Screening Room: Zombieland 2, Dolemite, Maleficent 2, Midnight Traveler, Trick
Tag Archives: George Wolf
The Long Way Home
Midnight Traveler
by George Wolf
“How do you say ‘help’ in English?”
A harrowing first person account of one family’s flight from a death sentence, Midnight Traveler frames the refugee debate with honest, heartbreaking intimacy.
In 2015, the work of Afghan filmmaker Hassan Fazili earned him a call for death from the ruling Taliban. Fazili and his family sought asylum in neighboring Tajikistan, only to be denied after 14 months.
Midnight Traveler joins Fazili, his wife Nargis and two young daughters the night before their scheduled deportation back to Afghanistan. Filmed only on three iPhones, the movie documents the family’s years and thousands of miles-long journey in search of a safe place to call home.
In last year’s Oscar-winning doc Free Solo, the filmmakers expressed angst over the effect their cameras might have on the decisions of free climber Alex Honnold. As the dangers mount for Fazili and family, we begin to feel the same, worrying our intrusion might somehow cloud their judgement.
As the Fazili family deals with smugglers, broken promises and spur of the moment evacuations, we also see smaller moments of daily life. The daughters manage to laugh and play, and there is tenderness between Hassan and Nargis, as they smile over past memories of a much simpler and safer time.
Even with a verite nature that is often frantic and understandably desperate, Hassan’s footage reveals an unmistakable eye for form and structure.
This is a family literally crying for help in real time, and a human rights issue that can suffer from anonymous enormity transforms before our eyes, consistently adding strength to the touching impact of Midnight Traveler.
Refugees are more than statistics and political footballs. They are human beings with families, dreams and dwindling options. Within the reams of names on a waiting list are urgent, personal stories of survival.
This is one.
It’s Alive!
Zombieland 2: Double Tap
by Hope Madden and George Wolf
“It’s time to nut up or shut up.”
“That line is so 2009.”
There you have it. A horror film that recognizes its desire to wallow in its former glory as well as its need to find something new to say.
We had our worries about the sequel to one of the all-time best zombie action flicks, Zombieland. Horror sequels so rarely work and Zombieland: Double Tap is slow going at the start, to be sure. But don’t give up on it.
Everybody’s back. Director Ruben Fleischer – who’s spent the last decade trying to live up to Z-land‘s promise – returns, as do writers Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese, along with newbie Dave Callaham, who’s written a lot of really big, really bad movies.
Still, it was enough to draw the most important elements—all four leads. Among Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone, Jesse Eisenberg and Abigail Breslin are seven Oscar nominations and one win. That’s a lot of credibility for a zombie movie.
They reprise their roles, now ten years on as a heavily armed and somewhat dysfunctional family. Little Rock (Breslin), in particular, longs to leave the nest, get away from a smothering Tallahassee (Harrelson) and find people her own age. Wichita (Stone) may be feeling a little smothered in her relationship with Columbus (Eisenberg), though he remains blissfully unaware.
Things pick up when the girls take off, the guys brood, a new survivor enters the picture (Zoey Deutch, scene-stealing hilarious), and a sudden road trip to Graceland seems like it might reunite the family.
The filmmakers spend plenty of time simultaneously ribbing and basking in previous success. So there is plenty here to remind us why we loved the first Zombieland adventure so much (especially during the credits), although Double Tap doesn’t come to life until it embraces some fresh meat.
A run-in with near-doppelgangers (Luke Wilson, Thomas Middleditch) leads to an inspired action sequence inside the Elvis-themed motel run by Nevada (Rosario Dawson). A pacifist commune stands in for the amusement park from part one, letting everyone poke some blood-splattered fun at the culture clash between hippies, survivalists, and of course, the undead.
An underused articulation of the way zombies have evolved over the decade could have offered the biggest update. Still, after a 10 year wait, this revival offers just enough fun to not only avoid a let down, but instantly become Fleischer’s second best film.
Say My Name
Dolemite Is My Name
by George Wolf
Can’t you just hear Dolemite now?
“I’m so m*&^@f#$@!^*’ bad they got that m*&^@f#$@! Eddie Murphy to play me in a m*&^@f#$@!^’ movie!”
They did, and Murphy could very well ride it to an Oscar nomination in this brash, funny, and often wildly entertaining look at the birth of a cultural icon.
“Dolemite” was the brainchild of Rudy Ray Moore, who created the character for his standup comedy act in the early 70s. Moore’s raw material was much too adult for record companies at the time, but the success of his early underground comedy albums (sample title: “Eat Out More Often”) finally gave Moore the cheering crowds he longed for – and the urge to take Dolemite to the big screen.
Moore’s string of so-bad-their-good blaxploitation classics not only became important influences in the expanding independent film market, but also for rappers and young comics like Murphy himself.
