Close June 3, 2022 By: Button Hunter Friesen Growing up on neighboring homesteads in the Belgian countryside, Leo and Remi have been inseparable all their life. The two thirteen-year-old boys can often be found acting out pretend battles, riding their bikes as fast as they can, and telling stories to each other during sleepovers. To them, their intimate relationship feels normal. They’ve created their perfect world where they are the only two inhabitants, the only ones that can truly understand each other. But to outsiders, specifically the inquisitive and suspecting kids in their class, there seems to be more under the surface. Some teasing and questioning about the closeness of their relationship seems to stick with Leo more than with Remi. Both boys genuinely deny that they are anything more than best friends, but that answer brings no satisfaction to either party. The pressures of conforming lead Leo to create some distance between himself and Remi. He wants to hang out with the “cool kids” and be perceived as normal, which includes taking up ice hockey and other conventionally masculine activities. To Remi, this is a betrayal of their lifelong friendship and how he sees himself, which initiates a chain reaction culminating in tragedy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6EJGnU2AmV4 The second film from Belgian wunderkind Lukas Dhont, Close, marks his return to Cannes after claiming the Queer Palm and Golden Camera for his 2018 debut, Girl , which similarly dealt with gender dynamics and how an outsider can disrupt non-conventional relationships. Filmed in ultra-high definition with immense precision, Close further establishes Dhont, as well as his regular cinematographer Frank van den Eeden, as one of the purist up-and-coming craftsmen. There’s a feeling of epic openness with the lush Belgian flower fields beckoning you to run through them just as the boys do in one entrancing tracking shot . But there’s also intimacy in the climactic scene where the camera holds on to a close-up of a mother for what seems like an eternity as she ponders how to answer her son’s question. The audience and the characters are trapped in that unbearable moment as the weight of the world is about to topple over. Similar to Trey Edward Shults’ Waves , Dhont’s film is distinctly split down the middle, with the tragic moment acting as the dividing line. The light questioning of the first half is immediately replaced with darkness, which Dhont isn’t able to handle with the same amount of depth. He traps his characters, as well as the audience, in a revolving door of suffering, making them go round and round a few too many times before they can move on. While not as extreme, it does often feel burdened by the influence of the provocative work of Lars von Trier. Just as the Danish bad boy can often be quite controversial, the reception to Dhont’s latter material may be as well. But even in its excessiveness, there’s still great beauty within all aspects of the production. While Dhont can’t fully handle both sides of the dramatic coin, Valentin Hadjadj’s wondrous score is fully up to the task. With fluttery strings and stinging violins, Hadjadj impeccably accentuates every moment. And Eden Dambrine, playing Leo, is a revelation. Bringing tenderness to his emotionally and physically wounded character, Dambrine always finds his way to push through the material. The same can be said for Gustav De Waele, who handles his character’s questioning with the necessary delicacy. As a filmmaker, Lukas Dhont is both mature and immature. At the young age of thirty-one, he can carefully find the emotional core that unlocks his sweeping coming-of-age stories of love and acceptance. But like many young directors, Dhont takes the emotion hostage as he churns it out with unnecessary curiosity. With a better sense of balance, we may soon have one of the premier filmmakers on the international scene. This review was originally published from the world premiere at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival. A24 will release Close in select theaters on January 27th. 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

Argylle January 31, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen Step right up, ladies and gentlemen, and behold one of the unexplained mysteries of the universe! What I present to you on the screen is a cat. But it’s also not a cat. It walks like a cat, talks like a cat, and has the overall presence of a cat. And yet, any time you look into its eyes, you are unable to detect any semblance of a soul. How can this be, you ask? The foremost scientists of our time have been unable to determine that answer, nor have they been able to ascertain an answer for why it exists. Did the producers of Argylle not think that cats already exist, and can be trained? Did they recently watch Tom Hooper’s Cats and think that they could go even further down the uncanny valley? Or are they modern Robin Hoods and decided to waste millions of dollars of Apple’s money on something so monumentally stupid? I leave all these questions up to you, ladies and gentlemen. But be warned, the journey to acquire the knowledge that you seek will not be as fun as the marketing would have you believe. A fully CGI cat is only one of several frustrating peculiarities within the freak show brought to us by the “twisted mind” of Matthew Vaughn. At this point, I’d suggest replacing “twisted” with “childish” or “immature.” “Edgy” would also be a good substitute, but only in the context of a twelve-year-old who thinks of themselves as edgy when they tell their first joke that involves swearing or sex. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mgu9mNZ8Hk “Original,” however, is a word I would not use for Vaughn or Argylle , no matter how much they try (and let me tell you, they try A LOT ) to make you think they’re one step ahead. In an opening almost ripped straight from Austin Powers in Goldmember (we’re really stealing from the cream of the crop here); we see Henry Cavill sporting one of the most hideous hairstyles in modern cinema, right up there with Taylor Lautner’s flowing locks from Twilight and Nicolas Cage’s from Con Air . He’s on the trail of Lagrange (Dua Lipa), but his role gets flipped to prey once she catches him in a trap. With the help of his two sidekicks (John Cena, Ariana DeBose), Argylle escapes and gets one step closer to solving the ultimate conspiracy. But scratch all that, as Agent Argylle is only a story within a story. The topmost layer has Elly Conway (Bryce Dallas Howard), the author of Argylle’s adventures, a series in a long line of successful spy novels. For some reason, almost everything that Elly writes comes true, leading to her life being in danger once a rogue spy syndicate decides to silence her. The only source of help to keep Elly safe and find out the full truth is a good spy named Aidan (Sam Rockwell), who claims to know more than he lets on. It’s not that the plot of Argylle is confusing; it’s more that it never registers as interesting or sensical. There are a lot of moving pieces, but the thread that connects them all is embarrassingly thin. Before you have time to raise your hand and question why anything is happening, writer Jason Fuchs takes a hard pivot for another “out of this world” twist. The unpredictability of everything becomes tiringly predictable, and even more annoying. What’s also predictable is Vaughn’s staging of the action, which contains no fewer than five set pieces queued to clichéd 60s tunes. To give him credit, one of those scenes contains some nice visual flourishes and choreography. But the rest are bogged down by either horrendous CGI or excessive editing. I’m sure with $100+ million at his disposal, there wasn’t much from Vaughn’s imagination that couldn’t be filmed. But the real question was if he should, not if he could. And the vast majority of this shouldn't have left the brainstorming session. Apple Original Films and Universal Pictures will release Argylle in theaters nationwide on February 02nd. 