Not sure Sydney Sweeney of “Euphoria” and Glen Powell (“Top Gun: Marverick”) move the needle for a lot of moviegoers yet. Maybe someday. Maybe after this rom-com (not a lot of “com” in this teaser) that’ll change.
It’s about a wedding in Oz, and Rachel Griffiths, Bryan Brown and Dermot Mulroney are the older adults in a cast that includes Alexandra Shipp and Darren Barnet of “Never Have I Ever.”
Dec. 26, here’s a bit of non “Oscar contender” counter programming at a cinema near you.
The best way I know of to ruin a vacation to this or that version of “paradise” — Aspen, Teneriffe, Curacao or Cozumel — is to make yourself see what the tourist websites don’t play up.
People are struggling no matter where you go. And once you notice the tourist advisories of neighborhoods to avoid in Kingston or Panama City, the Homestead, Fla. buses that drive service sector workers into too-pricey-to Key West every day, those cooks and hotel workers who could never afford to live in Aspen, the campers outside the city limits, it’s hard for most sentient beings to not feel empathy and guilt for the struggles of people most of us see as “a few bad breaks and that could be me.”
“Waikiki” is an impressionistic nightmare of paradise, a dreamy story troubled, struggling native-born singer and dancer hustling three jobs in one of the most beautiful places on Earth, where “rent” is a goal that’s forever just beyond her reach.
The first film written and directed by a native Hawaiian addresses the underbelly of a place the rest of the world sees as an idealized “escape.” In Christopher Kahunanhana’s movie, there’s no “escaping” to Waikiki Beach for many of the residents of Oahu.
For Kea (Danielle Zalopany), his heroine, the beach never figures into her life. She’s a hula dancer at a tourist trap restaurant far from the surf, and a karaoke singer/”bottle girl” at a somewhat seedy bar. She also teaches Hawaiian to at a local school.
Even with those three gigs, she can’t make rent, let alone support herself. So she lives in an ancient Toyota van. Kea holes up there because she fled her raging, abusive longtime beau Branden (Jason Quinn). And despite being young and beautiful with a work ethic and a little talent, there’s no escaping this trap for her. She grew up on one of the most expensive places to live on in America, an island.
There’s nothing for it but to don the skirt and bikini top and smile through another night to the syrupy, insipid hula strains of “Waikiki.”
But her after-hula gig at the borderline brothel-bar named for it’s owner (Cora Yamagata) Amy is where Branden catches up and lashes out. He’s hellbent on getting her out of this “slut bar” and “home.” And life-on-the-edge or no, Kea isn’t having it.
But making her getaway, she makes her biggest mistake of all. She hits a homeless man. Her rock bottom just found a new bottom.
The man seems dead, just a “pilau” (filthy) “crackhead.” Still, Kea won’t simply abandon him. Maybe she’s thinking twince before looking down on anybody. In no time at all, she’s out on the street with the homless man her only comfort, camping in the rough and getting turned down for housing by a barely sympathetic real estate agent.
Without legit paystubs and proof of steady income, “You’re not going to qualify for anything.”
There are hints of “Once Were Warriors” and the nightmarish dreams-in-close-up of David Lynch in Kahunanhana’s film, as we wonder about this homeless fellow named Wo (Peter Shinkoda) Kea has taken responsibility for, and thinks herself protected by.
Flashbacks show her childhood abandonment issues, and there are hints of a “family” she denies having. We aren’t sure which of her hallucinations to believe, which are accurate about the exact nature of this strange man in her care.
Zalopany’s riveting performance has desperation, manipulation, narcissism and panic folded into it. She makes us feel the disaster that having her van towed is for someone living in a car. We sense the pride that makes but a momentary appearance, the rage she can barely keep in check, the trap that her abusive relationship continues to be and the need that drives her begging and flirting with people who can help her out.
The dreamy, diffuse nature of reality in this narrative makes it feel incomplete. But Zalopany grabs our attention and has us fearing, not just for Kea’s precarious hold on survival, but for what we might not know about her that may or may not be revealed as she sinks or swims just off “Waikiki” beach.
Rating: unrated violence, profanity
Cast: Danielle Zalopany, Peter Shinkoda, Cora Yamagata and Jason Quinn
Credits: Scripted and directed by Christopher Kahunahana. A Level 33 release.
Running time: 1:24
Benny Safdie (“Uncut Gems”) is involved. Nathan Fiedler co-created (HBO’s “The Reheasal”) and co-stars. And it’s on Showtime.
Nov. 10.
Rosamund Pike, Carey Mulligan, Richard E. Grant, Jacob Elordi of “Priscilla,” Millie Kent, adie Soverall and Barry Keoghan as the innocent among the posh in this Gothic thriller, which comes out Nov. 17.
Today, we take a break from sight seeing in Panama to revel in an IMAX 3D summation of Panama,the nation created so that Teddy Roosevelt could build a canal, a tale that can only be told by Morgan Freeman.
I’ve long enoyed the standup stylings of grinning but grumpy Bill Burr. I’ve even followed him on social media, just for the odd tirade or epic download of “You people” complaints about those less politically astute than he.
But never have I ever been more relieved to hear someone sniff, “Okay, BOOMER” at a character, and hear Burr’s let-my-demographic off the hook comeback in his film, “Old Dads.”
“GENERATION X!”
Burr plays an amped-up version of his public persona in this starting-a-family-at-50 comedy about an unfiltered vulgarian, “toxic” rageaholic and judgemental jerk who takes 90-plus minutes of screentime to finally take a hard look at himself in the mirror.
It’s funny, here and there. Burr’s not a bad actor, and he surrounds himself with better ones. But this “Last Man Standing” is a smug, presumptuous, pose for any funnyman, even if you are slightly more evolved than Tim Allen.
As Jack Kelly, he’s got a crew, two lifelong friends (Bokeem Woodbine and Bobby Cannavale) who have stuck with him through thick and thin. Their vintage athletic jersey reproduction company did well enough to be bought out, and as Jack has a little boy and he and wife Leah (Kate Aselton) have another on the way and private school is ruinously expensive in SoCal, he agreed.
The script briskly sets us up for a movie where working class/outspoken Jack is at odds with his performantive, buzzwording touchy-feely new Gen Z boss (Miles Robbins), and his kid’s school’s pretentious, even more touchy-feely Generation X principal, “Dr. L.” (Rachel Harris)
Let the f-bombs fly as Jack tears through coddled kids (“Just rub some dirt on it!”), indulgent parenting, smirking, ageist Millenials (“How f—–g self-inolved ARE you?”), rants at “the United States of Gender” and blasts at the legions of “snowflakes” among his true peers, sometimes to his amen chorus of friends, often directly to the faces of permissive parents and judgmental, bullying-obsessed mothers and educators Jack finds himself at odds with.
“I’m paying you to educate my KID, not me,” he barks at his academic nemesis, Dr. L., a character drawn in to make one realize that the decade-long obsession with “bullying” isn’t so much to end the practice, just to change who’s allowed to do it. Harris, by the way, is wonderfully loathesome as Dr. L.
The waypoints of the plot have only limited promise and little originality. Post-vasectomy lawyer Mike (Woodbine) has to face a fresh pregnancy and possible marriage with his uncomplicated, much younger girlfriend (Reign Edwards) with his pals counseling “Just flush it,” a refreshingly blunt blast at the abortion debate. Pretending he’s younger and hipper Connor (Cannavale) has to grapple with the fact that he’s not young and hip, and that he’s letting his younger wife (Jackie Tohn) empower their out-of-control preschooler by refusing to correct or restrain the tantrum-tosser’s impulses.
Business “issues” come to a head in an impotent generational clash.
The best reason to reset movies like this Burbank/Pomona picture to the Pacific Northwest, the northeast or southeast is to avoid the laziest trap “Old Dads” falls into, the inevitable “guys roadtrip to Vegas” to escape all these feelings and complications. Nothing like gambling, coke and a strip club brawl to sort it all out, eh, Gen X?
Woodbine and Cannavale do decent. energetic work in support. And screen legend Bruce Dern shows up for some third act giggles as Jack meets Future Jack in the most obvious way.
Burr has a few ideas, none we haven’t seen before, and one can appreciate his rants while recognizing that there’s nothing subtle about them, no pre-cancelation Louis C.K. nuance.
What we’re left with is the spectacle of watching a “bully” punch down at assorted cultural straw men, with his “boys” there to high five him after he does. That gets old fast, “Dad.”
Rating: R, drug abuse, fisticuffs, profanities by the bucketful
Cast: Bill Burr, Bokeem Woodbine, Bobby Cannavale, Katie Aselton, Reign Edwards, Rachel Harris, Miles Robbins and Bruce Dern.
Credits: Directed by Bill Burr, scripted by Bill Burr and Ben Tishler. A Netflix release.
Running time: 1:44
Writer-director Christopher Kahunahana made this “Lynchian” thriller which made the festival rounds a few years back and just now is getting a theatrical release.
Danielle Zalopany plays a hula dancer who goes through some things after colliding with a man on the non-touristy side of “Waikiki.”
“Waikiki” opens Oct. 27.
Deadline.com is reporting that the Taylor Swift “Eras” tour movie is still doing Swifty business, and that despite falling off a cliff from its opening weekend (73%), it takes in just over $31 million.
It did fading business during the week, but by midnight Sunday, “The Eras Tour” will have cleared $130 million in North America. Take that, Ticketmaster.
But you have to be impressed that a three and a half hour Martin Scorsese epic that looks like what it is — a very long made-for-Apple TV+ streaming movie — is managing to sell over $23+ million in tickets. A big Friday is driving
Killers of the Flower Moon” to that grand opening.
It’s a big, important story and I’m glad he chose to tell it. Needed a lot of trimming for pace and punch and pathos, though.
“Paw Patrol” is benefiting from that lack of kiddie/”family” entertainment with another weekend in the top five — over $4.55 million. But it’s not A-list animation, and while $56-57 million is nothing to sneeze at, consider that Disney re-releasing “Nightmare Before Christmas” is tallying $4.1 million, plainly this is a case more of an audience starved of something to take the kids to than any “Paw” magic.
“Exorcist: Believer” has one last weekend in the top five before “Five Nights at Freddies’ chases it into the ether next weekend, just under $4 million for an Ellen Burstyn curtain call turn.
“Saw X” continues to chew up the leftovers, $3.585 per The Numbers.
“A Haunting in Venice” adds another $1.1, which puts it over $104 million worldwide.
“Soul Mates” is a “Saw” styled torture-then-kill thriller that hangs on an online dating hook and the cackling menace of Mr. Blond Bad Guy Neal McDonough.
A tale of obvious twists and traps and under-reacting performances, about the best one can say about it is that there’s an underlit gloom to the production design that lets McDonough’s sequined-tux turn as “The Matchmaker” pop out.
Allison (Annie Ilonzeh of TV’s “Arrow” and “Person of Interest”) wakes up shackled to Jason (Charlie Weber of TV’s “How to Get Away with Murder”) in a dungeonesque bedroom, neither of them knowing who the other is.
Someone “jumped” them and put them there together. Someone has pictures, phone recordings and video of their lives, knows all their associations, past lovers. Someone is playing “a game” with them, someone whose ads are scored to the ear-worm “Getting to Know You” from “The King and I.”
They ponder their fate but never “work the problem” as they’re led from one room to another, facing touch screen commands and horrific dilemmas that begin promisingly enough.
They’re quizzed “about” each other, which is a way of “getting to know you,” albeit it under duress. And they’re forced to sing karoake to save a gagged and tied stranger dangling over a big meat grinder.
Allison struggles through Jason’s beloved “In the Air Tonight” (Phil Collins). Jason has no prayer of pulling off Allison’s “How to Love” (not a Lil Wayne fan, I guess).
Strangers, loved ones and people from their past turn up as victims they must try to save. A shock collar is among the instruments of torture introduced as they’re lectured about what it’s going to take for The Matchmaker “to make an honest man and woman out of you” “before the walls of loneliness close in on you.”
Cue the walls, closing in like a “Star Wars” trash compactor.
Binge eating and showers and having sex to save themselves all hurl at this hapless duo, who can’t excuse their numbed reactions to all this trauma with “shock.” Leading lady and leading man have got to give us more than this.
The script, like the villain, is pitiless and the pawns in the “game” not remotely interesting enough to invest in.
And just when you think it can’t fail any further, they “explain” what we figured out two acts ago. And explain it some more.
McDonough is always a good bad guy for the money. But not very suspenseful or scary, and somewhat soulless, that’s the bottom line on “Soul Mates.”
Rating: R, violence, sex, nudity, profanity
Cast: Annie Ilonzeh, Charlie Weber and Neal McDonough.
Credits: Directed by Mark Gantt, scripted by Chris LaMont and Joe Russo. A Faith Media release.
Running time: 1:26
Northern Australia on the cusp of World War II is the backdrop for this cattle station tale of a woman come to the Outback and the hard times and tough men she encounters there.
A few familiar Aussie faces in that supporting cast.
Hulu has this one, which begins streaming in late November.
Movie Nation 