Tag Archives: Hope Madden

Outtakes

Wrestling with the Past

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Raging Midlife

by Adam Barney

If you were the right age in the late 80s, professional wrestling was an unavoidable cultural monolith with larger-than-life stars like Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant, Macho Man, and many more.  In Raging Midlife, Alex (co-writer Nic Costa) and Mark (Matt Zak) were the biggest fans of “Raging Abraham Lincoln” when they were kids. (Ragin’ Abe is so much in the mold of the Macho Man that he’s played by an actual impersonator who is credited as “Motch O Mann”. )

At a wrestling event, their idol tears off his iconic purple tank top and tosses it to the two boys, but they can only hang on to it for a moment before Alex’s younger sister Mindy (Emily Sweet) causes it to be lost amongst the frenzied crowd.

Flash forward to the present and Alex and Mark are now in their 40s and stilling searching for the tank top from Ragin’ Abe, believing it will somehow fill the void in their lives. Alex has dreams about how much better his life would be if he could walk around wearing that shirt. They get sniped at the last second on an eBay auction and spend the rest of the film pursuing Tyler (Darielle Mason), the woman who won the auction, so they can take back the tank top.

Raging Midlife is a comedy that leans HARD on being silly. As an example, as an adult, Alex’s sister Mindy is basically a cartoon character of a villain. At one point she wears a hunting outfit with tiger hide shoulder pads and drives a four-wheeler covered in animal bones that happens to have a harpoon cannon. It’s so out of left field and inconsistent with the film’s otherwise grounded universe that I can only compare it to Nickelodeon shows like The Adventures of Pete & Pete or Salute Your Shorts that were unafraid to suddenly swerve to the absurd.

The movie bounces between hijinks as Alex and Mark continue to try and steal the tank top from Tyler. It briefly swings into romcom territory as Alex sets himself up to go on a blind date with Tyler and then he predictably develops feelings for her, but this really doesn’t go anywhere with so little time given to the subplot and the lack of chemistry between the actors.

Raging Midlife is propped up by some notable cameos—Paula Abdul, Eddie Griffin, and Walter Koenig. Koenig, with his real life Judy Levitt, helps deliver the funniest scene in the movie as dry cleaners who have strange costumes and impressive sex toys in their shop.

Director/co-writer Rob Tyler also earns some laughs by playing Rob the eccentric tech support/hacker friend who will accept payment in puppies.

In the end, the film delivers more groans and cringe-worthy moments than laughs. Nostalgia can be a funny thing; I just wish Raging Midlife was funnier.

Outtakes

Made from Scratch

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Control Freak

by Hope Madden

When writer/director Shal Ngo’s Control Freak opens, we watch Val (Kelly Marie Tran)—in front of a backdrop of clouds, all Tony Robbins like—tell a rapt audience that they alone control their destiny.

Tran is compelling, but it’s an obvious way to open a horror film (or a comedy). Pride goeth before the fall. Within the first three minutes of the film, we can be pretty certain what Val is going to learn, where the big reveal will come, who will witness it, and how bad it’s going to be for her career.

Ngo doesn’t leave you hanging, but the way he works around the cliches is both the film’s strength and weakness.

Why did Val become a motivational speaker? Because of her own tough life, at one point waiting tables and living in her Toyota while chain smoking and eating gummy worms. But look at her now: loving husband (Miles Robbins), great house, new book, global speaking tour about to kick off. All she needs is her birth certificate, which means a visit to her dad, rekindling old trauma. Plus, there’s this incessant scalp itch…

There’s a larger metaphor at work here concerning the way generational trauma works like a parasite sucking your will to live. Ngo weaves complicated family dynamics and backstories in and around obvious horror set pieces, turning the familiar on its side in often fascinating ways.

Tran’s supporting cast also wiggles out of cliché in effective ways. Kieu Chinh’s droll comic timing as Val’s auntie also efficiently delivers needed information. Callie Johnson’s single-minded characterization as Val’s PR exec offers even more biting wit.

