“Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” is a hacked up mess, and that’s not just the editing, but boy is it also the editing. The film tediously recycles the plot of the original, with two characters switching places and another one cut out so haphazardly that it’s genuinely embarrassing and hurts the whole film. Plus it’s an uncleaned fish tank of visual noise, with laughable dialogue and a plot that makes less sense than usual.

To be fair it’s not like the original “Aquaman” was a high point in the history of superhero cinema, but James Wan’s attractive and epic production was anchored by the endearing chemistry between its stars, Jason Momoa and Amber Heard. The movie may have been formulaic and ridiculous but it was an amusing journey through a series of strange locales with memorably weird moments and an occasional grasp at gravitas. It was Conan the Barracuda-barian and that was just fine.

Like the original, “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” sends Aquaman on a series of quests to one weird place after another to prevent a villain who has gone mad with power from wrecking the world. Also like the original, Aquaman spends the whole film bickering with someone he can’t stand and gradually growing to like them. Except this time instead of physically sparring with King Orm and verbally sparring with Mera, he’s physically sparring with Black Manta and verbally sparring with Orm. It’s almost like a new movie but not really.

Meanwhile, Mera has been demoted from a powerful hero with a powerful personality to a woman who has babies, folds laundry and sits dutifully by Aquaman’s side. She barely speaks and when she does it’s to dole out exposition or remind us that yes, technically she’s still in the film. Either Heard’s role was awkwardly cut down in post, as has widely been speculated, or “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” just has an underwritten and sexist screenplay. Possibly both, but either way it’s a huge distraction and it undermines not just her character but Aquaman’s as well. If we take this film’s editing at face value it suggests he sidelines his spouse at every opportunity and has no interest in anything she has to say. Some hero.

Since last we saw Aquaman he has taken his place on the throne of Atlantis, even though he’d rather be spinning donuts on his wicked chopper and telling violent stories to his newborn son. (Incidentally, Aquaman gets peed on so many times in the first half of this movie that you expect it to be important later, like maybe Arthur Curry Jr. is going to save the world by peeing on Black Manta’s power suit and shorting out its circuits. But no, it’s just a joke that was already hackneyed when “Three Men and a Baby” did it. And it happens over and over.)

Anyway, if there’s one thing Aquaman hates more than bad guys it’s representational democracy, because he thinks the Atlantean parliament is standing in the way of him doing what really needs to be done. Exactly what that is, the film leaves up to our imaginations so that we can assume it’s a good thing and not whatever a lout with no political experience would probably actually do with unchecked power.

Anyway, when Black Manta tries to destroy the world with ancient Antlantean climate change the only way to track him down is to enlist the help of Aquaman’s villainous brother, Orm (Patrick Wilson). The people’s representatives don’t like the idea of letting a former leader who took over the most of the world and got countless of people killed out of prison, but Aquaman does it anyway. Because he knows better. Over the course of their worldwide adventures our hero learns that this murderer and despot is actually a really good guy once you get to know him.

There doesn’t seem to be a coherent thematic through-line in “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom,” except maybe that great men should be allowed to do whatever they want so long as other great men think it’s okay. Black Manta’s scheme revolves around the real world issue of climate change but the film also suggests that climate change has an easy fix. All we have to do is get the Atlanteans involved, which has as about much connection to the real world as the scene where the Aquaman, Orm and the regular human Dr. Shin (Randall Park) all get blown up, but somehow the explosion does more damage to the super-people than the normal guy.

James Wan is nothing if not a consummate entertainer, whether he’s directing a freaky horror movie or a nonsensical car chase movie or an underwater superhero flick. There are definitely moments in “The Lost Kingdom” with visual panache and there’s no shortage of enjoyably weird monsters. But the story is so poorly conceived, the CGI worlds are so busy, and the editing is so choppy that it’s hard to get invested in any of it. The visual effects are chaos. The sound effects are chaos. It’s exactly the kind of insipid malarky superhero movies spent the last few decades trying to prove that they’re not.

“Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” isn’t the worst DCEU movie, and thanks to “The Flash” it’s not even the worst DCEU movie of the year. But these are incredibly low bars and the film deserves no credit for barely clearing them. That being said this film does deserve credit for one thing. The last shot of this movie, without giving anything away, is one hell of a way to end an entire franchise. At some point in production they knew that that this was going to be the last shot and that’s the way they decided to go out. It’s one hell of a choice, and when you see it I think you might agree that it kind of says it all.

The post ‘Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom’ Review: The DCEU Goes Belly-Up With One Last Disappointment appeared first on TheWrap.

A good time was had by all? Not bloody likely, Mate.

In Will Gluck’s overstuffed “Anyone But You,” that destination is summery Sydney, Australia. Look: it’s the opera house, sandy beaches, a koala bear and a really horrifying spider! The racy rom-com centers on an affluent wedding between two lovely, compatible, delightful women, Claudia (Alexandra Shipp) and Halle (Hadley Robinson).

It’s all very modern, celebratory and sporadically raunchy – except for two particular guests. Halle’s sister Bea (“Euphoria” siren Sydney Sweeney) and Claudia’s good friend Ben (squinty, six-packed Glen Powell) take the transatlantic plunge. But the pair have history, bitter history.

The circle dance of discord and desire between Ben and Bea form the story’s core – in a movie where it seems that just about everybody has been doing a lot of core work at the gym. The attractive leads conform to the enemies to lovers romance trope. This tension animates “Pride and Prejudice,” “The Proposal” and Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing,” which forms a very loose roadmap, hold the wit, for “Anyone But You.”

Naturally, the pair meets cute if uncomfortably. One thing leads to another, and another, and his apartment. They spark and connect and cuddle. They look good together. But they’re both gun-shy.

When morning comes Bea makes an Irish exit. Then she reconsiders, returns and overhears Ben saying snarky things about her to his best friend, Claudia’s brother Pete (Ga Ta). Ben’s just saving face – but it stings Bea like a slap in the cheeks. We’ve entered the enemies phase. Having shown their vulnerabilities and seemingly been rejected, they are now both defensive to the max.  

From there, they reunite on the plane to Sydney. They will try their best not to screw up their near and dears’ wedding. But, true to the classic enemies to lovers formula, they just can’t keep out of each other’s way for the common good.

Their mutual bad vibes and runaway hormones create a domino effect, playing with the heads of the two sets of parents fronting the extravagant nuptials. Halle’s parents Leo (Dermot Mulroney) and Innie (Rachel Griffiths) and those of Claudia, Roger (Bryan Brown) and Carol (Michelle Hurd) are trying, too hard, to ensure that everything goes smoothly. They courteously want the brides to remain the focus of the Aussie adventure. But what’s the fun in that?

Ironically, all four mature actors, who could each lead a movie of their own, aren’t given fully-realized characters. Mulroney, best known for the classic rom-com “My Best Friend’s Wedding,” is reduced to a soft-boiled doofus Dad. A scene where the pale papa strips to his bathing suit and belly flops in the pool, again and again, until Ben teaches him how to dive is far from the best use of the still-dashing Mulroney.

“Breaker Morant’s” manly Brown loiters around doing dad things, and being endlessly, almost exhaustingly, supportive. Griffiths is almost unrecognizable as the moderately hysterical mother of the bride. Hurd fares a little better, but overall this generation of actors don’t get to bring their full comic potential – and sexiness – into the mix. It would have helped. What about a little cross flirting?

As for the leads, one thing that can be said in their defense is that they look great in bathing suits. Powell (“Top Gun: Maverick”) is cut within an inch of his life as if with a set of Ginsu knives. The self-conscious Sweeney, with her fishbowl eyes, come-hither lips and big curves on a tiny frame, is a generic sex bomb.

On the enemies to lovers scale, “Anyone But You” most closely resembles “Ticket to Paradise,” which reunited George Clooney and Julia Roberts. No one would mistake Powell and Sweeney for those charismatic A-listers. Yet both destination wedding tales share the strain of trying too hard to make the audience believe the frenemies hate each other, while their ultimate reunion is so inevitable there’s no narrative tension. At the very least, it’s not Shakespeare. It’s not even “10 Things I Hate About You.”

“Anyone But You” opens exclusively in theaters on Dec. 22

The post ‘Anyone But You’ Review: Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell Rom-Com Is Overstuffed appeared first on TheWrap.

Running a brisk 75 minutes (and preceded by both a Minions-fronted short and title card), this mallard road comedy tracks the well-trodden ground of scrapes and squabbles and action set-pieces; landing midway between the releases of this year’s franchise starter “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” and next summer’s brand extender “Despicable Me 4,” this original title also augurs a slight but welcome change of scenery. If far from an auteur picture, “Migration” nevertheless benefits from this pause in IP management, making for a lower-stakes outing with a more recognizable creative signature.

Cartoonist-turned-filmmaker Benjamin Renner (of the Oscar-nominated “Ernest & Celestine”) hatched the story with screenwriter (and “The White Lotus” creator) Mike White, and one can easily spot both creative inputs. With a background in the European funny-pages, Renner designs his critters with vast and expressive eyes – lily-white globes that occupy 1/3 of the characters’ faces, often with rippling brows that rise and fall like animated exclamation points — while the director’s comfort with the more placid rhythms of arthouse animation results in some appealing detours whenever the frenetic narrative stops to feel the breeze.

Meanwhile, White’s creative voice resonates throughout that narrative, which finds a worrywart dad breaking free from the prison of his own anxieties. That worrywart is Mack (Kumail Nanjiani), a green headed duck living with his small clan and expansive neuroses somewhere in the Adirondack range. Mack might be perfectly happy to never leave his homestead pond – a point he hammers home in guise of bedtimes stories meant to instill existential terror – but his wife Pam (Elizabeth Banks) and two critter kids (voiced by Caspar Jennings and Tresi Gazal) feel the pull of the wider world.

How could they not? Not once the fall leaves fill the backgrounds with color, and especially not when a migrating flock makes a pit stop at the family pond en route to warmer climates. Fearing marital strain, and recognizing that his battle is already lost, Mack reluctantly leads his family into the sky, with the lead character’s inner apprehension standing in marked contrast to the outer majesty of animals in flight. Indeed, Renner returns to this visual throughout the film, often following the flock from the ground and into sky as natural vistas whoosh below them.

Hewing a circuitous route from the northeast to Jamaica, and keeping with the built-in rhythms of the family road movie, the rather episodic “Migration” plops the mallard clan in and out of danger, introducing friends and foils (and all of them fowls) like a cantankerous uncle voiced by Danny DeVito, a possibly murderous heron toned by Carole Kane, and a scrappy pigeon kingpin played by Awkafina. The familiar voices pop for a scene or two before fluttering off, capping each dedicated interlude with a chase, or a narrow escape, or a dance number, all to keep the freight train moving.

Still for all the requisite action and derring-do, no sequence soars quite so high as a near-wordless flight through a cloudbank that reimagines the condensation as airborne mounds of snow. The mallards frolic in their winter wonderland before the clouds part to reveal a surprisingly unfamiliar vision of Manhattan, here seen with the aerial axis looking down. Of course, “Migration” is hardly the first animated film to reframe common sights with an appealing change in perspective, only most tend to do so from the ground up.

Of course, aerial reverie might work for a scene or two, but there are wider commercial considerations at play. And so, once our flock touches down in the Big Apple at the around the midway mark, our filmmakers quickly trot the first (and only) human character – a taciturn celebrity chef who resembles Salt Bae mixed with French culinary star Marc Veyrat, and whose flagship dish is Duck à l’Orange. Would it surprise you that this newfound antagonist sets the stage for a typically busy back half?

Without the discounting the often witty dialogue (including one terrific line describing the chef as “a predator that serves you to other, lazier predators”), and factoring in Keegan-Michael Key’s winning turn as the chef’s patois-speaking parrot, the film’s more terrestrial rinse-repeat cycle of chases and escapes has a somewhat perfunctory feel – a fact made all the more apparent by a narrative that views this business as necessary pit-stops, and not much more. All the frenetic action and popping colors unfortunately cannot keep one from asking that most common road-trip question: Are we there yet?

“Migration” opens exclusively in theaters on Dec. 22.

The post ‘Migration’ Review: Illumination’s First Original in Years Is a Welcome Change of Pace appeared first on TheWrap.

Nominated for 11 Academy Awards, the backlash in 1985 was swift and all encompassing. In addition to banning the book in schools across the country for its sexual content, and situations of abuse and domestic violence, Norman Mailer and feminist Gloria Steinem called the book a near-criminal assault on black family life and heterosexual relationships. Upon the film’s release, author James Baldwin accused its director, Steven Spielberg, of mangling the poetic vision of Walker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel.

Its cast on Broadway and in the original feature film are now legendary, and it seems as if history may repeat itself with this reimagined version marrying the musical, book and film adaptation. Trust me, this is not your mama’s “The Color Purple.”

Inspired, in part, by a story that Walker’s sister told her about a love triangle involving their grandfather, this film adaptation has director Blitz Bazawule taking the audience on a journey of generational trauma through the lens of character Celie (Fantasia Barrino), Shug (Taraji P. Henson), Sofia (Danielle Brooks), Harpo (Corey Hawkins) and Mister (Colman Domingo) told entirely from Celie’s point of view and imagination.

The sheer joy of the first ten minutes will make your heart sing. The mood is set with some good ole’ banjo picking, followed by a haunting sunlit field of Georgian trees where a young Nettie (Halle Bailey) and young Celie (Phylicia Pearl Mpasi) sit atop a branch sharing a sweet rendition of “Huckleberry Pie,” immediately followed by Grammy winner Tamela Mann swirling her anointed vocals onto the song “Mysterious Ways.” This is all complemented by thrilling choreography from award-winning choreographer Fatima Robinson.

Bailey and Mpasi create a thematic sisterhood and powerful performance that permeates the remainder of the film with neither character feeling like victims but rather young women acutely aware of their reality and dreaming to change their outcome through reading and acknowledgement of their African lineage. Deon Cole, mostly known from his recurring role on the hit Peabody Award-winning ABC sitcom “Black-ish” is unrecognizably evil as Celie’s father. Steely and stoic, Cole will surely be a much sought after commodity for more dramatic turns moving forward.

Reprising her Tony nominated role as Sofia, Danielle Brooks straddles humor and drama with meticulous precision, stealing every scene. Her powerful jail cell performance and dinner table scene, alongside many poignant moments with Corey Hawkins as her husband, Harpo, and her powerful show-stopping rendition of “Hell No” will make her hard to ignore this awards season.

Fantasia Barrino (who also starred in the Broadway production) declared during a recent post screening Q&A, when she walked away from the role on Broadway she would never revisit Celie. However, it was Bazawule’s reimaging of the story from Celie’s imagination and making her a fighter with a voice that coaxed Barrino back one last time. Her Celie is so understated and raw that by the time she sings “I’m Here” the audience erupts in thunderous applause for a life that has endured, suffered, and is now on an unforgettable journey to being triumphant in life and love.

Colman Domingo may see himself as a double Oscar nominee following in the footsteps of Jaime Foxx and Al Pacino for playing the title role in “Rustin” and Mister in “The Color Purple.” As Mister, Domingo feels a little more empathetic than the gruff characterization in the book and original adaptation.

His scene with Celie in her shop (while Fats Waller’s “Black and Blue” softly permeates in the background) makes him a shell of the man once known for beating her into oblivion. It’s a stark contrast from the same man who arrives on the scene playing banjo and attempting to woo Nettie from atop a horse. Domingo’s range within this one film is astoundingly resonant and layered making Mister a character of many colors and moods.

Former Oscar-nominated actress Taraji P. Henson sparkles and shines as Shug Avery. Henson’s characterization is sexy, smart, comical and vulnerable, which is blatantly obvious as she shares in a stripped-down, intimate scene with her father (played by Tony-winning actor David Allen Grier).

Corey Hawkins has a small, but pivotal role as Harpo, and makes him humorously sweet and supportive despite the way the men in his family have encouraged him unapologetically to disrespect women for control.

All of this works due to the amazingly gifted direction of Bazawule’s, a skillfully crafted screenplay from Marcus Gardley, stunning cinematography from Dan Laustsen and a score by the incomparable Kris Bowers, who does a wonderful job of marrying a new score with selections from the Broadway production.

A perfect example is when Mpasi, with strength and tenacity after seeing her child, executes the song “She Be Mine” through a chain gang of men and a flowing waterfall of women scrubbing laundry on washboards illustrating the grass roots of Celie’s journey into becoming reborn with a sense of renewal. Or, when Corey Hawkins (Harpo) breaks out into a rendition of “Working” while building a home on the swamp waters.

Bazawule seamlessly transitions from one moment to the next, expediently pacing the film without wearing out its welcome. Placing Celie on a giant record disc with Shug, naked in a tub, sets up the lesbian story line with respect and class. Their relationship is further solidified with a stunning, sophisticated jazz club rendition of “What About Love” set in a movie theatre. It’s a little on the sappy side, yet somehow simple and sweet.

This iteration of “The Color Purple” beautifully honors all the previous genres with respect and reverence, yet makes it palatable for a whole new generation in the 21st-century. With cameos from Whoopi Goldberg, Louis Gossett, Jr., Jon Batiste and Aunjanue Ellis each presence is powerfully understated and welcomed.

Just in time for the holiday season, no matter what you believe spiritually, your soul will soar and be lifted through the words and imagination of Alice Walker. Bring some tissue, you’re going to need more than a few.

The post ‘The Color Purple’ Review: Broadway Adaptation Stuns With Powerhouse Performances, Crowd-Pleasing Numbers appeared first on TheWrap.

The three adult siblings at the core of this family dispute are amusingly nasty, backbiting, vile and loathsome toward each other. As families go onstage, the only ones approaching this brood in terms of miserableness would be the bickering bunch in Tracy Letts’s “August: Osage County” and Eugene O’Neill’s “A Long Day’s Journey Into Night.”

The genius of Jacobs-Jenkins, as well as that of Letts and O’Neill, is that he keeps these three characters not only human but very relatable, especially if you happen to be of European descent and your family arrived to America a century or two or three ago. Jacobs-Jenkins gives each of his characters time to make his or her point, and, of course, each of them is rarely right. None of them, including their three young children, manages to escape the sins of the recently deceased patriarch who has left them his ancestral mansion (and former plantation) in Arkansas to dispose of.

The incisiveness of Lila Neugebauer’s marvelous direction is most evident in her control of those three principals. Playing the eldest sibling, the archetypal older sister-caretaker of the family, Sarah Paulson is very alpha here. Pissed-off to the extreme, her Toni can’t take one more infraction from her two younger brothers (Corey Stoll and Michael Esper), and lets them and her sister-in-law, Rachel (Natalie Gold) know it in no uncertain and very loud terms. Paulson manages to find nuance in her almost nonstop screeching.

Much better known for her performances in television, Paulson hasn’t been seen on Broadway for well over a decade, and in the meantime, Laurie Metcalf has held the franchise on these prickly defiant-woman roles. Paulson’s performance recalls Metcalf’s work in plays as varied as “Misery” and “A Doll’s House, Part 2,” but makes the Toni role her own, especially in a touching kiss-off speech to her two brothers, delivered with great style from the grand staircase of the magnificent two-story living room set, designed by dots.

Paulson’s performance begins loud and bitter, but ends soft and wounded. Neugebauer’s direction delivers the absolute reversal of that progression with Corey Stoll’s portrayal of the “successful” beta brother from New York City, Bo. Stoll remains quiet and extraordinarily reasonable, even when Toni takes the bait of his wife to deliver a slur on her Jewish heritage. And even when Rachel is freaking out over her two children (Alyssa Emily Marvin and Everett Sobers) having seen some racist artifacts in the vast mess that is her dead father-in-law’s house, Stoll’s Bo remains the still eye of the family storm swirling around all of them – until near the end. His late-in-the-play explosion, which is much louder than anything detonated by Paulson, provides the play’s comic high point.

Once upon a time not so long ago, the other brother, Franz (a.k.a. Frank), would have been called the black sheep of the family. Now, it is more politically correct just to call him a major loser, and he has disappeared from family view for a good 10 years. Franz has the bad timing to show up on the eve of the big auction, and brings with him a too-young girlfriend named River (Elle Fanning).

Playing Franz, Michael Esper perfectly embodies the ephemeral smoke that rises from Toni rubbing everyone the wrong way. He is full of apologies until he is full of the BS of a self-proclaimed baptism, even though the guilt he has inherited can never be washed away by a simple dip into the pond somewhere between the family’s ancestral cemetery and the cemetery of the slaves that his family once owned.

Elle Fanning makes an impressive Broadway debut playing the loopy River. It’s the one character where perhaps Jacobs-Jenkins’s originality deserted him. With her hippie garb (costumes by Dede Ayite) and plant-based diet and nonstop good-vibrations spiel, River is a cliché. Her real name isn’t River, it’s Tricia. At least the playwright didn’t name the character Karen. To her credit, Fanning resists going for the easy laugh.

Graham Campbell rounds out this extraordinary ensemble, playing Toni’s troubled teenage son, Rhys. He is the play’s mystery character, and Campbell is expert at keeping him at the edges of the drama, except for his middle-of-the-night jerk-off session that is misinterpreted – or not – by Uncle Franz.

The post ‘Appropriate’ Broadway Review: Sarah Paulson and Elle Fanning Fuel a Spectacular Family Smash-Up appeared first on TheWrap.

Harnessing all these qualities, “The Boys in the Boat” is the best kind of easy-to-consume and inoffensive underdog tale, tracing the rousing journey of one penniless young man in his quest to become something more than his financial predicaments have thus far allowed him. And it helps that it’s Clooney that’s steering this ship. In his hands, “The Boys in the Boat” stays its course as a wholesome and forgivably formulaic movie you won’t ever regret seeing on a Sunday afternoon with the whole family.

It also helps that what’s at the center of the film is an untold true story of perseverance that is easy to root for, one that sees the University of Washington’s shabby but hardworking rowing team beat the Nazis in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin despite all the odds stacked against them.

Based on a best-selling book by Daniel James Brown, “The Boys in the Boat” chiefly follows the headstrong Joe Rantz, played by a captivating and reflective Callum Turner who looks like a brawnier version of a young Richard Gere. A college student in the mid 1930s, Joe is hopelessly broke, quietly patching up the soles of his shoes and picking up odds jobs here and there to make ends meet. When he finds that he can no longer afford his tuition, he decides to go out for his school’s crew squad, where only the very best can claim one of its nine coveted spots.

At first, Joe is only after room and board and enough money to cover his school expenses like the rest of his teammates—social class and the snobbery of the well-heeled is a capably navigated through-line in the film that rings truthful. It’s no spoiler to reveal that he soon discovers his natural aptitude for rowing crew, which was apparently the most watched sport of its time.

The beats from there are reassuringly familiar even when they err on the side of too predictable. The customary influential coach duties go to the always great Joel Edgerton, who plays Al Ulbrickson, next to assistant coach Tom Bolles (James Wolk), a clear-eyed duo with their hearts and minds in the right place. There is also a romantic interest of course—Hadley Robinson’s charming Joyce Simdars, who doesn’t have a lot more to do than being a supportive and often cheering girlfriend. But like she did in Scott Cooper’s moody macabre “The Pale Blue Eye” with a small part, Robinson brings her verve to the film, in step with the picture’s old-timey disposition.

Among the most impressive feats Clooney pulls off here is providing the viewer a clear understanding of what makes a strong rowing team. Those (like this critic) who associate the sport mostly with the Winklevii twins of David Fincher’s “The Social Network,” and that film’s stupendously edited race sequences, might just be surprised to have a newfound appreciation of its complexities, where each of the rowers serve an exact, engine-like purpose.

Written by Mark L. Smith, the script economically differentiates the boat’s entire team throughout, establishing each of the boys as individuals first before we can perceive them as a unified block. Elsewhere, lived-in production design and costuming elements (by Kalina Ivanov and Jenny Eagan, respectively) plausibly elevate the movie to something that feels like a prestige period picture of yore across handsomely lit academic corners and era-appropriate movie places where people sometimes packed to watch news footage.

Nothing in the film is perhaps more soundly designed than its pair of central racing sequences that the team wins despite having no powerful connections or even sufficient funds. Fluidly lensed by Martin Ruhe and swiftly edited by Tanya M. Swerling, these segments are both stirring and shamelessly emotional in the way they pull at your heartstrings.

Admittedly, the cheesy shots of Hitler become a little too…well, cheesy, during the final Berlin race. But thanks to the sincerity Clooney conjures up through it all, you might just about overlook that particular gaudiness. After all, his “The Boys in the Boat” isn’t here to become a high-brow reinvention of the sports movie. It’s here to show you a respectably fun, inspiring time and it does just that.

The post ‘The Boys in the Boat’ Review: George Clooney’s Disarmingly Old-School Rowing Movie Gets It Right appeared first on TheWrap.

It’s a pertinent question, both literally and figuratively within this adaptation of the podcast of the same name. While most of its first half focuses on the deceptive glamor of Dr. Paolo Macchiarini (Edgar Ramírez), a real-life surgeon who engaged in widespread scientific and medical misconduct, he rarely appears on screen in the latter stretches. The final episodes center instead primarily on others — his former lover, along with Nate and his two other colleagues — and the drama behind their efforts to prove Macchiarini’s misdeeds. The doctor becomes literally absent from the show, but Nate’s question rings another way: Where is Macchiarini, the real man behind the surgeon mask? And who is he really?

The show appears somewhat reluctant to try to figure that out, the core blemish to an otherwise entertaining entry into the bad-doctor true-crime subgenre. Our introduction to Macchiarini comes in two different settings that the show shuffles back and forth between. The first is in his early work at the prestigious Karolinska Institute, where he is presented as a pioneer of a new kind of regenerative medicine: after bathing an artificial trachea in stem cells, he is able to place it in a dying patient, where it’ll supposedly grow into a living, breathing windpipe. It’s a breakthrough that, he claims, will essentially allow for on-demand organs and reshape medicine forever. As one might expect, his claims are from the truth, even as he goes on to operate on several patients, to devastating consequences.

Fast forward a couple of years, Macchiarini meets Benita (Mandy Moore), a television producer who begins to conduct a story on his groundbreaking work. In the process, she becomes swept away by his impressive life: a handsome, jet-setting, motorcycle-riding surgeon whose shiny life is only matched by the passion he has for patients whose lives he is determined to save. Soon, she falls for him, blurring the line between her work and her feelings.

Ramírez plays the role of suave sociopath well; there is what initially appears to be a sturdy, grounded nobility in his turn as Macchiarini that feels believable — a quality that only makes the monster underneath that much more unnerving. And yet, the turn from Jekyll to Hyde never feels like it truly arrives, as the horrific truths are accentuated mostly in the facts and realities that are left in his wake, far after he’s left for another country, another patient.

Of course, there is an unknowable aspect to any story involving psychopathic con men — how can we ever really understand people that seem to act beyond what is human? But the show is strangely reluctant to understand or depict who Macchiarini truly is, or most importantly, what motivates his actions. Save for a couple moments in the finale, the mask mostly remains intact.

As Benita begins to catch onto Macchiarini’s lies, she travels to Spain and sees a vacant lot where there was supposed to be a house that they were planning to move into within days. What exactly was the plan? she asks herself incredulously. This unanswered question, on a purely practical level, echoes across the show — to what end exactly was Macchiarini conducting his widespread and deadly malpractice?

We get an answer somewhat peripherally, in the way the series prods at the flawed, corrosive nature of institutional medicine: cutting-edge hospitals like Karolinska require boatloads of funding, and funding requires the appearance of successful research from star doctors like Macchiarini, careful scientific vetting be damned! The more frightening truth — something that a sharper show could have explored — is perhaps that Macchiarini is less a murderous sociopath, but simply an unfeelingly pragmatic man who understands how the medical system works.

But, as Nate and his colleagues fight to reveal the truth and come up against institutional backlash, the show commits more to becoming a procedural about exposing the bad doctor’s crimes. And it’s a relatively engaging one at that, anchored in particular by Kirby, who is often good at calibrating his emotions just enough to steer the show away from falling into soap opera drama.

Then again, that kind of melodrama is the allure of true-crime stories, even while there is horribly real-life tragedy and pain at the heart of it all. But “Dr. Death” mostly avoids cheapening the actual terror and injustice of its source material — perhaps, in that sense, the show seems to say, Macchiarini, the real one underneath all the lies, doesn’t deserve the extra dimension.

“Dr. Death” Season 2 premieres Friday, Dec. 21, on Peacock.

The post ‘Dr. Death’ Season 2 Review: Edgar Ramírez Impresses in Engaging but Limited True Story appeared first on TheWrap.

The latest, Zack Snyder’s “Rebel Moon – Part 1: A Child of Fire,” came about in a similar way. Snyder famously pitched an idea for a “Star Wars” spin-off inspired by Akira Kurosawa’s “Seven Samurai.” When that project didn’t come together. he transformed his old pitch into a new film.

Except Lucas infused his “Flash Gordon” riff with lots of other influences, so although you can recognize the individual elements — “The Hidden Fortress,” “The Dam Busters,” “Silent Running,” etc. — “Star Wars” still feels like its own film. But Zack Snyder’s “Star Wars” riff is pretty much just “Star Wars.” Farmers going to cantinas full of weird aliens. Cocky smugglers with questionable morals who take them on their journey. Mysterious badasses with glowing swords that cut through anything. An evil empire that dresses like Nazis.

It’s “Star Wars” crossed with “Seven Samurai,” sure, but not much else and that’s also been done already with the Roger Corman-produced “Battle Beyond the Stars” (1980). So nothing about “Rebel Moon” feels fresh. Competent, usually, but never fresh.

Indeed, the biggest difference is that Zack Snyder is, well, Zack Snyder. “Rebel Moon” is full of the slow-motion action sequences he’s famous for, and it’s unusually violent for a space opera. There’s an upsetting attempted sexual assault scene that throws a pall over the whole first act. And then there’s the scene where Luke Skywalker gets hassled in a bar and the retired soldier has to save him — sorry, the scene where “Gunnar” gets hassled in a bar and the retired soldier has to save him, except now it’s about a gay and physically grotesque sexual predator who won’t take “no” for an answer and gets killed instead of just getting his arm cut off.

Who is that scene for, we have to ask? Why, in a movie about saving fictional oppressed people, is there a scene that goes out of its way to present a demonic caricature of actually oppressed people? Even “Rebel Moon’s” simplistic argument that “cruelty is bad” gets undermined by the film’s insistence that cruelty is also entertainment.

“Rebel Moon – Part 1: A Child of Fire” stars Sofia Boutella as Kora, a soldier with a mysterious past living a quiet life in a village full of peaceful farmers. When a giant warship from the Motherworld shows up, the gestapo-esque Atticus Noble (Ed Skrein) declares that he’s searching for rebels and he needs this one tiny town to supply his entire army with grain. He’ll return in ten weeks to collect, even if it means the farmers will starve to death.

Noble leaves behind a small squad of rapists and one pacifist robot, the latter of whom is voiced by Anthony Hopkins. The robot explains that the Motherworld was ruled by an honorable royal family, whose princess was prophesied to bring peace to the galaxy. With that royal family now dead, the robot army refuses to fight anymore, and now they just lug crates around for the human soldiers. Never mind that later in the movie we see that same king of the Motherworld in flashbacks and he’s celebrating his armies for conquering planets and committing mass murder. The film still claims he was the good guy keeping Motherworld from getting… I dunno, even eviler? “Rebel Moon’s” attitudes towards tyranny are a little inconsistent and confusing.

When Kora kills the soldiers after they try to assault a young girl — in a sequence, again, so unnecessarily disturbing you can’t help wonder why the film had to go there at all — the village is left with no choice. They’ll have to fight Noble’s army when he returns. So Kora teams up with Gunnar (Michiel Huisman), a farmer who got their leader killed because he was a greedy capitalist — but who will then be portrayed as a soulful, innocent, heroic type for the rest of movie, because again, consistency is not “Rebel Moon’s” strong suit — and sets out to enlist a group of warriors to protect the village.

What follows is a series of vignettes where Kora meets larger than life badasses who all just happen to be in the middle of pulpy situations. Tarak (Staz Nair) is trapped in indentured servitude and can’t get out unless he tames a space griffin. Nemesis (Doona Bae) is a cyborg with light sabers who had fighting a giant spider on her “to do” list that afternoon. Titus (Djimon Hounsou) is a former Motherworld general now working as a gladiator, although apparently we meet him on his day off from gladiating, which feels like a bit of a copout. Devra Bloodaxe (Cleopatra Coleman) and her brother Darrian (Ray Fisher) are rebel leaders, who seem to lack ambition in the whole “rebellion” department. And Kai (Charlie Hunnam) is literally just Han Solo.

The majority of these side quests are exciting and nifty to look at. Zack Snyder, who is also the film’s cinematographer, knows how to make an action sequence look epic, even if the climactic battle quickly loses track of where all the characters are, and then descends into spatial chaos. Still, as “Star Wars” knockoffs go, “Rebel Moon” is one of the most visually ambitious, and the visual effects creations are often genuinely interesting, although some of them are less convincingly rendered than others.

The cast is all over the place as well. Charlie Hunnam looks like he’s having fun. Djimon Hounsou looks like he’s super bored. Ed Skrein chews scenery and seems to particularly enjoy the bit where we find out his character has a tentacle fetish. But it’s Boutella who carries “Rebel Moon” on her shoulders, and once again reminds us that she’s a great action movie actor. Snyder’s space opera may not be a great action movie, but at least it’s an excellent showcase for Boutella and Hunnam, and an adequate showcase for most of the others.

“Rebel Moon – Part 1: A Child of Fire” isn’t a complete film. The story will continue and presumably conclude in the next installment. So perhaps some of this movie’s issues will be addressed later on, and “Part 1” will improve with the benefit of hindsight. Or perhaps it will look worse after the follow-up comes out, which is equally plausible. Until then it is simply what it is, and that is a hugely expensive but uninspired “Star Wars” knockoff with some thrilling action sequences, and some truly ugly moments that taint the entire thing.

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Writer Rick Riordan became a household name in children’s fantasy literature when he debuted the first of six novels of the “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” series in 2005. Beginning with “The Lightning Thief,” readers grew to understand the struggles of 12-year-old Percy Jackson, a demigod whose human mother fell in love with an unknown god and raised Percy on her own. As young Percy discovered who he was, where he came from and the supernatural abilities he possessed, he began an immense quest.

Riordan’s novels were adapted for the silver screen in the mid-2010s, with actor Logan Lerman in the titular role as Percy Jackson. The film saga resulted in two motion pictures that grossed a total of $428 million at the box office, leaving room for an audience to consume more stories in ancient Greek mythology. Ten years later, and through the use of streaming television and updated visual effects, Percy Jackson lives on.

Disney+’s “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” stays faithful to its source material while giving the middle schooler some time to exist in the modern world. Walker Scobell (“The Adam Project”) takes on the reign of the half-god-half-human role as Percy Jackson defies the odds to uncover his family’s deepest secrets. Chief among them is an admission from his mother, Sally (Virginia Kull), that Percy is a demigod. Brought up with no knowledge of his father’s identity or whereabouts, Percy has low self-esteem and no friends, leading to problems standing up to bullies and those who don’t understand him.

He takes solace in one classmate, Grover (Aryan Simhadri), who is quickly outed as a satyr. It turns out that discovering his best friend is half-horse is only one of many revelations young Percy encounters outside school grounds. In fact, a dangerous element is out to get Mr. Jackson, which materializes in the form of a math teacher (Megan Mullally) secretly attempting to harm him. Being a half-blood is dangerous, and most of the time, it gets one killed. Once Percy comprehends what he is, those serving Hades will also sense it and come for him.

The danger comes to a head when Percy’s mother explains everything to her young son, blowing his mind and changing everything he’s known as fact. An epic battle with a minotaur results in his mother disappearing and Percy killing the creature. To fend off the terrible forces looking to kill him, he hides in a camp for half-gods where he can be safe and adapt to his newfound powers.

At this camp, Percy uncovers the truths that have been carefully hidden from him throughout his life. His professor, Mr. Bruner, is actually a centaur. There are 12 Houses at the camp representing the 12 Olympians of Greek mythology, and that mythology is not just the stuff of ancient legends. He also finds comfort in other young campers, who’ve experienced the same struggles to fit in growing up. Making friends was never an easy feat for Percy, but at this camp, he is successful.

But not everyone believes Percy is who he says he is. Annabeth (Leah Sava Jeffries) is a camp superstar and the daughter of Athena. A fierce warrior in her own right, Annabeth challenges Percy’s every move, leading the 12-year-old to realize what he’s good at and what he’s not. Annabeth recruits Percy to be on her team for Capture the Flag, though he still needs to learn where he fits in the game and in life. But Annabeth has a clue, and through the use of some ingenuity, the entire camp finds out that Percy Jackson is actually the son of Poseidon, god of the sea.

Through monumental visual effects and a captivating story that will entertain even the casual young observer, “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” is a win for Disney+. Percy’s father needs his son’s help returning a bolt to Zeus, which is most likely held captive along with Percy’s mother by Hades in the Underworld. The world’s fate hangs in the balance, and it is with this quest that Percy must prove his talents and rescue his mother from the clutches of pure evil.

The character of Percy Jackson has seen his time in the spotlight through Riordan’s books and the film adaptations that brought Logan Lerman some attention. This television adaptation borrows much of the same storylines Riordan wrote about in “The Lightning Thief,” introducing characters to a younger generation while holding true to the components that make Percy Jackson an entity worth rooting for. The writing in the two episodes available for review, by series co-creator Jonathan E. Steinberg, is quick-witted, the action is stellar, and making Percy’s journey an episodic tale helps to propel the young character forward in exciting directions.

Walker Scobell embodies a bullied pre-teen looking for solace and friendship that grounds “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” in an authentic way. Simultaneously discovering oneself and one’s abilities is a time-honored tradition of puberty shown on screen, but it doesn’t feel heavy-handed here. Percy’s plight and promises to his parents are genuine and surreal, leaving room for supporting characters to shine alongside the young demigod. This new adaptation is more of an ensemble than a one-person band, and it shows with the casting of all the supporting players.

Though “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” doesn’t break new ground for a character that’s been remade in popular culture several times over the past two decades, it gives new light to a beautiful story meant for younger viewers. Outstanding character development and enthralling personalities help build the television series to new heights. If the show succeeds with audiences, the other books in Rick Riordan’s canon might follow suit as the basis for additional seasons.

For Percy Jackson’s sake, let’s hope that’s the case.

“Percy Jackson and the Olympians” premieres with the first two episodes Wednesday, Dec. 20, on Disney+. Episode 1 will also be available to stream on Hulu.

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After Diana’s death (chronicled in Part 1 of Season 6, released last month), the royal family finds itself entering the millennium with the new generation coming to the forefront. A still-grieving Prince William (Ed McVey) struggles to return to normalcy as he enters adulthood and a new era of promised independence. In a family devoted to tradition, the birth of Will-mania is a shock to the system for everyone, most of all William himself. The dawn of the 21st century means the molding of a new future heir, and with it comes a hunger for a new princess. Enter Kate Middleton (Meg Bellamy), a nice middle-class girl attending St. Andrew’s University.

So much of these final episodes, set for release Thursday, cover events that many of us saw happen in real time. It involves people who are never out of the headlines and who inspire intense devotion or revulsion, depending on your politics and newspaper of choice. Morgan’s gaze always worked best when given some distance from the modern day, or at least through a narrower scope that forces him to get specific with his ideas. As evidenced in the show’s early and still best seasons, Morgan had room to emotionally expand upon well-known figures because they, despite their stratospheric fame, were closed books to the majority of the world. Trying to bring soapy life to the likes of Charles and Diana hindered Morgan because of this, but also due to his steadfast refusal to truly rock the boat.

Lo and behold, this dual problem means that the final episodes of “The Crown” are pretty bland.

Much of the season feels repetitious, with Morgan and company uncomfortable with deviating even an inch from the status quo or well-documented truths. This doesn’t bode well for the elder generation who previously dominated the series. It’s hardly shocking that the Queen (Imelda Staunton), Prince Philip (Jonathan Pryce), and Princess Margaret (Leslie Manville) were sent to the sidelines. That’s how the monarchy works. Still, it’s a shame to see this trio of beloved British actors, who can typically spin gold from straw, have little to do but sit in the background and spout expository dialogue. The cycle has become well-worn now: the royals are struggling to keep up with changing tides, the public’s opinions of them evolve, and we hear about the difficulties of balancing duty with desire. Every new Prime Minister brings with it this pattern, from Churchill to Thatcher to Tony Blair (Bertie Carvel, not quite a patch on Michael Sheen in Morgan’s “The Queen.”) At one point, worried by Blair’s popularity, the Queen is chastised by her own mother for not seeing the ways that this cycle unfolds with every new leader. One wonders how aware of their own predicament the writers were when penning that line.

This doesn’t change much with William, who is given far more focus than Harry, positioned here as the party prince and not much else. Like Diana, he’s obsessed over by the public, but unlike his late mother, a lot of the attention is feverishly sexual. Teenage girls scream at him and fling roses his way as though he’s the member of a boy band. Scenes of adoring fans eager to get to Will echo the press attention that besieged Diana, but now the weight of grief hangs over his head, an awareness of what such demands from the public did to his mother.

It’s all very straightforward in style and dialogue, perfunctory with the occasional good quip thrown in, although this is not a show especially concerned with telling jokes. When it tries to be actively funny, or at least experiment beyond its narrow confines, it falls flat, such as a dream sequence where the Queen fears the monarchy being overthrown and replaced by the Blairs (complete with a boys’ choir cover of “Things Can Only Get Better.”)

The Will and Kate years will undoubtedly soak up the most headlines, with the usual suspects looking for things to be outraged over. They’ll have to give that up pretty quickly because it makes for the dullest parts of an already dragged-out season. The writers have stripped away any semblance of personality or motivation from both of them, with Kate’s mother being positioned as the social-climbing matchmaker who forced her passive daughter into dating a prince. There’s playing it safe and then there’s just giving up, and it’s tough to avoid the sense that Morgan is doing the latter. Well, that or he’s worried about putting a future knighthood at risk.

For all the panicky headlines from British royalists over the series tainting the “good” name of the Windsors, “The Crown” has always been immensely sympathetic towards the royals, often to a fault. Morgan hasn’t done much to rock the boat or really delve into the darker aspects of a monarchy frequently mired in scandal. He also never wanted to speculate or fantasize, even when the plot desperately called for it, and that worked in the early seasons thanks to distance from time that gave the story some mystique. Now, what we have is a series too timid to be anything other than a glossy Wikipedia article.

While the closing moments may inspire a few tears from devoted viewers, the overall experience of watching the final season of “The Crown” is one of tedium. In January 2020, Morgan announced that the series would end with the fifth season, but that changed a few months later to expand to a sixth, purportedly because they needed time to “do justice to the richness and complexity of the story.”

But that didn’t happen here. These final episodes truly feel like Morgan and company wanted to tie things up as quickly as possible. They didn’t feel like the product of invested storytelling, but rather homework produced by bored students. It’s an inglorious ending to a series that had previously proven so captivating.

In playing it safe, “The Crown” rendered itself unnecessary.

“The Crown” Season 6 Part 2 is available to stream on Netflix.

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