Week Ending 12/8/23
Animation binge
There were a lot of animated films this year. While that seems to be the case every year this past decade, 2023 has a lot of big-name titles. And despite having caught up with most of the non-Hollywood titles (NIMONA, SUZUME, etc.), I needed to catch those others. ELEMENTAL last week. MARIO, TMNT, and WISH this week. And there’s still THE BOY AND THE HERON, ROBOT DREAMS, THE MONKEY KING, and CHICKEN RUN: DAWN OF THE NUGGET to go.
Add the live-action screeners to that list and it really is impossible to see them all. We’re less than two weeks from the GWNYFCA vote, so I’ll be focusing on English-language most since the group doesn’t generally watch many foreign films. Then I’ll pivot to the International Oscar submission before the OFCS voting window that starts 1/1/24. There’s always a strategy. The order of watching does matter.
I only hope that Searchlight hits my inbox with POOR THINGS and A24 hits my mailbox with THE IRON CLAW soon. Both open Buffalo on 12/21 … two days after the nominations cutoff.
What I Watched:
BARBIE
(one VOD/Digital HD)
It really is wild that a major Hollywood studio and multi-billion-dollar toy company allowed something like BARBIE to be made. The self-awareness and self-parodying on display is of the sort that would normally be quashed via legal jargon in whatever contract director Greta Gerwig had to sign before starting to write the script with Noah Baumbach. If that doesn’t show you the power of sitting at the table, whether it comes to box office take or Oscar nominations, I don’t know what will. Gerwig took her clout and turned it into that rare product-placement tie-in that actually has something valuable to say.
Don’t call the result a message movie, though. It never stands on a soapbox or demeans one side in order to champion another (I’d honestly argue it could have done a lot more to skewer Mattel executives with purpose rather than merely jokes). It simply allows its characters to naturally evolve by way of providing necessary conflict. Because none of these dolls have ever faced that sort of existential crisis before. They’ve all maintained their pristine utopian forms in Barbieland as they were passed from child to child so their innocence could become a personality trait.
So, throwing a curveball like depression or fallibility proves to be a monumental adjustment. You’re going from zero (a record loop of routine complacency) to sixty (questioning the very fabric of your reality) in an instant. No wonder it throws Barbie (Margot Robbie) off enough that her body chemistry shifts. Give a perfect imaginary ideal a whiff of the cesspool that is human biology and everything falls apart. Because it also falls apart that fast for us. One setback can spiral into years of torment. That yo-yo-ing ruins lives because we crave normalcy. To start over? To realize we’ve never actually begun? That’s too daunting to even consider.
What’s ingenious about Gerwig and Baumbach’s story (say what you will about the whole, but you cannot deny the best part of BARBIE outside its immaculate production design is its script) is that they kill two birds with one stone via their conceit. Not only is the idea of Barbieland being a literal manifestation of a child’s imagination allow them to dig into a Barbie’s potential to empower (connecting each doll to the many youngsters who have indelible memories of them), but it lets them comment on the ways in which the toy’s reductive nature in a patriarchal, capitalistic world is problematic for those gains too.
Barbie awakens to the fear and anxieties of being a woman in a man’s world just as Ken (Ryan Gosling) opens his eyes to the possibilities of having autonomy after a lifetime of always being relegated as the plus-one. We begin to see that neither end of the spectrum is perfect (although we should all be able to agree that Barbieland is much closer) and that the real lesson is realizing empathy and originality is key. And that it’s not always external forces that delude us into thinking conformity is better. Oftentimes our worst enemy in that regard is ourselves.
Can dolls made real who bring back what they learned to their fictional existence teach that lesson alone? No. They get halfway with some wonderfully witty humor capped off by memorable turns from Michael Cera as Allan and Kate McKinnon as “Weird” Barbie, but we need someone on the other side to complement and bolster that journey. Enter Sasha (Ariana Greenblatt) and her mother Gloria (America Ferrera)—two women fighting for their place in a world that treats them like second class citizens. Two women who can educate the Barbies about reality and reclaim a bit of magic by remembering what it means to dream.
The result is inspiring. It’s also heartbreaking (yes, Ferrera’s monologue is that good and hopefully turns her into a dark horse Oscar pick). For all the great things Robbie and Gosling are doing on a comedic level of committing to the bit, their brilliance lies in the ability to also bring pathos to a narrative that never shies away from the complicated nature of listening to, understanding, and ultimately accepting another’s lived experience and desires. Because we all deserve to exist as our own person outside the shadows of utility, ownership, or conditions. We all deserve the opportunity to love ourselves and have that be enough.