Screenwriters Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski, who penned the scripts for The People vs. Larry Flynt, Ed Wood and Man on the Moon among others, are certainly at home fleshing out the stories behind creative legends, and their script fills Dolemite Is My Name with heart, joy and raunchy laughs.
Director Craig Brewer (Hustle & Flow, Black Snake Moan) keeps the pace quick and energetic, crafting a bustling salute to the creative process that never forgets how to be fun.
Two pivotal and very funny scenes bookend the film’s biggest strengths.
Early on, Moore and his crew leave a movie theater dumbfounded by the white audience’s love for a popular feature that had “no titties, no funny and no kung fu!”
Then, during filming of the original Dolemite, Moore doesn’t feel right about his big sex scene until his character’s prowess is pushed to ridiculous levels. We’re laughing, but there’s no doubt we’re laughing with Moore, not at him. And while we’re laughing, we’re learning how Moore took inspiration from the world he lived in, and why he wouldn’t rest until his audience was served.
At the Toronto International Film Festival last month, Murphy said he wanted this film to remind people why they liked him.
Done.
Leading a terrific ensemble that includes Craig Robinson, Keegan-Michael Key, Kodi Smit-McPhee and a priceless Wesley Snipes as the “real” actor among these amateurs, Murphy owns every frame. This film wouldn’t work unless we see a separation between Moore and his character. Murphy toes this line with electric charisma, setting up the feels when Moore’s dogged belief in himself is finally rewarded.
Dolemite Is My Name tells a personal story, but it’s one that’s universal to dreamers everywhere.
And it’s also m*&^@f#$@!^* funny, suckas!
I Don’t Want to Go Out – Week of October October 14
Not a bad week in home releases. One absolute gem that you likely missed is our strongest suggestion, although there is a toothy grin waiting for your Halloween enjoyment. Plus Stuber, which has at least two funny jokes.
Click the film title for the full review.
The Art of Self Defense
Crawl
Stuber
Fright Club: Vehicular Horror
We homaged another topic! Thanks Paul for talking us into doing a podcast on vehicles in horror. So many to choose from!
5. Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983)
We don’t want to leave out airplanes—that terrifying vehicle of the sky, the tight metal tube of death hurtling you thousands of feet above ground to a somewhat likely death. Here were our thoughts:
- Red Eye
- Final Destination
- Quarantine 2
- Snakes on a Plane
We landed (ha! Get it?) with John Lithgow on George Miller’s visceral, claustrophobic segment of Twilight Zone: The Movie, “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet.” Lithgow’s John Valentine’s so much more posh, more vulnerable, more priggish than scene-chewing Shatner of the 1963 TV episode. He’s hard to root for, but that thing on the wing—slimy, aware, goading—he’s reason enough to stay on the ground.
4. Christine (1983)
Obviously we needed to include a film about a killer car. Our options:
- Death Proof
- The Hearse
- The Car
A diabolical beauty seduces a young outcast, killing anyone who infuriates her. A fondness for Fifties culture, a solid performance from Keith Gordon, and John Carpenter’s thumbprints make this Stephen King adaptation a goofy bit of fun.
3. Road Games (2015)
We also wanted at least one car chase movie, and there were a lot of great possibilities:
- Jeepers Creepers
- Duel
- Joy Ride
- Road Games (the 1981 Stacy Keach/Jamie Lee Curtis one)
- Race with the Devil
That’s a good looking crop of movies! We liked Abner Pastoll’s Road Games for the list because not enough people have seen it, it keeps you guessing from beginning to end, and, like you, we love Barbara Crampton.
2. Transsiberian (2008)
It turns out, an awful lot of great or bizarre or awful-but-endlessly-watchable horror has been made aboard a train. We narrowed down our list to:
- Creep
- Midnight Meat Train
- Terror Train (a George Wolf favorite)
- Beyond the Door III (Amok Train – which I think is really set aboard a boat)
- Night Train to Terror (insane, just insane)
- Horror Express
And somehow we wound up choosing a thriller more than horror, and you’re asking yourself why. Because Transsiberian is a nailbiter from writer/director Brad Anderson (Session 9, The Machinist), it’s clearly a superior film than the rest of those on this list, and we want you to watch it. Woody Harrelson, totally unaware that his wife (Emily Mortimer) is unsatisfied in their relationship, keeps introducing her to the wrongest possible people on this train. Where is his head? Goes scary, wild, tense places.
1. Train to Busan (2016)
We are always, always interested when a filmmaker can take the zombie genre in a new direction. Very often, that direction is fun, funny, political—but not necessarily scary. Co-writer/director Sang-ho Yeon combines the claustrophobia of Snakes on a Plane with the family drama of Host, then trusts young Su-An Kim to shoulder the responsibility of keeping us breathlessly involved. It works. Sometimes funny, sometimes shocking, always exciting and at least once a heart breaker, Train to Busan succeeds on every front.
