Review: "THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW" is Always Waiting For Us

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 25 of 2023 (No. 1914) by Leroy Douresseaux

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)

Running time:  100 minutes (1 hour, 40 minutes)

MPAA – R

DIRECTOR:  Jim Sharman

WRITERS:  Jim Sharman and Richard O'Brien (based on the original musical play by Richard O'Brien)

PRODUCER:  Michael White

CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Peter Suschitsky (D.o.P.)

EDITORS:  Graeme Clifford

COMPOSER:  Richard Hartley

SONGS: Richard O'Brien

MUSICAL/COMEDY/SCI-FI and FANTASY/HORROR

Starring:  Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon, Barry Bostwick, Richard O'Brien, Patricia Quinn, Nell Campbell, Peter Hinwood, Jonathan Adams, Meat Load, and Charles Gray

The Rocky Horror Picture Show is a 1975 comedy-horror and musical fantasy film directed by Jim Sharman.  The film is written by Sharman and Richard O'Brien and is based based on the 1973 musical stage production, The Rocky Horror Show, for which O'Brien wrote the music, lyrics, and book.  Both the film and stage musical pay tribute to the science fiction and B-movie horror films that appeared in theaters from the 1930s to the 1960s.  The Rocky Horror Picture Show follows a newly-engaged couple who, because of car trouble, seeks shelter at a castle-like country home that is populated by bizarre guests and an even more bizarre host.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show introduces a naive young couple, Brad Majors (Barry Bostwick) and Janet Weiss (Susan Sarandon).  It is late November, and the couple are attending the wedding of their friends, Ralph Haphschatt (Jeremy Newson) and Betty Monroe (Hilary Labow), at Denton Episcopalian Church.  Brad and Janet get engaged after the wedding and decide to celebrate with their high school science teacher, Dr. Everett Scott (Jonathan Adams).

In Brad's car, the duo are en route to Scott's house on a dark and rainy night when they get lost and then get a flat tire.  Needing a telephone to call for help, the couple walk to a nearby castle.  There, they find the place in the throes of a rowdy party.  The guests are both flamboyantly dressed and bizarre.  What is even more bizarre however, is the host, the transvestite scientist, Dr. Frank-N-Furter (Tim Curry), who is about to unveil his latest creation.  There are two things of which Brad and Janet are unaware.  The first is Frank-N-Furter is from the planet “Transsexual,” located in the galaxy “Transylvania.”  The second is that at some point in the future, their story will be narrated by a noted criminologist (Charles Gray).

When The Rocky Horror Picture Show was initially released in the United States in the early fall of 1975, it was not well-received by either critics or audiences.  However, by the spring of 1976, the film's infamous cult following began, thanks to midnight showings, first in and around New York City, and then, spreading throughout the U.S.  Soon, fans in costume were performing alongside the film.

Dear readers, I must admit that I have never seen The Rocky Horror Picture Show in a theater.  I first saw it in the late 1980s via a Japanese import or bootleg copy at the science fiction, fantasy, and gaming convention, CoastCon (I believe), in Biloxi, Mississippi.  It was a wild screening, and I freaked out when audience members jumped out of their seats and started performing bits from the film.

As some of you may know, Netflix is shutting down its DVD-by-mail service – currently known as DVDNetflix or DVD.com.  I decided to spend some of these final months on this beloved service re-watching favorite films and well as trying some older films that I have never seen.  Watching The Rocky Horror Picture Show seemed like the right thing to do as a sendoff to the service that I used to build my movie review blog, Negromancer.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show is indeed a tribute to science fiction, B-movie, and monster films.  There are references to such films as Universal Pictures' Frankenstein (1931) and Bride of Frankenstein (1935), RKO's King Kong (1933), Hammer Films' The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958), Fox's The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), and MGM's Forbidden Planet (1956), to name a few.

However, Rocky Horror's punk rock fashions, colorfully dyed hair, corsets, torn fishnet stockings, glitter, androgyny, and sex and violence are more important than its haunted mansion, secret labs, rival scientists, and sci-fi angles.  For me, this film is about having a good time and being liberated.  Sometimes, the film may seem like it is being outrageous for the sake of being outrageous, but one of its final songs personifies the film for me, “Fanfare/Don't Dream It, Be It.”  It's okay to look like you want to and to be what you want to.  And yes, it's okay to be turned on by both Susan Sarandon in her unmentionables and Barry Bostwick in his Jockey classic Y-front briefs.

I can certainly point to Tim Curry's legendary performance as Dr. Frank-N-Furter, but everyone, from the filmmakers, cast, and crew to the artisans, craftsman, and technicians that brought the sets and costumes to life, made The Rocky Horror Picture Show memorable and, for many, unforgettable.  I can't forget the songs, so I need a soundtrack album.  Meat Loaf makes the most of his short time on screen.  The narrator turns out to be hoot.  Even the passing of DVDNetflix won't stop me from seeing this show again.  The music, the songs, the cast, and the setting seem as if they will never let me forget that part of me belongs, at least for a little while, at The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

8 of 10

A

★★★★ out of 4 stars

Thursday, June 15, 2023

NOTES:

2005 National Film Preservation Board, USA:  National Film Registry

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Review: "TRANSFORMERS: Rise of the Beasts" is the Best Transformers Movie That I'VE Seen

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 24 of 2023 (No. 1913) by Leroy Douresseaux

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (2023)

Running time:  127 minutes (2 hours, 7 minutes)

MPA – PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi action and violence, and language

DIRECTOR:  Steven Caple, Jr.

WRITERS:  Joby Harold, Darnell Metayer, Josh Peters, Erich Hoeber, and Jon Hoeber; from a story by Joby Harold (based on Hasbro’s Transformers Action Figures)

PRODUCERS:  Don Murphy, Tom DeSanto, Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Michael Bay, Duncan Henderson, and Mark Vahradian

CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Enrique Chediak

EDITORS:  William Goldenberg and Joel Negron

COMPOSER: Jongnic Bontemps

SCI-FI/ACTION

Starring:  Anthony Ramos, Dominique Fishback, Luna Lauren Velez, Dean Scott Vazquez, Tobe Nwigwe, and Sarah Stiles; (voices) Peter Cullen, Pete Davidson, Ron Perlman, Peter Dinklage, Liza Koshy, Michelle Yeoh, Cristo Fernandez, Michaela Jae Rodriguez, John DiMaggio,Tongayi Chirisa, David Sobolov, and Colman Domingo

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts is a 2023 science fiction action film.  It is based on Hasbro's Transformers toy line, and it is the seventh movie in the Transformers live-action film series.  The film serves a standalone sequel to the sixth film, Bumblebee (2018), and also as a prequel to the first film in the series, Transformers (2007).  Set during the 1990s, Rise of the Beasts sees a new faction of Transformers join the Autobots as allies in a battle to save Earth from a planet-eating threat.

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts opens thousands of years in the past.  There, the planet-eating dark god, Unicron (voice of Colman Domingo), devours a planet inhabited by the Transformers known as the “Maximals.”  Unicron had sent his servant, Scourge (voice of Peter Dinklage), and the Terrorcons to steal the Maximals' greatest piece of technology, “the Transwarp Key,” which can open portals through space and time.  Optimus Primal (voice of Ron Perlman) and the Maximals:  Airazon (voice of Michelle Yeoh), Cheetor (voice of Tongayi Chirisa) and Rhinox (voice of David Sobolov), escape to Earth with the Transwarp Key.

