Enys Men March 19, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen Mark Jenkin’s Enys Men is the kind of film you stumble upon late at night as a kid on a public access channel while you are staying over at your grandparents’ old summer house. That description may be too ultra-specific for most people to relate to, but watching this movie lovingly took me back to those youthful nights when you had no idea what you were watching and if it was any good, but you couldn’t help but be endlessly transfixed by it. In true David Lynch fashion - a figure Jenkin takes much influence from, including having similar total creative control by filling the positions of writer/director/cinematographer/composer/sound designer – the plot of Enys Men is entirely dependent upon what you put into it. Speaking to The Guardian in December, Jenkin described his favorite movies as ones “that take you into the woods. You don’t know what the fuck is going on… then they leave you there.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7Pwf94_XLY Taking place on the titular island, with “Men” using the Cornish pronunciation of “main,” meaning “stone island,” Jenkins’ looping story follows a woman (Mary Woodvine) simply named The Volunteer. She seems to be a researcher observing the growth of a rare species of flower on a remote island somewhere off the coast of Cornwall. Her day follows the same pattern: she wakes up and strolls down to the cliff to record the soil temperature and observe the petals, tosses a rock down the abandoned mine shaft, returns to her small cottage, and records her notes for the day. The OCD-level repetition of this ritual leads to a sleepy sense of banality for the woman and the viewer, with our instinctual expectation that the cycle will eventually be broken going through several rounds of testing. But just as your eyes and senses tire out after the first half hour, Jenkin snaps you awake like a Catholic teacher with a ruler, with unsettling imagery and sounds slowly burned into your memory. There’s nothing purely horrifying about the hallucinations and strange events that fall upon our woman. Still, there is a heavy amount of discomfort and dread that they instill, keeping you in fearful excitement of what’s coming next. Clues of the overarching narrative are dripped through eerie radio recordings and historical landmarks, yet nothing seems to be set in stone (pun intended). Just as he did with his 2019 debut feature Bait , Jenkin goes ultra-low tech by shooting on scratchy 16mm and recording all sound in post-production. It’s as if this were a lost film that had just been unearthed on an abandoned island, rotting away for years until being saved at the last minute. Woodvine’s stark red jacket is the sole bit of lively color, sticking out like a sore thumb against the muted green and brown landscape. Her sparse dialogue is raspy and cold, hinting at long-buried torment, something that may lead a person to seclude themselves on an island for months on end. Neon’s wonderful, yet entirely misleading, trailer for Enys Men may signal it to be too experimental for the casual viewer. But just as Ari Aster and Robert Eggers have amassed cult followings for their new-wave style of horror, Jenkin deserves the same for his now-signature trips down the psychological rabbit hole. The beckoning of Hollywood doesn’t seem to be having much effect on him, promising more distinctly singular work from this up-and-coming artist. Neon will release Enys Men in select theaters on March 31st. More Reviews Primetime September 22, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Unabomber September 24, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Look Back September 16, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Elsinore September 14, 2026 By: Hunter Friesen Hunter Friesen

Materialists June 11, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen Materialists opened during the Paleolithic period of the Stone Age. A caveman brings tools and flowers to the woman he loves, hoping it’ll be enough to earn her affection. We may think that love gets purer the further you go back in time, but there has always been a business angle. Dowries, negotiations, and aligning kingdoms are the old ways of forming a union. Now there’s an algorithm for that, loaded with statistics like height, income, and political views. And for those that are more serious (or desperate) and have the funds to do so, there are services like Adore, which will assign a personal matchmaker to search for you. Lucy (Dakota Johnson) is one of those matchmakers, and a damn good one to be specific. She’s responsible for nine marriages, salvaging the most recent one by spinning the bride’s cold feet confession that part of the reason she’s marrying the groom is that it makes her sister jealous into a lesson about finding value and feeling valued. The key to her success is to treat dating as a business venture, using the same calculating mindset you’d find on Wall Street. “Market forces,” “competitive advantage,” and “strategic skills” are her phrases of choice. The results speak for themselves, and there’s no denying that this is the path that the dating landscape is rapidly progressing along. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4A_kmjtsJ7c It’s natural and odd that after writer/director Celine Song tenderly explored the concept of destiny and love in Past Lives , her follow-up takes a cold, hard look at the facts. There isn’t going to be a Prince Charming waiting in the wings, or a Cinderella who perfectly fits the glass slipper. Dating is a trial-and-error endeavor, with adaptability and compromise being the most important qualities. Song makes sure there are a lot of laughs to be had with all this nonsense. Lucy’s customers are demanding, neurotic, and impatient. A potential match must be this tall, be in this age range, like these certain songs/movies, and make at least this amount of money. Living in the Midwest all my life certainly didn’t prepare me for the astronomical figures that people expect to receive on the East Coast. But all of this is funny because they’re saying the quiet parts out loud, and deep down, we all know we do it too. The eternal bachelorette who has a knack for helping others find love is a trope as old as the romantic dramedy itself. Song may know how to reexamine it in the ways I just described, but she also knows how to harness its extremely potent traditional qualities. She also knows how to best steer the performers on all sides of this love triangle. Yes, Lucy gets more than she bargains for when she simultaneously finds affection in two separate places. Johnson is perpetually on a pendulum swinging back and forth. And after the swing (and miss) that was Madame Web , she