On the Spring Radar…

Happy Spring, readers! Although it feels like Spring came around much sooner this time. I wonder why that cou-oh, right. Well, at least we have the Cannes Film Festival to look forward to next month. As well as the 76^th Writers Guild Awards, Society of the Snow very likely sweeping the 11^th Platino Awards, and Canada finally closing out this awards season in its entirety.

Being the website we are, we don’t rest at the end of an awards season; we get right back into speculating on the next one. Starting with this piece, which makes sense since we’ve got the passion project of an Academy Award-nominated actor, a prequel to one of the greatest movies produced in this century from an Academy Award-winning filmmaker, a sequel to an Academy Award-winning animated film, two star showcases directed by Academy Award-nominated filmmakers, and a movie belonging to a subgenre that used to guarantee Academy Award nominations once upon a time to cover in this piece. Let’s take a closer look at them…

MONKEY MAN – In Theaters April 5

Directed by…

And starring Dev Patel, with Sharlto Copley and Sobhita Dhulipala

What is it about? An anonymous young man unleashes a campaign of vengeance against the corrupt leaders who murdered his mother and continue to systemically victimize the poor and powerless.

How am I feelin’ about this one? God bless Jordan Peele. I wasn’t 100% onboard with his two follow-ups to my favorite film of 2017, but he is one of the very few – very few – currently working Hollywood figures with a not-insubstantial influence over his own projects and the projects he chooses to support under the umbrella of his company Monkeypaw Productions who doesn’t depend on spreadsheets or ROI projections in his greenlight decisions. He invested in the first feature film project from Henry Selick in over a decade. He joined Jason Blum in funding the vehicle for Spike Lee’s only competitive Academy Award.

And now, after the movie had already been acquired by Netflix for its debut as a streaming exclusive, Dev Patel’s directorial debut Monkey Man has been bought from Netflix by Monkeypaw because Peele believed this movie should be a big screen experience. To be clear, I am not saying that this approach to film production and distribution is an act of artistic philanthropy. I actually believe that, in the long term, investing in talented artists to just make whatever cool and weird passion project is on their minds is the most successful business strategy for a film studio. Far more so than dumping millions into a movie based on misinterpreted social media data points and franchise construction “road maps.” Star Wars was a weird passion project. So were Titanic, The Blair Witch Project, and… Get Out. Risks on projects you believe in will, more often than not, pay off in the long run. Assessing the viability of projects as content-generating widgets on an assembly line will eventually put out diminishing returns.

God bless Dev Patel, too. Stumbling out of his breakout role in Slumdog Millionaire by appearing in one of the most reviled fantasy films of the last twenty years, it’s been pretty amazing seeing him diligently recovering from that to building up his profile as a striking onscreen presence and Academy Award-nominated actor. This is going to be the biggest test of his star power, as it’s a visceral action thriller very openly inspired by John Wick with complicated, dangerous fight choreography that he’s not only at the center of, but also directing himself. Personally, I am psyched to see that someone applied a movie with a very North American aesthetic (with some East Asian influences) to a different cultural context. It should be done more often, like we saw Oliver Hermanus do with Akira Kurosawa’s Ikiru and what Kurosawa himself did with William Shakespeare’s King Lear. Martin Scorsese won the only competitive Oscar of his entire career from a movie doing that with Andrew Lau and Alan Mak’s Infernal Affairs. Moving the metropolis setting from New York City to Mumbai changes the colors, motifs, political undercurrents, and the architecture the action rips through. Patel might suffer some of the same filmmaking hiccups that fellow first-time director Michael B. Jordan displayed in his directorial debut Creed III, but also like Creed III, Patel could similarly show us some very creative shot and blocking choices a more veteran director would shy away from. Joey seemed impressed by Patel’s filmmaking in his review, so that’s promising.

At the very least, we know his directorial sensibilities impressed at least one more experienced filmmaker:

CHALLENGERS – In Theaters September 15 April 26

Directed by Luca Guadagnino

Starring Zendaya, with Josh O’Connor and Mike Faist

What is it about? Following a losing streak, the wife and coach of a Grand Slam champion signs him up for a Challenger event where he will face off against her former lover.

How am I feelin’ about this one? From the look of the trailer (where I also pulled the above screenshot from), this movie could have easily been called Zendaya Can Get It. And honestly, good for her. “Woman Being Romantically Pursued By Rival Twinks” is not an opportunity any actress is going to pass up, and her involvement was a major factor in getting this project snagged by MGM despite being workshopped by director Luca Guadagnino before post-production on Bones & All had even concluded. Which also makes perfect sense; she’s not only an Emmy Award-winning co-star of one of the most popular Gen Z shows out there, she also plays a prominent role in what has become a lucrative sci-fi tentpole series. Both of them fell in love with the script by novelist / playwright / YouTuber / Celine Song’s husband Justin Kuritzkes, described as “sexy and fun” by sexy movie enthusiast Guadagnino just before setting off to collaborate with him again for his next project. For her part, Zendaya was turned on to the script for very different reasons, interpreting it more as a character study of toxic people and saying it might as well be called Codependency: The Movie. That she was still dead-set on getting this movie made with a vision for it not entirely in line with its director is interesting, but this also prompts me to make a… sort of shameful admission:

I don’t really care for Zendaya as an actress. Please do not grab your torches and pitchforks over that. Believe me, I want to; for someone so young to have exerted so much power over two entirely different entertainment industries is genuinely impressive. She’s a workhorse diving full-bore into project after project after project requiring an insane level of drive, and she is a committed activist for a number of progressive causes. She keeps choosing interesting acting vehicles, to a point where even if it’s bad, you can still be reasonably sure that you’ll see something that’s bad in a unique, thought-provoking way. And then I see her try to exude any kind of star power in the projects themselves and I struggle to understand what anyone could possibly see in her as an actress. Yes, this includes Dune: Part Two, where she is constantly upstaged by everyone around her despite carrying the film’s emotional throughline. And so it goes with Challengers. Even though she’s very much the star at the front and center of this movie’s marketing, I find myself more interested in what the boys are bringing to it.

Josh O’Connor’s feature film acting career has been simmering for a number of years now, but unlike the leading lady of Challengers, he hasn’t yet been able to fully vault from his success on television into the big screen yet. This antagonist role could be his ticket to doing just that. His tennis and paramour rival is played by my Best Supporting Actor of 2021. Remember how awesome Mike Faist was in West Side Story? Not just the best dancer of the entire ensemble, but also attuned to the “old timey” mannerisms and mood of the legendary musical better than anyone else onscreen. There’s a risk in going too far in that direction to come off unpersuasive as a threat, and yet he retains a tightly-coiled energy animating his emaciated body like a rattlesnake. And did you know that scene in the bar when he places the barrel of the gun on his forehead was improvised by him?

Damn, he was great in that movie. So yeah, I really want to see him in more movies. I’m most interested in seeing how he acquits himself in a role that doesn’t call on his singing or dancing abilities (or maybe just singing, since I imagine tennis players have a similar level of physical conditioning to dancers?) more than any other single advertised element of this film.

BACK TO BLACK – In Theaters May 17

Directed by Sam Taylor-Johnson

Starring Marisa Abela, with Jack O’Connell and Eddie Marsan

What is it about? A chronicle of the remarkably successful career and tragically short life of singer-songwriter Amy Winehouse.

How am I feelin’ about this one? Hollywood can be so cruel and unfair. Here you have Universal Pictures and Focus Features acquiring the rights to adapt a smash hit novel that they had to have known was a poorly-written fad destined to fail the test of time, which by itself is fine – this is a business and Fifty Shades of Grey did make a ton of money at the box office – but then they make the outrageous decision to give its egotistical hack author a level of creative control that, at the time, was quite literally unprecedented for any author whose work was being adapted into film. Seriously, J.K. Rowling didn’t achieve the kind of veto power over her Harry Potter franchise that E. L. James was just handed on a silver platter for years. And to add insult to injury, when the first film was ripped apart by critics, rather than accurately detecting their petulant source author’s insistence on rigid symmetry with her sloppy fan fiction, they fired director Sam Taylor-Johnson and screenwriter Kelly Marcel from any further work on the trilogy for the crime of applying borderline heroic effort to make the first film somewhat functional as a narrative feature and gifted Big Baby Author with even more power over the substantially worse sequels. Oh, and the Razzies dogpiled on both of them because of course they did. Their only mistake was agreeing to the gig in the first place and giving it far more artistic investment than it deserved.

Both of them, thankfully, seem to have rebounded from this undeserved public mockery; Marcel is about to make her directorial debut and now Johnson is helming what would have been a plumb project not that long ago: a biopic portraying the tragic life of a musical icon. Again, I just don’t know why we’re bothering with these kinds of movies after Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, but still, I’m happy for Sam Taylor-Johnson’s cultural relevance outlasting E. L. James’ time in the public eye. Few musicians have had a more dramatic and heart-breaking personal story than Amy Winehouse, and we’re due for a reckoning on all the systemic failures that led to her death at the age of 27. At a minimum, we’ll be gifted with a reminder of how amazing she was as a singer, recreated by Marisa Abela in what will surely be mimicry that’ll please fans of the…

Oh…

Oh no…

… well, I don’t know what to do with that, to be honest. Of all the times musical biopics just revert to lip-syncing in recreating their subject’s singing performances, why wouldn’t they just do that here?

FURIOSA: A MAD MAX SAGA – In Theaters May 24

Directed by George Miller

Starring Anya Taylor-Joy, with Chris Hemsworth and Tom Burke

What is it about? Set before the events of Mad Max: Fury Road, a young Furiosa is snatched from the Green Place of Many Mothers and into the hands of a Biker Horde led by the Warlord Dementus.

How am I feelin’ about this one? Despite being a hit that was quickly lauded as one of the greatest action movies ever made, and despite winning six Academy Awards, continuing on after Mad Max: Fury Road tore through cinemas almost a full decade ago was a surprisingly fraught ordeal. In fact, the next follow-up to Mad Max: Fury Road wasn’t even supposed to be a prequel; it was a direct sequel that was set to star Tom Hardy again under the working title of Mad Max: The Wasteland. But then, two years after Fury Road hit theaters, Miller alleged that Warner Bros. had stiffed him out of a promised $7 million bonus and sued them. Lawsuits between two parties have a habit of cooling off any planned collaborations from them, and so future movies set in Max Rockatansky’s post-apocalyptic world were put on hold until that was settled. By the time it did, Miller pivoted to a prequel telling the origin story of Imperator Furiosa, and it was around this point that I started to get a little apprehensive.

It’s already going to be hard enough to get out from the shadow of one of the crowning achievements of 21^st century cinematic spectacle, doubly so if you’re doing it in a way that requires you to make explicit connections to characters, settings, and story beats that Fury Road so masterfully alluded to through background details and subtext. I generally don’t like prequels for precisely this reason, and it’s especially puzzling that George Miller would want to jettison the episodic nature of his Mad Max series in favor of something that affords a much narrower range of narratively acceptable creative decisions. And to gain what, exactly? I don’t need a full explainer of how Furiosa fell in with Immortan Joe’s army, because this one shot told me everything I needed to know:

I don’t know how many times I have to repeat this: pop culture consumers, even when they insist they do, don’t actually care about “the lore” of a movie series they like. They do to the extent that it should be consistently laid out and evocative of the general tone of the story, but fans chasing down a drip-feed of extraneous details to feel more “immersed” in a sprawling fictional world is the cultural equivalent of eating an entire bag of potato chips and still feeling hungry. You are just never going to feel satiated eating that kind of food. The character growth, the emotional thrust of the story, a complete narrative arc, those things are the delicious cuts of storytelling steak that fills you up and leaves you feeling stuffed and satisfied. Which is why Mad Max: Fury Road felt like enjoying a full course Kobe meal. All of the critical points of its dramatic heft are interwoven with its white-knuckle action and joyously demented visual designs.

I want to believe that Miller hasn’t forgotten this, especially since most of his collaborators from Mad Max: Fury Road – including editor Margaret Sixel, composer Junkie XL, production designer Colin Gibson, set decorator Katie Sharrock, costume designer Jenny Beavan, and co-writer Nick Lathouris – are returning for this go-around. But since this is a prequel set decades before, we’re getting a new Furiosa, this time played by Anya Taylor-Joy. Who, to her credit, has a potent screen presence… but she’s not a Charlize Theron-level presence. Combined with good-but-not-Tom-Hardy-level Chris Hemsworth as the leading man of this prequel, and there’s a lingering feeling that we’re getting a bit of a downgrade in front of the camera.

Still, I’m holding out hope that this can at least stand shoulder-to-shoulder with such an intimidating classic.

HIT MAN – On Netflix June 7

Directed by Richard Linklater

Starring Glen Powell, with Adria Arjona and Austin Amelio

What is it about? Loosely based on a Texas Monthly article by Skip Hollandsworth, undercover Houston police officer poses as a reliable hitman to arrest those trying to hire him until he tries to save a woman in need.

How am I feelin’ about this one? Glen Powell is, as the Gen Z kids would say, Having A Moment right now. He’s been acting for over twenty years, but only recently, after his supporting role in the box office smash hit and Best Picture nominee Top Gun: Maverick vaulted his profile to the A-list and the surprising box office “legs” of romantic comedy Anyone But You proving his commercial viability as a leading man, has he become a full-blown movie star. In my opinion, one of the best career decisions a film performer nearing the peak of their stardom can do is team up with a filmmaker who specializes in bending and exploring their public persona in interesting ways. The filmmaker who is absolutely the best at this is… well, Steven Soderbergh, but Richard Linklater is a respectable second place (and both of them better look out, because Marielle Heller is catching up fast in that department). Powell had a small role in Linklater’s Everybody Wants Some!!, but now he’s not only the leading man but also the co-writer of a story about an undercover cop posing as a contract killer who finds himself entangled with a mysterious, alluring woman.

And yes, this is supposedly based on the life of a real guy, who not only worked for law enforcement to pose as a fake assassin negotiating murder-for-hire plots as a ruse to implicate dangerous organized criminals, but he also lived a full life as a community college professor who passed away in 2022. Though the trailer makes it very clear that Hit Man will be taking some liberties with the truth to give its audience more of a good time. Which apparently went over so well during its festival run that Netflix acquired its commercial distribution rights for a pretty hefty sum.

It certainly went over well with Joey, who effusively praised its charm and humor when he saw it last year at Toronto. Whatever “It” factor Glen Powell possesses, we’re very likely going to know exactly what it is and how to make it a foundation for memorable character development in this movie when it makes its streaming debut in June.

INSIDE OUT 2 – In Theaters June 14

Directed by Kelsey Mann

Starring Amy Poehler, with Phyllis Smith and Lewis Black

What is it about? Riley is now a teenager, and with that adolescence comes an additional set of personified emotions.

How am I feelin’ about this one? It’s unfortunate to consider that Pixar is arguably now on the “lower tier” of quality output among the major American animation studios. Obviously they’re in no danger of going out of business any time soon, but while DreamWorks Animation – a studio I grew up perceiving as the shallow, crass, pop culture-referential counterpart to the more emotionally potent and thoughtful Pixar twenty years ago – has been putting out some of the most unexpectedly visually impressive CG animation of recent years, including at least one surprise bonafide masterpiece out of nowhere, and while Sony Pictures Animation has been pushing the technological boundaries of the art form (and the bounds of workplace abuse, unfortunately) with their Spider-Man: _____ the Spider-Verse series of films, Pixar seems content to lazily putting out mediocre sequels and prequels to their old hits and whipping up haphazard metaphors for prejudice that don’t make sense if you think about them for more than a few seconds.

So it shouldn’t be that surprising to see Inside Out getting the sequel treatment, especially since the idea was being bandied about even before the first film had won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. But, to be fair, unlike a spinoff about Buzz Lightyear that strips him of all the things that made Buzz Lightyear such an appealing character in the Toy Story movies, the potential for this particular story to continue on makes a bit more sense. If you remember the very end of that movie, Anger points to a giant red “PUBERTY” button and asks what that’s all about. All of the adults watching that scene, of course, chuckled knowingly at what an emotional nightmare roller coaster Riley was looking forward to, and it seems like the higher-ups at the studio felt that deserved more than just a brief gag at the very end of Pete Docter’s film exploring a child’s emotions. Amy Poehler’s Joy, Phyllis Smith’s Sadness, Lewis Black’s Anger, Bill Hader Tony Hale’s Fear, and Mindy Kaling Liza Lapira’s Disgust are still in Riley’s mind, but they’re having to accommodate several new guests complicating her emotions through the twists and turns of adolescence: Maya Hawke’s Anxiety, Ayo Edebiri’s Envy, Adèle Exarchopoulos’s Ennui, Paul Walter Hauser’s Embarrassment, and June Squibb’s Nostalgia are moving in as well, along with possibly other emotions that the marketing is keeping close to the chest for now.

Already, I see a potential pitfall that I hope screenwriters Meg LeFauve and Dave Holstein were cognizant of, which is that they’re adding a lot of new characters to this sequel. The first one had to maneuver a bit to focus the narrative primarily on two emotions for the main conflict so it didn’t feel overextended as a story. How many of these “new emotions” are going to be fleshed out as characters versus glorified cameos? Are we looking at something that’s going to feel overstuffed and overplotted to accommodate this expanded ensemble? This is a problem that a lot of sequels risk running into, and if this was 2007 or 2009, I’d be fully confident in their ability to manage it. But now? I don’t know if Pixar’s current talent pool has that same ingenuity, at least relative to their competition, but I’m hoping I’ll be wrong. Joey recently visited Pixar to preview the film, so we’ll be hearing more about it soon.

How do you feel about the state of Pixar these days? Do you have faith in Back to Black doing justice to the legacy of Amy Winehouse? Let us know in the comments.