MST3K, RiffTrax, and Beyond: Cinema Playground Journal 2025: Week 44 (My Cinema Playground)

Multiplex Madness

Anniversary

⭐️⭐️

Genre: Drama, Thriller

Director: Jan Komasa

Starring: Diane Lane, Kyle Chandler, Madeline Brewer, Zoey Deutch, Phoebe Dynevor, Mckenna Grace, Daryl McCormack, Dylan O'Brien

I'd hate to get political up in here but the movie made me do it. Let's blame Diane Lane for this. Lane plays a college professor who finds her son, Dylan O'Brien, is dating a woman she used to teach, Phoebe Dynevor, who has a radical political ideology that Lane found to be frighteningly anti-democracy, hypothesizing that the current political party system can't be saved and the country needs to evolve to a different, more singular system (I don't believe the movie ever mentions the words "fascism" or "dictatorship" but this is clearly what's implied). Dynever publishes her theory as a political book called "The Change," which begins a political movement within America. Of course, the premise of this movie is complete bollocks because a book such as this wouldn't change the world. It would end up like all political books, purchased then placed on a shelf to collect dust by people who pretended to read it and/or asked their intern to write up bullet points from it so they can scream about it on social media before forgetting about it completely, while most voters might start it, get bored, and read a Jack Reacher book instead. If I were to hazard a guess, the movie is a commentary on a dozen things within the political landscape, from "Make America Great Again" to the polarized political party system fueled by a media landscape that sells outrage. I think the movie is supposed to be an imagining of what such present attitudes might result in at their most extreme, but, honestly, the movie feels like a half-assed prequel to a garbage young adult dystopian book series. You could probably label this as a Hunger Games prequel and it would have more value than it's current stand-alone status.

If one looks at this movie as simply a satire of how political ideology makes everyone a petty little bitch, the movie could accidentally convince you that it's smart. The problem is that it's doing so through a made-up ideology that's supposed to be both inspiring and threatening at the same time and the movie is so generalized and vague about it that it just comes off as a load of bullshit. The movie is at its most interesting when it's about the uncomfortable tension between two sides of the same dinner table that loathe each other's ideology. Unfortunately, the movie wants to be more than that, shifting into a "new world order" gradually, though seemingly in the blink of an eye given the film's time jump presentation. Weirdly enough, the movie brought to mind a Spanish movie from a few years ago called New Order (I did not think I was going to reference this movie anytime soon), which chronicled an overthrowing of the government from the perspective of a wealthy family who found their power meant nothing almost instantly. That movie has its ups and downs but it plays its status quo change better than Anniversary, which wants to do the same thing but also wants its characters to be relevant to the events that are happening outside the house they are stuck in. It's a bit messy to show off world changing players in an environment that is this boxed in. In both commentary and vibes, Anniversary is more like The Purge, but with passive aggressiveness instead of murder. I miss the murder. I kind of wish this movie pulled it off, because clearly thought was put into it and the cast is giving it their A-game. The movie is at least smarter about its provocative presentation than After the Hunt was a few weeks ago, but like After the Hunt, it's not the hot button discussion piece it thinks it is.

Bugonia

⭐️⭐️⭐️

Genre: Comedy, Drama, Thriller, Science Fiction

Director: Yorgos Lanthimos

Starring: Emma Stone, Jessie Plemons, Aiden Delbis, Stavros Halkias, Alicia Silverstone

