It's weird being in a place with almost no furnishings. I feel like a squatter, lol. My roommate is out as of Friday, so I'm enjoying the last of the TV while I can, being as how mine died. After that, I'll only have my computer, but I should be out myself by Sunday, so I'll live.
As mentioned in prior articles, we had a run of free movie channels and watched a small army of movies as a result. Since then, we've been mostly watching Netflix and the occasional major network show, i.e. Zoey, Good Girls, 9-1-1, Modern Family, The Goldbergs, How to Get Away with Murder (apparently, become the President of the United States 😏), etc.
Here's another round-up of some of the stuff I watched and what will likely be the last article I write in my old abode. 😔
Den of Thieves
Easily the best thing I watched when we had free movie channels, Den of Thieves is a fantastic heist flick that's in a league of its own. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's not without precedent- Heat is probably the most prominent influence- but it's a damn good movie that I wish I'd seen in the theatre.
Written and directed by Christian Gudegast (London Has Fallen) and adapted from a story by him and Paul Scheuring (Prison Break), this is, remarkably, Gudegast's directorial debut, and it's one of the most assured debuts I've seen in many a moon. A sequel is already in the works, but don't count on many of the principal characters here returning, as the body count is pretty high.
As with Heat, we see things from both the criminal and the law enforcement backgrounds, and switch back and forth throughout the film. After the film's opening heist goes somewhat sideways, it puts the bad guys on the radar of "Big Nick" O'Brien (Gerard Butler, in his best role in years) and his team of renegade cops, who, you guessed it, tend to play by their own rules.
Leading the bad guys is Ray Merrimen (Pablo Schreiber, Orange is the New Black, American Gods), who possesses razor-sharp smarts and knows how to put a solid team of thugs together. His latest criminal endeavor is a multi-layered affair that actually involves multiple heists to get to the big one- robbing the seemingly unassailable Federal Reserve Bank, which has never been successfully robbed, ever.
Thanks to the first heist gone wrong, O'Brien is able to nab Donnie Wilson (O'Shea Jackson, son of Ice Cube) to serve as an informant, but it isn't long before he all but hangs Wilson out to dry, in an effort to let Merrimen know that he knows exactly what he's up to. You'd expect that that would land Wilson on the side of dead, but Merrimen brushes it off and instead lets O'Brien know that he knows that O'Brien knows he's up to something and that he's going to do it anyway.
He does this in a riveting scene which serves as this film's equivalent to the big meet between Al Pacino and Robert De Niro, in which Merrimen could easily get rid of O'Brien, but doesn't because he wants to show how little he's intimidated by the man. This, of course, only further inflames O'Brien's desire to bring him down, but Merrimen seems to always be one step ahead of everyone.
What I loved about this film was the way it kept you guessing throughout. It's almost like a more realistic version of Now You See Me, minus all the magical hocus pocus. Here, everyone does their thing out in the open, as if to dare anyone to stop them, and that's on both sides, to the extent that there's little difference between the "good" guys and the "bad" guys. What makes the film great is that, even while doing so, the script manages to stay a few steps ahead of the viewer as well. Just when you think you've got it pinned down, it takes a hard left in another direction.
While, like most ensemble dramas, it's almost inevitable that certain characters fall by the wayside somewhat, and end up more sketches of people than fully-fleshed out characters, the three main leads are all so strong that you really don't mind. The action is plentiful and loud and in your face, perfectly replicating the whole "you are there" thing Heat did, but with a different vibe of its own.
I'm not saying it's necessarily better than Heat, but it's absolutely in the ballpark of being that good, and will almost certainly go on to be regarded as a modern-day classic in its own right, just like that film. It was a modest success at the box office, grossing $80 million on a $30 million budget, but it's since become a favorite among discerning action movie fans and should play on cable for years to come like gangbusters. I just loved it, and if you like a good heist movie, it ranks up there with one of the best I've ever seen. Check it out, for sure.
Donnybrook
This one flew completely under my radar, and I knew absolutely nothing about it, beyond who was in it, up to a point. The deciding factor for my watching it was catching a little of it one night before going to bed, and being fascinated by it, but unsure of what was going on, which made me seek it out another day to watch in full. Luckily, I got my chance before the movie channels went away.
Margaret Qualley, who I've become a big fan of since The Leftovers, Fosse/Verdon, The Nice Guys and Once Upon A Time...In Hollywood, was another big draw for me. She's made some really interesting choices in her career, not unlike Kristen Stewart, post-Twilight, only better than that, as I only begrudgingly became a fan of Stewart's more recently. Qualley, by contrast, has yet to make a dire misstep, at least in terms of the movies and TV shows of hers that I've seen to date.
Here, she plays Delia, the younger sister of the abusive "Chainsaw" Angus, played by Frank Grillo, perhaps best-known for his role as Crossbones in the Marvel Universe, and for his recurring role in the Purge movie series. Angus is a gruff meth dealer that rules his neck of the woods with an iron fist. He's abusive towards his sister, forcing her to do unseemly things, and then belittling her for doing them. He's a real piece of... um, work.
Meanwhile, there's "Jarhead" Earl, played by Jamie Bell, a long way from Billy Elliot. Bell has made some pretty interesting career choices as well, since his breakthrough role, including movies like Jumper, Flags of Our Fathers, Defiance, Jane Eyre, Snowpiercer, Nymphomaniac, Skin and Rocketman. He's nothing short of riveting here, as a man driven to extremes to provide for his family.
Earl starts out by robbing a gun shop(!) - a decidedly brave move, to be sure- in order to come up with the money to enter a famed bare-knuckle brawl-to-the-death contest, which gives the movie its name. If he can win, he and his family will basically be set for life. Unfortunately, he gets on the wrong side of Angus, catching him terrorizing his drug-addicted wife, and the two get into it. Delia intervenes, saving Earl's life, but just barely.
Knowing that Angus will be back, Earl rounds up his family and they go on the run, with Earl ultimately stashing them in a hotel, but making the fateful decision to bring his son along for the ride. Eventually, Delia manages to escape Angus and catches up to Earl, accompanying him to Donnybrook, where she plans to sell the cache of meth she stole from her brother and start a new life. But hot on everyone's trail is a drug-and-booze-addicted cop, Whalen (James Badge Dale, The Departed, Iron Man 3) determined to bring them all down, but especially Angus.
Perhaps needless to say, this is a really bleak film, and things do not go well for a lot of characters here, and not always the ones you might think. Instead, it's the ones you're rooting for that can't seem to catch a break, more often than not. As such, this may be a bit too nihilistic for some people's tastes. But I found it intense and compelling, and if I'd found out about it sooner, it almost certainly would have made my list of the Best Films of 2018.
The cast is just fantastic, and you really feel for the actors that had to put themselves in such a dark headspace to pull this sort of thing off. Qualley, in particular, gives a fearless performance that is so gritty and real that you'll wish you could give her a hug afterwards and tell her everything will be alright, just keep repeating to yourself, it's only a movie, only a movie, only a movie... 😱
Fair warning: don't expect happy endings for everyone here. Things don't always go the way of what passes for heroes here. You'll probably need to wash this down with a Disney movie or a musical or something light like that to get out of the darkness intact after watching this one. But it's a cult classic in-the-making, that's for sure. I'll be checking out more of writer-director Tim Sutton's work ASAP- I've heard good things about the forthcoming, Joker-esque Funny Face. He's one to watch.
Them That Follow
Another lovely downer of a film, this one likewise takes place in a similarly downtrodden part of America, in this case, the Appalachian territory. It revolves around the mysterious religion of the Pentecostals, aka the ones who handle snakes but don't believe in hospitals and medications and the like, aka "Faith Healers."
*Fun fact: Actress Megan Fox was raised Pentecostal. A good friend of mine's ex-wife went to school with her in Florida after she'd converted to Catholicism and said Fox remade herself in her image- something she wasn't too happy about, to this day. (Probably because Fox became a big star and she didn't, but I digress.)
Interestingly, the film stars Alabama native Walton Goggins (Justified, The Hateful Eight), who I'm a big fan of, as Lemuel, a Pentecostal preacher- one of a decidedly different sort than the Megachurch evangelist type he plays on the wacky, fun Danny McBride vehicle The Royal Gemstones. It takes a hot minute, if you're familiar with that show, to realize that he's playing things straight here, but once you get past it, as I did, it's a really fine performance.
Lemuel is preparing for the marriage of his eldest daughter, Mara (Alice Englert, best-known for Beautiful Creatures and for being the daughter of director Jane Campion, of The Piano fame), to a loyal parishioner, Garret (Lewis Pullman, Bad Times at the El Royale), who took the fall for Lemuel when a minor was bit by a snake at one of his gatherings. Unbeknownst to him, however, Mara is having an affair with Augie (Thomas Mann, Me & Earl & The Dying Girl), and is carrying his child.
Needless to say, this revelation has the weight to bring down the entire family, and all others concerned, including Augie's parents, Hope (Oscar winner Olivia Colman, The Favourite) and Zeke (comedian Jim Gaffigan, of all people), who are good friends of Lemuel's family and devout worshippers, and Mara's little adopted sister, Dilly (Kaitlyn Dever, Booksmart), who is also very much by-the-book. Though things here end on a hopeful note, more or less; like Donnybrook, the film is also pretty bleak, bringing to mind something like Winter's Bone.
However, the cast is across-the-board great, especially Goggins and Colman- but there's no weak link here, really. Even Gaffigan acquits himself nicely, playing decidedly against type. I'm surprised I didn't hear more about this one last year, but better late than never. As with Donnybrook, it surely would have been a contender for my list of the Best of 2019. It's just that good. Although, it's not an easy watch and you might want to avoid it if you're not a big fan of snakes, for obvious reasons. 🐍😨
Adrift
Based on a true story, this one is just as harrowing as the last two, but much more uplifting in the grand scheme of things. It tells the tale of Tami (Shailene Woodley, of the Divergence series fame), who, like the title implies, is a bit adrift in life, traveling from place to place, taking odd jobs, typically in coastal locales, like Tahiti. There, she meets and falls for a British sailor, Richard (Sam Claflin, The Hunger Games movies), who is likewise drifting through life.
One fateful day, an older couple offers Richard a whopping $10,000 to sail their luxury yacht from Tahiti back to their homebase of San Diego, California. He accepts, if Tami can come along. She's hesitant- and should be, given what happens- because the two just met and have only been dating a short while, but decides to throw caution to the wind and go anyway because she's young and in love and doesn't want to be away from Richard for such an extended period of time. Bad move.
While en route to their destination, Richard proposes, which is never a good thing in a movie like this. Tami accepts, thus sealing her fate. Not long after that, the two hit rocky waters and the boat is seriously trashed in the process, with Tami getting knocked out and Richard thrown overboard. She later finds him barely clinging to a dinghy, and knows just enough about sailboats to get it up and running and is able to save him, but he's in dire condition, with broken ribs and a shattered shin. If she doesn't get help, he's likely done for.
Mind you, none of this is really spoiler territory, as the film opens with the disaster having already happened, and Tami waking up on the trashed boat. We get the rest of the info in flashbacks, as we work our way to the storm and then proceed accordingly to the events afterwards. As tends to be the case in movies like this, things drag a bit here and there, but overall, it's a solid little flick featuring a stand-out performance from Woodley, another young actress making cool choices after her initial success, most recently the much-loved HBO series Big Little Lies.
Woodley also produced the film, so it was clearly a story that meant a lot to her, and she gives it her all. This could not have been an easy movie to make- a lot of directors have lamented their woes filming on water, i.e. Steven Spielberg and James Cameron. So, kudos to Woodley and Claflin for enduring it, and to Icelandic actor/director Baltasar Kormákur for getting it done. This is not his first go-round in choppy waters, having also helmed The Sea, but you may know him better for directing such action-thrillers as Contraband, 2 Guns (both with Mark Wahlberg) and Everest.
While the film wasn't a huge hit, grossing only around $60 million on a $35 million budget, it's well worth seeing, and like I said, in spite of the grim events at hand, this one does have a slightly happier ending than the other films on this list, at least to a certain extent, though obviously not everyone emerges unscathed by the experience.
It also manages to be more substantial that a lot of similar TV-movie films of this type, notably in the cinematography department (Oliver Stone and Tarantino's main man Robert Richardson does the honors), thus justifying it being a big-screen effort, so there's that. But yeah, those movie channels sure were throwing a lot of downers at us, for the most part, lol.
The Seagull
Yep, it's another dark one, this one based on the legendary Russian writer Anton Chekhov's play of the same name. I'm not a big costume drama person, but one of my favorite actresses, Saoirse Ronan, is the star of it, and I'd literally watch her in anything, and it was on at the right time, so I went for it in spite of my reservations.
Ronan plays Nina, an aspiring actress dating Konstantin (Billy Howle, Dunkirk), an aspiring playwright that also happens to be the son of renowned stage actress, Irina Arkadina (Annette Bening, American Beauty, Captain Marvel). Irina makes the big mistake of bringing home her current lover, Boris (Corey Stoll, The Strain, House of Cards), a highly successful- and pretentious- author.
In no time, Nina falls for Boris, upending her relationship with Konstantin and Irina alike, and it would seem that the feeling is mutual for Boris, who is himself smitten, even though he recognizes she's way too young for him and things probably won't end well. Flash-forward a few years and we see how things have turned out, and they're not necessarily for the better for anyone concerned. Once again, things don't end well here, so yeah, like I said, another downer of a movie.
Be that as it may, the performances are great across the board here as well, including a to-die-for cast that also includes Elisabeth Moss (Mad Men, The Handmaid's Tale), Brian Dennehy (First Blood, To Catch a Killer), Jon Tenney (The Closer, Major Crimes), Mare Winningham (American Horror Story, The Outsider), Michael Zegen (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel) and Glenn Fleshler (Boardwalk Empire, True Detective).
Ronan and Howle have a natural chemistry- in part, no doubt, because the two also starred in the movie On Chesil Beach together prior to this film, which I haven't yet seen, but want to. But it's Bening that mostly steals the show here, as the vain, clueless Irina, who nonetheless ultimately proves right in a lot of things, whether she wants to or not. She's a terrible mother, but she knows a thing or two about longevity and how to hang in there when the going gets tough, correctly knowing that things will likely go her way in the end. She's not wrong, but to what end?
As fantastic as the cast is, you never quite forget you're watching a movie adaption of a play, which I've found to be true of a lot of such films. Every now and again you get one that manages to surpass its stage origins- Glengarry Glen Ross comes to mind- but more often than not they come off as, well, stagey, if you know what I mean. This one is no exception, and even features an intentionally bad play-within -the-play for good measure! (Although, I must say, the forest staging of said play was quite possibly my favorite moment- I'd love to see a play that way for real- albeit preferably a better one, lol.)
Still, it's hard to go completely wrong with a cast like that, and this one doesn't. You just never quite forget you're watching a play adaptation, which is too bad. It's worth seeing, but most everyone is better served elsewhere by their other, more famous roles. A lot of your enjoyment of the film may depend on how you feel about Russian tragedies, I suppose, but even by those lofty standards, this is just okay- the movie, I mean, not the play, which is obviously a classic. Check it out if you're a fan of any of the cast, but tread the boards lightly, if you know what I mean.
Ride
We conclude with what is easily the worst of the (parking) lot, a literal Bella Thorne vehicle that, like the movie Locke (featuring Tom Hardy), almost entirely takes place inside a car. I don't why I put myself through these things. I mean, Thorne is smoking hot, I'll give her that, but most of her movies are just meh at best, save maybe the enjoyably trashy The Babysitter, and she just has a supporting role in that. Ditto The Duff, but that's more Mae Whitman's show. Maybe she should stick to supporting roles in better movies.
Thorne executive produces this one, along with co-star Jessie T. Usher (The Boys, Shaft), who plays a ride-share driver/aspiring actor, James, that gets lucky when he hits it off with Jessica (Thorne), who invites him to a party with her. He should have gone. Instead, he agrees to try and stop by after picking up and delivering his next fare. Bad move, as that turns out to be the decidedly shady Bruno (Will Brill, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel).
Bruno comes off as James' new best friend- at first. But something doesn't add up about his story, and he keeps requesting and doing dubious stuff. Eventually, Bruno convinces James to go to that party and seek out Jessica, which he does, successfully getting her to leave with him, ostensibly to attend another party that Bruno knows about elsewhere. No sooner has Jessica gotten in the car than things quickly go south and the two find themselves in a sticky situation as Bruno shows his true colors.
Things go from there and get progressively more insane and dangerous, as Bruno pushes the two to their absolute limits, challenging them at every literal turn. This one has a more open-ended ending than the rest of the movies I reviewed here, so it's hard to say if it qualifies as a happy ending or not. It kind of leaves what happens next to the viewer. What I will say is that it at least ends in such a way that it could be a happy ending for some characters. Or not. It is what it is.
To be fair, it's not a terrible film. The main threesome are fine, acting-wise, and Thorne and Usher have genuine chemistry. Usher in particular has true star quality, boding well for his future. And Brill treads the fine line between charismatic and annoying like a thread through a needle. You know something's off about Bruno, but he does a good job of concealing it until he doesn't care to anymore. Thorne, however, is just playing a variation of herself IRL. But she sure is pretty. 😍
Okay, so I only have myself to blame for getting into this one. I have a bad habit of watching shit movies when I know good and well they're going to be shit movies, if it has someone I like in it, especially an actress I find attractive. Sue me. I'm shallow that way. But hey, you get what you paid for, and I didn't pay a red cent for this, it being a free preview at the time, so nothing ventured, nothing gained. Truth be told, it wasn't THAT bad, just sort of predictable. Or, as I said before, kind of meh.
Well, that about wraps it up. I still haven't quite gotten through reviewing all the movies I watched recently, but we'll get there eventually. One more article should do it, I think. Until then, thanks for reading, and by all means, let me know what you think in the comments section. Hey, I know you're all stuck in your respective homes like I am, so there's no excuse anymore. 😊
See you next time... likely in an all-new place! (For better or worse.)
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