The monster metaphor is less compelling, as if Ngo can’t quite bring himself to get really uncomfortable with his viewers. In fact, the film steers clear of any real parasitic nightmare images—a serious misstep, if Ngo was hoping to create horror from the monsters in his monster movie .

There’s an untidiness in the whole narrative that, at times, feels welcome. No character is entirely good or bad. Most are a somewhat imbalanced mix of both. This choice brings with it a refreshing complexity and sense of surprise. But it all becomes muddy, no specific layer of the film ever entirely satisfying, all of it obscured by a metaphor that doesn’t quite fit.

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Stinking, Thinking and Saving Lives

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The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie

by Hope Madden

I am not what you would call a Looney Tunes fan. Writer/director Peter Browngardt and co-writers Kevin Costello and Alex Kirwan (along with a writing team of at least a dozen) clearly are. Their animated feature The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie delivers looney adventures that are hard to deny.

Essentially an odd couple buddy picture, the film follows Porky Pig and Daffy Duck as their live progress from youngsters with their beloved Farmer Jim, to adults with a problem. On the one hand, the problem is the hole that alien space pod left in their roof.

On the other hand: ALIEN SPACE POD?!!!

Though a bizarre tone and a wild variety of animation styles entertains, the film’s a tad slow moving at first. But once the bubblegum monster shows up, things get pretty fun.

Eric Bauza voices both Daffy and Porky without losing any of the character that made the two popular in the early going. Daffy, that chaos agent, is delivered with the love and lunacy necessary not only to do justice to his long history of animated disruption, but to serve a real narrative purpose. Because Porky, upon meeting the weird but efficient Petunia Pig (Candi Milo), begins to crave the kind of life you can have without a buddy who uses an oversized mallet to solve problems.

Browngardt makes sure you’re emotionally conflicted. That’s pretty impressive, really.

But mainly, he and his animation team make sure you’re entertained with clever sight gags, surprising humor, fascinating animation, and a fun B-movie vibe.

It gets weird, this one. But when the chips are down and the gum zombies are chewin’, these two will rise to the occasion.

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It’s Guys Like You

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Mickey 17

by Hope Madden

People mainly familiar with filmmaker Bong Joon Ho’s Oscar-sweeping masterpiece Parasite may not know of his remarkable skill with a SciFi creature feature. Mickey 17, then, will be an excellent primer.

Robert Pattinson is the titular Mickey. Well, he’s a bunch of Mickeys, all 17 of them. Hoping to get away from some pretty bad fellas on Earth, Mickey signs up for a flight of space pioneers, but there’s a lot of competition to make the voyage and he has no skills so he signs on as an expendable: a clone who, for the betterment of science, subjects himself daily to every conceivable new threat so science can better prepare the non-expendables.

Chief among the unexpendable on this colonizing mission are the commander, vainglorious attention whore Kenneth Marshall (Mark Ruffalo), and Lady to his Macbeth, Ylfa (Toni Collette).

Joining Mickey onboard are his best friend, con-man extraordinaire Timo (Steven Yeun, playing delightfully against type) and the love of his many, many lives, Nasha (Naomi Ackie, Blink Twice).

Pattinson’s a hilarious, self-deprecating charmer, a man who believes he somehow deserves his fate. Fates. Through him the filmmaker employs absurd, sometimes even slapstick humor to satirize our own current fate. Beautifully (and characteristically), all of this is in favor of the reminder that our humanity requires us to be humane.

There’s great tenderness in this film, though it competes with sharp satire and fun action. But what fuels every scene, however lunatic or sweet or absurd, is the heat of Bong’s rage. His more than capable ensemble—from the sycophant scientist (Cameron Britton) to the ego-stroking puppet master (Daniel Henshall) to the guy forever dressed as a mascot (Tim Key) and on and on—brings every enraged idea to vivid, remarkable, too-close-to-home life.

