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      ‘Shalom Taiwan’ Review: Taking the Long Way Home

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      In this film, a rabbi from Buenos Aires hits the road in Taiwan to raise money for his community center.A rabbi from Buenos Aires pounds the pavement to raise money for his community center in “Shalom Taiwan,” a film whose meager plot could use a bit of a boost itself. After finding little support on a fund-raising trip to New York, Rabbi Aaron (Fabián Rosenthal) ventures out to Taiwan on a hunch, and routine culture-clash content and sightseeing montages ensue.The story, partly by design, is a series of anticlimactic encounters, as Rabbi Aaron pitches the merits of his newly renovated center to prospective donors. One meeting in Taipei takes place on the careening rides of an amusement park, another among verdant tea groves in the serenity of the countryside.Rabbi Aaron’s good-natured wife (Mercedes Funes) grows impatient with his absences, and the ticktock plot keeps checking in with the community center as it faces takeover by a creditor. The rabbi’s milquetoast assistant is in charge during his travels, but the film’s director, Walter Tejblum, doesn’t do much with that or other potentially humorous (or dramatic) setups. Rosenthal’s balky presence and Tejblum’s indifferent direction together ward off a sense of urgency or deep engagement.Rabbi Aaron finds a kindly soul in a Spanish-speaking clerk (Sebastián Hsu) at the capsule hotel where he’s staying, and the movie coasts to an ending about accepting life’s vicissitudes and moving on. It’s hard to argue with that message, but one doesn’t have to accept the ho-hum experience of watching this movie.Shalom TaiwanNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 25 minutes. Rent or buy on Amazon, Apple TV and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators. More

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      Stream These 10 Titles Before They Leave Netflix in August

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      Of the many movies leaving the streaming service for U.S. subscribers this month, these are the ones most worth checking out.There are scares aplenty in the titles leaving Netflix in the United States at the end of the month, with two contemporary horror favorites and one absolute classic departing the service. We can also recommend a handful of first-rate thrillers, one of the most quotable comedies of the 21st century and a Kevin Costner Western that’s neither “Dances With Wolves” or “Yellowstone.” (Dates reflect the final day a title is available.)‘The Conjuring’ (Aug. 20)When this modestly-scaled haunted house movie hit theaters in summer of 2013, few could have imagined that it would not only become so profitable — returning $319 million worldwide on a $200 million budget — but also spawn a multi-movie “universe” of eight films and counting. But that was all to come; the pleasures of this initial entry are simple, rooted in the authenticity of its ’70s setting, the grounded performances by Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga and Lili Taylor and the confident direction from James Wan (particularly his execution of one of the single best jump-scares in recent memory).Stream it here.‘The Visit’ (Aug. 25)M. Night Shyamalan’s career was in rough shape by the mid-2010s after a series of big-budget, high-profile, major studio flops. So he performed a miraculous reinvention, stripping his style down to its bare bones and teaming up with the genre producer Jason Blum to make this low-budget yet frighteningly effective chiller. Olivia DeJonge and Ed Oxenbould star as teenage siblings who head to their long-estranged grandparents’ house for an extended visit and find much of what happens there … disturbing. Shyamalan deftly mixes elements of comedy, horror and found footage into a darkly entertaining package, and in the process, he reminded audiences of his considerable gifts.Stream it here.‘In the Line of Fire’ (Aug. 30)Clint Eastwood made a rare late-career acting-only appearance in this first-rate thriller from the director Wolfgang Petersen. Eastwood stars as the Secret Service agent Frank Horrigan, one of the agents working in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963, when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. That connection catches the attention of a potential assassin (John Malkovich), who baits Horrigan into a game of cat and mouse by threatening to repeat history on his watch. Malkovich was nominated for an Academy Award for his chilling turn as the ruthlessly intelligent killer, but Eastwood’s performance is the real deal; the taciturn actor finds striking notes of vulnerability and melancholy for his guilt-ridden character.Stream it here.‘Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy’ (Aug. 31)Will Ferrell’s breakthrough vehicle was one of the most culturally inescapable comedies of the 2000s, endlessly quoted and memed, and for good reason: It’s a screamingly funny comedy, taking an absurd concept (the 1970s-set story of a local “Action News” anchor) to its absolute limit, thanks to a spot-on turn from Ferrell as a dopey blowhard, great supporting work from the likes of Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, David Koechner and Fred Willard, and Christina Applegate’s perfectly modulated turn as his foil turned love interest. But it was also the feature directorial debut of the future Oscar winner Adam McKay, who was already using broad comedy as cover to smuggle in headier themes (this time, of gender roles, toxic masculinity and media ineptitude).Stream it here.‘Cliffhanger’ (Aug. 31)Few megastars have mounted as many comebacks as Sylvester Stallone (one of the many parallels between the actor-filmmaker and his most famous creation, Rocky Balboa). He was rebounding from an ill-advised attempt at comedy — remember “Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot”? — when he fronted this white-knuckle thriller in 1993. The boilerplate script (which Stallone co-wrote) amounts to “Die Hard” on a Mountain, with Stallone as the rugged but desperate hero, John Lithgow as the elegant terrorist villain and the Rocky Mountains as the locale. But Stallone and Lithgow fill their roles nicely, and the director Renny Harlin (previously of, by no coincidence, “Die Hard 2”) orchestrates the mayhem with panache.Stream it here.‘The Dark Knight Rises’ (Aug. 31)Christopher Nolan capped his Batman trilogy — and followed up “The Dark Knight,” one of history’s most commercially and critically successful comic book films — with this 2012 action epic. It’s neither as thrilling as “The Dark Knight” nor as narratively efficient as the earlier “Batman Begins,” and it borders on bloated at nearly three hours. But there’s something boldly operatic to its ambition, to how Nolan folds in new villains, post-Occupy politics and a decidedly unheroic tone of borderline nihilism. Tom Hardy’s Bane is a true terror, and Anne Hathaway’s Catwoman is a gem of complex sensuality.Stream it here.‘Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol’ (Aug. 31)It speaks to the high quality of the entire series that no clear consensus seems to exist on the best film of the “Mission: Impossible” franchise. But there’s a strong case to be made for this, the fourth entry, which was the live-action directorial debut of the Pixar alum Brad Bird (“The Incredibles”). Tom Cruise returns as Agent Ethan Hunt, this time drawn into the complex, globe-trotting pursuit of a nuclear terrorist who frames Hunt and his team for a bombing at the Kremlin. Simon Pegg, back from Part 3, offers welcome comic relief, the new additions Jeremy Renner and Paula Patton add considerable spice, and two of the set pieces — the aforementioned Kremlin sequence and Cruise’s gripping climb of the Burj Khalifa — are among the franchise’s best. (The series’s first and second installments also leave Netflix at the end of the month.)Stream it here.‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’ (Aug. 31)Wes Craven went from a genre journeyman to a horror icon — and launched one of the most venerable slasher franchises ever — with this 1984 creeper. Craven wrote and directed this story of suburban teens that find their dreams haunted — often with deadly, real-life results — by the neighborhood boogieman, Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund). Heather Langenkamp is the resourceful protagonist, while Johnny Depp, in his film debut, is one of the more memorable victims. Subsequent sequels would highlight Krueger with greater prominence but diminishing returns, effectively turning the films into horror-comedies. But this inaugural entry is a lean, mean, scare machine, filled with terrifying images and well-crafted suspense.Stream it here.‘Public Enemies’ (Aug. 31)Twenty-five years later, Depp was at the height of his career, starring as the Depression-era bank robber John Dillinger in this crime epic from the director Michael Mann (“Heat”). Mann also co-wrote the script for this fact-based tale, which tells the parallel stories of Dillinger and Melvin Purvis, the F.B.I. agent using all of the tools of the agency to track him down. Mann’s use of contemporary digital photography was controversial at the time, but it is an inspired choice, giving the picture a contemporary sheen that keeps it from feeling like dusty, unapproachable history.Stream it here.‘Wyatt Earp’ (Aug. 31)Some good movies just suffer from rotten timing. That was certainly the case with this 1994 western epic, which re-teamed the writer and director Lawrence Kasdan with his “Silverado” star Kevin Costner. Unfortunately, their film hit theaters six months after “Tombstone,” which also told the story of Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday and the gunfight at the OK Corral. But the two films tell the same story in a very different way: “Tombstone” is a brisk, contemporary interpretation, emphasizing action and thrills (it shared a director with “Rambo”), while “Earp” is an old-fashioned, character-driven western in the style of John Ford (who made his own Earp film, the classic “My Darling Clementine,” in 1946). But time has been kind to Kasdan’s take, and the popularity of western TV dramas like Costner’s “Yellowstone” make “Wyatt Earp” ripe for rediscovery.Stream it here.Also leaving:“Taxi Driver” (Aug. 25), “Wind River” (Aug. 27), “The Departed,” “Goodfellas,” “Kung Fu Panda 2,” “Rise of the Guardians,”“Starship Troopers,” ‘Titanic” (all Aug. 31). More

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      After Pixar Ouster, John Lasseter Returns With Apple and ‘Luck’

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      John Lasseter was toppled five years ago by allegations about his workplace behavior. He’s back with an animated film and a studio that could be Pixar 2.0.LOS ANGELES — The most Pixar movie of the summer is not from Pixar. It’s from Apple TV+ and the lightning-rod filmmaker-executive who turned Pixar into a superpower: John Lasseter.Five years ago, Mr. Lasseter was toppled by allegations about his behavior in the workplace. Almost overnight, his many accomplishments — building Pixar from scratch, forging the megawatt “Toy Story” and “Cars” franchises, reviving a moribund Walt Disney Animation, delivering “Frozen,” winning Oscars — became a footnote.After employees complained about unwanted hugging by Mr. Lasseter, Disney investigated and found that some subordinates occasionally felt him to be a tyrant. He was forced to resign as Disney-Pixar’s animation chief, apologizing for “missteps” that made staff members feel “disrespected or uncomfortable.”Mr. Lasseter, 65, is now on the verge of professional redemption. His first animated feature since he left Disney-Pixar will arrive on Apple’s subscription streaming service on Friday. Called “Luck,” the $140 million movie follows an unlucky young woman who discovers a secret world where magical creatures make good luck (the Department of Right Place, Right Time) and bad luck (a pet waste research and design lab dedicated to “tracked it in the house”). Things go terribly wrong, resulting in a comedic adventure involving an unusual dragon, bunnies in hazmat suits, leprechaun millennials and an overweight German unicorn in a too-tight tracksuit.Apple, perhaps the only company that safeguards its brand more zealously than Disney, has been using Mr. Lasseter as a prominent part of its marketing campaign for “Luck.” Ads for the film, which Peggy Holmes directed and Mr. Lasseter produced, describe it as coming “from the creative visionary behind TOY STORY and CARS.”“Luck” arrives on Apple TV+ on Friday.Apple TV+Apple’s chief executive, Tim Cook, shared a look at the film in March at the company’s latest product showcase event. “Luck” is just the beginning of Apple’s bet on Mr. Lasseter and Skydance Media, an independent studio that — contentiously — hired him in 2019 as animation chief. (Skydance hired lawyers to scrutinize the allegations against Mr. Lasseter and privately concluded there was nothing egregious.) Skydance has a deal to supply Apple TV+ with multiple animated films and at least one animated series by 2024.Pariah? Not at Apple.“It feels like part of me has come home,” Mr. Lasseter said in a phone interview, noting that Steve Jobs, Apple’s co-founder, helped build Pixar before selling it to Disney in 2006. “I really like what Apple TV+ is doing. It’s about quality, not quantity. And their marketing is just spectacular. It’s the best I’ve ever seen in all the movies I’ve made.”Mr. Lasseter’s return to full-length filmmaking comes at an awkward time for Disney-Pixar, which appears to be a little lost without him, having misfired badly in June with a “Toy Story” prequel. “Lightyear,” about Buzz Lightyear before he became a toy, seemed to forget what made the character so beloved. The movie, which cost an estimated $300 million to make and market worldwide, has taken in about $220 million, which is even worse than it sounds for Disney’s bottom line because theaters keep at least 40 percent of ticket sales. “Lightyear” is the second-worst-performing title in Pixar’s history, ranking only above “Onward,” which came out in March 2020 at the start of the coronavirus pandemic.Mr. Lasseter declined to comment on “Lightyear,” which arrives on Disney+ on Wednesday. He also declined to discuss his departure from Disney.The Race to Rule Streaming TVTurmoil at Netflix: Despite a loss of subscribers, job cuts and a steep stock drop, the streaming giant has said it is staying the course.An Expensive Gamble: Netflix hopes “The Gray Man” — its new $200 million action movie — can be the start of a blockbuster franchise that attracts much-needed subscribers.Live Sports: Apple and Amazon are eager to expand their streaming audiences. They increasingly see live sports as a way to do it.End of an Era?: The golden age of streaming might be over, and we probably won’t like what happens next, our tech columnist writes.More than 50 people have followed Mr. Lasseter to Skydance from Disney and Pixar, including Ms. Holmes (“Secret of the Wings”), whom he hired to direct “Luck.” The screenplay for “Luck” is credited to Kiel Murray, whose Pixar and Disney writing credits include “Cars” and “Raya and the Last Dragon.” Mr. Lasseter and Ms. Holmes hired at least five more Disney-Pixar veterans for senior “Luck” crew jobs, including the animation director Yuriko Senoo (“Tangled”) and the production designer Fred Warter (“A Bug’s Life”).John Ratzenberger, known as Pixar’s “good luck charm” because he has voiced so many characters over the decades, pops up in “Luck” as Rootie, the Land of Bad Luck’s unofficial mayor.The upshot: With its glistening animation, attention to detail, story twists and emotional ending, “Luck” has all the hallmarks of a Pixar release. (Reviews will arrive on Wednesday.) Some people who have seen the film have commented on similarities between “Luck” and the 2001 Pixar classic, “Monsters, Inc.” Both films involve elaborate secret worlds that are accidentally disrupted by humans.“I want to take the audience to a world that is so interesting and beautiful and clever that people love being in it,” Mr. Lasseter said. “You want the audience to want to book a week’s vacation to the place where the movie just took place.”It remains true, however, that Mr. Lasseter continues to be a polarizing figure in Hollywood. Ashlyn Anstee, a director at Cartoon Network, told The Hollywood Reporter last week that she was unhappy that Skydance was “letting a so-called creative genius continue to take up positions and space in an industry that could begin to be filled with different people.”Emma Thompson has not changed her public position on Mr. Lasseter since backing out of a role in “Luck” in 2019. She had been cast by the film’s first director and quit when Mr. Lasseter joined Skydance.“It feels very odd to me that you and your company would consider hiring someone with Mr. Lasseter’s pattern of misconduct,” Ms. Thompson wrote in a letter to David Ellison, Skydance’s chief executive. (Her character, a human, no longer exists in the radically reworked film.)Ms. Holmes, the “Luck” director, said she had no qualms about joining Mr. Lasseter at Skydance.“It has been a very, very positive experience, and John has been a great mentor,” she said.Holly Edwards, the president of Skydance Animation, a division of Skydance Media, echoed Ms. Holmes. “John has been incredible,” she said. “I’m proud that we’re creating an environment where people know they have a voice and know they are being heard.” Ms. Edwards previously spent nearly two decades at DreamWorks Animation.Some of Mr. Lasseter’s creative tactics have not changed. One is a willingness to radically overhaul projects while they are on the assembly line — including removing a director, something that can cause hurt feelings and fan blowback. He believes that such decisions, while difficult, are sometimes crucial to a quality outcome.Peggy Holmes, the director of “Luck,” said she had no reservations about working with Mr. Lasseter.Michael Tran/FilmMagic“Luck,” for instance, was already in the works when Mr. Lasseter arrived at Skydance. Alessandro Carloni (“Kung Fu Panda 3”) had been hired to direct the film, which then involved a battle between human agents of good luck and bad luck.“As soon as I heard the concept, I actually was kind of jealous,” Mr. Lasseter said. “It’s a subject that every single person in the world has a relationship with, and that is very rare in a basic concept of a movie.”But he ultimately threw out almost everything and started over. The primary cast now includes Jane Fonda, who voices a pink dragon who can sniff out bad luck, and Whoopi Goldberg, who plays a droll leprechaun taskmaster. Flula Borg (“Pitch Perfect 2”) voices the overweight, bipedal unicorn, who is a major scene stealer.“Sometimes you have to take a building down to its foundation and, frankly, in this case, down to its lot,” Mr. Lasseter said.Mr. Lasseter did not invent the concept of doing real-world research to inform animated stories and artwork, but he is known for pushing far beyond what is typically done. For “Luck,” he had researchers dig into what constitutes good luck and bad luck in myriad cultures; the filmmaking team also researched the foster care system, which informed part of the story. (The lead character grows up in foster care and is repeatedly passed over for adoption.)As at Pixar and at Disney, Mr. Lasseter set up a “story trust” council at Skydance in which a group of elite directors and writers candidly and repeatedly critique one another’s work. The Skydance Animation version will soon include Brad Bird, a longtime Pixar force (“The Incredibles,” “Ratatouille”) who recently joined Mr. Lasseter’s operation to develop an original animated film called “Ray Gunn.”Ms. Holmes said Mr. Lasseter was a nurturing creative force, not a tyrannical one.“John will give you notes on sequences,” she said. “He will suggest dialogue. He will comment on color or timing or effects. He’ll pitch story ideas. He’ll draw something — ‘Oh, maybe it could look like this.’“And then it’s up to you and your team to execute against those notes. Or not. Sometimes we came back to John and said the note didn’t work — and this is why — or we decided we didn’t need to address it.”Ms. Holmes added: “When the answer is no, he’s really OK with it. He’s really OK with it.” More

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      Will Smith Says He Is ‘Deeply Remorseful’ Over Chris Rock Slap

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      In an apologetic video, Mr. Smith addressed questions over his behavior at the Oscars, which resulted in a 10-year ban from the ceremony.Four months after slapping the comedian Chris Rock at the Oscars, shocking audiences and prompting a decade-long ban from attending the ceremony, Will Smith posted a video on Friday expressing regret over the incident and promising that he was doing “personal work” to address his behavior.“It hurts me psychologically and emotionally to know I didn’t live up to people’s image and impression of me,” Mr. Smith said in the video. “I am deeply remorseful, and I’m trying to be remorseful without being ashamed of myself, right? I’m human, and I made a mistake.”Mr. Smith, who resigned from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences days after the ceremony, apologized to numerous people during the nearly six-minute video — starting with Mr. Rock, who had made a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith’s shaved head shortly before Mr. Smith walked up and slapped him on live television. (Ms. Pinkett Smith has been open about her struggles with alopecia, a condition that leads to hair loss, and in a statement shortly after the incident, Mr. Smith said a joke about his wife’s medical condition was “too much for me to bear.”)“Chris, I apologize to you,” Mr. Smith said in the video. “My behavior was unacceptable, and I’m here whenever you’re ready to talk.”Shortly after the attack, Mr. Smith won the Oscar for best actor. In the video, he explained that he had failed to apologize to Mr. Rock during his speech because he was “fogged out” following the incident.Mr. Smith said he had tried to contact Mr. Rock later on but had received a message in response that the comedian was not ready to talk and would reach out when he was. Mr. Smith apologized to Mr. Rock’s family, including his mother, Rosalie Rock, who gave a television interview saying, “When you hurt my child, you hurt me.”He also apologized to his own family “for the heat that I brought on all of us,” as well as the other nominees that night for having tarnished their moment.Ms. Pinkett Smith has said little about her own experience of that night, but last month she centered an episode of her online talk show, Red Table Talk, on alopecia, interviewing a woman whose 12-year-old daughter died by suicide as a result of bullying over the condition.Regarding the slap, Ms. Pinkett Smith said: “My deepest hope is that these two intelligent, capable men have an opportunity to heal, talk this out and reconcile.”Mr. Rock has not publicly discussed his response to the attack in depth, but earlier this week, at a comedy show in Brooklyn, Mr. Rock mentioned it in a joke. During a portion of his set that was focused on victimhood, he told the crowd that after Mr. Smith slapped him, he shook it off and “went to work the next day,” prompting sustained applause from the audience. A representative for Mr. Rock did not immediately respond to a request for comment.In Friday’s video, Mr. Smith seemed to be working to repair his reputation and reassure fans that his behavior at the ceremony did not reflect who he truly is, saying, “There is no part of me that thinks that was the right way to behave in that moment.”“I know it was shocking, but I promise you, I am deeply devoted and committed to putting light and love and joy into the world,” he concluded. “If you hang on, I promise we’ll be able to be friends again.”Melena Ryzik and Jason Zinoman contributed reporting. More

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      ‘Purple Hearts’ Review: A Marriage of Convenience

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      Netflix’s romantic drama, featuring the Disney-minted star Sofia Carson, follows a Marine and a musician who wed out of financial desperation.The romantic Netflix drama “Purple Hearts” tries to wring a heartfelt story from an arrangement that can’t help but feel absurd.Based on the novel by Tess Wakefield, the film depicts the fraudulent military marriage between Cassie (Sofia Carson), a singer-songwriter and Type 1 diabetic, and Luke (Nicholas Galitzine), a former addict who’s attempting to win back his father’s approval by joining the Marines. While they both initially seek the benefits of marriage out of financial desperation, the couple’s dynamic changes when Luke is injured in combat, forcing Cassie into the role of unwilling caretaker.“Purple Hearts” had the potential to be a poignant melodrama — or maybe a sharp satire — about the options available to those left behind by the U.S. health care system. Instead, the film wallows in contrived plots and subplots, made worse by the dearth of chemistry between the two leads. By the time Luke violently confronts his former dealer in a parking garage in what resembles a deleted “Euphoria” scene, you wonder how much of the movie was dictated by Netflix’s content algorithm.The film frames itself as a star turn for Carson, whose character’s ascendance from dive bar performances to opening for Florence + the Machine at the Hollywood Bowl resembles Carson’s own recent rise to fame through the Disney Channel ranks. But the music, just like the marriage, rings hollow.Purple HeartsNot rated. Running time: 2 hours 2 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

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      ‘Not Okay’ Review: Posting Through It

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      In this social media satire, a young woman desperate to find her purpose executes a heinous hoax.In our era of branding and ubiquitous social media, where posts masquerade as life stories and mere traits become entire identities, it can feel inadequate — even impossible — to just be yourself. That’s how Danni Sanders, the ditsy antiheroine played by Zoey Deutch in “Not Okay,” becomes the most hated person on the internet. She can’t be just an upper-class 20-something living in “J train Bushwick,” so she pretends to be a survivor of a terrorist attack. As satires go, this one by the writer and director Quinn Shephard is hardly subtle — but though it lacks narrative finesse, “Not Okay” is brimming with provocative in-jokes for the extremely online.As the film opens, YouTube drama channels explain Danni’s deception, and several real-life influencers eviscerate her. Reece Feldman (or @guywithamoviecamera, to his more than 800,000 TikTok followers) both appears in the film and is credited as its “social media consultant.” Notably, Caroline Calloway, the messy influencer who rose to online infamy for bungling a self-run workshop series, is a recurring reference. Danni watches her makeup tutorials and reads articles about her on the subway. Calloway eventually makes a cameo in the film playing herself.“Not Okay” stabs at the adverse effects of social media on our psyches and mostly succeeds at making Danni more than just “a privileged white girl who thinks she’s the main character,” as a woman played by Shephard calls her. But the film is ultimately more content to luxuriate in the toxic sludge of internet culture than it is to try and clean it up. Giving Calloway the spotlight is a prime example. Like Danni, Calloway essentially rose to prominence for behaving erratically in public. “Not Okay” may sympathize with its protagonist’s mental health struggles, but it also leeches its clout from real, pitiable people.Not OkayRated R for sex, lies and a weed vape. Running time: 1 hour 40 minutes. Watch on Hulu. More

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      An Avant-Garde Film That Went for Laughs Instead of Scandal

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      Nothing controversial: Adolfas Mekas’s “Hallelujah the Hills,” from 1963, is romantic slapstick, with two guys competing for the same young woman.The early 1960s was the golden age of underground movies. Some, like Jack Smith’s “Flaming Creatures,” provoked scandals. Others were too explicit to be written about (see Barbara Rubin’s “Christmas on Earth”). At least one was a commercial success: Adolfas Mekas’s “Hallelujah the Hills.”“A wild spoof on art movies by a new American director scored a surprise success Saturday at the New York Film Festival,” Eugene Archer reported in the New York Times in 1963, the festival’s first year.Returning to Lincoln Center for three shows, part of a series devoted to the early ’60s avant-garde, “Hallelujah the Hills,” may be the series’s most conventional selection — a feature-length movie with actors, some even professional, and a semblance of plot, shot in crisp black and white by Ed Emshwiller, an underground filmmaker of great technical expertise.The movie is romantic slapstick, set far from the bohemian Lower East Side in sylvan Vermont. Two guys, Jack (the intrepid photographer Peter Beard) and Leo (painter and assemblagist Marty Greenbaum) are infatuated with same young woman, Vera (“a lovely and enigmatic winter sprite” per Archer’s review). She is played by two different actresses (Sheila Finn and Peggy Steffans), both with a marked resemblance to Jean-Luc Godard’s muse Anna Karina. The rivals court Vera in different seasons over the course of seven years — a crisis arises when both show up for Thanksgiving.As its title suggests “Hallelujah” is nothing if not exuberant. Adolfas Mekas, the younger brother of Jonas Mekas and, like him, an immigrant from rural Lithuania, was in his late 20s when he made the movie. Pratfalls and drunken antics abound. Beard gives a particularly athletic performance — at one point bounding bare-assed through deep snow. (With his horn-rimmed glasses, Greenbaum seems more the Woody Allen type.)Jump cuts are common, too. Very much an American homage to the French new wave movie, “Hallelujah” suggests a frothy “Jules and Jim” made in the insouciant style of “Shoot the Piano Player.” Perhaps there was a two-way street. As “Hallelujah” was a hit at the 1963 Cannes Film Festival, reviewed by Godard, it’s not inconceivable that it was an inspiration for his 1964 “Band of Outsiders.”“Hallelujah” is not unduly sappy, although it does demand a tolerance for madrigal jazz (heavy on a tinkly harpsichord) and rampant cinephilia. “I haven’t seen a movie in 10 days,” Leo complains. The rivals play at being Kurosawa samurai. There are nods to not only Godard but the early cinema of Charlie Chaplin, Mack Sennett and W.C. Fields. Late in the movie, Mekas interpolates a celebrated bit of ice floe excitement from D.W. Griffith’s 1920 “Way Down East.” The sequence still works and so, in a more limited way, does “Hallelujah the Hills.”Actually, as fashionable as Mekas’s film once was it has an atavistic quality. Beneath the surface lurks a Lithuanian folk tale about rival princes and a princess (or goddess) linked to the changing seasons. Hallelujah indeed.Hallelujah the HillsJuly 29, Aug. 2 and 3, at Film at Lincoln Center, Manhattan, filmlinc.org. More

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      ‘Honor Society’ Review: Ivy League Strategist’s Cynical Shell Is Cracked

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      Angourie Rice plays an initially unappealing character, as a Harvard striver with sneaky moves.There’s a species of Young Adult novels — and their attendant film adaptations — that wears sophistication on its sleeve. Mostly for the purpose of demonstrating that sophistication won’t save the anguished teenage soul — see “The Perks of Being a Wallflower.” In the teen rom-com, sophistication usually manifests itself in a near-endless stream of pop culture references.“Honor Society,” directed by Oran Zegman from a script by David A. Goodman, comes out of the gate flashing a formal and thematic sophistication so dazzling it might take you a while to realize it’s actually a Young Adult movie. The relentlessly driven title character, Honor (Angourie Rice, whom you may remember from “The Nice Guys,” terrifically appealing throughout), snidely dismissive of her working-class parents, has crafted a persona ruthlessly focused on getting out of her one-horse town and into Harvard. A place where “mediocre people get outsized opportunities,” she tells the camera.Notes of “Election” and “Rushmore” here are strong. Some fully grown-up viewers will feel old seeing Christopher Mintz-Plasse, of “McLovin” fame in “Superbad” (2007) playing the (ultimately sleazoid) guidance counselor who feeds Honor the unpleasant surprise that she’s actually one of four students vying for his Harvard recommendation.This news motivates Honor to weave a manipulative web that grows spectacularly tangled. One of her foils, Michael, is played by Gaten Matarazzo, that winsome kid from “Stranger Things”; Michael responds with sweet-natured goofiness to Honor’s temptress moves. So of course he is the one to crack her cynical shell.A twist whipsaws the movie into a darker place, one in the vicinity of Patricia Highsmith. But no murder takes place, and the movie’s resolution confirms what one may have suspected all along: Its dominant room tone is kinda-sorta that of “To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before.”Honor SocietyNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 37 minutes. Watch on Paramount+. More