was due for a major slide to the lighter side. We meet Pedro Pascal’s Harry as he charms his way through his brother’s wedding reception. He’s also obscenely rich, tall, and handsome. He’s what Lucy refers to as a “unicorn” in her line work - the man of every woman’s dreams. John (Chris Evans) has some of those qualities, but definitely not the financial ones. He’s your usual struggling actor with a part-time catering job who lives in a shitty apartment. But he’s real, and there’s a reason Lucy and he were together for five years before they broke up. We’ve seen characters with these archetypes before, but here they’re steeped in enough authenticity so you can’t just immediately pick a side. Materialists can also be too honest for their own good. There’s a darker element that gets introduced later in the story that drives part of Lucy’s decision-making about her personal life. Song handles it to the best of her ability, but its inclusion is habitually distracting from the other excellent qualities. Honesty is still the best policy, and Song continues to show that she’s a master of telling us how it is in the ways we want to hear it. A24 will release Materialists in theaters nationwide on June 13th. 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

Priscilla November 2, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen What’s most evident about Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla is how much it is the antithesis of Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis from last year. The Australian showman’s authorized propaganda piece (I don’t mean that as derisively as it sounds; all biopics are propaganda to some degree) lit up the marquee signs at the multiplexes thanks to its bright cinematography, fast-paced editing, and roaring soundtrack. Coppola’s film will subsist within arthouses and the back of the multiplexes as she trades all that in for a somber mood, silence so deafening that you could hear a pin drop, and a soundtrack so devoid of Elvis hits that you would think he was a one-hit wonder. Of course, as per the title, Coppola shifts away from The King and examines the woman who constantly lived in his shadow, someone who only got one scene in Luhrmann’s rendition (and looked about twice as old as she was supposed to be). Actually, scratch all that. The most evident thing about Priscilla is the star-in-the-making presence of Cailee Spaeny, a growing sentiment considering her Best Actress win at this year’s Venice Film Festival. She’d been relegated to playing the younger versions of lead characters to this point: young Lynne Cheney in Vice , the daughter of Ruth Bader Ginsburg in On the Basis of Sex , and young Eleanor Roosevelt seen only in flashbacks in The First Lady . She is technically playing the younger version of a real person here, but this time the focus is entirely on her. That expanded canvas allows her to spread her wings, showcasing an immense talent to hold your attention and convincingly play across an elongated timeline. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBWk6BohVXk We first meet Priscilla Beaulieu in Germany, circa 1959. Her father has been stationed at the local Army base, making her the loneliest American in all of Bavaria. Just like it was a fairy tale, the sad girl gets her wish when an Army captain asks her to come along and meet Elvis Presley, who’s also been stationed abroad. He’s an undeniable, beaming example of Americana that seems to have leapt off the posters to fulfill her wildest fantasies. He’s ecstatic to bring her into his world, and she’s naively happy to go along for the ride. Quickly comes a move to Graceland, marriage, a child, and the duties of being a reliable homemaker to the most desirable man in the world. Coppola’s film is at its best in the beginning as she explores the morally questionable inception of the couple’s relationship. She was 14, and he was 24, but Elvis was always kind and courteous, and she was emotionally mature for her age. Despite their initial hesitations, her parents consented to their star-crossed union. Coppola doesn’t heavily lean to one side or the other, instead offering evidence for both camps. There are moments of both intentional and unintentional grooming on the part of Elvis, as well as Priscilla's imprudently rushing in without understanding what she’s signing up for. What’s less interesting about Priscilla is what happens once the dust settles. Graceland quickly morphs from a luxurious palace into a gilded cage where Priscilla is forced to spend her most youthful days. She’s not allowed to leave the compound without supervision, and also not allowed to bring anyone in. It’s a more subdued version of Pablo Larraín’s duology (soon to be trilogy) of Jackie and Spencer, as Priscilla is a prisoner in a dream, caught in a cycle that doesn’t become more impactful despite Coppola’s insistence on keeping it on loop. That lack of energy is almost a winking joke on Coppola’s part as she takes one of the most charismatic men in entertainment history and reveals him to be a scared child doing his best to masquerade as an adult. Jacob Elordi sees Elvis as someone who always wants to stay in control, but never does anything of value to maintain it. He’s lucky that his looks and sphere of influence do all the work for him. Fantasy slowly catching up to reality is often a theme of Sofia Coppola’s filmography, and, along with Marie Antoinette , this is one of its most clear historical instances. It’s the more authentic version of the story Luhrmann avoided telling, although it is missing some much-needed spectacle that he could have shared. At the very least, Spaeny should join the ranks of Kirsten Dunst, Scarlett Johansson, and Elle Fanning, all of whom Coppola announced to the world through her work. A24 will release Priscilla in select theaters on October 27th, followed by a nationwide expansion on November 03rd. 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 Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare April 18, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen With each subsequent entry in his ever-growing filmography, Guy Ritchie seems to make it a mission to make the most Guy Ritchie-esque film yet. The rough edges of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch have been streamlined over the decades, which may be the primary reason why the British writer/director has been one of the most prolific filmmakers since the pandemic, pumping out five feature films since the beginning of 2020. Hell, he already has one in the can titled In the Grey that’s dated for January of next year (reuniting Ritchie with Jake Gyllenhaal, Henry Cavill, and Eiza González), and is in the process of shooting another Apple adventure movie with Natalie Portman and John Krasinski. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvwDen1Wrx8 Some may cry foul at Ritchie essentially becoming an institution rather than a distinct filmmaker, but his brand of mid-budget action comedies is something that our current movie market sorely lacks. It’s also commendable how mindless they are, like a Michael Bay movie without the migraines. I couldn’t tell you much about the plots of the Sherlock Holmes films, The Gentlemen , or Wrath of Man , but I can recall how entertained I was watching them. The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare is no different, as it partakes in a giddy showcase of violence. Luckily for you and me, there is no guilt to be felt at the sight of knives slashing throats, bullets shredding torsos, and axes severing limbs, as all these victims are the stormtroopers of the Nazi regime (producers love this cheat code!). We first find our heroes, Gus March-Phillips (Henry Cavill) and Anders Lassen (Alan Ritchson), posing as Swedish fishermen as they’re being raided by the most punchable Nazi officer the movie has to offer. But the sight of over a dozen Nazi foot soldiers pointing guns at them doesn’t inspire fear in our burly warriors; rather, it whets their appetite for German blood. Also along for the ride is their demolition expert (Henry Golding), pilot (Hero Fiennes Tiffin), and strategist (Alex Pettyfer). Their mission, apart from general Nazi ass-kicking, is to locate and destroy the ships that supply Germany’s U-boats, which sink anything that dares to cross the Atlantic Ocean. The ships are located off the coast of West Africa at Fernando Po, where two undercover agents (Eiza González and Babs Olusanmokun) have already been stationed to set the trap in motion. Between the yellow-colored subtitles, the Ennio Morricone-esque score by Christopher Benstead, the casting of Til Schweiger as a Nazi, and general vibes, there’s no sense in arguing the heavy influence of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds . This imitation even has its own Mike Meyers in the form of Cary Elwes as Brigadier Gubbins 'M', who has Ian Fleming (yes, that Ian Fleming) as his right-hand man. While Tarantino’s suicide mission perpetually hung in the balance, Ritchie’s feels like watching the ‘95 Chicago Bulls going up against your local junior college. Our heroes’ indestructibility and inability to be deterred are sometimes features, allowing for maximum carnage and the clichés that come with missions going wrong. But there’s also a lack of tension, leaving little to the imagination. Not every joke lands (or was even that good in the first place), and almost all of the characters are pretty one-note. Cavill and Ritchson let their frames do most of the talking, and it’s certainly a sight to behold. Fans of Cavill’s M:I - Fallout arm reload, and Prime Video’s Reacher are certainly getting more than what they asked for here. I won’t complain if we just keep getting more of these good-but-not-great actioners from Ritchie for the next half-decade or so. Lionsgate will release The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare in theaters nationwide on April 19th. 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

Ballerina June 4, 2025 By: Button Hunter Friesen A franchise needs to reach a healthy stage of maturity before it can begin to produce spin-offs from the main feed. It took Star Wars seven episodes before it sidestepped with Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and Solo: A Star Wars Story . It took until the ninth installment of the Fast & Furious series to get the buddy adventures of Dwayne Johnson's Luke Hobbs and Jason Statham's Deckard Shaw in Hobbs & Shaw . Besting both behemoth franchises is the John Wick series, which has produced its first spin-off (we're not going to count the short-lived Peacock series, The Continental ), Ballerina , after only four mainline entries. Franchise creator Derek Kolstad, director Chad Stahelski, and star Keanu Reeves are nowhere to be found here except during the end credits as part of the long list of producers. It's a testament to the world they've created that their physical absence doesn't fully knock over this tower of cards. It is perpetually teetering, as the trio has set such a high bar over the past decade that no newcomer could and should be expected to flawlessly meet or exceed it. Director Len Wiseman, finally given permission to grace the silver screen after a decade-long banishment to low-tier television following the calamity that was 2012's Total Recall reboot, does just that, giving us more of the same through slightly inferior methods. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FSwsrFpkbw The production qualities are all still top-tier, with the sets and atmosphere beckoning us to dig deeper into its history and importance. But while we, the audience, see it all as decorative eye candy, the characters experience it as just lipstick on a pig being sent to the slaughterhouse. Violent actions breed violent consequences, which is what John Wick has had to reckon with since those goons decided to kill his puppy back in the first film. Eve Macarro (Ana de Armas) had that choice forced upon her at a young age when her father was murdered by The Chancellor (Gabriel Byrne) right in front of her. The Ruska Roma organization took her in and gave her the skills to transform from a victim to a victor. Vengeance lingered in her mind for all those years, acting as the fuel for her rageful fire. Through the inanimate nature of a bullet and the two sides of a coin, the analogy of choice is presented to Eve while she's working through her origin story. Revenge won't bring her father back, and will very likely lead her down a darker path of self-destruction. Returning from the previous two John Wick entries, writer Shay Hatten tries to use this conflict to instill tension over where Eve will fall on the spectrum of good & evil. The nuance becomes almost entirely lost when an abducted child becomes involved, and Eve must protect her from The Chancellor. No studio would allow its tentpole blockbuster to contain a scene of the hero being apathetic toward the mistreatment of a kid, so we know Eve will do the right thing and keep her safe. I’m not a sadistic freak, but just once I’d like a film to fully subvert this tiring trope. Apart from that stumble, the other concepts relating to the action are decent. Eve is physically weaker than her opponents, which means she has to be more resourceful when it comes to establishing an advantage. The combination of hand grenades thrown like snowballs and a military-grade flamethrower makes for some exciting set pieces. There's also the usual hand-to-hand and gun play, which de Armas handles well. Her acting may not be up to par, a common problem for any actor who tries to tackle the stilted dialogue they're given in this franchise. But she has the raw physicality and star presence to carry the lengthy fight sequences. Going back on what I said earlier, Reeves does appear as Wick in a cameo that likely acts as a teaser for a team-up movie down the line. I wouldn’t mind seeing de Armas and Reeves work together again in this series, as long as Stahelski is back at the helm. Each of the successive entries in the John Wick series has successfully improved upon the previous one, both in terms of scope and scale. Ballerina is the first to take a step back, a minor one nonetheless. But there are still certain aspects that are promising, so I’ll treat this like one of the lesser entries in the MCU that are meant to be connective tissue for the large-scale Avengers films. Lionsgate will release Ballerina in theaters nationwide on June 6th. 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

