Tag Archives: George Wolf

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Beasts of Burden

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Rumours

by George Wolf

Did you know that swag bags at the G7 Summit come with a free copy of Incumbent Life magazine?

That’s just one example of the winking comedy at work in Rumours, which finds Guy Maddin teaming with brothers Evan and Galen Johnson to pen a well-developed satire about the “burden of leadership.”

At this latest Summit, the leaders of Germany (Cate Blacchett), the U.S. (Charles Dance), Canada (Roy Dupuis), Italy (Rolondo Ravello), Great Britain (Nikki Amuka-Bird), France (Denis Ménochet) and Japan (Takehiro Hira) all agree they need to draft a cohesive statement on an unnamed world crisis.

Actually doing it becomes more of a challenge, one that gets even harder when they all find themselves lost in the woods around the German compound. With no servants in sight, the Heads of State grow fearful of Bog Zombies, are perplexed by the oversized brain they come across, and incredulous when the missing President of the European Commission (Alicia Vikander) suddenly reappears.

That’s a busy night.

Evan Johnson directs, putting understandable confidence in these wonderful actors to craft distinct personalities while grounding the comedy with the bone dry delivery required to wring the last ounce of wry mischief from every line. The target is more than just fiddling while the world burns, it’s aimed at those who congratulate themselves just for agreeing that the temperature has changed.

This is high concept satire, for sure, but Johnston doesn’t front load the fun. The steady pace has room for surprises throughout, with enough relatable truth to smooth out the overly goofy spots.

And for those who thought Don’t Look Up was just too obvious and on-the-nose, Rumours may be the perfect blend of comedy and world’s end commentary. It’s quieter, more polite, but still able to wield absurdity as a potent spotlight on the pathetic.

And just look at that big brain near Blanchett!

Fright Club

Fright Club: Weddings in Horror

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Brides are terrifying. That is a simple fact. It’s just one of the reasons that weddings are so ripe for horror’s picking: emotions are high, the promise of a lovely future creates ironic tension, a lot of people are confined (and often drunk). And do you really know who you’re binding yourself to for the rest of your life? We invite you to the best in wedding day horror.

5. [Rec] 3: Genesis (2012)

Paco Plaza’s third [REC] installment takes place simultaneously with his original found footage classic but picks up on the religious elements of the first sequel.

It’s wedding day for Clara (Leticia Dolera, badass) and Koldo (Diego Martín), but one guest was bitten by a dog and that is not going to bode well for the many, many guests at the reception. The confined chaos is all viscera and glory, perfectly staged and executed. There’s a lack of cynicism in this film that suits it and makes the finale more touching than what you might expect.

4. Ready or Not (2019)

Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett (Scream, Scream IV, Abigail) invite you to join one happy couple as they plunge into a world where the wealthiest among us would rather commit murder than do without what none of them worked very hard to earn. The inky black comedy plays like a game of Clue gone mad with arterial spray.

Samara Weaving is reliably badass, her central performance elevated by the sometimes inspired work of the ensemble. Andie MacDowell, in particular, seems to be enjoying herself immensely. It’s fun, it’s funny, and it’s a bloody mess.

3. The Lure (2015)

Who’s up for Polish vampire mermaids? Gold (Michalina Olszanska) and Silver (Marta Mazurek) are not your typical movie mermaids, and director Agnieszka Smoczynska’s feature debut The Lure is not your typical – well, anything. The musical fable offers a vivid mix of fairy tale, socio-political commentary, whimsy and throat tearing.

Underneath everything, this is The Little Mermaid, leading to the big wedding. Expect lurid side turns, fetishistic explorations, dissonant musical numbers and a host of other vaguely defined sea creatures to color the fable.

2. Freaks (1932)

Short and sweet, like most of its performers, Tod Browning’s controversial film Freaks is one of those movies you will never forget. Populated almost entirely by unusual actors – amputees, the physically deformed, and an honest to god set of conjoined twins (Daisy and Violet Hilton) – Freaks makes you wonder whether you should be watching it at all. This, of course, is an underlying tension in most horror films, but with Freaks, it’s right up front. Is what Browning does with the film empathetic or exploitative, or both? And, of course, am I a bad person for watching this film?

Well, that’s not for us to say. We suspect you may be a bad person, perhaps even a serial killer. Or maybe that’s Hope. What we can tell you for sure is that this film is unsettling, and the final, rainy act of vengeance after a wedding ceremony gone wrong is truly creepy to watch.

1. Demon (2015)

The British Piotr travels to his Polish fiance’s old family vacation home for a proper Catholic wedding. There he attempts to maneuver a new language, impress reluctant in-laws, and grasp wife-to-be Zaneta’s (Agnieszka Zulewska) heritage. Though Zaneta’s family is reluctant to embrace him, a wandering spirit is happy to.

