July Movies Part 3: The Dink & Spider-Man: Brand New Day

July is nearly at an end but I managed to squeeze two more movies in. Want to go to the theater or want to stay on the couch? I've got both options covered!

The Dink: Written by Sean Clements and directed by Josh Greenbaum, this is a very silly and fun movie about what happens when a bunch of pickleball enthusiasts demand more courts at a tennis club. Ed Harris plays Chuck Boyd, the owner of the tennis club, while his son, Dustin (Jake Johnson) is a tennis player who injured his wrist early in his career and now has to make do as a tennis instructor at the club. He still thinks of himself as being an elite player (with a lot of beef with Andy Roddick), but really he's just a sad little man who needs to boost his ego. 

Due to various circumstances, Dustin is forced to start playing pickleball, a sport he regards with the utmost contempt. Further, he is playing with three older women, and his partner is Candace (Mary Steenburgen), a divorcee who has taken up a lot of hobbies to try and get on with her life. My favorite thing about this movie is that there ends up being a little bit of a May-December situation between Distin and Candace, which is amazing, because come on, Mary Steenburgen's still got it. Putting that storyline aside, however, this is ultimately just a movie about a showdown between pickleball and tennis. If you're a pickleball enthusiast, there will be a lot of references and jokes that I'm sure will delight you, but if you only have a passing familiarity with the sport (like me), this movie may seem pretty mid. The actors are fun, the premise is wacky - it's a perfectly acceptable way to pass an afternoon. But it is definitely some serious pickleball propaganda.

Spider-Man: Brand New Day: I don't know why, but I keep forgetting that Spider-Man is from New York (specifically Queens - Let's Go Mets!) but this movie absolutely does not let you forget that fact. It is SUCH a New York movie and has such beautiful shots of the city throughout every amazing action sequence or just those wonderful shots of Spidey commuting around by slinging webs at tall buildings. Even the end credits are this lovely little ode to New York - according to my husband, the only thing missing was a shot of Zohran as Mayor. So yes, I loved this movie immediately, just for that.

But of course, there's a whole story we need to discuss so let's get into that. Written by Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers, and directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, this movie picks up after the events of Spider-Man: No Way Home, so poor Spider-Man/Peter Parker (Tom Holland) is no longer remembered by his best friend Ned (Jacob Batalan) and girlfriend, MJ (Zendaya) after Dr. Strange cast a spell to make them forget him (don't question the Marvel logic, I don't remember any of the previous movies either). Now, he's very sad and depressed, working closely with NYPD Detective Jean DeWolff (the delightful Liza Colon-Zayas), and eschewing any work-life balance whatsoever in his unrelentless quest to put criminals away so he doesn't have to think about his complete lack of a personal life. He's also reluctantly working with Frank Castle (Jon Bernthal), a man with some sort of dark past who is now a vigilante with a lot of guns (apparently this character is the Punisher - a fact that completely blew past me while watching this movie).

There's Michael Mando as Scorpion, but then it turns out there's a different villain who can mind control people, so they become slightly more important to deal with. Just rest assured there's some great action, a lot of emotion, and it will be worth your time. I thoroughly enjoyed this movie, but also, Instagram has been constantly serving me reels of Holland and Zendaya so I just spent this movie swooning over those two as my favorite Hollywood couple. I don't know if this is a movie that comic lovers and Marvel purists will care for (there ARE some great cameos from certain Avengers), but if you're simply looking for spectacle and good ol' fashioned Hollywood razzle-dazzle, this movie serves that up in spades.

July Movies Part 2: The Invite & The Odyssey

This week I watched two of my favorite movies of the year. They were spectacular and you need to jump on the bandwagon right away. What are you waiting for?!

The Invite: Adapted by Rashida Jones and Will McCormack from a Spanish film, Sentimental (that was itself adapted from a play), and directed by Olivia Wilde (who also stars), this movie is an incredible cringe comedy that had me and my husband gasping and laughing out loud for 100 minutes straight. Wilde and Seth Rogen play Angela and Joe, a couple that have been married for too long and can't seem to stop bickering with each other. Angela has invited the upstairs neighbors over for dinner, a fact that she failed to mention to Joe, so they're fighting about that as the neighbors, Pina and Hawk (Penelope Cruz and Edward Norton) arrive. Which already makes for an awkward start to the evening, but you have no idea how much more awkward things are going to get from there.

If all four of these actors receive an Oscar nomination next year, it would be welcome. The dialogue being bandied about back-and-forth is exhilarating. It's like watching a very tense tennis match with occasional pauses to burst out laughing. I can't get into the plot because you need to just experience it ratchet up and escalate continually for yourself. But what a well-made movie! It's beautifully shot, with every scene meticulously framed and composed, and the music by Devonte Hynes offers up a perfect accompaniment to these couples and their chaos. There's one scene in particular, that is set to Habanera from Carmen, and I definitely want to watch a masterclass when Wilde dissects how she perfectly choreographed the dialogue, music, and blocking to create a visually stunning and hilarious piece of cinema. 

Fair warning, this is a great movie to watch if you're in a stable relationship but may bring up some uncomfortable discussions if you're on the rocks and arguing all the time. But maybe even in that case this movie will bring you both together because you'll finally be laughing as one. Get to the theater - you have received an invitation.

The Odyssey: Written and directed by Christopher Nolan (based on Homer's epic poem, of course), there was a lot of hype around this film, and what can I say? The hype was thoroughly well-deserved. This movie is three hours long, but with this deft script that keeps weaving in and out like Penelope's loom through all of the different scenes of Odysseus' journey, the Trojan War, and the troubles in Ithaca, you simply won't notice the time passing by. It's a singular cinematic achievement and I can't begrudge all the Oscars it's bound to receive next year.

The cast of this film is pitch perfect. I had my doubts about Matt Damon as Odysseus, but he does an incredible job - he is just the right amount of old and weary but still has a trick or two up his sleeve to try and survive this perilous journey home. Tom Holland is wonderful as his son, Telemachus, who has to protect his mother, Penelope (Anne Hathaway, in what is definitely her best role this year), from the greedy suitors (including Robert Pattinson as the very evil Antinous) who have posted up at their palace in Ithaca and want to marry Penelope so they can be king. The other big-name stars in this movie mostly have extended cameos, but damn do they deliver in their scenes. I was particularly astonished by Samantha Morton as Circe - there was something so eerie and menacing about her voice that even if you didn't know anything about this character, you'd suss out within ten seconds that something very bad was about to happen to Odysseus's men.

I've been obsessed with Greek mythology since I was a child; I've taken many courses on it and read The Odyssey as well as modern retellings of Homer's work, so I have a great familiarly with this story and the various characters and settings. I don't know if someone with zero knowledge of The Odyssey would love this film as much as I did, but I think they would still be completely mesmerized by the spectacle of it. The extended sequences with the Trojan horse are stunning, watching the sailors get tossed around on a vengeful ocean is harrowing, interacting with the varied cast of characters is a constant delight. I found myself astonished simply by the armor that different characters wore - Agamemnon in particular, has the most foreboding armor I've ever seen, and it chilled me to the bone every time he was on screen. And is it weird that everyone has an American accent? Sure, for about ten minutes. Then you just put that aside and let yourself be swept away by this ancient tale. The locations are dazzling, the practical effects are glorious, the script is immaculate, the actors are captivating. You can see the blood, sweat, tears, and love that went into every frame of this movie and the result is truly a wondrous thing. Nolan went on quite the odyssey to give us this film, and I'm so glad he did.

July Movies Part 1: Supergirl & Moana

July is here, with a brand-new set of summer blockbusters. We have the latest superhero offering from the DC Universe, and then Disney's latest live-action remake. Looking for original IP? Move right along!

Supergirl: Written by Ana Nogueira and directed by Craig Gillespie, this movie stars Milly Alcock as Kara Zor-El, aka Supergirl, who is Superman's cousin. She is turning 23, so you may ask, why is she a "girl" and not a "woman"? That is a meta question this film also seeks to ask and answer. But first, we must give our poor heroine a purpose, because as this movie opens, she is on an epic pub crawl and has no desire to save the universe.

