From the Front Row

trans|cendental cinema

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Thu, 20 Jun 2024 21:45:00 +0000

Some bittersweet news - this will be the final post at From the Front Row. Today I am unveiling my new website, www.transcendentalcinema.com.

After 18 years at From the Front Row, I decided it was time for a refresh and a rebrand that just wasn't possible on Blogger. With trans|cendental cinema, I hope to aim a uniquely trans lens at the movies, and really bring a more personal touch to my film criticism.

So what does this mean for From the Front Row? It will continue to exist in order to preserve the work I've put into it over the last two decades. But from now on, trans|cendental cinema will be my primary outlet. I am excited about the possibilities this will bring, and hopefully one day using it as a platform to amplify other transgender voices. Thanks for supporting me over the last 18 years, and I hope you'll follow me into this next adventure.

Blu-Ray Review | Three Revolutionary Films by Ousmane Sembène

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Tue, 18 Jun 2024 14:44:00 +0000

One of the great filmmakers to emerge from the African continent, Senegal's Ousmane Sembène is also one of the greatest revolutionary masters of the moving image. His films railed against colonialism, capitalism, sexism, racism, and religious hypocrisy, looking at the political situation in his beloved Senegal while examining the global struggle for people's liberation. In Criterion's new box set, Three Revolutionary Films by Ousmane Sembène, three of the filmmaker's era-defining works of the 1970s get tremendous restorations that will bring his work to a wider audience of cinephiles.

While the French fight the Nazis back home during WWII, in colonized Africa they were forcibly conscripting (enslaving?) Africans to fight in their war, while collecting "taxes" in the shape of rice crops, the absence of which caused starvation for a Diola-speaking tribe in Africa under brutal French-colonial rule.

In Emitaï, these elements create a powder keg of revolutionary fervor led by the women of the village who can no longer take the oppression of their colonizers and the inaction of their men, who prefer to meet in councils and endlessly debate religious protocol rather than stand up to their oppressors. While I think Mandabi (1968) is perhaps a stronger vessel for Sembène's communist political ideas, Emitaï is such a raw howl of anger that it's impossible to ignore. This is the Senegalese filmmaker's Lysistrata, a feminist screed whose magical realism points to the uselessness of clinging to tradition in the face of deadly subjugation. The old gods are dead, we can only rely on ourselves. Tradition won't save you. Faith won't save you. But women will.

I was struck, having encountered this after seeing This is Not a Burial, It's a Resurrection (2019), how much inspiration Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese took from Sembène. Emitaï is filled with righteous fury, an unflinching statement of Senegalese opposition to colonial interference, and the feminine history of cleaning up the messes of both ruthless and useless men.

Sembène's 1975 satire Xala turns a withering eye on Senegal's patriarchal, post-colonial corruption. Based on Sembène's novel of the same name, Xala follows the misadventures of Hadji Beye (Thierno Leye), an ambitious mid-level bureaucrat who, after marrying a much younger third wife, is quite literally stuck impotent and quickly finds himself becoming a town laughingstock.

Sembène had a special disdain for male arrogance, and that disdain informs the backbone of his work here. As a representative of the local chamber of commerce, Hadji has become embroiled in the same kind of bureaucratic hell that revolutionaries once fought to overthrow. Sembène's contempt for this character is palpable, as he puts him through a Job-like series of trials and humiliations and ends with him literally being stripped and spat upon.

Of the three films Sembène made during the 1970s, Xala is the only one set during that time period. Rather than turning his ire upon the French colonial forces, Xala criticizes the post-colonial government structures, which Sembène saw as an *ahem* flaccid attempt to enact the kind of African socialism for which he advocated. While the ineptitude of men and their subjugation of women were frequent themes in Sembène's work, Xala is proof that Sembène did not reserve his criticisms for the French colonial power structures that wreaked havoc on his beloved Senegal. Here, he constantly reminds us of the suffering happening in the periphery of the increasingly absurd drama happening at the film's center - keeping the plight of the people in view even as the dignitaries and bureaucrats bicker about the most trivial of disagreements. In Xala, the powers that be in Senegal have lost sight of the revolutionary fervor felt in Emitaï (again, upheld by women in the face of inaction from men), and through Sembène's acerbic lens, that once glittering promise becomes little more than a bitter joke.

For his third and final film of the decade, Sembène looked further back in time than his previous two films to examine a precolonial religious conflict that arises when a princess is kidnapped by Ceddo revolutionaries after her father the king allies with a group of radical Muslims who seek to convert their people to Islam. At the same time, Christian missionaries are exacerbating the conflict by attempting to convert the people to Christianity, creating a veritable witch's brew of religious conflict that threatens to tear the Ceddo people apart.

While Ceddo is set in Senegal's pre-colonial era, the film very much deals with contemporary issues facing the African nation. Senegalese self-determination was a major theme that pulsed through Sembène's work, along with resistance to often violent colonial influences. Here, both the encroachment of Islam and Christianity represent a threat to the Ceddo identity, both violently imposing themselves in an attempt to manipulate and control them. And once again, it is the women who stand up to the oppression, asserting their independence in a world that seeks to bend them to its will, refusing to be defined by anyone's terms but their own.

Despite the heavy subject matter, Sembène's filmmaking is often playful, lampooning the inherent ridiculousness of the religious hypocrisies on display while taking bold formal swings as the film shifts into present day to tie the past to its contemporary effects. It is not a condemnation of the religions themselves as much as the colonial attitudes that support their forcible spread. For Sembène, it is the ability to chart one's own path that made up the backbone of his work - whatever that path may be. He detested colonialism in all its forms and all who sought to wield its power, and in Ceddo , he delivers a full-throated statement of independence that hits like lightning.

Three Revolutionary Films by Ousmane Sembène is now available on Blu-Ray and DVD from The Criterion Collection.

Now Streaming | The First Omen | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Tue, 04 Jun 2024 11:58:00 +0000

A belated legacy prequel to The Omen (1976) probably has no right to be this good, but Arkasha Stevenson's The First Omen is a surprisingly strong horror film in its own right.

Richard Donner's original film told the story of the Antichrist as a child; adopted by an American diplomat, he unwittingly finds himself in the halls of power as death and destruction follow in his wake. The First Omen tells the story of the woman chosen as the vessel to give birth to the Antichrist by a rouge Catholic sect who believes that ushering in the reign of the Antichrist will drive people to the church in droves.

It's not the most farfetched idea, considering the apocalyptic beliefs of many American evangelicals, but you'll be forgiven if you think this sounds an awful lot like this year's other demonic horror film, Immaculate. The two films share a nearly identical plot, and since they were released almost simultaneously, it's nearly impossible not to compare the two. For what it's worth, I think The First Omen is the stronger film, despite its franchise roots. For one, Stevenson's direction is consistently elegant and avoids many of the pitfalls of a legacy sequel by mostly avoiding cameos and callbacks, at least until the very end when we finally catch up with the events of original film. Those references make for nice little easter eggs for fans of The Omen, but don't feel like mere nostalgia bait.

A spooky air of gloom and dread hangs over the film, and Stevenson isn't afraid to explore the darkness at the heart of the concept. The birth of the Antichrist was never going to be pretty, and The First Omen fearlessly dives in headfirst with some truly shocking imagery. It's a beautifully constructed yet agreeably lurid piece of legacy horror that never quite feels like it should work, but it sticks the landing with aplomb.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

THE FIRST OMEN | Directed by Nell Tiger Free, Ralph Ineson, Sônia Braga, Bill Nighy, María Caballero, Nicole Sorace, Tawfeek Barhom, Charles Dance | Rated R for violent content, grisly/disturbing images, and brief graphic nudity | Now available on Blu-Ray and DVD and streaming on Hulu.

Review | In a Violent Nature | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Thu, 30 May 2024 15:40:00 +0000

With In a Violent Nature, director Chris Nash attempts to breathe new life into the well-worn slasher genre by focusing on the masked killer rather than the teenage kill fodder who meet gruesome fates at the end of his knife.

It's not exactly the first time something like this has been done - Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006) will spring to mind most readily to horror fans. Yet Nash has something darker and more subversive in mind, stripping the genre of its typical trappings of jump scares and musical stingers to create an atmosphere of quiet menace. In a Violent Nature follows the killer, an undead, Jason-like behemoth kept at rest by his mother's locket, as he meanders from kill to kill after the locket is stolen by a group of teenagers camping in the woods.

The campers are appropriately vapid, and we catch bits and pieces of mostly insipid dialog as they are being stalked, but they're not the focus here. There is something very smart about the way the film acknowledges the genre's penchant for giving us mostly forgettable characters - they're here simply to be killed in increasingly gory ways, and on that front In a Violent Nature does not disappoint, offering up some truly gnarly kills sure to satisfy even the most bloodthirsty gorehounds. Yet the conceit can only go so far, and Nash never fully commits to it, giving the campers enough air to convey exposition to the audience and provide context for what we're seeing.

It's telling, then, that the killer's presence is most keenly felt in his absence. By the time we reach the climax, the film switches gears, pulling focus away from the killer and onto the "final girl," culminating in a sequence that is perhaps one of the most unsettling scenes I've seen in a horror film in recent memory. It's all made even more remarkable for the simple fact that nothing is really happening, and that the longer Nash shies away from the action, the more intense the moment becomes. His ability to squeeze suspense out of seemingly nothing should be studied in film schools - it's a masterclass in crafting dread in the absence of the threat because his absence here allows him to be anywhere and everywhere all at once.

The way the film flips the script, following the killer rather than the campers, allowing us to see who he's stalking rather than having him come out of nowhere, builds suspense in a unique way. The audience is fully aware of the slasher's presence, and we follow him as he gets closer and closer to the kill; but when it steps back and allows him to disappear, the film really shines. In those moments, the vast, desolate expanses of the forest become a character all their own, even more terrifying than the creature himself. This works so well because the audience has become accustomed to his constant presence. After having our eye on him for the entire film, losing sight of him in the final stretch is so unnerving that we are left on the edge of our seats, waiting for a shoe to drop that may never fall. The film may feel like it's meandering at times, but the payoff is ultimately worth it. It requires a certain amount of patience, but by upending the expected rhythms of the genre, the deliberate stillness of In a Violent Nature feels more intense than any slasher has in ages.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

IN A VIOLENT NATURE | Directed by Chris Nash | Stars Ry Barrett, Andrea Pavlovic, Cameron Love, Reece Presley, Liam Leone | Not rated | Opens Friday, May 31, in theaters nationwide.

Review | Evil Does Not Exist | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Wed, 29 May 2024 21:01:00 +0000

There is something almost unspeakably beguiling about Ryūsuke Hamaguchi's Evil Does Not Exist. The filmmaker behind Drive My Car (a 3-hour meditation on loneliness and Chekov that was so stunning even the Academy couldn't help but nominate it for Best Picture) and Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy is no stranger to thoughtful and introspective dramas. Still, his latest film feels even more ambiguous and unsettled, a meditative tale of people from disparate backgrounds whose destinies collide in the forest surrounding a rural Japanese village where a Tokyo-based talent agency plans to build a glamping site to attract affluent tourists from the city to get a taste of country living.

On the surface, the film appears to be a story about big city interlopers wreaking havoc on an idyllic small town, yet Hamaguchi is interested in something much deeper and more contemplative. The key is in the film's title, a nod to the idea that our downfalls are often brought about less by evil as a literal force, and more by simple human foibles and helplessness in the face of nature, whose elements can be both beautiful and deadly, an unfeeling force against which humanity is ultimately defenseless.

At the center of Hamaguchi's haunted parable is Takumi (Hitoshi Omika), a local handyman who spends his days doing chores for local business folk. His daughter, Hana (Ryo Nishikawa) is mostly left free to roam the almost mythical forests that surround the tiny town, a forest that becomes a target for a cynical talent agency hoping to capitalize on government subsidies by building a hastily planned glamping facility that is met with suspicion and vocal criticism by the locals. The lack of care in creating the facility shows the company's lack of respect for both the local citizens and for the natural world they seek to exploit, inviting city folk to spend time in the woods in an untamed environment with the illusion of both safety and authenticity, the seemingly bucolic site actually polluting the natural order and the all-important water supply for the town.

Then Hamaguchi does something quite unexpected - he turns the focus onto the two representatives of the talent agency. It turns out these aren't just soulless venture capitalists (even if they may represent some) because they too are enchanted by the small town's simple pleasures, free from the hustle and bustle of city life and the soul-crushing drudgery of their corporate jobs. Yet their presence upsets the delicate balance of the village, and the proverbial road to hell becomes paved with good intentions.

There's a lot going on beneath the surface of Evil Does Not Exist. The gorgeous cinematography, coupled with the dreamy score by Eiko Ishibashi, creates an atmosphere that is both beautiful and menacing, an unknowable landscape that harbors both wonders and horrors. We're all just people trying to make it and carve out our own place in a world uninterested in our designs - a dispassionate Eden indifferent to our struggles, desires, and feelings, fighting back against our own incursion. If that sounds fatalistic - it isn't really. If anything, Hamaguchi's vision is deeply empathetic; a lyrical tone poem with the heart of a pressure cooker about humanity's innate and sometimes contradictory desire to find somewhere to belong, even in a place that rejects them. Evil Does Not Exist is a film whose sensual pleasures continue to reveal themselves, whose themes reveal deeper layers the more they're peeled away. It's small and rapturous wonder that cements Hamaguchi as one of our most compelling contemporary filmmakers.

GRADE - ★★★½ (out of four)

EVIL DOES NOT EXIST | Directed by Ryūsuke Hamaguchi | Stars Hitoshi Omika, Ryo Nishikawa, Ryuji Kosaka, Ayaka Shibutani, Hazuki Kikuchi | Not Rated | In Japanese w/English subtitles | Now playing in select theaters.

Now Streaming | Madame Web | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Thu, 23 May 2024 19:35:00 +0000

Giving a negative review of Madame Web feels akin to shooting fish in a barrel at this point. The film was a punchline before it was even released in theaters, and its disastrous press tour has been nearly memed to death, with its star, Dakota Johnson, clearly going through contractual motions to the point of embarrassment over the final product.

Yet no matter how bad you imagine this movie is based on its abysmal buzz, it's somehow so much worse. Madame Web is so shockingly inept that it's hard to believe it's real. Every choice is seemingly the wrong one, from the stilted writing to the lazy ADR to Sydney Sweeney's terrible red wig.

Johnson's Cassandra Webb is a paramedic who inherited special spider powers after her mother was bitten by a spider in the Amazon before dying in childbirth. When she starts having premonitions that she doesn't understand, she ends up protecting three teenage girls who are destined to bring down Ezekiel Sims (Tahar Rahim), a superpowered businessman with a shadowy connection to Cassandra's mother.

There's a lot of convoluted plotting here, which the the screenplay lays out for us in often stilted, awkward fashion. It's almost painfully apparent, however, that no one's heart is particularly in this. Johnson's character is supposed to be sulky and unlikable, and honestly good for her for coasting through this dreck and collecting her paycheck, but the ennui from the cast and crew translates to boredom for the audience. One has to wonder who the intended audience for this was, because it seems tailor made to please exactly no one, and if that was the goal, it's the only thing the movie does right.

GRADE - zero stars (out of four)

MADAME WEB | Directed by S.J. Clarkson | Stars Dakota Johnson, Sydney Sweeney, Isabela Merced, Celeste O'Connor, Tahar Rahim, Kerry Bishé, Adam Scott, Emma Roberts, Mike Epps | Rated PG-13 for violence/action and language | Now streaming on Netflix.

Review | Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Tue, 21 May 2024 18:01:00 +0000

Set hundreds of years after the events of 2017's War for the Planet of the Apes, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes finds Earth now firmly in the grasp of ape dominance, with humanity reduced to a mostly non-verbal population of scavengers living in the wilderness. The apes, once led to liberation by Caesar (Andy Serkis), now live in separate nation-states, with tribal warlords attacking other settlements to consolidate their power.

In the centuries since his death, Caesar has become a kind of messianic figure for the apes, and as such, his "teachings" have been interpreted in wildly different ways by various factions. Taking center stage in this new film is Noa (Owen Teague), a young chimpanzee whose village is kidnapped and forced into slavery by Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand), a despotic warlord bent on prying open vault once designed to protect governments during the fall of mankind. As he follows the trail of Proximus' minions, Noa meets a human woman named Mae (Freya Allan), who has secret motivations of her own, as they work together to end the reign of Proximus Caesar and prevent him from claiming the wealth of human knowledge and technology contained within the ancient vault.

Filmmaker Wes Ball is a newcomer to the Planet of the Apes franchise, having previously directed only the three Maze Runner films, a series that ran from 2014 to 2018, but he holds his own. The previous three films, directed by Rupert Wyatt (The Gambler) and Matt Reeves (Clovefield, The Batman), respectively, set a high bar for contemporary studio tentpole filmmaking. Thanks to groundbreaking motion capture technology and Andy Serkis' tremendous performance as Caesar, they contained some of the most spectacular visual effects ever seen on film. While Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes doesn't quite maintain the same sense of gravity as Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and War for the Planet of the Apes, what hasn't been lost is the impressive quality of the special effects, which remain just as eye-popping as ever.

Because of those effects, the new Planet of the Apes is one of the most handsome-looking studio blockbusters in recent memory, at the very least since James Cameron's Avatar: The Way of Water (2022). It's not breaking any unique ground and its story follows a familiar hero's journey structure, but it's clear that great care was taken in crafting this world, the characters are strong, and the stakes feel grounded. Most interestingly, the idea that Caesar's revolution, as seen in the previous three films, has sparked a religion that has splintered into sects is very compelling; and while it begs for a more in-depth exploration than it ultimately gets, the idea that even those whose interpretation of Caesar's words hews closest to their spirit are missing key historical context that has been lost to time is a surprisingly nuanced idea for a film of this magnitude.

It may not be quite up to the level of the trilogy from which it spawned, but Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is nevertheless a solid continuation that upholds the series' reputation as one of the most consistently strong modern blockbuster franchises, and it doesn't show any signs of running out of steam quite yet.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES | Directed by Wes Ball | Stars Owen Teague, Freya Allan, Kevin Durand, Peter Macon, William H. Macy, Eka Darville | Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi violence/action | Now playing in theaters nationwide.

Review | I Saw the TV Glow | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Mon, 20 May 2024 16:40:00 +0000

(L-R) Justice Smith and Brigette Lundy-Paine in I SAW THE TV GLOW. Courtesy of A24.

Jane Schoenbrun's I Saw the TV Glow is ostensibly a film about the bonds created by the communal act of watching favorite TV shows. These are the kinds of deeply personal cult hits that feel as though they're made just for you; like a secret shared amongst friends that not only defines you but gives you an identity as a member of an exclusive club in which minutiae and trivia become a kind of language only the initiated can understand.

This is an experience and a media landscape that streaming has all but destroyed. But as many of my fellow transgender critics have already pointed out, I Saw the TV Glow isn't just about the shared love of beloved television shows; it's about nothing less than the trans experience itself. Told through the lens of two disaffected teenagers in the 1990s who grow up worshipping a late-night young adult show called "The Pink Opaque," I Saw the TV Glow examines a kind of unique communal experience that speaks of some kind of yearning bubbling just beneath the surface.

Before I came out as transgender, I was often plagued by the feeling that the person I was to the world wasn't the person I was meant to be. As a child, I'd always felt like a girl - and I said as much, many times. But it was something I was told to suppress, not to say aloud, so I buried it deep. The result was decades of feeling almost like an avatar of myself, a character in a movie I was watching but never fully participating in. Schoenbrun, who is also trans, has expressed something almost indescribable here - an indelible encapsulation of the feeling of not fitting inside your own skin. Their characters are seemingly adrift in life, but find meaning and purpose through "The Pink Opaque" in ways that some understand and use to blossom into their own, and others miss completely, still believing it's just a TV show, despite the constant, nagging sense that it's actually so much more.

It's a feeling that trans folks will undoubtedly find achingly familiar - the sensation of suffocating inside your own body, plagued by a kind of phantom sensation of something missing, like the lingering memory of someone who doesn't exist. That nagging sense that we don't belong here, that who we seem to be isn't really who we are, and that the only choices are escape from that mental bondage or die; or perhaps an even more horrifying prospect, playing it safe and waste away never knowing.

Ian Foreman in I SAW THE TV GLOW. Photo by Spencer Pazer. Courtesy of A24.

I Saw the TV Glow is just such an overwhelming sensory and emotional experience. Like the TV show at its heart, it has become a kind of communal experience amongst trans people that has been incredibly special to watch. To see so many people feel so seen by this has been validating in ways that are almost impossible to articulate. It's as though Schoenbrun has captured the very feeling of what it's like to be transgender, as if someone opened up my heart and saw that TV glow. That little girl whom the world once saw as a boy and wanted so badly to be seen as someone else, to embrace media meant "for girls," to become the woman she idolized on the screen, felt so deeply seen. That I am not the only one to feel this warmth amongst the neon-lit unease of Schoenbrun's haunted, harrowing masterpiece of communal anxiety feels somehow revelatory.

Schoenbrun, who previously dealt with the disquieting landscape of the shadowy corners of our shared media in their first two films, A Self-Induced Hallucination (2018) and We're All Going to the World's Fair (2021), has announced themselves as a generational talent; a foremost chronicler of the trans experience who has crafted something major. I Saw the TV Glow is at once troubled and hopeful, moody and inspiring; a howl of grief for those who haven't yet found themselves, and a deep, warm hug for those who saw the TV glow and successfully escaped into the embrace of the pink opaque. It is a film for which I am endlessly grateful.

GRADE - ★★★★ (out of four)

I SAW THE TV GLOW | Directed by Jane Schoenbrun | Stars Justice Smith, Brigette Lundy-Paine, Ian Foreman, Helena Howard, Lindsey Jordan, Danielle Deadwyler, Fred Durst | Rated PG-13 for violent content, some sexual material, thematic elements and teen smoking | Now playing in select theaters nationwide.

Review | In Our Day | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Mon, 20 May 2024 13:33:00 +0000

Ki Joobong in Hong Sangsoo's "In Our Day." Courtesy of Cinema Guild.

The rate at which Hong Sang-soo continues to crank out films, often one-two per year, is impressive enough; that they continue to be such incisive observations about life is something of a minor miracle.

Of course, Hong's prolific output is facilitated by his low-budget, shot-on-the-fly, mostly improvised process, and his latest film, In Our Day, doubles down on that DIY aesthetic. It almost feels as though someone is filming random interactions with an iPhone, capturing small moments of humanity that build up to something quietly shattering. That's what really makes Hong so unique - his more recent output almost feels like something anyone could make in their backyard, barely cobbled together trifles filled with meandering observations and unassuming situations. But these are anything but amateur endeavors, and the deceptively unassuming structure of In Our Day ultimately makes its emotional wallop all the more unexpected.

The film follows an actress (Kim Min-hee) who has returned from abroad and is living with a friend who also dreams of becoming an actress, and her cat, who lives life as she pleases. We also have our typical Hong avatar in the form of Ul-ju (Ki Ju-bong) and aging poet whose newfound popularity amongst young people has given him a new audience, and the questions of young students sent to interview him force the artist to reflect on his life and career.

In Our Day may not be as formally experimental as other recent Hong films like The Novelist's Film or in water, but it finds Hong in an almost autumnal, self-reflective mode. Hong's films have always been incredibly introspective, often reacting to or reflecting on the current state of his life with disarming candor. "Maintaining a clear vision might be the hardest thing in the world" laments Ul-ju, and therein lies the heart of In Our Day. You can feel Hong grappling with what art is, it's purpose in the world, and his relationship to it. How does one continue to stay fresh and be true to one's self in a world that is trying to fit you in an easily definable box?

The answer? "Be thankful for the small things and to the best of our ability, appreciate what's in front of us." The themes of In Our Day are simple, yet universal. The film may occasionally feel like an afterthought, yet sometimes the simplest things can be the most profound. This film is an attempt by an artist to not only grapple with his place in the world and how his voice fits into it, it's an attempt to accept things as they are. That's what makes it feel like such an essential late-period work. Hong is only 63 years old, yet In Our Day is his 30th feature film, and there's a sense that the filmmaker is taking stock of both his life and his work and wondering if it's all worth it. Yet there's nothing fatalistic here - it's a wistful yet hopeful reverie of a filmmaker grappling with seeking truth in artifice, and through that lens the barebones style suddenly comes into sharp focus. It's another stunner from a master of the craft.

GRADE - ★★★½ (out of four)

IN OUR DAY | Directed by Hong Sang-soo | Stars Ki Ju-bong, Kim Min-hee, Song Sun-mi, Park Mi-so | Not Rated | In Korean w/English subtitles | Now playing at Film at Lincoln Center in NYC.

Now Streaming | The Beekeeper | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Wed, 08 May 2024 12:55:00 +0000

David Ayer's The Beekeeper often makes little sense. When it does, it's exceedingly stupid. Yet, that's almost part of the charm of this gleefully violent vigilante adventure that sends Jason Statham's titular beekeeper after a shadowy gang of phone scammers who prey on the elderly.

It's a thriller in the tradition of Death Wish, Man on Fire, and John Wick, sending a former top secret military operative into a relative hornet's nest of violence to enact bloody justice in the face of the law's inaction. Statham is essentially a blank slate here, and his history remains mostly a mystery, allowing him to be a vessel for the audience's anger towards these scammers who make their living bilking unsuspecting grandparents out of their life savings. Nevermind the fact that many of these scammers are actually a kind of modern-day slave being forced into their trade by even more shadowy organizations; The Beekeeper wants you to let Jason Statham take out your frustrations on some smug assholes who victimize the weakest among us.

There's certainly something cathartic about it, but its fetishization of extreme violence and torture also feels uncomfortably fascistic. What saves it is its complete lack of an ideological point of view. Statham is the product of a classified CIA program gone rogue; his target is the privileged son (Josh Hutcherson) of the President of the United States, whose campaign was almost completely funded through her son's multi-billion dollar scam. He's also willing to kill anyone in his way in the most brutal fashion, be they scumbag scammers or FBI agents, and Ayer dispatches them all in increasingly imaginative ways.

Your mileage may vary depending on your tolerance for such wanton carnage, but for what it's worth, I found The Beekeeper to be mostly big dumb fun - a stylish revenge thriller with no thoughts in its head but giving the audience a roller coaster ride of violent retribution. It's no John Wick (or Atomic Blonde, for that matter), but it's a future basic cable staple that is as silly as it is satisfying.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

THE BEEKEEPER | Directed by David Ayer | Stars Jason Statham, Emmy Raver-Lampman, Bobby Naderi, Josh Hutcherson, Jeremy Irons, Taylor James, Phylicia Rashād | Rated R for strong violence throughout, pervasive language, some sexual references and drug use | Now available to rent and own digitally, and streaming exclusively on MGM+.

Review | Unfrosted | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Mon, 06 May 2024 17:47:00 +0000

While I don't think Jerry Seinfeld's Unfrosted is the kind of once-in-a-generation stinker it's being made out to be, it's still the kind of bad film that is so inoffensively bland that it doesn't even have the temerity to stick around in the mind as a memorable disaster.

On the surface, Unfrosted appears to be a parody of product origin films like Blackberry or Air that tell the story of how an iconic product came to be. But the fact that, according to Seinfeld, this thing has been in the works for over two years seems to scuttle the idea the film is a parody of any recent trends. Instead, it's a goofy, wholly imagined origin story of the Pop Tart, conjuring up an alternative past in which Kellogg's and Post are in a brutal fight for dominance of the US breakfast market. Both specializing in cereals, the two grain giants seek to find a new, portable breakfast option that will revolutionize breakfast for an on-the-go culture.

Unfrosted portrays this battle in increasingly ludicrous terms, framing the invention of the Pop-Tart as an impossible task that required space-age technology to perfect. This leads Seinfeld's Kellogg's executive, Bob Cabana, to try and recruit the top minds in their fields to workshop a new breakfast treat that will beat Post and keep them on top of the breakfast game. What he ends up with instead, however, is a ragtag bunch of has-beens who somehow some up with the revolutionary pastry despite interference from the conniving Post CEO Marjorie (Amy Schumer) and a disgruntled brigade of cereal mascots led by Thurl Ravenscroft (Hugh Grant).

There's a lot going on here, none of it good. That's really the biggest issue with Unfrosted - Seinfeld is clearly throwing everything AND the kitchen sink at this thing to see what hits, and nothing really lands. It's just a constant barrage of half-cooked jokes and barely thought-out bits that lead nowhere, culminating in a scene spoofing the January 6th riots led by Tony the Tiger as the "Q-anon shaman." It's busy, overstuffed, and just not very funny. It almost feels like a focus group for an SNL sketch - one of those 12:30-hour leftovers that air after most viewers have tuned out when things start to get weird and any laughs the show may have gotten earlier have long since died down. It's almost as if these are jokes being tested for another project - unfortunately none of them should have made the final cut. It's a half-hearted shrug of a movie, a barely there and seemingly tossed-off piffle destined to languish in Netflix's never-ending content machine.

GRADE - ★ (out of four)

UNFROSTED | Directed by Jerry Seinfeld | Stars Jerry Seinfeld, Melissa McCarthy, Jim Gaffigan, Hugh Grant, Amy Schumer, Max Greenfield, Isaac Bae, Chris Rickett, Rachael Harris, Kue Lawrence | Rated PG-13 for some suggestive references and language | Now streaming exclusively on Netflix.

Review | Challengers | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Tue, 30 Apr 2024 16:51:00 +0000

Mike Faist as Art, Zendaya as Tashi and Josh O’Connor as Patrick in CHALLENGERS, directed by Luca Guadagnino, a Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures film. Credit: Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures © 2023 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc. All Rights Reserved.

One need not be particularly interested in sports to find Luca Guadagnino's new tennis drama, Challengers, compelling. Guadagnino frames his tennis matches as either gladiatorial blood sports or sex, and sometimes both at the same time. Tennis is a relationship, Zendaya's Tashi Donaldson explains; and indeed, the tennis matches here are often thinly veiled stand-ins for dialogue the characters are either unwilling or unable to have.

The romantic entanglement comes from one-time pro-tennis hopeful Tashi, and two best friends, Art (Mike Faist) and Patrick (Josh O'Connor). One-time tennis partners, a rift forms between them when both fall in love with Tashi, whose career is cut short by a knee injury, leading her to become a highly successful coach whose heart nevertheless longs to play. The film follows several years in their lives as they split up, reunite, and trade partners, eventually ending where the film begins, with Art and Patrick once again essentially dueling on the tennis court for Tashi's hand.

The film slowly reveals the context of what we're watching through a series of flashbacks and flashforwards, gradually bringing the emotional complexity of those opening moments into full focus. Guadagnino's characters are all flawed in some way, each willing to use and hurt the others in pursuit of their own individual goals. But there is something that inexorably holds them all together, a connection that is stronger as three than it ever was as two. Therein lies the film's central conflict - how do people reconcile their own selfish desires with their love of another person? Or in this case, people? The tennis matches themselves are sweaty and propulsive, shot with the erotic energy of a sex scene, with Guadagnino's camera becoming untethered from reality - flying on the back of a tennis ball or swooping up under the court, to create an exhilarating, often breathtaking, sensory experience; a bisexual love triangle that moves from the bedroom to the tennis court and back again.

Challengers seeks to leave us just as breathless as its characters, and it works. Interestingly, I was most reminded of Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Véréna Paravel's 2012 documentary Leviathan in which the camera was thrown loose from the typical bounds of natural camera movement to become something almost otherworldly. Set to a pulsing techno score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, the film feels like it's in a constant state of motion, glances are lobbed between its characters like tennis balls being bandied about on a court. erotic tension vibrating throughout every frame. It's refreshing in this sexless cinematic landscape to see a film so unafraid of sexuality; and with Love Lies Bleeding barely in our review mirror, its enough to give one hope that horny cinema isn't dead.

GRADE - ★★★½ (out of four)

CHALLENGERS | Directed by Luca Guadagnino | Stars Zendaya, Mike Faist, Josh O'Connor, Darnell Appling | Rated R for language throughout, some sexual content and graphic nudity | Now playing in theatrs nationwide.

Cinema Obscura | Pulgasari | 1985

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Fri, 26 Apr 2024 13:51:00 +0000

Cinema Obscura is a periodic feature at From the Front Row, highlighting little-known films that I believe need a second look. The mission of Cinema Obscura is to bring attention to hidden gems and forgotten masterpieces from around the world that readers may not otherwise have had a chance to discover.

Often referred to as North Korea's answer to Godzilla, Pulgasari actually reminds me more of The Golem (1920), with its tale of an oppressed people who conjure a monster to protect them from their oppressors and seek vengeance for their fallen comrades.

The monster, in this case, is Pulgasari, a creature made from a ball of rice and a dying farmer's last wish that his people be liberated in his name. The creature born from that rice ball becomes a metal-devouring monster that fights alongside a band of farmers and peasant rebels who seek to liberate their people from tyranny. It's a film in which the revolutionary spirit is alive and well, but it's also surprisingly nuanced, lacking the blatant didacticism one might expect from political cinema. Pulgasari feeds off of iron, and by the time the battle is won, the monster's insatiable hunger threatens to ruin those it once fought to protect. No longer satisfied by devouring swords and other weapons of war, the farmers realize they must also sacrifice their tools to satisfy Pulgasari, facing starvation and ruin in order to maintain their military strength.

One could read this as an intentional critique of Kim Jong-il by director Shin Sang-ok, a South Korean filmmaker who was reportedly kidnapped and forced to make this film by the North Korean leader as part of a plan to bolster the country's film industry. One could also read it as an essentially Stalinist critique of the idea of permanent revolution championed by Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky, which is certainly more in line with North Korea's isolationist Juche ideology. Or one could read it as a more straightforward warning about the devastating effects of war. Regardless of its political intentions, Pulgasari is a fascinating curio; difficult to take seriously as a genuine piece of leftist agitprop, perhaps, yet designed to be palatable to audiences outside of North Korea as a would-be showcase for the country's nascent film industry. It was a release that never came to pass, but it is nevertheless a well-made and often thrilling answer to Japan's kaiju films, using its monster as a double-edged sword in a feudal struggle against exploitation.

The creature itself looks great, superior even to some of Japan's kaiju suits of the Showa era. It is both fearsome and adorable, his antics as a young, growing monster recalling Godzilla's bumbling son, Minilla, and providing some moments of levity in an otherwise serious-minded film. While it never received the international attention Kim hoped for that it probably deserves, Pulgasari is readily available on YouTube for those who are feeling adventurous and looking to discover something new.

Review | Late Night with the Devil | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Thu, 25 Apr 2024 14:40:00 +0000

Laura Gordon, Ingrid Torelli, David Dastmalchian, and Ian Bliss in Colin Cairnes and Cameron Cairnes’ LATE NIGHT WITH THE DEVIL. Courtesy of IFC Films and Shudder. An IFC Films and Shudder release.

It's a shame that much of the discussion surrounding Cameron and Colin Cairnes' new film, Late Night with the Devil, has been focused on its unfortunate use of AI to generate logos and intertitles for its central television show. It's a solid low-budget chiller with a crafty twist on found footage horror, purporting to show the lost tape of a late night TV Halloween special from 1977 gone horribly awry.

The AI images only make up a small part of the film but represent a much larger issue for the movie industry in which AI not only replaces the work of actual artists and graphic designers but steals from their work to produce its own. On the one hand, I hate that it has dominated the discussion surrounding this otherwise solid film, but it's absolutely something that must be called out and discussed because it represents such a creative threat.

Make no mistake, it's a good film. Prolific character actor David Dastmalchian shines in his first leading role as Jack Delroy, a second-rate late night talk show host who is tired of being trounced in the ratings by Johnny Carson and is willing to do anything to lure in new viewers. Then, one fateful night for the show's Halloween special, Delroy hosts a psychic, a professional magician who moonlights as a skeptic debunking the paranormal, and a child psychologist who believes that her young ward is possessed by a demon. Strange occurrences begin to plague the production, and when Delroy asks the psychologist to conjure the demon in her patient for an on-air interview, all hell quite literally breaks loose.

The film's analog aesthetic creates an indelibly spooky atmosphere. There's something of a low-rent DIY feeling that nails the vibe of a struggling late night TV show. However, one can't help but wish that the filmmakers had dived deeper into the madness of its protagonist's Quixotic quest for a ratings coup against Carson, which I felt flew under the radar for far too long. That's what Late Night with the Devil is truly missing - a spark of madness. While it's supposed to be the tape of a television broadcast from 1977, it can sometimes feel too clean, keeping its dark heart too far in the shadows, undercutting the power of its horrifying finale. Until then, however, there's a sense of growing unease that is hard to shake, and it creates the feeling of a slow motion car crash - we know this is going to end in disaster and the filmmakers keep the audience on edge waiting for the next shoe to drop. The way it so indelibly ratchets up the suspense and the stakes is thrilling, and the film's slow burn build-up feels like an urban legend being born before our eyes.

In the end, was the AI worth it? No. We should be talking about a ghoulishly effective little horror film by two relatively unknown filmmakers, but that one mistake is so big it overshadows the film and distracts from the otherwise strong work on display. Your mileage may vary.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

LATE NIGHT WITH THE DEVIL | Directed by Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes | Stars David Dastmalchian, Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss, Fayssal Bazzi, Ingrid Torelli | Rated R for violent content, some gore, and language including a sexual reference | Now playing in theaters nationwide and streaming on AMC+.

Blu-Ray Review | I Am Cuba | 1964

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Wed, 24 Apr 2024 14:18:00 +0000

Courtesy of The Criterion Collection.

In the wake of the missile crisis, Soviet filmmaker Mikhail Kalatozov went to Cuba to make a film examining life in the tiny island nation that had defied the American empire. In the wake of the revolution, Cuba did not have a strong cinematic tradition from which to draw inspiration, and filmmakers of all kinds were called in to help develop a uniquely Cuban cinematic language.

I Am Cuba, however, was released during a time of tension between Cuba and the Soviet Union. Whilst revolutionary fervor had cooled in the more established USSR, the young Cuban government led by Fidel Castro favored a more aggressive expansion of socialism through violent revolution. As a result, Kalatozov's film received a somewhat muted response when it was released in the Soviet Union, and was likewise dismissed by many Cuban critics who preferred a more realistic brand of revolutionary cinema.

Interestingly, leftist critics mostly ignored the film upon its release according to critic Juan Antonio García Borrero's essay included in this release's liner notes, because I Am Cuba is one of the most extraordinary pieces of revolutionary propaganda ever produced, as vibrant and vital as anything the Soviets released during the silent era. While its heart is a lyrical paean to the revolutionary spirit that gave rise to Castro's communist takeover, it is also a thrilling verité look at the lives of the Cuban people prior to the revolution. The film is divided into four vignettes that illustrate the struggle of the proletariat in which a young woman is forced into prostitution unbeknownst to her lover, a farmer burns his crop of sugarcane after being evicted by the wealthy landowner, a group of young students plot the assassination of the local police chief, and a rural peasant trades in his pitchfork for a rifle to join the revolution.

Kalatozov's camera is free-flowing, switching seamlessly between up close and personal handheld shots that puts the audience right in the middle of a student uprising, to soaring crane shots that sweep across an impromptu funeral procession, through a cigar factory, and out over the crowd, as if it has been liberated from the confines of its earthly bounds. It is clear that Kalatozov fell in love with Cuba, as the revolutionary fervor of the young nation invigorated his filmmaking. I Am Cuba stands tall alongside Eisenstein's Strike (1925), Pudovkin's Mother (1926), Ermler's Fragment of an Empire (1929), and Kalatozov's own Salt for Svanetia (1930) as one of the great works of Soviet revolutionary cinema. By framing the film from the point of view of the island itself, Kalatozov creates an unforgettable ode to the revolutionary spirit, something that feels especially timely right now, as student protests against the genocide in Gaza draw the focus of mealy-mouthed Western politicians and journalists bent on preserving the neoliberal capitalist order. I Am Cuba offers a ray of hope that a better world is possible, that the struggle for justice is not in vain, and that the arc of human suffering bends toward liberation.

This release marks first collaboration between the Criterion Collection and Milestone Film. Milestone has long been dedicated to releasing long unavailable masterpieces such as Charles Burnett's Killer of Sheep, Billy Woodbury's Bless Their Little Hearts, and Lionel Rogosin's On the Bowery. Not shown in the United States until a screening at the Telluride Film Festival in 1992, and gaining support from such cinematic luminaries as Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola, I Am Cuba's release on 4K and Blu-Ray is a triumph, a breathtaking presentation of a visually ravishing work whose rediscovery here feels like a minor miracle.

GRADE - ★★★★ (out of four)

I AM CUBA | Directed by Mikhail Kalatozov | Stars Sergio Corrieri, Salvador Wood, José Gallardo, Raúl García, Luz María Collazo, Jean Bouise, Alberto Morgan | In Spanish w/English subtitles | Now available on 4K UHD and Blu-Ray from The Criterion Collection.

Review | Night Swim | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Fri, 19 Apr 2024 13:51:00 +0000

Amélie Hoeferle as Izzy Waller in Night Swim, written and directed by Bryce McGuire.

Horror movies generally require a certain suspension of disbelief to work as intended. The best ones can still operate by their own internal sense of logic as long as they've convinced the audience that even the most outlandish of scenarios are plausible in the world presented to us.

A failure to abide by a sense of internal logic is often what trips horror movies up. Even the most surreal and abstract films can operate on their own sense of logic and create an indelible time and place that exists outside our known reality. But few things can lose an audience more quickly than a refusal (or an inability) to play by your own rules.

Therein lies the biggest problem with Night Swim, the new horror film by Bryce McGuire, making his feature debut adapting his own 2014 short film of the same name. The film centers around a haunted pool whose deadly past is hidden from the unsuspecting family who moves in, and soon begin experiencing strange things in the water. The father, a famous major league baseball player whose career has been cut short by multiple sclerosis, soon finds his symptoms mysteriously healed after a few short swims. His family, on the other hand, keeps having near-death experiences and hearing strange voices calling to them from the pool, trying to drag them down into the depths in their quest for...something.

There are a few half-hearted attempts to explain this, but none of them hold any water (har har). Naturally, there's something to be said for the terror of being in the unknown; the attempts to explain the haunted pool are silly at best and downright stupid at worst. And of course, there's always the option to...not go in the pool, which never seems to occur to anyone at any point. Spooky things happening in a pool at night? There's an eerie idea there. But Night Swim's "what if The Shining but in a pool instead of a hotel" premise is too goofy to take seriously and too repetitive and bland to be frightening.

GRADE - ★ (out of four)

NIGHT SWIM | Directed by Bryce McGuire | Stars Wyatt Russell, Kerry Condon, Amélie Hoeferle, Gavin Warren | Rated PG-13 for terror, some violent content and language | Now streaming exclusively on Peacock.

Now Streaming | Drive-Away Dolls/Lisa Frankenstein | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Thu, 18 Apr 2024 13:53:00 +0000

Margaret Qualley and Geraldine Viswanathan in DRIVE-AWAY DOLLS.

On paper, a film about two lesbians on the lam after being caught up in a clone-a-willy heist should be right up my alley, especially if said film is directed by one of the Coen Bros. Unfortunately, Drive-Away Dolls, the first solo directorial effort by Ethan Coen, is something of a bust.

There are elements of stronger films here - The Big Lebowski and Burn After Reading among them. But Drive-Away Dolls is so tonally messy that it's nigh-on impossible to settle into its rhythms. Star Margaret Qualley, normally a magnetic screen presence, is surprisingly bad here. Her drawling Texas accent sounds more like Sandy Cheeks from "Spongebob Squarepants" than an actual Texan, and is so distractingly over-the-top that in nearly singlehandedly derails the film. This could have worked if the rest of the film had matched her parodic energy, but instead it seems to aim for the dry sense of humor we've come to expect from the Coens. Qualley is in another movie altogether, and it's surprising that Coen didn't pull it back, or bring the rest of the film up to meet her. The result is something that feels deeply confused and often adrift, a Thelma & Louise parody in which the queer subtext has been made text, but with nothing else to really add.

It's a shame because Joel Coen's first solo effort, The Tragedy of Macbeth, was terrific, and while Drive-Away Dolls has a few recognizably Coen-esque ideas, they feel so half-hearted that it makes us long for the days of that old Coen brothers magic.

Kathryn Newton stars as Lisa Swallows and Cole Sprouse as The Creature in LISA FRANKENSTEIN, a Focus Features release.

On the flip side, I was a certified Juno hater circa 2007, and while time has somewhat dulled the visceral aversion I had to its specific brand of comedy back then, it's still very much just not my cup of tea. So I was surprised to find myself completely charmed by Lisa Frankenstein, the latest film written by Juno Oscar-winner, Diablo Cody.

Cody is in that rarefied company of screenwriters whose name alone can generate interest in a film. Her words carry a specific cadence that is unmistakable, often transcending whatever her directors are bringing to the table. There's something charmingly low-rent about what director Zelda Williams is doing here, like a Disney Channel original movie with an actual pedigree - but that's the whole point of the Lisa Frank-ification of the film's aesthetic. It's a film perfectly in tune with its period, the colors and trappings of 1989 leap off the screen, right down to the scalloped lamps and wavy lampshades. Its tale of a disaffected young goth girl (Kathryn Newton) who finds herself in love with the reanimated corpse of a Victorian boy (Cole Sprouse) whose grave she tends on her daily sojourns to an abandoned local cemetery is a disarmingly endearing one, even as it delves into violence when the creature begins to exact vengeance on those who have wronged her. It's a sly and subversive candy-colored fantasy that plays like the fevered romantic ramblings of a disaffected teenager's diary, and I loved every minute of it.

DRIVE AWAY DOLLS - ★½
LISA FRANKENSTEIN - ★★★

DRIVE AWAY DOLLS | Directed by Ethan Coen | Stars Margaret Qualley, Geraldine Viswanathan, Beanie Feldstein, Joey Slotnick, C.J. Wilson, Colman Domingo, Pedro Pascal, Bill Camp, Matt Damon | Rated R for crude sexual content, full nudity, language and some violent content.

LISA FRANKENSTEIN | Directed by Zelda Williams | Stars Kathryn Newton, Cole Sprouse, Liza Soberano, Henry Eikenberry, Joe Chrest, Carla Gugino | Rated PG-13 for violent content, bloody images, sexual material, language, sexual assault, teen drinking and drug content.

Drive-Away Dolls and Lisa Frankenstein are now streaming exclusively on Peacock.

Review | Civil War | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 14:46:00 +0000

Alex Garland's Civil War was so controversial before it was ever released, that it's ironic that the final product is so toothless. There's something to be said about the nature of our divided culture that the idea of a film about a modern-day American civil war produced such strong negative reactions from both right and left, but Civil War's dogged lack of politics seems designed not to offend either side. That lack of POV is the film's biggest Achilles heel - Garland's determination to remain as neutral as possible ensures the film has as little to say as possible.

Set in a fictional present day, Civil War follows a group of war journalists attempting to travel through the war-torn countryside of the formerly United States to interview the embattled President in Washington D.C., where forces from secessionist states are closing in. Who these forces are and why they seceded are kept intentionally opaque, although characters talk about being in the President's 3rd term and his disbanding of the FBI. The whys and wherefores are ultimately less important by how its protagonists respond to the conflict; in this case, journalists whose job is to document the conflict as objectively as possible. "Our job isn't to ask questions, it's to document so others can ask questions."

Yet in its attempts to valorize journalistic neutrality, it feels frustratingly noncommittal. There was a moment I thought Garland may go in a direction that explores the spiritual and emotional toll of neutrality in the face of such grave human conflict, but it was not to be. Its characters constantly put themselves in mortal danger to capture images of violence and conflict, but without broader context, what's the point? They keep telling us their job isn't to contextualize, only to document, but what are the broader implications of that? Anything interesting the film has to say about that is consistently undercut by the director's own public statements about what he was hoping to convey, leaving the messaging of Civil War muddled at best.

There are some striking images here (the crashed helicopter in the parking lot of an abandoned JC Penney was especially haunting), and the performances are strong (especially Kirsten Dunst, Cailee Spaeny, and Jesse Plemons in a small but terrifying role). The film's depiction of rural America as a warzone is often quite harrowing. Still, its passing mention of fictional factions like the "Portland Maoists" or events like the "Antifa Massacre" betrays its bizarre attempts to exist both a part of and yet apart from our current time and place. It desperately wants to be a warning about our Current Moment ™️, but its tepid refusal to actually engage with any politics (even fictional ones) leaves it feeling toothless. It's all handwringing, no backbone, a weak attempt to insert itself in the middle of ideological conflict and stand for nothing, never bringing anything new or interesting to the conversation.

GRADE - ★★ (out of four)

CIVIL WAR | Directed by Alex Garland | Stars Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, Cailee Spaeny, Nick Offerman, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Jesse Plemons | Rated R for strong violent content, bloody/disturbing images, and language throughout | Now playing in theaters everywhere.

Review | Immaculate | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Tue, 09 Apr 2024 17:50:00 +0000

Sydney Sweeney in IMMACULATE. Photo courtesy of Neon.

I can't remember a movie marketing campaign as sly or subversive as Neon's go-for-broke promotion of Michael Mohan's new horror film, Immaculate. With star and producer Sydney Sweeney front and center, showing it to pastors for shock value and selling tickets for $6.66, Neon has positioned Immaculate as a gleeful piece of blasphemy, thumbing its nose at conservative backlash with its subversion of the story of Christ's immaculate conception.

Is the movie really that sacrilegious? Not really, no. Of course, it is unfair to judge a movie by its marketing, but it is key to understanding the film's self-image when contrasted to its actual content. Immaculate wears its inspirations on its sleeve - Suspiria chief among them, as it follows a young American novitiate (Sweeney) who travels to Europe to join a convent, and soon discovers that dark forces are afoot within its frescoed walls.

Upon learning that she is pregnant, Sister Cecilia becomes the subject of both adoration from her superiors and jealousy from her fellow nuns. Is her mysterious pregnancy the result of a miracle from God? Or something much more sinister? Those who want to go in with as little information as possible should stop reading now, because it's hard to dissect the film's POV without divining into its secrets. The convent, it turns out, is home to a Catholic sect bent on "resurrecting" Jesus Christ through cloning - using DNA collected from a nail that was supposedly used in his crucifixion. Cecilia, it turns out, has been chosen by the sect to be the new Virgin Mary, the mother of their new savior, whose birth they hope will usher in the second coming and, in turn, the end of the world.

Sweeney reportedly fought hard to bring Immaculate to life, having first auditioned for the role when she was 16, then resurrecting it (heh) through her own production company years later after the project had stalled. You have to admire the chutzpah it takes to bring something like this to life - it's bold and edgy and goes places that mainstream horror films rarely dare to touch. But in going where it goes, one almost wishes it had gone farther. Director Michael Mohan conjures an agreeably eerie atmosphere, and Sweeney is terrific as the would-be Mary whose journey becomes one of reclaiming her bodily autonomy in the face of repressive religious dogma. Still, in the shadow of Suspiria, this story almost begs for something more surreal and dreamlike than the more literal film we ultimately get. No matter how far it thinks it's going, there's always a nagging sense that it wants to go further. And while it's impressive for a film of this size to go for broke in the way that it does, its transparency about its own mysteries ultimately holds it back from being something really special, even if it still has some gruesome surprises in store.

GRADE - ★★½ (out of four)

IMMACULATE | Directed by Michael Mohan | Stars Sydney Sweeney, Álvaro Morte, Benedetta Porcaroli, Dora Romano | Rated R for strong and bloody violent content, grisly images, nudity and some language | Now playing in theaters everywhere.

Review | Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Fri, 29 Mar 2024 19:17:00 +0000

(L to r) GODZILLA and KONG in Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures’ action adventure “GODZILLA x KONG: THE NEW EMPIRE,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release.

Legendary's Godzilla franchise continues its delve into Shōwa-era silliness in Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire, the second mashup between the two titans after 2021's Godzilla vs. Kong. This time, the two immortal cinematic monsters are pitted against a new threat stemming from the depths of Kong's uncharted new domain in Hollow Earth, where an ancient evil is ready to emerge and lay waste to the surface world.

There's something agreeably silly about the premise, credit where credit is due to Legendary for allowing this series to stray from its more serious roots in 2014's Godzilla into the kind of sci-fi weirdness that dominated the latter half of the original run of Toho's Godzilla films that lasted from 1954-1975. Unfortunately, their American counterparts haven't quite gotten the knack of it yet (2019's Godzilla King of the Monsters came closest), because Godzilla X Kong has outlandish plot points to spare, but it spends so much time explaining them that it almost forgets why we're there in the first place - to watch giant monsters beat the shit out of each other.

Sure, if it's kaiju action you're looking for, The New Empire has it - and lots of it. But its determination to explain its weirder elements takes away any sense of wonder or mystery. Poor Rebecca Hall is essentially wasted as an exposition machine, saddled with pages of laboriously expository dialogue that makes sure the audience understands the whys and wherefores of every single detail of its convoluted plot. What it misunderstands about those Shōwa era films (and the darker Heisei era films, whose neon city-scape battles it also emulates) is that the plots of these films don't really matter. Everyone is here to see giant monsters duke it out, and attempts to complicate that with intricate mythology to make it somehow more plausible feels like a shallow distraction from the main event.

In the case of Godzilla X Kong, that mythology feels confusing at best and irrelevant at worst. There are some fun monster battles to be had here, and the reappearance of Mothra is a welcome surprise after she was essentially wasted in King of the Monsters (even if it still doesn't really seem like the American films know what to do with her), but the film feels painfully bloated. It also has the unfortunate position of being released just three months after Toho's Oscar-winning Godzilla Minus One. And while these are clearly two different films with two very different aims, it's almost impossible not to look at the Japanese film and think that Toto is doing this better than their American counterparts. This may be a more lighthearted adventure than the more somber Minus One, but Godzilla X Kong feels buried under the weight of its own mythology, at once over-explained and undercooked.

GRADE - ★★ (out of four)

GODZILLA X KONG: THE NEW EMPIRE | Directed by Adam Wingard | Stars Rebecca Hall, Kaylee Hottle, Brian Tyree Henry, Dan Stevens | Rated PG-13 for creature violence and action | Now playing in theaters everywhere.

Review | Love Lies Bleeding | 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Wed, 20 Mar 2024 19:02:00 +0000

As someone who was fairly mixed on Rose Glass' otherwise widely acclaimed 2019 debut feature, Saint Maud, I am now fully a Glass convert thanks to her sophomore film, Love Lies Bleeding.

In fact, Love Lies Bleeding is perhaps the horniest, most aesthetically electrifying film I've seen in a multiplex in very long time. It's a sweaty, sweltering, heady mix of queer eroticism, crime thriller, magical realism, and dark comedy that feels genuinely rebellious in a way films rarely do anymore. Glass lures us in with a love story between a new-in-town gym rat named Jackie (Katy O’Brian) and a sullen gym clerk named Lou (Kristen Stewart) who spends her days cleaning toilets, vaping, and taking care of her sister (Jena Malone). When Jackie accepts a job working for Lou's sleazy dad (Ed Harris), it sets off a violent chain of events that could either tear them apart or unite them in a shared exorcism of generational trauma.

This is essentially Thelma and Louise for a new generation, dealing much more directly with themes of sexuality and gender, textualizing the queer subtext and giving us something we really haven't seen portrayed on screen before. I never thought I'd be watching two women make love after giving each other testosterone injections, but Love Lies Bleeding revels in that kind of gleeful gender-fuckery. It's also completely disinterested in playing around with queer respectability politics, allowing its characters to be messy and flawed, to make mistakes, to commit crimes, and even celebrate them for doing so. In that regard, it's kind of a fairy tale, a misty-eyed daydream of rebellious love and bloody revenge cut from the cloth of sleazy 1970s exploitation films and gay erotica.

The film's conscience and soul might be Stewart, but O'Brien is its fiery heart, and that tension creates something strange and wholly beautiful, a fascinating exploration of love's sometimes messy contradictions as people navigate their individual dreams and family backgrounds that seem determined to keep them where they are. There's a lot to love here - from the killer soundtrack to Glass' crackling direction to Stewart's remarkable, lived-in performance, but what astonished me most is its unapologetic queerness. It wasn't that long ago that something like this would have been relegated to arthouse screens in major cities only, but to see something so provocative and so alive with queer sexual energy playing multiplexes across the country feels like a minor miracle. It feels like both a rebuke of sexless Hollywood film culture and almost radical embrace of a queer aesthetic makes for some of the most revelatory filmmaking in recent memory.

GRADE - ★★★★ (out of four)

LOVE LIES BLEEDING | Directed by Rose Glass | Stars Kristen Stewart, Katy O'Brian, Ed Harris, Dave Franco, Jena Malone | Rated R for violence and grisly images, sexual content, nudity, language throughout and drug use | Now playing in theaters everywhere.

Now Streaming | Ishtar | 1987

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Sat, 09 Mar 2024 16:45:00 +0000

Dustin Hoffman and Warren Beatty in Elaine May's ISHTAR.

Once synonymous with phrase "box office bomb," Elaine May's notorious 1987 flop, Ishtar, has been the subject of some critical re-evaluation in more recent years.

In many ways, Ishtar was a victim of its own reputation - the troubled production and incessant delays giving it an air of failure before it even arrived in theaters. Seemingly unhappy with the difficult process and the poor reception, its stars Dustin Hoffman and Warren Beatty would publicly distance themselves from the film, even if they were reportedly happy, even proud, of the finished product. Elaine May never directed another film.

Yet despite its reputation, Ishtar is surprisingly good. Gary Larson, creator of the comic strip "The Far Side," would later apologize for a cartoon he once published of Hell's Blockbuster being stocked with nothing but copies of Ishtar. He admitted to not seeing the film before drawing the cartoon, and regretted the dig after watching it on an airplane, taken aback by how much he enjoyed it.

Conceived as a kind of modern-day "Roat To" movie much like the Bob Hope and Bing Crosby films of the 1940s like Road to Morocco and Road to Zanzibar, Ishtar follows the exploits of two washed-up lounge singers (Hoffman and Beatty) who find themselves in the middle of an international conflict at a gig in Morocco when one falls in love with a communist revolutionary (Isabelle Adjani) and the other gets tricked into becoming a CIA informant.

Ishtar plays its humor much more straight than the Hope/Crosby comedies, which may explain why it never connected with audiences, but it's that deadpan nature that really makes it work. The two protagonists take themselves so seriously, making the outlandish scenarios they find themselves trapped in all the more ridiculous. The film itself, on the other hand, is much more self-aware, and its criticisms of US foreign policy and how the CIA destabilizes developing nations and props up brutal dictators are surprisingly astute for a big-budget studio comedy, especially in the waning days of the Cold War. Is it a great film? Not particularly. Nor is it some misunderstood masterpiece. But it is a solid comedy that does not deserve the negative reputation with which its box office failure branded it.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

ISHTAR | Directed by Elaine May | Stars Warren Beatty, Dustin Hoffman, Isabelle Adjani, Charles Grodin, Jack Weston, Tess Harper, Carol Kane | Rated PG-13 | Now streaming on The Criterion Channel.

Now Streaming | Dicks: The Musical/Kokomo City/Rustin | 2023

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Sun, 25 Feb 2024 16:56:00 +0000

DICKS: THE MUSICAL (Larry Charles, 2023)

A deliriously stupid, riotously raunchy musical about two rival hyper-masculine sales executives who discover that they are actually long-lost twin brothers, and set out to Freaky Friday their parents into getting back together. The problem is, mom (Megan Mullaly) is senile and Dad (Nathan Lane) is gay - lots of queer hijinks ensue.

At times, it feels like a feature-length RuPaul's Drag Race musical challenge, but, you know...good. It's just so ridiculous that it's difficult not to be charmed by it - and the cast is so much fun, especially a delightful Bowen Yang as God. Over the top, low rent, and goofy in all the right ways

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

DICKS: THE MUSICAL | Directed by Larry Charles | Stars Josh Sharp, Aaron Jackson, Nathan Lane, Megan Mullally, Bowen Yang, Megan Thee Stallion | Rated R for strong crude sexual content, graphic nudity, pervasive language and brief drug use | Now streaming on HBO Max.

KOKOMO CITY (D. Smith, 2023)

D. Smith's stirring portrait of four black transgender sex workers is perhaps one of the most vibrant and essential pieces of queer cinema in recent memory. As these four women recount their experiences being black and trans and how those things have affected how they relate to the communities around them, Smith also explores their, at times, complicated relationships with the men who love them and how it has affected how they relate to their own sexuality and gender. Kokomo City's amplification of oft-unheard voices, even within their own communities, explores the intersectionality of race and gender, and how transness affects their black womanhood, feels startlingly unfiltered - its raw and poignant observations recalling the work of iconic queer filmmaker Marlon Riggs.

GRADE - ★★★½ (out of four)

KOKOMO CITY | Directed by D. Smith | Rated R for strong sexual content, graphic nudity, language throughout, and drug use | Now streaming on Paramount+.

RUSTIN (George C. Wolfe. 2023)

Colman Domingo is excellent in this well-meaning but bland biopic of Bayard Rustin, a prolific organizer in the civil rights movement and mastermind behind the historic March on Washington, whose contributions have been widely overlooked because he was gay. The double discrimination that Rustin faced certainly makes for intriguing drama, often being hidden by those within the movement in order not to hurt the wider cause in the eyes of the public, but Rustin is a fairly bland, paint-by-numbers affair. It lacks personality, and Chris Rock as NAACP president Roy Wilkins is a wild bit of miscasting that makes his scenes difficult to take seriously. Rustin's is a story worth telling, but it's very much one of those movies that mistakes an important message for compelling filmmaking.

GRADE - ★★ (out of four)

RUSTIN | Directed by George C. Wolfe | Stars Colman Domingo, Aml Ameen, Glynn Turman, Chris Rock, Gus Halper, Johnny Ramey, CCH Pounder | Rated PG-13 for thematic material, some violence, sexual material, language including racial slurs, brief drug use, and smoking | Now streaming exclusively on Netflix.

Now Streaming | The Last Voyage of the Demeter | 2023

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Sat, 17 Feb 2024 16:22:00 +0000

The story of the Demeter is perhaps the most haunting passage from Bram Stoker's "Dracula."

Written as a series of entries from the captain's log, Stoker's original novel describes the voyage of a sailing vessel called the Demeter on which Dracula's coffin travels from Transylvania to England. One by one, the crew mysteriously disappears until the derelict ship drifts unmanned into the harbor, its captain lashed to the wheel, dead. It's an eerie tale of creeping madness, as the crew descends into paranoia as an unknown entity picks them off at sea one by one.

It's the kind of story that seems perfect for a standalone movie adaptation - most Dracula adaptations mostly skip right to the ghost ship drifting into the harbor. The problem with The Last Voyage of the Demeter is that it squanders the chilling possibilities of the story by revealing its hand far too early. It's a story that really needs that element of the unknown to work, but director André Øvredal (Troll Hunter, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark) shows the creature early and often and allows the characters to discern what's going on fairly quickly in order to mount a defense that culminates in a large-scale action showdown on the deck of the ship that seemingly squanders any build-up of mystery or suspense. The creature itself is also an extremely hit-or-miss CGI creation, and its lack of tangibility can be distracting. There's so much potential here - the rainy, windswept atmosphere is appropriately gloomy, but the film lacks any real sense of mystery. Dracula on a boat is a great concept, rife with possibility, but The Last Voyage of the Demeter is more interested in being a bloody creature feature, bulldozing the creepy sense of desolation and despair that permeates Stoker's prose.

GRADE - ★★ (out of four)

THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE DEMETER | Directed by André Øvredal | Stars Corey Hawkins, Aisling Franciosi, David Dastmalchian, Javier Botet, Liam Cunningham | Rated R for bloody violence | Now streaming on Paramount+.

Blu-Ray Review | 35 Shots of Rum | 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Mattie Lucas) — Thu, 15 Feb 2024 20:23:00 +0000

Perhaps it's because it was my first encounter with Claire Denis as a budding young cinephile, but 35 Shots of Rum has always held a special place in my heart. Perhaps too it's due to my general affinity for the work of Yasujiro Ozu, because this film is Denis' loving riff on Ozu-ian themes; a widowed father facing loneliness as his adult daughter falls in love and contemplates getting married and moving out.

It's a classic Ozu storyline, most indelibly captured in his 1949 masterpiece, Late Spring. But Denis is not one to simply retread what has been done before, and she puts her own spin on 35 Shots of Rum's bittersweet father/daughter tale. She sets the mood immediately - Lionel (Alex Descas) is a train conductor, we follow him riding the rails in cinematographer Agnes Godard's dusky hues, accompanied by the melancholic noodlings of Tinderstick's dreamy score.

If any filmmaker can be said to be a master of creative vibes, it's Denis, and 35 Shots of Rum has *vibes* to spare, but it's certainly more than the atmosphere she conjures. There isn't a lot of dialogue in the film - we gather what we need to know through snippets of conversations, glances, symbolic gifts; there's a lot of meaning in Denis' film that exists between the lines. Lionel's co-worker, Noe (Grégoire Colin) is interested in his daughter, Josephine (Mati Diop), a match she initially shows little interest in but he reluctantly encourages so as not to feel like a burden. In his attempts to end the isolation they've felt since the passing of his wife, he may isolate them even more than they were before.

Denis' films often have an otherworldly quality, like something out of a half-remembered dream (see, for instance, Beau Travail). And while that is in some ways true of 35 Shots of Rum, it also feels incredibly lived in and world-weary, pregnant with the heaviness of a life of loneliness and disappointment at a crossroads that could lead to happiness and liberation, or even more loneliness. It feels as though its characters are somehow resigned to a mixture of both, and therein lies its inherent sadness - the more things change, the more things stay the same.

Cinema Guild recently released the film on Blu-Ray for the first time in the US, and it's a hugely welcome upgrade. While many of Denis' other films have enjoyed Blu-Ray releases in recent years, 35 Shots of Rum has remained fairly scarce since its original DVD release in 2009, and it's good to see one of her most celebrated films get the treatment it has long deserved. Special features include "A Dance of Feelings: Claire Denis in Conversation with Eric Hynes (2022)," "A Regis Dialogue at the Walker Art Center: Claire Denis: Unpredictable Universe (2012)," an excerpt from 'Talking With Ozu.' a Theatrical Trailer, and a booklet featuring an essay by Blair McClendon. But the real special feature is, of course, the film, as moving a portrait of familial relations as the movies have ever produced, and a great entry point for anyone looking to explore the varied and intoxicating filmography of Claire Denis.

GRADE - ★★★★ (out of four)

35 SHOTS OF RUM | Directed by Claire Denis | Stars Alex Descas, Mati Diop, Nicole Dogué Grégoire, Colin Julieth, Mars Toussaint | Not Rated | In French w/English subtitles | Now available on Blu-Ray and DVD from The Cinema Guild.

From the Front Row

trans|cendental cinema

Blu-Ray Review | Three Revolutionary Films by Ousmane Sembène

Three Revolutionary Films by Ousmane Sembène is now available on Blu-Ray and DVD from The Criterion Collection.

Now Streaming | The First Omen | 2024

A belated legacy prequel to The Omen (1976) probably has no right to be this good, but Arkasha Stevenson's The First Omen is a surprisingly strong horror film in its own right.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

THE FIRST OMEN | Directed by Nell Tiger Free, Ralph Ineson, Sônia Braga, Bill Nighy, María Caballero, Nicole Sorace, Tawfeek Barhom, Charles Dance | Rated R for violent content, grisly/disturbing images, and brief graphic nudity | Now available on Blu-Ray and DVD and streaming on Hulu.

Review | In a Violent Nature | 2024

With In a Violent Nature, director Chris Nash attempts to breathe new life into the well-worn slasher genre by focusing on the masked killer rather than the teenage kill fodder who meet gruesome fates at the end of his knife.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

IN A VIOLENT NATURE | Directed by Chris Nash | Stars Ry Barrett, Andrea Pavlovic, Cameron Love, Reece Presley, Liam Leone | Not rated | Opens Friday, May 31, in theaters nationwide.

Review | Evil Does Not Exist | 2024

GRADE - ★★★½ (out of four)

EVIL DOES NOT EXIST | Directed by Ryūsuke Hamaguchi | Stars Hitoshi Omika, Ryo Nishikawa, Ryuji Kosaka, Ayaka Shibutani, Hazuki Kikuchi | Not Rated | In Japanese w/English subtitles | Now playing in select theaters.

Now Streaming | Madame Web | 2024

GRADE - zero stars (out of four)

MADAME WEB | Directed by S.J. Clarkson | Stars Dakota Johnson, Sydney Sweeney, Isabela Merced, Celeste O'Connor, Tahar Rahim, Kerry Bishé, Adam Scott, Emma Roberts, Mike Epps | Rated PG-13 for violence/action and language | Now streaming on Netflix.

Review | Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes | 2024

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES | Directed by Wes Ball | Stars Owen Teague, Freya Allan, Kevin Durand, Peter Macon, William H. Macy, Eka Darville | Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi violence/action | Now playing in theaters nationwide.

Review | I Saw the TV Glow | 2024

GRADE - ★★★★ (out of four)

Review | In Our Day | 2024

The rate at which Hong Sang-soo continues to crank out films, often one-two per year, is impressive enough; that they continue to be such incisive observations about life is something of a minor miracle.

GRADE - ★★★½ (out of four)

IN OUR DAY | Directed by Hong Sang-soo | Stars Ki Ju-bong, Kim Min-hee, Song Sun-mi, Park Mi-so | Not Rated | In Korean w/English subtitles | Now playing at Film at Lincoln Center in NYC.

Now Streaming | The Beekeeper | 2024

David Ayer's The Beekeeper often makes little sense. When it does, it's exceedingly stupid. Yet, that's almost part of the charm of this gleefully violent vigilante adventure that sends Jason Statham's titular beekeeper after a shadowy gang of phone scammers who prey on the elderly.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

Review | Unfrosted | 2024

While I don't think Jerry Seinfeld's Unfrosted is the kind of once-in-a-generation stinker it's being made out to be, it's still the kind of bad film that is so inoffensively bland that it doesn't even have the temerity to stick around in the mind as a memorable disaster.

GRADE - ★ (out of four)

UNFROSTED | Directed by Jerry Seinfeld | Stars Jerry Seinfeld, Melissa McCarthy, Jim Gaffigan, Hugh Grant, Amy Schumer, Max Greenfield, Isaac Bae, Chris Rickett, Rachael Harris, Kue Lawrence | Rated PG-13 for some suggestive references and language | Now streaming exclusively on Netflix.

Review | Challengers | 2024

GRADE - ★★★½ (out of four)

CHALLENGERS | Directed by Luca Guadagnino | Stars Zendaya, Mike Faist, Josh O'Connor, Darnell Appling | Rated R for language throughout, some sexual content and graphic nudity | Now playing in theatrs nationwide.

Cinema Obscura | Pulgasari | 1985

Review | Late Night with the Devil | 2024

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

LATE NIGHT WITH THE DEVIL | Directed by Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes | Stars David Dastmalchian, Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss, Fayssal Bazzi, Ingrid Torelli | Rated R for violent content, some gore, and language including a sexual reference | Now playing in theaters nationwide and streaming on AMC+.

Blu-Ray Review | I Am Cuba | 1964

GRADE - ★★★★ (out of four)

I AM CUBA | Directed by Mikhail Kalatozov | Stars Sergio Corrieri, Salvador Wood, José Gallardo, Raúl García, Luz María Collazo, Jean Bouise, Alberto Morgan | In Spanish w/English subtitles | Now available on 4K UHD and Blu-Ray from The Criterion Collection.

Review | Night Swim | 2024

Horror movies generally require a certain suspension of disbelief to work as intended. The best ones can still operate by their own internal sense of logic as long as they've convinced the audience that even the most outlandish of scenarios are plausible in the world presented to us.

GRADE - ★ (out of four)

NIGHT SWIM | Directed by Bryce McGuire | Stars Wyatt Russell, Kerry Condon, Amélie Hoeferle, Gavin Warren | Rated PG-13 for terror, some violent content and language | Now streaming exclusively on Peacock.

Now Streaming | Drive-Away Dolls/Lisa Frankenstein | 2024

On paper, a film about two lesbians on the lam after being caught up in a clone-a-willy heist should be right up my alley, especially if said film is directed by one of the Coen Bros. Unfortunately, Drive-Away Dolls, the first solo directorial effort by Ethan Coen, is something of a bust.

DRIVE AWAY DOLLS - ★½LISA FRANKENSTEIN - ★★★

DRIVE AWAY DOLLS | Directed by Ethan Coen | Stars Margaret Qualley, Geraldine Viswanathan, Beanie Feldstein, Joey Slotnick, C.J. Wilson, Colman Domingo, Pedro Pascal, Bill Camp, Matt Damon | Rated R for crude sexual content, full nudity, language and some violent content.

LISA FRANKENSTEIN | Directed by Zelda Williams | Stars Kathryn Newton, Cole Sprouse, Liza Soberano, Henry Eikenberry, Joe Chrest, Carla Gugino | Rated PG-13 for violent content, bloody images, sexual material, language, sexual assault, teen drinking and drug content.

Drive-Away Dolls and Lisa Frankenstein are now streaming exclusively on Peacock.

Review | Civil War | 2024

GRADE - ★★ (out of four)

CIVIL WAR | Directed by Alex Garland | Stars Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, Cailee Spaeny, Nick Offerman, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Jesse Plemons | Rated R for strong violent content, bloody/disturbing images, and language throughout | Now playing in theaters everywhere.

Review | Immaculate | 2024

GRADE - ★★½ (out of four)

IMMACULATE | Directed by Michael Mohan | Stars Sydney Sweeney, Álvaro Morte, Benedetta Porcaroli, Dora Romano | Rated R for strong and bloody violent content, grisly images, nudity and some language | Now playing in theaters everywhere.

Review | Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire | 2024

GRADE - ★★ (out of four)

GODZILLA X KONG: THE NEW EMPIRE | Directed by Adam Wingard | Stars Rebecca Hall, Kaylee Hottle, Brian Tyree Henry, Dan Stevens | Rated PG-13 for creature violence and action | Now playing in theaters everywhere.

Review | Love Lies Bleeding | 2024

As someone who was fairly mixed on Rose Glass' otherwise widely acclaimed 2019 debut feature, Saint Maud, I am now fully a Glass convert thanks to her sophomore film, Love Lies Bleeding.

GRADE - ★★★★ (out of four)

LOVE LIES BLEEDING | Directed by Rose Glass | Stars Kristen Stewart, Katy O'Brian, Ed Harris, Dave Franco, Jena Malone | Rated R for violence and grisly images, sexual content, nudity, language throughout and drug use | Now playing in theaters everywhere.

Now Streaming | Ishtar | 1987

Once synonymous with phrase "box office bomb," Elaine May's notorious 1987 flop, Ishtar, has been the subject of some critical re-evaluation in more recent years.

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

ISHTAR | Directed by Elaine May | Stars Warren Beatty, Dustin Hoffman, Isabelle Adjani, Charles Grodin, Jack Weston, Tess Harper, Carol Kane | Rated PG-13 | Now streaming on The Criterion Channel.

Now Streaming | Dicks: The Musical/Kokomo City/Rustin | 2023

DICKS: THE MUSICAL (Larry Charles, 2023)

GRADE - ★★★ (out of four)

KOKOMO CITY (D. Smith, 2023)

GRADE - ★★★½ (out of four)

KOKOMO CITY | Directed by D. Smith | Rated R for strong sexual content, graphic nudity, language throughout, and drug use | Now streaming on Paramount+.

RUSTIN (George C. Wolfe. 2023)

GRADE - ★★ (out of four)

Now Streaming | The Last Voyage of the Demeter | 2023

DRIVE AWAY DOLLS - ★½
LISA FRANKENSTEIN - ★★★