The first two episodes of Ahsoka dropped earlier this week, and I am not alone in thinking it could be the best Star Wars series yet. Lucasfilm and Disney are keeping the hype train going with three new character posters. Two of them feature droids who will be well-known to fans, while the villainous third is shrouded in mystery.
There are always new and popular droids emerging in the Star Wars universe, and Chopper can be counted among them. A key member of the Ghost crew in Star Wars Rebels, Chopper makes his live-action debut in Ahsoka, continuing to work alongside Hera Syndulla as she helps lead the fight against the Empire.
We also get a poster for Huyang, a Mark IV professor/architect droid who spent thousands of years teaching Jedi younglings how to construct their lightsabers. That includes Master Yoda and Mace Windu. Huyang now works directly with Ahsoka Tano after the fall of the Jedi Order.
And then there’s Marrok, the helmeted Inquisitor working with Balan Skoll and Shin Hati in their efforts to locate Grand Admiral Thrawn. Marrok is skilled with a lightsaber, and successfully battled Ahsoka at the end of the second episode. There are rumors out there that it could be someone significant under that helmet. Perhaps…Ezra Bridger? Hiding in plain sight?
Because our school’s social studies programs barely teach history anymore, some may not even know about the founding of the nation of Israel, the many troubles and wars they had to endure as a brand new nation, and how they are now a centerpiece for geopolitics in the Middle East in the present day, for good or for bad. While the State of Israel is almost always in a constant state of war readiness, in their infancy they had to deal with numerous wars with their Arab neighbors including the Arab-Israeli War, the Six-Day War, the War of Attrition, and the subject of director Guy Nattiv’s latest film Golda, the Yom Kippur War as Golda focuses on Israel’s first (and only) female Prime Minister Golda Meir as she navigates a war on all sides from Egypt and Syria.
Golda starts off with Golda Meir (Helen Mirren) facing an inquiry about possible failures of her leadership during the war, and then the audience is brought on a journey through the war from the politician while she is trying to lead her country out of a crisis. She smokes up to 70 cigarettes a day, so it’s no secret that she’s battling cancer in secret, and low and behold, a war on her country’s borders isn’t gonna help her in any way. After receiving an intelligence briefing that Syria and Egypt have amassed at their borders over a territorial dispute from the Six-Day War, she’s flung into action and must stand strong with her leadership to ensure her country’s survival.
Of course, she makes tactical mistakes at the beginning of the war, which ends up costing young soldiers their lives (hence the inquiry), and has to rely on her friendship with Henry Kissinger (Liev Schreiber) over here in the States for support, weapons, and intelligence assistance. But of course, America has its own interests (the need for oil and avoiding nuclear war with Russia if the war spreads), which creates a complicated relationship between the United States and Israel. Kinninger even says he’s a US diplomat first, then a US citizen, then a Jew when talking with Golda Meir. Ultimately as we all know, a cease-fire and peace accord was struck, which allowed Israel to be recognized as a nation-state and have relationships with Egypt and Syria, which remain to this day. We’re still working on complete Middle East Peace, but this war was a starting block.
Throughout the course of Golda, we are treated to the ins and outs of military strategy meeting with Meir and her security council as they try and launch counter-offensives, rescue fallen soldiers, and try to find a way to negotiate a peace treaty with Egypt and Syria. This makes Golda a smaller movie as we almost barely see any military action in the film. It’s very reminiscent of Thirteen Days, which focused on the strategy and politics of war instead of showing the war itself.
Golda also shows archival footage that slices the real-life participants in the conflict, but other times shows the actors in obviously false archival footage. Director Guy Nattiv should have probably stuck with either showing the “real” historical archival footage or recreated archival footage, but doing both was a mistake as it could possibly confuse the audience. While the actors all do a fine job (especially Helen Mirren who is great in everything she does), a dramatized film about these events might not have been the best choice. Either a dramatic limited series (to truly flesh out the timeline of the war and not limit it to a 100-minute film) or a good old-fashioned documentary about the events would probably work better at telling the entire story of the Yom-Kippur War.
Golda works as it helps inform the viewer about a little bit of global history, but it doesn’t hit the nail on the head in regard to being a biopic about a fascinating historical figure. Because the film is about the war and not necessarily about Meir, it doesn’t succeed at exploring either in depth. However, Helen Mirren always understands the assignment and doesn’t know how to phone it in ever. She’s captivating as Meir and elevates Golda through her performance. She allowed to bring some gravitas to a leader during wartime, faced with impossible decisions, and ultimately made the world a better place for it.
