Project Hail Mary (2026) * *

 

Directed by:  Phil Lord and Christopher Miller

Starring:  Ryan Gosling, Sandra Huller, Lionel Boyce, voice of James Ortiz

If Project Hail Mary feels eerily like The Martian (2015), it is because both are Andy Weir novels adapted by Drew Goddard.  The Martian is more upbeat even though its protagonist is stranded on Mars alone and has to come up with ways to communicate with NASA and pray for a timely rescue.  Project Hail Mary despite giving its hero Dr. Ryland Grace (Gosling) an alien lifeform to play off of, threatens to collapse under its own heavy atmosphere.  It reminded me of Interstellar (2014), which wasn't exactly a picnic either despite its outstanding technical achievements.  Project Hail Mary is a bloated downer of a movie with even some of the visuals looking chintzy.

Dr. Grace is a middle school teacher with a PhD in molecular biology but personal issues have forced him to work at the school.  If you think about it, being a teacher isn't bad.  You get weekends and holidays off and sometimes all summer if you play your cards right.  But, Ryland is approached by Eva Stratt (Huller) with an offer to use his skills to determine if bacteria is eating the sun.  I kid you not.  Dr. Grace determines that there is and if the bacteria isn't destroyed, life on Earth will cease in about thirty years.  The catch:  Dr. Grace and two other astronauts will have to man a shuttle to a destination light years away to perform the mission with no hope of returning home alive.  Dr. Grace has reservations about participating in a suicide mission, but his hand is soon forced.

The beginning of the movie has Dr. Grace awakening with the other two crew members already dead, so he has to figure out not only his mission but how he even got there.  Dr. Grace then meets an alien life form shaped like a walking, talking rock.  Dr. Grace is able to use a special translator to translate the language he affectionately calls Rocky speaks into English and the two we learn are on the same mission to save their respective planets.

Gosling does all he can to give Dr. Grace dimensions, but it's quite a load to carry.  Rocky is lovable...for a rock, but the movie itself becomes a 2 1/2 hour slog to get through, not to mention how depressing it is.  You could see where such material could be fun in a schlocky sci-fi way, but Project Hail Mary is so solemn and deadly serious that fun seems to be the furthest thing from its mind.  It makes Interstellar appear cheerful by comparison.

2026 Oscars: A Review.

 

The 2026 Oscars are in the books.  Once again hosted by Conan O'Brien, the show clocked in at nearly 3 hours, 40 minutes.  It could've easily trimmed thirty minutes by expunging lame bits like the cold open where Conan was made up like Amy Madigan's character in Weapons and chased through the scenes of the 10 films nominated for Best Picture.  This is a callback to Billy Crystal's bit from when he hosted.  However, back then only five movies were nominated, not ten, so the bit is twice as long while not generating any laughs.

The unfunny banter between presenters was also back in full force and it never felt more forced than when the Bridesmaids cast reunited to present the Original Score Oscar.  One of the "notes" received by the cast complained about how the show was running too long and to get on with it.  There isn't an audience member who didn't agree at that point, either at home or in the Dolby Theater.  Of course, it would be better to simply make the show shorter than creating commentary spoofing how long it is.  

The In Memoriam segment featured touching tributes to Rob Reiner, Diane Keaton, and Robert Redford and naturally there were noticeable omissions but that's par for the course.  The most glaring to me was Brigitte Bardot.  I pray it wasn't because of far-right comments she made over the course of her lifetime.  The idea is to pay tribute to the artist, not his or her politics. 

The acting categories returned to showing clips of the nominated performances, but could they be a little longer?  By the time the crowd stops applauding and cheering over the clip, the clip is over.  There are plenty of places to trim time from the show, let's not give the acting nominees (which are why most people tune in) short shrift.  

The show remained mostly non-political, but Jimmy Kimmel (who presented the documentary awards) intimated that the United States no longer practices freedom of speech and then took a swipe at CBS for axing The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and giving the show one year's notice in doing so.  Most cancelled shows are ended immediately.  Kimmel himself was suspended (with pay I'm sure) for a few nights before returning to his show to bash the right and Trump on a nightly basis.  

Since Kimmel and Colbert are not in prison for speaking their minds, how can they say that there is no longer freedom of speech in the United States?  Just wondering.  

Revolutionary Road (2008) * * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Sam Mendes

Starring:  Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Michael Shannon, Kathy Bates, Kathryn Hahn, David Harbour

A Titanic reunion featuring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet in a story about 1950's suburban angst?  Directed by Oscar winner Sam Mendes, who made American Beauty, also about said angst?  Let the Oscar nominations flow.  However, Revolutionary Road mustered a Best Supporting Oscar nod for Michael Shannon and that was it.  It was almost too Oscar-baity even for an Academy that falls for Oscar bait often.  

The movie itself was wonderfully photographed and acted, but after a while I grew tired of listening to people jabber on about problems 99 percent of the world wished it had to contend with.  Frank Wheeler (DiCaprio) and wife April (Winslet) live a comfortable life in a new Connecticut home with Frank holding down a job at a Manhattan company which pays well.  They have two children who play little into their daily concerns and aren't seen much.  Frank goes to work daily while April stays home to be a homemaker and mother to the kids.  Yet, April yearns for more.  She feels Frank gave up on his dream of being a writer and wants to move to Paris so Frank can write and April can work in civil service.  For a time, she's able to talk Frank into agreeing to the move, but then Frank is offered a promotion at work and he second-guesses his decision much to April's horror.  

So Frank and April fight, and they reconcile.  Frank cheats on April with various women in the secretary pool at work, and April is the apple of her neighbor's eye.  Maybe Frank will be happier in Paris.  April sure would.  The kids?  I can't say I recall their names.  Then April becomes pregnant and thinks seriously about an abortion much to Frank's distress.  April doesn't want to bring another child into this horrible world of suburban comfort and affluence.  Frank wants the baby because now he'll have a third child to ignore and April will have another one to resent.  I think you're getting the picture here.  

I know, I know...April is suffocating in this 1950's world where women were expected to stay home while the husbands went to work.  Oh, the horror.  April wants to move to Paris where the roles will be reversed in a true case of believing the grass will be greener on the other side.  But, when Frank and April bicker and fight over how horrible their lives are, I wish I could relate, as would most of the audience.  DiCaprio and Winslet could shout at each other numbers from the phone book and be compelling, but their central arguments are ones which most people would reply, "Yeah, and?" 

2026 Oscar Predictions

 The 98th Annual Academy Awards are Sunday March 15, 2026 (tonight!) These are my predictions of what will win, not what I think should win.  However, 2025 was an unusual year in that so many of these films and performances were unseen by me.  Nonetheless, here are my picks:

Best Picture:  One Battle after Another

Best Director:  Thomas Anderson (One Battle after Another) 

Best Actor: Michael B. Jordan (Sinners) 

Best Actress: Jessie Buckley (Hamnet)

Best Supporting Actor: Sean Penn (One Battle after Another)

Best Supporting Actress: Amy Madigan (Weapons)

Best Original Screenplay: Sinners

Best Adapted Screenplay: One Battle after Another

Best Original Song: Golden (KPop Demon Hunters)

Best Original Score: Sinners

Best International Feature: It Was Just an Accident

Best Animated Feature: KPop Demon Hunters

Best Documentary Feature: Mr. Nobody Against Putin

Best Costume Design: Sinners

Best Make-Up and Hairstyling: Frankenstein

Best Production Design: Sinners

Best Sound: F1

Best Film Editing: Marty Supreme

Best Cinematography: Sinners

Best Visual Effects: Avatar: Fire and Ash

Best Live Action Short: A Friend of Dorothy

Best Animated Short: The Girl who Cried Pearls

Best Documentary Short: Children No More: Were and Are Gone

Best Casting: Sinners

Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990) * *

 

Directed by: Joe Dante

Starring:  Zach Galligan, Phoebe Cates, Robert Prosky, John Glover, Haviland Morris, Christopher Lee

Gremlins 2 is a retread of the second-half of the original, when the mischievous gremlins wreaked havoc on a small upstate New York town.  The original idea was how teenager Billy Peltzer (Galligan) was given a cute little creature named Gizmo for a birthday present.  The lovable little guy came with two rules:  Don't get him wet and don't feed him after midnight.  There might be a third, but I don't recall it.  

Well, we know there wouldn't be a Gremlins movie if the rules weren't disobeyed, and now there wouldn't be a sequel if the commandments were followed this time around.  The first Gremlins was cute and fun enough, especially when I saw it as a teenager.  However, the sequel (which I didn't see when it was released) is much, much more of the same gremlins only this time they're destroying half of New York City.  They get into everything and seem a bit nastier in Gremlins 2.  Soon enough, there are so many of them that it's a relief to see the humans when they do appear. 

Billy and his girlfriend Kate (Cates) live in New York and work for Clamp Industries, a conglomerate run by Daniel Clamp (Glover), and who is certainly modeled after Donald Trump.  His assistant and soon-to-be-girlfriend is named Marla just so the point can be jammed home.  Clamp's building and security system are state-of-the-art, until Gizmo finds his way back to Billy and of course gets wet accidentally.  The offspring that pop up in little balls from Gizmo's body then eat after midnight and away we go.  Billy and Kate spend the bulk of the movie warning the others of danger and trying to outwit the clever critters. 

The gremlins themselves range from sorta cute to dastardly.  They take over the movie much in the same fashion they take over Manhattan.  They're proof that even somewhat cute little monsters like them can still be too much of a good thing.  

Sinners (2025) * *

 

Directed by: Ryan Coogler

Starring:  Michael B. Jordan, Hailee Steinfeld, Delroy Lindo, Wunmi Mosaku, Miles Caton, Jack O'Connell, Jayme Lawson, Yao, Li Jun Li

I caught up late to Sinners, following a record sixteen Oscar nominations this year.  The movie is an ungainly mix of crime drama, social commentary, and vampire horror all in one.  The vampire stuff seems typical no matter how Coogler introduces it and tries to dress it up.  The first hour before any bloodsuckers even show up gives us the players and some backstory, but it is a slog getting to the main event.  

Sinners centers around bootlegging twins Smoke and Stack (Jordan), who are difficult to differentiate not just because it's Michael B. Jordan playing them both, but because their personalities are similar.  One actor playing twins can be distracting because you're looking for the editing tricks.  Sinners does this seamlessly, but after a while I gave up trying to figure out which twin is which.  One way the movie differentiates them is by giving them different love interests.  Stack is in love with Mary (Steinfeld), who is half-black but passes as white in societal circles.  Smoke wants to reconnect with a voodoo priestess (Mosaku) whom he left behind when he and Stack moved to Chicago to work for Al Capone after they fought in World War I.

The twins want to open a juke joint in their Mississippi hometown and dream of making big dollars, but on opening night, the establishment and its many patrons are accosted by three vampires (concealing their identities of course) who ostensibly want to enter so they can play the blues.  They're turned away and the horror show starts as the vampires turn each of the living into the undead.  There is also teenager Sammie (Caton), a blues guitarist who wishes to break into the blues scene.  In one time-bending scene, he plays a blues song, and Coogler reflects on how the blues influenced future music like disco, rock, etc. and the room is replete with visions of future singers and dancers occupying the same space.  

Sinners is superior from a production standpoint, capturing the essence of its time and place in 1930's Mississippi, but it tries to be too many things at once, almost as if Coogler was filming two different movies at the same time and attempted to mesh them together.  Themes of racism and cultural appropriation are also explored.  Are the white vampires symbolic of these?  Sinners makes the answer apparent, and you will be the judge as to whether that works for you.  But from an entertainment perspective, Sinners is a mixed bag that never lifts off the ground despite its lofty intentions.  

The Bride! (2026) * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Maggie Gyllenhaal

Starring:  Jessie Buckley, Christian Bale, Peter Sarsgaard, Annette Bening, Penelope Cruz, Jake Gyllenhaal

The Bride! comes equipped with an exclamation point but has nothing for us to be excited about.  Maggie Gyllenhaal's retelling of The Bride of Frankenstein is complete with a feminist twist, hints at MeToo, and an annoying bride.  It is told in overly artsy fashion in which Mary Shelley's ghost inexplicably possesses Ida (Buckley), who is getting drunk at a Chicago mobster's party circa 1936 and makes enough of a spectacle of herself to soon be murdered by the mobster's goons.  The Bride! like Frankenstein's monster is an ungainly spectacle of ill-fitting parts. 

The Bride! steps wrong in the first frame with the black and white spirit of Mary Shelley yapping about some nonsense before stepping into the body of Ida at the worst possible time.  Soon after Ida's death, Frankenstein's monster (Bale) appears at the doorstep of Dr. Euphronius (Bening), who was inspired by and written books on Dr. Frankenstein's work.  "Frank" as the good doctor soon calls him, is pent up with a century of loneliness and wants the doc to reanimate a dead woman to be his, er, companion.  They dig up Ida, jolt her with electricity, and then she's back to life with little memory of who she was.  Frank is ecstatic, or as ecstatic as anyone is allowed to be in such an ironically lifeless film, which is telling considering how much activity Gyllenhaal wants to cram into it.

Once Ida and Frank become an item, they visit a nightclub which wasn't likely to be found so easily in 1936 and following a confrontation in which two men try to rape Ida and Frank kills them, they find themselves on the lam like Bonnie and Clyde.  Do they go on a crime spree?  Not intentionally, but bodies soon pile up and Chicago detectives Wiles and Malloy (Sarsgaard and Cruz) are on the trail of the couple to New York and all over the country where they are taking in the movies of actor Ronnie Reed (Gyllenhaal, who has the mannerisms of a 1930's movie star down).  By then, The Bride! has become all but incomprehensible.  

Gyllenhaal saddles the actors with too many subplots, questionable motivations, and no real reasons to care.  They try mightily, but ultimately The Bride! just isn't much fun to watch and even less fun to think about.  Gyllenhaal does indeed swing for the fences, but strikes out.