So the Den of Thieves wasn’t quite as crowded the second time around. Christian Gudegast’s heist sequel starring O’Shea Jackson Jr. and Gerard Butler has made roughly half of its 2018 predecessor with $47M worldwide. However, Lionsgate is still quite happy with the franchise, and are ready to move forward with a third caper.
Lionsgate, Tucker Tooley Entertainment, and Butler’s G-BASE are moving ahead with Den of Thieves 3. Will this one have a cool location attached to its name, similar to Den of Thieves 2: Pantera? Perhaps Den of Thieves 3: Djibouti?
Jackson and Butler are expected to reprise their roles as Donnie Wilson and Detective Big Nick O’Brien, who began on opposite sides of the law but ended up working together to pull off a diamond heist in the sequel. You can read my review of the film here.
None of this should come as a surprise. Lionsgate, which had a dismal 2024, has been excited over Den of Thieves which has been one of the studio’s few homegrown hits and Gudegast a rising star. The filmmaker was ready to go on a third movie before the second one debuted, telling THR in January…
“It’s already pitched. It’s already done. We’re ready to go.”
When Chris Evans hung up his Captain America shield and exited the MCU, it was a big blow for Marvel fans. It can be argued that the MCU hasn’t been the same since, even with Anthony Mackie picking up the mantle and starring in Captain America: Brave New World. There was still a lot of excitement for Evans’ reported return in Avengers: Doomsday, not as the Cap we all know and love but possibly as Nomad. However, Evans is now throwing cold water on those reports. So what’s the truth?
Speaking with Esquire, Evans shot down hopes of his return for Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars.
“That’s not true, though,” Evans said. “This always happens. I mean, it happens every couple years—ever since ‘Endgame.’ I’ve just stopped responding to it. Yeah, no—happily retired!”
Is he telling the truth, or pulling an Andrew Garfield? With Robert Downey Jr. coming back as Doctor Doom, anything is possible at this point.
So what about Evans’ pal, Anthony Mackie, who he starred with in multiple Marvel movies? He echoed what his red, white, and blue pal had to say…
“I didn’t know!” Mackie admitted. “I talked to Chris a few weeks ago and it wasn’t on the table then. At least, he didn’t tell me it was on the table, because I asked him. I was like, ‘You know, they said they’re bringing everyone back for the movie. Are you coming back?’ He goes, ‘Oh, you know, I’m happily retired.’”
Mackie will be seen next in Captain America: Brave New World on February 14th, with Evans MAYBE showing up in Avengers: Doomsday on May 1st 2026.
Marketing a movie like Companion must be a real pain in the ass. Sure, it has a few modestly well-known actors in Jack Quaid, Sophie Thatcher, and Harvey Guillen, but none are the put-butts-in-seats type of stars. The premise is clever, too, dealing with love, romance, gender and power dynamics, with some darkly comedic action and violence with a twist that’ll stun audiences. It’s perfect for Valentine’s Day, but if you don’t spoil the surprise will audiences even care? Unfortunately, promos have given away some of the best stuff that Companion has to offer, and yet it doesn’t completely ruin a wonderfully twisted date night flick.
Jack (Quaid) and Iris (Thatcher) have what seems like the perfect relationship. They have a classic meet-cute in a grocery store (those darned oranges!) and it’s all magic from there. The couple’s banter is light and they have their own inside jokes. When Josh asks Iris the weather she quickly responds with Siri-like efficiency. So cute! They’re headed to a lake house weekend getaway with friends Kat (Megan Suri) who doesn’t like Iris much for reasons explained later, Eli (Guillen) and his boyfriend Patrick (Lukas Gage), and Kat’s wealthy Russian boyfriend Sergey (Rupert Friend).
Something doesn’t feel quite right. Sure, they’re all having a good time, dancing and drinking and what not. But Josh and Kat are being kinda shady. When Sergey starts getting too frisky with Iris, she defends herself with lethal efficiency. While the blood is still wet at the crime scene, we learn right along with Iris that she’s something other than what she appears to be. She’s a robot.
It’s unfortunate that part had to be spoiled, but it’s already out there anyway. A shame because Josh and Iris’ relationship looks fairly normal up to the reveal, and that’s telling in and of itself. Iris is a companion robot, meant to be the perfect woman. She can’t lie, be aggressive, and is everything Josh has programmed her to be. Even when he’s a bit of an asshole, she eats it right up.
