The Materialists: this is a new movie from writer and director Celine Song.   Earlier she had brought forward the really good Past Lives which described a couple who over the years had their relationship change.  She writes about real people, fully formed with flaws and backgrounds.  The relationships are relatable for those in the audience with a few under their belts.   Starring Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans and the ever-present Pablo Pascal.   For me, this was not the typical romantic-comedy.  It was more real than that, exploring deeper and more serious issues.  

The story revolves around Johnson who is a matchmaker in NYC.  She is single, but active in finding her clients a romantic relationship.   She has a pool of people to draw from.   We are introduced to a few of her clients.  We learn that she has a knack for this work, but nothing else that she had tried.  She has life experience and brings it forward to her job and assessment of potential matches.  For many of these she regards the match as a business deal and the “math has to add up”.   She had her own personal long term relationship with Evans that didn’t work out and she believes that she needs to be with someone “rich”.   At a wedding she accidentally meets up with Evans, a struggling wanna-be actor.   At the same wedding, she is approached by Pedro Pascal, the brother of the groom who she regards and explains is a “unicorn”.   Pascal is interested in her, although she tries to explain that the math doesn’t add up for them.   He convinces her otherwise.  Things happen.  Of these things there are some real world challenges which makes Johnson to question what she is doing.   Dating may just be dating but in this day and age it can have some real risks and not just to your heart or self-esteem.  This isn’t the typical rom-com and I wasn’t sure just how dark it decided to go.  Viewers will have to see for themselves.  Matters of the heart are complex, and finding the right partner is not an easy journey.  This movie ably addresses a few of the challenges while still providing some humour which can show how ridiculous it can all be as well.   Worth the viewing.

How To Train Your Dragon(animated):  the “live” version of this has been newly released into the theatres.  I had not seen the original animated cartoon from 2010 and decided to watch over a recent flight this week.  I was pleasantly surprised by this story however formulaic it can appear on the surface.  

In the story, set on a mythical island with Vikings populating it (although strangely the Vikings sound more Scottish than Nordic but never mind) there is a long held problem with dragons of all shapes, sizes and abilities which steal from the Vikings.  The Vikings then are forced to slay the dragons for self preservation.  Those who slay best are valued the most by the people.   Canadian Jay Barushel voices Hiccup who is the son of the fearless leader of the island. He slays dragons easily. Meanwhile, Hiccup not only doesn’t resemble his tribe physically, but he doesn’t have the killer instinct. As a teenager he is coming of age and teased by his fellow teens but also doesn’t have a terrific relationship with Dad. Hiccup is a reader and investigates his environment all the while working as an apprentice to the local blacksmith. Hiccup is good with this. He notices young women his age but knows that they have no time for him. The village gets attacked by dragons and Hiccup decides to try and use a new weapon against the attackers. He thinks he succeeds but is unsure. He needs to investigate. I won’t share further details except to say that the results are not as predicable as you might expect. Yes Hiccup gains the trust of his father and townspeople, but he also helps out a dragon (and thus the name of the movie). I will say that the dragon teaches Hiccup too. The dragon is named Toothless, and has his own journey. This is a “kids’ movie” that works on an adult level. It is a good story and the animation is well done. But more importantly the audience cares about awkward Hiccup and cheers for him and the dragon. In this story there is a great deal of growth all around and in ways that were not obvious. I will likely need to see the updated live version to see how it compares. This was worth my time.

I wish that I could say that I have some Irish content for this day, but I don’t. I have been away and so I am recounting a new movie that I watched on the plane from Europe on Sunday. So instead of Irish content (Northern Ireland and Ireland), of which there is plenty – from excellent movies like The Commitments, Sing Street, Once for music, to others like My Left Foot, In the Name of the Father, Brooklyn, Belfast and Banshees of Inisherin I have a new Clint Eastwood movie.

Juror #2: Released in 2024, this Clint Eastwood produced and directed courtroom drama plays a lot like a retelling of 12 Angry Men from 1957 with Henry Fonda in the principal role. It starts that way and then decides to take a little bit different take and turn on it. The cast is impressive with Nicholas Hoult, Toni Collette and JK Simmons. Hoult plays a recovering alcoholic with a young very pregnant wife. She is worried about the pregnancy as she has lost children before. Hoult has been called for jury duty. He still needs to go through the selection process and understand the case he could be involved with.

The case turns out to be a homicide case, involving a couple who had a domestic dispute in a bar full of people on a dark and stormy night, and she ends up dead at the end of it. The boyfriend with a checkered past is charged with her murder. Collette plays the prosecutor, looking for an election as a District Attorney in an upcoming election. Simmons is on the jury for a time and brings forth some new ideas to the deliberation. On its face, the case seems pretty straightforward but the Hoult character has a dilemma of his own which he doesn’t share with the rest of his fellow jurors. They are no longer angry white men only but since this is set in Georgia they have a cross section of diversity. A good number of them just want to conclude their business and go home. Then the drama unfolds. It is Hoult who has the real dilemma and pressures on his personal beliefs and what is right for his family.

Given the cast this is well acted if not more or less predictable. The defense attorney, played by Chris Messina does a good job of creating doubt. The story shows how the criminal justice system can work, and also how it can stumble from time to time. One glaring error for me with a legal lens on would be that a potential theory on what took place (which was not investigated) could be to examine the vehicle driven by the accused. My second challenge is that the prosecutor herself spends time doing some of the additional legwork in digging up some facts. I don’t think that she would undertake this work but rather seek out further police investigation. After all, this is what the police actually do. The story examines whether justice means truth, or whether a person can change in a meaningful way. Hoult professes that he can. Still one also wonders why the attorney approached by Hoult doesn’t explain legal concepts like double jeopardy. Or potential sentencing for a first-time convicted felon. If justice seeks out the truth, isn’t there also a concept of mercy, accident and lack of motive which could all come into play? All in all this is a movie that I don’t even recall being in the theatres. Most Eastwood films do get that attention. This was okay to fill time on a flight but I was pleased that I didn’t have to pay for it.

A Real Pain:   Released in 2024, this movie is directed and written by Jesse Eisenberg.   It tells the story of two Jewish male adult cousins David and Benji (played by Eisenberg and Culkin) who are making a pilgrimage back to Poland.   Their grandmother had recently passed away, and she was from Poland.   She had survived the holocaust through “a thousand miracles” according to the boys.   She had left a sum of money for the boys to see where she had lived and experience Poland.   It is a memorable trip.  

In Forrest Gump fashion we meet the Culkin character, Benji, sitting on a chair at the airport, watching the people go by.   In contrast there is Eisenberg leaving him an endless succession of voicemails to make sure that they meet up.   The boys couldn’t be more different in personality or how their lives are presently situated.  Jesse has signed them up for a guided tour through Poland with a small group of other tourists led by a young British man as their guide.   

Culkin is getting the acting accolades for his performance.   He plays a guy who outwardly is witty and charming.  Inwardly and once he gets acclimatized, he can become hurtful and dark.  He lives on the edge.   He finds ways to be a rebel.   In contrast, Jesse plays a married online content seller who has a responsible job, a wife, a child and responsibilities.  He is straight laced.   He follows the rules, while wishing he was more like his cousin.   There is a love/hate dynamic for Jesse.   We see this in various scenes.  The culmination of the trip is a subdued visit to a concentration camp.   And it should be subdued. Thousands have been murdered there.   They are desolate, grim reminders of an incomprehensible past and how human beings can treat one another.    

I am not an Eisenberg fan.  Haven’t been since I watched him play in The Social Network.  He is unlikeable and pompous for me with a face that just screams “punch me”.   This movie doesn’t change my opinion about him.   Culkin will forever be tied to his brilliant role in Succession with the smart assed, quick witted and unreliable Roman Roy.  This movie was 1:30 and it kept a quick pace.   The pattern of Culkin doing inappropriate things while Jesse quietly looks on and later apologizing for him becomes repetitive.   I liked the scenes of Poland.   In many ways I wish the film took the Culkin advice to heart given to the tour guide and male there be more interaction with native Poles.   Speak with the people.  Break bread with them and share stories of grandma and who she was.   I think that this could have been more.   I do not see this as a Best Supporting Actor Oscar as others had more significant impact on the main character, like a Guy Pierce in The Brutalist.   The was average.  I am thankful I didn’t pay for this is a theatre.   Fun fact: the divorced woman on the tour with the boys is played by Jennifer Grey of Dirty Dancing fame.

