Synopsis: Brilliant but disgraced detective John Luther breaks out of prison to hunt down a sadistic serial killer who is terrorizing London. Stars: Idris Elba, Cynthia Erivo, Andy Serkis, Dermot Crowley, Jess Liaudin, Lauryn Ajufo, Natasha Patel, Henry Hereford Director: Jamie Payne Rated: R Running Length: 129 minutes TMMM Score: (6/10) Review: Over twenty episodes between 2010-2019, star Idris Elba led audiences through the dark world of Detective Chief Inspector John Luther in the eponymous television series for the BBC. Tracking serial killers and other sordid criminals, Luther also dealt with demons from his past and a slinky psycho who became obsessed with him and took their cat-and-mouse game to terrifying extremes. As Elba’s fame began to heat up, there was little time for more Luther, and eventually, creator Neil Cross announced that the series was over. Ah, but you can’t keep a good DCI down, and now Cross and Elba have reteamed, returning for Luther: The Fallen Sun, a feature-length trek through another sadistic nightmare.
As we rejoin the world of DCI Luther, he’s promised a young mother that he’ll find the person responsible for the brutal murder of her son. The young man’s body was found among a group of deceased individuals, and we already know that David Robey (Andy Serkis, The Batman) is the mastermind behind it all. Still, just as Luther is getting close, his rival finds a way to send him to prison, allowing his devious game to continue. As more victims pile up and Robey toys with Luther stuck in a cell, Luther attempts to work through his old friend DSU Martin Schenk (Dermot Crowley, Octopussy) and current lead investigator DCI Odette Raine (Cynthia Erivo, Harriet) before breaking out and doing it his way. The ensuing pursuit will test Luther’s limit beyond anything he’s encountered before because Robey is curiously one step ahead of them all.
For his part, Elba (Concrete Cowboy) slips effortlessly back into the recognizably comfy coat Luther sports and plunges back into his psyche. Nominated for four Emmys (and winning the Critics’ Choice Television Award, Golden Globe Award, and Screen Actors Guild Award for his performance), this is truly the role of Elba’s career, and he knows it. I think Cross has come up with a dandy script too. Often tense and gruesome, frequently scary, because we identify Robey early on, it’s perhaps less of a puzzle than previous Luther chapters have been. I ultimately missed the crackle of Luther having a genuinely equal opponent or partner to work with. As strong supporting players, Serkis and Erivo do what they can, but something is missing in their limited time to develop.
Ultimately, what keeps Luther: The Fallen Sun from rising too high is its director. Jamie Payne is most notable for his work in television, and there’s an odd lack of energy as the film moves into its final act, just when it should be picking up its most significant momentum. It’s too bad, too, because there’s a nifty location set-up for Luther’s confrontation with Robey, but Payne stages it with such a clumsy hand that there’s never much excitement to draw from.
Four years was a long time to wait for another check-in with Luther, and I hope we don’t have to sit around as long for the next case to come in. Now that this feature has been produced by Netflix and streamed on the service, perhaps Elba can be talked into a few more films or a limited series again. For now, I’m grateful to bask in the warm rays of Luther: The Fallen Sun, even if it occasionally has a few clouds roll by.
Synopsis: With the help of a cricket as his conscience, a living puppet must prove himself worthy of becoming a real boy. Stars: Tom Hanks, Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Keegan-Michael Key, Lorraine Bracco, Cynthia Erivo, Luke Evans Director: Robert Zemeckis Rated: PG Running Length: 104 minutes TMMM Score: (5/10) Review: We all have our individual Disney origin stories. While I have fond memories of seeing The Jungle Book countless times during its numerous re-releases as I grew up and was a fervent devotee of The Sword in the Stone, the one Disney animated film I vividly remember watching more than any other was Pinocchio. The second animated feature Walt Disney Productions made after 1937’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the 1940 release of Pinocchio won two Oscars but surprisingly was a dud at the box office thanks to the Second World War limiting international distribution. Eventually, it became a worldwide hit when it was re-released later and during the Regan years it became a staple in my household.
Looking back, I’m wondering if it wasn’t pushed a bit on me because I was an only child, and there are many gentle lessons to be learned from the adaptation of Carlo Collodi’s 1883 novel. They’ve been Disney-fied, of course, but instructions on being “good” and “letting your conscience be your guide” were essential words for impressionable minds (especially a precocious one like mine) to hear on repeat. Seeing the consequences of disobeying your parents or putting your trust in the wrong people was enough to encourage me to stay on the straight and narrow and trust my instinct. In actuality, it’s pretty frightening in places, and dark like many of these early Disney films were. Still, it easily earns its place in the canon of Disney classics.
