Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed city in England, the horror film “Starve Acre” (based on the 2019 novel of the same name) features an all-white group of people representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: A married couple, who live with their 5-year-old son on the husband’s inherted estate property, experience terror that has to do with a wood sprite character named Jack Grey, who was written about by the husband’s now-deceased father.
Culture Audience: “Starve Acre” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the movies headliners and the book on which the movie is based, but this is a horror movie that has more style than substance.
Morfydd Clark in “Starve Acre” (Photo courtesy of Brainstorm Media)
The overrated horror flick “Starve Acre” is a hollow, pretentious and boring adaptation of its namesake novel. By the end of the movie, nothing of substance is revealed about the main characters or the evil that wreaks havoc on those characters. If you want to watch a movie where the majority of scenes are of a married couple looking confused and/or mopey, then “Starve Acre” is the movie for you.
Written and directed by Daniel Kokotajlo, “Starve Acre” is based on Andrew Michael Hurley’s 2019 novel of the same name. “Starve Acre” takes place in an unnamed city in England but was actually filmed in Yorkshire, England. The movie had its world premiere at the 2023 BFI London Film Festival.
“Starve Acre” moves at such a sluggish pace, a period of time that is supposed to take place over a few days feels like much longer. The movie has many unanswered questions that were answered in the book. There’s no other reason for the movie’s voids of information except lazy and sloppy filmmaking.
In the “Starve Acre” movie, married couple Richard Willoughby (played by Matt Smith) and Juliette Willoughby (played by Morfydd Clark) live with their 5-year-old son Owen Willoughby (played by Arthur Shaw) in a remote rural area, on a vast estate property that Richard inherited from his father, who was a successful novelist. (In the “Starve Acre” book, the son’s name is Ewan.) Richard’s mother is also deceased, but she’s barely mentioned in the movie. Richard works as an anthropologist. Juliette is a homemaker.
Richard’s father Neil Willoughby wrote a book called “Starve Acre” that has a character called Jack Grey, a wood sprite that inflicts evil and lives in a certain tree. Richard says that Neil’s intention in creating the Jack Grey character was to scare children. About two-thirds into the movie, Richard has an emotional breakdown and reveals to Juliette that his father was very abusive to Richard when Richard was a child. Richard says his father would often make Richard strip to Richard’s underwear and stand outside in the freezing cold for hours.
On the property, there’s a patch of land where a massive tree used to be. In a scene that takes place early on in the movie, Richard and Owen are walking in this area, and Richard tells Owen that the tree was probably cut down “to make way for farming.” Of course, as soon as Richard says this, you just know that the reason why this tree was cut down was because of a nefarious secret that is revealed toward the end of the film. The secret is exactly what you think it is.
In the meantime, “Starve Acre” plods along with dull scene after monotonous scene of Richard and Juliette becoming aware that strange things are happening to Owen, inside and outside their household. One day, when the family is at a community festival fair, Owen inexplicably uses a long stick to poke out the right eye of an innocent pony. The violence in “Starve Acre” is never explicitly shown on camera. The aftermath of the violence is shown on screen instead.
The rest of “Starve Acre” shows how this family starts to go downhill as something sinister seems to infiltrate their lives. An elderly neighbor named Gordon (played by Sean Gilder) is very superstitious and has been telling Owen some stories, so Richard eventually bans Gordon from coming over to the Willoughby property, but Gordon comes back anyway. On one of Gordon’s return visits, after he’s been supposedly banned, he brings an elderly friend with him named Mrs. Forde (played by Melanie Kilburn), who says she’s a healer through yoga and meditation.
Not long afterward, Richard finds the skeletal, rotting corpse of a wild rabbit on the property. He brings this corpse to work to shows a co-worker named Steven (played by Robert Emms), who is baffled over why Richard would bring this rabbit cadaver to their workplace. Richard begins to act strangely and becomes obsessed with digging in the area where the fallen tree used to be.
Something life-changing happens to the family. And that’s when Juliette’s sister Harrie (played by Erin Richards), with her pet Shih Tzu named Corey in tow, comes to visit the family. Harrie witnesses a lot of the increased strangeness happening in this family. Harrie’s reaction is just to stand around and ask Richard and Juliette what’s going on, but Richard and Juliette won’t tell her. The movie reveals nothing about Harrie and her life except for a brief mention that she lives with a guy named Tommy, who is never seen in the movie.
Except for one part of the movie involving a major plot development for one of the characters, there are no real surprises in “Starve Acre.” Don’t expect to get much insight into any of these characters or even an interesting origin tale of the evil in the story. Smith and Clark give adequate performances, considering that the characters of Richard and Juliette are very opaque and there’s almost no meaningful information about them. Forget about Juliette having a backstory, because she doesn’t have one in this movie.
The best production qualities of “Starve Acre” are its cinematography and production design. There are some scenes that are mildly creepy and somewhat unsettling, but nothing that comes close to being terrifying. The very last scene in “Starve Acre” is almost laughable because of how silly it looks. It’s supposed to be shocking but it’s actually quite underwhelming. Ultimately, “Starve Acre” is a horror movie that over-relies on atmosphere but doesn’t bring enough to the film that is truly scary or can make viewers really care about the main characters.
Brainstorm Media released “Starve Acre” in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and on VOD.
Ivan “Vanya” Beerkus and Angela Nikolau in “Skywalkers: A Love Story” (Photo courtesy of Netflix)
“Skywalkers: A Love Story”
Directed by Jeff Zimbalist
Culture Representation: Taking place in various parts of Europe and Asia, from 2015 to 2022, the documentary film “Skywalkers: A Love Story” features a predominantly white group of people (with some Asians) who are connected in some way to Russian daredevil skyscraper climbers Ivan Beerkus and Angela Nikolau.
Culture Clash: Beerkus and Nikolau, who became a couple in real life, have their relatonship and other aspects of their life tested as they increase the stakes of of their skyscraper climbing, also known as rooftopping.
Culture Audience: “Skywalkers” will appeal mainly to people who are interested in watching a well-edited documentary about daredevil athletes and the complexities of couples who work together.
Angela Nikolau and Ivan “Vanya” Beerkus in “Skywalkers: A Love Story” (Photo courtesy of Netflix)
With stunning cinematography, “Skywalkers: A Love Story” (about rooftopping couple Ivan Beerkus and Angela Nikolau) is an absorbing documentary that shows the parallels between the highs and lows in the couple’s skyscraper stunts and in their relationship. People who get queasy at seeing views from extreme heights, be warned: If you watch this documentary on the biggest screen possible, you might feel uncomfortable or even feel some sort of vertigo. The journey is worth seeing if you have an interest in watching true stories about unconventional people doing extreme stunts.
Directed by Jeff Zimbalist, “Skywalkers: A Love Story” was filmed from 2015 to 2022. The documentary had its world premiere at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival. Some of the footage was previously filmed archival footage from Russian couple Beerkus (whose nickname is Vanya) and Nikolau, who became a couple because of their shared passion for rooftopping, the daredevil (and often illegal) athletic stunt of climbing to the top of extremely tall buildings or structures without using ropes, nets or other safety measures.
Nikolau and Beerkus give voiceover narration to talk about their personal background, how they met and fell in love, and how they feel when their relationship goes through its ups and downs. The footage that was filmed exclusively for “Skywalkers: A Love Story” features cinematography by Renato Borrayo Serrano. Drones were used for much of the documentary’s exclusive and archival footage. The documentary begins by showing Nikolau and Beerkus attempting to do their most extreme and most dangerous stunt at the time: climbing the Merdeka 118, a skyscraper in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Merdeka 118 was under construction at the time the couple decided to do this stunt in 2022. With a total height of 2,227 feet (or 678.9 meters), the Merdeka 118 is the second-tallest building in the world. After showing a glimpse of Nikolau and Beerkus starting this stunt, the movie flashes back to the beginning of their love story and shows how their relationship developed and some of their rooftopping stunts in countries such as France, China, and Thailan. “Skywalkers: A Love Story” then circles back to the Merdeka 118 stunt for the documentary’s very dramatic, tension-filled climax.
Nikolau opens up about some childhood turmoil that she experienced that might explain why she chose such an unconventional profession. Her parents, who were circus performers, split up when she was a child because her father abandoned the family. Nikolau says after this breakup, her mother became severely depressed and was unable to be an emotionally present mother. Nikolau was then raised primarily by her grandmother, whom Nikolau decribes as “a caretaker who taught me to be strong.”
Nikolau adds, “For years, I didn’t let myself cry. I didn’t know who I was. I was searching for who I was.” She adds that having a tough exterior helped when she found a passion in rooftopping but got resistance and prejudice from the male-dominated group of rooftoppers who didn’t accept her because they think women can’t be just as skilled as men in rooftopping. Nikolau comments, “I don’t want to prove a woman is strong like a man. We have our own strength in femininity.”
As for Beerkus, his parents remained together, but he says he turned to climbing buldings as an escape from when he would hear his parents arguing. Beerkus (just like Nikolau) describes himself as an eccentric loner. However, he met his match with Nikolau, whom he credits for opening up his mind to being more artful in rooftopping photos and videos. It wasn’t long before Nikolau and Beerkus began collaborating and documenting their work together on social media. The documentary has some scenes of Nikolau interacting with her loving grandmother and Beerkus interacting with his supportive parents.
