EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN - Vol. 29

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN
Vol. 29 - July 2021

By: Hunter Bush

Howdy! Howdy, one and all. Welcome to another installment of Everything Old is New Again, the column where I assess some of the upcoming film & television projects with an eye on the ones that are based on some previously existing intellectual property. More importantly, welcome back to some sense of cautious normalcy.

That's right! You can, if you so desire, return to theaters in most places. I was just in a theater for the first time since March 10th, 2020 (that time was to see The Hunt, this time to see the latest Fast & Furious) and while it obviously wasn't a completely normal experience, it still felt a little like coming home. I love movie theaters. That feeling when the lights go down is unlike almost anything else for me - the closest comparison is cresting the first hill of a roller coaster. But it won't feel "normal" until I can feel comfortable in a crowded theater again, which for me will be a while.

That said, *you* might be rip roarin' and ready to go, in which case you're in luck: There are a LOT of in-theater options for your viewing pleasure in July! As always, EOINA only deals with Remakes, Adaptations and Legacy Sequel projects. Even so, you won't be hurting for choices. Let's take a look!

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PREMIERS

All the brand new flicks worth talking about!

2nd

The Forever Purge (dir. Everardo Gout)
Where: Theaters

"Art imitates life". By now, things being the way they have, you've probably become familiar with this saying. Maybe you yourself have pondered, as I have, the prevalence of post-apocalyptic/dystopian stories being told now, the way the concerns of the 1980s lent themselves to viral outbreak narratives. Well The Purge series which began in 2013 has certainly had moments that feel not only reflective of the times, but occasionally horrifyingly prescient. And if that weren't enough, they're throwing down the gauntlet with their latest installment The Forever Purge which seems to be tied to another axiom: "No matter how bad things are, they can always get worse." In the world of The Purge, for those not familiar, there is one night a year in which all crime is legal. A sort of societal pressure valve that serves as the bread and circuses for the citizens of this particular near-future semi-dystopian American. But a really messed up and dark system is still a system and there will always be folks who find ways to benefit from trying to collapse even the grimmest ones. In the trailer for The Forever Purge, the employees and owners of a ranch in the American Southwest are terrified to discover that some group aren't content with one Purge night and intent to extend the lawlessness forever. I'll be interested to see what their motivations are, both public and secret, for this extremely edgelord bloody coup.

Fear St. Part 1: 1994 (dir. Leigh Janiak)
Where: Netflix

This long-rumored/long-in-development adaptation of R.L. Stine's book series which began in 1989 with The New Girl looks amazing, frankly. The Fear Street series were a little more adult than Stine's generally better-known Goosebumps series, with more teen angst and melodrama as well as a bit more raw violence and gore. The approach being taken here is incredibly fun: in the "present" (1994) the town of Sunnyvale is beset by evil forces, something that only certain few residents, including the lone survivor of a massacre in 1971 (Gillian Jacobs) recognize as part of a cycle of evil that dates back to 1666. Director Leigh Janiak gained notoriety in 2014 with her feature debut Honeymoon, which balances a supernatural inciting event with interpersonal conflicts and questions very well. You can see why I'm very excited for her take on the Fear Street subject matter. Full disclosure: I actually only read the first FS book, when I was in Junior High and I recall almost none of it, so none of the trailer resonated especially strongly with me, but I know the series contains over 160 books (if my math is correct) so I imagine the plot is inspired by at least a few of them. This looks to be a lot of fun, very splattery and colorful and absolutely soaked in genre staples like ax wielding maniacs standing in a cabin doorway, puritan townspeople performing a ritual sacrifice and, my favorite, a kid in the '90s rapping to himself while playing Castlevania before getting an ominous phone call. Netflix is staggering the releases of the 3 installments, each set in one of the key eras, and I've listed them on the appropriate dates below, but this review, much like the trailer, covers all of them.

Monsters At Work (series)
Where: Disney+

This spin off series from the Monsters Inc. universe seems focused on the day to day operations within the actual Monsters Inc corporation. As you may recall, at the end of 2001's original Monsters Inc., Mike (Billy Crystal) and Sully (John Goodman) changed the status quo of the company, finding that laughter was a much more powerful energy source than screams of terror. After a brief prequel detour back to Mike & Sully's college years in 2013's Monsters University, we're finally going to see what Monsters Inc. looks like now that top "scarers" aren't getting prime gigs and are instead regulated to custodial/maintenance work. Crystal & Goodman are listed in the cast but I'd imagine they won't be the stars. We're more likely going to focus on new recruit Tyler Tuskmon (Ben Feldman) as he gets to know his custodial/maintenance co workers voiced by Mindy Kaling and Henry Winkler among others. This looks really cute (both the Monsters Inc. movies have a lot of adorable, fun design work and characters) and could be really interesting, but I have no clue from the trailer what the overall story of the show might be.

8th

Resident Evil: Infinite Darkness (series)
Where: Netflix

Resident Evil, for the unaware, is a genre-defining video game series that began in 1996 (that genre btw is "survival horror") and continues currently. Beginning in 2002, it also spawned a film franchise starring Mila Jovovich! As a franchise, Resident Evil is completely batnanas (that's batshit + bananas), which is part of the fun of it! It could just be your regular degular zombie series with some chemical compound as the catalyst, but that's been done to death, so the RE franchise just keeps getting weirder with more and bigger and stranger mutations, every flavor of body horror and, as of the 8th game in the series, Village, which was released only a few months ago, canonical vampires and werewolves! OK! The other calling card of an RE story is a labyrinthine backstory about greed and corruption. Every game and at least most of the movies spend at least half their time uncovering corruption on a global scale that has lead to the continued existence of the T-Virus, as I believe it is still called - it's been a while since I've personally checked into the series. It seems almost a no-brainer then that the series spend some time in Washington DC but this CGI animated series coming from Netflix is the first time I can recall seeing that locale in a Resident Evil project (as I said, I'm a bit out of the loop, so if I'm wrong, let me know in the comments). The series stars RE games semi-mainstays Leon Kennedy and Claire Redfield (voiced here by Nick Apostolides and Staphanie Panisello respectively) doing more of that uncovering that I mentioned - Claire even has a full on Pepe Silvio conspiracy board in one shot, and fighting various appropriately Resident Evil-y creatures: zombies, super rats and a guy who looks like if Swamp Thing fucked a garden salad who also has his heart on the outside. All that is totally cool, fine and to be expected but my issue with this series is that it's animated like a videogame cut scene. Maybe, if you're a kid whose grown up watching the dead-eyed refugees from the uncanny valley, and are used to trying to form emotional attachments to them, this might not be as big an issue. I personally cannot imagine many hells more interminable than being expected to watch more than a few minutes of this at a time.