But we see that Josh being an asshole is more the default for him, which might explain why he needed a sex robot in the first place. What Companion does extremely well is present this technology in a way that feels grounded and real, like something we might actually see in the future. And you know what? The prospect of that is terrifying. I’m probably more in the Kat camp in hating what robots like Iris represent. Relationships demand real work, an acceptance of the other person for all of their attributes and flaws. To have someone who has no actual faults and is just there to do as you say is probably what toxic tech bros would want but not someone who wants a meaningful relationship.
Writer/diretor Drew Hancock skillfully navigates gender roles and power dynamics, as well, while also exploring how technology such as this would get exploited. That he does all of this without making the messaging too obvious and heavy-handed is a plus. Companion shares some thematic and plot similarities with M3GAN, especially when it comes to the mix of bloodshed and comedy. Even as a robot, Iris is constantly underestimated for being female, something she becomes attuned to as she grows in self-awareness. None of the kills are particularly gruesome, but the body count is higher than expected and shot well by Hellraiser DP Eli Born.
It’s back-to-back textured, complex performances by Thatcher, following her recent role in Heretic. As Iris, she’s asked to take on a lot of conflicting emotions while experiencing the wonder of new discovery. Iris loves Josh, she was programmed to love him, but she’s also beginning to realize that love hurts…a lot. “It feels like pain”, she says, discovering that her emerging sentience has emotional consequences she’s not yet ready for.
Quaid has done a good job of veering as far away as possible from the nice guy role he plays on The Boys by taking on characters with a darker edge. He’s an actor who is so charming and likeable that when he plays heel, it hits pretty hard, just like his performance in Scream. I was also impressed by Gage and the Terminator vibes he gives off as Patrick. It’s another solid horror role for Gage following Smile 2.
It does feel like Hancock is holding something back. Companion isn’t nearly as crazy as it could be given the plot, and it’s possible that’s being held for a potential sequel. The best advice I can give going into Companion is to steer clear of trailers if you can. I’ve tried to maintain some of the mystery here, but this is definitely a movie that is better the less you know going in. If that’s not possible, go see it anyway. With its mix of romance, humor, and violence from a talented ensemble, there’s nothing robotic about fun you’ll have!
If I Had Legs I’d Kick You pulverizes you with stress for 113 minutes and doesn’t let up until the credits roll. It’s an ironic description, considering many have described motherhood in the same way. Mary Bronstein’s second feature, takes an Uncut Gems approach to parenting (Benny Safdie produced this film), showing her audiences the dark side of the “most natural job in the world.”
Rose Byrne plays Linda, a therapist and mother of an unnamed child with debilitating eating aversions that keep her out of school and in an outpatient treatment center. Her husband is gone on a two-month work trip, all too happy to be absent and to criticize her over the phone. With her daughter’s progress declining and the program’s doctors riding her, there’s not much more Linda can handle. Of course, if Bronstein obliged her character’s needs we wouldn’t have much of a film.
When the mother and daughter duo come home one day, they find the house has flooded due to an enormous and ominous hole looming over the primary bedroom’s ceiling. Resigned to a seedy beachside hotel, Linda takes the time while her child is sleeping to drink, smoke, and ignore her troubles away. She will leave her child in the middle of the night to check on the house repairs or to get a break. While at the motel, she deals with a young judgemental goth receptionist (Ivy Wolk) and the friendly maintenance man (A$AP Rocky) who eventually joins in on her drug fuel escapes.
Because her husband (Christian Slater) is so absent and her daughter so demanding, Linda receives daily therapy from a colleague in the same office. Conan O’Brien is impeccably perfect in this role. He’s droll yet caring, a rule follower who checks in despite boundaries being crossed. If this role is any indication, the former talk late-night host could have a similar dramatic career to Robin Williams if he wanted — he’s that good. His character is so by the book and Linda so opposed to doing the actual work, that an increasingly hostile relationship evolves between the two of them.
Rose Bryne has never been better. She is the Energizer Bunny of If I Had Legs. She does not stop and is totally game for whatever Bronstein throws at her. The entire film rides on her shoulders and she not only meets the challenge but gives Linda the grace an audience needs to be on her side. Her performance is a great argument for compelling unlikeable female characters because of the relatability and humanity she brings to the role.
