Power Tripping

Movies: Sanctuary

Spoiler warning for the entire post

I was in New York City recently, taking a fun trip with my friend, and during a rainy afternoon we decided to see a movie. We specifically wanted to see a movie that was only playing in New York and when I saw that Sanctuary was playing--a movie about a dominatrix and her client facing off in some tense way in a hotel room--I was like "this is the movie we have to see".

My friend was skeptical when some previews for horror movies played before the movie. She was like "Jenny, is this a horror movie?" and I was like "I don't...think so??" But I think that built some tension in our minds before the movie even began. 

Sanctuary is directed by Zachary Wigon, who is very new to directing, and it's based on the screenplay by Micah Bloomberg (not to be confused with *Michael* Bloomberg). It stars Christopher Abbott, whose breakout role was playing Charlie Dattalo in the show Girls and has been taking some incredibly interesting film roles since then (this is his second role as the client of a dominatrix!). Abbott plays Hal, a very wealthy 30-something guy who is heir to a hotel empire. His father just died, leaving everything to him. But Hal isn't the man his father wanted him to be. Sanctuary gives off big Succession vibes with a Mean, Rich Daddy hovering in the back of the main character's mind at all times. Hal's father wrote a book explaining that there are two types of people in this world: people who win, and people who don't.

Hal desperately wants to be a person who wins, but he is not. 

Margaret Qualley, a supremely talented young actress, plays Rebecca. The movie opens with a scene between Rebecca and Hal that ends with Rebecca in a power suit, sitting in a chair with her legs open in a total bitch boss stance while Hal cleans the (already clean) hotel bathroom on his hands and knees in his underwear. Rebecca at first tells Hal he's garbage, but then amends this to say that he's actually less than garbage: he is nothing. "You don't even take up space" Rebecca cruelly purrs into Hal's ear as he masturbates at the end of their scene.

But the next scene of the movie shows Hal and Rebecca eating luxurious room service food and talking about what a great BDSM scene that was. The audience realizes that these two have a relationship. It might be a customer/service provider relationship, but they appear to have real affection for one another and enjoy each other's company outside of the bedroom--err..the bathroom, that is.

So when Hal informs Rebecca--after giving her an extremely expensive watch--that they can no longer have their sessions now that Hal is the head of the hotel conglomerate, Rebecca is taken aback. At first, she leaves in a huff--a sort of "well, I'll take my ball and leave" kind of way. But in the hallway, something makes her turn back. She comes back to the room and informs Hal that she's need a larger parting gift than the watch.

She explains to Hal that it is she, Rebecca, who has given Hal the confidence to run his dad's company. Before their sessions, Hal couldn't express what he wanted and Rebecca taught him to do that. You might be wondering, "wait, so by being forced to clean a toilet on his knees and being told he's garbage, Hal gained confidence!?" Yes, BDSM--like God--works in mysterious ways. I can totally buy that a weak, scared man would become a confident man with the help of a skilled sex worker*

*please note that sessions with a dominatrix is no replacement for work with a licensed therapist! They may cost roughly the same though...

So Rebecca asks for half of Hal's salary for the first year he's in charge of the company--4 million dollars. When Hal refuses, Rebecca tells him that she has videos of their sessions and that she can easily send them to the board. Thus begins a cat-and-mouse game where Hal and Rebecca fight for power. 

My friend and I were both scared that Sanctuary might go in the "dead sex worker" direction. Hal even informs Rebecca that he can "make her disappear". But whenever Hal has the upper-hand, Rebecca manages to always take it back. Her demands become even greater: 4 million is not enough. She wants a position in the company. "Would it be crazy if we were co-CEOs?" she asks Hal. "Yes!!" Hal replies in exasperation.

What I loved about Sanctuary is that every time the movie would start to go in a scary direction (such as when Hal literally has Rebecca tied to a bedpost), it would always come back to something funny, playful, sexy, and even sweet. Watching the movie was like being part of a BDSM scene: I had to put my trust in the director and writer, and submit to wherever they were taking this. And they did not disappoint and led the audience to a delightful climax.

At a certain point in the movie, Rebecca reveals her cards: she has dumped her boyfriend and stopped dominating other men because she wants to dominate Hal full time. She points out how well this dynamic works for both of them--she gets to be the funny, mean woman she always dreamed she'd be and Hal gets to have the catharsis of having his worst fears about himself confirmed ("you are nothing") but then in doing so gain the confidence and self-respect he's actually looking for. But let's be real: Hal is not CEO material and both he and Rebecca know it. Hal just can't admit it to himself and admit what he really wants...

...until the very end, where he and Rebecca discuss business strategy (which Hal knows nothing about and Rebecca knows a lot more than you'd guess). Hal decides that he will buy his company back from the stakeholders because then he can put whomever he wants in charge. He convinces Rebecca that *she* should be the CEO of the hotel empire. But what will Hal do? Hal tells her that if she's going to be running a company this big, she'll need a lot of support: a clean house, meals on the table, and sex. 

Hal: "What's the name for someone who provides all that?"

Margaret: "A slave?"

Hal: "Yes! A slave! That's the job I was meant to have."

My heart was fluttering. And then when Rebecca asks what Hal will tell his mother about this crazy turn of events, Hal says "I'll say, 'This is Rebecca. We're in love. And she's in charge now.'"

They kiss in the elevator and the movie ends. THIS IS THE ROMANTIC COMEDY ENERGY I'VE BEEN LOOKING FOR. 

Of course, the movie and the ending are unrealistic and ridiculous but that's because Sanctuary was a stealth romantic comedy and ALL romantic comedies are unrealistic and ridiculous...but you can't help but grin like an idiot when the two lovers overcome their obstacles and decide to be together. And while I pretty much hate all vanilla romantic comedies, I finally found one that speaks to my heart. 

My only criticism is that Sanctuary didn't spend enough time establishing the romantic connection between Hal and Rebecca. We don't know who these people are to each other, except a service provider and a person who pays for a service. So when Rebecca confesses that she wants their Dom/sub dynamic to be full time, it feels a bit out of left field. I guess part of that choice was to keep the audience on its toes. But I think if there had even been a couple more minutes of banter between Hal and Rebecca while they chill out after their scene at the beginning, it would all make a lot more sense.

Despite that criticism, I found Sanctuary to be delightful, as did my friend. We need more wholesome kink movies. And this one was both wholesome and edgy, never getting too dark and never getting too sentimental or cute. Truly a Goldilocks of an erotic-thriller-rom-com!

Grade: A-

Stuff I watched in...April, 2023

April was a weird month for me in terms of watching movies and TV. I "DNFed" (did not finish) three movies and rewatched a couple favorites. All told, I only watched three "new" (new to me) movies all the way through, one of which was Beau is Afraid, which I did a separate review for. So, overall, a wildly uneven and disappointing month for movies.

***

The Scary of Sixty-First

The only good thing about this 2021 horror film about two women who inadvertently rent a New York City apartment that was previously owned by Jeffrey Epstein is its run time: a blessedly short 80 minutes.

Directed by Dasha Nekrasova, The Scary of Sixty-First is a film with a good idea (a cursed apartment) that unfortunately uses a real life person whose crimes go beyond disgusting or tragic and into the realm of "if there is a Hell, it's too nice a place for this motherfucker" as the crux on which the movie lies. The problem with this is that the movie becomes exploitative. The movie turns Jeffrey Epstein's crimes into horror entertainment, and thus makes a joke of his victims. 

This is not a documentary about Epstein and it's not a drama about him. It's a movie where two young women rent a suspiciously cheap apartment in NYC, only to discover that it was owned by Epstein. One of the women, Noelle, becomes obsessed with Epstein conspiracy theories (fair enough) while the other, Addie, basically becomes possessed and spends the majority of the movie begging her boyfriend to "fuck me like I'm 13" and humping pictures of Prince Andrew while sobbing hysterically. Boy, I wish I was joking. The "reason" behind this behavior is that the CIA is controlling Addie's weak mind...or the apartment is possessing her...or something about the occult...? It's never really explained.

I've watched Salo. I've watched Martyrs. I've watched movies where nuns use a crucifix to masturbate (Ken Russell's The Devils--highly recommended!). I am not easily offended by radical and blasphemous ideas in film. But this movie offended me. Like I said above, whether intentional or not, the movie makes a joke out of the many children who were raped by Jeffrey Epstein and his friends. I'm sure the director would say that she wasn't intending that to be the message, but that is how it feels when we see Addie furiously masturbating to a picture of Prince Andrew and whining in a high-pitched, childlike voice. 

Fuck this movie. I recommend staying far away from it. 

Grade: F

***

Experimenter

Written and directed by Michael Almereyda, Experimenter is a biographical drama about the life and work of Stanley Milgram (played by one of my faves, Peter Sarsgaard). 

In case you skipped Psych 101 in college--Milgram is the guy who would have an authority figure tell a participant in the experiment to deliver electric shocks to another participant when they made mistakes, even when the participant being shocked begged the other participant to stop. Often, the person delivering the shocks would ask the authority figure (just a guy in a lab coat) if they could stop the experiment and the authority figure would always say no. In 65% of the experiments, the person delivering the shocks would keep going until the other participant (often in another room) would stop responding as if they were hurt, passed out, or even dead.

Now it turns out that the participant in the other room receiving "shocks" was actually in on the whole thing and was not being shocked at all and only faking their distress. The experiment was all about if people would listen to an authority figure even if that person was telling them to hurt someone else. 65% of time, regardless of gender or race, the person in the experiment would do just that.

The movie delves into Milgram's personal life (he was Jewish and was motivated to create this experiment based on the trial of Nazi Adolf Eichmann who claimed that those who committed atrocities during the Holocaust were just following orders) and his other experiments (the lost letter experiment, which is much cheerier than the shock experiment). Experimenter is a very solid biopic with a great cast...but I feel like it's less about being a good movie, and more about serving as a tribute to a man who conducted one of the most important experiments of the 20th century. If the movie inspires people to learn more about Milgram and about human psychology, then it has done its job.

Grade: B

***

Succession (season 1)

Succession is a good show about contemptible people. Very well-written, often hilarious, and with wall-to-wall fantastic acting, Succession is still difficult to watch because all the characters are rotten to their core, none more than the patriarch Logan Roy (Brian Cox) who, frankly, can fuck right off to hell in my opinion. But his progeny, Connor the milquetoast coward (Alan Ruck), Kendall, the entitled bro (Jeremy Strong), Siobhan, the faithless bitch (Sarah Snook), and Roman, the disgusting psychopath (Kieran Culkin) are all equally fucked up. 

Now, of course, as you watch you see glimmers of humanity in all of these people, but at the end of the day this isn't a show about well-rounded and flawed characters doing their best in this crazy world. It's about the super wealthy taking out their massive psychological problems on other people and doing so in comfort and style. I'm probably going to keep watching for the clever writing and to see if maybe at the end of the series they all die (in great pain) in a fire. One can only hope!

Grade: B+

Tom Wambsgans, still a piece of shit but the only character I don't want to murder at all times.

***

DNFed:

House of Darkness

When I saw that this mediocre vampire movie was written and directed by Neil LaBute, I wasn't surprised. It has his signature cringe gender politics (LaBute strikes me as a misogynist who hides his true feelings in plain sight by writing pathetic, asshole men into his plays and movies). I didn't have the patience for it, so I turned it off.

The Autopsy of Jane Doe

The premise is intriguing (two men do an autopsy of a young woman with very mysterious symptoms--for example, her lungs are burnt to a crisp while her skin is unburned) but, 1) Emile Hirsch is in it and he's a violent asshole (he assaulted a woman and strangled her in 2015) and 2) I just wasn't feeling it. So I looked up what happens at the end and just stopped watching.

Dashcam

I was warned about this one. The main character, Annie Hardy, is an indie singer playing herself and, unfortunately, she is profoundly annoying. Hardy is a Trump-supporting, anti-vaxxer who is also just very loud and the human equivalent of nails on a chalkboard. This is a found-footage horror movie, but the real horror is the MAGA asshole treating everyone around her like shit. There was no way I was watching the entire movie, especially when I found out (SPOILER!!!!!!) that Hardy doesn't die in the end. 

***

Rewatched:

Fargo - A+

The Departed - A

Game Night - B+

Freudian Slip

Movies: Beau is Afraid

Between Skinamarink, Infinity Pool, are Ari Aster's latest film, Beau is Afraid, we are getting some wild shit in theatres these days and I. Am. Loving. It.

After the success of Hereditary and Midsommar, horror buffs were waiting with bated breath for Ari Aster's next film. But as images and information about the film started coming out, it was hard to tell exactly what this movie was going to be about. We knew it would be a three hour long film starring Joaquin Phoenix and that was about it (or, at least, the extent to which I knew about it going in).

Beau is Afraid has been categorized as a "horror-comedy", but personally I would describe it as a surrealist comedy where horrific things happen. The film is about a man, Beau Wasserman (Phoenix being very Phoenix-y), who suffers from intense, chronic anxiety. The opening scene is Beau meeting with his therapist (Stephen McKinley Henderson) and airing concerns that he might have stomach cancer after swallowing some mouthwash by accident.

But unlike most people who suffer from chronic anxiety, Beau actually lives in a world in which his worst fears come true all the time. Beau lives in a shady neighborhood where he has to dodge knife-wielding naked men and violent skinheads just to get to his apartment. The apartment, by the way, is home to brown recluse spiders and the water gets turned off right after Beau takes anxiety meds that his therapist warns MUST be taken with water. When Beau fearfully leaves his apartment to buy a bottle of water, he comes up ten cents short and the bodega owner screams that he will call the police on him...etc etc. Basically, the movie is like "what if all the dumb shit you worry about actually came true all at once?"

Beau ends up on a journey to visit his overbearing mother, Mona (played in flashbacks by Zoe Lister-Jones and in present day by Patti LuPone). Of course, this journey is beset with obstacles, including Beau being hit by a car and having to recuperate at a couples' home. The couple, played by Nathan Lane and Amy Ryan, serve to further confuse and frighten Beau, as does their aggressive teenage daughter. Again, nothing is easy for Beau and when tragedy that has nothing to do with him strikes, he is blamed for it and forced to run away. That's another theme of the movie: guilt. Especially too much guilt for small things or things that aren't actually your fault.

Beau is Afraid leans into being outrageous and over-the-top. It would be annoying if the film wasn't so damn funny. The first hour has the most jokes and visual gags-per-minute, but depending on how dark and weird your sense of humor is, there are laughs to be had all the way until the bitter end of this fucked up Freudian nightmare. Aster showed off his sense of humor in Midsommar, which has some pretty funny moments in between a lot of emotionally heavy shit. He goes full-on surrealist comedy with Beau is Afraid. Some of the jokes are hidden in the production design and only visible for a few seconds of the film (for example, Beau is seen warming up a Hawaiian/Irish frozen meal from a company called O'Aloha)...and some of the jokes involve enormous testicles giant penis monsters. I'm not even kidding.

Here are a few ways I described Beau is Afraid to others:

• It's like if Wes Anderson directed a horror movie while on drugs.
• It's like a Hieronymous Bosch painting.
• It reminds me a lot of the show Big Mouth (it has: anthropomorphic genitalia, Richard Kind, Jewish fretting, etc). 

If any of that sounds like your cup of tea, you'll probably enjoy it. If you are confused or turned off by the above statements, you'll probably hate it. It's a very divisive film.

I do have some criticisms of the movie. For one thing, there is zero character growth or change. Beau is Afraid is a journey movie, where a character must travel and overcome obstacles to get to where he is going. Typically, journey movies involve spiritual changes in the main character(s) as well. Beau ends exactly as he begins: a terrified, cowed man, whimpering and blubbering for help and forgiveness. And none of the other characters are in the movie long enough to experience change. 

I was left wondering what the point was. The movie is hilarious and fun to look at, but other than that, it's pretty shallow. Sure, there is "symbolism" and "a message", but unlike Midsommar, which had some interesting things to say about how cults prey on vulnerable people and how grief can lead to profound loneliness, Beau is Afraid doesn't feel like a full meal. It feels like you ate a bag of potato chips and expected to feel full. 

I feel like the plot alone earns a C, but the production design, humor, and sheer audacity of the movie raise it to a B+. It's my third favorite Ari Aster film (not including his short films), but the worst Aster film is still better than a lot of movies. Do I recommend it? Well, you probably already know if you're the kind of person who is going to enjoy, or at least appreciate, this movie. Follow your heart. Or, in this case, your enormous, distended testicles. 

Grade: B+

Stuff I watched in...March, 2023

Triangle of Sadness

Director Ruben Ostlund is the king of taking cringe comedy and turning it into art. I saw his movie Force Majeure a few years ago and loved it. That film is about the breakdown of a family after the father reveals that he would abandon his wife and kids and save himself in a disaster situation--a hilarious and excellent commentary on the absolute house of cards that is the male ego. 

Ostlund's most recent film, nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards this year, is Triangle of Sadness. This time, Ostlund turns his satirical eye towards the extremely wealthy and how useless they are when money and rank are stripped away. The film is broken into three parts. The first part focuses on the relationship between Carl and Yaya (Harris Dickinson and Charlbi Dean), two models who are unspeakably shallow. The second part takes place on a luxury yacht--Yaya and Carl have scored a free vacation in exchange for Yaya promoting the cruise line on her social media. This section of the movie is absolutely hilarious, with mega-wealthy people doing stupid shit like demanding that the entire crew take the day off and go for a swim, which fucks up the schedule and maintenance of the boat and even causes the food served at dinner to go bad, which leads to a long scene of everyone puking everywhere. 

Although most of the actors are unknown to American audiences, Woody Harrelson plays the ship's drunken captain who gets into a playful argument over the values of socialism vs. capitalism with one of the super-wealthy passengers. Most of this argument takes place over the ship's intercom while the majority of the passengers are barfing their guts up due to the spoiled food and intense waves.

The final part of the movie takes place on an island after the yacht is bombed by pirates and sunk. A handful of survivors--some of the them the wealthy passengers and some of them the ship's crew--must work together to stay alive until help arrives. When one of the crew--the woman who cleans toilets--reveals herself to be the only person who can catch fish for food, the power dynamics between the rich and the proletariats comes toppling down.

Triangle of Sadness is hilarious and ridiculous in the most delightful way. Fans of "eat the rich" movies/TV will love it.

Grade: A

***

The Bear

Streaming on Hulu, The Bear was the most critically acclaimed show of 2022. The very short season (8 episodes, about 30 minutes each) follows Carmine "Carmy"Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White, who starred in the show Shameless before this, but I think most people will see The Bear as his breakout role), a James Beard award-winning chef who worked in a Michelin starred restaurant in New York, but moves back to his hometown of Chicago to take over his dead brother's sandwich restaurant. 

Carmy is determined to make over the shitty, yet beloved Original Beef restaurant and turn it into something great, something better. But the crew that worked under his brother's supervision is stubborn as hell and outright hostile, especially Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), a close friend of Carmy's brother. 

On top of this, Mikey Berzatto (Jon Bernthal in flashbacks), the dead brother, was an addict and is dead by his own hand. So Carmy is deep in grief on top of all his other problems. He's so deep in grief, that he doesn't even see it, let alone allow himself to feel the fullness of it. Like a lot of shows and movies coming out these past few years, The Bear is about loss and trauma. 

The Bear is great, although I can't quite give it a straightforward "A" or A+" rating simply because I didn't connect with it as much as I suspect people who have worked in the restaurant industry would connect with it. To say the show is intense would be an understatement--it will give you anxiety. The restaurant industry is mysterious to me and, based on what I've heard, I would prefer it to remain that way because it kind of sounds like hell on earth to work in a restaurant. Instead of working in one, I'll just watch shows and movies like The Bear and The Menu and continue to tip well and be thankful I don't work in such a stressful atmosphere.

Grade: A-

***

Nocebo

I was pleasantly surprised at how good this psychological horror film was. Eva Green plays Christine, a high-powered business woman who designs expensive clothing for children. After receiving some shocking news at work one day, Christine sees a mangy dog who approaches her and shakes, causing a tick to fly off and attach itself to Christine. This seems to just be a stress-induced hallucination, but from that day forward, Christine is plagued with vague health problems that force her to stop working even though she doesn't really have a clear diagnosis. 

One day, a Filipino woman named Diana (Chai Fonacier) arrives on Christine's doorstep, claiming that Christine hired her to help out around the house. Christine has no memory of this, but since forgetfulness is one of the symptoms of her illness, she chalks it up to a faulty memory and invites Diana in. Christine's husband, Felix (Mark Strong) is highly skeptical of Diana and their daughter, Bobs, is cold to Diana at first. However, after Diana's household help and folk remedies appear to be helping Christine, the family (especially Bobs) warms up to Diana.

Ah, but this is a horror film so things are not as they appear. I won't spoil the twist, but I will say that I saw it about a mile away. It's pretty obvious from contextual clues. In fact, maybe it shouldn't even be considered a "twist" at all. In any case, Nocebo roars to an intense climax that had me on the edge of my seat. For fans of psychological thrillers/horror, check out Nocebo. It might be the "cure" to your boredom. 

Grade: B+

***

The Last of Us

I wasn't planning to watch The Last of Us because I don't play vidja games and figured I wouldn't be into it. But when I found out that the infection in the show that turns regular folks into crazed zombies was a fungus--specifically, a cordyceps--I was intrigued. And I am so glad I watched the show because hot damn it is good!

The Last of Us is less about the zombie/fungi apocalypse and more about how people relate to and love one another when the world as we know it has basically ended. If you don't live under a rock, you've probably heard about episode 3, "Long, Long Time", which follows the relationship between survivalist Bill (Nick Offerman) and Frank (Murray Bartlett), a man who accidentally falls into one of Bill's traps. After a lovely meal of rabbit and Chablis, followed by singing some Linda Ronstadt around a piano, Bill and Frank fall deeply in love and live together in Bill's house, which he has made into a fortress, for nearly two decades.

This episode doesn't feature any zombies, it just shows what human relationships might look like in the aftermath of a worldwide calamity that kills like 90% of people. Similarly, the main plot of the show is Pedro Pascal's Joel Miller escorting Bella Ramsey's Ellie to a facility where her seemingly magical ability to be bitten by the zombies but not become infected herself will be studied in the hopes that a cure might be developed. But the REAL story is Joel learning to open his heart to a daughter-figure again, two decades after his daughter was killed when things went to shit after the initial outbreak. 

While there is plenty of action and violence, The Last of Us places the emphasis squarely on "us"--humanity trying not just to survive, but find meaning and joy in that survival in the most dire and soul-crushing situations. 

Grade: A+

***

Boston Strangler

What if Zodiac, but with chicks? Director Matt Ruskin takes heavy inspiration from David Fincher's Zodiac (one of my all-time favorite films) for his film about the journalists who covered the story of a series of stranglings in Boston in the mid-1960s. Sadly, he comes up short. The film is well-acted and the cinematography is slick, but the movie never excites and terrifies in the way you want a true crime thriller to excite and terrify you.

Keira Knightley and Carrie Coon play Loretta McLaughlin and Jean Cole--journalists for the Boston-based newspaper The Record American. Despite pushback from their bosses, the two women pound the pavement to do excellent investigative journalism about a disturbing number of women in Bean Town who have been found strangled to death with their own stockings. It's a fine, but forgettable film, and I'm willing to bet that there's a book, podcast, or documentary about the Boston Strangler that goes into more depth (the murder investigation was indeed complex, and there were likely multiple killers) and is more interesting than this film. I recommend you find that piece of media and enjoy it instead.

Grade: B-

***

Aladdin (1992)

So, obviously I've seen Aladdin before, but probably not in over 20 years. I watched this at my friend's house with her two little ones and the nostalgia hit hard! The songs and animation are top-notch, which is no surprise since this is Renaissance-era Disney. Admittedly, this is not my favorite Disney movie and maybe I'm just a terrible person, but I find Robin Williams' genie a touch annoying (he's A LOT). But overall I can't deny the power of a classic Disney movie. Also, Jafar is fucking cool. All those queer-coded villains from Renaissance Disney are cool. 

Grade: A-

Stuff I watched in...February, 2023

Severance

AppleTV's Severance blew my mind. The TV show, produced by Ben Stiller and starring Adam Scott, is a mix of genres and themes: workplace satire, dark comedy, drama, horror, and science-fiction all rolled into one. 

