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The Super Mario Bros. Movie April 4, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen While every genre has its share of highlights and lowlights, video game movies have always seemed to have a lot more low-quality content compared to everyone else. It doesn’t take a genius to see that year after year of films from the Mortal Kombat, Resident Evil, Hitman , and Street Fighter series really poisoned everyone’s appetite for stories that spawned a controller. Japanese gaming company Nintendo (probably the only gaming company every mother knows) at least had the smarts to quit when they were behind, shutting almost all film adaptations of their properties after the disaster that was 1993’s Super Mario Bros . Now exactly thirty years later, and with the help of Universal and Illumination, the studios behind the Despicable Me and Secret Life of Pets films, Nintendo is bringing Mario back to the silver screen in animated form for The Super Mario Bros. Movie . The Mushroom Kingdom is under attack by the evil Bowser, with Princess Peach and Mario being the only heroes capable of stopping him. Both Peach and Mario have dedicated their lives to helping others, whether it’s the entire population of Toads within the Mushroom Kingdom, or Mario’s more timid brother Luigi, who’s been captured by Bower. Their journey takes them to other worlds, which will delight longtime players of the Mario franchise. Whether it’s in the form of karts, platforms, or brawling arenas, there are plenty of callbacks, almost as if you’re wielding a controller and guiding Mario on his heroic journey. And while that exact statement has ruined so many video game movies in the past (who wants to watch a game rather than play it?), the filmmaking on display here turns that liability into an asset. The camera moves with Mario, with lots of tracking shots as our characters traverse through the levels in both 2D and 3D sequences, with the sound effects all ripped straight from the games. Brian Tyler’s fun score features many of the iconic motifs, with the added bonus of quite a few needle drops, none of which are all that imaginative or above ultra-literal, but they get the job more than done in the moment. The voice cast is above the punching bag they were made out to be when they were initially announced. Chris Pratt is still as likable as ever, and at least doesn’t commit too hard to the Italian accent for it to be embarrassing. Anya Taylor-Joy and Charlie Day are commendable as Peach and Luigi, respectively. Jack Black is probably the most inspired choice with Bowser, being both menacing as a villain and entertaining as a character with some laughs (and songs) along the way. It may not exactly be as super as its title states, but The Super Mario Bros. Movie is a vastly superior version compared to the last time the plumber brothers were in theaters. It doesn’t matter if you lean towards either the classic or the modern games, there’s something for all fans, with the added bonus of future occasions to level up. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Awards Update: Final Pre-Festival Predictions August 26, 2024 By: Hunter Friesen Welcome to an ongoing series where I cover the 2024/2025 awards season. On a regular basis, I will update my Oscar predictions, taking into account the new information that has been received since the last update. Full predictions in every category can be found on the Home and Awards page. The runners have taken their positions on the starting block. All that can happen now is for the gun to be fired to commence the next phase in the awards race. Save for Telluride, which won’t reveal itself until the day before the festival commences (although hints from Venice Artistic Director Alberto Barbera and premiere designations by both TIFF and NYFF have pretty much confirmed every title that will appear in the mountains), every fall festival has unveiled their slate for the year. I did a piece a month ago analyzing these lineups and what they mean for the Oscars. But that was done before TIFF added 20+ new titles a few weeks ago, and NYFF finalized their Main Slate and Spotlight section, which calls for a refreshed look at how everything stands just before the onslaught commences. Between his two features as a director, The Childhood of a Leader and Vox Lux , Brady Corbet has steered far away from the Oscar conversation. Most of the information we have on his new film, The Brutalist , seems to fall in line with that same trajectory. It carries a 215-minute runtime, is said to be nightmarish at times, and has ambitious swings. It also doesn’t have a North American distributor at the moment (Focus Features holds International rights). But the sight of it going to Venice, TIFF, and NYFF does project a lot of confidence, and there’s been more than a few rumors that it’s an absolutely gorgeous masterpiece. I don’t have it any of my predictions at the moment, but I’ll be the first to slot it into more than a few categories if those rumors turn out to be true. Of course, a good start at the festivals is only one step of the journey, and I’m skeptical about its prospects outside of the critical establishment. I’ll be seeing it early in the morning on my second day of TIFF, and it’s by far my most anticipated film of the festival. Other films on the bubble in terms of my predictions are Saturday Night , Hard Truths , and Nightbitch . Also recently announced to be making the trek from Venice to TIFF are The Room Next Door and Queer , with both venturing