Director/co-writer Marcin Wrona’s final feature (he ended his life at a festival where the film was playing) offers a spooky, atmospheric rumination on cultural loss. Like the mournful soul that clings to poor bridegroom Piotr (Itay Tiran), Demon sticks to you.

Nightmares Film Festival

Blame Canada

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Hunting Matthew Nichols

by George Wolf

Is this a faux documentary? A true crime thriller? Found footage horror? It’s all of that, at least some of the time.

You know what, just don’t worry about it and enjoy the clever way Hunting Matthew Nichols tips its hat to a variety of genre influences.

Director and co-writer Markian Tarasiuk plays himself as a documentary filmmaker out to solve an over-two-decades-old missing persons case. Canadian teens Matthew and Jordan went missing on Halloween night of 2001, and now Matthew’s sister Tara (Tara Nichols) is teaming with Markian to get to the bottom of what really happened.

Early on, we come along on an engaging hunt for clues. A succession of solid supporting performances bring welcome authenticity to Tara’s fact-finding interviews, until a surprise discovery turns the film on its found footage ear.

The missing kids were big fans of the Blair Witch Project, and took a camcorder into Black Bear Forest to uncover the local legend of Roy McKenzie. This turns out to be a slyly organic way of acknowledging the big comparisons that will follow, and to setup the type of in-your-face finale that more than a few BWP naysayers may have preferred.

The ride is well-paced and impressively assembled, and the payoff is satisfying enough to make you forget about who’s manning the camera or why we’re watching reactions to a shocking videotape instead of the tape itself.

But this Hunt is a fun one, and it comes complete with a mid-credits stinger that flirts with the possibility of another chapter.

If so, count me in.

New In Theaters

Fun Bones

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Title Below

by George Wolf

I had this review written and ready to post, but it seems the AI program picked up trigger words that seemed like a shady sales pitch, and wouldn’t allow it.

So take two.

Ahem…THIS IS A MOVIE about a woman not backing down from the evil spirits that are blocking the path to her dream house.

In the enchanting mockumentary titled For Sale By Exorcist, resourceful realtor Susan Price is likely to tell those ghosts “Out of the way, Jose!,” with a big smile and maybe even a “Bless your heart!”

Susan (Emily Classen) also happens to be a certified exorcist. After a decade of flipping haunted houses coast to coast, she realizes the irony of not having a home a call her own. But just when Susan is looking to put down some roots, the displaced spirits she’s sent packing through the years come back to torment her.

“I don’t want some boo-hag lookin’ at me when I’m down here doing my yoga!”

First-time feature director Melissa LaMartina digs into the silly charm of the premise with a confident and strategic touch. She employs plenty of quick cuts, reaction shots and non sequiturs to keep the pace lively and craft a “The Office” or “Parks and Recreation” – styled expose.

Classen is an engaging and energetic presence, while screenwriters Chris LaMartina and Rob Walker keep the goofs and gags coming, including a well-dropped aside about searching for a good BLT sandwich that eventually gets its other shoe.

Both the horror and the comedy here are on the lighter side, but THE MOVIE CALLED For Sale By Exorcist is heavy on love for each genre, and built with some seriously fun bones. It’s a delight.

And also a movie. Not a sales pitch.

Shudder Premiere

Parent Trap

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Daddy’s Head

by George Wolf

You see the title Daddy’s Head and you might expect a bit of grind house fun, full of schlock and awe and signifying little. But this Shudder original has higher aspirations, as writer/director Benjamin Barfoot pulls off a nifty creature feature steeped in the psychology of grief.

Young Isaac (Rupert Turnbull) lives with his father James (Charles Aitken) and stepmother Laura (Julia Brown) in the English countryside. Life has already dealt the boy a terrible blow with the death of his mother, so James’s fatal car accident weighs heavy with cruel trauma.

Isaac is left with no next of kin, and officials from social services favor Laura taking over as legal guardian, if she is agreeable.

But while Laura is sorting through the legalities, days and nights begin to get bumpy.

Isaac insists that his father has returned. Something breaks through a picture window and attacks the family dog.** A kitchen knife turns up missing. And James’s divorced friend Robert (Nathaniel Martello-White) is always finding reasons to drop by.

As Isaac becomes convinced that is father is calling to him from the nearby woods, Barfoot punctures the questionable realities with some well-crafted jump scares and satisfying practical effects. The frights that come in the third act succeed because of the character dynamics that Barfoot and his talented cast build in the first two. The child-centered mystery and sleek, imposing aesthetics will likely call Goodnight Mommy to mind early on, before giving way to a Babadook-styled struggle with a monster.

But Daddy’s Head tripping is committed to upping the ante, and the escalation ultimately delivers enough to satisfy fans of both blood and metaphors.

**trigger warning: violence to animals

The Screening Room

Screening Room: Joker: Folei à Deux, Salem’s Lot, White Bird & More

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Joker: Folie à Deux, Salem’s Lot, White Bird, Things Will Be Different, Frankie Freako, Hold Your Breath, V/H/S Beyond, The Platform 2, The Wait, Me Myself and the Void

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Send In the Clowns

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Joker: Folie à Deux

by Hope Madden and George Wolf

Five years ago, Todd Philips made a dangerous film, a comic book movie through a fractured Scorsese viewfinder that cried with the clown the world said was not funny. Cleverly bitter, it was an excellent retooling of Scorsese’s violently alienated loner. But mainly it was a stage for the unerring brilliance of Joaquin Phoenix.

Phillips’s sequel, Joker: Folie à Deux (which means “delusion or mental illness shared by two people”) revisits poor Arthur Fleck shortly before he stands trial for murdering five people, including late night talk show host Murray Franklin (Robert De Niro).

Fleck is a shell of his former self. No jokes, no laughter. Until prison guard Jackie Sullivan (Brendan Gleeson) gets Arthur included in a singing class over in the minimum-security ward, where Arthur meets Lee Quinzel (Lady Gaga).

And suddenly, Arthur has a song in his heart.

Phoenix continues to be so good he’s worrisome. Gaga delivers on nearly the same level—which is unheard of—and her spark is sorely missed when she’s not onscreen. Philips flanks the couple with two of the business’s best, Catherine Keener as Arthur’s lawyer and Gleeson, whose brutish jocularity is alarmingly authentic.

Where Phillips found the tone for his alienated white man in Scorsese, his love story takes on the fantastical theatricality of a musical. It’s a choice that works better in theory than execution, mainly because the sequel is almost entirely confined to prison and courtroom drama. The pace is leaden, the grim brutality repetitive. Where the first film used a half dozen or so profoundly human scenes to break your heart, the sequel fetishizes Arthur’s misery to the point of sadism.

Phillips surrounds the terrific ensemble (which includes another memorable turn from Leigh Gill) with several well-staged set pieces, but the ambition of this new vision soon finds itself battling curiosity and tedium.

Phoenix and Gaga make a truly electric pair, but as the courtroom scenes drag on its not hard to side with Lee’s impatience at the strategy in play. What begins as a relevant comment on the blurring of realities descends into a self indulgence that seems to find Phillips still taking on critics of his first Joker film.

The clear Scorsese moments amid all the musical numbers are an appropriate reminder of how the film can’t quite bring its ambitions of mold-breaking to fruition. And as it leaves behind a slightly open door, Folie à Deux exits the stage as a dark, frustrating exercise, as capable of painful beauty as it is of clowning around.

New In Theaters

Pleased to Meet Me

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My Old Ass

by George Wolf

If the assignment was to write a letter to your younger self, keeping in mind the painful mistakes you’d like to erase while illustrating John Lennon’s classic line “life is what happens while you’re busy making other plans” and peppering in some R-rated laughs, then writer/director Megan Park absolutely aced it.

My Old Ass is all of that and more, a smart, funny and surprisingly emotional comedic fantasy that ranks with the best coming-of-age films of the last several years.

In a breakout big screen debut, Maisy Stella (from TV’s Nashville) is completely captivating as Elliot, a restless just-turned-18-year-old more than ready to leave her family’s cranberry farm in rural Canada for the University of Toronto in just 22 days.

But after a wild and hazy birthday party with her besties, Elliot gets an unexpected visit from an old new friend: her 39 year-old self (Aubrey Plaza). It takes some unique convincing, but eventually Elliot has questions…and some weird requests. Her old ass has answers, thoughtful advice and one stern warning.

“Avoid. Anyone. Named. Chad.”

“Chad?”

Enter Chad (Percy Hynes White).

Three years removed from her standout filmmaking debut The Fallout, Park lightens the mood via a charmingly fantastical premise, but keeps the film grounded with a refreshing and authentic voice. There’s so much honesty here about appreciating the journey to finding yourself, and it’s all perfectly fleshed out by the contrast of Plaza’s jaded deadpans and Stella’s enthusiastic naiveté.

Yes, life is about having the courage to make mistakes and find out what and who you really want, but it still wouldn’t hurt to be a little nicer to your brother. One day you’ll appreciate the memory.

Not one moment of either performance feels false, a testament to Stella, Plaza and to the strength of Park’s script and directing vision. While none of the sentiments here may be new or even especially profound, give in to the slightly Twilight Zone setup and the way My Old Ass delivers its life lessons might just knock you on yours.

And bring tissues. You’ll need them for more than just cushion when you land.