It wasn’t until about halfway through The Nest that I started to question what the latest film from Sean Durkin (Martha Marcy May Marlene) was really about. Best described as an uncomfortable familial drama, Durkin’s feature is set in the high-stakes world of status chasing. Perched in the periphery of a patriarch’s quest for large sums of money from his Trans-Contential business dealings, The Nest’s emotional center is a family suffering the ambitions of a father and his vacuous pursuit of wealth and status. Read More
X-Men Franchise Dies A Final Death With Disposable Super-Teen Flick ‘THE NEW MUTANTS’
Fox’s often venerated (and occasionally lampooned) X-Men quasi-continuity goes out with a whimper with the young-adult-led nonstarter that is The New Mutants. The 20-year old franchise has seen watermarks high and low, witness to its share of failed entires (The Last Stand, Origins: Wolverine and Apocalypse to name a few offenders) balanced out by a handful of genre-defining classics (X2, First Class, Logan). At the end of the era comes not a new low so much as a defeated shrug, as there has never been an entry that felt more identity-drained and inert than Josh Boone’s final death knell. But that’s not necessarily the sole fault of the writer-director. Read More
Blockbusting Bore ‘TENET’ Revels In Nolan’s Worst Instincts
Christopher Nolan’s fascination with time as a storytelling variable is well-documented throughout his filmography. In his breakout indie hit Memento, the story of John G and his murdered wife ran backwards with consecutive scenes taking place before what we have just watched; with Inception, dreams within dreams meant that different levels of the film’s universe occurred at different speeds creating a kind of temporal layer cake; and most recently, Dunkirk saw a major military event unfold over land, sea, and air in a matter of a week, a day and an hour, respectively, the various timelines intersecting and blending into one another. And the less said about Interstellar, wherein Nolan got all mushy over time and love, the better. This obsession with time as a resource and narrative centerpiece has finally gotten the best of Nolan in Tenet, an overblown blockbuster absolutely suffocated by tricks, bloated by exposition and wholly lacking in a human touch. Read More
Suburban Sci-Fi ‘VIVARIUM’’s Solitary Metaphor Is Stretched Way Too Thin
“I don’t like the way things are. It’s horrible.” Little did Vivarium screenwriter Garret Shanley know how piercing this sentiment might be when his film about a couple forced into seclusion was released. No one could have predicted that in the midst of the film’s rollout, the world over would be forced into mandated seclusion. Schools shuttered. Concerts, political rallies, and festivals pinched off. Everyone shut into their whatever square footage their budget affords. At least Jesse Eisenberg’s Tom and Imogen Poots’ Gemma have access to toilet paper. Read More
Inflammatory and Ultraviolent ‘THE HUNT’ Triggers Both Sides of the Aisle
Originally scheduled for release in September of last year, Craig Zobel’s satirical modern spin on “The Most Dangerous Game” factored political divisions into the equation to decidedly contentious results. The Hunt became so controversial that its release was pulled indefinitely when the President (in a totally characteristic ego trip of a move) slammed the film, calling it “a tremendous disservice to our country” and threatening that “we’re going to be very tough with them.” Soon after, the death threats came flying. Read More
Surprise! Intimate Abortion Procedural ‘NEVER RARELY SOMETIMES ALWAYS’ a Very Somber Ride
The not-so-chipper premise of Eliza Hittman’s Sundance premiere Never Rarely Sometimes Always involves a teenage Pennsylvania girl and her cousin commuting to the Big Apple in order to terminate an unwanted pregnancy. Viewers used to the seriocomic approach to the abortion flick (Obvious Child and Juno are probably the best examples of modern mainstream movies on the subject) may find Never Rarely Sometimes Always a startlingly somber and even oppressive affair, the film from Hittman shying away from any flirtation with taking the matter any less than extremely seriously at any given intersection. Not that most people associate abortions with a good laugh but, man, this movie is just about as unrelentingly unpleasant and heavy as they come. Read More
Sad Affleck: The Movie, ‘THE WAY BACK’, a Dour Character Study Dressed Up as a Sports Drama
My man Ben Affleck just can’t catch a break. His career has been a series of precipitous rises and steep plunges. From a breakout Oscar win with Good Will Hunting to the critical depths of Gigli in his whole Bennifer period, onto his comeback directorial streak (which ended in a Best Picture win for Argo) which then led into a second slump following his turn as Batman in the largely maligned DCEU. Ben’s trajectory is like the stock market during a pandemic. It just can’t decide whether to float or flounder. Read More
Trauma (and Push-Pins) Are Buried Deep in Cringy ‘SWALLOW’
An experience that’s both lurid and cathartic, Swallow is not the movie you think it’s going to be and yet its unpredictable journey is one that’s well worth taking. Focused on sedate young housewife Hunter’s relationship with her family, old and new, and her newfound habit for swallowing non-food objects (a psychological disorder called ‘pica’ that gives people an appetite for normally ”inedible” things like cat hair or pins and needles), Swallow is a delicately-told, well-acted, and often-cringe-inducing tale of identity and reclamation at death-defying costs. Read More
Victorian Love Lives Matter in Pampered, Prissy, Punctuated ’EMMA.’
Thank Black Phillip that Anya Taylor-Joy accepted the devil’s bargain to live deliciously, otherwise we would have been spared the scrumptious spreads of Emma’s delectable buffet of baked goods and mouthwatering treats. From the nimble macaron to the towering croquembouche, just gazing at the saccharine foodstuffs of Autumn de Wilde’s Jane Austen adaptation is enough to give the viewer a diabetic flair-up. Read More
Believing Women and The Power of ‘THE INVISIBLE MAN’
The idiom of the wolf in sheep’s clothing is a particularly terrifying one. By virtue of his unassuming appearance, the predator becomes non-threatening. He can hide in plain sight and hunt with all the privilege of inconspicuousness. If looks could kill. The only thing worse than a predator in sheep’s skin is one with no skin at all. Those who lurk not in the shadows, but in the light of the lord. Luring the unsuspecting into their hidden traps. Predators do live among us but thankfully they are visible. With visibility comes consequence, accountability. The hunters have to at least make an effort to conceal their predatory behavior. We can, at the very least, see their fangs. And we can fight back. Read More