Megalopolis May 30, 2024 By: Button Hunter Friesen Megalopolis is the most fascinating film I’ve ever watched, a glorious triumph of the creative spirit and a catastrophic failure in the execution of it. It’s a Jenga tower forty years in the making, each block brimming with an idea that’s been born, reshaped, killed, and reborn several times over to the tune of $120 million of its creator’s personal fortune. Make no mistake, there is not a minute where this tower isn’t dangerously teetering or in complete free fall. But how glorious it is to watch it all crash to the ground! That same verve for the fate of the film itself can be applied to writer/director/producer Francis Ford Coppola’s take on the Roman Empire, which has found a new life in an America lost in time and space. This retro-future New York is decorated head to toe in Roman regalia, with Madison Square Garden transformed into a coliseum and everyone flashing their favorite togas and olive branch crowns. But the skyline (a hideous amalgamation of matte paintings and the digital backdrop technology pioneered by The Mandalorian ) is still littered with the skyscrapers of the past, and Cadillac Escalades remain the vehicle of choice. How and why the world got to this point is not fully explained, nor is it even that important. What is important is what it all represents… which is also often a mystery. For Cesar Catalina (Adam Driver), this version of New York is all wrong. His mantra is shaped by the words of Kylo Ren from The Last Jedi : “You’re still holding on! Let go!” His dream project is the titular city of Megalopolis, a utopian urban space to be built upon the crumbling infrastructure of the old world. His designs are fueled through Megalon, a new element he has created that functions similarly to Wakanda’s Vibranium. It’s stronger than any metal, heals wounds, and plugs whatever holes the plot deems necessary to fill. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pq6mvHZU0fc Considering Coppola conceived this project in the late ‘70s and actively started developing it in the ‘80s, a tumultuous period that saw him reach his creative apex with Apocalypse Now and financial ruin with One from the Heart , it’s not hard to visualize the director creating Catalina as his stand-in, Megalopolis as American Zoetrope, and New Rome as the studio system at the tail end of the New Hollywood movement. Coppola has always had a disdain for the corporatization of filmmaking, and so does Catalina for how Mayor Frank Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito) perpetually puts a stop to his plans. Cicero decries Catalina’s vision as merely idealistic daydreaming, badmouthing his name in the media, and passing legislation to maintain the old ways of thinking, including plans for a casino that will most certainly funnel all its profits to its already rich benefactors. Caught in the middle of these two warring titans is Cicero’s devoted daughter Julia (Nathalie Emmanuel), who quickly becomes a star-crossed lover of Catalina. To give Coppola the highest amount of credit, his ideas of a new way of thinking are not limited solely to the pages of his script. Megalopolis is not a movie that can be defined by normal filmmaking grammar, which allows it to maintain a rambunctious energy that is just as infectious as it is sickening. Frames crash into one another in triptych fashion, the camera feverishly swirls around as it captures the debauchery, and the music can never decide if it's backing up an opera or a circus. To break the mold of reality and fiction even further, Coppola integrates a live element into the film as a man walks toward the screen and interacts with Catalina in real time, asking him questions and receiving answers. The merit of that moment and its viability once the film reaches a wide release remain a mystery, but its sheer existence is what pushes the giddy “what the fuck am I watching?” energy of the whole thing to an entirely new level. But even if the studios are meant to be the ultimate bad guys in this fable, Coppola’s mishandling of his production inadvertently makes a case for their existence. We may decry their reckless spending and inability to take risks, but there’s no denying that any studio could have spent $120 million more efficiently than it has here. The sets and costumes look hideously gawdy, with the actors populating them speaking in unintelligible Shakespearean dialects. The cinematography is reminiscent of a perfume ad, the backdrops always in a magic hour mode and overstuffed with more visual effects than George Lucas’ Star Wars prequels. That badness does become part of the charm at a certain point, an almost inadvertent way for the director of The Godfather trilogy to tear down your preconceptions of what a master filmmaker concocts once the guardrails have been fully removed. Almost all of the actors are just as off the chain as Coppola, with Aubrey Plaza and Shia LaBeouf matching the chaos to perfection. She plays Wow Platinum, a TV personality who enacts a gold-digging strategy to marry Catalina’s decrepit banker uncle Hamilton Crassus III (Jon Voight), and he plays Crassus’s degenerate cross-dressing grandson who tries to steal the empire through Trumpian tactics. Everyone else, most notably Dustin Hoffman and Talia Shire, can barely figure out where they are and what they’re doing, leaving the whole ensemble feeling like a mishmash of high school theater kids yearning for an adult to tell them what to do. Going into Megalopolis determined to make heads or tails of whether it was worth all the time, energy, and resources isn’t the correct attitude. Just as Coppola’s past risk-taking endeavors have furthered the evolution of cinema long after their initial birth, so might this maddening behemoth in the decades that follow. Do I want its influence to reach beyond this moment and shape the future? I don’t know, but I’m absolutely ecstatic that the question has been raised in such a memorable way. This review was originally published from the world premiere at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. Lionsgate will release Megalopolis in theaters nationwide on September 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

