Category Archives: 2022

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness      4 stars

The world’s most powerful sorcerer, Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch returning to the role after an outing as a cowboy in The Power of the Dog) makes another entry in the Marvel universe in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. This second installment about the man who can control portals to other realities and can battle demons is directed by Sam Raimi, the man who brought us the Spiderman movies of the early 2000’s and a host of horror movies including the popular Evil Dead movies. This time out Doctor Strange crosses paths with a young girl named America (Xochitl Gomez) who is being pursued by demons and is forced to become involved and protect her. It seems that America has the power to travel to other universes that make up the multiverse, a reality that exists in the MCU. This power and a book that figures in the story is what some entity is seeking to obtain for itself, and it is Strange’s mission to prevent this union that could result in the destruction of the universe. (What else?) For help Strange goes to an associate, Wong (Benedict Wong) and Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olson). I can’t go into the story much more than that except to say that the viewer is in for a real roller coaster of an experience as the characters travel to other universes, battle demons and meet alternate versions of themselves and other people in their lives including some very different Avengers. The movie is very action packed as one would expect in a Marvel movie and has a story that can be followed by most viewers. Fortunately, it does keep the number of characters limited, which can’t be said for two recent Avengers movies. The concept of a multiverse was used recently in Everything Everywhere All At Once, but with much greater comic effect than Doctor Strange, something I greatly enjoyed. Strange gives it a more serious tone which I also approve of. It has been nine years since Raimi’s last directorial effort, Oz the Great and Powerful. Let’s hope that he finds another suitable project without waiting that long. Be sure to watch for some interesting cameos, including one of a street vendor by Bruce Campbell!

The Lost City

The Lost City                       2 ½ stars

Anyone who pays any attention to the media has seen the promotions for The Lost City a hundred times by now. This is the newest lost treasure adventure rom-com that stars Sandra Bullock as an adventure/romance novelist and Tatum Channing, her book cover model. The movie follows a tried and true formula for these types of movies that goes back to Romancing the Stone. In this one Bullock’s character, Loretta Sage, is kidnapped by the billionaire adventurer Abigail Fairfax (Daniel Radcliffe, against type, cast as the villain) because he believes Sage can translate an ancient fragment from a lost civilization that can reveal the location of an ancient treasure. Thus, most of the action takes place on a remote island in the Atlantic Ocean. The dimwitted Alan, Channing’s character believes that he can rescue her pretty much on his own, setting up a variety of comic scenes between the two leads. Bullock does her best with her comic sense in this very predictable relationship. There is a decent set of comedic supporting cast that includes Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Oscar Nunez of The Office, Patty Harrison and SNL’s Bowen Yang. Credit must also be given to Bullock’s wardrobe of the magenta sequined jumpsuit that she wears through most of the movie. It appears so often that it deserves its own credit, figuring into the plot of the movie. Anyone who has seen the promotions will recognize it. There is little that could be called original in this comic caper, but it can easily be watched on an afternoon when you don’t have to be completely absorbed with what is happening on the screen. And you certainly should not be thinking about what is credible in the story line.

Top Gun: Maverick

Top Gun: Maverick          4 ½ stars

By now everyone has heard about Top Gun: Maverick, probably the most highly anticipated movie of the year. The sequel to the 1986 movie, Top Gun has been in the making for years and was delayed until it was finally released last month. Most have heard of the premise of the film, how Pete “Maverick” Mitchell is brought back to the military’s top flight school to instruct a group of the Navy’s best flyers, for a top secret mission against an enemy that goes largely unnamed, but is critical to US and NATO security. Maverick (Tom Cruise in his most famous role) is still a test pilot for the Navy having passed on promotions repeatedly and is still much the fearless risktaker he was in the original film. But certain events and relationships have had their impact on him, especially those related to Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw (Miles Teller), the son of “Goose”, Maverick’s deceased wingman from over thirty years previous. One actor that doesn’t really have much to do is Academy Award winner Jennifer Connelly who plays the woman that owns the bar where the Navy flyboys tend to hang out. I’m not really sure why she is in the movie. This is all background for the story, but the main impact of the movie are the thrills and performances of the navy jet flyers in the training exercises and the ultimate mission that involves the highest level of danger for our flying heroes. This is a movie that must be seen on the big screen to get the full experience of the speed and sounds of flying a jet at high speeds with the dangers of combat. Whatever you may think of Tom Cruise, you should not miss this movie while it is still playing in the theaters.