to NYFF a few weeks later. The trailer for Pedro Almodóvar’s English-language debut looked stunning, hinting at a sumptuous score by frequent collaborator Alberto Iglesias and performances by Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton. I feel confident in at least two of those three being nominated for their work, with Almodóvar possibly making his way into the ever-crowded field of Best Adapted Screenplay. Two films that will be premiering at Telluride are Nickel Boys and The Piano Lesson , both adaptations of lauded source material. Oscar-nominated documentarian RaMell Ross co-writes and directs the former, with a cast that includes Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, Hamish Linklater, and Daveed Diggs. Its selection as the Opening Night film at NYFF bodes well for its chances in many above-the-line categories, the same areas that The Piano Lesson will also be vying for with its all-star cast. The Netflix film will be stopping in Toronto after Telluride, a smart play to get the crowds behind a long-overdue Oscar campaign for Samuel L. Jackson. Good reviews, sympathy for Danielle Deadwyler’s snub a few years back, and the backing of Netflix could make this film a worthy contender. Just as we have to entertain the possibility that one or more currently heavily predicted awards players will flounder, we also have to consider that there’s a hidden gem buried somewhere. For a film I hadn’t heard about until a few weeks ago, the Telluride-TIFF-NYFF journey that The Friend will be taking has certainly piqued my interest. TIFF also has two underdog sports dramas in Unstoppable and The Fire Inside , both repped by Amazon MGM and slated for release in the winter. Likely half of my predictions will be proven wrong or right within two weeks, meaning this is pretty much the last time to try and hope-dict stuff into reality. I’ll be on the ground at TIFF for all ten days, seeing almost every film mentioned in this article. Stay tuned for reviews, recaps, and a new slate of predictions immediately afterward. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen

The Monkey February 17, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen The tagline for The Monkey , the new film by writer/director Oz Perkins, says that "everybody dies, and that's fucked up." You know what else is fucked up? Watching a filmmaker you've admired over the years torch all that goodwill with the same hellbent rage that Adam Scott has for the titular toy monkey during the film's cold open. This is not Longlegs , both in terms of the tone and overall quality. How and why Scott came to hate this monkey is a bit of a mystery. Even he's not exactly sure what it does, only that bad things happen whenever you turn the key on its back and let it bang its drum. And the definition of "bad" here isn't just a stubbed toe or missing the bus. It's the kind of bad that results in an extremely gruesome death in a series of events that would even make Rube Goldberg blush. The simplicity and inevitably of the threat that this primate possesses is where Perkins - adapting from the 1980 short story of the same name by Stephen King - finds his kernel of truth about the balance between life and death. Any of us could die at any time by any combination of causes. "It's like life" reads the box that the monkey comes nicely wrapped in, a sentiment echoed by the mother (Tatiana Maslany) of twin brothers Hal and Bill (played by Christian Convery as kids, and Theo James as adults). The boys learn firsthand on several instances the cruel power that life has to give and take away from you at any moment. Like me, just being aware of the concept of the Final Destination and Dumb Ways to Die franchises gives you more than enough familiarity with this concept. Perkins doesn't offer much of anything beyond the surface-level observations, opting for the comedy-horror tonal balance to do much of the heavy lifting. But between several horribly unfunny and/or funnily unscary sequences, the only facial expression you'll be making is one of annoyance. That weightless unpleasantness also applies to the deaths that litter the runtime. While everything that is happening to the people around the boys is horrifying, Perkins always dons a dastardly smile. A falling shotgun here, a slippery kitchen knife there, it's all supposed to make you simultaneously wince and howl with laughter. The suspense of the unknown in Longlegs has been replaced with the suspense of the inevitable. Granted, that is the point. It just makes everything feel so tedious, with a filmmaker taking us on several extra laps around a track that wasn't that good the first time. What is good is James' dual performance. Most of his time is spent as Hal, the smaller of the twins who constantly gets bullied and belittled. His ruggedly good looks and tall frame are submerged under glasses and a sheepish demeanor. Between him, the physical monkey doll, and the frames concocted by Nico Aguilar, The Monkey does at least have some visual splendors to enjoy. But the occasional treats for my eyes do not make up for the wretched experience that the rest of my body and soul were put through. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse May 31, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen We all know Hollywood has had an aversion to using numbers within their titles due to the implication that you must have watched the previous entries to comprehend the upcoming one. Instead of just Resident Evil 2, Resident Evil 3 , etc. we got Resident Evil: Apocalypse, Resident Evil: Afterlife , etc. Sure, using subtitles may have lessened the audience’s weariness for a sequel, but it also makes it impossible to sort franchises in the correct chronological order. And as a further act of the snake eating its tail, we now have the beginning halves of multi-part stories not containing the title of “Part One,” à la Dune , Fast X, and now Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse . Yes, for all of you who weren’t already in the loop, this sequel to the 2018 surprise critical and commercial success is only the first half of a two-part story, with the concluding chapter to come in only nine months. And in keeping with that Harry Potter/The Hunger Games/Avengers-inspired trend, we leave off here with a cliffhanger, which of course I won’t spoil. With a 140-minute runtime (making it one of the longest wide-release animated movies of all time) and IMAX engagement, Sony is truly treating this like an event picture. In terms of production qualities, the movie more than lives up to its ambitions. Similar to Denis Villeneuve and Greig Fraser’s work within Dune , Across the Spider-Verse contains mountains upon mountains of beautiful sequences that require the largest screen possible to appreciate. It can become a little too chaotic at times, such as the backgrounds shifting entire color palettes just between shot/reverse shot moments, but it’s all in service of something more creative than almost any other animated movie. Between Loki, Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania , and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness , comic-book fans (or MCU fans to be more precise) are well accustomed to the concept of the multiverse. Thankfully, Spider-Verse leaps over that slowly tiring concept and delivers on its true potential of having access to a limitless version of Spider-Men. Directors Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, and Justin K. Thompson revealed that the film contains nearly 250 characters, which happens to include a car and a dinosaur version of Spider-Man. I guess that doesn’t sound that far-fetched considering John Mulaney’s Spider-Ham stole the show in Into the Spider-Verse . Miles’ introduction into the multiverse comes from a new villain on the scene named The Spot, whose Rorschach-esque body allows him to shoot teleportation spots. His quest to become Spider-Man’s nemesis leads him to open up portals into other dimensions, all happening to contain their version of Spider-Man. But shifting between dimensions isn’t exactly a natural process, nor a safe one, as bridging them together leads to catastrophic consequences. Miguel O’Hara leads the unofficial Spider-Man version of the Justice League that seeks to retain order, sometimes achieved “by any means necessary.” Between Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield, Tom Holland, and Shameik Moore, we’ve had our fair share of stories about the web-slinging superhero. For all its visual inventiveness, Across the Spider-Verse struggles to break the mold (or should I say web?) when it comes to delivering a unique story. We’ve still got the radioactive spider, the inability to share his secret identity, and the struggles of balancing responsibilities. At this point, it’s a little tiring, especially in a movie like this that kicks all the resolutions down the road. Still, those weary concepts are given a lot of mileage out of the extremely talented voice cast. Jason Schwartzman, Oscar Isaac, Issa Rae, and Daniel Kaluuya round out the newest additions that join the returning core. Through the expressive animation, they’re all allowed to plentifully run the gamut of emotions. Providing background to their one-liners and dramatic moments is a bevy of hits on the soundtrack by the likes of Metro Boomin and Future. The world may not need more Spider-Man stories, but Across the Spider-Verse makes enough of a case for its existence thanks to its breathless animation and fun ideas. With 140 minutes spent on developing just the beginning of this story, I’m intrigued to see all that the finale has to offer. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Poor Things December 4, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen Stripping away the artifice of society and the exertion of power over another person are two things that director Yorgos Lanthimos, the lead figure behind the Greek Weird Wave movement, has consistently explored throughout his wacky career. Whether it be parents going to extreme lengths to manipulate their children’s worldview in Dogtooth , the threat of being turned into an animal if you don’t fall in love in The Lobster , or an omniscient Barry Keoghan terrorizing Colin Farrell’s family in The Killing of a Sacred Deer , Lanthimos has always taken the road less traveled to tell his twisted tales of morality. Marking as his reunification with The Favourite star Emma Stone and writer Tony McNamara, Poor Things attempts to wrap all of Lanthimos’ earlier work into one lavishly produced feature, a move that both creates a wondrously unique film and wholly exemplifies the idea of having too much of a good thing. In another life, Bella Baxter (Stone) could have been the world’s greatest poker player. She’s a master at calling out people’s bluffs through her inquisitive nature and unfamiliarity with modern life. Why don’t people have sex all the time? Why do we eat things that are revolting? Why do we make meaningless small talk with people we care little about? Everyone regurgitates the usual “because it’s polite” or “because that’s just