Moving forward to Brooklyn, 1994: the story introduces two humans that are about to get caught up in the Transformers' drama.  The first is Noah Diaz (Anthony Ramos), an ex-military electronics expert who struggles to find a job to support his family, his mother, Breanna Diaz (Luna Lauren Velez), and his younger brother, Kris (Dean Scott Vazquez), who suffers from sickle cell.

The second is Elena Wallace (Dominique Fishback).  She is an intern at a museum and an artifact researcher who doesn't get the credit for how her knowledge benefits the museum.  She has discovered that an artifact which her museum recently obtained has what turns to be a Maximal symbol on it.  Soon, Noah and Elena will find themselves in the company of the Autobots:  Optimus Prime (voice of Peter Cullen), Mirage (Pete Davidson), and Arcee (voice of Liza Koshy) and caught in a battle to protect the Transwarp Key from falling into the clutches of Scourge in service of Unicron.

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts is the best Transformers movie that I have seen, although I have only seen three of the previous six.  I liked the first film, Transformers, and its sequel, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009), but after the second sequel, Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011), I'd had enough.  I didn't bother with Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014), and I tried to watch Transformers: The Last Knight (2017) on television and found it unwatchable.  I have never gotten around to watching the first prequel film, Bumblebee (2018), although I had planned on doing it.

There are several things that make Rise of the Beasts stand out from the earlier films.  First, there is some genuine human drama.  Noah's dedication to his family, especially his little brother, Kris, resonates, and Noah's determination to help his family financially makes his decisions seem logical.  Honestly, I really identified with Elena, whose boss, Jillian (Sarah Stiles), keeps taking credit for her work, a situation I have dealt with on and off for four decades (!).  I give the filmmakers a lot of credit for choosing non-white actors as the leads, and the screenwriters even more credit for being willing to depict the slights, micro-aggressions, and job discrimination that talented people of color put up with from mediocre white people.

Also, Rise of the Beasts has excellent visual special effects and eye-popping computer-generated imagery.  The transformational process the robots go through still looks really cool and sometimes mind-bending.  The robot fight scenes rival and probably surpass anything audiences would find in Star Wars movies.  This time, however, it means something and isn't just one long slog of creatures of metal slamming into each other.  There is a real sense of peril for both human and Autobots.  They might die or be destroyed, and the Earth might be devoured.  Plus, Unicron is a deliciously evil villain who is equally god and monster.  I hope he returns in future movies because as much as he scared me, he also fascinated me.

Director Steven Caple, Jr. has delivered a Transformers movie that is both visually busy and also dramatically hefty with genuine melodrama.  Yes, the third act is a bit tedious, but...  I'm shocked to say this.  I heartily recommend Transformers: Rise of the Beasts.

[Transformers: Rise of the Beasts has an extra scene that appears just after the credits begin and also a mid-credits scene.]

7 of 10

A-

★★★½ out of 4 stars

Friday, June 9, 2023

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Review: James Gunn Delivers a Series Best in the Great "GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 3"

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 20 of 2023 (No. 1909) by Leroy Douresseaux

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023)

Running time:  150 minutes (2 hours, 30 minutes)

MPAA – PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, strong language, suggestive/drug references and thematic elements

DIRECTOR:  James Gunn

WRITERS:  James Gunn (based on the Marvel Comics characters)

PRODUCER:  Kevin Feige

CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Henry Braham (D.o.P.)

EDITORS:  Fred Raskin and Greg D'Auria

COMPOSER:  John Murphy

SCI-FI/FANTASY and ACTION/ADVENTURE/COMEDY

Starring:  Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Karen Gillan, Pom Klementieff, Chukwudi Iwuji, Sean Gunn, Will Poulter, Nico Santos, Miriam Shor, Elizabeth Debicki, Sylvester Stallone, Nathan Fillion, Michael Rooker, Gregg Henry, and the voices of Linda Cardellini, Seth Green, Maria Bakalova, Bradley Cooper, and Vin Diesel

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is a 2023 science fiction, comedy, and action-adventure film written and directed by James Gunn and produced by Marvel Studios.  It is the third film in Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy film series, following 2014's Guardians of the Galaxy and 2017's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.  It is also the 32nd film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU).  Vol. 3 finds the Guardians fighting to save one of their members from his creator, a mission that may destroy the Guardians whether they are successful or not.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 opens on Knowhere, the strange space station where the Guardians of the Galaxy have established their headquarters.  Their leader, Peter Quill/Star-Lord (Chris Pratt), mourns the loss of his girlfriend, Gamora (Zoe Saldana).  The alien warlord, Thanos, killed Gamora (as seen in Avengers: Infinity War), but an alternate universe version of her appeared (as seen in Avengers: Endgame).  This new Gamora does not love Peter, and she associates with The Ravagers, which was once essentially Peter's surrogate family.

The group has bigger troubles ahead.  The Guardians are being targeted by the “Sovereign” empress Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki), someone with a grudge against them (as seen in Vol. 2).  She sends her son, Adam Warlock (Will Poulter), to attack the Guardians, and he grievously wounds Rocket (voice of Bradley Cooper).  To save Rocket, Peter and his fellow Guardians:  Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista), Groot (voice of Vin Diesel), Mantis (Pom Klementieff), Nebula (Karen Gillan), and a reluctant Gamora, must confront The High Evolutionary (Chukwudi Iwuji), the Counter-Earth scientist who created Rocket.

The original Guardians of the Galaxy was one of the surprise hits of 2014, if not the surprise hit of the year.  Vol. 2 was a fun sci-fi-action movie and a surprisingly thoughtful character melodrama.  Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 does everything the first two films did well and amplifies that.  Vol. 3 is the series' funniest film, and I found myself laughing throughout it.  That still surprises me because this movie has some pretty dark moments, especially concerning The High Evolutionary, who is superbly played with volcanic intensity and unremitting cruelty by the most excellent Chuckwudi Iwuji.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is one of Marvel Studios' best films in years.  I think it works for three reasons.  First, the film's production values and special effects are impressive.  The CGI-created environments, backdrops, sets (interiors and exteriors), space-ways, worlds, etc. are so dazzling in scope, color, and imagination that they surpass the impressive work of the first two films, especially the second film.  The entire entire “Orgoscope” sequence is an eye-popping collection of inventiveness.  Even the menagerie of people, creatures, and robots exceeds the first two film, probably combined.

The acting is quite good, and that makes me want to engage the characters even more.  Chris Pratt gives his best tern as Peter Quill/Star-Lord – drama, pathos, big emotions, and the sarcasm and quips are still here – but with edginess.  This is the first time that I really hoped that Star-Lord would be a long term MCU character.  It is so shocking that Zoe Saldana can convince me that she is a different Gamora.  Karen Gillan as Nebula and Pom Klementieff as Mantis do superb work with the character arcs that the story gives them.  As Drax the Destroyer, Dave Bautista makes the character seem not extraneous for the first time.  Vin Diesel and Bradley Cooper as always are winning in their voice roles as Groot and Rocket, respectively, with Diesel bringing some extra to Groot this time.

The third reason Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is so damn good is writer-director James Gunn.  This is Gunn at the peak of his powers.  Honestly, I liked Vol. 2 so much that I didn't think he could top himself, but he does with this third film.  I did find Vol. 3 a little dry and too dark in the beginning, but once it grabbed me, it would not let go.