9th

Black Widow (dir. Cate Shortland)
Where: Theaters

This one is a real head-scratcher. Ok. So the character Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) within the Marvel MCU film series is dead. She died in the last Avengers movie so that they could get all the space magic stones for their Nintendo Power Glove and save the day. So ...NOW is when they release her stand alone movie? Admittedly, this has been "in development" for, I dunno, roughly 50 years right? Basically someone at Marvel said they might make a Black Widow movie almost as soon as she showed up because OF COURSE THEY MIGHT. They MIGHT make a movie about literally ANY character that they think will put butts in seats because the whole thing is a crazy perpetual money machine. Obvs. Now having said that, some of this looks kinda fun. I like superheroes and comic books. I'm a sucker for spy flicks, espionage, gadgets and well choreographed fight scenes, which this trailer had a lot of! I'm not too familiar with Black Widow's comics-continuity backstory beyond her being a former soviet super spy who defected to join the Avengers eventually. In the movies (specifically Age of Ultron, I think?) they show some stuff about a Red Room where kids were trained in the espionage and mercenary arts from a young age. The BW solo movie seems to be dealing with a lot of that, as well as Natasha's (Johansson's) family? Which is weird because I thought she was an orphan, but maybe I'm just projecting that trope onto her story? Anyway, here we get references to Florence Pugh being her sister and Rachel Weisz being her mother, plus David Harbour is there so is he her papa?!?! What a talented family! The plot is a little hard to parse but it seems the person now running the Red Room, a skull-masked villain named Taskmaster (a personal favorite character of mine from the comics) needs to be taken down because he's not just turning the kids from the Red Room into stone cold killers but also brainwashing them which is, I guess, just a bit out of bounds. We get a lot of what you'd expect: vehicle chases and fisticuffs and the like and that's all fine. Where my eyes begin to glaze over is seeing one of those Big Action Set Pieces that are all just starting to feel very same-y to me because they're just actors on wires in a green screened environment. This one is Widow fighting Taskmaster as they both free-fall through the debris of some (maybe) SHIELD Helicarrier? Beyond that though sure, I'm reasonably interested. Also worth noting is that the movie is playing it close to the vest with who is playing Taskmaster. Maybe it's a big star? Maybe it's another character in the movie? Maybe it's something tied to the greater MCU? Who can say? ...Me. It's me. I'm Taskmaster in the Black Widow movie. Tell everyone.

Fear Street Part 2: 1978 (dir. Leigh Janiak)
Where: Netflix

The 2nd part of the Fear Street trilogy drops. This one is the guy-with-an-ax-at-a-summer-camp one. Can't wait!

11th

Wellington Paranormal (series)
Where: The CW / HBO Max the following day

This comedy series spins off of the, and I cannot stress this enough, mind-bendingly funny vampire film What We Do in the Shadows (2014) and follows some members of the local Paranormal branch of Wellington New Zealand police department. As they say, dryly and without  a hint of irony, they are "a bit like Mulder and Scully" from The X-Files: called to cases involving werewolves, ghosts, vampires, UFOs and other spookums. If you're a fan of the mockumentary style that WWDITS nailed - or rather staked - then this might be for you. The trailer is a bit scattered as far as giving me much insight into what the show is beyond monster-of-the-week shenanigans, but I'm still completely willing to check it out when it becomes available in the US (having already premiered outside the country back in February).

16th

Fear Street Part 3: 1666 (dir. Leigh Janiak)
Where: Netflix

The final installment of Leigh Janiak's Fear Street Triptych. This is the one set in a rural township in what looks like New England, but that's just a guess, and will presumably deal with the original evil that has cursed the land that would eventually become the town of Sunnyvale.

Space Jam: A New Legacy (dir. Malcolm D. Lee)
Where: Theaters

"The computer dude kidnapped my son." My sweet Satan this looks like torture. I'm not a fan of the original Space Jam, but one thing I can say for it is: at least its crappiness can be excused by being 25 years old and made at a time when studios still didn't TRY very hard when it came to "children's entertainment". That's kind of the reason Pixar broke so big was that they clearly respected animation, and children's intelligence, and the knowledge that some adults would have to sit through their movies, so why not make them, y'know, ...good? But here we are in 2021 with this awful looking hunk of junk where Don Cheadle (as the aforementioned "Computer Dude") kidnaps LeBron James' family to lure him into a basketball game. Word on the street is that his motivation is slightly deeper than that - he is trying to steal all of James' internet followers for some nefarious ends? But like, is that better? No. That sucks. A big selling point for this one is that Warners can use any of their intellectual properties in a sort of even-more-bullshit-nonsensical Ready Player One bid to stay relevant and keep people interested in their IP, but like for what and for whom? What person who would otherwise be uninterested in this movie, is going to go see it in theaters because Alex's droogs from A Clockwork Orange are in the background? You people know you can just WATCH THESE MOVIES ON YOUR OWN, yes? If you absolutely have some fundamental, DNA-deep desire to throw away the price of a couple of movie tickets, might I suggest you subscribe to the MovieJawn Patreon and get (I swear a fucking blood oath) MUCH MORE bang for your buck. Also Daffy Duck straight up steals a joke from a The Simpsons season 7 Treehouse of Horror segment Homer³. Eat shit, movie.

23rd

Snake Eyes (dir. Robert Schwentke)
Where: Theaters

Spun off from the G.I. Joe films (though presumably Paramount intends this to restart the franchise), based on the toy line popular throughout the '80s, this scratches a real similar itch for me as the Black Widow trailer: street-level action scenes (for the most part) and some well choreographed combat. The cast is stacked: Henry Golding, Iko Uwais, Samara Weaving & Peter Mensah to name a few stand-outs, and the direction looks solid (as much as one can tell from a trailer) but I'm hesitant on this one because it looks like it's half kung fu movie origin story stuff (rad) and half laying track for future G.I. Joe entries (ehh), so there's a good chance I'd enjoy it until it collapsed under the weight of its franchise. Having said that, it could lean into things and embrace getting bigger and crazier (like a certain street racing franchise famously has) but what are the odds? Also, famously, Snake Eyes (Golding) doesn't speak, at least not after becoming Snake Eyes, so if this does eventually get full on "Go Joe!", will he just be entirely silent, like Nic Cage (star of the other, unrelated Snake Eyes) in Willy's Wonderland? Interesting. Not hitting theaters for this, but I'll keep an eye out for it streaming definitely.