This film is only 108 minutes long, so I won't give away scads of plot. There's a young girl, Ruthye (Eve Ridley), who is seeking revenge after the brutal murder of all the members of her family, and she crosses paths with the reluctant Kara, who is persuaded to help her for her own reasons. Naturally, our heroine is full of ennui and doesn't think there's any point to being a superhero, but she will eventually get her redemption arc and start to crawl out of her depressive funk. Prepare for lots of action sequences, many repetitive rescues of the hapless naif, and some cameos from a very concerned Clark Kent (David Corenswet) as he video calls from Metropolis to keep tabs on his wayward cousin. Oh, and also Jason Momoa shows up as an alien mercenary character called Lobo, for some reason.

This movie is rather forgettable. Now that James Gunn runs the DC Cinematic Universe, you can see his fingerprints all over it in terms of random music choices during various scenes and a desperate attempt to keep things light, even when we're talking about a lot of heavy themes. Alcock and Ridley are a great duo, and they are both very personable, even whilst their characters are being extremely angsty, and the action choreography is wonderful. But overall, this movie thoroughly failed to captivate me, and I almost forgot I watched it a few days later. It exists, and that's about all I can say about it.

Moana: Written by Jared Bush and Dana Ledoux Miller and directed by Thomas Kail, if you're a fan of the original animated film, then you'll be perfectly happy with this live-action remake, i.e. just like my husband. I do not care about Moana as much as he does, but I still found myself captivated by this movie. 

If you've never seen the original before, I suppose a short plot summary is in order. Catherine Laga'aia plays the titular Moana, the daughter of the chief of Motonui, a Polynesian island. Her whole life, she has been forbidden from venturing too far out into the ocean, but her grandmother (Rena Owen) believes the ocean has chosen her for a crucial journey. When the island is stuck by a blight, she tells Moana that she needs to set sail and find the demigod Maui (Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson who voiced this character in the original film), who can then help her restore the heart of Te Fiti, the goddess of Nature.

The cinematography is beautiful and enchanting, the songs (both English and Polynesian) are rousing and wonderful, and the actors are fully committed and having a great time - it's particularly great to see the Rock do his thing in live action this time around. Is it almost identical to the animated film? Of course. Did that dampen my enjoyment at all? Nope. Disney is gonna do its thing, but when they do it with a movie this beloved, it's hard to really screw it up, you know? There has been a lot of uproar about why we need this remake, which is the same uproar we have been getting for every single Disney remake to date, but I found myself bopping along for the ride. I know most critics are in absolute disagreement with me on this one, but I don't care. Sometimes it's just nice to get some Polynesian comfort food.

June Binges Part 1: The Boroughs & Spider-Noir

Another month is flying by, and there's still so much new TV to watch! I recently had surgery, and unfortunately, I've been using all my recovery time to nap instead of bingeing and blogging as I anticipated. But, I am now on the mend, which means it's time for me to finally tell you about all these epic shows you should be watching. Let's dive right in.

The Boroughs: Created by Jeffrey Addiss and Will Matthews (with an executive producer assist from Stranger Things' Duffer Brothers), this is a very bizarre and fun show about a group of older folk in a retirement community in the middle of nowhere who discover that maybe something rather sinister is going on. Something sinister that may involve...aliens? 

Frankly, that's about all I want to tell you about the plot. There are only eight episodes, and you'll have to figure out how things unfold from there. The cast boasts people like Alfred Molina, Geena Davis, Alfre Woodard, Clarke Peters, and Denis O'Hare, who are all people I have been watching for long enough that I was a little startled to realize that they are now old enough to be playing retirees. But these are all impeccably excellent thespians and man are they having fun. Older actors rarely get the chance to showcase their chops like this, and at one point I realized this show felt like The Goonies but for sixty-somethings. It has that crazy Spielbergian vibe of a group of people going on an adventure, and something weird and wonderful is afoot, and they're gonna band together to solve the mystery despite all the obstacles in their way.

The sci-fi element means that this show is probably not going to be everyone's cup of tea, but the plot is compelling, the actors are brilliant, and it's just so unique and unusual that I was riveted throughout. It's a quick and dirty binge that should keep you enthralled for the entirety of its runtime, so give it a shot. There's a lot of fun lurking in those boroughs!

Spider-Noir: Developed by Oren Uziel, this show is set in the 1930s New York in an alternate universe where Spider-Man is the alter ego of a world-weary hard-boiled detective named Ben Reilly. Who is played by Nicolas Cage. What more do you need?!

My husband and I watched this show in black and white as God intended. There is also a color version available for heathens; we did watch a few minutes of that version and begrudgingly accepted that it was still shot in an old-timey technicolor kind of way that still made it feel retro. But, come on. The show is called Spider-NOIR, what are you even doing if you watch it in color? The cinematography and production design is truly out of this world and it's an immersive and dazzling experience if it's been a while since you last watched a classic movie.

Cage is hamming it up brilliantly in this role, complete with a Cagney/Bogart-esque accent that is cleverly explained in the script. Karen Ruiz is wonderful as his weary secretary, Janet, while Lamorne Morris is his trusty friend and journalist, Robbie. There's a mystery involving a sudden rash of folks with superpowers who are taking over Manhattan and committing crimes, and of course, our hero has a tragic backstory and doesn't ever want to don his spider costume again but will eventually have to. There's some romance, beautifully choreographed action set pieces, and a whole lot of humor. It's an absolute vibe from start to finish, and even if you're not a superhero person, you should watch this show if you're simply a cinema person who wants to indulge in this world for a little while.

June Movies Part 1: Backrooms & Power Ballad

I headed to the movies this weekend and watched one Gen Z blockbuster horror film that everyone's talking about and one sweet, melancholy Irish movie that almost no one is talking about. I enjoyed both, but for very different reasons.

Backrooms: Written by Will Soodik and directed by the 20-year-old (!) Kane Parsons, based on YouTube videos he started creating in 2022, this movie is extremely wild and twisty and slightly impossible to explain. But my god it's a vibe, and I vibed hard with it. Chiwetel Ejiofor stars as Clark, an angry divorced man who aspires to be an architect but instead owns a struggling discount furniture store. After his wife kicked him out, he has been living in the store, and has noticed the electricity is behaving erratically, with power surges and losses at all hours. One night, he goes down to the basement to investigate why the lights are off, and he sees something shimmering on one of the walls. When he approaches, he discovers he can walk through this wall, and into the titular "backrooms." 

This is where all kudos goes to Danny Vermette, the incredible production designer, without whom, this film would be nothing. The backrooms are a weird and eerie, slightly-off maze of interconnected rooms that just keep getting stranger and stranger as Clark wanders through them. The score and sound design by Edo Van Breemen and Parsons also deserve a lot of kudos because we get the constant hum of the overhead fluorescent lighting as an accompaniment, but then the sudden footsteps, or sudden silence that signifies only bad things could happen next. Honestly, the sound design scared the crap out of me more effectively than the appearance of actual monsters.

Yes, there are monsters lurking in these rooms, and yes, things will get a little bloody towards the end, but the majority of the time, you are just wandering through this insane world, trying to figure out what's going on, and having a mild panic attack for 110 minutes. Ejiofor is excellent as our protagonist who is also a little despicable, while Renate Reinsve is an excellent audience surrogate, playing Clark's therapist, Mary, who has her own intricate back story that will unfold over the course of the film. It's all very layered and complex, like the backrooms themselves, and there are so many interpretations you could come up with as you watch this film. The main thing though, is that you have to see it. It's a wild ride, and I joyously went along for it.

Power Ballad: Directed by John Carney, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Peter McDonald, this is a classic Carney piece about the conflict between artists who make music because they love it and the record labels and big stars who make music because of capitalism. Paul Rudd stars as Rick Power, a former rockstar who settled down in Ireland 15 years ago after he married an Irish woman and had a daughter. Giving up on his rock dreams, he now sings for a wedding band. It's not glamorous work, and he misses being able to play his own songs instead of the usual comfort fare required at a wedding. 

At one wedding, however, Rick meets a famous singer, Danny Wilson (Nick Jonas who is not playing a character too far from reality, but still acted the hell out of this part, much to my surprise). Danny was formerly in a boy band but is now trying to strike out on his own, and he's trying to write songs for his upcoming album. He and Rick have an all-night jam session once the wedding festivities conclude and joyously make music together, riffing on each other's work, and enjoying a very creative collaboration that leave both in admiration of each other. What could go wrong?

Rick goes back to his life, and Danny goes back to his, and then six months later, Rick hears a song playing at the mall. He instantly recognizes it as "How to Write a Song Without You" a song that he has been noodling on for years, and that he had shared with Danny during their collaborative night. Well, Danny was able to add a bridge, produce the hell out of it, and now has a #1 single on his hands, with no songwriting credit to Rick whatsoever. What follows is a story that made my husband nervous, because he thought the tone of the film was going to become very dark and insane. But I knew the most I could expect from a Carney movie was a little melancholy and a lot of soul. There's a fair amount of comedy, because how could you not when you have Rudd at the helm, but he does a great job playing this slightly sad sack musician, who isn't quite living his dreams and just wants recognition for finally writing the hit song he has been chasing for so many years. 

It's a beautiful story about creativity and collaboration and credit, all topics that are so dicey and controversial when it comes to making music and art, and it's deftly told and distilled with that traditional Carney whimsy and Irish flair. I loved this movie and it made me tear up at various points. And not for nothing, "How to Write a Song Without You" is a certified banger - I hope it starts climbing up the charts, because nothing makes me happier than when a movie about a hit song actually generates a hit song. It's such a difficult task, and initially, when I heard the song in the movie, I didn't think it was that great, but by the time you hear it twenty times, in multiple contexts, with different production values, you really do learn to appreciate the art and craft of songwriting. It's a beautiful musicology lesson and movie all wrapped up in one.

May Movies Part 2: The Sheep Detectives, I Love Boosters, Obsession

What are you looking for this weekend? A breezy British murder mystery solved by a flock of sheep? An absurdist tale about end-stage capitalism and greed in the Bay Area? Or a supernatural horror thriller about the dangers of making your wishes come true? Yup, this post is really covering all the bases!

The Sheep Detectives: I was so excited for this movie and it absolutely did not disappoint. Written by Craig Mazin (adapted from the novel Three Bags Full by Leonia Swann) and directed by Kyle Balda, this movie stars Hugh Jackman for about ten minutes as a shepherd named George who lives a seemingly idyllic life in a gorgeous little English village until he ends up...murdered. Every night, he would read murder mysteries to his flock as a bedtime ritual, and turns out, these animals could fully understand him. One of them, Lily (voiced by Julia Louis-Dreyfus), is the smartest and always figured out who the killer was in those nighttime stories. Well now she had to put all her deductive reasoning to the test to examine clues and study the cast of motley human characters who all may have had their own reasons to kill the beloved shepherd.

The mystery is very cleverly plotted, and I can honestly say that the revelation of the killer was extremely satisfying. The script hits all the mystery tropes, and there are lots of shadowy and mysterious characters who show up, while we have Nicholas Braun as the hapless British police officer who has never had to deal with a murder in this village before and therefore will need plenty of coaching from the sheep to get this case solved. The animation is perfect, lending a lot of character and sass to the sheep (otherwise famously expressionless animals) with excellent voice casting from the likes of Bryan Cranston, Chris O'Dowd, Regina Hall, Rhys Darby, Brett Goldstein, Bella Ramsey, and Patrick Stewart. The live-action cast also features stalwarts like Emma Thompson, Hong Chau, Molly Gordon, and Nicholas Galitzine, who certainly do not disappoint. This movie was everything I wanted and expected it to be. No notes.

I Love Boosters: Written and directed by Boots Riley, this movie is certainly everything I expected it to be, i.e. weird and wacky. Keke Palmer stars as Corvette, the leader of the Velvet Gang (also consisting of Naomi Ackie and Taylour Paige, and later, Poppy Liu) who shoplift designer clothes exclusively from a high-end chain called Metro Designers that is owned by a high-strung designer named Christie Smith (Demi Moore). Christie is incensed at the amount of money she is losing because these boosters keep stealing her clothes, and most of the film consists of the juxtaposition of the bougie life led by Christie and her insanely expensive fashions alongside the very colorful but chaotic lives of the boosters who are struggling to make ends meet.

Aesthetically, this movie is a veritable rainbow of delights. The whole plot about how Christie's stores operate was wildly inventive and fun, and costume designer Shirley Kurata has done miraculous work from start to finish with every single outfit Keke Palmer and the rest of the cast sport in this movie - give the woman an Oscar immediately. But, in classic Boots Riley fashion, the third act of the movie leaps wildly into the absurdist abyss, pushing its metaphor of labor exploitation and capitalist evil to the umpteenth degree and featuring a lot of sci-fi and fantasy elements that imply a great deal of weed was consumed in the making of this film. If you're familiar with Riley's previous film, Sorry to Bother You, none of this will surprise you in the least, but if this is your first foray into his work? Settle in, you're in for a very bumpy ride.

Obsession: Yes, I gave in to the hype and headed to the theater to watch this film to ensure it continues to break box office records. Written and directed by Curry Barker, this is a classic horror movie about a man named Bear (Michael Johnston) who has a crush on a girl named Nikki (Inde Navarette) but is afraid to tell her or do anything about it. When he buys a magic object called the One Wish Willow, he expects it to just be a novelty toy, but makes a wish anyway. Obviously, he wishes that Nikki loved him more than anything else in the world. And obviously, that wish comes true in rather horrifying fashion.

What follows is a creepy and hilarious tale about how horrible it is when your dreams come true. At first, we have the honeymoon period where Bear and Nikki are deliciously in love and happy. But gradually, it becomes clear that Nikki might be a tad...unwell. She is behaving strangely, getting way more clingy, and eventually, starts to lose her mind if Bear leaves her for any period of time. Things keep escalating and getting more frightening, and eventually more bloody. 

Did this movie telegraph most of its jump scares from miles away? Yes. But was it still awesome to watch this in a crowded theater and scream and laugh alongside the rest of the audience? Hell yes. Horror movies are such a fun genre to highlight the collective spirit of movie watching, so if you only have the time and money to see one movie in theaters this month, this should probably be the movie you pick. The performances are brilliant (Inde Navarette in particular is getting a lot of love for her insanely eerie and incredible work - what she can do with her face and voice is simply a marvel), the script is entertaining, and it is endlessly compelling from beginning to end. The hype is real.

May Binges Part 1: Big Mistakes, Beef, The Miniature Wife

Yes, I'm still desperately trying to catch up on all the new TV - truly a losing battle. But I've binged more shows and now it's your turn to binge them too!

Beef: I ordinarily don't do season-to-season reviews, but given that this is shaping up to be an anthology series and this season was extraordinarily good, I'll just go ahead and tell you to watch it, shall I? Created by Lee Sung Jin, this season felt much more chaotic and epic in scope than the first, now featuring two warring couples whose lives get intertwined in increasingly dangerous ways. Oscar Isaac and Carey Mulligan star as Joshua and Lindsay, a couple who help manage a fancy country club in California, but are trying to save up for their dream of running their own bed and breakfast. They used to be a cool couple, but now they are approaching midlife, their marriage is getting fractious, and it seems clear that thigns are goign downhill fast. Contrast this with the young couple Ashley and Austin (Cailee Spaeny and Charles Melton) who work at the country club. They are young and naive, desperate to start their lives together but constantly set back by financial pressures. Will any of these couples succeed? Or will everything fall apart spectacularly? Watch to find out!

Over the course of eight episodes (much tighter than the first season's ten!), this season takes you on an emotional rollercoaster and you can never predict from one minute to the next who is going to be blackmailing whom, and when there might accidentally be a murder or two. Youn Yuh-jung also stars as Chairwoman Park, the Korean billionaire who becomes the new owner of the country club, and as she gets more involved in all the drama, things escalate to an absurd and exciting degree. Just let this show unfold before your eyeballs - make sure you set aside enough time to do so, because you're not going to be able to stop once you get started.

The Miniature Wife: Created by Jennifer Ames and Steve Turner (based on a short story by Manuel Gonzalez), this show stars Elizabeth Banks and Matthew Macfadyen as Lindy and Les, a couple that have been married for a very long time. The spark is fading from their marriage, and they mostly just tensely quote their couples therapist's aphorisms at each other in arguments. Lindy is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author whose career has now stalled after she moved to St. Louis to support Les's dream of working on cutting-edge research that could potentially earn him a Nobel Prize. That research involves the ability to shrink food so it could be transported more easily and then regrown when it arrives at the desired location. As the title of the show might have suggested, there is an accident and Lindy accidentally gets shrunk down to six inches tall. And Les, who hasn't yet figured out the formula to grow the shrunken objects back to their original size, has his work cut out for him.

I would watch this show a little bit at a time and frankly, it got to be a bit of a slog. Ten episodes long, 40+ minutes each, it was a bit too bloated. It would have been much better as a zippy half-hour comedy, but unfortunately, the writers meander through the story of this couple's chaotic marriage in far too much detail, giving us all the backstory about every single slight that led them to this precipice. In the present day, there's also a lot of unnecessary drama with supporting characters who don't really need to be there. The show covers a lot of good ground about how marriages require constant work, and also the nature of parenting, as both Les and Lindy have very different relationships with their teenage daughter Lulu (Sofia Rosinsky). But apart from the fun production design and camerawork to take us into Lindy's tiny world, this show struggles to be particularly engaging. I love these actors, and I watched all of it, but the whole time I found myself wishing they were doing something else.

Big Mistakes: Created by Dan Levy and Rachel Sennott, now here's a zippy half hour comedy that gets in and out in eight episodes. Levy and Taylor Ortega star as Nicky and Morgan, siblings who accidentally get on the wrong side of some Turkish crime bosses and are blackmailed into helping out with bizarre criminal enterprises. Meanwhile, their mother, Linda (Laurie Metcalf), is busy with their sister, Natalie (Abby Quinn), planning a campaign to run for mayor of their New Jersey town, so both women are too consumed with those logistics to notice the chaos Nicky and Morgan have descended into. 

Given how short and sweet the show is, I'll refrain from more details so you can let all the surprises wash over you. Suffice to say, Levy and Ortega are a great comic duo and watching Levy's face contort as he finds himself in impossible situations was my favorite part of the whole show. Nicky and Morgan are stereotypical adult siblings who have lost touch and have all these misconceptions about each other, but over the course of the show, they will start to learn and grow from each other, in both good ways and bad. I will warn you, the ending does have a cliffhanger, and Netflix hasn't picked this up for a second season yet, but I think the first season stands on its own two feet perfectly well and kept me very entertained on an otherwise boring weekend. It's charming and breezy, and sometimes that's all you can ask for. 

May Movies Part 1: Mother Mary & The Devil Wears Prada 2

Anne Hathaway is set to have five movies come out in 2026, and two of them are currently in theaters. Sadly, the Hathassaince is off to a rocky start. Let's dive into my reviews.

Mother Mary: Written and directed by David Lowery, I was very excited for this movie, given how much I loved his 2021 film, The Green Knight. I was expecting something similarly surreal and visually spectacular but unfortunately this movie is weird and unsettling, not in a good way. Hathaway stars as a pop icon named Mother Mary, who sings haunting dance music while wearing elaborate costumes and a halo. She is staging a comeback tour after she had an accident, but is unhappy with the costumes being proposed by her team. She heads to England, where her former collaborator, Sam (Michaela Coel), is working at a remote country estate, trying to prepare designs for an upcoming show. Sam is initially reluctant to work with Mary to prepare a new outfit, but after a lot of mysterious dialogue hinting at their past and Mary's clear desperation for someone who can interpret her artistic vision, Sam agrees.

What follows is a bizarre film where two women talk at each other and work out their creative differences and hostilities, but also, there's a ghost? Eventually there's an exorcism? And throughout there are flashbacks to Mary performing various songs, so the whole thing has a slightly surreal feel of a concert film? Listen, I did not get this movie at all, and I did not like it all. I'm sure there are high-minded people out there who thought this was a bold work of art, but to me it was a thought experiment that was better suited to being a 20-minute short film than a meandering two-hour extravaganza. Coel and Hathaway are two great actresses, and I would love to see them in another film where there's some actual plot. And maybe just make it a fun comedy, so we don't have to watch these two women weep at each other when they are capable of so much more expressive silliness. As far as I was concerned, this movie was an unfathomable waste of time.

The Devil Wears Prada 2: I am tempted to write "Electric Boogaloo" after that title, because unfortunately, this is a terrible sequel to the much-beloved 2006 movie. Directed by David Frankel and written by Aline Brosh McKenna (who were also responsible for the first film), Anne Hathaway, Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, and Stanley Tucci are all back to reprise their roles. This time, Andy (Hathaway), who has successfully spent the past twenty years building out a journalism career, finds herself unexpectedly fired and in need of a job. Well, turns out Runway, the magazine still led by Miranda (Streep) and her consigliere, Nigel (Tucci), is in need of a features editor, so Andy is back into the world of high fashion, trying to craft meaningful articles alongside puff pieces on chemical peels. Meanwhile, Emily (Blunt) now works at Dior, who is a main advertiser for Runway, so Andy is reunited with another former colleague. 

I won't get into the plot - there is a lot of drama around ownership of the magazine and evil billionaires (you'll get to see Justin Theroux chewing the scenery for all its worth, with an assist from BJ Novak who just has the same expression on his face throughout), and there are a LOT of cameos from random people that help to jolt you awake while you fade away into boredom. For a movie that is concerned about how magazines and creative pursuits could be replaced by AI, it's ironic how the script and hapless editing make the proceedings feel like abject AI slop. All of the plot points feel tropey, and no amount of valiant acting from this all-star cast can rescue the film from feeling completely unnecessary. It's the curse of high expectations - having just rewatched the original, which was so iconic, I wanted more of the same, and the sequel simply could not deliver. I do know folks who have thoroughly enjoyed this film as a likable piece of nostalgia, but if you were expecting quality cinema, steer clear.

March Movies Part 2: Project Hail Mary & Ready or Not 2: Here I Come

To finish out the month, I saw two movies I had been hotly anticipating, and they both did not disappoint. Whether you're looking for uplifting apocalyptic sci-fi or hilarious apocalyptic horror, I've got you covered.

Project Hail Mary: Adapted by Drew Goddard from the 2021 novel by Andy Weir, and directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, this movie is a perfect example of how book-to-screen adaptations should be filmed. I saw it with members of my book club because we just read this novel in January, and while yes, we noticed some minor things that were missing from the book, we certainly didn't think any of it mattered. Instead, I was astonished at what a faithful adaptation this was, and how adeptly it managed to convey all the science and logic of Weir's novel with cinematic flourish and aplomb. The first five minutes of this movie manage to convey information and action that take up fifty pages of the book, and I was incredibly impressed with the filmmakers' ability to condense this novel while still capturing its essence.

Ryan Gosling stars as Ryland Grace, a man who wakes up from a coma in unfamiliar surroundings and gradually pieces together that he is on board a spacecraft that is in a completely different solar system from Earth. He has retrograde amnesia but keeps flashing back to memories of his life back on Earth to help him piece together who he is and what his mission is supposed to be. Turns out he was a middle-school science teacher and former academic biologist. Scientists discovered the Sun was dimming, which would lead to catastrophic consequences for all of humanity. This led to a global scientific push to investigate the phenomenon and come up with a solution. They discover that a microorganism called astrophage was eating away at the Sun and growing exponentially. Grace was recruited by a woman named Eva Stratt (Sandra Huller) to help study astrophage, and eventually, Project Hail Mary was born, a long-shot mission to study a distant star in another solar system, that seems to be infected by astrophage but is somehow not dimming like the Sun. 

You'll have to watch the movie to find out how Grace ended up on the mission, and of course, the piece de resistance of this whole tale, how he runs into an alien, Rocky (voiced and puppeteered by James Ortiz and a team of four other puppeteers), who is on the exact same mission for his people to investigate this non-dimming star and maybe help save his planet from extinction. They got the character of Rocky exactly right, and the friendship that blossoms between him and Grace is just as perfect as it is in the book.

I was a huge fan of the novel, but many members of my book club were turned off by the amount of hard science it contained. As such, this movie is perfect for folks who don't want to read all of that but still want to experience this moving, profound, and absolutely rollicking story for themselves. It has so much plot, so much heart, and the cinematography and visual effects are absolutely stunning. The actors are truly excellent (who could ever get tired of watching Ryan Gosling be both earnest and funny in space?) and the movie is Hollywood at its cinematic best. Head for this mission: it's unlike anything you've ever seen before.