Weaving sensibilities and ideas present in Snowpiercer, Okja, The Host as well as any number of clone movies, Mickey 17 could feel borrowed. It doesn’t. Like the best science fiction, it feels close enough to reality to be a bit nightmarish.

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Grow Old Along With Me

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The Rule of Jenny Pen

by Hope Madden

In 2021, Kiwi filmmaker James Ashcroft made his feature debut with the lean and unforgiving thriller Coming Home in the Dark. While his follow up discards the taut terror of a road picture in favor of lunacy and a hand puppet, The Rule of Jenny Pen mines similar tensions. Vulnerability, institutional ignorance, helplessness, bullying—Jenny Pen comes at it from a different angle, but the damage done bears a tragic resemblance.

The great Geoffrey Rush is Judge Stefan Mortensen, a self-righteous ass who finds himself institutionalized after a stroke. But as soon as he’s better, he’ll be out of there. In the meantime, he will berate and belittle staff and patients alike—even his kind roommate, Sonny (Nathaniel Lees).

But Dave Creely (John Lithgow, never creepier) doesn’t think the judge is going anywhere. He doesn’t think he’s such a much, if you want to know the truth, and he looks forward to pressing every vulnerability the judge has, terrorizing him until he breaks him. Just as Dave has broken every other patient at the home—with the help of his bald little hand puppet, Jenny Pen.

Back in the Sixties, hagsploitation (or psycho-biddie films) featured middle aged women with likely mental health concerns that led to various kinds of horror: What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?; Hush, Hush Sweet Charlotte; Strait-Jacket. The women’s age was what made them suspect, the films reveling in the grotesquerie of their images.

Lately, though, filmmakers are realizing that the more powerful horror mines our own fears by empathizing with the aged characters, forcing us to see through their eyes. Relic, Bingo Hell, The Taking of Deborah Logan, The Demon Disorder and Bubba Ho-Tep all focus on the inevitable and terrifying vulnerabilities of aging.

The Rule of Jenny Pen fits neatly into this real estate. Ashcroft’s direction situates the sadistic within the well-meaning. Hospital staff, visiting musicians, family members—all genuinely hope to make the world better for these patients. But this is a world Dave knows well, and he exploits every opportunity to wield his and Jenny’s sadistic power.

Lithgow’s a maniac, making the most of his substantial physical presence among the fragile patients and delivering the most unseemly moments with relish. And Rush is his absolute equal. The veteran broadcasts pomposity with rigid authenticity that only lends power to the judge’s most helpless moments.

Outtakes

Fearless Oscar Predictions 2025

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It is time! And whether you think Wicked was wonderful, Emilia Pérez was overrated or Nosferatu needed more love, one thing is certain. It will be tough for this year’s Oscar broadcast to reach the wild heights of last year. (Please bring back Nicolas Cage, Kate McKinnon and Ryan Gosling!)

In the meantime, here are our predictions for this year’s big winners:

Actress in a Supporting Role

For a while, it looked like Netflix’s big bet this year was going to make a big splash at Oscar. But as the race draws to a close, we think Emilia Pérez will content itself with just one win.

Should win: Zoe Saldaña, Emilia Pérez

Will win: Zoe Saldaña, Emilia Pérez

  • Monica Barbaro, A Complete Unknown
  • Ariana Grande, Wicked
  • Felicity Jones, The Brutalist
  • Isabella Rossellini, Conclave
  • Zoe Saldaña, Emilia Pérez

Actor in a Supporting Role

What a great field this year. Each actor cut an unforgettable character.

Should win: Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain

Will win: Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain

  • Yura Borisov, Anora
  • Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain
  • Edward Norton, A Complete Unknown
  • Guy Pearce, The Brutalist
  • Jeremy Strong, The Apprentice

Writing (Adapted Screenplay)

There were two real standouts in this field in 2024. We believe one of those two will go home empty handed, but the other will take home the Oscar.