VACATION FRIENDS 2-The first Vacation Friends was a summer treat. This pathetic sequel, with the worst Rotten Tomatoes score in over a decade for John Cena, is less funny than unpaid overtime.
We often bemoan undeserving films that get sequels seemingly because the studio feels there’s supposed to be one. But Hulu had reason to want more of their surprise hit comedy, Vacation Friends, which had their biggest opening weekend audience ever for an original movie when it was released in summer 2021. And on paper, Vacation Friends 2 looks like more of the same raucous, unhinged vacay humor of the original, with John Cena, Lil Rel Howery, Meredith Hagner, and Yvonne Orji going wild.
If only that were the case. What made the first film work so well was that the chaotic comedy was kept tight on the four central characters. You’ve got straight-laced Marcus and Emily (Howery and Orji) who just want to have a relaxing trip, and the twin force hurricanes Ron and Kyla (Cena and Hagner) as nomadic free spirits who show them how to cut loose. The sequel scuttles the good vibes of that dynamic by throwing in a number of elements that simply don’t work. Extra characters, lame subplots, a baby…a baby isn’t always just death for a funny sitcom. Sometimes it’s death for a potentially funny sequel, too.
This time around, Marcus and Emily are ready for Ron and Kyla’s brand of madness. Or so they thought. Organizing a reunion trip to the Caribbean, Marcus is caught offguard that Ron and Kyla are just as immature and maddeningly inappropriate as ever, abusing the airport PA system like a couple of children. It seems that becoming parents hasn’t changed them one bit. They still drink and curse and party as hard as ever. The baby can pretty much fend for itself, right? It takes a community, right? When random folks aren’t watching the kid better than his parents, they also brought along an old friend from the first movie, hotel bellboy Maurillo (Carlos Santos), to be the babysitter.
Already the chemistry is disrupted by a lousy B-plot that finds Maurillo on a quest to find love, only to be hindered by his babysitting gig. Further getting in the way is the arrival of Steve Buscemi as Kyla’s father, a scheming criminal who appears to be the only person on the planet who doesn’t like Ron, who is just a big ol’ hard-drinking, coke-snorting teddy bear. There’s also some nonsense involving a drug kingpin (played by The Wire‘s Jamie Hector) and a missing stash of money that Kyla’s daddy is eager to find. Buscemi just throws off the energy every time he appears. He’s great in certain kinds of comedies but he doesn’t fit in Vacation Friends 2 which relies on rapid fire jokes, while he grinds things to a crawl.
The central plot is quite funny and would’ve worked on its own, as Marcus tries to strike a deal with the resort’s Korean ownership group to build a 5-star hotel. The always-funny Ronny Chieng plays one of the execs who Marcus must win over without Ron and Kyla screwing things up with their crazy antics. Meanwhile, Emily and Marcus are trying to have a baby of their own, and he’s going overboard to embarrrassing fashion to track the best time to conceive.
Cena, with untamed hair and dressed like he’s been living on a friend’s couch, is having the time of his life in this role. Ron is such a big, dumb lug and a badass (who may or may not have killed 42 people), but also a protector and loyal friend. Paired up with Hagner, they create the kinds of characters you wish you could be out there hanging out with, downing margaritas and shots hand over fist. Howery is solid, too, even though he’s meant to keep the film on an even keel rather than be swept up in Cena’s madness.
As Vacation Friends 2 spins out into helicopter explosions, shootouts, and kidnappings, there aren’t more laughs to go along with it. It’s not a lost cause, though. These characters are worth keeping around. We want to see them party and wake up the next day not knowing what happened. Keep it simple, and the next vacation we get to spend with these friends could be the best one.
The battle for control of Arrakis will have to wait until next year. Warner Bros. announced today that Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two, the second of his Frank Herbert adaptations, has been delayed until March 15th 2024. The move is largely due to the ongoing SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes, which would prevent talent from promoting the big-budget, star-studded sci-fi film.
We’ve already seen a number of major studio projects bumped out of 2023 due to the strikes, and Variety had heard rumors that Warner Bros. was considering this move.
The ripple effect will also see next year’s Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, which had been set for March 14th, instead open in theaters on April 12th.
Dune: Part Two stars Timothée Chalamet, along with Zendaya, Rebecca Ferguson, Austin Butler, Florence Pugh, Dave Bautista, Javier Bardem, and more.
Here’s the synopsis: “Dune: Part Two” will explore the mythic journey of Paul Atreides as he unites with Chani and the Fremen while on a path of revenge against the conspirators who destroyed his family. Facing a choice between the love of his life and the fate of the known universe, he endeavors to prevent a terrible future only he can foresee.
