Kiernan Shipka Archives

Review: ‘Red One’ (2024), starring Dwayne Johnson, Chris Evans, Lucy Liu and J.K. Simmons

November 12, 2024

by Carla Hay

Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans in “Red One” (Photo by Karen Neal/Amazon Content Services)

“Red One” (2024)

Directed by Jake Kasdan

Culture Representation: Taking place in the United States and in the fictional North Pole, the sci-fi/fantasy/action film “Red One” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some African Americans and Asians) and fictional creatures representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A rebellious bounty hunter/computer hacker and Santa Claus’ uptight security chief meet each other and team up to find and rescue Santa Claus, who has been kidnapped.

Culture Audience: “Red One” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and Christmas-themed movies that are loud, hyperactive and silly.

Kristofer Hivju and Dwayne Johnson in “Red One” (Photo by Frank Masi/Amazon Content Services)

The Christmas action comedy “Red One” is the equivalent of Santa Claus delivering an avalanche of coal. The incoherent plot is about rescuing a kidnapped Santa, but viewers will feel like the ones being taken hostage by this unfunny and bloated abomination. It’s the type of big-budget movie that looks like it came from a low-rent concept for a video game with product placements.

Directed by Jake Kasdan and written by Chris Morgan, “Red One” lurches from scene to scene, often by explaining what’s going on in a sloppy and hyperactive way. There is no character in this movie that has an emotional range that goes beyond (1) inflicting chaos or (2) reacting to the chaos inflicted. There’s some half-hearted preaching about adults keeping their inner child alive during the Christmas holidays, but it all comes across as tacked-on sentimentality.

Product placements and visual effects are the main priorities for “Red One,” which has a story that’s overstuffed with stupid distractions and moronic dialogue. The movie clumsily begins with a scene showing future bounty hunter Jack O’Malley as a kid (played by Wyatt Hunt), who’s about 8 or 9 years old and has an enthusiasm for using the Internet. Jack doesn’t really believe in Santa Claus, even though Jack’s Uncle Rick (played by Marc Evan Jackson) tells Jack that Santa Claus really exists. It’s mentioned that Rick is a father figure in Jack’s life because Jack’s biological father abandoned Jack and Jack’s mother.

Thirty years later, Jack (played by Chris Evans) is a bounty hunter and an elusive hacker on the Dark Web, where he has the nickname The Wolf. Jack is a freewheeling bachelor with commitment issues. It’s one of the main reasons why he’s been a flaky and frequently absentee father to his son Dylan (played by Wesley Kimmel), who’s about 13 or 14 years old.

Dylan lives with his mother Olivia (played by Mary Elizabeth Ellis), a medical doctor who is currently married to a husband who is not named or seen in the movie. It’s implied that Jack and Olivia were never married, never lived together, and never even had a committed relationship, but they decided to co-parent Dylan. So far, self-absorbed Jack has been failing miserably at being a responsible parent.

Meanwhile, Santa Claus (played by J.K. Simmons), also known as Nicholas or Nick, has been dutifully making an appearance at a shopping mall to meet children who tell him what they want for Christmas. This Santa Claus is not a traditional jolly and plump Santa. The Santa in “Red One” lifts weights for physical workouts and has an attitude of a cynically wise grandfather who knows what he has to say to make kids happy, even if he really doesn’t mean it.

Santa Claus’ security chief is Callum “Cal” Drift (played by Dwayne Johnson), a muscular and stern protector who has been working with Santa Claus for the last 542 years. (Johnson is also one of the producers of “Red One.”) Callum has recently given his resignation to Santa Claus because Callum believes that things have gotten worse in the world and there are more naughty people than nice people. Callum says he can also no longer see the inner children in adults. Christmas no longer makes him happy but has made him sad for this reason.

This is the type of abysmal dialogue that’s in “Red One.” In a scene where Callum and Santa discuss Callum’s impending exit from the job, Santa Claus says about the world’s people: “They need us now more than ever.” Callum responds: “You need someone younger.”

Santa comments, “We don’t need to change them. They need to change themselves. We work for the kids, Cal—even when they’re not kids anymore.” Santa adds, “Let’s have a cookie.” Callum replies, “The answer to everything.”

Santa is obviously disappointed that he is losing Callum, but Callum has made up his mind that he wants to retire from this line of work. Callum works for the Mythological Oversight and Restoration Authority (MORA), a secretive security corporation where he reports to Zoe Harlow (played by Lucy Liu), a no-nonsense supervisor. MORA looks out for mythological beings and protects them at all costs. Santa Claus’ code name with MORA is Red One.

Jack was hired by an anonymous entity to hack into a computer system. Unbeknownst to Jack, this hacking exposed the secret location of Santa Claus on the North Pole to the entity that hired Jack. Santa Claus is then kidnapped from his home on the North Pole. MORA finds out that Jack was indirectly responsible for this kidnapping, so Callum is dispatched to force Jack to help Callum find Santa Claus.

