Barbarian

Official Australian release date: 20/10/22.
Viewed: 30/10/22.
Director: Zach Cregger
Actors: Georgina Campbell, Bill Skarsgard, Justin Long, Richard Brake        
Genre: Horror / Thriller
Rating: MA

‘Barbarian’ is both a straightforward thriller/horror, but also a bit unique and unconventional. The set-up is simple – Tess (Campbell) is staying at an AirBnB in Detroit, which happens to be double-booked by Keith (Skarsgard). Seems straightforward what might happen next… AJ (Long) comes along as the landlord and there’s a few flashbacks of Frank (Drake). Other than that, a very light on cast, carried by each of the stars.

Even though it’s a horror film, the tone is often light, but allows for tension to be built, mostly thanks to the good score. I did like the turn it took after the first act. Always good to see Justin Long in a horror film – this is up there with one of my favourites, ‘Drag Me To Hell’, and is better than ‘Jeepers Creepers’ and ‘Tusk’.

It’s fun and fast – only 100min – and Campbell does a convincing job of being empathetic and not the stereotypical victim. See it to find out what happens! Great directorial debut from Cregger.

Overall: Fun, different horror tale.
 
Gav’s Rating: 4 stars.

Moonage Daydream

Official Australian release date: 15/9/22.
Viewed: 17/9/22.
Director: Brett Morgen
Actors: David Bowie        
Genre: Biopic / Documentary
Rating: M

 

‘Moonage Daydream’ is a not-really-documentary about David Bowie, as it doesn’t follow the traditional talking heads of friends, family and colleagues. It’s also not a concert film, although it does have some live concert footage, apparently much of it previously unseen. Directed by Brett Morgen (who did ‘Montage of Heck’ about Kurt Cobain and ‘Crossfire Hurricane’ about The Rolling Stones), it’s also not wall-to-wall songs – I’d say there were only ~10 songs played in full, with lots of others used as transitions.

The film does well to show his impact on his fans, with bits and pieces from outside shows and plenty of crowd closeups during the live bits. There’s plenty of archival Bowie interviews, much of it overlaid with other visuals of him or with the psychedelic “screensaver”-type CGI. It’s edited well, so it feels like he’s talking directly to you, rather than an interviewer. Lots of his other art – paintings, video-snippets, dance – edited in too.

It’s sort-of chronological, starting in ~’72 and the Ziggy Stardust era, covering up to the early ‘90s, but some of the interviews jump to an older Bowie, so he can juxtapose himself and some of the comments/views from his younger self. He was certainly a bit of a mystery and for a lot of the film comes across as someone just trying to find his place in the world. Good to see some of his reasoning around certain things and his genius definitely shines through. Hard to believe he’s already been gone almost 7 years.

Overall: Different, but fitting, overview of one of the greats.
 
Gav’s Rating: 3.5 stars.

 

Nope

Official Australian release date: 11/8/22.
Viewed: 11/8/22.
Director: Jordan Peele
Actors: Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, Brandon Perea, Michael Wincott           
Genre: Sci-Fi / Horror
Rating: M

 

‘Nope’ is Jordan Peele’s 3^rd film and another unique take on the thriller film. It follows OJ (Kaluuya), his sister, Em (Palmer) & father Otis (David) as they try to run their Californian horse-training ranch. When some strange happenings occur, they bring in Angel (Perea) & Holst (Wincott) for help. Ricky (Yeun) is the neighbour trying to run a theme park. The mystery is revealed after ~45min and then the stakes are raised.

No spoilers here, other than to say it’s probably both what you might expect and also completely unexpected in parts. The film has a pretty good score and soundtrack, with a great use of light. There’s a few good laughs and jumps, but nothing overly horrific.

The three main actors are all good, but not exceptional – the character development wasn’t really there. It could’ve been called ‘Don’t Look Up’, but Adam McKay beat Peele to it! It’s hard to put a finger on it, but there’s just something missing which would’ve elevated this to another level. It’s a good concept, but not flawlessly executed.

Overall: Different take on the sci-fi/thriller concept.
 
Gav’s Rating: 3.5 stars.

Thor: Love and Thunder

Official Australian release date: 6/7/22.
Viewed: 6/7/22.
Director: Taika Waititi
Actors: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tessa Thompson, Christian Bale           
Genre: Sci-Fi / Action
Rating: M

 

‘Thor: Love and Thunder’ (or Thor 4) is a bridge between ‘Avengers: Endgame’ and ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3’ and is not really linked to any of the other recent MCU films/TV shows, but it does a really good job of building on ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ and the spirit of that film, including making Valkyrie (Thompson) and Korg (Waititi) the two main sidekicks of Thor (Hemsworth), who both ground him and add humour.

The plot is based around Gorr (Bale) having a sword that can kill gods, set-up well in the first 10min, and at the same time, Jane (Portman) being back as “The Mighty Thor” and being able to wield Mjolnir. A lot of this is explained in nice quirky montages, courtesy of Korg. There’s plenty of great cameos – from a lot of Aussies too, since it was filmed here – but the biggest (not a spoiler) is Russell Crowe as Zeus, who has a semi-important role, and is great.

Love & Thunder is very fast-paced, using the soundtrack excellently – especially four Guns N Roses songs – and it’s amazing the difference of “the vibe” during/after ‘Thor: The Dark World’ and 9 years later compared to this film. The black and white scene is excellent, there’s plenty of battles and whenever it starts to get too serious, there’s some well-placed jokes. The ending seems fitting and leaves you happy to see where Thor’s journey takes him.

Overall: Another enjoyable MCU action/comedy.
 
Gav’s Rating: 4 stars.

Jurassic World Dominion

Official Australian release date: 9/6/22.
Viewed: 12/6/22.
Director: Colin Trevorrow
Actors: Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Isabella Sermon, DeWanda Wise
Genre: Sci-Fi / Action
Rating: M

 

‘Jurassic World Dominion’ (or Jurassic Park 6) is the presumed end of this second trilogy. It primarily follows Owen (Pratt), Claire (Howard) & their adopted daughter Maisie (Sermon), as she’s hunted/kidnapped by bad guys that think she’s a clone. Then they throw in the original team of Ellie (Dern), Alan (Neill, struggling to find his accent from the original film) and Ian (Goldblum) who are working to bring down Biosyn Corp and their GE locusts, led by Dodgson (Scott). They have help from Kayla (Wise), Ramsay (Athie) and Barry (Sy), and BD Wong is also back as Dr Wu.

While the premise of dinosaurs roaming wild is an interesting concept, it’s not fully explored and only hinted at in parts. Where it is shown, such as Owen wrangling the Parasaurolophus, there’s more questions as to the potential realness of it, i.e. reptiles living in the snow, horses being as fast as them, their calmness. There’s a lot of “really?!” moments in this film. There’s some funny moments and some good action scenes, but it all seems to have too many chefs and lacks focus/seems rushed.

This is nowhere near the quality of the original film – probably slightly better than ‘Jurassic Park III’ and ‘Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom’, not that that means much. Oddly, while we see a few dinosaurs, including some new ones, but mostly the tried & tested favourites – there seems to be not that many scenes where dinosaurs are the main focus. While not horribly slow, it doesn’t feel like it all comes together and starts working until the final 40min, which isn’t much of the 2 hour 20min running time.

Overall: Average attempt to wrap up the dinos-gone-wild story.
 
Gav’s Rating: 3 stars.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Official Australian release date: 5/5/22.
Viewed: 5/5/22.
Director: Sam Raimi
Actors: Benedict Cumberbatch, Elizabeth Olsen, Benedict Wong, Rachel McAdams
Genre: Sci-Fi / Fantasy
Rating: M

 

‘Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness’ (Dr Strange 2) feels odd in a few ways, as it’s been six years since the first film, but we’ve seen so much of Stephen Strange (Cumberbatch) recently, in the last two Avengers films and ‘Spider-Man No Way Home’, where he was almost the co-lead. This is also a bit different, as it dips slightly into horror territory, with demons, monsters and zombies – it is directed by Sam Raimi, from the original Spider-Man films, but also ‘Evil Dead’ fame.

The plot follows new character America (Gomez) and her teleporting power and what that has to do with Strange, Wong (Wong) and Wanda (Olsen). This film follows along the lines of what happened in ‘WandaVision’, ‘Loki’ and ‘No Way Home’, so it should be no surprise to viewers with all the interdimensional hopping, magic and psychedelic “other worlds” in this film. It’s good to see some of the alternate Strange’s and the other characters they chose to show us.

While not actually horrific or scary – even though there’s a few minor-shocks – it’s certainly quite dark and tragic, with the Scarlet Witch storyline being quite well-done, even if it leaves little room for humour or fun. It’s good to have McAdams back and she gets some screentime. Cumberbatch is good, but Olsen practically carries the film. The score is good, the CGI top-notch as always and the plot not too indecipherable. As always, there’s two end credit scenes.

Overall: Dark, brooding dive into the dark & mystic arts.
 
Gav’s Rating: 3.5 stars.

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

Official Australian release date: 21/4/22.
Viewed: 3/5/22.
Director: Tom Gormican
Actors: Nicolas Cage, Pedro Pascal, Sharon Horgan, Tiffany Haddish
Genre: Comedy / Action
Rating: M

‘The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent’ starts off like a biopic, but with Nic Cage playing “Nick Cage”, a slightly-nuanced version of himself and almost veers into dramatic territory when it involves his daughter, Addy (Sheen). But his ex-wife Olivia (Horgan), agent Fink (Patrick Harris), Vivian (Haddish) & Martin (Barinholtz), as well as Javier (Pascal) help keep it on track as a mostly-comedy.

Cage is forced to take a gig going to super-fan Javier’s party in Majorca, Spain, where it’s quite funny to see The Mandalorian in dick-togs and fawning over Cage! Then a bit of plot is introduced with Vivian & Martin being CIA agents who recruit Cage to spy on Javier & Lucas (Leon). When his family gets endangered, it becomes a full-on action film.

While maybe trying to be too meta for it’s own good, it’s certainly fun for almost the whole time and Cage certainly gets a few good moments to shine. He does well to both play up his action chops – and only a little of crazy-Cage is on show. The setting is lovely (although apparently Croatia, not Spain), soundtrack good, over quite quickly (~100min) and supporting cast excellent.

Overall: Fun twist on the action-comedy.
 
Gav’s Rating: 3.5 stars.