Tag: movies

Jay’s Quick Take: Underworld Blood Wars

A spoiler-free movie review (not that it matters).

Which “Underworld” are we on now? Six? Seven? Seventeen? No no no, it isn’t that bad – we’re only on number Five, which for some is four too many. I personally never connected with any of the Underworld movies, except the third. My issue was always with the backstory: why is there such a complex lore for what is essentially vampires & werewolves shooting guns at each-other? I never really knew what was going on in those movies and that’s probably my fault for not paying more attention (a lot of “this character knows this other character from hundreds of years ago, and there’s a relic that does this-and-that but only under certain conditions and blah blah blah”), but I always had one-foot out the door with these sorts of things anyway. Sure, I’ve read my share of vampire stories and watched my share of monster movies, but anything tinged with a touch of magic, or involving children with superpowers, or “the fate of the world rests on this motley crew of pale attractive twenty-somethings” is more my wife’s department.

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Jay’s Quick Take: High Tension

A spoiler-free revisionist movie review.

Did you know Philippe Nahon died during COVID? Too bad. “High Tension” from 2003 is one of the original entries in the New French Extremity movement, and its reputation therein would not be as solidified weren’t it for the committed turn by the late Mr. Nahon. It made me check his IMDB page to see if there were any other movies of his I was missing out on, only to find the ones I knew were what I expected to be his highlights: his early Gaspar Noé contributions and “Calvaire”. Hey, if I was a professional actor, I’d probably be satiated with the kind of marquee Nahon got from this and “I Stand Alone” – inevitable typecasting aside. Some people like playing the villain, and some were born to play villains. Nahon falls squarely into the second category, and his methodical killer at the heart of director Alexandre Aja’s first feature (who went on to make the “Hills Have Eyes” & “Piranha” remakes) rescues what is unfortunately a very opuscule “college girls trapped at a secluded location while being hunted for unknown reasons” genre ride.

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Jay’s Quick Take: The Invitation

A movie review with minor spoilers (but nothing the advertising hasn’t given away already).

I’m not sure if this is even going to fill your elementary-school quota of three paragraphs but we’ll try. “The Invitation” was not a bad movie. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one concentrating on the “brides” of Dracula before – lots where ol’ Drac has his bevvy of buxom & consenting babes already turned and who approve of his polygamist & non-monogamous ways, but not one where we see the actual process of acquiring said-babes, or how said-babes approve-or-disapprove of their seduction (followed by forced spiritual-and-physical confinement). The Invitation is not about Dracula himself, thankfully, as that Transylvanian dude has been done to death: this time it’s some random rich British guy with the suggestive last name of De Ville (the script is content with peppering Easter Eggs from the Bram Stoker novel though, such as the creepy castle named New Carfax, or Renfield the Butler). The acting is earnest from an odd collection of you-know-them-or-you-don’t folk who are all happy to be working post-COVID, the production design is expectedly opulent & gothic (it’s clear from that big dragon statue in the castle lobby that the majority of the budget went there), and – despite 90% of the plot’s mystery being spoiled in the trailer – I was genuinely interested to see how everything ended. It was worth the half-price “last week of Summer because there’s nothing new for general audiences” ticket the movie theatre was flogging.

BUT! I can’t help but think of how much better it would have been if they had made some small changes… take note, Sony-owned Screen Gems! Two-time film-school dropout Jason is here to teach you a thing or two:

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Jay’s Take: The Thing Called Love

A revisionist movie review.

“You have a room where you go inside and you lock the door, and I’m not even allowed in! How come you get a room like that?”
“Well, I’ve lived here for a while, and I enjoy the space, I pay the rent…”

– Samantha Mathis, getting nowhere with River Phoenix about the whole “room” issue

How many of you knew there existed a River Phoenix “gotta be a country music star” movie? That was the primary reason I chose to watch “The Thing Called Love”, controversies aside: it’s a nightmare to find anything I would consider “general viewing” in my house (ie. my wife hogs the TV & often complains about my movie choices). She was a ranch-hand in another life, so to say my spouse is a fan of country music is like saying bananas have potassium. And for the first half of “The Thing Called Love”, I thought I had found a winner: a making-it-big-in-Nashville odyssey with Samantha Mathis (Daisy from the “Super Mario Bros” movie) directed by the “Don of the Down & Dirty” Mr. Bogdanovich (“The Last Picture Show”), with music that my wife actually knew the words to? To say, then, that finishing the movie was disillusioning is pre-emptive, since no one really talks about the film: either as a Phoenix movie (even though it was his last-completed before his death) or a Bogdanovich movie. But I’ll tell you why anyway. It’s hot outside.

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Jay’s Take: Vortex

A relatively spoiler-free movie review.

France’s resident moviemaker/troublemaker Gaspar Noé (“Enter the Void”; “that movie where Monica Bellucci gets raped for ten minutes”) has a new movie out called “Vortex” . It’s one of the best new movies I’ve seen in the last 10 years. That’s a mean feat. Discuss:

Vortex is about a small family – an elderly couple, living alone; and their son – dealing with the late-stage dementia of the matriarch. And while in many ways it – aesthetically & thematically – slides nicely into the controversial director’s filmography at this point in his life (he’s turning 60 next year), it’s also unique amongst his back-catalogue. In this way and others, it’s sure to draw comparison with Michael Haneke’s 2012 movie “Amour” (also about an elderly couple and their offspring dealing with the deterioration of the wife). With Amour, a well-known & incendiary director took his unique cinematic language and translated it successfully to a serious, contemplative “chamber piece”. I’ve always wanted to call a movie a “chamber piece” and now I can. Twice! Vortex is a “chamber piece”: a serious-toned character drama in-and-around one location.

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