the way things are” answer, but both they and Bella know that it’s all bullshit. Bella is a science experiment by the mad scientist Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe). Once she was a woman named Victoria who threw herself off the London Bridge because of perinatal depression. The opportunistic doctor seized the moment to do something that had never been done before, something that “was obvious once I thought more about it”: Take the brain out of Victoria’s unborn child and put it into her own skull. She is now a woman with a clean slate, unchained from the tethers of Victorian society and free to form a path of her own. This version of London has the usual trademarks we expect: smog, brick roads, and cockney accents. But then there are electrified cable cars, dogs with duck heads, ducks with dog heads (brought to you by our boundless doctor), and cruise ships emitting green smoke. The influences of Terry Gilliam are apparent, even down to cinematographer Robbie Ryan’s employment of peephole lenses and crazy angles to go along with his reintroduction of the fisheye lens from The Favourite . Those orgiastic visuals go hand-in-hand with Bella’s extraordinary journey around Europe. Her companion for much of the adventure is Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo), a chauvinistic lawyer who whisked her away from her safely guarded cage. He’s a himbo who thinks of himself as an intellectual, which makes him the antithesis of Bella’s burning passion to understand the world. Fortunately, there are other people (Hanna Schygulla, Jerrod Carmichael, Suzy Bemba) who are more open to uncovering the backwardness of the patriarchy. There does become a point where McNamara’s script starts to run out of ideas. A few too many retreads about Bella’s observations artificially elongate the 141-minute runtime and grind down the final third, a common minor problem within Lanthimos’ filmography (I say that as one of his biggest fans). But then he always closes the book with gusto, this being no exception. Poor Things is also not an exception to the rule that Stone and Lanthimos have formed one of the most exciting actor-director partnerships of the modern era. Stone turns in one of the finest performances of the year, playfully illustrating the transition from an amusing child to a full-fledged intellectual, all while flawlessly carrying the film’s emotional core. Her burden is lightened by her great supporting cast: Dafoe an idyllic partner for Lanthimos’ vision, Ruffalo appears as if he thought this was a Monty Python sketch, Ramy Youseff plays the terrifyingly intrigued rookie doctor, and Kathryn Hunter’s brothel owner opens up Bella’s view on pain and pleasure. It’s a true testament to Lanthimos’ pedigree as a director for me to say that this is my least favorite of his English-language features. It will surely land somewhere at the tail end of my Best of 2023 Top 10, and will just as surely pick up a bevy of nominations and wins at the Oscars. Lanthimos has already finished production on his next film, AND (Also starring Stone and Dafoe), which will presumably be released sometime in 2024. If that film continues this winning streak, we may very well need to start having the conversation about him being the best director working today. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

The Invisible Man March 5, 2020 By: Button Hunter Friesen The Invisible Man opens on a secluded waterfront mansion. Inside it, Cecilia Kass is executing her plan to run away from her abusive boyfriend, Adrian. She successfully escapes, but not without Adrian running after her in a violent fury. A few weeks after her departure, Cecilia is notified that Adrian has committed suicide. Her relief at his demise doesn’t last long as a series of coincidences begin to take shape. Cecilia starts to hear noises and has the constant feeling she is being watched. After some time, she discovers that Adrian isn’t dead, but invisible. He’s gaslighting her into submission, playing vicious tricks around the house, and tormenting others connected to her. With no one believing her situation, Cecilia must work to defend herself and the people she loves from unseen harm. As the writer/director behind several horror franchises such as Saw and Insidious , Leigh Whannell once again proves his chops here. He commands the material with his expert use of the camera and lighting. A multitude of slow pans and still shots imbue each scene with a lingering sense of terror that never ceases to grab hold of you. The dark, shadowy lighting puts a magnifying glass on Cecilia’s isolation as she battles her internal and external demons. And because the assailant cannot be seen, Whannell also relies on some expert sound design that is similar to the style used in A Quiet Place . Silence is the most abundant and effective sound device as it fills the gaps between the creaks and rumbles. It becomes clear throughout that hearing nothing is much scarier than hearing something. But what Whannell can be respected for most is his refusal to stoop to jump scares, especially considering the story allows for that. Sure, a jump scare here or there would have jolted some energy into the often overly-slow pacing, but Whannell’s insistence on taking the high road makes for a more complete horror experience. Of course, the concept of someone turning themself invisible is a little silly. The movie doesn’t totally defend against that criticism either, only mustering a quick line about how Adrian was “a leader in the field of optics”. However, once