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      Frank Miller Sues Widow of Comics Magazine Editor for the Return of Artworks

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      Two of Miller’s original drawings that were used in 1980s issues of David Anthony Kraft’s magazine Comics Interview were gifts, Kraft’s wife says. Miller says they were not.The comic writer and artist Frank Miller is suing the widow and the estate of a comics magazine founder over two pieces of promotional art he created that she was trying to sell at auction. The art, which appeared on covers of David Anthony Kraft’s magazine Comics Interview in the 1980s, includes an early depiction of Batman and a female Robin — from the 1986 The Dark Knight Returns series — and is potentially a valuable collectible.The lawsuit seeks the return of the Batman piece, which was used on the cover of Comics Interview No. 31 in 1986, as well as art depicting the title character of Miller’s 1983 Ronin series. He had sent both to Kraft for his use in the publication; the Ronin artwork was used as the cover of Comics Interview No. 2 in 1983. Miller contended in the court papers that he and Kraft agreed they were on loan, citing “custom and usage in the trade at the time,” and that he made repeated requests for their return.But Kraft’s widow, Jennifer Bush-Kraft, disagreed with Miller’s assertions. “My husband kept all his correspondence,” she said in a phone interview. “When I say all of it, I don’t know if you can comprehend the level of meticulousness. He bound all of this correspondence by year, by name and in alphabetical order by company.”When the question was raised about demands before 2022 to return the artwork, she said, she searched her husband’s files and found no such requests.Silenn Thomas, the chief executive of Frank Miller Ink, said in an email that Miller would not comment on the ongoing legal matter. The lawsuit, which was first reported by Law360, was filed on Monday in the Gainesville division of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.Bush-Kraft said she believed that Miller had gifted the art to Kraft. “If it was not given, David would have given it back,” she said. (Another promotional piece by Miller, for his Sin City comic, was used by Kraft in the 1990s, and was returned, he said in the lawsuit.)“He wouldn’t have ruined the relationship with someone he would potentially work with in the future,” she continued. “He certainly wouldn’t have ruined his relationship” with DC Comics, which published The Dark Knight Returns and Ronin. The art was created for promotional use, she said, and it was common practice for Kraft to keep those types of pieces.The dispute started in the spring, and in May, a lawyer for Miller sent a cease-and-desist letter after Miller learned of a potential sale of the works on Comic Connect, an online auction house devoted to comics and pop culture memorabilia, saying he had given them to Kraft as a loan and expected their return after a period of time.A lawyer representing Metropolis Collectibles, a sister company of Comic Connect, wrote in response that “the actual, relevant ‘custom in the trade at the time’ was that comic artists would give — not loan — artworks to Mr. Kraft and other comic publishers in the hopes that publishers such as Mr. Kraft would use the artwork in their publications and thereby provide publicity and exposure to the artist and their work.” The lawyer also wrote that because Miller was only just now demanding the artwork be returned, decades later, his request might be untimely because of the expiration of the statute of limitations and under other theories.But Miller, in the court filing, wrote that he and his publisher had sought the return of the works directly and indirectly since the 1980s, and that they believed the works were lost. Miller is seeking damages for the value of the works “in an amount, exceeding $75,000, to be determined at trial.”The sale of the artwork could be lucrative: In June, the cover of Issue No. 1 of The Dark Knight Returns was auctioned for $2.4 million. In 2011, a page from Issue No. 3 of the series that showed the older Batman and Carrie Kelley — then a new, female Robin — mid-leap over the Gotham City skyline, sold for $448,125.“I can’t afford to go to court and I can’t afford not to go to court,” Bush-Kraft said. “I’m just one person. I’m not Frank Miller. I don’t have a company.”Currently, neither Miller nor Bush-Kraft is in possession of the art; Bush-Kraft had given it to Comic Connect ahead of the auction, which had been planned for June. (Both works were pulled from the auction before it started.)“We will let the court decide who owns the pieces, and in the meantime we are retaining possession,” said Stephen Fishler, the chief executive of Comic Connect and Metropolis Collectibles. More

