"Onslaught" - Movie Review

Dir: Adam Wingard

Starring: Adria Arjona, Dan Stevens, Eric Wareheim, Michael Biehn, Drew Starkey, Alex Pereira, Reginald VelJohnson, and Rebecca Hall

Adam Wingard plunges straight back into the chaotic, blood-soaked battlefields of his early days with Onslaught, an adrenaline-fueled kinetic action, horror, sci-fi mashup. Wingard channels the gritty grindhouse stylings of the 1970s and the straight-to-video DNA of fast action films from the 1980s. It’s easy to see the influence of films like Assault on Precinct 13, Universal Soldier, and The Terminator throughout the scenes and among the characters. Wingard bypasses modern style and polish to resurrect an era when wild cinematic premises and unhinged characters ruled the midnight movie screen.

The story begins in an isolated trailer park where a traumatized former soldier (Adria Arjona) and her young daughter (Blake Kennedy) find themselves trapped under a nighttime siege. Three experimental super-soldiers, dragged back from death to serve as modern military technology, tear into their desert community. One lugs a roaring chainsaw, another brandishes an oversized butcher's cleaver, and the third a tactical rifle; together they turn a quiet rural night into a visceral slaughterhouse.

Wingard leans hard into this nostalgic aesthetic, packing the frame with a pulsating synth soundtrack, splattered practical gore, and a keen sense of slasher-cinema characteristics. Dan Stevens, a consistent collaborator of Wingard, chews the scenery as a deranged scientist complete with a Friar Tuck tonsure haircut and a dead-eyed stare, sharing space with an amusing high-on-drugs operative (Drew Starkey), and everyone’s favorite 90s TGIF dad Reginald VelJohnson playing a supportive veteran to everyone in the trailer park. Adria Arjona anchors the violence as Celeste, a sniper battling severe PTSD who struggles with the tender demands of motherhood while operating entirely on primal survival instinct when the moment calls for it. Arjona shines in the quiet family moments and in the big action moments when she takes confident control. Add in three physically intimidating super-soldiers, including UFC heavyweight Alex Pereira, and Onslaught has enough personalities to carry its underwhelming script. 

Problems surface when the director tries to stretch this tight, B-movie siege into a sprawling government conspiracy that introduces too many ideas and a few too many characters. The manic corporate cleanup operative, played with style and charm by Drew Starkey, is an interesting character, but he is left to float in and out of scenes with little purpose. The widening mythos tied to Wingard’s earlier cult thriller The Guest ties a great movie into this one, but it never fully connects the dots. Eventually, the pacing stumbles as it tries to juggle too many moving ideas and themes, leaving the final act scrambling to contain a universe that has grown far too big for its runtime.

Even as this film stumbles to find its narrative footing, the sheer gleeful energy and style of Onslaught carry it across the finish line. We rarely see studios support unapologetic, genre-blending midnight movies like this anymore. While everything in Onslaught certainly doesn't work, the film succeeds at creating a genre mashup with bizarre characters and unleashes action sequences with chaotic, gory energy.

Monte’s Rating

3.00 out of 5.00

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“The Dog Stars” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Ridley Scott

Written by:  Mark L. Smith, based on Peter Heller’s novel

Starring:  Jacob Elordi, Josh Brolin, Margaret Qualley, Guy Pearce, Benedict Wong, and Allison Janney

Runtime:  118 minutes

‘The Dog Stars’:  The cinematic stars do not perfectly align, but the performances and pacing make this post-apocalyptic tale worth a look

Stars. 

The last word in the title of director Ridley Scott’s new movie is apropos.  

Jacob Elordi, Josh Brolin, Margaret Qualley, Guy Pearce, Benedict Wong, and Allison Janney play roles in Scott’s post-apocalyptic presentation.  

What a cast!  

This regal acting ensemble does not lend their voices to play animated canines.  Their characters are humans in a live-action story – along with one dog named Jasper - set in a world where a cataclysmic virus has decimated humanity.  The year is 2035, and the few who survived this unknown flu-like tidal wave must fight to continue their individual existences. 

Scott’s film – based on Peter Heller’s 2012 novel – feels like a combination of few genres.  “The Dog Stars” carries the primal, rabid danger of “28 Days Later” (2002) and “The Road Warrior” (1981), pays homage to classic westerns where an isolated ranch can always be vulnerable to strangers, like in “The Outlaw Josey Wales” (1976), and wades into a deliberately casual pace where the leads try to find meaning in their current state of affairs, such as in “The Postman” (1997). 

The threats are horribly real, but they appear in a few different forms from the aforementioned genres.  It’s tricky to pin down the nature of the antagonists.  Some act zombie-like or are first cousins to the maniacs from “Mad Max: Fury Road” (2015).  Additionally, an aggressive, but not fanatical, assembly rides on horseback, and filmmakers conjure a couple of other villainous twists, so it’s a bit confusing.  

However, if Scott, Heller, and screenwriter Mark L. Smith wanted to communicate that peril can appear in any form, then mission accomplished.  

Meanwhile, the protagonists attempt some semblance of normalcy with a few creature comforts and try to avoid the said creatures. 

You see, food, electricity, gasoline, and medical supplies are worth more than their weight in gold (that is, if any modern currency existed).  One would stand a better chance of winning a pre-pandemic Powerball windfall than discovering a bottle of penicillin.  

If one possessed such a medicinal luxury, then prepare to face the ongoing problem of keeping it.  Outsiders could burst into view or silently sneak onsite, shoot you and your loved ones dead, and then rob you blind while they step over your corpses.   

Hig (Jacob Elordi) and Bangley (Josh Brolin) are on constant high alert, as the two pals live on an abandoned multi-acreage airfield in rural Erie, Colo.

(The film is set in Colorado, but cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt films gorgeous mountainous rigor in Italy.)

Bangley, a pragmatist, frequently perches from a tower as a sniper. 

“Shoot first and never ask questions” could be Bangley’s motto.  

Hig had a pragmatic occupation before life went to hell.  He was a mechanic and a pilot.  

Still, Hig is an idealist at heart and wonders if life could be better outside his and his pal’s discouraging but effective reality, especially when he occasionally communicates with a friendly voice in Grand Junction, a town just over 250 miles away. 

“The Dog Stars” street cred leans into the actors championing their characters.  

Hig and Bangley share a congenial “The Odd Couple” vibe, and Pops (Guy Pearce) and Cima (Margaret Qualley) are a welcome sight for Hig and the audience, as this father/daughter team doesn’t share Bangley’s decree.  Although, Pops patience towards strangers has been worn thin – off-screen – in recent years.  His trigger finger could prove itchy if provoked.  

Still, he hopes for peace, but Pops protects Cima and their spot of nirvana, as she attempts to balance a positive outlook while coping with a painful backstory.  Curiously, Hig’s upsetting history – which Scott and Elordi frequently revisit - did not resonate as much as Cima’s 60-second mention.  Still, these two survivors’ past experiences do effectively draw them together. 

This critic cared about these characters, and Scott’s and editors Sam Restivo and Claire Simpons’ choices to spend long stretches in casual, everyday moments of grace that are sometimes interrupted by unpredictable violence made the 118-minute runtime seem regrettably too short.  This is especially true when those same filmmakers wrapped up the third act too quickly, as if they were under some unforgiving edict of limiting the film to a two-hour theatrical runtime.   

Wanting “The Dog Stars” to run longer is a good sign, and while the cinematic stars do not perfectly align, the performances and pacing make this post-apocalyptic tale worth a look. 

Jeff’s ranking

2.5 / 4 stars

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“Mutiny” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Jean-Francois Richet

Written by:  Lindsay Michel and J.P. Davis

Starring:  Jason Statham, Annabelle Wallis, Ramon Tikaram, Roland Moller, Adrian Lester, Chaneil Kular, and Simon Kluth

Runtime:  87 minutes

‘Mutiny’ doesn’t stay afloat

In “Mutiny”, Cole Reed (Jason Statham) leads a one-man uprising on a cargo ship, called the Artemis, against a crew of 20 (plus one captain and an additional small group of newcomers).  For anyone who has enjoyed Statham – a Bona fide action-movie star – raise fisticuffs and firearms fury against a collection of baddies before, one knows that the antagonists are in deep trouble.  Yes, deep trouble of the ocean-depth kind, especially since director Jean-Francois Richet’s and screenwriters Lindsay Michel and J.P. Davis’ movie is primarily set on the said vessel that sails from the Gulf of Thailand and then somewhere into the great beyond. 

For diehard Statham fans, “Mutiny” navigates a chance to see the ever-ready, British-born bruiser dispose of villains in the most merciless manner, including Cole utilizing a pair of handy props readily found on a boat as deadly weapons.  

Granted, Richet and the writers conjure up four or five kills that will elicit audible exclamations from movie theatre audiences, but there are not enough of these gleefully violent moments to offset the paper-thin, cliché revenge plot.  

“Mutiny” feels like the filmmakers’ sole goal is to simply ask Jason to do his thing (i.e., dispense brutality) at sea during a shallow 87-minute runtime (according to this critic’s watch), which he does, as opposed to on land or in the air.

After a brief opening scene – that could be a flashback or flashforward – the film’s next couple of minutes show Mr. Reed scouting out a skyscraper’s lobby, located in Bangkok, Thailand, for potential trouble.  He works for Tibu Campallo (Ramon Tikaram), the head of KMG, a leader in the shipping industry.  Cole, a former police officer, now works as Tibu’s head of security.  Still, Cole is more than an employee.  Tibu thinks of him as family!  This billionaire-and-bodyguard family/friendship is legit. 

Cole would lay his life on the line for Tibu, and Mr. Reed is put to the test during the first act.  Mercenaries ambush Cole and Tibu on Bangkok’s streets with an avalanche of gunfire.  Let’s not divulge if KMG’s CEO passes away or not, but Cole effectively shoots back.  After the ruckus abruptly ends, Cole seeks to discover who attempted to murder his employer/friend/figurative kin.

One of the gun-popping scoundrels is a crewman for a KMG ship.  You don’t say!  Since the aforementioned outlaw is bald, Cole decides to assume his identity, board the ship, and do some police work!  

Although Cole doesn’t take advantage of his follically-challenged condition and inexplicably wears a hat when trying to board.  Why?  Perhaps, he wears a ballcap to hide his appearance because the crewmates know his alter ego?  It’s a bit confusing. 

What’s not confusing is that Cole attempts to mow down the crew, including Captain Marko Madsen (Roland Moller), especially after Mr. Reed discovers that the ship is being used for human trafficking.  

Luckily, Cole finds an ally in the form of the ship’s third mate, Angie Ellis (Annabelle Wallis), who is a recent KMG hire and not at all part of the crew’s nefarious plans.  Cole and Angie are outraged over this unconscionable development, and Ms. Ellis states that there are a few dozen victims on board.  But Richet and cinematographer Brendan Galvin’s camera never shows more than about a dozen (at the very most, and it’s more like nine) unfortunate souls that are held in one shipping container.

Obviously, one victim is too many, but this is a massive ship, and one would think that Angie’s math and the number of actual individuals would agree or at least land within the same ballpark.

Despite Angie’s (or the filmmakers’) challenges with calculations, she and Cole make a positive, workable team.  The film adds a few mentions of Angie’s daughter waiting at home to help gain our sympathy, but Angie is physically capable in a fight and seems to have learned some weapons training in the past.  Still, Cole does most of the killing, while Marko repeatedly jumps on the walkie-talkie and orders his men – who might as well be cardboard cutouts - to finish the job with this stowaway, but when it comes to slaying a Statham action-hero character, well…good luck! 