Over time, it seems filmmakers can’t get enough of Pinocchio. Multiple iterations of the tale have been told throughout media. Operas have been written, TV shows produced, too many movies to count (including Italian Roberto Benigni starring in TWO versions seventeen years apart), and now Disney’s live-action remake of its property. Brought to life by celebrated Oscar-winning director Robert Zemeckis, who revised the script with the help of Chris Weitz (A Better Life), this is a tweaked version of the perennial classic more than it is a complete overhaul. Some of this is good news for film fans, and some is not so great. Mostly, it’s just kind of head-scratching as to why this talented group has kept things so decidedly wooden when given a chance to bring this story to literal life.
The Walt Disney Studios logo has been accompanied by the Oscar-winning tune “When You Wish Upon a Star” for some time, so it’s no surprise the narrator of the story, Jiminy Cricket (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Looper), makes an early entrance before the famous castle fades from view. He’s dropped in to introduce his reflection of the night he hopped into a small village and took respite in the shop/home of a widowed woodworker putting the finishing touches on his latest creation. Known for his intricate cuckoo clocks, Geppetto (Tom Hanks, Toy Story 4) has turned his attention to a marionette of a young boy he’s modeled after his late son. Before turning out the light, he notices the brightest star in the sky has appeared and makes a silent wish.
Later that evening, a stream of blue light radiates out from the night sky and connects with the lifeless puppet, bringing it magically to life. Soon after, the Blue Fairy (Cynthia Erivo, Chaos Walking) appears and lets Pinocchio know he must prove himself to be unselfish, brave, and truthful if she can grant Geppetto’s full wish for him to become a real boy. Naming Jiminy as his conscience, the Blue Fairy vanishes, but not before singing a full-throated version of the film’s most famous song. Once Geppetto learns of the magic, he treats Pinocchio (Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, The Haunting of Bly Manor) as his son and prepares to send him to school.
Pinocchio’s adventures outside of the safety of home take up the rest of the film, passages that will slowly wiggle away from the original narrative. Pinocchio is still sidetracked by sly fox Honest John (Keegan-Michael Key, Tomorrowland) and dopey sidekick Gideon the Cat, but there are a few more wrinkles to their interaction. The little wooden boy still appears as a featured attraction at Stromboli’s puppet show. However, now there’s a young female apprentice with a leg malady who dreams of ballet stardom and naturally works the lithe ballerina puppet Pinocchio takes a shine to.
The downward spiral begins with the arrival of Luke Evans as The Coachman. Transporting a gaggle of unruly children to Pleasure Island, The Coachman and lackey Lampwick (Lewin Lloyd, Judy) pick up Pinocchio and, when he wavers on going for the ride or not, sing a grotesque song newly written for the movie. One of several contributed by the film’s composer Alan Silvestri and musician Glen Ballard, it’s all about being a “real” boy and has cringe-y lines like “Real Boys Always Want More and Real Girls Always Like the Real Boys More.” Shivers. Evans (Midway) excels at playing these ghoulishly monstrous characters, so it’s hard to fault him entirely, but yeesh, the entire Pleasure Island sequence is a true hellscape of poor CGI and misguided decisions.
On misguided decisions, Zemeckis and Weitz make a rather significant change to how Pinocchio solves his various problems in the film and the resolution at the end. I didn’t mind the end because I think the message it conveys is worthwhile. Those other “outs” Pinocchio gets bothered me because of what they wind up omitting in the overall narrative. I won’t spoil it here, but it feels like a poor decision from an optics perspective. Adding more/new characters isn’t the solution (though I did get a chuckle out of Lorraine Bracco’s Brooklyn accented seagull), and sidelining one essential character didn’t feel right.
I know that Hanks and Zemeckis have a long history together, but in much the same way I felt that Hanks wasn’t right for the Elvis movie, I’m not sure if Geppetto was the role for him either. Admittedly, Hanks wears the part naturally and warmly. Yet, at the same time, I think there’s a safety net that Hollywood could remove from these live-action remakes to free up the studio heads to take more creative-minded swings. If you’re going to remake these movies and set them apart from the animated classic, don’t do it halfway. Casting Erivo was a thoughtful choice, but that’s about where it ends. Written like an extension of the Fairy Godmother Helena Bonham-Carter played in Kenneth Branagh’s 2015 remake of Disney’s Cinderella, I would have liked to see the Blue Fairy be more knowing, less showy. Someone must have all the answers in the movie, and it should be her.
