Hello everyone! Do you love to play Call of Cthulhu 7th edition? Want a scenario set on the world’s most notorious prison? If so, I have something in store for you soon! In May, I will be releasing the second of my “On the Rock” series of scenarios set on Alcatraz in the 1930’s.
You and your friends will play inmates who have to confront mundane routines, harsh punishments, and cosmic horrors from the depths of the Pacific Ocean! If that sounds cool to you, let me know in the comments.
Keep an eye on this blog to find out how you can get the scenario at a discounted price and how you can bundle it with my first “On the Rock” scenario!
This won’t be for everyone, but if you are interested stay tuned! Also, let me know in the comments what you think of the cover design so far! It’s not final yet, but I’m hoping it clicks with some of you TTRPG players! Let me know if you like the black and white or think something in color would look better!
Hello film fans and happy Oscar day! It’s Slick Dungeon and I am back to review the last of the films nominated for the Best Picture Oscar this year. I am talking about The Zone of Interest which was nominated for five of the prestigious awards. There will be spoilers in this review so if you have not seen it make sure you do so before reading the review. Also, content warning here for the film and the review, this film deals with the Holocaust so the subject matter is very heavy and if that sort of thing bothers you, stay away from both the movie and the review.
What’s it about?
The year is 1943 and the film opens with a dark screen and loud background noises. We shift to an idyllic countryside scene where a family of five are laughing, swimming and having a picnic in the local river. We soon find out this family is lead by Rudolf Höss, the Commandant of Auschwitz.
From the outside the family almost seems normal. The siblings fight amongst one another, the mother gardens, the father is constantly working. But, in the background are repeated sounds of gunshots and hints of smoke from both trains and gas chambers.
With cold, emotionless efficiency, a team of engineers meets with Höss to talk about a new crematorium that will be able to keep a much faster pace of killing people.
In the house, there are camp prisoners forced to work to serve the family. They are all doing things in the background and ignored or abused by the family by turns. The horror in the film is snuck in quietly as we see things happen like the young boys looking at gold teeth they have collected, the wife giving away clothing from the camp to her servants while keeping a fur coat for herself, and the husband going through phone calls and paperwork to make it all happen.
Eventually, Höss is ordered to move near Berlin to improve efficiency in all the camps. His family remains behind in their spacious house and grounds. Höss is tasked with transporting 700,000 Hungarian Jews so they can be killed or used for labor. The majority are likely to be killed and the rest will be used to do work that helps the German war effort.
Höss attends a party in Berlin where all he can think about is how he would gas the entire room if he needed to. At the end of the party he heads down the stairs and retches into the corridor repeatedly.
Suddenly, we cut to modern day where a group of janitors clean the Auschwitz–Birkenau State Museum. There are piles of shoes, luggage, crutches and other personal belongings on display. We see the uniforms the prisoners were forced to wear and we see a long hallway with the photos of hundreds of people who were at the camp. It’s the strongest visual hint we get of what happened at these camps and the sheer scale of it is enough turn anyone’s stomach.
The movie then cuts back to Höss where he finishes going down the staircase and the film ends.
The movie makes some interesting choices. By having the violence and horror be implied and in the background, it emphasizes how normalized all of this was. It’s clear just how horrible a person Höss was even as we see him riding his horse with his son and pointing out things in nature. This was a person who had no trouble approving and engineering the deaths of literally millions of people. The pace of the film is also cold and methodical, much like Höss himself, and at times were it not dealing with the subject matter it did, might feel like a film where the biggest conflict was a father having to move away from his children for a time. But the horrors in the undercurrent here can’t be ignored or dismissed so this cold efficiency just emphasizes the horrific nature of it all.
Whether or not we needed a film from the perspective, or at least looking at Höss, is not clear to me but it is an effective film in what it is trying to achieve.
The Awards
The Zone of Interest is up for several awards and has a stronger chance in some categories than others.
Directing
The film is directed by Jonathan Glazer. He does a fine technical job, and there are a few sequences that seem almost surreal in a way. There are bold choices as far as sound and visuals but the majority of it is directed in a way you would direct any competent film. His competition is quite notable with Justine Triet for Anatomy of a Fall, Martin Scorsese for Killers of the Flower Moon, Yorgos Lanthimos for Poor Things, and Christopher Nolan for Oppenheimer. Even with these notable directors and films, I still am betting on Christopher Nolan to take home the award.
International Feature Film
This category is not entirely fair for me to judge because I have only had a chance to watch two of the films in this category. (I tried to review as many of the Oscar nominated films as I could and I got through a lot but I couldn’t do them all) However, of the two I have seen, The Zone of Interest is the better film and I imagine is the most likely to win. I’ll still try to get around to reviewing the others when I can but it won’t be until after the Oscars are over.
Best Picture
I have now seen all of the Best Picture nominees and as good and strong as many of them are, Oppenheimer is still the best one. That was an incredible film and I just can’t imagine any of the rest of the entries winning, including The Zone of Interest.
Sound
This is a tough category to win. The competitors to The Zone of Interest are The Creator, Maestro, Mission Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, and Oppenheimer. The Creator has great sound, as does Mission Impossible but Oppenheimer has a particular sequence where the sound conveys so much of the storytelling that it’s clear how vital the sound actually is. The Zone of Interest similarly plays with sound at times but I don’t think it does so quite as effectively. While typically sci-fi and fantasy films tend to take home the award in this category, I think Oppenheimer is actually going to win here because of that sequence.
Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
The writing here is excellent and if The Zone of Interest were to win, it would be deserving. But there is also really strong competition in this category. The Zone of Interest is up against American Fiction, Barbie, Poor Things, and Oppenheimer. I think this one is going to go to American Fiction or The Zone of Interest but honestly any of these winning would make complete sense.
In Conclusion
The Zone of Interest is an intriguing film and uses normality to allow us to think about the horrors in the background. There is good reason it was nominated for so many awards but at times it can be difficult to tell if this is coming at things from the right perspective. It does have quite the impact at the end but there are spots it could improve. I would recommend for people to watch this if they can handle films that deal with the Holocaust but I wouldn’t say it is the best of that type of film either.
Hey film fans it’s Slick Dungeon! I’m back to review the Oscar nominated Live Action Short films for this year. This is a category where I wish all of the films could win because for each and every one of them there was great effort put in. For that reason, I am going to keep the spoilers as mild as possible here because you should all go and watch them. Still, to talk about them all there will have to be a little bit of spoilage so if you want to go into these blind, watch them first and then come back to read the review. I’ll also give you my prediction for the winner.
the After
This film is hard to describe without spoiling but let’s just say an unexpected incident occurs early on and the rest of the film deals with what happens after. It is heart wrenching and surprisingly emotional. It’s a fantastic little film and absolutely worth watching.
Invincible
This is the only film in this category based on a true story. I can spoil a little more of it than some of the others without giving anything away. This is about a troubled youth in Canada who lives in a youth detention center. It gives us a portrayal of the young man and the lengths he will go to in order to change his circumstances. Another film that is heartbreaking here and quite well made.
Knight of Fortune
This is a drama with a bit of graveyard humor in it. It tells the story of Karl who has come to the morgue to identify and say goodbye to his late wife. There are awkward and hilarious moments all wrapped into one here and it leads us to some unexpected places while still being grounded. In the end it’s a sweet film and fun to watch despite dealing with death.
Red, White and Blue
This is a film that leads us in one direction and wallops us into another direction in a jaw dropping manner. I can’t say much more than that other than to say this is a very American film dealing with a very current American problem and is just utterly excellent. If I could give out the awards, this is the one I would give it to, but it’s probably not going to be the winner.
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar is a short film based on a short story written by Roald Dahl. It has major stars in it, including Benedict Cumberbatch, Ralph Fiennes, Dev Patel, Ben Kingsley and Richard Ayoade. It is directed by Wes Anderson. It’s as wild as you can get when it comes to the imagination of Roald Dahl, and while I am not typically a Wes Anderson fan, his style really does work well here. Because it is so chocked full of big names and has such production value, this is almost guaranteed to win. It’s a fun watch for sure but it still wasn’t my favorite out of all of these. Definitely worth watching though.
In Conclusion
While I would love for any of these films to win, I’m convinced The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar is the only prediction that makes sense here. I urge all of you to go out and watch these and judge for yourself. Short films don’t get the attention they deserve and audiences should watch more of them when they are accessible.
Hello film fanatics! Slick Dungeon here back to review the oddest of all the Best Picture nominees for the year, Poor Things. There will be spoilers in this review so if you haven’t seen the movie and you care about that sort of thing, book yourself a cruise to Paris, watch the movie, and come on back here to read the review. Before we get into it though, some content warnings for this one. The film has some pretty intense body horror, a whole lot of nudity, and hints of steampunk. If any of those things are something you’d prefer to avoid, don’t watch the film or read the review.
What’s it About?
Hoo boy. I don’t even know where to begin with this one but I’ll give it my best shot. Imagine the story of Frankenstein. Now, think of Frankenstein’s monster as following in Victor Frankenstein’s footsteps to become a surgeon and person who experiments on corpses. Then have that person find a pregnant woman who has thrown herself into the river. This Frankenstein’s monster who is highly educated and well respected in the community, if a bit fearsome to behold, is Godwin Baxter (Willam Defoe). Godwin takes the dead woman, extracts her live baby, and implants the brain of the live baby into the body of the dead woman and brings her back to life. This is Bella Baxter (Emma Stone). With me so far? Good because, it gets strange from here on out.
Godwin’s medical student, Max McCandles is hired to document Bella’s development. Bella has poor motor coordination, limited verbal skills, and is experiencing everything for the first time. Max falls in love with her. Godwin thinks it is a good idea for Max to marry Bella so he hires a lawyer to draw up a rather intense marriage contract that essentially keeps Bella a prisoner. This lawyer is Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo) and he is a cad. He basically convinces Bella to run away with him, which is not hard because Bella is looking for new experiences anyway. And he also wants sex from Bella, which Bella is curious about herself.
The two run off to Lisbon where they are happy for a while. But soon Bella is saying things in public that are considered rude in polite society because she does not know any better and she seems to enjoy getting under Wedderburn’s skin a bit anyway.
To gain more control of her, Wedderburn tricks Bella into getting onto a cruise ship with him. His plan backfires, however, as Bella makes friends on the ship and is exposed to philosophical ideas and the cruelty of the world. Deciding to make a difference, Bella tries to give money to the needy, although it’s clear the deckhands who take her money to give it to the needy are just going to keep it. Thus, she and Wedderburn are kicked off the boat in Paris.
Back in London, Godwin and Max try to replicate the experiment that created Bella but the results do not go as well and the resurrected woman’s cognitive faculties don’t develop nearly as fast as Bella’s did.
Here, Bella discovers she can trade sex for money and decides to do so. Wedderburn has become enraptured with her at this point but is horrified at her behavior. Bella pretty much tells him to kiss off and goes about her life there. She stays in Paris getting money in the same way for a while, learning more about herself and humanity. But she receives a letter that Godwin is dying so she decides to go back to London.
In London, Godwin tells Bella the truth of her origins and Max says he still wishes to marry her. But before the ceremony is complete the man who was married to Victoria (Bella’s mother before she became Bella) shows up and demands to have his wife back.
Bella thought she knew cruelty before but this guy, General Alfie Blessington (Christopher Abbott) is malicious on another level and tries to cut off Bella’s, uh parts. Bella doesn’t take this lightly and she shoots Alfie but decides to save his life. However, she implants a goat brain in him as well. She also decides to become a doctor. Godwin dies and we end pretty oddly, just as we began.
Throughout the film there are hints of gothic horror, steampunk vibes, absolute body horror, animal experimentation along the lines of The Island of Doctor Moreau, and the repression of sexuality in society, especially for women. There are layers of metaphors here I am still trying to wrap my head around and I can’t say it all makes sense but it’s certainly memorable.
This odd combination of factors added up to one of the most nominated films of the year so let’s take a look at those.
The Awards
Poor Things was nominated for a whopping 11 categories this year.
Supporting Actor
Mark Ruffalo is up for his cad of a character, Duncan Wedderburn who goes from selfish to lost, poor and selfish. There is notable competition with Sterling K. Brown for American Fiction, Ryan Gosling for his role as Ken in Barbie, and Robert De Niro for Killers of the Flower Moon. It’s never smart to bet against Robert De Niro winning an Oscar. I think he’s the most likely but we’ll have to see.
Best Actress
Emma Stone had to put on quite the show for this role. She also had to have a good bit of bravery to do it. And she is good at conveying Bella in different stages of development. I won’t say she is a lock for the win, but she is definitely in the top two here. She’s facing off against Annette Benning for Nyad, Sandra Huller for Anatomy of a Fall, Carey Mulligan for Maestro, and Lily Gladstone for Killers of the Flower Moon. At this point, I see this as a competition between Gladstone and Emma Stone with both having an equal shot at winning. If Stone does win, it can’t be denied she put a huge amount of effort and went places not many actresses could for the part.
Cinematography
The cinematography here is really interesting. The color palette is wide ranging, the camera makes use of lots of different lenses, and the framing of the shots can be pretty wild here. I could see this sneaking in a win but it’s facing off against the juggernaut of Oppenheimer and I still think that one is more likely to win. The other nominees are, Killers of the Flower Moon, El Conde, and Maestro.
Costume Design
Okay, the costumes are fantastic here and the choices are beyond bold to the point of being almost surreal. This movie must be in the top three, if not the top two in this category. It might go to Napoleon, but honestly, I think Poor Things is much more creative. It’s also up against, Oppenheimer, Killers of the Flower Moon, and Barbie.
Directing
The directing is certainly interesting and there are a lot of bold choices. I’m not sure all of them work but they at least try something new with this film. But, yeah, sorry, Christopher Nolan still has the upper hand with Oppenheimer and I don’t think Poor Things is going to beat that out. It’s also up against Justine Triet for Anatomy of a Fall, Martin Scorsese for Killers of the Flower Moon, and Jonathan Glazer for The Zone of Interest.
Film Editing
Another category where, in my opinion, Poor Things will lose out to Oppenheimer. The editing in Poor Things is decent although there were moments I wasn’t sure if the best choices were being made as far as when to exit or enter into a scene. The other nominees are Anatomy of a Fall, The Holdovers, and Killers of the Flower Moon.
Makeup and Hairstyling
Yeah the makeup is quite good. Willam Dafoe in particular has the most striking look and the makeup is an integral part of the film. I have to say, I think this film is the most deserving of the award this year. It’s up against Oppenheimer, Golda, Maestro, and Society of the Snow.
Music (Original Score)
The score is fine but I didn’t find myself overly paying attention to it here. It fits well but it’s not as striking as the rest of the film and it’s the part of the film I least remember. think Killers of the Flower Moon has a much better shot here. The other movies in question are American Fiction, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, and Oppenheimer.
Best Picture
I can’t see this winning over Oppenheimer, although it is a very inventive film. I think it’s still going to take me a few viewings to fully believe I understand the thing, whereas Oppenheimer is unforgettable and makes sense on the first viewing. I’ve got two more films to see in this category so I can’t say for 100% certain I think Oppenheimer is the best but those movies would have to impress me a lot more than Poor Things did to change my mind.
Production Design
There is pretty fantastic production design, especially surrounding the cruise ship and Paris scenes. But, in this category, I still think Barbie did the best job. This category does have some other notable films including Oppenheimer, Napoleon, and Killers of the Flower Moon.
Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
There are a lot of well written films in this category this year. Poor Things does have good writing but sometimes it may actually reach to far and trust the audience a little too much to get what is going on. It is up against American Fiction, Barbie, Oppenheimer, and The Zone of Interest. I think this one is going to go to American Fiction or The Zone of Interest but honestly any of these winning would make complete sense.
In Conclusion
Poor Things is a tough one to completely wrap your head around. If you don’t mind body horror, a wild, wild, story, and more nudity than most films get away with, this might be one for you. It’s got good acting, great sets, amazing costumes and makeup, and is mostly well written. But there are times that the audience is left more confused than anything and the film seems to try to go a little further past the edge than makes sense. I can see why it was nominated but it’s definitely not for everyone.
Hello film fans, Slick Dungeon here! I’m back to review yet another Oscar nominated film. This time I’m reviewing the latest film where Paul Giamatti gets to play a grumpy old man who is quick to anger but just may have a soft heart underneath after all. I am, of course, talking about The Holdovers. There will be spoilers for this film in the review below so if you don’t enjoy that, get your wealthy parents to hire a helicopter, have them pick you up for ski week where you can go and watch the movie, and then come on back here to read the review.
What’s it About?
The Holdovers is a coming of age film that takes place at a prestigious boarding school which is a pipeline for wealthy boys to end up in Ivy League colleges. Over winter break several students have to stay behind because for one reason or another their parents don’t want them back during the Christmas and New Year break. This means the school has minimal staff and only a single faculty member there to watch over the boys. The year is 1970 and Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti) is not only the most hated teacher at the school, by both the other teachers and the students, he’s also the one who is stuck staying over the break. Mr. Hunham is a tough grader, even for the students who have parents that pay enough to the school where they expect their kids to get good grades. As if that were not enough, he also simply has an arrogant and abrasive personality so not a lot of people tend to like him. This has landed him in some hot water so he is stuck with the babysitting duty this year.
Also left behind is Mary Lamb (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) who is the school cook and has just lost her son who was serving in Vietnam.
As far as the students go, there is a group of five of them left behind, including Angus Tully who was not expecting to be left there. Despite the fact the school is on break, Mr. Hunham forces the boys to study, exercise, and generally keep to the strict discipline of the school regulations.
We also learn that Mr. Hunham was once a student at the school. The routine goes on for six days with some infighting amongst the boys, a few shouting matches and some shoving, the boys desperate to get out of there and barely controlled chaos. But one of the boys has a wealthy father who arrives with his helicopter to take as many of the students as are allowed on a ski trip.
Unfortunately for Mary and Mr. Hunham, Angus Tully’s parents can’t be reached so he can’t get permission to go on the trip. This means the three of them are stuck at the school together. At one point Angus gets so fed up with being there he runs through the halls with Mr. Hunham chasing him. Angus gets to the gym which is supposed to be off limits and does a little tumble where he badly hurts his arm.
Mr. Hunham has no choice but to take Angus to the hospital and he knows this could get him fired. But, Angus covers for his teacher that way he won’t get fired and Angus’ parents won’t find out. While Mr. Hunham isn’t happy with Angus lying, he does seem to soften his attitude a bit.
Angus and his teacher end up going out to dinner where Angus almost gets into a fight but Mr. Hunham smooths things over. And, they meet a woman from the school working part time at the restaurant who invites them for a Christmas party. Angus, Mary and Mr. Hunham all go to the party. Angus is devastated to find out that Lydia who is throwing the party has a boyfriend. Mary who has been holding herself together breaks down over the loss of her son. And Angus, for the first time the whole break, is having a good time, having met a girl who is interested in him.
Trying to get Mary home, Mr. Hunham argues with Angus. Angus says his father is dead and Mr. Hunham shouts at him. Mary scolds the teacher for making a kid who has been left all alone at Christmas feel like no one wants him.
The next day Mr. Hunhams’ attitude softens a bit more and he even goes to the point of buying a Christmas tree. He offers to do anything that will make Angus and Mary’s break better and Angus immediately wants to go to Boston. Hunham reluctantly agrees and the three take a road trip, figuring it falls under the purview of the school rules because it is a field trip.
Mary catches up with her sister who is pregnant. Meanwhile Angus and Mr. Hunham get to know each other a bit more, going to book stores, museums and bowling. Angus tells Mr. Hunham that if he were to explain ancient civilizations to his class the way he does in the museum, a lot more of the students would like him. We also find out about Hunham’s past and it turns out he has had a bit of a scandal that was not his fault that landed him at the school he now teaches at. He doesn’t regret it but he bends the truth to impress people he knew in his past.
Angus runs away from his teacher to go see his dad. Mr. Hunham catches him just in time and tells Angus he can go to a cemetery but it turns out the dad is actually in a mental institution. Angus meets with his dad and it doesn’t go well.
Mary, Mr. Hunham, and Angus all go back to the school and ring in the new year.
Finally the other students return and it turns out that Angus’ mother and step father are really angry about Angus seeing his dad. This is especially bad for Angus because if he is kicked out of his current school he will end up in a military academy and if he ends up in a military academy, he is almost certain to end up in Vietnam. But, Mr. Hunham covers for Angus at the cost of his own job.
The film has a folksy soundtrack to accompany it and plenty of shots of a New England winter to set the scene. It’s well acted and we can see Paul Giamatti’s character go from abrasive and curmudgeonly to more accepting of others and more willing to try and achieve something for himself. Mary goes through an emotional journey to accept the loss of her son as best she can. And Angus seems like he’s more willing to stick to the rules for long enough that he might make it through school.
While the plot doesn’t sound funny at all, there are some rather funny parts. Paul Giamatti is excellent at insults filled with lots of academic language and he is a good foil for almost any other character in a scene with him. He shows his softer side when it comes to Mary, having a strong understanding of how hard things are for her, and understanding that most of the students at the school he teachers are wealthy enough not to have to worry about much in life. Da’Vine Joy Randolph puts in a great performance as a woman trying to keep herself together in the worst of circumstances. And Dominic Sessa who plays Angus does a great job tapping into teenage angst and fear while maintaining an intelligent mind.
The film is up for several awards for good reason so let’s get into those.
The Awards
The Holdovers is up for five Oscars this year.
Best Actor
Paul Giamatti is a consistently good actor and he has been nominated lots of times. The problem he has in this category is coming from a couple of directions. First, he is playing the kind of character we have seen him play before. That is, a person who goes from angry and standoffish to one who softens but still keeps some of that abrasiveness. More importantly, he is up against Cillian Murphy for Oppenheimer. As good as Giamatti is, I don’t see him winning over that performance. As far as the other nominees, Colman Domingo had a great turn as Bayard Rustin in Rustin, Bradley Cooper dove completely into his role as Leonard Bernstein in Maestro, and Jeffrey Wright has a strong case to make with American Fiction. Paul Giamatti will no doubt be up for this award again but this year he is not going to get it.
Supporting Actress
Da’Vine Joy Randolph is truly one of the best parts of the film, knowing when to hold in emotion and when to let it out for the audience to see. She does a fantastic job as Mary Lamb here. But, in this category I think Danielle Brooks who was in The Color Purple had an even better performance. And while that film may have been largely overlooked in the Oscars, I am hoping Brooks’ performance won’t be. Da’Vine Joy Randolph is also up against Emily Blunt for Oppenheimer, America Ferrera for Barbie and Jodie Foster for Nyad.
Film Editing
The editing in this film is fine. There’s nothing wrong with it and it keeps a pretty good pace. There weren’t any major editing mistakes or odd choices. But it’s not the best edited film of the year. I think both Oppenheimer and Killers of the Flower Moon had a more difficult and technical job to do and both are better edited than The Holdovers. I think Oppenheimer will win this one. The other nominees are Anatomy of a Fall, and Poor Things.
Best Picture
The Holdovers is a good film and so far out of the ones I have seen nominated for Best Picture is one of the funniest. It’s also got some good emotion in it with a nice personal story and fully developed characters. There is a lot going well for it and if you watch it I don’t think you will regret it. But Best Picture? No, sorry it is not the best this year. Again, that’s Oppenheimer but really, who can compete with that? I’ve still got a few movies to see in this category but I would be pretty surprised if any of them changed my mind here. Still, watch the blog for more reviews!
Writing (Original Screenplay)
This is the category I think The Holdovers has the best shot of winning. It’s not competing against Oppenheimer, or Killers of the Flower Moon. It’s up against Anatomy of a Fall which is a really well written courtroom drama, Maestro which tells the life story of Leonard Bernstein, May December which is a bit of a melodrama but no doubt well written, and Past Lives which tells a very personal story. In this category I think the top three are Maestro, Anatomy of a Fall, and The Holdovers. I strongly suspect The Holdovers has the best case to make here. I won’t be shocked if another movie wins but I am placing my bet with The Holdovers here.
In Conclusion
The Holdovers is a good film. It has a little bit of the DNA of Dead Poet’s Society but with a bit less pretentiousness and is more of a personal story than that one. It’s got a bit of oddball comedy that only Paul Giamatti can truly pull off. And it has some truly emotional moments in it. I can say it is probably one of the ten best films of the year and may even be in the top three. Unfortunately for The Holdovers 2023 was a seriously good year for films so the competition is hitting hard against it. I recommend to anyone who likes a good drama with a bit of comedy but it’s not going to win as many Oscars as it might have if it came out a different year.
Hello there film fans, guess who? Yep, it’s me, Slick Dungeon, back to review another Oscar nominated film. This time we’ll be diving into the intense crime and courtroom drama Anatomy of a Fall. There will be spoilers in this review so if you don’t like that, head to your snow covered chalet, pop on the movie, give it a watch and then head on back here to read the review. Also, quick warning for anyone who needs it, this film deals with suicide, domestic violence and potential murder so if that sort of thing is triggering to you, stay away from the movie and the review.
What’s it About
Anatomy of a Fall is a French crime thriller and courtroom drama. A family of three live in an isolated chalet near Grenoble, France. There is a husband, a wife, a visually impaired boy, and his guide dog, Snoop.
The wife is Sandra Voyter (Sandra Hüller) who is a well known novelist. Her husband is Samuel Maleski (Samuel Theis) and her son is Daniel Maleski (Milo Machado-Graner).
The movie starts with Sandra being interviewed by a woman curious to know about Sandra’s writing. Not long into the interview loud music starts playing from the upper part of the chalet. Sandra attempts to continue for a while with the woman and does so in what might even be considered a flirtatious manner. But eventually she gives up because the sound is simply too loud.
We then see Daniel go out for a walk with his dog. When he returns Daniel finds the body of his father, bloody and in the snow. Daniel shouts for help, although it takes a while for Sandra to hear him because the loud music is still going. Sandra rushes down the stairs and immediately calls for help.
The rest of the film takes us on a journey to discover what happened in the moments between the interviewer leaving and Daniel finding the body of his father. It unfolds like a true crime documentary in a lot of ways. We see the polices asking questions, Sandra hires a lawyer, and investigations continue. Sandra, for her part, proclaims her innocence but there are a few suspicious things.
First, Sandra has bruises on her wrist. Second, the autopsy concludes that the impact to the head of the husband could have been made before he fell out of the window where they know Samuel was. Finally, Daniel is sure he heard his parents talking in a calm manner before he left for his walk but when they try to reenact this, he can’t hear it from where he says he was.
Ultimately, Sandra is charged with murder but the situation is highly complicated. First, while Sandra speaks French, she is a native German and mostly speaks English in her day to day life. This means it will be difficult for her to fully convey her side of the story in French. Second, and more importantly, Daniel is considered a witness in the case but since Sandra has not yet been found guilty of anything, she is free to keep living with Daniel. This brings up the potential conflict that Sandra could be in a position to try to unduly influence Daniel’s testimony. Therefore, the court assigns a monitor to stay in the house and now Sandra has to speak in French even to her son. Her son is fluent in French so that is no problem for him but it’s not as easy for Sandra.
The movie then basically shifts entirely to a courtroom drama where more and more is revealed about Sandra’s life and marriage. There is some audio that sounds extremely damning because the couple are heard having a heated argument that ends up with some violence. And this is where Sandra finally admits she got the bruise. Obviously that doesn’t look good to the court.
