Culture Representation: Taking place in Buffalo, Wyoming, in the late 1800s, the Western action film “Catch the Bullet” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some Native Americans) representing the working-class.
Culture Clash: A U.S. marshal goes on the hunt for criminals who kidnapped his 12-year-old son, killed another boy, and left the marshal’s father seriously wounded during a home invasion.
Culture Audience: “Catch the Bullet” will appeal mainly to people who don’t mind watching horribly made Western movies.
Gattlin Griffith and Mason McNulty in “Catch the Bullet” (Photo courtesy of Lionsgate)
A horrendous dud on every level, “Catch the Bullet” is a completely useless movie, unless anyone needs an example of a Western action flick that does everything wrong. The story seems like it was thought up by a child with no concept of making a good, original story. The dialogue is completely cringeworthy. The technical aspects of the film (cinematography, film editing, sound, production design, etc.) are all amateurish.
“Catch the Bullet” is supposed to take place in Buffalo, Wyoming, sometime in the late 1880s, but there are some glaring mistakes throughout the film that are inauthentic to the time period. For example, the main house in the movie has features (such as modern electrical plugs) that didn’t exist in houses back then. It’s just one of many examples of the sloppy filmmaking in “Catch the Bullet,” which was directed by Michael Feifer and written by Jerry Robbins.
The main reason why anyone might be suckered into watching this time-wasting junk is because somehow the filmmakers got some fairly well-known actors to star in the movie. That name recognition can just barely be considered the only asset the movie has, although it’s not saying much because the acting in “Catch the Bullet” is beyond embarrassing for everyone involved. “Catch the Bullet” also has the dubious distinction of being the last movie of actor Jay Pickett (whose credits included the daytime TV soap operas “Port Charles” and “Days of Our Lives”), who died of a heart attack in July 2021, at the age of 60.
In “Catch the Bullet,” Britt McMasters (played by Pickett) is a U.S. marshal who frequently has to be away from home for weeks or months at a time. Britt is a widower with a 12-year-old son named Chad (played by Mason McNulty), who has a lot of resentment over his father’s frequent absences from home. Britt and Chad live in a ranch house with Britt’s widower father Dex (played by Tom Skerritt), who has a better relationship with Chad than Britt has with Chad.
In an early scene in the movie, Chad is playing “cops and robbers” outside his house with his 10-year-old friend Albert Hanson (played by Ryder Kozisek), who lives nearby. Given the choice between playing the role of famous bank robber Jesse James and his father Marshal McMasters, Chad doesn’t hesitate when he says he does not want the role of his father. Britt is currently away from home because of his job, and Chad hasn’t seen Britt in three months.
While the boys are playing outside, a thug named Jed (played by Gattlin Griffith) rides up to the house with four of his cronies. Jed says he’s looking for Marshall McMasters. When he finds out that the marshal isn’t home, Jed shoots Dex and Albert and then kidnaps Chad. Albert is immediately killed. Dex survives but he’s severely wounded and barely conscious. It turns out that Jed is an escaped prisoner who was convicted of robbing a bank and is out for revenge on Britt, who arrested Jed and helped send him to prison.
Three days later, Britt comes come and is horrified to find out what happened. Dex can describe the basic facts but the crime, but he can’t give a good-enough description of the culprits because his memory is hazy. Two law enforcement officers are on the scene to investigate: Sheriff Wilkins (played by Peter Facinelli) and Deputy Clay Tucker (played by Calder Griffith), who is about 20 years younger and a lot less experienced than Sheriff Wilkins.
Britt immediately wants to look for Chad. Sheriff Wilkins says he can’t go with him because of other pressing commitments, so he assigns Deputy Tucker to go with Britt. Deputy Tucker doesn’t have enough tracking experience, so an experienced tracker named Chaska (played by Cody Jones) is enlisted to help this small search-and-rescue team.
Chaska is biracial: His father was a Native American warrior from the Pawnee tribe; his mother was a white missionary. Chaska’s racial identity isn’t a problem for anyone except for Deputy Tucker, who’s very racist. “I ain’t riding with no Injun,” he says of Chaska.
Deputy Tucker tells anyone who’ll listen that he doesn’t think Chaska can be trusted, just because Chaska isn’t white. Britt tells Deputy Tucker that Chaska is the most qualified of the three of them to do the tracking and that there’s no way that Chaska will be dismissed from this mission. Expect to see a lot of pouting and brattiness from Deputy Tucker, who’s not as competent as he thinks he is.
Jed’s four accomplices in this crime spree are so generic, viewers won’t be able to remember anything to distinguish their personalities. Cass Gibbs (played by Kevin McNiven) is the crony who was Jed’s accomplice in the bank robbery that sent Jed to prison. The other members of this gang are Silas (played by Rick Moffatt), Blade (played by Ardeshir Radpour) and Willie (played by Tucson Vernon Walker), whose fates are easy to predict in this cliché-ridden Western.
Jed and his gang aren’t the only people who might be threats to Britt and his small posse. They have to go through Sioux Indian territory, and it’s very likely that members of this Sioux tribe will attack anyone who’s caught trespassing in Sioux territory. It’s just an excuse to litter the movie with more ineptly filmed battle scenes.
There’s a scene where Britt is able to turn around and shoot an opponent on a quick draw before the opponent could shoot Britt in the back. Deputy Tucker marvels at this move and says to Britt: “Your back was to him. How’d you know he was going to draw?” Britt replies, “A glint in his eyes said he knew better than me.” This is the type of idiotic nonsense in “Catch the Bullet.”
“Catch the Bullet” plods along and does almost every stereotype that you would expect in this type of unimaginative Western. Following an over-used Western formula isn’t the problem. The problem is that the movie is so ineptly filmed and filled with such atrocious dialogue and subpar acting, all of it just lowers the quality of this already low-quality film. By the time the very predictable ending happens, the only thing that might surprise viewers is that they had the patience to watch this dreck until the very end.
Lionsgate released “Catch the Bullet” in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and VOD on September 10, 2021. The movie was released on Blu-ray and DVD on September 14, 2021.
Culture Representation: Taking place in France from 1941 to 1944, the war action film “Hell Hath No Fury” features an almost all-white cast (with one African American) representing the working-class, middle-class, and wealthy Europeans and Americans who are caught up in the brutality of World War II.
Culture Clash: A French woman who is the mistress of a Nazi military leader is held captive by American soldiers, who force her to lead them to buried treasure that was stolen by Nazis.
Culture Audience: “Hell Hath No Fury” will appeal mainly to people who are interested in World War II movies with a lot of suspense and violent battles, even if the movie has some noticeable flaws.
Nina Bergman in “Hell Hath No Fury” (Photo courtesy of Well Go USA)
“Hell Hath No Fury” is one of those action movies that makes up for some clunky dialogue and mediocre acting with plenty of suspense and a memorably fierce lead performance by Nina Bergman. She plays a mysterious French woman named Marie Dujardin, who has been imprisoned during World War II. Marie keeps people guessing on her loyalties and allegiances. This political intrigue makes “Hell Hath No Fury” slightly better than the average movie about a woman being held captive for nefarious reasons.
Directed by Jesse V. Johnson and written by Katharine Lee McEwan, “Hell Hath No Fury” opens in 1941 in Aubagne, France. Two lovers are canoodling the back seat of car that’s being driven through a wooded area at around 10 a.m. The two lovebirds in the back seat are Colonel Von Bruckner (played by Daniel Bernhardt) and Marie Dujardin. He asks her, “Marie, are you okay?” She answers, “Tell me again.”
Von Bruckner then tells her: “If we are ever separated, no war, no injury, no challenge will be enough. You see, I know that you are waiting for me. I will find you, and I will love you. Love is stronger than death.”
This amorous moment is interrupted when four French Resistance people (two men and two women), who are armed with guns, ambush the car. The car driver is immediately killed. A woman in the group sneers at Marie, “You’re the German’s whore.”
A shootout ensues that leaves all the French Resistance people dead, because Von Bruckner is an expert marksman. Von Bruckner and Marie escape with their lives. This scene reveals that Von Bruckner is a Nazi, and Marie is considered a French traitor by being his lover.
After this narrow escape from death, the movie fast-forwards three years later, in 1944. Marie is being held captive by American soldiers in a prisoner-of-war camp. They soldiers shave off Marie’s hair into a buzz cut and paint a Nazi swastika on her forehead. She’s then taken by four of the men into a heavily wooded area.
The men don’t want to torture her or force her to tell them any political secrets. They’ve brought her to the woods because they think she knows the location of buried gold that was stolen by Nazis. The Americans want Marie to lead them to this treasure so that the Americans can steal the gold for themselves.
The leader of these rogue soldiers, who could get court-martialed for what they’re doing, is Major Maitland (played by Louis Mandylor), who’s the greediest of the four men. The other men in this group of captors are Chris (played by Luke LaFontaine), a trigger-happy hothead; Jerry (played by Timothy V. Murphy), a ruthless, middle-aged soldier who wants to rape Marie to get information out of her, but Major Maitland won’t let this sexual assault happen; and Vic (played by Josef Cannon), the only one in the group who shows signs of having a guilty conscience about what they’re doing.
There are also two French Resistance soldiers named Clement (played by Dominiquie Vandenberg) and George (played by Charles Farthy) who are key players in this story. And what exactly happened to Von Bruckner? That’s revealed in the movie, which eventually shows how and why Marie got involved with Von Bruckner.
“Hell Hath No Fury” isn’t dull, but the movie has some gaps in the story that needed filling. Although there are some flashbacks, there could have been more explanation over what happened in the three years in between Marie and Von Bruckner’s escape in the woods and her capture as a prisoner of war. Marie’s family background is quickly mentioned near the end of the movie. Her family history explains many of her motivations.
The movie’s dialogue is at times stilted and corny. For example, when Marie tells Major Maitland that the gold is cursed, he snarls at her: “I’m American, Marie. We don’t believe in spirits. We don’t believe in curses. In gold we trust.”
However, what makes “Hell Hath No Fury” watchable is figuring out the mystery of Marie, and seeing how Bergman skillfully depicts this character who has a lot of secrets. As a villain, Major Maitland is fairly generic. None of the work in this movie is award-worthy, but it’s not a terrible or entirely predictable film.
The fighting and shootouts aren’t particularly innovative, but the pacing serves the movie well. The filmmakers also made good use of the locations to create the sense of isolation in the woods that takes up most of the movie. The intrigue of “Hell Hath No Fury” is seeing if or how Marie can outwit her captors when she’s outnumbered. As the movie’s title suggests, someone who seems to be a vulnerable victim should not be underestimated.
Well Go USA released “Hell Hath No Fury” on November 5, 2021, and on digital/VOD on November 9, 2021. The movie was released on Blu-ray and DVD on December 21, 2021.
Sidney Poitier, the first black man to win an Oscar for Best Actor, died at his home in the Bahamas on January 6, 2022. He was 94. According to the Associated Press, the announcement was made by Eugene Torchon-Newry, acting director general of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the Bahamas.
Born in Miami on February 20, 1927, Poitier was the son of tomato farmers from the Bahamas, where was raised. Poitier moved back to Miami age 15, and he began his acting career in his 20s. He made his feature-film debut in the 1950 drama “No Way Out,” in which he played a doctor who has to give medical treatment to a white racist. It set the tone for many of his subsequent film roles where he played characters who did not fall into negative stereotypes of black men and were career professionals but also had to deal with racism. Poitier also became one of the first black men to have a leading role in major studio Hollywood movies.
His most notable movies include 1959’s “The Defiant Ones” (for which he earned his first Oscar nomination for Best Actor), 1961’s “A Raisin in the Sun,” 1963’s “Lilies of the Field” (for which he won the Oscar for Best Actor), 1965’s “A Patch of Blue” and the 1967 movies “In the Heat of the Night,” “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?” and “To Sir, With Love.” His other well-known films included 1970’s “They Call Me Mister Tibbs!” (a spinoff to “In the Heat of the Night”), 1988’s “Shoot to Kill,” 1992’s “Sneakers” and 1997’s “The Jackal.”
Poitier also branched out into directing movies, such as 1972’s “Buck and the Preacher,” 1974’s “Uptown Saturday Night” and 1975’s “Let’s Do It Again.” He had co-starring roles in those three films. Poitier also directed 1980’s “Stir Crazy,” starring Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder. Poitier’s last on-screen acting role was in the 2001 TV-movie “The Last Brickmaker in America.”
In addition to his work in film and television, Poitier was a humanitarian and an ambassador. From 1997 to 2007, he was ambassador of the Bahamas to Japan. From 2002 to 2007, Poitier was ambassador of the Bahamas to UNESCO. He received numerous prestigious accolades, including a British knighthood in 1974, a Kennedy Center Honor in 1995, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009. In 2002, he received an honorary Academy Award (a non-competitive prize for career achievement), in the same year that Denzel Washington became the second black man to win an Oscar for Best Actor and Halle Berry became the first black woman to win an Oscar for Best Actress.
Poitier was married twice. His first marriage to Juanita Harris, which lasted from 1950 to 1965, ended in divorce. He married his second wife, Joanna Shimkus, in 1976. During and after his first marriage, Poitier was romantically involved with actress Diahann Carroll, from 1959 to 1968. Poitier is survived by his widow and his six daughters: Beverly, Pamela, Sherri and Gina (from his first marriage) and Anika and Sydney Tamiia (from his second marriage). He is also survived by his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Culture Representation: Taking place in Phoenix, the dramatic film “Jockey” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few Latinos) representing the working-class middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: An aging horse racing jockey has to come to terms with his failing health and his fading career.
Culture Audience: “Jockey” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of star Clifton Collins Jr. and stories about getting older and the dark side of horse racing.
Molly Parker and Clifton Collins Jr. in “Jockey” (Photo by Adolpho Veloso/Sony Pictures Classics)
“Jockey” is a low-key but effective “slice of life” movie about a middle-aged horseracing jockey who has to face realities about his declining health and career. Clifton Collins Jr. anchors the film with a meaningful and authentic performance. People looking for a lot of horse racing in the movie might be disappointed that “Jockey” doesn’t have much of this type of action. “Jockey” is more of a human drama that examines something that most movies about jockeys almost never show: the health problems that often force a lot of jockeys to retire before they feel ready for retirement.
Directed by Clint Bentley, who co-wrote the movie’s screenplay with Greg Kwedar, “Jockey” had its world premiere at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, where Collins won the U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Best Actor. “Jockey” takes place and was filmed on location in Phoenix. There are quite a few striking scenes (cinematography by Adolpho Veloso) that happen at sunset, showing silhouettes and majestic skies. Whether it’s intentional or not, the sunset is a metaphor for the sunset of a career of a middle-aged jockey, who has made horse racing his entire life and is afraid of what his identity will be without horse racing.
Jackson Silva (played by Collins) is the protagonist/title character of “Jockey.” He’s a never-married bachelor who lives by himself and made horse racing his entire life. The movie’s opening scene is one of the sunset scenes, and it takes place at a horse racing track. Jackson and his longtime jockey friend Leo Brock (played by Logan Cormier), who are both in their 40s, are watching some younger jockeys practice on the track.
Jackson says to Leo: “I ain’t the same anymore, Leo. We’re both getting old.” Leo, who’s a bit of a sarcastic joker, replies, “But I’m like fine wine—I’m getting better.” Jackson can’t say the same thing. In fact, he knows his health is deteriorating, but he doesn’t really want to talk about it with anyone.
It’s not seen on camera, but Jackson has asked a veterinarian who treats horses to give Jackson an X-ray of his back. What is shown in the movie is the doctor discussing the X-ray results with Jackson. And the news isn’t good. When the doctor asks Jackson what kinds of injuries he’s had, Jackson tells him that he’s broken his back about three times. And those are just the injuries he’s willing to talk about to this doctor, who urges him to go to a medical doctor for humans as soon as possible.
Jackson has been working with the same trainer for years. Her name is Ruth Wilkes (played by Molly Parker), and she’s known Jackson since they were both in their 20s. Ruth senses that something isn’t quite right with Jackson. When she asks Jackson if he has any problems or concerns that he’d like to talk about, he denies that anything is wrong with him.
Meanwhile, one day Jackson is at a local diner and sees a 19-year-old aspiring professional jockey named Gabriel Boullait (played by Moises Arias), who has been asking around about Jackson and has recently started working as a stable boy for Jerry Meyer (played Daniel Adams), the owner of multiple race horses. Jackson joins Gabriel at his table and strikes up a conversation with him.
At first Jackson gives some friendly advice, such as telling Gabriel that he should focus on getting the right trainer before thinking about getting an agent. And then, Jackson starts asking Gabriel about where Gabriel grew up. Gabriel says that he’s originally from the South but he spend the last several years living in San Diego before moving to Phoenix. Jackson is curious to know why Gabriel has been asking about Jackson.
And that’s when Gabriel blurts out his mother Ana told Gabriel that he’s Jackson’s son. Jackson’s immediate reaction is a firm denial about being Gabriel’s father: “I don’t know what she told you, but that’s not possible. I’m not going to get in the particulars of it, but you and I are not related.” Jackson mumbles something about some wild times he had with Ana, but he implies that the timeline of their fling doesn’t match with when Gabriel would have been conceived.
Jackson then gets suspicious about Gabriel’s intentions and says that even though he’s a well-known jockey, he’s not rich and is actually barely surviving on his meager salary. “I’m not after your money,” Gabriel says defensively. Jackson replies, “Good, ’cause I’ve got nothing else to give you.”
Before Jackson ends the conversation and leaves the table, he tells Gabriel: “Don’t go around telling people you’re my kid. Makes me look like an asshole. You know what I don’t need? To look like an asshole.”
Around the same time that Jackson meets Gabriel, Ruth buys her first horse: a young racing mare named Dido’s Lament. Ruth is sure that the horse can be a champion with the right jockey. Ruth introduces Dido’s Lament to Jackson and lets him take the horse for a test run.
Jackson is flattered but he’s also realistic when he tells Ruth that he’ll understand if she chooses to have a younger jockey ride Dido’s Lament in any upcoming races. Ruth tells Jackson that she wants him to be the horse’s jockey. “We’ve come this far,” Ruth says. But she also hints to Jackson he needs to get in shape because he’s gained weight. “We’ve both gotten comfortable,” Ruth says as she pats his stomach and her stomach.
An elated and grateful Jackson immediately begins training to get physically fit for upcoming horse races. He tells Ruth that he’s “in it to win it.” The rest of “Jockey” shows what happens when Jackson gets this chance to extend his career. He also ends up mentoring Gabriel and becomes almost like a father figure to him.
However, Jackson can’t ignore his health problems. When he visits a doctor, he finds out exactly what’s wrong. How he handles it is a measure of his character and how much he wants to hold on to horse racing as part of his identity. As an example of how Jackson’s state of mind, not the horse racing, is the focus of the film, during Jackson’s horse racing scenes, there are only closeups of his face. (It’s also an easy way for this low-budget film to avoid staging any tricky horse races.)
Because of Jackson’s budding relationship with Gabriel, Jackson also has to face painful realities about what his life has become. It’s not that Jackson has regrets about not having children. It’s more about Jackson starting to understand that although he devoted to horse racing, he doesn’t have much to show for it, except some trophies, mementos, health problems, and a shaky financial future. He has friendships with other jockeys, but they talk mostly about work-related things.
Jackson sacrificed a lot of relationships along the way in his single-minded pursuit of his career, so now he’s alone when it comes to love. If he has any family members who are still alive, they’re not mentioned in the movie. In a candid conversation with Gabriel, Jackson shares some of his childhood memories, which explains why Jackson ended up making the choices he made in life. Jackson sees a lot of his younger self in Gabriel. And it makes Jackson feel proud, happy and scared.
Collins gives an understated but impactful performance as this lonely but defiant jockey. All of the other cast members (some who are real-life jockeys) give realistic performances too, but Collins’ portrayal of Jackson is the heart and soul of the movie because Jackson goes though the most mentally, physically and emotionally. Some viewers might think that “Jockey” is too slow-paced for a movie about a horse racing jockey. But if viewers have the patience to watch the entire film, it’s worth it just for the last scene, which is proof of why Collins gave an award-winning performance.
Sony Pictures Classics released “Jockey” in select U.S. cinemas on December 29, 2021. The movie is set for an expanded, nationwide theatrical release on February 11, 2022.
Culture Representation: Taking place in Colombia, France, the United States, Morocco, the United Kingdom and China, the action film “The 355” features a racially diverse cast (white, Latino, black and Asian) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: Five women from five different countries join forces to prevent a world-destroying computer hard drive from getting into the wrong hands.
Culture Audience: “The 355” will appeal primarily to fans of the movie’s star-studded cast and spy movies that are big on action and lacking in believable and well-written stories.
Bingbing Fan, Lupita Nyong’o and Jessica Chastain in “The 355” (Photo courtesy of Universal Pictures)
If you’re going to do a “female empowerment” film set in the world of international espionage, then don’t make a movie that’s not just embarrassing to women but also to anyone who wants to make or see a good movie. Even with an all-star cast of headliners, “The 355” is just a silly parade of fight scenes to distract from all the plot holes and lack of logic in this witless spy caper movie. “The 355” has a very talented and experienced cast, but the entire story is so cringeworthy and badly conceived, it seems like it was made for a beginner student film instead of a major studio film starring at least two Oscar winners.
“The 355” was directed by Simon Kinberg, who co-wrote the atrocious screenplay with Theresa Rebeck. Kinberg is best known as a producer and writer of several “X-Men” movies. He made his feature-film directorial debut with the 2019 tedious train wreck called “Dark Phoenix,” which was a lackluster end to “The X-Men” prequel movie phase that began with 2011’s “X-Men: First Class.” “The 355” is another train wreck, but at least it has more adrenaline-packed action than “Dark Phoenix,” even if the action scenes are ridiculously staged.
“The 355” is about five women from five different countries who band together to stop the wrong people from getting a computer hard drive that’s capable of destroying the world. Four of the women have experience in international espionage, while the fifth woman is a “fish out of water,” which is just an excuse to have a woman act like a Nervous Nellie in a gun-toting action movie because she’s afraid of guns. The movie’s title refers to the code name for the unidentified female spy who was crucial in helping the Americans in the U.S. Revolutionary War. Some female spies are still referred to as 355.
The five heroines of the story are:
Mason “Mace” Browne (played by Jessica Chastain), a hard-driving American who’s an independent-minded agent for the CIA.
Marie Schmidt (played by Diane Kruger), a ruthless German spy working for an unnamed agency, who’s even more of a cold-blooded assassin than Mace is.
Khadijah Adiyeme (played by Lupita Nyong’o), a computer-savvy Brit who used to be an agent for MI6, but she left the agency to become a computer specialist.
Lin Mi Sheng (played by Bingbing Fan, also known as Fan Bingbing), a mysterious Chinese operative who plays the role of a wealthy art curator in charge of a pivotal auction in the movie.
Graciela Rivera (played by Penélope Cruz), a Colombian psychologist who unintentionally gets mixed up with these spies and spends a lot of time complaining about it.
The sought-after destructive computer hard drive is shown in the movie’s opening scene, which takes place 150 miles south of Bogotá, Colombia. A British financier named Elijah Clarke (played by Jason Flemying) has arrived at the palatial estate of a man named Santiago (played by Pablo Scola), who is obviously a shady character, based on all the menacing-looking armed bodyguards on his property. Santiago’s young adult son is a computer whiz named Jeronimo (played by Marcello Cruz), who has invented a computer program that can cause massive global destruction, including worldwide blackouts and aircraft explosions—all by doing a few keystrokes on a computer.
Jeronimo and Santiago proudly show off a few demonstrations for Elijah, by making a plane explode in the air and causing a citywide blackout in Bogotá. Jeronimo brags about his destructive computer program: “Try to make a copy, it deletes itself. I’m the only one who can make it.”
Meanwhile, a group of six Colombian National Intelligence Directory agents are hiding outside in a jungle near the estate. The agents are armed and ready to attack, because they think a major drug deal is happening in Santiago’s home. But they hear on their audio surveillance equipment that this isn’t a drug deal. It’s something involving computers and cyber destruction.
When the agents see the plane explode in the air, the agents go on the attack and raid the home. A shootout happens that leaves almost everyone in the house dead, except for Elijah (who made a quick escape) and a Colombian National Intelligence Directory agent named Luis Rojas (played by Édgar Ramírez), who takes the computer hard drive. Luis then decides to sell the hard drive to whoever is the first to pay him $3 million, because he wants to take the money and disappear with his family to have an anonymous, wealthy life.
Someone should’ve told Luis (and “The 355” filmmakers) that $3 million is a ridiculously low amount of money for this type of weapon that can cause global destruction. And it’s really not even enough money for a family to live on for the rest of their lives, if they want to be considered “rich.” It’s one of many poorly conceived details in “The 355,” which is one of the worst big-budget, major studio movies about international espionage in the 21st century.
The word gets out to various government intelligence agencies that this destructive computer drive is up for sale on the black market. As an example of how creatively bankrupt “The 355” is, the filmmakers don’t even come up with a name for the computer hard drive. The characters in the movie just keep referring to the computer hard drive as “the drive.”
“The 355” then shows how various people (heroes, villains and some people in between) try to get possession of “the drive” and all the dumb shenanigans that ensue. There are so many things wrong with how badly these operations are bungled. For example, this scenario is repeated to boring predictability in the movie: People who think they’ve stolen the drive find out that they don’t have it after all.
This computer hard drive is the equivalent of a deadly weapon, but no one in the movie takes any precautions to put this computer hard drive in any type of protective casing to avoid scratching or other damage. Time and time again, the drive is plopped into backpacks, mishandled and tossed around in so many fights, it’s a miracle that this hard drive comes out unscathed, as it does in this grossly unrealistic movie. And if this hard drive is a weapon of mass destruction that can’t be duplicated, then none of the “heroes” thinks of taking the obvious action, until toward the end of the film.
Another ludicrously awful thing about “The 355” is how it depicts spy agencies of First World countries as woefully understaffed and incompetent. It’s the only illogical reason to explain why these agents zip around the world with almost no accountability to supervisors, but they have miraculous access to resources that can only be cleared through supervisors. Major decisions about international security are staged to look like only one mid-level spy supervisor in each country makes all these important decisions, thereby completely erasing a realistic chain of command.
That’s what happens when Mace and her longtime spy partner/best friend Nick Fowler (played by Sebastian Stan) get assigned by their supervisor Larry Marks (played by John Douglas Thompson) to retrieve “the drive” in Paris. Larry’s CIA title is never revealed, but he’s not at the highest level, based on the small number of people who report to him and the low-quality office space where he works. The same could be said for Marie’s boss Jonas Muller (played by Sylvester Groth), who is later described as Marie’s closest confidant, even though he doesn’t really trust her.
Why do Mace and Nick have to go to Paris? It’s because the CIA somehow found out that Luis will be there at an outdoor cafe to sell “the drive.” Why choose an outdoor cafe where there could be dozens of witnesses, street cameras and many things that could go wrong in a public place? Why not choose a private place to do the deal in secret? Because it’s an idiotic movie like “The 355,” were so-called trained professionals make the dumbest decisions.
Mace and Nick have been assigned undercover identities for this mission, where they have to pose as American newlyweds named Joel and Ethel Lewis. And they just happen to sit right next to the same outdoor cafe table as Luis. Nick just happens to have a backpack that’s identical to Luis’ backpack. Luis, like a fool, leaves his backpack on the ground.
You know what’s in the backpack. Nick does too. And so does a cafe waitress, who is really German spy Marie going undercover. Nick and Mace try to distract Luis in a conversation, so that Nick can switch his backpack with Luis’ backpack when Luis isn’t looking. But what do you know: Marie, posing as a waitress with Nick’s order, spills the food and drinks on Nick, and then steals Nick’s backpack intead of Luis’ backpack. A person with common sense would’ve taken both backpacks, in order to leave nothing to chance.
The ruckus results in two simulatenous chase scenes: Mace chases after Marie, who ends up getting away in a subway train. Nick chases after Luis, who takes his backpack and runs away in a panic on a busy street. The chase scenes predictably have “near miss” scenarios where subways and cars get in the way, and it looks like people might be run over if they’re not careful. And after all that trouble, Marie finds out that she took the wrong backpack.
Luis goes into hiding at a hotel, but the Colombian government finds out where he is and dispatches Graciela to offer him therapy. “I’m the only one in the agency who really knows you,” Graciela tells Luis. It’s an obvious ploy to see if Luis will give up secrets about where he has “the drive.” And that’s how Graciela gets caught up in this battle for “the drive.” She finds out the hard way when she barely escapes a shootout that takes place when she’s walking with Luis through a fish processing facility, while Luis still has “the drive” in his backpack.
Graciela has a husband and two sons (the kids are about 6 to 9 years old) at home in Colombia, so the movie makes a big deal of Graciela being not just the only mother in the group of five heroines but also the only one who’s not trained to be a spy. Therefore, “The 355” has multiple scenes of Graciela lying to her family on the phone by telling them that’s she’s away on a safe business trip, while griping to everyone who knows the truth that she doesn’t belong in this dangerous mess.
Graciela is so afraid of guns, she doesn’t even want to touch guns. Why did Graciela choose to work for a government spy agency then? Couldn’t she be a psychologist somewhere else? Of course not, because then “The 355” wouldn’t have a stereotypical “I’m so not prepared to defend myself in fights” confused character that always seems to be in action movies that are plagued with the laziest clichés.
And here’s another lazy cliché for a spy movie: If a female spy is a lead character in the movie, then she has sex with a co-worker. That’s what happens when Mace and Nick hook up for real, shortly after they find out that they’re supposed to be posing as newlyweds. The movie drops big hints that Mace is secretly in love with Nick but she doesn’t want to admit it to anyone.
Nick has been hot and heavy to be “more than friends” with Mace for quite some time, but she tells him: “You’re my best friend. I don’t have anybody else. I don’t want to mess this up.” Immediately after she gives Nick this mini-lecture about wanting to keep things strictly professional between them, she starts seductively undressing in front of him in their Paris hotel room, and they have sex.
After the debacle of losing “the drive” in Paris, Mace goes to London to reconnect with her estranged friend Khadijah. Mace, who has now become a rogue agent, begs Khadijah to help her find Luis and “the drive,” as well as to get revenge on Marie. Khadijah, who has comfortably settled into civilian live with her understanding husband Abdul (played by Raphael Acloque), reluctantly agrees to help Mace on this mission. Abdul handles Khadijah’s decision to go on this mission and possibly be killed as casually as a husband being told that his wife is going away on an adventure trip.
More chase scenes and shootouts ensue. Marie poses as a police officer and whisks Graciela into her custody in a hotel room. Mace and Khadijah burst into the hotel room because they’ve been tracking Marie. They all decide they have a common enemy and decide to join forces. The scene where they decide to team up is so trite and overly contrived, you almost half-expect them to yell, “Girl power!”
Mace, Khadijah, Marie and Graciela end up in Morocco. And when an unimaginative action movie takes place in Morocco, you know what that means (cliché alert): a chase scene in a crowded outdoor marketplace in Marrakesh. And “the drive” gets bounced around in more backpacks and knapsacks.
After the hijinks in Morocco, the four women go to Shanghai, where there’s an auction of luxury art. That’s how Mace, Marie, Khadijah and Graciela meet Lin Mi, who is overseeing this event. And you know what that means (cliché alert): the female spies dress up in banquet attire so they can mix and mingle with elite society people at this auction. Predictably, it’s a scene where the women’s sex appeal is used as a distraction to men in at least two instances.
More clichés clog up the film. And almost all of them are unconvincing. One of the clichés is about someone who supposedly dies during a fight. But surprise! This person isn’t really dead after all.
This person’s “departure” is so abrupt and unrealistically handled in the movie, as soon as this person is announced as dead, it’s obvious that this person will be back in the movie at some point. The fake death subplot doesn’t take into account that many people (including a medical examiner) would have to see the body in order for a death certificate to be signed. Of course, “The 355” filmmakers assume that viewers are too dumb to know these facts.
“The 355” is so shoddily filmed, it’s obvious to tell who the stunt doubles are in the action scenes. In a scene where Mace and Marie are in a physical fight before they decide to team up, there’s a shockingly bad close-up where the face of Chastain’s stunt double can clearly be seen. Kinberg and Chastain are two of the producers of “The 355,” so they bear a lot of the responsbility for how this disaster of a movie turned out.
Beyond the stunts, some of the action scenes are plotted with absolutely no sense. There’s a scene were certain people are held captive in a house, then they are inexplicably let go (when in reality they would be killed by their captors), and the newly freed kidnapping victims find out that there’s an arsenal of loaded weapons in a nearby unlocked room. How stupid do kidnappers have to be to let that happen? As stupid as they are in “The 355.”
The acting in this movie is nothing special, and it often looks subpar because of the moronic dialogue. Khadijah is written as the most intelligent and level-headed of the five heroines, but she also just spews a lot of computer jargon that’s very phony. Unfortunately, Fan’s acting as Lin Mi is so stiff, it’s easy to see why she has the least screen time out of the five actresses—she doesn’t appear in “The 355” until the last third of the film.
Even though Marie is supposed to be the secretive “ice queen” of the group, ironically, she’s the only one of the five who’s given a backstory, so that she can have a scene where she gets emotional about her past. (It has to do with her father, who was also a spy.) It’s worth noting that Kruger replaced Marion Cotillard, who was originally cast in “The 355” as a French spy named Marie. Cotillard should feel relieved that she didn’t get stuck in this terrible movie.
Graciela is a one-note character, whose main purpose is to say variations of “I don’t belong here! I want to get back to my family!” Mace is a hollow shell that the filmmakers obviously want to portray as the group’s badass leader. Too bad they forgot to give Mace an intriguing personality.
“The 355” also perpetuates outdated and sexist movie stereotypes that the best female spies can’t possibly be mothers too. It’s no coincidence that in “The 355,” the only trained spies in this group of heroines are women who don’t have children. It’s a not-so-subtle message that if you’re a female spy, being a mother is supposed to ruin your chances of being great in your career. In reality, there have been plenty of prominent female spies who were mothers at same time they were spies. Mata Hari and Josephine Baker are just two examples.
One of the most laughable things about “The 355” isn’t on screen but it’s in the movie’s production notes. There’s a statement in “The 355” production notes about the intention of the movie: “Character, realism and authenticity were key to the filmmakers’ vision.” However, almost everything in “The 355” is the opposite of realistic. As a spy movie, “The 355” is as unrealistic as James Bond being a Russian astronaut becoming an American cowboy who starts working for the CIA.
Universal Pictures will release “The 355” in U.S. cinemas on January 7, 2022.
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed city in Wales, the horror film “The Feast” features an all-white cast of characters representing the working-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: A mysterious woman is hired to be a cook/server for an upcoming dinner party in a wealthy family’s countryside home, but strange and sinister things occur before, during and after this meal.
Culture Audience: “The Feast” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in watching European horror movies that take their time to get to the biggest action scenes.
Steffan Cennydd and Annes Elwy in “The Feast” (Photo courtesy of IFC Films/IFC Midnight)
“The Feast” is a horror movie that’s a cautionary tale about the gluttony of pillaging the environment. It’s a deliberately paced film whose plot stumbles a bit in the last third of the movie, but it has enough gruesome images and haunting themes to make an impact. People with short attention spans might not enjoy the movie as much people who have the patience to watch a story unfold, bit by bit.
Lee Haven Jones, a director who has worked mostly in British television (on shows such as “Dr. Who” and “The Long Call”), makes his feature-film directorial debut with “The Feast,” which was written by Roger Williams. The movie is set in an unnamed Welsh countryside city in the present day, but the costume design and production design bring an otherworldly, timeless quality to the film that doesn’t peg it to a specific year in the 21st century. Because the entire film takes place on the wooded property of a wealthy family, the atmosphere of the film is intentionally isolating.
“The Feast” begins with the arrival of a temporary worker in her 20s named Cadi (played by Annes Elwy), who has been hired to be a cook/server for the family’s upcoming dinner party in their mansion. Yes, it’s another horror movie about a mysterious employee who works in a mansion in the woods, and then bad things start to happen. However cliché that concept might be, “The Feast” at least takes it step further by being more than just a violent gorefest horror flick.
The lady of the house is family matriarch Glenda (played by Nia Roberts), who is annoyed that Cadi has shown up late. Glenda scolds Cadi: “We’re a long way from town, but I did give directions. Did you follow them? It doesn’t matter. You’re here now.” Over time, viewers see that Glenda is pretentious and very particular about the image that she and the rest of the family project to the outside world.
Cadi was hired as a sudden replacement for a woman named Lynwen, who became ill earlier that week. Glenda is supervising the cooking for this dinner, which will be a three-course meal for seven people. Cadi spends most of her time in the kitchen and in the dining room, but she still finds time to wander around the property.
Cadi is quiet but appears to be easily agitated by sights and sounds of hunting, which is a frequent activity of the men of the house. Glenda’s husband Gwyn (played by Julian Lewis Jones) has hunted rabbits that will be served during the banquet. When he plops two dead and bloody rabbits on the kitchen countertop, Cadi acts very disturbed. And when the couple’s younger son Guto (played by Steffan Cennydd), who is in his late teens or early 20s, shoots a gun in a nearby field, the sound of the gun frightens Cadi so much that she crouches down in fear.
It doesn’t take long for Cadi to find out that this is a dysfunctional family. Glenda and Gwyn have two sons: Elder child Gweirydd (played by Siôn Alun Davies) is an obsessive overachiever type who left his job as a hospital doctor to go into intense training for a triathlon. Younger child Guto, the “black sheep” of the family, is a needle-using drug addict who has been in rehab and who has overdosed at least once.
Cadi’s arrival at the house piques the interest of the three men who live there, and she shows some curiosity too. Gweirydd immediately stares lecherously at Cadi. Later, she spies on Gweirydd while he shaves his pubic hair in a sauna. Cady seems more attracted to Guto, who accidentally injured his foot outdoors when a metal part of fence dropped on his foot. What happens to this foot injury later in the movie is not for the faint of heart.
After seeing Cadi’s horrified reaction to the dead rabbits, Gwyn tells Cadi that he’s sorry that he scared her. “I want to be your friend,” Gwyn tells Cadi. It’s an odd thing to say to a stranger who’s been hired to work in the home for just one evening.
But things get even more bizarre. Soon, it becomes obvious that Cadi is not a “normal” employee. She secretly spits in the food when no one is looking. And when she has some free time alone, she goes in Glenda’s bedroom, tries on some of Glenda’s perfume, and then starts laughing like a maniac.
The guests at this dinner party are a businessman named Euros (played by Rhodri Meilir) and a farmer’s wife named Mair (played by Lisa Palfrey), who have not been invited just as a social visit. Euros describes his job this way: “I help small businesses find ways to make money with their assets.” And it turns out that Gwyn wants Mair to convince her husband Iori to sell their farm land so that consortium can use the land for drilling purposes. Iori is presumably the third guest who was expected at this dinner party, but he is not in attendance.
This fateful dinner party is really the catalyst for most of the horror action that takes place in the movie. Because the dinner party doesn’t happen until the last third of the movie, viewers must have patience and observe all the clues that explain what happens toward the end of the movie. One of the first signs that something terrible is about to happen is when Glenda shows off the house’s sauna/retreat room to Mair, which Mair thinks looks more like a prison cell. Shortly before they leave, Glenda notices a red feather float down, seemingly from out of nowhere.
“The Feast” is perfectly adequate when it comes to the performances of the cast members. Some viewers will think that the movie takes too long to get to the big scares. (“The Feast” spends a lot of time on the family squabbles and images of the meal being prepared.) Still, director Jones capably handles the film’s brooding atmosphere and how the movie’s feeling of dread slowly increases as time goes on in the story. The most memorable characteristic of “The Feast” is in how its intended message sneaks up on viewers, but it’s cloaked in a very creepy and brutal horror movie.
IFC Films/IFC Midnight released “The Feast” in select U.S. cinemas on digital and VOD on November 19, 2021.
Culture Representation: Taking place in unnamed U.S. cities, the sci-fi drama “Needle in a Timestack” features a racially diverse cast of characters (black, white and Asian) representing the middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: In this time-bending story, two men and two women experience their lives differently when the men and women pair off as couples at different points in their lives.
Culture Audience: “Needle in a Timstack” will appeal primarily to people who don’t mind watching a convoluted, poorly written and extremely dull movie.
Orlando Bloom and Freida Pinto in “Needle in a Timestack” (Photo courtesy of Lionsgate)
Looking for a needle in a haystack is more fun than watching “Needle in a Timestack.” This excruciatingly dull movie tries to have a “musical chairs” approach to romance, but it’s ultimately a time-wasting bore with nothing to say. Unfortunately, this misguided movie doesn’t do much with its talented cast except give them snooze-inducing dialogue and scenarios that are just too ill-conceived to take.
“Needle in a Timestack” is based on Robert Silverberg’s 1966 collection of sci-fi short stories the same name. It’s easy to see how “Needle in a Timestack” screenwriter/director John Ridley thought that the intriguing concept of time-traveling changing the course of people’s romances that should be made into a movie. But this concept just turns into a haphazard mishmash of tedious scenes where the actors look almost as confused as viewers will be if they try to wade through this cinematic muck.
“Needle in a Timestack” is about two men and two women who have intertwined romances, but the main couple that audiences are supposed to be rooting for are spouses Nick Mikkelsen (played by Leslie Odom Jr.) and Janine Mikkelsen (played by Cynthia Erivo), who are the couple who gets the most screen time. Nick works in real-estate development for an architectural firm called Randall Corp. Janine is a photographer. Nick and Janine have been married for five years. (“Needle in a Timestack” takes place in the U.S., but the movie was actually filmed in British Columbia.)
The other two people in this quasi-love quadrangle are business mogul Tommy Hambleton (played by Orlando Bloom) and Alex Leslie (played by Freida Pinto), who are presented as possible threats to Nick and Janine’s love for each other. At various points in the movie, these couplings are shown: Nick and Janine; Tommy and Janine; Nick and Alex; and Tommy and Alex. The movie then plays a lot of tricks over which scene might be a flashback, an altered reality, or possibly a figment of someone’s imagination.
At first, Nick and Janine seem like a blissful married couple in love. When they’re at a house party together, Nick looks adoringly at Janine and says to her, “Sometimes, when you’re not looking, I watch you from across the room. And I ask myself, ‘If I didn’t know you, would I still fall in love with you?'”
The beginning of the movie shows that Janine has made a sad video of herself where tears are rolling down her cheeks. Janine says wistfully as she looks into the camera: “Love is drawn in the form of a circle. No one knows where it begins, and it never really ends. You and I, we are forever and always and all ways.”
Why is Janine so upset? And why is she talking like a cheesy Valentine’s Day card? The movie comes back to this video as a placemark to show viewers that Janine might know something that some of the other characters might not know. That’s because in this movie, memories and versions of reality can be erased by people who have the money to time travel and alter the fates of themselves and loved ones. Messing with fate in this way results in a “time shift,” which can usually be detected when people get nosebleeds.
Nick experiences a series of unsettling time shifts that are so alarming to him that he tells Janine that he suspects someone is trying to “erase” their marriage and possibly their memories of each other. Nick eventually figures out that Janine’s wealthy and jealous ex-husband Tommy is causing these time traveling manipulations because Janine broke up with Tommy, and Tommy is still bitter about it. When Nick confronts Tommy (who’s in charge of a company called Hambleton Solutions) about his suspicions, Tommy smugly replies by saying, “No one can really change the past. Just clean up the present a little.”
Nick is so sure that Tommy is going to erase Nick’s memories, Nick gets help from a company that sells Past Protect, which is described as a cloud service for storage of memories. People upload their photos and files on Past Protect to preserve memories. There’s some very manufactured and predictable drama about the Past Protect part of the story.
The rest of “Needle in a Timestack” sluggishly goes back and forth in different “realities” that show the four different couplings that happen between Nick, Janine, Tommy and Alex. None of these pairings is the least bit interesting or sexy, although the movie tries its hardest to make it look like Nick and Janine are the most “passionate” of the four pairings. The personalities of all these characters are so bland, it’ll be hard for viewers to remember much about the movie’s characters.
Odom and Erivo seem to be doing their best to play a convincing married couple, but their acting just seems a bit too forced in their love scenes. Bloom and Pinto look like they’re just going through the motions and reciting their lines. It doesn’t help that almost all of the dialogue in the film is awkward and stilted. (Trivia note: Odom and Pinto also portrayed a couple in the 2020 post-apocalyptic drama “Only,” which isn’t a very good movie but at least it’s much more interesting than “Needle in a Timestack.”)
“Needle in a Timestack” also has a time-wasting subplot about Nick’s neurotic younger sister Zoe Mikkelsen (played by Jadyn Wong), who’s a self-admitted commitment-phobe when it comes to romance. There are several tiresome scenes in the movie showing Nick and Zoe having phone conversations where Zoe constantly talks about her best friend Sibila (played by Laysla De Oliveira), who’s originally from Portugal.
Zoe invites Nick to go rock climbing with her and Sibila, but Nick declines the offer because he thinks rock climbing is too dangerous. And in a movie where people try to change something in the past that they didn’t want to happen, it’s very easy to guess what happens during this rock climbing trip and what someone wants to do to change it. However, this subplot didn’t need to be in the story and just seems like the filmmakers’ way of stretching the already thin plot even more.
It’s not as if Ridley is new to making movies from adapted screenplays. He won an adapted screenplay Oscar for writing the 2013 drama “12 Years a Slave,” a movie where he was also an executive producer. “Needle in a Timestack” tries to look like a movie that’s a mind-bending puzzle, but it’s really a series of scenes that are patched together like different people’s hazy memories. Much of the story becomes unfocused to the point where viewers might be wondering why this movie was even made. “Needle in a Timestack” can easily put viewers to sleep, so at least the movie is good for the purpose of curing insomnia.
Lionsgate released “Needle in a Timestack” in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and VOD on October 15, 2021. The movie was released on Blu-ray and DVD on October 19, 2021.
Culture Representation: Taking place in 1906 in the Oklahoma territory of the United States, the Western drama film “Old Henry” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with one Latino) representing the working-class and middle-class.
Culture Clash: A widower farmer and his teenage son find themselves in a violent standoff in their home, after they take in a mysterious, wounded stranger, who is accused of being a bank robber on the run.
Culture Audience: “Old Henry” will appeal primarily to fans of Westerns that have good acting and suspenseful twists to the story.
Stephen Dorff in “Old Henry” (Photo courtesy of Shout! Studios)
At first glance, “Old Henry” seems to be another Western about a bank robbers and gun shootouts. However, the movie has different layers and a few twists that are eventually revealed in this suspenseful and intriguing story. Led by a memorable performance by Tim Blake Nelson, “Old Henry” is also a family drama that tackles issues of father-son relationships and how a family can shape someone’s identity.
“Old Henry” (written and directed by Potsy Ponciroli) takes place over a few days in 1906, in the territory of Oklahoma. (The movie was actually filmed in Waterton, Tennessee.) Henry McCarty (played by Nelson) is a widower who lives on a farm with his son Wyatt McCarty (played by Gavin Lewis), who is about 16 or 17 and is reluctant to follow in his father’s footsteps of being a farmer. Henry’s wife/Wyatt’s mother, Marie Hobbs McCarty, died of tuberculosis in 1896, at the age of 35. Marie’s brother Al Hobbs (played by Trace Adkins) regularly visits the farm to help out when he’s needed.
Henry is a stern and strict taskmaster who’s not very talkative, and he doesn’t express deep emotions very easily. However, there are things in his past that haunt him. These memories are shown in flashback scenes that are like pieces in a puzzle that eventually reveal the answer to a mystery. Henry and Wyatt are also grieving over the death of Marie, but they have the type of household where these feelings are not openly discussed.
What Henry does talk about to Wyatt is how he made something of himself after a life of hard knocks. Henry tells his son that he was born in New York. By the time he was 3 years old, Henry and his family had moved to Kansas, then Arizona, and then New Mexico.
“Finally,” Henry says, “I settled on the life of a farmer, which is what I am.” Wyatt says skeptically, “I still can’t believe that’s what you wanted.” Henry replies, “There are worse arrangements.” If Henry wanted to do something else with his life besides being a farmer, he’s not about to tell Wyatt in this conversation.
One day, a mare wanders onto an open field on Henry’s farm. The mare has a bloody saddle and no rider. Henry goes to investigate and finds an armed man nearby with a bullet hole in his chest and a knapsack full of cash. The man is barely alive. Henry doesn’t seem to want to take the cash at first, but he soon changes his mind and takes the knapsack and the man’s gun.
Meanwhile, Henry brings the mystery man back to Henry’s house to give him medical attention. Because Henry doesn’t know anything about this stranger, as a safety precaution, Henry ties the man’s hands and feet to a bed while Henry and Wyatt look after him. Eventually, the man regains consciousness and tells Henry that his name is Curry (played by Scott Haze), and that he’s a lawman who was shot by bank robbers.
Henry is immediately skeptical of the story, but he has no proof that Curry is lying or telling the truth. Not long after Curry is found, three men on horseback arrive at the farm. Their leader introduces himself as a sheriff named Sam Ketchum (played by Stephen Dorff), and the two men with him are named Dugan (played by Richard Speight Jr.) and Stilwell (played by Max Arciniega). The movie’s opening scene shows how far Ketchum and his men are willing to go to get what they want.
Ketchum tells Henry that he and his cronies are looking for a bank robber who got away with a lot of cash. Ketchum’s description of the man fits the description of Curry. However, Henry doesn’t quite trust these three strangers either, so Henry lies and says that he hasn’t see anyone fitting that description. Meanwhile, Curry tells Henry that Ketchum is lying and that the sheriff’s uniform and badge that Ketchum is wearing were actually stolen in the shootout that wounded Curry.
When Ketchum asks to look around the property, Henry gets hostile and says no, so this reaction arouses Ketchum’s suspicions that Henry might be hiding something. What follows is a tension-filled battle where viewers have to guess who’s telling the truth and who’s lying. And because “Old Henry” is a Western, there are inevitable gun shootouts that take up a great deal of the action. Henry and Wyatt also have their trust in each other tested in this life-or-death situation.
“Old Henry” is a great example of a movie that does a lot with a low budget, a relatively small number of people in the cast and only a few locations. Because the movie doesn’t have a lot of dialogue, Henry’s personality is shown through his actions and facial expressions, thanks to the admirable acting talent of Nelson. “Old Henry” is a taut mystery thriller wrapped in the genre of a Western that effectively shows the lure of America’s Old West as a place for new beginnings and wild endings.
Shout! Studios released “Old Henry” in select U.S. cinemas on October 1, 2021, and on digital and VOD on October 8, 2021.
Culture Representation: Taking place in Madrid, Spain, from 2016 to 2019, the dramatic film “Parallel Mothers” features an all-Hispanic cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.
Culture Clash: Two single mothers (one middle-aged and one teenage) and the teenager’s mother find their lives intertwined and affected by secrets and lies.
Culture Audience: “Parallel Mothers” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar, star Penélope Cruz and well-acted movies that explore the highs and lows of family histories.
Penélope Cruz and Milena Smit in “Parallel Mothers” (Photo by Iglesias Más/El Deseo/Sony Pictures Classics)
“Parallel Mothers” is more than a drama about the relationship between two single mothers. On a much broader level, it’s about how secrets can be damaging to families. Written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar, “Parallel Mothers” is one of his most emotionally moving and effective movies in his illustrious filmography. “Parallel Mothers” had its world premiere at the 2021 Venice International Film Festival, where “Parallel Mothers” star Penélope Cruz won the Volpi Prize for Best Actress. The movie’s North American premiere was at the 2021 New York Film Festival.
“Parallel Mothers” (which takes place from 2016 to 2019) begins and ends with a very personal family quest by a Madrid-based photographer named Maria Janis Martinez Moreno, also known as Janis (played by Cruz), who is trying to find the anonymous mass grave where her great-grandfather was buried, after he was murdered in the Spanish Civil War. Janis, who is 39 when this story begins, comes up against a lot bureaucratic stonewalling from government officials who seem to want to erase this shameful part of Spanish history where thousands of murdered people were buried in unmarked graves without notifying the dead people’s family members. It’s important for Janis and her family to give her great-grandfather’s body a proper burial, according to their Catholic traditions.
The only details that Janis knows about the grave are from what her grandmother told her: It’s an unmarked grave, where 10 men were buried. Janis’ grandmother gave her the names of the other men who are said to be buried in the same grave. Janis’ great-grandfather was not in the military during the Spanis Civil War, which lasted from 1936 to 1939. He was a teacher and a photographer, who went missing during the war. The family got the news that he was murdered, but his body was never found.
During her search for this grave, Janis ends up doing a studio photo session with a forensic entomologist named Arturo (played Israel Elejalde), who works for the Association for the Recovery of Historical Memory. It’s a group that decides its projects years in advance, and it has the authority to decide which unmarked graves can be excavated. Janis asks Arturo what he can do to help her start the process to excavate a grave that she’s fairly certain is where her great-grandfather is buried. Arturo says he can talk to his management supervisors about this issue.
There’s some sexual attraction between Janis and Arturo. Not long after this photo session, they begin having an affair. Although Janis is completely single, Arturo is not. He’s up front in telling Janis that he’s married, but he and his wife are having marital problems. The movie later has some back-and-forth drama over whether or not Arturo and his wife (who is never seen in the film) will break up or not.
Soon after Janis and Arturo begin their affair, Janis unexpectedly gets pregnant. Janis is at an age when she thought she would never have children, so she’s elated by this unplanned pregnancy. Arturo is not. In fact, he questions if he’s the father of the child and asks Janis to consider having an abortion.
Janis is so insulted that she breaks up with Arturo and tells him she wants to raise the child without any financial help from him. Janis also tells Arturo that she won’t have a paternity test done for the child, and that she doesn’t Arturo in the child’s life. Arturo accepts this decision, but he seems hurt that Janis wants to completely cut him out of her life. Without giving away too much information, it’s enough to say that Janis and Arturo aren’t completely out of each other’s lives after she gives birth to their child.
When it comes time for Janis to give birth, she checks into a maternity ward at a local hospital. Janis knows that her baby will be a girl and already has decided that her daughter’s name will be Cecilia. Janis’ roommate is another single, expectant mother who’s about to give birth to her first child that was the result of an unplanned pregnancy.
Janis is sharing a room with Ana Manso (played by Milena Smit), who’s about 16 or 17 years old. Unlike Janis, Ana is not excited to be a mother. Ana is terrified and reluctant about parenthood. Ana doesn’t feel that she’s ready for this big change in her life. Ana also tells Janis that she regrets getting pregnant, while Janis tries to get Ana to think about the positive benefits of being a parent.
Janis has her somewhat-comical best friend Elena (played by Rossy de Palma) as a support system during this pregnancy. Ana is under the care of her divorced and domineering mother Teresa (played by Aitana Sánchez-Gijón), who greatly disapproves that Ana is going to be an unwed, teenage mother. Teresa thinks that Ana is headed down the wrong path in life, and she frequently berates Ana about it.
Teresa is a busy actress who often has to travel for her job. She does a lot of work on plays that tour. It’s not stated what Teresa’s ex-husband Alex (Ana’s father) does for a living, but he makes enough money to give financial support to Ana and Teresa. During Ana’s stay in the hospital, Ana says to Teresa that Teresa should tell Alex that he needs to increase his child-support payments, now that Ana is about to become a mother who is still underage.
Despite their very different attitudes about their impending motherhoods, Ana and Janis become fast friends in the maternity ward. Their bond becomes stronger when they both end up giving birth to daughters on the same day. Ana names her daughter Anita. Ana is overwhelmed by being a new mother, but she loves Anita and wants to do what’s best for her. Janis is also a doting mother to Cecilia.
The friendship between Ana and Janis continues after they both leave the hospital. When Ana’s mother Teresa temporarily goes away because of a job in a play, she thinks it’s a good idea for Ana to stay with Janis, who has plenty of room in her home. Janis also has a comfortable living situation because she has a nanny and a housekeeper to help.
Janis and Ana become closer and eventually confide some secrets to each other. Ana, who is a self-admitted “wild child,” tells Janis how she really got pregnant. Janis tells Ana that Janis’ seemingly upstanding family has some shady history: Janis’ father was a Colombian drug dealer. As a sign that Ana wants to start a new life and possibly appear to be more mature, Ana cuts her hair short and dyes it gray.
Ana and Janis initially bond over being two mothers of two daughters who share the same birthday. Their friendship turns into a more intimate relationship when Janis and Ana become lovers while they live together. They do not put a label on their sexuality. Janis has told Ana about Arturo from the beginning. It should come as no surprise when Arturo seems to want to come back into Janis’ life, Ana gets very jealous.
But the real test of the relationship between Ana and Janis is when Janis finds out a shocking secret that she knows could very likely ruin her relationship with Ana if Janis tells Ana. Much of the suspense in “Parallel Mothers” is about whether or not Janis will tell anyone this secret. And if she does, what will happen?
During all of this drama, Janis still has not lost sight of looking for her great-grandfather’s grave. Janis learns more about her family history from her Aunt Brígida (played by Julieta Serrano), who keeps a lot of the family’s ancestral mementos and records. One of the most emotionally moving aspects of “Parallel Mothers” is showing how the Spanish Civil War and its aftermath resulted in thousands of missing people who were presumed murdered but whose families never got proper closure over these disappearances. These disappearances and the untold number of unmarked graves have left an immeasurably sad impact on families and on Spain as a country.
“Parallel Mothers” is not a political film that points fingers at the right-wing Nationalists who won the war, or at Francisco Franco’s regime that ruled Spain until Franco’s death in 1975. Instead, the movie brilliantly weaves the stories of Janis, Ana and Teresa together as examples of what can happen when dishonesty, love and pride have long-term effects on relationships. And what Almodóvar does so well, in very nuanced ways, is show that the “Parallel Mothers” is also about another mother—a mother country called Spain and the effects of dishonesty, love and pride on this mother.
All of the cast members do commendable jobs in their roles, but Cruz is a clear standout because of how authentically she expresses the range of emotions that her Janis character goes through in this story. Simply put: Cruz gives one of her best performances in “Parallel Mothers,” which has a knockout ending that will stay with viewers long after seeing the movie. Considering the movie’s subject matter and Janis’ secret, “Parallel Mothers” could have easily devolved into into a mawkish soap opera. But under Almodóvar’s artistic and thoughtful guidance, “Parallel Mothers” makes an impactful statement about trying to heal from emotional scars, whether they are from personal battles or national wars.
Sony Pictures Classics released “Parallel Mothers” in select U.S. cinemas on December 24, 2021.
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed U.S. city, the sci-fi drama film “Swan Song” features a predominantly black cast of characters (with a some white people, Asians and one Native American) representing the working-class and middle-class.
Culture Clash: A graphic designer, who is dying from an unnamed illness, keeps it a secret from his family and secretly arranges for a clone to replace him.
Culture Audience: “Swan Song” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of star Mahershala Ali and will appeal to people who are interested in to seeing well-acted, emotionally heavy movies about how people might prepare for death.
Mahershala Ali and Naomie Harris in “Swan Song” (Photo courtesy of Apple TV+)
The sci-fi drama “Swan Song” is a somber and slow-paced film that viewers have to be in the right frame of mind to see. It’s a very well-acted film that handles its subject matter with sensitivity, but it should be avoided if you’re not in the mood to see a movie about terminal illness and death. The second half of the movie is much better than the first half, which has some pacing issues and takes a little long to get to the heart of the story. “Swan Song” viewers also must have patience with movies that tell stories in a non-linear, non-chronological way.
Written and directed by Benjamin Cleary, “Swan Song” does a lot with the relatively small number of people in the cast. The movie is set in an unspecified year in the future, in an unnamed U.S. city. A graphic designer named Cameron has recently found out that he’s dying from an illness, which is also not named in the movie. The only clue to what this illness might be is that it causes deterioration of the brain.
Cameron is married to a loving and loyal wife named Poppy (played by Naomie Harris), a British immigrant who works as a school teacher for children with learning disabilities. Poppy uses music therapy for her students and composes and sings a lot of the music for this therapy. Cameron and Poppy have a bright and energetic son named Cory (played by Dax Rey), who is 8 years old.
Cameron is the more introverted spouse in the marriage, while Poppy is more of an extrovert. These personality differences are reflected in what Cameron and Poppy chose for their respective careers. When the movie does show Cameron do anything related to his graphic designer job, he’s by himself, with any outside communication done electronically.
Because a great deal of “Swan Song” is shown in flashbacks (including the movie’s opening scene), this is not a movie that people should watch while being distracted by other things. There are subtle clues that can be picked up when people watch this movie with their full attention. These nuances can lead to greater appreciation of “Swan Song,” which might bore some viewers who are expecting more action.
Cameron hasn’t told his family that he doesn’t have much longer to live. That’s because he’s secretly decided to sign up for a relatively new scientific experiment from a company called Arra, which lets terminally ill people agree to have replacement clones made of themselves. (In this story, a human clone is sometimes called a “regeneration.”) As part of the contract with Arra, the terminally ill people who agree to be replaced by clones have to keep this decision a secret from everyone they know except for Arra employees.
Cameron’s clone is temporarily named Jack (also played by Ali), who not only has a replica of Cameron’s DNA but he also has a full transfer of Cameron’s memories, including subconscious memories. The only physical difference between Cameron and his clone is that the clone is given a small mole on the inside of his hand, so that the Arra staffers can tell the difference between the real Cameron and his clone. Clones are able to mimic human emotions, based on the clone’s implanted memories.
There’s a transition period when the terminally ill person and the assigned clone get to know each other. After this transition period, the clone officially replaces the terminally ill person when the clone starts to live its replacement’s life, and the clone’s memory of being a clone is permanently erased. The terminally ill person than lives at Arra headquarters until death comes.
“Swan Song” goes back and forth between Cameron’s ambivalence over wanting a clone to take over his life and flashbacks to what Cameron’s life was like before he knew that he was dying. In order to prepare for the clone to take over his life, Cameron has to spend time at Arra’s headquarters, which are designed to look like an upscale retreat. Cameron tells Poppy that he’s away on business to explain his absence from home.
Dr. Jo Scott (played by Glenn Close) leads Arra’s cloning project, and she’s determined to make it a success. She has only two human subordinates working with her: a technician named Rafa (played by Lee Shorten) and a psychologist/head technician named Dalton (played by Adam Beach). As Dr. Scott explains to Cameron, the rest of the staffing duties are done by artificial intelligence technology that she says can do the work of abut 50 humans.
Dr. Scott also tells Cameron, when he asks, that he’s only the third human who’s going through Arra’s clone replacement process. She has no ethical qualms about human cloning. “It’ll be as common as heart transplants, in a few years,” Dr. Scott confidently predicts to Cameron. Dr. Scott also keeps a tight reign on Arra’s secret cloning. When Cameron says he wants to tell his family about it, she’s quick to remind him that he signed a contract and that he will “lose the opportunity” if he tells anyone that he arranged to have a replacement clone.
During his stay at Arra headquarters, Cameron meets another terminally ill person named Kate (played by Awkwafina), whose clone has been out in the world for about 42 days when Cameron and Kate first meet. Dr. Scott says that Cameron should also meet Kate’s clone, so that Cameron can see how it’s nearly impossible to tell a clone from a real human being. Cameron goes to Kate’s job (she’s a real estate agent), where he meets Kate’s clone and Kate’s daughter Sammy (played by Mikayla Lagman), who’s about 10 or 11 years old. Sammy has no idea that Kate has been replaced by a clone. The experience of meeting a clone in the real world somewhat unnerves Cameron, who starts to doubt if he made the right decision.
Kate also has mixed emotions about seeing how her family and other loved ones were easily fooled into believing the clone is the real Kate. On the one hand, Kate says that “my guilt faded pretty quick” after she saw how her family wouldn’t have to worry if they knew the truth about Kate being terminally ill. On the other hand, it’s unsettling and sad for Kate to see a clone take over her life while Kate is still alive. Cameron will also go through the same mixed feelings, which Ali conveys with as much skill as a great actor can have when depicting an introvert.
There are additional reasons for why Cameron wants to keep his cloning decision a secret from his loved ones. Poppy is two months pregnant with their second child. And a few years earlier, Poppy’s twin brother Andre (played by Nyasha Hatendi) died in a motorcycle accident. Poppy went into a deep depression, where she could barely leave the house “for a better part of a year,” as Cameron tells Kate.
Poppy is in therapy over her grief. By contrast, Cameron has never been in therapy. Cameron doesn’t want to add to Poppy’s grief by telling her that he’s dying. Cameron also doesn’t want their unborn child and Cory to grow up without a father. Cameron’s own family history is barely mentioned, except when he tells Dr. Scott that his parents divorced when he was 5 years old, and he was raised by his mother. It might explain any extra motivation that Cameron has to make sure that his children have a father in their lives.
Before Cameron found out that he was terminally ill, he and Poppy hit somewhat of a rough patch in their marriage, where they seemed to be drifting apart. In a private conversation between Poppy and Cameron, she tells him that’s she convinced that her unexpected pregnancy with their second child is a sign that the child will be good for their marriage. Cameron seems to agree, but his terminal illness diagnosis has permanently altered those plans, because it’s very likely that Cameron won’t live to see the birth of this child.
Flashbacks show how Cameron and Poppy met: They were both commuter train passengers sharing the same table. They both ordered the same chocolate bar, but when Poppy started eating the chocolate, Cameron mistakenly thought that she was eating his chocolate bar, but they ended up sharing it anyway. It became an endearing joke between them.
Other flashbacks show their courtship, marriage, parenthood, and how Andre was a close member of their family. (Ace LeVere portrays Cory at age 2. Aiden Adejuwon plays Cory at age 5.) One of these flashbacks is of a conversation between Cameron, Poppy and Andre, where Andre talks about the news that human cloning experiments were happening. Cameron seems turned-off by the idea and says that he wouldn’t want a human clone of himself. He obviously changed his mind after getting diagnosed with a terminal illness.
Ali and Harris, who co-starred in the Oscar-winning 2016 film “Moonlight,” have good chemistry together and make a believable couple. Some viewers might feel that not enough of Cameron and Poppy’s relationship is shown, since the vast majority of the relationship is presented in flashback snippets. Harris’ role as Poppy does feel a little underwritten, since she’s mostly depicted as a cheerful and upbeat wife. The depression she had over Andre’s death is not really shown, even though this depression no doubt caused some of strain in her marriage to Cameron.
“Swan Song” is also a little uneven in explaining Arra’s cloning procedures. There are some questionable decisions in the process that no self-respecting psychologist/psychiatrist would recommend. For example, terminally ill humans are allowed to see how their clones interact with loved ones as the humans’ replacements. The clones are equipped with contact lenses that are linked to live video monitors that can be watched at Arra headquarters by the scientists and the human who’s being replaced. If there are no problems in the trial run, the clone’s memory is then erased about being a clone, and the clone will then move on to living life as the human’s replacement.
“Swan Song” doesn’t do a very adequate job of explaining why these scientists would want terminally ill people to see clones completely replacing these humans without the humans’ loved ones knowing, when the psychological effects would be too risky. Some terminally ill people might feel comforted at seeing their replacement clones take over their lives. However, most terminally ill people would probably feel disturbed by seeing a clone living the life that the humans want to have.
After Jack the clone (before he officially becomes Cameron) is sent to live with Poppy and Cory for this trial run, Cameron sees how Jack is interacting with his family. Cameron reacts exactly how you would expect him to react. It leads to a certain confrontation that affects Cameron’s decisions for the rest of the story.
“Swan Song” (whose futuristic cinematography is awash in a lot of gray and blue) doesn’t hit its best stride until the last 20 minutes of the movie, when Cameron makes a pivotal decision that affects his journey. Ali has his most impactful “Swan Song” scenes in this last part of the movie. Cameron is not a naturally expressive person, so he keeps a lot of his emotions bottled inside until he can no longer ignore his feelings. “Swan Song” might be set in the future, but it effectively shows how issues about humanity and the fragility of life are timeless.
Apple TV+ released “Swan Song” in select U.S. cinemas and on Apple TV+ on December 17, 2021.
