Indiana Dunes

Headed out on our annual Fall vaca today, first stop the Dunes. Really nice but a bit overshadowed by the heavy industry around.

'No One Will Save You' A Review

No One Will Save You is a scifi horror movie, home invasion by way of alien invasion. Brynn(Kaitlyn Dever) is a seamstress who lives alone in a small town and is outcast from her community, one night she is awoken by an intruder and she fights to survive.

Dever is a solid lead and its nice to see her get the time and space to really flex as she is, in essence, the only real character in the whole movie. She is constrained by one of the movies conceits however which is that there is only 5 words of dialogue. Similar to All Is Lost this doesn't really add anything particularly meaningful to the story, the situations are effective in-and-of-themselves to ratchet up tension, and it in fact detracts as pretty quickly it becomes obvious this is a script decision not a character one, its not believable she wouldn't talk to herself at all, part of why Castaway is good is because Hanks sparse dialogue when he is marooned brings us into his head. The same with this years Inside it is the most human thing in the world to talk to oneself or to at least vocalize in someway. Dever navigates this lay on well but more dialogue or even voice over would serve to more effectively flush out her character and give weight to Brynn's backstory which is kind of clunkily inserted.

The production is excellent writer/director Brian Duffield knows how to put together a well crafted genre flick, it looks good, the locations are spot on, the score is eerie and relentlessly builds, and the alien design is truly spectacular and well thought out. This is another straight-to-streaming feature that should have been released in theaters especially with Halloween fast approaching, its a mid-budget solid piece of work that has the potential to have really caught on and would have easily made decent box office regardless, get your heads outta your asses studio heads!

A relatively minimal, forceful, propulsive genre flick perfect for the spooky season, if somewhat muddled in its human element.

Currently streaming on Hulu.

Rent It.

Sometimes Its Hard

My wife and I were watching this docuseries Wrestlers
(great, would recommend)

and the main guy, Al Snow, says at one point

talking about the prospects of his wrestling company

"No one's going to eat a shit sandwich on this but me."

and he ain't wrong, sometimes its your turn

and no one ever tells you that

your parents don't tell you that

your teachers don't tell you that

no one tells you until you've already figured it out

that sometimes life is hard

that's it

full stop

sometimes its just tough

there's no magic bullet

there's no quick fix

there's no get-out-of-jail free

you just gotta muscle down

open wide

and eat the shit

'Dumb Money' A Review

Dumb Money is a biographical dramedy about the 2021 GameStop short squeeze. Keith Gill(Paul Dano) is a financial advisor and recreational youtuber who makes vids about GameStop stock which he has heavily invested in. Other retail traders connected through Reddit bring on the short squeeze in opposition to various hedge funds who have shorted GameStop.

The cast is stacked with talent and celebs, to run down a few- Dano is wonderfully gentle and moral as Gill, Sebastian Stan and Vincent D'Onofrio(as rich start up guy and rich hedge fund guy respectively) both give really specific funny performances. But the rest don't have much to do, this isn't a movie about people this is a movie, ultimately, about the stock market and it has little interest in actual humanity. The rest of the cast come and go through scenes but have little in the way of actual dimension or personality(no fault of the actors).

Sharply made with lots of time jumps, quick edits, and text on screen - The Big Short meets the The Social Network but derivative of those and equally focused not on people or narrative but recent historic financial instances. It's a bizarre focus to make a feature about and shows, along with the recent glut of movies about products(Air, Blackberry, The Beanie Bubble) that Hollywood is adrift, aimless, when it comes to understanding what we, regular folks, want to watch. This movie is fine, Dano's pretty great in it actually, but this isn't entertaining enough or interesting or moving enough to be really great. The attempted commentary on class is, quite frankly, insulting. It's much more interested in getting the titular dumb money to get involved in the stock market than telling a compelling story about the working or middle class. All these corporate movies are fine but they're never going to make a splash, they are never going to be hits because they've forgotten what good stories(and therefore good films) are about. People.

An inoffensive waste of time and talent.

Currently in theaters, coming soon to VOD.

Stream It.

'The Equalizer 3' A Review

The Equalizer 3 is an action movie, the 3rd installment in the Denzel Washington led Antoine Fuqua directed series. Robert McCall(Washington) returns this time in Italy. He gets wounded in the course of one his job and is nursed back to health in a small costal town. As he befriends the locals and acclimates to the locale problems arise when Camorra(mafia) members attempt to put the squeeze on the townsfolk. Sounds like that's a situation that needs to get Equalized!

Washington is one of our last great movie stars so, needless to say, he's great here. He's funny, he's badass, and his honestly way odder and more idiosyncratic than he has been as McCall previously. There's way more small embellishments, way more almost non-sequitur micro moments. It's a lot of fun. It's great to see him and Dakota Fanning together again, her as a CIA operative, twentyish years after the incredible Man On Fire. Although Fanning's role doesn't amount to much beyond a scene or two. The supporting cast, especially the townsfolk, are all great although the Camorra heavies are a little thinly drawn(and portrayed). All in all its a solid cast.

Visually its slick, with Fuqua's typical penchant for action, edits, and heavy(effective) scoring. Italy looks wonderful. The fight scenes, somewhat limited by Washington's age, are thrilling if a bit more sparse than in the previous films. Fuqua knows how to make a solid popcorn flick- it looks good, its paced well, Washington is showcased- its not amazing but its entertaining.

Currently in theaters, coming soon to VOD.

Rent It.

What Is Art

I work in insurance
which is stereotypical in its dryness

in its uniformity

in its corporatization

which is not unjust

but even so

in the execution of my duties

there is a beauty in faultlessly executed documentation

nuance and language working together in a logical fashion

to demonstrate intent, to codify utility

yes, fundamentally, this is a cut-and-try exchange

of goods-and-services, and yet

if done with integrity, if done with expertise

with a purity of motive

the process is not only professional but creative

and the result goes beyond a contract, goes beyond simple product

in it there is artistry

because it is in everything, because it is not the thing itself

it is how a thing is done and who is doing it and what that person puts into it

in anything that requires effort 

there is the mark of humanity behind it.

'The Pope's Exorcist' A Review

The Pope's Exorcist is a horror movie about the titular Father Gabriele Amorth(Russell Crowe) and follows the case of a possessed boy at a former monastery in Spain.

Crowe is absolutely having a ball here, he brings gravitas, humor, and that undeniable movie star quality to this, quite frankly, mid-to-low-tier exorcism flick. He singlehandled brings the movie up to something not only watchable and entertaining but kind of unique. Not to say the supporting cast are all duds, they're all serviceable, but having a vet with Crowe's undiminished star power and his glee in the role makes it really fun.

Its shot proficiently, the action/scare sequences are well done, gory and surprising. The plot clips along, framed in an almost detective/espionage type of procedural(clearly angling for this to be a franchise), it just works. There's not a lot to it, what you see is what you get, but anchored by a truly incredible Crowe this B-level horror flick has got a fair amount of juice.

Surprisingly funny, decent scares, and a clear propulsive(if not totally original) story it rises above this years middle-of-the-pack horror offerings with ease. Perfect watch going into the Fall.

Currently streaming on Netflix.

Rent It.