Reaction Shots

The love child of the HAL-9000, Sam from “Her”, and Ava from “ Ex Machina ”, M3GAN is a terrorist doll I’d hang out with. For a little while before I run like hell. She’s a genuinely interesting AI character in a very sly, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, and not-without-thrills flick.   It is remarkably fleet of foot; we go from zero to sixty in about the time it takes to type those words. There’s a fake ad for an AI companion/toy and before you know it, a child has lost her parents and is sent to live with her mother’s sister, the woman behind the design for these toys.  Sounds like a lot to process and it kind of is because Gemma, Alison Williams (“Girls”, “Get Out”, and “The Mindy Project”) is ill-equipped to be of any use to her niece. Cady, bless her, is palpably afloat and alone and stuck with an adult she doesn’t know, who doesn’t know how to talk to her, and a life unmoored with seemingly no rules, except one: don’t touch the toys on display in the living room. They...

To say it’s been a strong year for lead actors and actresses is a ridiculous understatement. However, if someone told me that Brendan Fraser takes it for Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale”, I wouldn’t blink. Hell, after walking out of the film, I wanted to find a truck full of Oscar statues, knock it over and hand deliver one to him.   It’s not just a towering performance. There’s nothing actor-y about it. As Charlie, a morbidly obese online English professor, Fraser’s presence is lived in, prosthetics and all. As much as I often steel myself for Aronofsky’s film (for a couple of reasons), I know that I’m going to see genuinely great performances. Additionally, Sadie Sink as Ellie, Charlie’s daughter, and Hong Chau as Elizabeth, his deceased partner’s sister, are revelations. Yes, yes, Sink has proven herself already on “Stranger Things” and I’ve been on the Chau wagon since “Inherent Vice” (and she was wonderful in “ The Menu ”); but here, they both have a chance to explore difficu...

“Me da miedo que la Guerra Civil pueda reproducirse algún día.”   - Carlos Saura   Perhaps nothing traumatizes a nation and its people as deeply as civil war. Studies by historians like Drew Faust and Heather Cox Richardson are persuasive in showing how deeply the fault lines and shadows of the American Civil War has left its mark on subsequent generations and how the divisions in society persist. The Spanish Civil War is more recent and the after-effects of the Franco regime continue to leave their mark.  Carlos Sauras’ short film “Rosa Rosae: A Spanish Civil War Elegy” is six minutes of filmic poetry and tragedy. Sauras had lived through it and seen its cost up front, the shift from a free republic to a repressive dictatorship. He fears it could happen again and this film is a graphic gut punch to serve as a reminder what that war was like. The film is set to the song “Rosa Rosae” by Saura’s fellow Aragonian contemporary José Antonio Labordeta and is comprised of ...

Another from the Vault. This was written when Alex Garland’s film came out. With advances made in AI over the ensuing nine years, the film itself is worth revisiting. Reading through this, I don’t disagree with the earlier assessment. If anything, I’d rather like to see the film again. Let me get this out of the way quickly. I liked Boyle’s “28 Days Later” and loathed “Sunshine”, both written by Alex Garland, whose “Ex Machina” I’ve approached with not-great expectations. What I encountered was both more and less than those expectations. Let’s get the expectations out of the way. I hate expectations; they often set unreasonable parameters to how a work is received, even though, particularly if you’re familiar with an artist’s previous work, that might be...hm, expected. Here’s what I expected: a reasonably intelligent first two acts followed by a really stupid third act. In other words, I felt burned by “Sunshine.” Sorry. Again, no. I’m not sorry. But to avoid further digression, I was...

Comparisons with “Spotlight” are apt, but “She Said” is set in a lower key and no less devastating in its conclusion. Expanding on an article about sexual harassment in the workplace, we follow two New York Times reporters as they follow leads investigating the extensive and systematic assaults of Harvey Weinstein.  Maria Shrader ably focuses on the work of tracking leads and the attempts to encourage women to step forward with their stories. Read that sentence again, particularly the “encourage women to step forward with their stories” because this is the crux of the issues. Weinstein sexually assaulted dozens of women in his time and all were browbeaten or traumatized into silence. By dozens, let me be clear: 82 women came forward with allegations against Weinstein. Sit with that for a bit: 82. We could well assume there were more that we will never know about. To be sure, while the Weinstein debacle is the center of the film and a large part of the reason for the #MeToo mov...

I see a lot more films than I write about. Even if this were a paying gig, that would be the case; I would most assuredly not write about everything I see. However, there are a lot of films from 2022 that I rather wish I had written about but that, frankly, I figured would be more analyzed by others and likely better, so I could take a powder. Butchaknow? There are movies that have been on my mind since I saw them and I regret not taking a look at. Here’s two: “Nope” and “She Said.”  I loved both and for reasons as different as the types of movies they are. Both shared substantial weight in terms of themes and deftness in execution. Both are formidable additions to their respective genres and both transcend those genres, as well. “Nope” grew on me. The first time around, I was content to let it rest as a Spielberg-level sci-fi adventure with family at the center; but it’s Jordan Peele and there is plenty more on his mind than just spectacle.  “Nope” ensnares you with th...