Crimes of the Future

Crimes of the Future                       3 ½ stars

After a long absence from filmmaking, David Cronenberg, the master of the “body horror” film, has returned with his new offering “Crimes of the Future”. People familiar with his work will recognize him for such sci-fi horror films as Videodrome, Scanners, The Fly and eXistenZ. His style includes images of gory, grisly mutilations of bodies and he is not letting us down in Crimes. So get ready for the gore. There is too much to describe here, but the setting is a time in the future when evolution has removed the threat of pain and infection from our lives and some people have gained the ability to rapidly evolve their own bodies. One such person is Saul Tenser (a handsome Viggo Mortenson), a performance artist who allows surgeries to be performed on him in public by his associate Caprice (Lea Seydoux) by means of an autopsy machine that is operated by a remote control that seems to resemble a vagina. During these autopsies any new “organs” that Saul has managed to grow inside his body are removed and displayed with Caprice making sketches of the new creation. As Tenser says, surgery has become the new sex and it is there to be viewed by a live audience. Tenser gains the attention of many individuals including the director of The National Organ Registry, a man seeking his skills for a “live autopsy” and a “New Vice Unit” agent seeking information on illegal activity. The feel of the movie is aided by the scenes of bodies being cut open with automated steel scalpels  and some interesting furniture pieces including a bed that looks like an open cocoon and a chair made of bones. There is a lot of talk about the meaning of art and beauty and many dark interior scenes and secret meetings. Unfortunately, the film seemed to end rather abruptly leaving one with a rather empty feeling at the end. This is a true Cronenberg film. It will not be for everyone.

Watcher

Watcher                               4 stars

Imagine what a moviemaker would do if asked to make a horror movie set in Romania that did not involve vampires. That task is accomplished by relatively new director Chloe Okuno in the horror thriller Watcher. The movie stars Maika Monroe as Julia, the lonely American housewife who has followed her Romanian speaking husband Francis to Bucharest for his new job. Monroe has made a career of being the victim in many horror and drama movies that include It Follows, Villains, Greta and Bokeh. In Watcher, Julia has no friends because of the language barrier and wanders the city going to shops and diners while her husband is working. But she is not entirely alone as there is a dark figure of a man in the window of an apartment across the street that seems to always be present looking at her apartment. To increase the threat there is a story of young women in the city mysteriously getting their throats cut by a serial killer. Could the murders be linked to the man in the window? Not wanting to be another victim, Julia, the watched becomes the stalker, following the mysterious man through the neighborhood. This has to be one of the slowest developing horror movies I have seen recently, but it’s done well as the tension builds constantly until the startling conclusion. Monroe does a believable job as a woman who refuses to be another victim. Watcher was featured at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. I had not heard of writer director Okuna before, but after seeing Watcher I look forward to seeing Bodies Bodies Bodies, a comedy horror movie that she has a writing credit for. (It is due to be released later this summer.)

Elvis

Elvis                       4 ½ stars

The new movie Elvis promised to be a grand extravaganza about the legend, the King of Rock and Roll, Elvis Presley and in the hands of Baz Luhrmann, it is all that and so much more. Luhrmann has previously brought us visually stunning movies like Moulin Rouge and The Great Gatsby. He does it again in this biopic about Presley and his longtime manager Colonel Tom Parker, telling it in a very nonlinear style that highlights the triumphs and tragedy that this relationship brought to them both. Tom Hanks portrays Parker as the carnival promoter who is always looking for the next big act that will make him rich, and the man who would exercise power over Elvis through his entire career. The transformation of Hanks into this bloated master manipulator is amazing. Look for an Oscar for the Makeup category for this one. Austin Butler who has had several small movie roles takes on the challenging job of capturing the spirit and energy of Elvis’s performances and his inner conflicts and I would say he just about has it. The movie hits all the major points of Elvis’s life, his rise to stardom, the controversy over his hip wiggling performances, his stint in the army overseas, the Hollywood era, the Las Vegas Elvis and his addiction to barbiturates and alcohol that shortened his life. But it also effectively shows how he was influenced by the Black music that he was surrounded by growing up in Tupelo, Mississippi. His performances are interspersed with those of B. B. King, Rosetta Tharpe and Little Richard and many others, so we see that without these Black artists there would have been no Elvis as we remember him. But the main story of the film is of the ties between Elvis and Parker as told through Parker’s eyes starting with his memories commanding that “The only thing that matters is that that man gets on that stage tonight.” This one deserves to be seen on the big screen. Next year look for Austin Butler as the notorious villain Feyd-Rautha in the sequel to Dune!

Mr. Malcolm’s List

Mr. Malcolm’s List                            3 ½ stars

In Mr. Malcolm’s List we travel back to the London of the 1810’s in a Jane Austen-esc period comedy romance about beautiful people of high society. I understand this type of thing is on TV now in Bridgerton, but Mr. Malcolm’s List is a much lighter version that should appeal to a variety of audiences. Mr. Malcolm (Sope Dirisu) is rich and single and is London’s most sought after bachelor who is on a mission to find his perfect mate. One candidate for Malcolm’s affections, Julia Thistlewaite (Zawe Ashton) has accompanied him to the opera and was embarrassed to have answered a question about local politics in a peculiar way and is ridiculed in a local publication. She is incensed to discover from her silly cousin Lord Cassidy that Mr. Malcolm has a list of traits that must be met for any potential mate. Julia must get her revenge and the perfect plan is to enlist her poor childhood friend from the country, Selina Dalton (the beautiful Freida Pinto) to fulfil the list’s requirements and then reject Mr. Malcolm. What a dastardly plan! The movie has all the features of a romantic story for this period: the grand balls, the polite conversation, the horseback rides and the secret meetings. It has a nearly all female production staff and a very diverse cast that gives a different look to London high society of the early nineteenth century. Previously, it was a short of the same name featuring the same two main actors, Dirisu and Pinto, in the main roles. It’s not quite Jane Austen but it will do for one and a half hours of light entertainment.

