Week Ending 5/26/23
Welcome Max, same as the old HBO Max
The latest phase of the streaming wars has begun with the introduction of Max. And what does Warner Bros. do to make it as seamless as possible? Add confusion. People have been posting screenshots of the old HBO Max app just having an error screen without telling their paying customers to download the new Max app. A “coding error” apparently mashed all the filmmaking credits into a group labeled “creators” with the DGA coming down hard via a statement demanding directors (and writers, etc.) be separated back out (which Max says they’re working to do now). It’s utter chaos all because David Zaslav couldn’t simply add Discovery content into the existing platform like any sane person would have done instead.
Showtime will soon be folded into Paramount+. Hulu will be a tile in Disney+. And who knows what’s next? MGM+ is an Amazon property, right? Will they keep double dipping? All I know is that the whole “vaulting” issue is probably just beginning with Disney removing 50+ titles from Disney+ and Hulu without any announced plan to offer them elsewhere (when HBO Max purged content last year, they did so to make extra money by offering them as Digital HD purchases/rentals on all major platforms). The time to pirate archive has thus reconvened. The likes of WILLOW, STARGIRL, and ROSELINE shouldn’t be lost forever. Because it’s not like they’re tax write-offs (RIP BATGIRL). They’re just casualties of a greedy board looking to save money by erasing those titles’ residuals from Wall Street’s ledger.
What I Watched:
GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 3
(now in theaters)
I wasn’t a big fan of GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 2. Maybe because it just didn’t do anything for me or I was fatigued from the hype or a little of both. I should rewatch it, though, to see if my estimation changes (it didn’t for the similarly meh THOR: RAGNAROK), but so much has happened since then that it feels insignificant to the bigger MCU picture now—a fact that made me want to finally watch ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA before heading to the theater for Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) and company’s latest adventure instead. I won’t therefore lie and say my expectations weren’t low going into GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 3. They weren’t bottom barrel (I actually really enjoyed the HOLIDAY SPECIAL), but they weren’t exactly “excited” either. So, color me surprised to find it might be the best MCU film since INFINITY WAR.
That’s better than SPIDER-MAN: FAR FROM HOME, ETERNALS, and WAKANDA FOREVER—the three best post-ENDGAME chapters in my opinion. Why? Because it possesses stakes. Not in the grand sense of Kang the Conqueror or mass extinction. Stakes insofar as the future of this group of misfits who call themselves a family. It’s about reckoning with what’s changed (Zoe Saldana’s Gamora now being an alt-timeline, past version of their Gamora who never met and grew alongside them) and what needs to change (Karen Gillan’s Nebula moving out from Thanos’ shadow, Peter finding a place outside his grief, etc.). These characters have gone through more than one gauntlet only to escape bent if not altogether broken. They should be allowed to get on each other’s nerves. They’re allowed to reevaluate what it is they need for themselves.
And writer/director James Gunn gives them all that and more in his MCU swan song (he’s currently co-filling the Kevin Feige role over at DC with a new Superman reboot in the works) by placing Rocket’s (Bradley Cooper) fan favorite and unlikely heart of the Guardians on life support. It’s the perfect set-up both as a way to look back (he has previously refused to talk about his harrowing past) and forward (this different Gamora gets a taste of who this makeshift family truly is by going to Hell and back to save him). Quill and Nebula must process one death with the potential of another. Drax (Dave Bautista) and Mantis (Pom Klementieff) must reconcile their fringe roles as comic relief with their unorthodox yet crucial roles as, for lack of a better term, “well-adjusted” protectors. They each rally around their friend to avoid their current demons, finally learning how to combat them in the process.
That Gunn is also able to tie-up loose narrative threads (the Sovereign haven’t forgotten what the Guardians did in VOL. 2 and add Will Poulter’s himbo Adam Warlock to wreak revenge—if he doesn’t unwittingly make things worse first) only adds to the fun because it allows the introduction of a great new villain (Chukwudi Iwuji’s High Evolutionary) to bridge the gap by being both Rocket’s and the Sovereign's creator. He is a puppet master responsible for universe-spanning nightmares, but also very personal pain. One of my favorite moments of the whole is when Quill tells him to shut up because he doesn’t care about whatever warped ideology the High Evolutionary’s climactic pontificating holds. The Guardians aren’t here to save the world. They’re here to save their brother. Nothing the High Evolutionary says will alter that mission. They’ve been all-in since discovering Rocket cannot be saved by usual methods.