“Skywalkers: A Love Story” has a disclaimer in the beginning of the movie that says these stunts are illegal and should not be done by the average person. As seen in the documentary, the issue of possibly getting arrested is an essential part of rooftoppers’ planning, since they often have to find ways to avoid security employees and security equipment. The documentary has footage from 2017 of Beerkus and Nikolau getting arrested in Paris for climbing the Eiffel Tower. Beerkus and Nikola spend the night in jail before beng released. It’s mentioned multiple times that other countries have much harsher punishments than France for illegally climbing buildings and other structures.
Even though rooftoppers often trespass or break other laws to get to the top of these structures, they can still make a living from what they do from sponsors who seek out extreme athletes. Such was the case with Beerkus and Nikolau, who were able to make a full-time income from the rooftopping activities. The documentary shows how the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative effect on their income and put a strain on their relationship. A minor flaw of the documentary is that some of the editing of the couple’s arguments is very much like melodramatic reality TV. It doesn’t ruin the tone of the movie, but it’s noticeable.
“Skywalkers: A Love Story” also shows how the physical danger of rooftopping often isn’t as risky or as scary as the psychological or emotional effects of these extreme stunts. One of the people in this daredevil couple starts to have panic attacks and has doubts about staying in the relationship. “Skywalkers: A Love Story” isn’t just about looking about a couple climbing tall structures. The bigger picture is about how trust and honest communication are essential in order for a relationship to stay healthy and survive.
Netflix released “Skywalkers: A Love Story” in select U.S. cinemas on July 12, 2024. The movie premiered on Netflix on July 19, 2024.
Culture Representation: Taking place in the year 2781, mostly in outer space, the sci-fi/action/horror film “Alien: Romulus” (part of the “Alien” movie franchise) features a racially diverse group of people (white, black, Asian, Latin) who are young space colonizers.
Culture Clash: During an unauthorized mission, the space travelers encounter an army of vicious and deadly alien creatures.
Culture Audience: “Alien Romulus” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the “Alien” franchise and movies that skillfully blend suspense with science fiction and gory horror.
Xenomorph and Cailee Spaeny in “Alien: Romulus” (Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios)
After a slow and somewhat jumbled start, “Alien: Romulus” gets better as it goes along. It’s one of the most suspenseful and visually striking movies in the “Alien” franchise, with a nearly perfect mix of science fiction and horror. The movie leans into some nostalgia for the first two “Alien” movies, but it does so in a way that seems like the right amount of fan service instead of being lazy and pandering.
Written and directed by Fede Alvarez (who co-wrote the “Alien: Romulus” screenplay with Rodo Sayagues), “Alien: Romulus” is the type of franchise movie where viewers don’t need to see any of the other movies in the franchise. Viewers who don’t know anything about the best “Alien” movies—including the original 1979 “Alien” film and the 1986 sequel “Aliens,” starring Sigourney Weaver has chief heroine Ripley—might enjoy “Alien: Romulus” slightly more than viewers who already know what to expect.
The story is essentially the same as the first “Alien” movie: People are trapped on a spaceship with deadly alien creatures that are spawned from a “mother” alien, who’s the most dangerous of all. “Alien: Romulus” is at its weakest in the beginning of the movie, because it could have done a better job of establishing who these characters are. All of the principal “Alien: Romulus” characters make their first appearances in the “Alien” franchise in this movie.
In “Alien: Romulus” (which takes place in the year 2781), the main protagonist is Rain Carradine (played by Cailee Spaeny), who is obviously supposed to be the “new” Ripley. Rain has an adoptive brother Andy (played by David Jonsson), who is soon revealed to be an artificial person, also known as a synthetic. The movie has several scenes that show how there is human prejudice against synthetics, which is a commentary on how some humans perceive artificial intelligence.
Rain and Andy live on the Jackson Star Mining Colony on a planet far away from Earth. The personal backgrounds of almost all of the characters are very vague. The only things revealed about the backstories of Rain and Andy are that they grew up together, and Rain’s parents died three years ago of an unnamed lung disease. It’s a post-apocalyptic world where human survivors are looking for new planets to colonize.
Rain and Andy soon get pulled into a scheme with other young colonizers from Jackson Star Mining Colony to raid and steal items from a decommissioned space station consisting of two modules: Romulus and Remus. The other space travelers are compassionately brave Tyler (played by Archie Renaux), who has a mutual attraction to Rain; Kay (played by Isabel Merced), who is Tyler’s friendly sister; Bjorn (played by Spike Fearn), who is Tyler and Rain’s mean-spirited cousin; and androgynous Navarro (played by Aileen Wu), who will remind some people of the Private Vasquez character (played by Jenette Goldstein) in “Aliens.”
Without giving away too much information, it’s enough to say that “Alien: Romulus” has several plot developments that happen because of what type of module is inserted into Andy, whose actions are affected by the programming in each module. Bjorn is bitter that his parents were killed by a synthetic, so he mercilessly bullies Andy. Meanwhile, Kay has a big secret that she tells Rain, and she makes Rain promise not to tell anyone else.
Jonsson gives Andy a soulful personality for a being that is supposed to have no soul. The heart of the movie is the close sibling bond between Rain and Andy, who have loyalty to each other that gets tested at least once in the film. Spaeny does a very capable performance as the main hero. But is the performance instantly iconic, like Weaver’s depiction of Ripley? No.
“Alien: Romulus” has some very formulaic elements of a creature feature horror movie. And there are a few scenes with elements that are directly copied from “Alien” and “Aliens.” However, where “Alien: Romulus” really excels in the last 20 minutes, which has a few surprises and some of the best scenes in the film. “Alien Romulus” has no mid-credits or end-credits scene, but there’s no doubt that this movie was made with a sequel in mind.
20th Century Studios released “Alien: Romulus” in U.S. cinemas on August 16, 2024.
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed U.S. city and in fantasy realm, the live-action/animated film “Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure” (featuring the stars of the Ryan’s World channel on YouTube) features an Asian and white group of people representing the middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: YouTube star Ryan Kaji becomes an animated superhero named Red Titan when he goes into a fantasy realm to rescue his twin sisters from an evil villain.
Culture Audience: “Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of Ryan Kaji and his family and can tolerate children’s entertainment that is silly, boring, and reeks of “cash grab.”
Evangeline Lomelino, Ryan Kaji and Dan Rhodes in “Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure” (Photo courtesy of Falling Forward Films)
“Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure” is an endurance test for anyone looking for quality family entertainment. This cinematic junk is what happens when underage YouTube stars with no acting talent have parents who pay for the family to star in a vanity movie motivated by greed. It’s not the kids’ fault. This film flop looks like it happened because of stage parents who want to cash in by extending their kids’ YouTube child star fame that will inevitably expire when the kids grow up and can’t do cute toy videos anymore.
Directed by Albie Hecht and written by Rose Frankel, “Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure” is based on Ryan’s World, a YouTube channel that is known for doing reviews of toys and showing the antics of a fame-hungry family. The stars of Ryan’s World are members of the Texas-based family who uses the stage surname Kaji. Channel namesake Ryan Kaji is the main star, but the YouTube channel also features Ryan’s father Shion Kaji, Ryan’s mother Loann Kaji, and Ryan’s twin sisters Emma Kaji and Kate Kaji. They all star in this movie as versions of themselves. Ryan Kaji and his family started doing YouTube videos in 2015. Shion Kaji, Loann Kaji and Hecht are the producers of this movie.
Since 2017, Forbes magazine has ranked Ryan Kaji in its Top 10 list of the world’s highest-paid YouTube stars. Ryan’s World (formerly known as Ryan ToysReview) has been at the center of legal and ethical controversy because of how it presents sponsor-paid product recommendations to pre-schoolers. In 2019, Truth in Advertising and the Federal Trade Commission filed a complaint, citing that Ryan’s World channel (then known as Ryan ToysReview) did not properly disclose which recommendations in the videos were sponsored.
The quality of “Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure” (which is a hybrid of live action and animation) is on the level of amateurish YouTube videos made by millionaires who want to become movie stars without having to put in any real work to become good actors. In other words: Don’t be fooled into paying any money to see this glorified YouTube video. There’s better-quality family entertainment that people can see for free on YouTube.
“Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure” is produced in part by PocketWatch, a children’s-oriented media company co-founded by Hecht, a former Nickelodeon president who worked closely with disgraced former Nickelodeon executive producer Dan Schneider for several years. Ryan Kaji’s parents signed a deal with PocketWatch in 2017, when it was a start-up company. Since then, the Kaji family’s brand (using Ryan’s name) has expanded to include merchandising, video games, TV series, and now this terrible movie that got a wide release in U.S. cinemas. Hecht cast himself in the movie in a cameo role, as an unnamed delivery guy.