This film has a heart – a center that is about the struggle to help a friend or family member no matter how bad his or her troubles might be or even if he or she resists and rejects the help.  In Vol. 3, Gunn makes all the characters unique individuals with wants, needs, goals, conflicts, and melodrama.  However, the best thing that Gunn does is accept that even the most intense relationships change, so he lets some of the characters move on.  The result is a last act for the ages and a closing sequence that recalls the beginning of the original film and leaves the viewer with the warmest feelings.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 opens in the U.S. today, May 5, 2023.  That is 15 years and a few days after the release of the first MCU film, Iron Man (2008).  Vol. 3 exemplifies something that I just realize runs throughout Marvel Studios' film.  In almost all of them, a dominant theme is the formation of surrogate families.  Friends, enemies, heroes, and sometimes even the villains come together in a unit that is more than just a group of friends; they are family.  In Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, James Gunn gives us the end of one version of the family as it evolves into something larger.  What makes Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 an amazing film is that it is as heartwarming as it is exciting and thrilling.  Yes, there are big, mesmerizing action set pieces, but by the end, I really believe that these guys love one another.  I could watch it forever.

9 of 10

A+

★★★★+ out of 4 stars

Friday, May 5, 2023

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Review: "Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania" Takes Us on a Fantastic Voyage

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 8 of 2023 (No. 1897) by Leroy Douresseaux

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023)

Running time:  125 minutes (2 hours, 5 minutes)

MPAA – PG-13 for violence/action, and language

DIRECTOR:  Peyton Reed

WRITER:  Jeff Loveness (based on the Marvel Comics characters)

PRODUCERS:  Kevin Feige and Stephen Broussard

CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Bill Pope

EDITORS:  Adam Gerstel and Laura Jennings

COMPOSER:  Christophe Beck

SUPERHERO/SCI-FI and ACTION/ADVENTURE/COMEDY

Starring:  Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Michael Douglas, Michelle Pfeiffer, Jonathan Majors, Kathryn Newton, Bill Murray, Katy M. O'Brian, William Jackson Harper, James Cutler, David Dastmalchian, Randall Park, and Corey Stoll

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is a 2023 superhero and sci-fi action film directed by Peyton Reed and produced by Marvel Studios.  It is the 31st film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and is also the third entry in the Ant-Man film series.  The film and the series are based on the Marvel Comics character, Ant-Man, who first appeared in Tales to Astonish #27 (cover date: September 1962) and was created by Stan Lee, Larry Lieber, and Jack Kirby.  Quantumania finds Ant-Man and the Wasp on an incredible adventure in a strange universe where they face a dangerous new foe.

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania finds Scott Lang/Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) living his best life after his most recent adventures with the Avengers (as seen in Avengers: Endgame).  He is a successful author and is happily living with his girlfriend, Hope van Dyne/The Wasp (Evangeline Lilly).  However, there is some trouble at home.  Scott's daughter, Cassie (Kathryn Newton), has become an activist and has been recently arrested during a protest.

While they are visiting Hope's parents, her father, Hank Pym (Michael Douglas), the scientist who was the original Ant-Man; and her mother, Janet van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer), who was the original Wasp, Cassie reveals that she has created a device that can map the “Quantum Realm,” a subatomic dimension of the Multiverse.  However, the device can also send messages to the Quantum Realm, which freaks out Janet, who was trapped there for 30 years.  Before Janet can do shut it down, a portal appears and pulls Scott, Hope, Cassie, Hank, and Janet into the Quantum Realm, separating Scott and Cassie from Hope, Hank, and Janet.

Once the two groups begin to explore the Quantum Realm, they interact with strange creatures and embark on an adventure that goes beyond the limits of what they thought was possible.  There is also a dark side.  Janet fears they are all headed for an encounter with someone she met when she was first trapped in the Quantum Realm – a despot named “Kang” (Jonathan Majors).

Ant-Man was a D-list character as far as Marvel Comics superheroes go, especially where familiarity with the general entertainment-consuming public was concerned.  Marvel Studios chose the right actor to play Ant-Man, the irresistibly likable, Paul Rudd.  The addition of Hollywood legends like Michael Douglas and Michelle Pfeiffer and television star Evangeline Lilly as a new female superhero made Ant-Man A-list box office.  The result was two lovable, loopy, and imaginative superhero films, Ant-Man (2015) and Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018), that seemed aimed at young viewers even more so than adult audiences.

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is just as loopy, but is bigger than the previous two films.  If French film director, Luc Besson (The Fifth Element), made a Star Wars film, it would probably look like Quantumania.  This film's menagerie of people, beings, creatures, machines, tech, etc. are almost on the level of Avatar: The Way of Water.  Quantumania is a dazzling spectacle, and it is nothing like what I expected based on the earlier films.  Everyone from director Peyton Reed and writer Jeff Loveness to the craft and visual effects people did the damn thing and the results are mind-blowing.

The performances are excellent.  As usual, Paul Rudd comes across as the actor most perfect to be Scott Lang and Ant-Man.  Michael Douglas plays Hank Pym with a mix of spry comedy and pitch-perfect drama.  However, I must make way for the women in this film.  Quantumania allows Michelle Pfeiffer to let the dog in her out to play Janet van Dyne, in a way that she probably has not done since White Oleander (2002).  She left me wanting more of Janet.

Evangeline Lilly is once again great as The Wasp, and in Quantumania, she makes me believe that it is time for the Wasp to have a solo outing.  Also, Kathryn Newton makes it impossible to leave Cassie down on the superhero farm (so to speak).  Katy O'Brian also gives a fierce turn as the Quantum Realm freedom fighter, Jentorra.

Finally, I'm not sure that I have words to quite describe Jonathan Major's brilliant turn as Kang.  It is as if Majors has given flesh to James Earl Jones' Darth Vader voice.  He makes Kang own Quantumania, and I think it will be a blast going forward to watch Majors play this character.

You may have heard bad things about Quantumania, from film critics and reviewers and others.  But fuck 'em.  Quantumania is one of Marvel Studios' best films of the past few years, and I heartily recommend it to you, dear readers.  With its sense of the unexpected and of the future known, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is the perfect start to what is called “Phase 5” of the MCU.

9 of 10

A+

★★★★+ out of 4 stars

Friday, February 17, 2023

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Review: "AVATAR: The Way of Water" is Indeed Too Long, But it is Never Boring

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 1 of 2023 (No. 1890) by Leroy Douresseaux

Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)

Running time:  192 minutes (3 hours, 12 minutes)

MPAA – PG-13 for sequences of strong violence and intense action, partial nudity and some strong language

DIRECTOR:  James Cameron

WRITERS:  James Cameron and Rick Jaffa & Amanda Silver; from a story by James Cameron, Rick Jaffa & Amanda Silver, and Josh Friedman and Shane Salerno

PRODUCERS:  James Cameron and Jon Landau 

CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Russell Carpenter (D.o.P.)

EDITORS:  James Cameron, John Refoua, Stephen Rivkin, and David Brenner

COMPOSER:  Simon Franglen

SCI-FI/FANTASY, ADVENTURE, DRAMA/WAR

Starring:  Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang, Kate Winslet, Cliff Curtis, Joel David Moore, CCH Pounder, Edie Falco, Brendan Cowell, Jemaine Clement, Jamie Flatters, Britain Dalton, Trinity Jo-Li Bliss, Jack Champion, Bailey Bass, Filip Geljo, Duane Evans Jr., Dileep Rao, and Matt Gerald

Avatar: The Way of Water is a 2022 science fiction-fantasy, action-adventure, drama and war film from director James Cameron.  It is a direct sequel to the 2009 film, Avatar.  In The Way of Water, the world of Pandora is under renewed threat from human invaders, forcing Na'vi Jake Sully to seek refuge for his family with a new tribe.