Undertone March 11, 2026 By: Button Hunter Friesen Throughout my ever-growing experience with the Dolby Atmos theatrical enhancements, I’ve become less and less enamored with the hype. At the tail end of the barrage of trailers, usually the moment I finally let out a sigh of relief, because I actually get to watch what I paid for, there’s another ad by Dolby touting itself as “the most immersive sound experience.” That might be true in their ideal testing environment, where every setting has been properly calibrated, and every pair of ears is finely tuned. But in the modern multiplex, where quality control is increasingly falling down a slippery slope, I’ve come to think of Atmos as an excuse for the theater to crank the sound up to 200%, claiming that louder is better. We all know that isn’t true, as that would mean Michael Bay would be perpetually atop the Sight and Sound polls. In the case of Undertone , neither louder nor quieter is better. The moments of loud noise split my ears, eliciting irritation rather than intimidation. And the (many) moments of silence nearly put me to sleep, a symptom of a been-there-done-that story infused with every modern elevated horror trope in the book. Somewhere between those large gulfs are a few tiny oases of craft and intrigue, just enough to make you have hope that this very flawed film would miraculously morph into something that was at least decently commendable. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6uDeBYDHu4 Undertone is all about the sounds that surround us, as well as the silence, which we should probably be more afraid of. We get that in the opening cue: the raspy breathing of a dying woman, all signs of a recovery fully absent. She is the mother of Evy (Nina Kiri, potentially a long-lost relative of Jenna Ortega), who has been living in her mother’s home to provide around-the-clock care in her final days. The mother was very religious, always saying prayers for the agnostic Evy. Based on those few sentences, I’m pretty sure you can predict all the spooky things that are going to happen next. Evy’s only connection to the mortal world is the paranormal podcast she hosts with her friend Justin, voiced by Adam DiMarco. She’s the skeptic, and he’s the believer. They receive a cryptic email of ten audio recordings, each progressively tracking the strangely creepy circumstances of a couple who begin hearing loud noises in their apartment. The explainable slowly turns into the unexplainable, with Evy’s circumstances at home seemingly being morphed by what’s happening in the recordings. First-time feature writer/director Ian Tuason shows more promise as a director rather than a writer. His script is scattered with the dime-a-dozen elements of grief, childhood traumas, motherhood, and religious guilt. What’s even scarier is the fact that a doctor makes a routine health call at 3:00 AM, and that Evy and Justin record their seemingly popular podcast in ten-minute chunks and fill it with some of the most inauthentic banter I’ve ever heard. DiMarco’s voice work is entirely too trained; every sigh, inflection, and pause is the result of overcalibration. Tuason’s camera is static throughout most of the film. Evy is usually on the side of the frame, the negative space being enveloped by a black void that could house any of our deepest fears. The editing is fairly routine, with close-ups and wide shots interplaced at the exact moments we’re expecting. The flourishes near the end may feel like they come from a film student thinking that they’ve somehow revolutionized the art, but they at least provide some semblance of a pulse. By that endpoint, I’d come to realize that I’d sat through eighty-five minutes of nothingness (plus twenty minutes of trailers for some of the most bottom-of-the-barrel new horror releases) for five minutes of something that kind of interested me. That’s not exactly a beneficial trade-off. And yet, it’s one that I feel like I’m being forced to make more and more in these post- Hereditary days, where filmmakers delude themselves into thinking that a grab bag of therapy buzzwords makes their genre picture into high art. A24 will release Undertone in theaters nationwide on March 13th. 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 Sheep Detectives May 6, 2026 By: Button Hunter Friesen In director David Fincher's flashy 1930s-set Hollywood period drama Mank , famed Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studio founder and boss Louis B. Mayer proudly declares that, despite all of its stars in its lineup, the studio only had one true star: Leo the Lion. For over a century, the lion has been the studio's mascot, his signature look and roar being the first sight and sound for each film. For Mayer and many cinephiles, Leo was a reassuring stamp of quality upon the brand. Along with the fact that his famed studio is now owned by the corporate overlord that is Amazon, Mr. Mayer might have rolled over in his grave at the sight of the king of the jungle's roar being replaced with a cartoonish sheep's baa for the opening of The Sheep Detectives . His loss is our gain, as that visual and audio dichotomy elicited smiles and chuckles throughout the audience, a mood that was pleasantly maintained for the entire runtime. Despite popular belief perpetuating the stereotype that they are dumb, sheep are actually just as mentally and emotionally intelligent as most farm animals. They can solve simple puzzles, pick up on emotions, and remember a person's face. One thing they haven't been proven to be capable of doing is solving murder cases, which is exactly what George Hardy's (Hugh Jackman) flock must do when their beloved shepherd suspiciously meets his demise. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyZI5oM6hWk Who could have committed the crime? Several citizens of this seemingly quaint English village had the means, motive, and opportunity to do the unspeakable deed. The list includes Ham (Conleth Hill), the local butcher who always lambasted George's strict vegetarian diet and refusal to sell his sheep for meat; Caleb (Tosin Cole), a rival shepherd; innkeeper Beth Pennock (Hong Chau), George's jealous secret admirer; and Reverend Hillcoate (Kobna Holdbrook-Smith), whom George viewed as a bad shepherd to the village's flock of religious congregators. Also mysteriously introduced are Elliot Matthews (Nicholas Galitzine), a junior reporter who happens to stumble upon this story, and Rebecca Hampstead (Molly Gordon), George's estranged daughter, who finally reconnected with him on the day of his death. Unfortunately, the town's sole police officer (Nicholas Braun) is a bumbling fool, which means the responsibility of catching the killer and restoring justice falls upon the hooves of the sheep. It's a task they coincidentally have been trained for their whole lives, as George's nightly ritual was to read his flock a bedtime story from the endless line of murder mystery novels. Unbeknownst to him (and everyone), they understood every word and developed the skills to solve the case. Taking some inspiration from modern whodunnits like the Knives Out films, and the English whimsy of Paddington , screenwriter Craig Mazin (returning to feature comedies after spearheading prestige HBO dramas like Chernobyl and The Last of Us ) spins a yarn that is both simple enough to keep straight, yet complex enough so that it doesn't immediately reveal itself. Rated PG, this is entertainment for the whole family that respects the intelligence of each member. Kids will be entertained by the talking animals and slapstick humor, while parents will be surprised by how invested they are in the plot and emotions. For as much as things are often (and successfully) played for laughs, there are more than a few moments tinged with melancholy and fear. George’s untimely death is met with sadness, and a scene where the sheep discover dark secrets about Caleb’s pasture is particularly scary, with the reality about the purpose of a farm animal’s life starkly observed. The combination of all these emotions makes each one feel earned, rather than just a pile of desserts. Although humans can’t understand them, the sheep all talk to each other, meaning there are plenty of opportunities for celebrity voice roles. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Chris O’Dowd, and Bryan Cranston voice the main trio quite well, the latter being particularly strong as the black sheep of the flock. There’s also Patrick Stewart, Regina Hall, Rhys Darby, and Brett Goldstein. Their voices are aided by the top-notch special effects that provide a healthy mixture of realism and expression. In the realm of talking animal movies, I’d seriously consider putting The Sheep Detectives at least near the top alongside Babe . It’s not every day that you can find a film that can be funny without being juvenile, heartwarming without being cloying, and intelligent without being overly complicated. It’s a perfect day at the farm, luckily without the usual smells. Amazon MGM Studios will release The Sheep Detectives in theaters nationwide on May 08th. 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

Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania February 16, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen So, whose idea was it to make Ant-Man less fun? This is a franchise that was initially going to begin with Edgar Wright in the director’s chair (who still got credit for the screenplay, along with Adam McKay and star Paul Rudd) and had its sights set on delivering size-shifting hijinks within a low-stakes environment. This strategy worked pretty well thanks to the positioning of the first and second entries immediately after the cataclysmic events in Avengers: Age of Ultron and Avengers: Infinity War , respectively. Now with Quantumania , those humorously tinged roots have been upended and mangled into one of the most overly serious and ugliest films within the entire 31-film catalog of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Turn on your listening ears, kids, because it’s time to learn about the Quantum Realm and the multiverse for the umpteenth time. After being a small man within a large world, Scott Lang becomes a big man in a super small world as he and his Ant-Man family are transported down into the Quantum Realm. Inside this realm is a collection of creatures, some that look exactly human (so that they can be played by famous actors, such as Bill Murray in a brief, so-so cameo) and some that possess physical form beyond simple anatomy. At the top of the food chain is Kang the Conqueror, who has a complicated past with Janet Van Dyne during her long years of being stranded. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlNFpri-Y40 Filled with such classic lines as “There’s something I need to tell you,” “You haven’t told them?” “What else have you been lying about?” and “I was trying to protect you,” the script by Rick and Morty alum Jeff Loveness capitalizes on every opportunity it can to deliver the most cliché lines about characters not being able to communicate properly. It’s a frustratingly weak way to build suspense for the exposition-dumped reveals and contradicts the genius-level intellect many of these characters are supposed to have. Much of the humor is absent since the first two outings. This is in “service” to raise the stakes of this lightweight hero and have him introduce us to the new Thanos-level threat in Kang. Jonathan Majors, already having a stellar 2023 with physically imposing roles in the Sundance title Magazine Dreams and Creed III , plays the conqueror with a menacing calmness. The character himself may not have won me over yet, but Majors in the role has intrigued me about the future. Fairing much worse than the writing is the cinematography by the usually dependable Bill Pope, last seen producing decent work in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (remember when that was also supposed to be a part of this universe?). With backdrops that make George Lucas’ Star Wars prequel trilogy look photorealistic and drabby brown shadings, Quantumania easily takes the cake as one of the worst-looking blockbuster films of the past few years. Actors are obviously running within fully green-screened sets, and the fully digital creatures are weightless. And don’t even get me started on one actor’s horrendously superimposed face (you’ll definitely know what I’m talking about when you see it), which incited the most laughs from the audience, although that might not have been intended. Rudd does the good work that is expected from him, and Evangeline Lilly gets next to nothing to do despite her character being in the title. Kathryn Newton is a welcome addition to the slowly-building Young Avengers. The Ant-Man franchise has mostly been unnecessary, but provided fun escapism. Quantumania is the inverse of that by being both required reading material and not fun, which essentially makes it homework. This has been the antithesis of Marvel during Phases 4 and 5, where the effort needed to keep up is not being properly compensated, both on the small-scale levels of individual films and the large-scale shared narrative. I’ve been on this train since day one, and have a completionist mindset (at least when it comes to the movies), so I’m kind of stuck in my seat. Although now I’m really starting to have serious doubts about all the picturesque promises the conductors have been making about the destination. Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures will release Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania in theaters nationwide on Feb. 17th. 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

