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Shut Up and Plot Your Revenge

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Motor City

by George Wolf

Man, if you can hang with Motor City for about an hour and fifteen minutes, you’ll get one damn fine action sequence. Suddenly violent, increasingly bloody and eventually downright grisly, it’s an impressively choreographed and well shot set piece.

It’s also curious, considering the film surrounding it is a pretty tedious exercise in navigating a needless hurdle of its own making. And needle-dropping some sweet 70s hits.

The theme is simple enough: revenge. Ex-con John Miller (Alan Ritchson) is on probation and trying to toe the line in 1977 Detroit. He pops the question to his honey Sophia (Shailene Woodley) and things are looking up. But then Sophia’s gangster ex-boyfriend Reynolds (Ben Foster) frames John with a staged drug bust, and back to the slammer he goes.

So how does director Potsy Ponciroli (Old Henry) refresh the familiar idea from writer Chad St. John? By crafting Motor City as a nearly dialog-free thriller propelled by mood and music.

That “nearly” is the first curious bump in John’s long road to payback.

The few bits of dialog that are here just end up drawing attention to how hard the film is trying to get credit for telling most of this story without words. And it just isn’t necessary. Scenes that should naturally have organic conversation do not, and the strain of keeping the silent device intact is just too obvious.

I mean, do it or don’t. Since there is some dialog, Ponciroli’s commitment to visual storytelling ends up feeling more gimmicky and forced.

Foster and Woodley are customarily fine, Ritchson continues to show raw talent and real charisma, and Pablo Schreiber makes a perfectly menacing henchman. The soundtrack choices from Jack White (who also has a cameo) are on point, too, which helps keep the boredom at bay when the story just takes too long getting down to business.

And though revealing just what derails the finale would be too much of a spoiler, the result is anticlimactic and just plain silly.

But man, that one elevator scene shows just how much action potential is wasted in Motor City.

Outtakes

Dill With It

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The Dink

by Hope Madden

I was cautiously optimistic about The Dink, Josh Greenbaum’s feature that pits the elegant sport of tennis against goofy good time of pickle ball. It seemed like a funny concept.

Jake Johnson plays one-time tennis phenom Dustin Boyd, also known as the Hammer because that was the name his dad (Ed Harris) gave him as a kid due to his incredible serve. But now, rolling through his 40s in his 1998 Dodge LeSabre and working at his dad’s country club as the junior tennis instructor, the Hammer’s hitting some hard times.

As luck would have it, Dad has hatched a plan to rid the club of the goofy menace that is pickle ball. Does it involve a tournament, one pickle baller vs one tennis player? Will the Hammer somehow screw up his opportunity to be that tournament tennis pro? Will he somehow find himself falling for pickle ball?

I’m not saying, but if you’ve ever seen either a sports film or a comedy, you may be able to guess. No, Sean Clements’s script doesn’t feel terribly fresh, but the sort of Dodgeball meets Caddyshack concept is immediately appealing.

Lower your expectations and you might enjoy the movie.

Johnson’s built a career on the likeable goof character, and he’s as endearingly off-putting here as anywhere. Greenbaum surrounds him with solid support. Harris, obviously, but the ensemble teems with comic talent: Mary Steenburgen, Patton Oswalt, Ben Stiller, Chris Parnell, and even more veterans in cameos.

The Dink opens on its funniest scene, of the Hammer and his sidekick bestie (Aaron Chen) regaling two unimpressed kids with tales of their instructor’s youthful glory. Both kids (Indiana Elle and Cayden Romero) are dry, droll comic gold.

Everything after that is formula broken occasionally by random comedy bits. Stiller’s doctor is preoccupied with the “stickyhoney” dating app. Oswalt’s pickle ball advocate wastes a lot of tiny paper cups. John McEnroe brings his own concessions. Nothing is laugh-out-loud funny, but all the silliness is delivered by such pros that you chuckle regardless.

The Dink doesn’t rank among the great sports comedies, surely, but you’ll crack a smile.

Outtakes

Better Together

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What Tomorrow Brings

by Rachel Willis

After her mother leaves, Clara is forced to take care of her little sister in director Matt Englebert’s feature, What Tomorrow Brings.