Hello, It’s Me
Gemini Man
by George Wolf
In 2013, a little-seen flick called The Congress glimpsed a future world where Robin Wright (as Robin Wright) didn’t have to act anymore, she just sold the rights to her likeness.
Barely six years later, Gemini Man shows us that day is coming more sooner than later. Trouble is, it shows us little else.
Will Smith is Henry Brogan, a master government assassin who wants to retire. He apparently hasn’t seen movies like the one he’s in, or he’d know that won’t sit well with villainous villain Clay Verris (Clive Owen).
Henry has barely taken that first fishing trip before he and Danny (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), the younger agent assigned to watch him, are globe-trotting for their lives.
Who wants them dead? And why?
Both those questions, though, have to get in line behind the big one: why does that hot new assassin look just like a young Henry?
So it’s Will vs. Will, as Oscar-winning director Ang Lee employs the latest de-aging CGI (somewhat impressive-but the mouth is still the final frontier) for a completely pedestrian black ops yarn overrun with standard issue spy game dialog, heavy-handed daddy issues and soggy sentiments on mortality.
There’s obvious talent involved here, and the film is certainly a showcase for the latest in tech wizardry. Much beyond that, though, and this Gemini Man’s biggest mystery is the very meaning of existence.
Welcome to the Jungle
Monos
by George Wolf
On a mountaintop that rests among the clouds, eight child soldiers guard an American hostage and a conscripted milk cow.
They play what games they can manufacture and train for battle under the exacting eye of The Messenger (Wilson Salazar), whose visits bring supplies, decisions on permitted sexual “partnerships” among the group, and orders from the commanding Organization on how to carry out an ambiguous mission.
While The Messenger is away, one bad decision creates a crisis with no easy solution, becoming the catalyst for Alejandro Landes’s unconventional and often gut-wrenching Spanish-language thriller.
Yes, you’ll find parallels to Lord of the Flies, even Apocalypse Now, but Landes continually upends your assumptions by tossing aside any common rulebooks on storytelling.
Just whose story is this, anyway?
The Doctora (Julianne Nicholson)? She’s the hostage with plenty of clever plans for a jungle escape, and a sympathy for some of her captors which may be used against her.
What about Bigfoot (Moises Arias, impressive as usual)? He’s got plenty of ideas on what’s best for the group, but without Messenger’s blessing as squad leader, limited power.
Wolfie, the “old man” of 15? Shy, baby-faced Rambo? Lady? Boom Boom?
Landes never gives us the chance to feel confident about anything we think we know, as the powerful score from Mica Levi (Under the Skin, Jackie) and an impeccable sound design totally immerse us in an atmosphere of often breathless tension and wanton violence.
While Monos has plenty to say about how survival instincts can affect the lines of morality, it favors spectacle over speeches. Even the gripping final shot, containing some of the film’s most direct dialog, conveys its message with minimal force, which almost always hits the hardest.
It does here. Landes, in just his second narrative feature, crafts a primal experience of alienation and survival, with a strange and savage beauty that may shake you.
He’d Vote For You
Mister America
by George Wolf
If you didn’t think Tim Heidecker’s Mister America had much in common with Downton Abbey, you’d be right…mostly. But like the big screen edition of that British saga, Mister America expands on a story in progress, superserving those that are already on board.
Fans of Heidecker’s antics may not be as numerous the Abbey faithful, but they may feel even more validated with this film, as he revisits a viral bit from 2017 that had him on trial for the murder of 20 people at a music festival.
Now, star and co-writer Heidecker re-connects with director Eric Notarnicola from their On Cinema and Decker TV projects for a mockumentary treatment of Heidecker’s attempt to unseat the San Bernardino DA who tried to lock him up.
If you know Heidecker for more than his higher profile roles (Us, Ant-Man & the Wasp), you know what’s coming, and you’ll be delighted. He can play it so straight, you start to wonder if some of this nuttiness is actually real.
Then, he goes into a barbershop to embrace racial profiling and propose a ban on rap music.
Sure, he’s riffing on the nature of today’s political climate, but the film often seems caught in between Borat-style bravado and Christopher Guest understatement.
Plenty of the bits land, but plenty others don’t, and those not already in on the joke may be left grasping for a narrative anchor and, much like newcomers to the Crawley saga, just plain bored.
I Don’t Want to Go Out—Week of October 7
Look out! Some big ass movies dropping this week. Seriously, take some vacation days or something.
Click the film title to link to the full review.
Toy Story 4
Midsommar
Memory: The Origins of Alien
Annabelle Comes Home