This has been a very busy week, including three straight days of seeing a film in a theatre. Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The common thread among all of them is that they were sequels. Some original movie I have seen, others I haven’t. Early September in Toronto has been the Toronto International Film Festival since 1976 when it was the Festival of Festivals. I am always excited to walk down these days at King Street where the main theatres are located (Roy Thompson, Royal Alex and Princess of Wales). There is just a buzz and energy in the streets. Actors and actresses are in the city. People who love movies gather and line up to see the over 240 movies over the roughly ten days. Covid put a pause on the activities, but it is fully back. On Thursday I had the opportunity to see a film, which ended up being a total shot in the dark. I had been looking for tickets and the gala prices were on resale were over $350, which is silly for a movie like Andrew Garfield’s We Live in Time, which will be released in a few weeks.

I, The Executioner: With no background, I found a reasonably priced ticket to see the South Korean film, I, The Exectioner. I knew that this movie had been shown at Cannes earlier in the year. Still the director Ryoo Seung-wan and his producer buddy were there with an interpreter. They also mentioned that they added a new vignette post the credits that was never seen before.

The film is a sequel to his 2015 film Veteran, and has the same cast returning. To cateogirize this movie broadly it is a high energy cop/team film where this team, lead by the very good Hwang Jung-min, as a veteran cop and his team try to solve a series of revenge killings. A number of perpetrators of murders who have been perceived publicly as been given too light sentences from the justice system, are then being hunted down and killed (presumably) by a killer who kills them in the same manner as they killed their victims. Social media is well engaged, with an influencer/broadcaster talking about the injustices and egging on someone to do something about it. All the while our team of police investigators have a new boss who wants to make a splash with a high profile case. In the opening sequence, it is like a Bond opening with a set up and then a sting going sideways with chases and fights. It engages the audience straight away.

As the plot unfolds, and the intrigue increases with tracking down potential suspects, there continues to be fights, car chases and mixed martial arts. All the scenes are well done, and with backdrops that would make for challenging filming (like a stone bridge in the middle of a city with a festival going on). The stakes rise for the team as they grapple with more high profile murders and attempted murders. I liked this because it kept my attention from beginning to end. There was some good laughs, some moments where injuries clearly would have occured and would have hurt. Still those involved show tremendous skills in combat and other physical acts. They are also people, notably our main character, who is not a rookie, and he has a wife, a teenage son and young daughters. His demanding job can take time away from all of them.

This movie that I never would have seen anywhere else was a very pleasant surprise. I see that it was picked up for distribution at Cannes which is very good. It deserves an audience. I also now am interested in tracking down the original Veteran from this same group. Well worth tracking down and checking out.

Alien Romulus: I saw this movie on Thursday night with a sparse crowd in the theatre. I have seen all of the Alien movies. I have liked them to varying degrees. There have been nine Alien related films, but I am going to discount the Alien vs Predator films, which means seven films. I will include Prometheus and Alien Covenant in this series though. The first Alien (1979) with Tom Skerritt and Sigourney Weaver and the crew battling the alien remains a sci-fi classic with scenes that were unique for their day. State of the art effects and film effects were used to raise the level of anxiety in the crew and the audience. It was such a success that the sequel in 1986 with the studio choosing James Cameron as opposed to Ridley Scott to direct. Aliens was a smashing success, building on the original premise and ratcheting up the number of alien creatures, but also the personal relationships, notably with Sigorney Weaver (playing Ripley) and a little girl and the humanoid robots (synthetics) who are in both films. We learn more, and we see the arc of Ripley’s character as she takes a more grey vision of those around her, and avoids painting all people and synthetics with the same brush. But that’s background. So what happening with this latest installment? Where did it go wrong? For me, this is the first Alien movie that I left and I was bored.

