Little Evil Is Another Netflix Movie Miss.

The Good: The acting is all right, Moments of humor, Decent direction
The Bad: Characters are types as opposed to individuals, Troubling blend of humor and horror, No chemistry between the adult leads, Obvious plot progression for the bulk of the film.
The Basics: Little Evil ineffectively blends humor and horror into a troubling film that is more unsettling than it is entertaining.


Netflix has a decidedly mixed record when it comes to the films it produces. Despite that, I still eagerly watch a lot of the original films Netflix produces and today, that meant taking in Little Evil. It appears that this year, instead of bucking cinematic trends, Netflix is simply adopting them and its participation in The September Slump (which is often characterized by schlocky horror films and banal comedies) is Little Evil. I was instantly encouraged that Little Evil might be a better-than-average Netflix film based on Adam Scott, Evangeline Lilly, and Clancy Brown participating in the film.

Sadly, that was not the case.

Little Evil is a horror-comedy that works so hard to try to balance the two genres that it fails to do either in a satisfying way and it completely fails to create characters that the viewer can be empathized with. And I get that some of the point of Little Evil is to create a satire where group therapy and religious people completely fail to recognize an antichrist, where the stepfather in the film is more engaged than the biological mother, but the film fails to successfully convey its points in a way that makes the story feel organic and well-developed.

A week before he is buried alive by his new stepson, Lucas, Gary moves in with his new wife, Samantha. Gary tries to engage with Lucas, but his stepson is creepy and weird, doing things like bringing Gary a handful of worms when Gary tries to bond with him. While Gary is in the process of selling an abandoned nunnery to a local evangelical priest who predicts that the end times are here, Gary is called to Lucas's school. Lucas, apparently, told one of his teachers to "go to hell," moments before she poured lye on herself and threw herself out a window. Gary is sent to group therapy where he hears other stepdads having issues with their new kids.

After a clown sets himself on fire at Lucas's sixth birthday party, Gary reluctantly visits the wedding videographer, who shows him footage of their disastrous wedding that indicates that Lucas might be the antichrist. Gary and his pal, Al, team up to try to learn more, journeying to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania to enlist the aid of Gozamel, who is killed on the trip back to Gary's home. When Gary resigns himself to the idea that he might have to kill Lucas to save the world and prevent the apocalypse, he takes his stepson out to a water park blessed by the Pope and begins to have doubts. Gary's role as Lucas's stepfather is complicated when he begins to bond with the boy, but doomsday cult leaders abduct Lucas and Samantha.

At the core of the issues with Little Evil is the fact that the characters do not work. Gary and Samantha are newlyweds who had a very short relationship before getting married and there is zero sexual chemistry between Adam Scott and Evangeline Lilly. Gary and Samantha apparently had a short, hot and heavy relationship, but days after they are married, they seem to have no connection. Sadly, the main relationship in Little Evil makes no sense as the two characters seem to have no genuine care for one another or even things in common. Gary clearly did not do his due diligence in getting Samantha's backstory before they got married, too.

Particularly troubling in the way Samantha is presented. Less than seven years ago, Samantha was taken in by a cult and raped, resulting in Lucas and that was followed by several men in her life meeting gruesome deaths. But, she's fine; she's been out dating and getting married, neglecting Lucas and showing no shock or reaction to what is given as exposition as a pretty horrible life.

The best relationship in Little Evil is the buddy comedy style relationship between Gary and his co-worker, Al. Al is going through step-dad issues of her own as her wife's son is not bonding well with her, so she and Gary actually have common experiences to relate with one another over.

While Little Evil generally treads toward comedy, it does so after being set up as a horror with jump scares and a thoroughly creepy performance from child actor Owen Atlas. Atlas is charged mostly with staring and looking evil and he nails it, but the early focus on Lucas as a creepy, evil child makes it hard to accept the turn toward comedy when it comes. The transition is much more erratic than it is entertaining.

Little Evil pulls itself out of its own mire in the final third, but by that point, it is hard to be invested in the characters, plot or even the themes of the film.

For other Netflix exclusive films, please check out my reviews of:
To The Bone
Okja
You Get Me
Shimmer Lake
War Machine
Girlfriend's Day
Take The 10
Clinical
Barry
Spectral
True Memoirs Of An International Assassin
I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House
Mascots
ARQ
XOXO
Tallulah
Special Correspondents
The Fundamentals Of Caring
The Ridiculous 6

4/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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All The Realism We Can't Stand Cuts To The Bone

The Good: Good performances, Good direction, Good writing, Realism
The Bad: Tries to do too much/conceits of the genre
The Basics: To The Bone does what it sets out to do exceptionally well, though its ambition occasionally exceeds its grasp.


I learned a long time ago that mental illness is not a good point of bonding and works about it are not an easy genre to objectively evaluate. Learning truths about yourself are a great thing, but trying to relate to other people who might have similar experiences is frequently more perilous than one might anticipate - and "I heard you had a complete psychological breakdown after high school, too" is not a great ice breaker for someone you barely know who you haven't seen in twenty years. Works about mental illness resonate with different people in different ways and as a genre it is tough to discuss without pissing off people for whom that work resonates. So, the people who fell in love with Girl, Interrupted accept no criticism of the film as a work of art and I recall It's Kind Of A Funny Story (reviewed here!) speaking to me. Sitting down to watch the new Netflix film To The Bone was a known minefield for me.

As much as the creators of To The Bone want to reject the premise; it has become a sub-genre, the mental illness recovery drama. The works within that genre have some conceits - "I have a bad feeling about Suicidey!" - and once one is familiar with the genre, it is tough to make something that is both truly original and completely compelling. In the case of To The Bone, the longer the film went on, the more problematic it became; the film is ambitious and, unfortunately, its attempt at being inclusive and having a bigger scope drags the movie out of effectiveness and its initial universal insight. To be clear, as I discuss To The Bone, my critiques are of the film as its own work of art, not a commentary on the people who created it and might have drawn from their own experiences to make express their own personal narrative.

To The Bone is a film that focuses on a young woman, Ellen, who suffers from anorexia nervosa and the movie starts with a very engaging and compelling quality that comes from a strong, universal quality of the depiction of the character's disorder. But as To The Bone progresses, it moves further and further from the universal quality and loses focus on the film's tortured protagonist to give voice to other people suffering from eating disorders. That both leads to the introduction of the conceits - one of Ellen's peers at the in-patient home is pregnant and her arc is entirely predictable - and distracting elements. The underlying factors of Ellen's body dysmorphia are painfully obvious from the way she is introduced in To The Bone, but the process of delving into her issues is distracted by the realistic depiction of the faults of a group home situation and the issues of other characters there.

Ellen is released from her in-patient treatment for her eating disorder and returns home, where she experiences friction with her step-mother. Susan tries to keep on top of Ellen's condition and Ellen's half-sister continues to express fear about what might happen to Ellen. Susan gets Ellen an appointment with the very successful Dr. Beckham. Beckham gets Ellen to commit to several weeks of in-patient treatment. There, Ellen meets other patients, like Luke (a former dancer), Megan (who is pregnant), Pearl (who has a feeding tube initially), and her bulimic roommate. At the in-patient treatment, Ellen is given a new name by Dr. Beckham (Eli) and she struggles to overcome the problems that made her anorexic.

To The Bone is instantly problematic as a character study because Ellen gets marginalized in her own story. The way the film is set up, Ellen's underlying problem is made painfully obvious - she is neglected by both of her birth parents (her father never shows up on-screen) and she craves a sense of stability - but To The Bone fails to get around to addressing those core issues at all. Dr. Beckham is charming as a character, but his psychological prowess is deeply suspect - how wise is it to give someone suffering from body dysmorphia a new name?! And how can Beckham not recognize that Ellen requires a sense of stability that an in-patient treatment center with a rotating patient-base cannot provide? In other words, the charm factor of some of the ancillary characters distracts from the core themes and character traits of the protagonist. By the time Ellen ends up in an electricity-less yurt in the desert being bottle-fed by her lesbian mother, the film has lost any pretense of trying to express a universal story. (And to be clear, Ellen's mother's sexuality is not a problem in the film - who cares why Judy abandoned and later pushed away her daughter, she's a self-centered narcissist and well-characterized as a flake - the running away to the desert to the place so remote and hippy dippy that it doesn't even have electricity seems like a forced conceit.)

So, a group home setting where Ellen is surrounded by people cheating the system seems like the wrong therapeutic setting for the character (How is it that Susan could believe that the fifth time is a charm?!) and while To The Bone includes characters who are realistically gaming the system and suffering their own issues which confuse them, they make for a more jumbled narrative. Ellen has a compelling backstory that is slowly revealed in a compelling way, but writer-director Marti Noxon does not seem to know how to make that compelling and retain focus on that or Ellen. As a result, To The Bone takes a shotgun approach to the characters and includes the pregnancy conceit and a whole field trip for the residents that serves Alex much more than any other character. Alex's presence in the narrative is useful in that it is good to remind viewers that men can suffer from eating disorders as well, but To The Bone pulls toward his story whenever Ellen's story is drifting.

The net result is that for a film that begins with a stark sense of realism and unsettling focus, To The Bone diverges and waters down its own intensity and character drama. Ellen is an angry, isolated young woman who is suffering and the process by which she either hits bottom or moves toward recovery could have been compelling. Instead, To The Bone treads toward predictable, logical and distracting divergences.

That said, the performances are quite good in the film. Carrie Preston steals her scenes in To The Bone. Preston seems to get cast frequently as a somewhat out-of-touch hick, a well-meaning woman who is nevertheless the product of a very conservative upbringing (I'm not sure if Preston chooses those type roles or after True Blood she just got pigeonholed into them); her stepmother character in To The Bone seems similar. But in To The Bone, Preston plays a character who clearly loves her step-daughter and wants desperately to do right by her. Susan is written to be like a mother who has done all the research she can on her daughter's disorder, tries hard and occasionally overcompensates and Preston plays the aspects needed to make such a character pop.

Alana Ulbach similarly shines for her brief performance that is uncharacteristically neither manic nor sarcastic. Keanu Reeves is fine as the poorly-written Dr. Beckham. Lily Collins is good as Ellen - she carries the beginning and last five minutes of the film and there are moments in To The Bone where she is able to emote wonderfully with the simple changing of her eyeline or a slouch that manages to instantly characterize disappointment and fear. The rest of the performers might be fine, but they are granted such thin characterization to play that they appear more as a "type" than an actual character (sadly, To The Bone is woefully out-of-balance with both distracting from the protagonist and then not developing many of the characters used to divert from the main character).

Ultimately, To The Bone tells an initially important story and perspective that explores a tragic disorder, but it becomes unable to sustain or develop one character's narrative in a compelling and effective way.

For other Netflix exclusive films, please check out my reviews of:
Okja
You Get Me
Shimmer Lake
War Machine
Girlfriend's Day
Take The 10
Clinical
Barry
Spectral
True Memoirs Of An International Assassin
I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House
Mascots
ARQ
XOXO
Tallulah
Special Correspondents
The Fundamentals Of Caring
The Ridiculous 6

6/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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R.I.P. Nelsan Ellis: Little Boxes Offers An Esoteric Goodbye To The Talented Actor.

The Good: Wonderful performances, Good themes
The Bad: Oppressively awkward tone, Unlikable characters,Virtually plotless
The Basics: Little Boxes is a depressingly awkward film that interestingly explores racism in the suburbs with an interethnic family that could truly stand to talk more with one another.


When Nelsan Ellis died just over a week ago, I was shocked, much like pretty much everyone else. Like many fans, I knew Ellis from True Blood (reviewed here!) more than any of his other works, but I recall when True Blood was on the air, I watched interviews with the actor and it only raised my appreciation for how he performed on True Blood. So, I was pretty psyched to look into something else he was featured in. I settled in to watch the indie film Little Boxes.

Little Boxes is a fish-out-of-water story that I was initially surprised remained on the shelf so long. The longer the film went on, the less surprised I was by that; Little Boxes is a painfully awkward film. Between the off-putting tone and the sexualization of pre-teens, it is tough to guess who the market would be for Little Boxes - after the film was completed, it seemed like it would be a tough film to sell to a distributor.

Opening in New York City, Mack Burns and his wife Gina have their lives packed up for the move to Rome, Washington. The suburbs are a huge change for Gina, Mack and their son, Clark, who is the town's only young person of color. The move is instantly problematic for the family as all of their possessions are ten days to two weeks away and Mack's new writing job involves cooking and the house Gina's university moves the family into is lacking a working stovetop. Mack starts to smell mold almost instantly and he is put off by how the neighbors treat him initially.

While Gina meets her faculty colleagues and discovers they are a bunch of bored lushes, Clark meets two neighborhood girls and begins hanging out with them. Ambrosia sees Clark as a novelty, while her friend Julie treats Clark with interest in who he actually is. Ambrosia starts to get Clark into trouble and Gina and Mack start to feel stress over the huge changes in their lives.

Little Boxes is a mood piece and its obsession with mood and theme make it a tougher sell than it ought to have been. In trying to paint the suburbs as a different type of bad from the big city, Little Boxes inadvertently reduces all of its characters to about the same mental age. Clark experiences peer pressure from his new "friends" and he starts to act out. That makes sense given that he is an eleven year-old boy. But the fact that Gina and Mack have virtually identical arcs is tremendously disappointing. Mack, for example, shows no interest in doing drugs and when he is offered some, he initially refuses. It takes only one follow-up offer from a guy Mack does not particularly know or like before he is popping pills with him. Gina is a feminist who succumbs to pressure from her new peer group for no apparent reason other than the fact that her colleagues are women.

So, Little Boxes quickly becomes a fish-out-of-water story in which an interethnic couple with a blended-ethnicity child find themselves in a setting where they are very much alone. The move, however, pulls all of the characters apart in a way that feels very forced. Clark, Mack and Gina appear to have a very close relationship prior to the move. But, the moment they get to Rome and discover they are outsiders, Gina never seems to be around and does not take Mack's concerns about mold at all seriously and Mack starts ignoring Clark's needs to focus on a writing project he can barely do.

That said, while the characters are all fairly unlikable - almost every problem in Little Boxes could be solved by the two adult characters keeping up their level of dialogue and concern that was established at the beginning of the film - the acting is exceptionally good. Nelsan Ellis is remarkable in the subtlety he plays as Mack. Ellis manages to play empathetic and wry and his body language is so different from how he played Lafayette that even when he smiles, there is not a hint of his most well-established character.

Armani Jackson gives a good performance as Clark, a child very much in the process of becoming. Melanie Lynskey plays Gina's frustration exceptionally well. Lynskey and Ellis, however, exhibit very little on-screen chemistry, which makes it tougher to invest in Gina and Mack's relationship. For all of the problems with Little Boxes, acting is not one of them. The performers in Little Boxes are all good, even if the characters they play are awkward or unsettling to watch.

Ultimately, Little Boxes is a film that shows genre fans just how much we lost when Nelsan Ellis died; he was incredibly talented and it is unfortunate that he did not have a chance to develop a larger body of work.

For other works with Melanie Lynskey, please check out my reviews of:
Happy Christmas
The Perks Of Being A Wallflower
The Informant!
But I'm A Cheerleader
Ever After: A Cinderella Story

4.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A Lot Of Flash In A Gross, Inhuman World: Ghost In The Shell (A Layman's Review Of The Film!)

The Good: Beautifully-directed, Moments of theme, Last quarter of the film
The Bad: Mediocre acting, Characters who are tough to empathize with, Packed and distracting setting with little emotional connection, Erratic plot development
The Basics: Ghost In The Shell creates a vivid setting, but invests far less on compelling plot and character development, making it a very tough sell for science fiction fans.


I have quite a few genre interests, but the truth is that anime has never been one of my interests. Anime and Cyberpunk have just never had the spark that makes me want to invest completely in the mediums and genres. Despite that, today I decided to watch Ghost In The Shell. When Ghost In The Shell was released many fans of the original anime were offended by the fact that Scarlett Johansson was cast in the lead role of Major. Having no attachment to the source material, that did not bother me.

It is worth noting that going into Ghost In The Shell, I had no prior knowledge of the film's universe, story or characters. As such, this is an ideal review for laypeople who want to know about the movie without an endless series of comparisons to the anime.

In the future, Hanka Robotics is building a military operative with a human brain in a synthetic body - a distinct upgrade from the typical human who is simply augmented by cybernetic technology. Major awakens from a drowning during a terrorist attack inside a synthetic body. Hanka's CEO, Cutter, tells Major's doctor - Ouelet - that he wants Major to join Section 9 and return to work. A year later, Major monitors a Hanka Robotics executive's meeting with the President of the African Federation when the meeting is attacked and everyone she is surveilling is killed. Major's synthetic body is damaged in the process and she returns to the Department Of Defense the next day for a briefing. Osmond was not the only Hanka executive killed the day before and Major and her partner, Batao, go to see Ouelet. Ouelet believes that Major's hallucinations are past sensory data that is processing and she tries to alleviate Major's concerns while she repairs Major's damaged arm. To try to find out where Kuze, the assassin, is, Major volunteers to hack into the murderous geishabot that killed Osmond.

Major is externally hacked during her connection to the geisha, but she completes the process certain she knows where Kuze is. Major and Batao go to a nightclub Kuze is supposed to be at, but they fall into a trap which results in Batao losing his eyes. After Batao is enhanced with new eyes, Dr. Dahlin is killed and Major discovers that the assassin is targeting scientists who worked on a secret project, 2571. The only member of that team still alive is Ouelet and an attempt is made on her life that Major and Batao are able to stop. Section 9 captures the would-be killer and Major finds out Kuze's location from him before he kills himself. Following the next lead, Major learns the truth about Kuze, who was an earlier iteration of the project that created Major. Learning the truths about the project and her own existence leaves Major with an existential crisis and she become targeted by Hanka security.

Ghost In The Shell is a very typical action-adventure conspiracy thriller where the real twist is simply the setting. Every machine in the world is vulnerable to hacking and it seems that Kuze has developed technology that allows humans to be hacked. As a result, everything in Ghost In The Shell is very dirty and carries an undertone of danger to it. The world of Ghost In The Shell is grungy and very uninviting; it is a setting it is hard to imagine living, breathing, humans in.

That said, director Rupert Sanders does an excellent job of creating a very packed setting. Throughout the city of Ghost In The Shell there are massive holograms and there are all sorts of people and droids moving about. Ghost In The Shell is a visually-packed film and Sanders does a decent job of fleshing out the setting to make the dark, filthy world seem very distinct. For all my problems with Ghost In The Shell, the film is beautifully-shot and well-directed.

Despite the technical accomplishments, Ghost In The Shell is so off-putting that it is tough to invest in. The film allows Scarlett Johansson to play completely stiff and passionless and the reason for her ability to act in that fashion only becomes evident in the film's very late portions. That, sadly, is one of the real issues with Ghost In The Shell; an objective viewer will sit through the first three-quarters of the film wondering just why a human brain in an inorganic body would result in such a forced, stiff performance.

As a result, for the bulk of Ghost In The Shell, I found myself more bored than I was intrigued or even entertained. When a viewer sits more amused by how incredibly well Takeshi Kitano fills a niche that Martin Sheen would occupy in an American film than by the plot and characters, there is something seriously lacking in the film. In the case of Ghost In The Shell it is the characters.

Ultimately, Ghost In The Shell is about a woman who has no idea who she is . . . because she has no clue that her identity is not her own. Films with amnesiac characters can be pulled off exceptionally well - Dark City (reviewed here!) leaps instantly to mind - but Ghost In The Shell goes far too long before revealing that Major is not who she thinks she is and it does not satisfactorily explore the speed at which her programming degrades. It seems like Major knows who she is for so long, is told something different and then is rather suddenly not a law enforcement operative at all.

Despite not being overly grabbed by the characters or the pretty generic scientific/government conspiracy plot, Ghost In The Shell executes well the cautionary tale that fans of the original Star Trek will find both enjoyable and familiar; technology is a tool, not our friend. Gene Roddenberry's stories were often obsessively focused on the idea that dependence upon technology will ultimately undermine humanity and that humanity risks becoming enslaved by it. Ghost In The Shell gets around to making a very compelling argument that identity and humanity are dangerously close to becoming lost to corporations whose primary concerns are profit and development. Unfortunately, but the time it does, it is hard to actually care.

For other works with cyborgs and replicants, please check out my reviews of:
Blade Runner
Android Cop
A.I.: Artificial Intelligence

3/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Better Than Most Teensploitation Movies: You Get Me Is A Sleeper Success For Netflix!

The Good: Surprisingly good performances from the young cast, Moments of character, Good direction and pacing
The Bad: Very predictable plot and character arcs, Mostly unlikable characters
The Basics: You Get Me does a good job of creating a thriller for teenagers that utilizes a young cast surprisingly well for a Netflix-remake of Fatal Attraction.


Netflix seems to have two general tiers of films it releases: the movies it cares about (promotes and wants its subscribers to know about) and the movies it produces and quietly slips into rotation. As Netflix works to provide a legitimate stay-in alternative to Summer Blockbuster Season, one of its second-tier releases is You Get Me.

You Get Me is the Netflix-produced, twentysomething-cast rendition of Fatal Attraction. For those who do not want to go out to the movie theaters for a big-screen, special effects-driven blockbusters, Netflix offers a much smaller film packed with amazing locations and young people who help perpetrate the Hollywood notion of beauty. It features dumb teenage characters who are willing to succumb to peer pressure to do drugs with the promise of sex that follows and who leap into stupid sexual situations, much like supposedly mature adults.

The last week of summer, Tyler is dating Ali and he is expanding his horizons with her. Tyler, Ali, and Tyler's friend Gil head to a party. There, Tyler sees Ali getting hugged by Chase and when Tyler confronts Alison, she claims she knew Chase from her time in San Francisco. Tyler meets Chase while getting a drink for Alison and Chase claims that Ali used to be known for giving blowjobs and in a fit of jealousy, Tyler and Ali break up. Leaving the party, Tyler runs into Holly, who was dumped at the party and they drive off to a one-night stand. Tyler and Holly spend a romantic day together in a house that Holly claims to have simply broken into.

Tyler returns home that night and the next morning, he and Ali reconcile. Tyler and Ali begin their Senior year of high school and Tyler is alarmed when Holly enrolls in their high school. When Tyler rejects Holly, Holly becomes upset and tells Tyler that he will be sorry. Holly befriends Alison, Lydia, and Gil so she can be proximate to Tyler and mess with his head. When Lydia becomes suspicious of Holly, Holly poisons her drink, nearly killing her. Holly then claims to be pregnant and becomes increasingly aggressive toward Tyler. As Holly spirals out of control, Tyler works to uncover the truth about her past and keep Ali and his family safe.

You Get Me is one of those films with a painfully-contrived conflict that is enough to make any adult viewer groan and slap their forehead in disgust. The moment Tyler and Ali reconcile, but Tyler lies through omission about hooking up with Holly, the film has a ticking time bomb and a very predictable trajectory. Holly is the archetype of the crazy ex-girlfriend or haunting one-night stand.

It is easy to belittle You Get Me for its young characters and predictable plot set-up, but the truth is that Bella Thorne is pretty amazing as Holly. Thorne is great at leaping in a single blink from sickly sweet to crazy eyes. Her performance might be the embodiment of a modern archetype, but Thorne plays the erratic and obsessive character with a chilling level of greatness. Thorne slowly ratchet's up the crazy in Holly's body language and deliveries, making her somewhat generic lines land with an unsettling quality.

Similarly, Halston Sage has the cute, innocent young woman thing down pat and she consistently delivers her lines with a naive sweetness that is the stuff of teenage fantasies. Taylor John Smith plays an immature young man and he manages to shift between guarded and nervous and appropriately angered by Holly's headgames well. Smith manages to make Tyler seem momentarily empathetic when he tries to backtrack from his lie. In fact, for as unlikable as Tyler's original lie is, writer Ben Epstein does a decent job of balancing the character with an adult-level of responsibility pertaining to his kid sister. Smith rises to the occasion of actually seeming decent when his character is supposed to seem like something other than an idiotic teenager.

The thing is, despite the somewhat predictable plot, You Get Me does what it sets out to do very well. The performances are all good, the direction is wonderful and builds tension surprisingly well and the suspension of disbelief issues are pretty easy to overcome. You Get Me stands as an unsettling thriller that creates a messed up antagonist in a truly disturbing teen drama that keeps just to the right side of realism over melodrama.

For other Netflix exclusive films, please check out my reviews of:
Okja
Shimmer Lake
War Machine
Girlfriend's Day
Take The 10
Clinical
Barry
Spectral
True Memoirs Of An International Assassin
I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House
Mascots
ARQ
XOXO
Tallulah
Special Correspondents
The Fundamentals Of Caring
The Ridiculous 6

6.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Not The Amazing Anti-Meat Argument One Might Hope For: Okja Reminds Us To Not Name Our Steaks.

The Good: Decent CG effects, Seo-Hyun Ahn acts like a pro opposite the effects, Generally good acting
The Bad: Painfully obvious themes, Simplistic plot, Unlikable characters
The Basics: Okja painfully blurs the lines between making a statement on the condition of the meat processing industry, animal rights activism, and the perils of making a food animal into a pet.


When it comes to Netflix Original Films, there have been none that have had the press momentum prior to their release like Okja. Okja, streaming today, has one of the most acclaimed casts yet for a Netflix film - Tilda Swinton, Giancarlo Esposito, and Jake Gyllenhaal being the most recognizable to American audiences - and was originally debuted at the Cannes Film Festival where it garnered a lot of positive press. Before sitting down to Okja, all I knew about the film was that Steven Yeun of The Walking Dead was in the movie and my wife warned me that, having recently lost our beloved Siberian Husky Myah, the film might be a little depressing for me.

Okja is the latest film in a fairly recent trend of movies that try to expose the conditions under which our food is made. Unlike something like Fast Food Nation (reviewed here!), which focuses on the United States and casts a wide net over the industry, Okja tells a far more intimate story. Okja almost instantly illustrates why most of us have different animals for food than we do for pets.

Opening in 2007, in New York City, Lucy Mirando takes over the powerful multinational Mirando company. Under her leadership, the new super pig that was born and reproduced in one of her holdings is being developed for future consumption. The twenty-five super pigs are shipped to different parts of the world for a ten-year competition to see which one will grow into the largest and most delicious super pig in the world. Ten years later in Korea, Mija lives with her grandfather in the hills, spending her days running around playing with her massive super pig, Okja. With the competition rushing to a close, Mija's grandfather lies to her and tells her he has bought Okja, but when a film crew comes to their home to see Okja, the truth comes comes out and Okja is taken away.

With Okja having been abducted to Seoul before her journey to New York City for the final portion of the competition, Mija runs away from home to rescue her beloved companion. Mija makes it to the Mirando offices in Seoul just in time to see Okja being taken away by truck. Mija manages to run and jump onto the truck transporting Okja, when animal rights activists smash into the truck and Okja is freed. Okja runs through Seoul wreaking havoc before she and Mija are rescued by the Animal Liberation Front activists. The leader of the ALF, Jay, tells Mija about the truth about Mirando's laboratories and he tells her that the ALF's plan is to use Okja as a spy in Mirando's laboratories. K, however, lies to Mija and Okja is taken to New York with the spy technology needed to expose Mirando.

Okja is being hailed as a masterpiece of animal rights, with viewers lauding it for illustrating just how horribly we treat animals in the food processing industry. Okja does not actually do that with any effectiveness. Instead, it simply makes painfully explicit why most people do not raise pets for food. There is a disconnect between food and pets; most people wouldn't eat meat if they got to know their food animals in advance of their slaughter. So, while Okja is being hailed as brilliant and a masterpiece, it plays out much more like a "simple problem, simple solution." In today's society, in our modern world, if one ants to be able to enjoy a hamburger, it helps not to spend time on the killing floor of a slaughter house. It is easy enough to avoid the entire thematic conflict presented in Okja.

Okja takes the stance that using animals for food is inherently and entirely wrong. For sure, in the real world, the meat industry is problematically regulated and slaughterhouse conditions are not ideal for humans or the animals slaughtered there. The Animal Liberation Front takes an extreme view about animal rights and when Jay details the ALF agenda, it is hard to take him seriously as a reliable narrator. Okja does not satisfactorily explain how the ALF got reliable intelligence on the Mirando Corporation, so it is easy to write off Jay's claims initially as the crackpot theories of extremists.

Lucy Mirando certainly appears - in closed-door meetings - as fairly idealistic and ethical, which helps to undermine the idea that Jay is a credible narrator. Lucy is clearly being manipulated by the more corporately-inclined Dawson, but for much of the film, Lucy is not presented as an actual or credible villain.

The performances in Okja are all good. Jake Gyllenhaal is virtually unrecognizable as the Mirando media presence, Johnny Wilcox. Paul Dano, Lily Collins and Steven Yeun are all credible in their intense performances of animal rights activists. All of the animal rights activist performers are great in their reaction shots throughout Okja. Tilda Swinton is her usual wonderful self as Lucy Mirando. Swinton gives viewers something new at the film's climax where she does a spot-on Jane Lynch impersonation. Shirley Henderson seems to be playing the same type character she did on Doctor Who and Harry Potter and Seo-Hyun Ahn does fine playing a little girl in love with her pet.

The direction in Okja is good.

Unfortunately, in addition to having a simple conflict with a simple solution, Okja is riddled with continuity problems. Most significant is that during the ALF's abduction of Okja, Jay has to speak through Kay for Mija to understand. Mija does not understand English initially, so Kay translates. But much of the scene has Jay speaking without Kay translating any to Mija. In a similar fashion, the suspension of disbelief in Okja is strained beyond the breaking point when Johnny Wilcox has access to the breeding area and behind-the-scenes laboratory area of the Mirando Corporation. That's simply not a location a figurehead or public face for the company would traditionally have access to and the scene - while monstrous - stands out as troubling in an unrealistic way.

Ultimately, Okja is a new presentation of the same arguments Fast Food Nation made a decade ago, that Vegans make every day and that omnivores with a strong "ignorance is bliss" lifestyle maintain in order to enjoy their burgers, chicken nuggets, and dolphin-safe tuna. And yes, I get it, humans are terrible. But so is Okja.

For other Netflix exclusive films, please check out my reviews of:
Shimmer Lake
War Machine
Girlfriend's Day
Take The 10
Clinical
Barry
Spectral
True Memoirs Of An International Assassin
I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House
Mascots
ARQ
XOXO
Tallulah
Special Correspondents
The Fundamentals Of Caring
The Ridiculous 6

3/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Mainstream Fetish: The Misogyny Of Sucker Punch [Review This Again]

The Good: Moments of direction, One or two performances
The Bad: Problematic plot, Constantly unsettling tone, Lack of distinct or intriguing characters, Most of the acting, Poor editing, Unrelenting misogyny in the writing
The Basics: Sucker Punch twists a disturbing creepy setting and a horrible personal tragedy into a masturbatory visual fantasy that falls utterly flat.


[There is a big meme in the art community going around now called "Draw This Again." In the meme, artists illustrate how they have grown in their chosen medium by putting side-by-side pictures of art they created in the past and now. My wife had the great idea that I should do something similar with my reviewing. So, for 2017, I will be posting occasional "Review This Again" reviews, where I revisit subjects I had previously reviewed and review them again, through a lens of increased age, more experience, and - for some - greater familiarity with the subject. This review is one such review, where I am re-experiencing Sucker Punch after many years, devoid of the hype that surrounded the movie and with more experience as both a reviewer and one who has seen more works by co-writer and director Zack Snyder. The film was originally reviewed here!]

My wife and I recently began watching the television series American Gods and it did not take long into the series before I found myself looking at actress Emily Browning, who plays Laura Moon in American Gods, and thinking that she looked somewhat familiar. The "somewhat" became clear the moment I realized that she was the same actress who played the lead in Sucker Punch; with only six or seven years between the first season of American Gods and Sucker Punch, Emily Browning's appearance did not significantly change. Instead, the reason it took me so long to identify the actress on American Gods was that she had more than three expressions on the television show. In Sucker Punch, Emily Browning's performance is unfortunately limited to staring blankly, expressing anguish, and screaming defiantly.

Sucker Punch is one of those films I recall being very excited about, swept up at the time in the promotions for it, and then incredibly disappointed by it when I rushed out to see it in the theater. My enthusiasm for the film was originally sparked by how much I enjoyed Zack Snyder's cinematic rendition of Watchmen (reviewed here!), but when I watched Sucker Punch, I recalled only feeling like it was a half-assed rewrite of Brazil (reviewed here!). But, seeing Emily Browning episode after episode on American Gods, I felt like perhaps I had misjudged Sucker Punch and I decided to watch Sucker Punch again.

I was wrong about Sucker Punch in my initial assessment.

Sucker Punch is worse than it initially appeared; on many levels. I have often been called a tough reviewer, one who is much harsher in evaluating films than many other reviewers. When it came to Sucker Punch, though, I quickly discovered in watching the movie again that I was not nearly stringent enough in my standards.

Watching Sucker Punch again, this time on a smaller screen, the film's flaws are far more glaring. While the movie initially appeared to be visually-spectacular, one of the things that caught me in watching Sucker Punch again was how unfortunately choppy much of the editing was. Given that I alternated between utterly bored by and appropriately horrified by the story, the fact that Sucker Punch cannot be relied upon to be considered even a visual masterpiece made the film an utter disappointment.

Sucker Punch is a film that attempts to be clever, but quickly degenerates into visual garbage. The movie focuses on a young woman who is not even given a proper name in the film. "Babydoll" is only given that name when she is committed to an insane asylum, as part of her fantasy sequence where she tries to escape the horrors of her new reality. Sucker Punch opens with Babydoll's mother dying, her step father getting custody of her and her sister and her mother's will granting everything to Babydoll and her sister. When their step father advances upon Babydoll to rape her, she resists, but in barricading herself away from him, she leaves her sister vulnerable to his attack. While the stepfather assaults her sister, Babydoll recovers his gun and breaks into her sister's room. There, she tries to kill her stepfather, but accidentally kills her sister. Babydoll is in shock when her stepfather has her committed to an insane asylum in Vermont where he bribes the orderly, Blue Jones, to have Babydoll lobotomized.

Five days into her stay in the asylum, Babydoll is set to be lobotomized against her will. And attentive viewers will notice that the film is pretty much over at that point. What follows this opening set-up is Babydoll having fantasies of the asylum being a very different place and within that dream, she imagines escape fantasies involving herself and four other inmates of the asylum.

Sucker Punch is a dark set up for absolute narrative garbage. The entire film is established as a cheap reversal flick where only the least-observant audience will notice that the narrator completely shifts as Babydoll transitions from the lobotomy chair to the stage within a brothel nightclub. The thing is, as unsophisticated as that is, Sucker Punch becomes even more clumsy as it nears its climax. One of the other patients at the asylum, Sweet Pea, becomes the film's protagonist in the film's final moments and that makes Sucker Punch one giant narrative tense slip, where its characters and dreams within a dream make no rational sense.

Co-writer Zack Snyder hopes viewers will not notice that the film does not make rational sense as Babydoll is given the role of apparent protagonist when she is constantly a victim and damsel in distress . . . always bailed out by men. For sure, Babydoll and her comrades have grand fantasy sequences where they slaughter steampunk zombies, orcs, dragons, samurai warriors, and twisted men, but it is hard to ignore two things: 1. those sequences are supposed to be analogies for training as the young women learn to work together and fight alongside each other (which makes no sense because in the fantasies, they are entirely proficient in every way) and 2. the sequences are fantasies for Babydoll escaping her reality . . . which is supposed to be her dancing in such a sexy and seductive way and objectifying herself that it distracts all of the men around her.

One of the fundamental issues with Sucker Punch is that it acknowledges its own sickness early on, but does nothing to fix it. Sweet Pea's proper introduction to Sucker Punch is the young woman, playing Babydoll in a play, rejecting the premise of sexualizing a lobotomy victim. Sweet Pea wants better material than a rape fantasy to portray and that is, sadly, the last moment where a woman is given an opportunity in Sucker Punch to stand up for herself and stand up against the patriarchy in a coherent way.

So, what follows are five chicks running around in short skirts, dancewear, tight tops, underwear, stockings, Hot Topic fetishwear, etc. shooting guns, running, and swinging swords when they are not in a more mundane fantasy where they are being constantly assaulted, exploited or menaced by men within the asylum/club.

The real peak of suckitude (it's hard to take Sucker Punch seriously, much less evaluating it like it deserves a high level of diction to deconstruct) is that with the writing being so terrible, only two performers are truly allowed to break out and show genuine range . . . and they are both men. Sucker Punch might have ass-kicking women on screen, but the female characters are monolithic and hard to empathize with. To be clear, it is easy to be horrified by Babydoll's abuse and her accidental killing of her sister. But that's over in the first ten minutes and the rest of the movie has Emily Browning running around wearing very little, performing with a blank expression for Zack Snyder's elaborate rape fantasy. Browning, Jena Malone, Abbie Cornish, Vanessa Hudgens, and Jamie Chung are given surprisingly little to do as the female characters other than cosplay and run around.

So, it is somewhat surprising when Oscar Isaac and Scott Glenn steal Sucker Punch. Glenn plays the sensei character who actually has a chance to smile in his final scene and play (no matter how nonsensical the leap is) a character who is genuinely good in a dark mess of a film. At the other end of the spectrum is Oscar Isaac. Isaac portrays Blue Jones with constant menace and a skeevie quality that is unsettling to watch. There is not a hint of the jubilation he portrayed as Poe Dameron in The Force Awakens (reviewed here!) or his innate charisma. Instead, Isaac is a thoroughly despicable villain in Sucker Punch and he rides the tone of constant menace and misogynistic malice from beginning to end.

Ultimately, Sucker Punch is a mess and on the small screen, it becomes even more obvious how bad the film's content actually is. The sound for Sucker Punch cranks up the music and plummets for the dialogue. Sadly, even if one watches Sucker Punch with the volume muted, it is no better a film. Sucker Punch could be called "empowering to women" only as tongue in cheek; Sweet Pea nails it early on - Sucker Punch is a sick fantasy wherein young women at their most vulnerable are subjugated, robbed of their identity and ultimately given an entirely irrational narrative in place of an authentic story.

For other works with Jamie Chung, please check out my reviews of:
Flock Of Dudes
Big Hero 6
The Hangover Part III
The Hangover Part II
I Now Pronounce You Chuck And Larry

1.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Scattered Potential: Shimmer Lake Doesn't Know What To Be.

The Good: Good direction, Decent performances
The Bad: Tone is incredibly erratic, Forced narrative conceit, Utterly unlikable characters
The Basics: Shimmer Lake could have been decent if it had committed to being either a comedy or a drama film.


Netflix's film acquisitions continue with Shimmer Lake. Shimmer Lake was quietly released on Netflix last week and it took me the past few days to even realize that it had made its premiere. Unlike one of the major Netflix Original Films releases, Shimmer Lake does not trade on any big name actors to bring viewers in its attempt to get people to watch.

Shimmer Lake is told, day by day, in reverse, in a style a bit less drastic than Memento (reviewed here!). Shimmer Lake uses the technique in a way that is supposed to add intrigue, but it becomes a much tougher sell than one might think. Because the characters are frequently killed before the viewer has any emotional investment in them, it's virtually impossible to care about the characters in Shimmer Lake as the investigation and the crimes intertwine.

Opening on Friday, Andy is hiding out in the basement of his ex-wife's house, when his daughter finds him there. The local sheriff, Zeke, misses finding Andy when he flees through a basement window, steals the neighbor's car and heads out to Shimmer Lake with thousands of dollars in a bag. While the police and FBI investigate a house where they find Brad Dawkins dead, Andy makes it to the Lake. Unfortunately, he is killed there when his ride arrives. On Thursday, Dawkins wakes up, while Steph encourages Andy to go kill Brad. Steph wounds herself to sell her alibi that her ex, who was part of a bank robbery, came over, hit her and ran off. Andy calls in to Zeke, his brother, but lies to him about his location while the FBI investigates another lead.

The film continues to unwind with a series of revelations on how the characters relate, what happened to lead to the two murders seen on Friday and the initial crime that started the chain of events.

Shimmer Lake is a film that seems largely unsure of what it wants to be. The movie employs some wonderful comedic actors - John Michael Higgins, Adam Pally, and Rob Corddry, for example - and includes scenes like a meth head desperately trying not to shit while hiding in a bathroom while two other characters talk in an adjacent room. But the narrative technique forces an amount of attention that is uncommon for comedies and Shimmer Lake includes some fairly gruesome murders and particularly unfunny moments like Steph wounding herself to be able to imply spousal abuse.

The problem with Shimmer Lake having an identity crisis is that the moments in the film fail to land - the humorous banter between the F.B.I. agents dulls the impact of a man's skull getting blown open moments before and the banter feels . . . disingenuous between to largely serious scenes where Andy very seriously interrogates other characters. Shimmer Lake never quite pops as a result of its mood changing dramatically from scene to scene.

That said, Shimmer Lake works well when it commits to its own comedic potential. Rainn Wilson has the intensity to play Andy with the requisite dramatic range and he is matched for the dramatic moments by Benjamin Walker, who plays Zeke. Walker is credible as a small-town sheriff and he plays the part with realistic professionalism. The rest of the movie delivers joy when the comedic performers deliver funny lines with their expert sense of timing. Adam Pally slumps his way through being forced to sit in the back seat of the police cruiser each morning and Rob Corddry is funny and understated as Kurt. Mark Rendall's slack-jawed portrayal of Chris is hilarious.

Unfortunately, the performances quickly undermine the suspense of what is actually going on with the various capers. Stephanie Sigman is too good an actress to hide how smart her character of Steph actually is. As a result, Steph quickly stands out as a prime manipulator in the various plotlines that are filled with bloodshed. Sigman is good; but she cannot credibly play dumb, which is what her character needed in order to make the misdirect work.

Ultimately, Shimmer Lake is a marginally entertaining distraction that has low resonance and does not quite land on any of its intended fronts.

For other Netflix exclusive films, please check out my reviews of:
War Machine
Girlfriend's Day
Take The 10
Clinical
Barry
Spectral
True Memoirs Of An International Assassin
I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House
Mascots
ARQ
XOXO
Tallulah
Special Correspondents
The Fundamentals Of Caring
The Ridiculous 6

3.5/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Netflix Competes In Summer Blockbuster Season With War Machine!

The Good: Great commentary, Wonderful performances, Some very funny lines, Good casting
The Bad: Pacing, Repetitive use of satire, Mood
The Basics: War Machine is a good idea with some very funny lines and decent performances, but it hits the same note far too often and drags entirely through its second act.


Summer Blockbuster Season has officially arrived and arguably the biggest surprise of it so far is that Brad Pitt is headlining a film that is intended to get viewers to stay away from the movie theaters. Instead of participating in a massive special effects-driven film that is intended to make huge bank at the box office, Brad Pitt is participating in a comedy film that is now out exclusively on Netflix. The film is War Machine and while theatergoers are competing for tickets and seats for the latest Pirates Of The Caribbean film and the Baywatch theatrical release, Pitt is encouraging viewers to stay home, get comfortable and take in some satire.

War Machine is a comedy about the U.S. military and it was strategically-released for Memorial Day Weekend. Had it been released in theaters, War Machine would have been an R-rated comedy, mostly for language. War Machine, like most military films, has a lot of swearing and the "adult themes" are ironic statements on the failures of policy, personality and strategy in a mismanaged war zone. Right off the bat, War Machine is very well-written and it is often quite funny.

Eight years into the War in Afghanistan, President Obama wants to get the war done. To that end, the General leading the coalition forces in Afghanistan is replaced by the determined General Glen McMahon. McMahon and his staff are brought in to do an assessment that will inform the President on what is needed to win the war - not more troops! After meeting with President Karzai and recognizing that he will get no more help from the infrastructure in Afghanistan, McMahon tours Afghanistan. After his tour, McMahon is told that Helmand province is unsecurable, so he sets his attentions to winning over the hearts and minds in Helmand.

McMahon asks the U.S. government for 40,000 more troops to secure Helmand and is told he cannot have them until the Afghan elections are over. When he learns about the bad conditions at the U.S. position codenamed Sasquatch, McMahon accompanies his troops out into the field. McMahon hires Badi Basim to represent Afghans in his new attempt at a regime. When the election results only confirm Karzai as Afghanistan's President, McMahon leaks his own report to try to get traction and public support in the U.S. about the war.

War Machine does an excellent job of making commentary on exactly what fails in a "nation-building" military conflict. The film details well how an insurgency is virtually impossible to defeat. War Machine is very well-written in that it explores incredibly well the rhetorical difficulties with attempting to win hearts and minds when you're armed and have no clear mission.

The satire in War Machine is appropriately dry and very funny, usually in a very off-putting way. Brad Pitt leads War Machine is a great series of incredibly dry deliveries paired with a very stiff and often-ridiculous physical performance. Pitt squints with one eye through almost his entire time on screen, while keeping his other eye very wide. Pitt's stiff back and gorilla arms help to define McMahon as much as his scowl and frown.

War Machine has brilliant casting and the cast is very well used. Anthony Michael Hall creates arguably his most abrasive character ever as McMahon's right hand man, Greg Pulver. Casting Sir Ben Kingsley as President Karzai is genius and Alan Ruck is credible as Pat McKinnon, the pragmatic government foil for McMahon. Topher Grace uses his brief time on screen to deliver very funny lines and Tilda Swinton creates yet another wonderful character, even though she is not in War Machine long. In War Machine, Scoot McNairy proves that his future in voice acting is secure for each and every position David Duchovny passes on.

War Machine is an unfortunately erratic film. While the opening narration in War Machine draws the viewer in, by the time writer Sean Cullen enters the narrative as a character doing a Rolling Stone profile on McMahon, the pace of the film is virtually at a dead stop. The essential joke of War Machine is that a hapless general is put in charge of a war zone where he cannot win using his military training; that punchline is delivered multiple times within the first ten minutes of the film. By the hour mark, War Machine struggles to say anything new.

That, sadly, is the death knell of War Machine; Netflix and Brad Pitt took a big, important risk on a film that had something to say and the statement is made with hilarity very quickly. The film's social commentary is also made exceptionally quickly and reiterated many, man times in War Machine. As War Machine trudges toward its inevitable end, the joke is beaten to death and the humor, ultimately, falls unfortunately flat.

For other Netflix exclusive films, please check out my reviews of:
Girlfriend's Day
Take The 10
Clinical
Barry
Spectral
True Memoirs Of An International Assassin
I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House
Mascots
ARQ
XOXO
Tallulah
Special Correspondents
The Fundamentals Of Caring
The Ridiculous 6

4/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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