Movies

Subterms

    More stories

    • 150 Shares169 Views

      in Movies

      ‘The 2024 Oscar Nominated Short Films’ Review: Small Running Times, Large Themes

      by

      Many of this year’s films take a darker turn, but there is some levity among the bunch.The Oscar-nominated short films are being presented in three programs: live action, animation and documentary. Each program is reviewed below by a separate critic.Live ActionWhatever your takeaways from the live action section of this year’s Oscar-nominated short films, a good laugh is unlikely to be among them. Suicide, abortion, bereavement, discoloring corpses — they’re all here, in a deluge of downers that only the Danes (and, depending on your tolerance for extreme preciousness, Wes Anderson) can be trusted to alleviate.Those Danes, though! In Lasse Lyskjer Noer’s magnificently morbid comedy, “Knight of Fortune,” two grieving widowers bond over toilet paper and the trauma of viewing a loved one whose flesh — as warned by a pair of ghoulish mortuary attendants — might be the color of a banana. Although, bathed in the sickly spill of the morgue’s fluorescents, no one’s complexion here is exactly glowing.If “Knight of Fortune” is a gentle nudge to the ribs, Misan Harriman’s “The After” is a two-by-four to the gut — and not in a good way. Trafficking in the kind of forced sentiment that can break you out in hives, this handsomely shot movie, featuring a garment-rending David Oyelowo, follows a London ride-share driver in the wake of a shocking personal tragedy. A trite, bullying soundtrack herds us toward the histrionic climax of a film that doesn’t trust us to get there on our own.More restrained, and infinitely more resonant, “Invincible” observes the final 48 hours in the life of a 14-year-old boy (Léokim Beaumier-Lépine) as he struggles to corral his emotions and earn release from a center for troubled youth. The acting is impressive and the direction (by Vincent René-Lortie, drawing from a painful real-life memory) is bold and intuitive. Subtly intimate photography by Alexandre Nour Desjardins does much to enhance a movie that understands when it comes to emotions, less is often more.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 88 Shares149 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Monolith’ Review: Friend of the Pod People

      by

      Lily Sullivan plays a podcaster investigating a supernatural mystery in this thriller from Matt Vesely.In “Monolith,” a single-setting thriller from the Australian director Matt Vesely, a recently disgraced investigative journalist attempts to salvage her career by accepting an ignoble and humiliating task: starting a podcast. She calls it “Beyond Believable,” and it’s a sort of spooky true-crime show about stranger-than-fiction mysteries — or rather, as she confesses in a moment of frustration, a “clickbait podcast” for listeners with “I.Q. levels below a lobotomized monkey.”It’s a far cry from her broadsheet glory days, but the juicy intrigue of a big scoop proves seductive. When she lands on a story that involves mass hallucinations, bizarre artifacts and (possibly) alien body snatchers, she and her audience become obsessed. How far she will go to pursue that obsession is the driving force of the film.Lily Sullivan plays this unnamed reporter with cagey, harried intensity, and she is more than capable of carrying this one-woman show. (The only other characters are voices on the phone.) Vesely makes good use of the single location — a large, sparely furnished modernist house in the Adelaide Hills of Australia — and he derives much tension from mundane things, such as a murky bathtub and slow-moving automatic curtains. The film is most effective when at its most granular, as Sullivan’s character carefully splices snippets of audio recordings and pores over research materials, scenes strongly reminiscent of Michelangelo Antonioni’s “Blow-Up” and Brian De Palma’s “Blow Out.”But “Monolith” becomes harder to take seriously as the drama escalates, especially when Sullivan, finding herself in danger, charges on with an impassioned plea: “I have to continue this podcast!”MonolithRated R for strong language, frightening situations and some disturbing podcasting. Running time: 1 hour 34 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on most major platforms. More

    • 75 Shares149 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Onlookers’ Review: Portraits of Picture Takers