This film is NOT a continuation of Alien Covenant and the Prometheus direction. Think of it as another unrelated story in the Alien world, where Weyland Industries is the dominant name in space exploration, mining, terra-forming and building worlds. Remember that in Alien the ship Nostromo was a mining space craft returning back to Earth, before being sidetracked in a rescue mission for a distress signal on an unknown planet. Here we have a much younger group of miners in a dreary planet that gets no sunshine at all. These seemingly twenty-somethings don’t like their lot in life, and one has this idea to leave the planet and explore a nearby space ship which has been decommissioned and presumably abandoned and empty. Inside there are some cryogenic pods that would allow these young people to head off to a new and more exciting planet. Early on we see our main protagonist Cailee Spaeny (Rain) and her brotherly companion and we learn that he is a synthetic named Andy (played by David Johnson). He is constantly being picked on.

The group of friends embark on their journey to the hobbled space station, not a ship, and it has predictable results. The challenge with this movie is that it offers nothing new to an already vibrant Alien universe. The creatures don’t talk. There is no interaction. They are just very difficult to kill, and once they get a hold of a human host, then really bad things happen. We already know about the babies spawning and extricating themselves from inside a human body from the chest cavity. I was surprised with the quickness by which it takes place here, versus the original when John Hurt’s character had the creature on his face for some time, then it disappeared and he seemed fine, until he wasn’t. The timeline has been enhanced greatly. This young crew doesn’t gain from having space experience, nor a science officer or a crew who knows the ins and outs of the ship. It is the youngest crew in the series, which was likely the goal. Alien has always had strong female characters. Ripley is, and has always been, one of the best of these women. Rain reminds me more of the new Star Wars Rey than Ripley. So young, without the training for taking on a substantive monster creature. Rain is no Ripley. They are lines from earlier Alien movies scattered in this version, but they fall flat. It feels like a movie trying too hard to live up to a movie series with impressive and intimidating pedigree. I wasn’t engaged with this young crew and cast. I knew what would happen with the creature. I learned nothing new. It seemed pointless to send these young people to die in this way. I also wasn’t convinced on the need to deal with the synthetic story as it happened. Those who saw and love the original I suspect will know exactly what I am referring to. It seems the ongoing underlying message is that humans always seem to find a way to mess with an unnatural engineered creature. Apparently there is no effective communication for people to be documenting the horrors of this creature that the Weyland company wishes to bring back to civilization. In short, the connection and story that engages you with the crew and hopes that they can find a way to survive, we just don’t know how, is missing in this latest version. It feels like a money grab, with the hope of introducing the series to a younger audience. I wish that they had surrounded the younger group with a better story, and a means to have a few new aspects of this complex creature. Sadly it was lacking.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice: The original Beetlejuice from 1988 was directed by Tim Burton. It featured a young couple, played by Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin, who lived in this old house on a hill. They die trangically but retain their overall kind disposition and life attitude despite being dead. They are the focal point and when a new family purchases their beloved house. The new family is husband and second-wife (Jeffrey Jones and Catherine O’Hara) with a young goth teenage daughter played by Winona Ryder. The new ghosts struggle with scaring away the step-mother O’Hara who is looking to change everything about this house. Beetlejuice is an underworld smart-ass character who offers his services of the supernatural and human real person exorcism. In the original, Ryder manages to thwart an effort by Beetlejuice to extract a marriage out of her in exchange of assisting with helping the Davis and Baldwin characters. Honestly I have to admit before seeing the sequel that I wasn’t entirely sure that I had seen the original. In the end it didn’t really matter. I think it helps to know the original but not fatal.

In the sequel, Charles Deets has passed on. A wise choice given the real-life complicated life of the actor Jeffrey Jones who played him, given the fact that he was on the Sex Offender list and was sentenced to five years probation back in 2002. The sequel cleverly tells the story of Charles Deets’ death and how Catherine O’Hara will movie forward with the house that she is in. Meanwhile, grown up Winona Ryder (Lydia Deetz) has a daughter of her own and is using her abilities to talk to ghosts. Just not the ghost of her departed husband, and the father of her daughter. Daughter doesn’t believe any aspect of what Mom does on TV and online. They don’t speak very often.

