|
Review by Sean Boelman
With an all-star cast of cinephile favorites who have blown up over the past year, including Jacob Elordi and Ayo Edibiri, The Sweet East might be one of the most singular, esoteric debuts in recent memory. Although the film doesn’t always work, its certainly admirable, thanks to the clear ambition on display.
The movie follows a teenage girl who, after getting separated from her peers on a class trip in Washington, DC, gets her first unexpected glimpse into the real world. What starts out seeming like a pretty standard road movie evolves into something more quirky and sinister as it goes on before culminating in a finale that’s undeniably wild yet works surprisingly well in context. In terms of what The Sweet East has to say, there’s some very sharp commentary — particularly in the first act — on the absurdity of the white supremacy movements that emerged in the fringes of American society but have become scarily mainstream. Few films on the topic have managed to so effectively convey how these disgusting individuals manage to look “normal” and could be among us. The supporting cast has a few recognizable faces, all of whom are entirely game for the movie’s weird vibes. Simon Rex is fantastic as a white supremacist, having a duplicitous charm about him that makes the character all the more menacing. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Ayo Edibiri and Jeremy O. Harris are wonderfully flamboyant as idiosyncratic filmmakers, and Jacob Elordi has yet another scene-stealing turn (his third this year) as a heartthrob actor. 
However, none of these performances would make much of an impact were it not for Talia Ryder’s commanding leading performance. From a scene early in the film where she sings an enchanting song into a mirror, Ryder is completely spellbinding. She is very quiet in the role but has a commanding presence nonetheless.
The transfixing nature of Ryder’s performance is further complemented by the movie’s aesthetic. Shot in 16mm, The Sweet East has a grainy, dreamy aesthetic that will remind viewers of old-school Americana, creating an interesting juxtaposition against the film’s snapshot of the modern-day alt-right. For much of the first half, it feels like the movie is trying to be a cringe comedy — particularly as we deal with the discomfort in the relationship the protagonist forms with Rex’s white supremacist. If this wasn’t enough to alienate some viewers, others will be thrown off by an absurd turn in the second act. Those who make it through both of these tones will be on board with the film’s weird wavelength. The Sweet East uses its warm aesthetic and charming performances to deliver a stunningly terrifying truth about our world. Although its unorthodox approach is unlikely to resonate with everyone, this is a confident debut for director Sean Price Williams and writer Nick Pinkerton. The Sweet East hits theaters on December 1. Rating: 4/5
0 Comments
Review by Daniel Lima  It is incredibly hard for an artist, no matter how great, to sustain creative success into perpetuity. Circumstances change, the artist changes, and eventually, they are forced to either adapt and find new things to say, new ways to express themselves, or otherwise become a pale shadow of what they once were. With Silent Night, his first American production in over two decades, legendary director John Woo attempts to prove that he still has what it takes to deliver an emotionally charged and exhilarating action film. It might be a laudable effort in theory, but it quickly proves to be bereft of all the things that made him so acclaimed in the first place. Joel Kinnaman plays a man who, after his son is killed in a drive-by shooting on Christmas Eve, prepares himself for a one-man war against the street gang that shot him. As an added twist to this well-worn revenge narrative, there is no dialogue, forcing the entire story to be told through visual and musical cues. It's a novel take on the formula, and one could imagine the John Woo of the 80's Hong Kong New Wave knocking it out of the park. To his credit, the director does commit to the conceit. The storytelling is always crystal clear, laying out the characters' goals and motivations, allowing a handful of expressionistic flourishes to sell their emotional state, and developing the investigative plot as Kinnaman unravels the criminal organization. Without prior knowledge, one wouldn't guess that this is the work of a septuagenarian working within an industry he hasn't been a part of for decades; this feels like the work of a young director given the opportunity to do something a bit off-beat. Not feeling like a John Woo movie, however, is a double-edged sword. It cannot be overstated how important Woo was to action cinema, with an unparalleled ability to imbue the most explosive, kinetic set pieces ever devised with pathos and beauty beyond most straight dramas. His best work interrogated notions of honor, loyalty, and brotherhood, possessing a rhythm and look unlike anything else at the time. Even his lesser Hollywood work, compromised as it was by executive oversight, still felt like it was coming from a singular auteur. As recognizable as his ideas and motifs were, he was nearly impossible to replicate.  Those idiosyncrasies are absent in Silent Night. Woo's keen visual eye, once so textured and intimate, has given way to a rote mid-budget studio sheen, looking like any number of anonymous Netflix releases. Beyond the low contrast lighting and workmanlike compositions, there is a curious lack of all of Woo's typical embellishments: the slow motion, the transitions that allow scenes to flow into each other, even the doves (a parrot shows up early on, seeming like a thumbing of the nose at the viewer's expense). The exceedingly rare moment where he does take a swing, typically quite at home in his more overtly stylized and melodramatic work, stands out as a non-sequitur in an otherwise grounded film. Perhaps this is Woo deciding to do away with what people expect of him, or maybe the realities of shooting an action film in 2023 on an American studio's dime preclude their inclusion. Either way, the result is a predictable revenge thriller that, while not especially ugly compared to its contemporaries, looks like it might have been directed by anybody. That gimmick only goes so far in distinguishing the film. The "one man seeking vengeance" power fantasy is familiar to modern audiences, one that has never called for much dialogue, and Woo is more acclaimed for his direction than his screenwriting. It quickly becomes evident that its lack won't be much of an impediment, so the film's unique element ends up being moot. More debilitating than the speechless characters is the actual narrative structure. Kinnaman is not a ruthlessly efficient killer at the start, so he must train and prepare himself for his crusade for an entire year, intending to mete out justice on the anniversary of his son's death. That means most of the film is just a training montage, watching this silent, bland protagonist steel his body and mind as he withdraws into himself. Without Woo's trademark style lending this a particular verve and heart, there is no reason to remain emotionally engaged in his quest. By the time the action starts in earnest, it's a challenge to muster up the energy to care.  For as long as the action is withheld, in the latest film from the consensus pick for the greatest action director of all time, what is here is sorely lackluster. A classic John Woo gunfight is impeccably composed, a tightly controlled cacophony of violence, but it was also operatic, baroque, and grandiose. As booming and destructive as the bullets and the car crashes were, there was always grace, with the action serving as a particularly out-sized representation of whatever animated Woo at the time. Even his previous American outings, hampered as they were by studios, managed to retain these qualities. Here, in the final act that all the big set pieces are relegated to, he is as clamped down and restrained as the rest of the film, eschewing all his trademarks in favor of the modern 87eleven style of action. It's bloody, brutal, and tactical — all the hallmarks of any movie influenced by John Wick (Jeremy Marinas, fight coordinator for the latest in that franchise, served as stunt coordinator here). It's not bad action by any stretch of the imagination, certainly not by the low standards of Hollywood. It's all clearly photographed; characters move through the environment and actively utilize it in the choreography, and it does maintain a sweaty, desperate energy. What it lacks, unfortunately, is anything to distinguish it from dozens of other bloody, brutal, and action set pieces in the past five years. Maybe Woo truly was energized by the changing landscape of action cinema and wanted to play around here. Perhaps he was forced to hand over the reins to a younger pair of hands, but either way, the style he pioneered is completely absent. Even a hint of the old master would have been welcome in 2023, where even the best action set pieces lack the deep emotions that Woo was able to weave into them. To see even the climactic payoff of this film be so indebted to others, rather than a reflection of Woo's own predilections, is nothing but disappointing. In truth, this is the inescapable flaw of Silent Night: it does not feel like the work of John Woo, an artist whose fingerprints can be seen in everything else he's ever touched. As bombastic as his most celebrated works are, they always have something more on their mind, underpinning all the cordite smoke, blood, pain, and chaos. The Killer questions how feasible a black-and-white moral code can be in a world of gray, if arbitrary societal divides are insurmountable, and whether redemption can ever truly be attained. Bullet in the Head is a bleak and tragic portrait of suffering and war, actively challenging his penchant for finding serenity in violence. Even Paycheck, his last American outing, offered a fleeting interest in the nature of fate and predestination.  By contrast, this film is just a bog-standard thriller. There's so little going on beyond the shallow stylistic exercise that it's hard to take even the questionable portrayal of minorities and women to heart (though admittedly, the latter, in particular, is a thread in all his films). If one were uncharitable, there's not much stopping an interpretation where this movie is Woo announcing a full-throated endorsement of vigilante justice, as there is no sign that his undertaking is anything other than cool and justified. Or perhaps that would be charitable because it would mean the director had some actual stake in a project otherwise lacking any personal stamp.
Arguing that an artist should not change their style is ludicrous, but Silent Night is not a director stretching his wings. This feels like a mercenary gig, with John Woo acting as a gun for hire, and that lack of investment in the material is evident in every solitary frame. From any other filmmaker, this might have been a bland, forgettable actioner, soon consigned to the ashbin of cinema history. From the man who made Hard Boiled, this is an especially embarrassing misfire. Silent Night arrives in theaters December 1. Rating: 2.5/5 Review by Adam Donato  The uninitiated would be surprised to find out that Bad CGI Gator is not associated with 2019’s Bad CGI Sharks. At least that movie had a 90-minute runtime, despite most of the cast lacking pictures on their IMDb profile. Danny Draven directs Bad CGI Gator, which makes sense since his last feature was Weedjies: Halloweed Night. He’s been directing crappy movies since the early 2000s. With a title self-aware about its budget, will the joke be as funny as the movie thinks it is? Six sexy college students vacation at a cabin in the middle of the woods. When one of the girls has aspirations of going viral, she convinces the gang to throw their laptops into the water as a form of protest. The group is split into couples for the most part: the meathead and the social media-obsessed; the douchebag guy with the airhead girl; The meathead’s shy younger sister; and then a third guy who is a dork and the other two couples hate. The audience is supposed to root for the two dorks and enjoy watching the other two obnoxious couples become fodder for a bad CGI gator. In this regard, the story does function, as the characters are over-the-top annoying. Luckily, the run time is just under an hour. Imagine if they inflated the run time to ninety minutes to make it feel more like a real movie. Enough time is spent with these characters as it is. It’s mildly funny to laugh at how cartoonishly ridiculous everyone is.  The bad CGI gator is the real audience grabber here. When the gator bites the laptops the group ignorantly threw in the water, it starts to electrocute him, and he grows a few sizes. Ironically, the CGI gets better when he grows bigger. Maybe it’s just because more detail can be seen when it enlarges and looks like it actually has a design. This is opposed to earlier in the movie, where it’s just this small, dark shape. Of course, the bit of the bad CGI gator is only a jumping-off point. The gator does many silly, impossible things throughout the film’s back half. The absurdity in the situation is where most of the humor is derived. It’s a pretty awful bit, as the bad special effects are far from the worst elements in the movie. Low budgets limit filmmakers, and this limitation is leaned into for a big joke.
Not to give this movie any technical credit, but it’s surprising how much effort went into shooting scenes in the water. There are several sequences where they do a perspective shot, like in Jaws, where the gator bobs through the swamp water on the prowl. There’s a person with the camera outside in the water. The shot is used to try to create a tension-filled scene without showing the gator that early into the movie. That being said, this movie doesn’t pretend to showcase a convincing-looking creature effect. It’s just nice that any amount of effort was made. Bad CGI Gator is certainly the type of bad movie to watch with your friends. Make fun of the audacity and stupid characters. It’s trying to be a "so bad it’s good" experience, so have some drinks and have a good time. Expect to see this one on the SyFy channel at 4 am. For better or for worse, this movie knows exactly what it is. Bad CGI Gator is now available on VOD. Rating: 2/5
Review by Sean Boelman
Screenwriter Richard Curtis delivered one of the most unexpectedly iconic holiday comedies of all time in Love Actually, so cinephiles were obviously eager to see him return to the genre with Genie. Unfortunately, the film’s bland and generic nature prevents it from connecting as well as his past work.
Genie follows a workaholic man (Paapa Essiedu) who enlists the help of a genie (Melissa McCarthy) to win back his family heading into the holiday season. Curtis hopes to put a fresh spin on the tropes of the wish-fulfillment storyline and the holiday genre, but mixing these familiar beats is not enough to create a distinctive product. It should come as no surprise to fans of Curtis’s work, but there is a maudlin sentimentality to Genie. While it’s hard not to crack a smile at the ending, even if it is overly saccharine, the rather generic storytelling does the movie no favors. Only in the third act does Curtis do anything interesting with these tropes, and by then, the first two-thirds have felt so bland that it’s hard to admire anything it does that is fresh. In a development not new to Christmas movies whatsoever, the central themes of Genie are about the value of family and spending time together. In many ways, McCarthy’s genie is effectively the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future all wrapped up into one — but the issue with the film comes in that Essiedu is no Scrooge. 
The balance Curtis is trying to strike with the protagonist is complex, and he is not entirely able to pull it off. On the one hand, if you make the character too neglectful, the audience would not possibly root for him. But here, where his main transgression is working too late on his daughter’s birthday, it’s hard to see an arc of substantial growth.
McCarthy is back to being typecast again after a few roles that actually took advantage of her talents. She’s back to doing slapstick and fish-out-of-water comedy, but at least she’s not getting body-shamed anymore. The surprising highlight of this movie is Essiedu, who brings an ineffable charm to his role. There is also a surprisingly rich supporting cast, including Alan Cumming, Marc Maron, and Luis Guzmán, but none of them feels well-used — almost as if some of their subplots ended up on the cutting room floor. Visually, the film is shot like virtually every studio comedy this side of 2000. It’s oversaturated, with festive but generic production design. However, there are some scenes that make use of CGI to create the more whimsical, magical aspects of the storyline, and these look distractingly bad. Genie isn’t a terrible movie, but it feels strangely uninspired. Even the generally warm touch of writer Richard Curtis cannot be felt in a film that lacks much in the way of a distinct identity or fresh approach to its storytelling. In other words, this is hardly a match to Curtis’s iconic holiday hit Love Actually. Genie streams on Peacock beginning November 22. Rating: 2.5/5 Review by Jonathan Berk  Bradley Cooper continues to demonstrate his talent both in front of and behind the camera. His directorial debut, A Star Is Born, had eight Oscar nominations, and it’s clear Cooper hopes Maestro can get similar recognition. The early part of the story is full of flashy match cuts and sweeping camera moves in a rich black and white that reminds of old Hollywood. It doesn’t take long for audiences to get swept away with the magic Cooper is setting up, but the later half of the film elevates the picture to one that surely will be full of award-season buzz. Maestro paints a picture of Leonard Berstein’s (Cooper) life and career with a passion for music that leans on obsession. At the center of his story is a lifelong relationship with Felicia Montealegre (Carey Mulligan). Their relationship and her impact on his life and career are felt throughout the film through powerful visuals and outstanding performances. The opening section of the film has so much style and flair. There is a manic energy Leonard projects in these moments, which is tied into the camera movement and editing, making it impossible not to get sucked in. Thematically, this ties into how quickly Felicia and Leonard fall into each other. The moment Felicia enters the movie, walking from a bus to a party where she will meet Leonard for the first time, is visually stunning. Cooper and director of photography Matthew Libatique utilize a deep focus throughout the film that reminds us of Citizen Kane and allows us to be both in the moment and bystanders catching a peek at their inner lives.  While ultimately a tribute to the musical icon, Maestro doesn’t shy away from the complexities of the couple’s lives. Once the dreaminess of their initial meeting ends, the film’s style shifts to reflect this by colorizing the frame and slowing the pace. The manic excitement is no longer present, and the reality of the world sets in. It’s an impactful demonstration of a competent filmmaker using the medium to not only be visually compelling but also thematically resonate.
Mulligan’s performance is beyond awards-worthy. The emotional impact she brings time and time again throughout the film is breathtaking. So much of the film’s emotional weight rests on her shoulders, and she delivers consistently. If she isn’t nominated for Best Actress in a Leading Role at the Oscars, it will be one of the biggest snubs ever. Cooper also delivers an incredible performance, but he gets to be a bit bigger. A few scenes where he conducts an orchestra allow him to be emphatic. They are quite a lot of fun to watch, and he definitely gets more of these moments than Mulligan. However, there are moments where Cooper can demonstrate his dramatic chops, especially later in the film, that make his performance extra noteworthy. Maestro is an incredible movie that will warrant a few re-watches to truly get all that it is saying. The love story in this film is hard not to fall into. It’s not a fairytale, and the hardships the couple goes through are not easily addressed. This film has many “Oscar bait” elements, but they feel organic rather than manufactured solely for recognition. Maestro will be in theaters on November 22 and on Netflix December 20. Rating: 5/5 |