The enjoyment of this take on Pinocchio comes in the details. Zemeckis (The Witches) has gone all out with the animation. Save for that aforementioned Pleasure Island sequence which will make even the gamiest gamer’s eyes cross, the more intimate scenes between Pinocchio and the people he meets along the way are often quite beautiful. For Disney fans, there’s a wealth of Easter Eggs to be found in Geppetto’s shop and Pleasure Island. Keep your eyes on the cuckoo clocks for several familiar characters; some flash by so quickly if you’re watching at home, you’ll be glad for the pause button. If this Pinocchio doesn’t float your boat, Netflix has Guillermo del Toro’s long-in-the-works vision of the piece coming before the end of the year as well.
Review: Is there anything more outright depressing than watching four talented (and, let’s be honest, gorgeous) actors loafing around in a truly ridiculous bit of nonsense filmmaking? Oh geez, but Needle in a Timestack is as eye-rolling as its title suggests, and despite the presence of those four aforementioned stars, two of which will surely win an Oscar within the next decade, it’s a real effort to get through and even then you feel no sense of accomplishment. What makes it even more of a depressing miss is that the team involved in front of and behind the camera could have collaborated on something more worthwhile and not wasted the precious time the very plot of the movie is so adamant about protecting.
I can see why rising stars like Cynthia Erivo (Harriet) and Leslie Odom, Jr. (One Night in Miami…) would be swayed into taking on the leads in this adaptation of a short story written in 1966 by Robert Silverberg. Directed by Oscar winner John Ridley (12 Years a Slave), the project had some relative glitter of attraction with Ridley’s script giving some modernity to Silverberg’s futuristic (for the era) story of a husband and wife torn apart by a fissure in time caused by the wife’s former flame. For two actors looking to have more dramatic arcs in unconventional stories that didn’t expressly call on their roots in musical theater, this had definite potential to show their clear range.
What they couldn’t have predicted is how much of a goober the story would come across to viewers, or how inconsequential nearly every event would feel when filtered through Ridley’s flat dialogue, his rote direction, and Ramsey Nickell’s solar flare golden hue cinematography which feels like an ad for a Nissan Altima circa 2004. Patch in an at times overly committed Orlando Bloom (Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales) as Erivo’s jealous ex Tommy who literally rewrites her history so she will be with him and Freida Pinto (Hillbilly Elegy) second banana-ing her way through an underwritten female role who exists just to be the fallback girlfriend for whatever man isn’t with Erivo and you have something decidedly uneventful. And it’s nearly two hours long.
The strange thing about Ridley’s movie is the way it’s so earnest and forthright about some relationships (i.e. the leads) but so cagey about others. Take Jadyn Wong’s character Zoe, the sister of Odom Jr.’s Nick who influences much of his decision making about how to fix the problem that Bloom causes. After Tommy manipulates time to bring Janine (Erivo) back into his life and cut Nick out like he never existed, (it’s more like Total Recallthan anyone wants to admit) Nick turns to Zoe for advice concerning her ‘best friend’ Sibila who she has a ‘special relationship’ with and also has a time mishap to solve. Ridley’s insistence on classifying this Zoe/Sibila relationship as ‘best friends’ throughout is akin to saying two men living together and sleeping in the same bed in the ‘80s were ‘dedicated bachelors’ or ‘special friends’. If the film weren’t about such honesty in relationships, this severely awkward entanglement between these two women (not to mention Wong’s obsessive need to say ‘Sibila’ in a gravely surfer twang in each line of dialogue) just sticks out more like a sore thumb. Let lesbians be lesbians, please.
It must also be said that as charming and commanding a presence as both Erivo and Odom Jr. are onstage and onscreen, they lack the necessary chemistry together to provide Needle in a Timestack that earnest edge to give us reason to care about their relationship being restored. To be clear, the acting isn’t at fault in the least because both are the least embarrassingly bad things about the movie, but they seem to be united in just getting through the film sitting comfortably in the friend zone. On the plus side, Erivo has just released an EP of original music that’s quite good and is prepping a promising sounding remake of The Rose while Odom Jr. has a nice role in the sequel to Knives Out in 2022 and will star in the intriguing trilogy continuation of The Exorcist. And check Pinto out in Intrusion on Netflix where she gets to be the star in a creepy home invasion thriller. Consider this Needle just a tiny prick in the midst of a greater haystack of more fulfilling projects these actors have set into motion.