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 Electric State March 12, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen Have you ever wondered why Netflix keeps hiking up the price of its streaming service? Beyond the simple answer that they can do whatever they want now that they’re the top dog in streaming (What are you gonna do? Go over to Peacock?), all that extra cash is needed to fund their quarterly ventures into blockbuster filmmaking. Q1 2025’s splashy title for the next investor meeting is The Electric State , which reportedly comes for $320 million, putting it within shouting distance of some of the most expensive movies ever made. This comes as no surprise, considering directors Anthony and Joe Russo are at the helm. They’ve displayed their expertise in creating entertainment out of the GDPs of small island nations numerous times before with their Captain America and Avengers films. Seeing all those box office dollars flowing like Niagara Falls, Netflix quickly snatched up the brothers, but not before they took forgettable detours to rival streamers Apple TV+ and Amazon with Cherry and Citadel , respectively. The Gray Man didn’t start the franchise that Netflix desperately needed, even with Captain America himself, Chris Evans, as a headliner. And now with Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon films and Red Notice failing to do the same, the steamer is back to the Russos in another attempt to become one of the big boy studios. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpN98z8Kf5E But just as one could tell once video games and other tie-ins were announced before the film had even been seen by the public, the desperation for this film to be in the first of a franchise permeates through each unremarkable frame, cloying emotional moment, and generic punchline. The Russos may be great at getting stuff over the finish line, but this is another reminder that they’re pretty inept when it comes to starting from scratch. Loosely adapting from the 2018 illustrated novel by Swedish artist Simon Stålenhag of the same name, the Russos and their ever-dependable screenwriting team of Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely center the story around Michelle (Millie Bobby Brown), a teenage girl all alone after her family was killed in a car crash. While she was in the hospital recovering, humanity waged a war against the worker robots that Walt Disney created back in the 1950s to lighten our load. These bots wanted personal freedom, something we weren’t willing to accommodate. Humans won the war thanks to the obviously evil techno billionaire Ethan Skate (Stanley Tucci), and all robots were deemed illegal and cast off to the Exclusionary Zone in the deserts of the southwest. As it turns out, Michelle’s brother is alive, his unconscious brain being used as the battery that powers the entire neural network that Skate’s corporation uses to control the masses. Yes, this plot is pretty much as dumb on celluloid as on paper. To break him out of his prison, Michelle will have to break the downtrodden veteran robots out of their prison, led by an animatronic Mr. Peanut. It’s obvious that the war chest Netflix threw at this production didn’t go into the screenplay, a dime-a-dozen story of a messianic teenager who leads the unlikely forces of good against an evil, domineering superpower. Even the relationship between Michelle and her brother is delivered in shorthand flashback scenes where the siblings only speak in big emotions as Alan Silvestri’s score reaches for the heavens. Silvestri is famous for being Robert Zemeckis’ go-to composer, a director who could have brought something interesting to this material if it were published back in his heyday. The effects/animatronics are very impressive, with robots of all shapes and sizes given a unique design and personality, providing several opportunities for famous actors to appear as voiceovers. Ke Huy Quan as a makeshift Windows PC and Jenny Slate as Penny Pal, the mailwoman, are notable highlights. Unsurprisingly, Chris Pratt has great chemistry with his CGI robot sidekick Herman, exceptionally and sneakily voiced by Anthony Mackie. There are also blink-and-you-miss-it roles for Jason Alexander, Holly Hunter, Hank Azaria, and Colman Domingo. Watching all of this never come to fruition was not an enjoyable experience, but it wasn’t a total waste of time, either. This is a prototypical four-quadrant film aimed to attract the maximum amount of eyeballs from around the world. While I don’t think anyone will be offended by what it offers, I also doubt anyone will be wholly pleased. Netflix will release The Electric State on its streaming service on March 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

Top 10 Pixar Films June 11, 2024 By: Tyler Banark When Pixar released its first feature-length film, Toy Story , in 1995, it immediately stated that it would be just as big (maybe bigger) than its parent company, Disney. They turned out to be more right than they thought, as this was just the beginning of a journey that would see Pixar evolve and grow in terms of its storytelling and animation techniques. Over the years they developed an unparalleled knack for crafting films for all ages with heavy themes, essential messages, and stunning animation, with the majority of their catalog ready to stand the test of time. With Inside Out 2 taking audiences back to the world of the little voices in our heads on June 14th, here’s a look at ten of the most exemplary movies Pixar has made in its three decades of existence. 10. Finding Nemo (2003) While I used to consider Finding Nemo the most overrated Pixar film, that all changed with Toy Story 4 and Soul (I guess good things do come from middling movies). Nemo is gorgeously animated and has resonant themes about parenthood, ableism, and the lengths we go to for the ones we love, all while balancing that great heart with some lighthearted humor. It’s also a two-way street for kids and adults, with parents learning just as much from their kids. Albert Brooks and Ellen DeGeneres give iconic voice performances, with the latter bringing life to one of Pixar’s greatest side characters and further capitalizing on it in the 2016 sequel. Above all, Nemo reminds us that no matter how hard life gets us…just keep swimming. 9. Toy Story (1995) As the film that launched a revolution, Toy Story often leaves me in awe of the boundary-pushing animation it was able to accomplish in 1995, a feeling that only recently relived with the Spider-Verse movies. From a narrative perspective, it’s a poignant reminder that we should strive to understand those different from us rather than alienating them, and how we can make the best out of any situation life places us in. As seen in Woody and Buzz, the former has to cope with how he’s no longer the top toy in Andy’s eyes and learns to appreciate Buzz, who must accept that he’s not who he thought he was (that staircase scene hits harder as an adult) and is taught by Woody that being a toy is more than infinity and beyond. Thanks to their excellent chemistry, Tom Hanks and Tim Allen made these arcs impeccable and made the movie more than what was generated by the computers. 