If you’re already rolling your eyes at the description of this plot, “Red One” gets even worse as it goes along. Other characters who are part of the story are Krampus (played by Kristofer Hivju), the horned mythological creature who punishes naughty children; a Christmas witch named Gryla (played by Kiernan Shipka); and a sleazy business jerk named Ted (played by Nick Kroll), who is tracked down by Jack and Callum on a Hawaiian beach. It’s all just an excuse for “Red One” to be filmed partially in Hawaii, where the movie filmed on the island of Oahu.

In “Red One,” Krampus is supposed to be Santa’s brother, with no explanation for why human Santa and non-human Krampus could be related. Krampus is also an ex-lover of Gryla, who is described as a “900-year-old ogre with 13 sons who work at her command.” The scenes with Krampus are some of the worst in this already bad movie, which didn’t need the Krampus character at all.

The visual effects in “Red One” also include life-sized villain snowmen that are about as exciting as watching snow melt. There’s a North Pole security team called ELF (an acronym for enforcement, logistics and fortification) that includes a talking polar bear named Agent Garcia (voiced by Reinaldo Faberlle), another character that didn’t need to be in this movie. There are also humanoid robots that show up with no real explanation of their origin. And, of course, there are Santa’s reindeer, who have no names and no personalities.

Jack and Callum go through the usual formulaic motions of two characters with opposite personalities who must learn to work together for a common goal. The expected bickering and wisecracking banter ensue. And almost all of it in “Red One” fails to be funny or entertaining. Johnson and Evans have played these types of roles in many other movies. There’s nothing new to see here in their mediocre performances in “Red One.”

Except for Gryla, female characters in “Red One” are merely sidelined observers of most of the action. “Red One” mainly has Mrs. Claus (played by Bonnie Hunt) in a small role as the worried wife at home who bakes cookies. Hunt’s considerable comedic talent is wasted in this movie, which relegates her to a shallow and almost useless role. Zoe is Callum’s boss, but Callum gets to make the biggest and boldest moves. Shipka looks like she’s having fun playing a villain, but this villain’s personality is restricted to being one-dimensional stereotype.

“Red One” tries to juggle many different subplots like a juggler who ends up dropping too many things thrown in the air. There might be enough in “Red One” to satisfy viewers looking for some fantasy genre visual effects, but the movie’s main characters and story are extremely derivative and fail to be interesting. “Red One” is just an unimaginative mush of ideas using the same formula as comedic movies about buddy cops with clashing personalities. “Red One” is also a shameless showcase of what people dislike the most about the crass commercialism of Christmas.

Amazon MGM Studios will release “Red One” in U.S. cinemas on November 15, 2024. A sneak preview of the movie was shown in U.S. cinemas on November 10, 2024.

Review: ‘Twisters’ (2024), starring Daisy Edgar-Jones, Glen Powell and Anthony Ramos

July 18, 2024

by Carla Hay

Daisy Edgar-Jones, Anthony Ramos and Glen Powell in “Twisters” (Photo by Melinda Sue Gordon/Universal Pictures)

“Twisters” (2024)

Directed by Lee Isaac Chung

Culture Representation: Taking place in Oklahoma and briefly in New York City, the action film “Twisters” ( a continuation of the franchise that started with 1996’s “Twister”) features a racially diverse cast of characters (white, Latin, African American and Asian) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A meteorologist, who feels guilty over the death of her three close friends in a tornado five years before, is persuaded to temporarily join a group of scientific tornado chasers, who are competing against a non-scientific group of YouTube tornado chasers.

Culture Audience: “Twisters” will appeal primarily to people are fans of the 1996 “Twister” movie and similar movies about weather disasters.

Glen Powell and Daisy Edgar-Jones in “Twisters” (Photo by Melinda Sue Gordon/Universal Pictures)

“Twisters” is not as suspenseful as 1996’s “Twister,” but “Twisters” still has plenty of action thrills in this franchise story about tornado chasers. The characters’ relationships are predictable but elevated by believable chemistry and good acting. As expected, “Twisters” has better visual effects than “Twister,” but the pacing of “Twisters” somewhat drags in the middle of the movie. Overall, it’s a crowd-pleasing film that does what is advertised.

Directed by Lee Isaac Chung and written by Mark L. Smith, “Twisters” has an entirely new set of cast members from “Twister,” but there are similarities between the two movies. Both movies have the tornadoes taking place in Oklahoma. Both movies feature storylines of “corporate-sponsored” tornado chasers versus “scrappy independent” tornado chasers.

Both movies have bickering between the leading male character and the leading female character because they’re in a power struggle, and they both want to deny an attraction that exists between them. The woman in this would-be couple is the more intellectual scientist, while the man is the less-educated by equally passionate tornado chaser. One of them has tremendous guilt over the tornado death of at least one person close to them. In both movies, the storm-chasing team that aims to find a way to diffuse tornadoes does so by using equipment with names inspired by characters in “The Wizard of Oz.”

