Check out some the films your favorite time-traveling podcasters have seen recently! Cory, Nick, Ash and Cass all throw a film your way that they've seen this past month, and tell you whether to watch or not!
Ash,
Movie Review: Talk to Me (2023)
"A24 continues to regurgitate indie sensations, and horror seems to be a preferred genre of the studio, with hits like Midsummer, Beau is Afraid and It Comes at Night, all reeling in dignified review but without the blockbuster revenue.
Danny and Michael Philippi are next up on the radar for A24 with their horror, Talk to Me. It centers on the casual supernatural abilities of an embodied hand that acts as a prop for teenage parties, like a jug would for spin the bottle.
It’s tone is both terrifyingly addictive and brutal, considering there is no build up to what this can do, instead it’s just as acceptable as a phone that can ring. Japan brought us The Ring. Nosferatu from Germany. Italy with Suspiria and the Americans with the slashers. It’s refreshing to see that after The Babadook, Relic and Sissy, the Aussies are now seriously stamping their mark on the genre that seems to be relishing with time. "
Nick,
Movie Review: The Marvels (2023)
"Look, its a Marvel movie. Most people are gonna live or die off watching this based on their level of superhero fatigue (as well as their tolerance for female led superhero movies, apparently). But for what it is, The Marvels is a fun mini-team up movie where the leads really show genuine chemistry, and its allows for a few hysterically weird moments that most of these movies either don't get, or fail to execute properly.
Not every MCU film is gonna be Infinity War or Now Way Home, so to put that expectation on every film they make is unfair (and just unrealistic with their current level of output). But Brie Larson is allowed to have fun here, and show her quirkier side, and she plays well off of Teyonah Parris and Iman Vellani (undeniably likeable), with some of the best scenes feature the trio just interacting and learning to work together.
Zawe Ashton, while not the worst MCU villian by a long shot (see Maliketh for one-note villainy), doesn't get the proper time to round out her motivations. Its all there, but just feels a bit rushed, and the script doesn't give her much to work with outside some predictable villain lines.
As for the weirdness, what I appreciated was it was there in favor of expanding a Marvel universe in the macro level: rounding out some cultures creatures from other worlds; something we really don't get to see much of in these movies. While some people may check out on these moments, I thought it was fine in the spirit and tone of the movie.
Again, it's not gonna break box office records, but its not the dumpster fire the internet wants you to believe it is. Marvel seems to be tying to course correct with its projects, and The Marvels seems to be baby steps in the right direction. Focus on characters and allowing a director to spend time in a world and put their unique spin of humor here and there is refreshing, but it still has the "Marvel sheen," with a need for over the top action and high stakes. But the latter is kind of part of the packaged deal when you're dealing with Space Mommy.
It still struggles with the need to connect with and setup other movies, but it still was fun outing for what it was. Whether its in theaters or on streaming, if you're still interested in the MCU, give this one a chance. "
Cass,
Movie Review: Five Nights at Freddy's (2023)
"As a fan of these games, it was interesting to see the 2014 Survival Horror Game “Five Nights at Freddy’s” become a movie in 2023. While I am someone who is wary of video games becoming movie/tv shows, this one didn’t disappoint me.
It was a bit different from the lore of the game but for the people who haven’t played the games or even heard of it still had an idea on what the game was truly about based on this movie. The movie brought a nice balance of horror, comedy (especially with the cheesy jumpscares, which is classic FNAF) and even suspense, especially with the two lead roles being Josh Hutcherson & Matthew Lillard, who both did an outstanding job. Even if some of the dialogue was cheesy, kind of cringe or even a bit weird, it was still enjoyable to watch.
Blumhouse Films can be questionable with some of their horror movies but since this one will have future sequels, I’m curious to what we will see next."
Cory,
Movie Review: Sisu (2022)
"First off, I might be a hypocrite. Like, I despise the Fast and the Furious franchise with a passion. I think that qualifies me as a “hater.” And I do hate those movies. But I’m supposed to, right? I am not the target audience for said films. I don’t give a shit about cars beyond their means of just getting me from Point A to Point B, I think Vin Diesel’s career is a slap in the face of every aspiring actor that didn’t make it but took their shot in Hollywood, and they are simply too over-the-top without having the common decency to call themselves a parody.
Two kinds of movie watchers enjoy the Fast and the Furious movies: car aficionados and pop culture contrarians that worship at the altar of Joe Bob Briggs (who is the only legitimate contrarian who truly loves the ‘bad movie’.) I just can’t handle Dwayne Johnson grabbing a torpedo with his bare hand and tossing it at a submarine or driving a car from one skyscraper into another or Vin Diesel’s obsession with the importance of his surrogate family of past villains but forgot he had a biological brother for eight movies. Not unless we are collectively in on the joke.
And we aren’t. We are expected to take these films seriously and I just can’t do it. And it doesn’t help that George Miller has proven with Fury Road that there is a right way to get me to buy into an excessively exaggerated car chase movie.
However, I have recently found out that I can handle a Finnish prospector tossing a landmine at a Nazi’s head with great accuracy from a hundred yards away just before lighting himself on fire to escape aforementioned Nazis into a pond and then manages to avert drowning by slitting the throats of any Nazi that dares to follow him into the depths and sucking the air from their severed windpipe. THAT, I can get behind.
Hypocritical? Maybe. But in all fairness, the Fast and Furious is just pro-cars. Sisu is anti-Nazi. And I think cinematic Nazi’s are deserving of elaborate extermination. There’s a reason that in Inglorious Basterds, Eli Roth empties an entire clip into Hitler’s face instead of the sufficient single bullet. Hitler deserved the whole clip and more, and we all feel that.
Sisu isn’t a perfect movie by any means. The English-speaking Nazi’s were a real disappointment. What it is, though, is exactly what the Fast and Furious crusaders consistently say about their beloved franchise; “It’s a lot of fun.” The movie is set in Finland at the end of World War II and the Nazi’s know that defeat is imminent, and they are just destroying everything they can until the white flag is officially waved. And one such Nazi regiment on their scorched earth mission, come across the wrong Finnish prospector that just happened to dig up his own weight in gold. It’s a simple plot. This prospector has a metric butt ton of gold, and the Nazis want it.
Sisu is the most modern Nicolas Cage movie that doesn’t feature Nicolas Cage that I have ever seen. The movie is a bit of an off-brand John Wick (another over the top action flick that manages to do it better than Vin and company) —a seemingly ordinary man is wronged by some bad people only for them to discover that this is no ordinary man, but a reputable killing machine with a cool nickname that is just short of being immortally unkillable. Of course, stolen gold doesn’t pull at the heart strings as much as a dead puppy.
I haven’t found myself texting my friends telling them to watch this movie immediately. But it is a fun watch. The acting is solid. Nazis get their due comeuppance in excessively violent fashion that would make Jigsaw blush. And the whole movie happens without a single word from the protagonist until the final seconds of the film. The only problem? I’d rather just watch Inglorious Basterds."
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