Multiplex Madness
The Accountant²
⭐️⭐️⭐️
Genre: Action, Thriller
Director: Gavin O'Connor
Starring: Ben Affleck, Jon Bernthal, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Daniella Pineda, J.K. Simmons
The Accountant is back. Whether we wanted him back is not something I don't know for certain, since the first movie is nine years old and more of a passive time-waster than something fondly remembered. But sure enough, Ben Affleck is reprising his role as the accountant/asskicker whose autism is a superpower and he finds himself trying to solve the last case of former F.B.I. associate J.K. Simmons while also bonding with his estranged brother, Jon Bernthal. I'm not sure what I expected from an Accountant sequel, but the film's u-turn in tone was something of a pleasant surprise. It's a more entertaining film than the first one, as Affleck is allowed to play off of other characters for longer periods. Jon Bernthal is a fun foil for him to interplay with, as his no-bullshit persona contrasts Affleck's unique personality in humorous ways. The movie isn't fully a comedy, though the attempted levity does provide relief from being as dour as the first film could get. Some of its plot points are goofy, which limits its appeal outside of the demographic who sees most movies like this anyway, but it's an entertaining sit-down for those who do.
The Legend of Ochi
If A24 is going to do a family movie, then it's going to do it the A24 way. In other words, get ready for a children's movie that no adult in their right mind would take their kids to see. The Legend of Ochi is a bizarre and quirky homage to that 80's subgenre of E.T. knockoffs, seeing a young girl rescue a young wild creature that is supposedly dangerous, known as an Ochi, which she strikes a friendship with and quests to return it home. The movie is well-made and ambitiously unconventional in its presentation of a conventional story. Sadly, the conventional and the unconventional don't offset each other, and the movie never rises beyond just being an idiosyncratic version of Mac and Me. The movie is just not very fun to watch, in spite of having the vibes of a movie that is only made for the director's own amusement. I also wonder just how many 80's throwbacks they're going to shove Finn Wolfhard into. Stranger Things, It, Ghostbusters, Hell of a Summer, and now this. Is this what we've decided he's destined to do? Congratulations for getting Willem Dafoe in that medieval armor, though.
On Swift Horses
Love triangles galore in this so-so to acceptable melodrama based on the 2019 novel of the same name, seeing two queer love stories playing out against the repressive backdrop of the 1950's. The first sees Jocob Elordi begin a risky and frisky relationship with fellow hustler and casino worker Diego Calva. The second sees the fiancée of Elordi's brother, Daisy Edgar-Jones, questioning her sexuality as she starts a lesbian affair with Sasha Calle. On Swift Horses is more about inner turmoil than about romance, showing two people who evolve as they're romantic ideals are challenged, showcasing a freedom that comes with it and also a unique fear within it. The movie hones in on the nuance of Elordi and Edgar-Jones, who are given a tall task in talking with their eyes and not allowing themselves to say their secrets out loud. One wishes it would stay that way because the more on-the-nose conversations are less compelling. This is a tricky movie to make because it wants to say a lot and it's not always allowed to do so, so when it allows itself freedom, it gets messier. The movie is already in a state of mopeyness throughout, so when it cranks it up to eleven, it can be a pain in the ass. It's not bad, and its ambition is well-intentioned. It's just not quite hitting all the right notes.
Until Dawn
When is an adaptation no longer an adaptation? Asking for video game movies. We're a long way from the day when video game stories were "guy in red hat kicks a turtle" and we're seeing films based on games that have full-blown stories and they're still overthinking how to make them. Until Dawn, for example, is less of a game and more of a choose-your-own-adventure story. It's also a bit of a crazy video game to adapt because the idea of the game is that it leans into horror genre tropes and presents themselves as an interactive experience to see how well players/horror fanatics can guide its characters through them, the goal being getting everyone out alive. Doing a straight adaptation of Until Dawn would just result in a generic horror movie, but Until Dawn also has a very specific storyline and I'm not sure how you can call your movie Until Dawn if you're not going to do Until Dawn. The only other thing that's a part of Until Dawn's identity is its interactivity, which is something you can't do in a theater. Similar things have been done before, such as a DVD special presentation of Final Destination 3 or the Netflix Black Mirror special Bandersnatch, but those were home media experimentation pieces. A theatrical movie is one product, one story, and one presentation. So, they decided to slingshot us back to a time where they created an original storyline and slapped a video game title on it for IP marketing reasons.