Should win: Greg Kwedar, Clint Bentley, Clarence Maclin, John “Divine G” Whitfield, Sing Sing

Will win: RaMell Ross and Joslyn Barnes, Nickel Boys

  • A Complete Unknown: James Mangold and Jay Cocks
  • Conclave: Peter Straughan
  • Emilia Pérez: Jacques Audiard; in collaboration with Thomas Bidegain, Lea Mysius and Nicolas Livecchi
  • Nickel Boys: RaMell Ross and Joslyn Barnes
  • Sing Sing: Greg Kwedar and Clint Bentley; story by Clint Bentley, Greg Kwedar, Clarence Maclin, John “Divine G” Whitfield

Writing (Original Screenplay)

What’s the old cliché —the film that should win best picture usually wins best screenplay instead? This year, we predict both awards go the same direction, but we’d love to see one messy piece of female rage get it instead.

Should win: Coralie Fargeat, The Substance

Will win: Sean Baker, Anora

  • Anora: Sean Baker
  • The Brutalist: Brady Corbet and Mona Fastvold
  • A Real Pain: Jesse Eisenberg
  • September 5: Moritz Binder, Tim Fehlbaum; co-written by Alex David
  • The Substance: Coralie Fargeat

Documentary Feature Film

As is often the case, the Academy draws attention to five brilliant nonfiction films, each shining a light on a piece of reality that we would otherwise never see. Vital, brilliant, necessary art, each one of these. Any win is justified.

Should win: No Other Land

Will win: No Other Land

  • Black Box Diaries
  • No Other Land
  • Porcelain War
  • Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat
  • Sugarcane

International Feature Film

Here’s another great and wildly varied category.

Should win: I’m Still Here

Will win: I’m Still Here

  • I’m Still Here: Brazil
  • The Girl with the Needle: Denmark
  • Emilia Pérez: France
  • The Seed of the Sacred Fig: Germany
  • Flow: Latvia

Animated Feature Film

This category is such a joy this year, with five of the year’s best features.

Should win: The Wild Robot

Will win: The Wild Robot

  • Flow
  • Inside Out 2
  • Memoir of a Snail
  • Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
  • The Wild Robot

Actor in a Leading Role

Tough call here, but we’re thinking Chalamet’s SAG win gives him the edge over Brody.

Should win: Colman Domingo, Sing Sing

Will win: Timothee Chalamet, A Complete Unknown

  • Adrien Brody, The Brutalist
  • Timothee Chalamet, A Complete Unknown
  • Colman Domingo, Sing Sing
  • Ralph Fiennes, Conclave
  • Sebastian Stan, The Apprentice

Actress in a Leading Role

Should win: Demi Moore, The Substance

Will win: Demi Moore, The Substance

  • Cynthia Erivo, Wicked
  • Karla Sofia Gascon, Emilia Pérez
  • Mikey Madison, Anora
  • Demi Moore, The Substance
  • Fernanda Torres, I’m Still Here

Best Director

Would we cry if Fargeat won this? Tears of joy, maybe. But the likelihood is low and, to be honest, the tightrope Baker walked to give his film an almost slapstick comedic tone (given that it’s a film about a group of mobsters who kidnap a sex worker) is a real testament to his mastery of the craft of direction.

Should win: Sean Baker, Anora

Will win: Sean Baker, Anora

  • Anora: Sean Baker
  • The Brutalist: Brady Corbet
  • A Complete Unknown: James Mangold
  • Emilia Pérez: Jacques Audiard
  • The Substance: Coralie Fargeat

Best Picture

The Substance has a real shot, with Conclave as the upset possibility.

Should win: Anora

Will win: Anora

  • Anora
  • The Brutalist
  • A Complete Unknown
  • Conclave
  • Dune: Part Two
  • Emilia Pérez
  • I’m Still Here
  • Nickel Boys
  • The Substance

The Academy Awards are Sunday, March 2nd, live on ABC and Hulu with Conan O’Brien hosting.