Conspiracy theorist Jessie Plemons kidnaps wealthy CEO Emma Stone under the assumption that she is an alien who is set to destroy the world in three days time. Obviously that's just crazy. Except this is a Yorgos Lanthimos movie, and letting Stone actually be an alien can't be ruled out. In fact, it's pretty much the most Lanthimos thing this movie could do, so she can't be an alien because that's too obviously the actual ending. Unless that's what he wants me to think. This is the problem with transcending expectations. If you do it all the time, your attempts at transcending become transparent. Lanthimos might have just achieved this point in his career. Lanthimos's movies work better for me when his subject matter is bizarre enough to carry his idiosyncracies. I loved Poor Things for this reason, while The Favorite drowned for me because a Lanthimos costume drama just came off as a bunch of people in dress-up acting like dipshits. Bugonia lies closer on the Poor Things side of the spectrum, as the subject of extraterrestrial conspiracy is inherently odd and kinda funny. Lanthimos is also odd and kinda funny, so it works out. The downside of Bugonia is that it's almost disappointingly straightforward for a Lanthimos movie. This is the rare case where I almost wish he went weirder. The film mostly his mocking of Plemons' bubbled existence, and many of the jokes are obvious conspiracy nut jokes. But the film almost exists in the same headspace as Ari Aster's Eddington where it wants to have its cake and eat it too by mocking such people then throwing us into an absurdist look of what might be if they were actually correct. Bugonia succeeds at that idea better than Eddington, but it still can't escape the fact that it feels like it's eating its own tail. It's amusing enough, and it's playful enough with the "rabbit hole" mockery that it shows time transition with a visual of a "Flat Earth." That's worth the price of admission, by itself.

Stitch Head

⭐️⭐️1/2

Genre: Comedy, Horror

Director: Steve Hudson

Starring: Asa Butterfield, Joel Fry, Tia Bannon, Rob Brydon, Alison Steadman, Fern Brady, Jamali Maddix

This animated comedy starts at the castle of a local mad scientist, who creates monstrous creations daily and casts them aside so he can create more. His first creation is named Stitch Head, who becomes the doctor's neglected assistant in his experiments. Stitch Head becomes disillusioned in his role and runs off to join the circus, where he befriends a local girl. Stitch Head has modest ambitions of being a family friendly Halloween option to take the kids to when they're done Trick 'r Treating, though it probably doesn't have the personality to really hit it off. One of the things Tim Burton's production team did right with films like Nightmare Before Christmas, Corpse Bride, and Frankenweenie is that they're productions that embrace the macabre. Stitch Head is one of those movies made by people who clearly love productions like that but fall into the temptation of making everything cute as not to give children nightmares. It's the idea that the macabre can be cute that sidesteps the temptation of the macabre. Stitch Head probably wants to be closer to Monsters Inc. than Nightmare Before Christmas, though it's more of a subdued slapstick comedy, leaning it more toward Hotel Transylvania without the energy to back it up. The movie's themes are about phobias and bigotry, as everyone in the movie has preconceived notions that make humans afraid of monsters and monsters afraid of humans. The movie's comedy is mostly making fun of the theatrical, albeit the movie isn't very theatrical itself, which hurts it. Stitch Head is an okay-to-solid Halloween option for kids, but when most theaters have Corpse Bride in re-release, why would you pick this instead?

Violent Ends

⭐️⭐️1/2

Genre: Thriller

Director: John-Michael Powell

Starring: Billy Magnusen, James Badge Dale, Nick Stahl, Alexandra Shipp, Ray McKinnon, Bruce McKinnon, Kate Burton

Is it chilly in here? Because someone's about to get fridged. A man who is trying to leave his family business of drug dealing finds his fiancée murdered in a robbery gone wrong. Because we know how this story goes, it's good ol' fashioned retribution. Violent Ends is a movie that is very content in that it's a jigsaw of tropes in a competent package of predictability. In all fairness to it, it delivers its package with minor effectiveness, but effectiveness nonetheless. Damn near every scene in this movie feels like deja vu, as if it were lifted straight from another movie and stitched into this one. I had to remind myself that I hadn't already seen this movie because it was in the new releases. This is the kind of mundane storytelling that Chris Stuckmann stumbled with last week with Shelby Oaks, where they're mostly mimicking the type of films they love but don't write it with enough characterization or personality to form an actual identity (there are no characters in this movie, just a group of Southern accents). Violent Ends wears it better than Shelby Oaks does because it actually has content in it. It's not unique content but it'll please it's audience, not because it's good but because it's good enough. Those who watch revenge thrillers religiously will watch it and think it's was worth the money. It's unlikely they'll remember the title by the next day, though.

Movies Still Playing At My Theater

Back to the Future ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Black Phone 2 ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Good Fortune ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

Last Days ⭐️

Pets on a Train ⭐️⭐️

Regretting You ⭐️⭐️1/2

Roofman ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Shelby Oaks ⭐️1/2

Sinners ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere ⭐️⭐️1/2

The Strangers: Chapter 2 ⭐️