Clara (Joely Englebert, who is also credited as a writer) is used to caring for Ruby (Phoebe Englebert, another co-writer). Even before her mother left, Clara’s dying father charged her with putting Ruby first, telling Clara her mother “wasn’t as strong” as Clara. Though Clara has fond memories of her father, the parent in me cringed to watch him put that burden on her.

The film’s present-day story is framed by voice-over narration in the form of Clara’s diary entries. Through these, we’re told rather than shown how she feels while shouldering the weight of caring for her sister alone.

The movie has some genuinely touching moments, but too often, those moments flounder under the weight of unnatural dialogue. The young actors struggle delivering such artificial lines.

The film’s tender heart and moments of true emotion manage to sparkle through the rough dialogue and some bizarre turns. This is due in part to the strength of the film’s youngest actor, Phoebe. She excels throughout, crafting Ruby as the film’s most believable character. Ruby’s moments of fear, heartbreak and joy are when the film’s emotion truly shines.

Though Clara anchors the film as its center, Joely never quite conveys the depth of anxiety the character feels. Nor is she quite able to show us how deeply she cares for her sister (despite their real-life relationship).

Directing, Matt glosses over the sisters’ hardships in favor of several montages that try to draw us into their sisterly bond. It doesn’t work.

Unfortunately, What Tomorrow Brings shies away from anything too intense or raw. This means that when the film reaches its climax, the turn feels unearned.

It’s too bad, because this is a movie that wants you to focus on hope, found family, and faith. Those are worthy themes, but when they come too easily, they don’t hold any weight. 

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Songbird Out Of Hell

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Hadestown: The Musical

by George Wolf

For the next week at least, Greece is most definitely the word at your local theatre.

While Christopher Nolan’s take on The Odyssey is wowing critics, audiences and box offices, the movie version of Broadway smash Hadestown combines the Greek tragedies of Orpheus and Eurydice and Hades and Persephone with an irresistible, jazz-infused treatment that dazzles from the opening glimpses backstage.

Screening in theaters for five nights only beginning July 24th, Hadestown unveils the “pro-shot” film capture of a reunion performance from last year in London. The five leads reprised their roles in the multi award-winning production, with veteran filmed stage feature director Brett Sullivan bringing new life to stage director Rachel Chavkin’s original vision.

Tony Award-winner Andre De Shields is a mesmerizing tour guide as Mr. Hermes, our host who explains “the road to hell is a railroad line,” as Anaïs Mitchell’s Tony and Grammy Award-winning score begins working it’s toe-tapping magic.

Young lovers Orpheus (Reeve Carney) and Eurydice (Eva Noblezada) face an uncertain future due to their life of poverty. When King Hades (Patrick Page and his delicious baritone) arrives to bring his wife Persephone (Amber Gray) back to the Underworld and usher in a harsh winter, Eurydice is intrigued by his offer to end her hunger and suffering. Urged on by the Fates, Eurydice signs Hades’s book and leaves Orpheus for a new life down below.

But Orpheus will not give up his quest to bring Eurydice home, and his commitment inspires Persephone to plead his case to her husband, leading to the legendary offer Hades extends to the couple for a final chance at their freedom.

Mitchell updates the classic myths with a timely parallel to our current chasm between the privileged and the struggling, and Sullivan bolsters that theme with a wonderfully active showcase for Rachel Hauck’s Tony Award-winning set design. Anchored by a rotating center stage with one circle descending to the Underworld, the set extends the movement outward to the dancing Fates, the terrific jazz musicians upstage and the frequently pacing Mr. Hermes.

Sullivan mines that sweet balance between framing the totality of the audience view with the more intimate moments a camera allows. Overplaying this hand would betray the innate beauty of a pro shot experience, but here the pushes only accentuate the emotion of the performances, the detail of the production design and the richness of the costuming (bonus points for turning Page’s cane and walking boot from an Achilles injury into a menacingly cool addition to the Hades swagger).

And much like its mythological sister The Odyssey, Hadestown‘s extended length (2h 21m) only gives you more time to relish the experience. The brief screening window (remember, only five nights beginning this Friday) however, does not.

So don’t miss your chance to bask in the joy and pain, tragedy and hope that Hadestown finally brings to the big screen. And get ready to put those jazz hands together, early and often.

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Trip of a Lifetime

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The Odyssey

by Hope Madden & George Wolf

Christopher Nolan likes a big room.

A massive cast, incredible set designs, far flung locations, 70mm IMAX cameras, The Odyssey has it all. And why not? Homer’s story is among history’s first ever epics.

And it’s quite a tale, trailing Odysseus (Matt Damon) as he struggles to return home to Ithaca after his savvy strategy leading to the defeat of Troy. Nolan, who adapts the 2700-year-old tome, finds echoes of Oppenheimer in Odysseus’s struggle. It’s a haunting narrative choice that gives the ancient proceedings a relevance that transcends time.

Damon is magnificent, wily and honorable, humble and arrogant, and Nolan surrounds him with a jaw-dropping ensemble. Anne Hathaway is bracingly wonderful as Penelope, the wife pushing off suitors circling the throne Odysseus left empty nearly two decades ago. Tom Holland, John Leguizamo, Mia Goth, Corey Hawkins, and Robert Pattinson join Penelope in the castle, and while the entire cast is solid, Pattinson again carves out unforgettable screentime.

Out in the wild world, Charlize Theron offers a beautiful dash of melancholy as Calypso, who prods Odysseus to search his memories and tell the tale. Himesh Patel is also exceptional as Eurylochus, Odysseus’s second in command. Elliot Page delivers a heartbreaking turn as Sinon, a youngster who follows Odysseus into battle, Jon Bernthal crafts a perfectly hardened King of Sparta while Samantha Morton finds remarkable depths as the witch Circe, given her limited time on screen. With even less screentime, Lupita Nyong’o and Zendaya leave an emotional mark.

And that’s not even the full cast, each of them bringing vulnerability to scenes of remarkable staging. The Trojan horse, the ship at sea, scenes of war, of mutiny,  scenes confined to a banquet hall or strewn across the black embers of hell—this is Nolan at not just his most imaginative, but his most insightful as he finds relatable humanity inside even the grandest of moments.

He also mines new relevance from this ancient text, increasing the narrative weight with each spectacular step on the journey. Set in “a time of apparent magic,” Nolan doesn’t let us forget that the sacred bonds between people are still very fragile indeed, and breaking them can still have haunting, tragic repercussions.

The Odyssey casts such a mesmerizing spell that its three-hour runtime seems inconsequential, and the occasional lapses into more contemporary types of dialog and phrasing are rendered mere curiosities. Even those who may not be quite scholarly in Greek mythology will find a rich, rewarding story to get lost in, one that is anchored in storytelling itself as a reminder of what power the ancient art can hold.

Expect witchcraft and monsters (maybe a horror film next, Mr. Nolan?), war, brutality, political skullduggery, love and longing, revenge and regret, sacrifice, cowardice, honor and visual wonder.

The magic here is more than apparent, so don’t cheat yourself by waiting for the streaming date. The Odyssey is a true cinema experience, and a reason to seek out IMAX, 70mm, the whole fantastic shebang. This trip of a lifetime deserves nothing less.

Fright Club

Fright Club: Temptation in Horror Movies

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Temptation is a big, big topic in horror. All sin begins with temptation and all horror begins with sin. But we narrowed down the list of our favorites so we didn’t focus exclusively on one kind of temptation. Which means we had to leave LOADS of movies out, including Nosferatu, The Lure, and Def by Temptation. But hopefully we made up for it with variety!

5. The Untamed (2016)

Sexual frustration leads to a lot of bad choices, but sexual satisfaction may be the real monster in Amat Escalante’s wild scifi/horror flick.

Alejandra (Ruth Ramos) is one of the sexually frustrated. Veronica (Simone Bucio) is not. Angel (Jesus Meza) is making bad choices. But there was this meteor, and it landed out by this isolated farm. What if the answer to all their problems is there?

Taking direct inspiration from Andrzej Zulawski’s Possession, Escalante reframes the taboo-defying frenzy of unbridled sexuality. Where Zulawski’s surreal, antiseptic environment suggested absurdism, Escalante grounds the fantasy in profoundly ordinary and relatable human drama. The result is horrifying.

4. Jennifer’s Body (2009)

The central premise in this succubus horror: Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them. Better still, lure them to an isolated area and eat them, leaving their carcasses for the crows. This is the surprisingly catchy idea behind this coal-black horror comedy.

In for another surprise? Megan Fox’s performance is spot-on as the high school hottie turned demon. Director Karyn Kusama’s film showcases the actress’s most famous assets, but also mines for comic timing and talent other directors apparently overlooked.

Amanda Seyfried’s performance as the best friend, replete with homely girl glasses and Jan Brady hairstyle, balances Fox’s smolder, and both performers animate Diablo Cody’s screenplay with authority. They take the Snaps conceit and expand it – adolescence sucks for all girls, not just the outcasts.

3. The Lair of the White Worm (1988)

Who tempted us first? It was that clever snake. And who better to turn Bram Stoker’s abysmal novel The Lair of the White Worm into a blasphemous, hedonistic blast than Ken Russell?

Hugh Grant’s unibrow! Amanda Donohoe’s serpentine strap on! Peter Capaldi’s impenetrable accent! It’s all here, with as much subtlety as you might expect from Russell. Campy fun from the opening credits (that font!), this one’s a hoot!

2. The Devil’s Advocate (1997)

Al Pacino is subtle as ever as the devil himself, here to tempt Keanu Reeves with power. Though carnal temptation does make a number of visits, it’s greed and ambition that drive this film.

Is this Taylor Hackford vehicle a campy act of excess? It is! Gloriously, absolutely ridiculously so! The acting is over-the-top, though Reeves is characteristically cardboard. But both Charlize Theron and Connie Nielsen are exceptional and the wretched excess is a kind of joy.

1. Raw (2016)

In a very obvious way, Raw is a metaphor for what can and often does happen to a sheltered girl when she leaves home for college. But as writer/director Julia Ducournau looks at those temptations and the excesses committed on the cusp of adulthood, she creates opportunities to explore and comment on so many upsetting realities, and does so with absolute fidelity to her core metaphor. She immediately joins the ranks of Jennifer Kent (Babadook) and Ana Lily Amirpour (A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night) – all recent, first time horror filmmakers whose premier features predict boundless talent.

The Screening Room

Screening Room: Moana, Evil Dead Burn, The Invite, Gail Daughtry & More

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This week, Hope & George review Moana, Evil Dead Burn, The Invite, Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass, The Outer Threat, Night Nurse, Mockbuster, and The Isolate Thief. PLUS! Movie News & Notes from The Schlocketeer Daniel Baldwin!

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Come Get Some

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Evil Dead Burn

by Hope Madden

Nasty. Relentless. Grim.

Evil Dead Burn saw me coming!

Say what you will about the Deadite franchise, but you’re not likely to use the adjective “boring.” One of the reasons it’s remained relevant over six films and a 3-season TV show is that the team behind the bloodshed is not afraid to switch things up. Sam Raimi’s original, Stooges-inspired trilogy and the Bruce Campbell starring TV series were more grossout comedies than anything.

But the films took on a darker tone with Fede Alvarez’s 2013 reboot, a style that continued with Lee Cronin’s 2023 episode, Evil Dead Rise. For their latest installment, Executive Producer Raimi tapped French filmmaker Sébastian Vanicek.

Vanicek’s 2023 arachnid horror Infested was an impressive exercise in claustrophobic terror. He brings with him the flavor of French Extreme Cinema, so vital and gruesome in the early 2000s. What he abandons is the underlying, though ever darkening, humor that has always marked the franchise.

That or it just doesn’t work this time.

In what is essentially a metaphor for abusive relationships, Evil Dead Burn follows one family in the wake of their eldest son’s ghastly vehicular death. Naturally, the family gathers to mourn in their dead grandpa’s old farmhouse. He used to travel the world collecting creepy stories, kept a journal scribbled with incantations. You know the drill. It stars with “kanda” and ends with serious carnage.

Vanicek writes the script with Raimi and Florent Bernard, who co-wrote Infested. The story is tight enough, and solid performances quickly carve out recognizable characters who still manage not to feel flat or cliché.

Souheila Yacoub is Alice, the deceased’s widow and our central figure. Her tortured past sometimes threatens to weigh down the mayhem, but it never drags anything to a stop. How could it? Vanicek opens hard and never slows down.

The action choreography is fascinating. Cinematographer Philip Lozano (MadS, Cobweb) takes inspiration from the Raimi classic, his camera snaking and stalking its way through scenes. But this camera rolls, dips, and flies, all of it in service of the slaughter.

