The Reel World

"I know you've been waiting a long time for this. The tracks are made, the songs are ready. Let's take it from the top!"

For a little over two hours Michael Jackson has risen from his grave. It's not a miracle. It's a little bit of movie magic and a performance by an actor with a little bit more at stake than the usual paycheck or quest for awards and accolades. When he decided to direct a bio-pic about Michael Jackson, Antoine Fuqua made a couple of smart choices. He hired John Logan to write the script. Logan is likely best known for Gladiator but he has a pretty impressive resume to call upon. But the wisest choice was to hire Jaafar Jackson to play the title character. And while Jackson was required to audition for the part like any other actor might be required to do, he had an edge both in getting the role and in turning it into something a little bit special. He is Michael Jackson's nephew and the son of Jackson Five member Jermaine Jackson. So there's certainly a lot of Jackson power in the film, and it's all put together to pull in a whole lot of a different kind of Jacksons at the box office. So hold on tight, because this story is going to be a whirlwind.

"Want some pie?"

Follow me if you can. Somewhere out there in movieland there is a place called Normal that is anything but. And Nobody lives in the town of Normal. Of course, I'm really talking about Bob Odenkirk. He's the actor who had a heart attack filming the last season of his Breaking Bad spin-off Better Call Saul. Now most actors will look at having a heart attack as a sign to slow down. That's not what Odenkirk did. He decided to push himself by training for his first action film for five years with the stunt guys who did a lot of the John Wick action. That film was Nobody with Odenkirk playing the titular "Nobody". The strange thing is that he had a ton of fun and was quite good in the role and ended up in a sequel. Not willing to take "no" for an answer, he is now starring in his third action film, which also happens to begin with the letters n o. This time out is with director Ben Wheatly and co-writer Darek Kolstad. The film is called Normal, and it's a lot more fun than this setup might make you think. It's not going to win any awards, and it's not going to go down as a classic. What it will do is provide 90 fast-paced minutes of pure entertainment, and you know what? I'm OK with that.

Writer Andy Weir has a bit of a predictable science fiction style that has already struck box office gold. His novel The Martian was directed by the iconic Ridley Scott and starred Matt Damon as a lone astronaut stranded on the planet Mars. Weir's stories have a common theme that mankind might find the answers that confound us on Earth out there among the planets and the stars. Fans of that kind of hopeful science fiction won't be disappointed when they encounter Phil Lord and Christopher Miller's adaptation of another one of Weir's hopeful space stories called Project Hail Mary. The duo have been noted for their work in the Sony Spider-verse films and have mostly experience with animated features. Their work on Project Hail Mary should elevate them deservedly in the world of live-action science fiction with this recent release.

"I put the 'not' in astronaut! I've never done a spacewalk. I can't even moonwalk."

“Is that a freaking pigeon?”

I think this may be the first second-chance love story that I didn’t mind watching. Probably because the film didn’t try to undermine the main character’s responsibility in the situation that caused her to need redemption. Marking the third Colleen Hoover film adapted for the big screen, Maika Monroe stars as Kenna Rowan, a young woman working to rebuild her life after serving seven years in prison for a car crash that killed her boyfriend. Hoover’s popularity continues to grow with this latest adaptation, with at least one additional one scheduled for release later in the year. I have no doubt that more will follow, with the likely exception of the It Ends With Us sequel, which seems unlikely for obvious reasons. In the case of Reminders of Him, this marked a heartfelt and honest interpretation of its source material with some subtle deviations in my opinion. In addition to the story, the chemistry between Monroe and Tyriq Withers, who is quickly becoming a person to watch, makes this a film worth watching. Rounding out the cast are Bradley Whitford, Lauren Graham, Rudy Pankow, and Lainey Wilson in her film debut.

"Be warned. A sequel is coming. I have a lot more to say."

When certain stories become public domain, you just have to expect that there will be a lot of people creating their own “unique” versions of the same tale, all in the name of making a few bucks.  When it comes to adaptations of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, I think we can all agree every attempt to tell the story has not been in the name of preserving the art.  What I do find surprising: despite all the attempts to bring the story to the screen, there still isn’t a version that I can say is a perfect retelling of the tale. Though each may have its pros, for the most part it just never seems to translate well. Recently del Toro put together one of the more faithful versions of the story, replete with atmosphere and wonder. You can tell he's a fan of directors like James Whale, who brought the first two Universal classic Frankenstein films to life. In 1935 Universal released what stands out today as one of the best horror films ever made with The Bride Of Frankenstein. So I was rather looking forward to seeing this year's entry in the complicated tale of a "monster" seeking companionship, The Bride. I think that both James Whale and Mary Shelley must be rolling in their graves asking to be brought back to curse this latest venture. Alas, they can't. Allow me to do it for them.

Something I was really looking forward to going into the new year was watching 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple (2026). The movie series, 28 Days Later (2002), 28 Weeks Later (2007), and 28 Years Later (2025), holds cultural significance in the post-apocalyptic horror genre. Its revival last year after 18 years was a big deal for those who have been following the franchise since the first release of 28 Days Later (2002), starring Cillian Murphy. It is somewhat unique in that it is less about the infected being “undead” and more about the “rage virus.” Part of what makes these movies so great, really, is how plausible this virus is in terms of epidemiology, as well as the downfall of civilization as a result. The original 28 Days Later (2002) details the nature of the virus, while 28 Weeks Later (2007) showcases how it seemingly cannot be contained, even with strict quarantine efforts. 28 Years Later (2025) is more about how what’s left of humanity has learned to cope with the virus as the new norm, and the second installment, The Bone Temple (2026), features a revelation about the virus that changes everything we are made to believe about it.

As noted, this second installment is a direct continuation of the events that transpired in 28 Years Later (2025), which featured a young boy, Spike (Alfie Williams), who is trying to help his mother, Isla (Jodie Comer), after she becomes sick. He hears of a doctor in the area over yonder, but instead discovers the Bone Temple. We learn that this structure serves as a memento mori, a reminder of death, meant to represent what we have lost and choose to remember. In fact, it is a Latin phrase that translates to “Remember that you must die,” which is meant to acknowledge our own mortality. While the doctor, Dr. Ian Kelson (Ralph Fiennes), was unable to save Spike’s mother, he performed a ritual meant to honor her death and help process grief.

"The water taught them peace. The fire will test their soul."

I don't really have to tell you what Avatar is. If you haven't heard of it by now, I have only one question to ask of you: how was that coma? Ever since he cleaned up at the box office with Titanic, James Cameron has been planning this movie series. The only trouble was that the technology to make it did not exist. Most filmmakers would have either tried anyway, or simply waited until the hardware caught up with their imaginations. Not James Cameron. He decided to invent the equipment himself. The result is a 3D filming process that allows for the most realistic images you likely have ever seen on a movie screen. He combined the new process and equipment with new state-of-the-art computer-generated technology. The result is a movie that was truly the first of its kind. It was a huge risk for Cameron. A lot of money went into not only making the film, but the technology development. In many ways Avatar was really an audition film. The technology continued to improve, and two years ago we got the second film, Avatar: The Way Of Water. The film explored more areas of Pandora, and now another two years later, we have Avatar: Fire And Ash.

Just as things started to get intriguing, what happened? The credits rolled. While I’m not completely surprised by the cliffhanger ending, I was mildly annoyed by it. Which is not to say that I didn’t enjoy this sequel that somehow managed to walk a fine line between funny and suspenseful. I won’t call it scary, because it’s still a little PG in that regard. However, the story was entertaining, as were the characters, most of which were reprising their roles from the first film. I wasn’t sure that a sequel could break new ground, but given that Five Nights At Freddy’s is both a popular video and book series, I suppose there are many places that the story can go. Josh Hutcherson, Elizabeth Lail, Piper Rubio, and Matthew Lillard reprise their roles and are joined by McKenna Grace, Freddy Carter, and Skeet Ulrich, which makes for a surprise Scream reunion. That said, if I am being honest, Ulrich felt criminally underutilized in this project. I expected that he would play a bigger start in the story, and I was really hoping for more interaction between him and Lillard in order to better signify the Scream homage. Well, I suppose there is always the next film, which as stated, is most certainly planned for.

Interesting detail: voicing Chica, the animatronic that Rubio’s Abby was closest to, was Megan Fox. Her involvement in the project was an unexpected surprise. Even more interesting, the return of Corry Williams (aka CoryxKenshin), who made a memorable impression as a cabbie in the first film and reprises that role for the sequel. His appearance this time wasn’t exactly on par with what I remember from the first film, but seeing him added to the continuity and intrigue of the film.

From the moment I saw the trailer for Caught Stealing I immediately was taken back to the late 1990s, when so many films were trying to emulate the success Pulp Fiction had by mixing comedy and violence.  I mean, the kinetic energy of the trailer was giving me the same vibes I got when I first saw Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and The Boondock Saints. This isn’t a bad thing at all; heck, I miss these kinds of films. Lately it seems all the action films now are bad John Wick knockoffs or the woke superhero films that lack anything resembling artistic merit. I had every intention on seeing Caught Stealing in theaters, because this just looked like the kind of film I’d have fun with, but unfortunately this had such a short window at the theaters that it was gone before it had a chance to even find an audience. The quick turnaround with these films moving from theaters to streaming is enough to make your head spin, and the film studios wonder why they are taking losses, and this isn’t even a big-budget film despite having a solid cast and a relatively well-known director at the helm. I’m not saying this is a film that would ever break the bank and be a $100 million runaway hit, but this is a film that has the potential to gain a cult following. In a world where physical media is being killed off by the studios, it’s as though the studios are making it impossible to generate a profit from anything no matter if it finds an audience or not.

OK, enough of my soapbox ramblings, and on to the film …

It is hard to believe it has been nearly a decade since Mel Gibson last directed a film. Hacksaw Ridge remains one of my favorite war films made in the 21^st century, and I thought for sure it signaled the return for Gibson, since he’s been in Hollywood jail since 2006. He’s managed to get some work in some bad direct-to-streaming films, though I feel the last great film we’ve gotten to see him on screen was 2018’s Dragged Across Concrete, which didn’t exactly set the box office ablaze. I’m bummed by this, because really he’s one of the few surviving icons from the 80s and 90s that I believe still has some talent and could give cinema a few more great films, that is if Hollywood could just give him that chance. He’s been attached for years to doing another Lethal Weapon, but I have a hard time believing that will happen, and then he’s been working on his sequel to The Passion of Christ, which in theory could give his career the boost he needs to go on to some bigger and better projects, bur unfortunately I’m just not too optimistic about that. This year Mel Gibson stepped back behind the camera to direct the new thriller Flight Risk, which opened to little fanfare, but is it any good? Well, fasten your seatbelts; we’re about to get into it.

Madolyn (Michelle Dockery) is a US marshall who has travelled to the Alaskan wilderness to track down Winston (Topher Grace), a weaselly fugitive they’d like to use to testify against a mob boss. They charter a plane to escort Winston to bring him in so he can testify, but unfortunately the pilot (Mark Wahlberg) isn’t who he claims to be. It turns out the pilot is an assassin hired to take out Madolyn and her escort, and this turns to a claustrophobic showdown 3000 feet in the air. Even when the US marshal is able to subdue the assassin, she still has to contend with the problem of flying the plane and not knowing how to fly or even where they are located.