The Starling Girl February 6, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen The narrative beats within writer/director Laurel Parmet’s The Starling Girl may not be the most original, but that doesn’t lessen their impact. Elevated by an excellent leading turn by Eliza Scanlen, who continues her upward trajectory after successful supporting roles in hit films and television shows such as 2019’s Little Women and HBO’s Sharp Objects , Parmet’s feature debut offers a youthful examination of the struggle between personal ambitions and the confines of religious tolerance. Scanlen is the titular Starling girl (Jem Starling to be exact), playing younger than herself through wardrobe decisions and physical performance. The Starling family is among many within a Christian fundamentalist community nestled in the Kentucky plains. Jem's actions are in the service of what God and her community would want, such as leading a group prayer dance for her youth group. But just like every teenager, Jem starts to become drawn to the other sex, particularly her handsome youth pastor Owen (Lewis Pullman, last seen as the shy Lt. Robert “Bob” Floyd in Top Gun: Maverick ), who happens to be ten years older than her and married. The attraction slowly becomes mutual, with the flirtation of danger being a catalyst for their desire for each other. Parmet’s script focuses both on the personal aspects of this complicated relationship and the societal judgment of it. As part of being a member of her community, Jem does not have the luxury of independence when choosing a romantic partner. Her devout mother and recovering alcoholic father have decided that Jem will be courted by Owen’s much younger brother Ben, despite there being no spark of affection between them. This loss of autonomy is painful to witness, mostly because Scanlen displays inner turmoil. Much of the film plays within the tropes of this specific story, as our character rebels against their societal expectations, leading to consequences in their relationship with themself and others. At 116 minutes, the pacing could have been greatly quickened, or at least some of it chopped off in bulk. Much of the material with Jem’s father, played finely by Jimmi Simpson, plays dangerously close to parody as the struggles with addiction are delivered with such heavy-handedness. If not for Scanlen’s performance, The Starling Girl would fall much further into the realm of obscurity, its middling writing and direction had it heading for. If not for anything else, Parmet’s film has given one of our brightest young talents room to shine. Those with a deeply religious background may find more depth to it, but they may also find it dryly conventional. This review was originally published from the world premiere at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. Bleecker Street will release The Starling Girl in select theaters on May 12th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

The Chronology of Water January 9, 2026 By: Button Hunter Friesen For many reasons, including, but not limited to, the COVID-19 pandemic showering existentialism upon people’s minds, the increased demand for content within the Hollywood system, and the need for projects to have a starry name in each facet of the production, the 2020s have been marked by a wave of high-profile actors making their directorial debuts. Some of the names that have placed themselves at the front of the credits have been Scarlett Johansson ( Eleanor the Great) , Chris Pine ( Poolman ), Kate Winslet ( Goodbye June ), Jerry Seinfeld ( Unfrosted ), Maggie Gyllenhaal ( The Lost Daughter ), Rebecca Hall ( Passing ), Michael B. Jordan ( Creed III ), Kristin Scott Thomas ( My Mother’s Wedding ), Anna Kendrick ( Woman of the Hour ), Patricia Arquette ( Gonzo Girl) , and Aziz Ansari ( Good Fortune ). The results have been varied, with most playing it safe now that the brunt of the praise or ridicule is aimed directly towards them. It’s hard to win when you’re playing not to lose. Kristen Stewart’s The Chronology of Water is anything but those other titles, seemingly bursting out of the actor’s frustration over the age-old quote that “if you want something done right, do it yourself.” Similar to the directorial debuts I mentioned above, the biopic genre is going through a fallow period of sameness, with each film seemingly containing puzzle pieces of the same shape and size. The only difference is the color, which is usually not that different. When everyone’s life stories are the same, why are they special? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCBwuJ0pKMA Granted, on paper, The Chronology of Water contains many of the tried and true biopic tropes. It is based on the memoir by Lidia Yuknavitch, who grew up in a household commandeered by an abusive father and an emotionally catatonic alcoholic mother. Lidia’s only escape is through swimming, which she excels at. Her father forbade her from going to colleges that didn’t offer her a full scholarship, as they would have done that if they really wanted her. Once she does go to college, her newfound freedom is laced with drugs and alcohol. Within her fleeting lucid moments, she discovers her uncanny ability to write from the heart, distilling her darkness within the bright white space on the page. Sandwiched between her years being caught in a love triangle with a shiny vampire and a perpetually shirtless werewolf in the Twilight franchise, Stewart had a bevy of collaborations with some of the world’s top auteurs: David Fincher ( Panic Room ), Olivier Assayas ( Clouds of Sils Maria , Personal Shopper ), Ang Lee ( Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk ), Kelly Reichardt ( Certain Women ), Pablo Larraín ( Spencer) , and David Cronenberg ( Crimes of the Future ). A student cannot graduate simply by emulating the master; they must understand what it means to be a master. This is a film that smells of bloody iron, jaggedly cutting between the past, present, and future. The scratchiness of the 16mm photography is matched by the sound editing, with a multitude of cuts marked by an aggressive slap to your ears. The music is loud enough to mask much of Imogen Poots’ narration, although the feeling in her words tells as much of the story as the words themselves. The 128-minute runtime could be labeled as one big montage, with very few scenes lasting more than a minute. It’s exhaustingly claustrophobic, with no pretty pictures to assuage our eyes. Lidia might find a lot in common with a soldier returning home from PTSD. Her memories turn on her in an instant, with younger suppressions becoming older realizations. Why did her older sister come out of a locked room crying, followed by her dad? Why did her hopelessly devoted boyfriend stick around through years of her abuse? The waves of pain are just as real now as they were then. I may have already known some of the markings and ultimate destination of this story, but the path always eluded me. It zigs where others zag, led by Poots’ unflinchingly magnetic performance. The Forge will release The Chronology of Water in select theaters on December 05th, followed by a nationwide expansion on January 09th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Bugonia October 29, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen Oh, when will they ever learn? It's a question that director Yorgos Lanthimos continually asks of his characters, and, by extension, the human species as a whole. His distinctly macabre filmography