The crew members feel disposable, and so does the story, and Statham’s four or five particularly vicious kills over almost 90 minutes doesn’t make for a worthwhile theatrical experience.  

Admittedly, Statham and Tikaram share some nice foundational moments that develop a palpable on-screen bond with their characters, but Cole’s eventual trek to jettison around a ship – where we often don’t realize where he is in relation to the bridge - to eliminate the degenerate crew is about as paint-by-numbers as it gets, and the color is a dull gray. 

Cole is all business but doesn’t possess a colorful personality.  He could have used Adam Clay’s (Statham) lines from “The Beekeeper” (2024), a Statham action-hero vehicle, which frequently causes smiles (or eye rolls, depending on your perspective) when he says the following puns in relation to the movie’s title: 

“Sometimes, when the hive is out of balance, you have to replace the queen.”

“When someone hurts an older person, sometimes they’re left to face the hornets alone.”

“I need to take care of the hive.”

“Mutiny” doesn’t really have any dialogue sweeteners, as noted with Stratham’s 2024 film, and unfortunately, the human trafficking element doesn’t pull on our heartstrings like it should, even though the script – a couple of times - refers to a little girl needing medical attention.   

Well, by paying a little attention, you can decipher the ultimate reason for the attempted assassination of Tibu eons before it’s revealed in the third act, and it’s about as predictable as a proficient ship successfully mastering buoyancy. 

Unfortunately, the movie has problems with buoyancy.  “Mutiny” sinks. 

Jeff’s ranking

1.5 / 4 stars

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Movie Review - "Tony"

Directed by: Matt Johnson.

Written by: Matt Johnson, Todd Bartels, Lou Howe, and Matthew Miller. 

Starring: Dominic Sessa, Antonio Banderas, and Emilia Jones. 

Runtime: 106 minutes

Anthony Bourdain biopic ‘Tony’ will have audiences asking for seconds

I’m ready to call it: Dominic Sessa is a star.

The 23-year-old actor returns with a headlining role and proves his winning performance in 2023’s surprise Christmastime charmer “The Holdovers” was no one-off. The stakes are higher here, wish Sessa slipping into the role of beloved and dearly missed celebrity gourmand, writer, and connoisseur of life, Anthony Bourdain.

“Tony” sticks to Bourdain’s early years, taking inspiration from his 2000 memoir “Kitchen Confidential” to offer a portrait of the artist as a young man at a crossroads: Will he end up just another college dropout with thwarted literary ambitions, toiling unseen in kitchens until his body gives out under the strain and drug use, or will he chart his own path outside the narrow confines offered him? 

Sessa’s Tony has plenty of dreams, he just can’t see how to reach them. A wry, rangy boy in a Stooges T-shirt with “A Clockwork Orange” poster on his bedroom wall, Tony wants to be the next Hunter S. Thompson, a writer with literary chops and no respect for the establishment. But he needs the establishment’s support: an unserious Vassar student, he applies for a cushy writing fellowship that would send him to New York City to craft what he’s certain will be the Great American Novel, if only someone would recognize his genius. 

Alas, it’s not to be the fellowship committee at Vassar, which soundly rejects his proposal, leaving Tony in a lurch, as he cannot bear to tell his family of his failure – nor can he bear to tell Nancy (Emilia Jones), his high school crush whom he’s desperate to impress. So, in a fit of desperate impulsivity, he tells a fib, claiming to have gotten the fellowship, and unbeknownst to Nancy, follows her to Provincetown, Massachusetts, where she’s spending the summer. 

He’s got no money, and he’s got no plan, but a drunken, angsty night at local seafood joint The Flagship lands him an unglamorous job washing dishes. Scrubbing butter and clam juice in an industrial sink is quite the tumble from Vassar and an all-expenses-paid writing fellowship in New York City, but it’s in this cramped, greasy kitchen that Tony finds what he was so desperately missing. 

Like a familiar, well-made dish you’ve eaten a thousand times before, “Tony” satisfies. It hits the predictable beats of a coming-of-age story: there’s the girl of his dreams, just out of reach; the bad boy sidekick and poor influence, Sal (Leo Woodall), a fellow restaurant worker with a cocaine habit who takes him under his wing; and most importantly, there’s his reluctant mentor, the Flagship chef (Antonio Banderas) who teaches Tony that food and its preparation is about so much more than mere sustenance, even as he himself has forgotten that truth. Banderas is wonderful, by the way, mysterious and reserved but as hinting of depth as the ocean; I’d happily watch a whole second film just about him. 

It feels greedy, then, to wish that “Tony” was a touch less pleasing. As beloved as Bourdain was and as missed as he is since his death by suicide in 2018, he was a complicated man, imperfect and foul-mouthed with the kind of rock star swagger and disregard for niceties that characterized so many of the artists he openly admired. “Tony” is a perfectly charming movie, but is “perfectly charming” what we want from an Anthony Bourdain movie? 

Maybe. Death has a way of gilding memories in gold, and “Tony” has such shine to it. Who knows what Bourdain would think of this cuddly depiction of himself, but one has to imagine him pleased with its understanding of kitchens as a place of community, its cooks a band of brothers in the trenches of social life.

Barbara’s ranking

3/4 stars

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“Nimrods” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Lee Kirk

Written by:  Lee Kirk and Green Day

Starring:  Mason Thames, Kylr Coffman, Ryan Foust, Jenna Fischer, Mckenna Grace, Keen Ruffalo, Ignacio Diaz-Silverio, Billie Joe Armstrong, Tre Cool, and Mike Dirnt

Runtime:  107 minutes

‘Nimrods’ is a fun road-trip flick that celebrates freewheeling, hazardous teen id

Tommy (Mason Thames), Fred (Kylr Coffman), and Chad (Ryan Foust) are suburban high school kids who escape from their realities with their punk band, Analog Dogs.  

Now, their lives in Kansas City are not dreadful nightmares or anything.  The boys have “normal” existences and work through scholastic drudgeries like other teens.  Although Tommy – the guitar player and lead singer – lost his dad.  Tommy, his mom, Jodi (Jenna Fischer), and his older brother, Wayne (Keen Ruffalo), miss him terribly, but the band is a glorious garage-gathering pastime.      

The rock trio shares groovy chemistry when they play and offers playful adolescent banter when not picking or strumming guitars (Tommy and Fred) or striking the drums (Chad), including Tommy scolding Chad for arriving at practice on time, as he explains that punk-band artists should show up late!  

Come on, Chad.  Get with the program!  

They have serious dreams of filling and rocking arenas someday but do not possess the know-how or the funds to reach a rock-and-roll promised land.  However, their fortunes dramatically change when Green Day stops in KC during their tour, and the high schoolers mistakenly believe that GD invited Analog Dogs to open for them at the Hollywood Palladium in La La Land on New Year’s Eve.   

(For the record, the Palladium is a fabulous venue!)

This is Analog Dog’s path, and director/co-writer Lee Kirk’s “Nimrods” is a fun road-trip flick that celebrates freewheeling, hazardous teen id with frank humor and superb buddy vibes from our young actor trinity.

For three 17-year-olds – with only $27 and no car keys in their pockets and zero adult life experience - traveling 1,620 miles from KC to LA seems as unimaginable as stumbling upon a rocket ship and flying it to Mars, but our heroes attempt to find a way. 

I mean, Tommy, Fred, and Chad will open for Green Day!   Well, they believe it anyway.

“Nimrods” channels the goofy hijinks of Todd Phillips’ “Road Trip” (2000) with the impossibilities of Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels’ tour in Peter Farrelly’s “Dumb and Dumber” (1994).  Granted, Thames, Coffman, and Foust don’t reach the comedic heights of the stars in Farrelly’s all-time classic comedy.  However, they embrace a close collaborative comic harmony as Jonah Hill, Michael Cera, and Christopher Mintz-Plasse did in “Superbad” (2007).  

Tommy – as the lead singer - is the leader of the troupe, while Fred frequently applies fuzzy logic, and Chad attempts to be the constant voice of reason.  Their dynamic elicits belly laughs and smiles throughout the picture, including when Fred attempts to pool their funds together at a diner, overindulges in hallucinogens, and causes a gasoline mishap.  

These boys try their absolute best to reach the Left Coast while dodging parental figures back home and on-the-road perils in front of them.  Tommy, Fred, and Chad have less than a week to get to Cali, and Kirk often feeds the audience with the days on the calendar on the big screen, giving us a countdown to the kids’ potential glory or doom, but we have no idea the individual cities in which they encounter.  The screenplay doesn’t provide a map of their progress, and that works just fine. 

The movie’s location management department and cinematographer David Robert Jones seem to always present a setting in some Nowhereland that feels like either a Midwestern Burning Man or a lonely small-town exit off Highways 335 or 40.  Our heroes barely know where they are located, and the audience feels this driving-by-the-seat-of-their-pants tone as well.  

However, Tommy, Fred, and Chad don’t carry all the screen time alone, as Kirk and the casting department hired complementary supporting actors to share the runtime who meaningfully add emotional and amusing elements to the journey.  Mckenna Grace gives a charming performance as a potential love interest, and Ruffalo builds tangible brotherly moments with Thames.  Meanwhile, one of Fischer’s “The Office” (2005-2013) co-stars delivers a memorable cameo, and a pair of Gen X comedians pop in out of nowhere to successfully lend their hilarious gifts to the film’s cause.  

Speaking of causes, Green Day legends Billie Joe Armstrong, Tre Cool, and Mike Dirnt make on-screen appearances through grounded everyday discourse and music!  

This flick is a labor of love for Green Day, as the band has writing credits for the movie.  It’s based on an initial idea from Billie Joe, and Kirk spoke with the Northern California band about their real-life adventures on the road as inspiration for Tommy, Fred, and Chad’s trek.  

“Nimrods” is a must-see for Green Day fans, and it lands with a similar pronounced cinematic punch as “I Love You, Man” (2009) did for RUSH fans, and full disclosure, I love both bands.   Still, you don’t have to be a Green Day fanatic to enjoy this entertaining ride. 

“Do you have the time” to catch “Nimrods”?   Well, I recommend making the time.  

Jeff’s ranking

3 / 4 stars

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"The End of Oak Street" - Movie Review

Directed by: David Robert Mitchell

Starring: Ewan McGregor, Anne Hathaway, Christian Convery, Maisy Stella

Run Time: 1h 39m

David Robert Mitchell’s The End of Oak Street wears its vintage Amblin inspirations on its sleeve, pulling straight from the late-80s and early-90s playbook of Steven Spielberg and Joe Dante. Think the spectacle of Jurassic Park, the scrappy charm of The Goonies, and the mean streak of Gremlins. The premise is pure pulp science fiction: an ordinary suburban neighborhood is plucked from the grid and dropped into an untamed prehistoric jungle, with a smoldering volcano in the backdrop! It’s a throwback sci-fi premise that balances domestic stakes against sudden, lethal creature mayhem.

Before the first dinosaur even enters the frame, the Platt family is already in freefall. Greg (Ewan McGregor) and Denise (Anne Hathaway) are quietly tiptoeing around an impending divorce. He copes by avoiding conflict at all costs; she leans on realistic expectations while writing a book in her basement that longs for the life choices she abandoned. Their kids, Audrey (Maisy Stella) and Brian (Christian Convery), read the room better than their parents realize, absorbing the silence that fills the halls and the fights that echo through the thin walls. Writer/director David Robert Mitchell sets this up with inspired visual choices, incorporating the picture-perfect family structure with an adorable dog amid glowing streetlamps in a charming neighborhood, thrilling creature creations that sustain suspense, and even a crisp split-diopter framing that traps the couple’s emotional distance in sharp focus. It all works in building an aesthetic that feels safe, perfect for unexpected shocks when the neighborhood is turned upside down. 

