If Halloween and Back to the Future had a love child, it would be Nahnatchka Khan’s Totally Killer (C+); and in terms of radical surprises, this comic horror movie has very few flux (capacitors) to give. The contemporary teen protagonist, played by a funny deadpan Kiernan Shipka, must go back in time to the 1980s to avert a killing spree affecting her loved ones. Olivia Holt is effective as the heroine’s teenage version of her mother, and Julie Bowen is entertaining as mom in the modern day. There are some clever time travel conceits, nifty needle drops and funny asides about what passed for acceptable a generation or two ago, but there’s not quite enough here – including few scares – to warrant a strong recommendation. The “Sweet Sixteen” murderer clad in a Max Headroom style mask won’t likely enter the pantheon of killer classics, but the acting skills of Shipka portend more opportunities for uncanny comedy ahead.
Packing for Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman’s vision of Theater Camp (B) may involve contraband supplies such as throat coat (for maintaining those satin vocals) or the occasional tear stick (because crying on cue takes real range), but mostly the characters in this mockumentary come equipped for the summer with dry wit. Fresh from this year’s Sundance Film Festival, this comic lark written by the co-directors along with actors Ben Platt and Noah Galvin, showcases faculty and budding performers at the fictional New York State ”AdirondACTS” sleep-away camp. After the program’s indomitable founder (Amy Sedaris) falls into a coma, her clueless “crypto bro” son (Jimmy Tatro) is tasked with keeping the thespian enclave solvent while long-suffering teachers played by Platt and Gordon (both believable in their bickering) endeavor to ensure the end-of-summer musical show must go on. There are some fantastic quips and acts of acerbic comedy, largely featuring Tatro’s character’s basic misunderstanding of the theatre kids. Galvin shines when explaining the rituals of the bohemian Rent kids versus the finger-snapping Fosse friends. Ayo Edebiri is also a supporting VIP as a counselor who lied on her resume but still has to muster up classes on mask theory and fight choreography. There are plenty of sassy sight gags, biting observations and creative asides to reward those who work in the performing arts milieu; tricking kids into being restaurant servers by convincing them it’s an exercise in immersive theater is one of the standout sequences. Other times the tone is too slight to have much bite. The saggy middle act rallies in the finale though, when a show-within-a-show comes brilliantly together. The movie’s creators are clearly caught up in the craft, and it’s all just campy enough to yield a few bonfires of hilarity.
Writer/director Greta Gerwig isn’t done with plumbing the psychology of little women, setting the sly subject of her brilliantly subversive new work as a personified plaything who’s awakening into the reality of contemporary life. The witty auteur has crafted a loving tribute to those who create, those who play and those who simply grind into the trials of daily life in the eccentric, existential and exuberant Barbie (A). Packing everything she can about the highs, lows, choices and challenges of womanhood into an efficient fish out of water comedy, Gerwig fashions a droll and dreamy doll’s house, a mythology in miniature and a cultural touchpoint that’s so much more than its pristine plastic surface might promise. Much credit goes to graceful physical comedienne Margot Robbie as the title protagonist, discovering empowerment and empathy with support from a mighty female ecosystem. America Ferrera and Rhea Perlman are formidable standouts in the cast who instill wonder and wisdom along Barbie’s journey of self-actualization. As comic relief and a character gaining an agency of his own kind, Ryan Gosling is a hoot as Ken; he’s certainly the source of some of the greatest belly laughs evoked from a character with washboard abs. The production design, costumes and music are exquisite in this candy-colored universe made even more bountiful by the words of Gerwig and Noah Baumbach’s observational and deeply meta screenplay. It’s a testament to Gerwig’s love of her subject that she can get away with in-jokes at the expense of her Mattel producers and evoke both nostalgia and a forward-looking vision all at once. The emotional undercurrent of the protagonist’s growing awareness about how the world works is something few will see coming; the sentiment is real and earned. This brainy modern classic is more than meets the eyes and will be studied for years to come.
Watch the “Seeing is Believing” podcast for Silver Screen Capture video review and discussion of a faith-based hot take on the #Barbenheimer phenomenon:
Adapted by Adrian Tomine from his own graphic novel and directed by first-time filmmaker Randall Park, the Sundance comedy-drama Shortcomings (B+) is an enjoyable contemporary take on being a young Asian-American male in American society. The story’s moody protagonist, an underemployed movie theatre manager and lousy boyfriend, is winningly played by Justin H. Min. His lesbian best friend portrayed by Sherry Cola is an absolute hoot and always knows just what to say. Ally Maki is also memorable as the hero’s polar opposite; the whole ensemble enjoys time in the spotlight. The cross-country, cross-cultural story transports viewers from Berkeley to New York City with wryly observant misadventures. Park plumbs heritage and hot takes for a film that feels like it’s not trying all that hard and yet still it says so much about its subjects. It’s genuinely funny and also moving at times. Expect this one to be a cult hit, a kind of Reality Bites for modern times.