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      ‘Inu-oh’ Review: Dazzling Anime Meets Medieval Epic

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      This modern riff on “The Tale of the Heike,” from 14th-century Japan, takes some confusing turns. But the animation is undeniably wonderful.Visually sumptuous and narratively tangled, the anime “Inu-oh” takes place in 14th-century Japan. The main story does, at least. It tells of two young, audaciously talented castaways — a blind musician and a cursed dancer — who meet one dark evening. After the usual how-do-you-do, they begin performing for each other and quickly slide into enchanted sync. Together, they frolic and jam and whirl, and before long they’re levitating, gyrating against an expanse of shimmery stars as they orbit each other like heavenly bodies.It’s fitting that these characters meet on a bridge, given that the movie spans past and present, reality and fantasy. It’s based on a novel, “The Tale of the Heike: The Inu-oh Chapters,” by the Japanese writer Hideo Furukawa that riffs on “The Tale of the Heike,” a foundational medieval epic about clans engaged in civil war. A font of innumerable interpretations, the original tale reaches a climax with the battle of Dan-no-Ura, during which the Heike clan is defeated, the child emperor drowned and a sacred imperial sword lost. That sword pops up periodically in “Inu-oh” — but good luck understanding why.What the sword — which at times drips blood — has to do with our two whirling strangers isn’t altogether clear. Those who’ve read Furukawa’s novel, which doesn’t seem to have been translated into English, may have no issue tracking the movie’s labyrinthine turns, its time shifts, storytelling elisions and fantastical flourishes. After the first hour or so and having forgotten much of the (confusing!) introductory exposition, I gave up trying to fit the pieces together. Instead, I just grooved along on the often-spectacular animation, savoring its watery hues, vivid character designs and recurrent, galvanizing embrace of near-abstraction.The director Masaaki Yuasa (“Ride Your Wave”) opens “Inu-oh” with a great whoosh of images that announce his visual ambitions and give you little time to establish your bearings. After a short, vivid sprint across time, the story settles on Tomona (voiced by Mirai Moriyama), a boy who lives in a fishing village with his parents. One day, two royal emissaries commission Tomona’s father to dive for a mysterious treasure. It goes disastrously wrong; the father is killed and Tomona blinded. He leaves home but soon finds a calling, becoming a biwa (lute) player and eventually meeting the stranger on the bridge.That would be Inu-oh (Avu-chan, from the rock band Queen Bee), and his background adds complications. A pariah born with severe deformities, including an arm that’s longer than his coltish legs — when he runs, it trails him as perilously as Isadora Duncan’s scarf — Inu-oh hides his face under a gourd mask. He also speaks with an adenoidal whine and scrambles about with feverish agility that evolves into a kind of superpower after he and Tomona meet. Together, they hit the road and refine their talents: Inu-oh becomes a performing sensation and Tomona a proto-rocker, complete with squealing biwa and admirers.Given the attention Yuasa lavishes on these passages, it’s clear that he loves the idea of 14th-century performers rocking out like modern-day arena gods. If nothing else, these interludes have a storytelling clarity and directness that’s otherwise lacking here. (The script is by Akiko Nogi.) Certainly it’s amusing to watch Tomona jam: He plays his biwa behind his head à la Jimi Hendrix (to be clear, the resemblance is strictly gestural), whips around his luxurious mane and bares his chest, lathering up the crowd. Yet while in time the performances reveal truths about the players and their lives, they rapidly grow tiresome.Still, sometimes beauty is enough (or almost). And “Inu-oh” is often visually arresting, starting with an early interlude that, with its washes of color, delicate figures, negative space and lateral movements, looks like an animated scroll painting. This sequence, like the rest of the movie, retains a strong trace of the human hand and shows a deep grasp of (and pleasure in) the medium’s plasticity, all of which are too often absent in contemporary commercial animation. Even as Yuasa’s approach changes from section to section — as he plays with texture, volume and hue and gently shifts the balance between the figurative and the abstract — his extraordinary touch remains evident in each line and in every eye-popping swirl.Inu-ohRated PG-13 for mild peril and death. In Japanese, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 38 minutes. In theaters. More