The film's most fascinating, and jarring, quality is Mitchell’s willingness to get vicious. This isn't a sanitized family adventure. The dinosaur encounters hit hard and fast, occasionally lingering on the brutal, prolonged fates of unlucky neighbors. That violence leads to wild tonal swings that feel straight out of 1980s genre cinema; one minute a raptor pack is tearing through backyard swing sets, and the next, Greg and Denise are giggling at the mating rituals of two long-necked, long-tailed dinosaurs. It’s distracting and, at times, absurd, but also entertaining; the film maintains a narrative that is consistently trying to keep the audience uneasy at every turn. The creature designs, a pleasant surprise also, lean heavily into contemporary paleontology, with feathered raptors, a slithering Titanoboa, and tiny herbivores that feel genuinely threatening.

The time-traveling mechanics behind the jump make almost no sense, and individual character beats occasionally get steamrolled to get the cast to the next set piece. But the cast carries the weight. McGregor and Hathaway give the marital friction real texture, moving naturally from terrified protectors to exhausted spouses clinging to what’s left of their bond. The neighborhood's monsters embody their relationship: destructive, in a state of survival, and leaving a trail of hurt people in their wake. Maisy Stella and Christian Convery also nail the sibling dynamic, trading aggressive banter before snapping into fierce cooperative survival mode when the moment breaks.

The End of Oak Street prioritizes audacity over much of its logic, just like many of the big summer popcorn movies that came before it. It’s inventive, messy, and surprisingly aggressive in all the right, surprising ways. It’s a summer creature feature that recaptures the eccentric magic of the classics it borrows from.

Monte’s Rating

3.00 out of 5.00

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“Olmo” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Fernando Eimbcke

Written by:  Fernando Eimbcke and Vanesa Garnica

Starring:  Aivan Uttapa, Diego Olmedo, Andrea Suarez Paz, Rosa Armendariz, Melanie Frometa, and Gustavo Sanchez Parra

Runtime:  79 minutes

‘Olmo’ is an engaging, empathetic 1970s coming-of-age tale with timeless and rare teenage challenges  

“Why change your shirt?  Why even get dressed at all?” – Olmo (Aivan Uttapa) says to his father, Nestor (Gustavo Sanchez Parra)

Olmo is a struggling teenager.  This 14-year-old isn’t old enough to drive or secure a job that would merit a proper income.  He daydreams about Nina (Melanie Frometa), the girl across the street, but with zero dating experience, Olmo hasn’t mastered the art of boy-girl conversation to win her over.  

His family has money issues looming over their head, while Olmo’s dad is immobilized and cannot work.  Olmo’s mom, Cecilia (Andrea Suarez Paz), and his older sister, Ana (Rosa Armendariz), manage Nestor’s care at home.  Our teenage lead is asked to pitch in now and then, but suddenly, he’s asked to help now.  

(Thankfully, Olmo can turn to his best friend, Miguel (Diego Olmedo), for solace, or as much as this fellow teen can muster.) 

However, a ray of sunshine cuts through the malaise and beams down on our adolescent hero when Nina requires Olmo’s immediate assistance.  How about that?

She needs a stereo to bring to a party and says to Olmo and Miguel, “So if there’s no stereo, there’s no party.  Could you lend me your stereo?”

Finally, Olmo has found a way to potentially capture Nina’s heart through resourcefulness, while he and Miguel can party the night away!   How will our hero make out…and will he make out with Nina?  

This is the plot of director/co-writer Fernando Eimbcke’s “Olmo”, an engaging coming-of-age indie that’s set in southern New Mexico during the 1970s, a time when Gen X kids could not temporarily scroll their troubles away for a few minutes at a time on social media or search for solutions on Google or YouTube.  During the 1970s, one was left to their own devices, imaginations, and nearby immediate means to solve problems and answer questions. 

Teenage years are already difficult to navigate, and Eimbcke throws the added hurdle the size of the 8,900’ Organ Needle in front of Olmo:  his dad’s medical problems.  

Not at the very, very beginning, but extremely early into the first act, Eimbcke (“Duck Season” (2004), “Lake Tahoe” (2008), “Club Sandwich” (2013)) launches the audience into the aforementioned (nearly) 9,000’ difficulty, where dreams of bliss are trodden with reality.  

This introduction earns empathy for Olmo, Nina, and Cecilia, but for Nestor most of all.  Parra lives and breathes Nestor’s despair and frustration of his bedridden condition.  He’s a man who can no longer support his family, and every molecule of his thin frame and despondent gaze exclaims hopelessness.  Parra’s Nestor floods the screen with this gloomy tone, and it’s up to the other three kin to lift the home’s spirits and raise economic sustenance.  

Since Olmo is in line within this domestic patriarchy, he feels the weight on his narrow adolescent shoulders.  

So, a party nirvana with Nina is the godsend he didn’t even know was a possibility until she asked Miguel and him that momentous question.  

Of course, our hero faces shirking his responsibility, breaking a rule or two, and figuratively tripping over his lack-of-life-experience blind spots to reach the promised festivities, as writers Eimbcke and Vanesa Garnica scribe moral tests for Olmo and Miguel to confront during the second and third acts.  

“Olmo” has a “Superbad” (2007)-like premise with a quirky, small-town “Napoleon Dynamite” (2004) production design and on-location vibe.  Eimbcke’s movie doesn’t reach the comedic heights and associated performances of those previously mentioned 21st-century classics and iconic casts.  

It’s a dramedy with plenty more drama than comedy, but “Olmo” hooks you straight away with its premise and establishes an irresistible will to follow the title character on his hopeful and faulty journey while also wishing happy endings for his three family members too.  

Eimbcke doesn’t (seem to) ask Uttapa and Olmedo to do too much other than embrace the characters and follow their on-screen alter egos on this winding path, which is all the two young actors need to grant audience buy-in.  The most memorable performances are a pair of supporting ones.  Armendariz demands a non-negotiable emotional distance with everyone within Ana’s sight, and Parra heroically hoists Nestor’s burden that resonates like a magical spell both on-screen and off-screen.  

Although “Olmo” doesn’t rely on magic.  With a family facing so much reality, the film’s authenticity, a catchy soundtrack, and flashes of hope can reward those who get dressed, change their shirt, and seek out Olmo journey and his timeless and rare teenage challenges.

Jeff’s ranking

2.5 / 4 stars

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“Spider-Man: Brand New Day” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Destin Daniel Cretton

Written by:  Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers

Starring:  Tom Holland, Zendaya, Jacob Batalon, Mark Ruffalo, Jon Bernthal, Liza Colon-Zayas, Tramell Tillman, and Sadie Sink

Runtime:  145 minutes

‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ feels like a busy yet uneventful Monday 

“I will remember you.  Will you remember me?” – Sarah McLachlan (1995)

During the last act of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” (2021), Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) casts a spell so that Peter Parker (Tom Holland) is wiped away from everyone’s memories, including Peter’s girlfriend, MJ (Zendaya), and best friend, Ned (Jacob Batalon).  

New York City residents (as well as inhabitants all over the planet) continue to recall and rely on Spider-Man, but no one can recollect a teenage Peter Parker.   

It’s a brand-new perspective for a suddenly anonymous Peter Parker, and this is where “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” picks up.  MJ and Ned move away to Boston to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Peter dives, sprints, and swings into his work as your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, cleaning up New York City while in frequent communication with Detective Jean DeWolff (Liza Colon-Zayas).  

During the film’s first act, Spidey works overtime chasing down criminals - like Scorpion (Michael Mando), Tombstone (Marvin Jones III), and more – with some exciting urban battles.  These snippets and montages feel like odes to the old-school Spider-Man comics, and director Destin Daniel Cretton and cinematographer Brett Pawlak capture some stunning first-person imagery, especially when Peter hangs upside-down from a girder and simply drops (maybe) 80 floors before shooting out one of his trusty webs.  

Before you can say, “My Spidey-senses are tingling,” it’s four years later, and MJ and Ned have moved back to NYC and are ready to take on the world after school, while Peter continues his nonstop days and evenings fighting crime and tending to his constant array of cuts and bruises.  

Will Peter reconnect with his old girlfriend and BFF?  

This plot point becomes the emotional center for “Brand New Day”, as Cretton (“Shang-Chi and the Legend of Ten Rings” (2021) and “Short Term 12” (2013)) grabs the webs…err, reins of Holland’s fourth Spider-Man film.  

Writers Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers (who co-wrote all four Holland Spidey flicks) scribe plenty of mental strife for Spidey.  Mr. Parker learns to cope without friends or family as a support system, ponders a possible reunion with MJ and Ned, wrestles with the long hours while taking a constant physical beating on The Big Apple’s streets, suddenly deals with new physiological changes to his body (What?), and investigates the mystery of an unknown villain frequently attacking a research agency called Damage Control headed by William Metzger (Tramell Tillman). 

Holland spins his best, most nuanced performance as Peter in the series with moments of self-reflection, tending to his wounds, and facing MJ and Ned as the MIT grads have no high school memories of him at all, and Tom is there for all of it.  And why not?  He’s been playing this role since “Captain America: Civil War” (2016), and his on-screen Peter carries the heft of years of baggage, including Aunt May’s (Marisa Tomei) death.  Tom and Zendaya share obvious chemistry in all their on-screen moments.  Surely, life as a real-life couple has its advantages.  Tom and Jacob share some glimpses into their on-screen former bestie status.  

Unfortunately, “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” sometimes feels like we’re slogging through a two-and-a-half-hour therapy session.  Normally, superhero inner conflicts can work exceedingly well to add indispensable character development.  For example, just turn to Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) and Thor (Chris Hemsworth) facing their struggles in “Guardians of the Galaxy” (2014) and “Avengers: Endgame” (2019), respectively.  

“Guardians” and “Endgame”, however, have compelling stories with gigantic stakes, like Ronan (Lee Pace) acquiring the power stone and attempting to destroy an entire planet and the Avengers trying to reverse Thanos’ (Josh Brolin) universe-shaking snap from “Avengers: Infinity War” (2018).  

“Brand New Day” takes an altogether different approach.  Cretton, McKenna, and Sommers introduce a mystery villain, the individual behind the aforementioned Damage Control attacks.  It’s up to Spider-Man to act as a detective and reveal the big baddie.  Obviously, one doesn’t need an interplanetary battle in a Spider-Man movie, but the film’s second largest conflict – where Spidey plays Sherlock Holmes – is flawed.  Even though the actual disclosure is a take-your-breath-away moment, the resolution in the third act is a letdown for reasons that will not be revealed in this review.  Sigh.   

Once one knows the revelation and the played-out events afterward, the film’s rewatch factor is infinitesimal compared to “No Way Home”, a movie with countless big moments that absolutely earned its 1.9 billion-dollar take in theatres. 

Granted, the stunt, visual effects, and special effects departments do draw up some sticky situations and glorious superhero skirmishes, including Spidey’s tangled on-again/off-again alliance with Punisher (Jon Bernthal) and some intriguing scenes with Dr. Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) and his alter-ego, Hulk.  Bernthal and Ruffalo should star in every MCU movie.  Oh, let’s not forget that Peter’s DNA is changing too!   There’s a lot to unpack here.  

Despite Holland’s and the supporting cast’s worthy thespian efforts, the overall film is the least satisfying in the series.  Rather than resolving all the given questions, “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” feels like a busy yet uneventful Monday while the MCU schedules the next day’s movie. 

Then again, your enjoyment of “Brand New Day” could be directly proportional to your investment in Peter, MJ, and Ned over the three previous movies since 2017.  Maybe that’s enough.  Maybe not.  

Either way, we do remember their friendship and “weep not for the memories.” 

Jeff’s ranking

2 / 4 stars

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"I Want Your Sex" - Movie Review

Directed by: Gregg Araki.

Written by: Gregg Araki and Karley Sciortino.

Starring: Olivia Wilde, Cooper Hoffman, Mason Gooding.

Runtime: 90 minutes

Raunchy ‘I Want Your Sex’ wants Gen Z to loosen up

You might not think you’d enjoy watching Olivia Wilde Sexually torture Cooper Hoffman and use unforgiving sex toys on rather indelicate regions of his body, but that’s because you haven’t seen “I Want Your Sex” yet. 

New Queer Cinema movement pioneer Gregg Araki (“Mysterious Skin,” “The Doom Generation”) returns with an unapologetically smutty new comedy cowritten with Slutever scribe Karley Sciortino that will have the more prudish and sex-averse Gen Z viewers clutching their proverbial pearls. But the battle-worn Boomer and kinky Millennial screenwriting duo are here to give them some pleasure and more than a few laughs if they consent. 

Elliot (played by a very game Cooper Hoffman) doesn’t know what he’s doing, professionally or romantically. Awkward, frumpy and broke, Elliot interviews for a job far outside of his league as an assistant at a blisteringly hip studio for renowned visual artist Erika Tracy (played by an also very game Olivia Wilde), whose contemporary work pushes the boundaries of taste and comfort. 

Elliot inexplicably gets the job, and fish-out-of-water doesn’t begin to explain how out of place the sex-starved boy is in the world of contemporary art, especially in Erika’s orbit. Erika is everything Elliot is not: confident, popular, well dressed, and in full control of her sexuality with a bed that never goes cold. That she would deign to hire Elliot is baffling. That he would become her personal sex toy seems madness. 

And yet Erika locks onto Elliot, and soon the high-powered provocateur has the hapless pup crawling on all fours, taking a spanking and begging for more in a BDSM-fueled escapade. Is Erika giving Elliot the gift that every young, dumb, full-of-you-know-what man dreams of, becoming the erotic muse of a libidinous sex fiend, or is this just an HR nightmare? Is Erika fulfilling a young man’s sexual fantasies or using his body and breaking his mind in the process? 

Oh, you should also know the film opens with Erika’s lifeless body floating in her swimming pool, with Elliot the prime suspect in her murder. So, there’s that.

“I Want Your Sex” is about as subtle and sophisticated as its title (which is to say, not very), but it’s also as cheeky and unabashed. Araki is wildly waving red flags at the angry bull of mainstream sex discourse – you’ve got a near-20-year age gap between a boss and her employee, grooming, uncertain consent, and kink without a safe word. It’s an unquestionably toxic dynamic made pleasurable against our better judgment by Hoffman and Wilde, who throw themselves into leather and lace with abandon, fixing the ball gags on tight and finding pleasure in the pain. 

It's a bold move in a prudish artistic era when the necessity of every sex scene is questioned. But Araki’s been around the block more than a few times since his Teenage Apocalypse film trilogy, and he’s more than happy to show the next generation the way. 

Barbara’s ranking

3/4 stars

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“The Dink” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Josh Greenbaum

Written by:  Sean aClements

Starring:  Jake Johnson, Mary Steenburgen, Ed Harris, Aaron Chen, Patton Oswalt, Cleo King, Lynne Marie Stewart, Wayne Wilderson, Christine Taylor, Ben Stiller, and Andy Roddick

Runtime:  96 minutes

‘The Dink’ is a sports comedy worth serving up 

Before Dusty Boyd (Jake Johnson) graduated high school, he became a pro tennis player!   His nickname was The Hammer, and Dusty’s dad, Chuck Boyd (Ed Harris), supported his son’s aspirations of nailing a top-notch professional sports career.   

However, Dusty’s dreams were shattered when he broke his wrist in the 2000 Vero Beach Classic.  It’s 26 years later.  He never went back to the pro tour, and The Hammer has been trying to piece his life back together with duct tape ever since.  In his 40s now, he teaches tennis lessons for his dad at the Mountain Crest Tennis Club, a shell of his former confident teenage self.  

Director Josh Greenbaum’s “The Dink” is a sports comedy in which a not-so-lovable “loser” attempts a shot at redemption.  Greenbaum’s (“Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar” (2021) and “Will & Harper” (2024)) movie shares some shades of “Caddyshack” (1980) due to the snooty country club setting and an impressive cast, and “Kingpin” (1996) with a down-and-out protagonist hoping to rekindle past glory.   

Now, “The Dink” isn’t in the same league with those all-time comedy classics.  Greenbaum and writer Sean Clements’ flick doesn’t volley with heaps of bouncing belly-laughs.  However, the filmmakers, Johnson, and company offer an engaging hook with Dusty’s down-on-his-luck story, and “The Dink” delivers lots of breezy, amusing moments, along with some heart, that play from the movie’s first serve all the way to its match point. 

For Chuck, he hopes to end the increasingly popular pickleball presence at Mountain Crest.  So, he finds a statute in the club’s charter to design a duel on the court, and if his chosen player wins, Chuck can pull pickleball from his club.  Boo!  To be frank, the whole duel setup feels forced and convoluted, and Chuck doesn’t exactly flesh out his idea for his organization’s top members or the audience, but they and we acquiesce anyway.  

Naturally, Dusty wishes his dad will choose him to “save” the club, but Chuck sees him as completely unreliable.  Look, The Hammer proudly sports a clear case of arrested development.  He frequently relives his yesterdecade glory days, and his automobile of choice - a 1999 Buick LeSabre with “less than 200,000 miles” and a license plate that reads DA-HAMMR - did not originate from this century either.  Thank goodness his best friend, PJ (Aaron Chen), is frequently by Dusty’s side and boosting his ego.  (Chen has lots of terrific one-liners, by the way.)  

Johnson gives a convincing portrayal of Dusty as a somewhat-out-of-shape, loudmouthed braggart.  Still, he simultaneously gathers audience empathy with his fall-from-grace teenage story and his inabilities to both move on from the past and please his father.  

He eventually decides to rehabilitate his tender right wrist on the pickleball court – a place where he discovers a dink shot - in preparation for this hopeful tennis encounter with the club’s reputation on the line.  This is where he meets Candace (Mary Steenburgen), a divorcee about 30 years older than him.  With her recent step into singledom, Candace feels vulnerable, like facing LOVE-40 without a racket, and after some initial (and then extended) teasing between the two, they become friends. 

During the second act, the movie shifts from a sports comedy into rom-com spaces, as Greenbaum explores a potential relationship between Dusty and Candace.  Certainly, a 30-year age gap for possible romance isn’t unheard of in the movies, but Dusty and Candace do call it out as a roadblock.  Their courtship, however, is handled with lovely grace.  Steenburgen, with a delightful performance in “Step Brothers” (2008), can flex her comedic muscles when needed.  Although, she isn’t given lots of chances to serve comical gems here, Mary has her spots to shine, including standing up for Candace’s favorite brand of music.  More so, Steenburgen successfully balances Dusty’s unrefined ways with Candace’s polish and poise.

Speaking of poise, outside of a pair of scenes with Dusty’s doctor, Dr. Stone (Ben Stiller), who expresses his appreciation for a certain off-color website and calls out a shady reason for Dusty’s ongoing wrist injury, “The Dink” can be considered a family film, one that avoids the (admittedly hilarious) gross-out humor of the aforementioned “Kingpin”. 

What “The Dink” lacks in luxurious art direction, gorgeous cinematography, and intricate plot devices, it makes up for with charm, absolute dedication to seeing through the results (good or bad) of Dusty’s arc, and a wonderful extended cast.  

Stiller (who is also a producer), Cleo King, Lynne Marie Stewart, and Patton Oswalt make memorable appearances, and former tennis star Andy Roddick finds his groove as a villain.  Another all-time tennis champ delivers an entertaining color commentary, like Fred Willard in “Best in Show” (2000) and Jason Bateman in “Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story” (2004), but don’t look up who he is on IMDb.  He’s an illustrious surprise.  

Jeff’s ranking

2.5 / 4 stars

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"The Odyssey" - Movie Review

Directed by: Christopher Nolan. 

Written by: Christopher Nolan. 

Starring: Matt Damon, Anne Hathaway, Tom Holland, Zendaya. 

Runtime: 172 minutes 

Christopher Nolan does the cinema gods proud with ‘The Odyssey’ 

How do you go bigger than the atom bomb?  

With “The Odyssey,” Christopher Nolan turns to antiquity for inspiration, bringing to life the fabled wars of old on the largest canvas he could find, with IMAX cameras and 70mm film projected onto 70-foot-wide screens. 

His 2023 film “Oppenheimer” won the Oscar for best picture for its portrait of a man ruined by his own brilliance, ambition and ego, his atom bomb still threatening to end the world entire generations after his death. Homer’s epic poem about the heroic king of Ithaca provides another such man – and in Nolan’s adaptation of the text, another such moral failing – for study. 

 Odysseus (Matt Damon), king of Ithaca, veteran of the great Trojan War – that of the Trojan Horse, one of the legendarily great tricks of warfare – has long been stranded on an island with the nymph Calypso (Charlize Theron), unable to remember what happened after the war or how to get home, and even who awaits him there.   

It’s been years since the war’s end, and his family, the steadfast and loyal Queen Penelope (Anne Hathaway) and young Prince Telemachus (Tom Holland) hold out hope for his return, denying the increasingly volatile group of suitors who have taken residence in the palace, eager to win Penelope’s hand and thus ascend the throne and take control of Ithaca.  

“The Odyssey” is a big film. Literally, of course, in length (at nearly three hours) and in form (it’s the first feature-length film to be shot entirely on IMAX film). It’s big in experience, placing the viewer in combat that feels real and urgent, the air of the movie theater and seat beneath you vibrating with the clang of swords against helmets. It’s big in adventure as Odysseus’ memories of his attempted voyage home return – memories of a giant man-eating cyclops, the many-headed creature Scylla and sirens serenading men to their doom, monsters brought to life with elemental, almost eldritch horror.  

It’s big, too, in meaning. Odysseus and Telemachus, separated by time and an ocean, grapple with the meaning of Zeus’ law as they fulfill or break it. Zeus’ law is an edict and a sacred duty to welcome those who cross your threshold, from the lowliest beggar to the loftiest king – with food, drink, safety and compassion. It’s essentially the Golden Rule but with the Bronze Age twist that any person, however downtrodden, could be a god in disguise. 

What does it do to a man’s soul to break Zeus’ law? What does it do to the soul of an entire people when a king break’s Zeus’ law, or his army?  

Nolan’s “Odyssey” is not just a sister in ambition to “Oppenheimer,” but a spiritual and thematic companion piece, asking just as urgently what of our humanity is lost when our weapons and our rage outstrip our compassion. As Odysseus’ memories come back, his family frantically searching for news of him, he’ll have to decide if remembering them is worth also remembering past actions he’s tried so hard to forget.   

It's fascinating that Nolan, one of Hollywood’s most powerful directors, is so laser-focused on moral questions of men’s ambition and ego, as he himself has had to invent a bigger canvas to contain his own ambition, down to the creation of a new IMAX camera system specially designed to muffle the deafening noise of the gargantuan camera. 

There’s something to be psychoanalyzed there. But it’s also incredibly moving. Not just the story beats, which are affecting – Holland and Hathaway are resonant in their delayed mourning, and John Leguizamo as blind servant Eumaeus and Samantha Morton as rage-filled Circe steal the show – but also the human effort that went into creating something so big. 