Sandra’s lawyers are trying to argue that Samuel was depressed and decided to kill himself. They have some evidence that might lead one in that direction, including a possible earlier suicide attempt.
A lot more happens in between but basically the film leads us to the point where Daniel will need to testify in court. Even he is not sure of what happened and it’s basically up to him to decide if he thinks his father killed himself or his mother murdered his father. An utterly heartbreaking thing for any kid to have to ever face.
Daniel suspects he has a way to prove whether his mom was lying about earlier testimony but it does involve nearly poisoning his own dog. He performs the experiment and don’t worry, the dog lives. But this consolidates things in Daniel’s mind. Ultimately he decides it makes less sense that his mother killed his father than for his father to have killed himself.
Ultimately, Sandra is acquitted and is able to go free and reunite with Daniel.
The film really does feel like watching a true crime documentary but with being able to be let in on all the emotional impact it has on the main characters. Sandra Hüller completely shines here bringing nuance and emotion that allows the audience to be on her side while still being unsure if she committed the crime. The film doesn’t let the audience off easily either as there is never a reveal of what exactly happened and like many of the best true crime documentaries, the audience must decide for themselves what really happened.
It’s easy to see why this is up for so many awards and it is one of the best courtroom dramas I have seen in a while. It’s definitely one of the best International films of the year but it may not quite have the oomph to compete with other films in the categories it is up for.
The Awards
To me, it’s odd that this one is not up for Best International Film but that is not one of the categories where it got the nod. Let’s take a look at what it did get nominated for.
Best Actress
Sandra Hüller is up for Best Actress here. She was wonderful in this role and she is playing an extremely complicated person who has to speak and emote in multiple languages and Hüller makes it look effortless. I was never entirely sure if I should be on her side or not and that was clearly intentional. She is up against Annette Benning for Nyad, Lily Gladstone for Killers of the Flower Moon, Emma Stone for Poor Things and Carey Mulligan for Maestro. Sandra Hüller did a fabulous job but the competition in this category really comes down to Emma Stone and Lily Gladstone.
Directing
This was great directing. The most impactful moments come as a surprise both visually and emotionally. The pacing is good enough to keep us paying attention while still allowing us to process a very complicated situation. Unfortunately for this film it is up against major competition. It’s up against Martin Scorsese for Killers of the Flower Moon, Yorgos Lanthimos for Poor Things, and Jonathan Glazer for The Zone of Interest and, of course, Christopher Nolan for Oppenheimer. I’d be surprised if Anatomy of a Fall gets the award but I would love to see more films directed by Justine Triet.
Film Editing
There is no doubt this film has great editing. The audience would not be left in such doubt over what happened if the editing wasn’t fantastic. The pacing can feel a little slow but by the end it seems to pay off by leaving the audience guessing. But, yet again this film has heavy hitting competition. I am calling this one for Oppenheimer. The other nominees are The Holdovers, Killers of the Flower Moon, and Poor Things.
Best Picture
While Anatomy of a Fall is a good film and I would recommend it for a lot of people, this was not the best film of the year. It’s definitely Oppenheimer to win in this category and I would be genuinely surprised if this one wins over it. I’ve reviewed a lot of the films in this category but I still have a few more to go so keep an eye out for those up to the Oscars themselves.
Writing (Original Screenplay)
Here’s a category where Anatomy of a Fall is quite strong. But it does still have some major competition. It’s up against The Holdovers which is moving, dramatic, and funny all at once, May December which is a bit of a melodrama but no doubt well written, Maestro which tells the story of composer Leonard Bernstein, and Past Lives which tells a very personal story. In this category I think the top three are Maestro, Anatomy of a Fall, and The Holdovers. And at this point, I strongly suspect The Holdovers has the best case to make here. If The Holdovers doesn’t win, then Anatomy of a Fall definitely should win.
In Conclusion
Anatomy of a Fall is a refreshing crime drama with plenty of ambiguity and great acting. There are genuinely shocking reveals that change the direction of the film and reposition all of the main characters in an instant. It’s absolutely a film worth watching if you tend to like true crime (it’s not based on any actual case it just feels like it) and want something that leaves you guessing just enough without insulting you. The acting is fantastic and I absolutely guarantee you will continue to think about this one long after you watch it.
Hey movie fans, it’s Slick Dungeon. I’m here to conduct (see what I did there?) another review for one of the Oscar nominated films this year. This time we are talking about the biopic film about Leonard Bernstein, Maestro. There will be spoilers in this review so if you don’t like that sort of thing, head on over to the theater, see the movie and come on back here for the review.
What’s it About?
Maestro tells the story of notable conductor and composer, Leonard Bernstein. If you don’t know much about his professional career, you probably at least know he was the conductor of the New York Philharmonic, and that he composed music for movies like On the Waterfront and musicals like West Side Story. And after watching the film, you’ll know… almost the same amount about his professional career.
You’ll get a lot of the picture of his personal life as we see him have affairs with men and women, fall in love, continue to have affairs, have fights with his wife, continue to have affairs, and then have more affairs. He also chain smokes an incredible amount in this movie, which I am sure was true in his life.
The film is certainly interesting to watch as we see Bernstein go from a young hopeful, just waiting to be called up to conduct an orchestra, to a household name. The film starts with Bernstein being interviewed in 1987 where we can see the fantastic work of the makeup artists who transformed Bradley Cooper into an old man for the character. We then flash back to black and white early days. Bernstein is an energetic composer and, apparently so afraid of being alone, he can’t stop having affairs. He meets his wife Felicia Montealegre (Carey Mulligan) at a party and they connect almost instantly. Felicia marries Bernstein knowing about and accepting his lifestyle, she just asks for him to be discreet about it.
Bernstein’s success grows and he becomes more famous while also teaching music. Soon the film changes to color but the color remains muted, giving it the feel of a film from the seventies or eighties. Again, the makeup on Bradley Cooper is really good because there was never a moment where I thought he wasn’t the age he was playing. Tensions between Bernstein and Felicia increase as his affairs continue and he becomes more and more reckless even with his children old enough to be subjected to all the rumors and gossip that comes with it. Meanwhile, Bernstein continues to be driven to create and conduct music. Felicia who has always been a notable actress is becoming somewhat frustrated not just from the affairs but also with the fact her career takes a bit of a back seat to Leonard’s.
Disaster strikes when Felicia is diagnosed with cancer. The couple are devastated and so are their children. Eventually Felicia dies but Bernstein goes on, continuing to create and conduct. We land back at the interview we started on and Bernstein talks about his attitude towards music, life and creativity.
If you are of a certain generation, I am sure there is plenty here assumed to be known about Leonard Bernstein. But, if you are younger than that, this movie will not really tell you a lot more about the man. I suppose I learned more about his marital affairs than I wanted or needed to know but the film feels a bit scattered, never quite delving as far as it can on the personal, and barely scratching the surface of the professional. I wanted to know more about how people surrounding Bernstein saw him, and not just those who were in his most immediate circle. It seems like his affairs were an open secret but we never get any sense of if this was difficult for him professionally or not.
While Bradley Cooper does an adequate job of directing, this may have been a case where the director is a bit too in love with his subject matter so leaves some vital information out that he assumes the audience knows.
There is some personal tension and conflict in several scenes but Bernstein’s personality in the film is so overpowering, it’s hard to get a clear perspective of anyone else’s feelings towards him with the exception of Felicia. And even in that case, she seems to eventually accept the inevitable of being at least somewhat in his shadow.
All in all I found this film to be too disjointed to truly come together. There has been a deluge of musical biopics lately, the latest one being One Love about Bob Marley and while I didn’t entirely love that one, I did find myself at least having more of an understanding of what Bob Marley did. Here it is overly implied for those of us who did not grow up with Bernstein as a figure in our lives.
But that doesn’t mean that the film is not an enjoyable experience. There is certainly a reason it is up for so many awards, so let’s go through them.
the Awards
Maestro was nominated for seven Academy Awards this year and it certainly didn’t hurt that huge names like Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese were producers on it.
Best Actor
Bradley Cooper does a fine job with the character. I believe him as Bernstein and he certainly took on the mannerisms and speech patterns of the time. This was a good performance and it’s easy to see how much effort Cooper put into it. But in all honesty I think I have seen better performances by him in other films. Add to that the competition here and I don’t see Cooper taking away the award. In this category I think it will be Cillian Murphy for Oppenheimer. Colman Domingo had a great turn as Bayard Rustin in Rustin, Paul Giamati who is no stranger to the Oscars is up for The Holdovers, and Jeffrey Wright has a strong case to make with American Fiction. I think Bradley Cooper proved he can make a film about a subject he is interested in and can still give a good performance while pulling double duty but I don’t see him winning.
Best Actress
Carey Mulligan is up for her role as Felicia Montealegre for this film. Mulligan pulls off the part well and is just as fast talking as Cooper, making the film feel like a more authentic period piece. And the role certainly must have been challenging to portray so she deserves some accolades here. But, her competition is extremely strong in this category. She is up against Annette Benning for Nyad, Lily Gladstone for Killers of the Flower Moon, Sandra Huller for Anatomy of a Fall, and Emma Stone for Poor Things. I would say Carey Mulligan is in the top three here but the competition in this category really comes down to Emma Stone and Lily Gladstone.
Cinematography
I can see why this film was nominated for cinematography. The color choice is bold and sets the tone well. The shots are usually fairly interesting and what we see in the frame can be unexpected while still conveying the information we need. But I never found it to be truly revolutionary or groundbreaking. It is good but it doesn’t reach to the level of greatness in my mind. I don’t see this having a hope of beating out Killers of the Flower Moon, let alone Oppenheimer. It’s also up against El Conde and Poor Things.
Makeup and Hairstyling
If there is any category this film has a strong claim to it would be this one. Bradley Cooper must have had to sit for hours in the makeup chair to get the look right and it doesn’t look fake at all. If you saw him walking down the street in full makeup you would not recognize him as Bradley Cooper but as an elderly man. However, there are a couple of films giving strong competition here. Golda pulled off some incredible makeup transforming Helen Mirren into Golda Meir to the point where I didn’t even recognize her. But also nominated are Oppenheimer which tends to take home nearly every trophy, Poor Things which I have heard has fantastic makeup, and Society of the Snow which is able to make strong young men look like they are truly on the brink of absolute starvation. This is a tough category to call and while Maestro very well may take home the Oscar, I would not be surprised if a different movie went home with it.
Best Picture
This category is a little easier to call. Sorry but Maestro is not going to win here. I can see why it was nominated but it’s simply not as engaging as several of the other entries in the category. And I am pretty sure Oppenheimer has a lock on this one.
Sound
Obviously when you have a film about a composer and conductor, you need to have great sound. The film captures all the music and sound just as it should. But again, like the cinematography category, this film doesn’t do anything to innovate or break the mold. It has good sound but it’s not so notable that it’s going to win here. The Creator, Maestro, Mission Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, and The Zone of Interest are also nominated. The Creator has great sound, as does Mission Impossible but Oppenheimer has a particular sequence where the sound conveys so much of the storytelling that it’s clear how vital the sound actually is. While typically sci-fi and fantasy films tend to take home the award in this category, I think Oppenheimer is actually going to win here because of that sequence.
Writing (Original Screenplay)
Here’s a category where I could see Maestro winning. It’s not competing against Oppenheimer, or even Killers of the Flower Moon here. But it does still have some strong competition. It’s up against Anatomy of a Fall which is a really well written courtroom drama, The Holdovers which is moving, dramatic, and funny all at once, May December which is a bit of a melodrama but no doubt well written, and Past Lives which tells a very personal story. In this category I think the top three are Maestro, Anatomy of a Fall, and The Holdovers. As good as the writing is for Maestro, it is still more disjointed of a film than the other two. And at this point, I strongly suspect The Holdovers has the best case to make here. I won’t be shocked if Maestro wins but I would be mildly surprised.
In Conclusion
If you love biopics about musicians and you have a good idea of who Leonard Bernstein was, then this is a great film for you. If you don’t know that much about the guy, I suspect that like me, you’ll come away wondering what they really left out here. It is worth watching Bradley Cooper’s performance and it’s neat to see him directing, but it’s a bit more scattered than I would like in a biopic. It will probably take home some awards this year at the Oscars but it will probably lose out on a lot.
Hellos film fans, Slick Dungeon here! I’m back to review another Oscar nominated film. This time I will be talking about the romantic drama Past Lives which is up for two Oscars this year. There will be some spoilers in this review so if that sort of thing bothers you, get off the video call with your long lost friend, go watch the movie, and come on back here to read the review.
What’s It About?
The movie starts off with someone playing that game where you look at people in a bar or restaurant and try to guess who they are to each other. In this case there is a Korean man and woman and a white man all hanging out together in a bar at 4 am.
We then flash back to 24 years earlier in Seoul, South Korea where a little girl named Na Young and a little boy named Hae Sung are good friends. Na Young is upset because she didn’t get top marks at school that day, for the first time losing to Hae Sung. We find out that Na Young is going to immigrate from South Korea soon and she has to decide what her English name will be. She goes with Nora. Her mother asks her what boys she likes in school and Na Young says she like Hae Sung and that he would marry her if she told him to. They moms of the kids arrange a “date” for the kids who seem to have genuine affection for one another. Na Young leaves fairly abruptly, leaving Hae Sung without his best friend.
We jump to 12 years later and now Na Young, going by Nora is an aspiring playwright. She is accepted into a writer’s residency in Montauk. But before she goes there, she finds out that Hae Sung has reached out to try and reconnect with his old friend. In South Korea, Hae Sung is going to school to study engineering when he gets a message in the middle of the night from Na Young. The two start talking over video calls and begin to reconnect. It’s clear there is still a bit of a spark between the two of them. Just before she has to leave to go to the writer residency, Nora tells Hae Sung they should stop talking because she is finding herself looking up flights to Seoul. Hae Sung is heartbroken over it but agrees. At the residency, Nora meets Arthur who she starts dating. Here she explains the Korean concept of past lives where if you come into contact with someone it means you had a connection to them in a previous life. Those who get married have had thousands of such connections and are paired together in this life. Meanwhile in Seoul, Hae Sung finds a girl to date who seems to be just as heartbroken as he is.
We jump ahead in time once again 12 years to catch up to present day. Nora has been married to Anthony for the last seven years but Hae Sung is coming to New York for the first time. The two plan to meet up and reconnect. Hae Sung is still clearly in love with Nora, although she is married. Hae Sung is on a break from his girlfriend because the circumstances don’t seem quite right for the two of them to get married. Anthony is a bit worried about Nora reconnecting with a childhood sweetheart but he deals with it as well as he can. Nora takes Hae Sung to the Statue of Liberty and hangs out with him for the day. Hae Sung is taken to meet Anthony who has learned a little bit of Korean and he talks to Hae Sung who has learned a little bit of English. We then end up at the bar scene from the beginning and are let in on the conversation that we only observed at the start. Hae Sung is basically asking Nora if she thinks they were something to one another in a past life. They go through some possibilities to the point where it seems they are pretty much ignoring Anthony. It’s clear there is still a connection between Nora and Hae Sung but Nora loves Anthony and plans to stay with him.
The movie ends with Hae Sung getting his Uber to go back to the airport while Nora sees him off. Hae Sung makes one last attempt and asks Nora, “What if this is a past life too?” And they wonder what they will be to each other in the next life. Nora goes back to Anthony and Hae Sung goes back to Seoul.
The film is slow paced, which I usually don’t mind. It’s also clearly on the lower budget end of the spectrum which I never mind. If pacing and budget were the only problems with the film, I would be fine with that but this movie really feels slow for a few reasons. One, there is a nearly twenty minute sequence of people talking to each other on video calls, with all of the, “Hello? Hi? Can you hear me?” awkward silences, and video glitching left in. Second, there are tons of long pauses in everyone’s dialogue which slows things down. Third, while there is some conflict here, it is only, purely emotional conflict, usually an internal struggle within the character that they seem to resolve by themselves. This makes the film feel a little bit pointless.
However, there are definitely themes almost anyone can relate to. Not only does it deal with the experience of immigrating to a new place, it deals with loss, reconnection, and love both unrequited and reciprocated. The personal is the universal so I can see why some people do love this film. Personally, it wasn’t for me but I can understand if someone enjoys it.
I’m not sure it was Oscar worthy as I do think there were better films that were overlooked for this one.
The Awards
Past Lives is up for just two Oscars this year, Best Picture and Writing (Original Screenplay)
Best Picture
There is no chance this film will win Best Picture. It’s not a bad film, but I don’t think it soars into greatness either. Oppenheimer is certain to win over this one. But even if that juggernaut of a film wasn’t in this category, I still don’t think Past Lives would win. It’s just not strong enough filmmaking.
Writing (Original Screenplay)
For writing, Past Lives is up against Anatomy of a Fall, The Holdovers, Maestro, and May December. In this category I think the competition is really between Anatomy of a Fall, The Holdovers and Maestro. I don’t see a world where Past Lives takes home the trophy but it is written well. It’s just not as well written as a lot of other films this year.
In Conclusion
The acting, soundtrack, cinematography and all the rest of it in this film are fine. The movie is mildly interesting and might be a good watch if you are feeling a bit heartbroken for one reason or another. But, it’s probably one of the weakest of the Best Picture contenders, although it certainly has themes a lot of us can relate to. If you love dramas, don’t mind slow pacing, and enjoy stories of unrequited love, this one may be for you.
Hello film fans, Slick Dungeon here! I’m back to review another one of the Oscar nominated films for this year. I’m going to review Killers of the Flower Moon which is up for 10 of the prestigious awards this year. There will be spoilers for this film below so if that sort of thing bothers you, grab your chauffeur, head over to the theater, watch the movie and come on back here to read the review.
What’s It About?
Killers of the Flower Moon tells the story of what happened when the Osage Nation struck it rich with oil in Oklahoma. Beyond becoming incredibly wealthy almost overnight, the Osage people in this area were also exploited and targeted for violence and murder on a scale nearly unheard of at the time. It was so bad that Mollie Burkhart (Lilly Gladstone) traveled to Washington DC, despite being very sick with diabetes, to beg for help. Help did come, in the form of the FBI and a formal investigation was launched delving into the background of the killings.
The film tells this story mostly from the perspective of Ernest Berkhart (Leonardo DiCaprio), a World War I veteran and nephew to William King Hale (Robert De Niro). Hale has been taking advantage of the situation by befriending Osage people, taking out insurance claims on them, and then having them murdered. He all but orders Ernie to marry Mollie because when the rest of Mollie’s family dies, her large estate will go to her, or in the case of her death, her husband and children. It’s basically a gigantic insurance scheme, loaded with violence, scheming and plenty of con artistry.
But one thing Hale, who is known around town as a member in good standing, friendly to the Osage people, did not count on is for Ernie to actually love his wife. The story unfolds with Ernie doing awful things behind the scenes that he is hiding from his wife, including robbery and even up to the point of hiring killers to kill Mollie’s family members.
The violence in the movie here is not overly gratuitous for the most part but when it happens it is utterly, wildly, shocking and comes when least expected making it superbly effective when we see it. The results of the violence are sometimes overly graphic but when put in the context of what is happening in the film doesn’t feel exploitative to the audience.
In the backdrop of all this there is building tension between Osage people and white people. This is especially notable as in one scene we see the people in the film watching newsreels of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre. This makes the people in the film, and the audience watching, feel like this situation is a powder keg just about to explode.
Mollie has enough resources to gather the Osage elders and hire a private investigator to look into the deaths of not just her family but those of several other Osage people she knows. This is especially difficult to do because the laws on the books at the time required court appointed white people to be the legal guardians of Osage individuals because they were considered, “incompetent.” A ridiculous notion but this was absolutely a real law at the time. And this meant Mollie had to go through back channels and around roadblocks to hire anyone that might help.
Unbeknownst to Mollie, Earnest Burkhart was working with his uncle and was in a prime position to kill or have killed any investigators that might come. All the while, Ernie acts as if maybe he actually does love his wife, who is suffering from diabetes. In order to keep Mollie alive so that he can inherit all her money, King Hale makes sure Earnest gets a new medicine called insulin to treat her illness.
The private investigator is killed but Mollie is not giving up, even though more of her family members keep dying and she is quite sick. She decides to travel all the way to Washington DC to convince President Coolidge to help her. In typical fashion he says less than five words to her so she thinks nothing will come of it.
She returns to her loving husband but keeps making noise around town. Soon, an FBI agent shows up named Thomas Bruce White Sr. (Jesse Plemons). He’s not afraid to ask around town about what is happening. Meanwhile, Ernie has been using Mollie’s needed insulin shots to add a sedative to keep her quiet.
The movie turns into a bit of a cat and mouse game for a while between the FBI and King Hale and all his cohorts. But, it turns out the mice aren’t very smart and they all start turning on each other. It also doesn’t help that Burkhart and Hale have stiffed several of their criminal fellows to the point where they want to turn on them.
At long last the law catches up to Ernie Burkhart who by this point has several children with his wife and at least says he loves her. He begins intending to testify against his uncle until he is brought to trial where Hart’s lawyer says he is also Burkhart’s lawyer. Ernie changes his mind and goes back to his uncle’s side.
Mollie is found nearly unconscious and definitely suffering by the FBI agents and rushed to a hospital. She is given regular insulin shots without anything extra added and is restored to health.
But, one of Mollie and Ernie’s children dies. Burkhart is certain his uncle is behind it and decides he is now going to testify against his uncle. He gives damning witness testimony but also exposes himself as being incredibly involved in the orchestration of the killing of Mollie’s relatives.
Mollie goes to meet with Burkhart in jail and asks him if he has told all his secrets. He says he has but he doesn’t admit to drugging his wife. She leaves him without a word, presumably never to return.
Oddly, the film ends with tying everything up by showing us an audience watching a radio broadcast. I guess it’s better than just writing cold text on a screen, and we get a cameo from director Martin Scorsese here which is neat to see. We get a summary of the prison time and consequences felt by Hale, Burkhart and everyone involved. We also find out Mollie dies at a pretty young age of 36 succumbing to her diabetes.
The film’s last scene is an overhead shot of a 21st-century Osage powow dancing circle.
All in all, the film tells a much ignored story and does so well, although I am not sure we get the story from the best perspective here. While the true hero of the story is Mollie, we mostly see things from the view point of the villain. I’m not sure what the best approach would be but I suspect there could have been better angles to tell the story from. Still, the movie is extremely compelling and yet another entry from a master filmmaker so it makes sense that it has been nominated for so many Oscars.
The Awards
Speaking of awards, here’s what I think in each of the categories for the film.
Supporting Actor
Robert De Niro is up for his role as King Hale. It’s been a while since we’ve seen De Niro in a role where he wasn’t just playing himself or a version of one of the characters he is famous for. This role actually showed his skill as an actor and allowed him much more of a range than we have seen in a long time. I think he has an extremely good chance of winning here. There is notable competition with Sterling K. Brown for American Fiction, Ryan Gosling for his role as Ken in Barbie, and Mark Ruffalo for Poor Things. But it’s never smart to bet against Robert De Niro winning an Oscar. I think he’s the most likely but we’ll have to see.
Best Actress
Lily Gladstone is up for her role as Mollie Burkhart and she pulled off a complicated and challenging role. She was fascinating to watch in every moment of the film. But, again she has a lot of competition. She’s facing off against Annette Benning for Nyad, Sandra Huller for Anatomy of a Fall, Carey Mulligan for Maestro, and Emma Stone for Poor Things. At this point, I see this as a competition between Gladstone and Emma Stone with both having an equal shot at winning. If Gladstone does win, no one is going to think she is not deserving because she certainly knocked it out of the park here.
Cinematography
No doubt the cinematography here is gorgeous and great effort and thought was put into it. Had Oppenheimer not been nominated in this category I would say this film was an easy win for it. But, with Oppenheimer in this category, I think Killers of the Flower Moon is a very close second. The other nominees here are El Conde, Maestro, and Poor Things.
Costume Design
Again the costume design is great here both as a period piece and it treats the Osage Nation with great care. But, I think there are more likely winners here including Napoleon and Poor Things. The other nominees are Oppenheimer and Barbie, either of which could also sneak out a win.
Directing
Martin Scorsese is up for yet another Oscar. If he won, no one would be surprised. And on almost any other year if he was up for the award I would say he is a lock for it. But, he is competing against Christopher Nolan for Oppenheimer which was such a notable film that I can’t really see anyone else winning here. I wouldn’t place money on it but I think Scorsese is not going to win. He’s also up against Justine Triet for Anatomy of a Fall, Yorgos Lanthimos for Poor Things, and Jonathan Glazer for The Zone of Interest.
Film Editing
I hate to keep saying this because I really think Killers of the Flower Moon is an excellent film but it’s going to lose to Oppenheimer. The film editing here is spot on and the scenes depicting violence intercut with the way we see slower, more emotional scenes is just brilliant. But it is not quite as brilliant as Oppenheimer. The other nominees are Anatomy of a Fall, The Holdovers, and Poor Things.
Music (Original Score)
In this category, I fully believe Killers of the Flower Moon is going to win. And that is despite being up against John Williams for Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. The score works so well in Killers of the Flower Moon that it can’t be ignored. The music is beautiful and knows just when and where to ratchet up the tension or dial things back to give the audience a moment of relief. I could certainly be wrong but this is a more than deserving score. The other movies in question here are Oppenheimer, American Fiction, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, and Poor Things.
Music (Original Song)
There is so much going on in this category. First, Dianne Warren is yet again up for an Oscar and she has yet to win one other than the Academy Honorary Award which acknowledges a career rather than a single song or soundtrack. This means Warren might get one here just because she is so overdue for one. Her song is The Fire Inside from Flamin’ Hot. Second, Wahzhazhe (A Song for My People) from Killers of the Flower Moon is up for the award. This is an Osage language song and is simply beautiful and it recognizes a culture often ignored (or sometimes demonized) in Hollywood films. Barbie was nominated for two songs in this category and might end up splitting the vote on itself for I’m Just Ken and What Was I Made For? Finally, It Never Went Away from American Symphony written and performed by John Batiste is up for the award. Batiste is a straight up musical genius and in my opinion, he has the most valid claim to this award. I predict he will win unless I’m Just Ken sneaks away with it.
Best Picture
It’s a little heartbreaking that Killers of the Flower Moon came out the same year as Oppenheimer because I think it is going to get fewer awards than it deserves. But Oppenheimer is virtually impossible to ignore in this category and is the odds on favorite to win. I truly enjoyed Killers of the Flower Moon but I have to call this for Oppenheimer. I’ll be reviewing all of the other films up for this award this week but I’ll be shocked if any of them change my mind here.
Production Design
The production design is great here and there were plenty of complicated sets that had to be made and used for the film. But, in this case, I think Barbie really has the upper hand. This category does have some other notable films including Oppenheimer, Napoleon, and Poor Things. Barbie remains my bet here but if Killers of the Flower Moon took it home, they would be deserving.
In Conclusion
This is a great film with excellent directing, sound, cinematography and acting. If this was released in any other year I really would put it as the odds on favorite to win all the Oscars. But it is up against such a masterpiece in Oppenheimer that this film may not see the full recognition it deserves. Don’t let that stop you from watching it because it is an excellent film.
