The Basement

I would allege
our success in life

our ability to achieve

and maintain contentment

to transcend the daily challenges

to enjoy

is directly proportional

to our willingness

to go down into the darkness

into the cobwebbed corners of the soul

to trudge into the mirk and mire

the sludge

of the past

and shine a light on what we find there

to accept and process the shadowed secrets

that lie dormant in us all

what prevents us?

only willingness

only fear

'Creed III' A Review

Creed III is a sports melodrama, the 3rd installment in the Creed series the 9th in the Rocky oeuvre. The movie opens on a flashback to 2002 with a young Adonis sneaking out of his house to meet his friend Dame and go to a boxing match(which Dame wins) on the way home the two get into an altercation, Adonis flees and Dame gets incarcerated for 18 years. Flashfoward to Adonis's(Michael B. Jordan) last fight, which he wins, and then retires. Flashfoward again Adonis and his wife Bianca(Tessa Thompson) have a daughter Amara, are very rich, and seem to be relatively content but yearn to be back in their respective fields(Adonis now runs Delphi Boxing, Bianca has put her solo career on hold to produce). Enter Dame(Jonathan Majors) fresh out of prison and driven to be a contender. Sound like a lot of plot? There's more!

Jordan, behind the camera as well as in front of it, doesn't make a particularly compelling case for either role. Adonis, as written, seems to have reset to a kind of reserved, prideful, petulance that he had in the original Creed jettisoning much of the character progress from I and II. The character is confused, muddled, and not particularly sympathetic and Jordan doesn't do much to bring him out of that morass of the page. We seem to be at the point again, asking the question who is Adonis Creed? As a result the titular character, the franchise focus, is the weakest link. Majors absolutely stuns, he is electric and emotive, raw and magnetic. When his character has a couple of illogical plot cartwheels he sells them. Thompson also comes out well, brings grounded, realistic, emotion. The rest of the cast doesn't get much screen time and a lot of what they do is dictated by the overly stuffed plot(particularly egregious in the case of the excellent Wood Harris and queen herself Phylicia Rashad). Perhaps the emotional logic is sound but the pacing is off, it simply covers too much ground and the drama is rendered as melodrama.

Visually the film is slick but generic, Jordan as director makes a couple of inspired flourishes in some of the shots in the fight scenes but the choreography itself is uninspired the same is true of the training montage, typically a highlight of the franchise, here seems to be an afterthought. Jordan doesn't seem particularly interested in engaging with these tropes of the series, which is OK but then what is he interested in is unclear. The music is fine but mostly forgettable and the production design is immaculate but all the economic opulence on display with Adonis and his family seems to undercut/avoid, again, one of the franchises staple themes- class- this is hinted at in the relationship between Adonis and Dame but under explored.

Jordan's ascent to stardom has plateaued and Creed III demonstrates his recent lack of growth. Without Ryan Coogler or Stallone directly involved the movie doesn't provide the necessary magic. Worth seeing solely for Majors performance.

Currently in theaters, coming soon to VOD.

Stream It.

'We Have A Ghost' A Review

We Have A Ghost is a horror comedy about the Presely family who move into a beautiful but rundown Victorian in a nameless midwestern town. Kevin(Jahi Winston) the youngest befriends the resident ghost Ernest(David Harbour) and works with him to uncover the circumstances of his death while Kevin's dad Frank(Anthony Mackie) monetizes Ernest through social media.

The cast is all quite talented- with some standouts from Winston, his friend/love interest played by Isabella Russo, and a brief cameo from Jennifer Coolidge as a TV medium- but overall the script is too overstuffed with plotting and characters to give any one of them actual room to breathe and develop.

Visually slick but the sizable budget seems to have actually hamstrung writer/director Christopher Landon who, here-to-for, was on a hot streak of low budget films with Blumhouse(Freaky, Happy Death Day 1 and 2). The oversized budget seems to prevented him from exercising much needed editing. For example there a lot of expensive needle drops, which are nice, but ultimately don't serve much of a purpose. The movie is about a father-son relationship, the ghost, the government, social media. It's just too much, there's little focus and as a result it doesn't pack much of a punch. It's relatively diverting, a breezy family friendly movie but overlong, with problematic pacing, and an over abundance of narrative threads that fail to coalesce.

Low stakes, low reward.

Currently streaming on Netflix.

Stream It.

Rebuffed

On a date once

in my drinking days
a second date

with someone I had known

for a number of years

towards the end

I floated the idea

of a third

and she said

"I like you,

right now you're very sweet,

but you have a temper."

never before

had I been so simply

and honestly rejected

I was incensed

went home

railed against her

to my friends

for her callousness and judgement

and held a grudge

but the truth is

I was upset

because she had seen me

summed me up

with a startling efficiency

and respectfully declined.

'Cocaine Bear' A Review

Cocaine Bear is a horror comedy, loosely based on a 1985 true story about a black bear ingesting cocaine dumped by a drug runner. The movie opens on said drug runner dumping duffle after duffle full of coke into the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest. The next day various groups of people converge on the forest for various reasons only to be confronted by the titular and murderous creature.

The ensemble cast is extensive and full of talent- Alden Ehrenreich(who has been mostly MIA since Solo), Margo Martindale, Isiah Whitlock Jr., Ray Liotta(in his last on-screen appearance)- to name a few. It's a big cast, maybe too big, but they all are able to carve out a bit of time to do some interesting/eccentric/funny character work. But the script moves a bit too slow, the plot given unnecessary attention(for a movie called Cocaine Bear at least), there's too many varying character arcs that are hinted at but not actually developed. It's just messy.

There's also the issue of tone, its not funny enough and its not gruesome enough and has streaks of confusing sincerity that just muddle the waters. It's a big swing, there's a lot of ambition here and a lot of talent but narratively there's a lot of confusion. Director Elizabeth Banks gets the job done admirably as does the cast but the script needed to be tightened up considerably for it to deliver on the hype.

Fun but thin.

Currently in theaters, coming soon to VOD.

Stream It.

Interrogation

This stranger asked me
"are you happy?"

and the answer is yes

but it is presumptuous

to ask the question

and he doesn't deserve any part

of my hard won joy

earned as it was

with time and trial and effort

even my confirmation

of its existence

I withheld

because I have seen

vampires like him before.

LA Visit

 Been in LA the past couple days to visit Jimmy and his family. Really wonderful, relaxing trip. I'd never much cared for LA before but this time tried to plan less, not have much of an agenda, and just go with the flow a bit more which worked out.