From the late 1970s through the 80s, three major non-Star Wars sci-fi franchises were all born into existence, all of which concerned some manner of spectacular creature born or willed into existence to eradicate the human race as we know it. The Terminator, the third such of these franchises, demonstrated to audiences the dangers of playing too comfortably in the world of artificial intelligence. The one before, Predator, took place within a new kind of jungle warfare against an extra-terrestrial foe following a wave of films about the ultimate jungle struggle in Vietnam. But the first of these franchises – and one of only two in which director James Cameron played a part – was Alien, which began in 1979 under director Ridley Scott, the first film of which quickly became known as the greatest sci-fi horror film ever made. It wasn’t long before James Cameron, following his success on the original Terminator, would execute the famous pitch for directing the film’s sequel, Aliens, eventually launching the property into the conversation of greatest sci-fi horror franchises ever made. Now, 45 years and eight films later – including two widely-maligned crossover events with the Predator films – we have arrived at Alien: Romulus, which sees Fede Álvarez stepping into the director’s chair to bring things all the way back to basics.
 
With its story set between the events of Alien (1979) and Aliens (1986), Alien: Romulus stars Cailee Spaeny as Rain, an orphan girl working on a mining colony in deep space for the Weyland-Yutani corporation, who hopes to earn enough working hours to secure a travel permit to the planet Yvaga III with her brother Andy (David Jonsson), a Weyland-Yutani synthetic android. Once it becomes clear that the corporation does not plan to offer travel permits of any kind, Rain decides to join a group of other young space colonists in seeking out a decommissioned spaceship floating above their planet, having been convinced that they can all travel to Yvaga III together using the cryo-sleep pods left on board. It becomes quickly apparent, however, that the ship was not decommissioned, but abandoned, and things turn awry quite quickly as the group comes face to face(hug) with most terrifying and perfect organism to ever haunt the stars. This film also stars Isabela Merced, Archie Renaux, Spike Fern, and Aileen Wu.
 
At their heart, the best of the of the Alien movies have typically had rather simple set-ups. There’s a group of space truckers, they end up on a spaceship somewhere with no ability to contact the outside world, and the titular creature wrecks shop, picking them off one-by-one. (The first movie is literally just called “Alien.”) Over time, and especially recently, the franchise has seemed more interested in exploring the sci-fi origins of its plot machinations in films like Prometheus and Alien: Covenant, having drifted further away from the horror that made the series a household name. Whichever approach one prefers, it’s been generally agreed upon that the franchise needed a solid reset (much in the same manner The Force Awakens gave a reset to the Star Wars). And while there are certainly elements of Alien: Romulus that feel too attached to the past, on the whole, it’s about as solid of a return to form for the series as one could have hoped under the new 20th Century (read: Disney) banner.
 
If there’s one thing the Alien films are known for besides perhaps the best creature design ever conceived, it’s the set-pieces, the most iconic of which is the chest-burster scene in the first movie. Luckily, Fede Álvarez knows how to do horror set-pieces better than just about any horror director working today, and Romulus contains around 3 or 4 major ones that immediately jump to mind, two of which are some of the best work the series has offered to date, both reinforcing the imagery of the face-huggers as a disturbing metaphor for sexual violence while also while also relishing in the grosser, more horrifying elements of birth as a xenomorph’s head begins to crown out of a literal birth canal. Both the music in these moments and the beautifully-crafted practical effects underscore just how terrifying the titular alien is in both concept and execution, a monster without equal whose emergence can be comfortably compared to death itself coming to life. But it’s not just the set-pieces involving the aliens that increase the the tension of the film; space itself is as terrifying as any extra-terrestrial monster, and as things continue to escalate, so too do the more basic elements our characters need to survive (i.e. depressurization, lack of oxygen, frozen cryo-fuel, etc.) These sequences  wouldn’t work nearly as well if the sound or production design lacked even an inch of quality, and with Álvarez committing to using as little CGI as possible to achieve the look of the film, only the sound could have afforded a little slack, which the film refused to give it. Of the Alien films I’ve seen to date, this is one of the best-sounding, most intentionally designed, and every bit of effort shows on a theater screen.
 
It's not just the design elements or the musical score in the film’s upper half that make Romulus worthwhile, however; the film also boasts two of the series’ best performances to date in Cailee Spaeny and particularly in David Jonsson. Spaeny’s star continues to rise as the Priscilla and Civil War star takes center stage here, never straying so far into Sigourney Weaver’s territory from the original films that her performance risks impressionism, but always staying just solid enough that the two characters could easily exist side by side without any viewer questioning whether they belonged next to each other. It’s doubtful that Rain becomes as iconic as Ripley, but at their core, the two parts are played similarly. The standout, though, is David Jonsson of Industry fame, whose performance as Andy anchors the film in its deepest humanity despite the fact that the character is not biologically human. Jonsson is able to play both the humanistic and the corporate practically seamlessly, cementing his place in franchise history as one of its finest new additions.
 
There are moments in which Romulus’ fan service feels too derivative of its inspirations, as though the divided responses from previous entries attempting to do something new had scared off the producers from continuing to try new things entirely, though in on case towards the unfortunately overlong ending, it did feel as though that derivativeness wore thin. I also won’t spoil a fairly major plot point here that has major ramifications on how the story of the film plays out, but suffice it to say, while the execution of it doesn’t read as anything especially egregious given its nature, the thought of whatever producers’ meeting gave the green light does make me feel a little queasier than anything involving the xenomorph ever could. There’s nothing wrong with going back to basics as a method for re-adjusting course, but as I’ve said many times, relying on those basics too much, beyond just a few cursory awkward line reads that harken back to what came before, ultimately detracts from the idea that filmmaking itself is a medium for growth and pushing the boundaries of storytelling.
 
Overall, there’s not much to say about Alien: Romulus that would offer any deeper insight into the movie itself or the franchise as a whole from my end of things. It’s just a really solid, well-crafted sci-fi horror film with a few great set-pieces, some great performances, and a good sense of what made those original films work in the first place. I doubt that it’ll end up in my Top 10 by year’s end, but if back to basics was what it took to get the acid blood on this ship pumping again, there’s not a whole lot more a viewer can expect than what was offered here. If anything, it’ll be interesting to see whether or not Fede Álvarez sticks around after this, and whether his apparent dream of a new Alien vs. Predator movie can actually come to fruition.
 
I’m giving “Alien: Romulus” an 8.6/10
 
- The Friendly Film Fan

Based on or inspired by the insane true story (it’s not immediately clear which), Strange Darling is the sophomore effort of writer and director JT Mollner, and stars Willa Fitzgerald as The Lady, a young woman for whom her own safety is top priority, who takes a chance on meeting a swell-seeming guy for a one night stand. At first, things appear amicable, but nothing is what it seems when this twisted get-together spirals out of control in a flash, and The Lady is forced to do whatever it takes to survive as she is ruthlessly pursued by The Demon (Kyle Gallner) across multiple states in one of the most deadly serial killer murder sprees in U.S. history. Shot entirely on 35mm film by producer and director of photography Giovanni Ribisi, and told in 6 distinct chapters in non-linear fashion, the film also stars Ed Begley Jr., Barbara Hershey, Steven Michael Quezada, Madisen Beaty, Bianca A. Santos, and Denise Grayson.
 
If I were to give readers one piece of advice when it comes to a film like this, apart from going in as blind as humanly possible, it would be to let go of the idea that one can figure this movie out before the next chapter begins. Given all the unexpected turns it has to offer, there’s little to discuss without spoiling, so if this review feels a tad vague, it is a deliberate choice. Whatever kind of serial killer movie one thinks this is at the start, or even further into it, well, it’s not that movie. That’s not to say that it doesn’t eventually find a more straightforward path as far as narrative is concerned, but the surprises in store for those whose grip on the “predictability” of movies like this is loosened are far and away some of the best any thriller this year has had to offer. As the cat-and-mouse chase between The Lady and The Demon plays out, it’s never clear where exactly the turns will come, or just where they’ll lead. As much as the film is lovingly informed by and pays tribute to the grindhouse horrors and slashers of old, it remains entirely undefinable by their usual tenets, comfortably sitting alongside them while forging a path all its own. In most films like it, the structural whiplash of flipping between chapters in non-linear fashion may seem like a crutch used to keep the narrative interesting without offering any real justification or depth, but for Strange Darling, that whiplash is not only a welcome tool used to piece the puzzle together, but the very mechanism by which the viewer learns that the film is, in fact, a puzzle.
 
But it’s not just the structured edit of the film that makes it such an impressively strong second effort for Wallner; in navigating the jigsaw pattern by which the film takes shape, the audience is also treated to two of the most exciting performances of the year to date between Fitzgerald’s Lady and Gallner’s Demon. The two characters could be perceived as one-note, arch ideas at first, the former for the risks women endure in public life, the latter for the literal manifestation of those risks, but Wallner is careful not to pigeonhole his actors, allowing Fitzgerald in particular to really strut her stuff through a range of different modes. To say anything further would be to spoil a film wherein even the lighter plot points I find myself dancing around so as not to ruin the experience, but suffice it so say, if awards bodies took horror performances more seriously, Fitzgerald’s work here, at the very least, merits a mention in the conversation.
 
Much of this film’s uniqueness may be attributed to the way the film is shot by actor Giovanni Ribisi, who also produced the film, and whose choice to shoot on 35mm feels purposeful rather than entirely stylistic, though style the film does employ to great effect. There’s something about the grainy textural look of the movie that offers a more robust sense of the danger all around our protagonist, much in the way that one can just tell something is off in older horror hits like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or films of the more unexpectedly brutal variety like Deliverance. Strange Darling is a far cry from either of those films narratively or even thematically, but tonally, the three share a distinct vibe of things being just a bit too eerie and stomach-churning, courtesy of an aesthetic that I can only describe as “grimy.” Perhaps the film itself is not exactly the most grotesque of its kind, but it fits well within that camp nonetheless.
 
Movies like Strange Darling come around so rarely, catapulting new voices in the world of cinema like those of JT Mollner to dynamic new heights with startling energy and exciting vigor; catching one this early, before Mollner becomes a household name, feels akin to discovering a great band right after their debut album. I can honestly say I haven’t seen a film like it in a very long time, and I doubt there will be another so uniquely positioned in this calendar year. Needless to say, I would encourage all readers, especially those that are fans of grindhouse horror and thrillers, to take a chance on seeing the film as soon as they are possible able. It feels like the beginning of a truly special era for Wallner and Co., and is bound to be one of this year’s great hidden gems.
 
I’m giving “Strange Darling” a 7.8/10
 
- The Friendly Film Fan

With their debut feature, We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, director Jane Schoenbrun burst onto the scene as a voice with a particular talent for examining gender dysphoria through coming-of-age horror, utilizing found footage and screen recordings a la Unfriended and Searching to explore how online spaces may exacerbate or further complicate the uncertainty of youth and our innate desire as human beings to belong to something…or somewhere. Hoping to pull off the hat trick a second time, Schoenbrun now has set their sights on the world of late-night 90s television in an effort to relay the experience of queer dysphoria primarily through the lens of trans identity using old-school, analog psychedelia as a means of telling their story. The central premise revolves around the relationship between Owen (Justice Smith) and Maddy (Brigette Lundy-Paine), who meet on an election night at the local high school. The two bond over their shared love for a late-night show called “The Pink Opaque,” which somewhat mirrors real-life hits like Goosebumps or Are You Afraid of the Dark? Over the next several years, both Owen and Maddy begin to feel that something about their lives isn’t quite right; stuck or suppressed, they know that whatever experiences they share through The Pink Opaque feel more real than reality itself – could it be more than just a tv show?
 
The plotting of this movie may occasionally feel static, the characters within not fully drawn while their respective personal journeys stretch too thin for comfort, but further examination of these elements’ relationship to the film’s themes reveal their deliberacy in being crafted this way. I Saw the TV Glow is not merely concerned with the idea of trans identity, but the with the journey of its inherent and often terrifying uncertainty, prior to its embrace or rejection by the individual wrestling with it. It is in this way that we come to connect with Owen as a character; because he doesn’t know who he is, we also don’t, and any queer individual will instantly recognize just what that feels like – to not really know if the real you is just a bug in the system, an idea that requires suppression because the truth is a terrifying antithesis to the reality you know. When we first meet Owen, he is a husk, a shell merely watching life play out on a tv screen; we witness his journey from boy to man between cut-ins of him sitting at a fire, recollecting what it was like to have lived as himself at all, attempting to examine his own repression, recalling how Maddy’s presence in his life has altered it in a way that terrifies him.
 
It is also in this way that Schoenbrun pleads with their audience to recognize the dangers of suppressing one’s true identity as a queer individual (in this film specifically, a trans individual); the melancholy that accompanies it leaves one in eternal night, a forever death that eventually subsumes all else, even as no one else can see it happening until it’s too late. To quote the film itself, “the longer you wait, the closer you get to suffocating.” Working at both a movie theater and the ironically-named “Fun Palace” where the only light sources are entirely artificial, Owen suffocates under the guise of living life how it “should” be lived; one of the quotes playing in the background film on display states that “machines now walk the Earth,” as Owen does. In refusing to let go of the life with which he is familiar, he becomes nothing more than a robot, a believer in the idea that even as he suppresses his true self, love will save him from the melancholy that plagues him, even as the viewer knows it won’t; it can’t – only though embracing his identity can it ever be conquered.
 
But as much as the film is a warning against the suppression of identity, it’s also a call to those people who feel this dysphoria to embrace the truth, even if it’s terrifying to confront one’s true self; “there is still time,” written in chalk on a suburb street, reminds us that though time moves quickly, one can be free of the “midnight realm” and defeat “Mr. Melancholy” through true self-actualization. As Owen walks down the hallways of his school during act one, the first sign he sees states “to thine own self be true,” the last “without courage no other virtues matter.” There is, of course, other signage on the walls, including one just down the hall from the last, but for Owen’s walk, these are not coincidental placements. Immediately after he turns down a different hallway, he is bathed in the light of the trans flag colors as they make up the stained glass in the windows. In the opening section of the film, prior to the title card coming on screen, Owen can be seen participating in a group activity with a gymnasium parachute which also features the colors of the trans flag; he is the only one to get up and walk around underneath it, in direct contrast to the previous idea of his being a husk stuck in “reality.” I feel here than Schoenbrun is asking their audience to walk around as themselves for a while, just to know what it looks like – at the very least, it’s better than being stuck in a world where suffocation and melancholy are the alternatives.
 
While the success of I Saw the TV Glow as a film is sure to vary from person to person, there is something entirely undeniable about its being; there’s no doubt this film comes from a very personal place, as it sees queer youth – specifically trans youth – through a lens that only a queer person really can. In one act two bar scene, the band Sloppy Jane performs their song “Claw Machine,” which features the lyric “I paint the ceiling black, so I don’t notice when my eyes are open.” If you have ever struggled as a queer person with your identity, you understand this lyric better than anyone. The confrontation of one’s true self is a terrifying thing; it can be so easy to just paint the ceiling black so one doesn’t even notice it anymore. Schoenbrun’s film is both an understanding of that temptation, and a plea not to follow it, with all the style and vision a story such as this would require. Queer cinema, horror cinema, and queer horror cinema have shown audiences a lot of ways to interpret identity dysphoria, but rarely has it been this clearly rendered. It’s an almost impossible feeling to apply language to, but suffice it to say, to bear witness to something that allows one to feel seen in this specific way – I’ve never experienced anything quite like it.
 
I’m giving “I Saw the TV Glow” a 9.8/10.
 
- The Friendly Film Fan

​The Friendly Film Fan Discusses Jordan Peele’s Return to the Big Screen.

In many ways, Jordan Peele is a bellwether for both the best and worst kind of movie fans. On the one hand, the now-iconic director of Get Out – the first horror film to be nominated for Best Picture since 1999 – and Us, is one of the few, if not only, filmmakers able to attract large crowds to the cineplex based solely on his name and reputation as both critic and craftsman. Get Out, in particular, was lauded for its searing depiction of white liberals’ use of Black bodies to achieve their own selfish ends without regard to the damage it causes. Us, perhaps less successfully, was more about class divide and the ways in which people take up and drop causes based solely on the moment they’re in. (It’s also more focused on the horror elements than its own subtext.) Both of these films were highly praised for their cinematography, haunting storytelling, standout comedic moments, and stellar performances from majority-Black casts. People loved going out to the theater and discussing the films after the credits ended. The former of them was itself a cultural reset for the whole of the horror genre, and is oft credited with being the picturesque portrait of horror mega-producers Blumhouse’ style and mission (Jason Blum himself even said it was the “perfect Blumhouse movie”). On the other hand, many of the moviegoers Peele attracts to the big screen now come laden with an expectation that whatever he puts out must have something inherently meaningful to say, and that to not lace his scripts with social commentary or some sort of political ideology or thesis simmering underneath is akin to failing or “slipping” in his directorial efforts. It is at the crossroads between these two forces that Peele’s new film, Nope, finds both its greatest success and its most challenging disconnects.
 
Nope is a straight-up thriller through and through. There are no hidden messages here for viewers to parse, no underbelly for them to wade through between Oscar-season cocktail parties or campaign events. Indeed, it seems to be the first of Peele’s films to not only avoid creating anything to drum up awards season chatter in its narrative, but to actively dismantle the hope of generating it. That’s not to say that it doesn’t deserve to generate awards season chatter, only that unlike Get Out or Us, there’s nothing here that viewers can latch onto to create an “Oscar narrative,” even if that narrative is stretched to its absolute limit in terms of plausibility. This is just rock-solid thriller filmmaking bolstered by some of the best craftwork moviegoers can see on the big screen; and make no mistake, people should see this on a very big screen.
 
The decision to shoot with IMAX cameras by Peele and cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema proves to be an ingenious one, even as much of what viewers ultimately wish to see within their lenses is kept out of frame or shrouded in shadow. The scope of the movie is one of its greatest assets; wide open spaces where anything can go wrong are often the driving force of the tension within the film. If characters need to get to one place to feel safe, and by proxy make the viewers feel safe, the best way to create tension is to separate those spaces as far apart as possible, something that Nope not only understands but continually repeats as it rachets up the intensity from moment to moment; even in its quietest scenes, the looming spectacle of whatever threat the characters face is held together by the frames of Hoytema’s lens, as well as stellar sound design which is given far more power here than even in Peele’s previous feature work. (Every shot also just looks absolutely beautiful. The score, too, though less prominent here than in films where it usually is one of the more notable elements, is utilized almost perfectly, though I would have liked to hear more of it in certain moments.)
 
But frames can only work as well as what’s contained within them, and Jordan Peele’s directorial efforts are most evident in the performances of yet another stellar ensemble cast, including a world-class Keke Palmer and returning (now Oscar-winner) muse Daniel Kaluuya, whom Peele directed to his first Best Actor nomination in Get Out. Kaluuya is in the film more than viewers might expect given how much of the initial marketing was focused on the Keke Palmer character, but when one has a performer as thoroughly engrossing to watch as him, why limit oneself to minimal use? Kaluuya once again, and often, draws the camera to his face and holds it there, the only true measure of his immeasurable talent being the image of his eye movements in silent moments, saying everything without a word being uttered. Other notable performances include a wonderfully wry Michael Wincott, a vulnerable-yet-commanding Steven Yeun, and supporting cast standout Brandon Perea. The star of the show, however, is the formerly noted Keke Palmer, who here stands out not only as the most charismatic and funniest of the main characters, but has the most to do in terms of what the narrative requires of her character. Palmer is already well-known for her work outside of Nope, but her performance here should rocket her into the stratosphere of the most sought-after talent Hollywood has to offer.
 
Where Nope begins to dip into what could be metaphor or commentary, but ultimately ends up more confusing in its inclusion than clarifying, is in its sub-narrative regarding a sitcom episode that features a monkey. The sequence is heavily tied to the Steven Yeun character, but while the sequence is arresting on its own, and frankly the most terrifying part of the film as its opening image cements that this will not be a light-hearted or comic subplot, its place in the larger narrative never seems to gel quite the way it seems to hope it will. While Yeun’s undersold and fairly brief performance is yet another in a string of successes for the actor, the inclusion of his character’s backstory seems to be its own story within the story, meant to shed light on what’s happening in the main plot but ultimately only used to reinforce a point the audience doesn’t really need to be reinforced.
 
On the whole, Nope may not be the cultural force Get Out was or even as tinged in commentary as Us, but it remains far better than it ever needed to be thanks to the efforts of world-class craftsmanship and dynamic performances. Jordan Peele’s thriller is one of the few in 2022 that genuinely embodies exactly what its mission is, and accomplishes that mission (for the most part) with tact and genuine excitement. It looks great, it sounds great, it’s chock-full of great performances, and it’s a perfect big-screen theater experience to round out the main portion of the summer movie season. Even as various directors have attempted to capture the same stylistic flourishes and filmmaking tricks of his trade, the truth remains for better or worse: no one makes movies like Jordan Peele.
 
I’m giving “Nope” an 8.2/10
 
- The Friendly Film Fan

The MCU has always been a little bit self-serious. Even in the films where comedy was the primary mode of storytelling (i.e. the Guardians and Spider-Man films), one has a distinct sense that though the material is self-aware, it’s not especially zany or eager to become playful with its subject matter, particularly on the crafts side. There are no star wipes, no cuts-to-black in the middle of proceedings, and zero freeze-frame lining the walls of the most popular and easily the most successful franchise – both critically and commercially – ever committed to digital rendering. There aren’t even any transitions where one frame bleeds into another as if characters are invading the narrative to take over its main thrust. Most of it, to be frank, is fairly straightforward comic-book storytelling, as straightforward as those things can be when dealing with a purple genocidal alien and a pair of best friends who take the forms of a tree and a raccoon. Generally speaking - and apart from the Guardians films – there’s not normally a ton of risk involved in directing a Marvel Studios film, at least not in terms of an audience being jarred by one’s sense of style; that can get boring after a fashion. In all truth, the MCU needed to get a little silly to stay fresh. It needed to evolve from a mere action/comedy franchise into something more akin to a fun exploration of what kinds of MCU stories can be told. And that, by far, is the biggest strength director Sam Raimi offers in directing the newest entry to the Disney juggernaut, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
 
As the titular sorcerer travels the multiverse with the help of newly-introduced multiverse-hopper America Chavez (Xochitl Gomez) in order to stop a fearsome evil from pursuing them and ultimately taking America’s power for its own, one can sense the Sam Raimi style bleeding into the frames from the edge until they consume the story entirely. There are multiple action sequences with genuinely silly effects – one in particular involving a classical music composition – and any number of transitions those unfamiliar with Raimi will no doubt notice as being distinct amongst the wider MCU. Raimi’s been no stranger to camp, ever since his original Evil Dead release in 1981, and it peppers Multiverse of Madness in some fairly significant ways. Another storytelling element to which Raimi is no stranger is horror; Multiverse of Madness is not a full-on horror film, but it does get significantly closer to that genre than any MCU movie has to date, though just how close Raimi was allowed to get is in question since Scott Derickson, the film’s original helmer, presumably left the project because Marvel didn’t want him to get too close to making an actual horror film. That said, certain images and moments are crafted with a horror element in mind, as is evident in certain sequences and with particular characters, especially the villains this time around.
 
Where the film runs into significant problems is its script, one that can’t seem to decide whose story it’s telling or how it wants to go about telling it. Whereas the initial Doctor Strange film had the benefit of being an origin story, thus only needing to set up one character, Multiverse of Madness carries the unwieldy task of not only introducing us to America Chavez, but to the multiverse at large, and all that it contains, both in its more brief appearances and its more significant layovers. That means a lot of characters and a lot of worlds to cover in a fairly short span of time, and it’s not always up to the task. Unfortunately, though the film certainly has at least a small arc for its titular hero, and he is very much in the center of the frame, the introduction of the wider MCU means that stories in which he’s involved can’t only focus on him now – even if he is, as noted, the title character. Because of all the setup involved, as well as needing to handle at least two other mainline characters’ stories, Strange feels a little bit pushed to the background in terms of development here. We know about him by film’s end almost as much as we knew at the beginning, and apart from some rudimentary introductory material, we don’t really know that much about what kind of person America Chavez is either. That said, MCU movies have bounced back from character development issues and over-bloat before – hell, even Iron Man 2 – the worst MCU movie – still coasts on the charms of Downey Jr. and Scarlett Johannson.
 
What Multiverse of Madness may not bounce back from is in how it handles the Wanda Maximoff character, whose MCU journey has been one of the most compelling of any of her cohorts across four movies and her own Disney+ limited series (though the number of movies drops to three if one considers she only briefly appears in Avengers: Endgame). It’s not to say that the place Wanda ultimately ends up in the film makes no sense, but on the whole, it’s merely a repeat of her emotionally-driven arc from WandaVision without the necessary developments taking place to get her back to where she needs to be at the beginning of it (I’m deeply sorry if that sentence is confusing, but keeping this spoiler-free means that will occasionally happen). There is one small line during the first act that hints at what might be driving Wanda towards this point of origin, but no justification for it or demonstration of its truth beyond what we already know from that series. Elizabeth Olsen, as always, acts the hell out of whatever she’s given to do, but her function in this film is more so as a plot device than as her own distinct character, ditto America Chavez for most of the film’s runtime. Wanda begins at an endpoint here without the MCU having earned that journey for her character, and while her story in this film may make sense in a vacuum, the question of how everything connects to the wider MCU forces it to confront a near-antithesis of itself without so much as a guide to who she is or who she has been.
 
All in all, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness does bring some of that much-needed fun back to the film side of the MCU, where nearly everything has been soaked in dour, post-Endgame dread or multiverse acknowledgement/setup, and is able to bring some of that Sam Raimi zaniness to this world with a decent amount of success, but the script for the film can’t seem to handle the weight of what it needs to accomplish in the amount of time it has to accomplish it. Everything that doesn’t work takes up a lot of the spotlight from the things that do, and despite the myriad showcases of style, some fun cameos, and a healthy dose of zany horror, this MCU entrant may end up disappointing audiences on a number of levels. Perhaps this film needed to be longer in order to accommodate everything it needed to include and flesh out some of its more significant pacing issues, but – while I won’t say I wasn’t at least a little bit let down by some of its less favorable material – for my part, it is refreshing to see the MCU dive head-first into becoming something almost entirely different than what it’s been to this point.
 
I’m giving “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” a 7.6/10.
 
- The Friendly Film Fan

The Friendly Film Fan reviews A24's latest horror feature from returning director Ti West​.

Over the weekend, a new horror film from indie powerhouse A24 released, entitled “X” (yes, that’s the whole title). This comeback of director Ti West is a 70s-set picture about a group of young people setting out to make what it is referred to in the film as “a good dirty movie” – porn and prestige filmmaking all in one place. It stars the likes of Mia Goth, Jenna Ortega, Brittany Snow, Scott Mescudi, Martin Henderson, and Owen Campbell. As the group arrives to a distant farmhouse, they are shown the boarding house where they’ll be allowed to stay. But something strange is going on with the land’s owner and his wife, and it will be up to this band of merry misfits to either determine what’s happening…or to survive it.
 
In as few words as I can put it, X is a good movie, to a fault. It takes some big swings, and mostly makes those into hits by being as bold and brash with its material as it could possibly be. The ride only gets wilder the longer it goes on – but don’t expect that wildness to hold all the way to the end. There’s a lot that works here, but there’s often almost as much that works against it, though to explain why may give away the game in some capacity. I’m not sure it’s even entirely possible to review it in any certain terms without spoiling it, but being that it did just release, I will do my best on that front. The truth is that the film is noticeably style over substance, although one doesn’t pick up on that right away. The allusions to old horror classics like the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre are obvious, but the film itself pretty much leaves them at that – allusions. The rest of it is filled with a lot of aggrandizing filmmaking – though one can tell director West is not aggrandizing himself; rather, he is aggrandizing the horror films of the 70s and 80s through his directorial style. That sweaty, summer-toned, sexy look is all over every scene of X, regardless of whether what we’re show is the film itself or the movie being made within it. In all this aggrandizing, however, whatever substance the movie has is pushed further downwards; it’s definitely still there, but it’s very much not at the forefront of the story here.
 
Is there a story here? There’s certainly a narrative: characters interact with each other and the world around them, things happen to them, they happen to things, there’s a clear beginning, middle, and end. But what is the movie trying to say exactly? That it is, in fact, possible to make a good dirty movie? Perhaps, and if that is indeed the point, consider X a success in that regard, but I won’t pretend to have loved it where I mostly just really enjoyed it, and part of that lack of infatuation with it does come down to the fact that the message of it doesn’t seem to be any deeper than “this is a slasher like the old ones you knew, and it doesn’t need to be anything else.” Many may call that simple or unpretentious, but for myself, I was still left wanting a little more.
 
However, that’s not to say that X doesn’t give us plenty of scenery to chew on. Its sexually-charged, hyper-stylized first half is a real treat to see, every performance toing the line between unhinged and charismatic – subtle or otherwise – and each scene laying down small but notable groundwork for how the rest of it is going to play out. Unfortunately, that incredibly singular first half with all its unexpected direction and character turnings eventually gives way to a second half that is essentially all horror with very little in the way of flourish. Once this thing morphs into a straight-up slasher (though with a noticeable wrinkle in that subgenre), all that sexy 70s-style pizzaz turns off like a light switch, as if a second movie has entered the fray; a good movie, to be sure, but one that feels a little bit at odds with what preceded it, stylistically at least. One part Texas Chainsaw meets The Nice Guys, and the next minute, a Halloween movie with an alternate Michael Myers.
 
And that’s really where the main problems lie. Despite all the good will it builds within the horror genre, and regardless of how many times Brittany Snow or Scott Mescudi end up stealing the whole show, that show never really gets around to defining what it really wants to be or be about. The words of the Sheriff at the end of the film (the main story takes place between a prologue and epilogue) ring in the audience’s ears: “one goddamn fucked up horror picture.” But is that really all X wants to be in the end? Perhaps, and perhaps that’s a fair shake, given how thoroughly A24 has been both largely praised and widely blamed for the rise of “elevated horror.” But just because a movie works on its own terms doesn’t mean that it couldn’t work on better ones.
 
Regardless of all the complaints I’ve made and issues I’ve attempted to address, I still thoroughly enjoyed myself watching X. Sure, it may be style over substance, but boy oh boy, that style sure is infectious. Maybe this is the move A24 needed to make in order to be done with “elevated” horror and simply produce something that doesn’t have to think about deeper meanings or the next way grief can be explored in some witch ceremony or ancient demon book. Maybe a straight-up slasher was the right move for a studio so associated with one kind of horror to make, and whether you love the idea of “elevated” horror or not will likely have a lot to do with how you view Ti West’s return to the silver screen. All that said, this one is still worth checking out, and it’s definitely the most fun, stylish piece of media in theaters right now that doesn’t feature a man beating up thugs in a batsuit.
 
I’m giving “X” a 7.9/10
 
- The Friendly Film Fan

Us is the latest horror film from producer, writer, and director Jordan Peele, the same half of the comic phenomenon “Key and Peele” that wrote and directed 2017’s Get Out, which was not only one of the most original and subversive horror films in recent memory, but also went on to boast a variety of Academy Award nominations, taking home the win for Best Original Screenplay. In his sophomore follow-up, Peele opts to tell a story about you and me (us), and how we are our own worst enemy. The film begins with a family setting off to take a vacation at Santa Cruz beach, at first nice and relaxed, only to be visited by a family standing in their driveway in the middle of the night. The catch? This family looks exactly like them. If they hope to survive, they must outsmart their counterparts who move and think as they do, or put an end to the chase, once and for all. The film stars Lupita N’yongo, Winston Duke, Elisabeth Moss, Tim Heidecker, Shahadi Wright Joseph, and Evan Alex.
 
Jordan Peele has become something of an overnight revelation in blockbuster horror filmmaking. Before Get Out, most people (including myself) knew him only as one half of the Key & Peele duo that initially charged his success, but in February of 2017, all of that became a thing of the past. Get Out was not only one of the biggest box office successes of that year relative to budget, it also racked up a strong number of Oscar nominations, becoming the first horror flick since The Sixth Sense to be nominated for Best Picture of the Year. In fact, so great was the success of Get Out that a mere two years later, people are starting to ask others if they’ll go to see the new Jordan Peele movie. Most accomplished directors take two or three films to get to that point, sometimes more, but for Peele, one was enough. Given all that success, Us had a lot to live up to given both the prestige of that first film’s success and that of its writer/director. And relative to expectations, it more than delivered.
 
Us is a great horror flick, and although not as thematically rich as Get Out was (i.e. I wouldn’t be looking for a lot of Oscar nominations for this, although there are exceptions), Peele once again brings that air of quiet tension roaring back onto the silver screen in full force. One can truly tell that this is a director in command of his cast, crew, and audience to such a confident degree he might as well have written the book on bringing horror back into mainstream cinema. There’s something incredibly assured about how he chooses to frame certain segments, allowing the camera to simply move throughout a given space and trusting that what’s meant to be scary will be. Even during the times when the audience is not meant to be scared, the camera lingers on characters, moments, and Peele milks every frame for every drop its worth.
 
While I may not get a chance to discuss the film plot-wise (seriously, it is incredible just how well they kept the secrets of it in the marketing campaign), what I can tell you about it is that the way this mystery plays out is wildly entertaining, with each relative set piece offering more creative and clever solutions for either the survival or demise of each individual character. Following that thread, the characters in this film are some of most interesting to follow in horror. The family being hunted by their doppelgangers has a natural, organic chemistry between them that makes them entirely relatable, and it is due to this same chemistry that those doppelgangers remain compelling on a narrative level. It really is something to see two completely opposite sides of the same person at the same time, especially considering the actors in it are basically reacting only to what they think the evil versions of these characters might be like. A lot of the film, as well, has a sharp humor to it that only a writer as well-versed in comedy as Peele would be able to pull off. Not every joke in the film lands on its feet, but most do, and in a more mainstream horror movie like this one, landing most of those jokes could be considered somewhat of a minor miracle.
 
The true purpose of this film though, it would seem, is to showcase the best performance-based justification for why Lupita N’yongo is as big a star as she is since her Oscar-winning supporting role in 2013’s 12 Years a Slave. She leads this film, practically carrying everyone who’s not Winston Duke on her shoulders, straight to the top of the horror-as entertainment category, and seeing the stark contrast in her performances as both herself and direct counterpart  is truly a wonder to behold. The Academy tends to have a bias against most horror flicks (with a quick glance at last year’s Toni Collette snub for reference), but given that Peele has already broken through to them with his previous film, I wouldn’t be surprised to find N’yongo with her second nomination (although a win seems unlikely this early). All of the other performances are also great, with Winston Duke proving he’s no one-off Black Panther scene-stealer. In the shadow of Lupita N’yongo, it can be easy to forget just how much skill he also brings to his role, both in physicality and in his voice. Elisabeth Moss doesn’t have as big a role as either of them, but suffice it to say, she more than makes up for her lack of screen time. The true revelations though are Shahadi Wright Joseph and Evan Alex as the leading children of the main family. Both of them are exceptionally good here, and their careers are sure to take a drastic upturn once enough people have seen the performances they’re both capable of.
 
If there is a true flaw in this massively entertaining spectacle of horror, it would probably be the thematic weight of it all. See, Get Out was absolutely a mainstream Blumhouse horror movie that had an eerie tone and fun-to-unravel mystery at its center to begin with, but it was also a biting satire on mainstream progressivism and a social commentary on how all-too-often a lot of “pro-black”, liberal America likes to say they’re in favor of progressive things like the Obama administration or greater diversity in mostly white spaces, but they don’t actually do much to bring those things to fruition, preferring to use black people and (more specifically) the black experience as a means to their own ends. Essentially, it was Jordan Peele giving the middle finger to Hollywood and saying “all you do is use us to feel good about yourselves and the ‘I have black friends/fans/producers/racism-is-bad-let’s-all-be-friends’ card isn’t gonna cut it anymore” (*cough* Green Book *cough*). That’s a pretty bold move to make with your directorial debut, and the fact that not only did Peele pull it off, but the Academy rewarded him for doing so, is astounding. That’s what makes it a tad disappointing that while Us can be viewed from a variety of different perspectives (duality of man, maybe we’re the real monsters, we drop causes when we lose interest, etc.), the thematic core of it being less clear is also the thing that hurts it the most. It doesn’t seem to pick up or stick with any particular thing it’s trying to say, preferring to let the audience choose for themselves, and while that’s certainly a bold choice, I’m not sure it was the right one (then again, maybe others see it as the perfect choice, so who am I to say?).  It’s not a deal-breaker by any means, but it does keep Us from soaring to the heights that Get Out did.
 
In the end, Us is another great success for Jordan Peele (especially given its $70+ million opening weekend), and a worthy follow-up to an astounding debut feature. It may not be as thematically rich or as bitingly satirical as his previous film, but Peele has planted his flag deep in the mainstream horror genre so confidently it’ll be impossible for him not to become a household name in the “greatest directors” conversation somewhere perhaps as soon as 10 years down the line. The writing is sharp, the performances are fantastic, what commentary and thematic weight there is is still better than most horror films will even attempt to put out there, and all the while, you can’t take your eyes off the screen. This film practically demands a second viewing, and I, for one, can’t wait to see it again.
 
I’m giving “Us” an 8.6/10