Red One (2024) * *

 

Directed by:  Jake Kasdan

Starring:  Dwayne Johnson, Chris Evans, Lucy Liu, JK Simmons, Kiernan Shipka, Bonnie Hunt, Kristofer Hivju

Red One feels like Blue Christmas.  It has a gray pall hanging over it even in the scenes where the sun shines.  Dwayne Johnson plays Callum, Santa Claus' head of security who plans to leave his post after several hundred years of service to Saint Nick (JK Simmons).  Callum has lost faith in humanity as he realizes the naughty list seems to grow longer each year.  Santa asks for Callum to believe in people, but glum Callum insists on tapping out.  However, the night before Christmas Eve, Santa is kidnapped by a witch named Gryla (Shipka), who also believes humanity is irredeemable and wants to imprison every person on the naughty list.  She holds him hostage and slowly saps his strength, which is considerable if you take into account how he's able to deliver billions of presents in one night.  

Simmons gives us a buff Santa Claus who needs to stay in shape to complete his duty on Christmas Eve.  No plump Santa in this movie.  Johnson, however, plays Callum as taciturn and gloomy when he should be having more fun.  The movie itself sets the same tone.  The heavily CGI-laden action scenes take up several minutes at a time, but the stakes just aren't there.  When Callum recruits expert hacker Jack O'Malley (Evans), who unwittingly gave the coordinates of the North Pole compound to Gryla, they go through the cop-buddy movie routine of dislike turning into like.  Neither actor seems to be enjoying himself.  They're going through the motions. 

Red One is not going to establish itself as a holiday classic anytime soon.  It's an action comedy with emphasis on action and not comedy, but soon we grow tired of both.  I enjoyed Simmons playing Santa not as a world-weary man, but as an ambassador of hope who just keeps plugging away until people's better nature takes over.  The rest of the movie feels very much defeated.  

Heretic (2024) * * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Scott Beck and Bryan Woods

Starring:  Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, Chloe East

The opening scenes of Heretic are riveting, but when the plot mechanics set in and the mystery lifts, Heretic morphs into an average thriller where characters miraculously survive lethal stab wounds.  Heretic takes place mostly within the home of Mr. Reed (Grant), a seemingly genial man who welcomes two Mormons who knock on his front door into his home.  The women are Sister Barnes (Thatcher) and Sister Paxton (East), who came to the house because Mr. Reed filled out a card expressing interest in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  

Mr. Reed is welcoming, awkwardly charming, and is baking a blueberry pie, as the aroma of the house would indicate.  The sisters state a woman must be present, and Mr. Reed assures them his wife is in the other room but shy about coming out to the living room.  The sisters take that explanation at face value, but soon find Mr. Reed isn't what he seems.  He engages them in a conversation about religion, but he clearly has an issue with the concept of religion and faith.  He says he has found "the one true religion", which the women discover to their horror later.  

Hugh Grant began his career as a romantic lead, but he is also an expert cad and villain.  He gives a fascinating performance here as a man who is angered by the idea of believing in a God who would allow these kind women to be fed to wolves like him.  In his mind, God has abandoned us.  The women try not to believe that, but it's hard to doubt the mounting evidence.  No matter whether Sisters Barnes and Paxton agree with Mr. Reed or not, their fate is sealed.  East and Thatcher provide effective counterpoints as two young missionaries who are naive and entirely too polite to protest and try to escape when it's clear early that Mr. Reed is deranged.   

Heretic's setup is so effective that the payoff can't possibly match it.  The final act morphs into the typical, which is a pity because the early atmosphere is suspenseful and creepy.  Heretic is a movie which can't quite grab the greatness within its grasp. 

City of Lies (2021) * *

 

Directed by: Brad Furman

Starring:  Johnny Depp, Forest Whitaker, Shea Whigham, Neil Brown, Jr., Dayton Callie

Brad Furman's City of Lies delves into the unsolved murder of Chris Wallace (aka The Notorious B.I.G.), the famous rapper shot and killed in the wee hours of the morning of March 9, 1997.  This was nearly six months after Tupac Shakur's slaying on the Las Vegas strip.  The media speculated an "East Coast/West Coast" feud between rivaling artists.  Detective Russell Poole (Depp) is assigned to the case and finds he is stonewalled because some LAPD cops moonlight for Death Row executive Marion "Suge" Knight and Notorious B.I.G.'s death opens a Pandora's Box of LAPD corruption.

City of Lies opens nearly twenty years after Wallace's shooting, with Poole still trying to piece together who shot Wallace.  He kept a promise to Wallace's mother Voletta (playing herself) to solve the murder, even after he was kicked off the case and forced to retire.  Poole teams up with journalist Jack Jackson (Whitaker), who is writing a historical article on Wallace and finds himself trying to solve the murder as well.   Was Poole ousted because he was coming too close to the truth which would blow the lid off of the department's corruption?  They've already taken a hit with Rodney King, OJ Simpson, and the Rampart investigations.  Being implicated in Wallace's death would be one more turn of the screw.

Despite the strong performance by Depp as a dogged, but world-weary former detective, and some solid supporting work, City of Lies buckles under its own weight.  It doesn't crackle with intensity like a superb police procedural should.  It never lifts off, even though the public remains interested in the high-profile unsolved murder.  How is it Wallace's killing is still not solved nearly thirty years later?  City of Lies believes it has the answer, but it scarcely brings those answers to life.  

Here (2024) * * *

 

Directed by:  Robert Zemeckis

Starring:  Tom Hanks, Paul Bettany, Robin Wright, Kelly Reilly

Robert Zemeckis' Here is an experiment in which a camera is planted in a spot and documents what happened in that spot throughout history.  The movie starts with the dinosaurs up to the present day, with multiple stories zig-zagging through time.  The bulk of Here takes place in a living room in a suburban Pennsylvania house.  Across the street is an old colonial home once owned by Benjamin Franklin, and the land on which these homes are built are ancient Native American tribal lands.  We meet the owners from the 1910's through the 2020 COVID pandemic.   My girlfriend told me that the movie reminded her of Disney World's Carousel of Progress only with sad parts.  It is an astute observation, and Here manages to be more than that.  Some parts are hokey, but others earn the audience's emotional response.

Here's main storyline focuses on the Young family, with WWII veteran Al Young (Bettany) and his wife Rose (Reilly) buying the home shortly after the end of the Second World War.  They settle into suburban life, raising three children with the oldest being Richard, who will grow up to be played by Tom Hanks.  Hanks is a gifted artist, but at eighteen knocks up his high-school sweetheart Margaret (Wright) and marries her.  Richard abandons his plans at an art career to raise his daughter in his father's home.  Meanwhile, Margaret laments the sacrifices she made for her family and verbalizes them at her 50th surprise birthday party. 

After a shaky start, I began to appreciate Here's sweep through time.  Zemeckis' style doesn't dominate the story and the characters.   Hanks and Wright, even de-aged, are still effective while harkening back to their pairing in Forrest Gump.  Could I have done without the time-jumping aspect?  Yes, a linear story framing would've worked well, but I was still moved by what's presented in the film.                                   

The Old Man (Season Two on FX) * *

 

Starring: Jeff Bridges, John Lithgow, Alia Shawkat, Amy Brenneman, Joel Grey, Navid Negahban

The first season of The Old Man was terrific.  It told the story of former CIA operative Dan Chase (Bridges), who is forced out of hiding by assassins working for an Afghan warlord Faraz Hamzad (Neghban) looking for personal payback.  It turns out Dan fled Afghanistan with the warlord's wife and baby daughter Parwana, who grew up believing she was Dan's biological child.  The mother passed away and Parwana (Shawkat) goes by the name Abby Chase but also Angela Adams when she is working for the FBI under Harold Harper (Lithgow), who aided Chase in smuggling Hamzad's family out.  

The finale of season one saw Parwana/Angela/Abby kidnapped successfully by Hamzad and brought to his village where he controls a lucrative lithium mine in Afghanistan.  Parwana doesn't put up much of a fight in her acceptance of the villainous Hamzad and her family she never met.  Soon, Parwana's concern for her family outweighs her loyalty to Dan and Harold as they travel to Afghanistan to rescue her.   The first season's complicated history between Dan and Harold was in the forefront and it crackled.  In the second season, they bicker like Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau in Grumpy Old Men, but that is the depth of their relationship. 

Season two meanders often, with Dan and Harold trying to save Parwana (who isn't exactly jumping for joy at the prospect of being saved), and then uncovering a conspiracy involving Russians trying to usurp control of the mine and wipe out the villagers.   This involves a visit to their mentor Morgan Bote (Grey), who is pulling the strings behind the scenes, although how he is doing so isn't fully explained.  Morgan has Dan's lady friend Zoe (Brennaman) with him when Dan and Harold drop in.  Was she kidnapped?  Did she go willingly?  There is no explanation on that either. 

Bridges and Lithgow shine even if the plot and subplots weigh them down.  I feel Lithgow is the heart of the show, acting as Dan's conscience while seemingly one step behind the plot as we are.  Harper halfway still believes in institutions like the FBI and CIA, even while seeing their handiwork firsthand.  The first three episodes drag, with endless dialogue and Parwana's monologues about how she found what was missing from her in Afghanistan.   Things perk up occasionally after that, and who knew being kidnapped could be such a positive experience?  

 

Conclave (2024) * * *

 

Directed by:  Edward Berger

Starring:  Ralph Fiennes, John Lithgow, Stanley Tucci, Isabella Rossellini, Carlos Diehz, Sergio Castellitto, Lucian Msamati

You wouldn't expect the conclave to elect a new pope would be the backdrop for a suspenseful thriller, but Conclave operates quite well within those parameters.  In the opening scenes of Conclave, the pope is on his deathbed and surrounded by the cardinals who aspire to take his place.  Among them is Dean Cardinal Thomas Lawrence (Fiennes), who is put in charge of the conclave which will elect a successor.  

Lawrence himself is not campaigning to be pope, but he has his supporters.  He is as close to saintly as one could be, perhaps naively believing everyone in the Vatican is there to serve God and only God.  He will learn the hard way that this isn't the way things are.  Various cardinals jockey for position to win the title of Pope.  Among them are Cardinal Tremblay (Lithgow), the last cardinal to meet with the pontiff when he was alive, and may or may not be involved in a financial scheme while also allegedly trying to besmirch Cardinal Adeyemi (Msamati) with issues from his past.  Tremblay fervently denies wrongdoing, but we know better than to take him at face value.

Also in the running is Cardinal Tedesco (Castellitto), a conservative cardinal who laments the direction the church has taken and wishes to restore more traditional values, Cardinal Bellini (Tucci), who is against all of Tedesco's ideas and is Lawrence's best friend, and the newest member of the conclave, Cardinal Benitez (Diehz), who arrives secretly at the behest of the late pope.  As the daily voting takes place, candidates gain and lose ground, while others steadily climb.  Lawrence uncovers each cardinal's secrets, and navigates the territory while trying to keep his faith in the system.  Fiennes, a brilliant actor, is a sympathetic lead we can most identify with.  

The cast, of course, is stellar and how could it not be?  They could make reading a phone book compelling (if there are any of those anymore).  Conclave operates on the level of suspense and behind-the-scenes negotiating, bickering, and politics which make up this process.  Is it realistic or accurate?  I have no clue, but what's here is compelling.  The ending may appear to be a swerve for swerve's sake, but it raises questions about not only the direction of the Catholic Church, but about how many strings the late pope was pulling even from beyond the grave.  Would Catholics dismiss the movie out of hand for being "anti-Vatican" or would they follow it and be entertained?  I found myself siding with the latter point of view.  

Venom: The Last Dance (2024) * *

 

Directed by:  Kelly Marcel

Starring:  Tom Hardy, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Juno Temple, Stephen Graham, Rhys Ifans, Peggy Lu, Alanna Ubach, Andy Serkis, Clark Backo

Venom: The Last Dance is the third in this Marvel trilogy of a symbiote from another planet which co-inhabits the body of Eddie Brock (Hardy).  After three films, the two have a funny chemistry which isn't explored enough.  Instead, the movie concentrates more on an alien invasion which had to be explained and from what I could see, they're here to take over the world somehow and the symbiotes that are being studied in a lab below Area 51 can stop them.  The plot itself is a mess, but Hardy redeems the movie somewhat. 

I don't know if studied is the correct word.  They hang in suspended animation in large jars with doctors marveling at them, while another is inside a prisoner (Graham) who tells the doctors and military commander Rex Strickland (Ejiofor) of an imminent invasion.  Meanwhile, Eddie and Venom are on the run from the government for events from the second film which I can't remember to save my life.  I gave Venom: Let There Be Carnage a positive review, mostly because of the solidified relationship between Eddie and Venom.   This third and tired installment doesn't even choose to fall back on that positive development.  

Hardy is up to the task of giving us a sympathetic Brock who has learned to how to co-exist with Venom and vice versa.  There is even a scene in which he dons a tuxedo to get into a Vegas casino with a strict dress code.  This is likely a tip of the cap to the persistent rumors that Hardy is running to play the next James Bond.  He looks the part, although, like Venom, the Bond series should rest in peace.