Avatar: The Way of Water opens on the habitable moon, Pandora (one of several moons orbiting a gas giant planet), a decade after the events of the original film.  The former human who led the Na'vi fight that expelled the humans, Na'vi Jake Sulley (Sam Worthington), is now chief of the Na'vi “Omaticaya” clan.  He raises a family with his mate, Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), that includes sons, Neteyam (Jamie Flatters) and Lo'ak (Britain Dalton); daughter, Tuk (Trinity Jo-Li Bliss); and two adopted children.  They are a human boy named “Spider” (Jack Champion) and Kiri (Sigourney Weaver), a girl who was born from the inert avatar of Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver), the late scientist who sided with Jake Sulley in his first battle with the humans.

However, to the dismay of the Na'vi, the human corporation, Resources Development Administration (RDA), has returned to Pandora.  This time, RDA wants to prepare Pandora as a new home for humanity because the Earth is dying.  RDA has even created new combatants, called “recombinants,” which are Na'vi avatars implanted with the minds and memories of human soldiers killed in the first conflict with the Na'vi.  One of them is Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), Jake and Neytiri's greatest human enemy and now leaders of the recombinants.

A year after the return, there is a confrontation between Jake's forces and Quaritch's forces.  Jake realizes that the RDA has made him, as a former human soldier and traitor, the focus of their mission.  To protect the Omaticaya clan, Jake and his family go into exile and retreat to the sea islands in hope of finding refuge with the “Metkayina” reef people.  The family struggles to adjust to the new home, especially the children who are coming of age.  And recombinant Quaritch and his squad are still hunting Jake, and they are willing to do anything to capture him.

When I reviewed the first Avatar film, I wrote that “Avatar is everything good that you have heard about it and more.”  I can say the same for Avatar: The Way of Water, although I will not say it with the same intensity as other film critics and film reviewers.  Some people seem to enter a kind of state of ecstasy when they talk about The Way of Water.  I am not that crazy about it.  Let us see how simply I can explain this.

When I first saw the original Avatar in theaters, I was blown away.  It was like nothing that I'd ever seen before then.  It was an epic science fiction film set on a strange new world, full of incredible creatures and environments.  Plus, Avatar has a great group of villains in the form of the invading humans.  However, as crazy as I was about it then, I have never watched the film in its entirety since.  I can't make myself interested in even watching sections of the film.

Avatar: The Way of Water is full of wonderful new characters, new environments, and a strange new tribe, living in a water world of amazing creatures.  I am impressed by how many intriguing new characters James Cameron and his co-writers have created for this film.  But, as good as the film is, I am not “blown away” by it.  I don't find it remotely as interesting as I found the first Avatar.  However, like the first film, James Cameron does quite a bit of skewering of colonialism and militarism and of toxic wealth and capitalism.

Avatar: The Way of Water is a great, big science fiction epic full of fantastic visual special effects and CGI (computer-generated images).  The motion-capture CGI that creates the Na'vi still makes the characters look and move awkwardly in some instances, but that does not ruin the characters.  Also, despite what some are saying, I did not find the first two hours of this three-hour plus film boring.  Yes, the last third of this movie is at least an hour of great, great action, but the first two hours also offer some thrilling and riveting action, engaging character drama, and eye-popping exploration of the reef world of the Metkayina.

Still, for me, the Avatar thrill left a long time ago, and Avatar: The Way of Water does not make it return.  I think it is a really good film, but not a great film.  But, hey, it might “blow you away,” dear readers.

7 of 10

B+

★★★½ out of 4 stars

Sunday, January 1, 2023

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Review: Steven Spielberg's "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" (Countdown to "The Fabelmans")

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 64 of 2022 (No. 1876) by Leroy Douresseaux

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Running time:  135 minutes (2 hour, 15 minutes)
MPAA – PG
WRITER/DIRECTOR:  Steven Spielberg
PRODUCERS:  Julia Phillips and Michael Phillips
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Vilmos Zsigmond (D.o.P.)
EDITOR:  Michael Kahn
COMPOSER:  John Williams
Academy Award winner

SCI-FI/ADVENTURE/MYSTERY/DRAMA

Starring:  Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Terri Garr, Melinda Dillon, Bob Balaban, and Cary Guffey

Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a 1977 science fiction film written and directed by Steven Spielberg.  The film follows an everyday blue-collar worker from Indiana who has a life-changing encounter with a UFO and then, embarks on a cross-country journey to the place where a momentous event is to occur.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind opens in the Sonoran Desert.  There, French scientist Claude Lacombe (François Truffaut), his American interpreter, David Laughlin (Bob Balaban), and a group of other researchers make a shocking discovery regarding a three-decade-old mystery.

Then, the film introduces Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss), an rural electrical lineman living in Muncie, Indiana with his wife, Ronnie (Terri Garr), and their three children.  One night, while working on a power outage, Roy has a “close encounter” with a UFO (unidentified flying object).  The encounter is so intense that the right side of Roy's face is lightly burned, and it also becomes a kind of metaphysical experience for Roy.  He becomes fascinated with the UFO and obsessed with some kind of mountain-like image that won't leave his mind.

Roy isn't the only one who has had a close encounter.  Single mother Jillian Guiler (Melinda Dillon) watches in horror as her three-year-old son, Barry Guiler (Cary Guffey), is abducted, apparently by a UFO.  Now, Roy and Jillian are headed to a place they have never been, Devils Tower in Moorcroft, Wyoming, where they will hopefully find answers to the questions plaguing their minds.

As I await the release of Steven Spielberg's semi-autobiographical film, The Fabelmans, I have been re-watching and, in some cases, watching for the first time, Spielberg's early films.  Thus far, I have watched Duel (the TV film that first got Spielberg noticed), The Sugarland Express (his debut theatrical film), and Jaws (which I have seen countless times).  I did not see Close Encounters of the Third Kind when it first arrived in movie theaters, but I finally got to watch it when it debuted on television.  I recently watched a DVD release of what is known as Close Encounters of the Third Kind: The Special Edition, a shortened (132 minutes long compared to the original's 135 minutes) and altered version of the film that Columbia Pictures released in August 1980.

The truth is that I have never been as crazy about Close Encounters of the Third Kind the way I have been about such Spielberg's films as Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Jurassic Park.  I liked Close Encounters the first time I saw it (a few years after its theatrical release), but I had expected a lot from it after hearing such wonderful things about the film from acquaintances who had seen it in a theater.  I was a bit underwhelmed,.  I liked Close Encounters, but was not “wowed” by it, and was less so the second time I saw it a few years after the first time.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a combination of science fiction, adventure, drama, and mystery.  The drama works, especially when Spielberg depicts the trouble that Roy Neary's obsession causes his family and also the terror of the “attack” on Jillian Guiler and her son, Barry.  Roy's adventure and journey are quite captivating and result in the events of the film's final half hour, which is the part of the film that many consider to be marvelous.  Close Encounters' last act certainly offers an impressive display of special effects and a dazzling light show.

I am attracted to the sense of wonder and discovery that infuses much of Close Encounters of the Third Kind.  I think my problem is that it seems like three movies in one:  Claude Lacombe and Davie Laughlin's story, Roy's story, and the the big “close encounter” at Devils Tower.  None of them really gets the time to develop properly, so the film's overall narrative and also the character development are somewhat shallow.  There is a lot to like about Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and it is an impressive display of Spielberg's filmmaking skills.  However, I am done with it.  I don't need to see it again, although I am a huge fan of UFO-related media.  I simply cannot warm to Close Encounters of the Third Kind the way I have with other Spielberg films.