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Rolling Along

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My Dead Friend Zoe

by Hope Madden

Filmmaker Kyle Hausmann-Stokes impresses with his feature debut, My Dead Friend Zoe. Based on his 2022 short Merit x Zoe, the film follows Army veteran Merit (Sonequa Martin-Green, Star Trek: Discovery) as she tries to overcome some post-Afghanistan trauma.

Merit’s best friend Zoe (Natalie Morales)—who is, as you might surmise from the title, dead—isn’t making recovery easy. A constant companion (at therapy, on dates, etc.), Zoe— as well as Merit’s noticeable interactions with the invisible friend—is a big part of Merit’s problem.

But therapy will have to hang on because Merit’s hero, Vietnam Veteran grandpa (Ed Harris), has early onset Alzheimer’s and Merit (with Zoe in tow) needs to get to the family lake house and figure things out.

While the title and premise may sound a tad flippant, My Dead Friend Zoe turns out to be a rewarding and earnest drama. Morales delivers a boldly funny and equally vulnerable turn, and love interest Alex (Utkarsh Ambudkar) injects the film with charming, self-deprecating humor. But the levity tends to enrich the film’s truly human quality rather than distract from its underlying tensions.

Hausman-Stokes’s patient direction and unsentimental script, co-written with Cherish Chen and A.J. Bermudez, slowly uncover Merit’s trauma, which gives the unfolding family drama the attention and respect it needs.

Martin-Green’s stoic performance is offset by well-timed flashbacks to the friendship during active duty. So often in other films, this structure feels cliché and formulaic, as the look back teases a dark episode that the frivolity is meant to contrast with. Instead, Hausman-Stokes and his remarkable cast clarify the joyous bond the two women shared, deepening the sense of loss that is now drowning Merit.

We’ve seen plenty of solid dramas depicting struggles facing veterans, Megan Leavey, Thank You for Your Service, American Sniper, and the masterpiece Leave No Trace among them. The commonality My Best Friend Zoe shares with these films is the profound need for the veteran services currently on the DOGE chopping block. While My Dead Friend Zoe’s delightful and moving buddy picture vibe carves a different direction than the others took, the message is even more urgent.

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No Place Like Home

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Invader

by Hope Madden

Lean, mean and affecting, Mickey Keating’s take on the home invasion film wastes no time. In a wordless—though not soundless—opening, the filmmaker introduces an unhinged presence.

Cut to Ana (Vero Maynez). She’s sleepy, it’s late, the bus is empty except for the driver hustling her off, his voice constant, annoyed, and on repeat: Come on. Get off the bus. Last stop. You gotta go.

It’s 4:30 am. The bus was late, the station is deserted, and Carmilla—Ana’s cousin—is not answering.

Immediately Keating sets our eyes and ears against us. His soundtrack frequently blares death metal, a tactic that emphasizes a chaotic, menacing mood the film never shakes. Using primarily handheld cameras from the unnerving opening throughout the entire film, the filmmaker maintains an anarchic energy, a sense of the characters’ frenzy and the endless possibility of violence.

Keating strings together a handful of believably tumultuous moments early in the film—particularly a couple of run-ins with a horn-blaring cabbie—to work the nerves and leave you feeling as raw and vulnerable as Ana. Rather than dip and settle, Invader delivers relentlessly on that early sense of harried terror.

Scenes possess an improvisational quality that coincides with the rawness of the overall effort. Keating is spare with exposition—if you can’t figure out what’s going on without having it explained to you, you are clearly not paying attention. The verité style accomplishes what it’s mean to, lending Invader an authenticity that amplifies the horror.

Maynez carries that authenticity. Ana never feels written, she feels alive. Her confusion, anger, fear—all of it runs together in a way that reflects what the audience is experiencing in each moment. Her limited screentime with Colin Huerta introduces enough tenderness to give the sense of terror real depth.

Joe Swanberg, with limited screentime and even more limited dialog, crafts a terrifying image of havoc. His presence is perversely menacing, an explosion of rage and horror.

Invader delivers a spare, nasty, memorable piece of horror in just over an hour. It will stick with you a while longer.