Meanwhile we learn that Beetlejuice in his prior life was married to the beautiful Monica Bellucci. He tells that backstory with the knowledge that she has returned to his world, in an unusual fashion and wants to kill him. She has some unique abilities. Meanwhile, moody daughter hears about her grandfather’s untimely death, as well as engagement of her Mom, Lydia, to her new boyfriend. It is all too much for her, and she bikes off into town, having a meet-cute with a local boy sitting in his treehouse. Ultimately Ryder needs to re-engage with Beetlejuice and his shenanigans in order to address a pressing problem. Michael Keaton clearly enjoys this role. This is a movie for pure entertainment sake. Did I laugh? Yes there were some laughs. I take this as some campy retro fun, much like Stranger Things which ressurected Winona Ryder’s career, and made 1980s music (like Kate Bush) become so popular again. Does this need to be seen in a theatre as opposed to at home? Not really. For those who loves the original, then this is fun to see. I actually don’t feel that the source material is all that strong, and they made the most of this plot. I think that Catherine O’Hara continues to show her genius, and turns what was a villian role in the original into a more sympathetic role in the sequel. Monica Bellucci plays a role that is thankless, with no redeeming character and used as a plot device to give something else for Beetlejuice to deal with. At a time when there hasn’t been much to watch in the theatre, at least Beetlejuice can provide some relief. For Toronto residents of course there is TIFF to enjoy for another week. Enjoy!!

Deadpool & Wolverine: Those who read me, and know me, know that I am not a big superhero movie guy, and especially I have not been well engaged in the Marvel world. From Iron Man to Avengers to Fantastic 4 , X-Men and lesser lights like Ant Man. I am not even certain that I have watched all of the Wolverine movies. Be that as it may, with an open mind I ventured out to see Deadpool & Wolverine. I have seen the two prior Deadpool movies, enjoying the first and the in-your-face profanity and humour and less so the sequel. I think that Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool has found the proper role for him. As opposed to The Green Lantern. He just embodies it and the earlier moments of this movie has a recap where he calls out the odd premise in terms of dealing with Wolverine, who in his last movie (spoiler alert) managed to save a young lady but sacrificed himself. In short, he’s dead and buried.

So Deadpool is saddled with a task of ressurecting Wolverine. The strange aspect is the whole time travel thing and ,in this instance, another plain of reality which is like a dead zone wasteland. Things end up here that aren’t wanted back in the real world. For the Torontonian it is very funny to see the CN Tower looking like it was dropped from the original Planet of the Apes, half buried in sand. Deadpool is asked to bring back Wolverine, and the rest of the plot doesn’t really need to be further explained. But the real question was whether this was fun and was it necessary? I genuinely laughed out loud a number of times. That itself was saying something, because I don’t necessarily get all the inside jokes. Some of these jokes were from interactions with other characters, like Electra (yes, Jennifer Garner) or Gambit (played by Channing Tatum) that were very funny. I still cannot understand how a playing card can become such a deadly weapon but never mind – hardy the most taxing aspect of reality that affects one’s thougts for this movie. The level of gratuitous violence with blood spurting with endless people falling is a little overwhelming at times. The story of the leader of this void, and how she got here, is an interesting side light. The cameos are fun. Stay in the theatre past the ending credits to catch one last joke. It was funny. I have to admit that seeing Chris Evans not being Captain America, but rather the Human Torch in this Fantastic 4 role is different. In the end, does it all makes sense? Not really. It is a good laugh at times. Yes. Was there an ending where you roll your eyes? Oh yes. So….take this for what it is. It didn’t suck. I could follow it. I had some really good laughs.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society: This was released in 2018, starring Lily James, the now ever-present Glen Powell, along with Matthew Goode and Penelope Wilton from Downton Abbey fame. It is set during WWII, and the aftermath. It is a wartime romantic film, focusing on the James character who is a writer and had exchanged some letters with a person in Guernsey. Guernsey is a small island of 24 square miles off the coast of France, closer to France than England. It is self-governing and not part of the UK although the British government has some financial responsiblity on the island. Guernsey was invaded by the Germans in WWII and occupied. The story focuses on a group of friends who one night during the occupation are stopped by a Nazi patrol and told about what they were doing. They use a made up literary society to try and avoid the Nazis and have an excuse for being out of doors beyond curfew. Although the film is fiction, there are a number of aspects as shown which reflect what happened on the island during the war. The story of this evening is recounted to James.