H.P. Lovecraft is an iconic horror influence, no doubt about that. Unfortunately, those films made in his honor or for which he served as inspiration don’t always hit their mark. Thankfully director Joe Lynch (Wrong Turn 2, Mayhem, The Movie Crypt Podcast) seems to have pulled from a number of places for the upcoming Suitable Flesh. Mostly, it seems to ooze the feeling of those wonderful low-rent horror films that came out in response to Halloween and Friday the 13th. You know the ones, or at least you know their VHS covers if you were a child of the 80’s like me. The films released between 80-83 with rad names and Van Wall art style covers.
Heather Graham, who is in her 50s but doesn’t look to have aged a day since the early 2000’s, stars as a psychiatrist who dives deep into dark magic and the occult to save a patient with extreme personality disorder. The film, as is evidenced by the trailer below, is being marketed as an “erotic body-swapping horror” and I’m here for it. Thankfully we don’t have to wait much longer as Shudder and Vertigo Releasing will be treating us to a dual theatrical and VOD release on October 27th, 2023. Don’t worry cheapskates, if your looking to enjoy for free Shudder will be streaming the film first thing next year, January 2024.
I’ll be honest, it’s depressing to see action stars I once liked begin to age out of doing them. Not that they ever stop, mind you; it’s just the action is diminished until eventually they aren’t doing much but sitting around while the good stuff happens around them. For Liam Neeson, who took on the role of action star later in his career, and once proclaimed that he was done with it, he’s been coasting for a while now. With Neeson’s latest, Retribution, he finally gives up in a tired thriller that barely asks him to do more than fasten his seat belt.
The film begins with an explosion, but don’t be fooled. A tremendous amount of nothing is right around the corner. Neeson plays Matt, one of those shady businessmen whose job it is to part clients from their money, whether they want to or not. He’s got a wife (Embeth Davidtz) who seems sorta checked out, a son (Avatar: The Way of Water‘s Jack Champion) who clearly hates him, and a daughter (Lily Aspell) who just wants her busy Dad’s attention. Well, she’ll soon wish he had let her take the bus to school.
During an already-tense drive, Matt gets a phone call from a mysterious stranger warning him that there’s a bomb under the car, and if he or anyone gets out, it’ll detonate. So it’s almost like the same premise from that awful Ethan Hawke/Selena Gomez flick Getaway, only worse. There’s very little tension to be found despite the combustible premise. The voice on the other end of the line doesn’t really have anything novel to say that makes him a compelling threat. Initially, it’s a bit murky whether Matt deserves what’s coming to him or not, and that is probably when the film is at its best. But this being a Neeson star vehicle, the edges are sanded off of his character pretty quickly.
There are a few explosions and lots of speeding around town, but it grows tired pretty quickly. It’s a disappointing effort from once-promising director Nimrod Antal, who directed what I feel is a pretty underrated Predators movie and the slasher film Vacancy. There just isn’t much here for a filmmaker to leave any real fingerprint. This is the kind of thing an up ‘n coming director does to get some experience.
At this point, I’d like to see Neeson return to old form and leave the action movies behind. I sorta miss rom-com Liam Neeson, or the Schindler’s List dramatic Neeson. Retribution isn’t going to make anyone happy, not even those who still like to think of him as the Taken guy. That was more than a decade ago and that particular set of skills is long gone.
Nowadays, if something becomes a viral sensation, it’s likely to be turned into a movie. That has turned out to be the case for Cat Person, based on the extraordinary Kristen Roupenian short story in The New Yorker that had everyone discussing modern dating horror stories. Susanna Fogel’s film was one of the buzz titles to emerge at Sundance earlier this year, and finally it’s ready to open in theaters to see if it’s truly the cat’s meow.
Starring CODA breakout Emilia Jones and Succession‘s Nicholas Braun, the film centers on college sophomore Margot, who goes on a date with the awkward Robert, an older man. However, the Robert she meets in real life isn’t like the guy she talked to online. For one thing, he claims to be a cat person…but where are the cats at his crib? Is he really giving off bad signals, or has Margot just been burned by sketchy dudes too often?
Fogel, who most recently helmed The Spy Who Dumped Me, directs from a script by Michelle Ashford. Others in the cast include Geraldine Viswanathan, Hope Davis, Fred Melamed, Isabella Rossellini, Michael Gandolfini, Liza Koshi, and Isaac Cole Powell.