The Accountant is back. Whether we wanted him back is not something I don't know for certain, since the first movie is nine years old and more of a passive time-waster than something fondly remembered. But sure enough, Ben Affleck is reprising his role as the accountant/asskicker whose autism is a superpower and he finds himself trying to solve the last case of former F.B.I. associate J.K. Simmons while also bonding with his estranged brother, Jon Bernthal. I'm not sure what I expected from an Accountant sequel, but the film's u-turn in tone was something of a pleasant surprise. It's a more entertaining film than the first one, as Affleck is allowed to play off of other characters for longer periods. Jon Bernthal is a fun foil for him to interplay with, as his no-bullshit persona contrasts Affleck's unique personality in humorous ways. The movie isn't fully a comedy, though the attempted levity does provide relief from being as dour as the first film could get. Some of its plot points are goofy, which limits its appeal outside of the demographic who sees most movies like this anyway, but it's an entertaining sit-down for those who do.
The Legend of Ochi
⭐️⭐️
Genre: Fantasy, Adventure
Director: Isaiah Saxon
Starting: Helena Zengel, Willem Dafoe, Emily Watson, Finn Wolfhard
If A24 is going to do a family movie, then it's going to do it the A24 way. In other words, get ready for a children's movie that no adult in their right mind would take their kids to see. The Legend of Ochi is a bizarre and quirky homage to that 80's subgenre of E.T. knockoffs, seeing a young girl rescue a young wild creature that is supposedly dangerous, known as an Ochi, which she strikes a friendship with and quests to return it home. The movie is well-made and ambitiously unconventional in its presentation of a conventional story. Sadly, the conventional and the unconventional don't offset each other, and the movie never rises beyond just being an idiosyncratic version of Mac and Me. The movie is just not very fun to watch, in spite of having the vibes of a movie that is only made for the director's own amusement. I also wonder just how many 80's throwbacks they're going to shove Finn Wolfhard into. Stranger Things, It, Ghostbusters, Hell of a Summer, and now this. Is this what we've decided he's destined to do? Congratulations for getting Willem Dafoe in that medieval armor, though.
On Swift Horses
⭐️⭐️1/2
Genre: Drama, Romance
Director: Daniel Minahan
Starring: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Jacob Elordi, Will Poulter, Diego Calva, Sasha Calle
Love triangles galore in this so-so to acceptable melodrama based on the 2019 novel of the same name, seeing two queer love stories playing out against the repressive backdrop of the 1950's. The first sees Jocob Elordi begin a risky and frisky relationship with fellow hustler and casino worker Diego Calva. The second sees the fiancée of Elordi's brother, Daisy Edgar-Jones, questioning her sexuality as she starts a lesbian affair with Sasha Calle. On Swift Horses is more about inner turmoil than about romance, showing two people who evolve as they're romantic ideals are challenged, showcasing a freedom that comes with it and also a unique fear within it. The movie hones in on the nuance of Elordi and Edgar-Jones, who are given a tall task in talking with their eyes and not allowing themselves to say their secrets out loud. One wishes it would stay that way because the more on-the-nose conversations are less compelling. This is a tricky movie to make because it wants to say a lot and it's not always allowed to do so, so when it allows itself freedom, it gets messier. The movie is already in a state of mopeyness throughout, so when it cranks it up to eleven, it can be a pain in the ass. It's not bad, and its ambition is well-intentioned. It's just not quite hitting all the right notes.