James as a writer is intriged by the story she is told and travels to the island to meet up with the people involved. Those residents involved that she meets and talks to have their own views and impacts from the war. Before her trip to the island, she is proposed to her by her American boyfriend (Powell) who likes to shower her with flowers. He heads back to the US. James’ character is British. The story unfolds. I won’t get into the details, but ultimately James needs to make some decisions about the story, her life, piecing together the details of what had actually happened and how she should want to have her life continue after the story is finished. Someone will get hurt, they always do. Someone else will find what it is to feel love and others will find new ways in which to direct their lives. Is it believable? Do I care about the people involved? Yes I think so. Despite that it isn’t all that compelling, nor anything worth seeking out. I wish that I had learned more about the occupation and the importance of Guernsey during the War. One would think that it would be very strategic. This is more personal than that involving specific individuals. I can’t recommend this.

Ammonite: Set in the early 1800s, this period piece stars Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan. For that reason abut forgotten lone I wanted to check out this TIFF film from September. This movie follows a now more familiar pattern; it is a repressed time for women who are told that they must live their life in the service of a husband and for his benefit. She is meant to have children and be valued less. She has no ability to be herself and follow her own dreams, even in the eyes of her own father and family. I am reminded how even 140 years later, Queen Elizabeth isn’t given a proper education by her parents because she just doesn’t need one. She disagrees. Winslet here plays Mary, an accomplished but forgotten (mostly) archaeologist who studies fossils found along the shores of her English home. Single, aging, and living only with her elderly mother. She early on in her life found a fossil that is in the British Museum and which paid for life for her sizeable family. Ronan plays a deeply depressed married woman who has recently lost a child. Her husband has an avid interest in fossils, but also yearns for his wife of earlier days. He leaves for a lengthy business trip but pays Winslet to look in on his wife. Winslet gets more than bargained for as she begrudgingly accepts the task, but Ronan falls ill. Much goes unsaid. Much is assumed. Wrongly or rightly. The viewer tries to piece together what has happened to both of these women. How have they been wronged? What has lead to the rather lonely existence of Winslet and her hardness? Ronan appears to be more of an “indoor girl” to borrow the words of Jack Dawson when speaking of Rose in Titanic. Mary alternatively is more sturdy and rugged. She is more outdoorsy, with dirty nails and no appetite for traditional women’s interests. She takes good care of her Mom and the sick Ronan. Mary is though rather awkward and uncomfortable around people. Things happen. Some more surprising than others. Portrait of A Lady On Fire was a very similar story. I think that it was told better. The difference being the star power of the main characters. This film has two top A-list stars who are showing more in many ways than expected. In the end I think we can better appreciate how difficult that these times could have been. Many would have lived, loved and fit directly into society. But quite a few would have had a great deal of difficulty and feeling as though they were likely living in the wrong time. I expect in a lean year that Oscar nominations will likely be forthcoming for one or both.

Downhill: A few years back at TIFF the Swedish foreign film Force Majeure was released and it was a dark film showing the tensions in a marriage when a husband and father at a ski resort betrayed his wife and family in an unexpected way and suffers the consequences. In truth I don’t remember the comedy elements. I just remember that there were uncomfortable situations and tension. Then, presumably Wil Ferrell and Julia Louis Dreyfus saw this as a movie to remake as more of a comedy. It doesn’t work. It’s not funny, but more contrived. I didn’t laugh. I marvelled at the mountain ski resort in Austria. The views and skiing makes me wish for a year ago at Whistler. But otherwise, this dysfunctional family is not where I would want to spend time. Like many Hollywood remakes of European films, this was not a good idea.

Wanda Vision: This new series on Disney + has been advertised hard in the past few weeks. It stars Paul Bettany and Elizabeth Olsen (the best actress in the Olsen clan). Both accomplished actors. After seeing the first episode and 10 mins in the second episode, I have to ask myself “what the hell were they thinking?!” This is bad in a way that I haven’t seen in quite some time. Episode one is a black and white Bewitched remake feel, with the robot “Vision” as Darren and Olsen playing Wanda (a woman with magical powers). I don’t know the point. I don’t the background. I don’t know the Marvel “superheroes”. Frankly, I don’t give damn.

Bridgerton: Saw the end of this. Enjoyed Season 1. I think that the ultimate resolution was satisfying if not altogether predictable. It was a good story. The characters were engaging. It was well written and well acted. Check it out.