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HELLMOUTHCON 2025 – Con report, interviews w/BUFFY/ANGEL actor James Marsters, Fandom Charities founder Marsia Powers and more

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 16:36:42 +0000

Camden Toy as one of the Gentlemen on BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER | design by Optic Nerve / photo courtesy Optic Nerve

HellmouthCon 2026: A BUFFY Celebration at Sunnydale High will be held June 13-14 at Torrance High School in Torrance, California, where Sunnydale High was shot for the first three seasons of the Joss Whedon-created BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER. Presented by Fandom Charities Inc. & Hellmouth Events, this is the third consecutive year at the high school venue for Hellmouth Con, which also celebrates all things regarding the BUFFY spinoff ANGEL and a few things FIREFLY.

The guest roster for this year includes actors Amber Benson (Tara on BUFFY), Amy Acker (Fred and Illyria on ANGEL), Charisma Carpenter (Cordelia on BUFFY and ANGEL), Clare Kramer (Glory on BUFFY), Doug Jones (a Gentleman on BUFFY, plus Saru on STAR TREK: DISCOVERY and a host of other high-profile credits), Emma Caulfield (Anya on BUFFY), J. August Richards (Charles Gunn on ANGEL), James C. Leary (Clem on BUFFY), Julie Benz (Darla on BUFFY and ANGEL), Iyari Limon (Kennedy on BUFFY), Larry Bagby (Larry on BUFFY), Mark Lutz (the Groosalugg on ANGEL), and Stephanie Romanov (Lilah on ANGEL), plus behind-the-scenes personnel. For more information on guests and tickets, go to fandomcharities.org/hellmouthcon.

Marsia Powers, founder and president of Fandom Charities and director of Guest and Sponsor relations for HellmouthCon, says that three of this year’s charity beneficiaries are the Al Wooten Youth Center, Rainbow Spaces for LGBTQIA+ Youth, and PanCAN. “We always will be supporting the Al Wooten Youth Center. The money we raise goes to the Ron Glass Memorial Scholarship Fund for kids to be able to go to college. they get a piece of it. We also are raising money [starting in 2025[,for PanCAN, which is the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, in memory of Camden Toy.”

Toy died of pancreatic cancer in 2023. On BUFFY, he played a Gentleman, Gnarl, and the original Ubervamp, and on ANGEL, he played the Nosferatu-like Prince of Lies. Powers describes Toy was “a supporter of Fandom Charities and his fans from Day One.” A memorial panel for him is scheduled at at the 2026 Hellmouth Con.

Powers estimates that, including volunteers and vendors, there were over 1,200 people at HellmouthCon 2025. Fans came from all over the U.S., as well as Canada, Europe, and Australia. So, what was it like?

At Hellmouth Con 2025, there is multi-track programming. Attendees can choose from panels about the show moderated by other fans, such as Release Your Inner Badass, Navigating the Creative Output in Today’s Social Media Landscape, Hellmouth Media Queer Creators Take the Mic, BUFFY Password, and much more.

BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER – Season 2 DVD | © 20th Century Fox

Alternatively, fans can attend or play mix-and-match with Q&A sessions with BUFFY and ANGEL actors and creative staff, including ANGEL co-creator/writer/producer/director David Greenwalt, comic book artist George Jeanty, James Marsters (Spike on BUFFY and ANGEL), Juliet Landau (Drusilla on BUFFY and ANGEL), Christian Kane (Lindsey on ANGEL), Armin Shimerman (Principal Snyder on BUFFY), D.B. Woodside (Principal Wood on BUFFY), Harry Groener (the Mayor on BUFFY), Keith Szarabajka (Daniel Holtz on ANGEL), Ken Lerner (Principal Flutie on BUFFY), Caulfield, Benson, and Romanov, in addition to numerous others.

Most of the convention guests are also available for photographs, autographs, and “special fan experiences,” where attendees can talk with them in smaller groups at greater length.

There is also an enormous vendor marketplace in the high school gymnasium, where photos, t-shirts, toys and other memorabilia are available for purchase.

A Q&A with Marsters and Landau, moderated by Landau’s husband Deverill Weekes, begins with Marsters asking the audience to stand up so he can record them with his cellphone. The has been reported on extensively elsewhere, but a highlight of this was Landau explaining that in her audition for Drusilla, who Angel had driven mad before turning her, she started talking to the ceiling, which she believes got her the role. Marsters says he was meanwhile preparing for his own audition in the hallway, which he did by going into a Shakespeare soliloquy. Seeing this before actually meeting Marsters, Landau says she was thrown, thinking, “Why is this guy talking to a wall? He’s not auditioning for Drusilla …”

Benson, herself the author of both the DEATH’S DAUGHTER and THE WITCHES OF ECHO PARK franchises, is here to publicly interview writer Raven Belasco about her BLOOD & ANCIENT SCROLLS series of novels; Benson narrates the audiobook editions. Belasco says she wanted to create a global world of vampires and for her protagonist, Noosh, “to be a big old nerd, but also to kick ass.” Benson observes that BUFFY is an iconic show that changed how vampires could be shown and written about.

In the evening, there is a concert, with Marsters and Kane taking turns playing songs. These are mostly their own compositions, although Kane also plays “L.A. Song,” written by Greenwalt for Kane’s character Lindsey to perform on ANGEL. Kane gives a shoutout to Greenwalt, who is in the audience.

On Sunday, there are more Q&As and fan panels. Landau runs a trivia contest for the audience of her podcast REVAMPED WITH JULIET LANDAU, with contestants coming in person and on Zoom from all over. Among the prizes are a Blu-ray edition of Landau and Weekes’s narrative feature A PLACE AMONG THE DEAD.

A villains panel with Groener, Kane, Marsters, Romanov, and Szarabajka has the panelists teasing each other and the audience.

Szarabajka stands up for his character Holtz, who kidnapped Angel’s infant son. He questions his billing on the panel. “Angel killed my wife and my infant baby, and turned my daughter, and I’m the villain?”

Kane quips, “You’ve said that twice now. I think you need therapy.”

Marsters contributes, “I find that if I’m acting out of a sense of ‘I’m the hero,’ or ‘I’m the victim,’ I can do anything.”

Romanov observes, “My character was bad, and she’d sold her soul. Why did she sell her soul? Maybe we don’t think about why we’re trying to do good, but we’re trying not to do bad.”

Groener found some good in the Mayor – whose main goal was to become a giant snake demon – when Eliza Dushku’s Faith character arrived in Season 3. “Something changes in him when Faith enters the picture.” He was happy he got to see the maquette of the snake.

Marsters was surprised he wasn’t killed off at some point on BUFFY. “At the start of every season, the producers would say, ‘We have no idea what to do with you.’ Marsters talks about the choices his character Victor makes on the Hulu MARVEL’S RUNAWAYS series, where he gets Earth-saving help from an alien – who unfortunately eats teenagers. “What is the price of your conscience?”

Romanov appreciates this philosophical question. The arc she says she never saw coming was Lilah’s affair with normally righteous Wesley (Alexis Denisof).

Kane reveals that he auditioned for the role of Buffy’s human boyfriend Riley, ultimately played by Marc Blucas, before being cast as Lindsey on ANGEL. He points out that, other than David Boreanaz, “I was the only guy who was in the first episode and the last episode.”

Because the final episode of ANGEL was top secret, Kane adds, “The day ANGEL was canceled, Joss said, ‘I’m going to kill you.’ They filmed it two months ahead [of the shooting of the rest of the finale] at four AM. Nobody knew.”

At some point on Sunday, Marsters takes time out of his incredibly crowded convention schedule to talk with ASSIGNMENT X.

Even though Spike was introduced in BUFFY Season 2 Episode 3, “School Hard,” which takes place primarily at the high school, all of his scenes there were indoors.

Therefore, Marsters says with a laugh, “I had never been here before. We had done interiors on the soundstages, but I’d never shot at the high school. And it is more impressive than I thought it would be. It looks great on film. I can really see why both 90210 and BUFFY wanted to shoot here. And apparently [Torrance High School] was able to refurbish their auditorium with the money that BUFFY paid to rent it out.”

Regarding the concert, Marsters says that he and Kane didn’t perform any songs as a duo, because “Christian had just got in from Serbia. So, there was no time, no way to rehearse.”

Doing the concert together, Marsters feels, was “absolutely fabulous. I had played with Christian numerous times on set in our trailers, and that’s fun, but I’d never heard him on a microphone before. It’s a whole different technical thing to sing on a mic, and then live without a mic. And Christian is so good. He’s so subtle, his intonation is so perfect and he moves around notes so cleanly and so quickly. He’s just amazing.”

If Marsters had known while doing BUFFY and ANGEL that he’d still be talking about the shows and Spike over two decades later, would he have done anything differently at the time – maybe taken notes?

“No, I wouldn’t do a thing differently. I suspected that the show was going to last while we were filming, because I am a STAR TREK fan, and I know what it’s like to love a show, even when you know what the dialogue is and when you know what the plot is, and still want to go back to that world. For STAR TREK, I wanted to go back to a world where the human race had learned to stop trying to dominate each other and started to try to support each other and tolerate difference. And that was a real draw. And BUFFY is a world that has someone in it that just doesn’t give up and tries to help. And that’s a good world, too, to go back to.”

This jibes with Powers’s vision for Fandom Charities and for HellmouthCon. “We put on a fantastic event, but because we’re a charity organization, we’re not able to hire a marketing company. So, anyone who knows any company that would like to be involved with sponsorship or getting the word out, it would be wonderful. We still get people who say, ‘Oh, my God, I had no idea,’ and we’d love people to be able to say, ‘Not only did I know everything about Fandom Charities and what they do, I knew about the HellmouthCon, and that we were able to be involved with it, and have fun at the same time.’ Because that’s what our goal is – to have fun while doing good works.”

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Article: HELLMOUTHCON 2025 Profile: Con report, interviews w/BUFFY/ANGEL actor James Marsters, Fandom Charities founder Marsia Powers and more

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Movie Review: CHUM

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Sat, 06 Jun 2026 04:01:22 +0000

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Alice Eve, Eric Michael Cole, Elle Haymond, Sarah Siadat, Johnny Gaffney, Lisa Yaro, Jim Klock, Vince Jolivette, Stephen Oliver
Writers: Jonathan Zuck and Joe Leone, story by Dick Grunert and Ryan R. Johnson and James Kondelik
Director: Jonathan Zuck
Distributor: IFC
Release Date: June 5, 2026

CHUM is the latest entry in the shark-obsessed-psycho-with-a-boat subgenre. It also meshes, perhaps coincidentally, with the 2024 sharks-but-no-psycho-ruin-a-Mediterranean-destination-wedding SOMETHING IN THE WATER.

Our narrator is Roy (Jim Klock) who, in the opening sequence, loses his wife to an enormous Great White in the sea off Malta. He begins by saying in voiceover, “You took her from me.” This is followed by a monologue about how much Roy loves his wife and includes the line, “Her scream lost in the roar of the sea.”

There isn’t anything particularly wrong with the line, except that we see the whole incident and then some – CHUM is very gore-friendly in all its shark attacks – and the woman is already underwater when the attack occurs. There’s no scream.

So, are we supposed to think that Roy’s imagination is playing tricks, or that director Jonathan Zuck and his co-writer Joe Leone, working from a story by Dick Grunert and Ryan R. Johnson and James Kondelik, aren’t paying close attention to what they’re doing?

Roy says he spent his life on the ocean, but “when you took her, I learned something new.”

Then we cut to a wedding banquet, where proud father Reginald (Stephen Oliver) is toasting his daughter the bride Tina (Alice Eve) and her groom Tom (Eric Michael Cole). Also in attendance are Tina’s irritable younger sister Sadie (Elle Haymond), bridesmaids Rachinda (Sarah Siadat) and Britney (Lisa Yaro), and Eric’s bro-ish best man Rick (Johnny Gaffney).

It’s a beautiful setting and a good-looking group, but it doesn’t take long for us to realize this union may not last. Tina and Tom have had a bitter fight about something that they seem unable to resolve. Tom winds up sleeping on the beach near the tide line, while Tina passes out on their hotel room bed in her wedding gown.

The nature of the dispute turns out to be one of the best aspects of CHUM. It’s real, it’s not the clichés that we too often get about onscreen marital disputes, and it’s wholly plausible that the timing is such that the couple haven’t had to confront it earlier.

Unaware of trouble in paradise, Rick has arranged a boat outing for the wedding party (sans Dad). Tina and Tom don’t want to go, but Rick guilts them into it – renting the boat for the day cost him a fortune.

The proprietor of The Tipsy Mermaid, Captain Mackey (Vince Jolivette), welcomes the six passengers aboard. He assures shark-averse Britney that there have never been attacks in these waters.

This again makes us wonder what’s happening on a meta level. We can see that The Tipsy Mermaid is out by the same coastline that we saw in the opening, so we know there’s been at least one shark attack here. Is Captain Mackey uninformed or lying?

A little later, we see that the microphone on the communications panel is severed. Our minds leap toward sabotage, but – spoiler alert – no, it’s just shoddy upkeep on The Tipsy Mermaid.

In reality (and easy to Google for Mackey or anyone in the group to who knew they’d be going out to sea that day), while they are rare, there have been shark attacks off Malta.

Furthermore, Tom, who is meant to be an expert on these matters, asserts that Great Whites are strangers to these waters, but are being driven north by climate change. It’s laudable that CHUM makes climate change part of the plot (and not just because of where the shark is), but again, there is a whole actual (albeit declining) subspecies of Great Whites in the Mediterranean.

We’re trying to figure out how all this will link up with Roy and what he’s learned, and we get to that, although perhaps not the way we expect, which is another CHUM asset.

Except for when the shark needs to interact with humans and/or vessels, the animal looks realistic, like footage of a genuine Great White. We also get a variety of fish in the underwater shots, which is a nice touch.

But there are the common-to-the-subgenre tropes of the shark looking way too big every time she breaches and eating way too much. Also, sharks do not growl.

One key aspect of this subgenre is how intrigued we are by the human villain. Here, the link between motivation and action doesn’t stack up well against that of comparable characters (e.g., Quint in JAWS or Bruce Tucker in DANGEROUS ANIMALS).

As these kinds of movies go, CHUM is moderately diverting, but it’s easy to see where it could have been better.

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Movie Review: CAROLINA CAROLINE

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Sat, 06 Jun 2026 04:01:15 +0000

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Samara Weaving, Kyle Gallner, Jon Gries, Kyra Sedgwick
Writer: William Thomas Dean IV
Director: Adam Carter Rehmeier
Distributor: Magnolia Pictures
Release Date: June 5, 2026

CAROLINA CAROLINE begins by showing us things went very wrong somewhere as we meet a young woman, whose name we’ll learn is Caroline (Samara Weaving), wearing a black wig and sunglasses, walking unsteadily out of a nondescript motel to vomit in the parking lot.

When a pickup truck pulls up, Caroline stands, pulls a gun, carjacks the driver (without shooting him), steals the vehicle and drives off. She removes the black wig while driving, checks out the man’s wallet, sees there’s not much cash.

Caroline goes into a gas station convenience store. There are “armed and dangerous” posters up for her, but they show her in the black wig, not as she looks without it. She shoplifts an item or two, buys a greeting card at the counter and does the old PAPER MOON scam with the cashier, confusing him so that she winds up getting back in change double what she spent.

An onscreen title tells us it’s now “Three Months Earlier, Texas.”

Caroline is sitting in the parking area for a different gas station convenience store, where she works. She is impressed by a cool car that pulls up. The good-looking driver, Oliver (Kyle Gallner), does the bamboozle the cashier/double his change back routine.

Caroline witnesses this. She’s not bamboozled, but rather tentatively intrigued. She confronts Oliver about what he’s done, he cheerfully admits it. There are sparks on both sides.

That night, Caroline spots Oliver’s car outside a local bar. She goes in, sits down next to him. One thing leads to another. He’s smitten; she’s fascinated.

Oliver tells Caroline he’ll do anything she wants, and he seems to mean it. What Caroline wants first, apart from Oliver’s affection, is for him to teach her how to pull cons.

This is very successful, especially as there are scams that can be done with a partner that can’t be accomplished solo.

Then Caroline wants two other things. She lives with and has a warm relationship with her dad, Hank (Jon Gries), who raised her as a single father. Caroline’s mom abandoned them both when Caroline was a baby.

Despite Hank’s warnings, Caroline wants to drive to South Carolina to meet her mom. A road trip is no problem for Oliver.

The other thing Caroline wants to do is rob banks. While Oliver hasn’t done this before, he’s more than willing to oblige. The problem is that, no matter how carefully they are planned, bank robberies attract a lot of notice from law enforcement.

It’s not clear exactly when CAROLINA CAROLINE is meant to be taking place, but phone booths are plentiful, people read newspapers, and there’s not a mobile in sight.

While the pre-contemporary era may not be absolutely necessary for the storytelling, it fits with the movie’s old-fashioned-feeling romance and pacing. There is genuine chemistry between Weaving and Gallner, so that we like them and want to see what happens between them as a couple.

The way the relationship is depicted removes CAROLINA CAROLINE from the film noir genre, as we’re never worried about betrayal. The encroaching danger is simply the nature of the lifestyle Oliver has chosen and Caroline has accelerated.

The script by William Thomas Dean IV hints at the notion that Caroline has bitten off more than she can chew without understanding the implications, and that Oliver is so intoxicated with her that his judgment takes a back seat. This might have withstood a little more examination, but as it is, there is enough nuance to the characters to keep us engaged.

Director Adam Carter Rehmeier has a few shots that seem to be art for art’s sake, but he mostly creates a steady mood akin to a narrative country-western or country-rock song, the kind that populate CAROLINA CAROLINE’s soundtrack. We see small towns, and glimpse folks living their lives, from the point of view of characters who are simultaneously envious and restless, respectful in theory but predatory in practice.

It is a bit of a mystery as to why the filmmakers decided to preview the film’s climax at its start. Some movies need to do this to let the audience know to hang in there, something is going to happen. Since that’s evident from the first meeting between Caroline and Oliver, CAROLINA CAROLINE holds our attention honestly throughout.

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Movie Review: THE SUMMONING

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Sat, 06 Jun 2026 04:01:08 +0000

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Valeria San Martin, Justina Ceballos, Daniela Flombaum, Augustín Olcese, Nannu Spannauss, Aaron Burt, Xochitl Gomez, Lorelei Olivia Mote, Gigi Zumbado, Carmela Zumbado, Julia Vera, Paige Bourne, Peter Berwick, Sara Canning, Adam Lolacher, Andrew Roy Drury, Mark Kandborg
Writers: Camilo Zaffora, Brandon Piskonik, Felipe Vargas, Vee Saieh, Corey Benson Powers, Brian Sepanzyk, concept by Michael Kraetzer
Directors: Sergio Gonzalez, Brandon Piskorik, Felipe Vargas, Corey Benson Powers, Brian Sepanzyk
Distributor: Brainstorm Media
Release Date: June 5, 2026 (VOD)

THE SUMMONING is a horror anthology with a wraparound story that involves invoking a spirit via a mirror (a la the Bloody Mary myth or CANDYMAN, to name a few examples).

In THE SUMMONING, the “Baby Blue” ritual can summon the ghost of a baby into one’s arms. If the baby is not set down in time, the baby’s ghostly mother (Nannu Spannauss) appears in the mirror, and she won’t be happy. Part of the challenge is to tell a spooky story before attempting to summon the ghosts, which is how the assorted short tales come into it.

The framing sequences, directed by Sergio Gonzalez and scripted by Camilo Zaffora, involve babysitter Laura (Valeria San Martin), whose pals Stacy (Justina Caballos), Maureen (Daniela Flombaum) and eventually Maureen’s boyfriend Hunter (Augustín Olcese) show at the house where Laura is watching a baby. Maureen proposes that they do the Baby Blue Challenge, which apparently is all the rage online.

Anyone watching THE SUMMONING will immediately know this is a catastrophically terrible idea, but since that seldom stops a viral sensation, our group goes for it.

Apparently the filmmakers were concerned that the movie might not get to its scares quickly enough via Laura and her friends, because THE SUMMONING starts with the segment “The Scarecrow” before we get to the babysitter, et al. Written and directed by Brandon Piskorik, this is a quiet, brisk piece about a driver (Aaron Burt) on a foggy highway who has a problem with scarecrows blocking the road.

Directed and written by Felipe Vargas, “Hive” takes place on a playground, where beleaguered Sasha (Xochitl Gomez) is having a tough time wrangling her energetic young charge Val (Lorelei Olivia Mote), even before things get creepy.

Also directed by Vargas but written by Vee Saieh, “Carnivora” has two sisters (real-life siblings Gigi Zumbado and Carmela Zumbado) dealing with their grandmother (Julia Vera). This takes familial obligation vs. personal freedom and cranks the subject matter all the way up, with some unusually gross material.

“Locksmith,” written and directed by Corey Benson Powers, has a young woman (Paige Bourne) dealing with a menacing locksmith (Pete Berwick). So far as we can tell, there’s nothing supernatural or twisty in this segment, just a fast cautionary ad for not letting strange workers into one’s home.

The last short is “In the Shadow of God,” written and directed by Brian Sepanzyk. Rachel (Sara Canning) returns to the home where she grew up. Her father (Mark Kandborg) has died under bizarre circumstances that soon seem to spread through the neighborhood. This has the movie’s best jump scare, although the piece remains fairly enigmatic as far as cause and effect.

Unlike some other horror anthologies, THE SUMMONING doesn’t attempt to tie its individual short films to one another and/or to the framework, something that is awesome when it works and frustrating when it doesn’t; here, it’s just avoided. Except for “Scarecrow,” there are common thematic elements about children and guardianship, so it all feels somewhat connected.

It also helps that, even though the crews and locations are different from segment to segment – THE SUMMONING is an Argentinian production, but some installments were made in the U.S. and Canada – there is a similarity in production style. Even the gore has some continuity.

The characters in the framing segment seem a little old to be doing something so potentially unhealthy. In fact, when Hunter arrives, he seems alarmed that the women have started the ritual, even though it was reportedly his suggestion in the first place.

There’s also a bit of a narrative glitch. The instructions for the summoning state that the fear-inducing yarn should be told before the teller goes into the bathroom and locks the door, but in practice, everyone goes into the bathroom and then tells the story alone. Not only is this counter to what we’ve just heard, it also doesn’t make dramatic sense, since getting reactions from the cluster of friends would seem to be the point.

Still, THE SUMMONING is an eerie, mostly pleasing variety pack. It may not provide many answers, but it has plenty of atmosphere and weirdness.

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SEVEN SNIPERS: Actors Radha Mitchell and Ioan Gruffudd on new action thriller – Exclusive Interview

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Sat, 06 Jun 2026 04:01:00 +0000

In the new film SEVEN SNIPERS, opening Friday June 5, Radha Mitchell stars as former elite sniper Kris Hendricks, code-named Voodoo Child when she was on active duty. Kris is now retired from the military, raising her rebellious teen daughter Anja (Annabel Wolfe) on their small farm in rural Queensland, Australia.

But when Kris has reason to believe that an old adversary known as the Dragon (Tim Roth) is coming for her, she calls in a favor from her old squad. Like Kris, most of them are no longer serving, but their bonds are strong enough for them to show up.

One of their number, Milk, played by Ioan Gruffudd, was often there for Annabel when she was growing up and Kris was away on missions. He is now part of the small group that arrives by helicopter to defend the farm.

Australian Mitchell is a multi-award-winning performer, whose many film and TV credits include HIGH ART, PITCH BLACK, MAN ON FIRE, FINDING NEVERLAND, MELINDA AND MELINDA, SILENT HILL, THE CRAZIES, OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN, and THE ROMANOFFS.

Welsh actor Gruffudd (his full name is pronounced YO-wan GRUFF-uth) is also an award winner, including for his performances as the title character in multiple HORATIO HORNBLOWER telefilms. Some of his other movie and TV credits include BLACK HAWK DOWN, KING ARTHUR, the 2005 and 2007 FANTASTIC FOUR feature films, immortal forensic pathologist Dr. Henry Morgan in ABC’s cult favorite FOREVER, regular mortal forensic pathologist Daniel Harrow in the British series HARROW, and Elsbeth’s Scottish boyfriend in ELSBETH.

SEVEN SNIPERS is written by Andrew O’Keefe and directed by Sandra Sciberras. Joining from separate locations, Mitchell and Gruffudd get on a Zoom call to discuss their involvement with the film.

Along with costar Ryan Kwanten, Mitchell and Gruffudd are among the executive producers of SEVEN SNIPERS. Mitchell explains that this came about after they were already attached to the project as actors.

“We were attracted to the script, and I think they offered that to us as a credit, and I accepted that,” Mitchell laughs. “But my actual producing was fairly limited on the project, other than maybe just to help it get its funding initially, when they were trying to raise the money.”

“Just as Radha said,” Gruffudd affirms. When he came aboard during preproduction, “From an executive [producer] standpoint, the movie was already up and running. Thanks to Radha and other producers, they found their financing, so my involvement on that side of things was more on a creative level and helping to bring my character in particular to life.”

While people talk in SEVEN SNIPERS, the film is more action- than dialogue-driven. Even in scenes where no one is running or shooting, emotions are often expressed wordlessly. Were the actors looking for roles that allowed them to convey what they were feeling through face and body language without having to speak about it?

Both of them laugh.

“Yeah,” Mitchell says at first, then amends, “No, that sounds so lazy. But it’s not lazy at all. It’s very physically demanding.”

She found it refreshing. “There’s a part of me, and maybe I’m a kook, but I’m just like, ‘The words, yadda-yadda-yadda, the words.’ What is fascinating to me is just experience, the emotional, the visceral, what’s under the words. And after so many years [of acting], you kind of find the words are interchangeable, and they could be lots of different words. To me, what people are feeling is the power of the drama. So, I like this sparse aspect of the story, that the writer had really constructed a very syncopated plot. It unveils itself in a very elegant way, but the text is very pared back.”

For Gruffudd, “Having played the leading man, specifically playing a forensic pathologist [in both FOREVER and HARROW], with lots of dialogue and lots of scientific and medical words to remember, I think there’s joy to be had in both of those worlds as an actor. I think there is a real joy to be found in the stillness that one needed to play Milk as a character, the unspoken words, and I think the confidence and the experience as an actor to really embrace that, and to trust that you don’t have to fill the gaps or the silences. You can just let the camera do the work.

“And when you do have lines to speak, they have somehow more resonance, especially from Milk in his scenes with Anja, played by Annabel Wolfe. I thought those scenes were very poignant, amongst very dramatic and violent scenes. You had that lovely juxtaposition there of the gentleness of the character and the humanity of these soldiers who are thrust into these impossible situations. So, yes, I did enjoy that very much.”

In SEVEN SNIPERS, we know Kris loves Anja fiercely, but there is no discussion of Kris making the choice to have a child. Was there ever any dialogue that was cut about Kris opting not to have an abortion, especially given the circumstances?

“I don’t think that was an option,” Mitchell replies I think she’d been captive, there was an opportunity to get out of that, and there was a lot of mess left behind, but I don’t think that there was a doctor around to resolve the situation. And I also think that’s kind of complicated, isn’t it?

“So, I think she certainly loves her daughter. And then the pain around [Anja] coming into the world is another layer to their relationship that can’t be really addressed until it’s forced into the light. But that was never on the table of conversation, because I think the situation was just so extreme.”

What kind of training did Mitchell and Gruffudd do in terms of handling weapons and overall being able to move like professional snipers, even ones who had been out of the field for years?

Despite looking extremely fit in SEVEN SNIPERS, Mitchell relates with a laugh, “I saw the movie, and I was like, ‘Gee, I wish I was a gym rat.’ And maybe one day I will be. But I felt like, the story is about people who stepped out of that life being forced back in, and re-remembering themselves.

“In this case, Kris has sort of tried to buffer herself against that potential future, so she’s been living [an isolated existence that is like a] fortress and doing what she can to maintain herself. But when this situation arises, she has to become who she was. I liked that aspect to it, actually, that they were snipers maybe twenty years ago. Coming back to who they were, that coming back to oneself is interesting to me.”

As for the physical side of the character, Mitchell continues, “We did a lot of weaponry training. A lot of it was done while we were shooting, because just the nature and constraints of the budget and the time that was available. But we had an ex-military person who was doing our costumes. We had a guy called Joey, who was a trained sniper, who was with us a lot of the time, who trained us in preparation, and then was there on set a lot of the time just to monitor. We weren’t making a documentary, so I’m sure there are things that you could pick at.

“But there was a real desire to be authentic, and to make it believable, and he was certainly there to reference and to show us things. There are moves that we were learning about how to move through grass and stay camouflaged, and just the carrying of the weapons themselves, aside from the kind of the science of the wind and all these elements that you have to take into account that he was educating us to.”

Gruffudd adds, “As Radha mentioned, the very nature of filmmaking in this day and age, sometimes you’re dropped in the deep end, with not much time to prepare. But we were very fortunate. I had a week of preparation with Joey, and the armorers themselves are also ex-military, so at any given time, we could rely on their expertise to help us to look the part during any particular scene.

“One thing I found quite interesting was, I thought I fit, and I have been looking after myself, and I had been training, bulking up a little bit to play this part, but I certainly wasn’t prepared to be in all that gear and all the fatigues that they wore and to carry around that weapon in the heat of the Australian Outback,” Gruffudd laughs.

“It gave me reverence, really, for the real men and women who serve in these zones, like in Iraq and the Middle East, in those searing temperatures, that they have to remain cool and calm, although they are probably working in sweltering heat. One of the elements that I enjoyed about the film was that we didn’t shy away from the fact that we were sweating quite intensely every day. You can’t put that kind of fake sweat makeup on. This was real sweat, and I think that came across and lent itself to help heighten the situation, that when there is so much heat, your senses are heightened and the aggression is heightened. So, I think it added to the violent nature of the story.”

Without getting too spoilery, Kris and Milk both lose longtime comrades, but cannot let their personal feelings impact their ability to continue to fight. How was that to play?

Mitchell offers, “Well, Kris is a professional, and she’s seen carnage, and she even deals with the corpse of someone who she’s loved in a very kind of detached way, because she’s a survivor. And I thought that was a portrait of character, and significant, to have that scene. Particularly Kris is so traumatized from the past, and she’s so determined to protect her child, and to survive. So, she can override her own emotional state if required.”

Gruffudd concurs. “Yes. When you speak to soldiers, you realize that that is their work, that is their job, they are very matter of fact about what they do. As artists and actors and as viewers, we put a lot of emotion into these stories, because they are stories and they are films, and by their very nature, they want us to feel something.

“I suppose it’s a little bit like a surgeon and a doctor. [In real life], everything in the operating room becomes very, very quiet when something serious is happening. Whereas when we play doctors on television or film, everything becomes very dramatic and busy and frantic to heighten the emotion of it for the purpose of telling the story.

“So, there were moments in the film, specifically for Milk, where we did see his emotional side and his love for Kris and her daughter Anja in amongst the severity of handing the pistol to [another character], knowing that [the other character] was not going to survive. Milk couldn’t stop him from leaving the safety of the farmhouse, but he wanted to give him an opportunity to maybe have a chance. But I think he knew deep down that he was going to perish out there.”

What do Mitchell and Gruffudd both most want audiences to get out of SEVEN SNIPERS?

Mitchell considers. “It depends on the audience. I think there’s something very inspiring, very interesting to see women soldiers and focus on a character like Kris Hendricks. I think it’s a very interesting way for women to see themselves. And in terms of just the entertainment factor, I really hope that, aside from the lioness aspect of the story, it’s very entertaining, that it holds your attention, that people appreciate the syncopation of the story, and that they’re satisfied by the end.”

Gruffudd opines, “I hope people will leave the movie theatre feeling satisfied and entertained, obviously, first and foremost, but they’ll have a lot of questions that will open a lot of discussions amongst their friends and their family and people who’ve seen it. Because what I loved about the script was the fact that there were a lot of things that were unsaid that we were able to bring to our characters, our backstories. I hope those moments of silence that we have in a very fast-moving movie open a lot of discussion about the military and the bravery of the men and women who serve and protect us. I hope it will bring up a lot of conversations about trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder.

“And I hope that they will have to watch this movie again, if it comes on their screen and they happen to come across it, flicking through the television, that it’s one of those sort of cult classics that they’ll always want to watch, time and time again.”

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Movie Review: BACKROOMS

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Sat, 30 May 2026 04:42:53 +0000

Rating: R
Stars: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Renate Reinsve, Mark Duplass, Finn Bennett, Lukita Maxwell
Writer: Will Soodik, based on the YouTube series by Kane Parsons
Director: Kane Parsons
Distributor: A24
Release Date: May 29, 2026

While it was made now (2025-2026), BACKROOMS is reminiscent of choose-your-own-interpretation science-fiction films that were most prevalent in the 1960s and 1970s. Splitting the difference, BACKROOMS is set in June 1990 in Santa Clara, California (just north of Los Angeles County). Then as now, it’s a relatively quiet area.

The film starts as with video cam footage shot by an uneasy man. He’s making his way through what looks like an office building, with yellow-wallpapered suites mostly devoid of furniture. We and he detect that someone or something is in there with him. He pleads for unseen comrades to find him and come to his aid.

Then we’re with Clark (Chiwetel Ejiofor), who runs the discount furniture store Captain Clark’s Ottoman Empire in a strip mall. Clark drinks, has a lot of bills, and has been living in the shop since his wife kicked him out.

Clark is in therapy with Dr. Mary Kline (Renate Reinsve), an author of successful self-help books. She seems sincere in her efforts to help Clark, who has anger as well as alcohol and financial issues. Clark has been trained as an architect and clearly resents what he’s doing for a living.

The store has been having some inexplicable electrical issues, with lights flickering on and off. When Clark goes to investigate the breaker box in the basement, he finds he can go through the wall into the empty office surroundings we’ve seen before.

There are empty rooms, there are rooms with piles of furniture in the middle, there are rooms with writing on the walls, there are floors made of sand, there are ALICE IN WONDERLAND-style doors of various sizes.

Eventually, Mary, plus Clark’s two employees, Bobby (Finn Bennett) and Kat (Lukita Maxwell), become caught up in the exploration as well. Things on the other side of the wall become increasingly strange.

Based on a series of shorts available on YouTube by BACKROOMS director Kane Parsons and written by Will Soodik, the movie deals with liminal space, defined in architecture (per Google) as an area meant only for passing through – hallways, corridors, etc. (Clark’s chosen profession isn’t random.) What if we were stuck in them? Moreover, as one character posits, what if places remember people, rather than the other way around, but don’t remember them accurately? What would that do to the people?

These notions are heady and fascinating. But BACKROOMS doesn’t necessarily dramatize them as well as perhaps is possible. It can be argued that the subject material defies conventional storytelling, and that’s fair.

On the flip side, when something that asks “What if?” is presented as a narrative, it can likewise be posited that the filmmakers might want to offer a few potential answers.

Even if we’re trying to give ourselves over to the BACKROOMS experience, there’s only so much wandering around without incident that this reviewer, at least, can take. Ejiofor is one of those actors who could be riveting in that proverbial reading of the phone book, but he’s only allowed so much variation of reaction to what he encounters as he goes from room to room to room. Again, the point may be that our reactions as humans become numb as we are subjected to these liminal spaces.

Ejiofor is excellent as the distressed Clark, as is Reinsve as a woman trying to keep her own demons at bay. The two have a terrific scene together near the end. Bennett adeptly conveys youthful curiosity and Maxwell ably puts forth anxiety. Mark Duplass makes his character properly ambivalent.

The “backrooms” are unsettling and depressing, even without the things lurking within it. So, for that matter, is Clark’s forlorn store. One of the many, many conversations BACKROOMS may spark is what’s worse: a place – or a life – that cannot fulfill its purpose or one that has no purpose at all?

BACKROOMS is conceptually marvelous, with multiple layers of meaning. But, for those who are not entirely caught up in its melancholic spell, it’s also slow going at times.

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Movie Review: SPEED DEMON

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Sat, 30 May 2026 04:42:46 +0000

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Katie Cassidy, William H. Macy, John Patrick Jordan, Allen McCullough, Sari Arambulo, Jeremy Matthew Feight, Sky Vaux Fuller, Noriko Sato, Michael John Improta, Sabrina Schlegel-Mejia
Writer: Domenico Salvaggio
Director: Jon Keeyes
Distributor: Maverick Film/Complex Corp.
Release Date: May 31, 2026 (theatrical, digital, VOD)

SPEED DEMON has a title that epitomizes truth in advertising: it’s about a literal demon on a speeding out-of-control train.

The opening, which is effectively eerie, has a little girl alone in her room. Her father at moments seems to be there with her, but he then blurs out and we see the shadow of a crow.

We then meet the little girl as grown-up Lucretia, or Lu (Katie Cassidy). She wakes up in a motel room with a large amount of cocaine and at least two naked people on the bed.

Lu realizes she’s late for work and puts on her professional garb: a nun’s habit. Clearly, she’s a woman with a lot going on.

Elsewhere, aspiring archaeologist Gabriel (John Patrick Jordan) is given a travel gift by his newish girlfriend Mireille (Sabrina Schlegel-Mejia).

Gabriel helps Sister Lu with her baggage when they board the same train from Montreal to New York.

Lu is accompanying her boss, Father Novak (William H. Macy), the Vatican’s top exorcist. Lu is his assistant. Lu has never performed an exorcism herself, as that is a job reserved for priests, i.e., men. Lu thinks this is unfair.

Father Novak disagrees and expresses extreme disappointment in Sister Lu. Novak raised Lu after her father died and she’s his protégé, but he knows she’s an alcoholic (it’s not clear if he’s aware of her other addictions) and now nobody except him will work with her.

Fellow travelers on the train include precocious and well-read little girl Sofia (Sky Vaux Fuller) and her nanny Nancy (Noriko Sato), loving couple Vicky (Sari Arambulo) and David (Jeremy Feight), pickpocket Louis (Michael John Improta), and old grouch Edwin (Allen McCullough).

Sofia’s dad designed the train and she’s been on this route at least twenty times, so she knows all the curves, as well as what speed it should be moving between the stations, etc. She’s also a font of general knowledge from being a constant reader. So, when she observes Gabriel opening his present, Sofia is able to identify it as a statue of demon king Asmodeus.

Gabriel pricks himself on the statue. Oops. This leads in short order to demonic possession, destruction of the train controls, and the need for an exorcism to save the passengers.

Directed by Jon Keeyes and written by Domenico Salvaggio, SPEED DEMON employs a lot of tropes from both exorcist and disaster movies of yore. However, it does so with a straight face and absolute lack of self-consciousness. There’s a charm in this kind of earnestness. It also moves with gratifying quickness.

Cassidy, who spent years as a DC Comics superhero on TV’s ARROW, knows exactly how to play all the notes of her character. Macy is fine and Jordan deals well with the demands of playing a nice guy and then the embodiment of Asmodeus.

SPEED DEMON has some goofs (at one point, someone says “concentrate” when they mean “consecrate”), but its heart is in the right place. The last scene may induce chuckles from a certain segment of the audience for whom, if this were real, it would explain a lot about our current moment. It isn’t the least bit scary but, for those with a soft spot for unironic old-fashioned material, it’s fun.

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Movie Review: PRESSURE

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Sat, 30 May 2026 04:42:40 +0000

Rating: PG-13
Stars: Andrew Scott, Brendan Fraser, Kerry Condon, Chris Messina, Damian Lewis, Tamsin Topolski
Writers: David Haig and Anthony Maras, based on Haig’s stage play
Director: Anthony Maras
Distributor: Focus Features
Release Date: May 29, 2026

The title of PRESSURE refers to multiple aspects of the film. There’s the psychological, emotional, professional, and temporal pressure all the characters are under. Then there’s the barometric pressure governing the weather, which threatens to wreak havoc with the planned attack on Hitler’s forces in Europe in June 1944.

PRESSURE assumes that the audience knows – eighty-one-years-later spoiler alert – that the Allied forces, a coalition of many countries, represented in PRESSURE primarily by the United States and the United Kingdom, won the war against the Nazis. Moreover, the film takes into account the likelihood that most viewers will know that D-Day, when the Allies stormed the beaches of France, was the decisive turning point in the war.

So, with ultimate victory a foregone conclusion, how do filmmakers generate suspense? Well, what do we, or Allied Supreme Commander Allied Forces General Dwight D. “Ike” Eisenhower (played here by Brendan Fraser) know about meteorology? This reviewer has in common with Eisenhower that the answer for both is, “Not much.”

Someone who does know a great deal about meteorology – perhaps more than anyone else alive at the time – is U.K. Group Captain James Stagg (Andrew Scott). Stagg reluctantly leaves the bedside of his extremely pregnant wife Liz (Tamsin Topolski) because he has been personally recommended by Winston Churchill to Eisenhower to help with planning D-Day.

Eisenhower has already been working with top American meteorologist Irving Krick (Chris Messina), whose confidence is a contrast to Stagg’s refusal to state anything as a certainty.

Krick relies on historical maps of what the weather has been like in the relevant area on that date in years past. His prediction is calm skies and smooth sailing. Stagg cares almost nothing for precedent, instead demanding constant readings from weather balloons everywhere. While he can’t be absolutely positive, Stagg believes that the beaches of Normandy will be experiencing severe storm conditions right at the time the Allies want to go ashore.

Giving their different techniques and beliefs, to say nothing of their personalities, it’s not surprising that Stagg and Krick clash. Since Eisenhower isn’t used to underlings telling him things he doesn’t want to hear, including they’re not a hundred percent sure of what they’re saying, he is taken aback and isn’t sure which of his scientists is right.

Since PRESSURE is primarily from Stagg’s point of view, we can guess he’s going to prove correct. However, even with this and our knowledge that the Allied forces weren’t all swept out to sea, director Anthony Maras and his co-writer David Haig, adapting Haig’s stage play, get us to lean forward quite a lot.

Much of the tension arises from human interaction. Fraser makes Eisenhower unexpectedly thoughtful and even vulnerable, the sort of commander we’d want in charge in a crisis. Scott puts passion and wonderment beneath Stagg’s restrained exterior. Messina is suitably brash and period-fitting as Krick.

Kerry Condon is outstanding as Captain Kay Summersby, Eisenhower’s driver and close confidante who, in this telling at least, takes it upon herself to try to keep the peace among men of extremely strong opinions. Damian Lewis contributes a memorable upper-class outburst as Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery.

There is spectacle in PRESSURE, as the filmmakers want to, and do, viscerally imprint upon us that lives are at stake. But our experience is more of watching something intimate and meticulously observed, of what is required in the innermost being of people making world-changing decisions. It is powerful and affecting.

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TV Review: GREAT PERFORMANCES: STAGEBOUND

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Sat, 23 May 2026 15:56:15 +0000

Stars: Luke Evans
Writer: Cody Williams
Director: Cody Wiliams
Network: PBS.org/gperf
Premiere Date: Wednesday, May 20, 2026

GREAT PERFORMANCES showcases stage musicals, concerts, operas and dance productions that are worthy of the series’ title Friday nights on PBS, thereafter streaming on PBS.org/gperf. Next up is BROADWAY MUSICALS: A JEWISH LEGACY, premiering Friday, May 29.

Now GREAT PERFORMANCES has expanded into doing shorter online pieces for its Webby-nominated series GREAT PERFORMANCES: STAGEBOUND, which streams on PBS.org/gperf, the PBS app, and PBS’s YouTube and Facebook channels. Episodes drop Tuesday nights/Wednesday mornings at midnight.

The new season of STAGEBOUND currently includes MARLA MINDELL’S JOURNEY TO OPENING NIGHT OF “TITANIQUE” and LUKE EVANS’ JOURNEY TO OPENING NIGHT OF “THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW.” ROBERT “SILK” MASON’S JOURNEY TO OPENING NIGHT OF “CATS: THE JELLICLE BALL” premieres May 26/27.

For people familiar with writer/lyricist/composer Richard O’Brien’s THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW primarily from its 1975 film version, it may seem that it’s so impossible to follow in the high-heeled footsteps of star Tim Curry (who originated the role of Frank N. Furter onstage before the film’s making) that there’s no point in trying, even in a different medium.

However, the new Broadway production of THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW, currently playing at Studio 54, looks like it has a new and vital vision. Certainly star Luke Evans has his own interpretation of Frank – check out him with most of the cast performing “Sweet Transvestite” for THE JIMMY FALLON SHOW (available on YouTube). While still strutting to the max and then some, Evans gives us a friendlier take on Frank, who sounds like a fan hoping to show off his collection when he sings, “I can show you my favorite obsession!”

LUKE EVANS’ JOURNEY TO OPENING NIGHT OF “THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW” consists of a 12-plus-minute interview with the actor, where he discusses taking on the role, his Broadway debut, while also playing tour guide around the Studio 54 theatre, the rehearsal space, and more. We don’t get to see as much rehearsal as we might like, but we do get to see the array of makeup, wigs, and costumes. We also get to meet Evans’s unflappable dachshund Lala, who apparently is unfazed by encountering her human in full Frank regalia.

GREAT PERFORMANCES: STAGEBOUND has charm and energy. If the interviews don’t go very deep, we at least get a taste of the ambience, the production and the philosophy of the performer in focus.

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Movie Review: PASSENGER

ABBIE BERNSTEIN — Fri, 22 May 2026 10:56:29 +0000

Rating: R
Stars: Jacob Scipio, Lou Llobell, Melissa Leo, Joseph Lopez
Writers: Zachary Donohue & T.W. Burgess
Director: André Øvredal
Distributor: Paramount
Release Date: May 22, 2026

The new PASSENGER – not to be confused with Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1975 THE PASSENGER, 2022’s THE PASSENGER (LA PASAJERA), or other previous films with similar titles – is crowd-pleasing horror, the kind that has the audience interacting enthusiastically (as opposed to derisively) with the screen.

This is the result of a number of intelligent choices made by PASSENGER’s writers, Zachary Donohue & T.W. Burgess, and its director, André Øvredal.

For starters, the movie’s mythos feels like something we’ve heard without it being over-familiar or pulling from any single specific source. Everyone has heard stories about haunted lonely places and demonic hitchhikers. PASSENGER combines these in its malevolent title spirit (played effectively by Joseph Lopez).

PASSENGER also has plentiful, sturdy jump scares and just enough exposition to keep things on track without making it seem like there’s a spate of survivors out there.

Perhaps best of all, PASSENGER is one of those blessed movies, horror or otherwise, that doesn’t require anybody to behave like an idiot to keep the plot moving. People don’t spend time doubting what they and we have clearly seen or tempting fate by unnecessary risky behavior. Consequently, as tension ramps up, we feel claustrophobia and helplessness along with characters who are doing everything they know how to do as they attempt to survive.

The Passenger begins by terrorizing two young men who pull over on a stretch of dark forest road for a needed pit stop. This doesn’t go well.

We then meet our two protagonists, Ty (Jacob Scipio) and Maddie (Lou Llobell) are moving from New York to life on the open road in their huge orange Mercedes-Benz van.

The van seems a bit like the TARDIS – large as it looks on the outside, it’s even roomier on the inside, with bed and kitchen space. It is also the source of low-key but growing friction between the couple. Maddie has viewed this excursion as a road trip/vacation, while Ty is entranced by the notion of permanent van life.

Then, on a stretch of dark road at night, they come upon the car from the opening sequence, its doors open and a possibly injured individual inside. Naturally, being decent people, Ty and Maddie pull over to try to help. Quicker than you can say “viral curse,” they’ve got problems.

Van life is a real thing and, while it is not the point of PASSENGER, the movie has some fun with the subculture, including its class divisions. (The Mercedes is an object of derision for van lifers who we gather are nomadic due to necessity rather than choice.) It seems like fertile ground for any number of stories.

In PASSENGER, van life is mainly a plausible source of a smattering of information on the nature of the evil that’s descended on our protagonists. Director Øvredal devises some clever methods of shooting the van’s interior, so that we’re not stuck with the same few angles. (Despite the spacious look, getting camera and lighting equipment along with the actors inside it cannot have been easy; it has been stated by the production that, yes, the shots were done inside a vehicle, rather than on a soundstage.)

Llobell is gently reasonable and convincingly terrified, while Scipio manages to make Ty a bit obtuse without losing our sympathy. Melissa Leo is impactful as a van lifer who offers some assistance.

For those who get a little impatient with, say, the CONJURING franchise, PASSENGER eventually swerves slightly into Catholic lore, but it’s not overwhelming.

PASSENGER is overall a smooth, enjoyable supernatural fright ride.

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