“Twister” (directed by Jan de Bont and written by Michael Crichton and Anne-Marie Martin) had Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton starring as divorcing couple Dr. Jo Harding and meteorologist Bill Harding, who unexpectedly get thrown back together into tornado chasing, after Bill says he has retired from tornado chasing. They try to put a stop to high-level tornadoes.

Jo is motivated to be a tornado chaser because she witnessed her farmer father die in a tornado when she was about 5 or 6 years old. Bill visits Jo in Oklahoma because he wants her to sign their divorce papers. Bill has brought his fiancée Dr. Melissa Reeves (played by Jami Gertz), a psychotherapist, along for this trip. Jo and her tornado-chasing team use equipment that they call Dorothy.

“Twisters” updates the franchise by having a racially diverse cast, compared to the all-white cast of “Twister.” Another 21st century update to “Twisters” is YouTube is a big part of the plot because one of the rival tornado-chasing groups has a YouTube channel where the group does many livestreams. “Twisters” also makes more of an effort to show the tornado chasers helping strangers who are tornado victims after a tornado has turned a community into a disaster area. In “Twister,” the tornado chasers were definitely more self-absorbed and more willfully oblivious to helping communities recover from tornado disasters.

“Twisters” begins in an unnamed city in Oklahoma, the U.S. state where the movie was filmed on location. A group of tornado chasers, led by Ph.D. candidate Kate Carter (played by Daisy Edgar-Jones), is chasing a tornado as part of an experiment to see if the scientific powder and data sensory devices and they’ve created will diffuse and track the tornado. They use equipment that they call Dorothy, which is a nod to the first “Twister” movie. The plan is to open barrels of the powders and data sensory devices in the eye of a tornado.

Kate calls this experiment the Tornado Tamer Project, which is part of her Ph.D. thesis about disrupting tornado dynamics. If Kate’s theory works, she hopes that she can get grant funding for the Tornado Tamer Project. The other young people in the group are Kate’s loving and supportive boyfriend Jeb (played by Daryl McCormack) and their close friends Javier “Javi” Rivera (played by Anthony Ramos), who is energetic and opinionated; Addy (played by Kiernan Shipka), who is perky and sweet-natured; and Praveen (played by Nik Dodani), who is thoughtful and nerdy.

It’s mentioned several times in “Twisters” that Kate has an uncanny ability to predict which are the most dangerous tornadoes to follow. It’s an instinct that her farmer mother Cathy Carter (played by Maura Tierney), who’s shown later in the movie, says Kate has had since Kate was a little girl. Kate is an only child who was raised by her single mother. Kate’s father is not seen or mentioned in the movie, although one of Kate’s friends calls Cathy “Mrs. Carter.” She welcomes Kate’s friends into her home and likes to cook meals for them.

In the beginning of “Twisters,” Kate and her Tornado Tamer crew are chasing a tornado where they plan to do their experiment. Unfortunately, Kate miscalculated about what level the tornado was: It turns out to be F5 (highest level of destruction) tornado. Kate, Jeb, Addy and Praveen are all in the same vehicle and are caught right in the middle of the tornado. They escape from the car, but Kate is the only one of the four to survive. Javi was in a safer area in a separate vehicle, so he also survived.

Five years later, Kate is now working as a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in New York City. Through conversations in the movie, it’s revealed that after the tornado tragedy, Kate dropped out of her Ph.D. program and gave up on tornado chasing. At this point in her life, Kate has also been avoiding her mother’s phone calls and has rarely visited Oklahoma since moving away.

One day, Kate gets an unexpected visitor at her office: Javi, who tells her that he also moved away from Oklahoma after the tragedy. Javi says that after he graduated from their university program, he went back to his hometown of Miami and enlisted in the military. He also tells Kate that while he was in the military, he worked with portable radars that detect missiles. Javi has access to the prototypes and says they can use these radars for tornadoes, to make three points in the shape of a 3-D type of triangle. Later, it’s revealed that these radars are called Tin Man, Scarecrow and Lion, and their power control center is called Wizard.

Kate turns down Javi’s offer to work with him. Javi is persistent though. Later, he calls Kate and tells her that he’s put together a great team of scientists called Storm Par to help him. Storm Par also has corporate sponsorship for funding. Kate is persuaded to help Storm Par because of Javi’s radar idea and because Oklahoma is having an outbreak of tornadoes. However, Kate tells Javi that she will only work with Storm Par for one week.

One of the flaws of 1996’s “Twister” is that it never explained why so many tornadoes were happening in such a short period of time. “Twisters” avoids that flaw by repeatedly showing flashes of TV news reports saying that Oklahoma is having a “once in a generation” outbreak of tornadoes. In “Twisters,” the tornadoes arrive with little to no warning. If there is any warning, it could be as short as two or three minutes.

