A tight and satisfying little horror film. The bloody denouement doesn’t really make sense–this isn’t Hitchcock or Wait Until Dark–but the more realistic tension is in the marriage: how can the husband bring his bride to Bucharest, where she knows no one and doesn’t speak the language, and ignore her isolation? Santa Barbara-born Maika Monroe is in every scene and, helped by the score, conveys terror while looking pleasantly gorgeous.
A ridiculous cartoon version of Elvis Presley’s life that, amazingly, is neither fun to watch or listen to. The real Elvis was sexy, dangerous and larger than life; Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis is mild, pretty and vanilla, a seeming leftover from the cast of Beverly Hills 90210. Elvis’s stage presence and movements were electric; Austin Butler’s hip-wiggles and shimmies just look silly. Perhaps worst of all: with one of the greatest musical catalogues of all time presumably available, Luhrmann repeatedly trots out two of Elvis’s least melodic songs–That’s All Right, Mama and Hound Dog–and covers the credits with hip-hop! Instead of Don’t Be Cruel, Love Me Tender, Marie’s the Name, Don’t, I Want You, Need You, Love You, All Shook Up, I Can’t Help Falling in Love, etc., we are force-fed the odious character of Col. Tom Parker. Tom Hanks is hard to watch on a good day, but adding 100 pounds around his middle, eventually removing his hair and giving him a stupid, from-nowhere accent made me back off the picture every time he showed up–and for some reason Luhrmann has chosen to tell the story through Parker’s ugly eyes. In the end, this is more a horror film–The Grip of the Zombie–than a film that was either joyous or tragic about Elvis. As the NY Times reviewer noted: Elvis is as much a biopic as “Heartbreak Hotel” is a Yelp review.
A one-joke movie (if you can call it a “joke”) that proceeds slowly, in a direct line, without subplot or supporting cast (maybe a Covid project?). As adroit as Emma Thompson’s acting is, her character is scarcely believable, from premise to finish. If, on the other hand, you take this as a Disney fantasy, and look on “Nancy Stokes” as a flesh-and-blood version of Jasmine, or Ariel or Elsa (names I’m making up), then you might find this charming, especially, I think, if you’re a woman.
Predictable, cliched, unrealistic and a total throwback, but what a pleasure, after Petite Maman, Everything Everywhere, and Crimes of the Future, to see a movie that made us cheer, laugh and cry, all on cue. Jennifer Connelly is a treat on the eyes, Tom Cruise is Tom Cruise, the supporting cast, led by Jon Hamm, is fun. Moral issues about war are minimized by never naming or showing the, literally, faceless enemy. In fact, despite all the action shots of aerial dogfights, the bigger enemy is the military bureaucracy. We can all unite against that!
In 50 minutes I couldn’t make out the premise, and the characters, action and language (Chinese) were so unpleasant that we figured anything we might do at home would be more fun.
A “love story” without chemistry set in a fairly bleak future world where public surgery to remove spontaneously growing extraneous organs is the hot ticket. This resembles a George Saunders short story or a Remedios Varo painting on steroids. Director David Cronenberg is the master of the “body horror” genre. One has to wonder why, other than a bizarre personal obsession, this exists.
A provocative documentary about whaling in the Faroe Islands–specifically, an annual (or more) slaughter of pilot whales unfortunately called a “grind.” While the killing is stomach-turning and Sea Shepherd activists politely present the arguments against, the local islanders, and the filmmakers, ask why is this different from slaughterhouse killing of the other animals we eat.
No surprises and nothing original, but in managing to tie up multiple stories with happy endings for everybody–and I mean everybody–Julian Fellowes brought a few tears to my eyes and gave us a pleasant afternoon in the movie house. Everything was a bit pat and no scene lasted more than its allotted 60 seconds; it was also helpful, maybe essential, to have the back stories of all the characters firmly in mind. But the residents of Grantham Hall have been good company for many years, and they didn’t let us down.
This one required a suspension of disbelief that I couldn’t quite muster. Or maybe it didn’t. Or maybe I missed something when the slow pace put me briefly to sleep. Two look-alike 8-year-old girls meet in the woods and I kept waiting–mercifully for only 1:18–for a plot to emerge. Three points for sincerity.
It felt like an art museum, the Watteau gallery in particular, with soldiers parading and lovers dallying. By adapting a classic play, the movie suspended disbelief and even made the songs feel integral to the plot, which they were. Peter Dinklage, of course, is not a traditional Cyrano, but again, we weren’t looking for realism once we fell under director Joe Wright’s spell. This also allowed us to cast aside contemporary feminism and appreciate the dutifully shallow Roxanne. It’s a matter of taste, but we found Cyrano sweet, especially when viewed on a theater big screen.
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