8. Coco (2017) Delving into the world of the Land of the Dead and tiptoeing around being a full-on musical, Coco narratively flourishes thanks to the wonderful music by Michael Giacchino and Robert & Kristen Anderson-Lopez and an exemplary script about family, following your dreams, and meeting your heroes. The Oscar-winning anthem “Remember Me” has multiple moments to shine, most importantly during the tearjerking scene when Miguel serenades Grandma Coco. By the end, the film has shot for the moon and hit all the right notes along the way. 7. Toy Story 2 (1999) A movie that not only one-ups the original but also sets the stage phenomenally for a third outing, Toy Story 2 is easily the best sequel of any Pixar film. It continues the world-building and character dynamics of Woody and Buzz, all while bringing a new character into the fold in Jessie. Her initial annoying energy is immediately replaced with a wave of sympathy once her pivotal backstory is illustrated and serenaded by Sarah McLachlan’s “When She Loved Me.” Numerous movies have tried to make a heel turn like this, but none have been as effective, which is why Toy Story 2 stands alone. 6. Monsters, Inc. (2001) Monsters, Inc. is an effortless blend of humor, heart, and creativity masterfully done by Pixar’s greatest maestro, Pete Docter. With its imaginative world-building, clever plot twists, and unforgettable characters, it’s the earliest Pixar work I’d go as far as to describe as feel-good. The vibrant and detailed animation spectacularly brings the colorful world of monsters to life, with the voice performances from John Goodman and Billy Crystal being pitch-perfect. But what truly separates this from the pack (and its eventual sequel) is its heart, as Sully and Boo’s relationship touches your heartstrings at every turn. Their reunion in the final minute is a bittersweet cliffhanger, acting as the cherry on top of this irresistibly charming comedy. 5. Toy Story 3 (2010) Toy Story 3 is a triumphant return to the beloved world of Woody, Buzz, and the gang, delivering an emotional and thrilling adventure that surpassed expectations. The toys now face an uncertain future after they’ve been mistakenly donated to daycare, all of them now having to grapple with franchise-favorite themes of identity and purpose. The film balances that emotional weight with some good lighthearted humor and exhilarating action sequences, with the incinerator scene tying it all together. It was a poignant and satisfying conclusion to Pixar's most beloved trilogy… that just had to be ruined in 2019. 4. WALL-E (2008) WALL-E saw Pixar interweaving many risk-taking ideas - a robot falling in love and finding meaning, minimal dialogue, and political commentary on environmentalism - all of which paid off phenomenally. As one of the best at the company, director Andrew Stanton took a “show, don’t tell” attitude toward the material, with Thomas Newman’s score and the wonderful animation, which contrasts the vastness of space and the deserted wasteland that was Earth, doing all the heavy lifting. It is, without a doubt, one of Pixar’s boldest works and anything but robotic. 3. Inside Out (2015) Over the years, Pete Docter has developed a reputation for delivering some of the most philosophical blockbuster animated movies ever ( Monsters, Inc . Up , Soul ), often posing fascinating messages to deep questions. Inside Out is a creative approach to exploring the human psyche, delving into the notion that each individual emotion we experience contributes to our overall growth. The voice cast, particularly Amy Poehler as Joy and Phyllis Smith as Sadness, and Michael Giacchino’s score add emotion to a film about emotions. They all reach a crescendo during several pivotal moments, such as Bing Bong’s death and Sadness being allowed to take over headquarters. 2. Ratatouille (2007) Not only is Ratatouille up there as one of the studio’s best, but it’s also one of Pixar’s most definitive feel-good movies alongside Monsters, Inc. Backed by an incredible voice cast, Ratatouille conveys an essential message to any lost soul to utilize their gifts and that the greatest minds can come from the unlikeliest of places. Not only is Remy an example of this, but so is Anton Ego with his pinnacle review towards the end of the film. It’s a wholesome meal of cinema and would definitely be at the top of my Pixar ranking if it wasn’t for another Brad Bird-directed flick… 1. The Incredibles (2004) The Incredibles is the best Pixar movie not just because of its stellar animation, impeccable voice acting, timely score, and shocking screenplay. The real magic lies in the fact that it was (and still is) Pixar’s riskiest film to date, with writer/director Brad Bird possessing a lot of guts to trust his audience with a film that flirts with subgenres not seen in blockbuster animated films before. Intense fight sequences and deaths, insurance company flaws, and a marriage hanging by a thread often push the PG rating to its maximum allowance. There’s also the presence of a rare item in a villain with justifiable motives. Syndrome’s back story is self-explanatory, which makes him more compelling as an antagonist. All of this entails why The Incredibles did so much for Pixar and animation as a whole, while also proving that superhero movies are more than what’s on the surface. You can follow Tyler and hear more of his thoughts on Twitter , Instagram , and Letterboxd . 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

Tony August 18, 2026 By: Button Hunter Friesen During the waning days of the press tour for The Odyssey , Christopher Nolan gave a surprisingly in-depth and frank interview with Chinese podcast host Zhong Shu. As part of the discussion, Nolan expressed one of his annoyances with modern film criticism: the tendency to gamify the experience of watching a film. Many audiences have an insecure need to be one step ahead of the story, as if knowing what's going to happen before it happens is the mark of an intelligent viewer. And if we're smarter than the movie, then it means the movie isn't pulling off its trick of illusion. "Because to be able to identify the mechanism does not invalidate the mechanism...” he said. "Because people have this idea that, ‘Because I can understand why the story affects me the way it is, therefore, it didn’t work." Apart from maybe superhero films, Nolan's grievance finds its greatest home in the biopic genre. Whether it’s the fact that they're (somewhat) based on true stories with rigid parameters for what can and can't happen, or that it’s simply what sells lots of tickets, biopics have some of the most recurring and recognizable traits in all of cinema. Throughout my time as a film critic, I've written ad nauseam about films like I Wanna Dance with Somebody , Back to Black , Bob Marley: One Love , and Bohemian Rhapsody . Just as they all presented the same cadence of trials and tribulations for their central figures, I wrote the same critique of having to sit through the formula again and again. Perhaps my fixation on the routine story beats prevented me from digging deeper into the juicier thematic material. Of course, like Nolan's view, my critique of those subpar films was not solely based on the innate fact that they followed the formula. Plenty of great biopics followed the Rosetta Stone to the letter just as much, such as A Complete Unknown , The Aviator , and Nolan's own Best Picture-winning Oppenheimer . What creates a feast out of a famine is the combination of all facets of the production. Bob Marley: One Love and A Complete Unknown both feature transformative performances (Kingsley Ben-Adir and Timothée Chalamet, respectively) at the center of their conventional stories, but only the latter featured the craft and unspoken warmth that kept me fully invested. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1MVnzd2aVc All in all, this brings us to Tony , the origin story of Anthony Bourdain (going by “Tony” here) before he became the bad boy of the culinary world with his Kitchen Confidential book and travelogue shows. Granted, he was always a bad boy, as evidenced by the opening quote (also prominently featured on the film’s poster): “I was – to be frank – a spoiled, miserable, narcissistic, self-destructive and thoughtless young lout.” In his eyes, his roguish charm comes from his cool wordplay, with lies spun with such a bragging nature that he wholly believes everyone hangs onto his every word like it is gospel. It’s why he’s telling everyone he’s going to get a summer writing fellowship grant from Vassar only a few minutes after coming out of the interview. It’s not much of a coincidence that the two people who see right through him are women: his stern mother Gladys (Dagmara Domińczyk) and Nancy (Emilia Jones), an older classmate he has a crush on. Unfortunately, the script by director Matt Johnson, as well as Todd Bartels, Lou Howe, and Matthew Miller, does not support these women as anything beyond functions for Tony to become Anthony Bourdain. They are uninterested in him when he needs to be at his lowest, and then interested in him once the story requires it. The double whammy of their initial disinterest is what sets Tony on his course of self-discovery. Inevitably, he doesn’t get the writing fellowship. Instead of admitting this fact to his parents and friends, he steals all the cash from his dad’s wallet and hops on a bus. His destination is the seaside Provincetown, where he’ll repair his broken ego by wooing Nancy at her summer job. On his first night in town, he’s thrown out of a restaurant for drunkenness, losing all his cash and bumming on the street. The restaurant’s owner and head chef (Antonio Banderas), who simply goes by “Chef,” takes pity on Tony, giving him a dishwasher job in exchange for the couple of bucks he needs to get back home. In the kitchen, Tony meets the salt and brine of the working class, filled with cursing, inappropriate jokes about coworkers' mothers, and the high stakes of surviving a lunch rush during the height of tourist season. It’s put up or shut up, with Tony unable to talk his way out of his inadequacy. As he did a few years ago with BlackBerry , Johnson has crafted an ode to outcasts, those who sweat over a hot stove all day, then throw away their apron to sit around a fire on the beach while throwing back a few (too many) beers. There’s a rambunctious rhythm to the chaos of the kitchen, the staff’s mismatched personalities merging into a found family. It’s admirable that Johnson focused most of his efforts on that aspect, because the biopic-y nature of this story is rather shallow, overrelying on our already established understanding of Bourdain. His ignition for cooking is rather absent here, with only a small handful of scenes featuring meals being served. For a movie about a chef, there was not a moment when my mouth watered, nor did I feel very educated about how a master chef starts his journey. What I did feel connected to was Dominic Sessa’s lead performance, a natural extension of his revelatory debut work in The Holdovers a few years back. It’s his time to come of age, to figure out the person he truly is instead of the person he keeps telling everyone (and himself) who he will be. Banderas is also quite incredible in a role that could have used just a little more padding. He’s found his oasis in the desert, secure enough in his dreams and ambitions to extend a helping hand to Tony, whose greatest life lesson was getting punched in the face as he was thrown on that first night. Even when you think you can’t eat anymore, a great chef will bring something out that makes your stomach find a new level of appetite. Even with a talent like Johnson, Tony didn’t do that for me, more or less just being another stage in the endless course meal that is the biopic genre. It’s appetizing to look at and has a smooth flavor, but little nutritional value. A24 will release Tony in select theaters on August 07th, followed by a nationwide expansion on August 21st. 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

Reptile September 9, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen Is a red herring a red herring if you know it’s a red herring? That tongue twister of a sentence rattled throughout my head throughout most of the bloated 134-minute runtime of Reptile . In this police procedural, there are several suspects and clues, most of them presented so obviously to be of fake importance that you know immediately that you don’t need to expend the mental energy to keep track of them all. Even with these self-inflicted wounds, writer/director Grant Singer, making his feature debut, can still mount an entertaining movie that is far stranger (mostly in a good way) the more you look under the hood. The body of Summer Elswick has been found in the home of her partner, Will Grady (Justin Timberlake). She was stabbed 33⅓ times, with the final strike being so powerful that it got the knife stuck in her pelvis. She has a shady ex-husband by the name of Sam Gifford (Karl Glusman) and an even shadier enemy in commerce in Eli Phillips (Michael Pitt). And then there’s still Will and his obsessive mother (Frances Fisher). There are probably other people who could have done this, too, but Detective Tom Nichols (Benicio Del Toro) is already starting to get lost in the mud of motives and opportunities. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS1cNkZ9o1U For all its talk of murder and treachery, what stands out the most about Reptile is the enlarged funny bone it has. There are little jabs here and there, most of them meant to raise your eyebrow as they create a hard break from the grisliness. Tom has a fascination with Will’s touchless sink faucet, even going so far as to take a picture of it during the recreation of the moment Will found Summer’s body. I can’t say it always works, but it does make for some interesting moments that make the film more watchable, especially considering the conventionalism of the events. Most of the story follows Tom and his partner (Ato Essandoh) going through the motions of finding evidence and investigating suspects. The answers are the ones you expect, with the same going for the twists. Singer and editor Kevin Hickman create some good moments of tension through their cross-cutting, overlapping the simultaneous actions of a handful of characters. It’s a disorienting technique that works to place you in the mind of Tom, who’s still dealing with his shady past that forced him to move to New England with his wife (Alicia Silverstone, unfortunately, not given enough to do). But Singer can’t help himself with the disorientation as he repetitiously punctuates many of his scene transitions with loud crashes, which gets about as annoying as you’d expect. Del Toro is giving it his all in a role he co-wrote with Singer and Benjamin Brewer. He’s a man who seems to have lost a little bit of his touch, never really knowing if he’s on the right trail or can trust anybody. It’s a slight shame that the material isn’t able to match his effort on screen. Timberlake has always been an uncomfortable actor, especially in dramas, as you can clearly see the effort he’s putting in to pull it off, as opposed to the nonchalant professionalism of Del Toro and Silverstone. Thankfully, that twitchy uneasiness is part of his character. The rest of the characters are real characters , mostly on account of their actors committing too much to the part. Reptile will likely fall into the pantheon of semi-forgettable Netflix originals. I can’t say that’s a shame because the movie doesn’t do a lot to make a case for its existence in my memory outside of a few questionable choices. But when compared to the other forgotten content, it’s a cut above. This review was originally published from the world premiere at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival. Netflix will release Reptile in select theaters on September 29th, followed by its streaming premiere on October 06th. 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