Soon after arriving in Oklahoma, an emotionally guarded Kate and the Storm Par team encounter a scrappy group of tornado-chasing YouTubers from Arkansas. The leader of the group calls himself a “tornado wrangler.” The group is led by cocky and frequently smirking Tyler Owens (played by Glen Powell), who is the star of this YouTube channel, which has about 1 million subscribers. Tyler’s tornado-chasing motto is: “If you feel it, chase it.” Like many YouTube content creators, Tyler sells a lot of branded merchandise.

Tyler is the only person in his group with experience as a meteorologist. (He also mentions later that he used to be a rodeo rider, as if the movie wants to prove that Tyler has cowboy credentials too.) The other people in Tyler’s group are camera operator Boone (played by Brandon Perea), a scruffy sidekick who does a lot of whooping and hollering; middle-aged Dexter (played by Tunde Adebimpe), who talks like a science nerd, even if he doesn’t have a college degree; Lily (played by Sasha Lane), a friendly hippie; and Dani (played by Katy O’Brian), an androgynous person who likes to hawk a lot of the group’s merchandise.

Tyler and his group loudly ride around and like to do daredevil things for their YouTube channel, such as set off fireworks in tornadoes. The Tornado Wranglers are being accompanied by a London-based reporter named Ben (played by Harry Hadden-Paton), who is doing an article about storm chasers. Ben, who is bespectacled and often nervous, is the token “buttoned-up” person who feels out of place and does the most screaming in fear as a passenger during these tornado-chasing runs. Dr. Melissa Reeves had that role in the 1996 “Twister” movie.

Besides Javi, the only Storm Par member whose personality is shown in “Twisters” is a frequently scowling or pouting colleague named Scott (played by David Corenswet), a scientist snob. Scott’s uncle Marshall Riggs (played by David Born) is the property developer mogul who is Storm Par’s chief investor. You can easily predict why Marshall would be interested in swooping in on victims of tornado disasters who lost their homes. Scott, who shows hints of sexism, is jealous/mistrustful of Kate.

Just like in “Twister,” the two rival groups of tornado chasers in “Twisters” compete to see who can get to the most dangerous tornadoes first. In “Twister,” the rival group to Jo’s independent group is a corporate-sponsored group led by sneering jerk named Dr. Jonas Miller (played by Cary Elwes), who is such an obvious villain, if he had a moustache, he would’ve twirled it. In “Twister,” Jo has the “underdog” group, which includes a wacky stoner named Dustin Davis (played by scene-stealing Philip Seymour Hoffman). In “Twisters,” Tyler’s group is the “underdog” group.

In “Twisters,” there is no love triangle, although there are hints that Javi is attracted to Kate, but he knows he has no chance of dating her because she sees him only as a platonic friend. The same can’t be said for Tyler. The back-and-forth sniping between Kate and Tyler is the type we’ve seen in many other movies where two people meet under competitive circumstances, they annoy each other with insults, but you know they’re really attracted to each other. After a while, Tyler makes his romantic intentions obvious, but Kate is the one who plays hard to get.

Because of advances in technology, the visual effects in “Twisters” are superior to what’s seen in “Twister.” Oddly though, “Twisters” does not show any signs that animals get killed in these tornadoes. In “Twister,” there’s a memorable scene where Jo and Bill see a cow caught up in the tornado. Maybe the “Twisters” filmmakers avoided showing animals getting swept up in tornadoes because they didn’t want animal rights activists to be offended.

As for the would-be romance, the circumstances are different in “Twister” and “Twisters.” “Twister” is about a couple with a marriage history together, and now a third person is involved. That’s in contrast to “Twisters,” which has a would-be couple who haven’t really begun dating each other. The relationships in “Twister” are more interesting to watch than the relationships in “Twisters.”

After the tornado tragedy happens in the beginning of “Twisters,” Kate is emotionally disconnected from almost everyone for most of the story, until she starts to warm up a little and show her vulnerabilities. Tyler is a stereotype of an overconfident heartthrob, but Powell brings undeniable charisma to this character. Edgar-Jones and Ramos also do quite well in their roles. “Twisters” could have told or showed more personal information about the other people in Tyler’s group. The movie never reveals what motivated these other members to become tornado chasers.

As it stands, “Twisters” capably handles what can be expected from movies about weather disasters, even if some of the scenes (just like in “Twister”) look unrealistic in how people are able to survive situations that would kill people in real life. The scientific aspects of the “Twisters” story are simplified so that the average non-scientist can understand. It’s obvious from the way that “Twisters” ends, many of these characters will be seen again in another movie in the franchise.

Universal Pictures will release “Twisters” in U.S. cinemas on July 19, 2024. A sneak preview of the movie was shown in U.S. cinemas on July 17, 2024.

Review: ‘Longlegs,’ starring Maika Monroe and Nicolas Cage

July 9, 2024

by Carla Hay

“Longlegs”

Directed by Osgood Perkins

Culture Representation: Taking place in Oregon in the 1990s, the horror film “Longlegs” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some African Americans and one Asian person) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: FBI agent Lee Harker is on the hunt for a serial killer who calls himself Longlegs and who has a connection to her past that haunts her.

Culture Audience: “Longlegs” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and horror movies about trying to capture serial killers.

Blair Underwood in “Longlegs” (Photo courtesy of Neon)

The horror mystery film “Longlegs” sometimes drags with slow pacing and repetitive scenarios, but the movie has a mostly gripping buildup that leads to a knockout ending. Nicolas Cage gives one of the creepiest and weirdest performances of his career. And that’s saying a lot, considering that Cage has been playing creepy and weird characters in many of his recent movies.

Written and directed by Osgood Perkins, “Longlegs” takes place in Oregon in the 1990s, wth flashbacks to the 1970s. (The movie was actually filmed in Vancouver.) “Longlegs” had its world premiere at the 2024 edition of Beyond Fest. The movie’s opening scene—which takes place somewhere in Oregon, during the winter season in 1974—shows who the title character is: He’s a serial killer who calls himself Longlegs (played by Cage), and he has evaded capture since he was first known to be a serial killer in the 1960s.

In the movie’s first scene, there’s snow on the ground, and Longlegs (who has long, stringy hair and a high-pitched voice) is seen talking to an adolescent girl (played by Lauren Acala) outside of her home. She’s about 12 or 13 years old. Longlegs’ face is only partially shown. He is babbling at her, saying nonsensical things such as, “It seems as if I wore my long legs for you.” He also reaches his hands out to her before the scene abruptly ends.

It’s eventually revealed that this girl has grown up to be FBI agent Lee Harker (played by Maika Monroe), who is on the FBI’s case to find and capture Longlegs. This elusive serial killer has a pattern: He sends letters to law enforcement taking credit for a massacre in which a father has killed his family members and then himself in the family home. The father usually does not have a history of violence, so these massacres are extremely shocking to the communities where the killings take place.

One of the main things that these massacres have in common is that there is a daughter in the family whose birthday is on the 14th of the month. Each massacre also takes place on the daughter’s birthday. He sends letters in coded symbols. (It’s a tactic that’s similar to what California’s real-like Zodiac Killer did.) “Longlegs” spends quite a bit of time on Lee trying to crack this code. Longlegs is also open about having occult beliefs and being a satanist.

Lee is a stoic workaholic who is a loner. Her bottled-up persona masks a lot of childhood turmoil. Lee was raised by a single mother named Ruth Harker (played by Alicia Witt), who is very religious and is overly protective of Lee. (Lee’s father is not seen or mentioned in the movie.) Several scenes in the movie show Lee and Ruth having phone conversations that indicate their relationship is very complicated.

The FBI colleagues whom Lee works with the most are her supervisor Agent Carter (played by Blair Underwood) and Agent Browning (played by Michelle Choi-Lee), who is more experienced than Lee. Agent Browning is somewhat condescending to Lee and doubts that Lee has what it takes to solve this case, even though Lee shows signs that she has an uncanny intuition that might be a psychic ability. A few scenes in the movie show Agent Browning clashing with Lee.

Agent Carter can be demanding but he sees himself as Lee’s caring mentor. At one point, Agent Carter invites Lee into his home and introduces her to his wife Anna (played by Carmel Amit) and their daughter Ruby Carter (played by Ava Kelders), who is very curious about Lee’s FBI work. It takes a while for Lee to warm up to Ruby because Lee seems to be uncomfortable with children.

“Longlegs” also features the serial killer’s only known survivor: Carrie Anne Camera (played by Kiernan Shipka), who is in a psychiatric facility. The movie has flashbacks to Carrie Anne (played by Maila Hosie) as a child when she encountered Longlegs. Naturally, Lee and her FBI colleagues think that Carrie Anne has vital clues that could lead to the capture of Longlegs. All of the “Longlegs” cast members give serviceable performances in this movie, except for Cage who goes all-in (and sometimes overboard) in depicting this very disturbed serial killer.

There are scenes that show that Longlegs is a big fan of T. Rex, the British band that was part of the 1970s “glam rock” era. Some of the lyrics from T. Rex’s hit song “Bang a Gong (Get It On)” are shown in the beginning of the movie, and the song is played during the film’s end credits. In a scene where Longlegs is driving by himself, he is listening to T. Rex’s “Planet Queen” in his car. And at Longlegs’ home, there’s a photo of T. Rex lead singer Marc Bolan hanging on Longlegs’ bedroom wall.

“Longlegs” does not show this serial killer as much as the movie’s title might suggest. His entire face isn’t revealed until about halfway through the movie. One of the movie’s biggest flaws is how it shows that Longlegs (his real name is eventually revealed) has been a well-known weirdo in the communities where he’s lived. There’s a scene where he walks into a convenience store and does his usual bizarre rambling. His physical appearance is also unsettling.

The teenage clerk (played by Bea Perkins) who’s at the cash register knows who he is and seems slightly alarmed but she also doesn’t seem surprised that he’s acting this way. It seems hard to believe that this creep hasn’t been on law enforcement’s radar sooner because he would stand out as a likely suspect by people in the community who would tell law enforcement about him. He’s not the type of serial killer who easily “blends in” anywhere.

Just like writer/director Perkins did for his 2020 horror film “Gretel & Hansel,” he bathes “Longlegs” in lighting that’s filled with brown and dark gold. (Andres Arochi is the cinematographer for “Longlegs.” Galo Olivares is the cinematographer for “Gretel & Hansel.”) There are just a few atmospheric scenes in “Longlegs” that don’t further the story very well. However, the storytelling in “Longlegs” is a marked improvement over the frequently incoherent “Gretel & Hansel.”

“Longlegs” does a very good job at keeping viewers intrigued about who Longlegs really is and the motives for his crimes. The revelations aren’t always predictable. The death scenes in the movie are quite gory and bloody, but not excessive. What sets “Longlegs” apart from many other “serial killer on the loose” horror movies is how it takes the story to an unexpected and twisted revelation that won’t soon be forgotten.

Neon will release “Longlegs” in U.S. cinemas on July 12, 2024. The movie will be released on digital and VOD on August 23, 2024. “Longlegs” wll be released on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray and DVD on September 24, 2024.

Review: ‘Wildflower’ (2023), starring Kiernan Shipka, Dash Mihok, Charlie Plummer, Erika Alexander, Samantha Hyde, Jacki Weaver and Jean Smart

March 19, 2023

by Carla Hay

Pictured clockwise, from left: Reid Scott, Alexandra Daddario, Jean Smart, Charlie Plummer, Kiernan Shipka, Samantha Hyde, Dash Mihok, Jacki Weaver and Brad Garrett in “Wildflower” (Photo courtesy of Momentum Pictures)

“Wildflower” (2023)

Directed by Matt Smukler

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed city in Nevada (and briefly in Van Nuys, California), the comedy/drama film “Wildflower,” which is based on real people, features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans, Asians and Latinos) representing the working-class. middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A sarcastic and intelligent teenager, who is in her last year of high school, gets in a coma after a mysterious accident, and she narrates her life story of being raised by intellectually disabled parents whom she resents because they depend on her to be the most responsible person in the household.

Culture Audience: “Wildflower” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and don’t mind watching rambling and disjointed stories about teenagers and bickering families.

Kannon Omachi and Kiernan Shipka in “Wildflower” (Photo courtesy of Momentum Pictures)

Based on a true story, “Wildflower” has an admirable performance from Kiernan Shipka, but there are too many problems with this uneven dramedy, including awkward subplots that go nowhere and underdeveloped characters that are bad parodies of real people. It’s one of those movies that has much of the narrative coming from voiceovers of a character who’s supposed to be in a coma. Very few movies can pull off this type of narrative in a way that is appealing. In “Wildflower,” the coma narration is cringeworthy—and so are many other parts of this misguided film.

Directed by Matt Smukler and written by Jana Savage, “Wildflower” is inspired by the real-life experiences of Smukler’s family. According to the “Wildflower” production notes, the protagonist of the movie is based on Smukler’s niece Christina. As part of Christina’s college admission application to the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), Smukler made a short documentary film about Christina’s experiences growing up as a child of parents with intellectual disabilities. Savage came up with the idea to make Christina’s story into a scripted feature film. The result is “Wildflower” (which had its world premiere at the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival), but the film takes shameless detours into formulaic schmaltz that cheapens the quality of what could have been a more meaningful movie.

In the beginning of “Wildflower” (which takes place mostly in an unnamed city in Nevada) viewers see Bambi “Bea” Johnson (played by Shipka) is in a coma in a hospital. Bea is 17 years old and in her last year of high school. She has a head injury, but no one at the hospital knows how she got the injury. A flashback later shows how an unconscious Bea ended up at the hospital and what caused her injury. Bea’s voiceover narration tells viewers that she can’t remember how she got injured either, but she wants to tell her life story, based on what she remembers of her life.

Several of Bea’s worried family members have gathered in the hospital room. And because this movie is filled with clichés about bickering families, it doesn’t take long for the arguing to start. The movie doesn’t do a very good job of introducing these family members, who talk over each other and disjointedly show up in this hospital scene that takes place in the beginning of the movie. You probably have to take notes (mentally or literally) to keep track of all these squawking relatives.

Bea is the only child of Derek Johnson (played by Dash Mihok) and Sharon Johnson (played by Samantha Hyde), who have intellectual disabilities. A flashback later explains that Derek got a head injury in a car accident when he was 12 years old. Sharon was born with an underdeveloped brain.

Derek and Sharon used to live in Van Nuys, California. They met when Sharon was 21, and Derek (who was around the same age, maybe slightly older) was hired by Sharon’s parents to mow the family’s lawn. Sharon and Derek began dating each other soon afterward. Derek and Sharon quickly fell in love wither each other, and they eloped—much to the dismay of both of their families.

Sharon’s parents are Peg McDonald (played by Jean Smart) and Earl Edelman (played by Brad Garrett), who are now divorced. (Peg went back to her maiden surname after the divorce.) Peg and Earl are among the family members who are in Bea’s hospital room.

Derek’s parents are Loretta (played by Jacki Weaver) and Hal (played by Chris Mulkey), who are also divorced. Hal is not in the hospital room, but Loretta is—much to the disdain of Peg, because the two women have had a longstanding feud with each other. Derek is an only child.

Peg has another daughter: the materialistic and vain Joy (played by Alexandra Daddario), who has a condescending attitude toward her sister Sharon. Joy and her equally snooty husband Ben (played by Reid Scott) are also in the hospital room. Peg is a control freak who constantly complains if things don’t go her way. Joy is a lot like Peg.

Loretta, who smokes a lot and drinks a lot of alcohol, immediately annoys Peg by lighting up a cigarette inside the hospital room. It’s a very rude (not to mention illegal) thing for Loretta to do in a hospital room, but Peg is the only one in the family with the backbone to stand up to Loretta about it. The movie makes it a running gag that Loretta’s constant cigarette smoking annoys Peg. And it’s a “joke” that quickly gets old and tiresome. Loretta’s obnoxiousness is supposed to look “cute” because she’s a senior citizen, but it just looks grating.

Flashbacks show that after Derek and Sharon got married, both of their parents were worried about Derek and Sharon not being capable of raising a family. During a family meeting between Derek’s parents and Sharon’s parents, both couples agreed that it would be a bad idea for Derek and Sharon to become parents. The purpose of the meeting was to figure out what to do about this marriage that does not have the approval of all four of the newlyweds’ parents. However, there was a big disagreement about what to do.

Sharon’s parents (who raised Sharon as Jewish) thought that Derek and Sharon should get divorced as soon as possible. However, Derek’s parents (especially Loretta) are strict Catholics who think divorce is a big stigma. Loretta suggested that Sharon be sterilized and said that Sharon was a promiscuous temptress who “trapped” Derek into this marriage. (Loretta used cruder terms than that to describe Sharon.) Peg was deeply offended by Loretta’s remarks and has held a grudge against Loretta ever since. Neither of these parents’ schemes became a reality, since Derek and Sharon became parents to Bea and remain happily married throughout this story.

More flashbacks show that when Bea was 10 years old (played by Ryan Kiera Armstrong), her father Derek illegally taught her how to drive. The secret is exposed when Bea crashed the car on a neighborhood street (fortunately, no one was hurt) when Bea went looking for the family dog, which ran out of the house because Sharon left the front door open. Although Bea denied being the driver of the car, Derek and Sharon were declared unfit parents. Joy and Ben (who had become parents of twin sons at this point) got custody of Bea.

Joy and Ben find out that Bea is extremely resistant to their rules and their trendy New Age way of parenting. From a very young age, Bea was expected to handle a lot of responsibilities for her parents, who treated her like a mini-adult who didn’t have the type of rules and discipline that other kids were expected to have. Bea is bratty and rebellious under the guardianship of Ben and Joy. Ben privately tells Joy what he thinks of Bea’s irreverence: “She’s like a feral dog.”

Eventually, Derek and Sharon convince child welfare authorities to let them have custody of Bea again. She has spent her teenage years living with her parents. As a compromise to giving back custody of Bea to her parents, Joy and Ben have insisted on paying for Bea to go to an elite private school.

Derek has problems holding a steady job. He currently works as a janitor at a recreational games center. He also plans to become a rideshare driver. Sharon, who is a gambling addict, was getting disability payments from the government until Derek put a stop to it, because he doesn’t think Sharon is disabled. Bea has a part-time job doing janitorial work at her school, to help pay for her parents’ household expenses, but she gets angry and frustrated because her parents often irresponsibly spend the money that they take from her.

There’s a lot of Bea’s family history to unpack in this movie, but “Wildflower” has a very disappointing way of starting off on one tangent and then not really finishing it before going on to others tangents and not really finishing them either. The results are an erratic, overstuffed movie fllled with a lot of underdeveloped characters, unfinished subplots and unanswered questions. “Wildflower” also has trouble balancing the comedy and drama.

There’s a very distracting and unnecessary subplot about a children’s protective services worker named Mary (played by Erika Alexander), who first met Bea on the day of the car accident. And lo and behold, Mary shows up years later at the hospital, while Bea is in a coma. Even though there’s no evidence that Bea’s parents were responsible for Bea’s head injury, Mary is there to investigate, since Bea’s parents lost custody of Bea in the past.

And so, there are several scenes of Mary awkwardly interviewing people close to Bea. Mary wants to find out who caused the injury, and she wants to determine if Bea’s parents are fit to take care of Bea if she wakes up from the coma and is discharged from the hospital. Mary is inclined to think that Bea’s parents will need help taking care of Bea in Bea’s recovery.

Bea’s life in high school is also told mostly in flashbacks. Before she ended up in a coma, Bea was an outstanding academic student whose favorite subject was astronomy. She’s also a star of the school’s track team. However, she shuns the idea of being a “popular” student. She feels like a misfit at this school, because she comes from a low-income household and because her parents are disabled.

Bea has a guidance counselor at school named Alex Vasquez (played by Victor Rasuk), who has been encouraging Bea to apply to universities to continue her education. However, Bea has been very reluctant because she thinks she needs to skip college to take care of her parents. Bea is also worried about how much college tuition might cost, even though Mr. Vasquez assures Bea that she’s such an excellent student, she should have no problems getting a scholarship. UCLA is one of the universities that Mr. Vasquez suggests to Bea.

Another person who thinks Bea should go to a university after she graduates from high school is Ethan Rivers (played by Charlie Plummer), a classmate who has recently transferred to this high school. Ethan comes from a rich family (his father owns the “largest Porta Potty company in Nevada”), but he downplays his wealth in order to let people know that he’s humble and down-to-earth. Many of the students automatically think Ethan is kind of weird because the word has gotten out that Ethan had testicular cancer that left him with one testicle.

Bea’s best friend at school is Mia Tanaka (played by Kannon Omachi), who is a brainy eccentric, just like Bea. And there’s predictably a “mean girls” clique that bullies and taunts Bea and Mia. This clique is led by an ultra-snob named Esther (played by Chloe Rose Robertson), who is attracted to Ethan, but she’s already dating someone else. Ethan, who’s in the same astronomy class as Bea, tries to get close to her by offering to share his class notes with her, but she rebuffs his obvious interest in her the first time that he talks to her.

Mia and Bea act like they don’t care about being accepted by the “cool kids,” but they really do care, because Mia and Bea tell Sharon to buy alcohol for them (it was Bea’s idea) so they can take the alcohol as a gift to crash a house party hosted by Esther. Also at the party is Esther’s older brother Tyler (played by Josh Plasse), an adult of college age who gets a snide remark from Bea because she says it’s pathetic that someone of Tyler’s age is partying with mostly underage high schoolers. It’s at this party that Bea and Ethan connect for the first time.

“Wildflower” then drones on and on with typical high school drama that sometimes gets very dull. Mia and Bea made a pact not to go to their school prom, but then things change when Ethan asks Bea to the prom, and she says yes. There’s some love triangle jealousy between Ethan, Bea and Esther. And, of course, there’s more arguing between Bea and her parents.

Nowhere does this movie explain why Bea has to do cleanup work at her high school, when there are so many other part-time jobs she could have had that wouldn’t make her feel embarrassed in front of her peers. It all just looks contrived for a scene so that “mean girl” Esther and “snarky underdog” Bea can have a verbal confrontation where Esther tries to humiliate Bea, and Bea makes snappy comments as a comeback. (This isn’t spoiler information. It’s shown in the movie’s trailer.)

The romance between Ethan and Bea is sweet but very rushed and at times hard to believe. Even though Ethan meets Bea’s parents and wholeheartedly accepts them with no judgment, Bea never shows an interest in meeting Ethan’s family, nor does Ethan invite her to meet his family. It’s yet another question that the movie never bothers to answer. Meanwhile, the friendship between Mia and Bea is reduced to superficial scenes of them shopping together and debating about whether or not it’s worth going to their school’s upcoming prom.

There are several talented cast members in “Wildflower,” but only Shipka has a character with layers to a personality. Everyone else just kind of drifts in and out of the story, in service of vapid sitcom scenarios or melodrama that often looks fake. “Wildflower” does the biggest disservice to Weaver, whose aggressively clownish Loretta character is very beneath Weaver’s immense talent.

The movie’s depiction of disabled people sometimes falls into negative stereotypes. “Wildflower” is not unwatchable, but it lacks a clear vision and a cohesive narrative. For a movie with a lot of voiceover narration, it ultimately doesn’t have a lot of interesting things to say.

Momentum Pictures released “Wildflower” in select U.S. cinemas on March 17, 2023. The movie will be released on digital and VOD on March 21, 2023.