In a cultural and historical moment when so much art and creativity is being sacrificed to the gods of convenience and the oracles of AI, Nolan turns to humanity in theme and craft.  

 Think of all the skilled hands Nolan’s 70mm film ran through on its way to the projector, loaded into specially made cameras, developed in tanks by chemists, cut by hand by editors, and loaded into cans and shipped. Think of Ludwig Göransson, the Swedish composer who sourced ancient Greek instruments – bronze gongs and lyres and aulos flutes, instruments far outside his ken or comfort – to create a score that make viewers feel they were on ancient Greek battlefields. Think of production designers creating a 40-foot Trojan horse, and of location scouts finding caves in Greece instead of green screens against which to film.  

 If there’s a Zeus’ law of cinema, Nolan has fulfilled it.  

 Barbara’s ranking 

4/4 stars 

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"Horsegirls" - Movie Review

 Directed by:  Lauren Meyering 

 Written by:  Lauren Meyering and Mackenzie Breeden 

 Starring:  Gretchen Mol, Lillian Carrier, Jerod Haynes, Iqbal Theba, and Matthew Schwab 

Runtime:  101 minutes 

‘Horsegirls’ gallops with emotion at times, but it meanders too often throughout the cinematic race. 

Margarita is a popular drink, one that can be enjoyed with Mexican food.   

 On the rocks with salt, served with chicken enchiladas, rice, beans, and a side of sour cream on a Friday night might be a small slice of heaven for this movie critic.  

 In director/co-writer Lauren Meyering’s “Horsegirls”, Margarita (Lillian Carrier) is an autistic 22-year-old who lives with her mom (Gretchen Mol).  She’s not terribly popular, and this talkative 20-something will awkwardly spill the story of how her parents conjured up her name (because they consumed the said drink on the night she was conceived), but all is not well in their home currently.   

 Sandy (Mol) is going through hell.   She has breast cancer.  

 Struggling through the pain and the emotional toil of (potentially) facing her own mortality decades sooner than she planned wears on Sandy’s psyche, but her primary concern is her daughter.   

 How will Margarita make it in the world without her?   More specifically, she worries about Margarita supporting herself after she’s gone, hopefully years and years from now, but Sandy frets that death’s door may open for her soon.    

This is the premise for Meyering’s feature film debut, a movie that centers around a caring yet contentious mother-daughter relationship.  In many ways, Sandy and Margarita share the same experience with households everywhere, namely the complex nuances of showing warm love while also holding each other’s feet to the fire through arguments and impatient, raised voices.   

 However, the two named medical realities exacerbate this contention.  

 There certainly is an audience for “Horsegirls”.  This quirky, indie flick is an easy fit for a film festival, and anyone who is a mom or daughter could instantly - and probably intimately - relate to Sandy and Margarita’s vibes.  Mol and Carrier (who has autism in real life) give authentic, sympathetic performances, as Sandy copes with her disease and Margarita struggles for acceptance outside her home.   

 “Horsegirls” seems poised for a strong, galloping cinematic run for 101 minutes, but the film misses its stride in a few ways, including the awkward execution of the main plot device based on the film’s title.   

 Look, Sandy wants Margarita to earn a paycheck.  This young woman needs to prepare for the real world, but Margarita procrastinates over the idea.  

 However, this 22-year-old scores a job at a Halloween store with an initially skeptical boss, Hank (Iqbal Theba), but Margarita wins him over, and she finds herself diligently helping customers, stocking shelves, and fitting in nicely in an abundance of delightful doodads of dress-up.   

 The marriage between drama-free employment and Margarita’s responsibilities is short-lived, though, when she discovers the existence of a hobby horse dance troupe.   

 Yes, you heard that right, and yes, hobby horse dance competitions are a thing.   

 Well, Meyering and the cast and crew filmed “Horsegirls” in Portland, Ore., so there you go.  

 Have you ever watched “Portlandia” (2011 - 2018)? 

 The troupe’s coach is named Coach (Jerod Haynes).  He leads the group of teenage girls on their toy-pony hopes of dance-team nirvana, when Margarita charges into Coach’s practice and asks to join.  

Even though the age limit is 18, Coach inexplicably invites Margarita (which seems like an impossibility in 2026) to enlist with his merry band of teen performers.  Still, most teenagers on Planet Earth are far from joyous, and Margarita’s acceptance seems more challenging than a hobby horse’s chances of winning the Kentucky Derby.   

 “Horsegirls” then shifts between the Coach’s gym, Margarita’s home, and Hank’s Halloween shop, as screenwriters Meyering and Mackenzie Breeden (who have been friends since college) heighten Margarita’s anxiety, because the script places her in the stressful position of skipping out on her day job to attend practice…and then lying to her mom.  

 (Everyone in theatre knows how this conversation will eventually go.)  

 Certainly, the three primary locations have eccentric charm, including Sandy and Margarita’s home, which sports a lovely, throwback ‘70s production design. Unfortunately, a significant percentage of the actual time spent in these locales feels uninspired.  

 This is led by the unfocused choreography of the hobby horse dance routines that don’t seem to build towards anything, and instead, resemble uncoordinated, random movements by the kids.  If the unimaginative dancing was designed for laughs, well, these moments will cause more eyerolls or furrowed brows than belly laughs.   

 However, Jerod and Lillian share resonant mentor-mentee synergy, as Coach offers patience, respect, and outright kindness, and Margarita returns her admiration.   

 The Halloween shop, with a cornucopia of costume merchandise at Meyering’s disposal, is not explored, and the manager-employee dynamics between Hank and Margarita almost entirely disappear after their first interaction.  Her co-worker, Felix (Matthew Schwab), fills in as Margarita’s main connection at the store, and to Schwab’s credit, he does deliver the funniest line in the film.   

Margarita’s relationship with her mom is obviously the most important, and Mol and Carrier share worthy chemistry as they both cope with their individual futures together as a loving two-person family.  The third-act events, however, seem a bit confusing, and one might start counting or replaying the days or weeks on one’s hand to piece together the timeline while “Horsegirls” strides towards the finish line.    

 Still, maybe the details are not that important, since the film properly centers its biggest moments with Sandy and Margarita, and that’s what ultimately matters.   

 Well, “Horsegirls” gallops with emotion at times, but it meanders too often throughout the cinematic race.  

Jeff’s ranking 

 2 / 4 stars 

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“Burt” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Joe Burke

Written by:  Joe Burke and Oliver Cooper

Starring:  Burton Berger, Oliver Cooper, Steven Levy, and Catlin Adams

Runtime:  78 minutes

 ‘Burt’ is a small, offbeat story that beats with a big heart

“Freedom!  Freedom!”  

The opening of director/co-writer Joe Burke’s “Burt” features the title character (Burton (or Burt) Berger).  Burke and cinematographer Daniel Kenji Levin closely capture Burt’s hands playing catchy chords on his acoustic guitar, and then the camera focuses on this 69-year-old’s slender face – along with his supporting glasses and curly hair - as he belts out a Dylanesque tune and exclaims, “I’ve got freedom!”

The song seems autobiographical, and in many ways, “Burt” is.  

Burke and co-writer/co-star Oliver Cooper have known Berger for years.  

As Burke explains in a January 2026 YouTube interview with Manny The Movie Guy, “I’m a narrative filmmaker, so I wanted to make a ‘movie’ movie, a narrative film, but I wanted to still kind of honor Burt as if it was a (documentary).”  

In the movie, Burt, a singer/songwriter and bachelor living in his golden years, has maintained his independence from commitments for almost seven decades.   

Today, however, his worldview suddenly flips and spins upside down when a bit unkempt 30-something fella, Sammy (Cooper), steps up to this sexagenarian after a performance at a local Los Angeles eatery and blurts out that they are related.    

Sammy is Burt’s son!

Of course, our lead has questions, but Sammy is the product of a brief affair from long ago.  Rather than dismiss this revelation, Burt embraces the news and Sammy with open arms.  So much so that he invites his newly discovered kin to his home and even tucks him in that evening with awkward, comedic results.  

Still, Sammy carries a problematic secret, one that he reveals to the movie audience, but not to his father, and this 78-minute indie centers around the angst and anticipation of this good-hearted soul discovering what we realize during the first act.  

Burke’s dramedy – filmed in black and white – leans into drama more than comedy, but what “Burt” lacks in belly laughs, it wonderfully swims in endearment from Berger in his first starring movie role.  

From the film’s opening minute, Berger is an irresistible personality.  He’s forthright, personable, and a complete open book.  Approaching 70 and coping with Parkinson’s disease, the years behind Burt outnumber the ones ahead.  

He doesn’t live in regret, even though monetary success and raising a family did not cross his orbit.   

Despite frequently “running against the wind,” Burt is an ever-present, optimistic force.

He wants everyone to enjoy his music, but record companies (if they are still a thing in 2026) aren’t knocking down his door.  However, he hasn’t given up yet. 

For instance, regarding dreams, he opines, “Don’t let anything stop you.” 

With resonant belief, Burt quips, “Things will work out,” even though they really haven’t for our hero.  

He lives with a cantankerous, insufferable roommate, Steve (Steven Levy), who seems to be Burt’s complete opposite except that they are both not involved in active relationships. 

Steve is a know-it-all busybody and is hypersensitive about his personal space and possessions.  He is a constant source of low-grade torment for anyone who disrupts his routines, and his primary cause for concern is Sammy. 

Steve trusts him less than a crosswalk on The Autobahn.

Furthermore, Steve rushes to offend Sammy, which instigates conflict with Burt, and Burke and Cooper use this dynamic between the roommates to further validate Burt’s altruism and convictions.

Admittedly, the on-screen time with Steve isn’t terribly amusing, but these precious minutes lift audience empathy for Burt even higher, while we simultaneously wonder when he will learn about Sammy’s hidden revelation.  

Amazingly, Burt and Steve are real-life roommates, and while this odd couple performs nicely in their first big-screen flick, the heavy lifting relies on Cooper, a busy TV and film actor since 2011.  

Cooper’s Sammy is the singular fulcrum that disrupts Burt’s (and Steve’s) ongoing existence, and he successfully conveys the trickiest emotive journey.  

Certainly, Burt is the heart of Burke’s movie, but Oliver is the convincing thespian workhorse who clears a path for Berger to land into the story’s impactful emotional moments.   

“Burt” is a small, offbeat story that beats with a big heart and sings with Burt’s decrees of optimism…and freedom. 

Jeff’s ranking

2.5 / 4 stars

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“Jackass: Best and Last” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Jeff Tremaine

Starring:  Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O, Chris Pontius, Dave England, Ehren McGhehey, Jason ‘Wee Man’ Acuna, Preston Lacy, Davon Wilson, Zach Holmes, Sean ‘Poopies’ McInerney, Rachel Wolfson, Lance Bangs, Jeff Tremaine, and Paul Walter Hauser

Runtime:  92 minutes

 ‘Jackass: Best and Last’:  The greatest hits inclusions from the television series and movies wallop this legendary troupe’s feature film finale 

“Hi, I’m Johnny Knoxville! Welcome to ‘Jackass’!”

And, unfortunately, goodbye to “Jackass”.

Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O, Chris Pontius, Dave England, Ehren McGhehey, Jason ‘Wee Man’ Acuna, Preston Lacy, and a collection of newer stuntmen and one stuntwoman are apparently hanging up their portable toilets, fireworks, bunny ears, and jockstraps, because this sixth “Jackass” cinematic installment (including “Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa” (2013)) is the legendary gang’s final feature film.  