- 8/10
CONCRETE UTOPIA [Konkeuriteu yutopia]
(now in limited release, expanding on December 15; South Korea’s International Oscar submission)
For those who don’t understand that THE WALKING DEAD is about the living monsters rather than the undead ones, director Tae-hwa Eom and co-writer Lee Shin-ji’s CONCRETE UTOPIA might be able to drive the point home. Why? Because the living monsters are the only ones available in their webtoon adaptation (Kim Soongnyung’s “Pleasant Bullying”). The horde of murderous outsiders looking to take over apartment complex delegate Yeong-tak’s (Lee Byung-hun) home aren’t zombies. They’re desperate men and women just like those inside the walls. They simply weren’t lucky enough to reside within the only building spared from an apocalyptic earthquake.
So, is it really a utopia? Or a fortress under siege? Are the inhabitants worthy of the comfort and security fate let them retain while the rest of the city freezes amidst the rubble? Or are they tyrants monopolizing their fortune and using delusions of grandeur as “the chosen” to steal and kill with impunity? It truly is the same central question behind Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore, and Charlie Adlard’s comic books. Is Rick Grimes really any different than the Governor or Negan or whomever else his band of survivors happen across? Or is he merely benefiting from his position as our protagonist?
Eom and Lee deliver the end of days for these Koreans and let us watch whether compassion or greed rules the day. The residents coexist with the “outsiders” (soon to devolve into the label “cockroaches”) at first. Not necessarily by choice since they storm the doors out of necessity for shelter, but well enough to be civil until a food shortage starts turning everyone feral. Suddenly it’s “Us vs. Them.” A resident-only meeting is called to vote on what to do and Yeong-tak becomes their unanimous leader after selflessly running into a fire to protect them all. Cue the inevitable “evictions.”
What follows is the usual chaos this archetype produces. It didn’t quite mark me as effectively as HIGH-RISE or ANIARA, but its slow descent into Hell as tensions and betrayals mount is effective. Credit the de facto leads in Min-sung (Park Seo-joon) and Myung-hwa (Park Bo-young) as a young couple that isn’t quite as easily swayed to the side of cutthroat tyranny as most. She’s a nurse who wants to help from the beginning. He doesn’t, but his conscience stays intact to ensure his many mistakes supply sufficient guilt. Will they be able to stop this out-of-control locomotive once it gets going?
I won’t spoil things by answering that question. Just know CONCRETE UTOPIA doesn’t shy from the dark depravity we know the actions of “ordinary people” in such extraordinary circumstances will reach. Not that this choice isn’t without complexity, though. Eom and Lee don’t have a season or more to play with the duality of “violent good” and “violent evil” via separate factions with character development. So, they portray it through one man: Yeong-tak. Lee Byung-hun is up to the task. He’s a very determined and very impassioned leader with a strong personality hiding his secrets. He’s hero and destroyer both.
How the film plays that conflict out isn’t surprising in its overall arc or demand that we question whether loyalty and protection negates the opportunism and deceit that allows it to flourish. The specific things that occur, however, can be quite shocking. There’s one moment towards the end that made me gasp as loudly as Myung-hwa. Despite being totally in character and believable in the moment, you don’t want to accept it. You still want to give these people the benefit of the doubt because you’d hope others would give it to you in the same situation.
Sadly, it doesn’t take a long time looking outside the window onto our own turbulent reality to admit that, these days, the benefit of the doubt is a luxury few if any deserve.
- 7/10
THE CREATOR
(now on Digital HD)
Despite the very sharp turn towards dissent that caused me to forget to even put Gareth Edwards’ THE CREATOR on my watchlist, I found the film to be both exciting and affecting. My favorite science fiction works are those that mine down from their high concept conceit to provide character-based drama instead. So, where you might think this is a story about war between humans and AI, it’s actually a potential redemption arc for a man who lost everything as a result of his fealty to a government wielding fear as a means to control its citizenry.
Joshua (John David Washington) had a choice, though. While the events of the prologue (quick hits of humanity creating AI, AI evolving into human-like simulants, and the inevitable rubicon crossing that was a nuclear blast in Los Angeles) inspire him to fight for his species, years undercover gave him an out. Tasked to follow Maya (Gemma Chan), daughter of the so-called Nirmata, or “Creator” of New Asia’s free race of simulants, Joshua falls in love. The two marry. Maya becomes pregnant. And it seems all is well until an unprovoked attack reveals he’s been playing both sides.
Cue tragedy. Pain. Regret. Edwards and co-writer Chris Weitz flash-forward five years to find Joshua broken and alone when the real plot begins. The US Army (led by Allison Janney’s Howell and Ralph Ineson’s Andrews) still wants to find the Nirmata—now more than ever since intel says he’s created a weapon that will give simulants an unequivocal victory. So, they recruit Joshua to lead the mission back to his old stomping grounds. They promise him he might even be able to reclaim what he lost. What none of them could guess, however, is that he’ll actually get the opportunity to find even more.
How? Via a young simulant girl (Madeleine Yuna Voyles’s Alphie). The US calls her a weapon. His old New Asian allies (including Ken Watanabe’s Harun) call her their savior. Joshua simply sees a means to an end—a way to find Maya again. Whether or not it’s just because she’s a child, his old rhetoric about simulants being “programming” gradually fades. He feels something for her. Maybe it’s pity at first, but it blossoms into respect and perhaps even acceptance. Because her innocence somehow renders her “real” in his eyes. And watching humans try to kill her renders them into the monsters they’ve always been.
The result is thus less about the dangers of artificial intelligence and more about America’s growing lack of empathy for those it deems foreigners (abroad and domestic alike). It’s about our ease at projecting our own violence and aggression onto our victims in order to justify our increased vitriol towards them as if it was us who was harmed by their very existence. The messaging and themes become closer to colonizers versus colonized. It’s Americans going to distant lands under the auspices of protecting home. Murdering with impunity and bloodlust in response to a tragedy they refuse to acknowledge their own complicity in igniting.
Sound familiar? So, much talk tried to connect THE CREATOR to the Hollywood strikes and the risks of AI displacing artists when its narrative more closely aligns with the current Palestinian plight against the globally-backed Zionist state of Israel. When do we finally recognize what’s happening? When the body in the crosshairs is no longer an adult we can imagine as the enemy. The same happens here. Joshua has extenuating circumstances as far as not putting a bullet in Alphie’s head straight away, but her being a child quickly becomes as much a deterrent as the possibility that she might take him to Maya.
I’ll leave why that duality means more in the context of the whole to the film itself since elaborating would create spoilers. All I’ll say is that it hit me exactly how Edwards and company hoped despite what I had read about it being a cold, emotionless affair. I will even disagree with comments about Washington being an unfeeling protagonist too since this might be his most three-dimensional and human performance yet. Add the gorgeous production design, breathtaking special effects (on a relatively tiny budget compared to its ilk), and a pitch-perfect ending and this thing is firing on all cylinders. Here’s hoping more people watch it sans expectations to discover just how good it really is.
- 8/10
THE END WE START FROM
(now playing NYC/LA; expands January 19)
It’s a new beginning for Mom (Jodie Comer) and Dad (Joel Fry). Their home is set in the heart of London and they have a baby on the way. Unfortunately, this chapter starts for them just as another ends for the entire world. Relentless storms and flash floods become so destructive that I thought the beginning of Mahalia Belo’s THE END WE START FROM was a metaphoric hallucination about childbirth for its main character. Only after young Zeb’s birth is crosscut with water crashing through a window do we realize it’s really happening. London is gone.
Adapted by Alice Birch from Megan Hunter’s novel, the narrative moves to its logical next step: a parent’s house. Luckily, Dad’s parents (Mark Strong and Nina Sosanya) are borderline survivalists living high above sea-level with a stronghold of provisions. But even those must deplete at some point. Eventually, those who were privileged enough to ride out the early chaos become the ones unprepared for what the world has become in the meantime. The story shifts to one of protection. Delusion. Nightmare and fantasy. Some can push through. Others cannot.
Belo’s film is slow-moving as a result. What began with a rousing couple of scenes with some real electric drama settles into a series of ordeals that want to be more confrontational than they are actually shown to be. More than once Mom and Dad get into a disagreement that ends with a jump cut to her having to fend for herself. Eventually she meets an ally in O (Katherine Waterston), another mother with a toddler, and we follow them as they move between shelters and chase the pipe dream that is an island commune seeking to forget the past while building a future.
Comer is very good in the lead. It’s easy to underestimate the performance since the whole turns into a one-woman survivalist show for long stretches. So, while it feels like we’re just watching the same thing in different forms over again, there is nuance if you’re willing to look. Even so, it’s the supporting characters that stick to your memory since their impact is more explosive. Waterston is fantastic—especially in her final scene. Strong too. Even Benedict Cumberbatch steals a moment via a brief cameo. They each shape Mom’s decisions to move forward by either allowing herself to look back or rejecting the urge.
Those who can take something more from the themes of motherhood and separation will surely come away with a lot more to say and like about the overall film. I personally found myself appreciating the journey more than taking anything away from what ultimately proves to be familiar tropes within the post-apocalyptic genre—albeit much quieter and more introspective than usual. It’s a solid story that looks and sounds great, but I wouldn’t be surprised to discover it works better on the page insofar as digging further to unearth the weight of emotion that’s ravaging Mom’s heart.
- 6/10
THE SUPER MARIO BROS. MOVIE
(streaming on Netflix)
You can't really blame the filmmakers for going full fan service with THE SUPER MARIO BROS. MOVIE. I would have liked a story, but loosely connected action set-pieces within Nintendo's sprawling Mario-adjacent universe is still fun. And that's what the young kids in its target PG-rated demo want anyway. Because this isn't for nostalgic Millennials and Gen-Xers. This is an advertisement for new generations to board the bandwagon.
So, we get a Mushroom Kingdom obstacle course complete with every power-up imaginable. A battle royale with Donkey Kong, Mario Kart race on the Rainbow Road, dungeons, water boards, and even Brooklyn with varying camera shifts to make the screen look like a side-scrolling platformer. Add a decent classic rock soundtrack, some interesting remixes of the original score, and a mostly passable voice cast and this low stakes romp excels at superficial entertainment.
Does it also disappoint? You bet. Especially on the level of being a real movie rather than episodic introduction with more loose ends (Is Peach human?) then concrete mythology. The whole multiverse angle has been played out too, but ... whatever. That's the easiest way to juggle multiple "stages."
The real head-scratcher, though, is an end stinger that epitomizes this mixed result's weirdness by teasing a character (Yoshi) whose world they literally showed an hour beforehand.
And the MVP? Juliet Jelenic's Lumalee. Perfection.
- 6/10
TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: MUTANT MAYHEM
(streaming on Paramount+)
Two things: Love a reboot of a known property that doesn’t default to origin story (even if MUTANT MAYHEM is the origin story of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ coexistence with humans, it keeps their first fifteen years post-ooze a fun flashback montage) and love that director Jeff Rowe, producers Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, and that trio’s other co-writers let the “heroes-in-a-half-shell” be teens (what a great, young voice-acting cast to make it believable too).
The story itself is a nice entry point into this new TMNT world (very reminiscent of the grunge animation popularized by the SPIDER-VERSE films). It introduces the idea of ooze, throws a bunch of mutants that haven’t been in previous films on-screen, and gives the leads a trial by fire confidence boost to prepare themselves for the fights ahead (watch the credits for a Shredder tease). The action is slapstick-y and kinetic with great choreography and the tone never falters in large part due to making April O’Neil (Ayo Edebiri) a teen too.
Jackie Chan as Splinter and Ice Cube as the big bad Superfly are both inspired choices and the needle drops are memorable (give Four Non Blondes their royalty check), but I will say that the joke construction gets very grating. Rogen and company went heavy on the name dropping and pop culture references that seem to scream “hey, we’re hip!” in the kind of way aging dudes who aren’t hip anymore would. I kept waiting for one of the turtles to actually turn to the camera and wink, that’s how cringey it became. Hopefully they can shore that up with the inevitable sequel.
- 7/10
WISH
(in theaters)
!Viva la revolución!
A people duped into believing their once benevolent king still has their interests in mind despite falling prey to ego and avarice must rise to defeat him by following the one person able to see through the deception because of her selfless heart.
Directors Chris Buck and Fawn Veerasunthorn along with screenwriters Jennifer Lee and Allison Moore pretty much deliver everything you'd want from an old school Disney film—complete with over-the-top villain (Chris Pine is having lots of fun as Magnifico) and talking animals and objects (Alan Tudyk is great as Valentino the goat, but nothing beats the mushrooms).
It's big on emotion and message yet very short on plot (Ariana DeBose's Asha leads a rebellion of the soul to take back the wishes her neighbors volunteered to Magnifico under the auspices that he was "protecting" them and not just hoarding them for loyalty once he loses himself to fear). Neither is necessarily a bad thing. I would have liked better songs, though, since they range from catchy ("Knowing What I Know Now") to obvious ("This Wish") to mostly forgettable ("This Is The Thanks I Get?!").
The real draw is the animation. It's like WISH took 2D cell paintings and modeled them in 3D. The backgrounds are simultaneously flat watercolors and 3D-rendered rooms with perspective depending on the camera's angle. Same with the clothing, hair, and faces. The duality can be jarring at first, but quite beautiful the more you sit with it.
- 7/10
Cinematic F-Bombs:
No new additions this week, so here’s Ed O’Neill from DUTCH. cinematicfbombs.com
New Releases This Week:
(Review links where applicable)
Opening Buffalo-area theaters 12/8/23 -
THE BOY AND THE HERON at North Park Theatre; Dipson Flix & Capitol; AMC Maple Ridge & Market Arcade; Regal Transit, Galleria & Quaker
THE CELLO at Regal Transit & Quaker
DIE HARD RE-RELEASE at AMC Market Arcade; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria & Quaker
EILEEN at Dipson Amherst; AMC Maple Ridge; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria & Quaker
“Moshfegh and Oldroyd [reach a point with the climax] where the curtain must be lifted to show the scars this world has etched upon the bodies of those we'd like to believe still maintain a semblance of innocence.” – Full thoughts at HHYS.
EXTRA - ORDINARY MAN at Regal Elmwood
HI NANNA at Regal Elmwood & Transit
THE LAST WIFE at Regal Galleria
LOVE ACTUALLY 20TH ANNIVERSARY at Regal Transit, Galleria & Quaker
THE OATH at Regal Elmwood, Transit & Quaker
THE PERFECT CHRISTMAS at Regal Galleria
Streaming from 12/8/23 -
BABY SHARK’S BIG MOVIE – Paramount+ on 12/8
BLOOD VESSEL – Netflix on 12/8
DATING SANTA – Prime on 12/8
DIARY OF A WIMPY KID CHRISTMAS: CABIN FEVER – Disney+ on 12/8
LEAVE THE WORLD BEHIND – Netflix on 12/8
MERRY LITTLE BATMAN – Prime on 12/8
MR. MONK’S LAST CASE: A MONK MOVIE – Peacock on 12/8
THE SACRIFICE GAME – Shudder on 12/8
WOMEN ON THE EDGE – Netflix on 12/8
YOUR CHRISTMAS OR MINE 2 – Prime on 12/8
TREES AND OTHER ENTANGLEMENTS – Max on 12/12
Now on VOD/Digital HD -
THE CANTERVILLE GHOST (12/5)
A DISTURBANCE IN THE FORCE (12/5)
“Coon and Kozak show that The Star Wars Holiday Special truly exists on an island alone as an unwitting cautionary tale never to be repeated again.” – Full thoughts at The Film Stage.
EVERYONE WILL BURN (12/5)
HUMAN FLOWERS OF FLESH (12/5)
KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON (12/5)
“Scorsese understands he can't truly tell [the Osage's] story as a white man in a way that gives them the voice they deserve. So, he tells the tale of their oppressors instead. And he does so with zero sympathy for even their most sympathetic members.” – Full thoughts at HHYS.
THE PERSIAN VERSION (12/5)
“The result is entertaining and not without its dramatic reveals. [But,] while a good time was had, I can't shake the sense that there was potential for so much more.” – Full thoughts at HHYS.
PET SEMATARY: BLOODLINES (12/5)
SUBJECT (12/5)
THERE’S SOMETHING IN THE BARN (12/5)
WAIKIKI (12/5)
“Some of what results can be confusing, but all of it is dramatically potent. And it's mostly due to a wonderful performance from Zalopany.” – Full thoughts at HHYS.
WALK UP (12/5)
FAST CHARLIE (12/8)
PORTRAIT (12/8)
RAGING GRACE (12/8)
THE THREE MUSKETEERS PART I: D'ARTAGNAN (12/8)
From the press kit archive:
