Screening Room: Zombieland 2, Dolemite, Maleficent 2, Midnight Traveler, Trick
Tag Archives: Hope Madden
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.
Killer Queen
Maleficent: Mistress of Evil
by Hope Madden
I’m not going to lie to you, I hated Maleficent. Not because it was a mediocre CGI mess, although it certainly was that. I hated that film because Disney turned one of its absolutely most magnificent villains—one of cinema’s most magnificent villains—into a heartbroken, misunderstood victim.
Screw that.
But five years after Maleficent’s (Angelina Jolie) maternal love saves Aurora (Elle Fanning) and several kingdoms in the process, humans are back to whispering evil stories about the guardian of the Moors. Meanwhile, Aurora and Prince Philip (Harris Dickinson) have decided to marry.
That first family dinner doesn’t go super well.
Stuffed to the antlers with sidetracks and subplots, characters and ideas, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil shows you everything and articulates nothing.
Flashes of social commentary stand out. In the name of greed, evil leadership whips up fear amongst the population to justify racism, jingoism, colonialism and even genocide.
Despite Maleficent’s fangs, the fact that the film clearly leans toward giving the colonizers one more chance as opposed to siding with indigenous rebellion renders the film biteless.
But who could resist Chiwetel Ejiofor? He calls for peace and languishes in some kind of Disney side character purgatory as wizened and wearied Conall, one of the winged Fey who look to Maleficent to lead their kind.
Dear Hollywood: please give Chiwetel Ejiofor better parts in better movies.
Ejiofor is hardly the only talent wasted in this slog. Littered amid the carnage of so, so many side plots are Imelda Staunton, Lesley Manville and Juno Temple, again bothersome at best as three pixies. Sam Riley and Ed Skrein are allowed to smirk and grunt, respectively. Only Jenn Murray stands out, weirdly sadistic playing the queen’s very small enforcer.
Even Fanning once again comes up lame, asked only to beam and blush, though Dickinson has it worse. Be quietly noble, his direction seems to insist. Noble, but never rude.
The film should be Jolie’s show, but she does little more than pose. Robbed of her imposing wickedness by the end of the first movie, she now just seems bored and is more often than not upstaged by Michelle Pfeiffer’s Queen Ingrith.
Ingrith is written with no more depth than any of the other few dozen speaking characters to grace the screen in this overpopulated mess, but it’s always fun to see Pfeiffer chew scenery up and spit it out.
Director Joachim Ronning shows moments of visual inspiration, splashing color across the screen one moment, forbiddingly grim grey tones the next, but the little magical creatures rarely suggest the CGI budget was spent very wisely.
What was the point again?
Oh, right. Maleficent made $758 million.
I Was Promised a Treat
Trick
by Hope Madden
Always choose treat.
That’s a great horror movie tagline. It’s also just good advice. Two for two before the credits even roll, Patrick Lussier. Onward!
Lussier co-writes and directs Trick, a new horror show about an unstoppable, maybe even supernatural serial killer who comes back to Smalltown, America on Halloween to kill teens.
Hang on, isn’t that the basic plot of the Halloween franchise?
It is! But wait, there’s more! This loner wearing face paint appeals to the disenfranchised of the world, creating an online following that’s almost dangerous in its obsessive behavior. Who knows what his influence might make them do…
Well, now that’s just Joker.
Correct! But this guy has a cool knife that says TRICK on one side and TREAT on the other side.
Yeah…that’s kind of cool…So if the knife comes up TRICK, he kills you, right? What if it comes up TREAT?
He still kills you. There’s no additional purpose to the knife. But stay with me, here! A beautiful, studious young woman who’s devoted to her invalid dad survived the first attack and now “Trick” Weaver may be coming back to claim her for his next victim!
Oh, come on! That’s every single slasher sequel. Ever! And this isn’t even a sequel—that’s just lazy. Does Trick bring anything new to the table? Offer anything provocative? Are the kills at least interesting?
Did I tell you about his cool knife?
Sigh.
Lussier (Drive Angry, My Bloody Valentine) cobbles a movie together from pieces of at least four different Halloween films plus a Scream vibe (even poaching two franchise actors, Omar Epps and Jamie Kennedy). His film would feel desperate to be socially relevant if it were not so incredibly lazy in just every conceivable way.
I was looking forward to a treat. Trick is like that time my babysitter said she was giving me a Tootsie Roll and it was really beef jerky.
That totally happened, by the way. I’m still mad.
Misty Mountain Hop
Gwen
by Hope Madden
“Steal a sheep and they’ll take your hand. Steal a mountain and they’ll make you a lord.”
Writer/director William McGregor clarifies the source of real horror in his period chiller Gwen, premiering this week on Shudder.
The Witch, Hagazussa, The Wind – something in the air has horror filmmakers examining the choices facing women throughout our brutal, unforgiving history. McGregor’s addition to the collective reflection is as slow a boil as any of them – slower, maybe. And though his film casts a spell, the scary part is how well it tells the truth.
Gwen (Eleanor Worthington-Cox) is a teenaged farmer’s daughter in 19th century north Wales, where the value of real estate is quite a bit higher than the value of three female lives. Her father’s away at war and her mother (Maxine Peake, extraordinary) seems harder and more frantic by the day.
With her cherubic cheeks and school marm’s stare, Worthington-Cox does an excellent job of oscillating between taking on the maternal role and behaving like a child.
Peake, as ailing matriarch Elen, pits herself against everyone—often even her own daughter—in an attempt to protect her family and stand up for herself. The performance is bone chilling as well as heartbreaking. There is palpable longing in the relationship between Gwen and Elen, both of them desperate for an existence other than this, one where maternal love and nurturing were more than luxuries.
McGregor’s wisest instinct is in confining the story to Gwen’s point of view, her immediate perspective. Outside of two brief scenes, we see only what Gwen sees, hear only what Gwen hears. Even as she readies herself for adulthood, the world is a mystery to Gwen, and so it is a mystery to us. Very little makes sense as she sees it, and that perspective gives the entire film a menacing quality, a spookiness that shapes the narrative.
Certainly if you thought The Witch lacked action, or Hagazussa explained too little, Gwen may be frustrating. Which does not make it any less exceptional as a film.
Though the filmmaker builds atmospheric dread that leads to a stunning climax, it’s a stretch to call Gwen horror. McGregor’s direction calls to mind gothic thrillers—ghosts and isolation, women slowly going mad—all elements he eerily amplifies sonically with whispering winds, crackling lightning, and a distant howl or shriek. The way he lenses Gwen’s surroundings, smoke and mist giving way to mine-ravaged hillsides, conjures similar bleakness.
But the story itself is a socially conscious drama brimming with despair and outrage.
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.
Screening Room Podcast: Gemini Man, Addams Family, Jexi, Monos, First Love, Mary, Little Monsters
Phone Shaming
Jexi
by Hope Madden
Jexi is the Captain Obvious of comedies.
We’re on our phones too much. We’re failing to take in the beauty around us. We’re not making human connections. We’re more comfortable isolating ourselves. The online world we create is false and sad.
Jon Lucas and Scott Moore, the insightful filmmaking team skewering society with cultural commentaries like Bad Moms and Bad Moms Christmas, wants to help you see the absurdity of living this phone-dependent life. They drag poor Adam Devine, Alexandra Shipp and Rose Byrne down with them.
Devine is socially isolated Phil—good guy, smart, but incredibly uncomfortable socially. He’d rather cozy up afterwork with take-out and Netflix, all of it brought up via voice commands. Then he meets gorgeous Cate (Shipp) who works with her hands, likes the outdoors, owns a brick-and-mortar shop and finds Phil’s cowardly self-deprecation charming. He’s so distracted he breaks his phone.
The defective operating system on the new phone promptly ruins his life, thereby setting him free. Jexi is like Spike Jonze’s 2013 masterpiece Her, only dumb.
Devine gives his all to a minor twist on his familiar character, the lovable dumbass. As the lead in the film, his edges are softened this go-round, and he settles into a nicely amiable schlub you can root for. Shipp doesn’t get to do much beyond be the girl you wish you were or you wish you were dating, but Byrne delivers some laughs.
Rose Byrne is one of the most reliable comic actors working today. Here she’s basically a jealous, controlling, psychotic Siri and her deadpan delivery is priceless. It’s just not enough to salvage the film.
Get off your phones. Kiss a girl. Ride a bike.
Duh.
Shipwreck
Mary
by Hope Madden
I am having a hard time figuring out Mary.
Some of my befuddlement has to do with Gary Oldman’s involvement.
Is it just me, or is there a part of everyone’s brain that says, “Wait, Gary Oldman’s in this? I will definitely watch it!”
Gary Oldman is a tremendous talent. You know what he’s not? Choosy.
Here Oldman plays David, an aging boat captain carting tourists around for a fishing company. He has big dreams, though—dreams of owning his own craft. So naturally, when a ghost ship washes ashore, he cashes in everything he owns to buy her at police action. Then he promptly loads his squabbling family and a couple of deckhands aboard and sails toward the Bermuda triangle.
Of course he does!
What exactly happens once he sets sail is a mystery David’s wife (Emily Mortimer) explains throughout the film’s running time from an interrogation room.
The police interrogation framework is very tired at this point. It’s lazy. As are dream sequences and voiceover narration. They’re cinematic crutches, ways of telling the audience what should be coming organically from the narrative.
Director Michael Goi (Megan Is Missing) relies on these devices to explain what the action should detail, just as he falls back on ominous music to create dread or signal character development. I’m not sure this script gave him loads of options, though.
Writer Anthony Jaswinski (The Shallows) sketches characters, action and a ghost story, but clarifies very little. His script is an unfocused mess and Goi’s pacing does not help. We skip CliffsNotes style through the family’s crisis, none of it feeling authentic, before discovering the hidden facts about Mary (the ship and, presumably, the ghost) sitting in a box in the hallway.
What’s this, ship ledgers and newspaper clippings? How convenient!
At 84 minutes (including credits), Mary feels simultaneously rushed and bloated. It’s a remarkable waste of both Mortimer and Oldman’s talent and the only true mystery—left unsolved, by the way—is how it drew these actors in the first place.