Cillian Murphy stars as J. Robert Oppenheimer in the biopic about the famous scientist
Hey film fans, Slick Dungeon here. Oppenheimer is one of the Oscar movies that I have already reviewed on this blog so a lot of this review will seem familiar. However, I am updating it to talk about the Oscars the film has been nominated for. If you have already read this review, feel free to skip to that part. If you haven’t and you are curious about what my thoughts were on the film, then by all means read on! This review will contain a few spoilers for the movie but nothing major. Also, since this is a biographical picture based off a book about a famous person and period in history and it’s pretty accurate, I guess this is also a warning that there will be spoilers for history as well? If you don’t want to be spoiled at all, go see the movie then come back here to read the review.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 5 out of 5.
Let’s start with the obvious here. The cast, the directing, the production, and the storytelling are phenomenal. This is one of those films that has the word Oscar written all over it in thirty foot letters. My bet is we’ll see at least a nomination for Cillian Murphy, Florence Pugh, Robert Downey Jr., Emily Blunt and Matt Damon. Not to mention one for Christopher Nolan. The film is worth watching for these performances alone. I especially think Cillian Murphy and Florence Pugh really shine in this film.
The plot of the movie centers around both the development of the atomic bomb during World War II and a hearing later in Oppenheimer’s career where his patriotism was questioned because he had some loose ties to communist organizations in his past. It essentially pits Oppenheimer against Lewis Strauss in a political sense. This is where the character tension is but the more fascinating aspect is how Oppenheimer seems to see the world. He’s one of the few people who could actually understand what he was building and why. And he was one of the few people who could actually understand how risky it was to use the bomb and what the worries of proliferation would be.
The movie is set in two basic time periods, before and after the war. Interestingly, the world is in color in the time period before the bomb is dropped but turns black and white when Strauss essentially tries to hang Oppenheimer out to dry politically. Where Oppenheimer’s world is full of bright colors, big events, huge casts of characters and scientists and politicians all trying to understand life, Strauss’ world is narrow, black and white and all about him.
While I’m not going to get into any major spoiler territory here, I do want to point out the few points I feel the film doesn’t handle perfectly. First, while we see Oppenheimer seem to imagine the devastation caused by dropping atomic bombs, there are no scenes of any kind where the explosions happened. I realize the story is told through Oppenheimer’s eyes but even a single scene set in Hiroshima or Nagasaki before and after the explosions could have helped the audience to understand the immensity of what was happening.
My second gripe is the movie only barely touches on the fact that Oppenheimer knew the need for regulating atomic energy and fought hard for that for the latter part of his life. While he still seemed to think the invention of the bomb was necessary given the circumstances of World War II, he understood how out of control things could get without major oversight of such an immense power.
I will say that the last line of the film is one hell of an ending and justifies the long run time of the film. Overall, it’s a great achievement of a film, worthy of the complicate man it portrays. If you haven’t gone out to see this one yet, get on it when you have a full day to dedicate to it.
The Awards
Best Actor
There are several great actors up for this award. Colman Domingo had a great turn as Bayard Rustin in Rustin, Bradley Cooper is up for Maestro, Paul Giamati who is no stranger to the Oscars is up for The Holdovers, and Jeffrey Wright has a strong case to make with American Fiction. But, none of those guys, and I mean none of them, dived as deep into their role as Cillian Murphy did for Oppenheimer. Murphy truly transforms into the person and delivers an extraordinary performance here. On any other year I would say this is a close call but this year, I think it has to be Murphy who gets the win.
Best Supporting Actor
This category is again filled with big name actors and for me, it’s a tougher call than Best Actor. Robert Downey Jr. is the actor up for the award for Oppenheimer. There is no doubt his performance was a good one and he made a great foil to Murphy’s Oppenheimer. But there are other actors in this category who may be more deserving. Sterling K. Brown is up for American Fiction, Robert De Niro is up for yet another Oscar for Killers of the Flower Moon, Ryan Gosling has lots of buzz for his role as Ken in Barbie, and Mark Ruffalo is up for Poor Things. I suspect Robert Downey Jr. is not going to win here but I’m torn on guessing who will win. I think De Niro has a really strong shot but Gosling may just sneak his way into a win here.
Best Supporting Actress
Emily Blunt is up for the award here for Oppenheimer. She plays Oppenheimer’s wife, Kitty. In the film, I actually thought Florence Pugh had a stronger performance than Blunt but she was ultimately not nominated. Blunt is up against Jodie Foster for her role in Nyad, Danielle Brooks for The Color Purple, America Ferrera for Barbie, and Da’vine Joy Randolph for The Holdovers. Out of all of these performances, I think Danielle Brooks is the most deserving in this case.
Cinematography
While there are several films in this category, I think only two have a real shot. The nominees here are El Conde, Killers of the Flower Moon, Maestro, Poor Things, and, of course, Oppenheimer. While all of these films have wonderful cinematography, only Oppenheimer and Killers of the Flower Moon have cinematography on a scale that is truly Oscar worthy. I think it’s a dead even match between the two so I would not be surprised if either of them took home the trophy.
Costume Design
The costume design here was definitely good. I can see why it was nominated. But, in this category I actually think it is going to go to Napoleon or maybe Poor Things, both of which are also period pieces but have more elaborate costuming than Oppenheimer does. The other movies in the category are Barbie and Killers of the Flower Moon. I could maybe see Barbie getting it but we’ll have to see.
Directing
In this category, I would be honestly surprised if Oppenheimer did not win. Christopher Nolan has proven himself a master of visual storytelling more than once and this is his greatest work to date. The other directors are certainly great directors themselves but Nolan definitely created a masterpiece here. His competition is quite notable with Justine Triet for Anatomy of a Fall, Martin Scorsese for Killers of the Flower Moon, Yorgos Lanthimos for Poor Things, and Jonathan Glazer for The Zone of Interest. Even with these notable directors and films, I still am betting on (not literally) Christopher Nolan to take home the award.
Film Editing
Again, I am calling this one for Oppenheimer. There are such memorable sequences and the way the film is structured is fairly complicated, with tons of editing necessary to make it work. The other nominees are Anatomy of a Fall, The Holdovers, Killers of the Flower Moon, and Poor Things.
Makeup and Hairstyling
I think this one is going to go to Poor Things over Oppenheimer but if Oppenheimer won, it would be well deserved. It’s also up against Golda, Maestro, and Society of the Snow.
Music (Original Score)
The film has a good score, although I am not music expert, but I think Killers of the Flower Moon has a much better shot here. The other movies in question here are American Fiction, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, and Poor Things.
Best Picture
I am calling it for Oppenheimer on this one as well. There are definitely notable films in competition, and I’ll be reviewing each one of them this week, but I think Oppenheimer is almost a guaranteed lock here.
Production Design
I think in this category Barbie is actually going to beat out Oppenheimer. While the production design was fantastic here, Barbie had to be even more innovative and creative so i think they will take away the Oscar.
Sound
This is a tough category to win. The competitors to Oppenheimer are The Creator, Maestro, Mission Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, and The Zone of Interest. The Creator has great sound, as does Mission Impossible but Oppenheimer has a particular sequence where the sound conveys so much of the storytelling that it’s clear how vital the sound actually is. While typically sci-fi and fantasy films tend to take home the award in this category, I think Oppenheimer is actually going to win here because of that sequence.
Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
The writing here is excellent and if Oppenheimer were to win, it would be deserving. But there is also really strong competition in this category. Oppenheimer is up against American Fiction, Barbie, Poor Things, and The Zone of Interest. I think this one is going to go to American Fiction or The Zone of Interest but honestly any of these winning would make complete sense.
Hello film fans, it’s Slick Dungeon and I am here to review one of the most Oscar nominated and absolute pinkest of movies this year, Barbie! The movie was nominated for eight Oscars this year and has absolutely blown away the box office by making over $1 Billion bucks globally. There will be spoilers here and I’m going to do an in depth review on the background, controversies (what?) and the awards. So, if you are one of the few people on the planet who has not yet seen Barbie and you don’t want spoilers, hop in your Barbie Corvette, head to somewhere you can see the movie and drive on back here to read the review after.
BAckground
This is a bit odd to me but to do this film full credit I have to touch on the background of it first. Everyone knows Mattel sells a doll called Barbie. At the time those dolls came out, they were a bit revolutionary because it was one of the first times (if not the first) that dolls meant for little girls to play with were molded into the shape of an adult instead of a baby. Some people loved this and others thought it was the death of the traditional family for some reason because, uh, I guess kids could choose what kind of toy they wanted?
Either way, Barbie was a huge success and went on to sell tons and tons of dolls. It’s one of the most popular toys on the market still today. This means most kids in the world have seen, owned, or at least played with a Barbie in their lifetime.
Mattel wanted to capitalize on the popularity of the brand so they thought it would be a good idea to make a movie about the toy. There have been successful films like this before, just take a look at the Lego movie.
To pull it off, Mattel hired a woman who has had a run of successful films to helm this one. I’m talking, of course, about Greta Gerwig who has made some major critical hits with Ladybird and Little Women.
Mattel went into the movie with a pretty strong hand for a few reasons. One, there were already huge fans of Barbie so it had a guaranteed audience. Two, they used a filmmaker who, whether you like her other work or not, is a good filmmaker. Three, they hired some extremely popular actors for the film, including Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, Kate McKinnon, Simu Liu, and America Ferrera.
But not a lot of people expected what happened in the real world with this movie. It premiered at the same time the other most Oscar nominated film of the year, Oppenheimer did.
It had literally been years, if not decades since two films wildly different in genre and both made with huge stars and competent directors were out at the same time. Audiences really took to this because for the first time in a long time they could see two different kinds of movies on the same weekend, or even same day and have a good time at both. Thus, the Barbenheimer phenomenon grew, boosting an already strong box office into the stratosphere for both movies.
Very rare for the Oscars nowadays is to have movies that were huge hits also be nominated for the awards. This year we got two such films and there are several categories where Barbie or Oppenheimer are the odds on favorites to win.
But, there has been something really weird that happened with this film. It has been mired in controversy. Yeah, somehow the pink plastic musical comedy seems to scare some people for some reason. And there is another layer of controversy surrounding the Oscar nominations that was also, well, controversial.
We’ll get into the controversies a little later in the review but first, what was the movie about? Was it any good? Does it deserve all the accolades and the smaller pockets of hate it has gotten? Let’s get into it. Spoilers follow.
What’s it ABout?
The film starts with an homage to the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. Barbie is actually filled with a ton of homages to lots of great films but this one is noticeable to almost any film goer. Girls are sitting around a monolith, playing with, you guessed it, baby dolls. We have a narrator explaining to us the background of the Barbie brand as these girls are suddenly given a new toy to play with.
We then switch to Barbieland where stereotypical Barbie, played by Margot Robbie, and all her fellow Barbies believe that because of them, all injustice towards women has been solved. We get to see a typical day in the life of this Barbie and there are a bunch of toy related in-jokes here. Barbie showers with no water, drinks from empty cups and waves to all her fellow Barbies.
We also see a typical day in the life of the nearly forgotten, Ken. See, along with Barbie dolls, Ken dolls have been produced but they are far less popular than any version of Barbie. Don’t get me wrong, they sell plenty of Kens just not as many as they do Barbies. The movie plays with this a bit by making it that Ken can only have a good day if he is acknowledged by Barbie.
Ken tries to impress Barbie by hopping into the plastic ocean on his surfboard but he injures himself. As Barbie consoles him, he explains that his job is hard. He’s not a surfer. He’s not a lifeguard either. No, his job is literally beach. For those who didn’t find that funny, first I don’t know how you couldn’t find the humor here but let me explain the joke in case you are not so familiar with Barbie and Ken. See, there are tons of different kinds of Barbies. There’s Nurse Barbie, Astronaut Barbie, Olympian Barbie, etc. But there are only a few kinds of Kens. One of the variations is Beach Ken. So, Ken, thinks Beach is his job.
Barbie is having a party and we get another homage, this time to Saturday Night Fever. At this party Ken (Ryan Gosling) is shown up by Ken (Simu Liu) who has a bit of a rivalry going.
The party comes to a screeching halt because Stereotypical Barbie asks the group if they ever think about dying. Apparently a bit of the real world is seeping into Barbieland.
Ken asks Barbie if he can go over to her house that night to, well, he’s not sure what exactly, he just knows he’s supposed to because he is ostensibly her boyfriend. But she’s having a girl’s night like she does every night.
The next day things have changed for Stereotypical Barbie. She’s got bad breath, her milk has expired, and she falls down, all while the background music is happily narrating this. Barbie even falls because her feet are on the ground, not pointed like you see in the Barbie dolls. Something has to be done.
Stereotypical Barbie goes to see Weird Barbie. We all know Weird Barbie even if we never owned a Barbie. It’s the one that got played with too much, some kid maybe drew on her, or her hair was cut with scissors or whatever. In Barbieland this apparently changes you so you have a glimpse into the real world.
Weird Barbie (Kate McKinnon) offers Barbie a Matrix style choice in our next film homage. She can either stay in Barbieland or she can go to the real world to try to solve the problem. Stereotypical Barbie has to find the girl who is playing with her. In hilarious fashion, Stereotypical Barbie wants to choose to just stay where she is in a reversal of the role Neo plays in the Matrix.
Barbie has a send off from all the other Barbies who are expecting her to find a perfect world full of strong women where everything is fixed because girls play with Barbie dolls.
Ken (Gosling) has stowed away in Barbie’s convertible because he doesn’t want to look uncool to Ken (Liu). And he figures he can help in case there is beach and Barbie might need someone who is a professional in that.
They then do a silly montage of transportation methods to get Barbie to the real world featuring a bunch of real Ken and Barbie sets. Fortunately, Ken has brought his rollerblades and the two make it into the real world. They stand out like sore thumbs in their colorful roller blade outfits and Barbie is immediately objectified while Ken seems to be admired.
Barbie and Ken are arrested when Barbie hits a guy after he has come up and spanked her. They get arrested again when they steal some western clothes that look very much like a Barbie set.
Barbie gets annoyed with Ken and sends him off on a walk by himself. For the first time, Ken, experiences something he is not used to. He’s not ignored by the majority of the world. In fact, it seems like there are a lot of men in charge of a lot of things in the real world, unlike in Barbieland.
At the Mattel headquarters the CEO of Mattel (Will Ferrel) finds out that a Barbie has escaped from Barbieland into the real world. The CEO demands they capture Barbie and Ken to send them back to where they came from.
Barbie, meanwhile, does find the girl who has played with her. This is Sasha who, once she understands who Barbie is, criticizes her for unrealistic beauty standards which is the last thing Barbie was expecting to hear. Barbie also meets Sasha’s mother, Gloria. Gloria actually works for Mattel and Barbie is having her existential crisis because Gloria has been playing with Barbie.
Eventually the Mattel executives do get Barbie and they want to put her back in her box so she can be remanufactured and go back to how she was. But Barbie wants to help Sasha and Gloria mend their somewhat rocky relationship. The three escape and head back to Barbieland.
Meanwhile, Ken is learning about patriarchy. He starts to realize there could be more to his life so he decides to go back to Barbieland before Barbie can return. Ken brings the worst of patriarchal ideals back with him and forces Barbies to be agreeable girlfriends, wives and maids.
Barbie finally returns to find her world changed and the Barbies are now essentially forgotten about in the way the Kens had been before. Barbie feels dejected and depressed but Gloria gives her a speech about society’s conflicting expectations of women and Barbie is reenergized.
With the help of Gloria, Weird Barbie, and a doll almost no one remembers, Alan, they are able to trick the Kens into infighting and regain power. But Barbie has learned that she too is guilty of objectifying and ignoring Ken. So, rather than have a patriarchy or matriarchy, they strive for a more equitable system for Kens, Barbies, and even the oddballs like Weird Barbie and Alan.
Ken and Barbie apologize to each other. Ken doesn’t know who he is without Barbie but Barbie encourages him to find his own autonomy.
Barbie decides to go to the real world and become an actual woman.
Throughout the film, there is incredible production and set design, the music is near genius with huge stars like Lizzo, Dua Lipa, and Billie Eilish contributing. The plot is pretty silly but in a fun way. The acting is good here with Robbie and Gosling really diving into their roles and the supporting cast nails being plastic toys at all turns.
The film is undeniably a good time. Yet for all of its merits there were controversies here. Let’s get into that for a minute.
The ControversIES
There are actually quite a few controversies associated with this movie. Some are utterly ridiculous and some have some potentially valid points. I’m going to start here with the controversies not surrounding the Oscars themselves and leave that for a later section.
One controversy is only of concern in China and to some of its allies. This concerns where a dash line is drawn on a map which defines where the South China Sea is. This is not the kind of blog where we can get too much into that. Other movies have been banned in China for having maps like this one so it’s not unheard of. While this can be of concern on the world stage and when it comes to drawing maps people use every day, political leaders may need to weigh in on that. But for a map shown for a few seconds in a movie, it’s a bit silly to care about. But it’s not the most ridiculous of the controversies here.
Next up is the accusation that this film is too political because it is too “woke” or too feminist. I suspect the fact the word patriarchy is used several times in the film is what drove people to get all up in arms here. But for a moment, let’s get into what the issues are. People on the far right politically have said this film is too “woke.” I have to say, almost no one on the right is able to give a definition of the word so I find it hard to give this argument any credence. The definition seems to be really flexible as anything from M&M’s to eating ice cream can seemingly be “woke.” If by “woke” people mean Barbie has an agenda, they are right there is an agenda but it’s not the one they are talking about. I’ll tell you what the agenda is in a minute.
Let’s talk about the argument that this is too feminist. Again, I think this is triggering people just because the word patriarchy is used in the movie. But what exactly is it to be feminist anyway? Let’s just look at the Oxford English Dictionary to define it. According to the dictionary feminist as a noun means, “an advocate of women’s rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes; a person who supports feminism.” And as an adjective means, “relating to or supporting feminism; advocating women’s rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes.”
So, this means to be feminist is to support the equality of the sexes, not the superiority of any sex. The way the Barbies treat the Kens in Barbieland is just as non-feminist as the way the Kens treat the Barbies later in the movie. If you think people should all be treated with the same kindness, dignity, humanity and respect that they deserve based on the fact they are human and judged for their actions not for their inherent traits, congratulations, you are also a feminist.
Barbie is not too feminist considering the fact, both men and women here are mistreated at varying points in the movie and add this to the fact that this argument misses the entire agenda of the film.
Yes, there is an agenda here. You want to know what it is? It’s pretty obvious in case you weren’t paying attention but I’ll spell it out. Barbie is made to make people feel nostalgic and good about Barbies so that… they sell more Barbies!!! Yep, that’s the big, nefarious secret here. This movie is made to sell toys that were already selling. It’s about as pro capitalist as you can possibly get with a film.
There’s also a few places in the world that don’t like this movie because they feel it promotes an LGBTQ+ agenda of some kind because, um, I guess because there are some cast members here who belong to that community in some way or another? But again, the agenda is not pushing anything LGBTQ+ (and in fact Stereotypical Barbie sure seems to be as stereotypical about her sexuality as it gets), it’s to make money for Mattel full stop.
The last of the most ridiculous controversies here is that some people think this movie is too grown up for seven and eight year old kids (especially girls) because it uses words like genitals, vagina, and patriarchy. Welp, I guess you’ve got valid criticism here… if this was made for seven and eight year old girls which it is not. Check the f–ing rating! It’s rated PG-13 and if you take your under thirteen year old to it without prescreening it to find that it has words that aren’t even censored on television, well, that’s kinda on you isn’t it? In fact, Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3 has a ton more swearing than Barbie yet a lot of the parents complaining about this movie took their kid to that one, so I have to say, I don’t have much sympathy for these people.
Anyway, most of these controversies are silly to the point of being stupid but it’s hard to place this movie in full context without at least mentioning some of the weird backlash here. I’ll mostly get off my soapbox here but there is one more controversy I will cover after I talk about the award categories this one is up for this year in the Oscars.
The awards
Barbie is up for a heck of a lot of awards for a movie about a toy. It’s landed nods in seven different categories and I’ll go through each one and tell you if I think it is going to win or not.
Supporting Actor
Ryan Gosling for his portrayal of Beach Ken is up for this one. I bet with Gosling’s long list of notable acting credits in critically acclaimed films, he wouldn’t have guessed playing a Ken doll would land him back at the Oscars. It’ll be really odd if he wins for that while having lost for La La Land but such is Hollywood. Anyway, Gosling is up against huge competition here. He’s facing off against Sterling K. Brown for American Fiction, Rober De Niro for Killers of the Flower Moon, Robert Downey Jr. for Oppenheimer, and Mark Ruffalo for Poor Things. If I was a betting man (which I am not so don’t bet based on my predictions) I would bet Robert Downey Jr. is the most likely to win but with Robert De Niro as a really close second.
Best Supporting Actress
America Ferrera is up for her role as Gloria, the human woman and mother who helps Barbie in both the real world and Barbieland. Again, the competition here is fierce. Ferrera is up against Emily Blunt for Oppenheimer, Danielle Brooks for The Color Purple, Jodie Foster for Nyad and Da’vine Joy Randolph for The Holdovers. While these are all notable actresses in notable roles, Danielle Brooks really knocked it out of the park with The Color Purple in her portrayal of Sofia so she’s my prediction to win here.
Costume Design
It’s surprisingly hard to make good costumes and to make them look like they walked out of the packaging of a Barbie box must have been extremely difficult. The costumes here are perfect for the film and the contrast between the Barbie and Ken outfits and the people wearing clothes in the real world works exceedingly well. I do think Barbie has a solid shot here but again there is a lot of competition. Napoleon, Killers of the Flower Moon, Oppenheimer and Poor Things are also up for the award. Most of these are period pieces in one way or another and those tend to do well in the costume category. I’ve heard great things about the costumes in Poor Things in particular (I haven’t watched it just yet though). For this reason, I think this category is truly a toss up. Barbie could definitely win but any of these films getting this award would be well deserved.
Music (Original Song)
Barbie has been nominated twice in the same category here, thus potentially splitting the vote on itself. The two songs nominated are I’m Just Ken and What Was I Made For? The first one is performed by Ryan Gosling himself and the second was made by Billie Eilish. I’m Just Ken is a really funny song that fits the tone of the film perfectly and I think anyone who has ever experienced unrequited love (man, woman or anyone else) can relate to it. While Billie Eilish is really good at getting critical acclaim for her music so What Was I Made For? has a real shot of winning. Between the two, my preference is for I’m Just Ken but everyone has their own tastes in music so it’s totally valid if you prefer the Billy Eilish jam. But, in this category there are a couple of things going on. First, Dianne Warren is yet again up for an Oscar and she has yet to win one other than the Academy Honorary Award which acknowledges a career rather than a single song or soundtrack. This means Warren might get one here just because she is so overdue for one. Her song is The Fire Inside from Flamin’ Hot. Second, Wahzhazhe (A Song for My People) from Killers of the Flower Moon is up for the award. This is an Osage language song and is simply beautiful and it recognizes a culture often ignored (or sometimes demonized) in Hollywood films. Finally, It Never Went Away from American Symphony written and performed by John Batiste is up for the award. Batiste is a straight up musical genius and in my opinion, he has the most valid claim to this award. I predict he will win unless I’m Just Ken sneaks away with it.
Best Picture
Alright, this is a little tough at this time for me to fully predict because I have not yet seen all of these movies (I will be this week so please watch for more reviews). But I am going to say it now. While Barbie was a good film and wildly entertaining (I laughed harder here than I have in a theater in a long time) it was not the best film of the year. I believe this is going to go to Oppenheimer hands down but we’ll see.
Production Design
Oh come on, just give this one to Barbie already. While this category does have some notable films including Killers of the Flower Moon, Oppenheimer, Napoleon, and Poor Things, only Barbie used so much pink paint that they sold out of the color in the UK. They literally created a whole Barbieland and nailed it perfectly. The production design in this film is straight up out of this world good and while the other films deserve their nominations, Barbie just kills in this department.
Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
It’s a little weird to think the screenplay here was adapted but I suppose it was for a couple reasons. It is based on an existing property and Greta Gerwig used a few sources as inspiration so in a way you can say this is adapted. The screenplay is smart, funny, and really really good at selling Barbies. But is it good enough to win the Oscar? I say no. Gerwig’s screenplay is up against the screenplays for American Fiction, Oppenheimer, Poor Things, and The Zone of Interest. This is a tough category to call and I’m not sure yet which one I think will win but I think there is a strong case to be made that Barbie will not win here. There’s just too much strong competition and when you get down to it, Barbie is just about a doll.
Those are my predictions for the film but I could absolutely be way off base here.
The Other Controversy
Now that we’ve gone through the categories I have to mention what might be the actual, valid criticism surrounding Barbie. It’s notable that while Gosling was nominated for his role as Ken, Margot Robbie was snubbed for her role as Barbie and Greta Gerwig was snubbed in the Best Director category. It’s almost as if the Academy Awards took a look at the movie and took away all the wrong lessons here. Gosling himself was pretty disappointed the two women didn’t get the nods and I think this is a fair point. But, both Robbie and Gerwig are going to be fine. Robbie has already received accolades for several of her performances and Gerwig has gathered a few herself. Plus, they all now can claim they were responsible for a billion dollar film, so it’s not like they won’t be hurting for work. Still, it does seem like a pretty rude snub.
In Conclusion
If you have a sense of humor, are of the appropriate age, and can enjoy a good musical with incredible set design, you really can’t go wrong with Barbie. It was one of the best films of the year and absolutely deserves to win in some of the categories it was nominated for. I don’t think it is the best picture of the year but it sure is one of the top few. And if the box office is anything to go by, I am far, far from alone here. So, if you can, go enjoy the film because it’s pretty much pure fun.
Hey film fans, Slick Dungeon here back to review yet another Oscar nominated film. This time I am reviewing the seventh film in the Mission Impossible series starring Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Ving Rhames, and Simon Pegg. This movie has been nominated for Best Sound and Best Visual Effects. There will be spoilers for this film (but if you’ve seen any Mission Impossible movie you already know what the basic beats are here) so be forewarned before you read the review. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to go watch the movie and then come on back here to read the review.
What’s it About?
The movie starts out just a little bit differently than most of the MI films in that we start in a Russian submarine. The sub is testing an advanced AI and things go wrong. The sub is targeted and destroyed by the AI. There is no reveal of Ethan Hunt here and there’s not even a high-flying, death-defying stunt for Tom Cruise. This sets up for the film to be a bit more mysterious than some of the past entries.
We then do catch up with our hero in the Arabian Desert where he gets a key from Lisa Faust, an ex MI6 agent. Faust also fakes her own death.
Okay, so I could go on with this plot, and give you all the intricate details. However, it gets down to this. There are two keys that unlock something. It’s something really powerful and the AI from the beginning of the movie has something to do with it. In typical fashion. Ethan Hunt needs to gather the pieces before other interested and deadly parties get ahold of it. To do this, he assembles his usual team (or in this case they really assemble around him without being asked). Along the way he meets some new people, sure to become cast members in the next film, he does some insane stunts, including driving a motorcycle off the Alps and parachuting down onto a moving train. There are shootouts, car chases, flirtations, bad guy monologues, mask reveals and the whole bit.
To go through the whole thing in intricate detail would be kind of pointless because either you are a super fan and already know all this stuff, you are a casual fan and would have to rewatch six films before this one totally makes sense, or you don’t care and there’s not much point in catching you up.
What this film gets down to is it is a fun, fast paced, action adventure film where the main character has to get a thing before other people get a thing so they can unlock another thing.
While I absolutely enjoyed the experience of watching the film, it is still nothing more than a bunch of characters chasing a McGuffin until the movie ends on a cliffhanger.
The Awards
Plot aside, the film is nominated for best sound and best visual effects. I will say the visual effects are impressive here and it’s hard to tell when the film uses CGI over practical effects because they tend to use those to enhance rather than replace visuals. The stunts look spectacular, as always in these films, and are exciting to watch.
The sound is loud and conveys to the viewer the information needed. I’m sure it is difficult to figure out just how certain things would sound in the movie and make them work. But, the sound isn’t really central in any way to the story of the movie, other than to help us understand what is happening on screen. It’s not really played with or used in a way we have not seen before in film. (I guess I should say heard rather than seen but you know what I mean).
I have strong doubts this film will win in either category it is up for considering the competition. For visual effects, I think it is going to lose to The Creator and in the sound category I think Oppenheimer or Maestro will beat it out.
In Conclusion
If you like fun action films, this is a good one to watch, albeit a bit on the long side. If you haven’t ever watched a Mission Impossible film, this is absolutely the worst one to start with. If you are a casual fan of these movies, you’ll have a good time but occasionally find yourself trying to remember who a character from several films ago is.
It’s not a bad film at all, there is some great stuff to look at and hear. But, I just don’t think it’s actually Oscar worthy this year.
Hello film fans! Slick Dungeon here, back to review another Oscar nominated film. This time we are diving into the latest animated film by the always absolutely brilliant animation company Studio Ghibli. The Boy and the Heron is nominated for Best Animated Feature Film this year. Before you read on, do be warned there will be spoilers. If you don’t enjoy that, take yourself to the mystical world where you can watch animated films, maybe stack some wooden blocks, and then come on back here to read the review!
What’s it About?
It is World War II and a young boy named, Mahito Maki, loses his mother Hisako in a fire at a hospital. Mahito’s father, Soichi marries Natsuko, HIsako’s sister. Soichi owns a munitions factory so he decides to move his little family to his rural estate. At first, Mahito is fairly cold to his aunt, both missing his mother, and overwhelmed by the major change in his life. At the new home, there is a mysterious tower. Some years ago, Natsuko’s granduncle was the architect who built the tower but he disappeared long ago.
One day, while Mahito is recovering from an injury, he spots a heron who leads him to the tower. The heron turns out to be more than he seems as he starts to speak and transform into a half-man half-bird creature. Mahito is nearly taken by a swarm of of toads but he is saved by Natsuko who fires an arrow at the frogs. Mahito takes this arrow, and a feather he gets from the heron, and makes his own arrow with that feather. This arrow gains true aim, meaning it cannot miss its target.
Later, an ill Natsuko disappears into the forest. Mahito and an elderly maid named Kiriko go to find Natsuko and end up at the strange tower. Mahito is beckoned inside and sees what he thinks is a vision of his mother. This was a trick designed by the heron. Mahito figures this out and shoots an arrow at the heron, breaking a part of its beak and further revealing the bird-man. A wizard comes out of nowhere and instructs the heron to take Mahito and guide him. Mahito, the heron, and Kiriko sink through the floor into another world.
In this world, Mahito sees wonders, faces dangers, and confronts strange creatures he could never have imagined. Strangely, he is rescued by Kiriko, who is years younger than she was in our world. The pair try to survive and they meet a woman named Himi who protects Mahito from a dangerous group of pelicans who are trying to eat small, strange creatures called Warawara.
More strange and magical incidents continue in the film until Mahito ends up meeting the wizard who turns out to be Natsuko’s grand uncle and he realizes that Himi is his birth mother, just much younger. Mahito is given the chance to reshape this magical world with a set of wooden blocks. But Mahito decides not to because the blocks are infused with malice. He is then offered his own set of blocks to create a world from scratch. He also declines to do this, saying he has malice in his own heart and must embrace those who love him first.
Eventually, he is able to get back to our own reality where he is surrounded by Natsuko, his father and Kiriko, all who love and care for him, even though his birth mother has passed away.
Even writing down the plot as I did above leaves a lot out of the story. It’s a tale of magical realism that has shades of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Alice in Wonderland. At the same time, it is paced and animated in the way only Studio Ghibli under the direction of the brilliant Hayao Miyazaki can achieve. In other words, as with most of Miyazaki’s films, it is an utter masterpiece.
It’s very slow by American animation standards and the plot can be hard to grasp even as you are watching it. This is more of a difference in animated culture than any kind of criticism of the film.
There are achingly adorable creatures in this movie and lots of mystical storytelling. And as usual it begins in reality but transports characters to another world where they can learn something about themselves before being returned a changed, and usually better person.
The soundtrack is composed by Miyazaki’s long time collaborator Joe Hisaishi who is uniquely qualified to pair the mystical vision of what we see on film with a score just as capable of transporting the imagination.
Once again, Studio Ghibli has truly delivered a masterpiece that reaches across cultural bounds to both Japanes and American audiences in the way only they can.
The Awards
On any other year, if Miyazaki was making this film, I would say The Boy and the Heron was an absolute lock for Best Animated Feature. He may still earn the award since this is likely to be his last animated film of his lifetime. The animation is incredible, with the hand drawn look but still using CGI in some scenes and backgrounds to make the storytelling work. I don’t think this is necessarily the best animated film by Studio Ghibli but that’s like saying you don’t know which is the most stylish slam dunk of Michael Jordan’s. In other words, they are all too amazing to really pick favorites.
However, there was another animated film out this year which was the most innovative animated film I have seen perhaps since I first saw a Studio Ghible film. Spider-Man: Across the Spiderverse has innovation in every second of it, if not in every frame of it.
If Spider-man does not win here, I guarantee you this award will go to The Boy and the Heron, if not to acknowledge the work of this film, then simply to acknowledge the body of work by Miyazaki with Studio Ghibli. (Guarantee not a real guarantee, please don’t make bets based on my predictions)
On most years I am hoping for the Studio Ghibli film to win. And while I would be perfectly fine with it winning this year, I don’t think it is actually the best animated feature length film of the year, despite it still being an actual masterpiece.
In Conclusion
If you have not seen The Boy and the Heron, do so as soon as you can. It’s a unique film made by a storytelling master who has already caught the imaginations of millions of people. Because Miyazaki was a creator with such brilliance, you can expect more brilliance in animation as those who come up after him try to emulate and surpass him. Do be warned that the pacing is slow for American audiences but don’t let that stop you from watching the film. If nothing else this film has significance because it is quite likely to be the last of Miyazaki animated films.
Hey film fans, it’s Slick Dungeon! I’m back to review yet another Oscar nominated film. This time we are taking a look at Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3. Wait what? That’s right, the 32nd film in the MCU has been nominated for an Oscar. It’s up for Best Visual Effects. Be warned there will be spoilers for the movie below so if you have not seen it, head on over to a Terran theater, see the film and come on back here to read the review.
What’s it About?
If you are an MCU fan, you probably know who the Guardians of the Galaxy are. But just in case you are not familiar with them, they are a ragtag group of outlaws and misfits trying to make their way in the galaxy and often find themselves confronted by maniacal villains looking to destroy the galaxy in one way or another. They are led by Peter Quill, aka Starlord who is a human from Earth. There is way too much background here for me to get into a deep dive of even just the first two films in the series but you can just consider this to be a science fiction, action, comedy thriller type of film.
I most definitely don’t recommend watching this one without watching at least the first two films in the series. And if you really want to know what is going on you have to watch a substantial chunk of the MCU, including at least two Avengers films.
For the third film in a series I didn’t expect this to cover much new territory. There is, of course, a bad guy who has to be stopped. But the film gets surprisingly emotional when it comes to the background of one of the key team members, Rocket Raccoon. It’s an impressive feat to see James Gunn pull off an emotionally compelling story about a raccoon with a machine gun. In fact, I was not the only Marvel fan to tear up just a bit during the film as we see Rocket both make and loss some dear friends.
It is one of the more entertaining films of the later MCU phase, although it still has spots of trouble where it could be more compelling to the viewer.
Like pretty much any MCU film, the good guys defeat the bad guys after a bit of misunderstanding and some teamwork. There are quippy one liners, lots of striking visual effects, and the hint of a romance or two.
The Awards
While this is all standard fare for Marvel, this film was never going to be nominated for best picture, screenplay, or acting. This is not the type of film that wins prestige awards. But, it is the type of film that could win an award for visual effects. The films in this category and those nominated for best sound tend have the largest audience appeal, and I will also admit, tend to be the ones I like the most.
But does Guardians of the Galaxy have enough here to win the category? I don’t think so. While the film is better than the third movie in a superhero story has any right to be, and the effects are fairly stunning, this film is just not quite up to the quality of competing films. It is up against The Creator which is my bet to win on visual effects, Godzilla Minus One which pulled off the nearly impossible feat of making a Godzilla film relevant again, Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part 1 which has incredibly good stunt work and Napoleon which is a sweeping epic full of intricate detail.
In Conclusion
I recommend this movie to those who are familiar with Guardians of the Galaxy and enjoy a good superhero romp with a bit of a story to it. But, if you are already over superhero films, or you haven’t even started in on the MCU somehow, there is no need to rush out to see this. It’s fine. The story is fun and it is nice to see a competent film in the later MCU phases but it’s ultimately skippable if you are not that interested.
Hello film fans! It’s Slick Dungeon and I am back to review another film nominated for an Oscar this year. This time I watched the unsettling and darkly comedic film May December which is nominated for Best Original Screenplay. Trigger warning here that this film deals with very adult issues and could be unsettling for those who have suffered any type of sexual trauma. Please be aware of that before you watch this film or read this review. There will be spoilers for this movie as well so if that sort of thing is an issue for you, make sure you go watch the film before reading the review below.
What’s it About?
While this film is not a biopic or technically based on a true story, the premise is one that seems like it is ripped from the tabloids. Years ago there was a famous case where a female teacher had, we’ll call them relations, with a thirteen year old boy, which is without a doubt a crime. Fast forward years later and the woman has given birth while in prison, has done her sentence, and the woman and man who are now both of legal age are married and living their lives. This film takes that premise and adds another layer to it. An actress who is set to portray the woman from the incident is visiting so she can understand her source material.
In the movie, Julianne Moore plays the wife in question. Natalie Portman plays an actress who wants to get deep in her role. Not a stretch for Natalie Portman, not that this makes her performance any less good, it’s just obviously familiar territory for her. Julianne Moore’s character has a life that is relatively stable. Her kids are about to graduate high school and go off to college. And her husband, while young, very young, is seemingly committed to her.
But the visit by the actress puts a strain on the relationship as issues from the past emerge once again. Neighbors, friends, and family are scandalized once more and know they will be again when the movie comes out, and things just generally become more difficult. In the midst of this, Natalie Portman’s character is trying her hardest to get in the head of the woman she is portraying while also trying to get the real story behind what happened. She’s subtle and manipulative of everyone around her but it’s ambiguous in the end as to who was truly using who in the movie.
While this is supposed to be darkly comedic, I didn’t realize that while watching. I guess there are parts you could find comedy in but the situation is so disturbing it’s hard to wrap my head around any of it being played for any kind of laughs.
So far, out of the films I have watched for the Oscars, this is the one I would most recommend skipping, not just because of the trauma aspect to it. It’s fairly slow paced and dull. But, Moore and Portman, as usual put in solid performances and newcomer Charles Melton also shines with a subtle but intriguing character.
The Award
I will say the screenplay here is original and there is one thing it does quite well. It gives us every perspective possible. There are no good or bad guys here, everyone is multidimensional and complex. But I still keep coming back to the fact that having sex with a minor is a crime, even if years later the couple is still together. So, while I understand the perspective shown of Julianne Moore’s character, I can never find where we should think to forgive her.
Natalie Portman’s character is not all innocent either as she seems to enjoy stirring up a bit of trouble as long as it gets her what she wants. And she does the one thing she knows could ruin the relationship between the wife she is portraying and her husband and seemingly has utterly zero regrets about it.
It is a film that you will still think about after if you watch it. Personally, i don’t think this film has enough here to take home the Oscar. It’s up against The Holdovers, Maestro,Past Lives, The Holdovers and Anatomy of a Fall. Every one of those has had more momentum in awards season than this one so this is a long shot.
In Conclusion
There are a lot of movies in the Oscar categories this year and while I recommend most of them, unless you are a huge fan of Natalie Portman, Julianne Moore, or Todd Haynes as the filmmaker, you’re probably okay to skip this one. There is good writing here, no doubt, and the characters feel real and fleshed out, but it’s such an uncomfortable watch, without much payoff to it, that it may not be worth your time.
Hey film fans, Slick Dungeon here! I am back on my quest to review every film nominated for an Oscar and review it. This time I am reviewing a bunch of movies all at once as I go through the nominations for Best Documentary Short Film. Here’s the thing about these. I almost hate to review these because each and every one of them took a great effort and a massive amount of time for the film makers. All of them talk about something that is either important to life or our society in general. So, to say that one is better than another in a category where there are not Hollywood stars, the films were made from the passion of the filmmakers, and each covers an important topic is almost impossible. I absolutely recommend you watch each and every one of these films. You can find all of them streaming for free somewhere so it doesn’t cost you anything but time. But, in the end, one of these has to win over the others. Therefore, I will do my best to let you know about each film and then I will give you my guess as to which one will win. Do be warned there are spoilers for all of these so if you haven’t seen them go watch first and come back here to read the review. (You should watch them anyway even if you just go ahead and read the review)
The ABC’s of Book Banning
There has been a lot of debate in America about books lately. There is a group of people who tends to want to restrict access to reading material based on a variety of factors, especially in the public school and public library systems. This makes obtaining appropriate reading material difficult for a large group of children. This film specifically takes a look at Florida, one of the states most notorious for denying reading material to kids based on LGBTQ issues and topics discussing race in history. What this film dares to do is to hear from the children who are affected. We see several kids of varying ages talk about what reading means to them and how confusing it is to them that books are missing from the libraries. Anyone thinking this is a topic that doesn’t matter should watch this film and rethink their stance. Allowing kids access to reading materials is vital to the future generations and a small group of people deciding what other people’s children can read is unjust. You can see this clearly when one of the kids talks about how she cried all day the day her library pulled most of their books down. The film does a good job of covering the perspective of the children but it perhaps could have used a little bit more buildup of the context of what has already happened here.
The Barber of Little Rock
The Barber of Little Rock is about a man named Arlo Washington. He is a barber in Little Rock, Arkansas as the name implies. But he is so much more than that. Out of all of these documentaries, Washington may be the man able to claim to have made the most change in his own community. He found himself in a situation where someone was desperate and asked for a loan. Arlo, trusting in human nature and being kind to others gave the loan which was then paid back in full. This gave him the idea to revolutionize the entire banking industry in his area. Banks in America, for those who do not know, have had a long, long history of treating black Americans worse than white Americans. Washington founded a non-profit community bank which will give loans to people in desperate situations or to those who want to open a business but can’t get a loan from the regular banking system. And guess what? Almost all of the loans he gives out are paid back. It turns out that when you help people in need, they not only appreciate it, they meet their obligations. It is absolutely clear in the film that he is literally changing lives in real time and making incredible community change.
Island In Between
Island in Between is a fascinating look at the island Kinmen, which is a democratic Taiwanese island that is so close to mainland China they can see it across the water. The story of the island is told by S. Leo Chiang who has lived in Taiwan, China and the United States and gives a great narration of the Cross-Strait relations, also interweaving tales from his childhood and growing up in the three places. We even see in the documentary some of the weaponry that is necessary on Kinmen, should China decide to attack. But Chiang balances this with his experiences of meeting people in China and finding them to be just as interesting, exuberant and joyful as those in Kinmen. The film is a unique look at a unique place from a unique perspective.
The Last Repair Shop
Just as there are not enough books in schools in America, there are not enough musical instruments for children to play in the public school system. Often times, people can’t afford an instrument very easily and those instruments sometimes break. In Los Angeles there is a warehouse where only four or five people work and they keep more than 80,000 instruments in good repair. The documentary tells the story of some of the kids who play the instruments and interweaves that with the stories of the few people who work at the repair shop. It’s clear both the kids and the repair workers are absolutely devoted to music and this is a meaningful thing in their lives. They all come to it in different ways and all have compelling stories to tell. It’s a fascinating look at a niche subject which affects far more people than you would expect. And, of course, the music in it is brilliant.
NǍI NAI & WÀI PÓ
If you need a life affirming film that will lift you up and make you smile, this is the one. This is about Sean Wang’s paternal and maternal grandmothers who are the best of friends and live with one another in their later years. The film shows joyous depictions of the two of them living their lives, depending on one another, and in general, being silly, fun, and entertaining human beings. They both have a zest for life but each one has a slightly different perspective on hardships and aging. It’s a slice of life film that will stand the test of time because the exuberance of these two cannot be contained. It’s a reminder that we are all human and here on this earth together.
In Conclusion
Again, it is so hard to simply choose one film as the “best” here. If I was to pick based on production value, The Last Repair Shop wins hands down. If I was to pick based on the most meaningful content, I would have to go with The Barber of Little Rock. If I was to pick based on the most relevant issue today, I would choose The ABC’s of Book Banning. If I was to pick based on the most unique story I would pick Islandin Between. And if I was to choose the one that leaves you with the best feeling in the end, I would choose NǍI NAI & WÀI PÓ.
But, here is what I think could happen in this category. While they are all worthy, I believe the ones with the best chances here are The Last Repair Shop, The Barber of Little Rock and NǍI NAI & WÀI PÓ. My preference to win is The Last Repair Shop because I think it is bringing the most meaningful impact to a large but relatively unknown problem. But I also think NǍI NAI & WÀI PÓ has the most momentum. I am predicting NǍI NAI & WÀI PÓ as the winner. As always, don’t take my guess as a better measure because I don’t have the best track record here.
Yet, whoever wins in this category, I can say with absolute certainty that they are deserving of the award.
Hello film fans! Slick Dungeon here back to review another film nominated for an Oscar. This time I am diving into the documentary American Symphony which is nominated for best song. There will be spoilers for the movie below so if that sort of thing bothers you, dance your way to the film, give it a watch, and dance your way back here to read the review.
What’s it about?
From the outside it looks like John Batiste is simply on top of the world. He was the leader of Stay Human, the band that plays on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, he had been nominated for 11 Grammys, and he was getting ready to make his debut at Carnegie hall with an original symphony.
But life is more complicated than it might seem from the outside. At the same time all of this was happening, John Batiste’s wife, Suleika Jaouad, was battling leukemia.
The film documents a year in the life of the talented musician, highlighting his ups and downs, his struggles with anxiety, and the challenge of navigating through one of the busiest times of his career while also dealing with major issues in his personal life.
Through the film it is easy to see that Batiste is not only a brilliantly gifted musical artist but a genuinely caring person who is going through a lot of things all at once.
Considering the fact that Batiste has so far won 5 Grammys I don’t have to tell you that the soundtrack here is brilliant. Batiste blends traditions from New Orleans jazz with pop sounds and classical music together in a unique way making for an unmistakeable sound.
His idea is to create a symphony that could be made today with all types of musicians collaborating on it and coming together in a classical orchestra.
Despite the troubles he has in his personal life, Batiste pulls it off in incredible and stylish fashion. But the film also lets us in on Batiste’s emotions by intercutting scenes from his life with scenes from the preparation and performance of his symphony.
All in all it is an incredibly moving, and life affirming documentary.
The award
After watching this documentary, I feel that leaving off of the list for Best Documentary is a definite snub by the Academy Awards. There is a lot going on here and while there are several other good documentaries up for that category this year, not all of them are as good as this one.
But, the award this film is nominated for is Best Song. Again, not nominating this for Best Score seems like an injustice. The song in the film nominated for the award is called It Never Went Away and is created by John Batiste and Dan Wilson. To say that the song is anything other than brilliant would be wrong. Out of all the Best Song nominations, this is the most well crafted from a passionate musician who knows music. However, there is huge competition here. Batiste will have to win out over Diane Warren and Billie Eilish which is no easy feat. I would say he might get lucky with Barbie splitting the vote with two songs nominated in the category but luck would imply that this is not an incredible song. I still think due to its popularity that one of the songs from Barbie will win here but if the world was fair Batiste would win hands down. And he may. He did beat out several musicians before.
Yet even talking about who might win Best Song in the context of this film seems wrong if you have heard Batiste’s Grammy acceptance speech. In it he says, “I believe this to my core, there is no best musician, best artist, best dancer, best actor. The creative arts are subjective and they reach people at a point in their lives when they need it most. It’s like a song or an album is made and it’s almost like it has a radar to find the person when they need it the most.” This is a beautiful sentiment and after watching American Symphony I truly believe he means every word of it.
While he might not think there is a best anything, I think he truly deserves to win in the category nonetheless.
In Conclusion
If you want to see a good documentary about an interesting couple with tons of heart, heartache, joy, success, struggle and emotion, American Symphony is a fantastic choice. It’s moving and enjoyable and it simply proves there is no one else on earth like John Batiste.
Hey there film fans, it’s me, Slick Dungeon! I’m here to review yet another Oscar nominated film. This one is Society of the Snow which is nominated for two Oscars, one for Best International Feature Film and one for Best Hair and Makeup. Fair warning here, this film was based on a real life disaster and how people survived a harrowing plane crash and being stranded on the Andes mountains for weeks in the middle of winter. In other words, all the trigger warnings because this film gets into dark, dark territory. Also, obviously, spoilers for the film follow below.
What’s it About?
In 1972 an airplane flying from Uruguay to Chile heading over the Andes mountains crashed. The flight held 45 passengers and was chartered to transport a Uruguayan rugby team to Chile. Upon impact several of the 45 people lost their lives. The plane broke apart into sections in the crash. After the initial crash there are several survivors, including the pilot but the pilot is on the brink of death. Some of the passengers try to find out where they are from the pilot but the information he gives is not clear enough to be of much use.
The injured are cared for as much as possible but some are clearly going to die. The passengers believe a rescue is inevitable and they simply need to wait a day or two until they will be found. In fact, they have good reason to believe this as they do see planes flying overhead. But days pass and no rescue comes.
At one point the passengers are able to find a radio and can receive real time news updates on it but they can’t communicate back out to the world. They hear that the search has been called off due to the extremely bad weather conditions. The passengers ration what little food they have found in suitcases and on the remains of the part of the plane they were in and try to survive.
An effort is made to try and find the tail section of the plane which the group believes is behind them because it split off on impact. But, the nights are barely survivable for even the most fit of them who are losing strength fast. They have to give up the search for the rest of the plane because it is simply impossible to climb the mountain with the gear they have.
As more people die, succumbing to injuries or the cold, the situation becomes even more desperate. There is no food, although the snow does provide water. The group is not at all equipped to make another effort to climb, no rescue is imminent, and there are no other resources to be found where they are on the mountain. The group had to decide how they will survive. The only possible source of food is found in the deceased passengers preserved in the snow. Extreme measures have to be taken and the protein that the consumption of their fellow passengers helps some of them to survive.
At the point that around 27 of the passengers are somewhat safe inside the remains of the airplane, another disaster hits. An avalanche buries them in snow. Several people do survive this impact and work to unbury their friends. Almost as soon as they do, another wave of snow impacts them and buries them a second time. Miraculously several people do survive this as well.
The group has to decide what to do and it is eventually decided that three of them will hike down the mountain, rather than up and hopefully find a source of food or make their way to another living human being. Three of them set out but one has to turn back because of an injured leg that is quickly becoming infected. Yet the expedition is a success. The two remaining hikers actually find the tail section of the plane which landing in front of the nose of the plane far down the mountain. There is a small amount of food there and even more importantly, a battery for a radio they can connect.
More days and weeks pass but they are not able to get the radio working and they decide once again to go down the mountain after the person with the injured leg succumbs to the infection. They take some supplies with them but only enough food to last for about a week. They estimate the hike into Chile would take around three weeks. The pair are confronted with the choice of either risking their own lives and continuing or turning back and waiting at the plane in the hopes rescue will resume. They decide to push on and incredibly, they do find someone.
The group gets help and the rescue efforts resume. In all, 16 out of the 45 people on board survive and are rescued by helicopter.
Throughout the film the survivors wrestle with questions of what is right and wrong, what they can do to survive, the meaning of all of this, and generally get quite philosophical.
If you are reading this and are a film lover like myself you might think this story sounds familiar, not just because it was a true story but because there was another film made about it. That is true. In 1993 a movie starring Ethan Hawke was released called Alive which recounted the same story. However, that version was a bit more fictionalized and starred Hollywood actors. Society of the Snow uses mostly newcomers to acting from Argentine and Uruguay.
Society of the Snow also treats the subject matter with greater care and respect than Alive did. For a film filled with newcomers, they sure seem like experienced actors because every moment of the film is believable.
The Awards
First off, this movie is nominated for Best International Feature Length Film. I would say this has a strong chance of winning but it has to compete with a film nominated also for Best Picture in The Zone of Interest. Still, the story is absolutely engrossing and nail biting from the moment the plane crashes until the end. It’s an extremely well made film about an impossibly difficult subject which handles the material deftly. Even if this never wins an Oscar it is well worth watching, although it is not for the feint of heart.
The other category this film might win in is Makeup and Hairstyling. Often, when we think of Makeup and Hairstyling we think about either makeup made to enhance the good looks of actors or we think about makeup used to create some horror creature that haunts our imagination. I think it’s great that Society of the Snow is up for this category because the hair looks like it came directly from a photograph from 1972 and the makeup is used to convey the more and more desperate situation the survivors find themselves in. While we know the actors portraying the characters are not starving, emaciated and sunburnt to extreme levels (at least we hope not) they sure look like they are. This is because the makeup is used in the right way here. It’s used to enhance the storytelling. But in this category, I think Society of the Snow will ultimately lose out to Poor Things or perhaps Oppenheimer.
In Conclusion
Society of the Snow may or may not win an Oscar but if you watch the film, it is going to stay with you. This is incredibly good filmmaking, acting, directing, cinematography and even makeup and hair. But, truly if you are disturbed by tragic situations and difficult events I don’t recommend you watch it. Also, if you have any fear of flying, stay as far away from this film as you possibly can because this film will make that fear much worse.
If you don’t fall into those categories and you haven’t seen this film, you should definitely watch it. It’s absolutely strong enough to be in the Best International Feature Film category and may have only missed out on the Best Picture nominations because it seems like a remake of 1993’s Alive (although it is not) and because 2023 was an exceptionally strong year for movies in general.
Well hello there movie lovers! It’s Slick Dungeon here and I am back to review yet another Oscar nominated film from 2023. I’m talking about the film that answers the age old question of what if a Chilean dictator was actually a vampire? And what if that film was shot beautifully? Then I must be talking about the seriously odd film, El Conde. This one is a bit of a weird ride so if you haven’t seen the film yet, fly on over to see the movie and come back here to read the review.
What’s it About?
The film starts out with a voice over telling us the story of a French soldier named Claude Pinochet. This dude is a vampire and he is found out. Mobs do what they do and try to kill him but he survives. He takes on a new identity and watches the French Revolution happen. From this point forward, Claude vows to suppress any destructive revolution he can in the world.
We then fast forward to 1935 where Claude joins the Chilean army and changes his name to Augusto Pinochet. If that name sounds familiar, that is because Augusto Pinochet was the real life dictator who overthrew the socialist government of Salvador Allende in 1973. Turns out he was a vampire. In this movie both metaphorically and literally. He demands his family refer to him as “Count” and he decides to fake his own death after years of ruling Chile with an iron fist.
He moves to a remote farm with the rest of his family and starts to lose interest in life. But his family also knows they are owed an inheritance out of Pinochet’s ill gotten gains. The only problems are that Pinochet is practically immortal and he has forgotten where he hid all his treasure.
One night someone starts killing people in the town of Santiago and consuming their hearts. Augusto’s family assumes this is him, deciding to extend his immortal life even further. But, in reality this is Fyodor, a white Russian who has worked for Pinochet for years and is the only person Augusto has turned into a vampire. The family is unaware of Fyodor’s part in the murders but they know their inheritance is at risk.
This is where a nun named Carmen comes in. She is hired to find out what happened to the money and to destroy Augusto Pinochet once and for all. She uses her charms to get information out of the family about all of their terrible secrets and tries to exorcise Pinochet. But Pinochet is too strong and seduces Carmen, allowing him to turn her into a vampire.
This prompts the narrator to reveal who she is and take action. It turns out the narrator is the mother of Augusto Pinochet and Margaret Thatcher. (checks notes) Yep, that Margaret Thatcher. Thatcher comes to reveal the truth to Pinochet who she is and demands that he kills Carmen. But it turns out becoming a vampire was all part of Carmen’s plan to expose the corruption of the Pinochet family.
Fyodor is having none of that and he captures Carmen and burns up the extensive documentation she has of the crimes of the Pinochet family. Then, Fyodor and Augusto’s wife, Lucia try to kill Augusto. But he’s been a vampire for longer and he is able to kill both Lucia and Fyodor.
Margaret and Augusto flee and the family is left to face a group of nuns looking for anything they can find. Augusto decides to remain in the country and wait to find more leftists to destroy.
All in all, the film has a bit of magic realism to it with a bit of an insane plot. But it’s well acted and comes together well enough.
The Cinematography
Whether you like the plot or not, the film is not up for best screenplay or picture, it is up for best cinematography. This is a category that can often be confused with directing. Basically, cinematography is the totality of how a film looks. Everything you see on screen, from the lighting, to the angle of the camera, to the focus and the camera movement falls into the category of cinematography. As an audience, it’s one of those things where you might be hard pressed to explain it but you know it when you see it.
El Conde is shot in a black and white style, reminiscent of the old Universal monster movies like Dracula or Frankenstein. I’m always a sucker for a film brave enough to choose black and white and look like a monster movie. But it also plays with this trope by letting the vampires in question look like pudgy old men who don’t seen so threatening when you take a close up look at their wrinkled faces. And the story also interplays with this style by having the characters be people who we know did real and terrible things in our own reality. Just because someone looks like a pudgy old man does not mean he is not capable of great cruelty if he has access to power.
The visuals from the film stay with you long after you have seen it, which is another good sign of great cinematography. There is no doubt this film looks great and is well made. A great example of the showcasing of the cinematography is when the family is at dinner and we are able to see all the schemings and machinations of the family members. Add in scenes where vampires are flying over the city in sweeping camera motions to frame the dictator as something dangerous and above us.
The soundtrack also works well here, using mostly classical sounds to reinforce the idea of this being something like, but not quite, a true monster movie.
As far as whether or not this will win, it is at this point hard for me to say. Out of all the films in this category I have so far only seen El Conde and Oppenheimer but I hear great things about the cinematography in Poor Things and Killers of the Flower Moon so I think this will be a category with some tough competition.
In Conclusion
The acting is good in the film, the directing is competent but the cinematography is actually outstanding whether or not El Conde wins in the category. As far as a film experience, this movie won’t be for everyone. You have to be comfortable with a bit of dark humor, a bit of magic realism, an amount of gore and a pretty over the top plot to enjoy it. But it will be one of the most unique films you see this year if you watch it.
What’s up film fans? Slick Dungeon here once again reviewing one of the 2024 Oscar nominated films. This time I watched a movie about a girl with spirit teaming up with the most wanted man in the realm in the animated feature Nimona. This is one of the films up for Best Animated film for 2024. Be forewarned there will be spoilers in this review. If you find that sort of thing problematic, put on your armor, head over to your couch, learn what a real monster is by watching the film, and then come on back here to read the review!
What’s it About?
Nimona starts out like a classic fairy tale, with a narrator reading from a book about a kingdom in the past with a hero named Glorantha who vanquished a monster. We then fast forward a thousand years and that same kingdom is basically a medieval yet futuristic kingdom protected by an elite class of knights who prepare to fight monsters. A wall has been built around the city to keep any monsters at bay as well.
An unusual event is happening in the kingdom because for the first time a commoner is about to be knighted. This is Ballister Boldheart. He is worried about the reaction to his knighthood but his boyfriend and fellow knight Ambrosius Goldenloin reassures Ballister before the ceremony.
But at the ceremony, things go about as wrong as they can. Ballister picks up his sword which is rigged to kill the Queen. Acting quickly, Ambrosius disarms his boyfriend by, well, literally taking his arm off. Before he knows it, Ballister is a wanted fugitive, trying to hide from his fellow knights and clear his own name. He goes into hiding and crafts a prosthetic arm for himself.
The film really gets going when a shapeshifting girl named Nimona shows up and wants to be Ballister’s villainous sidekick. Ballister is still trying to clear his name, Nimona is looking for a friend, and the two basically team up to figure out what is going on.
There are plenty of fun action sequences where Nimona shapeshifts and Ballister attempts to maintain his innocence while doing things that look guilty on camera. Meanwhile, Ambrosius is torn between his loyalty to the crown and his love for Ballister.
Ballister also tries to get Nimona to stop shapeshifting and just be a regular girl. But, of course, that’s not who Nimona is and she doesn’t take kindly to being told what to do.
Throughout the film we find out that Nimona is more than what she seems until it is revealed that she is actually the monster that was banished a thousand years ago. But there is more to the story. Nimona, it would seem, is the one who was wronged for just being who she is. She was never trying to hurt anyone.
Things come to a head with both Nimona and Ballister where it looks like Ballister is the most wicked man in the realm and Nimona is about to destroy the city. But through their connection, Ballister is able to pull Nimona back from the brink of destruction and clear his own name. Thus the two of them become heroes while the real villain, the Director, who plotted everything from the beginning is exposed to the masses.
The heroes come together, Nimona is seen for who she is, Ballister is lauded for his bravery and he is able to have a life with Ambrosius. This is all done with a good amount of punk rock attitude.
The Animation
The animation is solid and it’s a neat blend of past and future which brings about a unique look for the film. The action is frenetic and satisfying and it has a killer soundtrack as well. The voice talent is strong, especially with Rhiz Ahmed as Ballister and Chloë Grace Moretz as Nimona.
While the blend of past and future is innovative, and the look of the film is unique, the animation isn’t so compelling as to be anything you haven’t seen before.
The Fun factor
The story is solid and the soundtrack is good but what makes this movie stand out is the sense of fun here. Nimona’s attitude is decidedly unconventional and it’s honestly refreshing to see that in an animated film. Even as she’s planning to do evil things, you can’t help but be on her side. And with Ballister as the foil to her attitude the whole thing just works pretty well.
It’s definitely one of the more enjoyable Oscar picks this year and is worth a watch if you enjoy animation.
In Conclusion
While Nimona has a lot going for it, and I do recommend it as a viewing experience, I don’t think this one will win the Oscar. The biggest innovation here is letting the characters be themselves in a world where most animated characters have to fit in a neat little box. The way the movie plays around with identity and the understanding of what makes a hero or a villain is nice to see. But ultimately, there were better animated films released in 2023 and Nimona would be a pretty long shot to win. Winning an award is not the only reason someone should watch a movie though. Look, if you are wanting a good time with an animated film, you could do much, much worse than Nimona. If you haven’t seen it, I do recommend it. Just don’t hold your breath expecting it to win the Oscar.
Hey film fans, Slick Dungeon here! I’m back to review another film nominated for an Oscar in 2024. This time I watched the biopic about Bayard Rustin who was a notable civil rights intellectual and activist and was instrumental in organizing the March on Washington in 1963. The film is simply titled Rustin and stars Colman Domingo as the title character. Domingo is up for Best Actor for his performance in the film. Be forewarned this review contains spoilers for the film and those who have not read enough history books to know who Bayard Rusin was. If that sort of thing bothers you, give the movie a watch and then march right back here to read the review.
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
What’s it About?
I’m sure most of us are familiar with the March on Washington in 1963 where Martin Luther King Jr. gave his famous, “I Have a Dream” speech. Who people may not be as familiar with is one of the most instrumental coordinators of the event, Bayard Rustin.
Rustin was an activist who already had a long history of fighting for civil rights before the idea of the event ever happened. He had worked closely with MLK about nonviolence techniques and helped to protect the property of Japanese-Americans who were interred during World War II. He had a long history of fighting for the rights of people he saw as being treated unjustly.
He was also an out of the closet gay man at a time when there were literally laws against being gay. Add to that the fact that he was at one time a card carrying member of the Communist Party, USA and you can imagine there were plenty of people both within and outside of the civil rights movement who did not like him.
While Rustin had a long and storied career and accomplished more things than I can cover in this blog post, the film focuses in on the most famous of his achievements. At a time when he was more or less shunned from the civil rights movement, he was able to get back into the good graces of Martin Luther King Jr. and organize the most iconic of all of the civil rights marches.
The film portrays some of the relationship troubles Rustin had, along with his professional struggles. Yet, with determination and skill he is able to win people to his side and lay the foundation for what would come next for the fight for civil rights. He has to maneuver through political setbacks, attacks from the press, and his own relationships in order to pull off the event.
It’s no surprise to anyone now that the event was successful but the film does a good job of portraying just how much effort went into it becoming a reality in the first place. If you don’t know the story behind it, the film does a decent job of capturing what was going on at the time but it obviously can’t cover everything.
The performance
If you are already familiar with the story of Rustin’s role in the March on Washington then the reason to watch the film lies in the portrayal of the man by Colman Domingo. It is a powerhouse of a performance and Domingo sells every second of screen time he is in. We can feel his pain and see his determination every time he is in a scene. Domingo is most definitely an actor who is deft enough to play an actual figure from history with believability and aplomb.
While the film overall leaves some things to be desired, for example the mashing together of several of Rustin’s real life relationships into one or two characters, the performance is flat out outstanding.
Bayard Rustin’s tale in the organization of the March on Washington is a story that should be told more often, however, focusing only on this time period leaves so much of the man’s life out of the film that it is almost incorrect to call this a biopic.
I would love to have seen a longer film, starring Colman Domingo, that truly went in depth into the entirety of Bayard Rustin’s life. But I cannot fault the performance one bit.
In conclusion
While this film is not perfect, and the directing and cinematography are nothing exceptional, the acting on the part of Colman Domingo is worth the price of admission. And the film, at least, begins to shine a spotlight on a man who was a true pioneer in the work of civil rights and social justice.
As good as this performance was by Colman Domingo, I think he is still a long shot for winning the Best Actor Oscar this year. He has some incredibly talented competition in the category. But, with a performance such as this one, he’s sure to have another shot in coming years.
Hey film fans! Slick Dungeon here back to review another Oscar nominated movie for you. This one tells the tale of a determined swimmer who achieved the nearly impossible, and did it far later in life than anyone would expect. The movie has two Oscar nominations, one for Annette Benning for Best Actress, and one for Jodie Foster as Best Supporting Actress. Do be warned there will be spoilers below for the film, and a sports event you could easily google. Still, if you hate that sort of thing just keep swimming away until you watch the movie and then swim on back here to read the review.
⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 3 out of 5.
What’s it About?
You know how everyone is feeling super hero movie fatigue right about now? Well, I’ve had film fatigue for a different genre of film for a long time. The inspirational sports drama film fatigue. I honestly can’t say I have seen anything new in this kind of movie since Rudy. Typically in these films there is an athlete or a team with the desire to win something or do something that hasn’t been done in sports. The said athlete or team faces adversity and challenges and nearly gives up. But in the end something changes and they become more determined and push on through the obstacles to win said game, medal, record etc. It can be moving and inspiring but it’s nothing unexpected. I wish I could say Nyad pulled me out of this fatigue but far from it.
This is not to say the real life Diana Nyad is anything other than an incredible inspiration with an amazing story. And this is also not to say that there weren’t stand out performances in this film. I’m just saying you aren’t going to find anything you don’t expect here.
The film tells the tale of Diana Nyad (Benning) who tried several times in her life to swim the Straits of Florida unassisted until she accomplished her goal. This swim is one of the most difficult open water swims possible and everything from severe weather to dangerous ocean life, not to mention the currents themselves, could easily derail the best swimmers in history.
When she was young and a star swimmer in her twenties, Nyad attempts the swim. She does the best she can but ultimately she can’t make it.
We then fast forward to Diana in her sixties. She’s had a successful career and is basically troubled by the lack of exceptionalism in the world. Something, to her, is missing. She spends most of her time with her friend, Bonnie Stoll (Foster). Her life is happy enough but she wants more.
Diana decides to once again hit the pool. She’s pushing herself to the limits to see if she could make another attempt at the swim she failed at decades ago. She tells Bonnie about her plan to get back out there and attempt the swim again.
A team is assembled around Diana and soon we have all the pieces for her to make another attempt. In this attempt the ocean currents push her off course far enough she has to quit.
Determined not to give up, Diana tries once again. This time she is injured by a box jellyfish which can be lethal to humans. She nearly dies.
Still determined not to give up, Diana tries again, this time after consulting with an expert on jellyfish who helps her create a protective suit. She goes out once again but this time is defeated by disastrous weather conditions.
By this point, Diana’s team are all pretty tired of making the attempts and try to convince her to give up. It goes so far that several of her key supporters quit, including Bonnie, her coach.
Finally, still determined not to give up, Diana apologizes to some of the members of her team and they all gradually, if reluctantly agree to make one more attempt. This time they face dangers and challenges but luck, weather, and the marine life are all favorable enough that Diana is close to completing the swim. She gets close to giving up, but Bonnie, Nyad’s coach and friend, hops in the water to give Diana one last inspirational speech to push her through. At long last, after four failed attempts at the most difficult swim in the world, Diana does the impossible and completes the swim.
Throughout the film we see flashbacks of Nyad’s childhood and see that her father inspired her to want to do the swim in the first place. We also see the darker side of her life as we get flashbacks of a coach who abused several young female swimmers. It’s not until after this man dies that Diana truly confronts her trauma and it’s not until after this that she completes the swim.
Also throughout the film we see Bonnie inspiring, pushing, consoling, and sometimes angering Diana all in an effort to get Diana to push through and give her all. Diana’s obsession nearly ruins the lives of several people in her orbit but ultimately, through Bonnie’s leadership they prevail.
The Performances
While this type of movie may be a formula I am tired of, I can separate out the performances here. Annette Benning gives an impressive, if stoic performance. Physically this film must have taken a lot out of her as I am sure she had to spend hundreds of hours swimming. As far as the character of Nyad goes, she doesn’t seem to have much character growth. She basically goes from determined to even more determined. And while, in life, this makes for an interesting person, on film it feels rather dull. Annete Benning does transform well into her character but other than be determined enough to win the race, and mildly change her attitude towards her past and her teammates, not much happens here.
On the other hand, Bonnie, played by Jodie Foster, goes through a roller coaster of emotions. She has to deal with an entire team of people, including an athlete that is so obsessive she nearly bankrupts her whole team. Bonnie goes from reluctant coach to cheerleader, to caring friend, to knowing just the right thing to say at the right moment. Foster’s performance here is impressive and brings much needed life to the film. When Foster is encouraging Nyad to walk the few feet of sand she has to in order to ultimately complete the swim, you can feel how emotional it is for her. To be fair, Benning’s face was covered up with lots of prosthetics in this scene so it’s harder to read to begin with. But when the camera looks at Foster, it’s easy to see she is giving her all to the character.
I don’t know if either actress will win in their categories but between the two performances, I think Foster’s is the stronger of the two.
In Conclusion
The story truly is inspirational but I’m not sure the film does it full justice. The performances by the lead and supporting actresses are impressive but may not be the best ones of the year. The directing, cinematography and all the rest of it is fine but not incredible. The reason to watch is definitely for the performances but the rest is just what you would see in any of those inspirational sports films.
If you haven’t seen this movie and you are curious about the performances of the two actresses then give it a watch. But, if you are looking for inventive film making or a different kind of sports film, this is not going to scratch that itch. The most notable part of the story is the actual accomplishments of the real Diana Nyad and I think if you were to watch a documentary or read an article about her, you’ll likely find it more inspirational than the biopic here.
Strange Tales #110 Photo Credit: Marvel, Writers: Stan Lee, Ernie Hart, Artist: Dick Ayers
Strange Tales #110 is a landmark issue in the history of Marvel 616. It establishes repeat villains teaming up against one of our heroes and contains the introduction of a new hero to the universe. Because there are two important stories here, I will be splitting my review of the issue up into two parts. This time I will be going over the A story, which features Johnny Storm in his most intense battle to date against not one but two of his mortal foes.
Villain team ups are pretty standard these days. They show up in comics constantly and there have even been a few movies and television shows where we’ve seen this happen. DC had perfected this type of story long before the Marvel 616 universe started to do it. But, it is always interesting when a hero we know has to go up against a new combination of evil characters. Johnny Storm, aka, The Human Torch has had his share of enemies both on his own and with his family The Fantastic Four. Two of the most dangerous for him were The Wizard and Paste-Pot Pete. The Wizard uses all kinds of gadgets and tricks to trap the hero while Paste-Pot Pete has a special glue gun that proves surprisingly adept at trapping Johnny. Ridiculous names aside, these guys are dangerous.
The issue starts with a teaser page, like most of the early 616 universe does but this one has my favorite pre-read warning so far where we are told to be cautious if we have a heart condition before we read on.
The story then gets going with a few panels showing Johnny Storm making his way as The Human Torch through an obstacle course he has set up for himself. He is compared to a trained athlete but it is noted that if Johnny makes a mistake, he doesn’t lose a game, he could lose his life.
Johnny next hits his school books which at one point mentions wizards. This gets Johnny’s mind drifting and he starts to remember The Wizard who he faced off against in the past. He takes a look at his scrapbook and we get a flashback scene reminding us of the last time Johnny faced The Wizard. This is a pretty common technique in the earlier Marvel 616 stories because they could reuse old art and fill up pages at the same time with adding just a bit of narration.
And, of course, it’s not just The Wizard who gets this treatment. We next see Johnny reminisce about ol’ Paste-Pot Pete himself. For a guy with a paste gun he sure got close to getting rid of Johnny. He had The Human Torch strapped to a missile and everything.
At the end of his reminiscing, Johnny wonders where both The Wizard and Paste-Pot Pete are now and what they are doing. It’s no surprise to the modern reader that we then find out, and it’s not good.
Paste-Pot Pete has returned to the country and he is clearly looking for revenge against The Human Torch. Pete realizes he alone is not enough to go against the super hero and he remembers how The Wizard nearly took Johnny out. The only problem? The Wizard is in solitary confinement at a place called Cortraz Penitentiary. And The Wizard still holds just as much of a grudge as Pete does.
Luckily for The Wizard, Paste-Pot Pete has some truly incredible paste. It’s so good, it can be used to make powerful binocular lenses.
Pete figures out the delivery schedule for the food supply trucks and hijacks it. Paste-Pot Pete makes his way into the jail and he is apparently a quick draw with the paste gun because none of the guards are fast enough to stop him. He then uses the same gun to glue onto The Wizard’s cell door and uses the, “reverse suction switch” on his gun to pull the door off.
Needless to say, The Wizard is all in on the plan to get our favorite hothead. The Wizard even has a little gas pellet he cooked up in prison that blows the gates open so the pair can make their escape.
But, like any good super villain team up, there is tension almost from the start. The Wizard basically starts giving Pete orders which he doesn’t take too kindly to. The plan is to first discredit and humiliate The Human Torch and then defeat him permanently.
Immediately they frame Johnny for being a spy. Reed and the rest of the FF call Johnny up to make sure he is okay. Johnny basically takes this the wrong way thinking his team thinks he can’t handle himself.
Johnny is ridiculed at school for being a traitor although some kids defend him. Not being one to take this sort of thing lightly, Johnny has a plan.
We switch perspectives back to the villains who read in the newspaper that one of the world’s richest men is going to arrive in town. The Wizard plans to wait until the man takes his nightly walk and then rob him. He’s also going to frame Johnny for this by wearing his asbestos suit, making it look like it’s Johnny in the dark.
Rest assured The Human Torch has this well in hand as it’s him who was walking down the street. He was just disguised.
The villains run back into their house where The Wizard has laid several traps for our hero. They get Johnny into a room which is basically a hall of mirrors. The Human Torch flounders for a bit as he tries to find a way out.
Johnny gives up momentarily and asks the bad guys what is next. They tell him they are going to flood the room with a fire extinguishing liquid The Wizard has invented. But first, Paste-Pot Pete pastes The Torch to the floor.
The villains then make the classic villain mistake of leaving the hero. Johnny thinks fast and makes a flame version of himself. He then burns the paste off of his feet to free himself. He then uses as much heat as he can to burn his way out through the ceiling of the room.
In another part of the house, the bad guys put their little contraption to work and watch what they think will be Johnny’s demise. But they soon notice that the figure disappears. This does give Johnny just enough time to recharge his power and come after the bad guys. Pete and The Wizard aren’t exactly friends but they both basically vow their revenge on Johnny as they are taken away by the police.
The kids at school are once again fans of The Human Torch and Johnny complains he missed so much schoolwork because of needing to fight the bad guys. And this is where the story ends.
While this may not have been overly groundbreaking it was a fun story and it showcased how even minor villains teaming up against a Marvel hero could make things much more difficult. Over the years, The Fantastic Four and The Human Torch alone will be dealing with plenty of villains getting together.
If this was the only story in this issue relevant to Marvel 616 it might only be mildly interesting. Yet this issue has something else worth noting.
Next up on the reading list we’ll be reading about the introduction of the sorcerer supreme himself as we see Dr. Strange in Strange Tales #110 [C story]!
Hey there film fans, it’s Slick Dungeon! I’m back to review another Oscar nominated film. This time I’ll be reviewing the latest entry from powerhouse animation studio Disney/Pixar, Elemental. The film is about a hotheaded element who meets an element fluid enough to go with the flow. Be forewarned there will be spoilers below so if that sort of thing bothers you, watch the movie and then come on back here to read the review.
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 3.5 out of 5.
What’s it about?
While on the surface this is basically a rom-com with most of the trappings you find in that genre, at its core, Elemental is about the immigrant experience. There is a big city where most elements live called Element City. This city has lots of air, earth, and water elements. More rare are fire elements.
Two such elements are Bernie and Cindie Ember. They immigrate to Element City with their daughter Ember and set up a shop called The Fireplace. With them, they also bring their blue flame which represents their traditions and culture.
Things seem to go relatively well at first. Bernie is successful at his business and he promises the store to his daughter once she is ready. Bernie does seem to have a serious dislike for all water elements. And while Ember is good at most things in the store, she does have a tendency to lose her temper at customers. Also, in general, the community is not entirely accepting of fire elements because, well, they can catch things on fire, and that would be bad.
We jump ahead a few years and Ember is grown up. She’s still helping her father with the store most days but he is near retirement. Ember has one last thing to do to prove herself. She has to get through the red dot sale day without losing her temper. The sale starts and things go okay at first but customers are customers and soon Ember heads down to the basement to let off some steam. She heats up and soon a pipe in the shop bursts. It looks like Ember has ruined the day.
But then, a city inspector comes out of the pipe. This is Wade Ripple who is a water element. He is horrified at the state of the shop but sympathizes with Ember. Still, he has to do his job and he writes up some citations that could get the shop closed down.
Ember does everything she can to convince Wade to ditch the citations but she’s too late and it’s out of his hands. But he is again sympathetic to her situation and allows her to meet some of the higher ups who could reverse the ruling.
In the process of all this, Ember ends up lying to her father about what happened to the shop. Wade and Ember also discover that the real problem has to do with the gate of the city.
As you can guess, in any rom-com, the lies pile up, the romance heats up, and it all comes to a head in a disastrous situation. But, in the end, things work out. Ember and her father are still on good terms even though she has decided not to run the family store and even though she is dating a water element.
The Animation
As with any Pixar film, the animation here is incredibly good. The design of the elements themselves is fun and enjoyable and the backgrounds make an entirely fictional setting look basically real.
This type of skill is what has won Pixar plenty of Oscars in the past but I would not say this film is breaking any new ground in animation here. While the style is good and it matches the story well, there isn’t anything we haven’t seen before visually. That’s not to say it is not an impressive feat. To still be this good at making an animated story work is saying something in and of itself. Pixar has nothing to be ashamed about in this film and I am not sure why it didn’t catch on with audiences so well. I think perhaps the marketing is to blame but if you have not seen it, this is worth a watch for the visual experience alone.
The Voice Acting
As far as the voice acting talent goes in this film, it is spot on and perfectly cast. All of the characters sound like you would expect them to and this, combined with the great animation makes for a very engaging viewing experience.
In conclusion
While the animation is great and the story is solid, in a lot of ways this film feels too conventional. It is nice to see the immigrant experience depicted in animation and I think that will resonate with a lot of audiences. The love story is fairly standard and ends the way you most likely guessed it would end. However, the film doesn’t quite push enough envelopes to make it stand out over other Pixar films. It is undoubtedly one of the best animated films of the year but I don’t think it is, in fact, the best one.
As far as whether this film will win an Oscar, my prediction is it is between Elemental and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Either one could win but my money is on Spider-Man. (Please don’t bet on anything based on my predictions because I am often wrong.)
Well, hello there film fans! Slick Dungeon here, back to review a bit of an oddball of a film full of grit, determination, innovation, exaggerations, Cheeto dust, and a potential Oscar winner. I am talking, of course, about the “true” story of Flamin’ Hot, telling the tale of how one of the spiciest snacks in the world came to be. Somehow this film is full of controversy, more inspiring than expected, and an Oscar contender. That’s right, this movie could technically win an Oscar. Fair warning, if you don’t want your eyes tearing up as if you’ve inhaled that famous fiery red orange concoction, this review contains spoilers. You have been warned. Although, can you really spoil a product line? Um, yeah I guess you can. Anyway, if you want to watch the movie first to stay spoiler free, do that and then come on back here for the review.
⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 3 out of 5.
What’s the Story?
Before I get into the review, there is, strangely, a bit of background to cover here. Flamin’ Hot is meant to depict a real life story about a man who goes from janitor at a Frito Lay manufacturing plant to inspirational executive at Frito Lay, opening up a new market with an innovative product line. Only… that may not be the full truth here. There have been multiple articles debunking the story of Flamin’ Hot in places like The New York Times, The LA Times, and NPR.
Regardless of the controversy, the filmmakers charged forward with making this movie, claiming the story was never about Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, but actually the story of the life of Richard Montanez. There are some facts here which are not in dispute at all. Montanez was, indeed, a janitor at Frito Lay. And he did become a top executive of PepsiCo. To me, that can be inspirational all on its own and anyone who can claim that sort of accomplishment should be proud.
What’s a little less clear is if he actually had the idea of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos or if it was more of a high level executive group idea.
I’m not here to figure out what the truth is. This ain’t that kinda blog. What I am here to do, is review movies. So I’m going to take this from the perspective of a film goer and see if the movie works, if it is worth watching, and how well it was made.
Why Review This?
There are a lot of movies out there. Personally, I am not in favor of this trend we have where the movies have started becoming not stories of people but products. Take for example, Air, Blackberry, and Tetris. While these are technically about the people behind the products, one could argue these films are nothing but one giant advertisement for said product. Heck, even Barbie could be considered that but at least it isn’t trying to say it’s based on a true story.
In the case of Flamin’ Hot, we have another, “based on a true story” style film about a product line. But here’s the thing. This year I want to try to review every film that is up for any kind of an Oscar in 2024. (Don’t hold me to that, there are a ton of movies on that list but I will do my best) And guess what? Flamin’ Hot is nominated for an Oscar. Best Picture? Nope. Best Director? Nope. Best Actor? Nope. This movie is nominated for… Best Original Song.
Yeah, so even if the movie itself is embroiled in some controversy, even if the story is pushing one that is more favorable to a whole corporation than to a single movie goer, the song could still be the best one in film from 2023. The song that is nominated is called The Fire Inside with music and lyrics by Diane Warren. Will it win? Never take my predictions as true on Oscar stuff because I have a pretty low percentage of being right. However, my prediction is this will not win best song because it has too much competition from Barbie.
By the way, the song only shows up during the credits so I watched the whole movie just for that. Since I did watch it, I might as well tell you about it. Spoilers follow.
A rough beginning
Richard Montanez is a hard working kid in southern California. He stands out in school where most of his classmates are white and they make fun of him for being Mexican and eating burritos. Not one to overlook an opportunity, Richard has the idea of letting some of the white school kids eat one of his burritos. The kid loves the burrito because, well because burritos are amazing as everyone knows. So Richard decides to sell his burritos for a quarter to the kids at school. Already he has a solid head for business.
Unfortunately for Richard, rumors go around that he is not earning his money but stealing it. He ends up getting arrested and essentially gets caught up in a life of crime. This makes it difficult to get a stable job because he now has a criminal record and no formal education to speak of. However, he has a supportive wife, Judy, his friend from school. Richard is determined to go legitimate and after a bit of convincing and using his powers of networking and persuasion, Richard does land a job at Frito Lay. He’s working as a janitor and he has nothing to be ashamed of as he’s earning a decent paycheck, he’s stable enough although somewhat dependent on government assistance and things might be looking up.
Reaganomics
At first, it looks like Richard is going to make it big. He persistently asks knowledgable people about how the factory works, what the machines do, and it seems like he could be on the rise and able to do more than just clean factory floors. But, the 1980’s hit pretty hard when it came to cutbacks on government subsidies. Trickle down economics did absolutely nothing to help people in need, and inevitably, people began to lose jobs, corporations cut back on production, and Richard knew his job would soon be in jeopardy as well.
He basically stagnates in his role for a while as everyone just tries to hold on. Some of Richard’s friends get fired, no one seems to get promoted, and life, in general, is looking tough.
Video Created the Cheeto Star
Fate, it would seem, decides to step in. Richard watches a corporate video produced by the CEO of the company, Roger Enrico. In it, Enrico tells his workers to, “think like a CEO.” Yes, that’s right, a wealthy CEO is here to save everyone because somehow CEO’s have this magical ability to inspire people. (Insert sarcasm in that last sentence if you did not already)
Anyway, Richard does take this advice to heart. And he realizes a few things. First, Frito-Lay is not actually serving the market of the Latino population. They don’t seem to buy the chips. Second, there are spicy flavors everywhere. True inspiration hits though when Richard is consoling his sons as they eat elotes (Mexican street corn), and his son yelps that it burns. Richard asks if his kid is okay and the kid responds, “I like it. It burns good.”
If you have ever enjoyed a bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos you know exactly what that kid is saying.
Between this incident and the video from the CEO, inspiration has struck. Richard is about to change the world. Maybe not the world, he’s about to change food. Maybe not food, he’s about to change snack food. Yeah I think that’s where it lands.
Cue the Flamin’ HOt Montage
We see scenes of Richard and Judy taking unseasoned chips from the factory and trying every kind of hot seasoning they know of until they get their kid to say it, “burns good.” At the same time, some corporate dudes in lab coats are basically trying to do the same thing. In the movie, Richard says he doesn’t really know what was going on with that and this is basically the heart of the real life controversy. Were the spicy chips being produced by lab scientists paid by a corporation or did one guy have the idea to make the spicy powder? Or maybe both happened at sort of the same time. Who knows? Not me. Anyway, back to the review.
Finally, the recipe is perfected and Richard is happy with it. But there’s one huge snag. He’s the lowly janitor. Who is going to listen to him? Well, Richard decides he could call the CEO of the company. He does so, and miraculously ends up on the line with Roger Enrico. Richard has the power of persuasion and he’s able to convince Enrico they need to add a product line and save everyone’s jobs. Enrico is kindly, perceptive, and can relate to his workers. He behaves just like every company would want you to believe their CEO acts. Not in the interest of themselves or their shareholders. No, that would be beneath them. Enrico is a man of the people and he listens to his workers. Well, he supposedly did once at least anyway, according to the movie.
Enrico tells Richard to send him a box of the Flamin’ Hot chips and guess what? Enrico likes them.
Cue the moment our hero overcomes hardship and we all know we can’t live without a specific product
Even with Enrico’s approval it’s still a struggle to launch Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. Richard is allowed to make 5,000 bags and put them on shelves. But, at first, they don’t sell. Why not? Lack of advertising! Richard gets friends and family from his neighborhood, factory workers, and basically anyone who will listen to hit the streets, pass out the chips and build buzz for the product. He specifically wants to target the Latino community which is underserved by Frito-Lay at this time.
This all turns out successfully and, as you probably know, there are a metric ton of Flamin’ Hot products flying off the shelves today. Richard moves up in life from janitor and becomes known as the, “Godfather of Latino Marketing.”
And the world becomes a happier place because we can eat Flamin’ Hot Cheetos.
In Conclusion
Is this film worth watching? It was certainly entertaining, mostly due to the enjoyable performance of Jesse Garcia as Richard Montanez. The directing was competent on the part of Eva Longoria but nothing spectacular.
In the end Montanez being known for marketing fits really well with the film because this movie is basically marketing a brand. It’s trying to say that the Latino market was not being noticed by PepsiCo and thanks to the vision of one man, the company changed what it was doing which profited both the company and the community. Even if this story were completely true, this is still marketing. It’s trying to show PepsiCo and Montanez in the best light possible. It’s what companies want us to think about both their executives and themselves.
As far as a bit of entertainment, this film is fine. It’s not Flamin’ Hot though. It’s just average.
That being said, will there be Flamin’ Hot Cheeto dust on my fingers this Sunday when I watch the Super Bowl? Absolutely.
Happy Friday everyone! Hope you all are having a good week. Here’s a little story I wrote, hope you like it!
At Death’s Door by Adam wright
Dee sat at her desk, laptop in front of her, warm coffee in hand and logged into the system. She worked her way through the myriad of safety and security protocols to enter the system. Putting in passwords when prompted, authenticating when needed, and feeling like this would never end, she barely registered Gary walking into her office.
Gary stood there in his slim fit suit, simple black tie and clean cut hair and cleared his throat. Dee ignored him. She opened her inbox and saw the backlog of work she had to do. Overdue on more projects than she cared to count, she knew answering Gary would delay things further.
Gary knocked three times, the sound echoing in the little office. He wasn’t going away anytime soon. Dee noticed a slip of pink paper in his hand and had the sudden realization that this conversation was about to get serious.
“What do you want, Gary? I’m pretty busy. As always.”
“It’s not what I want. It’s from upstairs. We need to talk.”
Shit. Anything from upstairs was a pain. Hell, anything from downstairs was a pain also. But you can’t just ignore the orders from above, even if the messenger here was the most annoying person in the whole damn office.
“I’m listening. What do they want?” Dee tried to keep her focus on the laptop but her ears began echoing in her head, the sounds of the outside world trying to crash in on her.
“First off, you have to know, Dee… if I can call you Dee… this isn’t from me.”
“Obviously. You already said it’s from upstairs.”
Gary’s hand shook as he stuck out the paper towards Dee. She didn’t take it.
“Okay, so just, please remember, I like you. It’s bad news but I don’t want it this way, they do. There’s nothing I can do to change their minds. They’re letting you go.”
Dee resisted the impulse to throw her coffee at Gary. She knew that would accomplish nothing. This was the time for a rational adult conversation.
“What does that mean exactly? Letting me go? Do they have any idea how important what I do is?”
Gary scratched at his collar but kept the pink slip in his hand.
“Look… it means what it sounds like. You don’t work here anymore. Your services are no longer needed. In fact, it is kind of unclear what you do. You show up here every day, same time, same coffee in hand. You log in, you go through an inbox and then what? What exactly happens at that point?”
Dee let out a long sigh. Explaining this to Gary would be impossible. Explaining to those upstairs was nearly impossible too. That didn’t mean her services were not absolutely essential.
“Trust me. Without my services things are going to get… messy. There’ll be a lot of clean up nobody wants. I’m happy to sit here and do my job. I like my job. I’m not bothering anyone else. I just do my thing, wait for the annual check in, and move on with my life. What’s wrong with that?”
Gary crossed his arms, a sure sign he was losing patience. He set the pink slip of paper on Dee’s desk. She didn’t touch it.
“You’re not making any forward progress. Where’s your ambition? Where are your career goals? I mean, you’ve been doing the same thing day in and day out forever. It’s time for a change. It’ll be good for you. Good for all of us. We all need a change. Now’s the time for you to change too.”
Dee rocked back in her swivel chair and took in a deep breath.
“Gary, you have to just trust me on this. If I am gone, this place is going to have issues. Real issues. The people upstairs, and the people downstairs, are going to have to get involved. No one wants that, do they?”
Gary’s expression changed to one of feigned sympathy. Dee didn’t know why the people upstairs were such cowards. They should at least have had the guts to get rid of her themselves.
“I don’t have any choice here, Dee. I can help you pack up. Hell, I’ll buy you an iced latte on the way out. Don’t make me call security. Please?”
“Have they said I have done a bad job? Violated any rules?”
“No.”
“Then what ground do they have to stand on?”
Gary suppressed a small laugh.
“You know they never have been the type to stand on firm ground. But it’s orders. I have to carry out orders. Can’t you just go peacefully?”
Dee clutched her coffee and stood up. She grabbed her gray wool coat and her red leather purse and looked Gary in the eyes.
“I’m not doing anything that isn’t peaceful. I’m just telling you, this is a mistake. And it’s going to be costly. But, as you say, orders are orders. I’ll get my stuff and go. Just remember this: When you all want to bring me back in and ask me to clean up the whole mess, the answer is no.”
Her dignity intact, Dee walked out of the office and onto the street. All she had to do was wait. She was at a busy intersection where cars flew past, bikers made their way precariously in the bike lanes, and pedestrians jostled past one another.
Twenty minutes later, it happened. A Ford Mustang hit a tan SUV in the intersection, a bicyclist caught between them. A head on collision, one that left no room for doubt about the fate of the bicyclist. Except, Dee no longer had a job. There was nothing she could do. The bicyclist stood, a piece of metal jutting out of his chest. It should have impaled him to death. He screamed in agony. There was still nothing Dee could do. He was going to be the first of many to meet such a fate. Reluctantly, she walked away, feeling the cool breeze on her face.
She walked the earth in those later days, watching all the pain go around, never able to end it. She wanted to help. But death was out of a job.
Tales of Suspense 42 Photo Credit: Marvel Writers: Stan Lee, Robert Bernstein Artist: Don Heck
One of the harsh realities of reading all of Marvel 616 in order is you can come across a really engaging and landmark issue, as with the introduction of The Wasp in Tales to Astonish #44, only to have it be followed up with a rather bland and boring story the next issue. This is the case with Tales of Suspense #42. It stars Tony Stark aka Iron Man doing what Iron Man does. Fighting communists. Over and over and over again. That’s not to say I am not interested in reading those stories but at this point they are getting repetitive and at times seem designed just to fill pages. To be fair, they had to come up with a lot of content at the time on multiple comics so there is no way all of the stories are going to be great.
This issue starts with a page promising we’ll have a shocking surprise coming to us, “as the knight in shining armor walks straight into this, the greatest danger he has ever faced!” It shows Iron Man walking into the lair of someone named The Red Barbarian.
The action begins on a boat where a group of spies is proud of themselves for stealing the latest American atomic bomb. They figure they will be well rewarded by this Red Barbarian but to make sure everything is looking good, they decide to open the crate with the bomb.
But to their surprise, Iron Man is waiting in the crate. Turns out the whole thing was a setup by the F.B.I. Iron Man stops the crooks with the use of some of his patented transistor technology and uses magnets to cause their guns to fire away from him. The overhead magnet is so strong, in fact, that it pulls the bad guys up with the guns. Not sure why they didn’t think to let go of their weapons but we’ll just figure they panicked. Iron Man also explains his armor contains alloys that reject magnetic attraction so he is not affected by the magnet. Glad we got that cleared up!
The F.B.I. do show up to collect their prize but Tony warns them that the Red Barbarian is probably planning some new kind of mischief. This person seems to be news to the F.B.I. and all Tony really knows is the bad guy is known for his brutality and lives somewhere behind the iron curtain. So, not a lot to go on.
We next see Tony changing out of his Iron Man suit and going back to his lab. He is now storing his suit in a suitcase and he is working on what he calls a, “pocket-size disintegrator ray.”
We see his heavily guarded lab as Tony takes comfort in the fact that no spy can get inside. Tony then demonstrates his ray to the U.S. Military. He is able to disintegrate tanks and walls and tells the men how it could be adapted to destroy whole enemy fleets. He does warn them that it is not yet perfected. The military is suitably impressed and everyone realizes how devastating it would be if the technology got into enemy hands.
The scene then shifts to The Red Barbarian’s headquarters where his men tell him of Tony’s new weapon. He demands the plans but his men say Stark’s compound is impenetrable, after which The Red Barbarian throws a ham at the messenger and threatens to shoot his incompetent staff.
As he is in his rage, The Red Barbarian is interrupted by someone who he thinks is Comrade K, a high ranking general in the communist party. This, however, is a ruse. The man is really someone who calls himself The Actor. He is able to mimic the look and manners of anyone he sees and claims to be the ultimate spy. The Actor changes his look to that of Tony Stark and claims he can steal all of Stark’s plans. The Red Barbarian hires him on the spot, promising him anything he wishes. The Red Barbarian also warns of what will happen should The Actor fail.
The Actor is quite bold in his claims as he says he can defeat both Tony Stark and Iron Man. He puts his plan into action by first impersonating a famous actor so he can get into the United States. The Actor then goes to the telegraph office in Washington D.C. and impersonates a senator. Next he finds the communist spies in the area to help him fake an entrance into Stark’s lab while Stark is away.
The Actor shows up at Stark’s lab once he knows Stark is gone. He tells the guards there, who assume he is Tony Stark, that the Pentagon meeting was cancelled and he has returned to his lab to do some work. The guards do try to stop the men with The Actor but he claims they are top men of the Pentagon and his office is open to them.
The ruse works well enough to get The Actor into the office where they go about the task of raiding Stark’s plans. While doing this, The Actor finds parts of Iron Man’s suit and puts the pieces together. He knows Stark is Iron Man. Deciding to keep the information to himself in case his life is threatened, he has the others find the plans for the disintegration ray. The Actor takes the plans and tells his men to wait for Stark and assassinate him when he returns. As Stark, The Actor dismisses all of Tony’s usual guards, telling them the Pentagon men will do the guard duty for the night.
The real Stark, realizing the invitation from the senator to the Pentagon was a fake, returns to his lab. The bad guys try to kill him but luckily he is still wearing his Iron Man chest plate under his clothes. Stark kills the lights and gets into his full armor and makes short work of the bad guys. He gets them to tell him why they are there, where to find The Red Barbarian, and when The Actor is scheduled to meet with his employer. To get there, Stark has to take a missile in order to arrive in time. The missile launch is successful and Stark arrives where he intended.
He stops The Actor who is driving on his way toward the headquarters. Iron Man basically folds up The Actor’s car as a way to keep the guy in place. He gags The Actor and walks right into The Red Barbarian’s headquarters.
Iron Man tells the bad guys he is The Actor and gives The Red Barbarian an attache case with a timed lock on it. He tells the The Red Barbarian the lock is a miniature atom bomb. Tony then leaves and goes back to let The Actor out of his trap. Tony flies away.
The Actor goes to The Red Barbarian to apologize for not giving him the disintegrator ray plans. The Red Barbarian flips out on The Actor and basically ends up shooting the guy (although we never see a body so who knows?).
Tony hears all this as he flies off and the story ends there.
While there are some mildly interesting things here, such as how close Stark is with the government, and how secure his compound is, for the most part this story is a bit of a dud. The bad guys are drawn like crude caricatures and borderline offensive. There are a couple of neat tricks like the suitcase for the Iron Man suit but we don’t learn much new here. It’s a passable story about espionage but it just doesn’t quite grab the reader and it really doesn’t help us understand Tony Stark or Iron Man more than we already do.
There are a couple of non-cannon stories in this issue of Tales of Suspense, one about a haunted house and one about a prisoner in the future who is taken to space. Both are much shorter than the Iron Man story and actually a bit more engaging in this case, although with decidedly less heroics. Those don’t count at all toward the larger story though.
Next up on the reading order we’re catching up once again with the hothead Johnny Storm as we read about him in the pages of Strange Tales #110!
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SYNOPSIS
Why escape death by demon just to die at the hands of heroes?’
Taitu Jathaeri, a sixteen-year-old girl with arcane gifts, is impatient to leave her matriarchal home island to train at Mecanta’s Academy of the Arcane Arts. But when her guardian, a recluse witch, is murdered, Taitu is tasked to go to the dreaded mainland, find a mage in the ruins of Old Anvadore, and give him the artefact Arjanna has hidden for twenty years. But Arjanna had many secrets. The young Thorn must learn who to trust and whether the murderers who are now pursuing her could be her salvation or her ruin. Has she unwittingly chosen the wrong side in a war that will release an ancient corrupting evil into the world of Itania?
To Save a Thorn is the second book of the Aerieti Chronicles of the Fall series. It’s largely self-contained and easy to follow without having to read the first book. That being said, reading them both adds context.
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Taitu Jathaeri is a bit unusual in her little island community. She is able to cast magic, unlike most of the women who live on her home island of Ilja. The island is mostly comprised of women who live there in a matriarchal society. Due to her magic, Taitu is given to Arjanna, the only other person capable of casting magic on the island, to raise. Although grateful to Arjanna, Taitu still misses her mother and wishes to go to the mainland to learn more about how to wield her magic. Yet, there seems to be more to Arjanna than Taitu knew when a group of strangers attack and Arjanna taks Taitu with keeping a secret artifact safe and getting it to a mysterious stranger far away.
On her journey, Taitu encounters people who want to recover the artifact but are they trying to harm Taitu or save her?
Like the first book in the series, To Save a Thorn has a charming protagonist who you can’t help but cheer for as she makes her way in the world. The story is full of fun and magic and a thoroughly enjoyable read. If you read the first book in the series, it will be a bit easier to pick up on who is trying to help and who is trying to harm Taitu but either way you can read this volume as a stand alone book. This volume brings along some characters from the first book but introduces us to plenty of new ones.
The book fits in well to the larger story and it will be interesting to see where the series goes from this point on.
If you enjoy fun fantasy adventures with lots of different creatures, magic throughout the world, and charming protagonists, this book is for you.
Note: this review was first posted on Reedsy Discovery, an awesome website that pairs independent authors and readers. To see the post there, click here.
If you are a book reviewer and want to contribute reviews on Reedsy Discovery, click here.
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SYNOPSIS
The Reset is a culmination of worlds colliding, timelines interweaving, and relationships that seemed indestructible, reaching dire breaking points.
Vincent gets in the midst of an international political crisis forged by his adversary, Philip Nardin. As he tirelessly works to offset the impact, Philip kidnaps Nozomi, Vincent’s daughter. In an endgame decision, Vincent relinquishes his time-correcting powers to Philip while the world leaders launch a devastating arms race to weaponize Intreton—the purest energy source that can alter reality if mishandled. The two opponents, Vincent and Philip, unite against political and military forces to save reality from crumbling. Their plan reveals a mind-bending past and the identity of a time-twisted villain Philip calls the Lunatic. Such revelation leads to a dramatic conclusion and opens the possibility of a Reset. As someone close to Vincent shows their true self, Vincent discovers that Nozomi’s complex ties to Emika and Akane may hold the key to the Reset in this time-hopping clash of love, egos, and desires.
A story of love that transcends time and reality, and the sacrifices masquerading as selfish acts, the final book of the award-winning Time Corrector series is a whirlwind of unexpected events—many questions will finally be answered.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 5 out of 5.
Dr. Vincent Abajian is a brilliant man who has a team of brilliant people around him. He’s been able to master Intreton, a substance that allows him to travel through time and even across realities. There are moments in his life we keep revisiting as readers but each time more complexities are revealed and we can see more of what each action means. The story is complex and intricate, much like a fine watch or brilliant piece of classical music can be. The third book in The Time Corrector series manages the nearly impossible by not only tying the first two books together perfectly and concluding in a satisfying manner, it still leaves the reader wishing for more.
If you had the power to change time, to change reality, to move the world in a more peaceful direction, what would you be willing to sacrifice? Would you be able to let go of ones you love in order to protect them? Can a selfish act mask one of kindness and love? These are some of the themes in The Reset. The book continues Avi Datta’s tradition of brilliant storytelling, non-linear plot making, and absolutely beautiful character development. Just when the reader thinks they have everything figured out, Datta will impress him or her with the most incredible twists and turns imaginable.
With each volume, this work becomes more and more brilliant. The intricate plot weaving is equal to the character development and as in the first two books, there are moments that completely change the reader’s perspective without feeling like a gimmick.
If there are any flaws in the series it may be that at times Dr. Abajian can occasionally be portrayed as too good and too brilliant but this is forgivable given the intricacies of the people surrounding him.
This is a series you must read from the beginning in order for it to make sense. If you have not already read The Winding and The Movement, do so before picking up the third volume.
If you enjoy expansive, non-linear storytelling, with a masterful plot and beautiful character development, this book is for you. If you just enjoy great books in general, this is a must read series.
Happy Friday folks! We don’t always know where inspiration comes from but sometimes we know the people who inspired us, even if they don’t know us. That’s what my story Inspiration is all about. I hope you enjoy it!
Inspiration by Adam wright
The store was poorly lit and Michael had to squint to see the titles on the graphic novels. He had walked past the aisles of men and women in capes, past the independent titles with questionable black and white art on the covers, and past the titles aimed at the really young kids littered with shiny ponies and round faced cartoon characters. He had made it to the bargain bins where you could get up to twenty comics for two dollars or fifty for five. The place where throw away stories went to die a quiet death but were afforded a last ditch opportunity to be discovered by someone who just needs one more issue to complete a collection. Michael wasn’t much of a fan of collectors.
When he was a kid, comics were seen as disposable. You read it, then you tossed it out, tore it up to line the bottom of a bird cage or used to wrap a gift. No one thought these things would ever be worth a damn. Hell, most of the people reading them didn’t think they were that spectacular to begin with. But time makes some things more valuable and some things less so. Michael, looking at his wrinkled hands as he thumbed through the pages and wondered which category he fell into. He decided it didn’t matter.
There was one good thing about the bargain bins. It meant that kids who had hardly any money could buy something to get themselves hooked on good stories. And Michael had to admit there were plenty of good stories out there. It was unpredictable what would hook a kid into loving a story. Sometimes it was as simple as a character that had a certain look, sometimes it was the drama of what happened in the story, or the nefarious villain that seemed so undefeatable to a young mind.
Michael spent a few minutes going through the bins when he discovered something he hadn’t expected. Right in front of him, in his hands, was an issue with his name on it. But not as the creator as he had expected. Michael thought about all those years with ink stained hands, painstakingly working at creating a picture. The pictures never quite looked like what he had in his head. Then came the dialogue. If the pictures were easy for him, it’s the words that killed him. He would spend hours sometimes just trying to make the ridiculous sound plausible. And finally the cover. That was the best part, the most fun part. He could do whatever he wanted and half the time it didn’t even have to relate to the story inside. The cover is what sold the thing.
This comic though, titled Michael Aarons: The Unsung Hero of Comics, had his own face on the cover. In it, he was standing next to a red brick wall. There was a street sign in the corner that marked the intersection of Cleveland St. and Grover Ave. It was where he spent most of his working life. He recognized it as a picture that was taken of him many years ago. The cover had a few things wrong. The wall was in a washed out sepia tone and he had one foot up, knee bent, his heel resting against the wall in a James Dean-like pose. That wall was always a bright and cheerful red, and Michael had never stood that way in his life. The artist must have altered the pose to “give it more action” as Michael himself used to say.
Michael took the comic out of the bin and pulled it out of the plastic in one quick movement. Collectors would have hated him if they had seen him do it. He opened the book, and licked his finger prior to flipping through the pages. Collectors would have hated that too.
Inside he found scenes from his own life. He saw his first wife and his second. The hair color on Gina was a deeper red than it should have been but it was close. He read how he was a pioneer in his field. Michael didn’t think that. They paid him to make funny books. That’s what they used to call them even when nothing was funny in them, and he did it for the pay. It didn’t amount to a lot of money but it was enough to buy a house with. It wasn’t enough to pay the alimony though, which is why he had to resort to some of the more questionable pulp novels he had cranked out. Those he never put his real name on but there were people who suspected it was him.
He didn’t really see much difference between the novels and the comics. Heroes sold and so did sex. If people wanted to buy it, all the better for Michael. He hadn’t ever thought of a biographical comic before. That was a new one to him. And one about his own life.
They put in all the things he had done professionally, like using the panels like a camera, doing an entire story from a first person point of view visually for the first time ever. They showed how he had intertwined his comics with other stories he had written, making them have what they called a shared universe. He just did it as a way to keep himself from getting bored.
What they left in was interesting but what they left out surprised him. There was no mention of his alcoholism. He didn’t see the years of himself drinking, virtually throwing away his relationship with his own son. Missing were the moments in his life where he had told fans that he couldn’t stand them. Missing was the lawsuit brought against him by his own publishers for not delivering on time. Missing was so much of his life but you could only fit a certain amount in the pages of a comic.
He stuffed the book back in its plastic, grabbed a stack of other books to buy without looking at them, then went up to the counter. The clerk was a young woman with purple hair wearing one of those air pod things in her ear. Michael assumed she was listening to music which was just fine with him. She barely looked up as she ran the issues through the scanner. Michael laid out his ten bucks, gave her a nod and went outside.
Just for an experiment, he leaned against the wall like the cover had him. It was awkward and uncomfortable and he hated it. There was a green trash can next to him. He tossed the comic of his life into it and walked away. He passed a young girl on the way, holding a crisp ten dollar bill in her hand.
Michael had long since driven away when the girl recognized his picture on the cover of a comic book.
She tucked it under her arm, hoping to find an incredible story. She wasn’t disappointed.
Tales to Astonish 44, Photo Credit: Marvel Writers: Stan Lee, Ernie Hart, Artist: Jack Kirby
Up to this point in the Marvel 616 comics we’ve had plenty of stories staring Henry Pym, aka Ant-Man. For the most part these have been short stories featuring our hero taking on crime of one kind or another. Quite often he has faced off against communists. We know he is a brilliant scientist who does secretive work for the government but it would be false to say we’ve ever gotten a full understanding of his motivations. There haven’t been any stories which really dive into his background, he’s just kind of there.
This all starts to change when Henry Pym gets his partner in peril in Tales to Astonish 44. This is both his first full length story and introduces The Wasp to the 616 universe.
Technically Tales to Astonish is an anthology series and in this issue there is a backup story after the main story of Ant-Man but as far as I can tell it does not relate to the rest of the 616 continuity. But this is still the most amount of pages dedicated to Ant-Man we have seen in a single issue. And, truth be told, at this point it was Ant-Man who was selling the magazine.
The issue starts with a teaser page that looks a lot like the cover but basically acknowledges that we haven’t really had a back story for Hank Pym up to this point and promises us one here.
The story itself starts with Ant-Man coming back from some heroic mission to his lab where he tells his ants to return to nature and lets them know he will call them again when needed. Pym releases his growth gas and goes back to human size.
Ant-Man takes a break and laments how he must always be alone and can’t reveal his secret identity to anyone. And he mentions someone named Maria for the first time.
It turns out, Maria, was Henry’s wife. We see in flashback panels that Henry and Maria went to Hungary for their honeymoon where Maria and her father had once been political prisoners. Hank has some valid concerns about going there but Maria says they won’t know her since she is now Mrs. Pym rather than Maria Trovaya.
For a brief moment in time the two have a good time together and Hank wishes he could always be on vacation with Maria. She replies that he is becoming a lazy husband and tells him her father always used to say. “go to the ants, thou dullard!” I think that’s supposed to just be a way of saying don’t be lazy but it lays the groundwork for Henry’s future fascination with ants.
The bliss cannot last long as Maria is kidnapped at gunpoint. Although Hank tries to stop the men, he gets pistol whipped and goes to the American embassy. While he is there, the embassy receives a call. Maria’s body was found with a note which said, “This is what happens to those who attempt to escape from behind the iron curtain!”
Now all this communist hunting Ant-Man has done in previous issues makes a heck of a lot more sense. The dude is looking to even the score. But as if that were not bad enough, as they attacked Maria in Hungary, back in the states they also blew up the lab where Maria’s father worked.
Hank storms out of there furious and vowing revenge. But within a few days he ends up in jail,”on the verge of a mental and physical breakdown!”
Henry Pym was unable to track down and find the killers but the American embassy has arranged for him to be set free and sent back to America.
Not knowing what else to do, Hank thinks about the past and about his wife. And then he remembers what she said. The funny part of this is that he actually misquotes her from a few panels before as he quotes her as, “Go to the ants, thou sluggard!”
Henry then works tirelessly to invent his reducing gas, perfect his cybernetic helmet and become Ant-Man. It has a Batman feel to it as Henry is basically vowing to wipe out crime because someone he cared about was a victim of it. The difference though is that Henry takes a decidedly scientific approach to it.
Back in the present, Ant-Man decides doing this himself is not going to be enough. What he wants is a partner who can carry on his mission in the case of his death. But he doesn’t know anyone he can trust with his secret identity and who would have the attitude to take on the task.
Just in case he ever does meet this person, Dr. Pym studies wasps and realizes he can shrink a human and give them wasp-like wings and antennae.
At that very moment, fate steps in as his doorbell rings. A Dr. Vernon Van Dyne has come to see the famous Pym. Dr. Van Dyne is also a scientist and he has brought his daughter Janet with him. Hank lets them in and is struck by how much Janet looks like his dead wife. Although, he admits she is not much more than a child at this point. Janet, for her part thinks Henry is handsome but figures he’s a bore since he is a bookish scientist.
Interestingly, what Dr. Van Dyne wants sounds more like something that would be worked on by Dr. Bruce Banner. he is working on a gamma-ray beam to pierce space and detect signals from other planets. Henry admits he has heard of Van Dyne’s work but says his specialty is in molecular cell transition and cell specialization. Van Dyne wants the beam strengthened but leaves Dr. Pym alone.
Despite the lack of help, Dr. Van Dyne is able to get his beam to work. This turns out to be his demise. Some vast, shapeless, darkness comes at him and starts to take form. This alien thing comes into the lab and Van Dyne asks what it is.
It tells him, “I am from the planet Kosmos deep in space! We of Kosmos are a fluid form of life! I escaped down the path of your ray to this, your planet!”
Dr. Van Dyne keys in on the word escaped and the creature admits it is a criminal who nearly enslaved his whole society. And he figures if he failed there, maybe he can succeed here on Earth.
The alien commands the good doctor to look into its eyes. Van Dyne tries to resist but is unable to. The creature smashes the lab and Janet returns to find an awful mist and her father dead. Not knowing what else to do, Janet calls Henry Pym because she knows her father trusted the man.
At first Henry Pym doesn’t believe Janet and thinks she is just a, “bored society playgirl” who is trying to get her kicks by making up stories. But in short order, ants confirm the situation through Pym’s cybernetic helmet.
He goes into action as Ant-Man and shows up at Dr. Van Dyne’s lab where Janet is understandably upset. Ant-Man tells her he is there to help. She thought he was a myth, which is odd, since there have been literal newspaper stories about him in the past but we’ll let that slide for now. Janet explains the situation and Hank figures out right away it had to be some kind of alien force to have done the type of damage to the lab he sees.
And in what seems to be the first instance of an Avenger wanting to avenge something, Janet Van Dyne knows what she wants to do. She wants to avenge her father.
Hank tells Janet to call the F.B.I. and ask for Lee Kearns and tell him what happened. He then instructs her to go to the lab of Henry Pym. Janet agrees.
Oddly, the ants that accompanied Ant-Man have left him alone. He catches up to them and asks why they left. They tell him that whatever was in there secrets formic acid like the ants do but it is alien and they are afraid. Henry has them take him back to his lab and spread out to look for the monster and go to the F.B.I. headquarters to see what they find out there.
Hank grows back to human size and meets Janet at the door. He asks if Janet really would do anything to avenge her father’s death and risk anything for justice. She says not only that but she wishes she could help track down all criminals.
For the first time ever, Dr. Henry Pym reveals to someone else that he is Ant-Man and tells Janet he needs a partner. It’s quite a fateful moment in the history of the 616 because here we have the foundations for what will one day become The Avengers. We’ve been introduced to Thor, Iron-Man, Ant-Man, The Hulk, and now The Wasp. It will still take some time but these are all founding members of the super group and Janet Van Dyne should not be underestimated here.
Janet agrees to become Hank’s partner and The Wasp. Moments later, Dr. Pym has injected Janet with wasp cells, shrunken her down, given her an outfit which seems to perfectly fit her, and allowed her to grow wings and antennae which is only possible for her to have while she is small.
Meanwhile, Kosmos seems to be tearing up the city. He smashes the Van Dyne lab, destroys the docks and causes a general commotion.
Hank gets word of this from his ants and tells Janet to change into her new costume. We get confirmation for the first time that Ant-Man actually lives in New York as he sees Kosmos head towards the George Washington bridge and clearing out Manhattan.
Ant-Man gives some quick instructions to Janet on how to use the reducing and enlarging gas and how she can communicate with the insect world through her antennae. They launch themselves into the air with Ant-Man’s miniature cannon and immediately Janet is hooked on adventuring.
Not only that, she tells Hank, in case they are killed, that she is falling in love with him. For his part, Hank gives a pretty hard no here, although with his background we all know he can love someone. He says, “No! You mustn’t say that, Janet! You’re only a child! Let’s get this straight… I chose you as my partner simply because I thought you had a reason, as I have to fight for mankind! I never want to love again! I– I couldn’t bear it if I had to lose a loved one– twice!”
This basically sets up the relationship dynamic we’ll see with these two for years to come. It will come to be much worse than this sort of thing but we’ll review that when we get there.
Hank’s rebuke only makes Janet more determined to make him fall in love with her. And Hank realizes if he is not careful, he will fall in love with her.
Ant-Man then introduces his ants to The Wasp and the ants tell Henry they can’t confront Kosmos.
The military comes to try to stop Kosmos but they retreat in fear. Janet decides to tackle the problem head on herself. Janet seems to be drawn to the creature but Hank saves her. He realizes he can defeat this thing through science and the pair go back to the lab. Hank whips up the antidote to formic acid, realizing the creature is mostly made of formic acid. They become Ant-Man and The Wasp once more but this time they have the ants carry shotguns filled with pellets full of the antidote.
They make it up to a rooftop and fire the shotgun at the creature and luckily for humanity this does stop Kosmos. Janet cheers and puts her arm around Hank who tells her, “Er.. we— we’d better get back to the lab! And from now on you must not display such emotion! It– it isn’t proper!”
Janet seems to just be happy she made him blush. Back at the lab Henry calls Lee Kearns at the F.B.I. and tells him everything is okay. Kearns says he wants to meet Ant-Man because they share the same goals and Ant-Man can’t keep going it alone. Looking at Janet, Hank replies, “I’m not going it alone, Kearns… not anymore… not ever again!”
In her mind, Janet vows to always be beside Hank and make him love her but until that day she will be his partner as The Wasp. The issue ends here but we know we have a lot more in store for these two.
This is absolutely a landmark issue for 616. It introduces a backstory for Henry Pym, finally gives him some motivation for what he has been doing, and provides a love interest and important character in her own right. No matter the problematic nature of the relationship between these two, this is the most fleshed out, well rounded, and best Ant-Man story so far. It also starts to feel like the pieces are coming together to tell a much larger story, although at the time readers would not have known this.
This issue also finally puts Ant-Man in the same city as The Fantastic Four and Spider-Man so our heroes are beginning to gather.
Next up on the reading list we’ll be checking in with another character who has it out for communists as we read about Iron Man in the pages of Tales of Suspense #42!
Hi there horror fans! Slick Dungeon here back to review another staple in the annals of horror. One of the most notorious and brutal films of all time which does not bury the lead in the title, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. This was a slasher before there were many slashers of note and is counted by some critics as the first actual slasher film ever made. I’m going to take a pretty deep dive into this series so if you have not seen the movie and don’t want any spoilers watch first and then come back to read the review where you will find out this movie is about a massacre with a chainsaw that takes place in Texas. Yes, I know it’s my keen and insightful analysis like that which brings you back to this blog over and over again. Anyway, if you don’t want spoilers from a 1974 film basically everyone knows about, watch the movie first!
Background
When I was a kid in the dark days before common use of the internet we liked to watch horror movies when we would have sleep overs at our friends’ houses. One of our favorite things to do at these sleepovers was to watch a super scary movie series and then stay awake all night from fear. Somehow, when I went to these sleepovers (or had them at my house) one film series that we never picked up was The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I’m not exactly sure why this one never came up for me but I suspect it has to do with the background of the film.
The movie was released in 1974 and was produced, co-composed and directed by Tobe Hooper. This film was somewhat inspired by the crimes of an actual murderer named Ed Gein, although the plot is basically fiction. While that is the truth of how the movie came to be, the rumors about this movie were wild. Much in the same way The Blair Witch Project would later cause people to believe actual crimes were committed in the making of the movie, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was rumored to have used real skeletons, actually have killed people in the production and be based on real events. This lead to many of our parents banning the VHS copy of the film from ever being played at a sleepover.
Of course, the movie is just fiction, it was made on a low budget in Texas and by the standards of almost any horror movie today is fairly tame for a lot of it. That’s not to say there isn’t blood here or that it is not disturbing. It very much is, even now, but it’s really not much more over the top than any of the Halloween, Friday the 13th, or Scream films, with the notable exception that a chainsaw features prominently here. I should also point out that obviously no one was actually killed in the making of the movie.
Even before the film caught on, it had trouble getting distributed due to the violent nature of the content. Hooper had been hoping for a PG rating (remember this was before there was a PG-13 category) so he reduced the amount of blood shown. Still, this earned an R rating and it was tough to find a distributor willing to take it on. Eventually the Bryanston Distributing Company took on the challenge and in 1974 the film hit theaters in the United States and internationally. It was banned in several countries and even in the U.S. several theaters pulled it after audiences complained about the content of the movie.
Critics were basically mixed here at the opening but Hooper got the last laugh. The movie was made for $140,000 which would be just under about a million today if you adjust for inflation. The movie sold a whopping 16.5 million tickets earning over $30 Million in domestic box office alone. Thus Hooper proved for a low budget, with unknown actors, and plenty of scares and gore, audiences will come out to be scared. Not only that, they’ll keep coming back and love it. The slasher genre was truly born.
Sure, there had been a few movies one could argue would be slashers before this, Peeping Tom and Psycho being the most notable examples. But in those films, they were more psychological thrillers than anything else. While they had lots of shocking moments and a good amount of violence, that was never the point of those movies. But when you name a film The Texas Chainsaw Massacre there are three and only three things the audience demands to see. One, a massacre. Two, a chainsaw. And three the setting of Texas. Check, check and check. The fear is the point of this movie, no matter how you look at it.
This caused such a sensation that even if you didn’t watch it, you knew about the movie. It was not ashamed of what it was and made no apologies. The film inspired sequels, spin offs, books, comics, and video games as well. There are, in fact, nine films in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise with a tenth that was never released.
So the question is, how did a low budget movie featuring unknown actors and an unashamed acknowledgement of what it was right in the title spark an entire sub-genre and how does it hold up today?
Let’s dive in and find out!
Spoilers follow!
That’s an Odd Start
The beginning of the film starts with a text crawl and voice over. It talks about the tragedy which befalls five youths and in particular it mentions Sally Hardesty and her “invalid” brother. The voice over and text laments that these youths, even had they lived long lives could not have imagined nor wanted to see as much of the mad and macabre as they would that day. It mentions this was one of the most bizarre crimes in the annals of American history. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
This never says the film was based on true events or that the story was inspired by a particular news item but the implication is there. This gives the film more weight without actually lying about anything and it primes the audience for what will indeed be bizarre and macabre.
We then see a date on the screen, August 18, 1973. Again this gives an inference this is something that happened on a particular day. Much like Psycho the date is fairly meaningless so why would the filmmakers put it there unless something actually happened that day? It was a brilliant tactic when Psycho did this and I have to imagine Tobe Hooper was well aware of that when he decided to put a date at the start of this film. It makes you feel like you are peering into a window of time into something more akin to true crime than just a bloody horror film.
Next we hear the sound of digging, along with some grunting. There are camera flashes. It’s difficult at first to tell what is being lit up in the flashes but after a few times of this, it becomes clear we are looking at images of a rotting corpse, or perhaps corpses. The effects here don’t quite hold up to today’s standards but they are convincing enough to be off putting right from the start.
When we finally get a full picture, we see the face of the corpse as a news story plays in the background which talks about a grave robbing in the area of Newt, Muerto County Texas recently. Whoever dug up the graves also displayed the corpses on a monument in a grotesque manner. And as the camera pulls out to a wide shot, it is apparent that whoever they are talking about in the story has to be the one who was taking pictures. And we see the corpse we were looking at is set up in a strange manner so clearly this person has not been caught.
Road SAfety Tips
More news stories play in voice over as we watch the credits overlayed on images of red which could be just about anything but might possibly be blood or lava. Next we see a dead armadillo lying in the road. A van pulls over and we see the first of our living human characters get out.
The person gets out and lays a couple of sturdy boards out from the side door of the van. For those of us living in the current era this is pretty confusing but it makes sense once we see a man in a wheelchair being rolled out of the van on the boards. This was long before ADA compliance was a big thing and it’s a standard van so there is no ramp.
The person in the wheelchair is Franklin Hardesty and he is one of five people out on the trip here. He goes off to the side of the road to do what most men do when they pull over on the side of a road in the middle of nowhere. Unfortunately for Franklin, he gets startled and rolls down the side of a hill. If only that would be the worst thing to happen to poor Franklin that day.
Back on the road, everyone is sweating in the van because, well, Texas in summer has a lot of heat. Franklin is complaining about the heat as a woman in the van talks about astrology.
The group gets out of the van a bit later and we get a glimpse of our full party here. This consists of Sally and Franklin Hardesty, Jerry, Kirk and Pam. Those last three don’t get last names. Apparently Sally is looking for the gravesite of her grandfather at a local cemetery. She goes off to find the sheriff but Franklin is left in the van.
An old man who is sitting on a tire lies back and looks up at Franklin and we get the first real feeling of something being wrong for this group. The man says to Franklin, “Things happen here abouts, they don’t tell about. I see things. You see, they say it’s just an old man. Talkin’. You laugh at an old man. There’s them that laughs and knows better.”
It’s not at all clear what this guy is talking about but it feels wrong. And it’s one of those tropes that ends up becoming adopted in so many slasher films. There is a warning before the group is truly in danger, often from someone who would be considered elderly or mentally ill or in some other way a person whose warnings could be easily dismissed or ignored by the rest of the community.
They get back on the road and Sally tells Franklin it didn’t look like their grandfather’s grave had been dug up. Soon everyone in the van starts complaining about a bad smell. Franklin points out this is where an old slaughterhouse was where their grandfather used to sell cattle.
And then Franklin goes into relentless detail about how the cows are killed, including descriptions of their heads being bashed in with a sledge hammer. And then he describes the modern way they kill the cows, still in graphic detail.
Someone in the van points out a hitchhiker and they decide to stop and pick him up.
Here’s a road safety tip from your old uncle Slick, don’t pick up hitchhikers! Seriously, it is a bad idea, so please do not do it. Trust me.
They even comment on how odd looking the guy is before they let him into the van. The guy talks about how his family worked in the slaughterhouse and he just gives off a real creepy vibe. The man also has a quite distinctive red mark on his face which could be a scar or blood or even a birthmark. Before you know it, this guy is doing really disturbing stuff. He’s handing out pictures of what look like polaroids of bloody masses of something. The characters in the van seem to take it to be cattle but it’s a little hard to tell what it is at all.
Then Franklin takes out a knife and starts playing with it. The hitchhiker takes the knife from Franklin and cuts deeply into his own palm with it. Road safety tip number two, if the hitchhiker you pick up seems a bit off, don’t flash a knife in front of him. Road safety trip number three, if the hitchhiker who you picked up seems a little off and he cuts into his own palm, make sure you let him out right then and there.
The hitchhiker then takes out a beat up old polaroid camera and takes a picture of Franklin. The hitchiker tells the group they could drop him off at his house up the road but the group says they are in a hurry. That’s the first smart move they’ve made so far here.
The hitchhiker even offers them dinner, saying his brother makes head cheese real good, but the group is not tempted. The guy then takes a picture of Franklin and demands two dollars for the picture. Franklin doesn’t want it so the guy takes the picture back, places it in foil, and lights it on fire. Everyone in the van starts to freak out but the hitchhiker grabs Franklin and cuts pretty deep into Franklin’s arm.
Only at this point do they finally kick the guy out of the van. The driver then says, “That’s the last goddamned hitchhiker I ever pick up.” One would hope so. Not that he’ll have much choice by the end of the movie here.
They patch Franklin up as Pam reads Franklin’s horoscope which seems like nothing but bad news.
We’ve now set up for a disturbing ride for the rest of the film and by the end, this group will be wishing they were just still on the road with an odd hitchhiker.
More Road Safety Tips
The van pulls up to a gas station. Everyone is a bit rattled from the day they’ve had. They are told the gas station has no gas, the tanks are all empty. This is odd but not impossible in a remote area like this. Franklin then asks about an old house they are looking for. The gas station attendant says they shouldn’t go poking around other people’s property because there are people who don’t like it and they’re willing to show you. In other words, poking around in deserted houses in the area is probably a bad idea. Franklin says it’s his father’s place though. The attendant offers them barbeque and says they should stick around a while and wait for the tanker to come fill up the gas tanks.
Another road safety tip here, if the gas station you pull up to has no gas, find the next one with gas as soon as humanly possible. Instead of go straight to the gas station, they drive out to Franklin’s grandfather’s place. This is a seriously bad idea.
Sally mentions the hitchhiker smeared blood all over the outside of the van.
They get over to the house they are trying to see, which is abandoned and look at the van to see that not only is there a blood smear, but it looks like a symbol of some kind.
Franklin seems rather paranoid about the hitchhiker following them and is real concerned about his knife.
There’s a pretty long sequence where the characters just kind of wander around the empty house for a bit as some ominous music plays.
Eventually Pam and Kirk decide they want to go swimming in a creek Franklin had mentioned and they take off. Franklin then notices some odd decorations made out of what look like bones.
That’s not a chainsaw
Kirk and Pam make it down the road and they see a house that seems to have a generator. Kirk figures he could go and get some gas if he leaves his guitar with these people as collateral until he can come back and pick it up. When they get close to the house there are a bunch of old broken down cars.
They wander around a bit and finally end up entering the house. This is when it starts to get real.
Kirk kicks a tooth on the ground and scares Pam with it. Rather than just leave, Kirk opens the unlocked door but Pam walks away. Kirk makes the mistake of walking in deeper and he starts to hear strange sounds like a person making pig noises.
We get our first view of Leatherface here as he pops out and bashes Kirk in the head with a sledgehammer. Wait, what? That’s not a chainsaw! Yep, that’s right, we’re saving that for later.
You’ve probably seen pictures of Leatherface before so I won’t go into too much detail but he wears a mask that is supposed to be made of human skin, and is wearing a butcher’s apron at this point in the movie.
Pam gives up waiting and goes to the door of the house and walks in after Kirk. She stumbles into a room just filled with bones. These are distinctly human bones and set up in all kinds of weird ways. Plus there is a chicken hanging in a cage for some reason. Pam starts freaking out and tries to leave. Leatherface pops out and grabs her.
He hangs her on a meathook as she is still screaming.
Oh, There is a Chainsaw
As poor Pam hangs there, Leatherface pulls out a chainsaw and starts to cut up Kirk’s body. We don’t really see too much blood here but the scene is still utterly disturbing.
Back at the van Franklin and Sally argue about who had his knife last. Jerry decides to go down to the creek and find Pam and Kirk.
Sally and Franklin continue to argue as Jerry goes to meet his doom.
Jerry finds the same house Pam and Jerry did and goes inside. He hears banging from a locked freezer and goes and opens it. A frozen Pam pops out for a minute.
Leatherface comes up from behind and guess what? Yep, sledge hammer to ol’ Jerry as well.
You really shoulda got that gas
By now it’s dark and Sally and Franklin are starting to wonder what has happened to their friends. There’s a bit of a long conversation where Franklin and Sally argue about whether they should go back to the gas station or go look for their friends. Turns out Jerry took the keys anyway so they can’t drive back to the gas station.
Finally the pair head down the path where their friends went and make all kinds of noise hollering for their friends.
When they are half way down the path they hear a noise and see a light at a house ahead of them. They go a bit farther and Leatherface shows up with his chainsaw. Franklin is no more but Sally runs away.
Leatherface runs through the forest after her swinging his chainsaw every which way. Sally makes it to the house where her friends died and runs up the stairs. She encounters an elderly man in a rocking chair. He looks like he might be dead but we’ll later find out this is the living grandfather of Leatherface. Sally runs down the hall.
Leatherface is close behind but Sally does what will become a signature move for her. She jumps out of the window to escape.
There is another chase through the forest until Sally finds herself all the way back at the gas station that had no gas.
I’ll pass on the Barbeque, thanks
In the gas station the attendant is there and he tries to calm Sally down. She tries to ask the guy to call the police but he says there is no phone. Again, odd but not impossible in those days. The guy says he’ll drive her over to the next town and leaves to get his truck.
And that’s when Sally notices the meat cooking in some kind of pit. That is definitely not beef. And another report about the desecration of graves plays in the background.
The gas station attendant comes back with a sack and Sally realizes she is still in some serious trouble. She tries to defend herself but gets beaten with a broom and knocked out. The attendant ties her up and gags her.
He tosses her in the truck and weirdly seems to be trying to reassure her that things will be okay as he keeps hitting her with the broomstick.
On the way, the gas station attendant picks up the hitchhiker from the beginning of the movie and yells at the guy. As if needed any more confirmation he tells the guy he was supposed to stay away from the graveyard. And we find out this guy is the brother of Leatherface.
The worst family dinner of all time
When Sally has the bag removed from her head, she sees the hitchhiker and she’s back in the house she escaped from. Things are not looking good.
Next, the gas station attendant tells the killers to go get their grandpa. He also tells Sally to take it easy and they’ll have something for her to eat right away.
Sure enough the guy in the chair from earlier is brought downstairs as Sally struggles the best she can to get away. Eventually she passes out and when she wakes up she’s at the family dinner table.
We also find out that the gas station attendant doesn’t like killing people and he lets the two brothers do all of that. Turns out the gas station attendant is, “just the cook.”
The whole room is decorated with bones and body parts and feels extremely uncomfortable to the viewer.
There’s kind of a long sequence here where they threaten and torture Sally and explain to her that their grandfather was the best killer they had ever seen. They make the mistake of trying to get Grandpa to kill Sally but he’s so old and weak that he keeps missing.
Fortunately for Sally she’s untied and able to escape the house. She once again jumps out of a window to get away. Leatherface and the hithchhiker run after Sally. Leatherface, of course, has his chainsaw with him.
Even More Road Safety Tips
Sally makes it to the road with the hitchhiker grabbing onto her. A semi-truck comes out of nowhere and basically flattens the hitchhiker. Look before you cross, people. And yeah, if you see a guy covered in blood grabbing a woman who is screaming for dear life as you drive your truck down the street, I can’t say I blame you if you hit the gas here.
The truck pulls over after this and the driver lets Sally into the cab of the truck. Leatherface comes with his chainsaw and saws the door a bit.
If I was the driver here, I woulda hit the gas so hard to get outta there but that’s not what he does. Instead, he and Sally run out the other side as Leatherface chases after them. But the driver grabbed a wrench on the way out and tosses it at Leatherface’s head. It connects and Leatherface falls, causing him to drop his chainsaw onto his own leg. It cuts him but it doesn’t sever the leg or anything.
A pickup truck comes by and pulls over. The driver of the semi-truck runs into the woods so who knows what happens to him? But Sally is able to get into the back of the pickup, she’s smeared in blood and laughing and screaming like she has lost her mind.
The film ends with a shot of Leatherface swinging his chainsaw around in the air as the sun rises behind him.
In Conclusion
There were a lot of factors that made this a successful horror film. One is the ominous soundtrack which plays in the background. The cinematography here is nothing special but it’s competent. The set design is completely off putting to the audience and with each watch through you are bound to notice yet another disturbing thing in the background you might have missed. Gunnar Hansen, who plays Leatherface is an imposing figure and you can’t take your eyes off of him whenever he is on screen.
But most importantly, this film was willing to cross boundaries and take risks where other horror films up to this point had not. There is not a larger story here other than people in danger and the end is not conclusive. The bad guys are not caught and punished for their misdeeds so one can presume they will be free to continue their horrific crimes into the future. The only one who seems like they might be out of the picture is the hitchhiker since he was hit by a truck.
It can’t be underestimated how influential this film is in the annals of horror. Most slasher films owe something to this one, whether it is a mysterious figure under a mask, a thoroughly creepy soundtrack, warnings from the community before the danger starts, or a collection of people going about everyday activities who find themselves confronted with a horror they can barely comprehend.
While there are definitely slasher films which I would say are better, this movie undoubtedly laid the groundwork for those. Since I have not yet seen all of the films in the franchise, I can’t say if the rest improve on the quality here but this first film is the one everyone knows about and for good reason.
Strange Tales Issue 109, Photo Credit: Marvel, Writers: Stan Lee & Robert Bernstein, Art: Jack Kirby
What would you do if you had the power of Pandora’s box? If you’re anything like The Sorcerer in Strange Tales #109, you’ll probably run around trying to steal stuff and attacking The Human Torch. The issue gets a bit weird as it dives into magic which is a newer threat for Johnny Storm.
The issue starts with a teaser page showing our hero threatened by a giant tidal wave. A man in a green robe is telling Torch that “Flood is the evil I’ve selected to destroy you!”
So, who is this guy and why does he have it out for ol’ flame head? Basically, it’s a kids get off my lawn story but let’s take a look at it anyway.
The story starts back at the Baxter building where three of the Fantastic Four are all gathered. Johnny flies in through the window and The Thing scolds Johnny for skipping school. But, of course, Johnny has done no such thing. His teachers are just having a conference so he got out early. Johnny was basically bored and missing his family so decided to drop on by. He complains a bit about school and then notices a map in the room and rightly realizes the rest of the team are planning a mission. Johnny wants to join but is told no because it has to happen the next day when Johnny is in school.
We don’t get any real information about the mission, other than the FF plans to “…make life a little tougher for the commies!” Which, yeah sounds about right for these comics at that time. Johnny complains about how boring it is being a full time student at boring Glenville. As Johnny flies off we get a rare glimpse of how Ben Grim actually feels about Johnny. He says he loves the hot-head like a brother.
On his way out, Torch sees a fire in a building and uses his powers to suck in all the flames and saves the people in the upper floors. Then he sees a flash flood which has washed out some train tracks. Luckily for the passengers, Johnny is able to convert the flood water into steam and the train passes by safely.
Yeah, sometimes the powers of The Human Torch are kind of silly and so are the random dangers he flies by. But his powers, especially at this time, are a bit flexible anyway.
The next disturbance Torch hears is some commotion at a place where he knows an “eccentric old hermit known as The Sorcerer lives!”
So what’s the big trouble about? Well, this dude is literally trying to get kids off of his lawn. But this time, with dogs. Dogs which are leashed I should mention. As far as I can tell, this guy isn’t actually breaking any kind of law, even if he is being rather unpleasant.
Not quite sure who voted The Human Torch the head of the neighborhood watch, but he decides to take things into his own hands. He puts a leash of flames around the dogs and basically yells at The Sorcerer for scaring the kids. Johnny tells the guy to put his dogs away or Johnny will take them to the dog pound. The Sorcerer puts the dogs away and asks Johnny to tell the kids to stay away from him and give him privacy. Johnny asks if The Sorcerer knows what he’s called around the neighborhood. The dude says yes and the name is well earned because he has studied black magic for years. Johnny then tells the guy if he wants privacy so bad, he’ll give it to him with a wall of flame around his house. The Sorcerer points out he won’t be able to come and go if there is a wall of flame there. Johnny responds he can’t have it both ways, “If you want freedom of movement, others must have it as well!” The Sorcerer gives in but tells Johnny he won’t forget it.
At this point, let’s sum up here. I’m not one to be on the side of a wealthy property owner or anything but in the last few minutes a guy who lives on private property tried to get kids off his lawn, with pets he legally owns and properly kennels, was called an eccentric by a super powered human, nearly had his dogs burnt by said super human, had his lawn burned by fire and was then told he had to let people just come onto his property. I think rather than threaten this guy, perhaps Johnny should have looked up real estate egress laws because, yeah, now this guy is going to go full villain.
Johnny doesn’t really think the guy has black magic so feels pretty safe leaving and taking the kids back to their home. But what Johnny does not know is that The Sorcerer is about to discover Pandora’s box. You know, the one from the myth where basically all bad things were let out into the world? Yeah that one. Which seems weird because if we believe the myth, the stuff in the box couldn’t be put back so how would owning it help? The only thing left inside was supposedly hope and we already have that too so, I think Pandora’s box is just a box at this point. Also, if we believe the myth it was a jar not a box but whatever.
Ah, but see, these are comics we’re reading so they have a ready excuse. The Sorcerer explains (to himself), “But what other experts on Greek legend don’t know is the Circe, the greatest sorceress of ancient times, used her fantastic magic to force all the evils to return to the box…” Circe then seals the box with a magic incantation. So there you have it, perfectly logically explained and we’re good to continue with the story.
If we are to believe The Sorcerer he got that very box “…unwittingly sent to him in a crate full of Greek artifacts by an expert from Athens!” If it was sent unwittingly, then this expert was not much of an expert. Or maybe they were looking for a jar not a box instead?
Anyway, The Sorcerer continues studying ancient texts and vowing revenge on The Human Torch. He also points out he can unleash and recapture all of the imps which are in the box through his magic.
Two weeks later he shows up at a bank holding a box. He is not taken seriously at first when he demands money from the bank and the security guards want to take him in to have his mental health checked. They don’t put it quite that nicely.
But the Sorcerer is prepared and unleashes the evil of hatred. Before you know it, everyone in the bank is fighting with one another over trivial stuff. The Sorcerer uses the opportunity to grab as much cash as he can and strolls out of the bank. He then recalls the imp of hatred and lets out the imp of… forgetfulness. I guess that’s a kind of evil in some cases? Anyway, it causes everyone there to forget what just happened. Johnny goes to investigate and realizes the people there are not lying, they’ve been manipulated somehow.
The Sorcerer goes on a bit of a crime spree, stealing jewels with the imp of… sleepiness, stealing art from a museum with the imp of… paralysis, and furs with the imp of… cold. And he covers his tracks in the same way after each one.
One night in Glenville the police hold a meeting where Johnny is present and one of the officers says it seems like the crook is some sort of wizard which makes Johnny think of The Sorcerer. The Human Torch rushes off to find the bad guy sorting his ill gotten gains. The Torch has the advantage of surprise but The Sorcerer unleashes disease from the box to sicken Johnny. This works for a moment until Johnny heats himself up enough to burn off any germs. So, instead The Sorcerer lets out the evil of a tidal wave like we were teased in the beginning.
Sure enough, Johnny is soaked and his flame goes out. The cops show up but The Sorcerer unleashes foolishness on the cops. But there are still more cops who are not affected yet and they fire shots at The Sorcerer. Good thing for him magic can apparently ignore the rules of physics completely because The Sorcerer unleashes… laziness… to slow down the bullets. Yeah, not kidding.
Johnny stalls for time by asking about the box, hoping he can dry out enough to flame on. And, as The Sorcerer thinks he has Johnny defeated, Johnny asks if he can choose the manner of his own death. The Sorcerer agrees and unleashes fire which, of course, only powers up our hero. Johnny grabs the box from The Sorcerer and welds it shut, saying he is going to take it to the ocean so it can’t be found again.
The Sorcerer is terrified when Johnny gets back. This is because, just before Johnny left, the imp of fear poked out of the box in the direction of The Sorcerer. This guy is probably going to be permanently scared of everything.
The last panel is Johnny reuniting with the rest of the FF who seem to have heard about Johnny’s exploits and all is well again.
There are a few interesting things about this issue. One, it firmly establishes magic as being a real and regular thing in the world of 616, thus truly paving the way for Dr. Strange to show up soon. Second, it separates Johnny Storm from the FF a bit so there is the possibility of splitting this group up into different adventures at any time.
Also, while I certainly don’t condone the behavior of The Sorcerer once he has Pandora’s box, Johnny sure seems bossy to random people in the neighborhood in this issue. This certainly doesn’t mean Johnny is bad or evil in any way but it would be easy to see how a super powered person could intimidate the heck out of someone for, you know, wanting kids not to hang around their lawn or whatever.
We’ve certainly not seen the last of Johnny Storm, or of magic in the 616 but it’s a long way from being fully explored just yet.
Next time we’re getting small again with Ant-Man but he’s going to bring along a new player in the 616 as we first meet The Wasp in Tales to Astonish #44!
Happy Friday folks! Here’s a little story I wrote, hope you enjoy it!
Handcuffs by Adam Wright
When the handcuffs clacked onto Thomas’s hands, the cold metal biting into his wrists, he knew he made a mistake. He must have been begging on the wrong corner. Some places it was ok to beg. Other places they made you move on.
The spotlight shone in his eyes, bright and unforgiving. The sea air whipped against his cheeks and he could taste the salt on his tongue. His clothes were old and torn, with brown smudges and stains on them. He was wearing four jackets and two pairs of jeans. The knit hat on his head had holes in places and was unraveling in others. The gloves he wore had holes where the fingertips should have been.
“What’d I do?” he asked the police officer.
“Thomas, I don’t know,” he motioned his head toward the squad car, “Feds tell me to put cuffs on, I put cuffs on, that’s it.”
Thomas looked back on the ground where his sketchpad and pencils lay. He never bought alcohol with the change he begged, but art supplies were expensive and hard to come by on the streets. On the paper was the beginning of his latest sketch, a building that not only scraped the sky but penetrated the clouds. It was an exact copy of an office building most people walked by without thinking about. Stock traders and big businessmen were the only ones who ever entered the place. Even they never paused to look at the structure. Thomas knew what it must have taken to make the building. The height alone was a challenge to the architect, but the way the walls creeped up into the air with such imposing dominance was perfection. He could tell without looking inside of the building exactly where the arch supports were, the floor plan on the inside, where the strongest and weakest points were located.
“Can I take my pad?” He looked hopefully at the officer.
“No. Get in the car.”
“That’s my livin’, my pad. It’s all I got.” He tried to move his shoulder toward the pad and the officer nudged him to the car.
Thomas sat down in the back of the car; the upholstery was cold and unforgiving. His hands were uncomfortable behind his back and the metal dug into him. He looked out of the window toward the crowd, if you could call it a crowd in a busy city like this, and saw a heavy dark boot step down and snap one of his pencils. The shards of fine lead scraped across the concrete as the foot moved away.
“Ohh,” he squeaked.
“What’s the matter, you hearin’ them voices again?” The cop turned his head toward the back of the car.
“No.”
“You know I told you about places that can help. I told you about them free doctors and clinics. If you woulda gone, maybe you wouldn’t be here.”
“I just wanna draw, don’t want no one tellin’ me I can’t draw or what I should draw. Them doctors do that to you, they do it all the time.” Thomas watched the buildings go by outside the car. He knew which ones were art deco, which were gothic or glass box style. He could name them all.
“Why didn’t you go to school, Thomas? I’ve seen your drawings, you coulda been an architect.” The officer kept his head straight forward looking at the road.
“I tried, sometimes I say stuff, talk to myself, can’t stop, said a bad word once, teacher thought I was cussin’ her. I was cussin’ them voices, they tell me I’m stupid, can’t do nothin’, won’t be nothin’, so I cuss ‘em. They kicked me out, I never tried again.”
Thomas and the officer were silent the rest of the way to the station. He loved the look of the station house. It had high curved arches, a large flight of concrete steps going up to the door, and big bright lamp posts that lit up the sidewalk. He had drawn that building too. In fact, he had drawn every building in the city at least once. From the coast to the business district, he sketched them all. The police station building was not a big seller on the streets. Most people wanted really tall buildings. Thomas could never get more than three dollars for the police station.
Inside the station, people were walking back and forth in a hurried fashion, ignoring each other. Phones rang and people shouted across the room. The officer led Thomas past the bustle and into a sterile, empty room with a table and two chairs. A man in a dark suit sat at the table and gestured for Thomas to sit down.
“Who’re you?” Thomas asked.
“Special Agent Fields, counter-terrorism division,” he replied as he pulled out a tape recorder and pressed record. The red light on it stared Thomas in the face. The agent was tall and thin and kept clicking the pen in his hand.
“Begin recording,” he said. “Interrogation of subject suspected of terrorist activities on February seventeenth. Subject’s name is?”
“I’m Thomas.”
“Do you know why you are here?”
Thomas looked at the man. He had no emotion in his face; he just stared in Thomas’s direction. Click, click, went the sound of the pen.
“I was at the wrong corner.”
“No, sir. You are accused of aiding an elite terrorist network with vital information about the design and structure of several buildings in the financial district. Do you draw buildings?” he asked, pausing long enough to cross his arms and sit back in his seat.
“It’s my livin’. And beggin’ but mostly I draw. Some people, they like it and want to buy ‘em.” Thomas moved his hands around as much as he could in the handcuffs.
“We have stopped an attack on the building you were outside of. One of their recon agents had piles of sketches in his briefcase detailing every inch of the building. They even knew delivery drop points and service entrances. How long did it take you to learn the layout, sir?” The agent clicked his pen again waiting for an answer.
Thomas looked down at the hard metal table and thought for a moment.
“I never been inside. I just know, I can feel the inside. It comes out when I draw. That’s when the voices stop, when I draw.” He rubbed his shoulder against his face to try to scratch the itch on his chin.
“Subject admits to knowing the inside of the building,” stated the agent.
“I never been inside,” said Thomas.
“Do you know what they do in that building?”
“No. People dressed all up in suits go there. They don’t give money even though they all dressed so nice. Some kinda office?”
“Yes. Some kind of office. It is the building that houses the nation’s foremost chemical weapons research lab. It is the most heavily funded lab on the west coast. You will be detained indefinitely, charges may or may not be pressed against you for your actions, you have been defined as a national threat, an aid to terror, and an enemy combatant. You should be happy. You won’t have to beg anymore for food, you will have a place to live and will be taken care of.” The agent set his pen down and pressed the stop button on the recorder.
“Can I draw?” Thomas asked.
“No. Never again, you are too dangerous to our security. Now let me remove those handcuffs.” The agent motioned to a police officer to take the cuffs off.
The key released the cold metal from Thomas’s hands.
“Now isn’t that better, sir?” asked the agent.
“Yes, sir, my hands feel much better now.” As Thomas rubbed his wrists trying to get the circulation back he knew that even if he was released he would not ever be free again. Not to draw was the same as cutting off his hands.
The Amazing Spider-Man Issue #3 Photo Credit: Marvel Written by Stan Lee, Art by Steve Ditko
Few heroes are as defined by their villains as Spider-Man is. Outside of Batman, Spidey has the most recognizable gallery of rogues in all of super hero comics. Undeniably one of the most infamous of those rogues is the one and only Dr. Octopus. He’ll have a huge and complicated influence on the life of Peter Parker and everyone around him. But he had to appear for the first time somewhere. For him it was the third issue of The Amazing Spider-Man. While his intro establishes a good number of the baselines of what we will come to know about the scientist turned villain, much of his origins will be revised and updated to become more intricate and complicated.
Yet, even at his debut, the cover of the issue promises something special with Dr. Octopus. He seems to be the first villain who can truly claim to have more power than Spider-Man. So who is he, where did he come from, and why does he have it out for Spider-Man? Let’s find out.
The first teaser page of the comic promises Doctor Octopus is the only enemy ever to defeat Spider-Man. This is a bold claim considering Spider-Man has been down a time or two but it does turn out to be the case, as Obi-Wan Kenobi would say, from a certain point of view. And we get the promise of a special appearance by the Human Torch. He’s already wrapped up in Spider-Man’s life but I find it intriguing every time Stan Lee brings on a guest in a comic because it helps to establish the shared universe of heroes each time it happens.
The story begins with a run of the mill bank robbery. The crooks think they’ll have an easy time of it until Spider-Man flashes his Spider signal at them and proceeds to knock the bad guys out with ease.
In fact, it’s so easy it leads Spidey to wish he had an opponent who would give him a run for his money. This kind of wish is a bit of a precursor to a running theme in Peter Parker’s life. Every time he thinks things are going well, or that he’s got his job as a superhero down pat, a huge threat will appear and often times come close to destroying him. As readers, we all know, if a hero is wishing for a bigger challenge, he or she won’t need to wait long.
The scene shifts to the generically named US Atomic Research Center where someone called Doctor Octopus is about to perform an experiment. We get our first glimpse of the doctor wearing his specially designed arms that become the defining physical feature of the bad guy.
What should be a tool of science will soon become the very thing which traps a decent man into doing evil things. The guards in the room observing Dr. Otto Octavius say he is the most brilliant atomic researcher in our country today. I’m not sure, but I would bet if Dr. Bruce Banner heard that, he’d disagree. And speaking of Dr. Bruce Banner, other than being brilliant scientists, they have something else in common. Failed science experiments. There is an accident involving radiation, although this issue doesn’t go into what the cause was, or how it happened. But, the end result is an explosion. Unfortunately, Dr. Octavius is caught in the heart of the blast. He survives but apparently absorbs an immense amount of radiation.
In the real world, an accident like this would without question kill the victim. But, in the world of Marvel comics in the 1960’s? Getting hit by radiation is virtually guaranteed to give you super powers. Quite frequently they turn out to be animal based super powers.
Sure enough, in the hospital the doctors know two things about Dr. Octopus. First, he is brain damaged. In other words, something has altered his mind, so even if he was a good and noble scientist at one time, there is no telling what he’ll be like now. Secondly, they cannot remove his artificial arms. It’s a bit unclear if doing so would actually kill Octavius or if they are simply fused into him and there’s not a clear way to remove them. This is something that will come up a lot in later stories involving Dr. Octopus.
When Dr. Octopus wakes up he insists to the doctor he must return to his work. I’m not sure if this was intentional or not but the doctor who is telling Octavius to stay put sure resembles one Dr. Donald Blake, and the nurse in the background looks a lot like Jane Foster. It’s never officially mentioned but it would be easy to assume Dr. Blake could have been asked to treat Dr. Octavius.
More importantly than who is in the background, this scene establishes how altered Dr. Octavius’ mind is. Rather than assume the medical doctor is acting in his best interest, Otto assumes people are jealous of him and want to keep him away from his work.
The window of the hospital room has bars on it, most likely to prevent accidents from a high floor, but Octavius thinks he is being kept prisoner. With a thought, his mechanical arms move and remove the bars for him and Dr. Otto Octavius officially becomes Dr. Octopus.
The Doc immediately uses his newfound power to intimidate others.
Meanwhile, J. Jonah Jameson wants pictures of the notable scientist at the hospital and one Peter Parker is more than happy to volunteer to be the one to get them. Peter figures that as Spider-Man, this will be as easy as taking out those bank robbers was. The hospital itself, known as Bliss Hospital seems a bit sketchy as it is fenced off and locked up when Spider-Man gets there. Spidey easily climbs the walls and wishes once again for a bit of real competition.
Be careful what you wish for, because as soon as he gets to the window, Spider-Man sees Doctor Octopus for the first time. Octavius has imprisoned the staff at the hospital and demanded they bring him equipment. He is refusing to let them go, even though they have given in to his demands.
When Dr. Octopus dangles someone out of a window, Spider-Man decides he has to launch into action and for the first time he takes on what will become one of his key villains. The artwork in this particular panel is notably exciting and I think one of the main reasons Doctor Octopus keeps coming back.
Peter doesn’t really know what he’s walking into here and Doctor Octopus wallops him with the mechanical arms hard enough to make Spider-Man think twice. Even though Spider-Man manages to web up a couple of the mechanical arms, Dr. Octopus snaps the webbing. This already puts Octavius in a stronger category than any other villain Peter has faced.
I’m not sure if this was a mistake, or a joke, or what but at one point Dr. Octopus refers to Spider-Man as Super-Man. Octavius also says his power is the energy of an atom, born of a nuclear accident. Pretty strong claims here. Dr. Octopus gets the upper hand and essentially tosses Peter right out of the window he came through.
Now, it must be said that although this only the third issue of The Amazing Spider-Man, there have been times when Spider-Man has lost a battle before. The Fantastic Four were able to subdue him, and the Vulture made a pretty good run at Peter. But, I would still say this is the first time Spider-Man was defeated. Why do I say that? Because that’s what Peter himself thinks. And Spider-Man is only truly defeated when he is doubting himself. This is the lowest point we’ve seen him anywhere so far.
Although Spider-Man was defeated here, he did win a small battle. The people who were being kept prisoner escaped during the fight, causing Dr. Octopus to realize he needed to flee.
But Octavius has a new plan and he heads right for the US Atomic Research Center. Dr. Octopus wants to destroy part of the nuclear plant to demonstrate his power and he lowers the lead shielding which was keeping the radiation at bay.
The authorities realize they are up against incredible odds and post sentries to keep anyone from going in or out of the research center.
At home, Peter is feeling pretty down after his defeat. He also has to tell J.J.J. that he can’t get the pictures of Doctor Octopus. But all is not lost. The Governor asks the Fantastic Four for help. Most of them are away on a different mission but the Human Torch has been asked to try and help out. Unfortunately the Torch is flamed out because he’s, “used my flame so much recently, I have to wait a few days to let it get strong again!”
And so, I guess, everyone thinks the best use of the Human Torch’s time is to go do an assembly at Midtown High where Peter Parker happens to be in the audience. Johnny Storm does a few fire based tricks but nothing major. Then he gives a bit of an inspirational speech where he talks about how the Fantastic Four have been discouraged before but it’s important to never give up.
Peter really takes this to heart. I find this super interesting because one of my favorite things about Spider-Man is how he refuses to give up the fight even when the odds are hopeless. Turns out, we have one of his contemporaries, Johnny Storm to thank for that.
After the speech, Peter thanks the Torch for the moving words but Johnny doesn’t seem to think much of it.
So, of course, Peter gets right back in the game and heads back to face Dr. Octopus. He’s able to use his spidey-sense to evade all the traps and security Octavius has set up.
And then, Peter does something else I love about this character. He uses his brains before his muscles. Instead of taking Dr. Octopus head on, he first makes his way to the chem lab.
We don’t know right away what he’s doing but it’s clearly risky and Peter has a plan in mind. He next goes to find Dr. Octopus and we learn that the chemicals Peter was messing around with were a chemical compound he made that would fuse Dr. Octopus’ metal arms together.
There is quite the fight but ultimately, Spider-Man prevails. Peter then decides to find The Human Torch to let him know Dr. Octopus is all taken care of and cryptically thanks him for saving Spider-Man.
The issue ends with Peter back in school watching Johnny do a demonstration in the sky as Flash Thompson tries to get under Peter’s skin.
There is a pin up page in this issue and for everyone who had an issue and cut that page out, well, ouch because this issue has at least once sold for $144,000.
This issue is a landmark issue for both Peter Parker and Dr. Otto Octavius which sets up stories for literally decades to come. It helps that the good Dr. got a full comic book length story for his debut and it sure didn’t hurt that The Human Torch showed up to help sales out a bit.
Next time we’ll be seeing more exploits of the one and only Human Torch as we catch up with him in the pages of Strange Tales #109!
Hello film fans! Slick Dungeon here back to review yet another Oscar nominated film. This time we’re talking about the film written and directed by Cord Jefferson, starring Jeffrey Wright and Sterling K. Brown, American Fiction. It’s up for five Oscars this year. There will be spoilers for the film so if you don’t like that sort of thing, find your nearest theater, go watch the film, and come on back here to read the review.
What’s it About?
Dr. Thelonious “Monk” Ellison (Jeffrey Wright) is an author and college professor. He has written several books which are well respected but not overly popular. In class one day, Monk gets in trouble because he tries to have a frank conversation about literature but teaches about a title in class that has an offensive word in it. A student feels she is uncomfortable with the word and this leads to a complaint that causes the college to put Monk on a leave of absence.
Meanwhile, Monk can’t get his next book published because his agent says publishers think it is not, “black” enough. Monk points out that he is black and he wrote the book so by definition it is a black book. This doesn’t help him sell it to anyone though.
While visiting his family, Monk has to confront his mother’s increasing Alzheimers and reunites with his sister who he has not seen in a long time. Unfortunately for the family, his sister Lisa (Tracee Ellis Ross) suffers a heart attack and dies while he is there. Monk’s brother Cliff (Sterling K. Brown) comes to pay his respects but is not willing to pay for his mother’s care. Cliff is also gay and has recently come out and as a result his wife divorced him and took his children with her.
As things become more desperate for Monk financially, he decides to write a book that panders to black stereotypes and sends it to his agent as a joke. To Monk’s chagrin, this book is picked up swiftly and enthusiastically by publishers unlike his other books. The amount of money he earns from selling it is enough to help get the care his mother needs, but Monk has to pretend to be someone he is not in order to keep the publishers happy.
The remainder of the movie has Monk dealing with crisis after crisis as he has to navigate a dual identity to his publishers and the media, all while still firmly believing the other types of books he writes have more value. He struggles with his girlfriend, he ends up having to judge his own work in a literary award contest, and his mother continues to get worse.
The film touches on ideas of duality, themes of loss, grief, joy, race and academia. It doesn’t hold back on any of these issues and asks complex questions without giving the audience an easy answer. After watching the film, many of the questions the viewers have will remain and you’ll find yourself thinking about this film long afterwards, including wondering if there are times this film actually falls into some of the categories it criticizes. It’s a multilayered portrayal of complex issues and is quite well made. It is one of the more entertaining of the Oscar picks this year and there is good reason it was up for so many awards.
The Awards
Speaking of awards, let’s take a look at each category this one is up for.
Best Actor
There are several great actors up for this award. Colman Domingo had a great turn as Bayard Rustin in Rustin, Bradley Cooper is up for Maestro, Paul Giamati who is no stranger to the Oscars is up for The Holdovers, and Cillian Murphy is up for Oppenheimer. Jeffrey Wright has a phenomenal and nuanced performance here playing a character that never quite opens himself up entirely to the world, all the while complaining that things are not the way they should be. As good a performance as this is, Cillian Murphy is almost certain to win in this category.
Best Supporting Actor
This category is also filled with big name actors and for me, it’s a tougher call than Best Actor. Sterling K. Brown is up for American Fiction. He has a memorable role as Cliff who is struggling with how the world perceives him but all in all he doesn’t have a huge amount of screen time here. There are several actors who could end up with the award here besides Brown. Robert De Niro is up for yet another Oscar for Killers of the Flower Moon, Ryan Gosling has lots of buzz for his role as Ken in Barbie, Robert Downey Jr. is up for Oppenheimer, and Mark Ruffalo is up for Poor Things. I think De Niro has a really strong shot but Gosling may just sneak his way into a win here.
Music (Orignal Score)
The score is fine in this film but I simply don’t see it winning. There are too many other films with more notable music in them. I think Killers of the Flower Moon has a much better shot here. The other movies in question here are Oppenheimer, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, and Poor Things.
Best Picture
American Fiction is an excellent film and despite being one of the Oscar nominees, I suspect not enough people have watched it who should. It’s rather entertaining and has some really good humor that makes you uncomfortable in the best way. But, this will not win Best Picture. That is still going to Oppenheimer in my mind. I have one more film to see in this category so unless The Zone of Interest is so incredible it has to change my mind, I don’t think any other film has a shot.
Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
There are so many well written movies this year. American Fiction is able to tell a nuanced story with complex matter while confronting things head on. It’s also about writers which can often help a movie win in the writing category. American Fiction is up against Oppenheimer, Barbie, Poor Things, and The Zone of Interest. I think this one is going to go to American Fiction or The Zone of Interest but honestly any of these winning would make complete sense.
In Conclusion
American Fiction is a great film with great performances and confronts issues that need to be confronted. It doesn’t tend to insult the audience (except maybe for a little bit at the end) and it will remain in your mind long after you see it. It’s an excellent watch and well deserving of being one of the most nominated films of the year. It’s up against major competition that may outshine it, however.
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