Synopsis: Two unlikely companions embark on a perilous adventure through the badlands of an unexplored planet as they try to escape a dangerous and disorienting reality, where all inner thoughts are seen and heard by everyone.
Stars: Daisy Ridley, Tom Holland, Mads Mikkelsen, Demián Bichir, Cynthia Erivo, Nick Jonas, David Oyelowo, Kurt Sutter, Ray McKinnon
Director: Doug Liman
Rated: PG-13
Running Length: 108 minutes
TMMM Score: (4.5/10)
Review: I don’t know, folks, there may be some trouble keeping Tom Holland on the A-List if these past few weeks at the movies have been any indication. It’s no wonder the hype machine on the third Spider-Man movie (titled Spider-Man: No Way Home, due later this year) surprisingly kicked into high gear right around the time the blistering review for Holland’s Apple TV+ film Cherry started popping up. Just two weeks later, Holland has a new project coming out and another reason for his team to be sweating. I can only imagine what bit of Spider-Man news will come out this weekend to direct attention away from the news that Chaos Walking is another dud from Holland, though this time it’s not entirely his fault.
This long in the works adaptation of the first book in a trilogy of YA novels by Patrick Ness published in 2008, it’s not shocking in the least why Chaos Walking struggled to get off the ground over the years. Arriving on the scene in the midst of a number of other popular series for teens being adapted into movies with more of an adult slant, a fair share of high-profile writers tried their hand at the script before it finally wound up back with Ness who gave it a final polish. At one point, Oscar-winning director Robert Zemeckis was circling the project and while that might have been an interesting route to take, I actually think the director Lionsgate wound up with, Doug Liman, is a solid choice. Responsible for admirable work like The Bourne Identity and Edge of Tomorrow, Liman is no stranger to complex narrative or impressive visuals so he wouldn’t have struggled with bringing to life a world that has unique characteristics while not getting too deep in the fantasy of it all.
Two hundred years in the future on another planet called, of course, New World, is the small settlement of Prentisstown, named after the malevolent mayor (Mads Mikkelsen, Casino Royale) who presides over the entirely male population. All of the females of the group were killed by the Spackle, native inhabitants to the planet that descended on the group one day not long after the settlers arrived on the planet, around the same time both genders discovered the planet gave them the ability to hear and sometimes even see the thoughts of other men. The women’s thoughts, however, were hidden. These thoughts on display came to be called “Noise”. While the book has the luxury of explaining this phenomenon in detail, the movie skirts the subject fairly quickly so we’re left with a “that’s that, move on” sort of attitude, not that we can ever hear the “Noise” that clearly thanks to the sound design being so muffled throughout.
Too young at the time of her death, Todd Hewitt (Holland, The Impossible) never knew his mother but is aware she trusted Ben (Demián Bichir, The Hateful Eight) and Cillian (Kurt Sutter, writer of Southpaw & creator of Sons of Anarchy) to care for him as his adoptive parents after she was taken. So he spends his days trying to suppress his Noise while helping on Ben and Cillian’s humble farm. He’s returning from the field one day when he sees something he’s never encountered before but only heard about…a girl. Crash landing on the planet as part of the Second Wave, Viola (Daisy Ridley, Murder on the Orient Express) is the only survivor from her crew and needs Todd’s help to find a communication device to contact her ship so they know she made it and won’t abandon their mission. However, Viola’s arrival uncovers a deadly secret from the history of Prentisstown that a number of people, including the town’s holy man (David Oyelowo, The Midnight Sky) would just as soon stay buried. Pursued by those he formerly trusted, Todd and his dog Manchee accompany Viola to the far ends of New World where they’ll discover more truths about Noise, New World, and each other.