you get past that barrier of disbelief, you’ll open yourself up to what this movie has to offer under the hood. The script for The Invisible Man , penned by Whannell himself, has more on its mind than just scares. The movie does a great job of conveying the torment and aftermath that an abusive relationship can have on someone. Cecilia as a character is given a full arc as we follow her journey of slow recovery from beginning to end. This added layer brings a deeper meaning that is both used to educate about a serious topic and make the horror material pack a bigger punch. Portraying our heroine is the commanding Elisabeth Moss. It’s another unhinged performance similar to her previous roles in Her Smell and The Handmaid’s Tale . Moss’s all-in attitude helps suspend our disbelief of the material and grounds her character in the real world. She’s utterly believable in even the most bewildering of situations and carries the emotional weight of the film. Commendable supporting performances come from both Aldis Hodge as a sympathetic detective and Michael Dorman as Adrian’s brother, Tom. Through inventive storytelling and craftsmanship, Leigh Whannell and Elisabeth Moss have quite possibly created the definitive version of this ludicrous premise. Released at a time of year infamous for forgettable horror movies, it’s a breath of fresh air to see quality original content have its time to shine. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Madame Web February 14, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen Sony has really outdone themselves this time. Venom was one of the worst movies of 2018, Venom: Let There Be Carnage was one of the worst movies of 2021, and Morbius was by far the worst movie of 2022. If Madame Web isn’t the worst thing I see in 2024, then God help us all. On one hand, I have to commend their consistency. But on the other hand, I have to ask if all these movies have just been some sort of sick joke, almost like an attempt at reverse psychology for us to hate Spider-Man. There’s no other explanation beyond that, because who in their right mind would give the green light to such low-tier characters (in the case of Morbius and Madame Web) and mess it all up on four consecutive occasions? Let’s just get this over with, shall we? Things begin in the Amazon as Cassie Web’s mother researches spiders just before she dies (sorry everyone, that memeified line isn’t in the final cut of the film). Ezekiel Sims (Tahar Rahim) has been hired to protect the very pregnant mother on her journey but backstabs her once she finds the elusive arachnid that grants powers to whoever it bites. It’s now thirty years later and Sims has been continually having visions about three teenage girls (Syndey Sweeney, Isabela Merced, and Celeste O’Connor) killing him with their own superpowers. What would any sane person do in that scenario? Brush off these nightmares and carry on with their life? Move as far away as possible from the location of this predicted occurrence? Wrong! The correct answer is to track down these girls with stolen Patriot Act surveillance equipment and murder them first. It’s so simple! This is how Cassie (Dakota Johnson) gets tangled into this web, as her path has seemed fated to cross with those of the girls. Like Ezekiel, she too can see into the future (or travel back in time if you’re going off the incredibly incoherent editing), only she uses it to save lives. She’s not like other women; or people for that matter, as evidenced by one of the most awkward baby shower scenes to ever grace the screen. But that estrangement isn’t from her mysteriously uncontrollable power or the fact that she’s an orphan, it’s from the “so bad it’s almost hilarious” script by the four credited writers of Matt Sazama, Burk Sharpless, Claire Parker, and director S.J. Clarkson. Never has expository dialogue been so in demand, and a plot been so needlessly convoluted. None of this makes any sense once you step back and think about the chronology of events. Ezekiel wants to kill the girls because they will eventually gain superpowers, but the girls only get the powers as a byproduct of Ezekiel trying to kill them. So wouldn’t him trying to kill them first only be speeding up what’s going to happen? That paradox aside, the shoddy camerawork and special effects make it nearly impossible to comprehend what’s going on in the present. That might have been a public service in disguise, as the less you see and think about this film, the better. Johnson is an actress who can be great in the right roles, but also awful in the wrong ones. Her two films with Luca Guadagnino - A Bigger Splash and Suspiria - are part of the former, with this being as far down the latter as you can go. Never has a comic book casting been this misjudged, with her line deliveries and overall demeanor signaling her apathy about being part of this project. Sweeney’s characterization and wardrobe almost sexualize her more than Euphoria , with Merced and O’Connor doing little else to impress. The biggest injustice of the film might be its extraordinary ability to make Tahar Rahim look like a terrible actor, with the revered French arthouse performer rendered to ADR’d lines and boilerplate villainous speechifying. Madame Web might do more harm to spiders than birds themselves. Sony has reached the point of insanity by releasing the same bland product over and over again and expecting different results, and I’m right there with them for watching each one. We’ve still got Kraven the Hunter and Venom 3 this year, so this crazy train isn’t going to stop anytime soon. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Hubie Halloween October 15, 2020 By: Button Hunter Friesen ! Widget Didn’t Load Check your internet and refresh this page. If that doesn’t work, contact us. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

