TRASH IN MY EYE Reviews: 2025

Showing posts with label 2025. Show all posts

Saturday, April 19, 2025

Review: Ryan Coogler's "SINNERS" is Crazy, Sexy, Cool, and Incredible

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 18 of 2025 (No. 2024) by Leroy Douresseaux

Sinners (2025)

Running time: 137 minutes (2 hours, 17 minutes)

MPA – R for strong bloody violence, sexual content and language

WRITER/DIRECTOR: Ryan Coogler

PRODUCERS: Ryan Coogler, Zinzi Coogler, and Sev Ohanian

CINEMATOGRAPHER: Autumn Durald Arkapaw (D.o.P.)

EDITOR: Michael P. Shawver

COMPOSER: Ludwig Goransson

HORROR/HISTORICAL/THRILLER

Starring: Michael B. Jordan, Hailee Steinfeld, Miles Canton, Wunmi Mosaku, Jack O'Connell, Tenaj Jackson, David Maldonado, Li Jun Li, Yao, Helena Hu, Jayme Lawson, Omar Miller, Bert Dreimanis, Loka Kirke, Saul Williams, Andre Ward-Hammond, Mark L. Patrick, and Delroy Lindo and Buddy Guy

SUMMARY OF REVIEW:

Sinners is crazy and incredible, and there is no other supernatural horror film like it.

Part period film, part Southern Gothic, and part African-American historical, the film's story packs a lot of explosive energy into a short period of time

Writer-director Ryan Coogler and star Michael B. Jordan collaborate Sinners into a film that could set Mississippi burning all over again

Sinners is a 2025 American supernatural horror, vampire, and period film from writer-director Ryan Coogler and starring Michael B. Jordan, who plays twins. In Sinners, twin brothers return to their Mississippi home to start a new business only to encounter the old enemy of racism and a surprise new enemy in a charismatic monster.

Sinners opens in Clarksdale, Mississippi, on the morning of October 16, 1932. Sammie Moore (Miles Canton) staggers into his father's church, the broken neck of a guitar clutched in his right hand. As his father demands that he drop the guitar, give up music, and repent, Sammy recalls the previous 24 hours.

Early in the previous day, Sammie's cousins Elijah “Smoke” Moore (Michael B. Jordan) and Elias “Stack” Moore (Michael B. Jordan), identical twins and World War I veterans, return to Mississippi after spending several years in Chicago. Arriving with a lot of cash and a shocking amount of expensive Irish beer and Italian wine, the brothers announce their intention to start their own juke joint. In the morning, they buy an old sawmill from a racist landowner, Hogwood (David Maldonado), and start the process of preparing to open their juke joint that very night.

They recruit Sammie, a talented blues guitarist; Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo), a local legend on the piano and the harmonica; and Pearline (Jayme Lawson), a sultry songstress, to provide the club's music. They also hire Smoke's estranged wife, Annie (Winmu Mosaku), a hoodoo woman and root worker, and Delta Chinese shopkeepers Grace (Li Jun Li) and Bo Chow (Yao), to cater opening night.

Smoke and Stack start selling the idea of a juke joint to the local black community, with the food and the music as the main draw. What Smoke and Stack don't know is that their very talented cousin Sammie's singing and guitar playing will attract the attention of both the human world and the spirit world – including a great evil ready to welcome every person inside the juke joint into its family.

Just before I saw Sinners, I realized that Ryan Coogler is one of the few directors of which I have seen and reviewed all of his feature films: Fruitvale Station (2013), Creed (2015), Black Panther (2018), and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022). I am still trying to process what I saw during a Sinners' Thursday night preview showing, but right now, I still cannot find anything that would make me say this film is not perfect. Coogler's talent is greater than I ever imagined, and I imagined a lot of greatness for him. Still, I was unprepared for this hurricane called Sinners that he has created.

Sinners is like a folk tale, and it is steeped in Southern African-American folk, religious, and superstitious tradition. Sinners is also deeply immersed in Mississippi Blackness. There is a scene in the film in which the past and future join the present to celebrate transcendent African-American art, Black excellence, and a spirit world connected to all humanity. Ryan Coogler's also screenplay recognizes the links between African-Americans and Native American and Indigenous, to Chinese-American, and to some reluctant poor White people.

Sinners is truly an American work of fiction and cinema, authentic in a way that the Hollywood film industry generally avoids marginalized, oppressed, and impoverished communities. Sinners is salt-of-the-Earth and no-ways-tired American cinema. Also, it sets the record straight on what the Great Migration of Black folks found when they went to Northern cities like Chicago.

Sinners also has a remarkable number of exceptional performances. I know that some people still have doubts about Michael B. Jordan as an exceptional actor, but as the twins, Smoke and Stack, he proves that his doubters are only hapless haters. Jordan makes the twins distinctive from one another in subtle shifts and sleight-of-hand moves. In a way, Jack O'Connell, in a supporting role as the lead villain, Remmick, matches Jordan's intensity by smoothly altering the way his character reveals his wickedness. O'Connell makes Remmick, a charismatic prince of lies and deceit, deserving of his own film, a prequel to Sinners.

Back in the aughts, Paramount Pictures put out a casting call for the female lead in the Coen Bros.'s 2010 Western film, True Grit. The casting call stated that young females vying for the role “must be able to portray Caucasian.” Hailee Steinfeld won the role in True Grit, and in Sinners, she proves that she can portray mulatto as Mary. I am not sure that a White actress has been as convincing as Steinfeld is as a Black and White biracial person in Sinners since Susan Kohner received a “Best Supporting Actress” nomination as “Sarah Jane” in Imitation of Life (1959).

So... I'm still reeling. I'll build a fortress around my heart to protect my belief that Sinners is perfect or as near to perfect as a supernatural horror film can get. As of today (Friday, April 18, 2025), it is my pick for best film of the year.

10 of 10

Saturday, April 19, 2025

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Tuesday, April 15, 2025

Review: Prime Video's "G20" Showcases Viola Davis and Black Excellence

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 16 of 2025 (No. 2022) by Leroy Douresseaux

G20 (2025)

Running time: 108 minutes (1 hour, 48 minutes)

MPA – R for violence throughout

DIRECTOR: Patricia Riggen

WRITERS: Caitlin Parrish & Erica Weiss and Logan Miller & Noah Miller; from a story by Logan Miller & Noah Miller

PRODUCERS: Viola Davis, Andrew Lazar, and Julius Tennon

CINEMATOGRAPHER: Checco Varese (D.o.P.)

EDITORS: Doc Crotzer and Emma E. Hickox

COMPOSER: Joseph Trapanese

ACTION/THRILLER

Starring: Viola Davis, Anthony Anderson, Ramon Rodriguez, Marsai Martin, Christopher Farrar, Antony Starr, Douglas Hodge, Elizabeth Marvel, Sabrina Impacciatore, MeeWha Alana Lee, John Hoogenakker, Julius Tennon, Theo Bongani Ndyalvane, Noxolo Diamini, and Clark Gregg

SUMMARY OF THE REVIEW:

-- I would call G20 a standard straight-to-streaming action movie, but Viola Davis makes this fast food hamburger almost seem like “USDA Prime Beef.”

-- G20 is hugely enjoyable, and it will keep you glued to your seats, dear readers, from beginning to end

--Yeah, I liked it enough to hope for a sequel

G20 is a 2025 action-thriller from director Patricia Riggen and starring Viola Davis, who is also one of the film's producers. The film is an Amazon “Prime Video Original” and debuted on the Prime Video streaming service, Thursday, April 10, 2025. In G20, the African-American female President of the United States battles a gang of white cryptocurrency terrorists after they take over the G20 summit she is hosting in South Africa.

G20 opens in Budapest, Hungary. There, former Australian Special Forces Corporal Edward Rutledge (Antony Starr) and his mercenaries are stalking a young woman. They are determined to acquire a $70 million cryptocurrency wallet in her possession.

Meanwhile, at the White House in Washington D.C., U.S. President Danielle Sutton (Viola Davis) is having some family melodrama. She may be President of the United States and an Army veteran of the Iraq War, but she is publicly embarrassed by the rebellious antics of her daughter, Serena (Marsai Martin), who has recently escaped from the White House without the Secret Service noticing.

President Sutton and her husband, the “First Gentleman” Derek (Anthony Anderson), decide that it is wisest to bring Serena and her brother, their son Demetrius (Christopher Farrar), with them to Capetown, South Africa for the G20 Summit of world leaders. However, waiting for them at the heavily fortified Grand Diamot hotel is Corporal Rutledge and his team of terrorists, ready to seize control of the summit and bring down the world economy as we know it. Soon, it will be up to President Sutton, Derek, Serena, Demetrius, and Special Agent Manny Ruiz (Ramon Rodriguez) to save themselves and the Summit's attendees and to stop Rutledge and his diabolical plot to burn down the world as we know it.

During the last year or so, I have seen a few star-studded, streaming original action movies, such as Prime Video's Role Play (2024) and Netflix's The Union (2024) and the recent Back in Action (2025). I have avoided most streaming action movies, but I have noticed something about the ones I have seen. They are a family and friends affair. Husbands and wives, children, and friends come together to stop the high-tech bad guys. In a way, they are like the 2004 kiddie action flick, Catch That Kid, which you probably don't remember starred a pre-Twilight Kristen Stewart.

Anyway, G20 has lots of violent gun play, and I would dare to guess that more characters were killed in it than in most spy and espionage movies. That's because G20 is a kind of hybrid military-themed movie about terrorism, except that the lead is a Black female President of the United States. She is the star and she does the most killing, and while her Black husband and their two Black children also fight the bad guys, only she uses firearms and military-style weapons to kill the bad guys.

I found G20 thoroughly enjoyable, and I enjoyed watching Viola Davis' President Sutton kill the bad guys. She is one of the few actresses that could take President Sutton and make her both a solid dramatic character and a heavy weight action hero. I also like that the most of film's biggest heroes are black and brown people. Viola Davis, Anthony Anderson, Ramon Rodriguez, Marsai Martin, Christopher Farrar, Theo Bongani Ndyalvane and Noxolo Diamini show out for real. Douglas Hodge, Sabrina Impacciatore, and MeeWha Alana Lee also do the damn thing. Even Antony Starr deftly chews up the screen as the overheated villain, Corporal Rutledge.

Amazon MGM Studios, I want a sequel. I heartily recommend G20 for its pure entertainment value and for making a violent, R-rated action movie seem like family entertainment. This is one time that I can say that a direct-to-streaming action movie is as good as most of the flashy action movies that get theatrical releases. Best of all, G20 lets Viola David act like an O.G.

B+

7 of 10

★★★½ out of 4 stars

Tuesday, April 15, 2025

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Saturday, April 5, 2025

Review: Tyler Perry's "DUPLICITY" - Come On, Man

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 14 of 2025 (No. 2020) by Leroy Douresseaux

Tyler Perry's Duplicity (2025)

Running time: 109 minutes (1 hour, 49 minutes)

MPA – R for language and violence

WRITER/DIRECTOR: Tyler Perry

PRODUCERS: Tyler Perry, Angi Bones, and Will Areu

CINEMATOGRAPHER: Corey Burmester (D.o.P.)

EDITOR: Larry Sexton

COMPOSERS: JimiJame$ and Wow Jones

DRAMA/THRILLER/CRIME

Starring: Kat Graham, Meagan Tandy, Tyler Lepley, RonReaco Lee, Joshua Adeyeye, Nick Barrotta, Jimi Stanton, Shannon LaNier, Kim Steele, Betty Mitchell, Angela Halili, and Kearia Schroeder

SUMMARY OF THE REVIEW:

-- Tyler Perry's Duplicity is for Tyler Perry's hardcore fans

-- The last 20 minutes of “Duplicity” are by far the best, but they are also filled with implausible and crazy crap, too

Tyler Perry's Duplicity is a 2025 drama and crime thriller from writer-director Tyler Perry. The film is an Amazon “Prime Original,” and it began streaming on the service April 20, 2025. Duplicity finds a high-powered attorney taking on her most personal case when she attempts to find the truth behind the fatal shooting of an unarmed Black man by a White police officer.

Duplicity opens in Atlanta, Georgia and introduces the high-powered female attorney, Marley Wells (Kat Graham). Her best friend is Fela Blackburn (Meagan Tandy), a co-anchor for the television station, Channel 3's “Early for Us” morning TV show. One day, while jogging, Fela's husband, Rodney (Joshua Adeyeye), is shot and killed by a white rookie police officer, Caleb Kaine (Jimi Stanton).

Marley becomes the grieving widow, Fela's attorney, and suddenly she is taking on the city in a wrongful death civil suit. Marley's boyfriend, Tony (Tyler Lepley), a private investigator and disgraced former police officer, helps her investigate the case. Fela's Channel 3 colleagues – Shannon Markus (Shannon LaNeir), her co-anchor, and Sam (Nick Barrotta), the station's chief investigator – also volunteer their services for Marley's investigation.

The fatal police shooting of Rodney becomes a hot-button political issue and protests and violent riots erupt. The case seems to be going in Marley and Fela's favor, but Marley is soon forced to stop ignoring the troubling signs and unanswered questions that surround the shooting.

I thought that Mea Culpa, a “Netflix Original” film released in February 2024, was likely Tyler Perry's craziest non-Madea film to date, being even wackier than his 2013 film, Temptations: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor. However, Perry's 2024 Amazon Prime Video drama-thriller, Divorce in the Black, released mere months after Mea Culpa, is Perry's craziest non-Medea film, at least of the ones I have seen. Perry's latest Prime Video film is not quite as crazy as Divorce in the Black, but neither is a good film (although I would say that Divorce in the Black is a little better than Duplicity).

Duplicity is simply an empty film, and I think the reason is the screenwriting. Watching this film, I got the idea that Tyler Perry wasn't trying very hard, either as a director or writer, and especially not as a writer. One of the reasons the performances seem so listless is that the actors really don't have much with which to work in terms of story or character. Also, Duplicity really is not a police shooting movie, nor a “Black Lives Matter” movie, nor even social commentary, for that matter (despite some flatly delivered “commentary” at the end). I can't say much more than that.

The last 20 minutes of the Duplicity are by far the most watchable, but even those minutes are filled with implausible and frankly inadvertently comical moments. However, I must admit that there is a particular set of violent acts in the last act that are cathartic. Ultimately, Tyler Perry's Duplicity is for Tyler Perry's biggest fans – alone.

3 of 10

D+

★½ out of 4 stars

Saturday, April 5, 2025

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Friday, February 14, 2025

Review: "CAPTAIN AMERICA: BRAVE NEW WORLD" Explodes with Intensity

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 9 of 2025 (No. 2015) by Leroy Douresseaux

Captain America: Brave New World (2025)

Running time: 118 minutes (1 hour, 58 minutes)

MPA – PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, and some strong language

DIRECTOR: Julius Onah

WRITERS: Rob Edwards, Malcolm Spellman & Dalan Musson, and Julius Onah & Peter Glanz; from a story by Rob Edwards and Malcolm Spellman & Dalan Musson (based on the Marvel Comics)

PRODUCERS: Kevin Feige and Nate Moore

CINEMATOGRAPHER: Kramer Morgenthau (D.o.P.)

EDITORS: Madeleine Gavin and Matthew Schmidt

COMPOSER: Laura Karpman

SUPERHERO/FANTASY/DRAMA and SCI-FI/ACTION/THRILLER

Starring: Anthony Mackie, Harrison Ford, Danny Ramirez, Shira Haas, Carl Lumbly, Tim Blake Nelson, Giancarlo Esposito, Xosha Roquemore, Johannes Haukur Johannesson, William Mark McCullough, and Takehiro Hira with Liv Tyler and Sebastian Stan

SUMMARY OF THE REVIEW:

--Captain America: Brave New World is the subject of a social media smear campaign, but it is one of the best superheroes movies of the 2020s, and it is probably the best action movie of the decade

--The cast is dynamite. Not only does Anthony Mackie light up the screen as Sam Wilson/Captain America, but Harrison Ford also tears up the screen the way a Hollywood legend and icon should

--The supporting cast of Captain America: Brave New World is excellent, and the actors help make this film a rampaging good time at the movies

Captain America: Brave New World is a 2025 superhero and action film from Marvel Studios and directed by Julius Onah. The film focuses on the character, “Sam Wilson,” as the superhero, “Captain America.” Sam Wilson is a Marvel Comics character that was created by writer Stan Lee and artist Gene Colan and that first appeared in Captain America #117 (cover dated: September 1969). Captain America is a Marvel Comics character that was created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby and that first appeared in Captain America Comics #1 (December 1940).

This film is the fourth film in the Captain America film series and also the 35th entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). In Captain America: Brave New World, Captain America must discover the identity of the mastermind behind a plan to launch the United States into a global war over access to an amazing new metal alloy.

Captain America: Brave New World focuses on Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie), who is still early in his tenure as the superhero, Captain America, replacing his friend, the original Captain America, Steve Rogers. Wilson was once the superhero, “The Falcon,” and now, that mantle belongs to his partner, U.S. Air Force First Lt. Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez). Captain America and the Falcon begin the film on a mission in Oaxaca, Mexico where they take on the “Serpent Society” and its leader, Sidewinder (Giancarlo Esposito), in a bid to intercept the sale of a canister of “Adamantium.”

Adamantium is the new metal alloy that was discovered on the “Celestial Island,” located in the Indian Ocean. Celestial Island is really the gigantic carcass of the “Celestial Tiamut,” whose emergence was stopped by the Eternals (as seen in the 2021 film, Eternals). The U.S., Japan, and India are vying to mine adamantium, and to that end, the three countries are working on a treaty that would create the infrastructure in which the three nations would share control of the island.

The current President of the United States, Thaddeus Ross (Harrison Ford), formerly known as General “Thunderbolt” Ross, asks Sam to be the face of the adamantium treaty as Captain America. President Ross also wants Sam to join him in a plan to reform the superhero group, “The Avengers.” However, the announcement of the treaty is interrupted by an assassination attempt. Now, Sam's friend and mentor, Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly), the Korean War veteran and once-imprisoned “super soldier,” is once again imprisoned because of the incident.

Despite a growing rift with President Ross, Sam decides to investigate the assassination attempt, and Joaquin joins him. Shadowing them is a former “Black Widow,” the Israeli Ruth Bat-Seraph (Shira Haas), but even she can't stop Captain America and the Falcon from discovering the mystery of a man named Samuel Sterns (Tim Blake Nelson). Can Sam Wilson stop a global war, and can Captain America really take on the creature known as the “Red Hulk.”

Captain America: Brave New World is the subject of an intense online and social media smear campaign. When you, dear readers, come across someone using the word, “woke,” to describe it, you should know that in the context of this film, “woke” is Confederate pig Latin for the name “Anthony Mackie.” People who complain that the story and/or the script are not good are against the film because of their grievances concerning an African-American actor, Antony Mackie, taking on the role of Captain America. With that said...

Captain America: Brave New World ties into some other Marvel Studios productions. Obviously, this film's “Celestial Island” subplot is related to events depicted in the 2021 film, Eternals. The Disney+/Marvel Studios series, “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” (2021) is a prologue to Brave New World. Surprisingly, Brave New World acts as a sort of sequel to the second film in the MCU, 2008's The Incredible Hulk. There are also references to numerous other MCU films.

Captain America: Brave New World is a superb superhero movie and great action film. Director Julius Onah has helmed a film that is a rampaging good time at the movies, doing this in spite of delays and reshoots. He should take pride in making a Captain America film that is as good as or better than the previous three films in the series. The action is great, and the conspiracy at the heart of the story is intense and shockingly personal. The character drama is surprisingly potent and is both complex and complicated. Plus, the Captain America vs. Red Hulk battle in the film's last act fell on me like a tree; it is so intense that for a moment I wished I was wearing an adult diaper while watching it.

With Captain America: Brave New World, Anthony Mackie not only proves that he is a true Marvel leading man who can carry a MCU film, but he also proves that he is a Hollywood leading man. In subtle ways, his performance and speeches clearly define that which Mackie fights in the real world and Sam Wilson fights in his world. Watching Mackie chop up this movie with his dramatic chops, I realized that it was long overdue that he lead a Marvel film.

I must also admit that Harrison Ford brings down the thunder in his role as President Thaddeus Ross, a.k.a. “Thunderbolt” Ross. Ford dominates his scenes so much that only Mackie can really match him in Captain America: Brave New World. Seeing Ford here reminds me of what a find dramatic actor he is and how he has always been fun in action movies.

Danny Ramirez, Shira Haas, Carl Lumbly, Tim Blake Nelson, Giancarlo Esposito, and Xosha Roquemore also deliver solid turns in their respective supporting roles. They deserve to pop up in the MCU again, many more times. I guess it is obvious that I am still buzzing from seeing Captain America: Brave New World last night (Thursday, February 13th). I had not expected much from this film because I had listened to too much of the propaganda. I love being wrong in these instance. Captain America: Brave New World is going to be my favorite film of 2025 for awhile, dear readers, and I heartily recommend it to you.

9 of 10

A+

Friday, February 14, 2025

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Saturday, January 25, 2025

Review: Netflix's "BACK IN ACTION" Finds Fun in Spy Parents

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 6 of 2025 (No. 2012) by Leroy Douresseaux

Back in Action (2025)

Running time: 114 minutes (1 hour, 54 minutes)

MPA – PG-13 for sequences of violence and action, some suggestive references and strong language, and brief teen partying

DIRECTOR: Seth Gordon

WRITERS: Seth Gordon and Brendan O'Brien

PRODUCERS: Beau Bauman, Peter Chernin, Seth Gordon, Sharla Sumpter-Bridgett, and Jenno Topping

CINEMATOGRAPHER: Ken Sang (D.o.P.)

EDITOR: Peter S. Elliot

COMPOSER: Christopher Lennertz

ACTION/COMEDY/SPY

Starring: Jamie Foxx, Cameron Diaz, McKenna Roberts, Rylan Jackson, Kyle Chandler, Glenn Close, Jamie Demetriou, Andrew Scott, Fola Evans-Akingbola, and Robert Besta

SUMMARY OF THE REVIEW:

Back in Action is no “Mr. & Mrs. Smith,” but it is an entertaining action-comedy and spy movie.

Jamie Foxx and Cameron Diaz work well together, well enough to make me look forward to a sequel.

Back in Action is a 2025 American action-comedy and spy film from director Seth Gordon. The film is a “Netflix Original” and began streaming on Netflix, January 17, 2025. Back in Action focuses on a husband and wife who were once CIA spies and now find themselves pulled back into the espionage game after their secrets are exposed.

Back in Action introduces the Reynolds family: wife, Emily (Cameron Diaz); husband, Matt (Jamie Foxx); daughter, Alice (McKenna Roberts); and son, Leo (Rylan Jackson). They are living the quiet suburban life until Matt and Emily's old lives intrude. You see, Matt and Emily were once “QRN” – “quick reactionary nonofficial” covert operatives for the CIA. Fifteen years ago, they were involved in a mission to capture the “ICS key” from the Polish terrorist, Balthazar Gor (Robert Besta). The mission goes bad, and Matt and Emily decide to quit the spy business and start a family.

In the present, Gor's gang of Belarusian terrorists, “the Volka,” launch an attack on Matt and Emily, who pick up their kids from school and go on the run. They head to England where they will reunite with Emily's estranged mother, Ginny Curtis (Glenn Close), a former MI6 agency head. However, a current MI6 agent, Baron Andrews (Andrew Scott), is waiting for them. Also awaiting Matt and Emily are their past and the people who will do anything to get “the Key.”

Back in Action is the fourth “Netflix Original” in which Jamie Foxx has starred (as far as I can tell), following Project Power (2020), Day Shift (2022), and They Cloned Tyrone (2023). For some reason, I felt as if I had to see Day Shift before I watched Back in Action, which I did a few days earlier. Day Shift is not great, but it is entertaining.

I can say the same about Back in Action. It isn't in the same league as 2002's Mr. & Mrs. Smith, which saw Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie play husband and wife who each worked for rival assassination firm. If you took Mr. and Mrs. Smith and mixed it with Spy Kids (2001), you might get something close to Back in Action.

I can honestly say that I enjoyed Back in Action. As a domestic comedy, it is genuinely funny, and Cameron Diaz and Jamie Foxx play off each other quite well. As a spy movie, Back in Action offers a lot of slick, attention grabbing car chases, fight scenes, shoot-outs, and an extended plane crash that kept me glued to the screen. The family dynamic works pretty well, although I must admit that Glenn Close seems a bit odd as a spy who is the mother of another spy.

That's all I have to say. Back in Action is not great, but it is the kind of star-driven above-average event movie that Netflix regularly offers. Such movies are how they make us feel that our Netflix subscription is worth keeping active.

6 of 10

★★★ out of 4 stars

Saturday, January 25, 2025

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Saturday, January 18, 2025

Review: Very Scary "WOLF MAN" is Gleefully Gruesome

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 4 of 2025 (No. 2010) by Leroy Douresseaux

Wolf Man (2025)

Running time: 103 minutes (1 hour, 43 minutes)

MPA – R for bloody violent content, grisly images and some language

DIRECTOR: Leigh Whannell

WRITERS: Leigh Whannell and Corbett Tuck

PRODUCERS: Jason Blue and Ryan Gosling

CINEMATOGRAPHER: Stefan Duscio

EDITOR: Andy Canny

COMPOSER: Benjamin Wallfisch

HORROR/THRILLER

Starring: Julia Garner, Christopher Abbott, Matilda Firth, Sam Jaeger, Benedict Hardie, Zac Chandler, and Ben Prendergast

SUMMARY OF THE REVIEW:

Wolf Man is a scary, scary movie – a real scary movie that delivers the thrills, the chills, and some gruesome, gory moments.

It is one of the best werewolf movies in recent memory, without ever using the term “werewolf” in the movie, but it is the real deal in bark-at-the-moon, horror movie craziness.

Wolf Man is a 2025 American horror film from director Leigh Whannell. The film follows a father, a mother, and their daughter in their struggle to fend off a murderous creature, even as the father begins to rapidly transform into something monstrous.

Wolf Man opens in 1995 in the remote mountains of Oregon. A hiker has disappeared, and people in the isolated local community speculate that he may have fallen victim to a virus called “Hills Fever,” linked to the region's wildlife. However, the Indigenous people of the area call this ailment, “the Face of the Wolf.” During a deer hunt, survivalist Grady Lovell (Sam Jaeger), and his son, Blake (Zac Chandler), spot a mysterious creature lurking in the forest. They have a terrifying encounter with it.

Thirty years later, Blake Lovell (Christopher Abbot) lives in the big city with his wife, Charlotte Lovell (Julia Garner), and their daughter, Ginger (Matilda Firth). One day, Blake finally receives documents indicating that his long-missing father has been declared dead. Blake convinces Charlotte that they should travel to Grady's remote home and take possession of his belongings.

The trip starts off well enough for Blake, Charlotte, and Ginger, but an accident leads them into an encounter with a fast-moving and mysterious creature (Ben Prendergast), which scratches Blake's arm. The three are able to escape the attack and arrive at Grady's home, where they barricade themselves. Although the creature lurks outside, the house, which had long been fortified by the paranoid Grady, offers some security. However, the scratch on Blake's arm has turned bloody and infected, and now, he is changing... into something.

Once upon a time, Universal Pictures wanted to build a “shared universe” (like the Marvel Cinematic Universe) around the portion of its film library known under the brand name, “Universal Monsters,” by rebooting select films from that brand. The shared universe was known named “Dark Universe,” and the film that launched it was the heavily-criticized, box office disappointment, The Mummy (2017), and I am talking about the one with Tom Cruise.

After that disappointment, Universal decided to move away from a shared universe concept, but kept the idea of rebooting its Universal Monsters films. The new direction was launched with writer-director Leigh Whannell's 2020 hit horror film, The Invisible Man, a reboot of the 1933 film, The Invisible Man. Now, Whannell is back in the Universal reboot game with Wolf Man, which is apparently a re-imagining of Universal Picture's 1941, classic horror film, The Wolf Man.

If you are wondering, dear readers, if Leigh Whannell's new Wolf Man is scary, it is scary as f*ck. It is a true scary movie. It is a scary-ass movie. Now, I think that Whannell and his co-writer Corbett Tuck offer shallow characters and melodramatic interpersonal character tropes, but they fashion a wild, hairy-ass horror movie that is not ashamed of being a gruesome, gross, and gory werewolf movie that leaks bodily fluids all over the place. By the way, the terms, “werewolf” and “wolf man,” are never used in this film as far as I can tell.

Whannell's collaborators are on their “A” game with this film. Hair and make-up and visual effects slow grind Blake's grisly transformation and throw us a nasty curve ball on consumption. It seems as if Benjamin Wallfisch is trying to use his film music to make me choke on my own fear, and the film editing is a constant fear machine.

The cast is quite good at selling us that all of this is real. The characters might by shallow, but the actors go deep into their craft, deep enough to make me feel as if I was there waiting to be slashed and gored by a... “mysterious creature.”

I didn't see Whannell's The Invisible Man, but Wolf Man makes me want to see all his films. Whannell may be best known for creating the 2004 film, Saw, with director James Wan, that launched a two-decade old franchise. However, I'd like him to return to the macabre world he has created with this new film. Wolf Man is not perfect, but it is a perfectly scary movie. Some of you might need a barf bag or some “Depends” undergarments in order to make it through the grim terror that is Wolf Man.

7 of 10

A-

★★★½ out of 4 stars

Saturday, January 18, 2025

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