Fingernails October 31, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen How far would you go to prove your love to someone? Would you move across the country? Would you undergo a career change? Would you rip off your fingernail to undergo a love test? If you answered yes to any of these questions, most importantly the final one, then you would be right at home in Christos Nikou’s Fingernails . In the Greek writer/director’s vision of the near future, there is such a device that can scientifically prove whether two people are in love. All it takes is for each person to rip off one of their fingernails and place it into the machine. Within a few minutes, you’re provided with an undeniable answer. What you and your partner do after that is entirely up to you. Most people who fail the test break up, causing divorce rates to momentarily skyrocket before reaching record lows. Anyone who passes the test is left with a sense of security, although that sense of risk that keeps a relationship from flatlining has now been eliminated. Unemployed teacher Anna (Jessie Buckley) is in the latter camp. She and her longtime boyfriend Ryan (Jeremy Allen White) passed the test a few years ago. He’s content with the coasting they’ve been doing since then, but she’s beginning to have doubts. What’s the point of being proven compatible if nothing else is going to come from it? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mY-by4qPQpE That kind of questioning is one of the many ways you can poke holes in Nikou’s concept of modern love. A couple’s love for each other is never constant, so should we be putting value in a machine that can only judge based on a fixed moment in time? What about open relationships? Same-sex relationships? It’s best not to ask too many questions, as Nikou and co-writers Sam Steiner and Stavros Raptis (the latter also co-writing Nikou’s 2020 feature debut Apples ) have little interest in answering them. Taking all of this at face value would be an acceptable proposition except for the fact that there isn’t much to discover on the surface. Nikou served as the assistant director to Yorgos Lanthimos on Dogtooth, and the influences are quite obvious. This transition to the English language takes an almost identical comically dry approach to The Lobster , sans the deadpan dialogue and threat of being turned into an animal if you don’t fall in love. What’s meant to replace that lack of originality is an edge, which is sorely lacking here. Many of Nikou’s ideas are left half-baked, with a lot of time and space budgeted for rote revelations we see from a mile away. What Nikou has shown a knack for is his ability to create a world that’s both detached and identical to our own. The all-knowing machine is a glorified microwave, put together and painted as if it were a prop for a high school stage play. A drab autumnal color palette envelopes everything, a visual metaphor for how love has lost its luster. One could question why Jeremy Allen White - a hot commodity after the success of The Bear - would sign onto the role of Ryan, a perennial wet blanket who makes it all too easy for us to root for Anna and her coworker Amir (Riz Ahmed) to get together. Buckley and Ahmed are charming, exchanging glances as their feelings for each other slowly develop. There’s also the likable presence of Luke Wilson as the inventor of the machine and Anna Murphy as Amir’s girlfriend. Fingernails is a pole vaulter who has an incredible walk-up, but somehow always seems to hit the bar. Nikou is finding his craft as an auteur, with this film proving that he can semi-successfully adapt his vision to a larger canvas. Here’s hoping the third time is the charm. This review was originally published from the international premiere at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival. Apple Original Films will release Fingernails in select theaters on October 27th, followed by its streaming premiere on November 03rd 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

Creed III February 24, 2023 By: Button Hunter Friesen With Creed III, the reins (or should I say gloves?) of the Rocky franchise have been fully passed down from Sylvester Stallone's The Italian Stallion to Michael B. Jordan's Adonis Creed. And in typical Rocky fashion, Jordan plants himself further into this universe by stepping into the director's chair, taking over after Ryan Coogler successfully revived this tired franchise in 2015 and Steven Caple Jr. adeptly continued that ascending trajectory in 2018. Fortunately for Jordan, he displays a higher quality of skill both in front and behind the camera than Stallone did with his sequels, which have the added benefit of decades' worth of nostalgia to make it palatable. For the first time in this now nine-film franchise, the character of Rocky Balboa is totally absent from the story, with no mention of how he's doing in Vancouver with his estranged son and grandson. Adonis now sits somewhere in between his shoes from the first two films and those of Rocky's, as he decides to hang up the gloves after a successful career. But while he deals with his new post-retirement future, a figure from the past shows up unannounced. It's Damian Anderson, Adonis's older brother figure, from when he was moving between group homes and running from the law. An incident from their youth caused Damian to spend the next eighteen years in prison, stripping him of his "rightful" opportunity to become the best boxer in the world after making a name for himself on the amateur circuit. Adonis tries to make up for lost time by extending an olive branch to Damian in the form of taking him under his wing and preparing him for a title shot. Quickly, things get out of control as Damian's pent-up rage and resentment take over, threatening to destroy Adonis' legacy as a boxer and the future he hopes to build as a leader. So, in the spirit of brotherly love, Adonis must protect what's his through the only means he knows how to: with his fists. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHmCH7iB_IM It may come as a shock to you, especially after that plot description, to know that Creed III spends just as much time debating the morals of fighting vs using your words as it does delivering those bone-crunching blows to the head. But while Keenan Coogler and Zach Baylin's script may take its time talking about why fighting doesn't solve everything, the overall narrative and kinetic work delivered by Jordan as a director say otherwise. A small subplot appears in the form of Amara dealing with bullies at school, an on-the-nose metaphor for Adonis and his situation, one that is quickly abandoned as soon as it could really mark a shift in the philosophy of this franchise. Maybe it was foolish of me to think that things could change even a little at this stage, because we know that all the talk of not wanting to fight means nothing once the going gets tough. The going doesn't really need to get tough here either for Adonis to lay down the challenge, just a few inconveniences and shots at his ego, which is subtly examined by Damian as he mentions the privilege the Creed surname has afforded Adonis. Jordan has repeatedly mentioned the inspiration that the anime genre had on the filming of the boxing scenes, a statement that he capably backed up with the final product. Gone is Coogler's fluid camerawork and long takes (except for one modest sequence early on), replaced with a not-egregious-but-still-considerable amount of Zack Snyder slow motion. It's used sparingly, mainly to focus on the split-second decisions made in the ring that can win or lose a fight. The sound of blows landing does rumble throughout the theater, with the final moments having the same raw power as a fighting game character unleashing their combo meter. Majors fills out the role of the final boss with immense theatricality, displaying the unbelievable threat he is with his cagey movements and fighting style. Jordan is the more composed one of the pair, preaching how boxing is more about control and strategy than it is about violence. And the always-great Tessa Thompson is regretfully sidelined to merely being a support figure to Adonis rather than the richer character she was in the original. Creed III may be the weakest of its trilogy, but the fact that the seventh, eighth, and ninth entries are all the best of a franchise is an accomplishment by itself, even more so when you factor in the inherent limitations of the boxing genre. Jordan and Coogler (and Stallone to an extent) have found a way for this cycle of storytelling to remain relevant, even if it sometimes punches below its weight class. Amazon MGM Studios will release Creed III in theaters nationwide on March 03rd. 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

La Gradiva September 14, 2026 By: Button Hunter Friesen La Gradiva is the type of film that could not be made anywhere, or at any time, within the United States. Before a single frame appears, over a dozen logos appear, each one either a well-known European production studio (Canal+, MK2) or a national/regional film fund. The latter is a totally foreign concept in America, a longstanding symptom of our country's view that art should be created out of a desire for profit, and not solely for the enrichment of the people. As we all know, there’s plenty of money within our government that never seems to find its way to the right place. Should just a fraction of it be diverted to providing young talents with no-strings-attached funding, we would likely have another movement on our hands comparable to what New Hollywood brought in the 70s. Pivoting away from the behind-the-scenes logistics of filmmaking and more towards the film itself, the actual main reason La Gradiva could never be made within the United States is that there are no mainland volcanoes with as much history, beauty, and terror as Mount Vesuvius. To look up at something and realize that it was responsible for wiping out entire ancient cities, and could do it again, is a reminder of our minuscule existence across the vastness of time and space. It’s an especially hard lesson for teenagers who are just becoming full of themselves, high on life, and with a carefree attitude that has so far shielded them from life’s eventual hardships. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yY6V9MbEoE On the cusp of experiencing that sobering life lesson is a group of French students on a class trip. They are among the four million tourists who visit Pompeii each year, standing in awe of history and the perseverance of the generations of locals who remain at the feet of the most dangerous natural elements in the world. As expected, teenagers can’t grapple with their own mortality as easily. That’s especially true for Toni (Colas Quignard), an aimless kid who puts on a front of being too cool for school. He’s really good friends with James (Mitia Capellier-Audat), who seems to be a natural student despite never showing any enthusiasm for the material. On the opposite end of the spectrum from Toni is Suzanne (Suzanne Gerin), introverted and bookish. Leading the group is Madame Mercier (Antonia Buresi), a single teacher who clearly has a passion for her job. Try as she might, it’s nearly impossible to reach students like Toni and James, who are merely listening for an opportunity to make a crude joke. Luckily, their loss is our gain, as writer/director Marine Atlan gives plenty of space for Mercier’s teachings, a gentle reminder of how the nurturing care of someone else often shapes our education. Mercier guides the students through the lessons of Vesuvius, as well as the artwork from the period of its eruption. By understanding the past, we better shape our future. Making her feature directorial debut with the utmost confidence after years as a cinematographer, Atlan shapes La Gradiva with a pristine sense of beauty and majesty. A slideshow of unknown old photographs is presented at the start of the film, capturing a bygone era and generation of people. The rest of the film emulates that style, the grain and framing reaching for something that’s no longer here. Even in its nearly 150-minute runtime and multitude of differing personalities, there’s a clarity to what’s going on inside everyone’s heads and hearts. This is the work of a rising talent behind the camera, and of all unknown actors who inhabit their roles. It’s not like that fact sneaks up on you, as the film constantly shows its cards for all to see. But this will be a film that lingers and grows for a lot of people, and might take a few more years to be as widely recognized as it deserves. Until then, it’s a little beauty in a pond of boisterous, loud fish. La Gradiva had its North American premiere at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. 1-2 Special will release the film in select theaters on December 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