The show is about a group of people who have undergone a procedure called "severance", where their memories are split, so that while at work, they have no recollection of who they are outside of their job, and while at home, they have no idea what they do at work. In theory, this "fixes" the work-life balance issue by making it literally impossible to think about work while at home. But in reality, it means that a person's work-self, or "innie" as they call it, never leaves the workplace. They get on the elevator to go home at the end of the day and then the elevator opens and they're at work again. It's like going under anesthesia--they simply have no concept of time passing.

We learn that Adam Scott's character, Mark, decided to try severance as a way to deal with the grief of losing his wife in a car accident. Obviously, the show has a lot to say about grief and how, basically, it's healthy to allow yourself to grieve and not healthy to try and avoid it. Scott is just transcendent in his nuanced portrayal of a man who has not allowed himself to feel his feelings and is now on the verge of alcoholism and is suffering so greatly, despite literally not thinking about his wife for 40 hours a week. He takes that grief with him to work, even if his "innie" doesn't understand what's going on.

All the actors in this show, including veterans like John Turturro, Christopher Walken, and Patricia Arquette and lesser known actors, like Zach Cherry, Britt Lower, and Trammel Tillman, give top-notch performances. The characters all feel three-dimensional, with complex and sometimes conflicting motivations. The acting and writing make Severance a show that is both intellectually fascinating and deeply humane and empathetic. It's one of the best shows I've seen in a while and I can't recommend it enough. 

Grade: A+

***

Desert Hearts

I actually watched this delightful sapphic romance at the end of January, and failed to include it in my last monthly round-up. Many thanks to my friend Kyle for suggesting this wonderful film!

Directed by Donna Deitch, Desert Hearts is a 1985 drama-romance which takes place in 1959 (which is like if a movie that came out this year was set in 1997, which is bizarre to think about...but I digress). Professor Vivian Bell travels to Reno, Nevada for a quickie Reno divorce (if you have no idea what I'm talking about, here is some more information). She rents a room at a ranch owned by a woman named Frances. 

Uptight Vivian meets free-spirited Cay, a younger woman who works at a casino and is a lesbian. Since this is 1959, the fact that Cay is gay is an open secret, but not really discussed. Over the course of her six-week stay in Reno, Vivian falls for Cay and the two begin a relationship. The film captures Vivian's reluctance, which almost verges on non-consent, making this a movie that is at odds with modern sensibilities but probably historically accurate. Vivian says "no" to Cay multiple times, but Cay gently pushes Vivian out of her comfort zone and the two women begin a sexual relationship.

The film ends on an ambiguous note that feels right for the story. There is no clear "happily ever after" ending, but rather an ending filled with hope and potential. It reminded me a lot of Carol in that way, another sapphic romance that ends with possibility and ambiguity. 

Desert Hearts is a bittersweet film: bitter in that these two women can't live life as openly as they deserve, but sweet in that they still have the courage to try. 

Grade: B+

***

Piggy

This Spanish film, directed by Carlota Pereda, follows Sara (Laura Galán), a fat teenager who is mercilessly bullied by three popular girls, including Claudia, her childhood friend. After a particularly traumatic run-in with the girls, Sara later witnesses the kidnapping of her bullies. Timid Sara is too scared to tell anyone what she saw, but still tries to find out what happened to the popular girls.

Piggy is a difficult watch and takes a lot of unexpected turns, not all of which I liked. Be warned that the bullying scenes in this movie are BRUTAL. Galán gives a truly vulnerable performance that is almost...too vulnerable at times. I thought this would be a movie where a weak character becomes a badass and, well, that's not quite what happens. Despite being brave enough to try to track down the whereabouts of the kidnapped girls, Sara has this overall vibe of passivity and victimhood which--though completely understandable based on what the character goes through--got old by the end of the movie. I kind of appreciate that Piggy does not have a generic and pat "every body is beautiful!" message. But I just wanted the character to be, like, 10-20% stronger.

Like Carrie, Piggy is a brutal movie about bullying and violence. It's definitely original and features an actress who is actually fat (and cute as a button, in my opinion), which is awesome. Although Sara is the butt of the joke to her tormentors, the movie itself does not make a joke of her, which is refreshing.

Grade: B

***

Swallowed

Directed by Carter Smith, this queer body-horror movie about a drug deal gone horribly wrong should not be watched by those with weak stomachs. Cooper Koch plays Benjamin, a young, gay man about to move to L.A. to become a porn star. His friend, Dom (Jose Colon), wants to send Benji off with some extra cash, so he offers to do a drug run for his cousin. But his cousin is passed out and the mid-level dealer is a very mean woman named Alice (Jena Malone) who ends up forcing Dom to swallow condoms filled with drugs at gunpoint. She then directs the young men to meet her at a rest stop over the border (maybe I'm dumb, but I couldn't figure out if this was at the Canadian border or the Mexican border...I think Canadian, since someone mentions being from Maine at one point). 

After Benji and Dom have a run in with a homophobic redneck at the rest stop and Dom gets punched in the stomach...things go awry. Alice has to take the ill Dom and concerned Benji to her boss's house, and her boss is one mean sonofabitch. And he wants those drugs out of Dom's system right now. No matter how much, uh, vaseline it takes. Yeah...when you swallow drugs, they have to come out the other end sooner or later. 

Swallowed is very much a queer horror movie in that the characters are queer, the actors are queer, the director is (I think?) queer, and the themes of the movie are queer. So if you are pissed that They/Them sucked as a queer horror movie, Swallowed might be more up your alley...or down your hatch, as it were.  

Grade: B+

***

Barton Fink

My friend encouraged me to watch this Coen brothers movie for the first time in...20 years? I saw Barton Fink in late high school and wasn't a huge fan of it, but this time around I really enjoyed it. It has that classic Coen bros fast-and-furious dialogue and characters that feel simultaneously cartoonish and lived in. 

John Turturro (so young!!) plays the titular Barton Fink, a New York-based playwright who moves to LA to start working in movies. He is given an assignment to write a script for a wrestling B-movie (the is the early 1940s, by the way) and immediately becomes blocked...probably because he thinks the material is beneath him. Fink moves into a weird, dilapidated hotel and befriends his neighbor, Charlie Meadows (John Goodman, just wild in this movie), a cheerful--almost too cheerful--and loquacious man. 

Barton Fink isn't super plot-driven. It's more about the many colorful and strange people Fink meets out in LA, including the perpetually drunk writer W.P. Mayhew (John Mahoney) whom Fink worships, even though the man is clearly a hack and a piece of shit. 

Barton Fink is one of those movies that's very, very sad...but also hilarious. The film is closer to the Coens' A Serious Man than to their more light-hearted comedies like The Big Lebowski. It's a movie about a man (Fink) who is almost willfully naive and ultimately doesn't know what he wants, so instead of adapting to his circumstances, he just flounders and then fails. If you're in the mood for a brainier, more intense Coen brothers movie, you can't go wrong with this one.

Grade: B+

***

Insomnia

This early Christopher Nolan movie is...fine? A remake of a Norwegian film, Insomnia follows veteran detective Will Dormer (Al Pacino) and his partner Hap Eckhart (Martin Donavan) as they travel from Los Angeles to the small fishing village of Nightmute, Alaska to solve the case of a dead 17-year old girl. 

It's summer in Alaska, and so it doesn't get dark at night. Dormer can't sleep and the insomnia (we have a title!) is causing him to freak out. It doesn't help that he knows that his partner, Eckhart, is going to testify against him in an Internal Affairs investigation about whether or not Dormer planted evidence at a crime scene years ago. 

I don't think it's a spoiler to say that the bad guy is played by Robin Williams. In the early 2000s, Williams began playing more villains and, honestly, it's always been a little hard to see him as the bad guy. He's not super believable as a killer in Insomnia, though he definitely comes off as creepy. 

Insomnia is not Nolan's strongest work. Hell, it's not the strongest work of anyone involved in the movie. If you like hard-boiled detective stories, you'll probably enjoy it. Otherwise, feel free to skip this one.

Grade: B-

***

Wayne's World

My friend wanted to watch a funny, chill movie one night so we decided on Penelope Spheeris' classic, Wayne's World. I hadn't seen the movie in years and I was struck by how much of the movie focuses on a woman (Cassandra--played by the lovely Tia Carrere) and her journey. Like, obviously Wayne (Mike Meyers) and Garth (Dana Carvey) are the main characters, but Cassandra (Wayne's love interest) has a lot of screen time too. In fact, I'd say that you can tell this movie was directed and co-written by women because, even for it being 1992, there are not a ton of cheap jokes about women. 

I have to admit I don't find Wayne's World to be the funniest movie of all time--probably because I don't really find Mike Meyers all that funny--but it's still got some great moments and Garth is sweet as all hell. It's just a goofy, fun comedy that goes down real easy and is a perfect movie for when you're feeling stressed out or down in the dumps. 

Grade: B

Sicko Mode

Movies: Infinity Pool

Brandon Cronenberg's latest movie is wild as fuck. As Stefon, Bill Hader's SNL character, might say, this movie has it all: executions, cum-shots, creepy masks, Alexander Skarsgard led around naked on a dog leash. It truly is a sick, twisted, and fucked up movie and, brother, I was here for it.

Skarsgard plays James, a writer vacationing in the fictional country of Li Tolqa with his wealthy wife, Em (Cleopatra Coleman). Because Li Tolqa is a very poor, very crime-ridden country, James and Em are staying at a resort where tourists are not allowed to leave the resort compound. The couple meets Gabi (Mia Goth) and Alban (Jalil Lespert), a rich couple who regularly travel to Li Tolqa. They convince Em and James to borrow a car, leave the resort, and go to the beach for a day. On the drive home, a drunken James hits and kills a local. The next morning he is arrested and told that the punishment for murder--even accidental murder--is death.

BUT! Since Li Tolqa relies so heavily on tourism they have a workaround for when a tourist commits a crime: James can pay "a significant sum" to be doubled. Like, literally, they create a copy of James that is identical in every way and even shares James' memories. The double can be executed in James' place. After watching his double get stabbed to death by the 13 year old son of the man he killed, James is...intrigued. Em decides she wants to go home immediately, but James claims to lose his passport and encourages Em to leave without him. He then gets invited to a party where Gabi and Alban introduce him to a group of friends who have all experienced the doubling process themselves. They basically treat it as a "get out of jail free" card...only it's not free. But these folks are wildly rich, so they can pay to have multiple doubles created and killed in their stead.

What follows is a fever dream of drugs, crime, violence, and debauched sex. The group, led by Gabi, push and pull James deeper and deeper into their fucked up games of dominance and submission. Infinity Pool is kinky. And in a way that only people who are actually into kink would understand. One comment I read said that this is an entire movie about a man with a humiliation fetish, and that's pretty accurate. Alexander Skarsgard plays James as a man who allows himself to be pushed around, insulted, and peer-pressured by other people--in particular, by beautiful women. His own wife acts cold and dismissive around him--even insulting him in front of others. Despite seeming to be bewildered by it all, James never really pushes back. One might even say that he...enjoys such treatment. 

The 6'4" actor walks with a hunch, even before all the crazy shit goes down. He has bags under his eyes. He looks like shit the entire movie--quite an accomplishment, given that Skarsgard is considered to be a supremely good-looking man. But this handsome giant is brought low by the tiny Mia Goth...yelled at, mocked, teased, and even lead around on a dog leash. This movie is definitely someone's fetish. 

But putting aside the kinky elements for just a moment...what is this movie actually *about*? Well, it's not exactly ground-breaking: it's about how rich people get away with everything. How indulging in life-ruining activities are just a bit of vacation fun for the super-wealthy. There's a great scene at the end of the movie where they're all taking a bus to the airport and talking about mundane shit like rearranging the furniture at home and picking up the house key from the nanny. This very normal conversation comes after some batshit crazy behavior, highlighting the fact that for these people even the most heinous crimes are nothing more than a trifle, soon to be fun memories as they return to their normal lives.

The use of both doubling and masks (Li Tolqa has a cultural thing for masks, and the group wears some really creepy ones while committing crimes) is pretty obviously symbolic of "shadow selves"--how we can compartmentalize our actions when we do bad things and convince ourselves that we're not bad people. Wearing a mask lowers our inhibitions (this is an actual psychological phenomenon) and in the world of Infinity Pool, a double is like a mask on steroids. Imagine what you would be capable of if you knew that someone else--another version of you--would pay the penalty and you would get away scot-free. 

I don't really think Infinity Pool says anything new or groundbreaking. It's the same old story: "the rich are different than you and me". But damn if it isn't a fun ride. Not to be an edgelord, but this movie is not for the faint of heart. It's got buckets of cum, blood, and piss. It's got mind-boggling hallucinogenic imagery (it even has a flashing lights warning at the beginning of the film). But as a certified Sicko, I enjoyed the hell out of it. 

Grade: B+

Stuff I watched in...January, 2023

Readers--I watched a lot of movies in January! The theme of the month seems to be "dark" as most of these films fall into the dark comedy, intense drama, or straight-up horror categories.

***

The Apartment

This 1960 comedy is directed by Billy Wilder and stars Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. Lemmon plays Baxter, an office worker who allows his bosses the use of his apartment as a place where they can go to cheat on their wives. He develops a crush on Fran (MacLaine), the elevator operator, who is the mistress of Sheldrake (Fred MacMurray), a bigwig who uses Baxter's apartment. The movie takes a very dark turn when Sheldrake takes Fran to Baxter's apartment on Christmas and basically treats her like a whore--giving her a "Christmas present" of $100 before leaving to be with his wife. Fran attempts to overdose on Baxter's sleeping pills and Baxter finds her before she dies and manages to get the doctor next door to revive her. As Fran recovers over the next couple days in Baxter's home, the two grow closer.

Damn y'all, this was a good movie. And I was not expecting the suicide scene to be so intense. Jack Lemmon is known for playing goofballs, but he really brings out the dramatic acting chops during the suicide/recovery scene. The Apartment reminds me a lot of Mad Men--but the parts of Mad Men where the characters suffer for their poor choices. If you're looking for a movie that doesn't romanticize the mid-twentieth century and shows that people were just as horny, drunk, sad, and cruel back then as they are today, this is your movie!

Grade: A-

***

In the Heat of the Night

Speaking of people being cruel in the mid-twentieth century... In the Heat of the Night is a 1967 crime movie directed by Norman Jewison and starring the indomitable Sidney Poitier as Virgil Tibbs, a homicide detective from Philadelphia traveling through Sparta, Mississippi to visit his mother. When a rich local man is murdered, Tibbs is arrested for basically being Black and near the body. When Chief of Police Bill Gillespie (Rod Steiger) realizes Tibbs is innocent and also, like, really really good at being a homicide detective, he asks him (with the insistence of the dead man's widow) to stay and help them with the case.

Only problem is that Tibbs is Black and this is Mississippi in the 1960s. So Tibbs is constantly in danger of being killed by the hicks in town. Poitier has this badass scene where they visit this rich racist and the racist slaps Tibbs and then Tibbs slaps him back and the rich racist basically cries like a little piss-baby about it. I just wish that Tibbs had slapped him harder.

Gillespie, who is also a racist, grows to respect Tibbs and protects him as best he can from the racist trash losers in town. However, don't go thinking this movie is super progressive. It's doing the best it can in 1967. Tibbs has to be THE BEST at his job to even get begrudging respect from Gillespie. And art reflects life: Poitier had to play dignified, intelligent, nearly angelic characters to get respect in Hollywood as a Black man. 

In the Heat of the Night is an interesting film, in that it is both dated and forward-thinking simultaneously. It's worth watching for Poitier's stellar performance. 

Grade: B+

***

Fire of Love

Fire of Love is a documentary about a couple, Katia and Maurice Krafft, who were volcanologists and captured unbelievable footage of active volcanoes before the were both killed by...you guessed it...a volcano in 1991.

The footage in this doc is truly amazing. I only wish I had a larger TV to watch it on. The rest of the movie about Katia and Maurice is not as compelling, so I found the movie beautiful but boring. Definitely recommended for fans of nature documentaries, though.

Grade: B-

***

Some Like it Hot

There's a good chance I've reviewed Some Like it Hot on this blog already because I watch it every couple of years. What can I say? It's a classic, and for good reason. Directed by Billy Wilder, and starring Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, and Marilyn Monroe, Some Like it Hot is one of--if not the--best comedies of all time. 

Also, this movie is SUPER GAY. I mean, there's the cross-dressing aspect, obviously. But even the straight parts of the movie are queer AF. The movie is also funny AF and in a way that still feels fresh over 60 years later. 

There's really nothing more to say. If you haven't seen Some Like it Hot, what are you even doing with your life. Go watch it immediately. 

Grade: A+

***

The Slums of Beverly Hills

This low-key coming of age comedy was my jam when I was a teenager. Directed by Tamara Jenkins and starring everyone's crush, Natasha Lyonne (as well as Marisa Tomei, Alan Arkin, and Jessica Walter), The Slums of Beverly Hills takes place in 1976. Ne'er do well Murray Abromowitz (Arkin) is a poor man who hustles, lies, and cheats for every penny (and has a gambling addiction, which doesn't help). He drags his three kids from cheap apartment to cheap apartment, always staying within Beverly Hills for the good schools. 

His daughter, Vivian (Lyonne), is 14 years old and hates this lifestyle. When Murray takes in his niece, Rita (Marisa Tomei), a fellow fuck-up who has been in and out of rehab and has never held down a job, Rita serves as a feminine--and questionable--influence on Vivian.

Although the movie is hilarious, it has a very dark streak. Vivian is surrounded by unstable people right when she needs stability the most. The film has a "family--even fucked up family--is important" message, but that message is shot-through with sadness, given that Murray is not that great of a father. When I was younger, I didn't really feel the heaviness of The Slums of Beverly Hills, but as an adult...woo, baby. Still, it's a great movie with a ton of excellent actors.

Grade: A-

***

Jawbreaker

Jawbreaker is a very dark teen comedy that was panned when it came out in 1999, but I think has cult status potential today. The movie stars Judy Greer, Rose McGowan, Rebecca Gayheart...and freakin' Pam Grier (Coffey herself!) as a detective. McGowan, Gayheart, and Julie Benz play Courtney, Julie, and Marcie--popular girls with deep mean streaks. Their clique is rounded out by Liz Purr (Charlotte Ayanna), who is very kind--in addition to being beautiful, rich, and smart--thus universally beloved at Reagan High School, much to the chagrin of Courtney. 

On Liz's 17th birthday, the girls kidnap her to take her out for breakfast. However, because Courtney shoves a huge jawbreaker candy in Liz's mouth, Liz chokes to death and the girls have to cover up the accidental death. When deeply unpopular Fern Mayo (Judy Greer) finds out what happened, Courtney offers to make Fern beautiful and popular in exchange for her silence and Fern reluctantly agrees. But when Fern--renamed "Vylette" by Courtney--becomes even more popular than Courtney, things get rough.

Jawbreaker is campy, brutal, and candy-colored. It also has a wicked good soundtrack, with Imperial Teen's "Yoo Hoo" as the cherry on top of this poison pastry of a film. This movie straight up scared the hell out of me when I saw it as a teen because of all the bad behavior and mean girl shenanigans, but as an adult I see the dark humor of it all.

Grade: A-

***

Pet Sematary

This 1989 adaptation of Stephen King's horror novel about an indigenous burial ground that resurrects whomever is buried in it is wildly campy, but also has some truly upsetting moments. Directed by Mary Lambert, the movie begins with the Creed family--doctor Louis, wife Rachel, and kids Ellie and Gage--moving to a small town in Maine where Louis takes a job as a physician at the University of Maine.

The family makes the incredibly bad choice of moving to a house near a busy road that a lot of trucks barrel down. Their neighbor, Jud Crandall (played by Herman Munster himself, Fred Gwynne), warns the family to be careful of the road and takes them to a nearby "Pet Sematary" where children have buried their beloved pets over the decades. 

When Rachel, Gage, and Ellie are away on a trip, Louis discovers that the family cat, Church, has been run over. Jud takes Louis to a second cemetery hidden beyond the first one and explains that it is the traditional burial ground of the Mi'kmaq people and if you bury an animal in the ground, it will come back. Louis, who can't bear to tell Ellie that Church is dead, buries the feline in the enchanted (or cursed) ground and...sure enough...the cat comes back. Only it's a mean sonofabitch now.

Surprise fucking surprise, can you guess who dies next? That's right--toddler Gage gets hit by a truck, which leads to one of the most honest and devastating scenes in the movie: Louis' father-in-law, who already hates him, insults him at his own son's funeral and Louis punches the motherfucker. Even though Pet Sematary is filled with campy special effects and make-up, I have to say that its approach to death and grief is on the money. People react to grief in pretty wild ways, so this funeral-punching scene, while dramatic, felt pretty honest.

Of course, dumbass Louis puts Gage in the burial ground and Gage comes back as a little monster who wants to kill everyone. Whatever animatronics or effects they used for killer Gage was...not great and inadvertently made the final part of the movie hilarious. But I feel like the horror of Pet Sematary isn't the killer zombie toddler, but about how people CANNOT deal with death. There is a conflict that sets off the entire chain of events between Louis and Rachel: Rachel doesn't want to have an honest conversation with their daughter Ellie about death, which inspires Louis to bring Church back to life (thus, learning about the power of the Mi'kmaq burial ground) rather than, um, teach a 7 year old about death. 

So, the real horror of Pet Sematary is bad parenting and adults not facing their own trauma, thus passing it on to their children. King is really good at writing about trauma and bad parenting. It doesn't always translate well to the big screen, but the overall idea behind Pet Sematary is excellent. The movie is...ok. But I think I'm going to check out the book.

Grade: B-

***

The Advent Calendar

The Advent Calendar is a Shudder original film about a wheelchair-bound woman who is gifted an old, wooden advent calendar that a friend stole from a German flea market. When they open it, the calendar presents them with a set of rules: if you dump the calendar, you'll die. If you eat the first piece of candy, you have to eat all the candy in the calendar. And you have to follow the commands of the calendar or you'll die.

Main character Eva discovers that by following the rules of the calendar, wonderful things happen: she gets immediately rich through investing, she is able to make a man fall wildly in love with her, and most importantly, she can walk again. Since Eva was a dancer before her accident, the ability to walk again is truly a miracle to her. But--no shocker here--it all comes at a terrible, murderous price. 

This was a fine movie to while away an evening, but it's nothing to write home about. Like most Shudder originals, it's good, but not great. 

Grade: B-

***

The Special

The Special is a movie where a guy, Jerry, is dragged to a brothel by a friend and given "the special"--literally a box you stick your dick into. Whatever is in that box is SO amazing and insanely orgasm-inducing that Jerry is willing to commit crimes--including murder--to put his johnson in it again. He steals the box and what follows is some of the most disgusting body horror I've ever seen. It's kind of like David Cronenberg's The Fly, if The Fly was a very bad movie about a guy sticking his junk into a box. 

This is a TERRIBLE movie. The acting is laughable, the dialogue is horrendous, the plot is ludicrous. The whole thing is so amateur, it hurts. But it's also entertaining because it's about a guy sticking his hog into a mysterious box. How would that not be entertaining? 

Watch at your own risk of either being disgusted by the body horror or the bad dialogue.

Grade: D+

***

The Apology

Another Shudder original, The Apology stars Anna Gunn (better known as Skyler White from Breaking Bad) as Darlene, recovering alcoholic whose daughter went missing twenty years prior. She is preparing to host Christmas at her house for the first time since her daughter's disappearance, but Darlene is far from ok. She is still holding out hope that her daughter will someday be found.

Just as Darlene is about to break her 19 years of sobriety with a good bottle of vodka, she hears a knock on the door. It's her ex brother-in-law Jack (Linus Roache) who claims his car broke down a few streets over. He was planning on coming to Christmas as a surprise. As Jack and Darlene catch-up, the conversation takes a dark turn when Jack reveals that he knows something about Darlene's daughter's disappearance and wants to alleviate some of Darlene's suffering by telling her what he knows. But will the revelations break Darlene? Or empower her to move on? You'll have to watch to find out!

The Apology is a solid thriller that rests entirely on Anna Gunn and Linus Roache's shoulders (Janeane Garofalo has a wonderful supporting role as Darlene's neighbor and best friend, Gretchen). Gunn is just wonderful as a woman whose guilt and complicated grief have held her back for 20 years. She portrays emotional agony and rage so well (I've always been annoyed at how viewers hated her character in Breaking Bad while loving Bryan Cranston's character. That's misogyny, folks!). Roache is perfect as a selfish scumbag. The Apology is not a feel-good movie at all, and in fact my anxiety was palpable throughout the whole movie. So watch at your own emotional risk!

Grade: B