is filled with disturbing tales of morality, each finding ways to twist the knife on our preconceived notions. The off-kilter performances and absurd concepts—such as being turned into an animal if you don't find a companion in The Lobster , or Barry Keoghan omnisciently terrorizing Colin Farrell's family in The Killing of a Sacred Deer —are never so disconnected from reality that they can be excused as pure fantasy. It's just another way of looking at things; once you take a step back, the error of our own ways is exposed in a deservedly uncomfortable light. Depending on your relationship with Lanthimos, you may either cheer or jeer at the fact that Bugonia is his most straightforward film to date… although you have to understand that we're very much grading on a curve. The weirder and more hostile the better, I say as one of the few fans of last year's mean-spirited Kinds of Kindness . Much of that might have to do with screenwriter Will Tracy subbing out the black heart of Efthimis Filippou and the sardonic wit of Tony McNamara for something a little more directly addressed to our modern times. The first half of the famous lyric to the leading question of this review is “Where have all the flowers gone?” For Teddy (Jesse Plemons), they’ve all but disappeared, both literally and figuratively. Living in his dilapidated bee farmhouse with his cousin Don (Aidan Delbis), the pair have fallen on hard times over the years through family tragedies. Part of that responsibility falls upon the local biochemical company, which has poisoned the local bee population and put Teddy’s mom (Alicia Silverstone) into a coma after a failed trial of an opioid drug. Michelle Fuller (Emma Stone) is the CEO of the company, and is the type of boss to passive-aggressively claim that employees can go home whenever they want and that diversity is what makes us special… so long as it all leads to a healthier bottom line. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bd_5HcTujfc Teddy wonders how humanity can be so cruel to one another, how he and Don can have so little, while the Michelles of the world can exact their will without consequence. At least in bee colonies, the worker bees have a sense of purpose for their queen, and everything in nature is perfectly balanced. Teddy’s narration mentions that there’s no sex when bees pollinate, so no one gets hurt. The odd unprovoked specificity of that line, along with a local police officer’s (Stavros Halkias) persistent apologizing for vague acts he inflicted on Teddy many years ago, hints at the darkness lying at the forefront of Teddy’s heart. Working from that mixture of long-buried PTSD and an avalanche of interest conspiracy theories, Teddy concludes that Michelle must be an alien from the Andromedan galaxy, sent to Earth to push the human species deeper into the mud. He and Don kidnap and hold her in their basement, waiting for the lunar eclipse in four days so that she can call her mothership and they can negotiate a truce between the two species. Of course, Michelle isn’t on that same wavelength, especially when she wakes up and discovers that all her hair has been shaved off (Teddy claims that Andromedans use their hair as tracking devices). Stone, working with Lanthimos on their fourth consecutive feature, is more than up to the task of working within a limited setting. In contrast to the revolving door of elaborately lush sets of Poor Things , most of the runtime in Bugonia is devoted to her being chained to a bed in a dingy farm cellar. She’s like a boxer, studying her opponent over several rounds, eventually using their weapons against them. Teddy’s biggest weapon is his confidence in his findings and his initial absolute refusal to be dissuaded by Michelle’s pleas of how ludicrous this all sounds. Without being overly specific to demographics, Lanthimos and Tracy highlight the societal divides we face based on our inability to close our mouths and open our ears. Every contradiction is a personal attack and an opportunity to dig your heels in even more. It should be noted that Ari Aster is a producer on this project, with his film this year as a writer/director, Eddington (also starring Stone), tackling these same topics through a much more confrontational lens. Lanthimos hasn’t lost his confrontational attitude towards his audience, dialing up the tension through Jerskin Fendrix’s bombastic score and some harshly precise editing. This chamber piece eventually becomes a torture chamber as DP Robbie Ryan goes back and forth between keeping a distance from the squirming and pushing it right in front of our faces. Despite being small-scale, this is still a gloriously cinematic project, one that stretches its dollars to their fullest potential. A few dips into Teddy’s nightmarish past are rendered in washed-out black-and-white, almost out of a gothic tragedy. This is a two-hander with an unfortunate third wheel in Don, who is neurodivergent and forcefully taken along on Teddy’s crazy train. He perfectly fits the mold of the innocent lackey to the evil boss, someone who is eventually made to realize the error of their ways by the compassion of the hero. That obviousness is evident from start to finish, covering this story in a layer of predictability. Some acts of cruelty come off as cheap provocation, something that Lanthimos has skillfully been able to circumvent throughout his career. Oh, when will they ever learn? According to Bugonia , it seems that we’re well aware of the problem, but lack the will to fight for the cure. Indifference is a much more pathetic reason for our downfall than ignorance, although it does have an ironic ring to it. Focus Features will release Bugonia in select theaters on October 24th, followed by a nationwide expansion on October 31st. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Alita: Battle Angel February 18, 2019 By: Button Hunter Friesen In the twenty-third century, a colossal war known as “The Fall” took place and wiped out a majority of the people and resources on Earth. The only two places that remain are the poverty-stricken wasteland of Iron City and the luxurious sky city of Zalem. Now in the year 2563, Dr. Dyson Ido scouts through the scraps and finds a broken female cyborg that appears to be a relic from the Great War. After her body and human brain are repaired, she wakes up and is named Alita, the same name as the doctor’s deceased daughter. Not remembering her past, Alita sets out to discover her past and the purpose that she serves in this divided time. Her journey takes her through the streets of Iron City as she interacts with a mix of both humans and robots, each fighting to survive in the tough world. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7pYhpJaJW8 After years of lying dormant, Robert Rodriguez was appointed to direct this adaptation of the first four manga books in the “Alita” series. Best known for making fast and cheap films focused more on action than story, right away it becomes clear that Rodriguez was the wrong man for the job. Needlessly setting the pace to maximum overdrive and never looking back, Rodriguez blitzes past all the background information and shoves the audience straight into the narrative. Important questions are never answered or given a passing thought, as the film either expects the audience to already know all the answers or to just not care enough to bother asking. Along with the fast-paced story comes some rapid action set pieces that share the same miserable fate. Keeping track of what is going on becomes a chore as the characters whisk around the screen with their superhuman abilities. Anyone wishing to see this in 3D should pack some ibuprofen. Despite being written by the usually brilliant James Cameron, the screenplay is filled with some of the most atrocious dialogue of the modern era. Cameron’s ham-fisted approach towards the themes of humanity and morals is so predictable and cheesy that it sparks a feeling of nausea every time a character opens their mouth. Even weaker than the dialogue is the overall plot, which is absolutely incoherent with no rhyme or reason for anything. Even when Cameron tries to explain anything, he lazily falls into drab expository dialogue that creates more questions than it gives answers. Alita: Battle Angel boasts a solid cast on paper, but the script fails to develop any of its characters in a meaningful way. Arcs and clear motivations are nonexistent as characters do whatever the script needs them to do, even if it makes no sense. Quite possibly the worst part of the script and film as a whole is the downright insulting cliffhanger ending. After answering zero questions and setting up nothing interesting, the film dares to stare right at the audience and tell them that all will be revealed once they come back and pay more money. Fairing just a smidge better than other departments, the acting is still subpar across the board, which comes as a bit of a surprise considering the supporting roles are filled by three Oscar winners. Playing the titular character is Rosa Salazar, who does an alright job. She does pretty well at blending her human emotions and robotic body into a believable character, but she tends to overact during the most important scenes. Keean Johnson plays Hugo, a motorcycle-riding drifter who gets romantically involved with Alita. Johnson is mostly just a pretty boy and is never able to make his character even tolerable enough to care about. Jennifer Connelly is very cold and stilted as Chiren, the ex-wife of Ido. Not speaking above a monotone, Connelly tries to make her character mysterious but ends up being boring and uninteresting. Both Christoph Waltz and Mahershala Ali are below average in their supporting roles as Ido and Vector, respectively. Each one doesn’t really seem to care and just kind of passes through each scene with little energy. With Robert Rodriguez, James Cameron, and a $200 million production budget, Alita: Battle Angel proves yet again that money can’t buy quality and that even the best talent in the industry can still make a truly awful film. 20th Century Fox will release Alita: Battle Angel in theaters nationwide on February 14th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Blonde September 28, 2022 By: Button Hunter Friesen Maybe we, as a society, have been too harsh on Netflix? Sure, they spend an exorbitant amount of money on cinematic trash that they’ll claim broke viewership records, yet will never make a cultural impact (*cough* Red Notice & The Gray Man *cough*). And yes, they may have created a culture that’s more focused on constant consumption than finely tuned tasting. But while all of that was (and still is) true, they’ve also financed some of the finest works from our best filmmakers. They stepped in and supplied Martin Scorsese with $150 million to bring The Irishman to life, and also gave Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma a much grander life than any arthouse film has ever had before. They also ushered in the grand return of Jane Campion to the feature film landscape with The Power of the Dog , which was undeservedly robbed of a Best Picture win by their rival Apple TV+’s CODA . And with Andrew Dominik’s Blonde , the paradoxical streamer has added another feather to its cap. To be fair to Dominik, he did have to fight Netflix tooth and nail to release his cut of the film, which runs at a hefty 166 minutes and is saddled with the infamous NC-17 rating. One can’t wholly blame the distributor for trying to demand cuts to make the film a bit more “mainstream,” while at the same time ridiculing them for not fully understanding who they were getting into bed with. “Mainstream” never has, nor will it ever be, a word used to describe Dominik’s filmography. This is the man who brought us not one, but two films starring Brad Pitt at the height of his stardom that bombed at the box office. That’s not to say the films deserved it, though. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and Killing Them Softly are both modern masterpieces that use their big-name stars for much more than good looks. The same goes for Blonde , which luckily won’t have to deal with the unneeded baggage of box office returns. Dominik uses star Ana de Armas to perfection, making her first solo leading role a mesmerizing experience. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WYYyZ75yO0 Telling the story of Marilyn Monroe, or Norma Jeane as that was her real name, Blonde has much more in common with David Lynch’s Inland Empire than it does with any biopic. A line by Monroe about one of her movies may as well have been planted by Dominik to describe his film: “You never know when the dream ends and the nightmare begins.” Working as a fever dream, Blonde interweaves between reality and fiction as it tracks Marilyn’s troubled upbringing to her untimely death. None of it happens in chronological (or just plain logical) order, with Dominik throwing the viewer, as well as Marilyn, through the wringer of her memories. The frames endlessly jump around as well, from a boxed-in sharp black-and-white that would even make Pawel Pawlikowski blush, to vivid widescreen Technicolor. Through this, Dominik traps you in Marilyn’s world, never knowing what the next moment will bring, always looking ahead with a sense of unease. As Monroe, de Armas finds that vulnerability that made her such an enigma of a public figure. How could such a beautiful and tempting bombshell be so broken? It’s a physically and emotionally demanding role, with de Armas going for broke with unnerving fearlessness. If not for the film itself being so off-putting, Netflix should make a serious push for her in this year’s Oscar race. Of course, some viewers (mostly the ones who stumble upon this because they press play on whatever fills the home screen on Netflix) will cry foul at the liberties Dominik has taken with Monroe’s story. One enemy he’ll surely have is Oliver Stone, who presumably will take great umbrage at the film’s vitriolic portrayal of President Kennedy. But is Dominik’s film, and by extension the novel by Joyce Carol Oates, any more or less “true” than other biopics such as this year’s Elvis or Bohemian Rhapsody , which also took great creative liberties with a person’s life? Blonde does better than those films because even with inaccuracies towards details, it delivers a cinematic experience that relates us more to the figure than we did before pressing play. Just as The Northman did for Robert Eggers, Blonde illustrates why Andrew Dominik deserves all the money and creative freedom that any studio can afford. Fortunately for him (and us), Netflix indulged in his fantasies, allowing for a nightmarish and surreal experience that highlights the beautiful tragedy that was the life of Norma Jeane. Netflix will release Blonde in select theaters on September 16th, followed by its streaming premiere on September 28th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Memoria July 15, 2021 By: Button Hunter