Ethan Hawke attempts to breathe new life into the biopic structure with mixed results in “Wildcat.” What is certain is that he’s drawn a rich and multilayered performance from his daughter, Maya Hawke, in the starring role. 

As director and co-writer alongside Shelby Gaines, Hawke tells the story of Flannery O’Connor by imagining that her work and her life were inextricably intertwined, with one constantly influencing the other. The mid-century American writer had a flair for the darkly dramatic, exploring humanity's grotesque and profane elements in ways that seemed shocking and inappropriate for a proper young lady from the South.  

In “Wildcat,” O’Connor and the real people from her life appear as characters from her stories as they blossom in her mind. But while it’s admirable that the script tries to deviate from the episodic, chronological constraints of the traditional biopic, these sequences end up feeling distracting and distancing. Most feature Laura Linney as both O’Connor’s real-life mother, Regina, and a series of bluntly racist Southern stereotypes. Among the other supporting players in the film’s impressively deep bench is Steve Zahn as a one-armed man (inspired by a gentleman she sees at a train station) and Rafael Casal as a charismatic, tattooed drifter. 

These flights of fancy are wildly over-the-top, with gifted actors offering their versatility in the service of obnoxious, eccentric caricatures. Some of these portrayals are so hammy and mannered it’ll make you wince. Maya Hawke herself, so strong in recent years in “Stranger Things” and “Asteroid City,” shows a great deal of range—so much so that you wish the fantasy sequences offered her more nuanced material. These segments never fully gel with the real-life moments from O’Connor’s life, as she struggles with lifelong illness and the frustration of feeling like she never truly belongs. A later interlude involving “Licorice Pizza” star Cooper Hoffman as a traveling Bible salesman comes closest to achieving a real sense of tension and danger, as it’s pitched in a lower key and plays out a little longer than the rest. 

What’s more intriguing is the inner conflict that torments O’Connor: her yearning to achieve the grace of her Catholic faith, even as she explores her blasphemous creative instincts. Lying in bed, dying of lupus at her family’s Georgia farm, she beseeches a priest (Liam Neeson in a brief cameo) to help her navigate this spiritual divide. It’s a welcome moment of quiet, and Maya Hawke makes O’Connor’s anguish feel immediate and true. The authenticity of scenes like this one, and an earlier one with Alessandro Nivola as her editor, reflect this fascinatingly flawed woman’s inner life more convincingly than the film’s fictional diversions. 

And yet, Ethan Hawke offers a vivid sense of place in the rural South, brimming with detailed costume and production design. Working with cinematographer Steve Cosens, he elegantly evokes her isolation with sunlight streaking through her spare bedroom window as she reads or fireflies lighting up at dusk as she lurches across a field on crutches. O’Connor’s life in 1950s New York is equally distinct. Hawke’s exchanges with the writer Cal Lowell (Philip Ettinger), her mentor, (and maybe more) give the film’s early scenes an emotional heft that’s missing elsewhere.  

During a visualization of O’Connor’s short story “Parker’s Back,” Hawke’s character, Sarah Ruth, tells Casal’s O.E. Parker that she classifies people into two categories: irritating and less irritating. Unfortunately, that’s how the back-and-forth of “Wildcat” feels, too. But seeing Maya Hawke take on this lead role with such verve—and clearly so much love for the shared creative experience with her father—offers an exciting glimpse into the long career ahead of her. 

A handsomely produced, nearly empty experience, "Unfrosted: The Pop-Tarts Story" is hard to describe because it's tough to tell what the filmmakers were going for, much less argue about whether they achieved it. I say "filmmakers" plural because in theory, it's a collaborative medium. But here the buck stops with Jerry Seinfeld, who directed, produced, co-wrote the script, and plays the lead role. 

Set in 1963, though it might be hard to tell because of the late '60s songs that keep sneaking onto the soundtrack, "Unfrosted" is supposedly about the rivalry between breakfast cereal giants Kellogg's and Post as they engage in a processed food company's version of the space race. Each hopes to produce a revolutionary new breakfast treat that will crush the competition, and obsessively monitors the opposing company, conducting corporate espionage by way of tiny movie cameras hidden in janitorial equipment. 

The movie is a mishmash of fact and fiction and goofing around. But there's just enough reality to irritate history nerds that the filmmakers apparently don't care about offering even a wildly exaggerated or satirized account of compelling true stories of the Kellogg's-Post rivalry. Their vaudeville/satire approach might've worked had the movie been conceived and executed with the panache that, say, the Coen Brothers bring to all of their slapstick features ("The Hudsucker Proxy" seems to have been a partial influence, at least on the "madcap" sequences); or, for that matter, the mix of daffiness and melancholy that Greta Gerwig brought to "Barbie."  

Seinfeld plays a made-up person named Bob Cabana who works at the uppermost level of Kellogg's. Cabana reels in his old partner—another made-up character, NASA scientist Donna Stankowski (Melissa McCarthy)—to help him perfect the Pop-Tart.  Jim Gaffigan plays Cabana's boss Edsel Kellogg III, a made-up member of the Kellogg family. Edsel is in lust with the boss of the competition, Marjorie Post (Amy Schumer). Post is a real historical personage: the daughter of Post Cereal founder C.W. Post. She actually did run Post (the company was once called Postum) as well as the international conglomerate that it morphed into, General Foods. The movie doesn't care about that stuff, of course; I just mention it in case you wondered if that character was based on anyone real, and if so, whether she amounted to anything other than the shallow, conniving, pushy horndog portrayed by Schumer. 

I could build out the fake/real list of characters for several pages, but there would be no point. You can't tell from looking at "Unfrosted" why some characters were based on fact and others were invented. There's no discernible aesthetic, only an immaculate but anonymous-seeming version of craft. In a sense, you could say "Unfrosted" is a very faithful adaptation, because the source is a Seinfeld standup routine on Pop-Tarts, and Seinfeld never cares about anything he talks about in his comedy, which is aggressively, at times petulantly trivial. His immense wealth so insulates him from the real world that he can afford to be the most blasé person alive, rising to passion only when griping to interviewers that comedy has become too woke. "Seinfeld" the sitcom (which Larry David, who has spent his entire adult life giving offense, co-created) often made comic art out of skewering that type of guy. Sometimes Seinfeld played him and was the butt of the joke.  

But I digress. "Unfrosted" doesn't make much of anything from its subject. It doesn't care enough to communicate, even in the most basic and lighthearted sense, why it exists, which is something you'd never wonder about, had the movie been overseen by somebody like Joe Dante ("Gremlins") or Adam McKay (back when he was making films like "Step Brothers" and "Anchorman" that were content to be just comedies) or the grandaddy of modern film parody, Mel Brooks. Seinfeld keeps going for Jerry Lewis or Looney Tunes-style surreal-absurd visual humor, like showing a spy camera barely hidden in the strands of a wet mop that's actively being used to clean a floor, or having one of the early Pop Tarts prototypes escape from a tank and scuttle around like an edible Pikachu. But he doesn't have the eye, the timing, or the anarchic spirit to pull it off, and whenever he tries, he achieves the eerily inhuman and cold sort of mastery that Boston Dynamics robots display in dance videos.

There are fleets of vintage mid-century cars, whole neighborhoods retrofitted with period-correct signage, and throngs of background performers wearing outfits that would've fit into an early season of "Mad Men." The circa-1963 clutter on office desks has been manifested with the kind of detail that Andrew Wyeth brought to the textures of wheat fields and farmhouses. It's evident that everyone who worked on the production cared deeply about their specific department. But the finished product has no apparent passion, even of the silly or self-deprecating kind. It doesn't even seem to love the consumer products, logos, and corporate mascots it gathers in one cinematic place as if trying to create the mid-20th-century consumer products answer to "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" or "Ready Player One." 

The dumpster-style accumulation of Wikipedia citations is nonsensical. For no apparent reason, Bob Cabana gathers a team of historical figures associated with legendary American brands, including Sea Monkeys creator Harold von Braunhut (Thomas Lennon), fitness entrepreneur Jack LaLanne (James Marsden), and bicycle magnate Steve Schwinn (Jack McBrayer). None of them are funny, no matter how much they mug and pop their eyes. Thurl Ravenscroft (Hugh Grant), who voiced Tony the Tiger, the Frosted Flakes mascot, is also a character, as are other Kellogg's and Post cereal mascot performers. JFK is represented (Bill Burr does a solid impersonation) along with Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev (a glowering Dean Norris) and Walter Cronkite and Johnny Carson (both played by Kyle Dunnigan). But none bear much relation to actual people or events, nor (more importantly) to anything amusing (JFK is reduced to his sexual obsessions, and we're told that he got the Doublemint Twins pregnant). If the pointlessness is the point, it doesn't come across.

"Unfrosted" is also strangely contemptuous of the foods, consumer products, and graphic design and marketing elements it references. Snap, Crackle, and Pop, the elf mascots of Kellogg's Rice Krispies, become three overworked actors who wear the costumes everywhere; they play bagpipes at the funeral of a man who died testing the Pop-Tart and behave insensitively towards his widow. After the dead man's coffin is lowered into the earth, Kellogg's Corn Flakes rooster mascots pour boxes of cornflakes into the grave site. Cornflakes are described elsewhere in terms that make them sound revolting. Some of the asides are smutty—not in a fun way, but one that feels obligatory and gross when juxtaposed with products that are mainly adored by children.

The hackery level is so high in this movie that they took the great Thurl Ravenscroft, an American who did all of his significant work as a voice-over artist in recording studios, including the voice of Tony the Tiger and the singing voice of the original animated Grinch, and turned him into a petty, embittered, run-down, Shakespeare-trained Brit who has to wear the Tony the Tiger costume during shoots and public appearances, hates that his usefulness comes from playing a copyrighted character, and worries that no one respects him as an artist. I liked this character best when he was played by Alan Rickman and the movie was called "Galaxy Quest," and second best all the other times I've seen it. 

"Unfrosted" is one of many free viewing options on a streaming platform with thousands more, so people will watch it, or the first five or ten minutes of it. It's not only a critic-proof movie, it's an artistry-proof movie, and an audience-proof movie. This review is the tree that fell in the forest with no one around.

On Netflix now.

If I were to explain to you the setup of Marisa Kavtaradze’s “Slow,” my guess is that it would lead many of you to more or less assume most of what is to follow. However, one of the many nice things about the film, which was Lithuania’s Oscar submission for this year’s International Feature Film category, is that it avoids those expectations, more interested in exploring the real issues and emotions inspired by the premise than falling prey to the usual formulas. The result is a quietly affecting work, one of the more engaging romantic dramas to come along in a while.

As the film begins, contemporary dance instructor Elena (Greta Grineviciute) is about to begin teaching a class for Deaf children when she meets Dovydas (Kestutis Cicenas), there to serve as a sign language interpreter between her and her pupils. From the moment they meet, there is an undeniable spark between the two. Over the course of the first 20-odd minutes, we watch as these two (both of whom are in positions to use their bodies as a form of communication) get to know each other, and it becomes apparent that they really like each other. (The moment when an initially crestfallen Elena realizes that he's only translating at an upcoming wedding he mentions to her is especially sweet.) 

Finally, they reach the point in the story where we expect them to go to bed together. It's at this point that Dovydas drops a bombshell—he is, in fact, asexual.

At first, Elena is under the impression that he simply is not attracted to her—a big deal since the film establishes her as a person with a cheerfully sensual aura (partially explained by a visit to her mother, a woman chilly enough to make the Mary Tyler Moore character in “Ordinary People” seem warm and effacing by comparison). But it's precisely because he is genuinely interested in her that he makes this admission in the first place, instead of stringing her along or cutting things off immediately. Given the strength of their connection, they attempt to make a go of things by moving out of their respective emotional comfort zones to some middle ground between her more traditional sexual relationship and the mere friendships he's used to.

If this premise had gone through the typical Hollywood studio machine, it probably would have been pitched more as a comedy about Elena trying to get Dovydas into bed, and would probably insinuate that his asexuality was just a case of not having found the right person. Kavtaradze instead treats the concept seriously, observing these two as they negotiate unfamiliar waters together. We see both the good times (when they seem so perfectly in sync that the very notion of sex seems like an afterthought) and the bad (when it is clear that will never be the case). 

Instead of piling on contrivances and cheap psychology to move the story along, Kavtaradze keeps "Slow" situated in a refreshingly human level, respecting the intelligence of her characters and the audience. In that, she is aided immensely by the work of her two stars, both of whom deliver smart and convincing performances. The level of emotional intimacy that they display in their scenes together is genuinely off the charts.

Of course, the notion of watching a methodically paced film about two attractive people who may never go to bed with each other may not exactly be to the liking of many moviegoers. Many of those people will most likely further object to how Kavtaradze concludes her story. I don’t know what to say to those people except that they're missing out on something special. For those who, like Elena and Dovydas, are willing to push themselves to something more challenging, they will be amply rewarded. 

“The Roundup: Punishment” is the third sequel in a series of Korean cop thrillers featuring a tank-sized boxer nicknamed the “monster cop.” Somehow, these movies aren’t as fun as that suggests. Ma Dong-seok, aka Don Lee, plays Seok-do, the only memorable constant in this episodic action franchise, which began in 2017 with the hit “The Outlaws.” In the last three movies, Seok-do punched bad guys across the room and smashed through whatever physical obstacles stood in his way. Because what else are you going to do with a guy who looks like Benjamin Grimm’s second cousin?

Lee wasn’t as big of a star in 2017, especially not outside of Asia, so it’s unsurprising that the tone of the first two sequels toggle wildly between unfortunately broad police comedy and bloody, generic crime drama. Somehow, each new “The Roundup” installment has simultaneously relied more on Lee’s presence and less on his gifts. He still pummels bad guys in “The Roundup: Punishment,” about an online casino and a handful of grisly murders. But Lee’s still not only in not enough scenes, but sadly, he also doesn’t get to show off his knack for physical comedy.

Seok-do remains part of a team of otherwise forgettable police officers. They abide by the law, get cheesed off by violent criminals, and always get their men. They’re not quite M Squad nor the Sweeney, but they do have a monster cop on their team, and that’s sometimes enough. When Lee’s not on-screen, these movies are all about their villains, desperate crooks who are usually Korean but still don’t quite fit in anywhere. 

This movie’s broody antagonist is Baek Chang-ki (Kim Mu-yeol), a chilly ex-mercenary who runs an online casino in the Philippines. Baek inevitably finds himself at odds with his business partners, led by the weaselly IT prodigy Chang Dong-cheol (Lee Dong-hwi). Baek also ruthlessly stabs one of his casino’s (literally) captive employees to death. That puts Baek at odds with Seok-do, who makes a promise to the victim’s mother (who dies almost instantly)—he will punish whoever’s responsible.

There are ways to dress up such a stock plot without taking viewers too far afield of, say, action or chase scenes, most of which are polished but unremarkable. But the makers of “The Roundup: Punishment” don’t seem to care enough to make their latest procedural seem personal. Without spoiling anything: nothing in this movie really suggests a strong emotional connection between Seok-do and the people he says that he’s fighting for. There’s also not much to latch onto during scenes where Chang acts like a snotty bigshot, mainly because his dialogue isn’t juicy enough to make you want to root against him. At least Baek never over-promises in his scenes; he glares, he stabs, he kills.

“The Roundup: Punishment” flounders hardest during any comedic tangent that isn’t about Don Lee. He’s sometimes a comic foil for Jang Yi-soo (Park Ji-hwan), a small-time crook who gets tricked into working for the police with a toy FDA badge (he thinks he’s been deputized). Park does well with his limited part, but his jokes are never as amusing as his presence. With all due respect to Park, who exactly wants to watch this guy mug for the camera when you could be watching Lee instead?

It’s not like the makers of “The Roundup: Punishment” don’t understand Lee’s appeal. He aces the comedic punchline at the end of a somewhat involved chase scene. The cops race after Choi Yu-Seong (Bae Jae-won), one of Baek’s associates, who seems to get away until Seok-do tricks Choi into joining him in the back of a mini-van. There’s not much to Seok-do’s dialogue—“Has to be for a reason, right?”—but Lee’s presence makes this subpar zinger seem worthy of Bugs Bunny.

Unfortunately, the action scenes in “The Roundup: Punishment” also lack the antic energy that makes Lee stand out in the first place. There’s a lot more boxing choreography but fewer scenes where Seok- demolishes solid barriers and glass jaws with hilarious abandon. The concluding fight with Baek has its moments, but more often feels skimpy and self-serious.

It’s not hard to see the appeal of “The Roundup: Punishment” given the technical polish and formulaic conventions that keep this series chugging along. But Lee still deserves better dialogue—“I made someone a promise. To punish you.”—and better jokes, too. He even devours throwaway laugh lines, like when Seok-do struggles to repeat an inspirational speech to his colleagues moments after the Commissioner delivers the same spiel to him. Watching the big man soldier on despite his poor memory is the best reason to get excited—and maybe a little disappointed—for yet another “The Roundup.” Someday, Lee will get the comedic starring vehicle he deserves; he’s a decent action hero but a better gagman.

In 1761, a 24-year-old penniless woman named Jeanne Bécu wrote a letter to a "dear friend," telling him she loved him before getting to the point: "I don’t want to remain a shopgirl, but a little more my own mistress, and would therefore like to find someone to keep me." She makes her pitch: "It will not cost you anymore rent ... To keep me and my headdress will be the only expense, and for those give me one hundred livres a month." 

The unknown man did not take her up on it, but the letter shows the boldness of the woman soon known to history as Madame du Barry. She was the illegitimate daughter of a cook and a monk. Not a good start. She needed protection. Eventually, Jean-Baptiste du Barry stepped into the keeper role. Not long afterward, she was introduced to King Louis XV and installed at Versailles as his mistress. The rest is history.

But what history? Does the story of Madame du Barry illuminate any truths or provide insight into historical events? I would argue that it does. Unfortunately, "Jeanne du Barry," directed by French director/actress Maïwenn, who she plays the title role opposite Johnny Depp as King Louis V, takes a surface-level approach to this famously controversial figure. 

"Jeanne du Barry" is undeniably pleasing to look at; cinematographer Laurent Dailland makes full use of those extraordinary rooms and vistas, with "Barry Lyndon"-style candle flames illuminating dark rooms, and Jürgen Doering deserves high praise for his costume design. But the story's intriguing complexities are smoothed over, submerged, and deemed less interesting than the lovers' stunning surroundings. 

The film starts with voiceover, an omniscient voice lecturing us on Jeanne's early history in flash-card fashion. We see her as a child, and 10 seconds later, she's a teenager, refusing to take her clothes off as an artist's model. Another ten seconds, she's tossed out of her job as a lady's companion after sleeping with the woman's two sons. Ten seconds after that, she's the most celebrated courtesan in Paris. How on earth did this transformation happen? There's no real exploration of the practicality of this woman (as evidenced in the letter above) doing what she had to do to survive.

Once ensconced in the home of the Comte du Barry (Melvil Poupaud), she is approached by La Borde (Benjamin Lavernhe), King Louis' adviser (and, let's face it, procurer). He arranges a meeting with the King. La Borde tutors Jeanne in royal protocols (one can't help but think of Julia Roberts in "Pretty Woman" learning about table settings). A doctor examines Jeanne with a speculum straight out of a torture chamber from the Spanish Inquisition. Everything is in order with her vagina, apparently. And so begins Jeanne's "affair" with the King.

Because it's Versailles, "affair" has a different meaning. Royal mistresses were a tradition, but Jeanne du Barry was no Madame de Pompadour (the mistress before Jeanne). Pompadour wielded immense power as a patron of the arts and political adviser. The court despised Jeanne, and the King's daughters rejected her. As presented in "Jeanne du Barry," the liaison between Jeanne and the King is an oasis of peace, the two instantly understanding and valuing one another. The nature of their bond is not explored with specificity. Is Jeanne flattered by his attention or just dazzled by the jewels? (The jewels include the famous necklace, which caused such a scandal that it reared its head 10 years later and became a huge factor in toppling Marie Antoinette.) The power imbalance in the relationship with Louis was not weird at the time, but there is a distinct lack of curiosity in digging into it. The bond is not explained. We are meant just to take it on faith.

Depp was a controversial casting choice (probably one of the reasons why the equally controversial Maïwenn chose him), and he sleepwalks through the part in his fabulous outfits and plumed hats, seeming mostly dispirited. Maïwenn's Jeanne is a cipher in a generalized emotional state of playfulness, humor, and tenderness. It appears she has no faults or flaws. There's no edge to the portrayal, nothing distinct. The most touching performance in the film is Lavernhe's Borde, who adds shadings of humor and kindness to what could have been a perfunctory role.

The film's presentation of Zamor, the slave child King Louis gave to Jeanne as a gift—literally in a box with a huge bow—is unsettling and uncritical. Zamor is played as a child and teenager by Ibrahim Yaffa and Djibril Djimo, respectively, and the relationship between him and Jeanne is shown as idyllic and childlike, the two of them cavorting around the palace, the open-minded Jeanne rising above the racist court. This is simplistic, not to mention dishonest, particularly if you know the real story. When revolution broke out a decade later, Zamor joined the Jacobins, calling for the arrest of Jeanne, detailing her love of aristocracy, her outrageous spending habits, and her "ownership" of him. Zamor brought about Jeanne du Barry’s downfall. She was beheaded in 1793.

At film's end, the voiceover informs us Zamor did what he did "out of distress or spite." "Spite"? This sounds suspiciously like “he bit the hand that fed him." It is the "tell," the giveaway of how the film wants us to view Jeanne. It seems that "out of justifiable anger" would be a better way to describe Zamor's actions. "Jeanne du Barry" cares more about the love affair between two non-distinct people wearing exquisite clothes in stunning rooms than the reality that would sweep away those rooms, those clothes, and those people in just a few years' time.

“Prom Dates,” about a couple of teenage best-bud girls getting in trouble during the run-up to prom, is a raunchy, R-rated but warmhearted teen comedy. It operates in a mode that’s been around for decades but reached its 21st century zenith in “Superbad” and got a social media-era upgrade in “Booksmart.” It was written by D.J. Mausner and directed by Kim O. Nguyen, who came up mainly through TV sitcoms, and has a sitcom-y feel, despite wide-format cinematography that’s supposed to say “this is different, it’s cinema.” It mostly feels like a very long pilot for a Netflix show that would go to series, build a modest but loyal following, then get canceled after two seasons so the streamer doesn’t have to give everyone a raise for going to three. But there's loads of talent in it. 

The friends are Jess (Antonia Gentry) and Hannah (Julia Lester). When they were just 13, they hid under a table at a prom they’d snuck into and made a promise that Hannah’s date would be the “love of her life” while Jess would be the most popular girl at school and be named prom queen. Five years later senior prom is coming up and all is chaos. Jess hopes to cement her chances at winning the crown by going with a handsome but shallow rich kid named Luca (Jordan Buhat), but she catches him cheating the night before prom and dumps him. (After Luca's secret other hookup storms out, he says to the room, "Siri, pause 'Sexy Time Playlist.'")

Hannah, meanwhile, doesn’t have a date lined up but gets invited, in song and in the middle of a school assembly, by her obsessive Number One fan Greg (Kenny Ridwan, channeling Mike Yanagita in “Fargo” something fierce). She says yes but her heart’s not in it, not just because Greg is annoying and has no sense of boundaries, but because Hannah is a lesbian and hasn’t come out to anyone yet, not even Jess. 

A long portion of the movie takes place at a college mixer where copious amounts of alcohol and drugs are consumed, and much sex is attempted (though not much actually had). The story flips around on itself multiple times, and would it surprise you to learn that in the end, the girls realize that all they really needed was each other? Well, that plus a bit of wish fulfillment that feels well-deserved by the time it finally arrives.

A lot of “Prom Dates” sounds and moves in accordance with the post-millennium, industry-standard cliches of scripted comedy, which include cathartic or transformative moments that are cruelly cut short by unexpected eruptions of body fluids (puke and blood in this one) and scenes where people have deadpan conversations with individuals at parties who don’t realize how truly, deeply weird they are (quite a rogue’s gallery here, including an aspiring serial killer and a young woman named Heather who discovered liquid courage and renamed herself Vodka Heather).  

A lot of the talk sounds like stuff that a Hollywood sitcom writers’ room would come up: declamatory and workshoppy, delivered in Tweet-sized bursts. It's a problem at every level of the industry, so it's not as if "Prom Dates" is a unique case. But the script takes so many shots at such velocity that a high percentage lands anyway, and a lot of it is quotable, even meme-able—especially the bits from Hannah, an emotionally bruised, prematurely cynical, rightly angry person who seems as if she might grow up to write a film like this one. “Your music taste is all women who sound like sad ghosts anyway,” she chides her devoted brother Jacob (JT Neal). When she texts every lesbian and possible lesbian she’s ever met in hopes of getting a prom date, one of them replies, “Sorry! I’m not gay, I’m just really into softball,” and Heather fumes, “That’s a lie! She hit 42 home runs this year!”

The cast is appealing even when the movie stuffs them into pre-fab teen movie character slots. And it’s fun to see so many young actors being encouraged to let their freak flags fly at the same time that they're being asked to do a lot of old-fashioned character-driven scene work. Gentry and Lester have such genuine chemistry (especially when the characters are fighting) that I wouldn’t mind seeing more films built around them. The performer who goes furthest is Ridwan, who inhabits Greg with a mix of nerdy innocence and fiery individuality reminiscent of young Nicolas Cage in early roles like “Valley Girl” and “Peggy Sue Got Married.” There's a scene near the end between Hannah and Greg that's unexpectedly piercing in its honesty. It might be instructive to check back on "Prom Dates" in about ten years and make a list of all the significant actors who first got noticed in it.

On Hulu now.

"I've been called a witch, a slut, and a murderer. Maybe people confuse me with the characters I play in films ... like I'm an empty vessel onto which they project their fantasies and their shortcomings, but I don't need to settle scores. I'm reclaiming my soul. I write as a woman searching for another adventure." 

Thus begins Alexis Bloom and Svetlana Zill’s documentary “Catching Fire: The Story of Anita Pallenberg.” Scarlett Johansson provided the voice-over, reading from an unpublished memoir written by model-actress-artist-icon Anita Pallenberg. Found by her children after her death in 2017, the words contained "will anger the lawyers,” she wrote. If only the rest of the documentary lived up to the vibrant voice Pallenberg established for herself. 

Like any number of recent bio-docs, the filmmakers use archival footage, film clips, photographs, and interviews with those who knew her, including director Volker Schlöndorff, her children Marlon and Angela, and even Keith Richards himself, to craft a surface-level reassessment of Pallenberg’s life. An audio clip from similarly sidelined icon Marianne Faithful states, "Neither of us wanted to be with them because we wanted their power. We had our own power." Yet, the documentary mostly anchors Pallenberg’s life around her time with The Rolling Stones.

A quick blast to the past sets up Pallenberg’s youth as a self-described “wild child” who grew up with conservative Italian-German parents who lost everything during WWII. This prelude tells us how deeply her childhood during the war affected her behavior. Still, this thread is abandoned later in the doc, aside from one assertion that she and Richards understood each other because they were both children during the war. 

The rest of the documentary follows her whirlwind life after coming to America in 1963 and befriending the downtown art scene, which included Jasper Johns, Andy Warhol, and Allen Ginsberg. “I loved the feeling of culture exploding,” she says about her time in New York City. We get a laundry list of miscellaneous jobs she performed without much exploration of exactly what she hoped to express as an artist. 

Instead, we get a very detailed re-telling of how she met the Rolling Stones and fell in love with Brian Jones, whom she described as her "doppelganger.” This was a mutually destructive, co-dependent relationship filled with drugs (and eventually violence) from Jones. This section of her life is illustrated with heaps of archival material that adds a cool sheen to everything, smoothing over its lack of any actual substance. 

One of the few times we learn anything about Pallenberg as an artist comes from director Schlöndorff’s stories of making “Degree of Murder” with her. This then transitions into a wonderful discussion of her larger-than-life talent as “The Great Tyrant” in the camp classic “Barbarella.” Of all the talking heads, Schlöndorff appears to be the only one interested in who Pallenberg was as an artist and keeping that part of her legacy alive. 

Of course, this is also the time in her life when her relationship with Jones imploded; she found solace with Richards, who would be her partner for the next decade, and also a brief fling with Mick Jagger while they made Nicolas Roeg’s "Performance" together. And yes, it is interesting that both "Gimme Shelter" and "You Can't Always Get What You Want" were written about her. Still, the doc would have been stronger if it interrogated how she felt about what she inspired rather than dwelling on the salaciousness of it all. 

Again, it proves just how deeply rooted this film is in telling Pallenberg's story by who she was in relation to all these men. Despite claiming otherwise in its marketing, this doc still wants to uphold her as the rock n’ roll goddess of the headlines rather than as a person on her own terms. Because we only get curated sections of her unpublished memories, which are few and far between, it remains unclear how much of her memoir explores her wants, desires, and inner thoughts. Did she write about her children? Did she write about her artistic drive? 

Worst of all, the most notorious stories from this period of her life—her affair with Jagger, fleeing with Richards and their children to Switzerland to avoid jail time for their illegal drug use, the death of their third child, the “Deer Hunter” inspired death of Scott Cantrell—are all told from an outsider's perspective. We never really get to know how these incidents affected Pallenberg. We only glimpse her inner life in relation to her darkest moment. On trying to kick her heroin addiction, Pallenberg wrote that she "felt like some nasty person who caused death and destruction around her." Up to this point, that’s all the doc has allowed her story to be.

She and Richards split for good in 1979, and Pallenberg was finally able to get sober. Yet, although the film is titled "The Story of Anita Pallenberg," it loses all interest in Pallenberg's life once her story parallels that of the Stones. Even with a two-hour runtime, the documentary reduces the last forty years of her life, in which she began modeling again and returned to film acting, among other artistic pursuits, to a cursory montage and some kind words from Kate Moss. Why is this part of her life not worth true inclusion? Why do Bloom and Zill not deem it integral to her story?

In a final piece of voiceover, Pallenberg says, "Writing this [memoir] has helped me emerge in my own eyes." Too bad, then, that her story has been filtered through eyes that still only see her as a mess or a muse, not the complex, imperfect artist, mother, and woman she really was. 

Tell me if this sounds familiar: A romantic couple, one American, one British, one the proprietor of a small, very narrow business, happy with family and friends but lonely and a little lost, one a global superstar, but lonely and a little lost. Both are spectacularly beautiful. And there’s a reason the star has to visit the ordinary person’s home, where a disgusting beverage is offered, plus a gift of a painting that carries a lot of meaning and constant predatory paparazzi. 

Yes, you will recognize a lot of the elements of “Notting Hill” in “The Idea of You.” It is a glossier but lesser work from writers Michael Showalter (who also directed) and Jennifer Westfeldt, whose better films have more texture. Here, they work from a beloved novel by Robinne Lee. The book's Amazon blurb reads, “included on The Skimm's 2020 list of Eight Books Both You and Mom Will Love.” Perhaps they erred on the side of fan service, hoping that their stars would fill in what the script was missing. They’re partially right. Anne Hathaway, playing the “older woman” of 40, is still as dewy as she was as an ingenue, and rocketing-to-stardom Nicholas Galitzine is a swoon-worthy Prince Charming. They do their considerable best, even when the screenplay limits them to longing glances, steamy embraces, and heart-breaking partings. 

Hathaway plays Solène Marchand, owner of a small art gallery in the trendy Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles and a divorced mother of Izzy (Ella Rubin), a high school junior. Solène's ex-husband, Daniel (Reid Scott), who is better at spending money on Izzy than spending time with her, has purchased VIP access passes for Coachella so that Izzy can have a meet-and-greet with August Moon, a boy band she has not loved since 7^thgrade. At the last minute, Daniel bails on the festival for a business trip, and Solène has to abandon her plans for a solo camping trip to take Izzy and her friends to the concert. 

That is where Solène somehow mistakes a singer’s trailer for a port-a-potty, this story’s attempt at a meet-cute. The singer is poor little rich boy Hayes Campbell (Galitzine), who has been a pop sensation since he auditioned to be a part of a boy band when he was 14. He is drawn by Solène’s combination of normality (not recognizing him) and stunning beauty (I mean, it is Anne Hathaway). He tracks her down at her art gallery, buys everything in it, and, because he is constantly hounded by press and fans, they go to her home for lunch, where they share some stories about their trust issues (and then a kiss).

So far, so good. But this is where it goes from a barely plausible fairy tale to a big, juicy target for one of those YouTube snark-fests about plot holes and character implausibility.  Despite being alive in 2024 and Hayes’ experience for nearly half his life with constant attention from fans and media, they somehow think Solène can go on tour with the band through Europe and smooch in public with no one noticing. While they did inch his age up four years from the novel’s 20, somewhat diminishing the oooky factor, they don't give Hayes much of a personality other than that of lost, sensitive guy whose immediate, unwavering devotion speaks only of his perfect boyfriend-ness. Never of, oh, I don’t know, undifferentiated neediness; his feeling of abandonment by his mother; any thought he might have about someday wanting children; any issues of generational disconnect; cultural, developmental, or life experience. 

Solène’s character is just as thinly developed (still hurt by her ex, adoring her daughter – though very cute when they sing along to St. Vincent in the car), enriched by her support for local artists, and, later, understandably unsure about whether a relationship with a pop star seven years older than her daughter is a good idea. But Hayes has even less to work with. His only traits are being in love with Solène and maybe wanting to write some songs. It's worth mentioning that the songs in the film, both original and needle drops, are quite good. 

If they gave Oscars for bringing underwritten characters to life, Hathaway and Galitzine would be contenders. Though many in the audience may find more satisfaction from the sweet revenge on her cheating ex than the romance, as implausible as it is, we cannot help rooting for Solène and Hayes to find a way to make it work. 

On Prime Video now.

With the notable exception of “Barbie,” the modern blockbuster can be pretty serious stuff. Whether it’s the dense lore and world-building of “Dune” or “Avatar: The Way of Water,” or the self-serious connected universe of the MCU, blockbusters have often felt like work lately too. This is not to say that some of these films aren’t masterful, only that there’s been a dearth of old-fashioned entertainment, the kind of Hollywood productions designed to entertain above all else. A movie where you don't need to take notes or have seen the ones that came before it. “The Fall Guy” wants to entertain you. It wants to put the blinding star power of two of the industry’s most charismatic leads in fun, romantic situations and see what happens. It wants to remind viewers of a time when stunt work mattered more than it does in the CGI era, and embrace the team aspect of filmmaking in a manner that’s infectious and, well, wildly entertaining. This is a ridiculously fun movie, anchored by a movie star in a part that fits him perfectly and a director who really has been working toward this film for his entire career.

David Leitch started as a stunt double, working with actors like Brad Pitt, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Matt Damon, and many more. His directorial debut was a little film called “John Wick,” and he parlayed that success into films like “Atomic Blonde” and “Bullet Train.” He returns to his roots in “The Fall Guy,” inspired by the Lee Majors show of the same name about a Hollywood stuntman who happened to also be a bounty hunter. Little narrative DNA is shared with the show beyond a profession and a name, but the 2024 “The Fall Guy” does have the general tone of ‘80s television in the way it blends a bit of humor, romance, mystery, and action into the mix, willing to drop references to the action stars that inspired it while also carving out its own personality.

Ryan Gosling is ridiculously charismatic as the new Colt Seavers, giving one of those broadly magnetic performances that made him so likable in films like “The Nice Guys” but also leaning on some acting chops and intensity that should remind fans of his iconic turn in “Drive.” “The Fall Guy” is very much about the people behind the scenes of the movie industry, but it’s almost more of an ode to the era of the movie star, when a performer could hold a viewer over any narrative speedbump. Mostly for the better, Hollywood shifted to a story-and concept-driven approach to moviemaking, but Leitch and the team behind “The Fall Guy” clearly remember when a superstar who was both sexy and funny—think Burt Reynolds at his peak—could be more than enough. Gosling has that easy-going charm. When he was singing “I’m Just Ken” at the Oscars, the man next to me at the bar at which I was watching it at SXSW, said, “I’m almost annoyed at how that guy can do anything.” “The Fall Guy” proves again the last five words of that statement true.

Colt is introduced on set as the double to a diva action star named Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson, doing enough of a blend between Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, and even Matthew McConaughey that he seems right without ever feeling like he’s specifically ripping on one actor). When a fall goes horribly wrong, Colt is sidelined for 18 months, leaving behind his girlfriend Jody (Emily Blunt) and maybe the industry for good. When Jody’s producer Gail (Hannah Waddingham) comes to Colt to beg him to double Ryder again on the set of Jody’s directorial debut, Colt relents. The first act of “The Fall Guy” basically plays like a romantic comedy as Jody berates Colt for running from their relationship after his accident in a great scene in front of a lot of cast and crew—it feels like a reminder of how little privacy there is on a movie set—and then the script by Drew Pearce pivots into mystery and action when Ryder goes missing. Winston Duke, Stephanie Hsu, Teresa Palmer, and a French-speaking action dog round out a great cast. More needle drops from the era of the show, including recurring use of the very recognizable riff of “I Was Made for Lovin’ You” by KISS, feel like a nod to both the era of the original series and when they made more action-rom-coms like this in Hollywood.

A theme of “The Fall Guy” is how stunt people have to put their life at risk, narrowly avoid injury, and, hopefully, give a thumbs up as a sign that they’re okay. They are people who never get credit but have made so many classic films what they are in our collective memory. So, naturally, “The Fall Guy” has to include some insane stunt work, including a record-breaking cannon roll stunt, an incredible fight in a spinning dumpster, and more than one massive vehicle jump. Leitch and his team find a great balance between character, comedy, and action, although it is worth noting that Blunt kind of takes a back seat in the second half of the film, which is disappointing after the pair’s excellent chemistry in the first. Hsu also feels a little wasted, although Waddingham and Duke get to have some fun, especially the latter, who gets to remind viewers that he too can do a little bit of everything.

With a message that should resonate with anyone worried about AI and deep fakes, “The Fall Guy” feels like a pushback against all the CGI-heavy, character-less, humorless blockbusters that have been coming off the content production line over the last few years. It’s actively—and its detractors would likely argue too aggressively—trying to simply provide ticket buyers with what too often feels like a secondary concern in big movies lately: fun.

This review was filed from the world premiere at the SXSW Film Festival. It will be released on May 3rd.

In middle school, John Green novels were the quintessential YA diaries in which my friends and I indulged. Ferociously consuming his books and feeding our angst and inflated otherness through Margo Roth Spiegelman and Alaska Young, or pining for the love of Hazel and Augustus, the announcement of an adaptation sent us straight to theaters to see our literary parasocial relationships on the big screen. 

“Turtles All the Way Down” is the newest page-to-screen translation of a John Green tale, directed by Hannah Marks and scripted by two “Love, Simon” co-writers Elizabeth Berger and Isaac Aptaker. With both the novel’s publication and film’s release taking place years after my entry to adulthood, the persistence of Green’s youthful narrative charm was in question. But “Turtles All the Way Down” is the opposite of tired, certain to find an audience in its targeted teens and tweens and delight the minds and hearts of those who may suspect themselves too old for it.

Aza (Isabela Merced) is a timid teen with OCD, habitually finding herself in intrusive thought spirals concerning infection and the human microbiome, feeling like an endless Russian doll of a person, unable to find herself in the layers. Juggling her mental health alongside the grief of her late father and the angst of feeling misunderstood by her hovering though well-intentioned mother (Judy Reyes), Aza often feels drowned in her own humanity. Her best friend Daisy (Cree) is the opposite of her in every way: outgoing, witty, and perpetually unbothered, at times to the point of recklessness. 

When a local billionaire goes on the run to avoid pending charges, Daisy convinces Aza to sneak onto his estate in search for clues, in the hopes of snagging $100k worth of reward money for pertinent info. When caught by security, their saving grace from a call to the cops is that Aza knows the magnate’s son, Davis (Felix Mallard), from a childhood summer spent at grief camp. This reunion prompts a swift change from a childhood crush to a budding romance. But as Aza desires closeness, the expected butterflies of anxiety are metastasized by the oppressive influence of her OCD. 

“Turtles All the Way Down” is on the pulse of a very present sense of youth, one marked by discussions of mental health. Marks’ direction and excellent sound design, which sets Aza’s thought spirals to a soundtrack of pulsing static, places us effectively into her interiority. Neither the film nor Merced’s highly emotive performance pities Aza or people like her in an othering way. The proximity we’re given to her inner dialogue through Merced’s narration, as well as the palpable, smile-inducing chemistry of Merced and Cree’s Daisy root Aza so empathetically that we, with ease, can pinpoint our own anxieties, present and remembered, amidst her shallow breaths. However, her OCD and intrusive thoughts are not defining. Equally, the film's tenderness and humor are touching and exciting in the wealth of moments that are peripheral to lapses where she’s trapped in her mind. It’s also undeniably relatable. 

Aza and Daisy spend their days waxing sarcastic on their love lives, coupon-dining at Applebee’s, and driving around habitually listening to the CD stuck in the player of Aza’s car, Stankonia by Outkast (a sweet moment of them rapping to "Ms. Jackson" being just one highlight in the film’s colorful soundtrack, which also boasts needle drops from LCD Soundsystem, Tame Impala, and Billie Eilish). 

The Davis-Aza relationship is responsible for a large amount of heartwarming, kick-your-feet sweetness, but Mallard’s performance struggles to match Merced’s authenticity. While a handful of their one-on-one moments and preciously awkward text convos may recall your first big crush, and others your dreams of what it could’ve been like (unless your high school sweetheart whisked you off on a private jet to Chicago, in which case, good for you), there’s simply no match for the Aza-Daisy dynamic. Through all their ups and downs, the feeling of best friendship perseveres through the film’s love, lust, and bacteria. 

Marks’ “Turtles All the Way Down” shines with John Green’s trademark whimsy. It’s a charming, delightful YA romance that doesn’t bind itself to the sole enjoyment of its target market. “Turtles All the Way Down” will find the youth identifying and everyone else remembering. 

On Max now.