Masters of the Universe: Revelation (series)
Where: Netflix

In the '80s the Masters of the Universe toy line was hot. Musclebound and monster heavy, the toy line sparked the imagination of children everywhere (probably - I was only in Philadelphia but it was definitely happening here) and had a tie-in cartoon series that never QUITE lived up to its potential. Occasionally you'd get a few scenes or episodes that really scratched the itch of what the He-Man & MOTU toys were capable of in your mind, but not always. Now, from producer Kevin Smith comes a version of the series that looks a lot more like what pre-teen me envisioned, with swords, sorcery, lasers (yes, you can have it all), monsters and, at least as far as the trailer is concerned, a bumping '80s soundtrack? Wild times. This looks like it will re-establish the setting, characters and rules of the old cartoon - like how fit but scrawny Prince Adam has to raise his sword and say "I... have... the POWER!" to transform into beefy blonde daddy He-Man - but beyond that I dunno what the plot might be. Now that I think about it, I don't know what the plot of the original series was either. I mean Skeletor (voiced here by Mark Hamill) was trying to do evil things because he was the villain, but like, to what end? Anyway, I always thought the He-Man/MOTU characters had some of the best, craziest designs and they all seem to be floating around in the trailer. Except maybe Ram Man, a toy whose legs you could compress into his abdomen which then sprung out, launching him to great heights of about 3 inches. He was more impressive in our heads. Getting back to the voice cast though: Sarah Michelle Gellar, Kevin Conroy, Lena Headey, Diedrich Bader, Henry Rollins, Alicia Silverstone, Stephen Root, Kevin Michael Richardson, Tony Todd, Justin Long and, most excitingly: Downtown Griffy Newms from the Black Check podcast as Orko, the tiny, weird magical wizard thing! Blank it? Thank it. Smith also recently said that the first 5 episodes were inspired by films from the same era as the toys/series: Superman 2, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Batman, Hellraiser and of course the Masters of the Universe movie starring Dolph Lundgren and Frank Langella.

30th

The Green Knight (dir. David Lowery)
Where: Theaters

Finally, after what seems an eternity, David Lowery's The Green Knight, based on the Arthurian legend, is actually coming to theaters. I enjoy some of Lowery's other film work, but I'm a big fan of a lot of these older mythologies and stories, especially because they're so out of public consciousness that you can do a LOT with them as far as reimagining/reinterpreting them goes. And that's kind of what it looks like is going on here. The story of the Green Knight is that one day a Green Knight appeared and offered to let any one strike him with his axe so long as they agreed to receive a blow back in exactly one year. Sir Gawain beheaded the knight, who then picked up his head, as one does, and basically said "See ya in a year" and left. One year later, Gawain sets off to find the knight so he can uphold his end of the bargain and along the way a lot of other weird things happened but the point was that Gawain was an honorable man. The trailer for Lowery's The Green Knight is wall-to-wall with amazing imagery and should absolutely be seen. It also has already spawned a Dungeons & Dragons style tabletop game, which I have played and written about and just through and through seems like something I surely WILL enjoy. This one I will be hitting theaters for, not just because I'm sure I can see it in a smaller, less packed, quieter theater than most of the large tentpole-y flicks above.

SPOTLIGHT

Not necessarily new, but recommended.

2nd

Bill & Ted Face the Music (dir. Dean Parisot)
Where: HULU

The long gap sequel to the Bill & Ted franchise, which started with 1989's Excellent Adventure and was followed by 1991's Bogus Journey, Face the Music catches up with Bill S. Preston Esq. (Alex Winter) and Ted Theodore Logan (Keanu Reeves), the two slacker goofballs prophesied to bring unity to the galaxy with their music. They're now grown men, doting fathers, diligent husbands and ...still haven't brought unity to the galaxy, though not for lack of trying! You don't really need to be familiar with Bill & Ted to understand this movie, stuff just happens. Yeah they have access to a time travelling phone booth. They're buds with Death (William Sadler) though things are a bit strained since he quit the band to go solo. They're wives are princesses they met in medieval times who now go to couples' couples therapy because Bill & Ted have trouble separating themselves from ...themselves. You just gotta go with it. If you do, you'll be rewarded with a genuinely touching film about what it means to "be important" and what exactly "family" is. Check out the Hate Watch/Great Watch podcast Episode 48, where we discuss Face the Music with a brief refresher of the first two.

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And there you have it. I kept the SPOTLIGHT section to one flick because July is already a pretty stuffed month for EOINA appropriate flicks. I hope I helped guide you to something you'll enjoy, or to avoid something you wouldn't. Either way, let me know: reach out on social media or leave a comment below!

Thanks as always to MovieJawn for the hosting and posting. If you, reading this, would like to thank them, there is a MovieJawn Patreon, as I mentioned above. For as little as $5 a month, you get quite a bit of bonus material with more on the way all the time! It's worth it. Thanks to you as well for reading this and if you're not sick of my opinions, why not check out the latest episode of Hate Watch/Great Watch which by the time you read this will most likely be on the Muay Thai action film Ong-Bak! Until next time: Long Live the Movies!

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This piece was written for MovieJawn, a fabulous site where you can find tons of other excellent movie-centric writings, a shop where you can subscribe to the quarterly physical zine, or listen to me on the  Hate Watch / Great Watch  podcast! Support the MovieJawn Patreon here!
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"F9: THE FAST SAGA" (2021)

"F9: The Fast Saga"
Directed by Justin Lin
Written by Daniel Casey & Justin Lin (screenplay)
Starring Vin Diesel, John Cena, Jordana Brewster, Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, Ludacris, Sung Kang, Nathalie Emmanuel, Helen Mirren, etc.
Running time 2 hours, 23 minutes
MPAA rated PG-13 "for sequences of violence and action, and language"

By: Hunter Bush

They let Helen Mirren drive! THE PROPHECY HAS BEEN FULFILLED!

Hi. I'm Hunter, a late-in-life convert to the world of The Fast & The Furious. Back in 2001, I was a young man trying to define myself; to figure out who I am. Not an uncommon situation, but I was going about it all wrong. Instead of trying any- and everything, I was carefully limiting what I exposed myself to; instead of joining a group of my friends who were going to see the first Fast & Furious, to see if I would like it, I declined because "What if I DID like it? Would I have to become a Car Guy? Etc., etc." Silly, teenage stuff.

To be honest, I probably wouldn't have loved it. Don't get me wrong, it's a perfectly effective car racing-based actioner (and it gets more rewarding when you've seen more of the franchise) but it wouldn't have blown back the hair of 18-year-old me. A few years later, however, I similarly turned down an invite to see Fast & Furious 3: Tokyo Drift in theaters with roughly that same group of friends, under the reasonable and defensible ground that I hadn't seen the first two. I self-fulfilling prophecy that assured I missed what is one of my favorite installments on the series.

I had unknowingly done myself a terrible disservice.

Toyko Drift flippin' rules! As a film, it's the first in the Fast Franchise to start to lean on the wall a little bit; to push the tonal boundaries that would otherwise have (probably - this is all speculation) found the franchise becoming another Direct To Video staple. You'd catch one of the first Fast & Furiouses on TV, wonder what happened to that series, and end up down a Wikipedia rabbit hole where you found out that the 11th one was released a year ago and starred some "Really? Him?" -level celebrity like Joe Rogan or something (shudder to think).

As I said, this is all speculative, but it's an educated guess based on my lifetime watching flicks. The first one comes out, does well, gets a sequel (from a notable director - R.I.P. John Singleton) but the sequel doesn't have a LOT to do with the first one. It's a thematic sequel, tied to the original by one actor (R.I.P. Paul Walker) and a word cloud of nebulous concepts such as "cars", "undercover cop", and "crime". It also does well and gets a sequel: Tokyo Drift. And that's where Justin Lin comes in (he's the director for F9, which is why I'm taking this walk - be patient).

Tokyo Drift has, ostensibly, nothing to do with the previous two installments besides similarly nebulous conceptual ties (until it does) but it's just the shot in the arm the franchise needed. As I said, it plays with the tone, adding a heightened melodrama, stylish direction, larger than life characters and tons of amazing car action that usually ends in equally amazing destruction! There were car stunts and crashes in the previous flicks, but never so lovingly depicted. Y'know how people used to use the phrase "food porn" to describe sumptuously-photographed pictures of your dinner? Well this would be "car crash porn" if that wasn't already the concept for a Cronenberg movie. There's just something so satisfying in watching these gorgeously designed and decorated cars turn into modern art sculpture and then burst into flames.

Lin took over directing duties on the next 3 Fasts & Furiouses, including Fast Five (the fifth one, obvs) which is probably still my favorite because it is THE true turning point for the franchise. Fast Five is the moment in The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy opens the door from her sepia farmhouse into the technicolor spectacle of Oz; when the franchise goes from a reasonably straight vehicular action series to being a Saturday morning cartoon. All it takes is one vault heist. Do you remember the moment in Speed when they manage to jump a city bus over the gap in an incomplete highway and you're just kind of like "Sure" because you're so invested and also you're just having too much fun to care? The vault heist in Fast Five is like that, but for about 20 minutes. The laws of realistic physics stop applying (though the sequence is pretty much entirely achieved through practical effects) and you're left with Pure Cinema. Something is happening that I know intellectually to be impossible to the point of comedy but not only do I believe my eyes, but I actually care about it all. Like I said: Pure Cinema.

After that, the franchise is fully a Saturday morning cartoon (specifically M.A.S.K.) but with more unironic heart than almost any other franchise I can think of. Not just of the "from one character to another character" variety either. The folks making these movies want us to enjoy them! They want us to cheer and clap when our favorite characters show up, and to get teary eyed when we think they might not make it, and then to cheer and clap through teary eyes when they do! In a world where talking about Star Wars around the dinner table is quickly getting to be just as verboten a topic as religion or politics, it's nice to have a franchise clap a hand on your shoulder and welcome you with a tall cool (franchise staple) Corona, y'know?

How much you, personally, will enjoy F9 depends on which side of that sepia farmhouse door you like your movies on. And unlike the Star Wars conversation, there are no wrong answers. If you're looking purely for car racing and realistic vehicular action though, you're going to be disappointed. The Fasts & Furiouses have long been flirting with what I think of as Car Superpowers: not only the ability to make cars do things that are highly unlikely (which happens) and not just having them do things that seem down right impossible (lotta that) but also to manipulate the cars as though they were an extension of themselves. Case in point: in more than one of these movies, Dom (Vin Diesel) will "catch" someone with his car. They will fall, say, 70 feet but rather than hitting the hard concrete, they land on a nice, soft car. And we are to believe this is *better* and, y'know what? It is. Or at least I do.

If you're someone who is on board with all the craziness of the recent sequels - the big action set pieces and such - F9 has them in bunches. If you've seen a trailer or two, you've got a decent idea of what's coming: explosive chase sequences, dangerous and hilarious fun with industrial strength electro magnets, some kinda enormous un-explodable military transport, etc. but seeing it all executed is tremendous fun.

F9 is subtitled "The Fast Saga" and while it would be obvious to say that this film is about "Fambly" - because they're all about "Fambly" - this is still the one most concerned with the concept of legacy. It's also the most flashback-heavy installment and while that necessitates the scenes set in the here & now be a bit exposition heavy at first, eventually things settle into just being an amusement park ride. Will you go into this thinking that it's faintly ridiculous that Dom has NEVER mentioned having a brother Jakob (John Cena) before? Maybe, but once you're in these flashbacks, seeing how things played out, you'll at least somewhat buy the logic of why he's never been brought up. Of course, that's the point, but it's really well done.

During the lockdown, my house watched all the Fast & Furious films, finishing up with the Hobbs & Shaw spin-off and Fast 8: The F8 of the Furious in May of this year, so all these things are quite fresh in my mind. So when we see young Dom (Vinnie Bennett) straight out of jail, setting himself on the path to becoming the champion street racer from the first film, I noticed that the handful of kids standing behind him looked a lot like Letty, Mia, Jesse and Vince, his crew from that first flick. But there's no ham-handed close-ups of them, no dialogue exchanged between them, none of that hokey shit that most other franchises wouldn't be able to restrain themselves from doing.

Restraint is an odd thing to be talking about in regards to F9, a film where Vin Diesel rights an overturned truck as it rolls down a hill using controlled explosions; where smashing your car bodily into the side of a mountain and rolling 30 times is not only the preferred scenario, but a totally fine and survivable thing to do; where Roman (Tyrese) posits that he and the entirety of the crew are in fact immortals because of the things they have survived, but here I am. That restraint is so unusual and so refreshing. It really feels as though not only is the franchise in good hands with Justin Lin but that Lin respects the fans enough NOT to do that kind of thing.

That thing I said at the start about Helen Mirren getting to drive? That happened because she was very vocal about wanting to drive a car in one of these flicks and thus the fans wanted that for her. So Lin & co. delivered. But if you just give fans what they think they want without really caring about it, it's pandering and feels hollow when you watch the movie. Like seeing a kid in a supermarket throw a tantrum because they want a candy bar until the exhausted parent doesn't care anymore and there's just some red faced tot with tears running down their face and a chocolate bar jammed in their maw. Justin Lin (as well as co-screenwriter Daniel Casey) want the same things as the fans. They want Helen Mirren to drive; they want that kid to have that candy bar.

At the end of a long day, after all the dumb adult responsibilities are out of the way, we all deserve a treat. It could be a candy bar, or a Corona, or two hours spent with a bunch of goofballs and badasses in nitro burning funny cars saving the world and celebrating with a BBQ.

F9: THE FAST SAGA  is in theaters June 25th.




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This piece was written for MovieJawn, a fabulous site where you can find tons of other excellent movie-centric writings, a shop where you can subscribe to the quarterly physical zine, or listen to me on the  Hate Watch / Great Watch  podcast! Support the MovieJawn Patreon here!

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"ROGUE HOSTAGE" (2021)

Rogue Hostage (2021)
Directed by John Keeyes
Written by Mickey Solis
Starring Tyrese Gibson, John Malkovich, Michael Jai White, Holly Taylor
Running time 87 minutes
Not Yet Rated (contains mixed messages about violence and maybe some gently adult language?)

By Hunter Bush

Rogue Hostage is a Redbox movie through and through: designed to grab you with a couple of recognizable actors, a vaguely exciting title and its sheer newness (remember after NBC branded their Thursday night lineup as Must See TV, when they went into reruns over the summer, their entire advertising perspective switched to "If you haven't seen it, it's new to you"?). Like a less popular kid approaching the playground where Netflix (and so many others) are playing a game, Redbox proudly proclaims "We can make original movies too!"

I won't belabor the point: Rogue Hostage isn't going to blow your mind. Nobody here is giving a career high performance but in fairness, no one is asking them to. That doesn't mean you can't have a good time with it. I love (and I say this with no disrespect) crap. A fun, junk food movie that isn't really asking too much of me mentally that I can toss on after a long day and unwind. Or maybe put on with some friends over and crack some beers to. Rogue Hostage is that kinda flick. It's anchored by Tyrese Gibson (lately of the Fast & Furious franchise) playing Kyle, an archetypal Tough But Sensitive Man Of Action With A Tragic Past. Kyle loves his daughter Angel (Zani Jones Mbayise) - who he's raising on his own - and has a difficult relationship with his stepfather Sam Nelson (John Malkovich) - a local chain department store founder and aspiring politician - and is good at his Child Protective Services job despite the fact that he's quietly falling apart due to PTSD from his time in the military.

That's all you need to know about Kyle. The movie itself gets almost all of that set up and out of the way within the first 15-20 minutes. The movie really wants to get all the players lined up ASAP so we can spend as much time as possible in the meat of the movie: a small group of local militia types, lead by a man called Eagan (Christopher Backus), invade a Nelson's department store while Sam Nelson is there to give some televised political speech. Claiming that they are prepared to die for their cause, and that the building is wired to explode should anyone try anything, the militia take everyone hostage and force Sam to read a prepared statement alluding to some questionably factual crimes in his past. But are they truly out for some kind of justice or are they after something more ...tangible?

Once the militia let half the hostages leave and Kyle sneaks back in to become the titular "Rogue Hostage" (though, surprisingly no one drops the titular line), the film becomes a Die Hard-alike with Kyle sneaking around intending to rescue everyone. Despite being outmanned and outgunned, the biggest obstacle for Kyle is his PTSD: how can he disable the three militia members - plus hilariously, one employee turncoat - if he can't bring himself to fire a gun? That becomes Kyle's big sticking point: as he manages to murder one dead-meat bad guy after another without actually resorting to firing a gun, it becomes clearer and clearer that he's gonna have to eventually.

What's wild to me is that Kyle only *kind of* has an issue with stabbing a man in the throat with a BBQ fork and even less of an issue lighting one guy on fire with a Molotov cocktail; each arguably a more brutal death!

Oh, also he sees a ghost! Sam Nelson's bodyguard Sparks (Michael Jai White) pulls his pistol early on in the siege and attempts to put Eagan down, only to be informed that Eagan is wearing a suicide vest & holding a dead man's switch so if literally anything happens to him, the entire building is coming down on all their heads. Sparks is then shot. A lot. And he dies, as you'd expect (but not before putting kind of a lot on Kyle's shoulders when his last words are "It's up to you now". The fuck, dude?). Later however, while Kyle is suffering an Act 3 crisis of confidence, he turns a corner and finds a much less bloody Sparks propped up, acting more tired than bullet-riddled and dead. Sparks talks him down, peppers in a few jokes ("You've only got one bullet left. They sell ammo here? Do you get a family discount?") and Kyle thanks him for the pep-talk and leaves with only one backward glance showing Sparks FULLY DEAD AGAIN! WHAT?

That's not the craziest thing for me personally however. For me, a thing which I spent entirely too much time thinking about was this: when Kyle, his CPS partner Clove (Brandi Bravo) and their new charge Manny (Carlos S. Sanchez) stop at the Nelson's store to grab some food, Manny is browsing through the movies department and we hear Kyle say the words "Serial Killers" then "Pirate Radio" and finally "Halloween." before another character says they saw that movie and it wasn't suitable for kids. BUT. Kyle is only holding one DVD. So either:

• It's a multi-film disc/pack containing two notably REAL movies (Halloween and Pirate Radio) and one generic nothing title (Serial Killers). How would that work? What's the connective tissue there?
  
  - OR -
  
  
• It's one amazing movie called Serial Killers' Pirate Radio Halloween which sounds like a Hanna-Barbera holiday special that I wish I grew up watching! Imagine little cartoon killers (probably spelled "Cereal") goofin' around with a haunted radio on Halloween night! And then maybe an actual pirate comes out of it!
  

I cannot guarantee that you'll have a similarly intellectually stimulating viewing experience with Rogue Hostage as I had. It's actually kind of stodgy, with too many characters, some inconsistent characterization and ultimately lacks a meaningful or impressive villain. In an attempt to give all the characters their own Moments, sequences tend to drag on a bit too long to allow for everyone to do A Thing or deliver A Line, etc., but at just about 90 minutes, Rogue Hostage isn't asking for a huge investment from you and it might be just enough of a movie to have some fun with.

Rogue Hostage is playing in select theaters and available on demand June 11th.

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This piece was written for Moviejawn where you can find tons of other excellent movie-centric writings, a shop where you can subscribe to the quarterly physical zine and also listen to me on the  Hate Watch / Great Watch  podcast!

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EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN - Vol. 28

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN
Vol. 28 - June 2021

By Hunter Bush


Howdy friends. Welcome to another installment of Everything Old Is New Again! The column where I peer into my crystal ball (which has Google) and see what films are coming to screens in the next month, and then specifically whittle them down by only addressing the ones based on some previously existing intellectual property. If it used to be a book, a TV show, a toy line or was inspired by an older movie, it's EOINA material!

So, when can we start talking about the lockdown, the pandemic, all the misery and uncertainty of the past year plus in the past tense? I eagerly look forward to the day when this is all firmly in the past. But that day is not today, not as long as there are still covid-19 alerts in place when you google theatrical release dates. But we're close! We're actually genuinely close to some semblance of normalcy.

So if you're planning on visiting a theater, please be safe. Now let's look at what's coming in June:


PREMIERS

These are new releases coming to screens great and small alike in the coming month.

4th

Sweet Tooth (series)
Where: Netflix

Based on the comic books series by author & illustrator Jeff Lemire about a young half-deer half-boy named Gus living in a post-apocalyptic world where such animal-human hybrids exist, this looks incredible! When "The Last Men" (survivors of the time before the hybrids) come looking to exterminate Gus (Christian Convery) he is rescued by a man (Nonso Anozie) who agrees to help him get to Colorado where Gus believes he can be safe. I've read some of Lemire's other work, but hadn't gotten around to Sweet Tooth just yet, so I had no idea what to expect from this trailer and it just ticked so many boxes for me. The design work shown in the costumes and the effects on the hybrids, the cast (if Will Forte is in it, I will be there), the balance of the slightly heightened visual style with the almost fable-like backstory & narration - it all worked for me. Even the cover of Duran Duran's "Ordinary World" works because it has bombast and motion to it (as opposed to the largely audibly static breathy covers popular in recent trailers). I'm all in on this one, gang. 

The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (dir. Michael Chaves)
Where: HBO Max / Theaters

This 3rd direct installment of the franchise begun in 2013 - which has also spawned 4 spin-off films (3 starring the haunted doll Annabelle, and one starring a scary nun) - looks fun despite, y'know, all the murder and terror and whatnot. Set in 1981, the Warrens (played by Patrick Wilson & Vera Farmiga, doing a lot of heavy lifting in rehabilitating the legacy of the actual Warrens who were hucksters) are brought in as consultants/investigators on a murder case where the accused (Ruairi O'Connor) claims, as the title states: that he is not responsible for a murder he apparently committed. We don;t see the murder in the trailer (I don't think) instead focusing on a lot of creepy waterbed shenanigans and the Warrens' investigation. I'm a sucker for horror movies and generally like more of the Conjuring extended universe than not (I maintain that Annabelle Creation whips absolute ass) so I'll be more than happy to check this one out. Especially because it features an appearance from John Noble!

5th


Rams (dir. Jeremy Sims)
Where: Hulu

Based on a 2015 film of the same name by Icelandic writer/director Grímur Hákonarson, this English-language-friendly remake stars Sam Neill and Michael Caton as brothers who each raise award-contender sheep in a small town. They haven't spoken in 40 years but when some kind of disease begins spreading through the sheep in town, they might have to learn to reconcile if either of them want to keep their livelihoods safe from the government agents sent to exterminate the animals. If any of you haven't seen Cathy Yan's truly excellent Dead Pigs, a similar event lends that film its title, though in that instance it's relegated to a subplot. (Also, if you haven't: see Dead Pigs!) Overall this looks cute in a way that gives me very strong late '90s indie comedy vibes - not a bad thing necessarily - and the cast, which also features Miranda Richardson, doesn't hurt. This is a strong maybe from me. I'll have to be in the right mood for this one.

9th


Loki (series)
Where: Disney+

Picking up where that last Avengers film left things, Loki (Tom Hiddleston) is now in trouble with one of Marvel Comics' least appreciated bureaucratic groups: the Time Variance Authority. Y'see, since comic books have a lot of timey-wimey nonsense happen pretty much on the reg, there exists an organization whose entire job is to make sure that all the time-hopping, retconning, revenging, prevenging and whatnot doesn't Swiss cheese their reality so badly that the whole thing collapses and everybody dies so bad they never even existed. And it seems that after snagging the Cosmic Cube, Loki went Spring Break levels of crazy, dipping in and out of the time stream, causing numerous divergent branches, so he's gotten caught and, as a sort of community service (continuity service?) been drafted by Mobius M. Mobius (Owen Wilson) into correcting these variances. So this series looks like it could have a LOT of fun with familiar characters presented in new ways (or by new actors as a result of Loki's time-fuckery). I'm here for it, of course. I've never shied away from the MCU flicks/series, and I am loving some of the Easter Eggs & eye candy in the trailer - my favorite is a neon sign reading "ROXXCART" which seems like the Roxxon Corp. (one of Marvel's routinely nefarious big organizations) mashed up with Amazon (one of real life's most nefarious ones).

NOTE: This is the drop date for the 1st episode, as Dis+ will be continuing the weekly drop schedule with this one.

11th


In the Heights (dir. Jon M. Chu)
Where: HBO

Based on the stage musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda & Quiara Alegría Hudes, In the Heights is centered around a number of characters living and interacting around a specific block of the Washington Heights neighborhood in Manhattan. The trailer is narrated by Usnavi (Anthony Ramos) who runs a small bodega, but he's got family, friends, and etc. and they've all got their own interconnected stories, desires, and conflicts. The musical takes place over the hottest weekend of the year and involves a winning lottery ticket and all the changes taking place. There are a lot of really stellar visuals in the trailer (the flick is directed by Jon M. Chu, recently of Crazy Rich Asians) like people dancing up the side of a building and a strobing, neon-lit tunnel! I'm a sucker for musicals, so I'm all in for this one, plus I've been a fan of LMM since he showed up for an episode of House M.D. to freestyle with Hugh Laurie. So, yeah, I'm in.

24th


Godzilla Singular Point (series)
Where: Netflix

Based on everybody's favorite gargantuan prehistoric monster lizard / tangible metaphor for man's complete disregard for nature and tendency to poison all he touches created in 1954 (who looks great for 67!) this animated series looks pretty spectacular! It's got kind of everything you could want in a new Godzilla series: tons of kaiju (obvs), great music (!), and a big honkin' robot (Jet Jaguar, baybee!). Plus the plot seems completely insane, but seems to have something to do with predicting the future? And it looking bad? And stopping it? Seriously, the dialogue in just one 2-minute trailer contains phrases like: "A magic lamp that enables the impossible", "So it would be like if the universe never existed", and "Bones with a secret will". I am confident I have no idea what is happening, but it looks fun! It's also gorgeously animated, with plenty of movement, color and fun character designs. I'm pretty excited for this.


SPOTLIGHT

These are older EOINA-friendly releases that I personally recommend.

1st


Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (dir. Tim Burton)
Where: Hulu

Based on the musical by Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler, this is yet another Burton/Depp/Bonham Carter joint that hit me right before I began to find those to be really tedious and just has a special place in my esteem. I love musicals and genuinely enjoy this one which, like the best musicals, leans into the sort of silly, heightened unreality inherent in their nature. When I first moved to South Philly this was one of the handful of DVDs I had with me. It's got fantastic musical numbers and a great cast including the late great Alan Rickman. This is just a fun, splattery horror-adjacent flick with catchy tunes, over-the-top characters and a plot that doesn't really matter beyond tying all the characters together. And while I'll admit that most of my appreciation for this may be a sort of Stockholm Syndrome effect from having been without a lot of options that first summer in South Philly, I still think it's an enjoyable time.

Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (dir. Kevin Reynolds)
Where: HBO

Based on the Robin Hood stories, this one is just a big dumb joy to watch. Sure, Kevin Costner's accent is famously wishy-washy. Sure, there's some troubling characterizations and actions. Sure, Will Scarlett is just straight up Christian Slater at all times (also: his accent). But it kind of doesn't matter? Watching this feels like when the Looney Tunes would reappropriate a public domain story and imbue it with their particularly chaotic brand of energy while ostensibly existing in a different time or place. Plus, again: Alan Rickman! And the rest of the cast (Morgan Freeman! Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio! Michael McShane! Brian Blessed! Michael Wincott!) ain't half bad either. Above all though, it’s just really versatile: the action pops, the romance is sweeping, it dips its toe into horror with Mortianna (Geraldine McEwan) and the bit with the scar on the statue of the Sheriff of Nottingham (Rickman) is so funny that for years I thought it was from Men in Tights! A solid popcorn movie, and perfect for summer.


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There you have it, June 2021's EOINA. I hope you spotted something up there that you might not have been aware of or, dare I dream aloud, that my writing might have swayed you one direction or another. Either way, drop a comment below, or on social media and let's start a dialogue. Let's be friends through movies!

If you're looking for a podcast to listen to, might I suggest mine: Hate Watch/Great Watch, which I co host with Allison Yakulis, can be found right here on the MovieJawn Podcast Network. Right around the time you're reading this, our episode on the 1999 Shakespearian RomCom adaptation 10 Things I Hate About You should be available. I'd never actually seen it before, believe it or not, so give a listen to find out what I thought!

Until next time, Long Live the Movies!

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN - Vol. 27

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN
Vol. 27 - May 2021


By: Hunter Bush


Step right up! Step right up! Right his way, and welcome to another installment of EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN, my column discussing upcoming movies & TV series through the lens of Adaptation, Remakes and the occasional Legacy Sequel. So if a movie (or series) is based on a previously existing intellectual property, I will endeavour to mention it here.



The way the column works, folks, is: I watch some trailers and, drawing on my lifetime of film watching experience, do my level best to give you an idea of what the movie (or series) is about. But that’s not all! I’ll attempt to give some context for the original property and maybe theorize about why this idea is coming around in this form, at this time. Finally I’ll let you know whether I personally am looking forward to this movie (or series). Howzabout that?

But wait! There’s more! Down at the bottom of the column is a SPOTLIGHT section, highlighting an EOINA-appropriate property that’s very good, it’s just not new this month! So follow me, right this way, to the hottest show in town!


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PREMIERS

There are all the movies (or series) premiering in May.

7th


Jupiter’s Legacy (series)
Where: Netflix

Based on the comic series by Mark Millar that deals with the concept of legacy (no surprise there) and the weight of responsibility, but told using superheroes, this series looks pretty good. Nice visuals, strong differentiation between characters, etc. The main ideological conflict seems to be between an older generation of super people - who we also see flashbacks of receiving their special abilities - and their children, the new generation. This concept is filled with potential but creator/comic author Mark Millar occasionally has some odd political viewpoints. As such, this seems to be leaning towards “The Olds are right and The Youth are frivolous” because we’ve got our Superman look-alike talking about that responsibility of legacy while the kids seem more interested in doing fashion photography. If the comic and this subsequent adaptation is genuinely expressing both sides of an ideological divide, I’ll be more interested in it than if it’s just a This Generation is Right and That One is Wrong screed. Of course, the trailer COULD be setting me up for a nice rope-a-dope. That IS a possibility. I’m hoping for the same level of melodrama as something like Riverdale, which understands how heightened it needs to be in order to work (also - read The Old Sport’s Riverdale Recaps). Though there is some of the prerequisite fist-fighting in the trailer, I got no real sense of what any physical altercations might be about. The majority of the dialogue is exploring that philosophical divide, which, as I said, I’m here for. Let’s see how this goes.

14th


Spiral: From the Book of Saw (dir. Darren Lynn Bousman)
Where: In theaters

A continuation of the franchise begun with James Wan & Leigh Whannell’s morality-death-trap obsessed Saw in 2003, this film takes place in Philadelphia! Therefore it is an automatic watch for me! But on top of that, it actually looks pretty great! Executive producer and star Chris Rock has been trying to get a project like this going for some time and I’m glad to see it happening here. Taking place some time after the original Jigsaw series of murders, a copycat has appeared, leaving a flash drive with a taunting message for detective Banks (Rock) that in some way involves his father (Samuel L. Jackson). The trailer seems to cover a lot of ground, with appearances from various death traps as well as the puppet and pig head mascots of the Jigsaw killer in addition to a marionette of a pig in a police uniform. There’s even a shot of Rock handcuffed to a pipe holding a hacksaw! A few years ago, I pulled my back out at work and ended up marathoning all the Saw movies (which at the time topped out at 7) and found that overall I really enjoyed the franchise and its determined efforts to twist back in on itself, altering things you thought you knew from the previous installments, even while I lamented their loss of the cohesive moral messaging that made the original feel so righteous. If this installment can maintain that kind of fleet-footed tone, while getting back to the series’ moral starting point, I’m all in. I’m still not gonna go to the theater for it though. Nah.


Those Who Wish Me Dead (dir. Taylor Sheridan)
Where: In theaters

Based on the novel by Michael Koryta, this flick looks rad! Angelina Jolie plays a fire marshall and/or forest ranger (I guess?) with survivor’s guilt who spots an injured kid (Finn Little) who is on the run from some possibly government affiliated bad guys who killed his dad and are now looking to do the same to him to tie up loose ends. Of course, given Jolie’s character’s backstory, they end up starting a forest fire to either drive them out or kill them. This looks extremely up my alley and about the only complaint I have with it is the shitbird remix of the Johnny Cash version of “God’s Gonna Cut You Down” where they added a thumpy drum thing to the rhythm of Queen’s “We Will Rock You” for some ungodly reason? Why do this? Hollywoo’: Stop Doing This! Either find a song that fits or just use an instrumental. It’s not quite as bad as that Breathy Acoustic Covers of Popular Songs thing that was happening ad nauseum a few years back, but it’s still not what I’d call Good. Those Who Wish Me Dead however, looks fun as hell and I definitely will see it. Just not in theaters yet though. Nah.


The Woman in the Window (dir. Joe Wright)
Where: Netflix

Based on the novel by A.J. Finn, this was all set for release last year before *gestures at everything for the last 14 months* so now it’s coming to Netflix. And honestly? That rules because this looks like a really decent thriller! Agoraphobic Amy Adams sees the murder of her neighbor across the way, Jane (Julianne Moore) from the window of her apartment, only to be told by Moore’s husband (Gary Oldman) that Adams has never met his wife. Another woman then appears claiming to be the real Jane and then the authorities start doubting Adams’ claims. This has a LOT of strong, very creepy vibes, like when Adams opens an email to find a photo of her sleeping. Imagine how terrifying that feeling is, then multiply it by the factor of ten that comes with her apartment being the ONLY place she feels safe! That’s good stuff, emotionally! There’s also a strong visual sense to this one (Adams’ meds can cause hallucinations, so that gives director Joe Wright a lot of room to play) AND the cast features Anthony Mackie and Wyatt Russell, both recently of Falcon and the Winter Soldier, among others. This looks like a good time and if the worst thing about it is that it’s a competently shot Rear Window meets Copycat knock off with a stacked cast, that’s really not so bad, right?

P.S. - Remember Copycat, where Sigourney Weaver is an agoraphobic CSI specialist being targeted from jail by Harry Connick Jr. with janky “white trash” teeth? That’s a good time.

21st


Marvel’s M.O.D.O.K. (series)
Where: Hulu

This stop-motion styled sitcom take on the Marvel comics character created by Stan Lee & Jack Kirby in 1967 looks really silly and fun! MODOK (Patton Oswalt) is a would-be world conquering super villain by day and a family man by night. Yes he’s got a giant head and floats around in a hover-throne, commanding hordes of henchmen but he’s also trying to save his marriage. Or at least retain custody of his kids. This is fertile ground for a comedy show, especially with this voice cast (which includes Whoopie Goldberg, Jon Hamm, Bill Hader & Nathan Fillion) and while the toyetic look of the series might not be everyone’s thing, I’m definitely onboard.

28th


Cruella (dir. Craig Gillespie)
Where: In theaters and Disney+ Pay-Even-More Access tier

Based on the 1961 animated film One Hundred and One Dalmatians, this isn’t the first project to spin off from the property. It had a long-gap animated sequel in 2003, a 1996 live action adaptation with its own sequel, and a pair of animated TV series that ran from 1997-1998 and 2019-2020 respectively! That’s a lot of dogs. Which brings me to my next point: Woof. This looks atrocious. Remember in Clueless, when Cher tells Tai “She’s like a full-on Monet. From far away it’s okay, but up close it’s a big ol’ mess”? That’s how I feel with Cruella. The closer I look, the worse it all is. Do we need another movie that humanizes one of Disney’s best-known, least sympathetic villains (following in the footsteps of the Maleficent films of course)? How about if it’s a straight-up rip off of The Devil Wears Prada, but with a dash of The Joker thrown in? And, y’know what, let’s also steal the setting-your-clothes-on-fire-to-make-an-entrance bit from The Hunger Games? Why not? I am not on board with anything about this beyond the look - the costumes and outfits are fantastic! So Disney is just going full Style Over Substance then, yeah? Basically reversing the polarity on the ethos that earned them their reputation (not to mention All. That. Cash.)? Count me out.


SPOTLIGHT

Films (or series) that are EOINA-appropriate but not exactly new.

1st:


The Towering Inferno (dir. John Guillermin)
Where: Amazon Prime

Combining elements of TWO novels - The Tower by Richard Martin Stern and The Glass Inferno by Thomas N. Scotia and Frank M. Robinson - this flick essentially invented the concept of star-studded disaster flick, paving the way for every ensemble cast that followed after. The pacing might be a little pokey for modern audiences, but once things stop simmering, they basically never slow down until the end! This perfectly handles the rising action that so many other flicks fumble. Something is always going wrong, but almost never in the way you might expect! I fully recommend watching this if you never have.


The Iron Giant (dir. Brad Bird)

Where: Hulu

Based on the 1968 novel The Iron Man by Ted Hughes, I recommend this to anybody at any time. Gorgeously animated, wonderfully odd with a truly beautiful message, this is also the movie that introduced the world to Vin Diesel. Groot himself! The “Fambly” Man! The Iron Giant, as a character, has been popping up recently now that all intellectual properties are owned by only a handful of corporations and he’s constantly kicking ass and taking names ...which is 100% the opposite of that character’s ENTIRE THING! So if you, like me, watched Ready Player One out of morbid curiosity and found yourself infuriated and sickened, maybe watch or rewatch The Iron Giant to remind yourself of how good things can be sometimes, when they’re NOT owned by a mega-corporation that has a hole full of money where its heart should be.

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About a week after this drops, I’ll be getting my 2nd vaccination shot and eventually hope to return to some kind of normalcy but it won’t be quite yet. I’m glad that some of these long-in-Limbo films are getting released but there is literally NOTHING that I want less than to be in a crowded theater full of strangers. But that’s just me. I hope you’re all getting vaxxed, and staying safe, and taking care of yourself and others.

That’s all for this month, folks! Thanks as always for reading! Check out a recent episode of Hate Watch/Great Watch, the podcast I co-host with Allison Yakulis, which is not only our Two Years On-the-Air Anniversary, but covers the entire Beethoven film franchise! Until next time - don’t take any wooden nickels and Long Live the Movies!

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This piece was written for Moviejawn where you can find tons of other excellent movie-centric writings, a shop where you can subscribe to the quarterly physical zine and also listen to the  I Saw It In a Movie,  Cinematic Crypt  or  Hate Watch / Great Watch  podcasts!

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Monochromatic For the People

Monochromatic For the People

An examination of cinematic reality through the lens of Noir & Chrome

by Hunter Bush

Movies used to be black and white (and silent to boot, can ya believe it!) until it stopped being cost-prohibitive to shoot them in color, at which time color films began to overtake them in frequency until b&w seemed largely like a thing of the past, foreign and/or independent films. Occasionally something like Schindler's List would come along and remind everyone about the undiluted power of b&w cinema, which essentially brings us to the subject of this article: the semi-recent semi-trend of converting films to black & white to better appreciate the language of film.

Illustration by Mary Tomcavage - Instagram @marytom_makes   

Specifically Mad Max: Fury Road: Black & Chrome directed by George Miller and Logan: Noir directed by James Mangold. Fury Road proper was released in summer 2015, with Black & Chrome getting a limited theatrical run in December the following year and was included on a later physical release. Logan was released in March of 2017 and, aside from a few specialty screenings, the Noir version was only included on the physical release. There was a feeling that perhaps this was a way to entice film lovers to continue buying physical media at time when it looked like digital would overtake physical the way color had done to b&w (I would argue that an true lover of film would intrinsically have a love and appreciation for its preservation via home libraries, but that's for another column entirely). I was curious what benefits - or detriments - the b&w viewing experience brought to these films.