There’s a lot of tough love on display due to the fallout of everyone being a raw nerve. They won’t all remember what was spoken (thanks, Mantis), but those who must remember will. That goes for us too since this trilogy capper is as much a beginning as it is an ending. It’s about new paths and new friends, but also the unshakeable bonds formed by the old. Moving on without forgetting. Finding the strength born from tragedy rather than lingering on the guilt we’re so quick to shoulder regardless of whether it’s earned. Because second chances aren’t always a result of mistakes. Sometimes they’re a product of accepting who we are—limitations and all. Forgiving ourselves for the choices forced upon us to be reborn in our own image instead of what had been projected upon us. And in so doing, there can be hope in the inevitable goodbye. Hope for happiness now that love’s foundation has finally made them whole.
- 8/10
INFLUENCER
(streaming on Shudder)
With the opening credits not arriving on-screen until the twenty-five-minute mark, director Kurtis David Harder and co-writer Tesh Guttikonda’s INFLUENCER isn't as straightforward as you may assume. Because despite starting out from Madison’s (Emily Tennant) perspective, it isn’t even her story. She’s instead an unsuspecting guide putting us onto the main narrative—a catalyst who simultaneously acts as the real focal point’s unwitting target and indirect adversary. Madison is a social media shill struggling to have fun in paradise because her boyfriend and quasi-agent Ryan (Rory J Saper) bailed at the eleventh hour. CW (Cassandra Naud) notices this isolation. Feeds off it. CW not only befriends her, she “saves” her. All to inevitably steal her money and leverage her clout for added comfort, knowing the world won’t miss Madison if she disappears. Not if the “brand” soldiers on. That’s all they’ve ever truly cared about anyway.
What CW can’t foresee, however, is that not every influencer is as grotesquely vapid as their online personas might portray. It’s a gig to some. A role played to reap the rewards. And the sheer fact that Madison is so obviously depressed and conflicted should be a red flag. Because the money and fame aren’t enough. This career isn’t what she wanted from her life as much as a byproduct of what her life with Ryan had become. As such, the bulk of the runtime actually follows CW contending with the unexpected fallout of stealing said life from Madison. Experiencing what happens when one of her supposedly plastic victims ends up proving to have had enough love to not be forgotten after all. And I will tell you straight-up that I’m mad at Harder and Guttikonda for making me kind of like Ryan as their expression of that truth. He’s horrible, but he does care.
The result is a well-executed thriller wherein we’re allowed to check our compassion at the door. CW’s newest mark is everything she assumed Madison to be (Sara Canning’s Jessica), so we don’t necessarily worry about her well-being (I’ll admit my complicity in relishing her potential demise) as much as accept her place as that figure in the puzzle. Ryan is a tool despite genuinely wanting to know why Madison dropped off the map (even if it’s probably half out of love and half out of vindictive pride). And CW is the clear-cut villain even if the proverbial noose is tightening around her neck as this trio’s actions and suspicions begin to expose just how difficult it is to cover your tracks when the internet is so crucial to the lives of those who made them. There’s no one to therefore root for, so we bask in the potential carnage to see who (if anyone) escapes alive.
My favorite part, though, is the filmmakers’ choice to let their characters breathe in the moment. Every conversation is natural. Every impulse to question a stranger’s motives is valid. Whereas this type of film generally feels reversed engineered from its conclusion, INFLUENCER builds and diverts. It reacts to the characters rather than forcing them to react to the plot. That’s why it doesn’t feel weird when perspective shifts (Ryan even gets to be the lead for the third act) or obvious when surprises are unveiled. Throwaway lines are throwaways until they’re not, instead of blatant foreshadowing to fixate on. Maybe CW will win. Maybe Ryan will save the day. Maybe it’ll be a bit of both. It honestly doesn’t matter because our expectations are curbed by blind investment. We’re just enjoying the ride, no matter where it leads. That shouldn’t be refreshing, and yet recent Hollywood pap ensures it is.
- 7/10
KANDAHAR
(now in theaters)
There’s an interesting film inside of director Ric Roman Waugh and star Gerard Butler’s latest team-up KANDAHAR and it’s called Guy Ritchie’s THE COVENANT. What Ritchie understood and screenwriter Mitchell LaFortune doesn’t is that the real issues facing Afghanistan today are way too complex to delve into with a two-hour movie. So, you focus on one aspect. You follow an American soldier and his translator as they risk their lives for each other and realize the reason they must is because their countries have ceased caring for them beyond being pawns in a never-ending war without winners. LaFortune tries to make that reality standout too, but overtly rather than a background. And he cannot help shooting himself in the foot every time he introduces another puzzle piece with faux humanity despite using them all as weapons of destruction.
Does he truly want us to feel something for the Iranian (Bahador Foladi’s Farzad) and Pakistani (Ali Fazal’s Kahil) hot on Tom Harris (Butler) and Mohammad’s (Navid Negahban) tail while they try to flee to Kandahar and catch a British plane home? The former is “just doing his job” and doesn’t want to hurt his hostages because he too has a child while the latter is getting sick of his desert posting because he really wants to embrace the West’s materialism and capitalism. They want to capture Tom to advance and/or survive. They have families to get home to too, each risking their life again and again under the umbrella of making the world better for them. They’re no different than Tom or Mohammad. They’re just on the opposite side. As is the Taliban, ISIS, and every other regime arriving to fill the void left by America’s retreat. Yes, they are human. We can’t care about them, though, if the script doesn’t first.
Our only focus is therefore the “heroes” we know: GI Joe and the “good” Brown man. It’s that simplicity that sells these war films. So, if you want to add in some gray, you have to try. You can’t just toss it in as flavor and think the audience is going to take the bait. We won’t. We’re just going to laugh at the melodrama of choosing to show the loved ones and bosses of the bad guys who inevitably die mourn them. We’re going to hope something of substance might finally be said beyond a hollow “I don’t care. They can fire me.” when someone does the correct wrong thing (even as that thing being the deaths of hundreds of people while those back at Langley clap their hands at the videogame on-screen is glossed over). When the filmmakers do attempt to add depth via Mohammad’s dead son and missing sister-in-law, they give it no weight. None of it is dealt with beyond the empty narrative calories of overwrought distraction.
Rip all that superfluity away and you could have coasted by with a mindless exfiltration film. Tom commits a huge act of black-ops aggression, gets burned, and has every entity in the Middle East looking to capture him to either publicly kill him or sell him to those who will. He and Mohammad must therefore race against time (that plane in Kandahar is their only shot out) and the bullets of enemies (and enemies of enemies) since the US can’t actually do anything but watch and “advise”. Throw in eccentric (Travis Fimmel) and controversial (Ray Haratian) “friends” and things do get tense enough to hold our attention without throwing in the kitchen sink of meaningless heartstring tugs for the characters we’re told to hate. You can’t “both sides” a one-dimensional escape film. Giving your Brown men wives and desires for modernity doesn’t magically erase that you’re still equating their existence with evil. The least you could do is own it.
- 5/10
REALITY
(streaming on Max starting 5/29)
It will never not be compelling to me to dramatize a real-life event from a verbatim recording of it regardless of whether the event itself or its reenactment matches its intrigue. The concept alone is enough to get you inching closer to the edge of your seat because it removes a layer of artifice. This is what happened. These are the words that were spoken. Artistic license must still be considered (even a photograph bears the subjectivity of its photographer), but you cannot deny the authenticity of the moment. Its awkward pauses and incongruous reactions as well as our knowledge that some details remain absent insofar as the internal motivations and context of each character. Tina Satter’s REALITY (adapted with James Paul Dallas from her play) allows us to witness an historically resonant conversation so that we may attempt to parse the truth removed from the biased editorializing of a for-profit, partisan media that’s lost all sense of objectivity.
In many respects, this isn’t even Reality Winner’s (a very good Sydney Sweeney) story. It’s really that of Agent Garrick (Josh Hamilton) and Agent Taylor (Marchánt Davis) since they’re the ones with the recorder. They’re the ones in control of the situation—smiling and talking with a calm demeanor despite the obvious power imbalance facing their “voluntary” subject. They’re steering the conversation, deciding when to walk away and return, and biding time as other officers and agents conduct their search of Winner’s home. So, there’s still a predatory demeanor to the whole (augmented by redactions manifested via aural and visual interference). It’s one that Satter does well to keep intact by way of body language and proximity in how Hamilton always moves closer to Sweeney whenever his Garrick needs to impose authority as opposed to his otherwise manipulated veneer of empathy.
We aren’t therefore watching to gain insight into what happened. We know what happened. Reality Winner sent classified information to the The Intercept, they in turn unwittingly burned her identity, and she paid the price by serving four years of a five-plus year sentence in jail for espionage. The film is instead a document on the interrogation process. How these Agents humanize themselves, build a rapport, and carefully choose their words to lead their suspect where they need her to go while also ensuring a consistent tone and pace to catch her off-guard and receive the seemingly innocuous facts that ultimately corroborate what they already know. It’s a masterclass of deception rather than coercion wherein Reality’s confusion turns to fear and finally acceptance. Their “curiosity” and “compassion” gradually securing trust through subterfuge.
How much of that subterfuge is real and how much is inferred by Satter remains unknown, but that fact only adds to the intrigue. Maybe Garrick really does have a sinus infection causing him to cough. Or maybe it’s a dog allergy that proves he’s been lying from the beginning. Satter implies the latter by always having him react when near the dog or the dog’s kennel. Artistic license? Maybe. And how about the clip at the end with a media personality talking about Winner “hating America.” Was he fabricating that quote or did Satter intentionally leave it out of the film since the moment never happens on-screen? It just helps to prove that everything we consume is a dramatization in some fashion. Everything is filtered through a prism of bias. Give this same script to a QANON conspiracy theorist and they will deliver a vastly different interpretation. The only person who knows the truth is Reality. And, by all accounts, she regrets nothing.
- 7/10
Cinematic F-Bombs:
This week saw AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER (2022), THE GRAY MAN (2022), RED NOTICE (2021), THIRTEEN LIVES (2022), and THE VAST OF NIGHT (2020) added to the archive. It was really interesting giffing the GRAY MAN f-bomb because the performances by Chris Evans and Ryan Gosling in that scene looked so over-the-top funny that it made me wonder if I should watch the film despite only hearing bad things. cinematicfbombs.com
New Releases This Week:
(Review links where applicable)
Opening Buffalo-area theaters 5/26/23 -
ABOUT MY FATHER at Dipson Flix & Capitol; AMC Maple Ridge; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria & Quaker
BLADE RUNNER: THE FINAL CUT at North Park Theatre (select times)
KANDAHAR at Dipson Capitol; AMC Market Arcade; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria & Quaker
Thoughts are above.
L'IMMENSITA at North Park Theatre
THE MACHINE at Dipson Flix & Capitol; AMC Market Arcade; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria & Quaker
MEM FAMOUS at Regal Elmwood
THE LITTLE MERMAID at Dipson Amherst, McKinley, Flix & Capitol; AMC Maple Ridge & Market Arcade; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria & Quaker
THE WRATH OF BECKY at Regal Elmwood, Transit & Quaker
YOU HURT MY FEELINGS at Regal Transit & Quaker
Streaming from 5/26/23 -
BEING MARY TYLER MOORE - Max on 5/26
BLOOD & GOLD - Netflix on 5/26
INFLUENCER - Shudder on 5/26
Thoughts are above.
TIN & TINA - Netflix on 5/26
UNCLENCHING THE FISTS - MUBI on 5/26
WILD LIFE - Disney+ & Hulu on 5/26
“My biggest takeaway from the whole is optics. This is a feelgood story with some effectively heartfelt and honorable machinations, but it's also a mostly superficial puff piece that can't quite shake its public relations air of artifice.” – Full thoughts at HHYS.
REALITY - Max on 5/29
Thoughts are above.
JELLY ROLL: SAVE ME - Hulu on 5/30
MIXED BY ERRY - Netflix on 5/31
A BEAUTIFUL LIFE - Netflix on 6/1
Now on VOD/Digital HD -
DARK NATURE (5/23)
“And with a bit of a twist waiting in the wings, Joy's arc solidifies in a satisfactory way. So much so that it ensures the journey was worth our time despite also emphasizing how her companions might disagree.” – Full thoughts at The Film Stage.
FIST OF THE CONDOR (5/23)
THE INNOCENT (5/23)
JOHN WICK: CHAPTER 4 (5/23)
“The meal itself is entertaining and a testament to stunt craft, but it's probably the weakest of the franchise in terms of overall success. Thankfully, that's still good enough.” – Full thoughts at HHYS.
LOVE AGAIN (5/23)
THE WORST ONES (5/23)
WHAT’S LOVE GOT TO DO WITH IT? (5/26)
“Khan and Kapur can let [the unrequited love] linger in the background as a major through line while focusing on everything else in an honest and authentic way. The topic of arranged marriages isn't just [a] gimmicky cupid's arrow. Its inclusion matters.” – Full thoughts at HHYS.
From the press kit archive:
