Movies

Subterms

    More stories

    • 75 Shares149 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Heart of Stone’ Review: Mission Improbable

      by

      Gal Gadot plays an international superspy who teams up with an all-powerful computer in this ludicrous and derivative Netflix espionage thriller.In the early going, “Heart of Stone” seems like a pretty routine action thriller about spies. Gal Gadot stars as Rachel Stone, a rookie hacker for an MI6 unit; when we meet her in the movie’s opening sequence, she’s in the middle of a covert mission to ensnare an arms dealer in the Italian Alps, ferrying her elite squad of operatives past high-tech security systems, mainly by tapping away at a computer, looking very serious and saying stuff like “writing a new access code … the system’s offline!”As tradecraft goes, this is not exactly John le Carré. But soon the bland espionage intrigue gains a surprising wrinkle: It transpires that Stone is a double agent working for another, even more secret intelligence agency, known as the Charter, which controls an all-powerful computer called the Heart. A kind of omniscient algorithm described at one point as “the closest thing mankind has to perfect intelligence,” the Heart has access to “trillions of data points” that effectively allow it to predict the future. Wired into the Charter headquarters via earpiece, Stone receives prophetic guidance from the Heart’s tech guru (Matthias Schweighöfer) to be transformed into an all-seeing superhero.The Heart’s on-the-fly analyses are rendered as big floating digital maps clogged with barely legible graphs and statistics, and Schweighöfer, scrutinizing the data, is forced to spend much of his screen time standing there waving his hands around in a vain effort to look like he’s actually controlling something. (Steven Spielberg made this same sort of thing look cool in “Minority Report,” but the “Heart of Stone” director Tom Harper does not have quite the same touch.) And yet, even if the computer shenanigans look goofy, they’re more interesting than the movie’s run-of-the-mill spy thrills. Bewilderingly, Rachel’s access to the Heart is severed early in the film’s second act — dragging us right back to the mundane cloak-and-dagger stuff.Computerless, Rachel gets her hands dirty through car chases, fist fights and more to regain control of the Heart’s predictive powers. Here, the movie’s influence shifts from “Minority Report” to a franchise also starring Tom Cruise: “Mission: Impossible,” from which “Heart of Stone” steals multiple set pieces in their entirety. A motorcycle chase strikingly similar to the exquisite one from “Rogue Nation” looks flat and pedestrian by comparison, with dull staging and a corny gag; its knockoff “Fallout” HALO jump, however, is shameless plagiarism, made all the more insulting by appearing so ludicrously fake. Cruise jumped out of an actual airplane. Gadot free falls through bad C.G.I.Cruise’s adversary in the latest “Mission: Impossible” is an omnipotent algorithm with the power to destroy humanity — a metaphor for the data-driven forces of the streaming landscape eroding the sanctity of the cinema. What does it say that in “Heart of Stone,” from Netflix, the heroes work for the computer, and the powerful algorithm is represented as a force for good? If Cruise is trying to save the movies, as he’s often credited with doing, he’s trying to save us from films like this.Heart of StoneRated PG-13 for intense action, strong language and some graphic violence. Running time: 2 hours 2 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

    • 100 Shares189 Views

      in Movies

      Striking Writers and Studios Agree to Restart Negotiations

      by

      The two sides in the Hollywood stalemate will formally meet on Friday, after an informal sidebar session last week.As television and movie writers started their 101st day on strike on Thursday, the leaders of their union said they had agreed to formally restart negotiations with studios for a new three-year contract.“Our committee returns to the bargaining table ready to make a fair deal, knowing the unified W.G.A. membership stands behind us and buoyed by the ongoing support of our union allies,” the Writers Guild of America negotiating committee said in a statement. The session will take place in Los Angeles on Friday.The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which bargains on behalf of entertainment companies, declined to comment. Carol Lombardini, the alliance’s president, contacted the Writers Guild on Wednesday with a request to return to formal negotiations. Her appeal followed an informal sidebar session between the two sides late last week.After that meeting, the Writers Guild sent a note to its 11,500 members saying Ms. Lombardi had indicated a willingness by studios to sweeten their contract offer in some areas, including finding ways to safeguard writers from artificial intelligence technology. The note added, however, that Ms. Lombardini had said studios “were not willing to engage” on other Writers Guild proposals, including success-based residual payments from streaming services. The note said guild leaders would not return to negotiations until studios were willing to engage on all proposals.The announcement of a return to the bargaining table was the first positive development in a dual labor walkout — tens of thousands of actors went on strike in mid-July — that has brought Hollywood production to a halt. Late-night television shows immediately went dark, and broadcast networks have retooled their fall seasons to include mostly reality series.Last week’s session, which lasted about an hour, was the first time the lead negotiators from each side had sat down in person since May 1, when talks collapsed. Both sides had characterized it as a meeting to determine whether it made sense to restart talks. With a strike starting to hurt companies and writers alike, was there a give-and-take to be had? Pressure has been increasing from multiple directions to reach an agreement.“It is critical that this gets resolved immediately so that Los Angeles gets back on track, and I stand ready to personally engage with all the stakeholders in any way possible to help get this done,” Karen Bass, the mayor of Los Angeles, said in a statement last Friday.Screenwriters and actors are worried about not receiving a fair share of the spoils of a streaming-dominated future. They say streaming-era business practices have made their profession an unsustainable one.Many streaming shows have eight to 12 episodes per season, compared with more than 20 made for traditional television. Writers are fighting for better residual pay, a type of royalty for reruns and other showings, which they have said is a crucial source of income for the middle-class writer whose compensation has been upended by streaming.The Writers Guild also wants studios to guarantee that artificial intelligence will not encroach on writers’ credits and compensation. The studios rejected the guild’s proposed guardrails, instead suggesting an annual meeting on advances in technology. (In recent weeks, studio executives have said in interviews that they made a mistake by not taking the union’s A.I. concerns more seriously.)The studios defended their offer after negotiations broke down, saying in a statement that it included “generous increases in compensation for writers.” The primary sticking points, studios have said, are union proposals that would require studios to staff TV shows with a certain number of writers for a specified period, “whether needed or not.”Caught in the crossfire of the Writers Guild and SAG-AFTRA, as the actors’ guild is known, are tens of thousands of crew members and small businesses (dry cleaners, caterers, lumber yards) that support movie and television production. The 2007-8 writers’ strike cost the California economy more than $2 billion, according to the Milken Institute, which recently estimated that losses this time could be double that figure. More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Movies

      ‘The Last Voyage of the Demeter’ Review: Blood on the Water

      by

      This horror movie, based on a chapter from Bram Stoker’s “Dracula,” is set on a cargo ship unwittingly transporting an evil demon.Horror heads are accustomed to screeching at the screen, “Don’t go in the basement!” In “The Last Voyage of the Demeter,” I found myself inclined toward the reverse exclamation: “Just go below deck and kill him already!”Based on a chapter in Bram Stoker’s novel “Dracula,” this squally scary movie is set on a London-bound merchant ship doomed to a bloody routine. Days are safe, but sundown brings the terrorizing thirst of the vessel’s vampire stowaway, who emerges in darkness to bite a few necks before retiring to his makeshift cargo coffin.The regularity of Dracula’s circadian timetable raises the question: Why doesn’t the crew just attack around noon? It could have saved the movie’s beneficent hero, Clemens (Corey Hawkins), a boatload of trouble.The movie begins as Clemens, a British doctor, appeals to Captain Eliot (Liam Cunningham) to join the Demeter’s company. The only educated man onboard, Clemens nonetheless proves an able deckhand, winning the favor of both the salty first mate, Wojchek (David Dastmalchian), and the captain’s wide-eyed grandson, Toby (Woody Norman).But “The Last Voyage,” directed by André Ovredal, doesn’t waste time on characterizations. Before long, bad omens and creaky floorboards give way to repetitive, swollen set pieces as Dracula picks off the shipmates one by one. The script does find time for a feeble feminist gesture — the story’s sole woman can cock a rifle — and a monologue about racism. These efforts to update the tale are about as successful as those of the sorry crew, whose fates were written over a century ago.The Last Voyage of the DemeterRated R for fighting and biting. Running time: 1 hour 58 minutes. In theaters. More

    • 75 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Love Life’ Review: Encounters in Grief

      by

      In this Japanese drama from Koji Fukada, the death of a child alters life for a couple and for the boy’s previously absent father.The Japanese writer-director Koji Fukada made his international mark with “Harmonium” (2017). Like that film, “Love Life,” his latest feature, concerns a family shaken up both by an interloper’s arrival and by a sudden tragedy, this time in the reverse order.Taeko (Fumino Kimura) is raising a 6-year-old son, an Othello board game prodigy named Keita (Tetta Shimada), with her husband, Jiro (Kento Nagayama). The arrangement wasn’t Jiro’s original plan: He had been preparing to marry a colleague, but he cheated on her with Taeko and ended up marrying Taeko instead. Taeko was already a mother to Keita, whose father abandoned them. Now Jiro’s parents, especially his dad, scorn Taeko and Keita as not theirs.Then — in a development that occurs around 20 minutes in, necessitating a spoiler warning — Keita dies while sustaining a concussion in a bathtub accident, after wandering off during a party. (Fukada, who elsewhere favors a placid, unobtrusive visual style, plays the drowning for suspense with an exceptionally cruel slow zoom.)The death lures back Keita’s absent father, Park (Atom Sunada), a South Korean man who is also deaf, and who, crashing the funeral, immediately hits Taeko before slapping himself. The recriminations, and efforts to downplay recriminations, begin. Taeko can’t forgive Park for leaving, but she also believes he needs her help. Jiro feels guilty for his relative lack of guilt.It’s more a grief triangle than a love triangle, and a late revelation alters its symmetry, erasing hard-won sympathy for one character. Part of Fukada’s rationale may be that straightforward catharsis would be too easy. But his drama is facile in other ways, particularly in its use of child endangerment as a device.Love LifeNot rated. In Japanese, Korean and Korean sign language, with subtitles. Running time: 2 hours 3 minutes. In theaters. More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Red, White & Royal Blue’ Review: Keep Calm and Pine On

      by

      This film, about an American president’s son who falls for a British prince, starts with a giddy premise and has the derring-do to succeed.Like a corgi back-flipping over a bathtub of champagne, “Red, White & Royal Blue” starts with a giddy premise and has the derring-do to succeed. The setup is thus: Alex (Taylor Zakhar Perez), the wild child of the White House, is commanded to clean up an international PR disaster by befriending Prince Henry (Nicholas Galitzine), the cloistered British spare. In the film’s first half, the scions secretly fall in love; in the second, they fret that going public might cause another global kerfuffle just as Alex’s mother (a Southern-drawling Uma Thurman) campaigns for re-election.It sounds like fan fiction and looks like it, too, particularly when Galitzine dips his chin bashfully — a tic that Princess Diana passed on to her boys. Yet, as in any screwball romance worth its trans-Atlantic sea-salt, the first-time director Matthew López gets us rooting for the cheeky couple’s transition from rivals to romantic bedfellows, boosted by the cinematographer Stephen Goldblatt, who photographs the leads so adoringly that you half-expect them to turn to the camera and hawk a bottle of cologne. Thanks to their playful chemistry, we’re sold.The film is a heavily trimmed adaptation of Casey McQuiston’s zesty 2019 novel, a TikTok smash whose hashtag boasts more than 500 million views. López (best-known as the Tony-winning playwright of “The Inheritance”) wrote the script with Ted Malawer, and the two add theatrical flourishes that feel over-florid: a late-night phone chat visualized by having Galitzine magically appear in a whirl of digital leaves; a museum stroll voice-over that’s so odd, you wonder if it was a postproduction fix for something gone awry; and, most goofily, an across-the-dance-floor stare-down where Alex and Henry lock eyes as the other revelers, grooving to Lil Jon, get so low that they appear to be playing Duck, Duck, Goose.But the story smartly zeros in on the couple’s cultural gap — or, as Alex expresses it, “He grabbed my hair in a way that made me understand the difference between rugby and football.” Henry has borne a heavy crown since birth and wears his privilege matter-of-factly, though he dreams of anonymity. The Yank is, true to stereotype, brash and idealistic. He remembers being an invisible suburban kid who vowed to accomplish goals that were out of reach for his father (Clifton Collins Jr.), a Mexican immigrant. (Perez also seems aware that his angular cheekbones and roguish swagger make him resemble a young Al Pacino.) Their centerpiece sex scene is intimately staged with Galitzine tracing Perez with his fingertips as though his character wants to remember the moment forever.The D.C. sequences are snappy, freshened-up versions of the banter we’ve long seen on TV. (Sarah Shahi as the president’s no-nonsense aide and Aneesh Sheth as a gruff Secret Service officer are standouts.) Though the credits list a royal etiquette adviser, it’s hard to gauge if this depiction of the monarchy is accurate (paisley loungewear, tiny topiaries, gilt-framed everything) or just a gaga fantasy that allows a prince to coo, “I went to an English boarding school. Trust me, you’re in good hands.”Red, White & Royal BlueRated R for swearing and some royal hanky-panky. Running time: 1 hour 58 minutes. Watch on Amazon Prime Video. More

    • 100 Shares109 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Jules’ Review: Close Encounters of the Lonely Kind

      by

      Ben Kingsley plays an elderly man struggling with a fading memory when an extraterrestrial crashes into his life.Generally speaking, alien movies tend to go one of either two ways: horror or tenderness. Marc Turtletaub’s “Jules” falls squarely in the latter category — the titular alien who crash-lands in small-town Pennsylvania is a vegetarian, and eats apple slices given to him by his genial human host.But while the film’s premise will be familiar to anyone whose parents sat them down in front of “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial,” “Jules” replaces the usual child protagonists with a trio of baffled senior citizens, all of whom find kinship with the alien’s outsider status and know too well what will happen if word gets out on his arrival to Earth.Milton (Ben Kingsley) is struggling with a fading memory and a strained relationship with his adult daughter (Zoë Winters), whose insistence that he see a psychiatrist escalates when he tells her an alien spaceship destroyed his bird bath. When his pleas for help with the small gray alien are ignored by the other townsfolk, Milton invites the injured extraterrestrial, played by Jade Quon, into his home, and the two quickly form a bond. (Despite Jules — Milton’s nickname for the alien — being nonverbal, he appears to perfectly understand English.) Before long, Milton’s neighbors Sandy (Harriet Sansom Harris) and Joyce (Jane Curtin) learn of the visitor and, noticing all the suited government officials that have mysteriously arrived in town, decide to help Milton keep their new friend a secret.Underneath its ridiculous framing and outer-space high jinks, “Jules” is full to the brim with empathy for its elderly characters and their desire for personal agency. Kingsley’s performance as Milton injects dignity into a character that could have easily (and cruelly) been played just for laughs, and Harris and Curtin provide similar complexities to their respective roles. In Jules, all three of them are reminded of the importance of companionship in their lives, and how isolation in their old age has made each of them desperately cling to what little they have left. It’s a realization that leads Joyce, with Jules’s help, to finally say goodbye to her aging cat, in a funeral scene that’s as heartwarming as it is absurd.Turtletaub keeps the film’s campier elements to a minimum, preferring to highlight the quaint suburban setting and a lighthearted, understated sense of humor. “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” this is not, and despite Jules being a threat to national security, it often feels as though Turtletaub would rather you be curled up in your seat with a mug of cocoa than on the edge of it. But the sweetness isn’t entirely unwelcome — not every alien movie can be “Alien.”JulesRated PG-13 for language and some cartoon sci-fi violence. Running time: 1 hour 30 minutes. In theaters. More

    • 75 Shares149 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Love in Taipei’ Review: Finding Home

      by

      In this romantic comedy set in Taiwan, a young American finds herself torn between a parent-approved boy wonder and a rebellious slacker.Big on high jinks and light on story, “Love in Taipei” is a breezy film about a woman exploring her roots, making friends and falling in love. The romantic comedy, based on the best-selling young adult novel “Loveboat, Taipei” by Abigail Hing Wen and directed by Arvin Chen, is a charming but ultimately formulaic exploration of cultural identity.Ashley Liao stars as Ever Wong, a young Taiwanese American woman bound for medical school. Raised in Ohio in a primarily white community, Ever feels disconnected from her culture, never having visited her ancestral homeland. Sensing this disconnect, her parents, both born in Taiwan, send her to a cultural summer immersion program in the country’s capital.Chen portrays Taipei as a playful and colorful place, rich with history and possibility. In the program, Ever — who is somewhat shy — meets the popular Rick (Ross Butler) and the mysterious loner Xavier (Nico Hiraga). Rick is the clean-cut, parent-approved boy wonder and Xavier is the rebellious slacker with rakish charm. Both represent a side of Ever’s internal struggle between pleasing her parents by becoming a doctor or taking a different path as a dancer.Despite her pressing career struggle, the screenwriters, Mackenzie Dohr and Charlie Oh, tell Ever’s story at a leisurely pace, more interested in the nuances of the relationships than providing any resolutions. The story functions much like a pilot, leaving Ever’s fate and romantic possibilities open-ended. Like many streaming Y.A. adaptations, “Love in Taipei” seems poised for a sequel.Love in TaipeiNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes. Watch on Paramount+.This review is supported by Critical Minded, an initiative to invest in the work of cultural critics from historically underrepresented backgrounds. More

    • 88 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Medusa Deluxe’ Review: Curl Up and Die

      by

      A gruesome attack on a stylist upends a hairdressing contest in this invigoratingly bold debut.Suffused with the sting of hair spray and the scent of Herbal Essences, “Medusa Deluxe” swaggers onto our screens, all cigarette smoke and mirrors. From its playfully inventive opening to its flash-forward finale, Thomas Hardiman’s wild — and wildly impressive — first feature, set during a British regional hairdressing competition, is a proudly indelicate, painstakingly structured pleasure.Playing out in real time and shot to suggest a single, continuous take, the plot circles the sudden death of the show’s star stylist, who has been found backstage, minus his scalp. As his competitive rivals and their models await questioning by unseen detectives, everyone is under suspicion, not just the creepy security guard with the urgent requests for wet wipes. There’s the mouthy Cleve (Clare Perkins, whose opening monologue is a doozy), a stylist with barely controlled anger issues; the devout Divine (Kayla Meikle), who works part-time for an undertaker and is hence no stranger to dead heads; and the scheming Kendra (Harriet Webb), who may have fixed the contest in cahoots with its silver-pompadoured organizer (Darrell D’Silva).Displaying a flamboyant finesse and a cheeky, can’t-sit-still sensibility, Hardiman hides nuggets of foreshadowing in seemingly throwaway remarks. The whodunit mystery droops well before the end, but the women are fantastic and their dialogue, sharp as a hairpin, has a gossipy tempo that’s fun and energizing. A jumpy, percussive score (by the British electronic artist Koreless) pulses unobtrusively beneath the action, punctuating the characters’ tightly choreographed movements and forming a sonic bond with the crumbling brick of the show’s cavernous venue.Filmed in and around a derelict building in a postindustrial town in the north of England, “Medusa Deluxe” unfolds mainly backstage and below stairs. Clinging as close as dandruff flakes, Robbie Ryan’s snakelike camera follows characters down dimly-lit corridors and echoing stairwells, idling in the fluorescent glare of unlovely bathrooms and dressing rooms before gliding onward.At a time when too many movies feel cautious and constrained, “Medusa Deluxe” is gloriously uninhibited and gaudily diverting. A disco blast of George McCrae will beckon you through the end credits, though the movie is not without poignancy as Cleve remarks that the medium she has spent her life teasing and weaving is dead as soon as it exits the scalp. She knows that her art is temporary, its rewards fleeting, and that her time in the spotlight may never come.Medusa DeluxeRated R for weaponized words and tortured follicles. Running time: 1 hour 41 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on most major platforms. More