Friesen The work of Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul (try saying that five times fast) has never fully been able to register with audiences outside of the festival circuit. He has amassed universal critical acclaim since he graced the Cannes Riviera in 2004 with Tropical Malady . He creates gaps between his feature films by creating several short films, some of which eventually spawned into feature-length films, such as the 2009 short A Letter to Uncle Boonmee, becoming the 2010 Palme d’Or-winning Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives . Now in 2021, Weerasethakul is stepping outside of his native Thailand for Memoria (translated from the Latin word “memory”), which prompted another return to Cannes, this time netting him the Jury Prize. The first English-language film for Weerasethakul, Memoria, is set in Colombia, following Tilda Swinton from destination to destination. The film opens with a surprising jumpscare illustrating our main character’s problem, which is that she often hears a loud crashing noise that seems to be confined entirely within her head. This noise confounds her, leading to an investigation into what exactly it is and why it is happening, which puts her in contact with a sound engineering student, a morgue doctor, and a strange fisherman offering profound insights on memory and identity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDU6B93ltds Those familiar with the work of Weerasethakul will know that the plot is not the driving force behind the ultimate narrative. Instead, the visuals and sound work do the bulk of the heavy lifting. Within Memoria , dialogue is seldom found for long stretches at a time, leaving the viewer to look at the screen like one would look at a painting, soaking in as much information as possible. This restriction of information will irritate those looking for answers to the questions the film raises, which Weerasethakul doesn’t have any intention of addressing. The Cannes World Premiere garnered nearly fifty walkouts from disgruntled viewers, and several nodding heads from the slow pacing that were often reawakened by the mysterious crashing noise, which shook the theatre. Swinton acts less like a character and more like a wandering observer. Never shot in closeup and always present in the world around her, she moves from place to place, learning new information about her condition, all without much dialogue from her end. The first half of the film is where Swinton does most of her traveling, which keeps the film moving at a steady, yet still slow, pace. Much of the “action” within these journeys would be considered filler in most mainstream projects, such as Swinton waiting patiently for the sound engineer to finish his work before addressing her, or an unbroken take consisting solely of car alarms going off. The last hour of the film is where some will applaud, and others will boo (just as they did at the world premiere). Swinton’s final journey takes her to a remote village housing a fisherman who claims to remember everything about his life. The two of them engage in an extended conversation that explores the strange connection they share. To an extent, the conversation acts as a vessel for Weerasethakul to talk to his audience about his ideas about cinema and life. It’s a bold move by a director not known for boldness, and it reshapes the way you look at the world at its best, and teeters on self-aggrandizing at its worst. Weerasethakul ties his thesis up in a perfect bow with an ultimate answer that is fittingly incomprehensible and produces several more questions. Memoria is a work for the cinephiles who need an escape from the noise of the modern world. It’s wildly beautiful and imaginative, all while challenging your patience and viewpoints. Go in with an open mind, and you find yourself enlightened. This review was originally published from the world premiere at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival. Neon will release Memoria in select theaters on December 26th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

The Best Hollywood Screenwriters of All-Time January 5, 2023 By: Hunter Friesen Happy National Screenwriters Day! Observed annually on January 5th, this day honors the often unnoticed and under-appreciated task force behind all those thrilling, adventurous, romantic TV or movie masterpieces. To show my appreciation for the people that build movies from nothing and make them into something special, I’ve compiled a list of some of the best screenwriters in cinematic history. This list will only look at writers who are not directors, so people like Paul Thomas Anderson, Woody Allen, or Spike Lee will not be featured. Some of the writers listed have directed films, but for the most part, they are not known for it, and mainly stick to writing scripts. And before you type in the comments about the omission of Charlie Kaufman or Aaron Sorkin, I have not included them because they have shown their intention to direct their own scripts for the foreseeable future. Plus, they’re probably featured on numerous other lists, so I’d like to give spots to other people that are less known. I will also not list anyone who is a frequent writing partner with a director, such as I.A.L Diamond or Charles Brackett, as the majority of their work was with Billy Wilder. So, without further ado, let’s dive into this list featuring some of the biggest wordsmiths of the cinematic art form. Robert Towne Widely regarded as the greatest script doctor in Hollywood history, Robert Towne’s fingerprints are on several of the best films of all time, whether you know it or not. Francis Ford Coppola thanked Towne during his Oscar acceptance speech for his uncredited assistance on The Godfather , and he kicked off the New Hollywood movement with his (also uncredited) work on Bonnie and Clyde . Towne did receive formal recognition in the form of an Oscar nomination for The Last Detail , and a win for Chinatown the following year. He would direct a few of his screenplays to vary success, with Tequila Sunrise and Without Limits being warmly regarded. And he would become Tom Cruise’s go-to writer for a few years, lending his pen to Days of Thunder, The Firm , and the first two installments of the Mission: Impossible franchise. Eric Roth As the recipient of six Oscar nominations for Best Adapted Screenplay, including a win for Forrest Gump , Eric Roth towers over all in modern Hollywood when turning preexisting material into cinematic classics. He’s often been trusted by top directors to bring their biggest projects into the light: Michael Mann ( The Insider, Ali ), Steven Spielberg ( Munich ), David Fincher ( The Curious Case of Benjamin Button ), Bradley Cooper ( A Star Is Born ), Denis Villeneuve ( Dune ). He’s adding Martin Scorsese to that venerable list with the upcoming Killers of the Flower Moon , so a second Oscar may be on the horizon. Paddy Chayefsky At three wins from four nominations, Chayefsky is tied with Woody Allen and Billy Wilder as the most-winning screenwriter in Oscar history. His winning percentage is even more impressive when you factor in that it took Allen 16 nominations and Wilder 12 nominations to reach that win total. Chayefsky initially started in television in the 1950s with director Sidney Lumet, a partnership that would reach its apex with the scathing satire in 1976’s Network . Director Delbert Mann was another figure that Chayefsky frequently worked with during his television days, and they each picked up Oscars for their work in 1955’s Marty , which would also be awarded the prize for Best Motion Picture. Leigh Brackett Brackett was a trailblazer in Hollywood, repeatedly destroying the misconception that women could only write “feminine” dramas. She had no problem working across several genres, from 1940s noir ( The Big Sleep ), westerns ( Rio Bravo ), to 1970s new crime ( The Long Goodbye ). Even for all her genre-hopping, she always called science fiction her home. She would mentor Fahrenheit 451 author Ray Bradbury, and be personally hired by George Lucas to write the script for Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back . Unfortunately, she wasn’t able to see her work on that film come to fruition, as she passed away in 1978 just after she handed in her script. But her work still lives on and remains an inspiration for anyone that wants to push boundaries. Steven Zaillian Along with Eric Roth, Zaillian is usually the first person studios call when they need someone to adapt existing material. He received an Oscar nomination for his second screenplay, 1990’s Awakenings . That was only the first of many large dominoes, as he won the Oscar for Schindler’s List , and would be nominated again for Gangs of New York, Moneyball , and The Irishman . Like Robert Towne, he’s also a go-to script doctor for many top directors. He’s done uncredited rewrites and polishes on films such as Crimson Tide, Patriot Games, Amistad, Saving Private Ryan, Black Hawk Down , and Road to Perdition . William Goldman As the author behind several best-selling books on the art of screenplay writing, it’s easy to see why Goldman is seen as one of the greatest writers ever. His critics would claim that he wrote for the director’s vision, and not for his own original ideas. But that would always be his biggest strength, as he could adapt to any genre between westerns ( Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid ), political thrillers ( All the President’s Men ), and nerve-wracking crime dramas ( Marathon Man ). He would eventually become the most sought-after adapter of Stephen King’s work, with Misery, Hearts in Atlantis , and Dreamcatcher . And to top it all off, he even adapted his own novel, The Princess Bride , for the screen. John Logan Don’t let Logan’s directorial debut failure with They/Them last year fool you into thinking he isn’t one of the most lauded screenwriters working today. Whether he’s working with Martin Scorsese ( The Aviator, Hugo ), Ridley Scott ( Gladiator, Alien: Covenant ), or Sam Mendes ( Skyfall, Spectre ), Logan loves to work in pairs with leading auteurs. He’s also dabbled in animation ( Rango ), musicals ( Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street ), Shakespeare ( Coriolanus ), and even television ( Penny Dreadful ). Robert Bolt Between his works with David Lean on Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago , and Ryan’s Daughter, there probably isn’t anyone who writes bigger than Robert Bolt. His first notice would come before all that when he wrote the play A Man for All Seasons in 1954. He would adapt it for the screen himself, winning another Oscar just one year after he won for Doctor Zhivago . 1986’s The Mission , starring Robert De Niro and Jeremy Irons, would be his next, and final, brush with awards success, with the film winning the Palme d’Or at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival along with several Oscar nominations. Ernest Lehman The only thing consistent about Ernest Lehman’s output is the excellence of its quality. One of his first scripts would be the 1954 romantic-comedy Sabrina for Billy Wilder. He would jump over to mystery thrillers with Northwest by Northwest for Alfred Hitchcock. Then came a brief settlement into musicals, as he adapted both the Best Picture-winning West Side Story and The Sound of Music from the stage to the screen. Another slight pivot came in the form of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? , and finally ending with a return to Hitchcock for 1979’s Family Plot . More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Heretic September 11, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen With as many organized religions as there are fast food chains, it can be quite hard to differentiate between “the one” and the imitations. It’s a conundrum that Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant) has dedicated much time to. He’s done the research, concocted some hypotheses, conducted experiments, and solidified his grand thesis on how religion has transformed the human race for thousands of years. And based on his secluded house filled with metal-lined walls and counterintuitive locks, his outlook isn’t going to be positive. Unbeknownst to Sister Paxton (Chloe East) and Barnes (Sophie Thatcher), Reed’s request made to their Church of Latter-Day Saints to receive a house visit wasn’t simply about hearing their sales pitch. But before the pair land in the trap, they must still navigate the polite society minefield. They’re mocked before they even open their mouths, with a group of teenage girls posing for ironic photos with them. For the first time in my life, I actually felt sorry for those missionaries you often find on the street corners handing out Bibles. But their faith is strong, and they believe in their mission, so the pain is just another hurdle in God’s grand plan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9i2vmFhSSY I wouldn’t want to meet their God if Mr. Reed were always part of his plan. Things start with simple pleasantries, with the girls making their rehearsed points and Reed intermittently countering with humorous observations he’s made in his studies. Grant weaponizes his charm to its full extent during this opening section, making no distinction between his buffoonish characters from his rom-com days and the darkness that we know Reed is hiding. The writer/director pair of Scott Beck and Bryan Woods know what they have on their hands, giving this moment of set-up the space to breathe far beyond what most horror films would allow. Once Reed starts to reveal his cards, that’s when the girls start to differentiate themselves. Paxton is the more agreeable one, always walking on eggshells to appease Reed’s demands and never seeming like a bad guest. She tells a story to Barnes about stumbling upon pornography, the shame and inexperience of it keeping her from saying the word “fucking.” Between this and her role as Sammy’s religiously fanatic girlfriend in The Fabelmans , East has claimed a bit of a monopoly on these roles. Dressed in black as opposed to Paxton’s white, Barnes is the more skeptical of the two, with the past opening the door to a more confrontational view of everything she preaches. Figuring out where this is all going is what makes Heretic so much fun. Cinematographer Chung-hoon Chung (a frequent collaborator with Park Chan-wook) keeps the camera roaming on a tightrope, expanding the exquisite, decorated confinement that production designer Philip Messina has crafted. The comparison between fast food chains and religions gets expanded once Reed brings in the Monopoly board game, with the theme of iterations connecting all three. There have been iterations of this type of production before, with Woods’ labeling during the world premiere screening of the film’s genre being “A24” being a pretty simple way to summarize it all. Whether that term is complimentary or derogatory is up to you. The film’s commitment to living up to this promise ultimately subsides for more familiar beats. Moments of the sound drowning out to make way for a loud crash are repeated a few too many times, as well as some conveniences in reveals. Reed may work in absolutes when making his claims, but that doesn’t mean that the filmmaking has to follow the well-trodden path of its genre brethren. Even if they can’t be fully supported by the end, the ideas at the forefront of Heretic are what take it to the next level. It’s not looking to offend or be the person who arrogantly claims that “they’re just asking questions.” This is a genre exercise after all, not a semester in Religion 101. This review was originally published from the world premiere at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. A24 will release Heretic in theaters nationwide on November 15th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen Gary Cooper: Jay Kelly. Cary Grant: Jay Kelly. Clark Gable: Jay Kelly. George Clooney: Jay Kelly. Not since The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent has a movie been about the actor playing the character as much as it is about the character themselves. Unlike Massive Talent , which mostly just used the meme-ified persona of Nicolas Cage for surface-level metahumor, writer/director Noah Baumbach plays it pretty straight, investigating the walls that have been built over decades to separate George Clooney the person from George Clooney the movie star. For instance, Jay Kelly and George Clooney have reached the point of fame where they pay the price of no longer being able to be a normal part of society. Merely walking down the street will initiate a mob of fans and paparazzi, and any form of contact is kept secret for security purposes. Everyone is either trying to get or give something, and the trajectory of his career and personal life is a perennial headline. It’s a lonely life, one that requires a great deal of sheltering and personal sacrifice to achieve and maintain. Sure, the rewards come in the form of millions of dollars and being worshipped as a god. But money can’t buy happiness, and it isn’t much fun to be a god to those you’ll never know. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8GbcVkqZwQ Baumbach communicates all of this in the opening set piece, a long take that swirls up and around the set of Jay’s newest film. There’s a person assigned to always be fixing Jay’s costume and makeup, a person to get him coffee, and a person to train the canine co-star. All those hours of work are to support the few seconds of artistic genius that are printed onto celluloid. Ron (Adam Sandler) and Liz (Laura Dern) manage Jay’s persona with the outside world. Does he want to do a movie with a pair of up-and-coming directors? Does he want to accept a career tribute award in Tuscany? Jay is on top of the world, which means the only direction for him to go is down. Jay is now becoming an empty nester after his youngest daughter is going on a European summer vacation before her fall semester at college. He’s estranged from his eldest daughter, the cost of his career blooming simultaneously as she was growing up. Jay’s longtime mentor, director Peter Schneider (played by Jim Broadbent), has also just passed away. He and Jay shared many good years in the past, making movies at the height of their powers. At the funeral, Peter’s son spins a different tale of his dad never being around, and how the movies both personally and financially ruined him near the end of his life. Jay fears that he may be heading down that path, so he decides to abandon his current plans and chase his daughter around Europe. Baumbach and co-writer Emily Mortimer (who also acts in the film as Jay’s personal hairdresser) never deny that the crux of this narrative was spurred by the fact that a rich, privileged actor is having a midlife crisis (or a three-quarters life crisis, since he is on the other side of sixty years old). His daughter is going on this trip because he’s paying for it, and he can follow her by immediately booking a private jet and having his entourage accompany him. With political and social upheaval, natural disasters, and the overall feeling of optimism fading away, why should I care about Jay Kelly? Frankly, there isn’t much of a reason to care about the plight of Jay Kelly beyond the fact that he’s so darn charming and likable. Clooney turns in one of his best performances, with the movie star wattage turned all the way up. But he’s also self-reflective and regretful, always asking if he can have one more take, a luxury that can only be afforded on a movie set. Ron’s biggest fault is that he can’t say no to Jay, always stuck between his roles as a manager and a lifelong friend. He gives and gives and gives, with the only source of gratitude being the 15% he claims from Jay’s paychecks. Sandler matches the excellence he previously delivered for Baumbach in The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected) . The tide of public sentiment has turned in his favor over the years, and an Oscar nomination would be a deserved apex. Nicholas Britell’s score includes tender strings, and Linus Sandgren’s cinematography is richly textured. Right after Jay lands in Paris, there’s a shot of the string of cars circling a roundabout. The sun hasn’t yet risen, with the blue hour bathing the streets and faraway Eiffel Tower in a pool of coolness. It’s a breathtakingly beautiful shot, and it was the moment I realized that this was some of the most fun I’ve had with a movie all year. Netflix will release Jay Kelly in select theaters on November 14th, followed by its streaming premiere on December 05th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

MSPIFF43 - Dispatch #1 April 22, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen The 43rd Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival (MSPIFF) is currently going on from April 11-25, with over 200 films screened. Here are some quick-bite reviews of a few of the films I have watched, with more to come soon. Green Border Agnieszka Holland’s Green Border is nothing short of ambitious, as it sees the revered Polish writer/director putting her native government through the wringer in the hopes of shining a light on the atrocities taking place on its eastern border. Split into several chapters, the majority of the film’s focus is on a Syrian migrant family as they start their journey to Sweden to start a new life with one of their distant relatives. Like thousands of other families, they are lured into Belarus under the government’s false advertisement of safe travel into the European Union. They are then harassed and extorted by border guards until being forcibly flung into Poland as part of a geopolitical war to destabilize the EU. Any hope of sympathy from the Polish forces quickly vanishes; replaced with more xenophobia, abuse, and forcible deportation back to Belarus. Holland captures the brutality of this inhumane game of tug-and-war in stark black-and-white, the endless forest along the border being perpetually shrouded in darkness. There’s always a “one step forward, two steps back” attitude towards the plight of the family, with Holland never crossing over the line of torturing her characters for the sake of a message. The themes of inhumanity extend further into the other chapters, which eventually becomes a bit of a Pulp Fiction -esque story of intersecting storylines. One of those storylines features a young group of Polish activists who circumvent the law to aid the battered migrants, although their work never seems to be more than putting a metaphorical band-aid on a gunshot wound. Although the feeling of hope rarely shines through in Holland’s material, a bit of it can be felt based on the anger it incites. It’s no surprise that for all the prizes (including the Special Jury Prize in Venice) and acclaim the film has received from Western audiences, it was heavily condemned and censored by the Polish government. Even if the film has been prevented from having its full impact at home, it at least still carries quite the universal punch abroad. (3.5/5) Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell You need to have serious guts (and a really trustworthy producer) to have your debut feature film run over three hours and feature little to none of the usual trappings audiences expect to keep them occupied in their seats. Vietnamese writer/director Phan Thien An has created a film of extraordinary uniqueness, aligning closely with the extreme slow cinema works of Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Béla Tarr. The plot is simple: A man’s sister-in-law dies in a motorcycle accident and he must escort his young nephew across the country to his estranged father. But the literal plot is something that An is least concerned with, instead focusing much of his attention on the spiritual ambiguity underlining every moment of our lives. Every scene is comprised of a single take, all of them extraordinary feats of production on account of their length and complexity. Time is often at a standstill, with no one ever seeming to be in a rush or wanting to have a direct conversation. Your attitude towards this style will be determined quickly, most likely in your ability to stay awake. But even those who drift off from time to time will have their dreams permeated by images from the film. It’s part of the experience, a little piece of the film that sticks with you, something the large majority of other works fail to do. Pham received the Camera d’Or prize for best first feature film at the Cannes Film Festival last year, where he premiered as part of the Directors’ Fortnight section. I have no doubt that it will be the first of many prizes he will receive at that festival, as their relationship seems to be a match made in heaven. (4/5) Shoshana Michael Winterbottom’s story of British Mandatory Palestine (specifically Tel Aviv) circa the 1930/1940s never knows exactly what side it wants to be on. It’s a film that wants to examine the British/Arab/Jewish conflict from all angles but always feels too scared to probe a little deeper for fear of angering viewers, which becomes most noticeable when the postscript reveals sentiments that the events of the film hardly supported. Winterbottom has usually been a filmmaker who plays fast and loose (see 24 Hour Party People and Wonderland ). Here he trades that all away for a polished procedural style, complete with bland archival footage and a tacky score by the usually reliable David Holmes. At the heart of this conflict are the star-crossed lovers of British police officer Tom Wilkin (Douglas Booth) and Zionist Shoshana (Irina Starshenbaum). They try to stay neutral with their feelings, but the increasing violence and tension ultimately force them to choose a side. Both of the leads are quite capable in their roles, it’s just that they end up being swallowed by the uninteresting forces around them. (2.5/5) Janet Planet Playwright Annie Baker’s feature directorial debut is a work of quiet observation, both literally and metaphorically. The nature of rural Massachusetts is the film’s soundtrack: crickets, swaying trees, and the distant verve of a car passing by on the dirt road. Inside one of the secluded houses live Janet (Julianne Nicholson) and her 11-year-old daughter Lacy (Zoe Ziegler). Throughout the summer of 1991, three people enter their lives: the reserved Wayne, former friend Regina, and pseudo-intellectual Avi. Baker captures the textures of an endless summer with ease, using a certain kind of slow cinema that’s mostly been found in cinema outside the Western hemisphere. While the argument behind the need for the theatrical experience has mostly been reserved for huge tentpoles filled with bombastic sound and visuals, Janet Planet makes just as much of a case to be seen in a dark room while barely registering over a whisper. The quiet rhythms and cinematography will surely not play as well at home, or in any multiplex with sound bleed. It’s one of those films I wished I could see alone in a screening room, just letting the vibes wash over me. Zeigler is tremendous in her first-ever performance. She and Nicholson share great chemistry, always at the heart of the film even as sometimes spins its wheels. Baker’s film could be the little indie sensation of the summer if A24 gives it the proper push it deserves. (3.5/5) More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Hamnet September 10, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen Not that the one-letter difference was totally throwing everyone for a loop, but the opening script to Hamnet , director Chloé Zhao’s adaptation of Maggie O'Farrell’s book of the same name, states that the names “Hamnet” and “Hamlet” were essentially the same in England during the 16th and 17th centuries. They were interchangeable, with both versions being equally represented across documents. By that logic, it doesn’t take a licensed psychiatrist to diagnose what kind of headspace William Shakespeare was in when he wrote “The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark,” only a few years after the death of his child, Hamnet. Despite being a master of words, young Shakespeare (Paul Mescal) was not as eloquent with his tongue. He is poor, tutoring the local children in Latin to help pay off his unloving father’s debts. It’s obvious he’s destined for something more than just being a glovemaker or farmer, but the opportunity to be anything more than that is simply not possible in the rural fields of Stratford. Anne Hathaway, or “Agnes” (Jessie Buckley), is also conflicted with the cards she’s been dealt, rebelling against her strict family by venturing deep into the forest with her falcon. One sight of her bright red dress contrasting against the lush green trees pushes Will to fall for her immediately. They’re perfect for each other, two souls seemingly lost in time. Before being sucked into the increasingly creaky Marvel machine with Eternals , Zhao delivered two of the most interesting American independent films of the last decade in The Rider and Nomadland . The latter became a sensation during the COVID-19-stricken 2020 awards season, winning Oscars for Best Lead Actress, Best Director, and Best Motion Picture. Zhao has an uncanny ability to view the natural world with a lyrical quality, simultaneously conveying stark realism and a dreamlike gentleness. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYcgQMxQwmk The rustling of the forest trees is just as important as any line of dialogue. The camera captures its sweeping serenity with compassion, inviting Agnes to live in a world of her own. That world is eventually populated with her three children: the oldest, Susannah, and twins Hamnet and Judith. The family is a tight unit, with their interactions providing hints for William’s inspirations for his work. His first kiss with Agnes is followed by a burst of inspiration for a romance about a pair of star-crossed lovers, and the children perform as three witches for their mother. Young Hamnet dreams of being a player on the stage for his father, practicing his sword fighting daily. As explained by William’s stern mother, Mary (Emily Watson), God can just as quickly take away what he has granted. The death of young Hamnet from disease, coupled with the physical separation between Agnes and Will as he works in London, sends Agnes into a downward spiral of grief. The pair goes through the stages in different cadences, losing sight of each other and inviting agony. This story may be a tear-jerker (this is the most I’ve cried during a movie in years), but there isn’t a single moment where it's cloying at those ducts. Zhao depicts an honest collision course of pain, featuring two of the best actors working today. Buckley is nothing short of transcendent, practically engraving her Oscar with every moment of laughter and cries. She is not a tragic figure to be tossed aside in favor of her husband’s greatness. She encapsulates the entire human experience, what it means to be your true self, and then produces an extension of that through children. Like Zhao, Mescal’s abilities are better suited for smaller stories, as evidenced by his relatively disappointing work in last year’s Gladiator II as opposed to his previous highlights of Aftersun and All of Us Strangers . But that’s not to say any of his performances are small, far from it. It’s heartbreakingly cathartic to witness him channeling his torment into his work, recontextualizing the most celebrated works of the English language for those who were previously uninitiated. A special mention must be given to the young actors who play the children: Bodhi Rae Breathnach, Olivia Lynes, and Jacobi Jupe. The latter is phenomenal as the titular boy, never once falling into the perennial trap of overplaying their hands. He is pushed just as hard as the adults, passing with flying colors at every moment. Outstanding music from the industry’s most underappreciated composer, Max Richter, aids in this journey. The apex is reached when he reintroduces his most famous piece of music, all but guaranteeing the need for tissues to be passed around for each person in the audience. By staging "Hamlet," Shakespeare preserved his child. His body may have only been a part of this physical world for a mere eleven years, but his spirit has lived on for over half a millennium, adapting to serve different cultures and contexts. Zhao’s film is a single drop in an ocean; the mightiest one that pushes the waves in a bold new direction. This review was originally published from the Canadian premiere at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival. Focus Features will release Hamnet in select theaters on November 26th, followed by a nationwide expansion on December 5th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

The Running Man November 11, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen Does a joke get funnier the more times you say it? Does a piece of music get richer if you play it louder? Does food taste better if you chew it more? Does a painting become more beautiful if you paint harder? Lessons in moderation are all around, each protecting us from the consequences of having too much of a good or bad thing. Edgar Wright is an excessive filmmaker, always keeping his editing zippy, set pieces cued to a hip piece of music, and comedy at its most deadpan. His indulgences had been held in check by a creative partnership with stars Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, or at least harnessed towards their fullest potential in a worthwhile endeavor. Now, in The Running Man , they’ve been tangled into their most off-putting form, all in service of a story that’s been beaten to the punch many, many, many times before. Set in the dystopian world of 2025 (hey, they got that right!), America is a vast land of the haves and have-nots. Ben Richards (Glen Powell) is one of the have-nots, forced to work in radiation-laced factories for less than minimum wage. But he’s the kind of poor you only find in the movies, which means that despite a dire physical and financial situation, he still has chiseled abs, pearly white teeth, and an expensive haircut. Those qualities, plus his hair-trigger temper, make him the perfect candidate for The Running Man , a game show where a contestant wins one billion dollars if they survive for thirty days while being hunted down. No one has ever won the game before, which practically means it's suicide. That’s already the situation Ben is in (his neighborhood is called “slumicide”), and his toddler desperately needs medicine for a fever. If you’re stuck between a rock and a hard place, you might as well get paid to suffer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KD18ddeFuyM Granting credit where it's due, the story of The Running Man is based on the novel by Stephen King, first published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman in 1982. A few years later, it was adapted for the screen as an Arnold Schwarzenegger action vehicle. That predates all the other dystopian stories revolving around games like The Hunger Games , Ready Player One , and Battle Royale . But in modern movie form, it’s already been lapped by those properties, plus adjacent stories like Ready or Not , Self Reliance , and The Hunt . It’s bad to come late to the party; it’s worse to also not come with a gift in hand. If Wright and co-writer Michael Bacall aren’t going to be first, they’re going to make damn sure they’re the loudest. You’d need more than two hands to count the number of speeches made about the 1% pushing their thumbs down on the little guy, and how the game, and, by extension, life, is rigged against all of us. Everything is a pre-packaged, corporate-sponsored meal to keep us in line for the slaughter, and we’re all too weak to do anything but swallow it whole. Never mind the retreading of these very timely themes, Wright might have had the audience raising their fists in solidarity if everything else about the film wasn’t so… lame. Fitting to his name, Ben Richards is a generic protagonist whose only sin is that he cares too much. His anger is righteous, and every supporting character’s sole occupation is to tell him how much of a hero he is for the commoners. That means a supporting cast of William H. Macy, Michael Cera, Lee Pace, and Emilia Jones is wasted. At least Colman Domingo brings a robust amount of charm to his duties as the game’s emcee, the lone supply of humor in this shockingly unfunny script. It’s hard to judge if this is a success or a failure in the test of whether Glen Powell is a bona fide A-list leading man. On one hand, he’s saddled with a nothingburger character and a shallow story. On the other hand, he doesn’t do much to rise above those limitations, mostly meeting the project on its level. If you can’t decide if something is good or bad, then you’ve probably already answered the question. Unfortunately for me (and us), it didn’t take long to decide that The Running Man is an extreme disappointment. It’s a fitting film for the time: grotesque, unapologetically brash, and always looking to send a message. A famous man once said that “I know writers who use subtext, and they are all cowards.” You know what’s also cowardly? Selling a prime steak, and then serving reheated hamburger. Paramount Pictures will release The Running Man in theaters nationwide on November 14th. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen