Category: Genre

LEAVE THE WORLD BEHIND

By Marc S. Sanders

Anxiety and the unknown are the themes of Sam Esmail’s apocalyptic Leave the World Behind.  Actually, I can’t even be sure it’s apocalyptic or not until the end arrives.  Even then I wasn’t so sure.  

A family (Julia Roberts, Ethan Hawke as the parents, Farrah Mackenzie, Charlie Evans as the kids) make an impromptu getaway from New York City and rent a luxurious upstate air B & B for the next five days.  Upon arrival they are quickly relaxed amid all the amenities and beautiful outdoor pool.  A visit to the beach is refreshing until an oil tanker arrives from the deep ocean waters and drifts upon the shore with no warning.  Strange, but okay.  No need for that to ruin the vacation.

Then other unexpected occurrences happen.  A charming gentleman dressed handsomely in a tuxedo and his formally dressed daughter appear on the doorstep of the home in the middle of the night.  They are played very well by Mahershala Ali and Myha’la.  The man claims that he’s the owner of the house and while attending a concert in the city, they needed to make a quick exit and the best place to hold up was at this house.  Conveniently, he does not have any ID to prove his identity along with no specific personal items in this home he claims to own, not even the title ownership papers.  No photos of family tucked away anywhere.  He does have a key to the liquor cabinet, however.

Quickly, the scene is set where the internet goes down.  Federal blue screen warnings appear on every television channel.  Cell phones don’t work.  Deer, lots and lots of deer, appear in the backyard and then disappear.  Pink flamingos wade in the pool.  Elon Musk’s white Tesla cars have a stand out scene.  Roberts then recalls seeing a grizzled Kevin Bacon collecting an abundance of supplies when she made an earlier shopping trip in the local town.  

The paranoia starts to set in beginning with Julia Roberts’ character Amanda.  Amanda declares early on that she fucking hates people.  Hawke’s husband character, Clay, is not ready to hit any panic button and is happy to accommodate the strangers on the doorstep and just wait for the internet to be restored with a logical explanation.  Ali’s character, known as G.H., lends a welcome smile but it’s clear he’s not sharing all that he’s thinking or maybe what he knows.  

Sam Esmail’s film wants to provide a demonstration of how people respond when they don’t know all that’s going on, particularly when modern technology fails us.  A more relatable inconvenience is suggested as Mackenzie’s character Rose is frustrated that her streaming channel shut down just as she was starting to watch the final episode of the sitcom, Friends.  I felt her anguish immediately as my daughter consumes the trials and tribulations of Ross and Rachel on a repetitive cycle.  Ironically, streaming goes down and now the girl can’t watch Friends.  Netflix is the distributor of this film.  Yet, I think they just gave a ringing endorsement for a dying medium.  If only this girl collected the DVDs.  

My problem with Leave the World Behind is the slow pace of it all.  This is one of those movies where its triumphs hinge upon the final five minutes or so.  Either you applaud what sums up the last two and a half hours you invested, or you roll your eyes at where the picture drops you off with the urge to throw your popcorn at the screen.  

Watching Leave the World Behind brought back experiences of shows like Lost or The Walking Dead.  The set ups are brilliantly intriguing from one development to another.  The follow through on each new happening amounts to nothing or at least not anything where I can suspend my disbelief.  Questions are answered with questions.  It’s like calling an insurance company for information following a car accident.  You just want to slam the phone down.

When Ali’s character chooses to check on a neighbor, he sees a watch embedded in the sand nearby.  He picks it up only to get a fright that makes us jump.  The viewer sees nothing else and we are led to believe that Ali sees nothing else, until Esmail goes to a wide overhead shot showing the massive wreckage of a commercial airplane crash, complete with black smoke and flames and endless amounts of luggage and debris.  It’s hard for me to buy a scene like this.  G.H. doesn’t smell any burning fire nearby?  He doesn’t hear anything? He doesn’t see any other debris left mere inches away from the wristwatch only until Esmail’s direction goes from closeup to wide?  I cannot accept the character’s tunnel vision.  My eyes would go towards the crashed plane before I’d ever discover a wristwatch.  It’s just eerily quiet.  The director’s manipulation is a set up shock for me, the viewer, to grab my attention.  Yet, it backfires because it’s completely implausible.  There are many moments like this in the film.

Other than Marhershala Ali (who I still insist should be considered a viable candidate for the next James Bond or a 007 adversary), the rest of the cast is not dynamic enough.  Julia Roberts is working a little too hard.  Ethan Hawke is not working hard enough.  The dialogue is often boring arriving at no conclusions.  Thankfully, most scenes are enhanced by unusual camera angles from Esmail’s artistic freedoms with his lens.  It’s reminiscent of the deliberately weird structure that Stanley Kubrick often did with The Shining.  Nevertheless, it’s exhausting after a while.

Sam Esmail’s work is no doubt shown through long ponderous imagination.  I certainly felt Julia Roberts’ frustration on display, but still, I got the point.  I see no reason to repeat the same lines at higher volume.  I got the point of a lack of trust between the two parties being brought together.  However, I just got tired of the act.  The racial elephant in the room is even suggested.  Though I wish it wasn’t. People quickly forget that George Romero’s Night Of The Living Dead steered clear of any racial factor, and just look at the legacy of that film from the era of the Civil Rights Movement.

The ending that arrives seems inevitable.  Without revealing anything literal, it is doom and gloom.  However, I might have had more appreciation if suddenly the TV and internet got restored and these odd occurrences all just happened to be one big nothing.  At the very least, then I’d understand that this whole freaking planet would just go nuts without their You Tube, Instagram and Netflix.  

You might have had a conversation at one point in the last decade or so that began as “How did we ever manage to survive before the internet?”  The truth is we did just fine.  The adults in Leave the World Behind never stop to remember that though. 

BAD SANTA: Director’s Cut (2003)

by Miguel E. Rodriguez

DIRECTOR: Terry Zwigoff
CAST: Billy Bob Thornton, Tony Cox, Brett Kelly, Lauren Graham, Bernie Mac, John Ritter
MY RATING: 9/10
ROTTEN TOMATOMETER: 78% Certified Fresh

PLOT: The world’s worst department-store Santa experiences an existential crisis in between drunken benders and burgling department stores.

[Author’s note: This review is of the Terry Zwigoff-approved Director’s Cut, NOT the studio-released Unrated “Badder Santa” version created without Zwigoff’s input. The Director’s Cut improves on the original theatrical release, in my opinion, by removing a lot of extraneous scenes (the Advent Calendar shots, Willie teaching the Kid how to fight, etc.) while keeping some bits from the Unrated version, resulting in a leaner, darker, yet even funnier movie.]


I recently re-watched this movie with my girlfriend, first time for her, first time in a long time for me.  I had forgotten how relentlessly funny it is, specifically because of how vulgar, offensive, and, let us not mince words, dirty it gets.  I don’t know if it’s because this was the Director’s Cut as opposed to the original version, but I was also reminded of the earlier films of Kevin Smith.  It has all the coarseness and low-budget production values of Mallrats, but with a better story and a funnier script (all due respect to Mr. Smith).

The film opens with our “hero”, Willie T. Soke (Billy Bob Thornton) getting drunk and puking in an alley while dressed as Santa Claus.  This is the high point of the movie in terms of his character.  It’s all downhill from here.  Almost.  Sort of.  Anyway, we learn that he is involved in a somewhat-feasible scam with Marcus, a felonious dwarf (Tony Cox), and his rather materialistic wife, Lois (Lauren Tom, aka “Julie” from Friends…I was today years old when I learned that, thanks to Penni).  After Soke does the Santa thing, muttering profanities under his breath the whole time, Marcus stays behind after hours, deactivates the store’s security system, and lets Soke in the back so he can crack the store’s safe.  Meanwhile, Marcus steals whatever is on the list his wife gives him.  (I liked that little touch; he’s not a random thief, he’s a very SPECIFIC thief.)

One day, a literally snot-nosed kid (Brett Kelly) perches on Santa/Soke’s knee and solemnly tells him, “You’re not Santa”…then peppers him with questions about the reindeer, Mrs. Santa, the elves, ad infinitum, while Willie does his best to keep up through his alcoholic haze.  To say this is the start of a beautiful relationship is straining the definition of “beautiful” and “relationship”, but there is a point to all of it.  Trust me.

There’s more, much more, that’s been crammed into this barely ninety-minute-long movie.  The bartender (Lauren Graham) whose non-traditional sexual kink makes Willie implausibly irresistible.  The department store detective (Bernie Mac) who senses Willie and Marcus are trouble but has plans of his own.  The store manager (John Ritter) who claims he’s no prude but who can barely pronounce the words he heard coming from the dressing-room stall in the plus-size section where Willie was…well, modesty forbids.  Not to mention the Kid’s grandmother with the apparent obsession with making sandwiches.  And the profanity.  The virtually non-stop stream of profanity pouring from Willie’s mouth.  In a comic strip, his dialogue would be almost entirely composed of symbols and punctuation marks.

The executives at the now-defunct Dimension Films must have had cojones of solid rock to give this movie the green light.  Who is this movie for?  I’ve seen so-called “polarizing” movies before, but this achieves some kind of high bar.  Some of the lines must be heard to be believed.  Bernie Mac and Tony Cox have an exchange late in the film that belongs in some kind of cuss-word Hall of Fame.  I can imagine Kevin Smith watching that scene and nodding his head in a kind of salute.

As I’ve said many times before, I have always had a hard time watching movies or TV shows with loathsome characters as the leads, no matter how funny they are.  I have never been able to stomach Seinfeld for this reason, but I do acknowledge the ingenuity of the show’s writing and the comic skills of the actors.  I just find it a shame it’s all been attached to characters whom I would cross the street to avoid.  But here is Bad Santa, with a lead character who is not only alcoholic, but who is also suicidal, who haunts mall arcades to hit on teenage girls (“She said she was eighteen”, he says at one point), has no compunction about swearing around children, and beats the crap out of some local bullies who are picking on his new friend…then has the chutzpah to look at the beating as a turning point in his life.  “You need many, many, many f***in’ years of therapy”, Marcus tells him.

And yet I don’t just like this movie, I LOVE this movie, because it makes me laugh.  I’ve been sitting here trying to self-analyze my affection (if that’s the right word) for this film, but I am failing.  I can only report that it has some of the raunchiest dialogue I’ve ever heard, that it is definitely NOT appropriate for kids, that it is certainly NOT one of Penni’s favorite movies (kudos to her for making it all the way through), and that hand-carved wooden pickles stained with blood are not the best Christmas presents ever.

And I laugh like a loon whenever I watch it.  Sue me.

MAY DECEMBER

By Marc S. Sanders

A blaring piece of pounding piano music from Marcelo Zarvos hearkens awake the silent opening few seconds of Todd Haynes’ May December against that of a caterpillar/butterfly terrarium.  I don’t like the music and I’m immediately reaching for the volume control on my remote.  It’s only as the film progresses, however, that I develop a grateful appreciation for the often-disruptive soundtrack.

Julianne Moore and Charles Melton are Gracie and Joe Yoo, the relationship referenced in the film’s title.  Twenty years prior, Gracie, at age 36 who already had children and a husband of her own, had an affair with Joseph, a 13-year-old seventh grader at the time, in the storage area of a Savannah GA pet shop where they worked together.  Gracie went to prison for the crime of statutory rape and delivered their baby while serving her sentence.  Once her term was finished, the two continued their relationship and got married, bearing a set of twins, a boy and girl.

As the twins are approaching graduation, a television actress named Elizabeth (Natalie Portman) has arrived in town to do observational research and interviews to prepare for her portrayal of Gracie in a made for TV account of what occurred.  On the surface, all seems calm with the past put behind everyone.  Townsfolk will say that Gracie and Joe are so appreciated and loved in the community, and they love each other.  However, the script from Samy Burch will reveal otherwise as Elizabeth develops different kinds of connections with Gracie and Joe, respectively, as well as others she speaks with in town, including Gracie’s attorney, her ex-husband, the pet shop owner, and Gracie’s now adult son from her first marriage.  His name is Georgie (Cory Michael Smith) who was close friends with Joe until the affair was revealed, and now let’s everything hang out avoiding any kind of subtlety.  He’s even candid about what he believes occurred in Gracie’s childhood that could have dictated why she committed her act.

Todd Haynes’ picture is a complete character study of a story that many would regard as sordid or seedy trash material to talk about over dinner with friends.  People like Gracie and Joe may seem real to any of us who live in another part of the country.  We will never have any kind of relationship with them.  They are meant for cover stories in People magazine and The Inquirer.  It’s soap opera junk or trashy romance novels brought to reality.  It’s easy to judge the kind of person Gracie in particular is because what she has done is wrong and disturbing.  All these years later and they are still receiving packages on their doorstep that contain feces.  Gracie committed a terrible crime, but what does an act like this say about someone who would go to that length, so many years later? 

The performances in this film are astounding.  Charles Melton especially.  Samy Burch writes a disturbing and well-drawn character with Joe.  He’s thirty-six years old now, in 2015 when this story takes place, and as his children are graduating and are about to make their home an empty nest, he seems so much more immature than them.  A telling scene occurs when his son takes out a joint and practically instructs Joe on how to use it.  Joe coughs uncontrollably.  He gets ill, and it is his son who is calming him down.  Gracie also appears to treat Joe like the child she bedded all those years ago, instructing him to straighten up the house and put away his butterfly garden, or not to get into bed because he reeks of the BBQ he used earlier in the day.  Joe lives in an adult body, but he skipped his progressive years to go straight into marriage and fatherhood, and therefore he has not had an opportunity to grow up.

Julianne Moore plays delusional all too convincingly.  She might have confessed guilt to her crime.  She served her time, but as her attorney and Georgie will imply, none of that means anything if she still believes she did nothing so terrible.  She’s now married to Joe, who is now well past legal age and has had a twenty-year relationship with him, as well as the children they share.  Gracie happily accepts her new role as a baker in the community.  Yet, it doesn’t even occur to her that some acquaintances merely place orders just to keep her occupied.  Either Gracie chooses to wear blinders or she’s truly unaware of how she’s considered; still remaining a pariah within her social circle.  It’s devastating when someone cancels a cake order, tells her to keep the money that was paid for the work, but is also told that the cake no longer needs to be baked.  Especially now, as her children from her second marriage are leaving the home for college, she is realizing that she has no worth or value to anyone anymore.  No one even wants to sample her cake any longer.  Part of me wants to say it serves her right, but with Julianne Moore’s performance, it’s also terribly heartbreaking.  There are acts we commit in our lives that we will never, ever recover from.

Natalie Portman adds another accomplished performance to an outstanding resume.  Todd Haynes assists with demonstrating how manipulative and subtle Elizabeth, the starlet actress, is supposed to be.  When she first arrives at the couple’s home for a summer barbecue, Haynes captures Elizabeth with no jewelry on and wearing a hat and sunglasses that she never takes off.  Gracie, Joe and the others come to greet her and offer her a hot dog, but Elizabeth doesn’t reveal herself.  She keeps herself hidden.  She’s begun a camouflage as she initiates her observations.  As the story moves on, we get to see how perhaps a Julliard trained method actor prepares.  She begins to apply her makeup just like Gracie would.  Elizabeth dresses like Gracie.  She wears her hair like Gracie.  Elizabeth duplicates Gracie’s hand gestures captured in news articles.  Most significantly, she develops a bond with Joe, just like Gracie did.  A crumpled-up letter from Gracie that Joe has held on to since they began their affair twenty years ago, is reintroduced later in the film that Elizabeth pounces on.  Todd Haynes captures an unbroken take of Portman reciting the letter in a mirror and it’s an eye-opening moment for the character.  Suddenly, I don’t see Elizabeth anymore.  I see Gracie, and Natalie Portman is playing the predatory sex deviant.

By 2015, this story is a been there/done that.  The general public has stopped caring.  Only a few still carry an anger with those packages that are left on the doorstep.  Otherwise, there’s nothing left to share or care about.  Yet, May December does a fine job of showing the residual detritus of what’s come from such an illicit affair.  Gracie’s husband before the affair will say he’s over the betrayal and humiliation, but clearly he’s not.  Gracie now has two families.  The first family from a standard marriage with adult and teen children she greets as if they are neighborhood kids.  She’s on the outside of what she used to have as a mother. Then there is the second family consisting of the college age daughter she delivered while in prison and the twins that came thereafter.  An awkward moment occurs in a restaurant when the two families run into one another.  No one is well recovered from Gracie’s transgressions, even if she served her time.

Reflecting back on the music, I wondered why it made such a presence in this intimate, quiet drama.  It literally pounds at you every time it is reintroduced.  I believe it first serves as an abundance of the cheesy melodrama that naturally spawns from an unwell story like this.  Elizabeth is set to appear in a television movie adaptation of this ripped from the headlines account, much like a Lifetime movie of the week which shamelessly thrives on this kind of gossip trash.  The music seems to tell me to “LOOK AT WHAT SHE DID!!!!!!”  Later though, Marcelo Zarvos’ composition seems to remind me that this is not just “another story” as Elizabeth freely dismisses it when talking to Joe during a personal crisis of insecurity.  Joe immediately snaps back at her that this is not just some story.  “This is (his) life!!!!!” 

Before Todd Haynes’ film begins, terrible acts have occurred.  During the course of the movie, we see that terrible results remain.  The narrative of May December is kept interesting because we don’t learn everything at once.  There is exposition to uncover as soon as the film begins all the way to the very end where Gracie undoes all of Elizabeth’s prep work with a curveball truth.  Then, we witness Elizabeth do one take after another on a soundstage with a pet shop prop snake twisting around her arms as the seduction of a young, teenage boy is reenacted.  I don’t think Elizabeth got a convincing grasp on what makes Gracie and Joe tick, and now she questions what she invested in and what she sacrificed of herself in order to learn about the character she committed to portraying.

It’s disturbing what Gracie did.  Perhaps it’s at least as ominous that it is now being duplicated for the sake of entertainment in front of a worldwide audience.

SEA OF LOVE

By Marc S. Sanders

Al Pacino is a twenty-year veteran New York City cop, working out of Manhattan, on the trail of a serial killer in Sea Of Love.  The profession is nothing new to Pacino’s repertoire of roles, but the portrayal is unique thanks to a smart and suspenseful script from Richard Price and intense directing from Harold Becker.

The killer leaves a calling card.  A 45 LP record of Phil Phillips ’50s classic crooner, “Sea Of Love,” spinning on the turntable.  The victims are naked men lying face down in bed with a bullet to the head.  Turns out that a cop from another precinct played by John Goodman has uncovered a similar crime scene in Queens.  So, the two team up.  They believe the murderer is a woman.

All the victims have posted a Lonely-Hearts Club blurb in a magazine. The invitation for a date stands out because the text rhymes.  The detectives decide to post their own ad in the same kind of format, meet the women who respond and hope to nab the killer.  It gets complicated when Pacino encounters a breathtaking and sultry woman played by Ellen Barkin. 

Pacino’s cop is a smart guy.  He’s got instincts.  Yet, perhaps due to his constant drinking, insomnia, and the bitterness he carries now that his partner (Richard Jenkins) has hooked up with his ex-wife, he’s also quite vulnerable.

The mystery is strong, and the tension builds as Sea Of Love moves on.  Barkin has Pacino and the audience convinced that she’s the prime suspect.  Still, he lets his defenses down because he’s easily getting seduced by her advances.

Whether you’re watching Al Pacino share scenes with John Goodman or Ellen Barkin, the execution is fantastic.  Great performances from the three.  Pacino and Goodman have a natural exchange with one another. Often humorous, but the guys always talk like cops.  When Pacino admits to tossing away a fingerprinted glass from Barkin, Goodman suggests lifting the prints from something- ahem – more personal of his.  A cute wink and nod exchange.

More important to the film is the erotic chemistry between Barkin and Pacino.  Harold Becker uses a late-night supermarket visit in the vegetable aisle to evoke the risky and irresistible nature the two characters develop for one another.  Other scenes build well on the relationship between these two lonely strangers who’ve only recently met. 

Moments of isolation and drunken stupors also work towards fleshing out Pacino’s burned out cop.  He’s got a schleppy posture to him and an exhausted expression with his sullen eyes and shaggy black hair.  At the same time, his character’s twenty years of experience seem to uphold his alertness.  This cop knows he’s letting his guard down. Without any dialogue, you see the internal struggle Pacino has with what should be done against what he is deliberately neglecting.

This film was Ellen Barkin’s breakthrough role.  She received rave reviews as someone who takes care to uphold a New York City trendy appearance by day as a shoe salesperson in contrast to a woman looking for some carefree lust in the evening.  For Pacino, Sea Of Love reinvigorated a career slump following a series of poorly reviewed films.  Together, they make for a sexy yet untrusting pair.

Circumventing this relationship is the mystery.  Is Barkin the culprit? She seems to have a dark way about her that may not surprise you.  Price, Barkin and Becker designed the character quite well for her to at least have the potential to be a killer of men.  Is she setting Pacino up to be the next victim?

New York City from the late 1980s looks great, even though interiors were shot in Toronto.  Trevor Jones offers a nail-biting soundtrack to keep the suspense heightened at just the right beats of the picture with Becker’s camera pointing down dark hallways or when new clues are discovered.

I’ve seen Sea Of Love a few times and even with knowing the surprise ending, the film still holds up thanks to the performances from its three stars, along with its taut editing, well-paced writing, and smart direction. 

This is a good erotic murder mystery.

NEXT GOAL WINS (United Kingdom, 2023)

by Miguel E. Rodriguez

DIRECTOR: Taika Waititi
CAST: Michael Fassbender, Oscar Kightley, Kaimana, David Fane
MY RATING: 9/10
ROTTEN TOMATOMETER: 41%

PLOT: In 2011, the literal world’s-worst soccer team from American Samoa gets a new coach one month before the next World Cup qualifiers.


In all the best ways imaginable, Next Goal Wins is a throwback to those countless formulaic sports movies of yore, from The Bad News Bears to Little Giants to Cool Runnings to The Mighty Ducks and beyond, right down to some of the songs used on the soundtrack. The underdog formula is nearly as old as film itself, and there have been many, many bad attempts at using it.  Where Next Goal Wins succeeds is in making the audience really care about the players and the coach before the big match.

Apparently, that’s not easy to do.  The list of films that get this basic concept wrong is long and undistinguished, from badly-thought-out sequels (Rocky V, Major League: Back to the Minors) to original concepts that crashed and burned (The Air Up There, The Babe).  In fact, there have been so many BAD sports films that I initially didn’t want to see Next Goal Wins.  But it’s from a director I admire, New Zealander Taika Waititi (Jojo Rabbit, Thor: Ragnarok), and the trailers made it look mildly interesting with its exotic setting in American Samoa.

After watching it, I am once again compelled to repeat Roger Ebert’s axiom: “It’s not what a movie is about, it’s how it is about it.”  The formula may be old, but Next Goal Wins executes it beautifully, like a textbook sliding tackle.

The story begins with a flashback to when the American Samoan national football team – that’s “soccer” to us Yanks – legendarily lost 31-0 to Australia in the first round of the 2001 World Cup qualifiers.  (The device for this flashback is a charming narration from Taika Waititi himself, playing a Samoan priest…or preacher…it’s not quite clear, but it’s pretty funny.)  Flash forward to 2011 when a down-on-his-luck soccer coach Thomas Rongen (Michael Fassbender) is given a take-it-or-leave-it offer to coach the American Samoan team…a team which, by the way, had never scored a single goal since its inception.  The existing coaching staff, along with the team’s devoted fans, are so beaten down by disappointment and defeat that they don’t even necessarily want a win.  They’ll take just a single goal in official competition.

(I should mention here that before you think this is going to be another “white savior” movie, I assure you, it’s not. In fact, one of the characters brings up that very question, and the team ultimately rises and falls based on how they incorporate their own attitudes and customs rather than in utilizing new methods from their new Caucasian coach. This is key.)

What happens next is predictable to anyone who has ever seen Major League.  We meet the team members, a squad of misfits that includes an oversized goalie, a guy who looks like a reject from the old Geico caveman commercials, and a transgender player who spends most of her time on the practice field standing alone and playing with her hair.  Tradition says that the goalie must redeem himself, the caveman guy will reveal hitherto-unknown skills, and the transgender player will rise to the occasion when it counts.

Does all of this happen?  Well, yes and no.  I don’t want to reveal too much, because a lot of the pleasure in this film is watching how it toys with cliches, turning some of them slightly sideways while fully embracing others.  …okay, I’ll reveal one example.  Remember the overweight goalie?  You’ve probably seen him in the trailer, where the coach tells him to go around instead of jumping over him during a drill.  In another, less-inspired film, he would somehow save the day during the climactic match.  Nope.  He’s replaced about halfway through the movie with the ORIGINAL goalie from ten years earlier, the one who allowed 31 goals against Australia.  (But, as another team member points out, he did make 60 saves in that same game.)  Now this guy has something to prove.

Predictably, everything leads up to the first qualifier against Tonga.  We’re never given much info about this team other than they are the opponents and are therefore two-dimensional douchebags.  They insult the Samoan team unnecessarily and taunt the transgender player at a pre-game mixer.  Formulaic, yes, but it fits neatly into the mold of this movie, and I’m willing to let it slide.  There’s even a revelatory discovery halfway through the match that blindsided me and imparted even more emotional weight to the entire movie.  Don’t let anyone spoil it for you.

After looking at the critical comments regarding Next Goal Wins, it seems like this is just going to be one of those movies that either works for you, or it doesn’t.  One critic calls it “deeply irritating” because it follows the underdog sports movie formula in lockstep.  Well, yes, but it does it so well and with enough variations on that theme that I forgive its predictability.  Another critic says the film “doesn’t seem nearly as challenging or risky as most of what Waititi has given us before.”  Well, geez, what were you expecting, Slap Shot crossed with Jojo Rabbit?  Other critics make that same complaint, that the film suffers relative to Waititi’s previous films.  Well, wouldn’t it be fairer to judge the movie itself instead of comparing it to his earlier work?  Or is that just me?

Next Goal Wins was just a great time at the movies.  It may not unlock the secrets of the universe, but I had more fun than I expected.  I can’t ask for much more than that.

(P.S. For those of you keeping score, my girlfriend cried twice.  Do with that information what you will.)

THE MARVELS

By Marc S. Sanders

If you just want to join your family to have fun at the movies then go see The Marvels. 

The thirty third installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (33???????? Wow!!!) follows a trio of women donning the superhero costumes and getting caught up in an exchange of bouncing around their respective presences with one another.  One second Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani) is in her Jersey City home with her family and then suddenly she’s in an astronaut uniform, floating through space, previously occupied by Monica Rambeau (Teyona Parris).  Another minute, Monica is in that uniform and then suddenly she is occupying the space once held by Captain Marvel (Brie Larson).  This happens a lot within the first twenty minutes and its edited so well for laughs and hijinks as the three main characters of the film are constantly having to switch adventures on a dime.

I have not watched the Ms. Marvel Disney Plus TV series yet.  I won’t lie.  This guy who grew up on Marvel comics, cartoons, and toys is getting MCU exhausted and I just have needed a break.   I’m told there are some elements of that show that lead to some things going on in The Marvels.  Didn’t bother me though.  While I like wink and nod subtleties, it is not why I go to the movies.  I’m not watching War And Peace.  I’m watching superheroes who wear spandex and capes and fly.  I trusted myself to pick up on who was who and what was what.

The Marvels works for the most part as a stand-alone story from the rest of the MCU stuff.  Ms. Marvel, aka teenager Kamala Khan, is a diehard fan of Captain Marvel aka Carol Danvers.  Her room is adorned with her idolized hero in various poses and flights.  Kamala finally gets to meet Carol when they share an adventure together.  Her parents and brother are the strangers in a strange world who give poor Nick Fury (Samuel L Jackson, who I think holds the record for most MCU appearances) a hard time for the sake of comedy.  Monica is the niece by friendship connection to Carol Danvers.  Monica was a child the last time she saw Aunt Carol.  Since that time, her mother has passed away from cancer while she disappeared during Thanos’ blip.

A new Kree villain is mounting an offence.  Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton) has recovered a wristlet of power (meh…it’s a MacGuffin).  Kamala has the other wristlet (meh…another MacGuffin).  Dar-Benn is going to fight the trio and then another MCU film will have been completed.

The Marvels is not a perfect movie.  At times the characters are speaking in their own science fiction scientific speak to tell me what is happening next and honestly I have no idea what in the hell they are talking about.  Meh!  I didn’t care.  Just get to where you need to go.

What serves the film is the set ups of scenes.  Kree bad guys wreck Kamala’s house while the family looks on as one dining room chair or another dish gets bashed.  Holes get smashed through the ceiling as well.  Three Stooges kind of stuff.

There’s also a planet The Marvels travel to for help where the citizens are dressed in pastel colors and ribbons and only communicate in song and harmony.  This could have been a season 3 episode of the original Star Trek series.

The most inspiring and memorable scene is especially catered for lovers of cats and Barbra Streisand.  This sequence that comes late in the film gives new meaning to the phrase “We are herding cats now.”  As silly as this moment is, it should remind you that producer Kevin Feige and his squad of MCU writers have not run out of inventive ideas yet.  This is on the level of the best Saturday Night Live skits you can find. 

Everything is still good in the MCU.  I still enjoy most of what has come down the pike.  The products are just oversaturating themselves by releasing so soon after each other. The MCU is not so enjoyable when it feels like homework to know who and what everything is and where it all left off.

With this installment, the cast is having fun.  The writers are having fun.  The visual effects are having fun.  The story and the bad guy really don’t matter.  The Marvels is simply a kaleidoscope of rainbow color sci-fi silliness and that’s enough to satisfy me.

What would have been a nice touch though is if Babs herself made a cameo appearance.  Then again, the reference joke made in the film during that cat scene left the teenage guys sitting next to me dumbfounded as to why I was laughing so hard at the inclusion of a Streisand number in the film.  Guys, have you not heard of Broadway?????????

THE HUNGER GAMES: THE BALLAD OF SONGBIRDS AND SNAKES

By Marc S. Sanders

The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes is a stellar prequel to Suzanne Collins’ well-known franchise approach to reality television within a barbaric dystopian setting.  Francis Lawerence returns to direct this characterization of the would-be antagonist Coriolanus Snow played by unknown Tom Blyth in a blazing performance of innocence eventually corrupted by a warped environment of law.

The story takes place just over sixty years before Collins’ first trilogy that centered on the heroine archer Katniss Everdeen.  A vicious annual tournament known as “The Hunger Games” has reached its tenth year and interest in the programming has waned.  Rebellion throughout the twelve districts of Panem is getting stronger and the idea of selecting children to compete in a battle royale to the death is frowned upon. 

The elite students, which include Coriolanus and his best friend Sejanus Plinth (Josh Andrés Rivera), have been assigned to a new development in the Games.  They are to serve as mentors to the selected contestants.  Sejanus, who is the son of one of Panem’s wealthiest entrepreneurs, protests the games altogether.  He’s outspoken and determined in his efforts to put an end to the event.  Yet, his father’s wealth always bails him out.  Coriolanus does not seem to have an opinion on the matter.  He’s more curious about the showmanship of the contestant that he’s been assigned from District 12, a wildcat by the name of Lucy Gray (Rachel Zegler, giving a magnificent presence to her role).

Lucy Gray is a free-thinking troublemaker wearing a wardrobe of colors and design.  She is a bursting talent with a guitar as well and an attitude to boot.  While the other contestants appear malnourished, poor, sad and legitimately pitiful, Lucy has a guise of confidence and independence.  She certainly stands apart from her competition when they are all locked up in a zoo cage for the public and press to look upon as hype ahead of the grand tournament.  Lucy is not a skilled fighter, but even without Coriolanus’ guidance she knows how to develop a following.

Elsewhere, there are the puppet masters.  There’s Dean Casca Highbottom (Peter Dinklage), the inventor of the games, and teacher to the mentors.  He stresses a promising future for the best mentor performance, but there is to be absolutely no cheating.  As well, Viola Davis plays a devil of a villain as a Dr. Volumnia Gaul.  Think of her as the equivalent to the Nazis’ Dr. Mengele who experiments with new inventions of hideous creatures and process.  Her towering canister of colorful snakes is chilling anytime it appears on screen.

The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes has a long running time for a science fiction piece catered for young adults.  However, it confirms the error that was made with Collins’ film adaptation of her third novel, Mockingjay, which was split it into two films for the sake of greedy revenue commercialization to line Lionsgate’s pockets.  Because this prequel is contained as one piece, Tom Blyth is invited to perform a thrilling character arc of a poor, but intuitive, and good-natured young man who is eventually transformed into an evil personification. 

Lawrence’s film has multiple opportunities to end and roll the credits.  However, it carries on and becomes a journey for its principal characters, Lucy Gray and Coriolanus Snow are much like in the same vein as Vito and Michael Corleone in The Godfather.  Novels often have the luxury of spanning a wide berth of time to inch their way towards a protagonist’s destiny.  Movies tend to want to hurry things along.  With Francis Lawrence’s film we are granted the time to see how Lucy Gray performs during the leadup to the games as a character of confidence that a public is willing to follow and bet on, but most importantly care about.  Accompanying her is Lucy’s mentor, Coriolanus Snow, who is curious and concerned for Lucy’s wellbeing.  While being separated from one another for large portions of time, the two characters convincingly fall in love. 

The second act of the film is the sport in an arena, far from the technologically sophisticated nature found in the other films.  In this prequel chapter, it is simply an in the round stone coliseum of wreckage following a rebellion strike with barbaric weapons left in the center to grasp for advantage. 

The third act, which in another director’s hands might have been saved for a churned-out sequel, follows the aftermath of where the characters go from here.  Coriolanus becomes an infantryman in District 12 along with Sejanus.  A whole new design is introduced late into the film, and it is as if we’ve begun a brand-new episode of a franchise series.  What keeps The Hunger Games installments feeling fresh is that we are granted both the events preceding the games as well as what’s occurring thereafter. 

The cast is outstanding.  Viola Davis and Peter Dinklage have those jaded and unusual appearances suitable for this disturbing setting.  Davis especially absorbs the scenery whenever she is on screen.  Her costume wear, hair and makeup only enhance her chilling performance.  Jason Schwartzman does a superb interpretation of Lucky Flickerman, an ancestor of Stanley Tucci’s flamboyant character from the other films, and the MC for the games.

Rachel Zegler lends her talents for song and guitar to the film, and I loved every second of it.  I know she is currently not favorable in the public eye based on comments she has made.  However, if she continues to follow a course of picking smart roles and playing them as well as she does here, and like she did in Spielberg’s West Side Story, then she is destined to becoming an elite leading actor in the likes of Julia Roberts and then later Anne Hathaway.  I loved every song she performed in the film as well.  She lends a twang to her vocals that blend beautifully with her guitar strings.

Tom Blyth is so trusting with his boyish complexion and bleach blond curly mop top.  He fits well into the destitute role of the son of a dead would have been tyrant.  His wardrobes are described as hand made at home, even with small bathroom tile pieces serving as fashionable buttons on his dress shirt.  Blyth, while humble, wears everything with confidence, remaining the exact opposite of the President Snow we knew from Donald Sutherland’s performance in earlier films.  This Coriolanus is someone I can trust.  Someone I do not question.  Yet, when the end of the film arrives, I’m left surprised by the outcome of the character even though I know what’s expected of him.  It’s a positively inventive characterization from Suzanne Collins, interpreted with a subtle balance between protagonist and antagonist from Tom Blyth.  This guy might have been a better casting choice for Anakin Skywalker in the Star Wars prequel films. 

I’m angry at myself for not having yet read The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes.  I imagine it’s a crackling good read.  The film concludes with doors open for questions that leave me curiously thinking, four days after having seen the picture.  I can only hope there are additional films to come that explore even more deeply into Suzanne Collins’ rich tapestry of dystopia and the complex characters that occupy it.

The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes is one of the best pictures of the year.

NAPOLEON

By Marc S. Sanders

I never knew much about Napoleon Bonapart.  He was short.  He’s French of course. There’s that famous painting with his right hand tucked into his tunic. Or was it his left?  The big hat. I’d heard he was kind of a brat.  Ridley Scott’s latest period piece, Napoleon, confirms most of what I recall.  The painting was nowhere in sight though.

Joaquin Phoenix portrays General Bonapart, and he surely had a great challenge ahead of him. I cannot say that I was bored with any part of the film, but I did find Napoleon to be quite bland during the first act of the film.  Phoenix, doing his best with a script by David Scarpa, seems to be a stand in with nothing of much consequence to say.  It is only when the Captain all but invites a promotion upon himself to the rank of General, following the guillotine beheading of Marie Antoinette, that his arrogance begins to show.  Thereafter, he takes it upon himself to force the hands of the governing council to resign from their positions, a very entertaining sequence for sure.  Then Napoleon sees no other purpose but ongoing conquest. 

With each passing scene in Napoleon, the ego of the title character grows and grows and that is the underlying theme of Scott’s picture.  We journey to the pyramids of Egypt to witness Napoleon lead his armies towards further conquest.  Alternatively, we also trek through the raw winters of Russia and on to a blazing Moscow.  Who set the Russian city alight is a question that history may contradict of the General’s claim.

Napoleon is sure to get a slew of Oscar nominations.  However, it will likely not be in any of the major categories.  The numerous battles are outstanding in whatever setting Ridley Scott offers.  Whether it is in the desert or murky winter grounds, I could not tell if the armies were physical extras or CGI.  It all looked seamless in its construction.  David Lean would be proud.  Sound editing was also perfectly in sync.  The set designs of the many scenes throughout are exemplary from bedrooms to halls and the wallpapers, furnishings and floors and even the outdoor landscaping of the French estates.  Even Napoleon’s tent on one battlefield after another are absorbing.  The costuming always makes a statement.  Every stitch and distressed shade of blues, reds and whites tell a story.  Yes, it’s all very impressive.  However, I did not go to Napoleon to grade a college project assignment in fine arts.  Overall, it has to be the movie itself that grabs me.

Unfortunately, Ridley Scott’s film suffers from shortcomings that cannot be forgiven.  I have to lend credit to my wife who pointed out flaws that did not come to my attention until I heard her input, and thus could not deny.  There are topics brought up in the film that are either not followed through clearly or are left with questions. 

One moment in particular occurs when Napoleon opts to marry the daughter of a leader. Do not ask me to remember which leader. Characters leave the picture just as quickly as they enter.  One daughter is of proper age.  The other daughter we are told is only age fifteen and Napoleon turns down the idea of the latter, but in the scene afterwards it appears that he actually did choose to marry the fifteen-year-old.  The girl certainly looked like a teenager.  So, how did that come to be? 

A storyline I really took an interest in was Napoleon’s marriage to Josephine (Vanessa Kirby).  The widow of a dead soldier, with three children, he marries her for love.  Then he leaves to conquer some more and more around the world.  Yet, the general returns when he realizes she is happily having affairs in his absence.  The bruised egotistic response of Napoleon is very well played out. Joaquin Phoenix has his best moments in the storyline he shares with Vanessa Kirby.  However, while I thought I understood, my wife pointed out that the film does not clearly explain how the relationship continues.  There’s animosity at first but then there is a mutual love between the couple and how exactly did that flourish and change?  When was the mutual affection eventually sparked?  What works best is how the two are unable to bear a child together.  Napoleon is nothing but forceful in his moments of sex with Josephine.  He will damn well force a pregnancy even if it means he has to thrust harder and harder inside of her.  Yet, no results come of his efforts. An heir must carry on the Bonapart legacy.  Since one does not appear, it taxes heavily upon the powerful leader.

Later in the film, following the couple’s dissolution of marriage, a child is born but who exactly carried the offspring?  Details like these seem to be glossed over.

Few directors are as skillful at showing grand scenes of battlegrounds with sharp, clear edits of how the fighting progresses.  Ridley Scott demonstrates that over and over again with one scene after another.  He accomplishes fare like this so well in other films like Gladiator and his interpretation of Robin Hood.  The dark hazy cinematography works beautifully on a big screen.  However, I’m not sure if it will be as effective on a sixty-inch flat screen where there’s a risk of intrusive glares in your living room.  These magnificent scenes need to be watched on a big screen.

Unfortunately, the attention to detail is not lent to the story as effectively. Napoleon’s mark in history did not just happen in a period of a few years.  For a brief window of time, France was a superpower ahead of the likes of Egypt, Britain, Austria, Prussia and even Russia.  Two hours and forty minutes may seem like a long film and yet Napoleon likely needed at least an additional hour to serve a complete historical recount.

If you want to see Napoleon, now is your chance while it plays in theaters.  Again, I do not believe it will have the same effect at home.  Regrettably, the film does not offer enough on the plate.  No one in the cast is doing anything of Oscar caliber accomplishments.  Ridley Scott comes up short of end of the year award considerations for not inviting tighter storytelling, and that also goes for David Scarpa’s script. 

The visual marvels of this period piece are what is to behold.  Watching Napoleon, I certainly felt like I was there amid the glorious costumes, set designs and cinematic photography.  Nevertheless, while I may have been in the room, the hosts of the picture were not sharing their entire conversation with me around the dinner table.  Alas, at times, I was left to stand in the corner, feeling like an unwelcome guest.

SPEEDY (1928)

by Miguel E. Rodriguez

DIRECTOR: Ted Wilde
CAST: Harold Lloyd, Ann Christy, Bert Woodruff, Babe Ruth (!)
MY RATING: 10/10
ROTTEN TOMATOMETER: 100% Fresh
Everyone’s a Critic Assignment: “Watch a Silent Film”

PLOT: An everyman helps his girlfriend’s grandfather keep his obsolete horse-drawn trolley business alive by finding odd jobs in New York City (when he’s not having fun at Coney Island with his gal).


Speedy is charming, delightful, inventive, funny, thrilling…I could go on.  For me, this movie, along with the other Harold Lloyd films I’ve seen (The Freshman, Safety Last!, The Kid Brother), cements my perception about Harold Lloyd when compared to the other giants of his day: Chaplin will always be The Tramp, and Keaton is the Great Stone Face, but Harold Lloyd, in his films, is us.

Lloyd plays Harold “Speedy” Swift (get it?), a young man who loves his girlfriend, Jane, almost as much as he loves Yankees baseball.  How much does he love it?  He interrupts his duties at a soda shop with frequent phone calls to a friend who gives him the up-to-the-minute score of the Yankees game.  (No radio stations or televisions yet…ancient history, folks.)  He then passes the score to the workers in the kitchen by using a pastry case as a scoreboard and doughnuts and crème horns as zeros and ones.  When he finds out the Yankees have scored three runs in an inning, I found myself actively wondering what pastry item he would use for a “3.”  The answer may or may not surprise you.

Jane’s grandfather, Pop, owns and runs the last horse-drawn trolley service in New York City.  Big-shot railroad owners want his track for themselves, but Pop won’t sell until they meet his price (craftily inflated by Speedy himself in one of the movie’s funnier scenes).  The rail tycoons learn that Pop must run the track’s route at least once in a 24-hour period, so they hire some goons to hijack the trolley the next day.  When Harold learns of their plan…

But this is just a synopsis.  There is a story here, but it is almost secondary to the delights to be had just from watching the film play out, not just because every scene is cleverly executed, but also because many of those scenes present the viewer with what amounts to a travelogue of New York City in 1927, from Times Square to Bowling Green to Washington Square Park to Coney Island.  (A documentary on the Criterion Blu-ray of Speedy reveals there were several skillfully concealed cuts to the streets of Los Angeles, but I was absolutely fooled, so I stand by my statement.)

The highlight of the film is the sequence when Harold takes Jane to spend his week’s pay at Coney Island.  These scenes left me flabbergasted.  I have seen many vintage photos of Coney Island in the 1920s, but never had I seen film footage of any kind.  Some of the rides there defy belief.  There’s a giant flat disk that spins on the floor and guests pay for their chance at a prize if they can stay on the revolving disk for three minutes.  There’s a flume ride where the ride vehicle shoots out into the bay instead of staying in a chute.  There’s something called the Steeplechase that looks like a death-defying ride on a gravity coaster, but instead of sitting in a car, you’re riding on top of a metal carousel horse…no lap bars!

The Coney Island segment is home to some of Speedy’s funniest gags, like the live crab that improbably winds up in Speedy’s pocket and causes havoc on the midway by popping balloons, pinching passersby, and stealing a woman’s negligee…from her purse, of course.  And let’s not forget the scene when Speedy looks at his reflection in a funhouse mirror, doesn’t like what he sees…and flips himself off.  That’s right: in this pre-Hays-Code film, a character in a mainstream movie, certainly seen by children and adults alike, gives himself the finger.  Don’t believe me?  Take a look:

I must have rewound that scene five times to make sure I saw what I saw.

Anyway, the other highlight of Speedy is when Speedy gets a job as a cabdriver and gets to drive Babe Ruth to Yankee Stadium.  That’s right.  BABE.  RUTH.  Just like with Coney Island, I had only ever seen The Babe in grainy newsreel footage and still photos.  To see the Sultan of Swat in a fantastically restored film from nearly a century ago was…damn, I seriously cannot think of the right word for it.  I had a big grin plastered on my face during his entire scene, and it’s a long scene, with Speedy careening through traffic, barely avoiding accidents, while Ruth hangs on for dear life.

The experience of watching Speedy, with its real NYC locations and the inclusion of genuine sports royalty, felt less like watching a movie and more like watching a magic window into the past, like a wormhole through space and time.  The last film that made me feel transported like that was the fascinating documentary Dawson City: Frozen Time, about a trove of forgotten films and newsreels from the turn of the century and slightly beyond found buried under the permafrost in the Yukon.  To be sure, there are plenty of old films that I’ve seen before, but Speedy is the first one of those that presents, not a manufactured set or a western town that was already old in the 1920s, but a living snapshot of a real, tangible place where the locations in the film can still be seen today.

And I haven’t even started on the brilliant performance from Harold Lloyd himself.  Lloyd carries the movie on his shoulders from the get-go, establishing himself as an everyday Joe who just wants to earn that cash and help his girlfriend.  He doesn’t mug, like Chaplin, and he doesn’t stare, like Keaton.  He just IS.  He never comes off as overacting, playing every scene absolutely straight, expressing consternation and exasperation at the fates that, for example, gets him away from a dirty mutt on the street, only to back into a freshly painted fence.  Or watch his face on the midway when he wins a special prize: a baby’s crib.  Jane, his girlfriend, lights up.  Speedy does what any man not ready for commitment would do: tries to give the damn thing back.

After a frantic chase under the city’s elevated train tracks that results in a genuinely unplanned accident – SUCK it, French Connection, we were here first! – everything comes together in a massive rumble (between the rail tycoons, their thugs, and residents of Speedy’s and Pop’s neighborhood) that has to be seen to be believed.  At the end of the film, I still had that stupid smile plastered on my face from earlier.  What a treasure this movie is.  What a delight.  I don’t know if Speedy is available on any streaming service, but if it’s not, I would urge anyone who loves film to buy or borrow a copy whenever they can.  For film aficionados, it’s a gem.  For anyone new to silent films, this would be a great place to start.

THE MARVELS (2023)

by Miguel E. Rodriguez

[Phase Five, #3, for those keeping track]
DIRECTOR: Nia DaCosta (the first African American woman to direct an entry in the MCU, incidentally)
CAST: Brie Larson, Teyonah Parris, Iman Vellani, Samuel L. Jackson, Zawe Ashton
MY RATING: 8/10
ROTTEN TOMATOMETER: 62% Fresh

PLOT: Captain Marvel, Monica Rambeau, and the fledgling Ms. Marvel get their powers “entangled” with each other, forcing them to work together to save the universe.


I’ll get to the actual review in a minute, but first:

The MCU is now so vast – and it’s only getting vaster – that even diehard fans are starting to experience what I’ll call MFS: Marvel Fatigue Syndrome.  The newest entry, The Marvels, is the thirty-third film in a franchise that began in 2008 with Jon Favreau’s Iron Man, not to mention the nineteen streaming and broadcast TV series, starting with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. in 2013, with more on the way.  With those hundreds or even thousands of hours of viewing time that are required (more or less) to keep up with current events within the franchise, it’s no surprise that some members of the Marvel fandom are already blogging and writing op eds proclaiming that The Marvels may be the movie that finally sends the MCU into a death spiral, due to its relatively low box-office grosses in its opening weekend.  Enough already, they’re saying.  The people have spoken.

My opinion?  Well, if you were to ask me which two movies were the least fun of the franchise in recent years, I’d have to go with Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.  That one-two punch of mediocrity would have been my choice of theoretical MCU-killers.  And yet here we are.

I say all this because I think we should all give the MCU a break.  They have no fewer than eleven films in development through 2027 and beyond.  The Marvel Cinematic Universe will be remembered as THE most profitable film franchise in the history of franchises.  They’re gonna keep cranking them out as long as we keep plunking down the money for tickets.  So, if you’re experiencing Marvel Fatigue Syndrome, allow Dr. Rodriguez to offer his expert advice: Don’t go.  Save the hate-watching for the new Aquaman movie in December.  (God knows he’ll need all the help he can get.)

Now, with that in mind:

The Marvels does indeed depend PARTLY on your knowledge of the events in the TV series WandaVision and Ms. Marvel, so if you haven’t watched either of those series, you may want to consider setting aside some binge time before heading to the movie theater.  Otherwise, yes, you may be a little lost.

Given how some of the movies in Phase Four were not exactly sensational (looking at you, Eternals and Thor: Love and Thunder), my expectations were toned down a bit.  However, speaking as someone who did his homework and watched all of the required TV, The Marvels turned out to be far more entertaining and fun than I expected.

Most of the unexpected fun comes from the “entanglement” of powers experienced by three powered individuals: Captain Marvel (Brie Larson), Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris), and 16-year-old Kamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani).  For reasons that have something to do with the “cosmic bangle” worn by Ms. Marvel, they switch places whenever one of them (or only two of them?) use their powers at the same time.  I’m at a loss to explain it logically, but the movie deftly handles the transitions visually, so we’re never confused about who is where and why.

No superhero movie is complete without a villain.  In this case, it’s a Kree warrior, Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton) who has somehow come into possession of the giant hammer first wielded by Ronan the Accuser way back in the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie.  Building on the ancient civil war between her race and the shape-shifting Skrulls, she intends to do whatever it takes to bring her desolate homeworld back to life, even if it destroys a Skrull planet/refugee camp or two in the process.  To do this, she’ll need two quantum bands.  She finds one near the beginning of the film, but where’s the other one?  Why, wrapped around Kamala Khan’s wrist, of course.

(One might wonder how Dar-Benn’s planet was desolated in the first place, and the movie does answer that question, but I’m not saying.)

There is great chemistry among the three leads, although I must confess it felt a little forced near the beginning.  However, they definitely clicked in two sequences: when they start to figure out how to work together and make their “entanglement” an asset instead of a liability, and when they visit a beautiful, almost water-covered planet to warn the population of an impending attack.

If I had my way, this world would be called “Planet Bollywood” forever and ever, amen.  The inhabitants can only communicate through song; plain old atonal speech is indecipherable to them.  Thus, when the Marvels arrive, they are greeted by an elaborate song and dance number with mundane lyrics accompanied by the most dizzying array of dance and colorful costumes outside of a Julie Taymor film.  I’ve never seen a Bollywood movie, but I have to believe this is what they’re like.

Other developments take place involving Nick Fury, Kamala’s family, a giant space station in Earth orbit, and Chewie/Goose, the Flerken cat introduced in Captain Marvel (2019).  There is a scene onboard the space station that absolutely must be seen to be believed involving Chewie, an emergency evacuation, and…Broadway.  ‘Nuff said.

I laughed a lot during The Marvels, and that’s a good thing.  With entangled powers, Bollywood, a sixteen-year-old girl with a bad case of hero worship, and an entirely unexpected “marriage of convenience” …with all that bizarre subject matter, striking a humorous tone works for the film.  Plus, it was, I must admit, refreshing that, with only one minor exception, the story didn’t include any of the three female leads dealing with a crush or a boyfriend or kids back home.  These were just three women kicking ass and taking names.  (The final battle with the villain was amazing, setting up a cliffhanger I didn’t see coming…make sure you stick around for the credit cookie!)

Am I experiencing MFS myself?  Not yet.  Sure, I groan with everyone else when a film doesn’t quite live up to expectations, going all the way back to Iron Man 2 and 3, but for every mediocre sequel, there’s a Black Panther, or an Avengers: Endgame, or…The Marvels.  Movies like this one keep me coming back to the MCU, for better or worse.  It was fun, witty, exciting, and pretty damn smart.  What more could I ask for?