No Other Choice September 6, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen No Other Choice had its North American Premiere at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival. Neon will release it in theaters on December 25. Man-soo has it all. A beautiful wife whom he can shower with expensive gifts, such as dance lessons and imported shoes. Two kids, one of whom is a cello prodigy. Two golden retrievers, each named after one of the kids. A nice house, the one he grew up in and poured his blood, sweat, and tears into when he rebought it once he had the money to do so. His company sends over an expensive eel for his family to eat, a thank-you present for the many years of loyal servitude. If this were a Christmas movie, the obviously impending bad times would be a wake-up call for Man-soo to take a step back and appreciate all that he has. But No Other Choice isn’t that type of film, and Man-soo is already very appreciative of the material and emotional wealth that he has. It’s what makes the words “no other choice” sting just a little bit more, and why he twists them into a comically sadistic motivational phrase for getting his life back on track. Those words are first used by an American businessman visiting Man-soo’s paper mill, a forewarning of upcoming layoffs. It turns out that the expensive eel was part of his severance package, a faceless and empty gesture to soften the blow. His self-imposed three-month unemployment period quickly becomes thirteen months, plunging the family into dire financial straits. The job he’s perfectly suited for at a different mill is currently filled by a yuppie, a resentful fact that leads Man-soo to seriously ponder killing him. But Man-soo is only one of several in an identical situation, with a few possibly even more qualified. So he pivots to the next best option: create a fake job posting to attract all his rivals, use that information to kill them off, kill the yuppie, and waltz into the open position. This darkly comedic scenario is lifted from the 1997 American thriller novel The Ax by Donald E. Westlake, first adapted into a feature film by Costa-Gavras in 2005. Director Park Chan-wook has been a lifelong fan of the novel, an adaptation perpetually teased as his next project since he first publicly announced his intent back in 2009. Coupled with his staggeringly immense filmography, which includes international hits such as Oldboy , The Handmaiden , and Decision to Leave , Park’s further statement that it is a "lifetime project" elevated the bar just that much higher. Luckily, this is one of those circumstances where the right filmmaker meets the right story. Those decades of pent-up giddiness are evident in Park’s visuals. Crisp digital cinematography is punctuated by fluid camera movements, many of which astounded me in how they were able to pull it off. Even the opening of a mortgage default letter gets a camera swoop and zoom. And in a time when most filmmakers have a phobia of cell phones (looking at you, Robert Eggers…), Park embraces them with open arms. You can bring a surprising amount of characterization to the surface through the jolt of a sudden phone call or the tiny expressions during FaceTime. Although he’s attempting to circumvent the job market grind, Man-soo’s plan just perpetuates the cycle of rejection. The people that he’s killing are under the impression that they’re applying for a respected position, another glimmer of hope in a long series of misery. Park grants these men just as much compassion as he has for Man-soo, making the farce of these violent acts all the more tragic. The rich get richer, all while the poor literally kill each other for the ever-shrinking scraps. Korean superstar Lee Byung-hun reunites with Park a quarter century after their initial breakthrough in Joint Security Area . He continues Park’s trend of totally emasculating the desperately pathetic male lead, while also earning the pathos. Son Ye-jin rises as Mi-ri, the matriarch of the family, who, unlike everyone else, is allowed to be very conscious about choosing what path she wants to take. The pendulum between comedy and drama may swing a little too leniently towards the former, keeping the ball from fully leaving the park. Still, this is a stand-up triple from one of our best working directors, someone who continues to find more passion in his craft. You should always cherish someone who consistently makes movies with this caliber of entertainment and intelligence. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Magpie October 23, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen Magpie screened at the 2024 Twin Cities Film Fest. Shout! Studios will release it in theaters on October 25. Early on in Magpie , Annette (Daisy Ridley) feels trapped in her home in the English countryside. Her husband, Ben (Shazad Latif), is chaperoning their young actress daughter, Matilda, during a movie shoot. Playing Matilda’s on-screen mother is Alicia (Matilda Lutz), an actress who’s been involved in a number of tabloid sexcapades. Paparazzi snaps some photographs of her and Ben together on set, and Ben’s phone constantly buzzes from Alicia’s texts when he’s home. Annette stares at herself in the mirror, seeing nothing but a blank face. She presses her hands upon the glass, incrementally applying pressure until the whole thing shatters. The floor is a mess with shards, a few of them still stuck in her hands. But she doesn't seem to notice as the blood starts to drip. This scene is emblematic of director Sam Yates’ approach to the material. A veteran stage director, most notably for 2023’s Vanya starring Andrew Scott, Yates has dabbled a few times in film with some shorts and television. Magpie marks his feature directorial debut, and the results could be the start of a promising career. Nothing about his work is flashy (“flat” would be the derogatory term), but his approach to the material builds a tightly wound atmosphere. The gloominess of the setting, both literally and emotionally, is reflected in the cinematography. Distance and uncomfortable closeness are mixed for a revolving door of claustrophobia, with quite a few of those shots being reminiscent of the POV shots that Jonathan Demme made so famous in The Silence of the Lambs . It’s tough to distinguish between Clarice Starling and Hannibal Lecter in Annette and Ben’s relationship, an intentional blurring of the lines by screenwriter Tom Bateman. Similar to Yates, he’s making his feature screenwriting debut here, having previously appeared as an actor in Kenneth Branagh’s two initial Hercule Poirot films (he met Ridley on the set of Murder on the Orient Express ) and other British productions. The idea for this story came from Ridley herself, influenced by her experience as an on-screen mother in The Marsh King’s Daughter (at least something came out of that movie). Annette doesn’t want to jump to conclusions about Ben and Alicia’s relationship. And yet, it’s the only thing she can do as she sits at home looking after her newborn. There are hints of depression and manic behavior within her due to Ben’s past behavior. Bateman initially plants this as a potential conversation starter about the pressures of motherhood and burrowed trauma. That all gets morphed into something much more kitschy as time progresses, with late revelations making me laugh both with and at the movie. It wants to please you, even if that doesn’t please the movie as a whole. Ridley is fierce in the lead, maintaining a steely presence that keeps you on edge. There’s both sympathy and guilty pleasure you put upon her as she grapples with her domestic situation. Latif and Lutz display great confidence in their increasingly villainous roles. The whole thing feels like a throwback, while also having its cake and eating it too about so many modern topics. It’s a delectable cake, with just a bit too much sugar added. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Wolfs September 26, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen In Wolfs , both George Clooney and Brad Pitt’s characters go unnamed. It’s a requirement of the trade, both of them holding the title of “fixer,” someone you call when you’re in a jam and need help. A person who finds themself in this occupation needs to have a certain type of monasticism, explains Clooney’s character. They have no name, possessions, or past. They are a ghost… a lone wolf among a city full of sheep. The city in this scenario is New York, a familiar stomping ground for writer/director Jon Watts after his trilogy of MCU Spider-Man films. Here he finally gets to turn the brightness down and send some characters to the morgue, although that Marvel-y banter has stuck around in his DNA. Prominent DA Margaret (Amy Ryan) is enjoying a night on the town. She picks up a young man (Austin Abrams) at the bar, gets a penthouse suite for the two of them, and starts drinking her troubles away. Except, new trouble arises when the man falls off the bed and crashes through the glass table, killing him. She can’t call the police, as the scandal would ruin her career. So, she calls the unnamed contact on her phone, with Clooney appearing at her door with assurances that he’ll make everything disappear. The swanky hotel fears a scandal just as much as Margaret does, which is why they send in their fixer (Pitt). Just as it is annoying to find out that your Airbnb host double-booked you with another person during your weekend getaway, so is it for these two solitary professionals. But the only way to get the job done is to work together, a task that gets exponentially hard once drugs are discovered and the supposedly dead man suddenly wakes up. A lot of the early pages in Watts’ script are meant for blowing smoke up the asses of the two fixers. Several speeches about how they are one of a kind and that no one can do what they do. Of course, that whole angle gets demolished pretty quickly as these two are pretty much a mirror of each other. They dress in the same slick black outfits, talk in the same confidently hushed tone, and have bad backs. One could surmise this ironic humor is meant for Pitt and Clooney just as much as it is for the characters. They’re two identical movie stars from the same generation who could easily swap roles without much difference in outcome. I’d guess that Clooney would have nailed Moneyball just as much as Pitt did, and vice versa for Gravity . Luckily, the animosity and distrust between these two clones aren’t shared by Pitt and Clooney. Four movies together and a lifelong friendship go a long way to sell their instant chemistry here. The wisecracks and insults they share get tiring very quickly, but they always work on a basic level because of the infectious love the two of them have for each other. It’s Newman and Redford for the modern age, with