Gratuitously Fun ‘NOBODY’ a Reverse John Wick Where Bob Odenkirk Kicks All the Ass

March 23, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Bob Odenkirk, Christopher Lloyd, Connie Nielsen, Derek Kolstad, Ilya Naishuller, Nobody, Out in Theaters, Pawel Pogorzelski, Reviews, RZA 1 Comment

You’ve seen it all before: a middle-aged off-the-grid specialist gets forced out of retirement when circumstances beyond their control stir up their humdrum life and curry them back onto a path of violence. Bryan Mills had a particular set of skills and hit the ground running when his daughter was kidnapped by Albanian human traffickers while John Wick’ skill with any sized caliber weapon came into sharp focus when Russian criminals killed his dog. In Nobody, no one has to kidnap his daughter or slay his pup to get Bob Odenkirk’s Hutch Mansell all fired up, his pent-up rage and years of living live on his belly reaching a tipping point when some amateur home invaders break into the wrong house. Like a nobody should, he does nothing. Read More

Nightmares ‘COME TRUE’ in Genuinely Scary Sleepwalk Through the Subconscious

March 10, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Anthony Scott Burns, Come True, Daniel Weissenberger, Horror, Julia Sarah Stone, Landon Liboiron, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Tedra Rogers Leave a comment

A few nights into a mysterious university sleep study, Sarah finds herself perusing a bookshop, pulled towards the Phillip K. Dick entries on the shelf. Jeremy, her primary researcher and maybe-stalker, suggests she give Dick a read, referring to his work as “hauntingly sad”. This description – hauntingly sad – accurately captures the weirdly affecting (and low-key terrifying) tonality of Come True, a descent into sleep paralysis and ancestral nightmares coming to life. Vividly tragic, but always in a darkly unspeakable way, Come True captures that in-between realm separating sleep and dreams and twists it into a malevolent manifesto about the collective terror that lingers in the mysterious netherworld of slumber. Read More

Sprawling Opioid Drama ‘CHERRY’ a Sometimes Entertaining Jumbled Mess

February 25, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Angela Russo-Otstot, Anthony Russo, Cherry, Ciara Bravo, Damon Wayans Jr., Forrest Goodluck, Jack Reynor, Jessica Goldberg, Joe Russo, Michael Gandolfini, Nico Walker, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Tom Holland 1 Comment

Once you pop you just can’t stop. Or so goes the philosophy of the Joe and Anthony Russo when it comes to telling the story of a college-drop-out turned bank-robbing, dope-addicted war vet in Cherry. The directorial pair who rose to the highest of box office heights helming a handful of Marvel’s most critical and commercial smashes (including the last two Avengers mega-hits) prove uneasy with actual drama. Their telling of Nico Walker’s semi-autobiographical best-seller of the same name – adapted in part by screenwriters Angela Russo-Otstot and Jessica Goldberg, is meandering and unjustifiable long-winded. Read More

God Save the Elderly Because Rosamund Pike is Here to Swallow Them Whole in Wicked ‘I CARE A LOT’

February 23, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Chris Messina, Dianne Wiest, Eiza González, I Care a Lot, J Blakeson, Out in Theaters, Peter Dinklage, Reviews, Rosamund Pike Leave a comment

J Blakeson’s I Care a Lot wears a lot of hats. What starts as a genuinely electrifying satire centered around a morally repugnant legal guardian who grifts the elderly out of their assets and autonomy slinks into all kinds of genre territory; becoming at various points a pulpy thriller, a tongue-in-cheek dark comedy, and a pointed takedown of our national tendency to slide the old and aging out of public view. It is at times trying to do too many things, and is noticeably better in certain arenas than others, but when Blakeson’s lampoon of carnivorous capitalism sinks its teeth in deep and his performers rein fire and brimstone down upon each other, I Care a Lot‘s fiendish joys are simply irresistible. Read More

Tender ‘MINARI’ Tells a Specific Story of Family Struggle With Universal Appeal

February 9, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Alan Kim, Lee Isaac Chung, Minari, Noel Kate Cho, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Steven Yeun, Youn Yuh-jung 1 Comment