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      ‘Bodies Bodies Bodies’ and Gen Z’s Struggle to Connect IRL

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      What happens when Gen Z loses Wi-Fi? Using horror and humor, the cast and filmmakers of the new slasher film aim for a generational portrait.A lip-locking close-up is the first we see of Sophie (played by Amandla Stenberg) and Bee, her girlfriend of six weeks (Maria Bakalova). Seemingly pulled from the pages of a fairy tale, Sophie confesses her love for Bee as they lie in a green meadow surrounded by nature. Within seconds, that affectionate scene gives way to a shot of the two absorbed in their phones as agitating dings and notifications dry up any remnants of intimacy or passion.These juxtaposed moments in the new satirical slasher “Bodies, Bodies, Bodies” ridicule the inability of its Generation Z characters to establish meaningful connections when a blinding screen forms a glaring barrier: “Sophie is expecting Bee to perform this intense level of vulnerability, even though she perhaps has not earned it,” Stenberg explained in a video call, “and I think that’s something that we expect now of everyone because we all perform vulnerability on the internet.”That’s one of several ways the film — about a group of privileged, internet-hungry 20-somethings stranded at a house party — tries to paint a portrait of the generation born within a few years before and after the millennium. Using humor, horror tropes and a cast of young stars, the film forces its characters to reckon with their nondigital identities and pokes fun at their symbiotic relationship with cellphones, their jargon based in trauma and the despot-like force of the group chat.As the director Halina Reijn said in a video call, “when the Wi-Fi goes out, it’s like they lose oxygen.”Soon after arriving at the isolated mansion, Sophie, Bee and their friends play Bodies, Bodies, Bodies, a party game involving a mysterious killer the players must identify and vote off in each round. But when the power goes out amid a hurricane, real bodies begin to fall. The characters’ behavior turns beastlike, Reijn said, and they forget how to respond to a crisis disconnected from the digital world.From left, Stenberg, Bakalova, Pete Davidson (David) and Rachel Sennott (Alice) in the film. The characters expect an intense level of vulnerability in person “because we all perform vulnerability on the internet,” Stenberg said.Eric Chakeen/A24“We can totally live in the face of death and still speak about things that are so unimportant but are so big to us,” Reijn said, adding, “I find that funny and tragic, of course, at the same time.”Stenberg, the star of “The Hate U Give” and the forthcoming “Star Wars” series “The Acolyte,” served as an executive producer of the film and drew on her own experience with digital life. She said the screenwriter Sarah DeLappe (a playwright known for “The Wolves”) embedded the script with so much wit that the moments of hypocrisy and vapidity became easy to create. “The point is not to say that Gen Z is not intelligent or sophisticated, but rather to provide a commentary for how absurd the circumstances” are, Stenberg said. (DeLappe was not available for comment.)Among those moments, the partygoers, friends since childhood, playfully film TikToks over the Tyga-Curtis Roach anthem “Bored in the House” and rave about social media likes.Gen Zers rely heavily on digital spaces for self-expression, community building and news gathering, Stenberg noted, but also face a sense of cognitive dissonance as they try to stay present in virtual life and reality. Indeed, said Sarah Bishop, a professor of communication studies at Baruch College, “for them to be able to defamiliarize or step back from this massive