      by

      This experimental nonfiction feature from Kimi Takesue aims to reflect on travel and tourism in Laos, but offers few striking images.A tourist in extreme long shot snaps a selfie in front of what looks like a mud-covered temple. A procession of monks shown in depth traverses a narrow bridge. Four people, accompanied by a dog, sit on low stools by a roadside, not paying much attention to one another or to the passing motorcycle traffic.That last image is rhymed at the end. The roughly 70 minutes of Kimi Takesue’s “Onlookers,” filmed in Laos, consist of found tableaus like these. It is a movie about travel in which the camera never moves. Some shots center on obvious visitors, others on apparent locals and still others on both. Takesue eschews context, and there is almost no audible dialogue. Rather, the director puts viewers in the position of interlopers — making them wonder whether a woman is hitting a gong correctly, or why an open-air lounge is showing reruns of “Friends.”The simplest way to look at this experimental nonfiction feature is as a consideration of tourism, a role that moviegoers often occupy themselves. Not infrequently, “Onlookers” consists of pictures of other people taking pictures. And even when Takesue’s camera — she’s credited with direction, producing, cinematography, sound and editing — isn’t actively looking at outsiders, it retains a detached outsider’s gaze.It also doesn’t capture much that is interesting. Ziplining and tubing episodes notwithstanding, the film does not contain much in the way of incident. And despite the exoticized location, “Onlookers” offers surprisingly few striking images. This is a concept in search of a movie, and an academic exercise that doesn’t give observers much to work with.OnlookersNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 12 minutes. In theaters. More

    • 113 Shares159 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Land of Bad’ Review: Tech Ops in the Jungle

      by

      Fighters on the ground, assisted by drone pilots, including Russell Crowe, half a world away — in Las Vegas.From a U.S. military installation in the Sulu Sea — where, a title card tells the viewer, “We are in a war … we just don’t know it” — soldiers board a chopper to execute a “sterilized op” (contemporary lingo for “secret mission”). The soldiers are played by a couple of Hemsworth brothers; a onetime Face of Reebok, Ricky Whittle; and a pumped-up Milo Ventimiglia. Their backup is a couple of drone pilots half a world away, providing lethal firepower from the comfort of Las Vegas.“Land of Bad,” directed by William Eubank from a script he wrote with David Frigerio, is commendable in the abstract for depicting the realities of 21st-century warfare both narratively and thematically: Its settings include a jungle and gnarly underground jails. “At the end of the day,” Whittle’s character says, in the jungle, “when tech fails, it all comes down to one very simple thing — man killing man.” He then welcomes a rookie soldier to “the land of bad.” What the squad subsequently encounters feels like several strains of global terrorism reconfigured into a jingoistic theme park.The former action star Russell Crowe plays Reaper, a drone guy at the other end of the soldiers’ communications devices. He’s not only fighting to keep this squad alive after the mission goes upside down, but to convince indifferent upper brass to pay attention.Moments presumably conceived to create suspense, like Reaper’s stop at a grocery store late in the picture, merely contribute to its longueurs. When Reaper, trying to keep a seemingly stranded soldier’s spirits up, recounts his career trajectory (“The Air Force found my responses to authority were not normal”), he doesn’t sound so much like Tom Cruise’s Maverick in an alternate universe as he does Robert Hayes boring a fellow passenger to death in “Airplane!”Land of BadRated R for language and violence. Running time: 1 hour 50 minutes. In theaters. More

    • 113 Shares99 Views

      in Movies

      ‘God & Country’ Review: One Nation, Under the Cross

      by

      Dan Partland’s blunt documentary follows the rise of Christian nationalist voters and argues that they threaten pluralism and democracy.The separation of church and state is a foundational principle of the United States, but as Dan Partland’s ominous documentary “God & Country” argues, a daunting portion of the country’s Christian voters may not hold this truth to be self-evident.Partland, who directed the 2020 documentary “#Unfit: The Psychology of Donald Trump,” draws upon Katherine Stewart’s book “The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism” for his new film.“God & Country” describes the growing threat to democracy posed by voters who subscribe to the belief that the United States is above all a Christian nation and that this should influence policies on abortion, public education, immigration, and so on. The film’s insights about the role of religion in politics feel especially well-informed because many of its commentators draw on their own personal and professional experiences with the Christian church. They’re believers, too, and they’re worried.The historian Kristin Kobes Du Mez; the pastor Rob Schenck; Reza Aslan, the author of “Beyond Fundamentalism”; and David French, an Opinion columnist for The New York Times, all discuss the ways in which this movement can threaten political and civic life.The rise of Donald J. Trump as a presidential candidate and his subsequent term in office galvanized antidemocratic attitudes in the country, and in the film the former president is likened to a fire-and-brimstone televangelist. A pocket history lesson charts how televangelists grew in power in the 1970s and ’80s, opportunistically using wedge issues such as abortion for conservative political goals.The film’s format can be blunt, cutting between unsettling talking head interviews and clips of crowds cheering on Christian leaders at politically charged events or conservative politicians making brash proclamations. But rather than come off solely as a grim forecast, the film presents possible alternatives for the country, most notably from the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, the minister and social activist who offers a voice of hope and inclusivity that feels genuinely healing.God & CountryRated PG-13. Running time: 1 hour 30 minutes. In theaters. More

