From an automatic spellcheck, to omnipresent domotica: what is looming for us when computers are no longer merely complementing our actions, but taking over the steering wheel? Will the machines treat us as stupid and inferior, the way we have treated people with an intellectual disability for millennia? Simon, Scott and Sarah, a trio of neurodiverse activists, trigger the debate in the presence of a group of peers. They all attempt to take the lead in the discussion.
Shadow is another one I won’t spend too much time on as it is only 56 minutes long, but it’s a film that has a cast comprised almost entirely of neurodivergent and disabled actors. It’s a very powerful piece where they get these groups together to talk about the future of human rights, the performances are extremely raw and really paint the picture of how much this discussion means to everyone involved. The film gives a voice to communities who are often ignored, just sitting there and listening to each person’s thoughts is very captivating. Although I do wish some topics were expanded upon that still does not take away from how powerful the movie really is, there’s some genuinely humorous bits combined with a few debates that are very thought provoking. Shadow is a wonderfully done 56 minute movie that really gets you invested!
Follows famous skater Tony Hawk’s personal life, career and relationship with skateboarding, including never-before-seen footage and unprecedented access to Hawk, along with interviews with figures from the skateboarding world.
Honestly there isn’t a lot here to be said despite the documentary being 2 hours and 15 minutes, what we have here is a deep dive into Tony Hawk’s career and him as a person. The documentary surprisingly goes in great depth and has this element in it about moving on as you get older. Tony Hawk is a skateboarding icon heck a sports icon at this point, yet we still learn so much more about him from this documentary it feels very personal and really grabs the attention of the viewer quite well. There’s so much detail in this documentary to the point where it’s quite fascinating and while yes some of the information is common knowledge it’s still beautiful to hear Tony Hawk talk about his career, the only main flaw with the documentary is the running time as I said earlier it’s 2 hours and 15 minutes. Which I do feel like 10-13 minutes could have easily been trimmed because it does feel like the documentary crams a little too much information at once at times. However everything else about this documentary is incredibly solid and quite interesting, even if you aren’t a fan of Tony Hawk or skateboarding I do highly recommend checking this out!
Tony Hawk: Until The Wheels Fall Off will release April 5th on HBO and HBO Max!
A man breaks into a tech billionaire’s empty vacation home, but things go sideways when the arrogant mogul and his wife arrive for a last-minute getaway.
Windfall is Netflix’s first great film of 2022 and that’s mostly due to the cast and the atmosphere. Jesse Plemons, Jason Segel and Lily Collins (definitely one of her best performances) all do a fantastic job here and have wonderful chemistry between one another. They each add their own strength to the film and make it all the more suspenseful, the film definitely feels a lot like Funny Games (1997) only that it’s much less disturbing. The atmosphere of the film is really strong, as it goes on it gets more and more suspenseful until the whole thing explodes at the ending which is a huge payoff. The direction from Charlie McDowell is also really well done, we explore each of the characters and really dive into their minds. I will say that Windfall is certainly not going to be for everyone, but is definitely something worth watching if the plot interests you!
Amanda and her daughter living a quiet life on an American farm, but when the remains of her estranged mother arrive from Korea, Amanda becomes haunted by the fear of turning into her own mother.
It’s very unfortunate the way Umma turned out, what could have been a genuinely powerful horror film about deeper themes of family trauma ends up being a very mixed bag jumpscare fest. I’ll start with the positives Sandra Oh and Fivel Stewart are both quite fantastic, it was about time that we finally got Sandra Oh in a horror film and I would love to see her be in more, although the movie itself isn’t very good she does give such a strong performance that really shows she wanted to make the movie work. I also liked the family trauma elements they are decently told and there’s a few scenes in particular that are actually pretty powerful, unfortunately that’s where the movie ends for me. What’s holding this movie back is the horror elements, a lot of the horror elements are very tired jumpscares. I do think that a family trauma horror film can work I just feel like if the movie would have cut the horror part out of this movie and made it a drama, it would have been a lot more successful and still would have gotten the point it’s trying to get across. Umma is definitely an example of a movie that feels like it was directed by two completely different people one person wanted family trauma themes while the other wanted a very below average horror movie. Overall Umma is very forgettable and something that could have easily been great had their been better direction and writing.
A young couple unable to conceive travels to a doctor’s remote facility.
The Institute has an interesting idea on paper and for some reasons it does a decent job with the storytelling. However it takes a bit too long to get going and at times feels very empty, the cast does a decent job in their roles and the performances compliment the atmosphere actually quite well, but the execution feels like it could have had a lot more strength into it.
The Institute releases March 22nd on all VOD Platforms.
With a dog named Lulu by his side, Army Ranger Briggs races down the Pacific Coast to make it to a soldier’s funeral on time. Along the way, Briggs and Lulu drive each other completely crazy, break a handful of laws, narrowly evade death, and learn to let down their guards to have a fighting chance of finding happiness.
Dog is pretty much a buddy road trip movie but instead of two people it’s Channing Tatum and a German Shepherd named Lulu. I’m going to be honest there is not a whole lot here to talk about, Dog is a movie that has it’s good bits such as Channing Tatum’s performance and some decently funny interactions between him and Lulu. But that’s really where the movie ends for me, the first half of the movie feels like a chore to sit through and is way too slow for no reason at all. Most of the jokes are just not funny, as I said earlier there are some decently funny scenes but they aren’t anything I’ll come back to. There’s definitely some charm in the movie and I guess it’s a decent enough time killer to watch when you have absolutely nothing else to watch. But really Dog is just forgettable all around.
Dog is available on all VOD Platforms.
5/10 C
Chasing his dream to join an elite K-9 unit, a state trooper partners with a fellow underdog: clever but naughty shelter pup Ruby. Based on a true story.
Rescued By Ruby is based on a true story about a man who wants to join an elite K-9 Unit which instead of training a German Shepard he instead trains a border Collie named Ruby. The movie itself is a straightforward telling of the true story, it definitely has that “made for TV” feel to it but at least it’s somewhat interesting. The acting is mixed bag, I sort of liked Grant Gustin in the leading role everyone else did fine enough. Outside of that there really is not much to this movie, reading the plot is about all you really need to know about Rescued By Ruby. The writing again is very mixed, there’s some very sweet moments that are heartwarming and then there’s some jokes that completely don’t land at all. Rescued By Ruby is definitely one of the better dog movies to come out but that is seriously not saying much.
Rescued By Ruby is available on Netflix!
5/10 C
What starts out as a weekend away in a remote luxury villa, turns into a tale of horror, death and alien invasion.
The Seed has a straightforward concept three women are on a weekend trip and some egg crashes into their pool, when it hatches it causes hell. The creature design itself is really great and actually pretty creepy, the movie has a decent atmosphere added on that’s also not bad either. The main criticism just comes with the characters, this is unfortunately another one of those movies that’s very heavy on having one of the characters be an obnoxious influencer. Which really got tiring after ten minutes and just completely takes you out of the movie, the other two characters just not very well written. The performances are fine enough and get the job done for the most part, but there’s really nothing much to it. The Seed isn’t anything bad it’s just very forgettable and misses a few marks that stop it from being passable.
A group of actors sets out to make an adult film in rural Texas under the noses of their reclusive hosts, but when the elderly couple catches their young guests in the act, the cast finds themselves in a desperate fight for their lives.
X is a prime example of when a filmmaker truly understands a certain genre, in this case Ti West having a complete understanding of the horror genre as well as the slasher film. The movie is a brilliant throwback to the 70s and 80s slasher films and perhaps the best type of throwback in recent memory, from the ground up Ti West and his team built this film as if it came out in the 70s or 80s. Which leads to a ton of elements that all combine together to make a masterful thrilling experience. Starting with the cast all of which do a fantastic job and have an excellent chemistry between one another, the characters actually get development which is very different from a lot of slasher films, but the standout performances are most definitely Mia Goth, Jenna Ortega, Brittany Snow (it’s wonderful to see her back in a horror film) and Kid Cudi. Mia Goth plays two characters Maxine and Pearl which she does an excellent job at and gives my favorite performances so far this year, her role as Pearl is thrilling, disturbing and quite fascinating. All of the performances here are absolutely well done, each of them giving something unique to the film and there’s a lot of emotion as well. Which leads to the writing and themes, X could have been just another slasher film but Ti West wanted to do something completely different. He took the slasher genre and a bit of slow burn and put in the theme of becoming old and missing your youth, which leads to some bizarre scenes that have a lot to them when it comes to emotion, this is the type of case where this would come off very silly in other slasher films. But the writing truly backs it up here and paints a disturbing atmospheric picture that becomes meaningful at points, the setting compliments the film well immediately it reminds you of Texas Chainsaw Massacre, it’s a really nice callback what I do appreciate however is the film does something different with it. It creates a different atmosphere than Texas Chainsaw Massacre with it’s setting so it avoids the risk of repeating. The filming is one of the major elements that make X such a successful film, as I said earlier X is completely done as if it was made in the 70s or 80s. The filming is a major highlight of this, there’s a lot of shots that look straight out of slasher films from that era. Especially when combined with the atmosphere it’s a very dark and mysterious atmosphere that a lot of slasher films had during that era, lastly there’s the direction which I’ve said a few things already on how and why Ti West did such a fantastic job with this film but here’s a bit more. Ti West didn’t just create another throwback film, he created a throwback film that feels AND looks like it was made in that era, plus he added so much more to the film, his knowledge of the genre is very present here and is a breath of fresh air. Overall X is so far my favorite film of 2022, it masters everything a slasher film should be while also including brilliant direction from Ti West, Mia Goth giving two completely different roles and nailing them both and adding so much to make this film straight from the 70s and 80s as much as possible!
A well-to-do husband who allows his wife to have affairs in order to avoid a divorce becomes a prime suspect in the disappearance of her lovers.
Deep Water is a very interesting case, it’s a terrible movie yes and that really shouldn’t surprise anyone. However it’s the type of bad that is hilarious and as the movie goes on it gets more and more baffling by the minute. Ana De Armas is by far the standout performance, Ben Affleck while not great still manages to be entertaining he’s the type of actor where no matter how bad some of his performances are he’s still very entertaining and that applies here. The first two acts are on the lines of guilty pleasure, tons of laughably bad scenes, some erotic scenes which I wish the movie did a bit more of. The erotic scenes are honestly no different than a lot of other scenes from other films, there’s just a little bit more of them. The final act is when things become incredibly baffling, Deep Water has this car chase scene at the end that is bizarrely edited and filmed that is just unbelievable, but then when you add how the movie decides how to end the movie completely breaks it. It’s like by the time the writing and filming process for the third act came along everyone just said “I quit!” and walked away, despite all of that it’s still a hilarious collection of scenes that gave me the biggest laughing fit I got from a movie in awhile. Overall Deep Water is a movie that must be seen to be believed, it’s truly one of the most baffling and broken movies I’ve seen in awhile. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if in the near future Deep Water goes on to be some sort of “it’s so bad it’s hilarious” classic.
A man and his wife navigate a hectic home life while trying to raise 10 children and manage the family business.
Cheaper By The Dozen (2022) is a prime example of a remake that did not need to happen, the best thing I can say about this movie is the acting isn’t as bad as you would expect. Sure nobody gives a performance that I would call great but this does lead to some charming moments that at least give the movie some heart in it. Outside of that however the rest of the movie is basically a bad Disney channel original movie disguised as a Disney+ Original, it feels very much like a sitcom which isn’t necessarily always a bad thing but in this case it goes for one that’s just not funny at all. Which leads into the biggest problem with this movie…the writing and jokes, think of any bad family movie from the early 2000s and then think about the humor that were in those movies. That’s the type of humor Cheaper By The Dozen consists of, which quickly grows both tired and incredibly annoying. If I had to compare this to another recent Disney+ Original it would have to be last year’s Home Sweet Home Alone another pointless reimagining/reboot/remake/I have no idea. Only that one was far far worse, but both movies share this type of feel that Disney looked around the library and randomly two movies to give the Disney+ treatment. I really don’t have much else to say Cheaper By The Dozen (2022) is very bare bones and does nothing interesting I’m not going to pretend like the 2003 movie was a masterpiece but at least it was entertaining, this one not so much.
A young woman grieving for past losses receives an unexpected invitation, leading her onto a solitary road trip across the American Midwest.
The Unknown Country is quite an interesting piece about a woman grieving who drives around the country and interacts with many different people. Right off the bat I absolutely loved the documentary/narrative hybrid, it works so well here and really captures the raw emotions of every person in the film. There’s a lot of moments that feel very Chloe Zhao like with a mix of Terrance Malick especially when it comes to the cinematography, there’s so many human moments as well it’s almost like you are going on a trip with Lily Gladstone as she takes around the Midwest of the country. There’s so many beautiful landscape shots that really compliment this film well, they add so much to the narrative being told and the documentary like style itself, plus the film pretty much shows the daily lives of the people shown in the film. It’s a very human film that really gives you all sorts of emotions, overall The Unknown Country is a fantastic film that was one of my favorites from SXSW definitely check this one out once it releases.
The Unknown Country currently has no release date!
Jerome Reviews... 