7 of 10
B+
★★★½ out of 4 stars

Thursday, October 27, 2022


NOTES:
1978 Academy Awards, USA:  2 wins: “Best Cinematography” (Vilmos Zsigmond) and a “Special Achievement Award” (Frank E. Warner for sound effects editing); 7 nominations: “Best Actress in a Supporting Role” (Melinda Dillon), “Best Director” (Steven Spielberg), “Best Art Direction-Set Decoration” (Joe Alves, Daniel A. Lomino, and Phil Abramson), “Best Sound” (Robert Knudson, Robert Glass, Don MacDougall, and Gene S. Cantamessa), “Best Film Editing” (Michael Kahn), “Best Effects, Visual Effects” (Roy Arbogast, Douglas Trumbull, Matthew Yuricich, Gregory Jein, and Richard Yuricich), and “Best Music, Original Score” (John Williams)

1979 BAFTA Awards:  1 win: Best Production Design/Art Direction (Joe Alves); 8 nominations: “Anthony Asquith Award for Film Music” (John Williams); “BAFTA Film Award     Best Cinematography” (Vilmos Zsigmond), “Best Direction” (Steven Spielberg), “Best Film,” “Best Film Editing” (Michael Kahn), “Best Screenplay” (Steven Spielberg), “Best Sound” (Gene S. Cantamessa, Robert Knudson, Don MacDougall, Robert Glass, Stephen Katz, Frank E. Warner, Richard Oswald, David M. Horton, Sam Gemette, Gary S. Gerlich, Chester Slomka, and Neil Burrow), and “Best Supporting Actor? (François Truffaut)

1978 Golden Globes, USA:  4 nominations: “Best Motion Picture – Drama,” “Best Director - Motion Picture” (Steven Spielberg), “Best Screenplay - Motion Picture” (Steven Spielberg), and “Best Original Score - Motion Picture” (John Williams)

2007 National Film Preservation Board, USA:  1 win: “National Film Registry”


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Review: "JURASSIC WORLD: Dominion" Ends Trilogy with its Best Film

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 50 of 2022 (No. 1862) by Leroy Douresseaux

Jurassic World: Dominion (2022)
Running time: 147 minutes (2 hours, 27 minutes)
MPA – PG-13 for intense sequences of action, some violence and language
DIRECTOR:  Colin Trevorrow
WRITERS:  Colin Trevorrow and Emily Carmichael; from a story by Colin Trevorrow and Derek Connolly (based on characters created by Michael Crichton)
PRODUCERS:  Patrick Crowley and Frank Marshall
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  John Schwartzman (D.o.P.)
EDITOR:  Mark Sanger
COMPOSER:  Michael Giacchino

SCI-FI/ACTION/ADVENTURE/THRILLER

Starring:  Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Laura Dern, Sam Neill, Jeff Goldblum, DeWanda Wise, Mamoudou Athie, Isabella Sermon, Campbell Scott, Justice Smith, Daniella Pineda, Omar Sy, Scott Haze, Dichen Lachman, and B.D. Wong

Jurassic World: Dominion is a 2022 science fiction and action-adventure and dinosaur film from director Colin Trevorrow.  It is the direct sequel to Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018) and the final film in a trilogy that began with the 2015 film, Jurassic World.  Dominion also ties up the story line that began with the 1993 film, Jurassic Park.  Dominion focuses on the heroes of two film trilogies as they try to stop a corporation's genetic experiments from endangering the world.

Jurassic World: Dominion opens three decades after the events depicted in Jurassic Park and four years after the cataclysmic volcanic eruption on Isla Nublar and the incidents at Lockwood Estate (as seen in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom).  Dinosaurs, no longer extinct, freely roam the Earth, causing ecological problems and the deaths of numerous humans – 37 in just the past year.  International corporation, Biosyn Genetics, has won the sole rights to collect dinosaurs, and it has created a dinosaur sanctuary in the Dolomite Mountains of Italy.

Meanwhile, Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) and Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard), former employees of the disastrous “Jurassic World” theme park, are still working to protect dinosaurs.  Claire works with a dinosaur protection organization and investigates illegal dinosaur breeding sites.  Owen works as a wrangler, relocating stray dinosaurs.  They live together in a remote cabin in the Sierra Nevada Mountains where they secretly raise 14-year-old Maisie Lockwood (Isabella Sermon), the granddaughter of the late Benjamin Lockwood and the granddaughter who turned out to a clone of Benjamin's late daughter, Charlotte Lockwood.  Living nearby is Blue, one of the Velociraptors (raptors) that Owen once trained at Jurassic World.  She is a mother, having given birth to a baby raptor that Owen named “Beta.”

It turns out that Lewis Dodgson (Campbell Scott), the CEO and owner of Biosyn, wants to possess both Maisie and Beta for the goldmine of information that their genes are.  Meanwhile, the original Jurassic heroes:  paleobotanist, Dr. Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern); paleontologist, Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neill); and chaos theorist, Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), are also investigating Biosyn's dark plans.  But can they infiltrate Biosyn and avoid a hoard of hungry dinosaurs?

A few months ago, I read a review of Jurassic World: Dominion in which the reviewer said that the presence of the star trio of Jurassic Park:  Ellie, Alan, and Ian, diminished the presence of Jurassic World's star couple, Claire and Owen.  I disagree.  Actually, Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard make the most of every minute in which their characters are on screen.  In fact, I believe that the film is more about Claire and Owen than it is about Ellie, Alan, and Ian, although they are a huge part of the film's narrative.  I see the union of Jurassic Park's biggest characters and Jurassic World's biggest as the best of both worlds.  Frankly, this union should have happened in the first Jurassic World film.

In addition to the stars, Dominion sees the return of previous franchise supporting characters.  Omar Sy returns as Barry Sembene, Owen's fellow animal trainer from Jurassic World.  BD Wong's Dr. Henry Wu only appeared in the original Jurassic Park, but has appeared in all three Jurassic World films.  Dominion offers Henry a chance at redemption.  Dominion also offers two killer new characters, DeWanda Wise's Kayla Watts, a pilot who could be straight out of yesteryear's adventure serials – except Black women were not pulp fiction heroes.  Mamoudou Athie is espionage-cool as Ramsay Cole, the head of communications at Biosyn Genetics.

However, Jurassic World: Dominion is not really about stories or characters.  Yes, there is a lot going on; the movie is essentially a … park full of subplots, all around a basic (thin) plot – which is to stop Biosyn.  Dominion is really a science fiction action-adventure movie filled with action scenes.  There must be about twenty or so action set pieces:  a race to escape illegal breeders; a stop the poachers fight; run away from the giant, killer locusts; and running away from the dinosaurs in the forest, on a frozen pond, in plane, in a cave, etc.

And it all works.  The cast, director, writers, and crew of editors, sound, cameras, stunts, visual effects, assistants and everyone else.  They all come together to make a thrill machine of a movie with action scenes that keep the viewer too occupied to notice the lapses in logic and common sense.

In the first trilogy, the films that followed Jurassic Park were inferior to it.  In the Jurassic World trilogy, the final film is the best of the lot.  Bringing in so many characters from previous films is a good idea.  Putting them in a series of well-staged action scenes is another good idea.  Giving us a happy ending full of happy endings and heartwarming resolutions is an even better idea.  Jurassic World: Dominion is not a great film, but it is a very satisfying conclusion to what started back in 1993, when Jurassic Park made us believe that its dinosaurs were real.