On a personal note, I’ve been an enthusiastic fan for over two decades, so it’s a colossal bummer that “Jackass: Best and Last”, directed by Jeff Tremaine, is the “Jackass” troupe’s swan song.  

However, the movie itself – sadly – is a disappointment. 

The prime reason for the letdown is that the film splits time between brand-new stunts/dares/flat-out insanity and a retrospective of classic bits from past movies that diehard enthusiasts enjoyed for the first time on the big screen, committed to memory, and cherished via repeated DVD, streaming, and YouTube viewings.  Tremaine, Knoxville, and the team also include gags from their original MTV program (2000 – 2007), including one dicey bit – involving the Los Angeles Police Department - that never aired on television.  

Admittedly, this critic hadn’t seen a couple/a few of the TV pranks.  One from 2001 included an Oscar-winning film icon, and, in another instance, I didn’t recall a joke from Knoxville’s spinoff flick, “Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa” (2013).  Therefore, some of the capers projected onto the silver screen from yesteryear or yesterdecade were or seemed like first-time watches, but, by and large, the intermittent flashbacks felt initially confusing and then increasingly discouraging as the movie moved forward. 

For instance, early in the film, and out of the blue, one of the lineup’s all-time best pranks from “Jackass: The Movie” (2002) begins frolicking on-screen, which caused this critic to almost say out loud, “Wait.  What is happening here?  This skit is 20-plus years old.” 

Alas, clips from “Jackass Number Two” (2006), “Jackass 3D” (2010), and “Jackass Forever” (2022) are also featured in the new flick, and their inclusion could be a pleasurable nostalgia trip or a celebration of the TV and movie series for many fanatics.  However, for this fan, their inexplicable presence feels cheap.   

It’s difficult to determine without a stopwatch how much of this film featured “Jackass” history, but my best guess is that the past gags landed somewhere between one-third and one-half of the movie’s runtime.  IMDb lists the film’s length at 92 minutes, but that includes an extended credits run that seems to persist for eight minutes, so do the math. 

Granted, seeing Bam Margera – who is no longer with the troupe - and the late Ryan Dunn remerge on historic skits, including one moment with Bam that was cut from “Jackass Forever” (2022), did induce warm feelings for these two hilarious, eccentric personalities.  

Still, moviegoers – one would assume - are primarily traveling to theatres to experience NEW turns of mischief, adolescent humor, physical bouts of impairment, and bodily-function hijinks.  In that respect, “Jackass: Best and Last” delivers for 45, 60, or possibly 70 minutes (again, it’s difficult to say), as our gray-haired, wrinkled 50-something heroes with the mindset of courageousness, invincible 15-year-olds, place themselves in harm’s way and set themselves up for ridicule for our amusement (and their own).  

Specifically, the fellas and one lady (Rachel Wolfson) devised three events of foolishness - a dubious medical exam procedure, a shaving and tattoo romp, and a disgusting twist on a popular game invented in 1966 - that induced absolute gut busters and brought down the movie house.  Fantastic stuff!  This triad of moments can proudly stand alongside the mischievous ensemble’s most celebrated creations, but not every stunt reaches those heights, and a couple of bits were simply derivative ideas from previous movies.  

Younger cast members - Davon Wilson, Zach Holmes, and Sean ‘Poopies’ McInerney – “enjoy” plenty of the physical brunt, but Steve-O, Chris, Dave, and Ehren certainly risk their health and dignity, while Jason ‘Wee Man’ Acuna and Preston Lacy are less involved.  Johnny is more of the ringleader and takes the approach of a brilliant comedian from the famous saying: he doesn’t figuratively run naked on the football field during the first quarter of the big game.  Johnny’s the guy who convinces the others to strip off their clothes and sprint.

Inexplicably, Rachel, who was a nice addition to the crew in her “Jackass Forever” debut, isn’t asked to run any bits other than a brief instant in the opening montage.  It’s an odd oversight, although she is frequently shown admiring the foolishness on mass as a spectator. 

Full disclosure, I am 56 years young, and with Knoxville (55), Steve-O (52), Chris (51), Dave (56), Ehren (49), Wee Man (53), and Preston (56) reaching (or close to reaching) AARP status, one cannot fault this comedic crew for seeking retirement and churning out less feats of folly in their last “Jackass” movie, but that doesn’t mean “Jackass: Best and Last” is their finest flick.  

Far from it. 

Jeff’s ranking

2 / 4 stars

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Phoenix Film Festival Interview: The Creative Team Behind Leviticus

It is a rare and exceptional feat when a filmmaker manages to seamlessly layer a terrifying supernatural horror tale with a tender, coming-of-age queer love story. Yet, that is exactly what director Adrian Chiarella accomplishes in his striking feature debut, Leviticus.

While this marks Chiarella's first time at the helm of a feature film, he displays a confident understanding of the horror genre and an impressive talent for character building. He deeply understands the traditional mechanics of genre cinema, and, more importantly, exactly how to subvert them. Rather than relying on cheap scares, Chiarella uses the horror framework to meticulously build a deeply resonant story of identity and resistance in the face of systemic oppression.

This thematic depth is supported by the exceptional, emotionally raw performances of its two leads, Joe Bird and Stacy Clausen. Their undeniable on-screen chemistry provides the beating heart of a film, often equal parts heart-wrenching and spine-chilling.

The Phoenix Film Festival had the absolute pleasure of sitting down with director Adrian Chiarella and stars Joe Bird and Stacy Clausen to discuss subverting horror tropes, building intimacy amidst terror, and taking a special look at each of their "handshake five" cinema choices.

Balancing Horror and Romance

Interviewer: You manage a great balancing act here between horror and romance, showing how what we fear and what we love can be interchangeable. Horror fans sometimes get asked, How do you find so much comfort in horror? And then those same people, the horror fans who can go to sleep with a violent, scary horror film as background noise, can't go up and talk to somebody that they care about because that's the scariest thing that could happen to them. How did you, Adrian, approach tackling that specific dichotomy between fear and romance when you began this process?

Adrian Chiarella: Uh, for me, it was something that I knew had to be calibrated really carefully. Like, I knew I wanted to do that, exactly what you were talking about. And I knew there would be a lot of—it's especially hard when you're writing a script because of sort of all the pitfalls people don't want you to fall into; they're going to steer you away from. And so, I knew that I was going to have to really work hard to convince people that this was going to work. And it was just a lot of writing, rewriting, and exploring.

I think for me, once I came up with the mechanism of the horror element—once I had this horror movie monster—then I could sort of park that and focus on the love story in the writing. And then it was just a matter of, like, bouncing between the two as I went through and worked on the script. And in fact, that balance was something that we worked on all the way through to the end of the edit, the end of the sound mix, really. We were constantly taking scenes out, putting them back, and figuring out, like, "Oh, hang on, we've got a horror movie that hasn't had any scares for 45 minutes, what are we doing?" So then we'd go back and look at the film's structure.

On-Screen Chemistry and Preparation

Interviewer: The authenticity between you two, Joe and Stacy, is amazing. Did you know each other or work together before production, or was this your first time meeting?

Stacy Clausen: Well, when we showed up to set, yes, we were friends by that point.

Joe Bird: Yeah, but like, we didn't really know each other, right? I mean, we'd text on Instagram and be like, "Hey, like, we're doing this film together." But no, we didn't actually have a proper chance to hang out until pre-production started. But we did FaceTime a few times beforehand, which was nice, and we just got to know each other.

Adrian Chiarella: I always bring up that you play Fortnite; I love that detail.

Joe Bird: Yeah, we play Fortnite. That's awesome. We play games together.

Adrian Chiarella: Fortnite is an actor's technique, an actor's tool. Play Fortnite with your scene partner.

The Editing Process

Interviewer: The film is so meticulously paced, and it really takes its time establishing the world. Knowing your background in editing, did you find yourself shaping that deliberate rhythm on set, or was it primarily found in the editing room

Adrian Chiarella: I worked with Nick Fenton, who is an incredible editor. He's worked with great directors on Björk's music, in some of her videos, and at her concerts, but he's also worked with incredible directors like Anton Corbijn, Justin Kurzel, and many others. He happens to live in Victoria, Australia, because his family is there, and he was looking for a project, and I was very, very lucky that he wanted to work with me.

And I think having been an editor meant I understood how to collaborate with someone with that wealth of experience. So it was really amazing. And I think what I was speaking about before was calibrating the romance and the horror and just figuring out structurally if this was going to work. We moved scenes around together a lot.

Also, Nick, I, and our producers shared an ethos of not over-explaining too many things to the audience. And, especially in this genre, people are really smart when they watch a film, and they don't want everything hit them over the head. And so we were constantly playing that game: Do we need to hit that line? Do we need to see that shot? Do we need that? Because I'm a big believer, from having been an editor, that the real magic is not what we put on the screen; it's the dots the audience connects between shots and scenes, activating their imagination. Because of the things that the audience doesn't see or hear, the things that they imagine going on between everything, that's more powerful than anything the best director can ever shoot or create.

Character Nuances and Personal Connections

Interviewer: There is a fascinating dynamic here between the fear of emotional vulnerability and the terror of losing your isolation. Where did you both draw inspiration from when building these specific character layers and nuances?

Joe Bird: Well, I was, you know, really impressed by Mikey Madison in Anora, and I really loved what she was doing in that film, the way she had her guard up the whole time. You can tell she's thinking a lot of things, but you can't know exactly what she's thinking. And that's the nuance in that. I found that really striking, and I thought it would be a good vibe place for this character as I was reading it. And then, obviously, you know, Adrian and I spoke together, and Stacy spoke together as well to kind of figure out who these characters were; it was all a collaboration with each other.

Stacy Clausen: And I feel like with something so emotional and so vulnerable, you really do have to bring yourself into it and see what you can substitute within your own life. And I feel like it's interesting—it's different in America. Growing up in Australia, we have a massive kind of "tall poppy syndrome," and people don't really like you succeeding or being who you want to be. And for Ryan, especially, he's always got this mask. He's always trying to protect himself and protect the way in which he's perceived. And I feel like I got a little bit of that growing up in Australia, wanting to be an actor. I went to an all-sports school, where you were only cool if you did sports. So yeah, there was a part of my life where I felt like I was hiding a bit of myself. And when I came across Ryan, and when the audition came in, I felt like I was able to apply that part of myself there. And when you have that emotional truth stemming from something real.

The Takeaway Message

Interviewer: I know we're almost out of time, so a final question for everyone: Beyond the entertainment and the great horror elements, what is the core message you want people to take away from Leviticus ten years down the road?

Adrian Chiarella: For me, I hope they fully understand the choice that Joe's character makes in the final frames of the movie, and that he is choosing to follow his own feelings and his own desires, and his own dreams, really, despite knowing that his fears may still be following him and may never go away.

Joe Bird: Echoing what Adrian said, I guess, making sure that people understand that we need to choose hope over fear.

Stacy Clausen: Exactly. Pursue what you want. And perhaps maybe if there's an awareness thing, just an awareness of how communities play a role in being repressive, and how that affects people growing up queer. And maybe, who knows, that can change an attitude within a community. That, if it can make a change, that's incredible.

Behind the Scenes: The Handshake Five

Interviewer: All right, thank you so much for sitting down with me. I'm Monte Yazzie, the program manager for the Phoenix Film Festival and the festival director for the International Horror & Sci-Fi Film Festival. I loved your movie when I saw it a few months ago, so I'm thrilled to welcome you to Arizona—even if we greeted you with a little heat today.