The pull of the American Dream lies at the heart of Lee Isaac Chung’s Minari, a story about a Korean immigrant family seeking out their chunk of economic ascension on Arkansas farmland. Steven Yeun (The Walking Dead) is Jacob Yi, an uncompromising patriarch dedicated to leaving his illustrious career of chicken sexing behind (more on this later) to grow crops from back home for the ever-increasing Korean-American population. Read More

Sundance 2021: Stalker Thriller ‘SUPERIOR’ An Identity-Driven Throwback to the 80s

January 30, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews Tagged Alexandra Mesa, Ani Mesa, Erin Vassilopoulos, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Sundance, Sundance 2021, Superior 1 Comment

The year is 1987. Halloween is on the horizon. You can tell because there’s a calendar hanging in the kitchen marking down the days. More importantly, the footage of Erin Vassilopoulos’ Superior is intentionally dated-looking, reflecting the lo-fi technology and grainy look of the end of the Regan era. After escaping a dangerous ex, Mary retreats to her unsuspecting identical twin sister’s suburban home, the perfect (and only) hideout she can think of in her unsuspecting Middle America hometown. Read More

Devotion is Cursed In A24’s Latest Great Horror ‘SAINT MAUD’

January 28, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged A24, Jennifer Ehle, Morfydd Clark, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Rose Glass, Saint Maud 3 Comments

“Never waste your pain” Maud (Morfydd Clark) advises, her voice rarely rising above a whisper, even in voiceover. A devout palliative nurse with quite a bit of emotional baggage, Maud searches desperately for meaning. More often than not, she finds that meaning in her own pain; pain suffered in the name of God. With Amanda (Jennifer Ehle), an ex-dancer knocking on the doorstep of the afterlife, she just might have found her purpose on this earth: to redeem and purify. Saving a soul proves nasty business, especially as intimate personal relationships blossom, but Maud will stop short of nothing to do just that, consequences be damned. Read More

Brutal ‘WRONG TURN’ A Hugely Enjoyable Franchise Detour into Wild Backwoods Schlock

January 25, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Adian Bradley, Alan B. McElroy, Bill Sage, Charlotte Vega, Dylan McTee, Horror, Matthew Modine, Mike P. Nelson, Movies, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Wrong Turn 2 Comments

A spin-off in name only, Wrong Turn (2021), from relative newcomer director Mike P. Nelson, takes the cult inbred-cannibal horror franchise in a totally new direction, pivoting away from the signature cornerstones of the slasher series towards something just as unflinching, addictive, and brutal but one that’s meant to be taken more seriously. And with no apparent cannibalism. Read More

‘THE FATHER’ Strands Audiences in the Cruel Grasp of Dementia

January 5, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Anthony Hopkins, Florian Zeller, Imogen Poots, Olivia Colman, Out in Theaters, Reviews, The Father 1 Comment

A formal experiment in the mental unraveling genre that boasts a tour de force Anthony Hopkins performance, The Father explores the existential horror of memories gone to soup. Begging audiences to step into the shoes of those experiencing Alzheimer’s, the debut film from writer-director Florian Zeller is an experiment in witnessing first-hand the cruelty of a disease that strips one’s mental facilities down to the nub. Read More

Heartbreaking ‘PIECES OF A WOMAN’ Kicks the Dead Horse

December 31, 2020 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Benny Safdie, Ellen Burstyn, Kata Wéber, Kornél Mundruczó, Molly Parker, Out in Theaters, Pieces of a Woman, Reviews, Sarah Snook, Shia LaBeouf, Vanessa Kirby 1 Comment

Emotional devastation is something everyone living through 2020 is too well acquainted with but Kornél Mundruczó’s tearjerking Pieces of a Woman suggests that things can always be worse. The Hungarian White God writer and director paints a tumultuous portrait of a husband and wife undergoing an incredible loss with unflinching precision, using a voyeuristic approach to nestle into their most personal, private moments and translating it to the screen in a novel, wholly disturbing manner. Read More