Ready or Not 2: Here I Come: I was a huge fan of the original Ready or Not that came out in 2019, so when I heard there was a sequel, again written by Guy Busick and R. Christopher Murphy and directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, I knew there was no way I would miss it. The action of this film picks up exactly where we left off, and what follows is another bloody and funny horror movie, now with two plucky heroines instead of just one. What could be better?

Samara Weaving is back as Grace, a woman who married a very wealthy man, but discovered on her wedding day in the last movie that he is part of an insane family that worships the devil. She had to play a game of Hide and Seek where every family member would try to kill her before dawn, but if she survived, they would all explode in gory and spectacular fashion. So, she survived, but as this movie begins, she is in the hospital and on the verge of being arrested, because the police who showed up at the house of horrors naturally assume she is responsible for murdering all the bodies inside while she sat outside on the steps in her bloody wedding dress. Her estranged sister, Faith (Kathryn Newton) shows up at the hospital because she was still her emergency contact. Unfortunately, Grace's in-laws were not the only crazy family involved in this whole situation. They're part of a syndicate of wealthy devil-worshipping families who basically run the world. And by winning Hide and Seek, Grace has triggered a rare clause in their bylaws that means that now she and her sister will be hunted by members of all the important families in a second round of the game. If she survives till dawn, she gets to take her place among them and help to rule the world. Sweet deal, right?

It's a bonkers premise, sure, but it's executed to perfection. The cast now features folks like Elijah Wood, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Nestor Carbonell, and many others, including Shawn Hatosy who is playing a rather insane character in stark contrast to his most recent role as Dr. Jack Abbot on The Pitt. And of course, our leading ladies are stellar, playing two women who have a lot of childhood trauma that they now have to somehow resolve at the same time as they are desperately trying to not get murdered. As you do. It's all very silly but very fun and if comedy horrors are your jam, this is one of the best you could experience. 

March Movies Part 1: How to Make a Killing & Hoppers

I headed back to the movie theatre and watched two very different movies this month. One is a murderous comedy that's strictly for adults, while the other is a sweet animated film that is appropriate for all ages. What are you in the mood for?

How to Make a Killing: Written and directed by John Patton Ford (who was inspired by the 1949 film, Kind Hearts and Coronets), Glen Powell stars as Becket, a young man whose mother was disowned by her eye-wateringly rich family after she slept with an unsuitable man and then insisted on keeping the baby. When the unsuitable man died, she became a single mother, who did the best she could to provide for little Becket, with absolutely no contact from any member of her family. After she died, he scrambled to make ends meet, but was then reminded that even though his mother was disowned by her family, the irrevocable nature of the family trust meant they couldn't actually disinherit her or her descendants. Which means that he could inherit a huge pile of money...provided all the other heirs in line before him were to die. I assume you can see where this is going.

When the first murder goes much more easily than he expected, Becket starts to think that maybe he could genuinely pull off this crazy scheme. Margaret Qualley stars as a femme fatale childhood friend who is the demon on his shoulder, egging him on, while Jessia Henwick stars as a new love interest who makes him want to be a better man. But murder is like a can of Pringles - one you pop, you just can't stop. While lightly comic throughout, the final tone of this movie is decidedly more ambiguous. But it's an entertaining ride, and if you enjoy that Glen Powell charisma, this movie will let you bathe in it for a crisp 105 minutes. Sometimes, that's all you want at the movies.

Hoppers: Pixar is back and better than ever. Written by Jesse Andrews and directed by Daniel Chong, this movie follows Mabel Tanaka (voiced by Piper Curda), a young girl who loves animals, but is furious that the adults around her seem to be so callous to their needs. Her grandmother is the only person who seems to understand, and together, they spent a lot of time at a local glade, quietly observing the pond life, listening to the sounds of Nature, and enjoying the contentment of that serene place. Her grandmother eventually dies, but Mabel always remembers her fondly, and as she enters into college, she continues to be a passionate advocate for Nature. Which means she frequently butts heads with Jerry Generazzo (Jon Hamm), the local mayor whose passion project is to build a beltway that will help to reduce commutes by four whole minutes! And where will a portion of that beltway cut through? The glade, of course.

Mabel is naturally indignant and determined to save her beloved glade. But the only way to do so is to re-introduce animal life into the area, since they have all mysteriously disappeared. She discovers that one of her college professors has developed "hopping" technology, that allows users to jump into a very life-life robot replica of an animal and then interact directly with animals. So, Mabel "hops" into a beaver, and sets off to convince animals to return to the glade and help her defeat Jerry.

I've barely scratched the surface here - the plot is so deliciously twisty and inventive that you really need to experience it for yourself. And like any great Pixar film, while there are cute animals and gorgeous animation to satisfy kids, there are a lot of poignant observations about seeking meaning in your life, having to regulate your emotions, and the dangers of end-stage capitalism, to make it very resonant for adults. I didn't bawl during this film, but tears definitely threatened to make an appearance at various stages. This is such a sweet, funny, and captivating movie - hop to it!

February Binges Part 2: A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms & Wonder Man

So many new shows to watch, so little time. This month, my husband and I miraculously found two shows we both wanted to watch and have now finished them, so it's your turn to give them a try!

Wonder Man: Yes, it's another Marvel show, but I swear, it's great! Created by Destin Daniel Cretton and Andrew Guest, this is a short and sweet eight-episode miniseries about Simon Williams (the divine Yahya Abdul-Mateen II), a struggling actor in LA who has been waiting to get his big break for years, but keeps getting the rug pulled out from under him. It probably doesn't help that he gets way too into his own head and his acting process and can become a tad difficult to work with, even if he just has a bit part. Enter Trevor Slattery (the divine Ben Kingsley), the man who was assumed to be the terrorist, the Mandarin, in Iron Man 3, only for the world to discover he was just a struggling British actor who auditioned for this terrorist role and had no idea he was colluding with actual villains. Do I remember any of this from a movie that came out in 2013? Hell no. But did I happily just go along with it so I could watch this hilarious odd couple run around LA doing auditions for a new superhero movie called Wonder Man? Hell yes.

This is a very LA show and a very fun insight into how actors struggle to find work, and all the changes wrought by the pandemic, like self-tape studios. There's a lot of discussion about process, as Trevor tries to help Simon loosen up some more so he can show the world just how great an actor he is. But of course, there's still a lot of action and drama, because it turns out Simon's powers may not just be limited to his acting ability. The show has many twists and turns, so I'll let you wind your way through them for yourself. Episode 4, Doorman, is a particularly odd and wonderful extravaganza. This show is a Marvel TV classic, kind of kooky and fantastical, but grounded in great characters with actors doing their best work and having a lot of fun. It's a short and sweet treat and I highly recommend it.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: Yes, it's a spin-off of Game of Thrones, but it's nothing like Game of Thrones or House of the Dragon. Created by Ira Parker and George R. R. Martin, it's based on a series of novellas by Martin, and takes place 90 years before the events of Game of Thrones. It tells the very small but potent story of Dunk (Peter Claffey), a gangly, poor, and naive hedge knight who is making his way to a tourney to see if he can joust his way into glory. Along the way, he picks up a young, bald urchin named Egg (Dexter Sol Ansell, giving the performance of a lifetime), who desperately wants to be Dunk's squire and will not take no for an answer.

The show is only six episodes long, and each episode is about a half hour, so it goes down smooth. It's quite comical, because Dunk has no idea what's he doing, he and Egg are frequently exasperated with each other, and yet you are fervently rooting for them to succeed in this wild and terrible world where everyone is just scrabbling for a better existence. There are a lot of vibes, but when the action gets going, it gets going with a bang and you'll be on the edge of your seat. I can't wholeheartedly recommend the show, because I did find the pacing to be a little stop-and-start and I am not that invested in the wider Thrones universe. But I loved the actors and the (mostly) lighter tone of the proceedings, so I will certainly tune in to Season 2 when it comes out.

January Movies Part 1: Marty Supreme, Avatar: Fire and Ash, Mrs.

I'll be honest, I saw two of these movies in December. But hey, it's hard to blog over New Year's. If you're interested in an awards contender, a blockbuster, and a quiet Hindi movie, this blog post will satisfy all your desires.

Marty Supreme: Directed by Josh Safdie, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Ronald Bronstein, this movie stars Timothee Chalamet as Marty Mauser, loosely based on the real-life Marty Reisman, who was a US table tennis champion. Set in 1952, we follow Marty's utterly chaotic life in New York City, as a man who doesn't have anyone believing in him, but that's OK, because he sure does believe in himself. The man is a hustler, figuring out any angle he can use to scrape up some cash so he can fly around the world to participate in table tennis tournaments and make a name for himself.

I genuinely wanted this to just be a table tennis movie. There are two sequences in this film, one towards the middle, another towards the end, when you get to watch Marty play table tennis against some of the best players in the world, and those sequences brought me so much joy. But the sport is secondary. This is Chalamet's Oscar vehicle, and he is going to do some Acting! This character is frenetic, whiny, always on the move, and always trying to scam someone out of something. He also gets an assist from the great Odessa A'zion who plays his childhood friend and eventual baby mama, Rachel, a woman who seems very sympathetic at the beginning, but then you realize she might be Marty's equal. Gwyneth Paltrow also stars as an actress who has an affair with Marty for her pleasure and his gain. Does this movie pass the Bechdel test? Of course not. 

I didn't love or hate this film. Chalamet is a powerhouse, but the story felt overwrought and never managed to win me over. It often felt like we were getting a bunch of hyper-intense set pieces that Safdie was struggling to string together into a coherent narrative. Also, 150 minutes tends to breach my tolerance for watching a man who is full of himself. It's a good movie, but in my opinion, certainly not a great one.

Avatar: Fire and Ash: Speaking of men who are full of themselves, writer-director James Cameron is back with yet another installment of the Avatar franchise. Do I remember anything that happened in the previous movies? No. Do I remember anything that happened in this movie despite having seen it just a few weeks ago? Barely.

At 3 hours and 15 minutes, this is yet another bloated extravaganza, that increasingly feels like I'm watching a video game, rather than a movie. This time we are introduced to the Mangkwan, an aggressive Na'vi tribe that live in a volcano and want to partner with humans to dominate the rest of the Na'vi. They are led by Varang (played by Oona Chaplin), and it's just more of the same with the Na'vi tribes having to battle the exploitative humans, environmentalism vs. ruthless capitalism, and Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) having to manage his wife and children and save all the Na'vi all over again.

These movies feel like they could just be AI-generated at this point, and obviously I do not care for them. Are they visually spectacular? Of course. But is that enough to sustain that runtime with clunky dialogue and actors who feel like they're just phoning in a performance so they can make bank? Nope.

Mrs.: Every Christmas, I meet a bunch of my relatives on Long Island. And this year, they were all shocked to discover I had never watched the Hindi movie, Mrs. (that is a remake of a 2021 Malayalam film called The Great Indian Kitchen). Naturally I had to go home immediately and watch this film. 

Written by Harman Baweja and Anu Singh Choudhary and directed by Arati Kadav (shoutout to female directors!), the movie stars Sanya Malhotra as Richa, a vivacious woman who enters into an arranged marriage with a seemingly nice and attentive doctor named Diwakar (Nishant Dahiya). As is custom, she moves into his house to live with his parents, and quickly discovers that the daughter-in-law is expected to spend all her time either helping her mother-in-law prepare mountains of food for the men of the house, or cleaning the house and ensuring it is clean enough to meet her father-in-law's exacting standards.

Richa starts out happy and excited about her new married life, but as the daily routine grinds her down, she realizes that her husband expects her to be nothing better than a housemaid and cook. Oh and of course, to have his babies, which turns sex into an increasingly dreaded activity. There's nothing particularly novel about this film, as it comments on the usual patriarchal bullshit that women wade through in traditional Indian households. But what is refreshing is Malhotra's commanding performance as a woman who is slowly driven to despair. You can see the light dimming from her eyes over the course of this movie: but don't worry. She does eventually fight for herself and reclaim her autonomy. It's a sad movie with a happy ending and packs an emotional wallop. Seek it out if you can.

December Binges Part 2: I Love LA, Pluribus, Heated Rivalry

So much TV! We really do love to see (binge) it. Last week, a bunch of shows I have been watching week-to-week had their finales, and every single one was a doozy. So now I can recommend them all to you!

I Love LA: I've been in the tank for Rachel Sennot ever since I first saw her in Shiva Baby, so how could I not love this ridiculous show that she has created and stars in? Sennot plays Maia, an anxious woman who moved from New York to LA to build her career as a manager of social media influencers and is finding it very difficult to figure out exactly how things work in this city. When her best friend Tallulah (Odessa A'zion) also moves to LA, Maia returns to becoming her manager, and the two of them wreak absolute chaos across the town while Maia's hapless, normie boyfriend Dylan (Josh Hutcherson) has no idea what is going on. True Whitaker and Jordan Firstman round out the cast as Maia's friends Alani and Charlie, who each have their own classic LA journeys as a nepo baby and a stylist.

This show captures the crazy world of influencers (how is this an actual job?), the difficulty of catching a break in this insanely fickle city, and the constant Gen Z hustle for things that don't matter that much but feel extremely important and vital in the moment. It probably shouldn't have been my cup of tea at all, but again, I have this fascination for anything that Sennot does, and A'zion is also a revelation. Frankly, my mouth was just agape every episode when I saw what Tallulah was wearing, so the bizarre costume design is worth the price of admission all on its own. I do not relate to these characters at all, but boy are they fun to watch. Won't you join me?!

Pluribus: Created by Vince Gilligan and starring Rhea Seehorn, we all knew from the jump that this show was going to be excellent, right? Well, the high expectations were perfectly matched. The plot is wonderfully fantastical - all of humanity has been infected by an alien virus resulting in the "Joining." Every human being is now connected as one big hive mind and can access each other's memories and experiences across the globe. They all act as one and are supposedly benevolent and non-violent, unable to even pluck an apple from a tree because they cannot kill any living thing. But for some unknown reason, thirteen human beings were immune to this event and have retained their individuality, one of whom is Carol (Seehorn), a misanthropic romance novelist, who doesn't trust the Others one bit and is desperate to figure out how she could undo the Joining. 

It's twisty, it's complex, it's full of long dialogue-less sequences where you're trying to figure out what Carol is up to until her ultimate plan is finally revealed. It's all very Gilligan-esque and glorious. The first season has a lot of scene-setting and information doled out in constant drips as Carol builds up a picture of what the Others can and cannot do, but in the final episodes, she may have found a partner-in-crime to help her on this supposedly futile quest to save humanity/herself. It's a race against time as the Others are also trying to figure out a way to infect Carol and the remaining immune humans. So who will succeed? And how?! These are the questions that will keep you coming back to this show week to week, or in this case, for one big satisfying binge. I cannot wait for Season 2.

Heated Rivalry: If your social media hasn't been blowing up in the past month with people raving about Heated Rivalry, then congratulations, we are being serviced by very different algorithms. Created by Jacob Tierney, who adapted the show from Rachel Reid's Game Changers book series about a bunch of closeted gay hockey players, this small little Canadian show has become an absolute sensation. I was sick a few weekends ago and decided to get caught up on the first five episodes that were out. I'll confess, I was unimpressed after the first two episodes, as the show just came off as soft gay porn and didn't seem to have much emotion behind it. But my god. Things took a turn in Episode 3, and when I finished Episode 5, I too, like half the nation, was desperately awaiting the finale on Boxing Day. And boy did that finale not disappoint. It was a celebration of queer love, and was so deeply charming and moving and wonderful. Sigh. I couldn't get enough.

The show stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie as Shane and Ilya, Canadian and Russian hockey players who start having illicit (and very explicit) encounters during their rookie season and proceed to spend several years quietly hooking up while never telling anyone else what they're doing and not really acknowledging to each other if this is just one very long booty call. The time jumps are disorienting and the lack of any real communication between the two of them is frustrating, but don't worry, because that will all get beautifully resolved at the end. My social media timeline is currently full of charming interviews with these two actors, and they full deserve this sudden stardom when just a few months ago they were waiting tables and struggling with their careers. It's going to be a long wait for the next season, but get caught up on the hype now - you'll thank me later. Happy New Year!

November Movies Part 2: The Running Man, Die My Love, Wicked: For Good

There are a lot of movies to watch this month so let's dive right into two blockbusters and some arthouse cinema!

The Running Man: This film was directed by Edgar Wright, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Michael Bacall (adapting Stephen King's 1982 novel, which already had a film adaptation in 1982, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, which I have not seen, so this review will not help you with any comparisons). This is classic dystopian fiction about a man who is forced into a brutal game for the entertainment of the masses while he is just trying to win a fortune so his family can live a healthy and comfortable life. In this case, the man is Ben Richards (played by the charming as ever Glen Powell), a troublemaker who is always chafing against the restrictions placed by his capitalist corporate overlords, and who is therefore blacklisted from various jobs and struggling to make ends meet. In desperation, he applies to be on The Running Man, a TV show where contestants must try to hide and evade public capture for 30 days, winning money for every single day they are successful. But of course, no one has ever made it all the way to 30 days. Will Ben be the first to succeed?!

There are a lot of parallels to The Hunger Games, with Josh Brolin playing the evil executive who runs the TV network and is all about manipulating this show to garner huge audience ratings, i.e. President Snow; while Colman Domingo is having a whale of a time as the host of the show, giving it his best Caesar Flickerman energy. But overall, this movie is a bit of a disappointment. Yes, there are some good action sequences and fun chases, and the production design by Marcus Rowland is grand, but it certainly starts to overstay its welcome and has a very weird tone throughout. It's occasionally trying to be a comedy, but then the subject matter is quite dark and earnest, and I don't think Powell quite figures out how to make his performance work. He does get quite unclothed in one scene though, so I guess the studio executives figured that would be enough to satisfy audiences. This is not a great movie, but if you enjoy dystopian action, this is certainly not the worst way to spend your afternoon.

Die My Love: Directed by Lynne Ramsay, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Edna Walsh and Alice Birch, this is a wild movie about a couple, Jackson and Grace (Robert Pattinson and Jennifer Lawrence), who move from New York to a rural home in Montana and have a baby. And then Grace absolutely loses her shit, presumably in post-partum psychosis, but also maybe just from living a life of seclusion with only Jackson's family for company.

I have just read the Wikipedia plot summary of this film in preparation for this review and now have a better handle on what it was I actually watched for two hours. If it's not clear yet, I did NOT like this movie. It is supremely vibey, with the vibes being, having a baby and an absent partner and living in the middle of Montana makes life hard, which...duh. Lawrence spends the entirety of this film either being horny, angry, naked, or inflicting grave bodily injury upon herself, which is not a particularly fun experience after the first hour. Lakeith Stanfield is also in this movie, very briefly, and I honestly cannot tell you what the point of his character was. This is definitely a gorgeous movie that is shot beautifully and has very interesting and unsettling set pieces. But was I interested in the story at any point? Nope. 

Wicked: For Good: Director Jon M. Chu is back with the long-awaited sequel of last year's Wicked: Part 1. And as expected, it's not as good as the first movie, as the musical's first act is famously much stronger than the second. So, if you go into it with those mediocre expectations, you should be in for a perfectly good time. Honestly, you could just read my review of the first movie and apply that here - I was still stunned by the production design, and those costumes continue to bewitch me body and soul. But boy is the music lacking in this installment. There's a reason it's subtitled "For Good" - that song is honestly the only one that sticks in my memory from the entire movie.

Of course, the acting continues to be top notch, and we get to see Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo really sink their teeth into these characters and bring out all their complexities, particularly Galinda who is walking an insane tightrope of being complicit with the evil Wizard and Madame Morrible, and trying to justify all her actions despite the continual danger they bring to her best friend. Jonathan Bailey, newly crowned as People's Sexiest Man Alive, certainly lives up to the moniker in this installment, basically swanning around as Anthony Bridgerton and being perfectly swoon-worthy. Overall, this is a satisfying movie and a worthy kick-off to the onslaught of holiday blockbusters. It's the most wonderful time of the year!

November Movies Part 1: Dead of Winter, Bugonia, Frankenstein

Alright, the theaters and streaming services are filling up with new movies and I'm on a quest to watch them all. Ready to join me?!

Dead of Winter: Written by Nicholas Jacobson-Larson and Dalton Leeb and directed by Brian Kirk, this is an icy and compelling story about Barb, a widow in Minnesota (played by Emma Thompson, doing her best Marge Gunderson impression) who is travelling to a remote lake in the middle of a snowstorm. Along the way, she stumbles across a kidnapping and now must attempt to rescue the young woman who has been kidnapped. And of course, she has no cell service and there aren't any people around, so she's going to have to get creative.

I would watch anything Thompson is in, and she unsurprisingly delivers a powerhouse performance as this innovative and courageous woman. Throughout the film we also get flashbacks of her younger self falling in love with her husband and the two of them building their life together, which makes for a very bittersweet narrative. I won't go into much more detail about the kidnapping, but let's just say that this film also stars Judy Greer in a particularly villainous turn, which is finally an appropriate use of Judy Greer as a proper co-star in a movie, and not just playing a supportive best friend or weepy mom. This is a taut, spare, and thrilling movie, with many compelling twists and turns, and it's the perfect treat if you're looking for more women-centered pictures that pack a bit of a punch.

Bugonia: Written by Will Tracy (who based it on a Korean movie by Jang Joon-hwan named Save the Green Planet!) and directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, this is a wonderfully weird and creepy movie about a man named Teddy (Jesse Plemons), who convinces his cousin Don (Aidan Delbis) to help him kidnap Michelle Fuller (Emma Stone), the wealthy CEO of a pharmaceutical company. Why is he kidnapping her? Because he is certain that she is actually an Andromedan, an alien masquerading as a human who is manipulating the entire human race to do the bidding of her alien race and consequently ruining human existence.

The premise may be absurd, but oh boy, none of the sentiment will feel out of the ordinary to you. This movie hits deep about how people get radicalized on the Internet, delving deep into conspiracy theories, and then attack the powerful in a bid to right socioeconomic wrongs. Stone delivers a brilliant performance here, initially thoroughly confused by these wild accusations, then attempting to placate this troubled man, and finally calling the shots and masterfully manipulating him in a desperate bid to escape. The movie mostly consists of Plemons and Stone talking at each other and it's an acting masterclass that crawls under your skin and leaves you wanting more. Of course, this is still a movie directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, so if this is your first time watching his work, please expect it to take some...unexpected turns. This movie further confirms that I prefer his work when he's a director but not the writer, because as weird as this movie might be, it's not as weird as it would be if Lanthimos were penning the script himself. And that's really saying something.

Frankenstein: Written and directed by Guillermo del Toro, this is a faithful adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel, with Oscar Isaac playing the titular doctor, and an unrecognizable Jacob Elordi playing his creation. Many years ago, I watched the National Theater's production of Frankenstein with Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller alternating the roles of Frankenstein and the Creature on different nights, and this movie felt very similar to that stage play. Except, of course, it is so much more epic in its vast scope and cinematography. Production designer Tamara Deverell and costume designer Kate Hawley had better be getting nominations on Oscar night, if not outright taking the statuettes home, because this is one of the most stunning movies I have seen in a long time. The gothic vibe reminded me a great deal of Crimson Peak, another drop-dead gorgeous del Toro movie, starring a different woman named Mia (in this movie, Mia Goth plays Elizabeth, the unfortunate woman who is going to get tangled up in Frankenstein's machinations).

This movie is two and half hours long and your mileage may vary if you are expecting something innovative story-wise. Del Toro is not interested in any reinterpretations or twists here - this is a classic story and he's going to tell it classically. I, for one, was completely on board from start to finish. Elordi delivers an incredible physical performance as the Creature initially stumbles into life and then has to contend with the fact that he might never die. Isaac is perfect as the crazed doctor, obsessed with proving his brilliance but lacking any ounce of empathy to actually do any good once he brings his Creature to life. And Mia Goth is a classic gothic heroine, virginal but intelligent and fascinated by the Creature, and bringing a little lust into the proceedings. But the British accents by all these non-British actors are a little iffy, so be warned if that's a pet peeve. Otherwise, no notes. I think Mary Shelley would be proud.

