What's that you hear?
“I got a jar of diiiirt.
I got a jar of diiiirt."
It's movie season at Netflix and in their deluge, combined with the other mass amount of movies dropping right now, I forgot to feature one of The Flix's more notable releases, the Marilyn Monroe kinda-sorta-biopic Blonde. I don't feel too bad as the reviews haven't been all that great, but the discussion around it has been - in volume at least. From it's NC-17 rating to debates about whether the movie that tries to detail the famous starlets exploitation is itself an exploitation. And be sure not to leave out whether lead Ana de Armas' accent was perfectly accurate. The draaaaama.
I'm also featuring two "specials" which are not technically considered movies, even if they run the rough length of one. First their is Kid Cudi's Entergalactic, which like Blonde, actually released last weekend (sorry x2), as well as Marvel's Werewolf By Night - which looks akin to a long episode of Wandavision in its experimental-ness (for Marvel at least).
Oh, also, the Cate Blacnehtt starring Tár, which is getting very good reviews, is releasing in limited theaters weekend (ie NY / LA). I'm waiting to do a full feature when it goes nationwide on the 28th of this month.
Extra Credit Movies:
Entergalactic - as noted above, it's an animated "special" to accompany Kid Cudi's album. There aren't a ton of them, but nearly all the reviews say it's a fun, visually interesting - and if you like his music - great sounding romantic comedy. Playing NOW on Netflix.
Blonde - might be remembered more for the "contrversy" than the movie itself. Which is almost sadly fitting when it centers on Ms Norma Jean. The reviews say the filmmakers portray Monroe's life as painful event after painful event, which makes the movie itself a painful event. Playing NOW on Netflix.
Werewolf By Night - I spoiled it a bit, but this is MCU canon, but mixes it up using old timey styling to follow some monster hunters. Reviews say it's just goofy enough to be entertaining, and escape the more recent MCU issues. Streaming on Disney + this Friday.
Mr. Harrigan's Phone - a Stephen King novel based horror movie where a dead guy (Donald Sutherland) keeps calling and killing. Reviews say it has its competencies, but overall is just not enough. Streaming on Netflix this Friday.
The Luckiest Girl Alive - pulpy schlocky lookin movie version of the successful novel starring Mila Kunis. No reviews yet, but I'm sure the wine you're going to watch it with would give it five stahhh.....😴🍷 Streaming on Netflix this Friday.
Most of us don't like constraints. Why would someone want to be restricted in their endeavors, right? And yet they're often quite helpful and contribute to some of the most interesting human accomplishments. How interesting would it have been to go the moon if we could just like, could go to the moon. Willy nilly (come on, say it out loud. it's fun! "willy nilly!"). I don't know the guy, but David O. Russell seems like a dude who reeeeally doesn't like constraints. And with Amsterdam he seems to have given himself none, nada, naught. He apparently called nearly every famous person in the world and asked them to be in his movie, and they all said yes. He loaded his "kinda sorta true, but mostly fictional" story up with more plot and subplots than a 26 episode season of Grey's Anatomy, and didn't cut any of it. And maybe predictably, sum ≠> parts. At least, so say critics. But you do get that sense from the trailer as well. Watching it is a lot of "wait, wtf is happening here and why should I care?"
And it's not just the ideas fault, because taking a real life event, stuffing it with stars and "tweaking it" to fit some cinematic endeavor has been done to good effect before, most notably in 2019's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. That one gelled for most people, whereas reviews say Amsterdam is basically the Hulu + Live TV +++ (the name, not the actual service) of David O. Russell's movies. And while it feels like you might want to just say f it and see it for the actors getting to ham it up, be warned one review said of the character played by Christian Bale, "Willy Wonka was a more believable human being." 😬
Vibe: a lot
Out Friday
Watch In Theaters
The Trailer | 2 hrs 14 mins | R | 🍅: 31%
I honestly have zero clue how many "classic children's books" there are, but if we aren't close to Hollywood mining every last god damn one of them for translation to the big screen, there are even more than I was expecting (see: Peter Rabbit, Mr. Popper's Penguins, Where the Wild Things Are, EVERYTHING ROALD DAHL, The Bridge to Terabithia, Charlotte's Web, A Wrinkle in Time and on and on).
Now, one can understand why Lyle, Lyle took... *ahem* a while. Because if you're doing a live action version of this story and use an actual croc, the production could end up on the wrong side of ROAR. But VFX have mostly caught up to our needs and thus we get ourselves a singing friend of the dinosaurs voiced by Shawn Mendes who performs ditties by the dudes who the wrote songs for The Greatest Showman. If you're all like a whosa sings a whatsa!? Don't fret, just know that if you have kids, and you take them to see this movie, good chance they'll be belting out the songs from it until you want to shove your Airpod Pros so deep in your ears they literally cancel all noise. Ya know, cuz they'll like pop your eardrums if you shove 'em in far enough. 🙃 And yes, this movie stars Javier Bardem and Constance Wu, but they seem to be there mostly for the reaction shots (and paychecks, don't forget the paychecks).
Vibe: a kid friendly musicaaaaaalllllllllll
Out Friday
Watch In Theaters
The Trailer | 1 hr 46 mins | PG | 🍅: TBD
I'm sure critics gained both pleasure and pain from the fact this remake of the Clive Barker classic is actually pretty decent. Pleasure because they see enough bad movies, but the pain too because the headlines were practically written for them if it was a stinker - "The new Hellraiser is pure torture. And not the good kind." or "You're a pinhead if you decide to see the new Hellraiser." Amma right??
Instead, we get the more complicated, yet way less pun-y "Yeah, it may not possess the same alternative - if now somewhat mainstream - perverse sexual energy of the original, but the new direction works for the most part even if it has some parts that lag." Juuuuust doesn't quite have the same ring to it. 🔕
And btw, if you're a Hellraiser neophyte, the series is basically like the kinkier sibling of the more established Nightmare on Elm Street / Friday the 13th / Halloween's of the world. Which makes sense as it's a bit easier to explain crazed madmen chasing teenagers, be it with claws, hockey masks or just like, A mask vs some godlike creatures who wear skin on their skin and consider stripping people of their organs a jolly ol' time.
But more importantly, let's all just be glad Ryan Murphy didn't get a hold of this one. Jk(?)
Vibe: hurts so good
Out Friday
Watch On Hulu
The Trailer | 2 hrs 0 mins | R | 🍅: 85%
A poster for this movie has one of the obscenely rich passengers of a luxury yacht puking gold (be warned, it ain't gold in the movie). It's not subtle, but at least it gets your attention? But grabbing ones attention and doing something interesting with it are two different things. And you'd think a director - Ruben Östlund - whose last two movies have won the Palme d'Or at Cannes (including this one!) would have more to say than "don't you think like, super rich people suck?" But reviews are saying Triangle of Sadness is mostly two and half hours of that, but with a sardonic and darkly humorous tenor. Which, if you hate billionaires, does sound kinda enticing, if begging for a bro Twitter 🧵 about how people should stop watching movies about people who have too much many and start making it themselves - "and here are my top ten pieces of advice to get you started." 🤢
Now, I don't want to be too harsh as the movie does have a positive reaction on the overall, just need to emphasize that the joke seems to be fairly one note. Which is slightly disappointing when you consider just how layered and rich Östlund's 2014 film Force Majeure was. It did such an excellent job of taking down perceived masculinity you wanted him to excoriate every hypocrisy ridden cultural norm around. Which, he does seem to be doing, if not quite to the same universal acclaim.
Vibe: fuck the (mega mega) rich
Out Friday
Watch In (Limited) Theaters
The Trailer | 2 hrs 28 mins | R | 🍅: 73%
I feel like giving a singular feature to the new Black Panther - Wakanda Forever trailer. So I'm going to.
But trust that there are loads more in the full list, including:
Count 'em TWO trailers for the cannibal love story starring Timothée Chalamat, and helmed by his Call Me by Your Name director Luca Guadagnino (yes, the irony is not lost on most).
Florence Pugh getting supernatural, or not, as she watches over a young girl suspected of... being a witch? A modern fasting queen? TBD
Spoiler Alert starring Big Bang Theory's Jim Parson's. It'll be the next gay romance story to come out in theaters. Which feels a bit more weighty after the "underformance" of Bros last weekend.
As well as the second trailer for what I hope is my favorite movie of the year, The Banshees of Inisherin, a look at the Will Smith movie Apple finally decided what to do with, and an action move with David Harbour from Stranger Things as Santa Claus.
So yeah, you got some stuff to watch. Giddy up. 🐴