To his credit, Ness has laid a groundwork for a series that has potential. So why is Chaos Walking so decidedly unexciting in its action and unmoving at its core? Much of that comes down to what I think are simple logistics; nothing in the movie ever works in harmony so you have, essentially, chaos throughout. The acting doesn’t seem to gel with the script, finding some of the cast exceling by tuning in their performances and taking the material for what it is and nothing more (like Ridley who got good at that working on the StarWars films) while others take it too far in the other direction, working so hard to uncover what’s not there that they wind up totally blank themselves (sorry, Mr. Holland). The simplistic, truncated script doesn’t seem to work with the style of movie Liman wants to make, either. Liman’s action sequences are the best parts of the movie without question but they’re few and far between and never turn the dial up far enough so that you feel like any stakes are raised.
Chaos Walking also has a very bad habit of letting the focus fall on the wrong people for too long and forgetting (sometimes entirely) about characters that were introduced as important. I won’t say who, but there’s one character played by an Oscar-nominated performer who never gets a final scene, so we have no idea what happened to them. The last time we saw them, they may have been in danger but Liman and Ness never make it clear which way the teeter was tottering. It’s unfair to leave people hanging like that. Also, the movie commits a cardinal sin that you simply donotdo if you want a compassionate audience to remain even the slightest bit on your side. Again, I don’t give out spoilers but if you’re paying attention to who goes with Viola on her journey you might be able to guess what said sin is. And it’s not pretty. It’s a cheap movie device that screenwriters should find a way out of using because it’s expected and, when it happens, only serves to show the inherent weakness in creative thought for how to motivate your hero/heroine.
Before I forget, we have to circle back to Ridley and Holland again. Though Ridley manages to come out slightly unscathed here, there’s still a bit of a wonder why she’s back in this neo-sci-fi work so close to the end of her tenure in Star Wars. If I were her agent, I’d be steering her away from these types of roles in favor of work that is completely different, so she isn’t pigeonholed. Ridley is a solid actress but there isn’t much for her to work with, but at least she’s able to fashion it into something not totally goofy. The same can’t be said for Holland who is reduced to muttering most of his lines (turn the subtitles on, you’ll thank me), many of which are descriptions rather than actual sentences, so he comes off like he’s just verbally pointing out things. “Yellow Hair” “Girl” “Pretty” “Bug” “Girl” “Pretty”. Could another actor have fixed this? Maybe not, but Holland seems more confused with what to do than anything… all the way up to flashing his bare bottom while fishing for his dinner. The scene feels there to wake up anyone that might have been about to doze off.
Though this is based on the first book in a trilogy I’d be amazed if Chaos Walking performs well enough to warrant a sequel and it seems as if the filmmakers knew that too. Thankfully, while the door is clearly open for a continuation, the ending can be interpreted in a number of different ways depending on how you’re approaching the film. As a fan of the novels, I’m sure you’ll see the possibilities of what’s to come. If you are new to the series and were entertained, could be that now you are invested and are crossing your fingers they can get Ridley and Holland back together again to finish the story. However, my camp is the one that gets to the end and is ready to walk on past any more installments. It doesn’t walk, nor run, nor jump, nor fly…Chaos Walking merely limps along, disappointingly so.
Synopsis: The extraordinary tale of Harriet Tubman’s escape from slavery and transformation into one of America’s greatest heroes, whose courage, ingenuity, and tenacity freed hundreds of slaves and changed the course of history.
Stars: Cynthia Erivo, Leslie Odom Jr., Janelle Monáe, Joe Alwyn, Jennifer Nettles, Clarke Peters, Vanessa Bell Calloway, Zackary Momoh, Deborah Ayorinde, Vondie Curtis-Hall
Director: Kasi Lemmons
Rated: PG-13 minutes
Running Length: 125 minutes
TMMM Score: (7.5/10)
Review: It’s been over 40 years since the last time there was a movie about the life of Harriet Tubman. I had to check to make sure because I couldn’t quite believe her story hadn’t been told at length on film since the 1978 television movie A Woman Called Moses starring Cicely Tyson. Yet, it’s true. Though Tubman has had a bit of a resurgence in the last few years having been featured on the now-cancelled series Underground and was chosen to replace notorious slave-owner Andrew Jackson on the $20 in 202 (though those plans have now been put on hold because the current administration happens to like Jackson where he is), she’s been out of the verified mainstream for too long.
It’s been some time since I was in an American History class and I’m ashamed to admit I don’t know as much as I should about the key players in the Underground Railroad movement that helped so many slaves move toward freedom. Tubman is one of the most well-known conductors on the Underground Railroad, that much I did know, but how she came to become a part of that network was an educational lesson I sorely needed a refresher course on. While I know it plays a little fast and loose with the timeline, the new biographical drama Harriet, is a straight-forward depiction of Tubman’s life as she escaped from slavery in Maryland and made her way to safety in Philadelphia.
