Tag: SXSW Film and TV Festival

Review: ‘The Dutchman” (2026), starring André Holland, Kate Mara and Zazie Beetz

January 2, 2026

by Carla Hay

Kate Mara and André Holland in “The Dutchman” (Photo by Matt Sayles/Inaugural Entertainment)

“The Dutchman” (2026)

Directed by Andre Gaines

Culture Representation: Taking place in New York City, the dramatic film “The Dutchman” (based on the 1963 off-Broadway play “The Dutchman and the Slave”) features a predominantly African American cast of characters (with some white people and a few Asian people) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A husband, who is upset over his wife having an extramarital fling, decides to have a fling of his own with a woman he meets on a subway, but his fling becomes a nuisance who uses racism to inflict emotional terror on him. 

Culture Audience: “The Dutchman” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners, the play on which the movie is based, and stories that have more of an underdeveloped concept than a coherent plot.

Zazie Beetz in “The Dutchman” (Photo by Matt Sayles/Inaugural Entertainment)

“The Dutchman” is an incoherent fever dream that doesn’t do justice to “The Dutchman and the Slave” play. Movie characters yelling and complaining about racism and infidelity don’t automatically turn this rambling mess into a good cinematic adaptation. Expect to see a lot of scenes in “The Dutchman” showing people talking a lot but not having much that’s meaningful to say. The movie also blurs the lines between fantasy and reality to irritating levels, by using the fantasy elements as an excuse for flimsy storytelling.

Directed by Andre Gaines (who co-wrote “The Dutchman” screenplay with Qasim Basir), “The Dutchman” had its world premiere at the 2025 SXSW Film & TV Festival. The movie is based on Amiri Baraka’s 1963 off-Broadway play “The Dutchman and the Slave.” “The Dutchman” takes place in New York City, where the movie was filmed on location.

“The Dutchman” begins by showing spouses Clay (played by André Holland) and Kaya (played by Zazie Beetz) in a tension-filled couple’s counseling session with their therapist Dr. Amiri (played by Stephen McKinley Henderson), who is soon revealed to represent Amiri Baraka. Clay and Kaya have hit a rough patch in their marriage because Kaya thinks Clay doesn’t communicate with her enough, while Clay has lost trust in Kaya because she recently had an extramarital fling.

Kaya is remorseful about this infidelity and wants to stay in the marriage. During the therapy session, she tries to deflect how much this affair hurt Clay. Kaya gives this explanation for why Clay is being irritable during this session: “Clay’s been in a lot of stress because of work and this fundraiser he’s hosting for his friend Warren’s re-election.”

In the play “The Dutchman and the Slave,” the character of Clay is a 20-year-old man who is college-educated and who wants to be a poet. In the movie “The Dutchman,” Clay is 42 years old and a highly educated businessman (it’s mentioned that he’s a graduate of Harvard University), but the movie keeps it vague on what type of business Clay does for work. Clay is such a thinly written character, by the end of the movie, viewers won’t know what his interests are at all, except to gripe about his marriage and talk about how hard it is for him to be a black man in society.

During the therapy session, Clay says to Kaya about how her infidelity has affected him: “You already know what I’m going through with people at work and in our community—being not black enough for one group and too black for the other. I’m already struggling to find balance.”

One of the many problems with “The Dutchman” is Clay is never seen going through this type of struggle. He only talks about it. The movie doesn’t show Clay at work or interacting with people in his “community.” It never shows Clay having to “code switch” to “find balance” in the places where he says he’s “not black enough” or “too black.”

The only social event that Clay is seen at is later in the movie, at the aforementioned fundraiser for his politician friend Warren Enright (played by Aldis Hodge), which looks like a racially diverse gathering of society elites who can afford to attend this type of fundraiser. (The movie doesn’t reveal the political job for which Warren is seeking re-election.) Clay is so well-respected at this gathering, he’s asked to give a speech. Where’s the struggle?

In the couple’s counseling session that’s shown in the beginning of the movie, Clay is openly frustrated that Dr. Amiri seems to be siding with Kaya. Dr. Amiri asks Clay if it would make Clay feel better if Clay had an extramarital fling. Clay doesn’t answer. Viewers will notice this annoying habit that Clay has of complaining and blaming but not doing much to solve problems. In fact, he makes such bad decisions, he makes his problems worse for himself.

At the end of the therapy session, Dr. Amiri recommends that Clay read the published book of “The Dutchman” play. Once it becomes apparent in the movie that someone named Amiri Baraka wrote this play, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Dr. Amiri is hawking his own book. It turns into shameless shilling during the course of this sloppily written movie.

Dr. Amiri tells Clay why he needs to read “The Dutchman,” which is about a black man whose life is turned upside down after he has an extramarital fling with a mysterious white woman whom he meets on a subway. Dr. Amiri tells Clay: “Sometimes, we find pieces of ourselves in literature that help us heal. Do you see yourself on that train, Clay? Trapped between who you are and who you must be?”

Clay is about to find out. Faster than you can say “terrible movie adaptation,” Clay is sitting by himself on a subway when he is approached by a frequently smirking 39-year-old woman named Lula (played by Kate Mara), who says hello to Clay when she sits down next to him. During the course of their conversation, Lula flirts with Clay, she gets confrontational with him, and she comes right out and says she wants to have sex with him. Clay tells Lula that he’s married, but she doesn’t care.

Lula says to Clay, “I know what you’re thinking. You think I want to pick you up, get you to take me somewhere, and fuck.” Clay tries to tell her that he’s not a fool, by saying, “Do I look like a sucker to you?” Lula replies, “You look like you’re trying to grow a beard.” Someone needs to tells Lula that Clay already has a beard on his face.

The movie is not subtle at all with trying to make biblical references to Adam and Eve. At one point in this idiotic conversation on the subway, Lula literally takes out a red apple and hands it to Clay. Later, to ramp up her “seduction,” Lula (who’s wearing a low-cut short dress) takes off her underwear in front of Clay.

The back-and-forth banter continues when Lula and Clay exit at the same subway stop. On the subway platform, Clay sees a woman (played by Sally Stewart), who has fallen down and dropped her belongings all over the platform. Clay rushes over to help the woman to her feet and help her gather her belongings. One of the items the woman has dropped is her cell phone, which will have significance later in the story.

As predicted in the book that Dr. Amiri gave to Clay, Clay has sex with Lula when they go back to her place. Clay wants to treat this sexual encounter as a one-night stand. However, Lula (like a “Fatal Attraction” jilted mistress) becomes obsessed with continuing to see Clay. (This isn’t spoiler information because it’s shown in “The Dutchman” trailer.)

One of the things that Lula does when she hounds and stalks Clay is insist that he take her as his date to Warren’s fundraising party. The more time that Lula spends with Clay, the more aggressive, racist, and unhinged she becomes. One of the more racially offensive that Lula says to Clay is: “Do you know if your great-grandfather was a slave? He definitely didn’t go to Harvard.”

At one point during an argument that Lula instigates with Clay, she shows Clay that she kept the used condom from their sexual encounter, and she threatens to accuse Clay of rape unless he takes her to the fundraising event. Clay and Lula both know that Kaya is also going to be at this fundraiser. And you can easily predict that nothing good can come out of this situation.

“The Dutchman” fumbles when trying to make weighty statements about how black men are under constant threat of either being falsely accused of crimes and/or being unfairly perceived as most likely to commit crimes. As an intimidation tactic to make Clay afraid, Lula sometimes screams in public when she’s with Clay because she knows that a white woman screaming when she’s with a black man will automatically make some people think she’s a victim being harmed by a black man. These are harsh racist realities that are clumsily handled in the film, which repeats these types of racist scenarios without anything significant to add.

Meanwhile, Dr. Amiri comes in and out of the story like a magical “know it all” genie who tries to act like his “Dutchman” book/play is some kind of survival guide for black men in America. There’s some nonsense about Dr. Amiri controlling Clay through a small figurine that Dr. Amiri keeps in his office. And the movie gets violent in a melodramatic confrontation scene that looks like it could be in the type of low-quality junk movie that gets dumped on a trashy streaming service.

“The Dutchman” has very talented cast members doing sufficient work with the weak material that they’ve been given. Unfortunately, all of the movie’s principal characters don’t come across as real people but as figments of the imagination of a pretentious and uncreative writer. Ultimately, “The Dutchman” is a redundant, dull and mostly pointless movie that misses many opportunities to be an impactful film. Instead of giving meaningful insight into relationships that involve sexual intimacy and racial identities, “The Dutchman” is just a scattered regurgitation of provocative themes that have been handled much better in other movies, such as Spike Lee’s “Jungle Fever” and Jordan Peele’s “Get Out.”

Inaugural Entertainment released “The Dutchman” in select U.S. cinemas on January 2, 2026.

Review: ‘We Bury the Dead’ (2026), starring Daisy Ridley

January 2, 2026

by Carla Hay

Daisy Ridley in “We Bury the Dead” (Photo by Nic Duncan/Vertical)

“We Bury the Dead” (2026)

Directed by Zak Hilditch

Culture Representation: Taking place in Australia, the horror film “We Bury the Dead” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few indigenous people and black people) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: After a nuclear accident in Australia’s island state of Tasmania leaves about 500,000 people dead and turns other people into zombies, a physical therapist travels to Tasmania to find her husband and has unexpected encounters. 

Culture Audience: “We Bury the Dead” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of star Daisy Ridley and zombie movies that are less about gore and more about the psychological impact of a zombie apocalypse.

Daisy Ridley in “We Bury the Dead” (Photo courtesy of Vertical)

“We Bury the Dead” is a different type of zombie apocalypse movie that is more about psychological effects for uninfected survivors than on gory action scenes. The movie has unanswered questions but interesting performances. “We Bury the Dead” will frustrate viewers who are expecting to see a lot of battle scenes between uninfected zombies and uninfected human survivors. The movie has some zombie/human fight scenes, but they are mostly one-on-one fights, and they don’t get a lot of screen time in “We Bury the Dead.”

Written and directed by Zak Hilditch, “We Bury the Dead” had its world premiere at the 2024 Adelaide Film Festival and its North American premiere at the 2025 SXSW Film & TV Festival. The movie takes place mostly in Australia’s island state of Tasmania. “We Bury the Dead” was filmed in Australia’s Great Southern Region, particularly in the city of Albany.

“We Bury the Dead” begins by showing a flashback to the wedding of physical therapist Ava (played by Daisy Ridley) and renewable energy executive Mitch (played by Matt Whelan), who are both in their 30s. Ava is American. Mitch is Australian. Their wedding is a happy occasion, but these wedding scenes are interrupted by a present-day voiceover of Ava frantically leaving voice messages for Mitch.

“Tell me you’re okay,” Ava says while breathing heavily, as if she’s panicking. “I’m scared. I need you. I love you. I’ll keep trying.” It’s later revealed that Mitch and Ava do not have children, but they have been trying to start a family, with no luck.

News reports on TV show that Australia has recently experienced a disastrous tragedy: The U.S. military accidentally deployed an experimental weapon off of the coast of Tasmania the week before. About 500,000 people across Tasmania died as a result of this catastrophe. The city of Hobart was completely decimated. An untold number of other people are “undead” zombies.

Mitch had traveled to Tasmania for a business conference/retreat and was staying at a place called Enso Resort when the disaster happened. The resort, much like most of Tasmania, is now considered a disaster area, where there is no communication available through technology. Mitch is considered a missing person.

Ava is determined to find Mitch. And so, she travels by airplane to Tasmania, on a flight where many other loved ones of missing people are also taking this trip for similar reasons. The Australian government has a volunteer “body retrieval” program, where adult civilians go to Tasmania and get bodies that need to be buried or cremated. Ava has signed up for this volunteer program because it’s the best way to get access to areas that are otherwise off-limits to the general public.

When she gets to the check-in area for the body retrieval job, Ava mentions to a briefing colonel (played Kim Fleming) that Ava’s husband is missing in Tasmania. The colonel warns Ava that if Ava uses her work time to find Ava’s husband instead of retrieving bodies, then Ava will be sent home. Ava says she understands, but you can tell Ava doesn’t care about this warning because her main goal will still be to find Mitch.

Ava attends a very short orientation session with other new volunteers. A military official named Captain Vance (played by Dan Paris) informs the group that the stories that they might have heard are true: There are survivors in Tasmania who are walking around as if “the lights are on but nobody’s home.” He doesn’t use the word “zombie,” but his message is clear: Be on the lookout for these zombies. Ava also finds out that the longer these survivors are in a zombie state, the more aggressive and violent they get.

“We Bury the Dead” has a few flimsy plot holes that are not adequately addressed. The volunteers are given no real training on how to do body disposals and are not required to wear any safety gear (such as hazmat suits) and are not supplied with any weapons. It’s a very irresponsible for a government to put civilians (most of whom are untrained rescue workers) in this type of danger, when it’s still unknown what the hazards and side effects will be of disaster caused by a weapon of mass destruction. You don’t have to be scientist to know that the existence of zombies is proof that people have been infected.

In the beginning of the movie, “We Bury the Dead” makes a brief mention of the international political fallout of this disaster. A TV news report says that protests in Washington, D.C., have escalated. Pressure has reached a “fever pitch” from the United Nations and the Australian prime minister to hold the U.S. president accountable for this disaster. Therefore, it doesn’t make sense that the Australian government would put Australian residents in more jeopardy by starting a volunteer “body retrieval” program without giving the volunteer workers any common-sense protections.

Questionable government decisions aside, “We Bury the Dead” is mostly an intimate portrait of how this work affects Ava. The volunteer body retrievers are supposed to work with at least one partner. Ava’s first partner (played by Deanna Cooney), who doesn’t have a name in the movie, ends up quitting immediately because the job is more traumatic than she thought it would be, and she wants to go back home to her daughters.

Ava’s next partner is a roguish type named Clay (played by Brenton Thwaites), who takes a hardened and cynical approach to this type of work. Ava is more emotional and is more concerned about following safety protocol than Clay is. At first, Ava wears an optional gas mask on the job, but Clay mocks her for it. Ava, just like Clay, ends up wearing no safety gear. As for weapons to fight the violent zombies, Ava’s weapon of choice is an axe, which she finds on her own. Just like in other zombie movies, “We Bury the Dead” shows that zombies can be killed by blows to their heads.

It takes a while, but Clay and Ava eventually open up to each other about their closest relationships and why they decided to volunteer for this body retrieval job. But another shortcoming of the movie is reveals nothing about the families of Ava and Mitch. It’s possible that Ava and Mitch could be estranged from their families, but the movie doesn’t say either way.

“We Bury the Dead” does reveal some more information about what Ava and Mitch’s marriage was like before Mitch went on the business trip. The movie also shows if Clay agrees to help Ava find Mitch. During their time together, Ava and Clay encounter a lone military official named Riley Harris (played by Mark Coles Smith), who has an agenda of his own. Something to do with Riley’s personal life ends up being a factor in the movie’s climactic scene. This low-budget film has believable visual effects, as well as convincing makeup and hairstyling for the zombies.

“We Bury the Dead” is somewhat of a “buddy movie” that shows how two people with differences in their personalities and backgrounds can meet under unusual circumstances and learn to trust each other while working together. Thwaites is believable in his role as rebellious Clay. Ridley gives a fairly adequate performance that is slightly marred by her inconsistent speaking accent for this role. Ava is American, but Ridley (who is British in real life) sounds American or British in her portrayal of Ava. It’s a minor flaw that doesn’t ruin the movie, but it’s a distraction that could’ve been prevented with better direction.

One of the best aspects of “We Bury the Dead” is the visually artistic cinematography by Steve Annis. The movie skillfully conveys the dichotomy of being in an area with wide open spaces but still feel doom and claustrophobia of being stuck in this area because zombies can suddenly appear and attack. “We Bury the Dead” will bore or annoy people who expect the movie to be a more typical zombie film that has epic chases and fight scenes. But for people who are open to a more introspective look at surviving a zombie apocalypse, “We Bury the Dead” can be a satisfying movie experience.

Vertical released “We Bury the Dead” in U.S. cinemas on January 2, 2026. A sneak preview of the movie was shown in U.S. cinemas on December 22, 2025.

Review: ‘Luv Ya Bum!,’ starring Wade Phillips, Dan Pastorini, Earl Campbell, Mike Barber, Terry Bradshaw, Peyton Manning, Jerry Jones, Von Miller and DeMarcus Ware

November 30, 2025

by Carla Hay

A 1970s photo of Bum Phillips in “Luv Ya Bum!” (Photo courtesy of Blue Harbor Entertainment)

“Luv Ya Bum!”

Directed by Sam Wainwright Douglas, David Hartstein and Andrew Miller

Culture Representation: The documentary film “Luv Ya Bum!” features a predominantly white group of people (with some African Americans) who discuss the life and career of football coach Oail Andrew “Bum” Phillips Jr., who was best known for being thr head coach for the Houston Oilers from 1975 to 1980.

Culture Clash: Unlike many football coaches who used fear and intimidation in their leadership style, Phillips (who died in 2013, at the age of 90) was known for treating his football players like family members. 

Culture Audience: “Luv Ya Bum!” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in watching documentaries about American football and football coaches who are sometimes overshadowed by bigger names.

Wade Phillips in “Luv Ya Bum!” (Photo courtesy of Blue Harbor Entertainment)

“Luv Ya Bum!” is a heartfelt tribute to NFL coach Bum Phillips, who treated his football players like family. This documentary includes an impressive array of interviews, great archival footage, and meaningful stories about his life as a coach. The movie is also a lesson on how he handled defeat with grace but also never lost his passion for being the best that he and his team members could possibly be.

Directed by Sam Wainwright Douglas, David Hartstein and Andrew Miller, “Luv Ya Bum!” had its world premiere at the 2025 SXSW Film and TV Festival, where the movie won the Documentary Spotlight Audience Award. The movie was written by Joe Holley. Dennis Quaid is the narrator.

“Luv Ya Bum” follows a traditional format for a biographical documentary, by mixing archival footage with footage that was filmed specifically for the documentary. Most of the exclusive documentary footage consists of sit-down interviews with people who knew Phillips or gave him extensive news coverage as sports journalists/commentators. It’s almost a “who’s who” of football luminaries from the mid-to-late 1970s, when Phillips was at his career peak as the coach of the Houston Oilers. The last 10 minutes of the documentary focuses on his legacy as the father of NFL coach Wade Phillips and grandfather of NFL coach Wes Phillips, who are both interviewed in the documentary.

“Luv Ya Bum!” briefly touches on telling Bum Phillips’ personal background before he became a football coach. He was born Oail Andrew Phillips Jr. in Orange, Texas, on September 29, 1923. (He died on October 18, 2013, in Goliad, Texas.) He got the nickname Bum from an early age. During World War II, Bum volunteered to serve in the U.S. Marine Corps, where he became part of a elite special operations team called the Marine Raiders.

In an archival interview with Bum, he says that his U.S. Marine Corps experience influenced him on how he wanted his leadership style to be and how he didn’t want it to be. Bum remembers how his Marine Corps leaders frequently humiliated and intimidated subordinates. Bum decided he wanted to have a completely opposite leadership style that would encourage and support the people who had to follow his orders.

Bum spent his entire career as a football coach. After being discharged from the U.S. Marines, he graduated from Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas, with a degree in education, in 1949. He was a football player when he was a student at the university. After his graduation, he spent several years as a football coach for high school and then as a football coach for universities throughout Texas. Bear Bryant Texas A&M University is mentioned as Bum’s most important coaching mentor in college football. Bum famously turned down a job offer to coach at the University of Alabama (considered one of the top football universities for decades) because he wanted to stay in Texas.

Bum was married twice and had six children. The documentary doesn’t go into too many details about his personal life. However, his daughter Susan Phillips is one of his children who is interviewed in the documentary. She says that although Bum was a loving father, it was hard on the kids for them to have to move around a lot because of the different football coaching jobs that Bum had in his career.

Susan says, “I think I moved 11 times by the time I was 18.” She also says that the family moved so many times, Bum often wouldn’t tell the kids that they were moving. She remembers that it wasn’t unusual for her to be called home when she was at school and find out when she got home that they were moving when she saw a moving truck at the house.

Bum got his first head coaching job for the National Football League (NFL) when he was promoted from assistant coach to head coach of the Houston Oilers in 1975. Bum replaced Sid Gillman, who quit the team in frustration, after just one year on the job, because he couldn’t break the Oilers’ losing streak. People in the documentary describes Gillman has having a leadership style that was like a dictator.

With Bum now in charge of coaching the Oilers, he brought a very different leadership style to the team. NFL fans already know that when Bum was coaching the Oilers (from 1975 to 1980), he took the Oilers to the AFC Championships twice (in 1978 and 1979), which was a remarkable comeback, considering the Oilers were considered one of the lowest-ranked NFL teams in the early 1970s.

During the Bum Phillips era of the Oilers, the fan enthusiasm reached a fever pitch. The team’s main color is blue. The Oilers had a fan slogan (“Luv Ya Blue!”) that was chanted almost like a chant at a religious service. Even when the Oilers lost the AFC Championships when Bum was their coach, the fans gave them a hero welcome back home to Houston, especially in 1979, when the Oilers lost the game after a controversial referee decision that invalidated a touchdown made by wide receiver Mike Renfro.

Renfro is one of several of former Oilers teammates who had Bum as a coach and are interviewed in the documentary. Other former Oilers team members who are interviewed include Dan Pastorini (quarterback), Earl Campbell (running back), Robert “Dr. Doom” Brazile (linebacker), Mike Barber (tight end), Elvin Bethea (defensive end), and Billy “White Shoes” Johnson (wide receiver). Barber remembers this type of pep talk that Bum used to give the team: “He never failed to end with this: “You just remember, guys, when you don’t think that anybody loves you, you just remember Old Bum loves you.”

The former Oilers players remember Bum generously inviting the players’ family members and dogs to be at Oilers practices, which was very unusual at a time when NFL practices were usually off-limits to most family members. The documentary shows footage of some of the Oilers with their sons and dogs on the football field during Oilers practices. And, of course, there is plenty of footage of the Oilers playing some of their most well-known games when Bum was their head coach.

Bum’s coaching style wasn’t just about giving his players positive encouragement instead of intimidation. When he was tasked with turning the Oilers into a winning team, he recruited from a lot of places that successful NFL teams weren’t really interested in recruiting, such as small colleges and amateur football teams. One of the Oilers’ most unusual recruits in Bum’s early years with the team was an Austrian immigrant in his 30s named Toni Fritsch, who didn’t have the physique of a typical football player, but he excelled as a kicker.

Bum’s son Wade Phillips made his NFL coaching debut with the Oilers. Wade and the former Oilers who worked with Wade say that Wade didn’t have it easy and had to prove he wasn’t just a nepotism hire. Bum was probably tougher on Wade than any other assistant coach that Bum had in the NFL, according to people in the documentary. Pastorini says that Bethea actually bullied Wade. Bethea doesn’t deny it and says he was hard on Wade because he wanted to make sure that Wade was tough enough to coach the Oilers.

Bethea, who was with the Oilers from 1968 to 1983, has high praise for Bum in the documentary and makes this comment about the Oilers during the Bum Phillips era: “We had a bunch of misfits. And he made a difference [with] the players on the field and off the field.” Bethea continues with a laugh: “I know that off the field, he saved a lot of people.”

Campbell says about Bum: “He was like the perfect dad that everybody thought they would love to have.” Pastorini also echoes the sentiment that Bum was like a father figure to the Oilers and other people associated with the team. The former Oilers quarterback also mentions how Bum convinced him to stay with the Oilers for one more year after Pastorini was ready to leave the team. Pastorini describes the compassionate conversation that Bum had with him when Pastorini made tough decision to leave the Oilers in 1980.

The documentary includes the controversial firing of Bum from the Oilers in 1980. Oilers owner Bud Adams fired Bum because apparently Adams didn’t like that the Oilers still hadn’t made it to the Super Bowl under Bum’s leadership. Bum’s dismissal from the Oilers shocked many people, including Bum. The documentary has archival footage of people’s reactions to the firing, including an interview that Bum did on “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.”

Campbell says in the documentary, “If Bud had left Bum alone, I believe we would’ve won the Super Bowl the next year.” Bum went on to be the head coach for the New Orleans Saints from 1981 to 1985, but that coaching stint didn’t and couldn’t recapture the magic that he had with the Oilers. Bum retired after leaving the Saints.

Other people interviewed in “Luv Ya Bum!” are several former NFL stars, such as Terry Bradshaw, “Mean” Joe Greene, Peyton Manning, Archie Manning, J.J. Watt, DeMarcus Ware, Von Miller, Aqib Talib and Gary Kubiak, a Houston native who was in high school when he met Bum and who went on to become coach in the NFL. Sports broadcasters and journalists are also interviewed, such as Michael Berry, Bill Worrell, Jim Nantz, Dale Robertson and Bob West.

Amy Adams, daughter of former Oilers owner Bud Adams, is also interviewed. And so is Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, who has this to say about Bum: “It was the personalities of men like Bum Phillips that gave me great motivation to be in the NFL.” Singer/songwriter Texas-born singer/songwriter Larry Gatlin, whose 1984 song “Houston (Means I’m One Day Close to You)” is featured in “Luv Ya Bum!,” is also interviewed in the documentary.

The documentary mentions that Bum’s heyday with the Oilers also coincided with a booming economic period in Houston, which was riding high in the late 1970s and early 1980s with the Houston Rockets (a National Basketball League team), the big business generated by the Houston Astrodome, the nightclub Gilley’s, and the popularity of the John Travolta’s 1980 movie “Urban Cowboy,” which was set in Houston. The Oilers craze reached such a peak that Oilers wide receiver Ken Burrough briefly became a recording artist, with the release of a 1979 novelty pop song called “Super Bowl Itch,” which is played in the documentary. The movie also has footage from the record release party for the song. (Burrough died in 2022, at the age of 63.)

Bum wasn’t a pushover, but his friendliness to rival NFL teams was unusual. The Pittsburgh Steelers were the biggest rivals to the Houston Oilers during Bud’s time with the team. Bradshaw (who was the Steelers’ quarterback during this time) remembers how Bum invited him and other Steelers for a gregarious and fun-loving gathering with the Oilers before the start of the AFC Championships in 1979, the year that the Steelers defeated the Oilers.

Bradshaw remembers Bum gave him a “beautiful” pair of ostrich blue cowboy boots during this meeting. And he says he’d never experienced this type of welcome from a rival team’s coach before or since. Bradshaw comments in the documentary, “If I could play for any coach in the NFL, I’d play for Bum Phillips.”

Bum Phillips’ football coaching legacy continues with his son Wade and Wade’s son Wes. Wade would go on to become a defensive coordinator with the Denver Broncos (from 1989 to 1992 and 2015 to 2016) and was a Broncos head coach from 1993 to 1994. Wade won the Super Bowl with the Broncos in 2016. Wade has also had coaching positions for other professional football teams, including the Dallas Cowboys, the Buffalo Bills, and the United Football League’s San Antonio Brahmas. Wes was a tight ends coach and pass game coordinator for the Los Angeles Rams, who won the Super Bowl in 2022. As of 2025, when this documentary was released, Wes is an offensive coordinator for the Minnesota Vikings.

Bum Phillips had a 2010 memoir (“Bum Phillips: Coach, Cowboy, Christian”), but “Luv Ya Bum!” can be considered a very entertaining and informative cinematic biography of this memorable football coach, who is described by some of the documentary interviewees as a “legend” and an “icon.” “Luv Ya Bum!” begins with archival footage of an interview that Bum did that best sums up his attitude about coaching and his time with the Oilers: “I was there for seven years, and it was the happiest seven years of my life—not because we won but the way we won, and the way the kids acted and the way the fans and players reacted.”

Blue Harbor Entertainment released “Luv Ya Bum!” in select U.S. cinemas on October 23, 2025. The movie was released on digital and VOD on November 25, 2025.

Review: ‘Bunny’ (2025), starring Mo Stark, Ben Jacobson, Liza Colby, Tony Drazan, Linda Rong Mei Chen, Eric Roth, Richard Price and Henry Czerny

November 23, 2025

by Carla Hay

Mo Stark in “Bunny” (Photo by Jackson Hunt/Vertical)

“Bunny” (2025)

Directed by Ben Jacobson

Culture Representation: Taking place in New York City, the comedy film “Bunny” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans, Latin people, and Asians) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A hustler, his best friend, and other people who live in the same apartment building try to hide the body of a man the hustler accidentally killed.

Culture Audience: “Bunny” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the low-budget independent films about.

Tony Drazan, Mo Stark, Ben Jacobson and Linda Rong Mei Chen in “Bunny” (Photo courtesy of Vertical)

“Bunny” is a shaggy but watchable 2020s movie that pays tribute to absurdist stoner comedies of the 1990s. The plot (about New York City apartment dwellers trying to hide a dead man’s body) drags and wears thin by the middle of the movie, but there are some genuinely funny moments. It’s probably why “Bunny” would’ve been better as a short film.

As it stands, “Bunny” (which clocks in at 87 minutes) doesn’t get too long-winded. It’s the type of movie best appreciated by people who like to see movies about misfits and weirdos getting into conflicts and trying to get out of one mishap after another. Much of the comedy in “Bunny” comes from the fact that many of the film’s main characters are too stoned to think clearly.

Directed by Ben Jacobson, “Bunny” had its world premiere at the 2025 SXSW Film and TV Festival. Jacobson, Mo Stark and Stefan Marolachakis co-wrote the “Bunny” screenplay. The movie takes place over a 24-hour period on a summer day in New York City’s East Village, where “Bunny” was filmed on location. Most of the movie’s scenes take place inside or nearby the apartment building, thereby keeping the plot fairly uncomplicated.

“Bunny” is named after the movie’s main protagonist, who does occasional voiceover narration, where he gives hindsight commentary. Bunny (played by Stark) is first seen handcuffed in the back of a police car. It happens to be Bunny’s birthday. He says in the voiceover, “Today, I fucked up. I upended the lives of people I love the most: my family.”

What exactly did Bunny do? He accidentally killed a man named Calvin, a stranger who attacked Bunny in a fight inside the apartment building. Most of the movie is about Bunny enlisting the help of friends and neighbors to hide the body.

Why doesn’t Bunny call the police and claim self-defense? Bunny doesn’t want to deal with law enforcement because he does illegal work as a gigolo servicing women and men. Bunny has assumed that the dead stranger who attacked Bunny was getting revenge for a recent sex worker job that went wrong when Bunny assaulted two male clients who got rough with Bunny during a sexual encounter.

This client attack incident is not shown in a flashback but is described by Bunny in a detailed confession to Bunny’s somewhat dimwitted best friend Dino (played by Jacobson), who lives on the same apartment floor as Bunny but in a different apartment unit. Bunny makes this confession in an apartment hallway and is overheard by an unnamed rabbi (played by Henry Czerny), who pops up later in the story.

The movie takes a little too long to get to the main conflict (what to do about the dead body), because this plot development doesn’t happen until almost halfway through the story. Before that, “Bunny” consists of a series of scenes showing the people in the apartment building who will get involved in this cover-up. It’s a motley crew that isn’t always beliveable, but there can be suspension of disbelief because “Bunny” is a comedy that doesn’t take itself too seriously.

There are many things in “Bunny” that are nods to the 1990s. Bunny looks like grunge rocker from the 1990s. Dino looks like bleach-blonde skateboarder from the 1990s. At one point in the movie, Bunny and Dino both wear jerseys sporting the name of the 1995 movie “The Basketball Diaries,” starring Leonardo DiCaprio as a New York City teenage basketball player who gets addicted to drugs. (“The Basketball Diaries” movie is based on Jim Carroll’s 1978 memoir of the same name.)

“Bunny” has a gritty visual aesthetic that is similar to independent drama films that were set in 1990s New York City, where the main characters (just like the main characters in “Bunny”) live in run-down apartment buildings that have unpleasant and unidentifiable smells. The main characters in these movies are often up to some type of illegal mischief. 1995’s “Kids” (directed by Larry Clark) and 1992’s “Bad Lieutenant” (directed by Abel Ferrara) come to mind.

In addition to Bunny and Dino, the conspirators to hide the body are:

  • Bobbie (played by Liza Colby), Bunny’s sexually fluid and fun-loving wife, who works as a production designer.
  • Linda (played by Linda Rong Mei Chen), the apartment building’s feisty manager/landlord.
  • Happy Chana (played by Genevieve Hudson-Price), an Orthodox Jewish divorcée who is renting a room from Bunny and Bobbie for a few days because she’s traveled from Tarzana, California, to meet an online boyfriend in person for the first time.
  • Loren (played by Tony Drazan, also known as Anthony Drazan), Bobbie’s estranged father who shows up unannounced after not seeing Bobbie for years.
  • Ciel (played by Kia Warren), a friend of Bunny’s and Bobbie’s, who spends most of her screen time getting high on cocaine and marijuana.

Complicating matters are two New York Police Department officers, who seem to have nothing better to do during their work time but loiter in outside of the apartment building and pester the building’s residents and people walking on the street about where to get certain types of fast food. The two cops are Officer Cellestino (played by Ajay Naidu) and Officer Nadov (played by Liz Caribel Sierra), who are quick to misuse their authority in ways that are meant to intimidate people over trivial matters. Officer Cellestino and Office Nadov frequently stop and question Bunny throughout the movie.

The beginning of the movie shows Bunny, who has noticeable fight wounds, as he frantically runs with a travel bag through the streets. He ducks into a park to change his clothes and then runs back to his apartment. It’s later revealed that he was running away from the incident where he assaulted two of his clients. Based on the way Bunny describes the assault, he was acting in self-defense.

Early in the movie’s voiceover narration, Bunny compares his gigolo work to being like Richard Gere in the 1980 movie “American Gigolo.” Bunny is kind of delusional, because he doesn’t do high-priced escort work, like Gere’s character in “American Gigolo.” Bunny says in the narration that the sex work that Bunny does is “a means to an end for a beautiful life.”

Not much else is revealed about Bunny except that he has a reputation in his apartment building for being friendly and helpful. For example, there are multiple scenes where Bunny assists a disabled neighbor named Ian (played by Richard Price) by carrying items (such as laundry) up and down the apartment stairs. (It’s a walk-up apartment building with no elevator.)

Before the dilemma over the dead body happens, Bobbie introduces Bunny to a woman named Daphne (played by Eleonore Hendricks), who has agreed to have a threesome with the couple to celebrate Bunny’s birthday. Bobbie also has some molly (ecstasy) and excitedly tells Bunny that a hotel room has been rented for this threesome. However, Bunny says he’s not interested because he doesn’t feel well.

Bobbie gets upset and storms off, bringing Daphne with her. (Bobbie and Daphne eventually come back to the apartment, where more hijinks ensue.) While Bobbie is temporarily away, her father Loren shows up because his current wife has broken up with him, and he needs a place to stay. Loren and Bobbie are estranged because Loren abandoned Bobbie and Bobbie’s mother (his ex-wife) when Bobbie was a child.

Meanwhile, Linda is angry because a young male tenant (played by Anthony Rodriguez) is long overdue on paying rent. The tenant isn’t returning her messages or answering when she knocks on his door, which seems to be barricaded. What happened to this tenant is eventually revealed in the movie.

There are also three “party girl” tenants who are friends with each other and are seen going in and out of the building: Betty (played by Noa Fisher), Elaine (played by Jaeden Gomez, also known as Jaeden Rae Gomez) and Yaz (played by Yaz Perea), who invite Bunny and his pals to a party in the midst of this chaos. These three characters aren’t really essential to the movie’s plot, but they add to the frenetic atmosphere.

“Bunny” has some cliché slapstick comedy and a few predictable scenarios. But some of the characters are written with specific quirks that make them unique enough for this movie. For example, Dino doesn’t have much common sense, but he’s a movie fanatic who can quote and namecheck trivia from his most-liked films. (He mentions 2006’s “The Departed” and 2007’s “There Will Be Blood.”)

There’s also a running joke about Happy Chana, who is very neurotic and particular about how people say her name. (Chana is pronounced Hanna.) She always introduces herself by saying that people can call her Happy Chana or Chana Eliza, but never just Chana. The joke is funny the first three times it’s in the movie, but it quickly gets old the more it’s repeated.

Happy Chana is also very religious and refuses to be in Bunny’s apartment unless Bobbie or two other women are there, because Orthodox Judaism teaches that a single woman cannot be in a space with a man unless the man’s wife or two other women are there. Bunny needs the money that Happy Chana is paying, so he has to accommodate her demands. While Bobbie is away, Linda and Ciel are the two women who can fulfill Happy Chana’s Orthodox Jewish protocol requirements.

Stark’s portrayal of Bunny has enough charisma to keep people watching when parts of the movie tend to be come tedious. Stark and Jacobson, who are friends in real life, have an easy chemistry together as Bunny and Dino. Colby does well in her role as outspoken Bobbie, while Hudson-Price is a scene-stealer as nervous Happy Chana.

The tone of “Bunny” is both freewheeling and tension-filled. Although some of the situations are definitely over-the-top, “Bunny” is an authentically New York City movie that skillfully captures a lot of the attitude and eccentricities that really are a part of New York City’s East Village culture. Despite many of the seedy and crude things that happen in the movie, “Bunny” leaves room for some sweet sentimentality about the power of community camaraderie.

Vertical released “Bunny” in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and VOD on November 17, 2025.

Review: ‘I Wish You All the Best,’ starring Corey Fogelmanis, Amy Landecker, Lena Dunham, Alexandra Daddario and Cole Sprouse

November 15, 2025

by Carla Hay

Cole Sprouse, Corey Fogelmanis and Alexandra Daddario in “I Wish You All the Best” (Photo courtesy of Lionsgate)

“I Wish You All the Best”

Directed by Tommy Dorfman

Culture Representation: Taking place in North Carolina, the dramatic film “I Wish You All the Best” (based on the novel of the same name) features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans and one Asian) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A nonbinary teenager moves in with their older sister after being kicked out of their parents’ home, and the teen starts a new life during a period of self-discovery. 

Culture Audience: “I Wish You All the Best” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners, the book on which the movie is based, and coming-of-age stories about LGBTQ+ people.

Miles Gutierrez-Riley and Corey Fogelmanis in “I Wish You All the Best” (Photo courtesy of Lionsgate)

“I Wish You All the Best” is a well-acted and charming coming-of-age drama about a nonbinary teenager who starts a new life after experiencing parental rejection. The movie is sweet-natured but unrealistic in some areas. That’s because after the teenager moves to a new city, the teenager doesn’t experience any prejudice from the people in this new city. The only bigotry/ignorance depicted in the movie comes from the teenager’s parents.

Written and directed by Tommy Dorfman, “I Wish You All the Best” is based on Mason Deaver’s 2019 novel of the same name. The movie (which is Dorfman’s feature-film directorial debut) had its world premiere at the 2024 SXSW Film & TV Festival. “I Wish You All the Best” takes place in North Carolina, primarily in the capital city of Raleigh. The movie was actually filmed in Los Angeles.

“I Wish You All the Best” begins with a brief montage of 16-year-old Ben De Backer (played by Corey Fogelmanis) having a seemingly idyllic life. In this montage, Ben (who is nonbinary and whose pronouns are “they/them”) is very close to Ben’s parents: Ben De Backer Sr. (played by Judson Mills) and Cathy De Backer (played by Amy Landecker). All three are seen watching a movie together at home in a seemingly loving and supportive environment. But everything changes one night, when Ben comes out as nonbinary to Ben Sr. and Cathy, who are religious conservatives.

This coming-out scene is not shown in full detail, but only snippets are seen in flashbacks. All viewers know is that Ben’s coming-out experience was emotionally painful, Ben’s parents rejected Ben, and Ben ran out of the home that night with no shoes on. Ben fled to a local convenience store, where Ben made a frantic and tearful call to Ben’s older sister Hannah Wallace (played by Alexandra Daddario), who lives in Raleigh. Ben tells Hannah what happened and asks her to take them to Hannah’s home, where Ben lives for the rest of the story. Ben’s 17th birthday takes place during this period of time.

Hannah, who is about 15 years older than Ben, lives with her husband Thomas Wallace (played by Cole Sprouse), who is a teacher at a high school in Raleigh. Ben and Hannah haven’t seen each other in 10 years because Hannah has been estranged from their parents, for reasons that are revealed in the movie. It should come as no surprise that liberal and open-minded Hannah has had her own issues with her conservative parents.

Hannah and Thomas (who is also liberal and open-minded) have an infant son named Cyrus, so Hannah is currently a homemaker. Thomas forges a permission notice from Ben’s parents so that Ben (who is a junior-year student) can be enrolled in the school where Thomas teaches. This type of forgery is illegal but is kind of glossed over in the movie because Ben’s parents accept that Ben wants to live in Raleigh with Hannah and Thomas. Hannah and Thomas eventually file an official application to become Ben’s legal guardians.

Ben is quiet and introverted and has an interest in fashion and art. Ben is very talented at drawing and painting portraits. Even though Ben is shy, it isn’t long before Ben meets three schoolmates who will become Ben’s closest friends: bisexual Nathan (played by Miles Gutierrez-Riley), queer Sophie (played by Lisa Yamada) and straight Meleika (played by Lexi Underwood), who considers herself to be an ally to LGBTQ people. All of Ben’s new friends are open about their sexual identities. Ben mentions later in the movie that Ben was a loner in Ben’s previous school.

Ben meets Nathan (who is a year older than Ben) when Thomas asks Nathan to give Ben a tour of the school’s campus. Nathan introduces Ben to Nathan’s friends Sophie and Meleika. Ben is immediately accepted into their social circle. In many ways, Nathan has a personality that is the opposite of Ben’s personality. Nathan is optimistic and confident. Ben is pessimistic and insecure. Ben and Nathan’s relationship evolves from a friendship into a romance.

The parents of Ben’s new friends are never seen in the movie, even though Ben sometimes spends the night at Nathan’s place. Ben, Nathan and their teenage friends never talk about what it’s like to be openly queer in their high school, which is a regular public high school, not an “alternative” school. The movie needed more realism in the teenagers’ conversations, which tend to be sitcom-ish and a bit superficial.

Ben gets mentorship from two adults who also happen to be queer: Ben’s nonbinary art teacher Ms. Lions (played by Lena Dunham) and gay transgender man Chris (played Brian Michael Smith), who is Ben’s supervisor at the senior citizen day camp where Ben gets a part-time job. It’s all so convenient how the only teachers/mentors who are shown interacting with Ben (aside from Ben’s heterosexual brother-in-law Thomas) are also queer. All of the cast members’ performances are very good (Fogelmanis and Gutierrez-Riley are the movie’s standout cast members), but the screenplay is the part of the movie that doesn’t ring entirely true.

Ben wears skirts and makeup in public and never even gets stared at by strangers. And although Raleigh is one of the more politically liberal cities in North Carolina (the city tends to elect conservative Democrats), it seems like a fantasy for the movie to depict Raleigh as a place where queer teens can go and not experience any hurtful prejudices from people who live there. Ben’s angst has mostly to do with how Ben feels about being rejected by Ben’s parents, who live in another city, which is unnamed in the movie.

Ben also gets lucky in Ben’s first romance as an openly nonbinary person because Ben’s partner Nathan is also openly queer and completely respectful to Ben. Ben’s biggest complaint about Nathan is Ben thinks Nathan is too cheerful. Ben experiences bouts of depression (in one part of the movie, Ben doesn’t leave home for a week and stays mostly in bed), but these mental health struggles are treated in a shallow way. Ben just gets a few stern lectures (not professional counseling) about this depression from the concerned adults in Ben’s life.

Many movies about LGBTQ+ people are centered on the hateful bigotry that LGBTQ+ people experience. It’s understandable if the filmmakers of “I Wish You All the Best” didn’t want to focus the movie on this type of harmful experience or for the movie to revolve around LGBTQ+ trauma. But at the same time, it’s far-fetched to erase the existence of this prejudice from the protagonist’s current community while positioning anti-LGBTQ+ bigotry solely as something from the protagonist’s past community, as represented by the protagonist’s parents.

Experiencing bigotry is a fact of life for anyone from a historically oppressed group of people. This type of toxic discrimination doesn’t magically go away by moving to a more politically liberal city. By refusing to address this reality, “I Wish You All the Best” does a disservice to its intended audience. However, if people are looking for a relatively lightweight approach to a coming-of-age story about a teenager who happens to be nonbinary, then “I Wish You All the Best” fulfills that purpose.

Lionsgate released “I Wish You All the Best” in U.S. cinemas on November 7, 2025.

Review: ‘Good Boy’ (2025), starring Shane Jensen, Arielle Friedman, Larry Fessenden and Indy

October 6, 2025

by Carla Hay

Indy and Shane Jensen in “Good Boy” (Photo by Ben Leonberg/Independent Film Company and Shudder)

“Good Boy” (2025)

Directed by Ben Leonberg

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed U.S. city, the horror film “Good Boy” features an all-white cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: Against the warnings of his sister, a man moves into an abandoned house previously owned by their deceased grandfather, and strange things start happening, as observed by the man’s loyal dog. 

Culture Audience: “Good Boy” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of uncomplicated horror movies that are effectively scary on low budgets.

Indy in “Good Boy” (Photo by Ben Leonberg/Independent Film Company and Shudder)

“Good Boy” is an impressive example of a horror movie that does a lot with a low budget. This simple story, which is told from a loyal dog’s perspective, can get a bit repetitive with haunted house scares, but it skillfully manages to maintain suspense. And at 73 minutes long, “Good Boy” doesn’t overstay its welcome. It’s a thriller that does what it needs to do in the right amount of time.

Directed by Ben Leonberg, “Good Boy” was co-written by Leonberg and Alex Cannon. Leonberg is also the cinematographer for “Good Boy,” which is his feature-film directorial debut. “Good Boy” had it world premiere at the 2025 SXSW Film & TV Festival. The movie takes place in an unnamed U.S. city. “Good Boy” was actually filmed in New Jersey, partially in Leonberg’s own home.

This “Good Boy” horror movie should not be confused with the 2020 “Good Boy” feature film that was part of Blumhouse’s “Into the Dark” anthology series on Hulu. Both are horror movies where a dog is the main character but the dog in the “Into the Dark” version of “Good Boy” is the a homicidal villain. It’s established early on in 2025’s “Good Boy” (and shown in the movie’s trailer) that the dog is the heroic protagonist.

Although the specific year of 2025’s “Good Boy” story is not mentioned in the movie, visual clues (such as the types of phones being used) indicate that the movie takes place in the mid-2020s. However, the house that’s at the center of the film is stuck in the 1980s, such as having a television and VCR that’s from the 1980s. The house, which is suspected of being haunted, has been abandoned for years until the grandson of the previous owner moves into the house with his male Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever dog named Indy. (The dog is actually Leonberg’s own dog, whose name is also Indy.)

“Good Boy,” which is told from Indy’s point of view, begins by showing Indy waking up to the sound of an iPhone ringing, as blood is dripping on the phone. Indy’s owner Todd (played by Shane Jensen) is unconscious nearby. Todd’s sister Vera (played by Arielle Friedman) is calling Todd and comes over to his place when Todd doesn’t answer the phone and doesn’t return her messages. Vera is alarmed to see Todd unconscious and calls for medical help.

It’s not directly said out loud, but Todd was unconscious because he attempted suicide. He spends an unnamed amount of time in a hospital and is eventually discharged. Todd decides to leave his home in the city to live with Indy in a dilapidated house in a remote wooded area. This house used to be owned by the unnamed grandfather (played by Larry Fessenden) of Todd and Vera.

This grandfather, who is seen in home video footage, had some type of mental and physical breakdown and was found dead. Vera is convinced that the house is haunted, so she begs Todd not to move into the house. Todd thinks that Vera is overreacting and being unreasonable.

But sure enough, strange things starts happening after Todd moves into the house. He starts having inexplicable nosebleeds. Indy sees a shadowy figure that seems to be lurking around. And one night, Indy sees a dog that looks exactly like Indy and follows this look-alike dog upstairs.

“Good Boy” deliberately obscures the faces of the human characters for most of the time that the people are on screen. It’s a clever technique for viewers to focus on and remember that most of the facial expressions in the movie are from the dog. There are some jump scares that turn out to be false alarms. But fortunately, these false alarms are few and far in between.

Because Todd is living in isolation, the vast majority of the screen time is about showing what happens to Todd and Indy. Todd treats Indy well, but as Todd’s physical condition starts to deteriorate, he becomes impatient with Indy. Todd has a few brief interactions with a hunter neighbor named Richard (played by Stuart Rudin), who knew Todd’s grandfather. Indy has some nightmares, but the movie suggests that this dog might have psychic abilities.

“Good Boy” has adequate acting from the humans, but the movie’s biggest strengths or how well Indy is made into a compelling character, as well as good use of score music, cinematography and visual effects to immerse viewers into the foreboding atmosphere. It’s worth noting that after the end credits, there’s a featurette, narrated by Leonberg, where he gives a behind-the-scenes look at the making of “Good Boy” (which was filmed over a four-year period) that gives an informative explanation of how he and the other filmmakers were able to make the most out of Indy’s facial expressions and actions. “Good Boy” is a promising feature-film debut from Leonberg and is proof that a horror movie with a nice dog as the main character really can be scary.

Independent Film Company and Shudder released “Good Boy” in U.S. cinemas on October 3, 2025. The movie will be released on digital and VOD on October 24, 2025. Shudder will premiere “Good Boy” on November 21, 2025.

Review: ‘Americana’ (2025), starring Sydney Sweeney, Paul Walter Hauser and Halsey

August 20, 2025

by Carla Hay

Paul Walter Hauser, Sydney Sweeney and Halsey in “Americana” (Photo courtesy of Lionsgate)

“Americana” (2025)

Directed by Tony Tost

Culture Representation: Taking place in South Dakota and in Wyoming, the comedy/drama film “Americana” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some Native Americans) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: Several people become entangled in a violent power struggle to own a valuable Lakota ghost shirt.  

Culture Audience: “Americana” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and 21st century Westerns that mix violent action with serious drama and absurdist comedy.

Gavin Maddox Bergman and Zahn McClarnon in “Americana” (Photo by Ursula Coyote/Courtesy of Lionsgate)

If 1994’s “Pulp Fiction” and 1996’s “Fargo were put in a blender and fermented in South Dakota and Wyoming, it would be the lumpy comedy/drama “Americana.” Halsey stands out in this erratic story about people fighting over a Lakota ghost shirt. “American” is very derivative in some ways but has enough unique elements and engaging performances to be watchable for people who don’t mind seeing an uneven Western with a second half that’s better than the first half.

Written and directed by Tony Tost, “Americana” is his feature-film directorial debut and had its world premiere at the 2023 SXSW Film and TV Festival. The movie (which was filmed in New Mexico) is told in five chapters, with events shown in non-chronological order in the first half of the movie. “Americana” features a group of characters, most of whom are strangers to each other, who become entangled in each other’s lives—for better or for worse.

It takes a while before “Americana” find its best groove because the characters start off being very one-dimensional. The movie begins in an unnamed small town in South Dakota, where Amanda “Mandy” Starr (played by Halsey) is living in a trailer with pre-teen Calvin “Cal” Starr (played by Gavin Maddox Bergman), who’s about 9 or 10 years old. Cal is an eccentric child who is being raised as Mandy’s brother. Also living in the trailer is Mandy’s abusive boyfriend Dillon MacIntosh (played by Eric Dane), who complains in the first scene that Cal is living with them.

Dillon (who’s about 20 years older than Mandy) owns the trailer and car that he and Mandy are using. It’s the first indication that Mandy has fallen on hard times and is financially dependent on Dillon. Cal is fixated on pretending that he is the reincarnation of Sitting Bull, the Hunkpapa Lakota chief who died in 1890 and led a resistance against U.S. government policies that were harmful to Native Americans.

Cal never wavers from acting as if he’s Sitting Bull. Why is Cal having an identity crisis? The answer is revealed later in the movie, which implies that Cal knows a secret that other people don’t want him to know.

Cal is outside when Mandy suddenly runs out of the trailer and tells Cal that they have to leave immediately. She says Dillon is unconscious because she smashed his head with a weapon. (A flashback scene later reveals that Mandy used a hammer for this attack.) Mandy is fleeing the scene by taking Dillon’s car.

Cal refuses to leave because, as Sitting Bull, he says his land is here. Mandy is in a frustrated panic and is in a rush to leave, with or without Cal. When she sees that Cal won’t leave with her, she tells him to go to the Whitleys’ house nearby because the Whitleys can take care of Cal. It’s presumed that the Whitleys are neighbors who know Mandy and Cal. Mandy then speeds away and leaves Cal to fend for himself.

“Americana” then shows the rest of the characters who make up this tangled web. Lefty Ledbetter (played by Paul Walter Hauser), who is actually right-handed, is a socially awkward and lovelorn military veteran who wants to find a nice woman to marry. He “falls in love” very quickly and his marriage proposals get rejected. How quickly does Lefty fall in love”?

In one of the movie’s first scenes with Lefty, he asks a woman named Brittany Gable (played by Austin Boyce) to marry him after they’ve been dating each other for two weeks. Brittany says no because even though she thinks Lefty is a nice guy, they don’t know each other well. Brittany immediately breaks up with Lefty after he proposes.

Lefty is a regular customer at George’s 50s Diner, where Penny Jo (played by Sydney Sweeney) is a server. Penny Jo is shy and sweet. She’s an aspiring singer whose idol is Dolly Parton. Penny Jo’s dream is to move to Nashville to become a country music singer, but she doesn’t have the money and she’s self-conscious about her speech impediment that often makes it hard for her to form words in a sentence.

Lefty and Penny Jo become platonic friends because they both feel like misfits in this world and haven’t had much luck when it comes to dating. Even though Penny Jo is physically attractive and gets attention from men, she is very introverted and seems to be afraid of having an active social life. Penny Jo lives with her strict and cranky grandmother Tish Poplin (played by Harriet Sansom Harris), who scolds Penny Jo for playing the guitar at night in Penny Jo’s bedroom. Tish thinks Penny Jo is foolish for wanting to be a country music star and discourages Penny Jo from pursuing this dream.

One day at the diner, Penny Jo observes three customers who are seated at the same table for a meeting. It’s a flashback scene showing Dillon, his younger crony Reggie Dale (played by Jasper Keen) and a museum owner named Roy Lee Dean (played by Simon Rex), as they concoct a scheme to steal a rare Lakota ghost shirt from a wealthy artifact collector named Pendleton Duvall (played by Toby Huss), who lives in South Dakota. Various people name prices of what they’d be willing to pay for in the sale of the shirt. Roy, for example, is willing to pay $500,000 for it so he could possibly resell it on the black market.

Some other people want the shirt for different reasons. The Red Thunder Society, which is described by its members as a Lakota Nation version of the Blank Panthers, also wants possession of the shirt, which was originally stolen from the Lakota Nation many years ago. Red Thunder Society leader Ghost Eye (played by Zahn McClarnon) and his main sidekick Hank Spears (played by Derek Hinkey) have prominent roles in the story.

It’s enough to say that the ghost shirt is stolen from Pendleton. And several people try to gain possession of the shirt, with deadly consequences. At one point in the movie, a desperate Mandy goes back to her family’s home in rural Wyoming. It’s revealed that she’s the prodigal daughter of a very religious clan led by Mandy’s father Hiram Starr (played by Christopher Kriesa), a racist and sexist patriarch who expects the women in the family to act and dress like farm women who live in the 1820s, not the 2020s.

Also living in the oppressive Starr household are Mandy’s mother/Hiram’s wife Grace Starr (played by Augusta Allen-Jones) and Mandy’s sisters Abigail Starr (played by Rhiannon Frazier), Florence Starr (played by Kenzie Shea Ross) and Calliope Starr (played by Emily Perry), whose ages range from late teens to early 20s. It’s during this tension-filled family reunion that Halsey has her best scenes, as the character of Mandy is revealed to be more than the self-centered rebel than she first appears to be.

Of course, not everyone will make it out alive when the inevitable gunfight showdown occurs. The trailer for “Americana” already reveals a lot about the movie that should have been left out of the trailer and left to be surprises for people who watch “Americana” for the first time. However, there are some worthwhile parts of the movie that aren’t in the trailer.

Because Mandy is the most complex character in “Americana,” the movie showcases Halsey’s impressive acting range, as she becomes the scene-scene star of the show. Not so great are the movie’s cheap-looking wigs that look like they’re from 1981: Sometimes, Mandy’s hair looks like she’s a Joan Jett wannabe. Other times, Mandy’s hair looks like Paul Stanley from Kiss.

Sweeney puts in a good performance as the stammering Penny Jo, who becomes more confident as the story goes along. However, you never forget that Sweeney is acting, whereas Halsey’s performance is more natural. Although “Americana” is marketed around Sweeney’s image and the Penny Jo character, Mandy has the most interesting story and is the real leading character.

All of the other well-known cast members in “Americana” are perfectly adequate in their roles but have played these types of characters many times before on screen: Hauser as the sad-sack outsider, Dane as the nasty criminal, Rex as a sleazy hustling/con man type. It doesn’t help that he characters of Lefty, Dane and Rex are underdeveloped. By the end of the movie, you still won’t know much about these characters outside of how they got mixed up in wanting the ghost shirt.

“Americana” gets a little awkward when it tries to bludgeon viewers over the head with messaging about anti-colonialism and pro-feminism. Cal’s impersonation of Sitting Bull is meant to be a symbol of misguided cultural appropriation, but sometimes the tone of Cal’s scenes are a little too preachy to drive the message home with the intended satirical edge that they need. Similarly, there’s a shootout scene where a man scoffs at the idea of a woman using a gun. And as soon as he makes this derogatory remark, you know what’s going to happen to him.

“Americana” isn’t as witty or funny as it could have been. Some of the characters could have been written better. But if viewers are patient enough to watch the movie past the halfway mark, the story improves and becomes more intriguing. The ending of “Americana” might seem like a tonal mismatch, but it should be satisfying for anyone who’s looking for some humanity amid the carnage and the chaos.

Lionsgate released “Americana” in U.S. cinemas on August 15, 2025. The movie will be released on digital and VOD on September 16, 2025. “Americana” will be released on Blu-ray and DVD on October 28, 2025.

Review: ‘I Don’t Understand You,’ starring Andrew Rannells, Nick Kroll, Morgan Spector, Eleonora Romandini and Amanda Seyfried

August 12, 2025

by Carla Hay

Andrew Rannells and Nick Kroll in “I Don’t Understand You” (Photo courtesy of Vertical)

“I Don’t Understand You”

Directed by David Joseph Craig and Brian Crano

Some language in Italian with subtitles

Culture Representation: Taking place in Italy and briefly in the United States, the comedy/drama film “I Don’t Understand You” features an all-white cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A married gay American couple, who are in the midst of adopting their first child, go on vacation in Italy and get involved in various hijinks when they accidentally kill an elderly woman and try to cover up this crime.

Culture Audience: “I Don’t Understand You” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and movies about obnoxious people who do stupid things.

Morgan Spector and Andrew Rannells in “I Don’t Understand You” (Photo courtesy of Vertical)

“I Don’t Understand You” could’ve been a wickedly funny satire of a vacationing American couple trying to cover up an accidental killing in Italy. Instead, this misguided comedy/drama is a witless bore that fizzles early and never recovers. “I Don’t Understand You” is the type of film where if you’ve seen the trailer, you’ve already seen the best parts of the movie. In this case, this is not a compliment.

Written and directed by David Joseph Craig and Brian Crano, “I Don’t Understand You” had its world premiere at the 2024 SXSW Film and TV Festival. The movie takes place in Italy and briefly in the United States. The challenges that gay couples have in adopting children are used as flimsy gimmicks to explain the motives for some the idiotic shenanigans that take place in the movie.

In “I Don’t Understand You,” married gay American couple Cole (played by Andrew Rannells) and Domenico, nicknamed Dom (played by Nick Kroll) are in the process of adopting an unborn child. The child’s biological mother Candace (played by Amanda Seyfried) is about seven or eight months pregnant when the story takes place. Candace communicates with Cole and Dom by videoconference. It appears to be a private adoption with no agencies involved.

Cole (who is neurotic) and Dom (who is more easygoing) are anxious to have this adoption go smoothly. That’s because they were previously victims of an adoption scam from a woman who pretended to be pregnant, but she really wasn’t pregnant, and she conned them out of an untold amount of money. This fraud is not shown in the movie.

Before the birth of the child, Cole and Dom decide to take a vacation to Italy, where they will be staying mostly in the capital city of Rome. A man named Daniele (played by Paolo Romano), who is a friend of Dom’s father, recommends that Cole and Dom go to a restaurant owned by a local family whose elderly matriarch is named Luciana (played by Nunzia Schiano).

The restaurant is in a remote wooded area. On the way to the restaurant, the rental car that Cole and Dom are using gets stuck in a ditch. Cole whines, “We can’t even get to dinner. How are we supposed to raise a child?”

The cell phone service is spotty, but Dom is able to call AAA car insurance to get the rental car towed and to get a ride to the restaurant. The driver drops off Dom and Cole at the rustic-styled restaurant, which is also the house where Luciana lives. Luciana greets them warmly but she doesn’t know much English. Even though Cole is a vegetarian, Luciana insists that he eat the meat-topped pizza she has made.

Through a series of circumstances, Cole accidentally kills Luciana when he mistakenly pushes her down some stairs, as already revealed in the movie’s trailer. Dom convinces Cole that they shouldn’t report this death because it could put their adoption plans in jeopardy. The rest of “I Don’t Understand You” includes ridiculous things that involve Luciana’s sons Massimo (played by Morgan Spector) and Gianni (played by Vincenzo Gallo), as well as Massimo’s fiancée Francesca (played by Eleonora Romandini), who are not-very-funny stereotypes of loud and emotional Italians.

Dom and Cole become increasingly irritating. And it should come as no surprise that the body count increases. “I Don’t Understand You” makes half-hearted attempts to poke fun at cultural barriers and misunderstandings when people travel to another country and don’t speak the country’s native language. But in the end, it’s just a stupid dark comedy about two people who want to cover up and not be held accountable for some heinous crimes.

Vertical released “I Don’t Understand You” in select U.S. cinemas on June 6, 2025. The movie was released on digital and VOD on June 24, 2025.

Review: ‘Clown in a Cornfield,’ starring Katie Douglas, Aaron Abrams, Carson MacCormac, Kevin Durand and Will Sasso

May 31, 2025

by Carla Hay

A scene from “Clown in a Cornfield” (Photo courtesy of RLJE Films and Shudder)

“Clown in a Cornfield”

Directed by Eli Craig

Culture Representation: Taking place in the fictional city of Kettle Springs, Missouri, the horror film “Clown in a Cornfield” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A 17-year-old girl moves with her widower father to Kettle Springs, and they find out that Kettle Springs has been plagued by serial killngs of someone dressed as a mascot clown named Frendo.

Culture Audience: “Clown in a Cornfield” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the book of the same name and horror movies about killer clowns.

Verity Marks, Cassandra Potenza and Katie Douglas in “Clown in a Cornfield” (Photo courtesy of RLJE Films and Shudder)

Some fans of the book “Clown in a Cornfield” might be disappointed by the movie’s tonal changes to this horror story about serial killings done by a mascot clown. The self-aware comedic revisions mostly work well, thanks to the movie’s appealing cast. The movie leans more into having sarcastic jokes in the story, compared to the book, and this satire is effective because the cast members have very good comedic timing.

Directed by Eli Craig, “Clown in a Cornfield” (which had its world premiere at the 2025 SXSW Film & TV Festival) is based on Adam Cesare’s 2020 horror novel of the same name. Carter Blanchard and Craig co-wrote the “Clown in a Cornfield” adapted screenplay. The story takes place in the fictional city of Kettle Springs, Missouri. The “Clown in a Cornfield” movie was actually filmed in Winnipeg, Canada.

The “Clown in a Cornfield” movie begins in 1991, during a party that teenagers are having in a cornfield. A teenager named Jessica (played by Kaitlyn Bacon) takes off her top and runs into a secluded part of the field. Another teen named Tyler (played by Dylan McEwan) follows Jessica because he thinks she might want to fool around.

Tyler notices that there are some large footprints in the muddy field. These footprints look too big for Jessica. Tyler sees Jessica in front of him. She’s vomiting because she’s been fatally wounded. And you can predict what happens next: Someone dressed as a creepy-looking clown suddenly appears and impales Tyler with a machete.

“Clown in a Cornfield” then fast-forwards to 2025 to show a teenage girl and her father arriving from Philadelphia on their first day as new residents of Kettle Springs. Quinn Maybrook (played by Katie Douglas) is a moody and introverted teenager who doesn’t really want to live in Kettle Springs because she thinks she will be bored in this small city. Quinn’s father Glenn Maybrook (played by Aaron Abrams) is a medical doctor who has accepted a job to be Kettle Springs’ chief physician.

It’s autumn, and Quinn will be a starting her last year of high school in Kettle Springs. Quinn and Glenn are grieving over the death of Quinn’s mother/Glenn’s wife a few months ago. It’s later revealed that Quinn’s mother died of a drug overdose. Glenn wanted a fresh start in a place that’s very different from Philadelphia, which is why he decided to move to Kettle Springs.

Quinn is dismayed to find out that Glenn bought the two-story farmhouse where they live in Kettle Springs without going in person to look at the house. He made the purchase based on photos he saw online. When they arrive at the house, Quinn gets even more upset when she finds out there’s no WiFi service in the house. The house also has a nasty odor, which turns out to be a dead raccoon that’s stuck in the chimney.

A big cornfield near the house can be seen from various windows in the house. Quinn notices that in this cornfield is a large building with a sign that says Baypen Corn Syrup Factory. The company clown mascot also appears on the same sign. Quinn later finds out that this clown is named Frendo, and the factory has been abandoned.

Quinn is a loner type who’s not very concerned about how popular she’ll be in her new school. Her first day at the school also happens to be her 17th birthday. A teenager named Rustin “Rust” Vance (played by Vincent Muller), who’s also a student at the school, lives nearby and has noticed that Quinn and her father have moved into this house.

Rust visits the house, introduces himself to Quinn and Glenn, and offers to walk with Quinn to the school. Glenn approves because Rust seems like a friendly guy. On the way to the school, Rust tells Quinn that hunting and fishing are the main leisure activities for the teenagers in Kettle Springs.

“Not everyone is a redneck,” Rust says. “I don’t really care what people think. Be careful who you hang out with. There are some real weirdos at this school.” Quinn thanks Rust for his advice but doesn’t really know what he means by “weirdos.”

Quinn is late for her first class, which is teaching astronomy. The no-nonsense teacher for the class is Mr. Vern (played by Bradley Sawatzky), who becomes furious when he finds out that unknown students have played pranks on him. First, they put a photo of Mr. Vern’s head on a photo of someone else’s muscular body so that this altered photo appears on the video projector in the class. No one in the class will confess to this prank, so Mr. Vern punishes everyone by giving them a surprise quiz.

Mr. Vern then sees that his dating profile has been copied on a surprise quiz that he hands out to the students. He has a screaming meltdown, which gets recorded by Janet Murray (played by Cassandra Potenza), who likes to think of herself as the school’s “queen bee.” Quinn quickly finds out that the pranksters are the school’s clique of “cool kids,” who introduce themselves to Quinn during this class. Janet is in the clique.

The clique is led by self-assured Cole Hill (played by Carson MacCormac), who comes from the wealthiest and most influential family in Kettle Springs. Also in the clique are Janet’s neurotic best friend Ronnie Queen (played by Verity Marks), Matt Trent (played by Alexandre Martin Deakin), who is Ronnie’s athletic boyfriend; and Tucker Lee (played by Ayo Solanke), who has a fun-loving personality.

This clique has a YouTube channel, where they like to post videos of pranks they’ve pulled on unsuspecting people. Quinn later finds out that Cole and Rust used to be very close, but they had a falling out and no longer speak to each other. The clique has a reputation for being brats who commit petty crimes.

Cole’s ancestors founded Kettle Springs. Cole’s image-conscious father Arthur Hill (played by Kevin Durand) is the current mayor of Kettle Springs. Cole’s great-grandfather founded Baypen Corn Syrup, which used to be the largest company employer in Kettle Springs, until a fire destroyed the inside of the Baypen Corn Syrup Factory about a year ago. The factory has remained abandoned. Kettle Springs has been suffering economically ever since.

Even though Kettle Springs has been going through hard times financially, the city is still continuing its tradition of having its Founders Day parade, where the biggest attraction is a float of Frendo. There’s been widespread gossip that Cole and his friends accidentally started the fire during while partying in the factory after-hours. For this reason and because of the clique’s prank videos, Sheriff York Dunne (played by Will Sasso), who’s in charge of law enforcement in Kettle Springs, has this clique on his radar as potential troublemakers.

The first time that Quinn is invited to hang out with Cole and his friends, they play a prank on her by having Tucker dress up as Frendo and scaring Quinn. They film this prank and post the video on social media. However, Cole notices that there seems to be a shadowy figure of someone else dressed as Frendo in the background of this video. None of this is spoiler information, because the trailer for “Clown in a Cornfield” reveals a lot of what happens in the movie.

Quinn develops a growing attraction to Cole, who seems to be attracted to her too. But this possible romance gets tested during a teen party at the warehouse, where various things happen. All hell breaks loose when people start getting killed in what turns out to be a Frendo massacre.

“Clown in a Cornfield” has many action-packed chase scenes and other terror scenes that should please horror fans but have a lot of typical horror stereotypes of people walking right into a trap when they should be going elsewhere to get help. The gore in “Clown in a Cornfield” is intense but it’s not excessive. This is the type of movie that knows how goofy it is but at the same time it keeps people guessing on who’s behind this killing spree and why certain people are being targeted. (The answer is eventually revealed.)

The movie doesn’t take itself seriously and has some comedy that spoofs how people in horror movies often do idiotic things. For example, there’s a scene where Janet and Quinn are trapped in a place where the only phone they can find is a rotary phone, which they don’t know how to use because they only know how to use phones that operate by pushing buttons. There’s another scene in the movie that’s a not-so-subtle dig at the stereotype of black people get killed off quickly in horror movies, when a terrified Ronnie (who’s black) mentions this stereotype when she says that she’s going to be the next one killed.

“Clown in a Cornfield” is effective because all of the cast members are believable in their roles, although no one is going get nominated for any awards for this movie. The story has some gravitas when it comes to Quinn’s tense relationship with her father and how they’re navigating grief over the loss of Quinn’s mother. Cole seems to be confident on the surface, but he’s also dealing with some insecurity issues having to do with his family and his identity. “Clown in a Cornfield” has an ending that raises some questions that aren’t adequately answered. But considering that the “Clown in the Cornfield” book has sequels, it seems inevitable that “Clown in the Cornfield” will also continue with movie sequels in franchise.

RLJE Films and Shudder released “Clown in a Cornfield” in U.S. cinemas on May 9, 2025. The movie will be released on digital and VOD on June 10, 2025.

Review: ‘Sew Torn’ (2025), starring Eve Connolly, Calum Worthy, K Callan, Ron Cook, Thomas Douglas, Caroline Goodall and John Lynch

May 25, 2025

by Carla Hay

Eve Connolly in “Sew Torn” (Photo courtesy of Vertigo Releasing)

“Sew Torn” (2025)

Directed by Freddy Macdonald

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed city in the United States, the dramatic film “Sew Torn” (based on the 2019 short film of the same name) features an all-white cast of characters representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A seamstress, who is struggling to keep her business operating, faces three choices when she comes across two wounded men and a suitcase full of cash on a deserted road.

Culture Audience: “Sew Torn” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in quirky thrillers that present multiple outcomes for different choices made by the story’s protagonist.

Thomas Douglas, Eve Connolly and Calum Worthy in “Sew Torn” (Photo courtesy of Vertigo Releasing)

“Sew Torn” can get tedious with its overabundance of offbeat characters. However, it’s an intriguing story showing three different outcomes when a lonely seamstress decides what to do about finding cash and two wounded criminals on a deserted road. The performances rise to the challenge of maintaining viewer interest, even though the characters aren’t quite as developed as they could be.

Written and directed by Freddy Macdonald, “Sew Torn” is his feature-film directorial debut and is based on Macdonald’s 2019 short film of the same name. The feature-length “Sew Torn” had its world premiere at the 2024 SXSW Film & TV Festival. The short film “Sew Torn” had no dialogue, while the feature-length “Sew Torn” has dialogue, some of which is darkly amusing, some of which is stuff and unnatural. Each movie has different cast members.

The feature-length “Sew Torn” (which takes place in an unnamed rural U.S. town; the movie was actually filmed in Switzerland) begins with a voiceover from protagonist Barbara Duggen (played by Eve Connolly), as the camera shows dead bodies on a floor. Barbara says in a flat voice: “If I were to tell you why I did what I did, when I was broke and alone, would you pity me, or would you say my actions were justified? Perhaps you’d relate to my isolation, my need. Or perhaps you’d simply see my lack of morality.”

The movie then shows a glimpse of who Barbara is to explain the choices she could make in the story. Barbara is a loner who owns a shop called Home of the Talking Portraits, which sells unusual products: custom-made yarn portraits that have audio recordings installed. Barbara inherited the shop from her deceased single mother (played by Petra Wright), who made several portraits of herself and Barbara. As part of the business, Barbara (who is a skilled seamstress) also operates a mobile sewing service, where she drives to do sewing jobs for customers.

Barbara is feeling despondent because ever since she took over the business, it’s been failing. In fact, the beginning of the movie shows that Barbara has already put up a Going Out of Business signs on display in the shop’s front windows. She is going to one of her last house appointments before she intends to close the shop for good.

This house appointment involves some last-minute mending and sewing of a wedding dress on the wedding day of a demanding socialite name Grace Vessler (played by Caroline Goodall), who will be marrying her third husband. Barbara is nervous because she’s a little late for the appointment. Grace is rude and tells Barbara that Barbara’s mother was better at doing business.

Barbara needs to sew a button on the wedding dress. However, Grace has been so obnoxious and impatient, Barbara pretends to accidentally let the button slip down a grate, when Barbara actually flicked the button down the grate. Grace is upset and Barbara uses this “lost” button as an excuse to go back to her shop to get another button. She assures Grace that she will be back as soon as possible.

While driving on a deserted road back to her shop, Barbara sees a bizarre sight. There’s been a motorcycle accident. The two men (one in his 40s, one in his 20s) are lying face down and wounded on the road. As Barbara drives closer, she sees that the younger man has a broken handcuff on his wrist, while the older man (wearing a motorcycle helmet) is grabbing the younger man by one of his legs, as if he doesn’t want the younger man to move any farther.

The younger man seems to be attempting to crawl to the briefcase on the road. Attached to the briefcase is the chain of the other handcuff. There are two guns nearby. Both men are too wounded to reach the guns and the briefcase. Barbara soon finds out that the briefcase is full of cash.

It’s pretty obvious that this is probably some crime that went awry. It’s later revealed that it’s a botched drug deal. Barbara has three choices: (1) Commit the perfect crime. (2) Call the police. (3) Drive away and do nothing about what she saw. The rest of “Sew Torn” shows what happens when Barbara makes each of these three choices.

Committing the perfect crime is what’s shown first. In this scenario, Barbara intricately threads yarn to each gun and to her car so that when she puts her car in motion, the guns will move close to each man to reach each gun. What happens next is exactly what she was expecting: Each man shoots each other. Barbara then backs up the car and steals the briefcase full of cash. This “perfect crime” scene is the entire plot of “Sew Torn” short film, which does not show what happens to the seamstress after she drives away.

The feature-length “Sew Torn” shows what happens after the seamstress drives away and thinks she has committed the perfect crime. Without giving away too much information, it’s enough to say that Barbara encounters several other characters in the movie. The younger gunman’s name is eventually revealed as Joshua Armitage (played by Calum Worthy), and the older gunman’s name is Beck (played by Thomas Douglas), whose job was to supervise Joshua.

Other characters in the movie are Joshua’s gun-toting father Hudson Armitage (played by John Lynch), who is a wealthy crime boss; a nosy elderly neighbor named Oskar (played by Ron Cook); and the town’s eccentric police chief Ms. Engel (played by K Callan), who is also the town’s notary and works as a wedding officiator on the side. “Sew Torn” has some compelling thriller sequences, but after a while, the characters in the movie might be a little too cartoonish for some people’s tastes. The movie uses a recurring motif of segueing to different scenes by showing a sewing machine stitching words with yarn.

Connolly does a very good job as the central character, considering that Barbara remains emotionally aloof for most of the film. “Sew Torn” is stylish on a technical level, but some viewers will have a hard time connecting emotionally to the movie, which keeps its characters fairly two-dimensional. If want to see a richly detailed movie about people with memorable personalities and interesting lives, “Sew Torn” is not that movie. If you’re in the mood to watch a unique movie to see how someone tries to get out certain dangerous predicaments with sewing skills, then “Sew Torn” is worth watching.

Vertigo Releasing released “Sew Torn” in select U.S. cinemas on May 9, 2025. The movie will be released on digital and VOD on June 13, 2025.

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