In “Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure,” the cast members in the live-action scenes struggle with saying their lines of dull dialogue with emotions that almost never look believable. Twin sisters Emma Kaji and Kate Kaji steal all of their scenes, but their acting skills are understandably limited, considering they weren’t past kindergarten age when they made this embarrassing film. Everyone else’s performances are pure cringe and the epitome of tackiness that isn’t fun to watch at all.
The movie begins by showing Ryan Kaji in what’s supposed to be his home backyard. He’s helping real-life YouTube teenage magician Dan Rhodes (playing a version of himself) participating in the old magic trick illusion of dissecting a human body by separating boxes. Rhodes has a brief, useless and pointless role in the movie that looks like it was done as a friend favor to give Rhodes some screen time, which is less than 10 minutes in the film.
The magic trick is being livestreamed, with Ryan’s tomboyish best friend Aiden (played by Evangeline Lomelino) operating the phone camera. Aiden is an annoying character who’s hyper and flaky but she’s the first to tell Ryan to calm down and be sensible. Lomelino does all the expected facial contortions and wide-eyed mugging where she tries to look like a comedic sidekick, but the acting performance is just too awkward and forced.
Ryan becomes angry with Emma and Kate because the twins have messed up his room and decorated his bike helmet with bedazzle-type beads and fake gems. Aiden and Ryan decide to go to Dabgib Comics, their favorite comic book store. A teenage store employee named Clark (played by Jack Reid) tells Ryan that Clark’s younger sister Mia is a superfan of Ryan.
Aiden and Ryan see a locked door in Dabgib Comics and are curious to know what’s behind the locked door. Clark tells them the room is off-limits except to store employees. Against Ryan’s objections, Aiden tells Clark that if he opens the door for them, Ryan will make a personal video for Mia. The enticement works. Clark gives Ryan and Aiden the code to unlock the door.
Inside this secretive room are pinball machines, comic books, games and some other entertainment. Ryan and Aiden find a “Red Titan” comic book. Ryan immediately notices that the story in this comic book is a ripoff of an idea that he already had. This movie is so sloppily written, it doesn’t explain where Ryan first presented this idea and how this idea could’ve been stolen.
As revenge, Ryan and Aiden steal the comic book and bring it back to Ryan’s house. As the two friends leave, Clark smirks and puts up a Closed sign on the store’s front window. The only way the movie could’ve made it more obvious that Clark will be a villain is if he was twirling a fake moustache.
Ryan and Aiden open the comic book, which has a magical portal. (All of this movie’s visual effects are tacky.) Somehow, Emma and Kate end up going in the portal and are being held captive in the lair of a villain named Dark Titan (voiced by Scott Whyte), so Ryan comes to his sisters’ rescue and turns into the superhero Red Titan. The “portal” scenes in the movie are animation. Meanwhile, Aiden stays behind in Ryan’s room during this adventure and isn’t seen for most of story, because let’s not forget that this is a crassly obvious nepotism movie.
The animated Emma and Kate are voiced by actress Brianna Jaynes, who is an adult in real life. Having an adult for these child voice roles is probably a way to avoid child labor laws and probably a way to reduce the overabundance of stiff acting from the Kaji family. The voice actors who are not part of the Kaji family are the cast members who fare the best in this movie because the animation has better acting than the abysmal acting performances from the live actors. Even so, the animated characters are a mishmash of generic and uninteresting, with dialogue that is bland and forgettable.
Inside the lair of Dark Titan are jail cells where his captives are held. Emma and Kate are in a jail cell next a talkative cat named Alpha Lexa (voiced by Julia Stockton) and a mischievous panda named Combo (voiced by Bradley Smith), which look like Pixar rejects. There’s also a bat-like creature that has a gold and circular body named Packrat (also voiced by Whyte), who flits around and has very little purpose but to fill up space. You already know how this movie is going to end.
Ryan’s parents Shion Kaji and Loann Kaji have perhaps the most cringeworthy appearances in this train-wreck movie. Luckily for anyone viewing this mess, these stage parents’ appearances are very short-lived—less than five minutes of screen time. For reasons that are never explained, the characters of Shion and Loann are in their house dressed as if they’re about to go to a kids’ Halloween party while everyone else in the house is dressed normally.
Shion is dressed as a pink bunny rabbit. At one point, he wiggles his rear end for the camera because it’s supposed to be hilarious to see a bunny tail on a man. Loann is dressed as a wizard, looking like someone who bought a cheap costume and thinking she’s going to win some sort of Harry Potter cosplay contest. Shion gets a little more screen time than Loann. Both of their acting performances are horrendous.
Who in their right mind thinks this type of self-absorbed nepotism project is funny and entertaining? Maybe people who are intoxicated or people who think anything they watch is good. It’s one thing to make lightweight videos on YouTube. It’s another thing to expect viewers (especially families with underage kids, who are the movie’s main target audience) to spend time and/or money to see bad acting and horrible filmmaking. With all the money that the Kaji family is making from YouTube fame, maybe they should invest some of that money in hiring competent filmmakers and taking acting lessons that produce results that movie audiences will pay to watch and not feel cheated.
Falling Forward Films released “Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure” in U.S. cinemas on August 16, 2024.
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed part of England, the dramatic film “Blackwater” (based on the 2017 novel “The Breakdown”) features an all-white group of people representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: A married schoolteacher sees a woman slumped in a car at night and later finds out the woman was dead in the car, and this witness starts to get harassed by a mysterious stalker.
Culture Audience: “Blackwater Lane” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners or the “Breakdown” novel, but the movie collapses under the weight of its own stupidity.
The time-wasting mystery thriller “Blackwater Lane” is an inferior adaptation of B.A. Paris’ popular 2017 novel “The Breakdown.” This soulless movie ruins the book’s story with a nonsensical narrative and lackluster acting. It’s one of those movies that goes around in annoying repetitive circles until the movie’s predictable and ridiculously staged ending.
Directed by Jeff Celentano and written by Elizabeth Fowler, “Blackwater Lane” takes place in an unnamed part of England. (The movie was actually filmed in Suffolk, England.) In “The Breakdown,” the three main characters are British. But because “Blackwater Lane” is an American production, the movie changes the main characters to all be people who were raised in the U.S., in order to explain their American accents.
“Blackwater Lane” is named for the street that is the location of the crime scene that’s the catalyst for the story’s mystery. The three main characters in “Blackwater Lane” are:
Cass Anderson (played by Minka Kelly), a former actress who is now a drama teacher at a high school. Cass is soft-spoken and has a gentle personality. It’s mentioned that Cass is half-British and half-American and was raised in the United States, but she’s currently living in a castle that she inherited from the British side of her family.
Matthew Anderson (played by Dermot Mulroney) is Cass’ American husband. It isn’t made very clear what Matthew does for a living, but he’s been spending a lot of time renovating the castle. Matthew and Cass have no children but have been trying to start a family.
Rachel (played by Maggie Grace) is Cass’ best friend. Just like Cass, Rachel is also a half-British and half-American person who was raised in the United States. Rachel is a confident extrovert who is a bachelorette career woman who works at an unnamed office job.
One rainy night, Cass is driving on Blackwater Lane when she sees a woman in her 30s or 40s slumped over in the driver’s seat of a car parked on the side of the road. Cass slows down to take a closer look but doesn’t get out of her car. Is the woman dead or alive? Cass doesn’t know, and she’s the only driver on this deserted and desolate road.
Ultimately, Cass decides to drive away without telling anyone or doing anything to find out if the woman in the car needs help. Cass also doesn’t tell anyone what she saw until she sees a TV news report the next day that the woman in the car was found dead in the car. Police suspect foul play. A medical examiner report later determines that the woman had been murdered.
The murder victim’s name is Jane Walters (played by Sally Blouet), and her next of kin are her husband Alex Walters (played by Kris Johnson) and 2-year-old twins. The police estimate that Jane died between 10 p.m. and 11 p.m. because she called Alex at 10 p.m. that night. Cass feels increasingly guilty about not checking to see if Jane was still alive and not reporting immediately that she saw Jane in the car.
It turns out that Jane was a co-worker of Rachel’s. Jane recently left the company and Cass actually briefly met Jane at the company’s going-away party for Jane. The movie reveals if Cass eventually tells anyone else what she saw on Blackwater Lane that night. In the meantime, Cass begins to be harassed by a mysterious stalker, who seems to have access to her home and who makes menacing phone calls to her. This harassment happens when Cass is alone and she can’t prove what happen, so Alex begins to question her sanity. How cliché.
There are half-hearted attempts to try to introduce possible suspects. Susie (played by Pandora Clifford) is a talkative British friend of Cass and Andrew. John Collins (played by Alan Calton) is a tennis coach for the wealthy people in the area. Andrew (played by Judah Cousin) is a student of Cass’ who seems to have an obsessive crush on her.
“Blackwater Lane” is filled with shallow scenes that don’t really go anywhere. The movie’s plot twists are crammed in the last 20 minutes and are sloppily filmed. In the end, the villain or villains of the story can be very easy to predict once you see that “Blackwater Lane” has nothing clever or inventive to offer.
Lionsgate released “Blackwater Lane” in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and VOD on June 21, 2024.
Culture Representation: Taking place in 2023 and 2024, in South Korea, the comedy film “Pilot” features a nearly all-Asian cast of characters (with one white person) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: A disgraced hotshot pilot, who’s been blacklisted from the airline industry, pretends to be a woman when he finds out that an airline is recruiting female pilots.
Culture Audience: “Pilot” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and comedies about gender swapping.
Jo Jung-suk in “Pilot” (Photo courtesy of Lotte Entertainment)
The breezy comedy “Pilot” has similarities to the 1982 film “Tootsie,” but Pilot has updated themes that demonstrate the role that social media can play in shaping public images. Even with its amusing moments, “Pilot” has a lot to say about gender stereotypes. There are some scenes that require a suspension of disbelief, but they are explained in a way that’s fairly reasonable in the context of the story, which still has a few plot holes.
Directed by Kim Han-gyul and written by Jo Yoo-jin, “Pilot” takes place in 2023 and 2024, in unnamed cities in South Korea, although it can be assumed that much of what happens is in Seoul. The movie’s opening scene shows what appears to be a female airline employee running frantically through a busy city street while being chased by dozens of people. Who is this person? And why are so many people chasing this person?
The first two-thirds of the movie explain what happened before circling back to this scene in the last third of the movie. The protagonist of “Pilot” is Han Jung-woo (played by Jo Jung-suk), a hotshot pilot with Hankuk Air, a leading South Korean airline company. In 2023, Jung-woo is 31 years old and a star employee on the rise who has recently been promoted from co-pilot to captain. He does TV interviews on behalf of Hankuk Air, which treats him like a celebrity, because Jung-woo is featured in Hankuk Air’s advertisements.
At first glance, Jung-woo seems to have it all: He has a lovely wife named Soo-young (played by Kim Ji-hyun) and an adorable 6-year-old son named Si-hoo. Jung-woo’s career is thriving. He has the respect and admiration of many people. Soo-young, a dancer who teaches ballet to children, is also doing well in her job. What could possibly go wrong?
But things go terribly wrong. Jung-woo has become arrogant. He has a dismissive and sexist attitude toward women in the airline industry. One day, at a company meeting, Jung-woo stands up and loudly compares flight attendants to bouquets of flowers that can wilt. His misogynistic comment is controversial and causes public outrage.
Jung-woo’s comment comes during a rough time for Hankuk Air. The company is experiencing a power struggle between the two siblings who are set to inherit the company brother Noh Jeong-wook (played by Hyun Bong-sik) is the vice president who takes credit for the hard work and innovative ideas of his older sister Noh Moon-young (played by Seo Jae-hee), who is the director of the company.
Due to Noh Jeong-wook’s mismanagement, the company’s stocks are plunging. Staff cuts are made. Jung-woo is one of the people who is fired, mostly because of his sexist remarks that he said in public. As a result of the scandal. Jung-woo has problems finding a job at another airline. He eventually finds out that he’s been blacklisted.
Things go from bad to worse for Jung-woo. Shortly after he gets fired, Soo-young tells Jung-woo that she wants a divorce and that she’s been thinking about ending their marriage for quite some time, long before he got fired. Soo-young later tells Jung-woo she doesn’t want to be married to him anymore because he’s become too self-absorbed. In their quickie divorce, Jung-woo loses custody of Si-hoo, but Jung-woo gets unsupervised visitation rights.
Because of the divorce, Jung-woo needs a new place to live. He moves back in to the apartment that he bought for his widowed mother Kim An-ja (played by Oh Min-ae) and younger sister Han Jung-mi (played by Han Sun-hwa), who live together. Jung-woo is still paying the mortgage for the apartment, but he’s too ashamed to tell his mother that he got fired from his job. Jung-woo feels obligated to continue to give this financial support to his mother and sister because he’s grateful that they helped raise him when he was younger.
Jung-woo is dismayed and embarrassed to find out that getting too caught up in hotshot pilot job has come at an emotional cost: His mother has become an obsessive fan of pop star Lee Chan-won (playing a version of himself) and has decorated the apartment’s spare bedroom with posters of Lee Chan-won. Jung-mi tells Jung-woo that their mother thinks of Lee Chan-won as her “new son” because Jung-woo has been neglecting his family.
During his job search, Jung-woo applies for a job at Han Air, which is owned by the same company that owns Hankuk Air. Noh Moon-young is on a panel of people interviewing Jung-woo, who is rejected. A Han Air pilot named Seo Hyun-seok (played by Shin Seung-ho), who is 35 years old and is a jealous rival of Jung-woo, tells Jung-woo that Han Air is giving hiring preference to female pilots. It’s implied that this gender preference is a public-relations move to make up for the scandal that Jung-woo caused with his misogynistic comments.
A dejected Jung-woo goes home and tries to figure out his next career move. Jung-mi is an ASMR beauty influencer who does videos for an unnamed social media platform. One day, Jung-woo gets a call for a job interview as a pilot for Han Air. Jung-mi is shocked to find out that Jung-woo used her name on the job application. Jung-woo then asks for Jung-mi’s help to make him look like a woman for this job interview.
At first Jung-mi refuses to do it. But then, Jung-woo reminds her that he needs to make enough money to continue paying for their home’s mortgage. He tells her if he can’t pay the mortgage, they’ll lose their home. Jung-mi quickly changes her mind and agrees to help. She also promises her brother that she will keep this gender deception a secret.
The rest of “Pilot” has plot points that are a lot like “Tootsie,” the Oscar-winning film starring Dustin Hoffman as a blacklisted actor who pretends to be a woman to get a role on a TV soap opera, he becomes a popular star of the show, and he ends up falling for a female co-star (played by Jessica Lange), who doesn’t know his true gender identity. The main difference in both movies (beside the jobs of the protagonists) is that the protagonist in “Tootsie” is a never-married bachelor with no family, whereas the protagonist in “Pilot” is a divorcé with a family.
Jung-woo uses his sister Jung-mi’s name, and he dresses like a woman when he goes to the Han Air interview, where Noh Moon-young is once again the leader of the interview panel. Several uncomfortable interactions ensue as he awkwardly adjusts to presenting himself as a woman. Despite a few mishaps, Jung-woo quickly gets hired by Han Air.
There are some glaring plot holes that are addressed later in the movie, such as how Jung-woo was able to get hired using a fake name and by misrepresenting his gender. Some of the comedy in the movie is about Jung-woo (dressed as Jung-mi) trying to prevent Hyun-seok from recognizing him as Jung-woo. That’s explained because Hyun-seok was a casual acquaintance of Jung-woo and is too narcissistic to notice the physical resemblance between Jung-woo and the newly hired Jung-mi.
As already revealed in the trailer for “Pilot,” the fake Jung-mi eventually becomes a star employee and a social media sensation after saving 215 passengers from a plane crash. Jung-woo’s mother An-ja becomes a big fan. How could An-ja not notice that this female celebrity pilot has the same name as her daughter and looks a lot like her son? The movie has an explanation for that too.
Meanwhile, cocky Hyun-seok becomes attracted to his new co-worker Jung-Mi, whom he thinks is a woman. Jung-woo becomes attracted to female co-worker who doesn’t know that new employee Jung-Mi is really a man named Jung-woo. Jung-woo’s love interest is a career-oriented pilot named Yoon Seul-gi (played by Lee Ju-myoung), who has the same ambition of being promoted to captain. Seul-gi and the fake Jung-Mi become very close and spend time together outside of work.
Seul-gi thinks of “Jung-Mi” as a sister. Jung-woo, who can’t tell Seul-gi that he’s really a man, wants more than a friendship with her. During a “girls’ night out,” Jung-woo (as Jung-Mi) tells Seul-gi that he knows many men whom he could introduce to Seul-gi as potential boyfriends. He asks Seul-gi what type of man is her ideal man. Seul-gi says her ideal man is someone who can understand how much she loves her job and someone who doesn’t lie to her. Uh-oh.
“Pilot” has some exepcted slapstick comedy moments about the lengths that Jung-woo goes to keep his secret and keep up the charade. The cast members’ talent and very good comedic timing are the reasons why some of these moments are laugh-out-loud funny instead of cringeworthy. Jo’s gender-swapping performance is entertaning to watch, even if “Pilot” is nowhere near a classic movie like “Tootsie” that’s worthy of several Oscar nominations.
The most ridiculous part of “Pilot” is the plane crash scene, which has cheat editing. One minute, the plane suddenly catches on fire. Jung-woo (as Jung-Mi) and Hyun-seok are piloting the plane, but Hyun-seok panics, and Jung-woo (as Jung-Mi) takes over flying the plane. A few minutes later, Jung-woo (as Jung-Mi) wakes up in a hospital. The movie completely skips over showing how the plane landed.
Despite some obvious flaws, “Pilot” doesn’t take itself too seriously—and neither should viewers. The movie could have taken a completely sappy direction in showing the outcome of one particular problem, but “Pilot” instead shows a realistic outcome. That’s not to say that “Pilot” is entirely realistic, but it does have some clever moments that show how a man can learn to better appreciate and understand women if he had to live for a period of time as a woman.
Lotte Entertainment released “Pilot” in select U.S. cinemas on August 9, 2024.
Culture Representation: Taking place in various states in the United States, from 2022 to 2023, the documentary film “Majority Rules” features a predominantly white group of people (with some African Americans, Asians, and Native Americans) who discuss voting reforms in the United States.
Culture Clash: The documentary examines what voting and elections look like in states where there is “open voting” that allows all registered voters to vote for whichever candidates they want in primary elections, regardless of party affiliations of the voters and candidates.
Culture Audience: “Majority Rules” will appeal mainly to people who are interested in watching a documentary that explores ways of voting in primary elections that don’t restrict U.S. voters to only vote for candidates from one party.
Sarah Palin (center) in “Majority Rules” (Photo courtesy of Abramorama)
The informative documentary “Majority Rules” is mostly adept at tackling a big issue: voting reforms that don’t restrict voters to choose candidates from only one political party. The movie looks at the pros and cons of this issue. Because “Majority Rules” was filmed in 2022 and 2023, much of what’s in the documentary will inevitably become outdated. However, “Majority Rules” serves as a capable chronicle of this particular time in American history when voter frustrations have led to a growing movement to reform voting laws in the United States.
Directed by AJ Schnack (who also does the documentary’s lively and engaging voiceover narration that he wrote), “Majority Rules” travels to various states to look at this voter reform issue. Case studies are shown or mentioned in Alaska, Nebraska, Maine, Oregon, Idaho, Nevada, and Wisconsin. Most of the documentary’s screen time examines Alaska’s 2022 elections for the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, because it was the first year that Alaska implemented a new system of open voting for these primary and general elections.
“Majority Rules” begins with narration from Schnack saying, “A lot of us have had the experience of going to vote and feeling like we have to settle—having to pick the lesser of two evils from either of the two major political parties, fearful that if we chose someone else, we’ll be handing over the election to a candidate we really don’t want.” Schnack uses a restaurant menu as an analogy to explain why he thinks voters are better off when voters are able to have choices from different categories (political parties) instead of being resticted to choose from one category.
At the time this documentary was made, the voting laws in most U.S. states are that the only people who can vote in primary elections are those who are registered for a political party, and they can only vote for candidates in that political party. It’s a system that excludes voters who are not registered with a political party, voters who are registered as independents, and voters who are registered for a party that does not have a candidate on the ballot. The winner of the primary election for that area’s dominant party (Republican or Democrat) is most likely to win in the general election.
As explained in “Majority Rules,” the problem is that the primary elections typically have a low voter turnout (about 8%, on average), which means a very small percentage of voters have a huge influence on which candidates go on to the general elections. It has led to candidates appealing to extreme factions of a political party (also known as a “party base”), since these extremists tend to be the most active in voting during the primaries. Furthermore, this rigid primary system prevents voters from voting across party lines if they think a candidiate from an opposing party is the best person for the job.
In 2022, Alaska passed a law that shook up the way that most other U.S. states vote. First, Alaska allowed “open voting” in primaries that do not segregate voters to only choose candidates from one political party. All voters choose from a ballot that lists all the candidates (regardless of party affiliation) in the primary election, with write-in votes allowed. The top four candidates who get the most votes in this open voting then go on to the general election. If any candidate of the top four candidates drop outs before the general election, that dropout candidate is not replaced.
In the general election in Alaska, voters choose from the eligible candidates through ranked preferential voting, which has each voter ranking the candidates in order of preference, from first choice to last choice. There is no obligation to rank all of the candidates, but voters must choose at least one candidate on the ballot. The winning candidate is the one who gets the majority of votes through ranked preferential voting, which is designed to avoid expensive runoff elections.
This voting reform in Alaska was implemented for the first time 2022. “Majority Rules” follows four elections in Alaska that happened in 2022 with Republican and Democratic candidates:
(1) A special election to replace the deceased Don Young, a Republican who was a longtime U.S. House Representative. Young served in this position from 1973 until his death in March 2022. The top four candidates who got the most votes in the primary election were in descending order:
Sarah Palin, a Republican who is a former Alaska governor and former U.S. vice presidential candidate
Nick Begich, a Republican who comes from an Alaskan political family dynasty of mostly Democrats
Al Gross, an independent candidate who dropped out of the race before the general election
Mary Peltola, a Democrat who had represented the Bethel region in the Alaska State Legislature
(2) A regular election where the winner of the special election finished out Young’s final term and then ran for re-election to keep that seat. This election was a rematch between Peltola, Palin and Begich.
(3) A regular election for U.S. Senate. The “Majority Rules” documentary focuses on two Republican candidates for this election: Lisa Murkowski (the incumbent) and her more right-wing primary election challenger Kelly Tshibaka.
(4) A regular election for Alaska State Senate. Cathy Giessel, a Republican incumbent who lost in a 2020 primary election, is followed in the documentary as she tries to win back her seat from Ron Holland, the Republican candidate who defeated her in the 2020 primary election and went on to win the general election in 2020.
“Majority Rules” features interviews with Peltola, Palin, Begich, Murkowski, Tshibaka and Giessel. People who follow Alaska politics probably know the outcomes of these four elections already. But for viewers who don’t know, “Majority Rules” has a well-edited behind-the-scenes chronicle of each of these candidates’ campaigns. The journey has a few unexpected twists and turns.
Viewers will get a solid sense of each candidate’s personality too. Peltola is soft-spoken, humble and deeply caring about the fishing communities in her district. Palin still uses her famous “mama bear” persona when campaigning. Begich comes across as somewhat entitled to win because he comes from a family of Alaska politicians.
Murkowski is pragmatic about the pros and cons of being perceived as a moderate Republican who is willing to work with Democrats and sometimes vote against the majority of her Republican peers. Tshibaka, a political newcomer who was endorsed by Donald Trump, has less funding than Murkowski, but Tshibaka markets herself to voters as more of a “real” Republican than Murkowski. Giessel is the candidate who shows the most insecurities, since she still seems emotionally hurt that she was voted out of office in 2020.
If “Majority Rules” had focused on just these elections in Alaska, it would have been more than enough for this documentary. However, “Majority Rules” starts to come dangerously close to being scattered and unfocused when it goes off on other tangents to look at voting reforms in other states. The movie admittedly jumps all over the place by going back and forth between telling the story of the 2022 elections in Alaska and what’s going on in other states. As a result, “Majority Rules” becomes a little overstuffed with talking head interviews, many of which are just reduced to short soundbites. The people interviewed range from political professionals to journalists to activist voters to “regular” voters.
In Alaska, the people interviewed include Scott Kendall, a Republican attorney who is the architect of Alaska’s Ballot Measure 2 that led to Alaska’s open voting reform; Bill Wielechowski, a Democrat state senator for Alaska; Alex Ortiz, a former chief of staff for the late congressman Young; Gail Fenumiai, director of Alaska division of elections; and voters Sam Berlin and Rachel Epchook.
In other states, among those interviewed are Stephanie Houghton, managing director of Fair Vote WA; Nathan Leach, executive director of Nonpartisan Nebraska; Rob Sand, state auditor of Democrat Iowa; Sandra Cosgrove, executive director Vote Nevada/history professor; Nevada attorney Bradley Schrager; Emily Persaud Zamora, executive director of Silver State Voices; Nevada lobbyist A’esha Goins; Sol Mora, an Oregon voter reform advocate; Pauline Ng Lee, former president of the Nevada Republican party.
Past and present elected officials who comment on voter reform include Jim Jones, a Republican former Idaho state supreme court chief justice; Butch Offer, a Republican former Idaho governor; Edward Polewarcyzk, a Republican state representative from Maine; Daniel Riemer, a Democratic state representative from Wisconsin; and Ron Tusler, a Republican state representative from Wisconsin.
Journalists interviewed for “Majority Rules” are Nathaniel Herz of the Washington Post, Jessica Hill of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Iris Samuels of the Alaska Daily News, Danielle Allen of the Washington Post, April Corbin Girnus of the Nevada Current, and Liz Riskin and Lori Townsend of Alaska Public Media. Also weighing in with their thoughts are Democratic political consultant David Axelrod are Republican political consultant Mike Murphy.
Interviewees also include Michael Thorning, director of structural democracy at Bipartisan Policy Center; Elaine Kamarck, political scholar/senior fellow at Brooking Institute; Lisa Saywell of Wisconsin Historical Society; John Updyke, president of Open Primaries; Barry Burden, director of Elections Research Center; Jill Douglas of Battle Born Republican Women; Rob Richie, president of Fair Vote; Colin Woodard, author of “American Nations”; philanthropist Katherine Gehl; and voters Gloria Enriquez and Deborah Boykins.
No matter what people think of open voting or other voter reforms, almost everyone agrees that it’s an uphill battle to get states to change their voting laws. The people who want voter reforms say that these reforms will be more inclusive to all voters, not just those who are affiliated with the Democratic Party or Republican Party. The people opposed to these reforms are those who prefer a system where party candidates are rewarded for getting partisan loyalty from voters.
As for ranked preferential voting, it’s even more controversial than open voting. In “Majority Rules,” some people agree with Alaska politician Palin, who complains that preferential ranked voting obliterates the traditional concept of a voter being allowed to vote for only one candidate for an elected position where there can only be one winner for that position for that election. Other people agree with Maine politician Polewarczyk, who says: “We need to go back to plurality voting on everything.” Regardless of how people feel about these political issues, “Majority Rules” gives a clear picture of what some voting alternatives are if U.S. voters feel that the current voting systems in their respective states need to change.
Abramorama released “Majority Rules” in New York City on June 28, 2024, and in Los Angeles on July 12, 2024.
Culture Representation: Taking place in Germany and in the United States, from 1986 to 1998 (with some flashbacks to previous years), the dramatic biographical film “Girl You Know It’s True” (based on the story of pop duo Milli Vanilli) features a cast of white and black characters representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: German native Rob Pilatus and French native Fabrice “Fab” Morvan form a pop music duo called Milli Vanilli and agree to German music producer Frank Farian’s demands to pretend to the world that Pilatus and Morvan sang the vocals on Milli Vanilli’s first album.
Culture Audience: “Girl You Know It’s True” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of Milli Vanilli, late 1980s pop music and dramas based on real-life celebrity scandals.
Matthias Schweighöfer and Bella Dayne in “Girl You Know It’s True” (Photo courtesy of Vertical)
The biopic “Girl You Know It’s True” has both tawdriness and gravitas in chronicling the rise and fall of lip-syncing pop duo Milli Vanilli. Some scenes are very rushed, but the acting is solid, and there’s some satirical comedy that’s handled well. The movie’s combination of tabloid spectacle and tragic downfall can be expected because it’s a reflection of the real-life story of Milli Vanilli, a musical act that flamed out after just two years of hit-making stardom, when it was revealed in 1990 that the two members of Milli Vanilli didn’t sing any of their vocals on their smash debut album. In 1998, former Milli Vanilli member Rob Pilatus died of an overdose of alcohol and prescription medication, after years of battling substance abuse. Pilatus’ year of birth has been disputed, but he was believed to be 32 or 33 when he died.
Written and directed by Simon Verhoeven, “Girl You Know It’s True” was released less than a year after the 2023 Paramount+ documentary “Milli Vanilli” (directed by Luke Korem), which has a fuller story than this low-budget biopic. Several of the people who participated as interviewees in the “Milli Vanilli” documentary are among the associate producers for “Girl You Know It’s True” and are portrayed by actors in this biopic: Ingrid Segieth, who was part of Milli Vanilli’s music production team; Brad Howell, one of the singers who did the real vocals on Milli Vanilli’s first album; Todd Headlee, who was part of Milli Vanilli’s management team; and Carmen Pilatus, who was the adoptive older sister of former Milli Vanilli member Rob Pilatus.
Also listed as an associate producer of “Girl You Know It’s True” movie is John Davis, one of the singers who did the real vocals on Milli Vanilli’s first album. Davis died in 2021, at the age of 66. Two of the co-producers of “Girl You Know It’s True” are Fabrice “Fab” Morvan (one of the former members of Milli Vanilli) and Milli Vanilli fraud mastermind Frank Farian, who are obviously two of the main characters in the movie. In real life, Farian died on January 23, 2024. He was 82.
Because so many of the real-life people involved with Milli Vanilli were also involved in the making of “Girl You Know It’s True,” this movie is essentially an authorized biopic. Most of Milli Vanilli’s hits (the original recordings and/or versions recorded by the movie’s actors) are in the movie, such as “Girl You Know It’s True,” “Blame It on the Rain,” “Baby Don’t Forget My Number” and “Girl I’m Gonna Miss You.” The recreations of Milli Vanilli concerts and music videos are mostly faithful to what they looked like in real life, but you never forget that you’re watching actors. For the purposes of this review, the characters in this movie are referred to by their first names.
“Girl You Know It’s True” opens with Rob (played by Tijan Njie) and Fab (played by Elan Ben Ali) lounging in a recording studio in Germany and looking back on their Milli Vanilli journey in a somewhat morbid context. In these hindsight scenes, Rob is supposed to be a “ghost” who shares the narration with Fab, who says in the introduction, “There’s another side to the story” about the Milli Vanilli scandal. Actually, there’s nothing in “Girl You Know It’s True” that hasn’t already been revealed in documentaries and news reports.
Rob is the more flamboyant, reckless and extroverted member of the duo. Fab is quieter, more thoughtful and more level-headed. It’s shown repeatedly that they both treated each other like brothers. However, “Girl You Know It’s True” (which is somewhat jumbled in the beginning of the movie) only shows Rob’s childhood and his family. Fab’s childhood (he was born in 1966 in Paris) is never shown. In real life, Morvan has given interviews saying that he had an unhappy childhood, and his family was not supportive of him wanting to be an entertainer. In the movie, Fab is shown making phone calls to his mother.
Before showing the early years part of Rob’s life, “Girl You Know It’s True” does a quick run-through of the origins of music producer Frank Farian (played by Matthias Schweighöfer), the music producer who created the Milli Vanilli concept and co-wrote much of Milli Vanilli’s songs. As Fab says in a voiceover: “Without this guy, our story wouldn’t have happened.” The movie then does a brief flashback to 1953 to Kirn, West Germany, to show 12-year-old Frank (played by David Verhoeven) playing outside somewhere. This scene lasts for less than two minutes before the movie abruptly fast forwards to 1973, when 32-year-old Frank is working as a producer with the German pop/R&B group Boney M, his first big successful music act.
Boney M’s best-known songs (which were mostly hits in Europe in the late 1970s and early 1980s) included “Daddy Cool,” “Ma Baker,” “Belfast,” “Sunny,” “Rasputin,” “Mary’s Boy Child/Oh My Lord” and “Rivers of Babylon.” Boney M, just like Milli Vanilli, was later exposed as a lip-syncing music act whose songs were sung by other people because Farian wanted more physically attractive people to be presented as the singers instead of the real singers. There are implications of racial exploitation in both cases, because Farian was white and Boney M and Milli Vanilli were black.
As a child, Rob (played by Romeo Guy Da Silva) wasn’t fully accepted by the racist people in the community where he grew up in Munich because he was biracial. (His single mother, who gave him up for adoption, was white. His father was black. What the movie doesn’t mention is that Rob’s mother was a stripper.) Rob lived in an orphanage for the first four years of his life until he was adopted by spouses Hans Pilatus (played by Thomas Bading) and Antonie Pilatus (played by Ulrike Arnold), who considered themselves to be progressive because they adopted a child of another race.
“Girl You Know It’s True” downplays the racism that Rob experienced as a child. By most accounts, in real life, Rob was viciously bullied by people in his school and other people in the community because he wasn’t white. However, in the movie, the only “racism” that Rob experiences as a child is he gets hostile stares from white people who look at him as if he’s some type of alien.
Rob is very close to his adoptive sister Carmen (played by Tijan Marei), who has to tell underage Rob that he’s not related to Boney M, a group that he greatly admires and is one of the few black German entertainment acts that he sees on TV. Carmen is also the one who tells Rob that his biological father is an American military soldier who had a short-lived relationship with Rob’s biological mother. Years later, after Milli Vanilli became famous, this biological father—Andrew Harrison (played by Cornell Adams)—makes his identity known.
“Girl You Know It’s True” then fast-forwards to 1986 and 1987 in Munich, during the early years of Rob and Fab’s relationship. The movie depicts Rob and Fab (a recent immigrant from France) meeting at an audition to be backup dancers for a pop singer. The two young men instantly become friends and move in together, as they struggle to make it in showbiz. Rob is depicted as the one who came up with the idea for them to get their famous long braids because he said that all superstar music artists have well-known hairstyles.
As Rob and Fab live in obscurity and poverty in Munich, successful music producer Frank is doing an interview with a magazine journalist named Ingrid Segieth (played by Bella Dayne), who asks him if the rumors are true that the members of Boney M aren’t the real singers of Boney M songs. Frank gets defensive and tells Ingrid that no other media outlets have questioned Boney M’s validity. Ingrid then goes from interrogating Frank to asking if she can work for him.
The movie shows what happened in real life: Ingrid, whose nickname was Milli, became Frank’s lover and his most trusted assistant. What’s fabricated or exaggerated for the movie is a scene where Ingrid sees Rob and Fab dancing at a Munich nightclub and tells Frank about this charismatic and good-looking duo. Frank then invites Rob and Fab to his studio. More likely in real life, Frank found out about Rob and Fab through some of the local media exposure that the two pals were getting as dancers and DJs.
During this first meeting, Rob and Fab assume that Frank is interested in them to be singers for his next album project. But, as the movie depicts, Frank had already planned (with Ingrid being in on the plan from the beginning) for this album to be recorded by other singers, while Rob and Fab would be “front men” impersonators because of Rob’s and Fab’s good looks. “Girl You Know It’s True” makes it look like Frank thought of the name Milli Vanilli because it was a combination of Ingrid’s nickname Milli and because she was eating vanilla ice cream during this first jubilant meeting where Fab and Rob agreed to work with Frank.
All of the real singers of the first Milli Vanilli album were from the United States: Brad Howell (played by David Mayonga), who did the vocals that Rob Pilatus lip synced in public; Charles Shaw and John Davis (played by Samuel S. Franklin), who did the vocals that Morvan lip synced in public; and twin sisters Linda Rocco (played by Ramona Gianvecchio) and Jodie Rocco (played by Bonita Lubliner), who both did backup vocals on the album. In real life, Shaw was the first to go public (in 1988) about Rob Pilatus and Morvan not singing on Milli Vanilli’s first album. But by Shaw’s own admission, Farian paid him off, and Shaw retracted his statements at the time. Shaw (who is mentioned but not depicted by an actor in “Girl You Know It’s True) was replaced by Davis.
In “Girl You Know It’s True,” Frank offers to pay for everything to develop the career of Milli Vanilli. But when Fab takes a closer look at the contract and sees that he and Rob will not be singers on the album, Fab is hesitant to sign the contract and thinks an attorney should look at it. By contrast, Rob is eager to sign the contract because he wants to be a star as quickly as possible. Rob tells Fab that they can convince Frank to have Rob and Fab sing vocals on the second Milli Vanilli album.
Many people watching the movie know the rest: Milli Vanilli’s 1989 debut album, “Girl You Know It’s True,” was an instant smash, first in Europe (where the album was released in 1988, under the title “All or Nothing,” with a slightly different track listing) and then in several other continents. As depicted in the biopic, Rob and Fab relocate to Los Angeles, where they get caught up in a “sex, drugs and rock’n’roll” lifestyle. (“Girl You Know It’s True” was filmed in Los Angeles, Munich and Berlin.) Rob is shown as the Milli Vanilli member who became seriously addicted to drugs (especially cocaine) and living a hedonistic lifestyle.
In the movie “Girl You Know It’s True,” Milli Vanilli’s manager Benny Dorn (played by Ashley Downs) is depicted as an opportunist who knew about the singing scam, but only after the first Milli Vanilli album was recorded. In real life, Sandy Gallin (who died in 2017, at the age of 76) was Milli Vanilli’s manager at the height of Milli Vanilli’s fame. It can be assumed that Gallin’s name was changed for this movie for legal reasons.
Gallin’s real-life assistant at the time was Todd Headlee (played by Graham Rogers), who is portrayed as someone who spent more time with Rob and Fab than anyone else in Milli Vanilli’s Los Angeles entourage. There’s also a vocal coach named Lisa (played by Natasha Loring) who is part of Milli Vanilli’s Los Angeles-based team. Todd and Lisa are portrayed as enthusiastic employees who did not know about the lip syncing scam until it could no longer be kept a secret. Even so, Lisa noticed early on that Rob’s and Fab’s heavy European accents and real vocals didn’t match what was heard on the recorded songs that were released under the Milli Vanilli name.
Kevin Liles (played by SteVonté Hart), one of the writers of the “Girl You Know It’s True” song, has a small role in the movie, which depicts Liles’ early career in the music industry, before he went on to high-ranking positions at Def Jam, Island Def Jam and Warner Music Group. Liles is one of the executive producers of the movie “Girl You Know It’s True.” As shown in the movie, he and the co-writers of the song “Girl You Know It’s True” were involved in a copyright legal dispute with Frank, who initially used the song for Milli Vanilli without permission.
Throughout the Milli Vanilli fraud, Frank is depicted in “Girl You Know It’s True” as a tyrannical control freak who was paranoid about people finding out about the scam and who would fly into rages if he thought he was losing control over Rob and Fab. For example, Frank is furious about Rob and Fab’s move to Los Angeles because Frank won’t be able to supervise them as much as he would if Rob and Fab stayed in Germany. Ingrid is depicted as a cheerful accomplice who repeatedly describes this scam as being one big “art project.”
Milli Vanilli was signed to Arista Records in the United States. In the “Girl You Know It’s True” movie, Clive Davis (who was president of Arista at the time) is not portrayed by any actor, but he is mentioned as someone who knew about the fraud all along. The record company executives who appear briefly in the movie are depicted as soulless and greedy corporate types. “Girl You Know It’s True” undoubtedly portrays Frank as the person who is most to blame for the scandal, but the movie lets a lot of other people off the hook (such as Segieth and record company executives) too easily.
As for the performances in the movie, Njie is more convincing as Rob than Ben Ali is as Fab. That’s because Njie has a credible German accent, while Ben Ali’s French accent isn’t very consistent. Still, Njie and Ben Ali have very good chemistry together and effectively portray the brotherly bond between Rob and Fab. There’s also some comic relief in the film when Rob and Fab bicker over petty things, or when something ridiculous happens that can only happen to people living an over-the-top celebrity lifestyle.
“Girl You Know It’s True” checks all the boxes of well-known moments in Milli Vanilli’s career. These moments include the notorious Club MTV concert on July 21, 1989, when the on-stage recording malfunctioned and Milli Vanilli cut short the concert in embarrassment; Milli Vanilli winning the Grammy Award for Best New Artist in February 1990; and Milli Vanilli returning the Grammy Award in shame at a press conference held in November 1990, after Milli Vanilli was exposed as lip syncers. Farian had gone public with the scam in a separate press conference held six days earlier because Milli Vanilli had threatened to go public first if Farian didn’t let Rob Pilatus and Morvan sing on Milli Vanilli’s second album.
Although “Girl You Know It’s True” has plenty of these expected career moments of Milli Vanilli, what’s missing from the movie is a deeper sense of who these people were apart from their music careers. It’s mentioned briefly that Frank Farian grew up in poverty, but there is no information on what led up to him becoming such a big fraudster in the music business. Likewise, Rob and Fab are hardly shown interacting with anyone who isn’t making money off of them or who isn’t a hanger-on. It might be the movie’s way of showing how empty a celebrity’s life can be without real friends or family for emotional support. But it still comes across as a little too superficial, when lesser-known aspects of Milli Vanilli’s lives could have been explored in this movie.
Milli Vanilli’s post-scandal existence is rushed in at the end, with no depiction of Rob and Fab’s real-life failed attempted comeback under the stage name Rob & Fab. There’s a brief portrayal of Rob’s downward spiral, including his three-month prison stint in 1996, for assault, vandalism and attempted robbery. Ingrid is shown asking Frank for money to help Rob with these legal problems, and she is the one to take Rob home when he is released from prison. As it stands, “Girl You Know It’s True” competently follows the usual celebrity biopic formula. This movie could’ve gotten so many things wrong in telling this real-life story, but “Girl You Know It’s True” gets things mostly right.
Vertical released “Girl You Know It’s True” in select U.S. cinemas on August 9, 2024. The movie was released in Germany on December 21, 2023.
Culture Representation: Taking place in 2006 (with some flashbacks to 2005), the dramatic film “A Place Called Silence” (a remake of the 2022 movie of the same name) features an all-Asian cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.
Culture Clash: A serial killer goes after people who are connected in some way to a mute girl in high school.
Culture Audience: “A Place Called Silence” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and the original version of the movie, but this remake is full of plot holes and unrealistic scenarios with substandard performances.
Janine Chang in “A Place Called Silence” (Photo courtesy of Niu Vision Media)
“A Place Called Silence” is a very unnecessary remake of the 2022 thriller of the same name. In this story about a serial killer whose targets include teenage bullies, the 2024 sloppily edited version of the movie has ridiculous plot twists with exaggerated acting. In fact, the last 30 minutes of the two-hour “A Place Called Silence” could be considered an unintentional comedy because of how the movie expects viewers to believe all the idiotic things that are on display, like a parody of a bad movie.
Sam Quah wrote and directed both versions of “A Place Called Silence.” The 2022 version takes place in Malaysia. The 2024 version takes place in China. The timeline for the 2024 version of “A Place Called Silence” is set mostly in 2006 in an unnamed Chinese city, but there are some flashbacks to 2005.
Near the beginning of 2024’s “A Place Called Silence,” it’s mentioned that the city was devastated by a tsunami that took place in 2005. Much of the movie’s plot is centered on Jing Hwa High School, a school for girls. The beginning of the movie shows the school having a memorial assembly to pay tribute to the school’s students and employees who died in the tsunami.
It isn’t long before it’s shown that the school has a clique of about six to eight “mean girl” bullies. These bullies have taken a mute student named Chen Yutong, nicknamed Tong (played by Wang Shengdi), to an empty classroom, where they have hung her up on a wall and are smearing gel glue all over her face and body. The leader of these hateful girls is Zhong Xiaoqing (played by Gu Mingyi), who seems to be the one to come up with the plans to inflict terror on the bullies’ victims.
A Jing Hwa High School teacher named Mrs. Zhang (played by Cheng Mo), who is unaware of this particular physical assault, is very concerned about Tong’s safety because she knows that Tong has gotten verbal bullying by this “mean girl” clique. Mrs. Zhang tells the school’s principal Au Ziumin (played by Liu Xiaohai), who doesn’t seem to want to get involved. He thinks that any bullying that’s going on is harmless teasing that isn’t serious enough to punish the bullies.
Tong manages to escape from the bullies who attacked her. However, three of the girls (including Xiaoqing) involved in this attack go missing. The movie shows that the serial killer, who wears a hooded raincoat, has been killing these “mean girls,” one by one, usually by bludgeoning them to death with a sledgehammer. The killer’s identity is revealed in the last third of the movie, but that revelation still has some twists.
Tong is an only child who lives with her widowed mother Li Han (played by Janine Chang) in a shabby apartment building. Han is very protective of Tong, but Han has some secrets that some people might or might not know. One of the reasons why Tong is taunted at school is because Han used to be an accountant, but Han now works as a janitor at the school. It’s explained in the movie why this family has had a change in financial fortunes.
Some other characters play pivotal roles in the movie’s plot, which gets annoyingly convoluted as it lurches along to a messy ending. Dai Guodong (played by Francis Ng) is the police detective in charge of the murder investigation. Lin Zaifu (played by Eric Wang) is an introverted former school employee whose teenage daughter Lin Huijun (played by Xu Jiao, seen in flashback scenes) died in 2005. Mrs. Xu (played by Cai Ming) is the shrill and meddling landlord for Huijun.
“A Place Called Silence” could have been a much better movie if it didn’t try to cram in so many “surprises” in the last 30 minutes of the film. The action scenes—particularly those involving a car chase and kidnapping—are poorly conceived and look very fake. Even worse is a suicide scene that looks extremely phony and exploitative.
There’s a mid-credits scene that’s supposed to add the “shocking” reveals in the plot, but it comes across as pretentious and contrived. “A Place Called Silence” tries to have artsy cinematography, but a stylish-looking movie is just superficial if the story is garbage, the film editing is incoherent, and the performances are not impressive. The 2024 version of “A Place Called Silence” is yet another remake that didn’t make improvements from the original film and instead made things worse.
Niu Vision Media released “A Place Called Silence” in select U.S. cinemas on August 2, 2024. The movie was released in China on July 3, 2024.
Culture Representation: Taking place in 1918 in California, the comedy/drama “Coup!” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with one African American and one person of Arab heritage) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: A mysterious con man assumes the identify of a dead chef to infiltrate and cause havoc in the household of a wealthy, politically progressive journalist.
Culture Audience: “Coup!” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and comedies/dramas that poke fun at social class snobbery.
Sarah Gadon and Billy Magnussen in “Coup!” (Photo courtesy of Greenwich Entertainment)
As a satire about social class biases, “Coup!” loses its edge in the last 15 minutes. However, this comedy/drama (about a con artist who works as a chef for a wealthy family in 1918) has enough entertaining performances to keep it mostly afloat. “Coup!” had its world premiere at the 2023 Venice International Film Festival.
Written and directed by Joseph Schuman and Austin Stark, “Coup!” has a concept that’s familiar in stories about con artists who set out to fool and possibly steal from rich people: The fraudster usually targets wealthy people not just for monetary reasons but also to prove that these wealthy targets aren’t as smart as they think they are. Money can’t buy class, but the con artists also want to show that money can’t buy intelligence.
“Coup!” never reveals the real name or personal history of the middle-aged con artist who’s at the center of the story. In the beginning of the movie, the con artist (played by Peter Sarsgaard) is seen in a residential room where a professional chef named Floyd Monk is seated at a table. Floyd (who’s about the same age as the con artist and slightly resembles him) is dead, with a bullet wound on the left side of his head. There’s a gun on the table.
The con artist mutters some comments in a tone that sounds as if he knows Floyd and thinks it’s a shame that Floyd had to die this way. The con artist then takes Floyd’s photo identification and other personal items, with the intent to assume Floyd’s identity. For the rest of the movie, this fraudster is only known as Floyd Monk. Was Floyd’s death a suicide, accident, or murder? The answer is revealed toward the end of the movie.
The fake Floyd Monk is then seen going to a mansion in a remote wooded area on a small fictional island called Egg Island, which is located somewhere in California. (“Coup!” was actually filmed in New Jersey.) The fake Floyd goes to this mansion because he knows the real Floyd was supposed to start a new job as chef for the family who lives at the mansion.
The mansion is owned by a politically liberal, muckraking journalist named Jay Horton (played by Billy Magnussen), a wealthy heir who lives in the mansion with his socially tolerant wife Julie Horton (played by Sarah Gadon) and their two somewhat spoiled children: Molly (played by Willa Dunn) and Tom (played by Callum Vinson), who are very close in age to each other. Molly is about 5 years old, while Tom is about 4 years old.
Also living on the property are three servants, who have their own living quarters, separate from the mansion. Catherine McMurray (played by Kristine Nielsen) is an authoritative governess, who sees herself as the enforcer of the household’s strict rules. Ruth Tidwell (played by Skye P. Marshall) is an obedient maid. Kaan (played by Faran Tahir) is a loyal chauffeur.
During this period of time in 1918, World War I is still happening (but would end in November of that year), and the world was affected by a pandemic of influenza, also known the Spanish flu. In scenes that will remind people of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns of 2020, there is paranoia about getting infected, as people wear masks and are under strict quarantine. In the beginning of the story, isolated Egg Island hasn’t been affected by the influenza outbreak, but that situation will eventually change.
Jay expects Julie to share the same political beliefs as he does. Jay wants his family to be known as vegetarians, pacificists and “conscientious objectors” to World War I. In multiple scenes in the movie (including early on in the story), Jay is seen typing angry letters to the editor of a newspaper called the Progressive Tribune. In one of the letters, Jay rants that the president of the United States is focused on the war in Europe, when the “true killer” is “the flu from Spain.”
Jay believes that America’s employers aren’t giving the average employees enough protection from influenza. “The real victims are the workers,” Jay says in one of his letter rants. Much of the comedy in “Coup!” derives from how Jay seems to always want to portray himself as an advocate for working-class people, yet he doesn’t necessarily apply those same preachy ideals in his own household when it comes to his own employees.
It’s eventually revealed that Jay has ambitions to run for governor of California. Jay admires and is envious of progressive liberal Upton Sinclair (played by Fisher Stevens), who is mentioned several times in the movie. People who know about California’s history will know probably know about Upton Sinclair’s involvement in California politics and Sinclair’s candidacy for governor of California.
When the fake Floyd meets Jay for the first time, there’s immediately a rivalry to see which one can outwit the other. Jay is somewhat suspicious that Floyd has arrived a day later than expected. Floyd makes an excuse that there was a mixup with his travel paperwork. When the fake Floyd shows the real Floyd’s photo ID, the real Floyd’s photo is blurry enough for the fake Floyd to convince anyone who sees the ID that he’s the one in the photo.
Jay desperately needs a chef for the household, so he puts his suspicions on hold for a while. Floyd immediately charms Julie. However, Catherine is a lot less impressed and notices that this new chef doesn’t like to follow rules and seems unfamiliar with cooking in a kitchen. The con artist is able to talk his way out of people questioning his qualifications and experience.
It doesn’t take long for Floyd to start to erode the authority that Jay wants to impose in his household. First, Floyd befriends Ruth and Kaan by planting ideas in their heads that they should demand raises and better living conditions. When it’s reported that influenza has spread to Egg Island, the household goes under quarantine, thereby making grocery trips or any trips outside the house more of a hazard. Through manipulations and some sabotage, the fake Floyd uses this quarantine to his advantage.
Publicly, Jay has political views that could be considered socialist. Privately, Jay has an attitude that’s very similar to the elitist capitalism that he likes to rant against in his writing. The mansion’s swimming pool is symbolic of the social class divides. Jay has a rule that the servants cannot use the swimming pool, but Floyd breaks that rule anyway by swimming in the pool in front of Jay.
The quarantine causes tensions to rise in the household and the power struggles to escalate between Jay and Floyd. Without giving away too many details, it’s enough to say that at one point, the household experiences a food shortage. And that’s a problem when Floyd thinks the family should start eating meat that can be obtained by hunting wildlife in the woods, while Jay wants the family to stick to their vegetarian principles.
Adding to the growing discord in the household, Julie seems to be attracted to Floyd’s rebellious spirit. Late one night, Julie sees Floyd, Ruth and Kaan having small party in the mansion, where they’re playing cards and drinking alcohol, which is against Jay’s rules. Instead of scolding these employees, Julie asks to join them instead.
“Coup!” has a tendency to get repetitive in making its point about how politically liberal rich people who think they’re enlightened and progressive can actually be extremely hypocritical. The biggest flaw in the movie is not enough is known about the con artist to really understand his motivations for this elaborate fraud. At a certain point in the story, it’s obvious he’s not playing these con games for the money. Why is he putting himself at risk for this fraud? What are his personal stakes? Don’t expect “Coup!” to answer to those questions.
The performances in “Coup!” are commendable but not particularly outstanding. Making the protagonist (the con artist) such an enigma is a big risk that doesn’t quite pay off in the movie and at times becomes frustrating if viewers want a substantial reason to care about the protagonist. Some viewers will also have a problem with how a certain showdown ends and is dealt with in the story. In addition to watchable performances, “Coup!” has very good cinematography, production design and costume design. It’s the type of film that is perfectly fine to watch to pass some time, but it isn’t an award-worthy movie that’s destined to be a classic.
Greenwich Entertainment released “Coup!” in select U.S. cinemas on August 2, 2024. The movie will be released on digital and VOD on September 3, 2024.