7 of 10
B+
★★★½ out of 4 stars

Saturday, August 27, 2022


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Review: Viggo Mortensen is a Kingpin in Cronenberg's "CRIMES OF THE FUTURE"

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 49 of 2022 (No. 1861) by Leroy Douresseaux

Crimes of the Future (2022)
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN:  Canada (with France, Greece, and UK); Language:  English
Running time:  107 minutes (1 hour, 47 minutes)
MPAA – R for strong disturbing violent content and grisly images, graphic nudity and some language
WRITER/DIRECTOR:  David Cronenberg
PRODUCERS:  Robert Lantos, Panos Papahadzis, and Steve Solomos
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Douglas Koch (D.o.P.)
EDITOR:  Christopher Donaldson
COMPOSER:  Howard Shore

SCI-FI

Starring:  Viggo Mortensen, Léa Seydoux, Don McKellar, Scott Speedman, Welket Bungué, Lihi Kornowski, Nadia Litz, Tanaya Beatty, Sotiris Siozos, and Kristen Stewart

Crimes of the Future is a 2022 Canadian science fiction film from writer-director David Cronenberg.  The film focuses on a performances artist who showcases the metamorphosis of his internal organs with the help of his partner who performs surgery on him during the performance.

Crimes of the Future opens sometime in the future when humanity has experienced a number of biological changes and evolutionary changes to human physiology.  The film introduces Saul Tenser (Viggo Mortensen) and Caprice (Lea Seydoux), a performance artist couple.  Saul's body is afflicted by “accelerated evolution syndrome,” which forces his body to constantly develop new vestigial organs.  Tenser is in constant pain, and he relies biomechanical devices in order to sleep and to eat.  Using a “Sark autopsy module,” Caprice performs surgery on Saul before an audience as an act of performance art, performances which have made the duo world renown.

Saul and Caprice's performances have started to draw official, governmental, and law enforcement interest.  They meet Wippet (Don McKellar) and Timlin (Kristen Stewart), the two bureaucrats in charge of the “National Organ Registry,” which catalogs and stores newly developed and evolved organs.

Not everyone is excited about “body-growth” and consider it a “body-crime.”  Cope (Welket Bungué), a detective with the “New Vice Unit,” a governmental police agency, wants Tenser to infiltrate the worlds of evolutionists, the people that want to accept and encourage “accelerated evolution syndrome.”  After he meets Lang Dotrice (Scott Speedman), a grieving father, Saul goes so deep into the world of this new human evolution that he might discover something about himself.

Some consider Crimes of the Future to be both a science fiction and horror film, but I consider it to be only a science fiction film.  However, I do recognize how much the film travels into the realms of the genre of “body horror.”  In that, Crimes of the Future does share many similarities with David Cronenberg's last science fiction-horror film, eXistenZ (1999).  Both are set in a world where biotechnology invents new machines that can directly interface with human bodies and control those bodies.  In both films, public performances of man-machine interfaces are both popular and controversial, and a diverse group of entities:  law enforcement, fetishists, secretive agencies, rebels, dissidents, and subcultures seek to control the future and future-tech.

In Crimes of the Future, Cronenberg presents a world in which the evolutionary change is spurred on by technology and other man-made efforts.  Once this new evolution starts, it is free to do as it pleases, outside the considerations of humanity.  As in many of his films, a lead character, group of characters, and/or society and the world at large struggle to adapt to that change.  To one extent or another, they are against it, afraid of it, and some ultimately, even if reluctantly, embrace that change.

Two things hold this film together, David Cronenberg's vision and his muse, actor Viggo Mortensen as Saul Tenser.  Cronenberg and his collaborators have created a world in which biotechnological and evolutionary changes take place in drab and rundown settings.  In Crimes of the Future, Cronenberg does not need flying cars and off-world colonies in order to communicate to his audience that the world and mankind are in a future undergoing radical transformation.  True to his ways, Cronenberg is both provocative and exploitative and visionary and elegant as he executes a story of a world in which evolution forces humanity to live in the world it made.

Crimes of the Future has a number of eccentric performances.  Lea Seydoux makes Caprice grow … and evolve, and Kristen Stewart is impish and mysterious as Timlin.  However, Viggo Mortensen is both the center of this film's narrative and the outer boundaries of its ideas and ambitions.  He holds it together both as one afflicted by evolution and as an explorer of the world of evolution and new humans.  Mortensen's gift is to make people buy into the idea that he is indeed the character he plays and that what he does as that character is authentic and not a contrivance of a really talented actor.

Once again, David Cronenberg offers a film that examines horrifying change, and he does it without nostalgia and sentiment, but with a superb score by the great Howard Shore.  Yeah, Cronenberg is a genius, and Crimes of the Future is his latest masterpiece.  The ending, which feels like a quick wrap-up, is the only reason I won't call this film perfect, but it would be a crime of the present for me to quibble about that.

9 of 10
A+
★★★★+ out of 4 stars

Thursday, August 25, 2022


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Review: "Everything Everywhere All at Once" is Action Movie T&A - Tedious and Amazing

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 45 of 2022 (No. 1857) by Leroy Douresseaux

Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)

Running time: 139 minutes

MPA – R for some violence, sexual material and language

WRITERS/DIRECTORS:  Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert
PRODUCERS:  Daniel Kwan, Mike Larocca , Anthony Russo, Joe Russo, Daniel Scheinert, and Jonathan Wang
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Larkin Seiple (D.o.P.)
EDITOR:  Paul Rogers
COMPOSER:  Son Lux

SCI-FI/COMEDY/DRAMA

Starring:  Michelle Yeoh, Stephanie Hsu, Ke Huy Quan, James Hong, Tallie Medel, and Jamie Lee Curtis and Randy Newman (voice)

Everything Everywhere All at Once is a 2022 science fiction and comedy-drama film written and directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert.  The film focuses on an aging Chinese-American woman who discovers that she must save the universe by exploring all the other universes and connecting with the lives she could have, but never lived.

Everything Everywhere All at Once introduces Evelyn Wang (Michelle Yeoh), a Chinese-American wife and mother.  Evelyn and her husband, Waymond (Ke Huy Quan), own a struggling laundromat.  Tensions are high because the laundromat is being audited by the IRS and because they are dealing with an intense, by-the-book, IRS inspector named Deirdre Beaubeirdre (Jamie Lee Curtis).  Waymond is trying to give Evelyn divorce papers, and her demanding and elderly father, Gong Gong (James Hong), has just recently arrived from Hong Kong.  Finally, Evelyn and Waymond's daughter, Joy (Stephanie Hsu), has been trying to get her mother to accept her girlfriend, Becky (Tallie Medel).

During the meeting with Inspector Deirdre Beaubeirdre, Waymond's personality suddenly changes.  According to this new “personality,” known as “Alpha Waymond” (Ke Huy Quan), he is a version of Waymond from another universe, and he has taken over her Waymond's body.  Alpha Waymond says that he is from “Alphaverse,” one of many parallel universes (the “multiverse”).  He explains that “verse jumping” technology allows people to access the skills, memories, and bodies of their parallel universe counterparts.  He says that Evelyn must learn “verse jumping” because only she can save the multiverse from the threat of “Jobu Tupaki.”  The problem is that the Evelyn of this universe has never been good at much of anything.

Writer-directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (collectively known as “Daniels”) are quite inventive and imaginative.  Everything Everywhere All at Once is filled with crazy ideas and crazier universes and the craziest characters.  Still, I find the mechanics of this film's concept of a multiverse and how one traverses it to be not that interesting.  Every time, Alpha Waymond started talking, I found myself bored and considered stopping the film.