Beginning shortly before she flees the plantation she’s lived on with her parents and siblings since she was a child, we meet Harriet (Cynthia Erivo, Bad Times at the El Royale) as she’s having one of her “spells”. Suffering a head injury when she was young, she often will fall into a trance like state where she’ll receive visions she interprets as guidance by a higher power of things to come. Married to a free man, Harriet wishes to be free herself and have children born outside the burden of slavery but when she’s denied that right and is put up for sale by Gideeon (Joe Alwyn, Boy Erased) the smarmy son of her late master, she knows she has to take freedom into her own hands even if that means leaving everything she loves behind. A well-staged escape is designed for audiences to lean forward in their seats, even though we know the outcome. Her eventual first step to freedom is the first of many moving moments in the film.
Director Kasi Lemmons (who had supporting roles in Candyman and The Silence of the Lambs before turning to directing) wrote the screenplay with Gregory Allen Howard (Remember the Titans) and the two manage to pack a lot of events into a trim 125 minutes. Obviously, this can’t possibly cover everything of importance in Tubman’s life so audiences are given a surface skim of the next years as Tubman arrives in Philadelphia and meets William Still (Leslie Odom Jr., Murder on the Orient Express) the abolitionist that came to be known as the Father of the Underground Railroad. She also takes a room in the boarding house of Marie (Janelle Monáe, Welcome to Marwen) a free-born black woman that hasn’t had the same struggles as Harriet but through her friendship comes to understand her pain.
While this film may get dinged a bit for it’s workmanlike way it moves through Tubman’s life events, I found the way Lemmons and Howard chose to focus on her accomplishments instead of her setbacks really refreshing. So often with movies about the horror of slavery directors feel a need to wallow in the cruelty and ugliness of that abhorrent period in our American history. Instead of having the obligatory vicious scene of a whipping or lynching, Lemmons and cinematographer John Toll (Cloud Atlas) catch us off guard when a character takes off their shirt and reveals their scars from a previous lashing. Seeing these reminders that will never fully heal or when Harriet recounts a beating when she was young have more of an impact the way they are presented than if we were to bear witness to them play out in real time. Same goes for the way Lemmons reserves the use of the “n” word to punctuate a character’s hate, not make it their defining manner of speech.
Lemmons and Howard also capitalize on Erivo’s talents as an award-winning singer and feature her gorgeous voice throughout the movie. In addition to Erivo writing and performing a song over the closing credits there are carefully selected spirituals or call outs during the film that are moving in their sound but haunting in their purpose. While I’m not sure how historically correct it is, I’d even say Lemmons and Howard seize some opportunities to turn Tubman into a bit of an action star, with Erivo slinging a gun and hauling off a few shots from the back of a horse. I say more power to them because it only added to the audience’s appreciation to the film. For each nuance they give Tubman (Erivo’s headstrong portrayal is a brilliant head-to-toe transformation you won’t be able to take your eyes off of) they seem to take two or three away from other actors like Alywn or country star Jennifer Nettles playing his deeply indoctrinated mother. Though under no obligation to give depth to characters that offered little hope or free-thought to others, Lemmons and Howard have etched out little pieces of informed info about nearly everyone else that to have these two figures so blank is curious…or maybe it’s precisely the intent.
Since her feature directing debut in 1997 with the unforgettable Eve’s Bayou (rent it, trust me, just rent it), Lemmons has been a little hit or miss in her efforts but she’s scored another win with this engaging look into the life of one of the most important women, or person, in American history. I’d likely have sat for another twenty minutes or so had Lemmons and Howard wanted to take a little more time in the middle or even at the end for a bit more of a measured wrap up of events. It ended a little abruptly…or perhaps I just wasn’t quite ready to leave off in Tubman’s story. Even if Harriet doesn’t quite dig as deep as it could have, it’s a captivating film made even more enthralling by a lead performance that truly soars.
Synopsis: Seven strangers, each with a secret to bury, meet at Lake Tahoe’s El Royale, a rundown hotel with a dark past. Over the course of one fateful night, everyone will have a last shot at redemption – before everything goes to hell.