Until Dawn
⭐️1/2
Genre: Horror
Director: David F. Sandberg
Starring: Ella Rubin, Michael Cimino, Odessa A'zion, Ji-young Yoo, Belmont Cameli, Maia Mitchell, Peter Stormare
When is an adaptation no longer an adaptation? Asking for video game movies. We're a long way from the day when video game stories were "guy in red hat kicks a turtle" and we're seeing films based on games that have full-blown stories and they're still overthinking how to make them. Until Dawn, for example, is less of a game and more of a choose-your-own-adventure story. It's also a bit of a crazy video game to adapt because the idea of the game is that it leans into horror genre tropes and presents themselves as an interactive experience to see how well players/horror fanatics can guide its characters through them, the goal being getting everyone out alive. Doing a straight adaptation of Until Dawn would just result in a generic horror movie, but Until Dawn also has a very specific storyline and I'm not sure how you can call your movie Until Dawn if you're not going to do Until Dawn. The only other thing that's a part of Until Dawn's identity is its interactivity, which is something you can't do in a theater. Similar things have been done before, such as a DVD special presentation of Final Destination 3 or the Netflix Black Mirror special Bandersnatch, but those were home media experimentation pieces. A theatrical movie is one product, one story, and one presentation. So, they decided to slingshot us back to a time where they created an original storyline and slapped a video game title on it for IP marketing reasons.
I'd say this bothers me but I was raised on video game movies like Super Mario Bros., Double Dragon, Street Fighter, and Resident Evil. The most faithful video game adaptation from my generation was Mortal Kombat, while almost every other movie took recognizable aesthetics and character designs and tossed everything else. I'd be really cross about an Until Dawn movie that does the same, but I don't have the energy. So, I'm ready to take this movie on its own terms.
For context, the Until Dawn game is a basic "Cabin in the Woods" premise that centers on a group of friends spending the night in a mountain lodge only to have beasties surround the place and terrorize them by doing monster things. This movie also centers on a group of friends, only they're searching for a friend who has been missing for a year. Their search leads them to a lodge in the woods, where they find themselves in the middle of horror scenarios that end in their deaths, repeating the night on an endless loop until they either die for good or finally survive the night. I think the idea behind this movie is based on the fact that Until Dawn is an intensely replayable game that you can go through multipal times in hopes to get a different outcome. The issue is that even when you replay the game, certain core elements of it are exactly the same. You might travel down a different scenario and find a new cutscene, but what's out to get you is a constant and doesn't really evolve and while the player retains knowledge of the previous playthrough, the characters they are controlling do not. The "death loop" would probably be a more apt idea to apply to this if it wasn't constantly shifting to keep the audience on its toes. But then it would just be a Happy Death Day clone, and Happy Death Day wasn't even the first movie to milk that concept. A quick rundown of things in the game that are actually present in the movie: both feature Peter Stormare, the monsters from the game (gamers know what they are) do have a role in the movie, and the film ends implying that the events of the game have happened, will happen, or happen concurrently. If nothing else, the movie at least wants gamers to think this is one big, unhappy universe, even if the time loop bullshit has nothing to do with Until Dawn.
Even ignoring the constant nagging thought of "Why the hell is this the Until Dawn movie?," Until Dawn just sucks. The movie is a gauntlet of horror ideas without living in them long enough to generate suspense, have fun with them, or flesh them out. It's like a tornado of different horror movies sucking the viewer up and spitting them out without really knowing what hit you. I'm sure this movie is convincing itself that it's a loving homage to the spectrum of horror scenarios but all it became was a series of empty ideas that are dragging the audience into a chaotic experience that doesn't reward the patience it takes to sit through it. One gains the idea that it is a movie that is more fun to make than it is to watch, as the group of actors get to do a full series of horror movie death scenes, which is probably the dream role for any horror actor. Unfortunately, few of the death scenes are memorable and the one that does have staying power in your brain, the "drinking the water" bit, is one that is both nonsensical and is shared by everyone. It's surprising that David F. Sandberg made this movie because his previous horror films, Lights Out and Annabelle: Creation, showed that he was an excellent craftsman of tension. Until Dawn isn't nearly as tense as his best work, as the movie's hectic pace and seemingly non-existent stakes prevent him from creating any memorable sequences of slow-building dread. What Sandberg does achieve, quite well, is that the movie does indeed look like the game that inspired it. The cinematography and murky mood does replicate a strong visual kinship, ensuring that there is a proper Until Dawn movie in here somewhere. Unfortunately, this ain't it.
Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
Warfare ⭐️⭐️⭐️
New To Digital
Ash ⭐️⭐️1/2
Hell of a Summer ⭐️⭐️1/2
Locked ⭐️⭐️⭐️
New To Physical
Coming Soon!