Luckily, the Daniels created engaging and lovable characters for Everything Everywhere All at Once, and they are played by a very skilled cast.  First, I am always happy to see the legendary Chinese-American actor, James Hong, who plays “Gong Gong.” and in this film, he has an opportunity to show the breath of his abilities.  Secondly, I am a huge fan of Jamie Lee Curtis (A Fish Called Wanda), and she gives an electric performance as the tough-talking IRS inspector, Deirdre, but she also makes a poignant turn as the “hot dog wiener fingers” universe version of Deirdre.  Ke Huy Quan plays several versions of Waymond so well that you might believe he is the lead character.  Stephanie Hsu is crazy, sexy, cool, dangerous, and even world-weary in her multiple turns in this film.

But Michelle Yeoh (Memories of a Geisha, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor) is the goddess here.  Apparently, the lead role in this film was originally written for Jackie Chan, who would have been magnificent in such a role in his younger days.  Circumstances, however, allowed Michelle Yeoh to show that she has the acting chops and the physicality to take on the kind of roles that have been afforded Jackie Chan for decades.  Yes, she is a great actress, and though Hong Kong and Chinese audiences have seen her range, I doubt many American moviegoers know that she could be so good in such a physically and emotionally challenging role as Evelyn Wang.

The influence of the Wachowski's groundbreaking 1999 film, The Matrix, on Everything Everywhere All at Once is obvious.  Ironically, Yeoh was one of the actresses considered to play “Trinity,” the lead female role in The Matrix.

Everything Everywhere All at Once is a whole lotta sound and fury for a film that is ultimately about the conflicts that can define a mother-daughter relationship, as well as basic family dysfunction.  I also think that it could have done the same thing in a considerably shorter run time than two hours and 19 minutes.  Everything Everywhere All at Once is good, but not great, and any greatness that it does have, it has because of the all-time great, Michelle Yeoh.

6 of 10
B
★★★ out of 4 stars

Friday, July 29, 2022


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Review: Yep! Keke Palmer Steals Weird and Scary "NOPE"

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 44 of 2022 (No. 1856) by Leroy Douresseaux

Nope (2022)
Running time: 135 minutes (2 hours, 15 minutes)
MPAA – R for language throughout and some violence/bloody images
WRITER/DIRECTOR:  Jordan Peele
PRODUCERS:  Jordan Peele and Ian Cooper
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Hoyte Van Hoytema
EDITOR:  Nicholas Monsour
COMPOSER: Michael Abels

HORROR/SCI-FI/MYSTERY/THRILLER

Starring:  Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, Brandon Perea, Michael Wincott, Steven Yeun, Wrenn Schmidt, Donna Mills, Eddie Jemison, and Keith David and Jacob Kim

Nope is a 2022 science fiction horror film and mystery-thriller written and directed by Jordan Peele.  The film focuses on two siblings who witness something uncanny and terrifying on and around their family's ranch.

Nope introduces Otis “OJ” Haywood, Jr. (Daniel Kaluuya) and his younger sister, Emerald “Em” Haywood (Keke Palmer), who own and operate “Haywood Hollywood Horses,” on their family's ranch where they train horses to perform on film and television.  Things have been difficult since their father, Otis Haywood (Keith David), died several months earlier in a mysterious accident in which random objects fell from the sky.

Since then, uncanny occurrences – strange sounds and odd sightings – have been happening in and around their isolated town with increasing frequency.  When OJ and Em begin to suspect they have an idea of what the abnormal events happening on their ranch are, they decide to capture video evidence of an unidentified flying object.  A local tech store employee, Angel Torres (Brandon Perea), injects himself into the siblings' situation.

However, the involvement of Ricky “Jupe” Park (Steven Yeun), the owner of a local amusement park, “Jupiter's Claim,” takes the mystery to a new level.  Now, OJ, Em, and Angel may come close to filming their own demise.

I am a big fan of the first two films Jordan Peele wrote and directed, the Oscar-winning Get Out (2016) and Us (2019).  I am also a fan of the 2021 sequel/reboot, Candyman, which Peele co-wrote and co-produced.  Nope isn't quite as good as his early directorial efforts, but it is not like them, nor is it like any film I have ever seen.

Nope is scary and thrilling, but also offbeat and really weird.  I want to emphasize weird, especially because the mystery the Haywoods are chasing is and isn't what they (or we) think it is.  I found myself trying to unravel the weirdness and the mystery as much as I found myself being scared.  Jordan Peele is so imaginative and inventive that he fills Nope with enough ideas and subplots for four movies.  That is something of a problem, as Nope often feels unfocused.  But I find it brilliant anyway.

Attentive viewers will notice that Nope has similarities to a number of films.  I noticed elements of two Steven Spielberg classics, Jaws (1975) and Close Encounters of the Kind (1977).  There is a touch of M. Night Shyamalan's Signs (2002).  Thematically, Nope brushes against Spielberg's Jurassic Park (1993), and Peele mentioned the influence of The Wizard of Oz (1939) on him while writing Nope's screenplay, which I don't see.  The last act does recall Alien 3 (1992) for me.

Nope does feature the kind of great characters and superb character writing that defined Peele's earlier efforts.  All the characters, especially OJ and Emerald, feel like characters that have a long history before this film and will have a life beyond the confines of Nope's narrative and run time.  Daniel Kaluuya does intense and laid back with equal aplomb; in this quasi-Western film, he makes OJ Haywood a true cowboy hero.  However, I think the actress and character that get the most mileage out of this film are Keke Palmer and Emerald Haywood.  This is the first time that I have seen Palmer play a real adult woman who has lived a life that is complex in its tribulations, but is also filled with good times, even some wild times.  Steven Yeun, Brandon Perea, Michael Wincott, and child actor, Jacob Kim, are quite good in their roles, but Nope is the Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer show.

Nope has a lot of lovely cinematography, especially involving the open sky and clouds.  The sound design is also absolutely good and frequently gave me a feeling of unease.  I think that in some ways Nope is trying to make us uncomfortable, and it proves that Jordan Peele is the master of making films that get at the fault lines of America.

However, in his bid to mystify us and to get at us, Peele might have gone a bit too far this time.  Nope is a brilliant work that is as weird and obtuse as it is thrilling.  With Nope, Jordan Peele is like Denis Villeneuve (Dune: Part One); he is too good for the own good of his film.

8 of 10
A
★★★★ out of 4 stars

Friday, July 22, 2022


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Review: "LIGHTYEAR" Works Hard, But the Robot Cat Steals the Show

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 37 of 2022 (No. 1849) by Leroy Douresseaux

Lightyear (2022)
Running time:  100 minutes (1 hour, 40 minutes)
MPAA –  PG for action/peril
DIRECTOR:  Angus MacLane
WRITERS:  Angus MacLane and Jason Headley; from a story by Angus MacLane, Matthew Aldrich, and Jason Headley
PRODUCER:  Galyn Susman
CINEMATOGRAPHERS:  Jeremy Lasky (D.o.P.) and Ian Megibben (D.o.P.)
EDITOR:  Anthony J. Greenberg
COMPOSER: Michael Giacchino

ANIMATION/SCI-FI/ACTION and FANTASY/ADVENTURE/DRAMA

Starring:  (voices) Chris Evans, Peter Sohn, Keke Palmer, Taika Waititi, Dale Soules, Uzo Aduba, Mary McDonald-Lewis, Isiah Whitlock, Jr., Angus MacLane, Bill Hader, Efren Ramirez, Keira Hairston, and James Brolin

Lightyear is a 2022 computer-animated, science fiction, action-adventure film directed by Angus MacLane, produced by Pixar Animation Studios, and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures.  The film is based on the character and story surrounding the character, Buzz Lightyear, that first appeared in the 1995 film, Toy Story.  Lightyear focuses on a marooned space ranger who takes on an army of robots with only an inexperienced group of recruits to help him.