    • 113 Shares179 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Poor Things’ Choreographer Uses Dance to Tell the Story

      by

      Constanza Macras, founder of the Berlin dance company DorkyPark, uses “dance as a function, as a language,” in her work, be it for the stage or the screen.“I have become the thing I hated, the grasping succubus of a lover,” sulks Duncan Wedderburn, the charming rake played by Mark Ruffalo in a scene set in a belle epoque Lisbon restaurant midway through Yorgos Lanthimos’s “Poor Things,” which is nominated for 11 awards at Sunday’s EE British Academy Film Awards, known as the BAFTAs.Bella Baxter, the film’s heroine played by Emma Stone, doesn’t seem to hear him. She is captivated by the rhythmic thump-thump-thump of the orchestra serenading the dinner guests. As if possessed, she follows the beat to the dance floor, where she lets loose with a joyous, primitive and sublimely wacky dance that has become one of the year’s defining screen moments.For Constanza Macras, the film’s choreographer, that scene was about more than just having fun. “It’s a moment that defines the relationship,” explained Macras, 53, who hails from Argentina and is based in Berlin.Macras noted that “what is great about Yorgos is that dance is a ‘pivot moment’ in his movies.”Schore Mehrdju“It’s the moment that she starts to go free from Duncan,” Macras said of Stone’s character — a woman reanimated with the brain of her unborn infant. Duncan has whisked her on a trip around the world in the hopes of debauching her.Instead, the Lothario finds that he can’t keep up with her in the bedroom or, as the scene under discussion reveals, on the dance floor. When Duncan leaps to his feet as well, he tries to save the situation and assert his control. “He’s trying to constrain her, he’s trying to show her how to dance normally,” Macras said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 75 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      Jaime King Is On a Journey

      by

      Jaime King had been feeling that something was off. “There’s this strange, volatile energy,” the actress, director and model said on a recent Saturday. She perched on the hearth of a fireplace at her home in Los Angeles, knees to her chest, gaze flitting between the fire and the view beyond a sliding-glass door. “If I’m not looking at you, it’s because I’m listening,” she said to a reporter.“I was nervous earlier, and then I was like, shaky, and then I was like, whoa, what is this vibration?”The premiere of her latest film, “Lights Out,” in which she plays a morally corrupt police officer, might have had something to do with her apprehension. Ms. King, a self-described introvert, was about to embark on a promotional blitz that would take her from the hillsides of Hollywood to the scrum of New York.“Socially speaking, I don’t really go a lot of places,” she said. “Once in a blue moon, I’ll go to the Bungalows,” meaning San Vicente Bungalows, the members-only club that has replaced the Soho House as L.A.’s premier venue for people of means. Besides that, “I’ve been keeping my circle very tight.”As a teenage model for labels like Christian Dior and Chanel, Ms. King, now 44, graced the covers of magazines, including a 1996 cover story for The New York Times Magazine called “James Is a Girl,” by Jennifer Egan and photographed by Nan Goldin.Ms. King choosing a card from Angie Banicki, a publicist turned tarot reader. “I’m used to doing readings where I have to bring the other person into it,” said Ms. Banicki. “But I came in, and the portal was open.”Damien Maloney for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 113 Shares179 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Wham!’ Documentary Had an Unusual Choice for a Director

      by

      The director Chris Smith was not a fan of the ’80s pop band when he decided to take on the project about George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley.Two young Londoners — one of Greek Cypriot origin, the other of Egyptian descent — set up a pop band in the 1980s that goes on to sell more than 30 million records. They break up several years later, at the pinnacle of their fame, when the two hit the ripe old age of 23.That, in a nutshell, is the story of Wham!, the British pop duo, and its two stars, George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley. It’s a story that the director Chris Smith tells in a Netflix documentary, which is nominated in Sunday’s EE British Academy Film Awards, known as the BAFTAs.Other contenders in the documentary category include “Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie,” about the actor’s battle with Parkinson’s disease; and “American Symphony,” a year in the life of the musician Jon Batiste.Smith previously directed the Emmy-nominated 2019 documentary “Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened,” about a fraudulent music festival that landed its organizer in jail.Two years earlier, he directed “Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond,” on the making of the 1999 movie “Man on the Moon,” in which Jim Carrey played the entertainer Andy Kaufman.Smith said that he was approached to shoot “Wham!” by its producers. There is no narrator: The tale is told using documentary footage of the duo during their career, paired with audio excerpts from interviews with the two pop stars themselves, which are voiced over — Michael died in 2016 at 53.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More