Anora June 7, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen Love him or hate him (I’m curious if there’s anyone out there who hates him), you’ve got to admit that Sean Baker knows how to open a movie. The catchy rhythms of NSYNC’s “Bye Bye Bye” jolt Red Rocket ’s Mikey Saber awake on his long-haul bus trip from LA to the middle of nowhere in Texas. The lyrics of “You’re probably going to start a fight / I know this can’t be right / Hey baby, come on.” reverberate throughout Mikey’s subsequent actions. But as much as you despise what he’s doing - just like the song - you can’t help but tap along with him. Baker’s newest work, Anora , takes an almost identical strategy. The high-energy beat of Take That’s “ Greatest Day (Remix) ” blasts from the theater speakers as Baker’s signature red-colored cursive opening studio logos bleed across the black screen. The words “Today this could be, the greatest day of our lives,” take over as we fade in on a sex worker giving a lap dance to a very enthusiastic customer. The camera glides from right to left, revealing an assembly line of workers and their male patrons. Everyone is living in euphoria at this moment, the world melting away with each strut of their bodies. I’m pretty sure Greta Gerwig’s Cannes jury only needed these initial thirty seconds to declare this their Palme d’Or winner. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1HxTmV5i7c For our titular Anora (Mikey Madison), or Ani, as she likes to be called, her night is only just beginning. As the only dancer in her club who can understand Russian on account of her family’s Uzbek background, Ani gets assigned to be the personal escort for a high-rolling Russian fuckboy looking to blow his oligarch father’s money on as many girls and drugs as he can. His name is Ivan/Vanya (Mark Eydelshteyn), and he speaks in respectably broken English, dons a haircut and skinny frame akin to Timothée Chalamet, and is obviously a rich kid who’s been handed everything on a silver platter all his life. But he pays handsomely and treats Ani with respect, so how can she say no? Things escalate from there, including a New Year’s Eve party at Vanya’s luxurious beachfront mansion and a week-long escapade at the swankiest spots in Las Vegas. Baker’s documentarian aesthetics keep this Pretty Woman- esque tale of young love grounded within reality. The club Ani works at is dingy and run by a pretty scummy group of older guys. And Vanya is no Richard Gere, acting more like a bratty child than the respectable man he’s been sent to America to become. But like any night of ecstasy, the sobering reality of the morning sun eventually sets in. A hasty marriage between Ani and Vanya at one of those seedy Las Vegas chapels brings out the wrath of Vanya’s neglectful parents, who sic their hired goons/caretakers to have the couple’s marriage annulled. They say you truly get to know someone during a moment of weakness, and Ani learns a lot about Vanya once the music stops. A series of misadventures ensues over several hours, more than enough to fill the 139-minute runtime, but not enough to make it wholly justifiable. It’s hard for a comedy, even a truly laugh-out-loud one such as this, to be great when 25% of its runtime could have been trimmed. Madison is always in her element as she follows Baker’s on-the-ground improvisational rhetoric. She delivers a true movie star performance, a quality Baker always seems to find in his often unknown (or underseen) stars. That level of showmanship goes a long way to carry the zaniness. The entire product reminded me of Triangle of Sadness , another Palme d’Or winner that often overstayed its welcome. But both that film and Anora always stand out from the rest of the pack and send you on a high note, which can never go unappreciated. This review was originally published from the world premiere at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. Neon will release Anora in select theaters on October 18th. 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

Maria November 25, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen Maria concludes Pablo Larraín’s unofficial melancholic trilogy of iconic women of the 20th century. Jackie started it all in 2016, with Natalie Portman’s Jackie Kennedy forced to witness the end of her Camelot after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Then came Spencer in 2021, a portrayal of a hellish long weekend Princess Diana (Kristen Stewart) had to endure over the Christmas Holiday with the Royal Family. But while Jackie and Diana only found themselves at the end of an era, Maria sees its titular subject, opera singer Maria Callas, at the end of her life. Bolstering that sense of finality even further is veteran screenwriter Steven Knight’s (also the writer of Spencer ) decision to start this story at the very end. Callas’ body is found by her loyal butler (Pierfrancesco Favino) and maid (Alba Rohrwacher) on the floor of her Parisian apartment. She was only 53 at the time, although her frail physical condition from years of seclusion would lead anyone to guess she was much older. She ran away from the stage years ago, although she can’t escape it in her mind. It’s the only thing she’s ever known, a former blessing that’s become a curse due to her strained vocal cords. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7_ze9palm0 Larraín separates the tone of this story from his other two biopics, substituting the frenzied claustrophobia with something more hauntingly elegiac. Maria's apartment is just as luxuriously furnished as the White House or the holiday estate of the Royal Family, but there's a stillness in the air. For Maria, that silence is deafening, and the absence of music forces her mind to wander between the past and present. Production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas has recreated the opera houses of Europe with exquisite craftsmanship, each captured beautifully by legendary cinematographer Ed Lachmann, who reunites with Larraín after their impeccable work on last year's El Conde . It doesn't matter if the frame is filled with the golden hues of autumnal Paris or the stark black-and-white of the mid-20th century; the result is always mesmerizingly gorgeous. Larraín and Lachmann have each set a high bar for themselves over their careers, but this might be their respective magnum opuses on a technical level. The likes of Mica Levi or Jonny Greenwood aren't around this time to supply the music. That role has expectedly been handed over to Callas herself. In a pre-recorded segment, Larraín introduced the film, explaining that for centuries, opera was an art for the common person, only for the wealthy class to subsume it. Maria serves as his act to give the music back to the people, complete with all the extra heft that cinema allows. Subtitles are not included for any of the performances, as the emotion in the words and on Angelina Jolie's face tells us all that we need to know. Callas described each of her performances as miracles, an opinion that grows more accurate the longer she stands upon that stage. Similar to Demi Moore in The Substance , the casting of Jolie brings an additional layer of context to the role. Here's a performer who was at the top of her profession for two decades, relatively vanishing from her stage over the past few years. Calling this a "comeback" for Jolie would be a disservice to everything she's done during her acting sabbatical (charity work, directing, family, etc.). It's more of a reminder of her immense screen presence and poise as a performer. We hang on every word as she describes her past to a noisy television reporter (Kodi Smit-McPhee), and share in her sorrow as she unsuccessfully tries to mount a comeback. Sure, she doesn't fully sing the words of Callas, opting for lip-syncing. But the passion is there, and that's what really sells it. As the biopic genre has continued to stay relatively tame over the last decade, let's give thanks to Larraín for steering it in a new daring direction not once, not twice, but on three separate occasions. He saved the best for last with Maria , defying his own specific genre trappings. I very much look forward to what he does next, although I wouldn't complain if he reversed that decision and stayed in this mode forever. Netflix will release Maria in select theaters on November 27th, followed by its streaming premiere on December 11th. 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

Cannes 2024 Predictions - Part 3: The Loyalists April 9, 2024 By: Hunter Friesen With Oscar season firmly behind us (although it never really ends), it’s time to set our sights on the next white whale barreling toward us: festival season! Sundance and SXSW have provided the appetizer with their concentration of indies and spring studio releases, opening the doors for Cannes to take center stage with glitzy red carpets and world-class talent. Last year’s edition proved to be one of its best, with Palme d’Or winner Anatomy of a Fall and Grand Prize winner The Zone of Interest being two of the most acclaimed and rewarded films of the year. Also featured were About Dry Grasses , Fallen Leaves , La Chimera , May December , and The Taste of Things . Last year’s SAG and WGA strikes will likely put a damper on the presence of Hollywood on the Croisette (and potentially at the later fall festivals), but it shouldn’t prevent Delegate General Thierry Fremaux and his team from assembling some of the best that world cinema has to offer. The festival will announce its full lineup on April 11. Until then, I’ll take a closer look at some of the films that are generating buzz and predict which ones are likely to make it up the coveted steps this year. This final part will cover films from directors who are just as much stars as the actors that feature in their films. These are filmmakers that have either debuted several high-profile films at the festival and/or won an award such as the Palme d’Or. Cannes is a festival built upon relationships, and these auteurs have been steady as a rock for so many years. Kinds of Kindness It was only a few weeks ago that Yorgos Lanthimos and Emma Stone were triumphing at the Oscars with Poor Things , and now there’s potential that they’re going to do it all over again. Lanthimos’ unique arthouse sensibilities have matched well with Cannes in the past, with Dogtooth, The Lobster , and The Killing of a Sacred Deer , all winning various prizes. He partnered with Searchlight on his two previous films, both of them premiering at Venice and garnering a combined 21 Oscar nominations. The June 21 release date immediately squashes that possibility, all but confirming the Greek auteur's return to Cannes. Emilia Perez A previous winner for Dheepan in 2015, Jacques Audiard returns with a Mexican-set opera musical featuring Zoe Saldaña, Selena Gomez, and Édgar Ramírez. Karla Sofía Gascón will play the titular role as her character helps “an escaped Mexican cartel leader undergo sex reassignment surgery to both evade the authorities and affirm her gender.” The Shrouds Cannes has been the birthplace for six of David Cronenberg’s films, with Crash wreaking havoc with vehicular-related sex 25 years before Titane . The Canadian icon has been outspoken in the past about his desire to debut his films on the Croisette, and his newest should be no exception. A festival-favorite cast composed of Vincent Cassell, Diane Kruger, and Guy Pearce headline this story of a widower building a device to speak to the dead. Bird Andrea Arnold doesn't make movies often, but she goes to Cannes every time she does. Her latest one lured Barry Keoghan away from Gladiator 2 , and has him paired up with rising star Franz Rogowski. A24 will be handling distribution, with a Palme d’Or certainly being in their sights. Hard Truths Mike Leigh is one of the most revered British directors of all time; competing for the Palme d’Or on four occasions, winning it in 1996 for Secrets & Lies . The last few years haven’t been kind to him, with Cannes rejecting Peterloo in 2018 and new financial backing not being easy to come by. The money eventually came in for his new story about a black British family grappling with life after the pandemic. Will he come back to Cannes after being shunned, or stick with the more welcoming fall festivals? Anora Sean Baker is in the company of Jerry Lewis and James Gray as American directors who are more greatly respected in France than at home. The Florida Project made its premiere in the Directors’ Fortnight, with Red Rocket netting Baker a promotion to the Official Competition. Neon has backed his latest feature, which tells the story of a sex worker between New York and Las Vegas. Limonov: The Ballad of Eddie / The Disappearance Cannes has shown loyalty to Russian auteur Kirill Serebrennikov during its multi-year banishment of his country’s government. His next film will continue the biopic streak from Tchaikovsky’s Wife , this time in the English language and focusing on the life of Soviet poet Eduard Limonov. Serebrennikov co-wrote the screenplay with Cold War director Paweł Pawlikowski and Ben Hopkins, and Ben Whishaw will play the titular character. And if that’s not enough, Serebrennikov has also shot a feature about notorious Nazi doctor Josef Mengele during his fugitive years in South America. I’d put money down on the former premiering this year, and the latter holding out for next year, or the fall festivals. Spectateurs! Although Arnaud Desplechin has competed for the Palme d’Or on seven occasions (plus a few times in the sidebar), his last few films have been disappointments. Still, there’s no indication he'll be rejected for his new film, especially with its cast featuring Anatomy of a Fall star Milo Machado Graner and Mathieu Amalric. Megalopolis Sure, Francis Ford Coppola hasn’t made a decent movie in over 25 years. But when you’re the director of The Godfather trilogy and a two-time Palme d’Or winner for The Conversation and Apocalypse Now , you get a free pass for life. The famed director revealed recently that his long-gestating film would be getting a large IMAX push in the fall, which keeps the door open for a long overdue return to the Croisette. 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

2026 Golden Globe Awards Nomination Predictions December 6, 2025 By: Hunter Friesen The Golden Globes have always been a surprising bunch. Luckily, those shocking nominees and winners have tended to lean more positively in the last few years. Inspired choices like nominating Payal Kapadia for All We Imagine as Light in Best Director, or Sebastian Stan winning Best Lead Actor - Musical or Comedy for A Different Man , have shown that a new leaf has turned. Because of this, I’m widening the scope of potential nominees, no longer just lazily name-checking big stars. Granted, there are still plenty of heavyhitters that can, and probably will, be nominated. It should all make for a fun nomination morning. Here are my predictions on what names will be called in each category, complete with a full breakdown detailing the seemingly endless combinations. Best Motion Picture - Drama Sinners Hamnet It Was Just an Accident Sentimental Value Frankenstein The Secret Agent Until the 2021 awards season, non-English language films were not allowed to compete in the top categories of Best Motion Picture - Drama and Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy. The group has slowly embraced this extra freedom in the years since, granting nominations to Anatomy of a Fall , The Zone of Interest , and Emilia Pérez . This is the year where they have the chance to blow the floodgates wide open, with several prominent contenders coming from outside the United States. Coincidentally (or not considering the company's strategy), that lot is almost all represented by Neon and premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. They've got the pedigree, so why shouldn't I go all in? More traditional choices would be Avatar: Fire and Ash and Is This Thing On? . Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy One Battle After Another Marty Supreme Wicked: For Good Jay Kelly No Other Choice The Testament of Ann Lee Similar to last year, this year's crop of musicals and comedies seems just as intertwined in the Oscar race as the dramas. Both Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery and Bugonia are just on the outside, as their buzz feels a little muted, and the reviews aren't any better than the other contenders. Yorgos Lanthimos and the Knives Out films have been consistent nominees in this category before, so one or both could easily make their way in. Best Director Paul Thomas Anderson (One Battle After Another) Ryan Coogler (Sinners) Chloe Zhao (Hamnet) Jafar Panahi (It Was Just an Accident) Josh Safdie (Marty Supreme) Guillermo del Toro (Frankenstein) This category gave us a pleasant curveball last year with Payal Kapadia from All We Imagine as Light . Considering all the heavyweight talent in contention this year, I don't foresee another one of those surprises. The only upset I'm predicting is for Joachim Trier to miss out, although he still has just as much of a chance of being nominated as Josh Safdie and Guillermo del Toro. Best Screenplay One Battle After Another Sinners It Was Just an Accident Hamnet Sentimental Value Marty Supreme Since the start of the decade, Being the Ricardos and Women Talking remain the only two films to receive nominations in this category without a corresponding Best Motion Picture nomination. There's also an equally strong correlation between this category and Best Director, which is why I'm predicting a Joachim Trier and Guillermo del Toro to swap seats. Best Lead Actor - Drama Wagner Moura (The Secret Agent) Michael B. Jordan (Sinners) Joel Edgerton (Train Dreams) Jeremy Allen White (Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere) Dwayne Johnson (The Smashing Machine) Daniel Day-Lewis (Anemone) Dwayne Johnson and Jeremy Allen White were at the top of my predictions in the early fall. Now they've fallen (pun intended) down to fringe contenders after their respective films bombed at the box office and received lukewarm reviews. The same is even more true for Daniel Day-Lewis in Anemone , although I can't bring myself to doubt his legendary status. Best Lead Actress - Drama Jessie Buckley (Hamnet) Renate Reinsve (Sentimental Value) Jennifer Lawrence (Die My Love) Laura Dern (Is This Thing On?) Jodie Foster (A Private Life) Julia Roberts (After the Hunt) Veterans like Laura Dern, Jodie Foster, and Julia Roberts are all hanging onto the last slots, each of them, along with Jennifer Lawrence, likely to be the lone representatives for their respective films. Both critically and commercially, After the Hunt has been one of the biggest bombs of the year. Roberts was given high marks for her work, and voters may reward her for emerging from that mess with some dignity. Jodie Foster seems to (deservedly) be in an era where people are eager to reward her for anything. She won Best Supporting Actress for her work in The Mauritanian , which didn’t even lead to an Oscar nomination. Plus, she speaks French! Best Lead Actor - Musical or Comedy Timothee Chalamet (Marty Supreme) Leonardo DiCaprio (One Battle After Another) George Clooney (Jay Kelly) Lee Byung-hun (No Other Choice) Jesse Plemons (Bugonia) Ethan Hawke (Blue Moon) The leads for each of the male-centered nominees I have for Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy are all here. That leaves two slots left, which I'm giving to Jesse Plemons for Bugonia and Ethan Hawke for Blue Moon . Plemons was nominated last year for Kinds of Kindness , a film that was much further outside the awards conversation than Bugonia is. And Hawke has received career-best reviews in a showcase role. Daniel Craig has been nominated both times as Benoit Blanc, and he's still just as great in Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery . But there's less of him this time around, and the extra competition seems like it will be too much. Best Lead Actress - Musical or Comedy Cynthia Erivo (Wicked: For Good) Amanda Seyfried (The Testament of Ann Lee) Chase Infiniti (One Battle After Another) Rose Byrne (If I Had Legs I'd Kick You) Emma Stone (Bugonia) Kate Hudson (Song Sung Blue) This is less competitive than the rest of the other lead acting categories. The seemingly only other viable contender would be Eva Victor for Sorry, Baby . As much as I would like to see that happen, I can't find a spot to slot her in. Best Supporting Actor Stellan Skarsgard (Sentimental Value) Sean Penn (One Battle After Another) Paul Mescal (Hamnet) Adam Sandler (Jay Kelly) Benicio del Toro (One Batte After Another) Jacob Elordi (Frankenstein) I see no reason not to predict the top six contenders for the Oscar, especially when all are (potentially) appearing in Best Motion Picture nominees. That logic could also mean that Delroy Lindo could get in for Sinners . Best Supporting Actress Teyana Taylor (One Battle After Another) Ariana Grande (Wicked: For Good) Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas (Sentimental Value) Amy Madigan (Weapons) Elle Fanning (Sentimental Value) Wunmi Mosaku (Sinners) Emily Blunt is one of this organization's favorite actresses, nominated seven times throughout the past twenty years. However, I don’t think that amount of preferential treatment will help her get nominated this year for her role in The Smashing Machine . I’m going out on a limb a little bit and predicting Wunmi Mosaku to get in over her, an actress who’s been steadily praised throughout the year in a juggernaut film. Best Foreign Language Film It Was Just an Accident (Iran) Sentimental Value (Norway) The Secret Agent (Brazil) No Other Choice (South Korea) The Voice of Hind Rajab (Tunisia) Left-Handed Girl (Taiwan) Considering that I’m predicting four of these films to be nominated for Best Motion Picture - Drama or Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy, I feel compelled to also slot them in here. That leaves two slots left to fill in a category that likes to deviate from the expected Oscar front-runners. The Voice of Hind Rajab and Left-Handed Girl have been making waves since their festival debuts. Several other contenders could make their way in instead, such as Sirāt , Sound of Falling , or Nouvelle Vague . Best Animated Feature Film KPop Demon Hunters Zootopia 2 Arco Little Amélie or the Character of Rain Scarlet Elio Pixar has been nominated each year since 2016, when Finding Dory found itself kicked to the curb. While it didn’t have the best reviews, that movie at least had a monster box office haul to stand behind, something that Elio sorely lacks. But the expansion of this category and the lack of bigger contenders will probably allow it to sneak in. The Globes are much friendlier to anime than the Oscars, which should bode well for the several high-profile films that have come out this year. Any combination of Ne Zha 2 , Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle , or Chainsaw Man could take that spot. I’m going to give the edge to the previous nominee, Mamoru Hosoda and Scarlet , which has Sony Pictures Classics behind it. Best Original Score Sinners One Battle After Another Hamnet Frankenstein Jay Kelly The Testament of Ann Lee Once an Oscar perennial, Alexandre Desplat hasn’t received a nomination since Little Women back in 2019. That hasn’t stopped his momentum at the Globes, as he’s received three more nominations since then. Even more beloved are Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, who pulled off the wild upset last year with their victory for Challengers . Their work in Tron: Ares is great, but the movie probably doesn't have the juice to push them over contenders from more acclaimed films. Best Original Song I Lied to You (Sinners) Golden (KPop Demon Hunters) The Girl in the Bubble (Wicked: For Good) Dream as One (Avatar: Fire and Ash) Train Dreams (Train Dreams) Drive (F1: The Movie) The top three predictions come from music-centric films, so I feel pretty secure about that. Miley Cyrus received a nomination last year for her song in The Last Showgirl . Seeing as how Avatar: Fire and Ash will be exponentially more popular than that film, she’ll probably be back again. Everything else is kind of a wild guess, leaning more towards big names in big commercial or critical movies. Cinematic and Box Office Achievement Avatar: Fire and Ash KPop Demon Hunters Zootopia 2 Wicked: For Good Sinners Superman F1: The Movie Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle In this category’s short and shameless existence, it has yet to honor a streaming film. That will probably change this year with KPop Demon Hunters dominating the culture for months, which includes muscling its way to the top of the box office weekend in late August despite a limited release. From there, I’m going down the domestic box office charts, picking each film that had some sort of critical and cultural significance. 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