I promise not to ask the standard 'influences' question, but I do want to ask something adjacent. I love getting to know filmmakers through a game I call the 'Handshake Five', the five films you would use to introduce your cinematic identity to someone else.

Joe Bird: I can go, I can go. So, number one, Get Out. And then, number two, Lady Bird. Then number three, maybe Call Me by Your Name, I love that film. And then, number four, Stoker. I really like Stoker. And then maybe number five, a bit of a recent one, um, Bugonia. I love that film. I love Emma Stone in that, I thought she was incredible in it. It's a weird film, but it's good.

Adrian Chiarella: So mine, number one, would be Paris, Texas. It's one of my absolute favorites. I watch it whenever it's on at a rep screening or anything. I've got the 4K at home, and I put it on all the time. Number two, In the Mood for Love, a brilliant Wong Kar-wai movie. Number three is Terminator 2, just a movie from my childhood that I watched over and over again. Number four is Onibaba, the old Japanese horror movie. Number five is a Japanese movie called After Life, directed by Hirokazu Koreeda.

Interviewer: I can feel the influences of Leviticus from those films.

Adrian Chiarella: Oh, yeah, definitely! Onibaba was a big one, just that idea of jealousy and desire leading to this horrific situation.

Stacy Clausen: Amazing. I'd go number one, Good Will Hunting. I think all my answers are performance-based, which are the best. Number two, Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcrawler is a favorite, for sure. Number three, Jake Gyllenhaal, again, in Prisoners. Great movie, so great. Number four, No Country for Old Men. I love Javier Bardem, he's so good. Unbelievably good. And then, number five, a childhood film, I'm going with Surf's Up, you know, the penguin one?

Joe Bird: Also, can I replace one? I need to replace the Bugonia. I just thought of a better one. Sentimental Value. That's mine. Sentimental Value.

Check out Leviticus in theaters on June 19, 2026.

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"Disclosure Day" - Movie Review

Directed by: Steven Spielberg

Written by: David Koepp, Steven Spielberg

Starring: Emily Blunt, Josh O’Connor, Colin Firth, and Colman Domingo.

Runtime: 145 minutes

‘Disclosure Day’ is Spielberg’s thrilling plea for humanity

“We are not alone.” 

It’s a slogan that’s been emblazoned for decades on T-shirts sold at Roswell, New Mexico rest stops and on dorm-room posters alongside bug-eyed aliens and flying saucers. It’s an assertion that can be read two ways: as a promise or a threat. 

Steven Spielberg’s films have read it both ways at various points in his career, with soul-stirring optimism in tearjerkers like “E.T.” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and more ominously in his post-9/11 powerhouse “War of the Worlds.” 

In “Disclosure Day,” the assertion that we are not alone serves as a litmus test, for both the film’s characters and the audience. Presented with irrefutable evidence of alien visitation on a scale that would upend our way of life and challenge our beliefs about the world and our place in it, would humanity descend into chaos or rise together in harmony to meet the moment? 

All Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor) knows is that the people have a right to know. 

A reformed hacker turned cybersecurity specialist, Daniel steals the data he was meant to protect, files detailing decades’ worth of alien visitation and contact with humans dating back to the long-speculated Roswell incident from 1947. He and his girlfriend Jane (Eve Hewson) abscond with the explosive information, but hot on their tail is Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth), the villainous head of WARDEX, a shadowy government agency tasked with keeping evidence of alien visitation hidden from the American people for their own good. The breach couldn’t come at a worse time for WARDEX, as humanity teeters on the brink of World War III, with background news reports suggesting imminent threat of nuclear warfare. 

As Daniel and Jane attempt to evade capture, something funny is afoot in Kansas City, where local weather forecaster Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt) finds herself suddenly able to understand and speak languages she’s never learned. On air, clicks rumble out of her throat beyond her control, some glottal alien language that Daniel understands as code when he catches the news feed. 

Connecting these two disparate souls is Hugo Wakefield (Colman Domingo), a WARDEX mutineer who’s gone rogue with some fellow former employees on a mission to expose the truth. Hugo calls Daniel and Margaret “experiencers,” hinting at some mysterious connection between the two as he guides them away from WARDEX’s hound dogs and towards each other – and either the destruction or salvation of humanity. 

Screenwriter David Koepp (“Jurassic Park,” “War of the Worlds”) has written a script that’s brisk and funny and packed with action. At its best, “Disclosure Day” feels like a happy marriage of “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and “Minority Report,” with two strangers drawn together by forces greater than they can understand under the watchful eye of a repressive surveillance state. Koepp’s script perhaps trips over itself a bit trying to unpack so many big ideas at the pace of a big summer blockbuster – stuff about the fragility of and need for faith and how empathy functions as an evolutionary advantage, lofty ideas that could use more room to breathe

But oh, the craftsmanship! This is some of Spielberg’s most balletic camerawork, his restless eye moving from one thrilling action sequence to another, including a particularly memorable getaway that pits a car against a speeding train as Daniel and Margaret race toward their destiny. 

What might that destiny be, exactly? “Disclosure Day” is reminiscent of so many of Spielberg’s films; he’s been grappling with visitors from outer space since he was a teenager making movies with his friends in the Arizona desert. But for all its familiarity, “Disclosure Day” is a film he only could have made now, at 79, a plea for unity and shared purpose in a post-truth era from a man who’s united us for five decades at the cinema. 

It would be easy to mistake Spielberg’s enduring faith in humanity’s goodness despite all evidence to the contrary for quaintness, to dismiss his lean into empathy as the connective tissue that can and will unite us all for sentimentality. 

They are charges he’s faced the entirety of his career and they’ve rarely been an accurate read of Spielberg’s work, which has time and again shown us the worst of humanity. His camera didn’t flinch from the slaughter on the beaches of Normandy in “Saving Private Ryan” or Plaszow concentration camp in “Schindler’s List.” He’s waged war with primal forces that can’t be reasoned with – sharks and dinosaurs, possessed semi-trucks and Nazis. And here, in “Disclosure Day,” the fear of alien invasion and the omnipresent threat of nuclear annihilation.

And here we are, over 50 years after “Jaws” ruined the beach for an entire generation, all so disconnected from one another, hermetically sealed in our own individual bubbles formed by our phone’s algorithms, so far removed from the kind of monoculture that made Spielberg a household name, we might as well be on Mars. Who could possibly believe there’s any coming back from this? Any more coming together in shared purpose?

And yet, Steven Spielberg still believes in us, even if we no longer believe in ourselves. It makes me want to believe in us, too. 

Barbara’s ranking

3.5/4 stars

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“The Furious” – Movie Review

Directed by:  Kenji Tanigaki

Written by:  Mak Tin-shu, Lei Zhilong, and Shum Kwan-sin

Starring:  Xie Miao, Joe Taslim, Brian Le, Yayan Ruhian, Joey Iwanaga, and Yang Enyou

Runtime:  113 minutes

 ‘The Furious’:  Xie Miao and Joe Taslim are a Dynamic Duo in this mind-blowing action film

“Bam!” 

“Pow!”

“Whamm!”

“Biff!”

Batman and Robin were officially crowned their Dynamic Duo title in 1940, but it’s 2026, and Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson should hand over that famous moniker to Wang Wei (Xie Mao) and Navin (Joe Taslim), the marvelous lead characters in director Kenji Tanigaki’s wildly entertaining martial arts action picture, “The Furious”.

Wang Wei is a reliable but humble handyman.  He lives a modest, content life with his elementary-school-aged daughter, Rainy (Yang Enyou), but he’s a bit of a mystery.  Wang Wei does not have a formal employment record.  He has no police record and is nonverbal, but he communicates easily with Rainy through sign language.  

Meanwhile, Navin is an accomplished investigative journalist, and so is his wife, Matia (JeeJa Yanin).  Tanigaki and Taslim imply that Navin and Matia have a supportive, loving relationship, but she goes missing – very early in the first act - during her search for a child trafficking operation. 

Now, Navin is desperate to find his spouse.  

Furthermore, Rainy is forcibly kidnapped by the same group of villains, and Wang Wei is equally desperate to locate his daughter.  

These two gentlemen are furious! 

In a Phoenix Film Festival May 28 interview with “The Furious” producer Bill Kong (“Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” (2000), “Hero” (2002), “House of Flying Daggers” (2004), “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change!” (2019), and “Mulan” (2020)), he explains the film’s title. 

“The title of the film is ‘The Furious’, so you need to be really, really pissed off to be furious, okay.  In order to really, really piss off people, have their close ones taken or (be) in danger.  That’s how people will accept (and think), ‘Ah, he’s really furious,’” Kong said, and he adds, “Kenji and (I) wanted to live up to this.  We want to see the fire in (their) eyes.” 

Xie and Taslim display their fiery martial arts skills and their characters’ fury in this relentless, nonstop 113-minute sensory encounter for movie audiences.  

The straightforward, rescue-mission premise - set against a nefarious business led by dastardly human beings - doesn’t overcomplicate life for the audience to discern good versus evil.  Conversely, Tanigaki – a longtime stunt choreographer – takes immense measures to feature intricate and elaborate stage combat with delightfully extended scenes in which protagonists and antagonists serve their unrelenting will to inflict savage personal destruction.  

Admittedly, this critic is not a martial arts film expert, but the mind-blowing stunt choreography feels on par with “The Raid” (2011) and the “John Wick” series.  Here, our leads and a small collection of villains proudly carry masterclass martial arts skills, Cirque du Soleil-like acrobatics, and cage-fighting killer instincts.  

Although there is a setting where seemingly hundreds of antagonists pour on-screen, almost every other battle features a combination of only a few villains, and casting director Yong Lu and the costume design team shifted into overdrive to feature two physically imposing ruffians to potentially run over Wang Wei and Navin. 

Ho (Brian Le) is a bald, instructible, and hulking brick wall of a human being, and Tak (Yayan Ruhian) is slim, deadly marksman who always carries a fearsome bow and collection of arrows and dons a red tracksuit.  “The Furious” has a few more key baddies who join the hand-to-hand combat, but Ho and Tak are the most memorable and have a future in several “The Furious” sequels or new James Bond flicks.  

This flick is set in an undisclosed Southeast Asian location, but the cast and crew filmed in Bangkok, and Tanigaki, production designer Pongnarin Jonghawklang, and set decorator Kasi Faengrod gladly worked on this Thai canvas.  

For instance, Wang Wei chases kidnappers, who take Rainy and attempt to make their getaway in a garbage truck on the open streets.  A warehouse and a blue-collar business – that sit in industrial locations - host two insane fist-fight clashes, and an apartment building is the spot for an extensive pursuit with a sea of humanity pouring into narrow hallways and stairways.  

There’s also a police station scene reminiscent of “The Terminator” (1984), but this critic doesn’t know if the locale was an actual vacant law-enforcement base or if the production team configured it into one.  Either way, the station looked authentic.   

This ground-level approach to showcase the local Bangkok setting adds to the realistic ambiance on-screen, even if the avalanche of physical punishment that Wang Wei, Navin, Ho, and Tak (and another key villain who will not be revealed in this review) absorb is absurd.  Tanigaki hands his actors countless creative instruments – like daggers, hammers and sledgehammers, ladders, and more – to maim the opposing characters, but both sides continue to recuperate and revive their brawls.

Some of these moments actually have “Batman” (1966 – 1968) vibes, but that television show should send accolades to “The Furious”.