Where the Crawdads Sing

Where the Crawdads Sing                             2 stars

I have not read the book that Where the Crawdads Sing is based on, but judging by the talk about it the book by Delia Shannon it must be a real page turner. It’s too bad that the feel of the book did not translate very well in Olivia Newman’s on-screen adaptation. The movie follows the life of young Kya (Daisy Edgar-Jones of Normal People) who must live on her own in the swamps of North Carolina after suffering the abuse of her father and being abandoned by her entire family. Kya is considered a pariah by the local people and is referred to as swamp-girl. She has few friends as she must fend for herself starting at age seven. The story involves a possible murder when a body is found at the bottom of a fire tower so naturally it is assumed that the loner Kya must have been the murderer despite a total lack of evidence. Enter retired lawyer Tom Milton (a very lawyerly David Strathairn) who volunteers to defend the accused Kya for no pay. One should not think of this movie as a murder mystery as doing so will leave them disappointed. The less said about that the better. Rather it should be viewed as a story about surviving against all odds and as a love story. Even so the story was not all that convincing perhaps because of some of the supporting performances or not taking full advantage of the southern setting of the movie. The abusive Chase (Harris Dickenson) who Kya initially falls for is very two dimensional. I saw it as so much melodrama that did not grab my full attention. None of this is the fault of the lead actress, Edgar-Jones who gives a creditable performance as Kya.

The Sea Beast

The Sea Beast                    3 ½ stars

With The Sea Beast, presented on Netflix, director and animator Chris Williams allows us to enter a world where those sea monsters of legend reputed to roam the seas actually exist. Here there are a cadre of heroes (both men and women) who sail in their wooden ships and hunt down and battle these giant creatures in defense of their kingdom. In this story, our two heroes are Jacob, a young man who was rescued from the sea as a boy and has served under Captain Crow of the Inevitable, (one of the best monster hunters who has served for decades); and Maisie, a young, orphaned girl whose parents were themselves monster hunters who lost their lives fighting the creatures. Maisie can’t get enough of the stories of the glory of the hunt, having read of them in her books, even including stories of Jacob. After Maisie stows away on Jacob’s ship and they do battle with a few of these monsters, including the most fearsome Red Bluster, Jacob and Maisie find themselves separated from the ship and her crew, stranded on an island inhabited by some of the creatures, including the giant Red Bluster himself. It is only after this encounter that they come to realize that Bluster and the other monsters may not be the dangerous creatures as told in the old stories. Perhaps the books are not telling the whole story. The film is another variation on the misunderstood creature that is befriended by a young person, who then must persuade the misguided adults into seeing things differently. This theme was present in the How to Train Your Dragon movies and in Raya and the Last Dragon as well as Nimona. The Sea Beast is much the same story, with the high seas as the setting. Chris Williams was the animator behind Big Hero 6 and Moana and has expanded his role to include director in The Sea Beast. It’s a good story for all ages but is clearly not original. It is reported that it may be getting the How to Train Your Dragon treatment with plans for a sequel. See it if you are a fan of animation. I recommend though to be wary of whales and sharks.

Nope

Nope                     4 ½ stars

Nope is Jordan Peele’s the third horror production and this one brings all the classic aspects of traditional Hollywood monster movies together, only set against a wide-open western frontier. Like his previous movies Get Out and Us, Peele tells his stories from a uniquely black perspective. In Nope, early on we are introduced by Keke Palmer’s Emerald Haywood to a story about the first “moving picture” which featured a two second clip of a galloping horse with a black rider, whose name is missing from history. Emerald claims that the man was her ancestor and in a way this reminds us of the role that Black Americans played in taming the West and in the early days of moviemaking. Emerald’s brother is OJ Haywood (Daniel Kaluuya) who runs the family ranch in the foothills of northern California that they inherited from their father who dies mysteriously early in the movie. Eventually OJ becomes aware that there is something strange going on as mysterious lights appear in the sky and the horses have a tendency to get spooked and run away. With the help of a tech store clerk, (Brandon Perea) the team puts together a video surveillance system in order to capture the alien visitors on film. Before we get a good look at the aliens there is a good indication of the level of horror we are in for when in a flashback we see an especially troubling incident involving one of the characters that occurs on live TV. (We learn there is a reason that chimpanzees do not appear in commercial TV shows.) Midway through the movie Peele takes us from glimpses of the threat, ala Jaws, to the full-on terror of facing the enemy. He gives us a cacophony of voices and noise and blood-soaked terrain as our heroes struggle to get the images recorded while at the same time surviving the assault. Through it all, the quiet OJ is amazingly cool and calm as he plans what his next move should be, (sort of a Clint Eastwood character in a classic western). Palmer, though much more vocal shows how resourceful her character can be. Peele’s hit blockbuster of the summer expands his story telling skills beyond what we have seen before. You will have to go see it in the theater to really get the full experience of this horror movie.