Director: Otilia Portillo Padua
Writer: Sheerly Anvi, Sara Dosa, Gabriela Damián Miravete
Stars: Julia Dolores Raimundo, Julieta Sarafina Amaya, Eliseete Ramirez Carbajal

Synopsis: Deep in Mexico’s forests, two Indigenous mycologists seek to reconcile the past and present while reimagining the future for themselves and the changing world they inhabit.

During a restless, chaotic time in human history, reviewing films and writing about art becomes a bit of a difficult task. It’s unfathomable to ignore global suffering but it’s also as important to connect with various documentarians, and watch documentaries which chronicle the lives of regular, hardworking people. Documentary filmmaking will always be the conscience of the world, and Daughters of the Forest is no exception.

Daughters of the Forest is an immersive sci-fi documentary about the coexisting harmony between mushrooms and indigenous tribes in Mexico. Through two scientists who are armed with both their scientific knowledge, and the culture they carry on their backs from their indigenous origins, we get to watch as they navigate the world of ancient women in the family, mushroom gatherers trying to get by in a world where basic things like farming, agriculture, and vegetable gathering is becoming less of a necessity and more of a dying art. 

Director Otilia Portillo Padua documents a world that is slowly grifted by the rise in fascist technology, wars, and climate emergencies. Defying the fear of extinction has become more of a responsibility for planetary repair. Codependent ecosystems and interspecies cooperation are terms that define the next stage of humanity, if people are serious about saving the planet from the hands of greedy, reckless billionaires. 

The documentary mixes between stunning visuals and realistic scenes of the scientists Lis and Juli as they navigate a world of deforestation and agriculture decay. Those two women spend hours in the laboratory or out there in the wild, identifying and sampling breeds of mushrooms, understanding fungal behavior, mixing that with the wisdom of their ancestors and trying to tie that into how human behavior can be enhanced. Instead of saving the world through pushing for more technology that eats off the life and hard work of farmers and gatherers, professions that sound silly nowadays in the era of digitizing everything. 

It’s bravery when someone decides to make an entire documentary about the life of mushrooms, and how fungi breathe, talk, and send messages. Padua mixes the lives of the scientists and their families, women who spend hours behind a microscope trying to refine the fine microcellular levels of a shaved mushroom stipe. She doesn’t just have those impressive, immersive beautiful shots of going inside the mycelium itself -the intricate root system of the mushroom- but she also integrates the culture of gatherers and secret keepers of the forest, the generations of mushroom collectors, the grandmas who know which one to eat, and which one to use for healing. She shows that culture and science go hand-in-hand, treating both the cottages of the guardians of the forest and the laboratories. 

What it could’ve benefited from is a bit of a focus on the immersive scientific experience. For a while, it felt like Padua didn’t really know what she wanted to focus on. Is this a fully dedicated film to the wisdom of the elders, or a mycological adventure into the heart and soul of a fungus? I know that is purposeful on her part, but it still created a bit of a narrative ambiguity. Had this been absent, the documentary would be positioned differently. Still, these are not integral flaws, just a hushed whisper in the ears of a promising documentary filmmaker who the world definitely anticipates her next move.

In Daughters of the Forest, scientists are going out of their way to discover new ways of using up the planet’s resources without destroying it. It is a race against a time that is not on their side, as the bulldozers of tree loggers clear-cut acres and acres of trees, and as Lis’s mother says in the film “Without a forest, what will become of us?” The documentary poses questions and offers solutions that may salvage the planet when people still have time. But who is listening?

Grade: B+

Director: Amy Wang
Writer: Amy Wang
Stars: Shirley Chen, Mckenna Grace, Elaine Hendrix

Synopsis: An insecure Chinese-American teenager undergoes experimental surgery to appear white, hoping to secure the prom queen title and peer acceptance.

Amy Wang’s Slanted represents an interesting crossroads between genres and inspiration that’s rather intriguing. Many will roll their eyes at the absurdity of the film’s premise, but the experience of actually watching Slanted represents a clash between a strong foundation and weak execution. The inevitable comparisons to Mean Girls and The Substance are somewhat apt, but Slanted is actually at its best within its core themes of immigration and what it actually means to be an American within a system that pressures you to question your identity. The messaging is rarely, if ever, subtle, but it clearly comes from a personal place for filmmaker Wang, and that is where the film is most thought-provoking. Unfortunately, it falters within most of the actual comedy and race commentary of its satire, basically acting as a less clever Get Out that never digs any deeper into the racial implications of its commentary besides telling the same jokes and making surface-level observations repeatedly. It all forms into a mixed bag that has its fair share of thought-provoking observations that are coated with unsubtle and blunt commentary, resulting in an appreciative but frustrating experience.

Slanted begins with the perspective of a younger Joan Huang, a Chinese-born girl who has just immigrated to a new town in America with her mother (Vivian Wu) and father (Fang Du). From the get-go at her school, we see her constantly bullied for the foods she eats, and she simply does not feel welcome in this environment, despite trying her best for her parents. From the very beginning, however, Joan saw becoming prom queen of her school as a sort of level that, if reached, would lead to everyone respecting her identity, and she’s been obsessed with it ever since. Now in the present day, Joan (Shirley Chen) is in high school, constantly seemingly embarrassed by her Chinese features and pressuring her parents to speak English instead of their native Cantonese. 

Every day at school, Joan discusses her plans to run for prom queen with her best friend Brindha (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan) and sees getting an endorsement from high school elite Olivia Hammond (Amelie Zilber) as her ticket to the tiara, but she is still made fun of and sees that her not being the pretty white blonde archetype as the problem. After being contacted by the company Ethnos for using their skin change phone filter so much, Joan is offered to undergo an experimental trans-racial surgery to appear as the pretty white blonde she sees plastered all over her school hallways. She jumps at the chance and becomes Jo Hunt (Mckenna Grace) post the surgery, hoping to gain the admiration she’s always dreamed of.

In retrospect, it’s absurd that Slanted’s marketing has leaned more towards its minuscule body horror elements rather than the clear passion it derives from the center of Amy Wang’s own personal experiences, as it’s where the film excels the most. The film has a rather fresh perspective on the Asian immigrant experience, homing in on those who self-hate or feel the need to erase their own culture in order to fit into a new one. The film is about as subtle as a sledgehammer in this regard (and it’s more of an issue in other areas), but these aspects of the film work the best because they are where Slanted is at its most authentic. The obvious personal experience is very similar to Didi in the way the performances carry the emotions of each scene, and channel the vision of the direction so well. Shirley Chen’s performance is particularly captivating, and the internal and external struggles she conveys between her parents make even the shakier parts of the screenplay more meaningful. 

It’s just a shame that Slanted ends up so weighed down by all the other elements of its satire that even its strongest elements can feel as if there was even more to delve into and there was a lot left at the table. The film leans more into its body horror and comedic elements in its back half as Grace replaces Chen, and it’s where all the commentary is either completely nonconfrontational or just completely predictable. 

The body horror never reaches any full commitment levels, the teenage melodrama is about as plainly drawn out as you’d expect, and the actual comedy rarely evolves beyond “white people listen to Michael Bublé a lot” level jokes. It’s this period that buries a decent portion of Slanted’s more noteworthy elements; there are so many genre aspects it tries to tackle as it goes on, and the writing never extends cleverly enough to punctuate anything purposeful about these, on paper, clever concepts.

Slanted presents a compelling perspective of the immigrant experience, bringing a personal touch to the meaning of finding your identity as an Asian American, which feels lost within a plethora of blunt racial themes that barely scratch beyond the surface. Amy Wang’s nuanced body horror comedy ends up as a valiant but futile attempt at a satire.

Grade: C

Director: Jan Komasa
Writers: Bartek Bartosik, Naqqash Khalid
Stars: Stephen Graham, Andrea Riseborough, Anson Boon

Synopsis: A 19-year-old criminal, Tommy, is kidnapped and forced into a rehabilitation process by a dysfunctional couple, Chris and Kathryn, who try to make him a “good boy.” Tommy must find a way to escape.

Jan Komasa has always been at the forefront of drawing cogent portraits of specific, complex individuals, whether in the religious-driven Corpus Christi or the cautionary tale of Anniversary, but he seems to have genuinely stumbled with his newest venture, Heel. Initially titled Good Boy, yet renamed to avoid confusion with the dog horror movie of the same title, Komasa, and screenwriters Bartek Bartosik and Naqqash Khalid don’t really know what they want to treat when focusing on their central character, who seems to be stuck in a fairly complicated predicament. 

The film opens in media res by introducing audiences to the delinquency of Tommy (Anson Boon, who was excellent in Guy Ritchie’s MobLand last year), who excessively consumes drugs and alcohol and purposefully gets into physical altercations with as many people as he can…until he’s suddenly abducted. We don’t know what happened to him for some time, as Komasa switches to the perspective of housekeeper Rina (Monika Frajczyk), who is being interviewed for  potential employment by Chris (Stephen Graham). She eventually gets the gig and travels to Chris’ house, where she meets his reclusive wife, Kathryn (Andrea Riseborough), their son, Jonathan (Kit Rakusen), and Tommy, who is being chained like a dog in their basement. 

Who is he? And what is he doing here? These questions will eventually be answered, but in a fairly nonchalant way, or at least treated as if none of this truly matters. Unlike Anniversary, which felt urgent, especially as a potent reflection of the politically unstable times America lives in, Heel possesses no sense of urgency or willingness to engage with the ideas haphazardly presented on screen. Komasa can still craft effective images and control his aesthetic extremely well in the edit, but they don’t have as much of a grip on us as they did in Corpus Christi, The Hater, and Anniversary. 

To be clear, pairing with cinematographer Michał Dymek – whose work in Jerzy Skolimowski’s EO and Magnus von Horn’s The Girl with the Needle is some of the decade’s very best photography – is a stroke of genius. However, his talents feel limited when the language isn’t as well-defined as Komasa’s previous works. There are still the odd image or two with lasting power, but they’re sparse compared to the Polish filmmaker’s previous works, which feature many frames that create a tangible impact. These occur near the end of the picture, where the story’s meaning is fully revealed. Despite an assured sense of style, many of these “reveals” fall pitifully flat, including its ridiculous ending, which renders most of the character development moot if Tommy regresses as a result of his time spent within a household he was forced to be in. 

It is difficult to discuss a movie whose plot shouldn’t be revealed in any form of critical writing, because most of the narrative developments occur near its conclusion, but please believe me when I say that Heel’s benevolent intentions no longer exist during the film’s baffling climax. You’d be forgiven for thinking Komasa was asleep at the wheel compared to the previous masterworks he’s helmed, because the film lacks the character-driven (and aesthetic) pulse he’s mostly known for, but it’s not entirely his fault. 

The screenplay has little to no interest in drawing compelling characters. Chris and Kathryn live in (very) morally grey areas and still seem to be riddled by the passing of one of their children, which might explain the reasoning behind Tommy’s kidnapping. However, none of these people are explored to their fullest extent, even during scenes of child abuse towards their remaining son. It should theoretically give a clue about how they’re controlling their house – and probably how their other son died – but it barely scratches the surface on who they are as trauma-ridden human beings. 

The same thing can be said for Tommy. Komasa will scratch an itch on the rise of “dare” (and, by extension, influencer) culture that has created more and more terrible people for their antics to be posted all over the internet, but there’s barely anything to hold onto in the character’s evolution. Even when he manages to break free from the shackles of his dog collar, the resulting catharsis is limited. It has a grab-bag of interesting – and thematically resonant – ideas, but Komasa refuses to go beyond the confines of the screenplay he’s been given. It’s frustrating, because we know of his talent as someone who has always put character first and wasn’t afraid to defy our preconceptions of what we believe a protagonist should accomplish in a film. 

He attempts to do it here with Heel, but none of his characters are remotely interesting enough for us to latch onto them, despite solid work from Graham, Riseborough, and Boon. The latter, in particular, gives the movie’s best performance, because he has the most varied register to play in, whilst Graham and Riseborough are stuck in their one-note archetypes from beginning to end. I did enjoy Kathryn’s voice evolving from the first time we met her, closing in on herself, to the last scene, where she has found a new purpose to live again, but it’s about the only thing we can peer into regarding the character. She is, unfortunately, as empty as everyone else.

The good news is that Heel isn’t a downright terrible movie, just a particularly unmemorable one. Komasa’s formal impulses are still intact, but they’re in service of a screenplay that has no idea what it wants to say about anything it lays in front of the audience. Unlike Anniversary, which had so much to say about the current rise in fascism that America is undertaking, Heel stops whenever it presents an idea and takes the easy way out of “leaving it open to interpretation.” The thing is, you can’t leave it open to interpretation if you don’t give the audience something to interpret with. There is nothing – and I genuinely mean nothing – to interpret this movie from. It’s complete vacuity from beginning to end. It’s also Jan Komasa’s first (and hopefully last) miss. It had to happen eventually, but I didn’t expect it to be this unremarkable…

Grade: D+

Directors: Phil Lord, Christopher Miller
Writers: Drew Goddard, Andy Weir
Stars: Ryan Gosling, Milana Vayntrub, Sandra Hüller

Synopsis: Science teacher Ryland Grace wakes up alone on a spaceship light-years from Earth. As his memory returns, he uncovers a mission to stop a mysterious substance killing the sun, and save Earth. An unexpected friendship may be the key.

Very rarely can you point to a film about redemption that also serves as a redemption story for its filmmakers. Project Hail Mary fits that description. I won’t go so far as to proclaim it a masterpiece, as some critics seem eager to do in their quote-pull fishing expeditions. Please, leave the narcissism at the door. If Ryan Gosling mugging for the camera in charming, hot-nerd fashion is enough to qualify as greatness, then this film certainly has that in abundance.

With Project Hail Mary, the writing and directing team of Phil Lord and Chris Miller will finally get the respect their names lost after being unceremoniously kicked off Solo: A Star Wars Story. After finding success with films likeCloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and The Lego Movie, they have finally made their space epic, one with plenty of heart and a comic touch that makes it a pure popcorn crowd-pleaser.

Not to mention, the script, along with the source material, keeps pivoting, making choices that are risky and brave in the world of cinema. While this critic kept waiting for the film to deliver a climactic, cathartic, showstopping third act, Lord and Miller respect the source material’s ending enough to craft a near-perfect marriage of art and commerce that will leave you giddy about what Hollywood studios can still achieve. 

The story of Project Hail Mary follows Dr. Ryland Grace (Academy Award nominee Ryan Gosling), a former scientist who was blackballed from the academic community for his original, outside-the-box thinking in molecular biology. Now working as an eighth-grade science teacher, Grace spends most of his days calming his students’ fears about the apocalyptic end of the world. The cause is something called “Astrophage,” aka the “Star-Eater.” 

The parasitic alien organism is known for consuming the sun’s energy and, for lack of a better term, dimming it. You are probably thinking, what’s the big deal? Less money on sunscreen. Not so fast. That means Earth would enter a rapidly accelerating Ice Age. The result would be mass crop failures, ecosystem collapse, and eventual human extinction, with every country treating resources as a free-for-all.

That’s when Eva Stratt (Anatomy of a Fall’s Sandra Hüller), head of the Hail Mary Project, steps in. The program is tasked with finding a way to save the sun and, by extension, the world. Right now, the sun will die in thirty years. Somehow, she comes across a paper Ryland wrote that hypothesizes life does not necessarily require water to evolve or exist. It was an original thought that led to Grace being banished to teach sniveling adolescents biology lessons.

Gosling is wonderful in the role, portraying the good doctor as endearingly awkward and almost diffident. Some of the best scenes come with The Bear’s Lionel Boyce, who plays officer/enforcer Steve Hatch assigned to Grace during the project. Ryland solves the most puzzling part of why the alien parasite is dimming the big, bad Helious with simple school project techniques, creating a hypothesis with cardboard, duct tape, and some Skittles.  

Yes, it has that obvious product placement, though it is not nearly as objectionable as the McCafé scene in The Day the Earth Stood Still. 

Surprisingly, Project Hail Mary draws the viewer into an immersive, cinematic world that is funny, heartfelt, and visually awe-inspiring. Adapted from the novel by Andy Weir (The Martian), the film is directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, working from an exceptional screenplay by Drew Goddard (World War Z), that is pure popcorn entertainment. And that may be underselling the experience. 

Yes, we should have high standards, but in the age of the streaming wars, it is rare to get a movie that sparks the imagination, fills the soul, and reminds you of the simple joy of watching a big, ambitious story unfold on the largest screen possible. This also doubles as a family movie, with teachable moments you can discuss with your kids about what truly matters in life. It is just as much about exploration as it is a stealthy, beautiful, evocative meditation on family, friendship, and sacrifice.

Yes, there are some plot holes that come with a film like this, with Ryland achieving MacGyver-like levels of miraculous engineering and compressed scientific discoveries. Of course, unlike The Martian, those gaps are largely smoothed over by the introduction of Rocky (voiced by puppeteer James Ortiz). I have left the character mostly out of this review, even though the trailer gives it away, because much of the film’s joy comes from going in with as little knowledge as possible.

Frankly, whatever you think of the picture’s destination, one that lands on a moment of pure, joyous, cerebral optimism, it is the journey that sets Phil Lord and Christopher Miller’s adaptation of Andy Weir’s creation apart. As a whole, the film is a suspenseful, emotional, and ultimately rewarding ride, the kind of experience that feels almost like cinematic therapy. 

There is an emotional spectacle just as much a journey as the space travel, that goes well beyond the film’s gorgeous, breathtaking visuals. See Project Hail Mary on any screen you want, preferably in a theater, because this is a rare film worth the price of admission, and take the ride of a lifetime.

You can watch Project Hail Mary exclusively in theaters starting March 20th!

Grade: A-

Director: Maggie Gyllenhaal
Writer: Maggie Gyllenhaal
Stars: Jessie Buckley, Christian Bale, Annette Bening

Synopsis: In 1930s Chicago, Frankenstein asks Dr. Euphronius to help create a companion. They give life to a murdered woman as the Bride, sparking romance, police interest, and radical social change.

The Bride!, for all intents and purposes, throws nothing but punches and refuses to sugarcoat a single frame in Maggie Gyllenhaal’s remarkable, fresh take on Mary Shelley’s creation. That hardly means the movie is easy to sit through. Gyllenhaal’s sophomore effort ( her first was the incredible Netflix film The Lost Daughter) is grueling, repellent, hideous, and depraved at times. Skulls are crushed. Limbs are ripped. Tongues are torn.

However, The Bride! is also feverishly funny and unhinged, the type of gothic controlled chaos whose violence, as Roger Ebert describes in his review of Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction, is like amusement park violence. Gyllenhaal does a remarkable job of creating a world of ugly people with even uglier souls that is savage, seductive, and subversive. And no, we are not just talking about the main characters. 

The Bride! reflects the classic source materials in a kinetic, highly stylized way. Monsters are not born, they are made. The grotesque creatures are curious, sensitive, and full of untapped compassion, longing for companionship, whose violence is sparked by a world that uses isolation, humiliation, and abandonment to shape them. This Frankenstein’s monster and his bride are products of their environment, living down to the expectations society has set for them. 

This story takes place in 1930s Chicago, where Ida (a phenomenal Jessie Buckley) is enjoying a heavy night of drinking and shellfish in a swinging mob speakeasy. She throws a fit, yelling at the local mob boss, Lupino (Superman’s Zlatko Burić), who tells his henchmen to get rid of her. Clyde (Past Lives’ John Magaro) and James (Air’s Matthew Maher) slap her around and eventually push her down the stairs because she won’t shut that filthy mouth of hers.

Ida falls head over heels, literally, as her skull bounces off several steps until she meets the hard cement floor, snapping her neck. She is buried and forgotten. That is, until Frankenstein’s monster (Academy Award winner Christian Bale) arrives at Dr. Euphronius’s (the iconic Annette Bening) home to ask her to feel compassion for him. Euphoria is well known, perhaps infamously, for reinvigorating the dead. 

So they do what any normal people would do: they go grave robbing, coming across an exquisite-looking dead woman with wild blonde hair in a silky orange cocktail dress that will surely pique the monster’s interest. The wild and reckless Ida is reborn, without a memory of who she was before. The Monster is taken back by The Bride’s chaotic vitality, and a tragic creation that turns out to have a streak of anarchic spirit that cannot be tamed. 

The Bride! works because of Jessie Buckley’s performance. Her portrayal is like a stick of dynamite; volatile, sensual, and feral, a far cry from past Frankenstein adaptations. Buckley’s take on the classic character can be viewed through a feminist lens: Ida’s behavior before and after her death is a rebellion against the rules society has designed for her, refusing to stay within the walls that seek to box her in.

Of course, Bale makes you feel for a character who becomes a gluttonous consumer of love and friendship. Now drunk on companionship, he has a remarkable way of making you feel for the character, then be frightened or disgusted by him. For example, the switch from endearing shyness can, in a split second, turn into monstrous rage. While the story clearly has a horror undercurrent, Bale’s turn drives the search for a cure for loneliness and identity, which is viscerally felt.

Gyllenhaal also makes the film a family affair, with her brother Jake playing a Fred Astaire–like Golden Age of Hollywood star who helps the Monster through hard times. Her husband, Peter Sarsgaard, plays Det. Jake Wiles, who, along with Penélope Cruz’s Myrna Mallow, Jake’s assistant, investigates Frank and the Bride. Unfortunately, that subplot feels forced rather than delicately layered into the story. 

While entertaining, unfortunately, that investigation feels less like a natural extension of the story and more like a narrative obligation. Also, while the feminist rebellion angle is clearly felt throughout the film, Gyllenhaal does find herself doubling down by creating an antihero character out of Ida, with people following her in the media. The layer of subtext is hardly subtle and self-indulgent. 

Though you cannot argue that the film always keeps you engaged and entertained, no matter how vile the movie can be, it becomes thought-provoking. Ultimately, The Bride is worth watching for the lens Maggie Gyllenhaal uses to tell the story and for Jessie Buckley’s electric performance. Maggie Gyllenhaal, beneath all the style and terrific performances, finds the humanity beneath the grotesque. 

You can watch The Bride exclusively in theaters starting March 6th!

Grade: B-

Director: Han Han
Writers: Han Han, Zhou Yunhai, Meng Wenyu
Stars: Teng Shen, Yin Zheng, Wei Xiang

Synopsis: Bearing the glory of being the “King of Bayanbulak,” Zhang Chi once again embarks on his racing journey, aiming not only to win the race but also to achieve something beyond the competition itself.

In the opening scene of Pegasus 3, a montage intricately set to Queen’s “Don’t Stop Me Now,” the evolution in the directing skills of former rally car driver Han Han is loud and clear. Whereas the first movie in the popular trilogy of Chinese sports films was an aesthetic (and editing) nightmare, Han began to hone in on his capabilities as an artist in the second installment, with more fluid cuts and sharper camerawork, but it wasn’t perfect. In Pegasus 3, he takes criticisms to heart and crafts a final hour of bravura filmmaking so exhilarating it might as well give Joseph Kosinski’s F1 a run for its money. 

The first Pegasus was terrible. The second was much better, but the difference between Pegasus 2 and 3 is night and day. Instead of retreading the same narrative beats as the previous two films, which saw rally car driver Zhang Chi (Teng Shen) stage a comeback in the Bayanbulak race, Han makes everything grander in scale and scope by ditching the central race of the first two films and prepping Zhang and his partner Sun Yuqiang (Yin Zheng) to compete in the MuChen 100. It’s essentially a longer (and more dangerous) version of the Bayanbulak, but it’s undoubtedly the best thing Han has ever directed. 

Old rivalries become friendships, as Zhang discovers that the team that initially brought them on board has been purposefully sabotaging their chances of competing. It gives Zhang, with the aid of Manager Ye (Wei Xiang), the opportunity to plan an intricate finale to get back at the people who have always doubted them at every second. Nothing is truly reinvented from a narrative perspective, most of it is actually plucked from F1 meets Neill Blomkamp’s Gran Turismo, but the aesthetic experience of Pegasus 3 is second-to-none and is well worth the time you’ll spend in a cinema with a sold-out crowd that will erupt in applause by the time Han reaches his final setpiece and consistently dazzles your eyes and ears. 

It does take a while to get there, and the forward-momentum can be slightly hampered by some lethargic pacing, but Han more than compensates with the trilogy’s funniest comedy and a genuinely heartfelt performance from Teng Shen, whose Zhang Chi is more vulnerable than he’s ever been and is still trying to make ends meet, despite retaining the title of “King of Bayanbulak.” In the more talky opening half, we ruminate more with the protagonist as he grapples with what the world of racing means for him and the friends he’s forged along the way, which makes the resulting propulsive energy of its final race more urgent and tangible. 

The final race is where the movie truly comes to life – a staggering hour-long scene where literally anything can happen, and every camera technique you can think of is employed. There isn’t a single moment where my jaw wasn’t on the floor, as we observe Zhang precisely execute his plan, where not even one step can falter. Of course, this being a movie, the inevitable pitfalls do happen, but how he surmounts them is when the movie is at its most dynamic. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a race quite like the one Han visualizes on screen before. The less you know about it, the better, because it takes turns (pun absolutely intended) you will not expect. 

What I can say, however, is that Han draws a cogent message on the use of AI integration and contrasts it with the sheer human willpower of Zhang’s plan. As sophisticated as machines can get, nothing – and I mean nothing – will beat human creativity and feeling. When the inevitable machine vs. human final stretch comes into play, who do you think will come out on top? I could spell it out for you, but the pleasures of watching a film like Pegasus 3 lie in your being transported by Han’s sheer mastery of the visual medium of cinema, who finally shows us the thrills of rally racing in a way no other filmmaker could. It took him several tries for the former racer to get to that point, but one can absolutely say that the third time is indeed the charm.

Grade: A-

Director: Polly Findlay
Writers: Bernard MacLaverty, Nick Payne
Stars: Lesley Manville, Ciarán Hinds, Niamh Cusack

Synopsis: Midwinter Break is a stirring meditation on faith, commitment, and the enduring power of love, as a longtime couple takes a life-changing trip to Amsterdam.

Sometimes, saying nothing at all is more powerful than uttering a word. This was true in Joachim Trier’s (incredible) Sentimental Value, and is the main driving force behind Polly Findlay’s Midwinter Break. Adapting from the book of the same name written by Bernard MacLaverty, Findlay, in her feature directorial debut, thrives in the silence and unspoken words of couple Gerry (Ciarán Hinds) and Stella (Lesley Manville), as the two go on a trip to Amsterdam over the holidays and perhaps fracture their longstanding marriage forever. 

Findlay is best known for her theater work, and she seems to apply the techniques developed in this art form to the medium of film. After all, Midwinter Break is essentially a two-hander between Hinds and Manville as they walk around the streets of Amsterdam and begin to reveal their vulnerabilities throughout their visit. Stella is a devout catholic who feels a close connection to a higher power and is travelling to Amsterdam for ulterior motives Gerry doesn’t know about, but he’s completely oblivious to anything going on since he’s always drinking. To say he has a drinking problem would be an understatement (we see him take his statins with a fairly full glass of whiskey, as an example), which bothers Stella, but she keeps these thoughts to herself. 

There was once love in this couple, but it’s nowhere to be found by the time the film opens. There’s an appreciation, sure, and they don’t mind being together, but the passion at the heart of the marriage is long gone, and has been for at least a decade. We know this because the characters barely look at one another when they’re speaking, and what they’re not saying about themselves reveals more about Gerry and Stella than a litany of extended dialogue scenes, which would’ve turned this filmic object into pure theatrics. 

There might have been a version of Midwinter Break in which MacLaverty’s book was adapted into a play, and the actors would have had to represent their innermost feelings through exaggerated histrionics, which wouldn’t have worked. Findlay keeps everything subdued for the most part and only reveals the reason why both characters have been drifting apart for a long time when the plot truly requires it. When that happens, it’s also the moment where Manville has to monologue in front of someone she has recently met (played by Niamh Cusack) and deliver a powerful gut-punch that will not only linger with you, but repurpose what came before in a genuinely meaningful way. 

Of course, this critic is trying to be (extremely) vague, not revealing what has caused the fractures in Gerry and Stella’s marriage, but I can say that Manville likely gives the best performance of her career in this. It’s a role that thrives on silence, until the unspoken feelings are too hard to bear and Stella must let it all out and reveal it all. When this occurs, it might be hard for you to hold back tears, because the emotions in Manville’s face, which have been built up throughout the film’s brief runtime, all cascade down in a monologue filled with immense, raw power. 

The final scene is also an exemplary demonstration of both Manville and Hinds’ acting talents, as Gerry and Stella reckon with their own beliefs and ask themselves if staying together is truly worth it. I’ll let you discover this incredible sequence on your own, but it’s clear that audiences are sleeping on this simple yet emotionally impactful film that does a lot more by thriving on minimalism and sitting with the two protagonists grappling with an unfulfilled life than by making them speak about these feelings. It might be a little too standard on the filmmaking side, but it also doesn’t need to be flashy. 

That said, the final image will probably stay with you forever, as Gerry and Stella now realize what’s most important about living in a world they don’t understand, and that has brought them massive amounts of pain. When this happens, you might gain a different understanding of your own life and perhaps see the world differently. In any event, don’t let this movie fly off your radar.

Grade: B+

Director: Frank E. Flowers
Writers: Joe Ballarini, Frank E. Flowers
Stars: Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Karl Urban, Safia Oakley-Green

Synopsis: A Caribbean woman gets her secret past revealed when her island is invaded by vicious buccaneers.

The high seas of making a film with pirates aren’t easy to navigate at all. Filmmakers don’t want to make another Cutthroat Island, they want to make another Pirates of the Caribbean. The vacancy of this kind of movie has been reduced to zero with the new film, The Bluff. The Bluff stars Priyanka Chopra Jonas as Ercell Bodde, who is  a housewife who’s awaiting the return of her husband Captain T.H. Bodden (Ismael Cruz Cordova) and his ship’s crew. The two share a son Isaac (Vedanten Naidoo) and T.H. ‘s sister Lizzie (Sofia Oakley-Green). Their home, Cayman Brac, is a little slice of paradise. Locals are able to raise their kids, work, and enjoy the weather every day without interference from others that aren’t welcome. That’s until Captain Connor (Karl Urban) and his men wash ashore searching for something that’s rightfully his.

Chopra Jonas is our lead and she gives a decent performance as Ercell. She doesn’t play her character as a damsel in distress. Ercell gives it her all by fighting these unwanted visitors with guts and grit. Protecting her family is her main priority and if she has to cut men from their upper torso down to their toes, then so be it. Jonas’ background as an actress in Bollywood films has always been one of her strengths as a performer because she’s an absolute pro in action sequences. The first thing I ever saw her in was the ABC series, Quantico. My eyes were fixated on her and the way that she commanded the audience with her beauty and her performance as an action performer.

As the movie goes on, we find out that Ercell has a secret life that she had before her husband came into the picture. She lived a life of swashbuckling and crime after being forced into it as a child by Captain Connor. Connor kidnaps her husband, T.H., after he finds his gold on their ship, they sail back to Cayman Brac, and that’s where the real story begins. Ercell turned into a killer in order to survive on the high seas with Connor. During a battle with others Ercell stabbed him and took his treasure. That brings us back into the present. Chopra Jonas and Urban try to sell the confrontation between the both of them but the blandness of the script doesn’t allow for the two to give us great performances. I know Karl Urban is known for his role as Butcher on The Boys but his acting as a villain in this didn’t make me feel anything. He wasn’t intimidating, scary, or a villain with traits to be frightened by. One thing I did notice was how he was constantly rubbing some sort of drug inside of his mouth. It looked like seaweed but it gave him the energy he needed to fight everyone that wasn’t in his crew. 

Pirate movies were made to be filmed on location. There’s no way that you can capture the magic of an actual island via green screen. It feels very manufactured and cheap when productions shoot beach and island scenes on a soundstage. Director Frank E. Flowers made a great decision to set principal photography in Australia because you feel the authenticity of the landscape. This was definitely a plus for me because they use the location to their advantage as much as they can. The action sequences are all heightened by the location. The cinematography from Greg Baldi was decent when there wasn’t any unnecessary cgi. 

Towards the third act of the movie we’re left with predictable plot points that have been done before, supporting characters with no real development, and some effects that don’t look convincing. While I’m happy to see Priyanka give a better performance than she’s had since Quantico, I really hope that she can pull off a surprising performance in another genre. Karl Urban is just using elements of his performance as The Butcher in The Boys. At this point in his career, I hope that he’s still able to switch things up like Liam Neeson. The Bluff will give audiences a nostalgic feeling of older movies focusing on pirates. Unfortunately, the feeling fades away when they realize that decent action sequences and bad dialogue aren’t enough to push this boat to shore.

Grade: C-