presence in their life is asking them to do something impossible, right? It’d be like asking them to imagine living without solid food.”Alice, played by Rachel Sennott (“Shiva Baby”), invites her 40-year-old Tinder match, Greg (Lee Pace), to the house party. In Reijn’s view, Greg serves as a bridge for older viewers: He tries to learn the rules of the game but uses sports analogies a dad might use, like “the best defense is a good offense,” and just bewilders the younger crew. For Reijn, who at 46 is a Gen Xer, Greg represented her personal detachment from Gen Z. “This goes, of course, for every generation that grows older, you always, sort of, lose touch,” she said.Sennott with Lee Pace, who plays Greg, a 40-year-old Tinder match.Gwen Capistran/A24Still, Reijn wanted the film to be real and honest but also funny, as each character shared the primal urge to belong when online usage swallows self-awareness.“I think we live in a time where we’re all very narcissistic, because we’re constantly on the camera,” she said. “Right now, we’re constantly aware of how we look and that is, of course, unprecedented, right? Normally, that was just actors, or musicians and now it’s all of us.”Despite the physical danger each character faces, their virtual realities remain central to the plot. As the lifelong friends, drunk and high, try to determine who the killer in the game is, Emma (Chase Sui Wonders) exclaims that her boyfriend, David (Pete Davidson), is gaslighting her. David’s response: The word is meaningless, and all she did was read the internet. Be more original.With the use of trauma-centered jargon like “gaslight,” “trigger,” “toxic” and “narcissist,” overuse can cheapen the language’s original value, Wonders said.“I think Gen Z has a brilliant, brilliant way of latching onto words, giving them so much beautiful meaning and having it spread like wildfire across cultures,” she said, “and then have it swallowed by irony.”Viewers can’t help but laugh at the friends’ misery as they take emotional stabs at each other. Sophie erupts about the double standard between Black and white drug users, but rather than admitting the disparity, Alice responds, “I’m an ally.” Or when Jordan (Myha’la Herrold) questions Sophie about ghosting the group chat, she responds, “You trigger me.” Herrold, who declared this her favorite scene, said the cast spent late hours editing and rewriting the sequence to make sure it remained relatable.“A lot of the Gen Z language, ‘gaslight’ and all that, some of that was cut and we were like, ‘No it has to stay in here,’” Herrold said.Bakalova, Mhya’la Herrold (Jordan) and Stenberg. Herrold said the cast made sure that Gen Z jargon wasn’t cut from the film. A24“Bodies Bodies Bodies” is one of a number of films from A24 to try to capture a generation — think “Spring Breakers” and “Lady Bird” before it — this time to the tune of Charli XCX’s “Hot Girl,” epitomizing the egotism of post, reply and repeat.This includes group chats. Comparable to cliques at a high school lunch table, the chat dictates who is in and out of the friend group. These chats hold political meanings, Stenberg said, and when Sophie strolls into the party without properly notifying the chat first, the house grows hostile.“I’ve been in friend groups before where it’s a big deal if someone is removed from the group chat or someone is added,” she said, “and it’s this horrendous, toxic thing where someone’s presence can be physically determined.”From digital media addictions to gripping group chats, Stenberg said, “Bodies Bodies Bodies” doesn’t aim to classify social media as the villain but the mirror within us all.“We have to think carefully and intentionally about how those tools can bring out and amplify the parts of us that are the scariest,” she said. More

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      ‘Free Chol Soo Lee’ Review: An Indictment of the Justice System

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      Activists helped free a Korean immigrant, and this documentary explores the wrongful conviction and its ripple effect.“Free Chol Soo Lee” tells the story of a wrongfully convicted man who, after spending nearly a decade in prison, was ultimately vindicated in court.But it isn’t an uplifting movie. As much as it celebrates the exoneration of its subject, a Korean immigrant in California named Chol Soo Lee, this documentary, directed by Julie Ha and Eugene Yi, is concerned with how the consequences of the failure of justice rippled through the rest of his life. It also considers whether the expectations of those who helped him, and his brief moment of celebrity, may have weighed him down. Just because Lee was innocent doesn’t mean he was perfect.Born in 1952 during the Korean War, Lee was eventually taken by his mother to San Francisco. Having lived, by the movie’s account, somewhat aimlessly, he was convicted of a 1973 killing in Chinatown. Persistent advocacy by K.W. Lee, an investigative reporter for The Sacramento Union, and a coalition of activists drew attention to significant flaws in the case. The process took years, and a separate death penalty case against Chol Soo Lee, for a prison-yard killing, only complicated matters.“Free Chol Soo Lee” takes its cues from Lee’s own words, read as narration by Sebastian Yoon, and from the recollections of his supporters. Archival material involving K.W. Lee, who said he saw a “very thin line” between himself and the man he was covering, is especially poignant. But “Free Chol Soo Lee” is somewhat dry and, as criminal-justice documentaries go, sadly familiar when it strays from Lee’s unique and grim perspective, which includes details of his struggles with prison life and depression. In a passage used as voice-over, he described death row as a system “designed so that the condemned man would kill himself before his execution.”Free Chol Soo LeeNot rated. In English and Korean, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 23 minutes. In theaters. More

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      ‘Emergency Declaration’ Review: Midair Contagion

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      The “Parasite” star Song Kang-ho plays a detective working to thwart a plan to unleash a deadly virus on unsuspecting plane passengers.It’s not enough for a disaster movie to rely on spectacle and peril; the crisis must allow characters to transcend their baser instincts so they might inspire hope. “Emergency Declaration,” a piercing thriller from the South Korean writer-director Han Jae-rim, manages to deliver excitement and melodrama out of a ludicrous story line.The premise for Han’s script borrows heavily from the “Airport” film series and “Air Force One.” In the movie, a troubled passenger (Yim Si-wan) releases a deadly virus aboard a plane heading from South Korea to Honolulu. The infected first develop a rash and then their blood vessels start bursting. The ensuing panic among the passengers spreads faster than the pathogen and demonstrates how greed and fear can lead to selfish survival tactics.Their flight is a race against time and a lesson in personal sacrifice that unearths a number of secrets: Hyun-soo, the plane’s co-pilot (Kim Nam-gil) despises Jae-hyuk, a disgraced former aviator (Lee Byung-hun, “Squid Game”) who is traveling with his young daughter. All are infected. On the ground, In-ho, a police sergeant (Song Kang-ho, “Parasite”) whose wife is on the plane, is desperately searching for a vaccine. Each actor, especially a raw Song, provides a sturdy performance in a narrative whose emotional course corrections occur so frequently that the film can feel directionless.Han pulls at his audience’s heartstrings by relying on redemptive shifts in tone for Jae-hyuk, whose climactic landing, edited for maximum sweaty palms, defies all gravity and logic, while offering an easy dose of disaster movie joy.Emergency DeclarationNot rated. In Korean, with subtitles. Running time: 2 hours 18 minutes. In theaters. More

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      ‘Stay on Board: The Leo Baker Story’ Review: Surviving the Grind

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      In this documentary, a professional skateboarder turns down the Olympics for the chance to live openly.When Leo Baker began skateboarding professionally in the early 2000s, skateboarding was mainly a hobby for punks. There were no Olympic trials for national teams, and advertisers were only beginning to notice the profits that could come from marketing sneakers and T-shirts to kids doing kick flips.Leo was a prodigy, but as a youth skateboarder, he wasn’t out as transgender and nonbinary. Erroneously, he was perceived as someone who could become the poster child for young women in skateboarding.The documentary “Stay on Board: The Leo Baker Story,” directed by Nicola Marsh and Giovanni Reda, uses a combination of archival, observational and interview footage to demonstrate how Leo navigated a career as a decorated professional skateboarder while managing the stress of gender dysphoria and public misconception.When the documentary begins, it’s the year leading up to the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. Leo has qualified for the United States’ first women’s team, and he is conflicted about that decision. The public misconception of his gender causes him great pain, but he is afraid that coming out will end his career. Supported by family and friends — many of whom are also queer veterans of the skateboarding scene — Leo ultimately chooses to live openly as a transgender person and withdraws from the Olympic team.The directors have made a compact film, but their footage packs a punch. Leo is a dynamic and generous subject, and he allows the filmmakers access through an intimate struggle, as he is misgendered publicly and seeking support from loved ones privately.This is a candid look at one person’s experience with coming out, a humane document that shows the bravery and resilience of queer people who seek relief from the categories that are imposed on them.Stay on Board: The Leo Baker StoryNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 12 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

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      ‘Laal Singh Chaddha’ Review: Forrest Gump in India

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      This Indian adaptation of “Forrest Gump” doubles down on its Pollyanna hero, substituting different historical touchstones.“Forrest Gump” has been called many things: a feel-good crowd-pleaser, a maddening piece of pap, and America’s version of Voltaire’s “Candide” (per the film scholar Dave Kehr). “Laal Singh Chaddha” offers up a fresh look: a luxuriantly produced Indian adaptation that doubles down on the story’s simpleton hero, with new historical touchstones.In the film’s framing device, Laal (Aamir Khan, the star of the 2001 crossover hit “Lagaan”) recounts his life story to passengers on a train. He grows up bullied because of his leg braces, despite his protective mother (Mona Singh), but he befriends a classmate, Rupa (Kareena Kapoor Khan), and later pines for her.The Gumpian formula of comical serendipity plays out as Laal accidentally becomes a track-and-field star, inspires a signature dance, rescues friend and foe during a mountain skirmish, and earns millions manufacturing underwear. The famous box of chocolates is reimagined, sweetly so: life is now like a golgappa (a crisp fried treat).In Advait Chandan’s film, traumatic national history gets a therapeutic recap: the military conflict in which Laal shows the power of compassion is the Kargil war, while the assassination of Indira Gandhi and sectarian riots also figure into the plot. (Laal is Sikh but only barely grasps these violent events.)Though treated as noble, Laal’s naïve optimism doesn’t rise to much more than the notion of having a good attitude. Khan’s portrayal suggests a cross between a lesser Farrelly Brothers comedy and “Being There,” and seems ill-suited to Rupa’s grim later experiences married to an abusive producer. The movie’s charms are limited by what comes to feel like a coddling conceit.Laal Singh ChaddhaRated PG-13 for some violent content, thematic elements and suggestive material. In Hindi, with subtitles. Running time: 2 hours 39 minutes. In theaters. More

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      ‘Free Puppies!’ Review: A Fight to Save a Dog’s Life

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      This documentary focuses on volunteer animal rescue groups in the rural United States.Animal lovers will find a bittersweet watch in “Free Puppies!,” a documentary on volunteer rescue groups working to adopt dogs in areas of the United States that are high in strays and, subsequently, high in euthanasia rates.The directors Samantha Wishman and Christina Thomas narrow their scope to Dade County, a rural area in northwest Georgia, where locals like the small-business owner Monda Wooten have stepped up to rescue stray animals and push for spay-and-neuter services in the absence of an operating animal shelter. Despite being on the local board of commissioners, Wooten has been unable to secure funding for a shelter or a comprehensive animal control unit for the county since she first started rescuing animals more than a decade ago. As Wishman and Thomas explain, the issue of shelter funding is a pervasive one across the Southeast that, coupled with the year-round warm climate and high rates of poverty, has created an environment with too many stray dogs and not enough kennels or homes to keep them in.The focus of “Free Puppies!” can feel a bit limited at times. It would have been nice to perhaps see how other counties in the South are responding to these widespread animal welfare concerns, or to examine more closely how poverty and the lack of social services in the region has had a trickle-down effect on nonhuman lives. Nevertheless, the film achieves its goal in raising awareness for these volunteer efforts, casting a spotlight on a chronically overlooked crisis.Free Puppies!Not rated. Running time: 1 hour 10 minutes. In theaters and on virtual cinemas. More