Stars: Chris Hemsworth, Jeff Bridges, Cynthia Erivo, Dakota Johnson, Jon Hamm, Lewis Pullman, Cailee Spaeny, Nic Offerman
Director: Drew Goddard
Rated: R
Running Length: 141 minutes
TMMM Score: (7/10)
Review: After making a sizable splash with the super fun horror film The Cabin in the Woods and then netting a well-deserved Oscar nomination for his adaption of The Martian, Drew Goddard was clearly given a wide berth for his next project. He was also evidently given final cut of the movie because Bad Times at the El Royale winds up clocking in at a staggering 141 minutes. Now, I’m all for movies that take their time but they have to earn their running length and, while I enjoyed El Royale for the most part there are absolutely sequences that could be trimmed or removed all together to keep the film moving along. This is, after all, a crime drama that sees a group of strangers converging on a motel that sits on the border of two states one rainy night. Told from various points of view (it has a Pulp Fiction vibe to it) with each person adding a piece to a complex puzzle of deception, the movie worked far better for me than some of my critic colleagues and that’s totally fine. It’s a movie that I think will play best in a home viewing instead of in a theatrical exhibition so you can stretch out and get comfortable. Though it’s filled with A-listers like Chris Hemsworth (Thor), Dakota Johnson (Suspiria) and Jeff Bridges (Only the Brave), it’s actually newbies Cynthia Erivo (Widows), Lewis Pullman, and Cailee Spaeny (On the Basis of Sex) that manage to be the most memorable. Worth a look.
Synopsis: Set in contemporary Chicago, amidst a time of turmoil, four women with nothing in common except a debt left behind by their dead husbands’ criminal activities, take fate into their own hands, and conspire to forge a future on their own terms.
Stars: Viola Davis, Michelle Rodriguez, Cynthia Erivo, Daniel Kaluuya, Liam Neeson, Colin Farrell, Garret Dillahunt, Carrie Coon, Elizabeth Debicki, Brian Tyree Henry, Jacki Weaver, Jon Bernthal, Manuel Garcia Rulfo, Robert Duvall
Review: If there’s one truly unfortunate thing that happened at the movies this year it’s that Steve McQueen’s Widows failed to catch fire at the box office. The director of 12 Years a Slave and Gillian Flynn, the writer of Gone Girl, have adapted an ‘80s UK crime series and updated it to present day Chicago and cast some of the best actors working today. It’s a gritty, great film and that it went largely unnoticed just totally baffles me. Oscar-winner Viola Davis (Suicide Squad) turns in what I think is the best performance of her career as a woman whose life is totally turned upside down and then is tossed sideways by a series of revelations that shock her and the audience. Gathering together a group of disparate women (Elizabeth Debicki, The Great Gatsby, Michelle Rodriguez, Furious 7) to follow through on a crime their husbands were planning, just when you think you’ve figured out where the movie is going it throws in multiple twists that I just did not see coming. It’s hard to pull one over on movie-goers but McQueen and Flynn do it twice.
Hopefully, this is one movie that people will rediscover when it arrives on streaming services and then kick themselves for missing it when it was on the big screen. Perhaps it was marketed wrong or maybe it was released at a bad time of year, but something strange happened with Widows because this is one of the best films of the year that just totally vanished way before it should have. Find it, see it…you’ll understand what I’m saying when you do.
Synopsis: Set in contemporary Chicago amidst a time of turmoil, four women with nothing in common except debts left behind by their dead husbands’ criminal activities take fate into their own hands and conspire to forge a future on their own terms.
Release Date: November 16, 2018
Thoughts: Oscar-winning director Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave) had a fondness for Widows, a UK television series created by Lynda La Plante (Prime Suspect). In fact, McQueen liked it so much that he brought on Gone Girl’s Gillian Flynn to modernize the story and signed on top notch talent to bring it stateside. The result can be glimpsed in this trailer, an exciting first look at a hard-boiled crime drama that could be an award contender when all is said and done. The cast is made up of Oscar winners Viola Davis (Suicide Squad) and Robert Duvall (The Paper), Oscar nominees Liam Neeson (The Commuter), Daniel Kaluuya (Black Panther), and Jacki Weaver (Life of the Party), not to mention impressive names like Colin Farrell (Saving Mr. Banks), Elizabeth Debicki (The Great Gatsby), Michelle Rodriguez (Furious 7), and Cynthia Erivo. If the finished product is as impressively dynamite as this trailer, McQueen and company will have a very good fall.
