harry_tk_yung

With a touch of arthouse flare, "The critic" is a not-too-thrilling crime thriller staged in the theatre-verse of London in the 1930s. I'm going to try something different, in not using any character name at all in sketching the plot.

The center conflict is between an actress who hasn't quite made it to the top (and already approaching the over-the-hill phase) and a vicious but immensely popular critic who has been tearing her apart, almost systematically (though not literally) over the last 10 years. He has, however, reached a crisis of his own when his boss, the owner of the influential newspaper where he is employed as chief theatre critic dies. The owner's son, the new owner who wants to steer the business in a different direction, tells the critic to mellow, or else.

As a necessary plot coincidence, the actress's lover, a renowned portrait painter, is married to the new owner's daughter (the successor of the newspaper when her father dies) who is rather alpha-type. The critic, together with his gay lover cum secretary, hatches a plot to offer the actress his still powerful influence in the theatre circle to catapult her to stardom, in exchange for her help in seducing the new owner, with blackmail as the ultimate objective. The plot proceed as planned, and then some deaths follow.

I'll stop here and you can imagine how convoluted things can become. But, not so. The trajectory is very straightforward, which is not a problem as this movie is never intend to be a convoluted whodunit type. The problem is that there characters promising at the start, do not fully live (some literally) up to expectation, despite good acting performances.

Almost single-handedly, Ian McKellen (otherwise known as Gandalf) as the critic, salvages the weakening plot and writing. His performance alone makes this movie worth watching. I said "almost" because Gemma Arterton, not A-class but capable and prolific (my favorite is "Clash of the Titans"), delivers a credible performance as the actress, especially when acting opposite formidable McKellen. A small part for a big veteran is Lesley Mansville (The Crown) as the actress's mother. Another veteran Mark Strong play's the new owner, with some good scenes but not much challenge. The critic's lover cum secretary is played by Enoch, a Harry Potter veteran. With just a couple of scenes as the new owner's daughter, underused, is Romola Garai, whose name may not ring a bell until I mention "The atonement" (2007) where she played the 13-year-old younger sister of Keira Knightley's character.

"Stranger darling" is a clever movie, not brilliant, or ingenious, or even ground-breaking. Just clever. Quite a few movies I can remember like to play sleigh-of-hand with the audience, rather effectively. "Strange darling" does that too, at just about every turn. This basically means showing you a "situation" (say, a dead body or something), leaving you in suspense of what got things there. The answer is revealed later with a flashback. You may or may not have seen it coming.

"Strange darling" comes in 6 "chapters" plus an "epilogue". Temporal scramble is of course not new (see footnote). But rather than following some of the iconic classic of telling a story backward, "Strange darling" starts with chapter 3, and goes back and forth in time. Furthermore, there are time scramble within a chapter, using what I may call "mini-flashbacks". Critical analysis shows that the movie is really in two parts, the first two chapters forming the first half of the movie. What you see in each of the subsequent chapters may mean many different things and you won't know until you see the previous chapter(s) leading to it. With the scrambling, this is really quite a lot of fun to watch, if you are game. But if you want a movie for which you can turn your brain to an "off" mode, forget this one.

It is quite obvious that going into any amount of detail spoils everything. I am just going to go the length movie critics have gone. As mentioned, the movie starts with the second half of the story, in chapter three, which shows a woman with a bullet wound over her ear (now THAT sounds familiar, does it?) running desperately from a man chasing her with a shot gun. She seeks refuge at a house occupied by an aged couple who, while initially thought to be tough mountain people who might offer her some kind of protection, turns out to be just old hippies who are also "doomsdays preparers".

Briefly on non-spoiler things. As advertised, it is a thriller, but not a supernatural or sci-fi horror type. There is no lacking of blood and gore, but if you have seen enough violent crime thrillers, there isn't anything here that you wouldn't be able to stomach. The leads Willa Fitzgerald and Kyle Gallner are good. A special gem is two veteran support roles, Ed Begley Jr and Barbara Hershey, and I don't need to tell you what characters they play. Just to mention that between the two of them, they boast of 453 screen credits!

Finally, my "footnote" on temporal scramble movies. There are three that unveils the story backwards.

Irréversible (2002) is the iconic classic that the late Roger Ebert described as "a movie so violent and cruel that most people will find it unwatchable" On the romance side, there is "Five times two" (2004) Francois Ozon's love story There is even a Hong Kong movie, starring Ekin Cheng and Karena Lam - Claustrophobia (2008), for which the Chinese title is a bit different, "Intimacy".

While all the above three are backwards temporal scramble, "Momento" (2000) tops it all, with two parallel narrative trajectories, one going backward and one going forward, converging at the climactic conclusion.

Some critics call it the most enigmatic from Miyazaki. I don't quite agree. Surreal, fantasy, you can apply these descriptions. Confusing too, yes. But things fall into place quite nicely at the end, with a marvelous closure. Heart-warming to see Mahito finally accepting Natsuko (Gemma Chan's voice!) as mother. The interesting twist with the connection between newly found pal (I hesitate to use the term "girlfriend") and deceased mother I could almost see coming. Still, it is fascinating to see the touching, poignant dramatization. The rich pageantry of all the other characters fit into the overall picture beautifully, and do not need to be fully and logically explained to the minutest details. The Oscar is well deserved.

My initial reaction, seeing the promotion of material for "His three daughters" was that it might be a distant relative of "Savages" (2007), starring the most sadly missed Philip Seymour Hoffman and the always reliable Laura Linney. Indeed there are similarities, in the struggle to care for aging parent bringing out conflicts as well as affections in siblings. But the difference is that in "His three daughters" the father is imminently close to dying.

At the time of this writing, rumor has it that "His three daughters" is shooting for six acting Oscars, all supporting, 3 women and 3 men. I'll come to the individual later, but while all the men deserve a nomination (if they get one), the women nominations should all be lead, rather than support. I know very little about jazz but watching the performance of these three superb actors (see why I chose the word "men" and "women" above; "actor" is gender-neutral) feels like watching three top-notch jazz musicians playing.

The movie, among many things, is about character development. It is actually not so much character "development" as character "discovery". To use a cliché, just like an onion peeling, characters that at the beginning look like stereotypes unfold as the audience learn more about their history, growing in dimensions, complexity and depth.

Right from the start, let me point out a detail that may be missed if you take a bathroom break, thereby missing some key dialogue. The three daughters come from not two, but three marriages. I'll leave it at that and it is already a spoiler. On the other hand this is quite crucial for really understanding the characters. With no further ado, let me go to the three sisters.

The youngest, Rachel (Natasha Lyonne) has "underdog" written all over her when she first appears. Black sheep of the family, to boot. Uncouth, a pot addict, she starts out unattractive, if not outright repulsive. It is past the midpoint of the movie, as details of the past gradually unfold, that you feel as if you wish to embrace and comfort her.

Oldest daughter Katie (Carrie Coon) personified never-perturbed, rational cool. Superficially it is the polar opposite to Rachel. Whenever the two quarrel, which is forever, it usually end up with Rachel storming away under Katie's freezing stare. But then, everyone evolves before eyes of the audience, as aforementioned.

In the middle, in more ways than one, is Christina (Elizabeth Olsen), trying her best to reconcile her two sisters. But she has her back-story too. She losses her cool only once when she is trying to break up a fight (literally) between the other two, and ends up uncharacteristically yelling at them, calling them names and screaming "I hate you both". But she soon calms down, and later apologizes sincerely saying that she was just frustrated and got mad.

There is much, much more to tell but any amount of details would constitute irresponsible spoilers because enjoyment of the movie comes very much from paying attention to, and digesting, all these detail and growing to appreciate his three daughters, despite, and because of, all their faults.

I wish I could talk about all the male characters but refrain for the same reason. What I would say though is that the one I like best is Jovan Adepo who plays Rachel's boyfriend Benjy. One particular scene will have you unreservedly rooting for him, a passionate outburst defending his girlfriend the black sheep of the family.

That all I have to say on "His three daughters". Oh yes, one final point of trivial interest. Can anybody remember Coon and Olsen acting together in another movie? True Avengers fans will have no problem with this. In Avenger: Infinity Way (2018), while Olsen is the celebrated hero Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch, Coon, totally unrecognizable, plays Thanos's right-hand villain Proxima Midnight. They would have appeared together in group brawling scene.

Looking at the top-billed cast of this surprisingly underpublicized movie, one can't help thinking "These two guys together again, without the nine others (then ten, then eleven) tagging along. How would that look?" It is still a lot of fun. Brad Pitt carries on with his trademark cool persona as in Once Upon A Time In Hollywood (talking about which the eatery booth scenes do look like a tribute to Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction"). George Clooney, interestingly, has traded in his trademark Cary Grant image for Sean Connery. In this movie, their characters' names are not revealed (which makes perfect sense for a sequel) and therefore I'll use their real names.

The plot doesn't very much to speak of, and the case has been made that this is more of a comedy than a thriller. Be that as it may, the opening scenes show a woman in a plush hotel penthouse staring at the dead body of a young man attired only in his boxer briefs. She makes a call to a number that someone had given her to use if she is in real trouble. This woman Margaret (Amy Ryan) is a public figure and her being found with such a dead body in such a place would have dire consequences for her career.

In comes Clooney, a lone wolf fixer whose professional service is to clean up messes make problems disappear (dead bodies included, needless to say). Before he really gets down to work, Pitt shows up. Turns out that the hotel room, felony notwithstanding, has a secret camera that allows the new owner Pam (Frances McDormand, voice only) to see what just happened. For obvious reasons, she sends Pitt, who has the last word: Clooney has to do all the heavy lifting (literally and otherwise); his own "supervisory" job is easier.

The fun in rest of the movie is watching these two lone wolfs banter, among other things. I wouldn't say much more other than entirely unsurprisingly, drugs in the deceased possession, as soon revealed. Both fixers recognize the situation, these drugs are known, and to be delivered to some Albanian gang by the dead person. Except that, the dead person is not really dead but heavily ODed. So much for the plot. The rest is neither suspenseful nor thrilling. Funny at times.

The movie is really about watching Clooney and Pitt, together. If you dig that, you'll have a good time.

Your initial reaction, after the opening 10 minutes of "Omni loop", may well be "C'mon! We don't need another Groundhog Day after the two trillion lookalikes that came after it". You grievance, at that point, may be justified. But watch on.

To being with, in this movie, the five-days (invariably) time loop is self-initiated, entirely controllable. The protagonist, upon doing poorly in a Princeton entrance exam, initiated the go-back-5-days loop. Lo and behold, you guessed it. The second time around, knowing the questions beforehand, she passed with flying colors and got into Princeton. I recount this is past tense because it happened in the past. This Princeton "cheating" incident is not shown as a flashback, but just comes out in a conversation, as told by the protagonist.

When the movie starts, Zoya Lowe (Mary-Louise Parker) is 55, and about to die in a week or two because of "a black hole in her chest" as the doctor's picturesque diagnosis goes. What else can poor Zoya do but initiate this loop every 5 days, hoping that eventually she finds a cure for herself? These 5 days loops invariably ends with Zoya's nose bleeding, signifying that the end is coming. She goes into the bathroom, locks the door, takes out a bottle of pill and swallows one. The loop starts again with her waking up in hospital when the doctor, with the abovementioned picturesque diagnosis, declares that nothing more can be done and sends her home to spend her last days with her family. Surely, if you have read this far, you'll agree with me that this is not a Groundhog Day copycat. Even Christopher Nolan can do no better.

Zola has a loving family comprising husband Donald (Carlos Jacott), daughter Jayne (Hannah Pearl Utt) with her significant other. Having reliving these 5-day loops with them again and again (the movie does not explain how the repeated 5 days unfold in these other people's lives), Zola decides to break out of the routine, sneaks out of the hospital to knock on the door of a science student named Paula (Ayo Edebiri). The trajectory then becomes a sort of buddy story between Zola and Paula, with some pretty far-fetched time-travel technical stuff (including a sub-atomic size "nano-man" who may be able to help solve the mathematical problems) that we are better off ignoring. There is sufficient emotion ingredients, in Zola's interaction with her family and with Paula, to chew on.

Those who have seen the original Planet of the Apes (1968, Charlton Heston) is unlikely to forget the iconic nerve-shattering final scene, when the protagonist, like being hit by a sudden thunderbolt, realizes that this alien planet ruled by apes enslaving humans is in fact his home Earth, sometime in the future (in the event that you still have not seen this all-time classic, I won't disclose here how he finds out the fateful truth).

I cannot remember how good (or not so good) was the makeup technology transforming human actors into ape. Thanks to the groundbreaking work of The Lord of the Rings (in which Andy Serkis was, a jaw-dropping experience for the first-time audience, transformed into Gollum) the Planet of the Apes franchise has taken on a new life.

The rebooted trilogy starting from 2011, introducing a baby ape named Caesar, keeps getting better and better. I am not going to waste your time by recounting its evolution following Caesar's life of vicissitude and final triumph, when he becomes leader of the apes community advocating peaceful coexistence with humans.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes picks up from where things were left off, in a world of peaceful coexistence (albeit temporary, as we soon find out) between apes and human, when apes honored Caesar's lifework with a solemn cremation ceremony at Caesar's death at old age.

Fast forward a few centuries and, lo and behold, things are not what Caesar would have loved to see. While apes have progressed to a stage when they are more comfortable (although far from eloquent) with speech, humans have lost that capacity, entirely. Well, except for a few. The plotline revolves around three communities, two apes and one human. One is a peaceful, rural community with no awareness at all of their greatest predecessor Caesar. From there comes the protagonist, Noa, a sensible youth just going into adulthood, together with a sweetheart and a sidekick. A constant threat is a warlike community headed by Proximus Caesar, who claims to be the rightful successor. Unfortunately he possesses only some of the guru's leadership charisma but none of his humanity (or should I say "apenity"? Anyway you know what I mean). The human community is a resistance group that narrowly escaped annihilation by Proximus.

With apes as the key protagonist, the trajectory of the plotline nevertheless comprises elements that are all quite familiar and I will not elaborate.

Of the cast, Freya Allen is one of the only two that are not motion-captured as apes. While hers may not be a household name, her comely face would be a household face to those who are fans of the "Witcher" TV series. The other one is William H. Macy, a well-known veteran who is unfortunately little more than a plot device here.

This movie is well-made and, while self-contained, would likely evolve into another trilogy, or more. Just one more observation, which should really be obvious. Those who are attracted to movies primarily because of well written dialogues are not exactly going to be thrilled by this movie.

Two things will get you taking note right at the start of this movie. First of all, there is a trigger warning. Secondly, the protagonist stares directly into your eyes, making a profound apology for something he has done (but not detailed in the movie) and intimates that he will take a sabbatical from public life, retreating to a private island he recently purchased. Said protagonist tech mogul Slater King, played by Channing Tatum, is somewhat understated considering the sort of psychopath he is.

The focus then switched to the female lead Naomi Ackie, playing Frida, a server at a plush gala, dressed extravagantly to entertain the rich and famous. Reemerged from seclusion, apparently, Slater is the host of the gala. Not surprisingly, Frida immediately develops a crush on him. You can probably write the script for this scene. The two lead connect, ending up his invitation to her, together with her bestie, to a party on his private island.

This is all too familiar, starting with Agatha Christies "Ten little n...", oh sorry, "Ten little I....", oh sorry again, still politically incorrect, "And then there were none". To list similar claustrophobic (despite open air) crime thrillers can easily fill a page. Closest in genre is perhaps Nicole Kidman's recent TV series "Nine perfect strangers'. The basic ingredients are all there, extravagant luxury, corrupted substance-abusing lifestyle, sex (surprisingly, implied rather than graphic), violence, and in the vortex of it all, mental disturbance. Then, debuting director Zoe Kravitz (all but unforgettable in TV series "Big little lies") goes still a little bit further into montages of jostled, disconnected and surreal scenes. When the dust finally settles, after blood and gore aplenty, you probably feel that there is really nothing you haven't seen, if you have had sufficient exposure to this genre, as I.

With due respect to the leads, the appearance I enjoyed most in this movie is Adria Arjona, just as charming as she is in "Hit man".

Movie critics make a lot out of "Close your eyes" (in Spanish, with English subtitle), and rightly so as this is what they are paid to do. These reviews display eye-catching words/phrases (doppelgängers, doubling motif, narratively elliptical) intending to conjure up an aura of depth, layering, allergies. Nothing wrong with that.

This movie, however, can also be enjoyed as a straightforward, simple story, splendidly well told. There is no conclusive evidence that it is something to the contrary, open-ending notwithstanding. Everything in this move can be explained with logical simplicity. There are indeed "pink herrings" (a term I just made up with obvious reference to "red herrings") leading you to think otherwise. For example, when the protagonist goes to a church-administered institution for seniors and psychiatric patients to look for a long-missing friend, you in the audience would automatically assume that said friend is a resident patient under treatment. It turns out that the friend only works there as a part-time handyman, as you'll soon find out.

One other thing I like to dwell on before I move on to the plot - songs. This movie makes very good use of songs. In no less than three places, songs (in Spanish) are used to re-connect people, with varying degrees of success. The one scene that I really love (at about the mid-point of the movie), though, has a song in English. I'll come to that scene later. The song, entirely unexpected, comes after some lazy guitar strumming, "The sun is sinking in the west; the cattle go down to the stream; the redwing settle in the nest; it's time for a cowboy to dream". "My rifle, my pony and me", originally with in indelible voice of Dean Martin, comes from western classic "Rio Bravo" (1959). As soon as the first line of this song is sung in "Close your eyes" I was ecstatic and grateful that I was not in a cinema but at home where I could sing along, about 2/3 of the lyrics I remember by heart anyway.

What follows has spoilers aplenty, be forewarned.

You might have heard a little bit about the movie. In this case the opening scene will be totally baffling, as it seems to have absolutely nothing to do with the context of the story. You see a rich man in his mansion hiring an investigator (not a true professional) to look for a 12-year old Chinese girl lost in Shanghai (his daughter, he intimates), giving him picture of this comely girl holding a Chinese fan. We expect to see next an exotic scene in Shanghai. However, a slightly advanced VO (an often used technique) brings us to Madrid. We come to realize that what we have just seen is from a reel of an unfinished movie which, together with another one, bookends the movie in a precise closure - a movie within a movie. Earlier, I mentioned "pink herring". "Close your eyes" is nowhere near being convoluted. Director Victor Erice just loves to stay a little ahead of you, making you think/wonder a little bit before showing you where it is heading. The details, as they unfold, are never mysterious or illogical.

The bookending movie-in-a-movie reels aside, this nearly 3-hour movie is structured in two parts, with a 15-20 minutes interlude (tonally speaking) in the middle, the most enjoyed part for me, as aforementioned. The first half starts with the protagonist Miguel (Manolo Solo) arriving at a TV studio, accepting an offer for him to appear in a popular program "Unsolved cases". He can well use the remuneration because his life as a director has gone downhill after a movie he was shooting 20 years ago (the reel we see as the opening scene0 comes to ab abrupt halt. Julio (Jose Coronado), the actor who played the investigator commissioned to go to Shanghai, disappeared right after shooting this scene. We are soon brought to understand that Miguel and Julio were lovers living together when this mysterious event happened.

What follows in the first half looks somewhat like a detective procedural, when Miguel's curiosity in what happened 20 years ago is revived. He proceeds with one lead after another, partly at the request of the TV program host Sor (Petra Martinez) and partly out of his own interest. These leads include producer of the movie Max (Mario Pardo), Jose's daughter Ana (Ana Torrent) and a once-glamorous woman Lola (Soledad Villamil) who had been intimate to both Miguel and Julio. Nothing conclusive comes out of these efforts, but the dialogues between Miguel and these three characters are rich in context though not necessarily philosophical.

Then comes this interlude that I find so elating. This is a small village, with humble structures that are more like shacks than houses. Up to this point we have been brought to understand that Miguel is not exactly financially comfortable. But even then, his accommodation is even shabbier than expected. The wonderful irony is that this setting is almost idyllic, although I readily acknowledge that this may not be the most appropriate word to use here. But you feel immediately warmed towards this place as he is greeted by his dog, which we soon learn has been under the care of a wonderful young couple while he is away. Over dinner joined by another chap who is closer to his age, the lively discussion evolves around naming the young wife's soon-to-be-born baby girl. After dinner, relaxing around the coffee table, the young neighbor starts lazily strumming his guitar which leads to, you've guessed right, "My rifle. My pony and me". This idyllic scene is as close as you can ever get to paradise in this movie, or any other movie, for that matter.

The final half is triggered by a phone call saying that Julio has been spotted, taking Miguel away from his humble abode again. His contact at the aforementioned senior home is a very helpful woman called Belen (Maria Leon). This is indeed Julio who, unfortunately, has lost the memory of his own history, but otherwise quite normal working as a part-time handyman there. The medical team that found Julio and attended to him has not found any specific cause for his loss of memory. Miguel brought Ana over but Julio does not recognize his own daughter.

Miguel's last hope is the aforementioned unfinished movie with Julio as the lead. In a small cinema in town, he shows the second part of the unfinished movie, which the audience sees for the first time. Julio's character has completed his assignment, bringing a young Chinese girl to the rich man's mansion. After the initial awkwardness, father and daughter begin to show signs of mutual recognition, culminating in their singing a song together before the rich man dies of a heart failure in the arms of the girl. In the audience are Julio, Miguel, Ana, Sor, Belen and a couple of nuns. The facial expression of each in the audience is shown individually. Julio's reaction to seeing himself on the screen is enigmatic, the concluding shot of the open-ended story.

This black-and-white movie in Spanish is stylish, mesmerizing, and leaves plenty of room for your mind to roam free.

When I first saw the title "fly me to the moon", I thought it is another of George Clooney's airline romance flick. But no. This one is literally (or at least semi-literally) meant. People do fly to the moon, although not the protagonists. It's about Apollo 11, or more precisely, the story behind the publicity schemes of the project.

The movie starts with a prologue-type scene (maybe real footage) of the tragic Apollo 1 failure, with three deaths. Then, we move on to Apollo 11, and are introduced, separately, to the two leads.

Cole Davis (Channing Tatum) is launch director of the mission, a tad nerdy and also dead serious. Yes, he can be both, even in the same scene. Kelly Jones (Scarlett Johansson), at least the name by which she is known when we first meet her, is an advertising executive making a pitch at a board meeting, perhaps not in her best conditions as it looks like water can break any moment in her advanced stage of pregnancy. After leaving the boardroom where she apparently did well and before even exiting the building with her assistant, she pulls this bulky pad from under her dress thereby reclaiming her alluring figure. Yes, we audience get the message. Then there is meet cute in a diner (when she isn't faking pregnancy) when the pair obviously show interest in each other but have not taken things any further.

Then comes the plotline of a fictional story based on a factual event. Kelly gets a visit from one Moe Berkus (Woody Harrelson, perfectly cast), a shady White House operative, oozing Plumbers' smell. Moe tries to recruit Kelly to undertake a project of filming a faked Moon landing video just in case Apollo 11 doesn't make it. "I never went to prison" is her initial reaction. He assures her that it is easy, just two-and-a-half hours' fake shot, "shorter than Ben Hur". Upon her probing, he intimates that Nixon doesn't know but "would probably approve". He becomes very convincing when he reveals that he knows everything about her past, which can be sum up in that everything in her life since her mid-teens was a con game (just like the fake pregnancy the audience witnessed at the opening scenes).

When Kelly and Cole meet again, at NASA, they assure each other that professionalism will supersede their embarrassing previous encounter. He proceeds to show her the world's o tallest ne-story building. Apollo 11, he explains, is the world's biggest jigsaw, with 6 million parts to be put together. He even makes reference to Mission Impossible, the TV series (1966-73) of course, not Tom Cruise's stunts.

You do not need a creative imagination to visualize the movie's trajectory, essentially the Apollo 11 project and the romance. On the latter, you may recall the iconic "Can you read my mind" scene between Clark Kent and Lois Lane, immortalized by Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder in 1978. Whenever circumstances allows (or indeed demand) a tribute, we could be treated to some creative scenes. The one I remember most, and quite enjoy, is Edward Cullen taking Bella Swan on a vampire "flight" in a towering temperate forest. Robert Pattison and Kristen Stewart's rendition of this scene is quite charming. In the flight scene in "Fly me to the moon", against the background jazzy title song, Johansson and Tatum gave it a fair shot. The chemistry between this pair, however, is kinda hit and miss.

Eventually, the plotline of having a fake scene of Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins on the moon wanders into over-the-top territory, when the final directive from Moe (audience are supposed to be able to surmise the height of the authority it came from) is to run the fake scene anyway, real time, regardless of whether the eagle had in fact landed or the icon phrase of "a small step for man etc" was in fact uttered on the surface of the moon.

That's about it. This is a movie which you would enjoy but be unlikely to remember.

Those who still remember "Twister" (1996) will likely best remember charismatic Helen Hunt. I do too. But it is with sadness that I remember in this movie young Philip Seymour Hoffman, one the greatest acting talents lost to the audience at the age of 47. But this review is about "Twisters" (2024), when the macro big picture has changed, although not particularly emphasized in the movie. The title however alludes, even if subtly, with a plural, to the drastically increased number of tornados, which many experts consider to be the result of climate change.

But then, a tornado is a tornado, whether in 1996 or 2024. Likewise the Everest. A movie about the awe-inspiring nature can be a pure documentary and still absorbing. As a commercial market product, however, the ingredient of "the human stories" is necessary. Whether the challenge of the Everest can become thrilling, moving, poignant (or all of the above and more) depends on the actors. In Twisters, it is the two leads. Glen Powell is really hot this year, particularly with "Hitman". Daisy Edgar-Jones, if you have watched "Where the crawdads sing" (2022), you will remember as the enigmatic "marsh girl" accused of a murder. Before talking about their performances, let me briefly recap the plotline.

After a prologue type opening scene of a tornado thriller, we see "five year later" in a New York a meteorologist Kate (Daisy Edgar-Jones), a survivor from the said prologue scene. The other survivor (out of a small group in the disastrous venture) Javi (Anthony Ramos) looks her up and seeks, nay, begs her participation in a new tornado-chasing venture, for her special gift of intuition in tracking tornados. There are other players, most notably a circus-like, showing-off team lead by flamboyant Tyler (Glen Powell) who, despite the annoying initial entrance, is not a sham, and even a good guy at heart. There are the mandatory greed subplots. You know the drill.

I have to confess that after watching Twisters, I re-watched the aforementioned Twister which I have in fact already watched several times. That dampens my enthusiasm for writing anything more about Twisters, a pale shadow by comparison.

It's not totally fair, I know, comparison. Taken by itself, Twisters is not a bad movie, Powell's charisma being a big plus. Edgar-Jones is a good actor, as mentioned, but her persona suits "Where the crawdads sing" much better than "Twisters", especially when I think about Helen Hunt's heart-felt energy. Worth mentioning is, in a small role, Harry Hadden-Paton, seasoned British actor you may recognize from The Crown and Downton Abbey (one of the spin-off movies).

I realize that one does not try to be intentionally vague when talking about the plot, but this approach might just be the way for "Mothers' instinct". This is a story about two women, both with a typical middle class family in the JFK era - a good husband and a normal 8-year old son. The women are great friends; the sons besties. They seem almost like interchangeable. But then, as the story unfolds, differences emerge. I'll describe some of these differences without specifically identifying which goes with whom.

One can no longer bear any more children. One seems to suffer from a guilty complex in the accidental death of her parents. One used to be a good reporter but is no longer working. One of the sons has a dangerous allergy to peanuts. These differences stay in the background, until something happens: a tragic accident.

One of the sons fall from the second floor balcony to his death, while his mother is downstairs vacuuming. The other woman, spotting the dangerous situation from her own lawn next doors, tries to give warning but is unfortunately too late. This little spin puts a twist to a normal situation of a good friend comforting the victim, trying to help her through the grieving. Here, there is a dubious perception of failure to raise an alarm in time. The women find themselves in a state of suspicion and guilt. Things become more sinister every minute, with conspiracy theories aplenty. Their roles begin to blur. The story treads more and more into psychopathic territory, whether apparent or real.

All this is very watchable, until the ending which at least one critic categorize as "silly". That may not be the best word. You won't call a Hitchcock movie "silly". While "Mothers' instinct" does not make an all-out effort to reference the master of suspense, there are some hints. It is not a haphazard coincidence that the look of Chastain in this movie reminds unmistakably you of Kim Novak and Tippi Hedren, in "Vertigo" and "The birds" respectively.

Perhaps the biggest mystery about this movie is that with the two leads Chastain and Hathaway, it doesn't get any publicity at all. In fact, in the US, it just got a "limited release" for the theatres. "Mothers' instinct" will be available for streaming in about a week.

I cannot recall a movie of a full 100-minutes dialogue between two people. Maybe I have seen one or two and forgotten, but certainly none like this one, taking place entirely (well, 99% if you really want to split hair) inside a cab. The dialogue, as you can well surmise, is between the driver and his fare. So refreshingly delightful, if you ask me, but obviously not for everybody. Needless to say, much rest with the quality of the writing. Considering the setting (with no disrespect to the cab driving profession) the conversation is unlikely to be one that reminds you of Shakespeare or Shaw. This one is not exactly Williams, Millar or Wilder either. Still, it is captivating in its own way. Let me back up a little.

At JFK Airport, sophisticated young woman (between 24 and 34 as the script goes, played by Dakota Johnson), just flown back after 3 weeks of family visit in Oklahoma, hops on a flat-rate cab to Manhattan, normally a 45 minute ride. Traffic jam midway through doubles the time. The grass-root looking middle aged drive (Sean Penn) initiated a conversation, a perfectly normal thing. But the protagonists have a little more fire in them than average. As it is quite unlikely they will see each other again after this ride, they throw away inhibitions. After some meandering, the conversation goes into personal territories.

It starts, expectedly routinely, with his complaints about apps taking over the human touch (and tips in hard cash too, needless to say). He is also a man, even at his age, full of curiosity. Upon learning that she is a computer programmer (rather than a fashion model or some such thing), he seems genuinely interested to learn about "zeros and ones". She proceeds to enlighten him. Then she takes over control (at least temporarily) and starts asking questions. A pattern follows, not unlike in a tennis match, where they alternatively serve and hold the service game. The questions become more provocative, and answers more philosophical and personal, both. It will be a crime to reveal more as that would take away much of the pleasure from watching the movie. The only plotline (as if there is one) detail I need to add is that she is, a lot of times, messaging back and forth with a man who is waiting for her to come home. While the context is explicitly sexual, it does not deter her from always coming back to pick up again and continue the conversation with the cab driver.

Johnson and Penn have excellent chemistry, and this is not 100 minutes of non-stop dialogue. There is plenty of eloquent nuances. As well, they tell a lot with their facial expressions, often presented in delicately shot close-ups. You can clearly hear their eyes talk. You can call it exaggeration but I'd say there is never a dull moment, due partly to beautiful cinematography. Yes, you don't see awe-inspiring scenes of desert sunrise as in Lawrence of Arabia. But the mesmerizing shots of hazy night Manhattan contributes much in enhancing the mood.

A rare gem, this movie "Daddio", the risk of boring some in the audience to death notwithstanding. While on that, one more disclosure: the title does not allude to the relationship between the protagonists. To a potential spoiler charge, I would plead not guilty.

"Hit man", Richard Linklater's (9-years-spaced "Before" trilogy; 10-years-in-the-making "Boyhood") latest work, is an unassuming, easy ride that grows on you, leaving a delightful, sweet, lingering aftertaste. As to the acting of the two lead, it can best be summed up in "Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan could not have done better".

The protagonist Gary Johnson (Glen Power) is a professor teaching philosophy is New Orleans. In a first person VO, he intimates that he leads a simple real-world life and a great "inner life": I'd always enjoyed living in a world of questions and ideas. The title role soon kicks in. Moonlighting for the police initially on technical work, he one day finds himself filling in for the undercover "hit man" Jasper (Austin Amelio), a somewhat despicable character who has been suspended for 120 days for misdeeds. The job is to meet with potential clients who want somebody killed, and obtain sufficient evidence for contemplation of murder, usually via audio recordings. A pageantry of a serious of Gary's posing as a rich assortment of personas for the assassin "Ron" is delightful eye candy (not in the erotic sense, of course). As well, the assortment of would-be behind-the-scene murderers is just a delightful. All are apprehended and most of them convicted.

Then comes the meeting with prospective client Madison (Adria Arjona) turns into a love-at-first-sight cute meet, during which Gary (posing as "Ron") successfully convinced Madison to drop the murder plan, and use the fees prepared for Ron to finance a disappearing coup, leaving the abusive husband (the intended murder victim) forever. End of first half.

I am not going to elaborate the events of the second half starting with, obviously, the re-encounter of Gary/Ron (essentially unchanged) and Madison (now a freed woman). There are some twists and turns that are none too convoluted. Still there are moments when you wonder where things will go as well as, putting it in the most colloquial level: who's kidding whom? There is also the ethical issue. If you think of "Baby Driver", you might remember that despite the over-the-top noir, the ending is steered back with the moral compass. Here, the marvelous dynamics between the two leads have you rooting for them so much that you wouldn't blink twice, whatever mischief they are up to.

Yet another dimension to this movie is Gary/Ron at a deeper level. "Layers" is a tempting word but there are no layers; just the two of them, Gary and Ron. As mentioned, Gary lives in a comfort zone any divorcee might have chosen. A cocoon, one might suggest. While one critic says this movie could be viewed as a coming-of-age story for Gary, it would seem even more appropriate to see it as the slice in his life when he breaks out of the cocoon. Preparing Ron (even to the extent of dressing up) for different client's fantasy, he gradually realizes that Gary himself actually has choices, for a life that is more connected to the real world. Madison, finally, provides the motivation, leading to the heart-warming final scene.

"Challengers" is not ground-breaking but it does offer some interesting things to talk about. Simply put, it's a love triangle (and they come in all sorts, starting with Camelot) anchored on a professional tennis trajectory. Style-wise, there are moments when it looks like it is winking at the arthouse fans but it does not take long for one to realize that it is targeting the mass audience after all. In terms of substance, after the sound and fury, what it really aims to do is to give you a good entertainment. The top leads are excellent in achieving a perfect balance. After all, they are selling charisma and glamour, not philosophy.

"Challengers" is more character-driven than event-drive. Indeed, the contrived back-and-forth flashbacks create an impression that it is a complicated story. Reimagined in linear fashion, however, it is not complicated. Art (Mike Faist) and Patrick (Josh O'Connor) are as close a pair of buddies as you can imaging, and their intimacy may take various subtle shades. In other words, nothing unusual. Enters Tashi (Zenday), who comes between them, literally (like, on a bed). Still, nothing unusual. The trio are all top-notch tennis pros. Tashi ends up marrying Art and coaches him towards Grand Slam championship, when her own career suffers a setback from injury. Then, Art fumbles (sorry about the vocabulary; this is tennis, not football, I know) into an existential crisis. Tashi tries to remedy it by entering him into a low-level championship, to regain confidence. There, they reencounter Patrick. Things get complicated, emotionally not the least. That's basically the story, which starts in the movie at the championship finas between the two men.

On the other hand, the audience is never let into any depth of the emotions of the characters. Art is the least complicated. "He is a good guy" maybe says it all. One may even question the reasonableness of his having a strong enough killer instinct for cut-throat competition of professional tennis. For Faist it is a reversal of character persona from his Riff in "West Side Story", an all alpha, flamboyant street gang leader. Faist did well in both.

In "Challengers", Patrick is the nearest to a villain although it is perhaps a bit too much to categorized him thus. But he is certainly a schemer, aggressive and flashy (sometimes literally). While a good guy often becomes a bore, it's the bad guys ooze alluring attraction. Even dominating Tashi sometimes falls for it. O'Connor, who plays unappealing Prince Charles in The Crown, plays unappealing Patrick in a different way - you take the high road and I take the low road. While Patrick is in fact not a poor kid, he tries to look like one, a stark contrast to Charles's regal presence.

It's Zandaya's Tashi who takes center stage, not only takes it, but also owns it (except for the final scenes when she surrenders the spotlight back to the two facing-off players). After Spiderman and Dune, she finally gets a movie role for her acting chop, and one that is worthy the pedigree an Emmy winner and glamour celebrity. A role just about custom-made for her, one may say.

Using the name of a 1980s TV series (and honoring it with a cameo from its star Lee Majors), "The Fall Guy" (2024) has a life all of its own. It is many things with mass entertainment, arguably, at the top of its agenda. It is also a sincere tribute to the "unsung heroes", the stunt crew, director David Leitch being a stunt man before being a director. Expectedly, therefore, it is an action thriller (top-notch). It is also a breezy light romance, a sometimes over-the-top comedy, with a mini murder mystery throw in for good measure. And still more: this movie is also a jab at deep fakes and AI.

Bring rather crowded, this movie is smart in adopting a simple, easy to follow story line, starting with first rate stunt man Colt's (Ryan Gosling) accident which puts him out of action for 18 months. While this breaks the heart of camera-woman Jody (Emily Blunt), the last thing he really wants is to hurt her. Be that as it may, when producer Gail (Hannah Waddingham) calls for his service again in a blockbuster "Metalstorm", which is also Jody's directorial debut, he is dismayed to find total rejection from his former girlfriend, who wants nothing to do with him other than professionally (and even for that, reluctantly). But, when Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) the hot star that he has always been doing stunts for disappears, suspected murdered, things start to get interesting. I'll leave you to fill in the rest by actually watching the movie.

Gosling is good as he has always been, in whatever role he is casted. Blunt fans will be a little disappointed that despite the billing, hers is more like a support role, albeit a strong one. Waddingham and Aaron Taylor-Johnson are both given roles with room to flex their acting muscles, and flexed away they did. On star-power, they have added a little "tail" to the end of the movie. The moviemakers (in the movie "The Fall Guy", that is), due to circumstances you will discover when you watch the movie, need to recast the lead role played by Tom Ryder. They approach Jason Momoa, who accepts. In the final few shots of the movie "The fall guy", therefore, we get to see Momoa appearing in "Matelstorm"!

One last tidbit. During a melee when Colt is thrown smashing through a glass wall by Iggy (very pretty and underused action star Teresa Palmer, really cool in "I am Number Four", as Number Six), he yells "I am in Metalstorm too!" This further inflames her anger "I am only in "Metalstorm One", she yells. Colt promptly explains himself "too! Also!" Reminds me of G&S's "Pirate of Penzance": "often frequently, or orphan as someone who has lost his parents".

Guy Ritchie (hilarious "Lock, stock and two smoking barrels") serves up a less over-the-top but still fun-to-watch "Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare". The plotline is all too familiar, where an alternative title "How the U-boats were defeated and the war was won" may well be used. The structure is also familiar: putting together a Dirty-dozen-ish team on a mission not officially recognized by the British government, to destroy the supplies vital to operating the Nazis U-boats, with the objective of neutralizing the deadly threat to trans-Atlantic convoys. If the team succeeds, they are unsung heroes. If it fails, its members faces two possible outcomes - prison if caught by the British, torture and death if caught by the Germans.

In more specific terms, this team is to blow up an Italian ship carrying these supplies harbored at a neutral (hence ruling out an "official" mission) island called Fernando Po. The two hour movie is basically run in three parallel lines after the establishing scene in London. Continuing in London is the people in high places, with Churchill (Rory Kinnear) opposed by almost everybody, threatening to remove him from office if things go sideways. The few loyal to him includes Ian Fleming (Freddie Fox), and I don't need to explain the suggestion of the original inspiration for 007. Making advance preparation at the island is a pair of spies, Heron (Babs Olusanmokun) is a popular playboy figure with lots of soft influence, so much so that he can easily introduce alluring Marjorie Stewart (Eiza Gonzalez) whose mission is to do whatever she can to distract the powerful German officer Luhr (Til Schweiger) stationed there.

Last, obviously not least, is the team itself that eventually converge with Heron and Marjorie. In the meantime, their trajectory is on a fishing boat, where the four-member team has to first rescue Geoffrey Appleyard (Alex Pettyfer) who is needed for his planning skills, to become the fifth. Leading the team is Gus March-Phillipps (mustachioed Henry Cavill), with Freddy Alvarez (Henry Golding) the explosive expert, Anders Lassen (Alan Ritchson) muscle man/ruthless kill and indispensable ship's captain Henry Hayes (Hero Fiennes Tiffin).

While it would be too much of an insult to call this movie a no-brainer, the demand on your concentration is minimal. There is just on big plot twist, which is simplicity personified. Just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Just two to tidbits. Don't miss Gonzalez's performance, in a private club, of Mack the Knife from The Threepenny Opera. This you may miss but trust me, it's there: the line "this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship". As a timeline of this movie is set just prior to the release of "Casablanca", it is the writer's tribute to, rather than the character's quote from, the movie.

"Ghostbusters: Afterlife" (2021) is considered by many as the true sequel to Ghostbusters (1984) and that is not wrong. "Ghostbusters II" (1989) is more like a spin-off, while "Ghostbusters" (2016), rebooted with an all-female cast, is in an entirely different time line/parallel universe. Both have left the fans of the original somewhat unsatisfied, if not outright disappointed. To these fans, "Afterlife" would feel more like a nostalgic encore than a simple sequel. "Frozen Empire" is in every sense a sequel to "Afterlife", and more (continuation of a Rocky-ish franchise?) Just as a brief recap: "Afterlife" started with 3 new characters, single mother Callie (Carrie Coon) and her two children Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) and Phoebe (McKenna Grace). Callie turns out to be the daughter of one of the Ghostbusters, Egon Spengler, who recently died and left his daughter a Gothic house in Oklahoma. Other new characters, surrounding this core family, were school teacher Gary (Paul Rudd), lovely young lady who calls herself "4th generation dump" Lucky (Celeste O'Connor), and even younger but professional-looking Podcast (Logan Kim). When the three surviving original Ghostbusters (character as well as actual actors) finally arrived on the scene, the heart-warming cup runneth over.

Now, the stage has moved to New York, where Gary has joined the Spengler family as a de facto step father which Phoebe steadfastly refuses to acknowledge, consistently throwing retorts such as "3 years is a tiny negligible percentage of your lifespan". They take over an abandoned firehouse and start their ghostbusting business. The two buddies of the young Spengler end up in the Big Apple, needless to say. Of the surviving three originals, Winston Zeddemore (Ernie Hudson) has the most to do, plotline-wise, having established his own high-tech paranormal investigation lab, a "home on the strange, where the specters and the entities play" (as the wise-crack in Gary cannot resist quipping). It accommodates one of the three newcomers to the cast, (James Acaster), a young(ish), no-nonsense scientist. Next comes (Manhattan Oswalt) an ancient language expert at the New York Public Library who unravels the mystery of the prime villain. The last newcomer is (Kumail Nanjiani ) whose secret identity is unknown initially even to himself, the "Fire-master" who eventually teams up with Phoebe to prevail over evil. "Last newcomer" pertains only to characters that are alive! There is lovely teenage ghost Melody (Emily Alyn Lind, unforgettable from "Code Black", the superb TV series), and that is her family name. She initially plays chess with Phoebe as an invisible opponent. When she suddenly appears with a "boo", intending to surprise (if not scare) Phoebe, she becomes surprised herself when Phoebe displays no reaction whatsoever, carrying on nonchalantly with the game.

I won't go into the plot and sub-plots, but just answer an obvious question: how can they fit such a big cast into a slightly less than 2-hour movie? The answer is except for Phoebe, you get to see just a little bit of everybody else. You get a lot of good laughs though and a warm nostalgic feeling. Whether that meets with your expectation is a personal thing.

"Damsel" fails to meet expectations, on two counts. The trailer with the protagonist wielding a sword triggers in your subconscious a trained giant-killer such as Arya in Game of Thrones. Similarly, the opening VO (which every film critic quotes) is tantamount to innuendos that the "reverse damsel" (I coined) here is a veteran combater. In this move, the "damsel" is really no different from any ordinary damsel-in-distress. She survives only because she has above-average courage, wit, and luck.

The plot is simplicity personified. The prologue shows a king charging into a gothic cave, only to have his entire platoon vanquished by the fire issued from the nostril and mouth of a hideous dragon. The king is spared; a deal is made. Some years later, in a poverty-stricken vassal state, the lord received a royal summon: the king wants his daughter to be the prince's bride. To the capital and the palace they journey, lord and lady, bride-to-be and her young sister. Elodie (Millie Bobby Brown). Is dazzled by the opulence which reveals "my limited definition of wealth". Their reception however is not exactly warm. "Your family needs money. Our family needs a bride. But we (the rich side) don't need more family", the queen states bluntly. But of course the marriage has more than meets the eyes. It involves deception, bloody sacrifice and a dragon. The plot is simplicity personified.

The main draw of this movie, to me, is Millie Bobby Brown. I can take the neurotic, suffering hero in the TV series "Stranger things" or the clever, resourceful girl-detective in the movie "Enola". I think I get a bit of both. While the movie disappoints somewhat, Millie Bobby Brown doesn't. As to the star-grade support case - Ray Winstone, Angela Bassett and Robin Wright - they don't really have much to do.

To someone who knows absolutely nothing about this movie, the narrative unfolds in s slightly confusing way, but things are explained soon enough. Most things anyway.

In sumptuous color, we see an elegantly attired woman jumping off a bridge, with desolation in her eyes. Then we see in black and while the same woman, somewhat younger-looking, banging on a piano. We soon become quite familiar, at least visually, with the awkward movement and clueless verbal exchange of this unattractive (facial beauty notwithstanding) creature Bella Baxter (Emma Stone), Dr Godwin Baxter's (Willem Dafoe) daughters, most likely adopted. The first appearance of Godwin's face may make some in the audience shudder, but only the every timid ones. And they'll get used to it. These sewn up lines on his face, together with similar atrocities in other parts of his body, are the torturous reminders of how Godwin's monster of a father had been using his own son for experiments. Bella doesn't mind God's face though. "God is lovely, like dog face" she reassures him.

It is quite obvious the mental growth of Bella hasn't quite match her physical growth. God's student Max (Ramy Youssef) tries to help coaching her. Not a lot of progress thought. "Bella nowhere girl" seems to be her only understanding. The full story is soon revealed. God collected the dead body of this woman who jumped off a bridge and replaced her brain with that of an infant's. There was one scene, at the early stage of this experiment, when Emma Stone has to portray what goes through in infant girl's mine when she discovers the joy of masturbation in the body of a grown up woman she possesses. Stone may well win and Oscar just with this scene. Bella, however, is a work-in-progress and the audience observe her "maturing" through the movie.

Enters Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo), a cad through and through, taking Bella on a grand tour of the real world which includes glamorous European cities and a luxury boat tour. En route, there are friendly characters, one of which gives Bella words of wisdom such as "Hope is smashable; reality is not". Bella also initiates "an interesting experiment to live with nothing", by giving Duncan's money away, to the last penny, to the poor and needy.

Through this interesting experience, I can spot two places referencing classic scenes in movies. One is when Duncan tries to educate Bella to speak in a fashion suitable for high society, a reminder of Eliza Doolittle at the Ascot Gavotte. The other is Duncan's cry of despair and remorse, from the street to the upper floor "Bella"! There is a familiar ring of "Estella" from Stanley Kowalski (best remembered is of course Marlon Brando).

The remainder of the movie - the visual feast, the wickedly funny dialogue, the spot on performance of the cast, the fateful little end-twist, and a lot more - I'll leave you to discover. "Poor things" gathered 11 Oscar nominations, just a little behind the forerunner "Oppenheimer". But as these two cannot be more different in genre, there wouldn't be too many head-on clashes. I expect both to bring home a nice collection of deserved trophies.

It's a bit perplexing to see the movie's opening scene with Frankie Avalon's "Venue" as background music, even if "Priscilla" is not as much about Elvis as a couple of other movies. In fact, there is no Elvis music at all in the entire movie. Copyright may be an issue, granted. But Sophia Coppola may just be making a point: this movie is not about Elvis. "We've had enough of those", you could almost hear her. This movie is based on Priscilla Presley's book (1985) "Elvis and Me." "About time we make a movie from her perspective", you can almost hear her again.

In this movie, Priscilla's story is told in simple, old-style narrative, with a clear timeline. (1) The first 6 months in Germany when they quickly become very close, after they first met. (2) After he returns to The States while she remains in Germany, they suspend communication. (3) The relationship reignites easily and upon his invitation, she visits him a few times. (4) Eventually she move to Graceland to stay with him (which, unfortunately, is more like staying with his entourage), while he goes away frequently on the business of making movies.

It may be absurdly strange, but watching "Priscilla" makes me think of "Waiting for Godot". Priscilla seems to be forever waiting.

The story starts in 1959, when an innocent 14-year-old meets the world's idol singer, to 1973, when a neglected wife divorces a superstar on his road to self-destruction through substance abuse. Throughout, a burning question challenges the audience, be it bluntly or subconsciously: how much love it there, from her, and from him. To give this question some perspective, one should remember that Director S. Coppola has a penchant for depicting (even studying) loneliness, as evident by her Oscar-winning "Lost in translation" (2004, for screenplay, and nominated for best director and best picture). Priscilla's loneliness needs no elaboration. Elvis's loneliness may not be outright apparent, but is palpable even when he is always surrounded by a hoard of lackeys. Is the love driven by loneliness, in both cases?

At their first meeting in the U. S. base in Germany, Priscilla (Cailee Spaeny, at 24 and looking not one day older than 14) is lilywhite innocent. Elvis (Jacob Elordi, quite impressive in "Saltburn" made in the same year) is 10 years older, and miles ahead in sophistication. Still, his loneliness is just as evident as hers. His intention is entirely honorable. He just needs to have someone from back home to talk with. This movie depicts the couple as entirely chaste, up to the consummation of their marriage. It is Priscilla who craves sexual intimacy. But if you think about it, he has all the opportunities to satisfy his erotic drive, while she doesn't.

It is quite believable that they are drawn to each other initially by romantic love. As the story evolves, she is continuously in this "waiting" state while he drifts away. One telephone dialogue says it all. He is in Hollywood while she is at "home" in Graceland, and she wishes to do just some small things to make her dull existence less unbearable. "When I call you, I need you to be there for me" is his reply, spoken not as command or a threat, but in a casual, matter-of-course manner.

The final scene of the movie shows her walking out of his house, literally. Upon being served notice that she is leaving him, Elvis's parting words are "Maybe another time, another place". She does not say anything more, but in the background emerging with languid poignancy is Whitney Huston's immortal "I will always love you".

A movie based on a true story, with no violence, no sex, no thrilling action, no international political intrigue, it is quite amazing that "Air" can be so entertaining. Contributing to the success are all the parts that make up the whole. The best is the teaming up of Matt Damon and Ben Affleck again, after they served notice in 1997 with "Good Will Hunting" that two major talents had arrived in the cinematic universe, to stay. A solid supporting cast is another reason (which I'll come to later). The dialogue is simply wonderful, well written and brilliantly delivered. Under Afflecks' deft direction, the pitch-perfect pacing renders this 111-minutes movie into an absolutely delightful cinematic experience.

The story, as the movie title suggests, is about "Air Jorden", the most-coveted sports shoes of all time. The year was 1984, as one characters quips "Mr. Orwell was right about this year". Not a good year shaping up for Nike, it would appear, having a 17% market share, way behind competitors Adidas and Converse. And you don't need me to tell you the rest of the story. With one master stroke, recruiting expert Sonny Vaccaro (Damon) seizes victory from the jaws of defeat, by signing up number 3 draft pick of the Chicago Bulls Michael Jordan, thereby saving the basketball divisions and all his colleagues working there.

You don't need Ben Affleck to tell you either, but he tells it in such a wonderful way that it is a joy to follow his reenacting of the scenes, almost entirely indoor, with people just sitting or standing, and, talking! Through these scenes, the long friendship between Sonny and Nike co-founder (now CEO) Phil Knight (Affleck) becomes lovingly palpable.

And he also takes care to go into the heart of the story in detail: how Sonny recognizes the "greatness" of Jordan and how he convinces his colleagues. Sonny is shown watching two TV screens, simultaneous, in a room by himself. The regular TV shows a tennis racquet commercial, with Arthur Ash endorsing it. The "work" TV shows the tape of an important shot Jordan made, one that basketball fans would have seen over and over again in one occasion or another. Suddenly, as if hits by lightning, he jumps up and runs to enlighten his colleagues on what just dawned on him. I wouldn't pretend to be and expert. What Sonny notices (which everybody misses) is the shot by Jordan is completely planned, so that the ball would be in his hands at that very moment in that very spot. What Sonny brilliantly observes is that just three seconds before he will be making the most important shot in his life, Jorden looks entirely relaxed and confident. And that, from a skinny 18-year-old freshman, spells greatness. Just like Ash endorsing the tennis racquet, having Jorden endorse a line of specially designed shoes will guarantee success. "A shoe is just a shoe, until someone steps into it". And when that someone is Michael Jordan, the rest is history.

On the excellent support cast, first comes inimitable Jason Bateman ("Ozark") playing marketing director Rob Strasser, who initially has doubts about Sonny's intuition about Jordan, but soon becomes a believer. Chris Tucker takes on a well-casted role of player-turned-company-man Howard White, providing further support to Sonny with his rapid-fire dialogue. Scene-stealing is Chris Messina playing fiery agent David Falk who, upon learning that Sonny has gone behind his back to approach Jordan's mother, takes the four-letter word into a new height in a phone conversation. Top of the list, without the slightest doubt, is Viola Davis playing the mother. We have seen her brilliant performance in many emotion-charged scenes. Here, she demonstrates that, with absolutely cool composure (almost minimalistic) she can move us even more.

The several opening scenes of "Dream scenario" seem confusing but soon string together to make sense. Be warned: the very, very first sound from this movie is a huge "bang", coming from nowhere as we watch what looks a silent movie (except for the soothing color palette) where Paul (Nicholas Cage) is raking fallen leaves around a backyard swimming pool. Relaxing in a lawn chair is a teenage girl. Then comes this nerve-wrecking dint which sends the girl into a state of panic, screaming out for "dad" to help. Paul, however, carries on as if nothing is happening as his daughter Sophie (Lily Bird) floats higher and higher into the air from her lawn chair. A dream, of course.

To cut a long story short, we witness Paul popping up in more and more people's dreams, with a common denominator: he is a nonchalant bystander, strolling past with an annoyingly disinterested glance at the direction of the event taking place. No matter how desperate the dreamer, how devastating the event, Paul doesn't care. The Paul in their dreams, that is.

Other than this mysterious dream situation, Paul personifies "unremarkable". He is a professor. This profession, while respectable, does not necessarily exempt him from being unremarkable. He is an ordinary man, with an "everyday" family, a role-model wife Janet (Julianne Nicholson) and two teenage daughters, aforementioned Sophia and Hannah (Jessica Clement).

The aforementioned "several opening scenes" include meeting two women, separately, both his past acquaintances. One is scheduled, the other by chance. Sheila is in the publishing circle and Paul is very interested in having his book published, one he hasn't even really started writing. Claire, he used to date. Paul and Janet happen to run into her after a play. Claire (like a lot of other people later revealed) finds Paul in her dream recently. Her "incident" was one in which she was trying to get help for a friend seriously injured in a traffic accident as Paul walked by casually. The two meet up again, and Janet is not exactly pleased, quite expectedly. Romantic reconnection however is not something to worry about. Claire is asking for permission to mention Paul in her blog. Probably out of politeness, Paul gives his consent. That may or may not be the reason why he all of a sudden gets viral. Cause and effect are often difficult to determine. Maybe people seeing him in social media start to dream about him. But these people's mentioning him in their social media sets up a global tidal effect.

Paul is initially pleased. However, commercialism soon raises its ugly head, as a cutting-edge corporation tries to get him doing ads of Sprite. His sole interest, poor man, is to get his book published, which will hopefully bring him the recognition he deserves. But then things begin to turn ugly, when the harmless bystander Paul in people's dream transforms into a violent, terrifying character. Dream turn into nightmares. Unfortunately for Paul, his nightmares are in his real life.

Cage seems to want to take a break from the habitual big pay checks to take up this challenging role, and meets the challenge successfully. His portrayal of the innocence in Paul is pitch perfect, an ordinary person sadly in need of recognition and get something he has not bargained for - becoming a memes.

There is a good support character as well. Michael Cera shines as the disgusting advertising guru. Tim Meadows is solid as the role he portrays is, Paul's department head who is firmly grounded on common sense. Best, however, is Dylan Gelula, a young woman half Paul's age who finds Paul in her erotic dreams. The scene in which she tries to get him play out her dream with her in real life is something you won't want to miss.

"Saltburn" can be many things: psychological thriller, social satire, dark comedy, erotic trip (almost to the extent of big-screen porn), maybe more. But, at the end of the day, style trumps substance. The movie ends up looking like a super-long music video, beautifully shot. This is not to say, however, that there is no plot.

The movie moves around its central character Oliver (Barry Keoghan). More specifically, it is about the relationship between Oscar and the title object, Saltburn. Appearing half an hour into the movie, Saltburn is a plush estate in the English countryside, where Oliver has been invited by Oxford classmate Felix to stay in the summer, to hopefully alleviate agonies after his father's death. The first half hour of the movie takes place in Oxford, tracing the first encounter and the subsequent development of friendship (or maybe more) between the two young men. Felix is the born-with-silver-spoon-in-mouth type. Oliver is a common folk, often appearing as nerdy and clueless, although academically, he is a budding scholar at Oxford.

As the door of Saltburn opens to Oliver's knock, stone-faced butler Duncan appears, and immediately tells him off for arriving earlier than expected. Felix comes to the rescue, jesting "Duncan, stop being so frightening". After a guided tour, Oliver is brought to the living room to meet the other players at Saltburn. A close-up of a conversation shows two glamorous top-notch stars, Rosamund Pike playing Felix's mother Elspeth and Carey Mulligan playing a frequent guest "Poor Dear Pamela". We see also Felix's standoffish father and erotic sister. Of the other guest, the one standing out is Oxford classmate Farleigh, whose favored place with the Saltburn population seems to be threatened by the arrival of Oliver, as sort of a new toy to these elite people.

I am not going to elaborate the interaction of Oliver with the various characters during this summer escapade in Saltburn. Quite a lot of those are erotic, as I mentioned, and some even lethal. And, as I also mentioned, despite the somewhat fragmented and haphazard narrative, there is a plot.

There is no question that Saltburn is Keoghan's movie. Oliver is a bit of an enigma. It is no exaggeration to say that Keoghan's interpretation of this character drives the movie. Pike, always a delight to watch, does not have as much challenge as in many of her other iconic movies. It's sheer joy, of course, to see Mulligan (I did not even know she was in this movie). It's a pity that she has only a few scenes, less than many of the other support characters. But this is a Mulligan I have not seen before and I would not spoil it by saying anything further.

While "Saltburn" is not everybody's cup of tea, none can dispute its stylish achievement in cinematography and product design. And there are Pike and Mulligan, even though it is not anywhere near any of their important work.

"Maestro" immediately reminds me of two comparable stories, in a movie and a TV series. All three feature a loving couple, both prominent performing artists, walking a rocky path. "Prominent" is in different degrees. In "Walk the line" (2005) while Johnny Cash is a household name, June Carter is not far behind. Some of her fans, not surprisingly, would put her ahead of her husband. In "Fosse/Verdon" (2019), the couple is given equal weight in the title of the TV series. While Bob Fosse is better known, it was Michelle Williams who plays Gwen Verdon that won two esteemed awards.

The "celebrity gap" between Leonard Bernstein (Bradley Cooper) and Felicity Montealegre (Carey Muligan) is considerably wider. While Bernstein is a towering icon, Felicity (I intentionally forego is not exactly a Montealegre household name, although she is an accomplished stage actress. The movie does not overly dramatize this discrepancy. It might even be seen as two separate stories, one about Bernstein's huge success, and the other about the rocky path the couple tread through their life together.

The love story (as the rest of the movie) starts in black-and-white and ends with color, with matching aspect rations synchronizing with those used at the actual time of the story. The initial romantic "clicking" is breath-taking. She takes him to an empty theatre, with just one spot light shining directly at the movie audience. Then we see from different angles a scene of Felicity trying to have Leonardo rehearse some lines with her. Romantic dialogue, those are, at the height of which they kiss. The lights in the theatre are suddenly all switched on, followed by an apologetic stage hand saying that he is leaving and leaving them alone.

The fairy-tale romance gradually fades, but the movie does not really put the blame on her being in his shadow (in one scene, literally). Well, maybe a little, but not as much as you might expect. The real problem is that he is rather reckless with his extramarital pursuits, with both sexes, in fact. In one scene, he quips to a baby, "I had sex with both of your parents". The baby of course doesn't understand a thing and the parents don't seem to mind at all.

But in the end, when she is inflicted with terminal cancer, he stays by her side to the end. It starts with a scene in which the doctor explains to the couple their predicament in nerve-wrecking minute clinical details. She understandably is devastated while he becomes the steely shoulder carrying her along to the bitter end. This is the most difficult part of the movie to watch, not the least of which because of Mulligan's heart-wrenching performance.

The success story takes on a different rhythm. Without much ado, the opening of the movie plunges directly into a phone call inviting Bernstein to fill in at the New York Philharmonic for tonight's conductor who is down with sudden ailment. The rest is history, as marked by a review likening the successful debut to "right next to Hitler bombing Poland".

In an interview later in his career, he intimates that while he is composer, conductor, moviemaker, teacher and maybe many more, it can all be crystalized into one thing: his love of music. Whenever he is doing music, he is happy (and excels, one may add). When asked about the difference between a composer and a performer, he has some insightful views: they are just the opposite, one extrovert, the other introvert. He sometimes feels that he is schizophrenic.

The pinnacle of "Maestro" is the re-creation the finale 7 minutes of Bernstein's conducting the London Symphony Orchestra's performance of Mahler's "Resurrection" Symphony No. 2, at Ely Cathedral in 1973. For a brief moment I was tempted to describe the scene here, but wisely decided against it. What I would like to describe is this. Only after the electrifying movement of the baton finally come to an end, the penning camera moves to bring Felicity into view, her face radiant with joy. He approaches her briskly and kisses her passionately, and she murmurs in his ears "There is no hate. There is no hate in your heart." Cooper took years of extensive conducting coaching for this project and re-created an amazing Bernstein on screen. Elaborate prosthetics also helps. Mulligan is a natural, in whatever she portrays. In this movie, she convincingly radiates charm in her youth, as well as heart-breaking vulnerability in her final year, in equal measures.

While there is a good-size supporting cast, I'll only mention Maya Hawke who plays the couple's daughter, a relatively minor role. She may not be that well-known, except to fans of "Stranger Things", delighting them with her brilliantly constructed comic persona. More worth noting, of course, is her parentage, Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman. I did not notice it watching "Stranger Things" but in "Maestro" her resemblance to her mother is very noticeable.