Here’s the synopsis: When Margot, a college sophomore goes on a date with the older Robert, she finds that IRL Robert doesn’t live up to the Robert she has been flirting with over texts. Cat Person is a razor-sharp exploration of the gender divide, the quagmire of navigating modern dating and the dangerous projections we make in our minds about the person at the other end of our phones.
It takes a lot to shock me nowadays, but even I was left floored by the new trailer for Beaten to Death, one of the most brutal-looking films I’ve seen in quite a while. The Australian survival thriller from Welcome Villain Films centers on Jack, a man taking an incredible beating while his wife lay dead nearby. While he manages to survive the attack, it’s just the start of a torturous amount of punishment in his future.
The sheer amount of blood and nasty cutting weapons is what stuck with me from this footage, along with the man’s isolation and the feeling of hopelessness. I want to know what this guy did to earn such grisly violence, as we don’t really get a clue from this teaser.
Behind the camera is Sam Curtain, from a script he co-wrote with Benjamin Jung-Clarke. The cast is led by Thomas Roach, joined by David Tracy, Justan Wagner, and Nicole Tudor.
Here’s the synopsis: BEATEN TO DEATH unfolds after a desperate choice leads a man named Jack down a path that leaves him beaten and bruised as he struggles against man, nature, and his own sanity. Stranded in the middle of nowhere after barely surviving a horrific assault, Jack encounters one local after another and quickly learns that a sick game of cat and mouse is about to begin. Battling the deranged country psychos and the harsh landscape, Jack must go to extreme lengths to survive.
Beaten to Death opens in theaters on September 1st.
Talk about an embarrassment of riches. Director Garth Davis has never had a shortage of top-shelf actors for each of his films: Nicole Kidman, Rooney Mara, Dev Patel, Joaquin Phoenix, Chiwetel Ejiofor, just to name a few. And that is just for his previous films Lion and Mary Magdalene. His latest, the sci-fi thriller Foe, is no different with multi-time Oscar nominee Saoirse Ronan and Best Actor nominee Paul Mescal.
Based on the novel by Iain Reid, Foe centers on married couple Junior and Hen, who farm on a secluded patch of land and lead a seemingly quiet, unremarkable life. But secrets begin to emerge when a mysterious stranger arrives with a shocking offer.
The film also stars Aaron Pierre of the recent acclaimed drama Brother. Davis not only directed but was joined by Reid in co-writing the screenplay.
Here’s the synopsis: Academy Award nominees Saoirse Ronan and Paul Mescal star in “Foe,” a haunting exploration of marriage and identity set in an uncertain world. Hen and Junior farm a secluded piece of land that has been in Junior’s family for generations, but their quiet life is thrown into turmoil when an uninvited stranger shows up at their door with a startling proposal. Based on best-selling author Iain Reid’s novel, directed by Garth Davis, and co-written by Davis and Reid, Foe’s mesmerizing imagery and persistent questions about the nature of humanity (and artificial humanity) bring the not-too-distant future to luminous life.
Foe will have its world premiere at the New York Film Festival before hitting theaters on October 6th.
The trailer for Zack Snyder’s space epic Rebel Moon is only a few days old, and already he’s talking about a Director’s Cut. And a pretty significant one, considering the film is already split into two chapters and is being released by Netflix. So what’s the point?
Rebel Moon will arrive as two separate films: Rebel Moon: A Child of Fire hitting Netflix on December 22nd, and sequel Rebel Moon: The Scargiver on April 19th 2024. Both will have Director’s Cuts of their own, and Snyder has revealed the amount of extra footage, while giving a reason it’s needed in the first place.
“The [Rebel Moon] director’s cut is close to an hour of extra content, so I think it’s a legitimate extended universe version,” he said to Netflix. “You really get to see a lot. It’s just more painted-in all the way. The director’s [cut] is a settle-in deep dive, which I have notoriously done throughout my career. I don’t know how I got into this director’s cut thing, but what I will say about it is that, for me, the director’s cuts have always been something I had to fight for in the past and nobody wanted it. It was this bastard child that I was always trying to put together because they felt like there was a deeper version. And with Netflix, we shot scenes just for the director’s cut. So in that way, it’s really a revelation because it gives that second kick at the can for big fans, like a real discovery that they would not [otherwise] get. I’m really excited about it!”
Sounds like a gimmick to me. What’s the point of a director’s cut of a movie that fans haven’t already consumed and pondered over? Can you fix something if you don’t know it’s broken?
Anyway, you can add Rebel Moon to Snyder’s list of previous movies with extended versions: Justice League, Watchmen, Sucker Punch (with another one planned), Dawn of the Dead, and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
