"THE HUNT" (2020)

THE HUNT (2020)
Written by Nick Cuse and Damon Lindeloff
Directed by Craig Zobel
Starring Betty Gilpin, Hilary Swank, Ike Barinholtz 
Running time: 1 hour and 29 minutes
MPAA Rated R for strong bloody violence, and language throughout

A bit of a disclaimer: Famously, the band on the Titanic continued playing even as the ship was going down and there are moments where writing about movies at this point in time has that feeling. The world is a mess, people are anxious and things seem uncertain, but people need something to take their minds off of it all. Be prepared, stock up on canned goods and for Satan’s sake *wash your damned hands* but beyond that, worrying about COVID-19 isn’t going to help any. So that, to me, is why movies and all we who love talking about them, should keep on keeping on. Like any bad times, we’ll get through it together; us and you and the movies. So now onto my actual review of The Hunt.

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Genre film has dealt with social and political issues for basically as long as there has been genre film, right? Maybe not 100% of the time, but in general if you're looking for a message of some kind, you're likely able to find one. Last September, The Hunt was delayed for ostensibly political reasons: both the Dayton and El Paso mass shootings were extremely fresh wounds to our country's psyche and Universal Pictures didn't feel it was the best time to release a movie where one group of people is hunting another group with guns (among other weapons). Added to that was the rumor that the flick itself was inherently political and you can perhaps understand what all the hubbub was about. Depending on what you might want out of your entertainments, I have either good or bad news: The Hunt isn't a genre flick with political subtext, it's one that uses politics as set dressing; as an excuse to get to what it really is: a brisk, funny, action-forward head-trip revenge story on a large scale. It has laughs, great performances, good-natured gore and sizable body count, and these days, what more could you ask for that something to take your mind off things?

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN 14

Everything Old Is New Again, Vol.14 - March & April 2020

by Hunter Bush


Welcome, welcome, one and all to another installment of Everything Old Is New Again, the column where I talk about upcoming movies that are one of the following: Remakes - movies based on a previous movie; Adaptations - based on some other pre-existing work; or Long-Gap Sequels - a direct continuation from an earlier film, but after an unusual length of time (these are also called Legacy Sequels or sometimes Requels since they're usually intended to gently reboot a franchise without erasing the previous entries).

That all make sense? Good. Cuz that's all you get. I'm trying a slightly different approach to this column, with very little chit-chat up top so we can get right to the trailers I watched and what my overall impression of them is. Then, at the end, I write a little bit more in-depth about this latest crop and etc. So let's get to it, shall we?

NOTE: This is the article as it ran on Moviejawn. Since that time, several of these flicks have been delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the ensuing quarantines. Okay, on to the article!

"I'm Right on Top of That, Rose!"

"I'm Right on Top of That, Rose!" :

How a Bad Mom's Absence Creates a Better Mom in Her Stead

An alternative POV on 1991's Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead.

When the co-titular Mom (Concetta Tomei) leaves her five kids in the care of the co-titular Babysitter (Ida Reiss Merin) while she's in Australia for a summer, events transpire on a spectrum somewhere between "wacky hijinks" and "unbridled chaos". Broken hearts and bones abound, the matriarchal per diem gets given away and the dishes get "done" only in the most gangland sense of the word. And while this is all presented to the audience as being the fault of unruly kids lacking in supervision, I posit here that it's all Mom's fault. Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead (1991) is definitely a Bad Moms Movie.

Thing is, it's presented as a different type of flick altogether: the Kids Minus Guidance Equals Chaos film. While this is a subgenre that has entries from probably all of film history, it really hit its peak in the late 80's early 90's during the rise of Nickelodeon and their "kid power" propaganda. Films like Adventures in Babysitting (1987), Camp Nowhere (1994) and The Goonies (1985) all showcase what happens to a group of kids without "proper supervision" and attempt to cross the aisle between kids and adults by showing all the fun & adventures the kids get into while usually having them get a firm talking-to and maybe a severe grounding in the final reel.

"THE RHYTHM SECTION" (2020)

The Rhythm Section

Directed by Reed Morano

Based onthe novel by Mark Burnell; Screenplay by MarkBurnell

Starring Blake Lively, Jude Law & Sterling K. Brown

Running time: 1 hour and 49 minutes

MPAA rating: R for violence, sexual content, language throughout and drug use

by Hunter Bush

The Rhythm Section hit a lot of sour notes for me. I promise to keep the Gene Shalit-style puns to a minimum, but I had to do at least that one. Honestly though, not much about this flick kept me interested at all. It's riddled with clichés, some of the worst needle drop music choices and bafflingly stifled action scenarios.

Pizza Film Club October 2019

Minutes from the Moviejawn Pizza Film Club meeting, October 2019
By Hunter Bush

  

Welcome once again pizza punks and movie goons, to another installment of MOVIEJAWN'S The Last Slice, where I will be relaying the minutes from the previous month's meeting of the Pizza 🍕 Film 📼 Club ♣ which - if you're not savvy - is our monthly meeting where we watch fun flicks, eat pizza and other goodies and generally socialize together as a group! We publish this newsletter to lead by example: we hope you'll see that we watched a movie or made a snack that perks your ears up and you'll want to get your own bunch of buddies together and host a Pizza 🍕 Film 📼 Club ♣  of your own!

In October, we celebrated another birthday coinciding with our meet-up, this time of P 🍕 F 📼 C ♣ co-founder, Moviejawn matron and host of the Cinematic Crypt podcast, Rosalie Kicks! She and husband Ben hosted (wait til you see the decorations) the group of us for a double feature viewing of The Devil Bat and The 'Burbs!

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN 13

Everything Old is New Again, Vol. 13 - January and February 2020

by Hunter Bush

Happy (nearly) New Year, readers! As we bid a fine farewell to 2019, if you're someone who enjoys a little bit of the bubbly maybe raise your glass to EOINA. Exact date aside, I've been writing this column for Moviejawn for three years! Huzzah and cheers!

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Or wait. No. You can actually go read any of the old EIONA columns here or on Moviejawn. I don't know what I was thinking. (RIP Rutger Hauer).

This year I got to review my first Nic Cage movie (a lifetime high point for sure) and at one point my phone autocorrected part of some rant or another to include the phrase "skunk of a bitch", so I'm just gonna make that mine now. I'm owning it. One thing I'm disappointed in about the past year is that I didn't watch nearly as many new movies as the year before. In 2018 I logged 68 so I spent some of 2019's final days trying to close that gap and ended up around 60. How about you? Any highlights you're especially proud of, let's hear 'em!

Now, looking ahead: This latest Everything Old Is New Again installment will be covering all the Remakes, Adaptations & Long Gap or Legacy Sequels or Requels (there are a lot of terms flying around out there y'all; watch your heads) for January & February of 2020. In this column's crop of flicks, there are a handful of movies that still have not dropped trailers despite their looming release dates, which is always a bummer (I was waiting for Polaroid to drop for about 3 years before it sneaked onto VOD late last year; still haven't watched it).

On the plus size, I noticed a higher-than-average instance of what I think of as Girls To the Front films. Movies with female leads would be considered rare in, I would imagine, almost any subdivision you choose as your data pool, but in the nook I've carved out here they're even more scarce. Yet within these two months, I spotted three instances of ladies leading what would traditionally be male-lead films. I shouldn't have to say this but I'll say it anyway: that's a good thing! Everyone should get the chance to see themselves represented onscreen because movies are for everyone! That's what's so great about them!

With that in mind, let's see what's to be seen.

"STAR WARS - EPISODE IX: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER" (2019)

Directed by J.J. Abrams Written by Chris Terrio, J.J. Abrams, Derek Connolly, Colin Trevorrow Starring Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill, Adam Driver, Daisy Ridley, with hundreds of other actors, extras, and CG critters Running Time: 2 hours and 21 minutes MPAA Rating: PG-13 for gratuitous space violence and action Hunter Bush and Allison Yakulis 

There may be spoilers, read at your own peril. It’s hard to talk about Star Wars anymore; many movies actually. Franchises have become such sacred cows that people feel personally attacked by any criticisms. Please know that is not our intent. While there are a lot of things in Rise of Skywalker (2019) that are genuinely good or fun or well-handled, it suffers from an overindulgence of fanservice and a general “more is more” sensibility that weakens its impact for even casual viewers. There is just so much stuff crammed into the film that nothing - good, bad or in between - is given enough time to land.