October Movies Part 3: Good Fortune & Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere

Do you want to go out for a light comedy? Or wallow in an intense drama? The world is your oyster!

Good Fortune: Written and directed by Aziz Ansari, who also stars, this is a story about Arj (Ansari), a struggling down-on-his-luck documentary filmmaker in Los Angeles who is relying on the gig economy to stay afloat. He is living out of his car and driving around LA to make food deliveries and run errands for anyone who will pay him, and one day he crosses paths with Jeff (Seth Rogen), a super-rich tech investor who lives in a swanky mansion in the hills and appears to be living his best life. Oh and also, Arj has a guardian angel, Gabriel (Keanu Reeves, in an excellent piece of casting). 

Now, Gabriel has a very specific remit as a guardian angel - he is in charge of preventing accidents from texting and driving. That's it, he's not meant to get more involved than that. But, when he sees how Arj is struggling, and begins to worry that he might be a suicidal "lost soul," he decides to take matters into his own hands. Which leads to Arj swapping lives with Jeff, which doesn't quite have the restorative, life-affirming effect that Gabriel was expecting.

If you've seen the trailer for this movie, you've pretty much experienced the entire film. The movie is still charming AF though, and Ansari, Rogen, and Reeves are an excellent trio, playing off of each other in funny and unexpected ways. The always charismatic Keke Palmer also puts in an appearance as Elena, a co-worker and love interest of Arj's who is the voice of reason as he seeks to live out his bougiest fantasies. The movie does end with a bit of a whimper, and Ansari can't quite write himself out of the predicament his script has placed him in a way that feels particularly honest. Nonetheless, it's a diverting and sweet movie about why we all need to be socialists. Eat the rich!

Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere: Written and directed by Scott Cooper, based off the book by Warren Zanes, this is the story of Bruce Springsteen (played with customary angst and stoicism by Jeremy Allen White) during the creation of his 1982 album, Nebraska. Springsteen is just coming off a highly successful concert tour, and he has rented a home back in New Jersey to slow down and take stock of what he wants to do next professionally. His manager, Jon Landau (played by the equally stoic Jeremy Strong), is looking out for him, but is also keen to discuss his next album. He's excited when Bruce starts preparing a demo in his house, unaccompanied and using a four-track recorder. But that demo contains a dramatic shift in Springsteen's usual rock n' roll, and what follows is a challenging process of deciding how to record this album and market it to the executives who are not going to be happy about this change in musical style.

Personally, Springsteen is going through a deep depression, reflecting on his childhood, his abusive father (played with complicated menace by Stephen Graham), and his blue-collar roots, all of which influence the deeply dark and personal songs on this new album. He meets a new woman named Faye (Odessa Young, in a somewhat thankless role as an amalgamation of all the women Bruce dated during this period in his life when he was a lost soul), and while like all tortured artists he tries to distract himself with their relationship, he finds that he simply cannot outrun his demons.

This movie is a bit of a slog. If you love Bruce's music, and particularly this album, it might be a real treat, but as someone who barely knows any Springsteen music, and certainly nothing from this album, the entire film just feels like a very somber treatise on depression and the artistic process. It's perhaps telling that the only time I got excited is when we see him record Born in the USA halfway through the film, before things settle back into melancholy. There isn't much plot here, and while White and Strong are delivering great performances and showcase a beautiful friendship between these two men, it felt like this movie was stuck in one gear throughout and grinded through. There's a scene at the very end when Bruce's mask finally breaks, and that was probably the most powerful moment of the film for me, but at that point I had already sat through two hours of rather humdrum storytelling. Ultimately, this movie might be worth it if you're a fan of the Boss, but otherwise, this is not going to be worth your while. 

September Movies Part 1: Caught Stealing, The Thursday Murder Club, Elio, Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale

We're halfway through September and I'm catching up on movies on streaming and in the theater. What are you craving? Period British drama, modern British mystery, 1998 New York crime caper, or fantastical Pixar animation? I've got it all!

Caught Stealing: Written by Charlie Huston (who adapted it from his novel) and directed by Darren Aronofsky, this is a movie about what happens when Hank (Austin Butler), a bartender living in the Lower East Side of Manhattan (Alphabet City to be precise) in 1998, unwittingly gets caught up in a lot of trouble when his neighbor, Russ (Matt Smith) leaves town and asks Hank to look after his cat. Turns out Russ was working for a bunch of drug dealers and had something they really want, and now those bad guys are all convinced Hank was working with Russ and could be persuaded to part with that information via violent means.

The movie gets a little bloody, and there's a lot of cringey body horror as various people try to torture Hank for his intel. The body count starts to go up, and yet everything is told with a bit of a comic spin. The content is bleak, but the tone is farcical, and you'll happily follow Austin Butler along on this ride through the grimy New York of yesteryear. I can't say the film is particularly memorable once you leave the theater, but while you're in there, you'll have a great time.

The Thursday Murder Club: If you're a fan of Richard Osman's British murder series, then rejoice, because the movie adaptation has arrived on Netflix, with a screenplay by Katy Brand and Suzanne Heathcote and directed by Chris Columbus. The cast is astonishingly good, with Helen Mirren, Celia Imrie, Pierce Brosnan, and Ben Kingsley playing Elizabeth, Joyce, Ron, and Ibrahim, four pensioners living in a retirement community, who have unusually decided to pursue a hobby of gathering together on Thursdays to discuss unsolved cold cases. However, when someone they know is murdered, they decide they're going to partner up with the police (sometimes against the police's will) to solve this brand-new case.

I loved the book, but watching the movie did make me realize how incredibly complex the plot is. While this cast is charming, this seems like the type of murder mystery that is fun to curl up with on the couch and read, rather than try and condense into a two-hour film. However, if reading is not your thing, this movie certainly does the source material justice and will give you a good idea of why this series is so popular, with the fifth installment due to be released at the end of the month (yes, I have already reserved it at the library and cannot wait!). After all, there can never be too many British mysteries in the world.

Elio: This movie came and went from theaters and it has taken me a long time to get around to catching it on streaming. Written by Julia Cho, Mark Hammer, and Mike Jones, and directed by Madeline Sharafian and Domee Shi, this is a story about a young boy named Elio Solis, who was orphaned and now lives with his very overwhelmed aunt who is an Air Force major. Obviously, with that tragic backstory, this kid keeps to himself and doesn't have any friends. But he does have a deep and abiding love for space, and firmly believes aliens exist who could maybe provide him with a way out of his depressing existence on Earth. Well, turns out aliens do exist, Elio does get to meet them, and when he is accidentally mistaken for Earth's leader, things start to spiral out of control.

The plot of this movie is extremely fantastical. The animation is all beautiful as you would expect of any Pixar film, but the story is a bit trite, really hammering home the themes of loneliness and parenting failures. It's all very inventive but it's all somehow still boring, which is astonishing for such an original concept. The tragic backstory felt too classic Disney for me, and even aliens and the threat of galactic warfare couldn't save it from being maudlin and prosaic. Watch this if you love animation and want to be a Pixar completist, but otherwise, this is not their best work.

Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale: Speaking of maudlin and prosaic...welcome back to Downton Abbey! I went to the premiere of the 2019 movie, and we all thought that was the end of this franchise, but Julian Fellowes has returned for one last (maybe?) time to follow the fortunes of the Grantham family in 1930. Everyone's back and hitting all the same character beats - Lady Mary (Michelle Dockery) is going through a scandalous divorce and is being shunned by all of polite society, the Earl of Grantham (Hugh Bonneville) is worried about money and continues to be incensed that the world is continuing to modernize and render his way of life obsolete, and Paul Giamatti enters the fray as Cora's (Elizabeth McGovern) brother from America, who has been helping to settle their dead mother's estate and is now in London to share the terms of the inheritance. 

There are also many plot lines involving the staff of course, with Carson (Jim Carter) and Mrs. Patmore (Lesley Nicol) due to retire and pass on their duties to the next generation. It's wonderful to see how these characters have grown and come into their own over the years, and while this movie is plainly just a bit of fan service, you can consider this fan fully served. My favorite part was when Edith (Laura Carmichael) declared "Is he also Turkish?" and all of us in the theater chuckled at this callback to Mr. Pamuk from Season 1. If you know, you know, and if you don't know, do not watch this movie!