The film’s humorlessness and its somewhat tortured (ha!) central metaphor keep it from feeling truly at home in the franchise. But for an hour and fifty minutes of unforgiving butchery, you could do worse.

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Mighty, Mighty Neighborly

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The Invite

by George Wolf

For a film set almost entirely inside one apartment, The Invite covers an awful lot of ground. It’s a trip through performative banter and anxious glances to repressed feelings, emotional honesty and possible new beginnings.

And it’s funny, in ways that are often relatable, revealing, and a good bit awkward.

Adapted from Cesc Gay’s The People Upstairs (stage play, then movie), the film finds Angela (Olivia Wilde, who also directs) and Joe (Seth Rogen) finally ready host their upstairs neighbors Pina (Penélope Cruz) and “Hawk” (Edward Norton) for dinner.

Well, Angela is ready, and schoolgirl nervous. Joe insists she didn’t tell him it was tonight, so he didn’t get any wine, and you know what if they come over he just might ask them to please tone down all those wild sex noises.

No! Joe can’t do that. Pina is so pretty, and Hawk is so cool! Angela just has to impress them and at least pretend that she and Joe are as happy as they are. Or at least as they seem to be.

It’s all polite laughter and rug compliments at first, but slowly the adapted script from Will McCormack and Rashida Jones begins probing old wounds, petty grievances and provocative possibilities. The cast wrings emotion from the dialog with the zest you would expect from a veteran foursome such as this. Cruz and Norton are effortlessly suave and sexy, while Rogen is the grumpy fly buzzing around the cheese tray and Wilde is the frazzled host desperate for the night to play out as she planned it.

It won’t. And everyone is better for it.

Wilde’s direction seems equally intent on bringing movement to this static setting, and for the most part she succeeds without showy desperation. Windows, doorframes and mirrors are carefully utilized in several shots, giving a visual boost to the emotional distance – or growing attraction – between characters.

It all works in wonderful unison for this wonderfully adult comedy/drama…okay I’ll say “dramedy.” Funny, biting, poignant, and surprising, The Invite speaks to how easily longtime couples can drift apart, and the hard fought honesty it takes to stick things out.

Plus, some people really like rugs.

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On the Boat Again

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Moana

by Hope Madden

Has there been a reason yet for one of Disney’s live-action remakes? Arguably, no, but some of them have been fun. Jon Favreau’s 2016 The Jungle Book used inspired casting and fun tweaks on the Disney’s 1967 animated classic to craft easily the best of the bunch.

Since then? They range from garbage (Robert Zemeckis’s 2022 abomination Pinocchio) to fine (Bill Condon’s 2017 Beauty and the Beast). Disney’s latest, Moana, falls somewhere in between.

Director Thomas Kail (Hamilton) guides the effort that sees Dwayne Johnson adding flesh to his voice role as demigod shapeshifter Maui. Catherine Laga’aia is Moana, the future leader of her Polynesian village in a long ancient time when islands were still being pulled from the ocean floor by gods.

Moana’s father warns her never to go beyond the reef, but if we know anything about young Disney heroes, we know Moana is destined to roam. Her quest: to find Moana, get him on her boat, cross the ocean, and return the heart of the sea to the goddess he stole it from a thousand years ago.

Laga’aia is in fine voice, and the story is as charming as ever. But even more than most of these remakes, Moana begs the question: why? Favreau used motion capture to bring actor and jungle character together, allowing for an experience the animated original couldn’t offer. The animals didn’t look or move like cartoons. They seemed like panthers and tigers, snakes and orangutans imbued with weirdly human personalities.

But a giant, bedazzled crab (still voiced gloriously by Jemaine Clement) just looks like a big, animated crustacean covered in glitter. Tiny coconut pirates, huge fire gods—every unusual creature Moana and Maui encounter still looks cartoon-like. If not cartoon, why cartoon shaped?

The fact that Kail works from Jared Bush, Dana Ledoux Miller, and Ron Clements’s original screenplay, varying barely an iota, doesn’t help. It’s not that Moana is bad. Were it a standalone, it would be a lovely family film. And in a way, that’s still what it is. It just isn’t necessary.

Hope Madden and George Wolf … get it?