Theater Camp July 24, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen If there’s one thing you’ll definitely walk away with after watching Theater Camp , it’s the sense of the immense amount of hard work that was put into this tiny film. Co-directed by Molly Gordon (also starring) and Nick Lieberman, and written along with Noah Galvin and Ben Platt, Theater Camp comes from a hodgepodge of places, such as an unreleased web series, a semi-improvised short film, and various internet sketches. Several different sources of ideas can be quite apparent, with much of the feature film playing more like a compilation of scenes rather than a whole narrative. Somewhere far upstate in New York is the AdironACTS theater camp, a place kept alive by its fearless leader, Joan (Amy Sedaris). Financial troubles are always beckoning, but everyone’s spirits are up because of their collective passion for the performing arts. But the good times seemed to be fading away after Joan had a strobe-light-induced seizure, putting her in a coma and leaving the camp in the hands of her dim-witted alpha-bro son Troy (Jimmy Tatro). The teachers, including former campers Amos (Platt) and Rebecca-Diane (Gordon), scramble to make up for the loss of Joan by putting on a lavish production to honor her life and legacy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puVDIUk0kM8 The influences of Christopher Guest, The Office , and Abbott Elementary are pretty evident within Theater Camp , with the mockumentary style being employed as a way to follow our underdog heroes as they try to beat impossible odds. We’re presented with an extremely inside-baseball version of events, such as auditions, casting sessions, tech demos, and rehearsals. Anyone with a theatrical background will find a lot to love about the unfolding events, even if the jokes surrounding them are a bit uneven. The script also establishes too many characters early on, only for half of them to be abandoned rather quickly. There’s a new teacher named Janet (played wonderfully by Ayo Edebiri of The Bear ) who has zero theatrical experience, as she lied on her resume. As the only outsider in this crazy environment, she intermittently serves as the audience surrogate. But she then gets dumped pretty quickly, with more time being given to Troy’s various schemes to save the camp. Thankfully, the production of the climactic play is quite endearing for both the story and the overall message about the positive influence the performing arts can have on anyone. There’s an overabundance of genuine love pouring out of the screen, which will surely be eaten up by any packed theater audience (Searchlight desperately hopes for this after acquiring the film for $8 million). Theater Camp is by theater kids for theater kids. Those who have never found themselves stung by the acting bug may not come away with a huge smile on their face, but they will be given an enjoyable peek into this world of make-believe and harsh reality. Searchlight Pictures will release Theater Camp in select theaters on July 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

Gran Turismo August 25, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen Screenwriters Jason Hall and Zach Baylin make it their main objective to never let you forget that Jann Mardenborough (Archie Madekwe) is an underdog that no one believes in. “This isn’t a game; this is real life. You’re just a gamer, what do you know about driving cars?” “This time there isn’t a reset button” is just a handful of lines that you'll become increasingly tired of hearing. It seems Hall and Baylin never took the lesson on diminishing returns, as all the suspense surrounding Jann’s outcome is completely evaporated by the fifth scene, where someone tells him he can’t accomplish his dream. To cut them some slack, this is based on a true story, a fact that the producers REALLY want you to know, going so far as to rename the movie Gran Turismo: Based on a True Story in some markets. Mardenborough is a real person who became obsessed with racing at a young age. But he didn’t have a similar upbringing to the other drivers on the professional circuit, filled with fame and easy access to the best cars money can buy. Jann’s window into the racing world was through the PlayStation game “Gran Turismo” (don’t call it a game in front of Jann because it’s a “racing simulation”). The opening scene (or commercial if you want to be more accurate) introduces us to the immense detail and precision that went into making the game as realistic as possible. Unlike other gaming series like “FIFA” and “Madden,” “Gran Turismo” is generally accepted as the most authentic portrayal of the sport it represents. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVPzGBvPrzw No one seems to believe that Jann’s world-class gaming abilities can translate into real racing, least of all his former soccer pro dad (Djimon Hounsou). Nissan marketing executive Danny Moore (Orlando Bloom) sees potential in the kid. If Jann can be made into a serious racer, it will make Nissan one of the most popular car companies among the untapped gaming demographic. Put in charge of the training process is Jack Salter (David Harbour), who’s also a non-believer in “sim racers.” Over time, his cold heart begins to thaw, with Jann proving himself to be just as good as he says he is. Upon the announcement, one would think that former wunderkind Neill Blomkamp is serving his time in director jail with this assignment. There are no signs of that here, fortunately, with the District 9 and Elysium director crafting some stunning racing sequences, even if there are so many that they end up blurring together. The roaring of the engines fills the theater corner to corner, and cinematographer Jacques Jouffret captures some decent shots. It’s old-fashioned studio craftsmanship applied to a sport that values tradition. Even with all the underdog cliches I mentioned earlier, there’s still a strong emotional connection to Jann and Jack’s partnership. Madekwe and Harbour have great chemistry as they play to the tune of “young upstart and grizzled veteran” we’ve heard many times before. But it’s been done so many times because it works, and it works here. The lows are bitter, and the highs are sweet. Gran Turismo is a product of brand synergy, meant to push the overall awareness of a product just as much as it's supposed to tell a cinematic story. It’s part of a worrying trend of corporations taking on the role of their own biggest fan (see Tetris and Flamin’ Hot ). But there’s also stuff like Air and Barbie that can make the most out of propaganda and entertainment. Blomkamp’s film doesn’t reach those heights, but it still does just enough to cross the finish line respectably. Sony Pictures Releasing will release Gran Turismo in theaters nationwide on August 25th. 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