If I Had Legs I’d Kick You will be compared to the prickly motherhood films that came before it, from The Lost Daughter to last year’s underrated Nightbitch. While they share similar themes, none are as unrelenting and brutal. I wouldn’t want to watch this while pregnant or even with a toddler. While a tense ride, it doesn’t let you know how Bronstein plans to land the plane leading you to wonder where it is going. Luckily, the film is so unrelenting that the rushed slightly unsatisfied ending doesn’t leave a mark.
If I Had Legs I’d Kick Youpremiered at the Sundance Film Festival. It will be released by A24, most likely this year.
Flying Lotus is already a Grammy Award-winning musician, record producer, DJ and composer, but the multi-talented artist is beginning to make a splash a filmmaker. Following the weird experimental film Kuso and the Ozzy’s Dungeon segment of V/H/S/99, Flying Lotus is embarking on the biggest project yet, the sci-fi thriller Ashstarring Eiza González (Hit Man) and Aaron Paul (Breaking Bad).
With Ash set to hit theaters in March, a new trailer has been released. Flying Lotus aka Steven Ellison directs and scores his sophomore effort, which centers on a woman who wakes up on a distant planet to find that the entire crew of her space station have been murdered. Now she must decide who can be trusted, including the man sent to save her.
Also in the cast are Iko Uwais, Kate Elliott, Beulah Koale, and Flying Lotus himself.
Ash will have its world premiere at SXSW, followed by a theatrical release on March 21st by RLJE Films.
Synopsis: On the mysterious planet of Ash, Riya (González) awakens to find her crew slaughtered. When a man named Brion (Paul) arrives to rescue her, an ordeal of psychological and physical terror ensues while Riya and Brion must decide if they can trust one another to survive.
A newly married couple is detained in a small European country’s police station. It doesn’t seem like they’ve been there long. They seem like every other American couple, talking about their neighbors and dreaming of tropical vacations. As a one-eyed officer comes in, you realize they are being questioned for smuggling — not drugs — but cabbages. The officer (Steven Yeun) explains that because the vegetable was the only thing its citizens could eat during a recent war, they have outlawed it due to psychological torment. As he walks the couple through the punishment for smuggling a cabbage (including paperwork, a fine, fingertips being cut off, and the offender being shot), they insist that he must be mistaken and the American couple they are looking for cannot possibly be them. When the officer leaves to bring back the man who will start the process, the couple argue about whether they should escape through an unlocked window. As the husband insists that they should, the wife refuses to move. When she finally does, she stands to reveal her pants are filled with small lumps.
If this premise sounds absurd to you, it’s supposed to be. Written and directed by first-time director Evan Twohy, Bubble & Squeak follows said newlywed couple, Delores (Barry’s Sarah Goldberg) and Declan (Yesterday’s Himesh Patel), as they try to flee the country and evade Shazbor (a fun yet underused Matt Berry from What We Do In The Shadows), the obsessed tyrannical head of the police force hellbent on catching them. Along the way, Delores starts questioning their relationship as they meet creepy children, other cabbage smugglers, and a stingy nun.
Twohy knows how to make a movie. Inspired by Wes Anderson, Yorgos Lanthimos, and even Taika Waititi, he thrives on color, symmetry, and visual comedy. The costume design is whimsical yet practical for their time in the woods. Editing, done by Sara Shaw is tight and fast paste. The score, composed by relative newcomer Brad Oberhofer, is the best thing about the film bringing a menacing frivolity to the action.
What Twohy lacks that the aforementioned directors have is an emotional throughline. Not only does Bubble & Squeak lack that, but its absurdity prevents any real character growth from happening. Both Delores, despite Goldberg’s earnest delivery, and Declan feel one note. These characters are almost too grating to spend 97 minutes with. This is solidified in the epilogue, the only scene set in America, where any resolution created in the final act is undone.
The production value is there. Twohy clearly has a developed visual style that is rare for a first-time filmmaker. A former playwright, maybe Bubble & Squeak would work better on the stage? With all of the care that went into it, you’d think a cohesive story would be smuggled into the plot.
Bubble & Squeak premiered at Sundance and competed in the U.S. Dramatic Competition. It has yet to be picked up by a distributor.
Two actors known for playing iconic villains are coming face-to-face in Locked. Anthony Hopkins channels his Hannibal Lecter performance in the film as he squares off against Bill Skarsgard, known for his chilling role as Pennywise the Clown.
Locked is directed by David Yarovesky best known for the Gunn brothers’ dark Superman thriller, Brightburn. The screenplay is by Turistas writer Michael Arlen Ross, with Sam Raimi as a producer.
The film stars Skarsgard as Eddie, a down-on-his-luck thief who breaks into the wrong luxury SUV and finds that it is a well-orchestrated trap laid by Hopkins’ self-professed vigilante, William, who has a thing about good manners and people not stealing things. That would be rude.
So how much damage can William do to Eddie from the inside of a car? Quite a lot, as you’ll see in the footage. Air conditioner as deadly weapon? Sure, why not.
The Avenue will release Locked in theaters on March 21st.
SYNOPSIS: From producer Sam Raimi (Evil Dead, Drag Me to Hell) comes a relentless horror-thriller where luxury becomes deadly. When Eddie (Bill Skarsgård) breaks into a luxury SUV, he steps into a deadly trap set by William (Anthony Hopkins), a self-proclaimed vigilante delivering his own brand of twisted justice. With no means of escape, Eddie must fight to survive in a ride where escape is an illusion, survival is a nightmare, and justice shifts into high gear.
Eddie Murphy is eager to jump back into the action, following last year’s long-awaited release of Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F. Deadline reports Murphy will star in Blue Falcon, an action-comedy from London Has Fallen writer Chad St. John.
Sony Pictures acquired the script by St. John that centers on a retired superspy who goes to his estranged son’s destination wedding, and ends up squaring off with his archenemy.
Blue Falcon is still in need of a director so it’s still in the early stages of development. Along with London Has Fallen, St. John was the writer of action flick Peppermint, and the Keanu Reeves sci-fi film Replicas. Next for him is the Alan Ritchson/Shailene Woodley actioner Motor City.
Murphy has a lot on his plate. He’s got a reunion with Dreamgirls director Bill Condon for a biopic of Parliament Funkadelic’s George Clinton. He’ll also return as the voice of Donkey in Shrek 5. A big part of Murphy’s comeback has been reprising his most popular roles with the occasional family comedy. Blue Falcon doesn’t seem to fit in either camp at this point. Don’t be surprised if the film ends up at Netflix or Amazon, streamers Murphy has a good working relationship with.
Sundance is often a place of experimentation, and that’s one of the great things about it. The quite experimental sci-fi romance Love Me was one of the most intriguing titles at the festival because the premise is so out there: a buoy and a satellite fall in love. Okay, how’s that work? And why does the promo image feature beautiful, and very human, stars Kristen Stewart and Steven Yeun? The answer is the problem. First-time filmmakers Sam & Andy Zuchero take a home run swing with an ambitious post-apocalyptic romance that never reaches the emotional heights or originality the filmmakers believe they have achieved.
Let’s get the praise out of the way first because there’s some good stuff to say about Love Me. Technically, this is a marvel of production for an indie film, utilizing multiple mediums including motion capture, animation, and live-action, and it all looks studio quality. Even the score is sweeping and romantic, whisking the audience across eons and into a rollercoaster romantic relationship. Sam & Andy suggested that movies like this will be the way of the future, and maybe that’s true on a visual front, but storytelling still matters and that’s where this film gets a failing grade.
In a clever sequence that reminds of Pixar’s Wall-E, we see the creation of our galaxy and that of Earth itself. Rapidly sprinting across millions of years, we see the Big Bang, the arrival of humans and the world today, then another flash, humanity is wiped out, then an Ice Age. It all happens in seconds and it’s pretty funny. Then, the sun returns. An ice thaw reveals a digital smart buoy (voiced by Stewart) that is eager to find something to communicate with. Looking into the sky, it sees a satellite (Yeun) tasked as a storage space for all of humanity’s collective knowledge. The satellite’s main charge is to inform any lifeform it encounters about Earth and what happened to humanity.
Desperate to not be alone anymore, the buoy reaches out to the satellite and their initial conversations through broken digital dialect is one of the movie’s cutest aspects, a rom-com of broken ones and zeroes. But the buoy misrepresents itself in order to trick the satellite, using the social media videos of vapid influencer Deja (also Stewart) to create an entirely new persona. The buoy is now Me, and the satellite slowly begins to accept its role as I am, a digital version of Deja’s real boyfriend Liam (Yeun). Drawn into a virtual world that replicates the couple’s apartment, they begin sharing a “life” together, crafting Blue Apron recipes for an audience that doesn’t exist, planning “Date Nights” that don’t actually lead to anyplace. Over the course of thousands of quesadilla nights, ice cream desserts, and episodes of Friends, they begin to act out the contours of a real human relationship. And as humans, we know that those happy moments aren’t forever. Eventually, he begins to bristle at the tight constraints of their union, while Me is unsure, knowing herself to be a fraud who is only playing at being human. If I am evolves, he’ll learn that Me is really just a buoy floating out in the water all by itself, with little to offer. Eventually, things get so awful that a split has to occur, giving both sides time to discover who they truly are without the other. We’ve all been there, right?
