3 Best Movies To Watch After Mystery Men (1999)
Madame Web
The latest chapter in Sony's Spider-Man Universe makes Morbius look like a masterpiece. In an age where the Marvel Cinematic Universe has categorically lost its luster, it's tempting to imagine how green the grass is on the other side of the hill. To imagine that someone, somewhere, is doing inventive work with some of America's most pervasive modern myths -- without the heaving strain of an interconnected narrative, a cast of over-it actors, or visual effects teams stretched beyond their breaking point. You won't find it, however, in the strangely-dubbed "Sony's Spider-Man Universe" -- that casually connected series of antihero films (the Venoms, Morbius) that attempts to cobble together its own Sinister Six from the contractual scraps Disney left Sony after its acquisition of Marvel Studios. And Madame Web, the latest grasp at superhero relevancy in a dying comic book movie landscape, is easily its messiest, most forgettable shrug in that direction. It's astonishing to think that Sony could put out a worse product than 2022's Morbius -- a misfire of a mad-scientist picture that at least contained a few interesting images and the perverse sight of Matt Smith gnashing his pointy vampire teeth through a chopped-up villain performance -- but boy, Madame Web manages it. It's a passive whisper of a film, one that barely registers its own existence. The only reason someone would even deign to make it is because they're contractually obligated to maintain a specific character's intellectual property, not to mention a heaping stake of product placement from Pepsi. Continue Reading →
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom
A decade's worth of superhero movies goes out with a big, stupid grin on its face. One would hope that a film franchise with as much money poured into it as the DC Cinematic Universe would rage, rage against the dying of the light. Yet here we are, limping towards the end of a slate of superhero flicks marred by terrible reviews (Shazam! 2), controversy (The Flash), or sheer too-little-too-late-ness (Blue Beetle). As the superhero genre continues to flag in a year of duds, DC's set for a reinvention, a clean slate courtesy of former Marvel it-boy James Gunn and co-head Peter Safran. Before they can wipe the board and start all over with the label's slate of classic capes, though, there's a few rounds left in the last guy's chamber to fire off. That's what Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom feels like, easily the least objectionable of the DC films to come out in 2023. Problem is, that's not saying much. A sequel to Aquaman should have been a slam dunk: Director James Wan's 2018 take on the King of Atlantis was a welcome breath of neon-soaked pop art in a franchise studded with Snyderesque dourness, leaning into the innate silliness of an underwater take on Flash Gordon. Jason Momoa is as effortless a casting as you could imagine for DC's hardest-to-pin-down superhero, brimming with giddy frat-boy energy. At its best moments, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom leans into its star's goofiness and even lets it infect some of the rest of the cast. But there's no escaping the feeling of weariness, both for a cast and crew who are just repeating the novel beats of the first and an audience that's just plain starved for something new. Continue Reading →
Fear the Invisible Man
Leigh Whannell's follow-up to Upgrade is a chilling, Hitchcockian thriller about the ways trauma follows us around. Six months after I moved in with my girlfriend's parents after college, I packed up my things and left one day while she was at work. Scratch that -- escaped. Her parents even helped me load my car. They knew I wasn't happy, and they hated seeing what was happening to me. I was trapped, emotionally (and in one or two cases, physically) abused; she literally would not let me leave if I tried to break things off in person. The prospect of escape was freeing, but also terrifying; Would she come to get me? And worse, would I still have the tools to exist as myself? There would always be something of her, the way she made me feel powerless and isolated, that would linger on for years afterward. Sometimes, I still feel her lingering stare behind me, even when I know she's not there. While Leigh Whannell's The Invisible Man channels the specifics of the way abusive men wield their power over women, the way it channels the dynamics of domestic abuse and intimate partner violence into a crackerjack sci-fi thriller shell resonated with me in ways I didn't expect. As the film opens, we see Cecilia Kass (Elisabeth Moss) hatching a long-gestating escape plan from her boyfriend of three years, wealthy "optics" scientist Adrian Griffin (Oliver Jackson-Cohen). Sneaking out of his mannered, Silicon Valley-ornate villa in the dead of night, she barely makes it out alive with the help of her sister Emily (Harriet Dyer) and childhood friend James (Aldis Hodge), the latter of whom lets her lay low at his house with young daughter Sydney (Storm Reid). Weeks later, they hear some shocking news: Adrian has committed suicide, and in one final power move, he bequeaths a $5 million inheritance to her, contingent on her avoiding criminal prosecution or mental distress. At long last, her nightmare can finally end. Continue Reading →