The brazen style and balls-out swagger of Emma Seligman’s Bottoms (C) earns the surreal comedy about marginalized young people some nifty novelty points, but the freshness of this brisk tale of two high school lesbians (Rachel Sennott and Ayo Edebiri) who set up a fight club as a guise to hook up with the popular cheerleaders wears off lickety-split. The compelling central duo at the film’s center certainly wins some deserved laughs with droll, deadpan and raunchy dialogue as well as heartfelt empathy, milking all they can from the outrageous premise and their characters’ plights. Havana Rose Liu and Kaia Gerber also bring spirit to the enterprise as would-be paramours, as do Nicholas Galitzine as an absurdist jock archetype and Marshawn Lynch as an aloof teacher who becomes an unwitting club sponsor. The rules of the film’s arch universe are loosely defined and keep viewers at bay from fully immersing. Although billed as a satire, the send-up doesn’t necessarily hit its targets with consistency, which is disappointing with as many topical issues to plumb. This one-note dark comedy wants to be Heathers or even But I’m a Cheerleader and doesn’t quite get there.
This movie was staid when it should have slayed. An intriguing premise devolves into just a bunch of running scared in Tim Story’s horror satire The Blackening (D). The film follows a group of Black friends on a Juneteenth holiday weekend who encounter masked murderers while staying at a cabin in the woods. At the film’s core is a mysterious board game that turns players against one another in a type of racial roulette, but most of the plot is just actors running from room to room screaming. Grace Byers and Melvin Gregg are among the accomplished standouts in the ensemble. Among those who stand out for all the wrong reasons, Jermaine Fowler gives a stupendously misguided performance, jawdropping in its caricature. Story shows scant skill in helming this type of horror movie, with no cleverness to the kills or pacing for the scares. There’s more mystery and suspense in any given Scooby-Doo episode. What could have been a sly play on tropes or an intellectual dissection of the role race plays in these kinds of movies is largely squandered. In terms of dignity of daring, nobody gets out of this one alive.
Existential and terrestrial, Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City (C-) also proves a quite inert affair within its lovely and meticulous menagerie of production design and between its fussy and overcomplicated bookends. It’s fitting there’s a subplot about aliens, as most actors in Anderson’s ensemble appear to only mimic the way earthly humans actually act and speak. The best thing about the film is its stylized use of whimsical color and imaginative set pieces amidst a widescreen panorama; there’s no mistaking in every genus and species and frame of the picture that it’s an Anderson film. Framed with an obtuse artifice of putting on a theatrical play, the central act of cinema revolves around denizens gathered in a remote desert town for an astronomy and invention convention circa 1955. The characters engage in conversations and quirks, but there’s little narrative thrust or storytelling propulsion governing the work. Vintage Altman it’s not. Much of this mawkish enterprise feels like Anderson bringing a Pinterest mood board to life. Someone must have vociferously complimented him in kindergarten show and tell, as adult Anderson shows great relish cataloguing collections of items and actors. No performer stands out much in this deadpan diorama; Jason Schwartzman as a dad and war photographer is the closest thing to a protagonist, and even his character goes largely undeveloped. The kid actors get a few funny bits, and many of Anderson’s regulars – from Jeffrey Wright to Tilda Swinton – get some droll moments in the spotlight. It’s all pretty stargazing but doesn’t add up to much.
A sweet story of unconventional friendship disguised as a raunchy comedy, Gene Stupntisky’s No Hard Feelings (B) pairs movie luminary Jennifer Lawrence with rising Broadway star Andrew Barth Feldman as characters meeting under unusual circumstances and creating quite a bond. The young man’s wealthy parents (an amusing if underused Matthew Broderick and Laura Benanti) want to bring their son out of his shell and turn to a down-on-her-luck thirtysomething Uber driver and bartender to help him lose his virginity and inhibition. Set in the coastal hamlet of Montauk, the film traces the misadventures triggered by an absurd premise, and both Lawrence and Feldman prove deft physical actors for the comedic chemistry of the occasion. Feldman in particular captures comic gold in his priceless reactions and even gets a moment to showcase his stunning vocal stylings. There are moments of wit and pathos amidst a bunch of adult gags, although it never gets as weird or wild as it could. It’s nice to see Lawrence getting loose and limber in this kind of loopy role after some of her more dramatic turns. This is a breezy, funny lark.
Premiered at Sundance Film Festival and now playing in select theatres including The Tara in Atlanta.
Casting Julia Louis-Dreyfus as a neurotic New Yorker hardly seems novel, but the brassy comedienne’s latest starring turn emerges as an enjoyable lark with ample doses of heart and hilarity beneath the hard edges. Writer/director Nicole Holofcener’s dramedy You Hurt My Feelings (B+) features the high-strung star in a winning, old-fashioned comedy of manners with a funny ensemble of lesser-known collaborators also effective in their roles. First world problems are front and center as the delicate characters endeavor to tiptoe around contemporary challenges without getting sucked down an emotional spiral. Louis-Dreyfus plays Beth, an author who struggles with a lack of self-confidence, and her marriage with an unsuccessful therapist portrayed by Tobias Menzies is thrown into a tizzy when she overhears he’s not a fan of her new work of fiction. Before this revelation, the couple had a peaceful but co-dependent relationship, which makes their only child (Owen Teague) uncomfortable. As Beth’s interior designer sister, Michaela Watkins is a hoot, and she helps Beth cope with her angst, possibly because of her own struggles with an underemployed actor husband (Arian Moeyed). Holofcener is skilled with wry, observational humor and captures breakthroughs in the banter, especially in the margins and knowing looks of disbelief between the two sisters. The relationship between Louis-Dreyfus and Watkins as siblings is marvelous to behold as they balance trying to be good people in a brittle world, accentuated by the appearance of their prickly mom, played with dry wit by Jeannie Berlin. Themes about micro-aggressions and the sweet lies lovers tell one another to blunt the pain are highly relatable. Awkward therapy sessions, debates about v-necks and leftovers and frequent attempts to smooth the rough edges of uncomfortable situations caused by other people abound in this talky, remarkably brisk and recommended film.
Kelly Fremon Craig’s joyfully innocent adaptation of the Judy Blume young adult novel Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret (A) is the book club conversation a generation has waited a half century to manifest. And it’s a modern-day film classic. Raised by a Christian mother (Rachel McAdams) and a Jewish father (Benny Safdie), a 12-year old girl (Abby Ryder Fortson) embarks on a series of questions about religion and faith while averting the preteen perils of life in the sixth grade. Craig magnificently evokes the 1970s milieu of the source material, with a spin the bottle smorgasbord of funny and heartwarming episodes ranging from fitting into a curious club to fitting into a bra. Fortson is a natural as the titular character at the center of her own set of crushes and crashes; she anchors the film with fortitude and nary a false move. She’s worthy of all accolades. Graduating from her own mean girls mentality, McAdams is exquisite as the eternally plucky mom, and Kathy Bates is a hoot as the family’s wry paternal grandmother. The film maintains sublime seriocomic delicacy as it balances glimpses at various belief systems and plumbs some taboos on the verge of adolescence. It’s heartwarming throughout, without a dash of cynicism. See it with someone you cherish.
The grand tradition of the dramatic road trip movie, so splendidly rendered in films such as Rain Man andY TuMamá También, can add a new sentimental two-hander to its ranks in Sheridan O’Donnell’s Little Brother (A-), an intimate and inspiring indie that world premiered at the Atlanta Film Festival. Jake, portrayed by Daniel Diemer, has been tasked by his father (J.K. Simmons) to reluctantly transport his suicidal older brother Pete, played by Philip Ettinger, home for a family intervention. The dynamic between the central brothers in motion through a brittle journey to face their sometimes fractured bond, is thoroughly captivating, alternately heartbreaking and hilarious; and their pathway through the gorgeous West in locations such as Albuquerque and Twin Falls makes for an enjoyable and enlightening ride. As Pete, Ellinger diffuses the effects of mental illness with humor and regression to juvenile highjinks to mask his inner tumult. He’s consistently absorbing and magnetic in the tricky part. As the sometimes stoic straight man, Diemer has a tough role too and slays it with steely restraint. His tender depiction of abiding brotherly love is also sublime. When the siblings come to breakthroughs in how to confront and reconcile mental distress that’s not likely to vanish from looming large, O’Donnell continues to nourish the story with direction and dialogue which is rarely reductive or overly sentimental. This is the kind of movie that can save lives, and its notions of making the most of one’s lived experience and savoring the familial bonds to lift us when most needed have the power to deeply move.
Plumbers mysteriously vanishing into an unknown universe isn’t just the scenario homeowners find themselves in when their toilets are backed up; it’s also the premise dogging video game siblings Mario and Luigi for damn near four decades. Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie (B-) animates Brooklyn’s cunning craftsmen with Chris Pratt spryly voicing heroic Mario and Charlie Day endearingly embodying his timid fraternal twin brother Luigi. Partnered with feisty fighter Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy), Mario must save his brother from the clutches of Bowser (Jack Black) who threatens to topple an idyllic Mushroom Kingdom the guys discover in an underground pipe lair. The movie is full bounce off the walls energy with kaleidoscopic colors and clever details dotting every horizon. But the uninspired script often throws a wrench in the good time with lackluster color by number plot points and groaner catch phrases. The highlight is Black’s Bowser chewing the scenery with relish and even tickling the ivories. He’s clearly in on the joke. Ultimately it’s hard not to be swept up in the parkour and pinball wizardry of the action sequences, and it’s largely good clean fun for the family. Despite some rather obvious needle drops on the soundtrack, Brian Tyler composes rousing music inspired by classic game play. The nostalgia factor is strong, and as Donkey Kong barrel battles and kart races on rainbows commence for the film’s mercifully brisk run time, you simply surrender and take the plunge.