There are aspects of Love Me that feel shockingly real and true, and others that are like a thought experiment gone awry. Its commentary about our social media age and the corrosive effect it has on our sense of self is scattershot at best, and also feels strangely out of date? But the film also goes off on wildly uninteresting tangents, like when I am discovers how to create water (a lot of this stuff is never explained; shit just happens) and goes on a taste-testing binge. Enraged breakdowns allow both Stewart and Yeun to scream a lot, cry a lot, and dance a lot, but they don’t add anything substantive or say anything truly original. A big problem with the film is that, despite its unique premise, the romantic conflict has been done before and done better elsewhere. Strip out the sci-fi elements, the buoy and the satellite stuff, and what you have is one person whose lack of self worth leads to controlling behavior, and another who struggles to break free from it. Ultimately, the filmmakers have put a lot of the burden of blame on Me, which makes her grand epiphany hollow and unearned.
There are some interesting avenues that could’ve been explored to greater depth, such as humanity’s lasting legacy and impact. Me figures out who she wants to be by exploring Youtube videos, searching through Google, and more. What she finds is a wildly complex humanity that does everything for show, to get Likes and Follows. In a funny little exchange, the buoy and satellite try to impress one another with memes, in order to secure the only Like they could ever achieve from the other. When the satellite, saddened that the buoy didn’t offer a Like to his silly meme of a dog with a Cheetos bag on its head, it says “You didn’t like it, so you don’t like me.”
Love Me offers another challenge for Stewart and Yeun, two actors who have made taking on challenging roles a common thing. Both show vulnerable sides to themselves here, and occasionally have moments that burn raw with passion drawn from a personal place. Ultimately, they aren’t the film’s problem. It feels like a great idea for a short that people might’ve actually loved, but grew out of control into a curious experimental failure.
Bleecker Street releases Love Me in theaters on January 31st.
*This review was originally part of our Sundance 2024 coverage.*
Released in 1993, Ang Lee’s The Wedding Banquet was an Oscar nominee for Best Foreign Language Film, but it was also a culturally significant film for its depiction of the LGBTQ community. So much so that in 2023 it was added to the Library of Congress for its cultural significance. But like all things, it could use an update for a new generation. Earlier this week at the Sundance Film Festival, a new version of The Wedding Banquet had its world premiere, led by stars Bowen Yang, Lily Gladstone, and Kelly Marie Tran.
Directed by Andrew Ahn (Driveways, Fire Island) and co-written by Ahn and James Schamus, The Wedding Banquet‘s plot is mostly the same although some of the characters have been tweaked. Yang plays a gay man in need of a green card, with Gladstone as the lesbian woman who marries him for the financial support. When his grandmother shows up and disrupts their plan for a secret wedding, all hilarity ensues.
Also in the cast are Han Gi-Chan, Joan Chen, and Youn Yuh-Jung. Ahn and Yang worked together previously on Fire Island. This is a chance to see the SNL star in a more dramatic role than we’ve seen before. Gladstone, best known for her Oscar-nominated performance in Killers of the Flower Moon, is also taking on a role that’s different from what we’ve seen from her thus far.
Bleecker Street will release The Wedding Banquet in theaters on April 18th.
From Director Andrew Ahn comes a joyful comedy of errors about a chosen family navigating the disasters and delights of family expectations, queerness, and cultural identity. Angela and her partner Lee have been unlucky with their IVF treatments, but can’t afford to pay for another round. Meanwhile their friend Min, the closeted scion of a multinational corporate empire, has plenty of family money but a soon-to-expire student visa. When his commitment-phobic boyfriend Chris rejects his proposal, Min makes the offer to Angela instead: a green card marriage in exchange for funding Lee’s IVF. But their plans to quietly elope are upended when Min’s skeptical grandmother flies in from Korea unannounced, insisting on an all-out wedding extravaganza.