some crime caper elements to keep the studio-mandated plot chugging along. Everything Everywhere All at Once cinematographer Larkin Seiple makes this look good for a streaming film, which is a backhanded way of saying it doesn’t look like a pile of digital garbage. Yes, there is a car commercial sheen to this that cannot be ignored, but the smoky shadows and nighttime gloominess of late winter New York sell the intriguing underworld that these characters dabble in. Theodore Shapiro provides a lofi techno soundtrack that’ll go great with any study session. None of this amounts to much of anything that will be memorable. I haven’t thought about it at all in the 24-hour gap between watching it and writing this review. It’s fun in the present and harnesses the power of movie stars in a time when that magic has steadily faded. For that, it gets a half-thumbs-up seal of approval. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

A Complete Unknown December 10, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen Featuring no less than two documentaries by Martin Scorsese ( No Direction Home, Rolling Thunder Revue ), an inspired-by-the-life biopic by Todd Haynes ( I'm Not There ), and countless other portrayals and parodies, much of cinema has devoted itself to telling the story of Bob Dylan. The sum of it all could lead a person to wonder what's left to be mined. But that's not really the question being asked in the production offices in and around Hollywood. The real question is what audiences are left to hear this story. For all their critical acclaim, documentaries and experimental biopics can only reach a relatively low viewership ceiling, leaving the vast majority of the moviegoing public untapped. That's where A Complete Unknown comes in, a straightforward studio biopic featuring all the trimmings that have defined this cornerstone genre of the industry for decades. And in a year where more than one of these ventures down the Wikipedia page has landed with a sour note ( Bob Marley: One Love , Back to Black ), there's a comforting feeling to seeing the old reliable go off without a hitch. It's out with the old and in with the new at the start of the story, although the old was never really born to begin with. Pete Seeger (Edward Norton) finds himself the elder statesman of folk music in the early 1960s, a minuscule subgenre in desperate need of revitalization after decades of weary tales inspired by the Dust Bowl and other rural hardships. Woody Guthrie (Scoot McNairy), Pete's best friend and closest contemporary in terms of star power, sits in a New Jersey hospital unable to speak from the then-unknown Huntington's Disease. During one of Pete's visits, a Minnesota-born drifter named Bobby Dylan (Timothée Chalamet) walks in to perform a song he wrote for Woody. The rest is history from there; a quick rags-to-riches story where the price of fame crashes down on our humble hero. While all of that is more or less true within veteran screenwriter Jay Cocks and director James Mangold's script, Bob Dylan is not humble nor the virtuosic hero of this story. What Mozart is to classical music in Amadeus , Dylan is to folk music in A Complete Unknown . He's a bit of an asshole, denying people common social courtesy and always looking to rebel against the status quo. Luckily for him, everyone else in America is starving for a shakeup to the system. Thanks to his politically active girlfriend at the time, Sylvie (Elle Fanning), Dylan found himself at the forefront of the culture wars. How much this shift in national ideology influenced his early music isn't fully explained, a deft decision by Cocks and Mangold to retain Dylan's titular persona. The constant pouring of musical genius from Dylan lends itself to nearly fifty music sequences, all of them featuring Chalamet vocals and hands on the guitar. Mangold never lets us forget that fact, keeping his camera steady on the target and the editing to a minimum. It allows the performances to breathe, matching the more mellow wavelength that folk songs operate on. The frames often remain beautiful without the melodies, the cinematography by Phedon Papamichael, and the production design by François Audouy illuminating with the warm hues of the decade. Chalamet fits the rest of Dylan's persona with ease. It'd be easy to label the voice, mannerisms, and chainsmoking as overacting, but that's just the kind of person Dylan was. Often up on the stage with him is Monica Barbaro as Joan Baez, the pair creating a wonderful harmony. Both she and Sylvie have to experience The Bob Dylan Show at all hours of the day, the mixture of half-truths and tall tales breaking down any hope of a lasting relationship. The only one who gets a portion of a rosy experience is Pete, with Norton surprising in a cuddly performance after several thorny decades. Boyd Holbrook makes a few appearances as Johnny Cash, an almost meta decision considering Mangold's helming of the singer's 2005 biopic Walk the Line . Mangold has learned a thing or two since then, trusting his audience a little more and painting around his protagonists just as much as he does within the lines. Those brushstrokes are big and broad, creating a rich experience that soothes our eyes and ears. More Reviews Wicked: For Good November 19, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Rental Family September 7, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Jay Kelly November 20, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Train Dreams November 21, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen