman

Directed by Vadim Perelman, PERSIAN LESSONS is a captivating Holocaust drama set in occupied France in 1942. The film tells the story of Gilles (Nahuel Pérez Biscayart), the son of a rabbi from Antwerp, who is captured by SS soldiers and sent to a German transit camp along with other Jews.  In order to escape sudden execution, Gilles pretends to be Persian, inventing a fake "Farsi" language. However, his survival hinges on a life-or-death mission: teaching Farsi to Nazi camp leader Koch (Lars Eidinger), who dreams of opening a restaurant in Iran after the war.

  As with any Holocaust film, the horrors of war are not left out or compromised in the film.. PERSIAN LESSONS showcases chilling moments, such as an angry German soldier punishing a Jewish kitchen worker by burning her hands on a hot stove due to her dirty hands, or the harrowing sight of Jewish prisoners rushing to stand in line, only to be shot dead after the formation of the line. These depictions, presented matter-of-factly, enhance the film's impact. However, the director's focus goes beyond the atrocities of war, emphasizing the eccentricities that arise from the protagonist's fictional story, which draws inspiration from true events based on Wolfgang Kohlhaase's "Erfindung einer Sprache."

The film explores the power of the mind to recall and memorize names, exemplified by Gilles' invention of the "Parsi" language using the names of fellow prisoners. 

To enhance the film's entertainment value, Perelman injects humour into the narrative, primarily through the character of a pompous Nazi officer, Koch who refuses to be corrected or wronged.  His relentless pursuit of his desires leads to hilariously ironic situations, finally culminating in his downfall.  More important is the fact that the humour never trivializes the horrors of the Holocaust and the thousands who have lost their lives in the concentration camps, unlike the Italian comedy "Life is Beautiful" (1997), which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film.  There is also a lot of humour in the dialogue, occasionally quite brilliantly written.  Example:

Klaus Koch: As long as you work for me nothing will happen to you. I bet 20 cans of meat that nothing will happen to you.

Gilles: Too bad I won't be able to eat them since I'll be dead.

PERSIAN LESSONS boasts stunning cinematography that vividly captures the WWII era, with scenes of trucks transporting prisoners at night and chilling lineups of Jews awaiting execution. The film's production values are exceptional, contributing to an immersive atmosphere enhancing credibility and adding depth to the story.

Overall, PERSIAN LESSONS is an intriguing Holocaust movie that explores the horrors of war while injecting a fresh perspective into a well-worn genre. Directed by Ukraine-born Canadian filmmaker Vadim Perelman, known for his triple Oscar-nominated debut feature "House of Sand and Fog," the film promises a thought-provoking and impactful cinematic experience.

PERSIAN LESSONS was Belarus' official submission for the 'Best International Feature Film' category of the 93rd Academy Awards in 2021, but was disqualified by the Academy because the majority of individuals involved in making the film were not from Belarus.

PERSIAN LESSONS premiered on June 16 in Toronto (Varsity and Empress Walk) and Vancouver (Fifth Avenue). It will be released on June 23 in Ottawa and Edmonton, with subsequent screenings in other cities throughout the summer.

 Trailer: 

SEIRE (South Korea 2021) ***
Directed by Park Kong

Every race has its folk traditions and superstitions.  South Korea is no exception.  Stories borne of these beliefs often make good horror fodder.  In Korean, the word samchil-il also known as SEIRE, the title of this new Korean horror flick that refers to the 21 days after a child’s birth.  The house is then often guarded by protective rope ensuring the infant’s safe passage into the world and no taboo should be broken.  The baby is believed to be especially vulnerable to bad luck, curses and evil spirits.  The film centres on one couple’s first child.  The father is generally a non-believer and the mother is a ‘better play safe than sorry’ follower.  So she and as well as forcing her husband - protect the baby.  The couple is also neighbours with the wife’s sister who is expecting a baby.

Though North America is familiar with Japanese horror films, many of which have spanned Hollywood remakes (best example: THE RING) but Korean horror films are still a rarity.  Many would be unaware of the practice of SEIRE.  SEIRE comes as a welcome surprise and it is a solid horror chiller with some dark humour added for good measure.

New mother Hae-mi carefully follows every one of the SEIRE practices. Father Woo-jin is reluctantly willing to play along, but when he attends an ex-girlfriend's (from college as he says) funeral, he unwittingly opens the door to dark supernatural dangers. Plagued by terrible nightmares, the skeptical Woo-jin gradually begins to understand the siere custom, as he is forced to unravel the mystery of what is haunting him and his family.

Park loves to blur the lines of reality and imagination.  Because of fear, Woo-jin sees rotting apples, whenever he cuts one open to eat or for his wife, the shape of the cut apple resembles a womb where a fetus gestates.  His wife tells him: “ I am craving apples”, which forces him to leave the house in the middle of the night to get her apples.  When she returns, she denies the fact and asks where he had been.  Then she relents and says that she is just messing with him.  So what is true and what is imagined is never clear in the film.  All the confusion adds to the confusion of the couple.  Park’s film moves at a slow pace, but he keeps counting the tension.  Boredom is never the issue.