In 1995, a young Andy Davis (of Toy Story) saw the film that inspired the “Buzz Lightyear” toy line that he loves so much.  Lightyear is that film.

Lightyear introduces Buzz Lightyear (Chris Evans), a “Space Ranger” in Star Command and the pilot of “the Turnip,” a space exploration vessel.  Buzz and his commanding officer, Alisha Hawthorne (Uzo Aduba), are exploring the habitable planet, Tikana Prime, when a series of accidents occur.  Now, the Turnip is stranded on Tikana, marooning the entire crew.

Lightyear spends the next several decades experimenting with hyperspace crystalline fuel in a bid to get the marooned crew off the planet.  Eventually, he is mostly a forgotten outcast, with only SOX (Peter Sohn), his robotic cat his only companion.  Buzz meets another group of misfits:  Izzy Hawthorne (Keke Palmer), Alisha's granddaughter; Mo Morrison (Taika Waititi), a clumsy recruit in the colonial defense forces; and Darby Steel (Dale Soules), an elderly paroled convict conscripted into the defense forces.  Together, they will take on a ruthless army of robots and their mysterious leader, Emperor Zurg (James Brolin), who has a shocking connection to Buzz Lightyear.

Lightyear is the first Pixar Animation Studios film to receive a wide theatrical release in North America in over two years, the last being 2020's Oscar-nominated Onward.  In that time, among the Pixar films that Disney released on its streaming service, Disney+, is one almost perfect Pixar film, Soul (2020), and one perfect film, Luca (2021).

Lightyear is a good, but not great Pixar film.  Yes, it follows the formula of Pixar films of having likable and lovable characters with engaging story arcs.  The characters have to overcome flaws, such as Buzz's insistence that he go-it-alone; Izzy's determination to be just like her grandmother; and Mo's clumsiness that is always endangering the mission and his compatriots.  Like many Pixar films, Lightyear has a last act filled with peril and near-disaster, if not near-death.  That is the problem with Lightyear, however; it is simply too formulaic.

Lightyear is not a particularly imaginative science fiction film.  Tikana Prime's aggressive plant vines and killer bugs are generic elements that can be found in American comic books, Japanese manga, sci-fi cartoons, etc.  Lightyear does have one great character, the robotic cat, Sox, who is in the great tradition of both Walt Disney and Pixar's memorable and lovable animal and animal-like sidekicks.  Sox is the reason that Lightyear does not fall into mediocrity.  Also, Peter Sohn, the actor who voices Sox, sounds like actor Jason Bateman (which is a good thing), at least, to me.

After seeing it, I realize that Lightyear is the kind of animated film that I usually wait to watch via the home media release instead of going to a movie theater to see it.  But Sox makes the trip to the theater worth it, and he is the reason for the grade I am giving the film.  While the last act is a nice reward for watching the entire film, Lightyear is not a Disney “instant classic,” and that's all there is to it.

7 of 10
B+
★★★½ out of 4 stars

[This film has three post-credit scenes.]

Friday, June 17, 2022


The text is copyright © 2022 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved.  Contact this blog or site for reprint and syndication rights and fees.

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Review: "SYNCHRONIC" is a Fresh and Intriguing Take on Time Travel Movies

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 24 of 2022 (No. 1836) by Leroy Douresseaux

Synchronic (2020)
Running time:  102 minutes (1 hour, 42 minutes)
MPAA – R for drug content and language throughout, and for some violent/bloody images
DIRECTORS:  Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead
WRITER:  Justin Benson
PRODUCERS:  Justin Benson & Aaron Moorhead, David Lawson Jr., and Michael Mendelsohn
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Aaron Moorhead
EDITORS:  Justin Benson, Michael Felker, and Aaron Moorhead
COMPOSER:  Jimmy LaValle

SCI-FI/DRAMA

Starring:  Anthony Mackie, Jamie Dornan, Ally Ioannides, Katie Aselton, and Ramiz Monsef

Synchronic is a 2020 science fiction and drama film directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, also known as the team of Benson & Moorhead.  The film focuses on two paramedics who encounter a series of bizarre accidents and inexplicable deaths that are tied to a mysterious new designer drug, which has otherworldly side effects on its users.

Synchronic is set in New Orleans, Louisiana.  It introduces two paramedics, Steve Denube (Anthony Mackie) and Dennis Dannelly (Jamie Dornan), who are also longtime friends.  They begin to receive a series of emergency calls that turn out to be unusual or inexplicable.  In a hotel room, they find a young woman suffering from the bite of an Eastern diamondback rattlesnake, which is not native to Louisiana.  At a domestic abuse call, they find a man who has apparently been stabbed with something like a sword, and they later find an old sword embedded in the wall of another room.  At these emergency calls, Steve usually finds an empty package for a new designer drug known as “Synchronic.”

After being injured on the job, Steve, a sexually active ladies' man, has a routine blood test.  It reveals that he has a brain tumor near his pineal gland, which is unusually underdeveloped and non-calcified for a man his age.

Dennis is married to Tara (Kate Aselton) and has two children, including a now 18-year-old daughter, Brianna (Ally Ioannides).  Responding to an overdose call, Steve and Dennis find a dead boy and an intoxicated girl who tells them that Brianna was at their party.  Steve and Dennis can't find her, but Steve does find an empty Synchronic package near where Brianna was supposed to be sitting.  Investigating Synchronic, Steve learns that it alters the perception of time and can even allow some people to time travel.  Now, Steve begins the journey of a lifetime in hopes of finding Brianna somewhere in time before he runs out of time.

Synchronic is a modestly-budgeted independent film.  It is also a high-concept science fiction film based on the fantastic concept of a street drug that can allow humans – to one extent or another – experience time travel or time displacement.  I think the budget is what keeps this film from really flying with this concept.  Don't get me wrong, dear readers.  Benson & Moorhead take their audience to some interesting places in the past, and I imagine that they could do even more with this concept if it were a television/streaming series or miniseries.  I can say that they are definitely not shy about depicting how treacherous New Orleans was for a Black man in the past and even now.

To that end, Anthony Mackie gives a performance that is bigger than this film.  In fact, no element sells Synchronic's ideas and plots better than Mackie's performance.  The script kind of relegates Jamie Dornan to the sidelines, although Dennis Dannelly is surrounded by some intriguing family melodrama.  However, it is Mackie as Steve who does the heavy lifting and convinces the audience that Synchronic the drug and its amazing effects are an actual thing.

So this is my way of saying that Synchronic should not be lost to time.  Benson & Moorhead have created a concept that could be … dare I say it... timeless.  Honestly, I only decided to watch this film after learning that this duo was directing two episodes of the Disney+/Marvel Studios six-episode series, “Moon Knight.”  Now, I'm just glad I watched it, and I recommend it to film fans and movie lovers looking for offbeat, indie sci-film films.  And I hope for more in the world of Synchronic.

7 of 10
B+
★★★½ out of 4 stars

Thursday, April 21, 2022


The text is copyright © 2022 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog or site for reprint and syndication rights and fees.

-----------------

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Amazon wants me to inform you that the affiliate link below is a PAID AD, but I technically only get paid (eventually) if you click on the affiliate link below AND buy something(s).