Jeff’s ranking

3.5 / 4 stars

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Interview with “The Furious” producer Bill Kong

Bill Kong is enjoying a 43-year career in the movie business, including producing “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” (2000), “Hero” (2002), “House of Flying Daggers” (2004), “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change!” (2019), and “Mulan” (2020).  Bill lends his expertise to director Kenji Tanigaki’s wildly entertaining martial arts action picture, “The Furious” (2025) starring Joe Taslim and Xie Miao.  “The Furious” stormed into the 2026 Phoenix Film Festival (PFF) and received lots of positive buzz in the hallways after its April 16 screening, and Bill was kind enough to join a call with the PFF and chat about his exciting movie.

“The Furious” opens in Phoenix theatres on June 12. 

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PFF:  Kenji Tanigaki has a (long) list of stunt coordination credits, but he’s also directed a few films, as well.  Is this the first time you worked with him as a director, and what put your faith in him for this project?

BK:  I’ve worked with him four times earlier as a choreographer.  It is the first time I’ve worked with him as a director.  I’ve known him (for) over 10 years, 12 or 13 years.  The reason I picked him is because of my past years working with him.  I knew that he would be ready to be a director.  I knew he would be ready.   I had this opportunity to do this movie, so I (chose) him.  I never doubted that he could direct.  I have faith in him because I’ve worked with him for many years, so I know that he’s good enough.   In many of the Chinese films we did (when he was) a choreographer, in (some) scenes, he was the director as well.   Experience-wise, attitude-wise, and (with his) ability to collaborate with people, he has everything to be a good director.  

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PFF:  Absolutely.  The film is compelling with high stakes as well as amazing action.  I like the fact that your two leads, played by Joe (Taslim) and Xie (Miao), had (high) stakes because (Navin’s (Taslim)) wife was in danger, and our mysterious dad’s (Miao) daughter, Rainy (Yang Enyou), was in danger.  Also, a couple of the villains – we find out – have (high) stakes with family too.  So, can you talk about including family to amp up the tension?

BK:  The title of the film is “The Furious”, so you need to be really, really pissed off to be furious, okay.  In order to really, really piss off people, have their close ones taken or (be) in danger.  That’s how people will accept (and think), “Ah, he’s really furious.”   You are right.  We have many, many people with family members being abused.  Kenji and (I) wanted to live up to this.  We want to see the fire in (their) eyes.

PFF:  Not only did our dynamic duo have to solve a problem, but there was a lot of emotion behind it.  That’s terrific!   Can you talk about our two (lead characters coming) from two different backgrounds?  Joe is playing someone who is very accomplished, and Xie is playing someone who doesn’t have an employment history, he doesn’t have a (police) record, and he’s also (nonspeaking), which adds some mystery.

BK:  Let’s talk about the Joe Taslim character.  I think he fits Joe very well.  (Navin) lost his wife.  Because (he) was away, we saddled him, a husband, with guilt.  “I should have been there.”  That guilt lives with him.   That guilt propels him along.  There’s hope that she still may be alive.   

Wang Wei (Miao) is a big mystery.  We deliberately designed that.  We don’t find out who he is.  The reason he is (nonspeaking) is because of a bullet in his head.  We deliberately wanted to make him a mystery person.  I don’t think there’s a reason to tell the public (who he is).  We believe it was a good idea to leave him as a person like that, a person with a mystery background with a daughter.  He’s living very inconspicuously.  He wants to stay out of trouble.  Don’t rock the boat.  (He lives his) life until he’s pushed to the limit. 

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PFF:  I love that (Navin and Wang Wei) were paired together.   There were so many amazing action scenes. I don’t want to give away all the different action scenes to our audience, but I do want to mention one, the police station setting.  It reminded me, as a Gen Xer growing up in 1984, (of) “The Terminator”.  I don’t know if that was a conscious choice or not.  Can you talk about (choosing settings) and how important that is for the film?

BK:  I think Kenji picked some of those locations.  For example, we picked the ice factory.   Actually, Kenji picked that because he wanted to play (a) tribute.   That was the same ice factory (where) Bruce Lee’s first movie was shot.   The police station is also familiar.  I think there’s a little bit of history to that too.   In a way, this film doesn’t ask for big sets.  It’s not right for (this) kind of film.   We were very careful about that.  We didn’t exaggerate (the support) of the film, the production design.   We wanted (the sets to be) very localized (and) very, very down to earth.  

PFF:  I love that.  We only have time for one more question.  With your incredible history in film, what are the ingredients for a great action film? 

BK:  The story and the characters are the most important of all, and then the action.   

PFF:  You’ve successfully delivered (with “The Furious”).  Thank you.  It was a pleasure.  Good luck with the film, and I’m proud (that it played) at our festival. 

BK:  Thank you, Jeff.  I hope that on my next production, you also invite me (for another interview). 

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"Pressure" - Movie Review

Directed by:  Anthony Maras

Written by:  David Haig and Anthony Maras, based on David Haig’s work on the 2014 play

Starring:  Andrew Scott, Brendan Fraser, Kerry Condon, Chris Messina, and Damian Lewis

Runtime:  100 minutes

 The forecast is accurate: Scott and Fraser give compelling performances in ‘Pressure’.

“In the Spring, I have counted 136 different kinds of weather inside of (24 hours).” – Mark Twain

General Dwight ‘Ike’ Eisenhower (Brendan Fraser) may have pondered a similar observation.

It’s June 1944, and Gen. Eisenhower is preparing the Allied Forces to storm the beaches of Normandy, France in three days.  However, with the typical unpredictable weather at the 49th north parallel, the Allied Supreme Commander absolutely needs a reliable weather forecast for the day of the said invasion.  If blustery meteorological conditions charge into the potentially choppy English Channel, D-Day could become a disaster for approximately 150,000 troops.  

For this perilous mission to be successful, Mother Nature must comply. 

Is the invasion a go or no-go? 

Hence, this real-life story is brought to the big screen by director/co-writer/editor Anthony Maras and co-writer David Haig, who wrote “Pressure”, the 2014 play.  “Pressure” – with a double-meaning of the ongoing anxiety to grasp the correct forecast and also a term about atmospheric conditions – is an intense, thrilling 100-minute historical drama, led by a pair of compelling performances by Andrew Scott and Fraser.  

Scott plays James Stagg, the UK meteorologist tasked with providing his best guess of the climate on that fateful day to Gen. Eisenhower. 

Set at the opulent and historical Mentmore Towers in Buckinghamshire, the United States and the United Kingdom joined in unison to hopefully plan a momentous turn in WWII.  Maras and Haig’s screenplay centers around conflicting personalities inside this unified military front.

Stagg carries the burden of formulating his best guess with so many military lives on the line, a possible pivoting point of the war, and Ike, who stands as an imposing, no-nonsense figure with the presence of a living, breathing M4 Sherman tank.  

Eisenhower, however, is not unreasonable, but, naturally, he’s hoping Stagg will utter, “Nothing but clear skies, no wind, with a high of 65 degrees Fahrenheit.”    

Stagg’s main contention is with his American weatherman counterpart, Irving Krick (Chris Messina), who differs – in almost every way – in his meteorological approach, forecast, and temperament.

Krick is brash, arrogant, and boisterous, while Stagg doesn’t have a sunny disposition.  James is pragmatic, professional, and sober.  

Since they offer different weather outlooks, one can imagine the linguistic, cultural, and methodical collisions that will also ensue.  Messina is perfectly cast as Stagg’s foil, and the always great Kerry Condon plays a critical role as Kay Summersby, a trusted voice for Eisenhower who may or may not find belief in Stagg.  

The prime strength of “Pressure” is the palatable clash of wills between Stagg and Krick, as if they were (almost) enemy combatants, while also leaning on their individual methods of persuasion for an audience of one, even though the weight of dozens, perhaps 100, sets of eyes stare at James in the war room.

Much of the film stacks the ultimate stakes in an office politics setting, but Maras also offers the audience to step outside of US/UK headquarters and into the Normandy invasion.  

In a May 2026 interview with Collider Interviews, Maras said, “We got access to the original 35mm footage that they shot 80 years ago.”  

Now, anyone who attended 10th-grade social studies in 1946, 2026, or any year in between (or who watched “Saving Private Ryan” (1998)) knows the result of D-Day.  However, the lead performances, the brisk, agreeable pacing, the stressful countdown and associated deadline, and Stagg’s daunting task make “Pressure” an awfully compelling watch, especially for those whose high school assigned textbooks never mentioned that day’s weather-forecast component.  

Whether or not Twain’s count is anywhere close to accurate, there’s an intense amount of pressure on Scott’s James Stagg….and movie audiences. 

Jeff’s ranking

3 / 4 stars

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Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu

Directed by: Jon Favreau

Starring: Pedro Pascal, Sigourney Weaver, Jeremy Allen White, Jonathan Coyne

132 minutes

After a nearly 7-year absence of Star Wars films on the big screen, Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu bring space adventures back to the theater, in the grandeur of an IMAX screen, recapturing the franchise's spirit through its two charming characters and a simple, action-packed story. Rather than trying to create a dense, overarching saga mythology, this film pivots back to what made audiences fall in love with the stoic bounty hunter and little green companion in the first place: it's a fun, captivating, and pulpy adventure that's accessible to everyone. 

The story returns to the Mandalorian bounty hunter Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) and his foundling, Grogu, as they are dispatched on a high-stakes mission by the New Republic to track down a growing Imperial threat. This quest sends the duo across the galaxy, navigating a series of dangerous new worlds and an encounter that brings back memories of a familiar Star Wars character. Along the way, they find themselves entangled in numerous obstacles, including a memorable venture into a Blade Runner-esque city dripping with noir aesthetics, complete with a shady dive bar, a prize fighter, and some clever gumshoeing. Despite some unnecessary detours that occasionally stretch the pacing, the core story remains a straightforward, creature-feature journey of survival and heroism.

Structurally, the film is really nothing different from the episodic television show that spawned it, occasionally feeling like four episodes of a shortened season stitched together for the big screen. However, that doesn't mean it's not a welcome and entertaining watch. By building on the foundation of its streaming predecessor, the film skips tedious introductions and dives straight into the adventure. It leans heavily on the established dynamic between its two leads, focusing on themes of friendship and family, while doing its best to create a sprawling world without the galactic politics that often follow the different Star Wars franchises. The Mandalorian and Grogu is a comfortable, theatrical extension of a formula that already works, expanding with more side quests without breaking the mold.

The movie shines brightly with its exceptional use of practical effects; the visual effects, unfortunately, are unevenly implemented. The aliens, animatronics, and physical monster designs work well within this film's structure, allowing the craftsmanship to guide the action sequences consistently. Against this tactile backdrop, the characters of the Mandalorian, played with stoic charisma by Pedro Pascal, and Grogu, continuously cute and mischievous, are charming in almost everything they do, whether Din Djarin is executing high-level heroics or Grogu is merely snacking and pressing shiny buttons. Add a phenomenal score by Ludwig Göransson, with new electronic beats and exotic drums, and the film finds its rhythm with ease.

While the film pushes through the finish line on the merits of its fun factor, there is almost no character development for the two leads, as they start and end the journey in virtually the same emotional and narrative place. The narrative wheel spins aggressively, but the characters don't have anything new to do or say beyond what audiences have already seen them experience in the long-form streaming series. This aspect tends to slow the film's pacing down at times, making the 2 hours drag in places. The minuscule character development unfolds as they face perils together, with the dangers revealing a deeper bond and establishing Mando and Grogu as an unbreakable family.

While this cinematic leap may feel somewhat unnecessary given its stylistic similarity to the already established television show, it doesn't mean Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu is unwelcome. The film delivers a thoroughly entertaining experience that is fun for all audiences. The simplicity of its design, the dedication to rich world-building, and its laser focus on pure adventure bring back memories of why Star Wars fans adore these films so much in the first place. 

Monte's Rating

3.50 out of 5.00

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