As would be expected in horror films, SEIRE contains a few gory and graphic scenes -the most disgusting as well as most effective, being a fetus dropping from Woo-jin’s vagina after her water is broken.

Park, a new voice in the Korean horror genre is best known for his "chilling indie horror debut” (SCREEN ANARCHY), an Official Selection in the Fantasia New Flesh Competition, was nominated for Best Film and captured the New Currents FIPRESCI Prize at the Busan International Film Festival, and also received a nomination for a Golden Eye Best International Feature at the 2022 Zurich Film Festival.

SEIRE premieres on VOD and Digital on June 16th, 2023.

Trailer: 

STAN LEE (USA 2023) ***½

Directed by John Gelp

The doc on Marvel cartoonist Stan Lee has the simple title of Stan Lee for the very reason that his name by itself would attract countless comic book fans and Action Hero movie fans to see the movie.  Stan Lee is a legend in our own times.

 The doc follows Stan’s journey to become one of the most influential people in the world of comic books and pop culture. Tracing his life from his challenging upbringing (from a child to teen to adult) as Stanley Lieber to the meteoric rise of Marvel Comics.

In order to tell the story of Stan Lee, the doc uses a combination of archive footage and animation while always using Stan’s voice as voiceover and narrator.

One of the film’s more intimate moments tells of Stan’s creation of one of the world’s most beloved Spider-Man.  First of all, he made Spider-Man a teenager - and one with problems.  He questioned the reason for being a superhero and often did not want to be one.  He would not be allowed to go out and fight crooks because his Aunt May would not let him go out because it was raining.  Stan made the action hero more down to earth and human with problems and that was what, according to him, made those comics sell.  The doc also included a part on how Stan fooled his boss to publish the first of the series that broke record numbers.  In short, Stan became a superhero on his own terms.  On being questioned what made a superhero popular, Stan said that readers must relate to the characters.  Spider-Man had empathy, the word Stan used many times to describe Spider-Man and the other heroes.

Also insightful is Stan’s description off the importance of the graphic artists.  He preferred Steve to Jack as Jack would draw the highlights of the action while Steve concentrated more on the story and human aspects of the series.

The doc also goes on to describe other heroes like Captain America and The Mighty Thor with the hammer.  It is interesting to note that The comics on The Might Thor was banned in Singapore, where this reviewer grew up, a country that is famous for censorship.  Thor was considered too violent and hence Thor was banned.  As a kid, my classmates would have someone go over to neighbouring Malaysia to buy the Their comic books.  So, Singapore kids did get to read those comics anyway.  Also good to note is that Marvel superheroes are all from Earth while those of the D.C. comics hailed from other planets or other worlds.

Stan Lee is also famous for appearing in a cameo in all the Marvel super hero action movies.  These are of course, too many to mention.  The doc is insightful and informative showing only the positive of Stan's life.  But the doc omits the more troubled life of Stan in his older age, of how he was abused as an elderly and how his business manager had physically and mentally abused him in his old age.

STAN LEE is available for streaming on Disney+ from June 156th, 2023.

Trailer:

VILLAGE (Japan 2023) ***
Directed by Michihito Fuji

Life is but a dream.  So goes the rhyme: Row, row, row your boat! Gently down the stream….Life is but a dream,”   This new Japanese horror film begins with the words: Dreams are fleeting.  Besides knowing this, humans still dream.  Waking up after 50 glorious years, it was all merely a dream…  so goes Kantun, a Japanese Not Play.  Dream stuff is also quoted in Shaekespeare’s THE TEMPEST.  "We are such stuff as dreams are made on; and our little life is rounded with a sleep." - William Shakespeare. From Act IV of The Tempest, this line is spoken by Prospero, as he compares his magical illusions "melted into air, into thin air," to the transient nature of our lives. 

In VILLAGE the dreams are more like nightmares as can be witnessed in the beginning disturbing sequence which intercuts a play with several images: a  hole in the ground surrounded by rubbish; a boy witnessing a fire; a man with a sweaty face.

Yu Katayama is a young man who lives in the remote, but beautiful village Kamonmura. He has lived there since he was a child and is unable to leave due to an incident in his past. To pay off his mother's debt, Yu works in a garbage disposal facility nearby. He lives without a dream or hope in his life. One day, Misaki Nakai returns to Kamonmura from Tokyo. Yu and Misaki were childhood friends. Her return changes Yu.  As they say, there is more than meets the eye.

VILLAGE runs for a full 2 hours.  Though it takes its time to tell its story (effectively mounting the suspense), the images are haunting, the storytelling convincing and the horror often felt.  The Japanese atmosphere also aids in the film’s intrigue.  Worth the watch on Netflix which begins streaming the film June the 16th.

Trailer: