MaXXXine (2024) – Review
Quick Thoughts – Grade – B – MaXXXine ditches the rural Texas settings and immerses itself in the grime and glitz of 1985 Los Angeles. The new location is welcome and there’s enjoyment to be had watching Maxine battle old demons and beat up Kevin Bacon.
One of the most pleasant surprises of recent years is the release of Ti West’s X trilogy made up of X, Pearl and MaXXXine. Taking place in 1979, 1918, and 1985, the Mia Goth (who also co-wrote Pearl) starring films have offered up some truly delightful gore, laughs and alligator action. X and Pearl were pleasant surprises that built up massive expectations for MaXXXine, which doesn’t have the luxury of being a surprise film (Pearl) or an under-the-radar A24 movie filmed in New Zealand during the pandemic. While the reviews so far have been mixed, I’ve found myself appreciating the movie more since my screening several days ago because of the evolution of Maxine Minx.
Maxine is now living in Los Angeles and has become a famous adult film star who dreams of breaking into Hollywood. The film opens with her nailing an audition for a prestige horror movie sequel directed by Elizabether Bender (Elizabeth Debicki), and then she’s followed around as she drives her 1985 Mercedes-Benz 380SL convertible around town to her various jobs at peep shows and adult film shoots. This isn’t the young and naive Maxine you remember from X. In MaXXXine, she’s become a badass 33-year old who when cornered by a creepy actor dressed as Buster Keaton, pulls out a gun and makes sure the buster will always remember her (and have to go to the hospital). Maxine is still haunted from the events in 1979, and they come back to haunt her during rehearsals, set visits, and pretty much every waking minute of her life. Her antics on the Texas farm really come back to terrorize her when a VHS tape of the movie she filmed on the farm is delivered to her apartment. What follows is a cat-and-mouse game between Maxine, a private detective named John Labat (Kevin Bacon), and a serial killer who kills Maxine’s associates in ways similar to the infamous Night Stalker who stalked Los Angeles between 1984 and 1985. Spoiling more of the plot wouldn’t be cool, just know that Giancarlo Esposito (who might be the MVP of the movie), Michelle Monaghan and Bobby Cannavale also pop up and make the most of their roles.
Filmed in a quick seven weeks in Los Angeles, Ti West decided to give the film a bigger scope so that the films didn’t repeat themselves. The bigger scope means less of a laser focus on characters, but I’m happy that this isn’t another Texas Chainsaw Massacre homage. X is about an indie film crew shooting a porno on a secluded farm, and Pearl is about the debilitating mental state of a woman who lives on a secluded farm. MaXXXine is about a woman who has entrenched herself in the Los Angeles film industry, so the film naturally has more scope as Maxine finds herself in movie studios, large mansions, and dingy apartments. Also, Maxine was hunted in X, and Pearl went insane in Pearl, so it’s nice watching Maxine become the hunter when her past comes back to haunt her. At first I wasn’t a fan of the expanded world, but I’ve grown to appreciate the film more because it allows Maxine to own the situation and finally become famous.
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The Movies, Films and Flix Podcast – Episode 569: Twister, Extreme Weather and Philip Seymour Hoffman
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Mark and Jay discuss the 1996 disaster film Twister. Directed by Jan dBont, and starring Helen Hunt, Bill Paxton and an unlucky cow, the movie focuses on what happens when a group of storm chasers enter the suck zone. In this episode, they also talk about catapults, sound mixing and the excellence of Philip Seymour Hoffman. Enjoy!
If you are a fan of the podcast, make sure to send in some random listener questions (we love random questions). We thank you for listening, and hope you enjoy the episode!
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MY CALL: What a delightful little bad movie. This has no real connection to its namesake, and has few effects worth mention. Still, this somehow entertained me just enough. MORE MOVIES LIKE Amityville Dolhouse: Uhhhhhh, when it comes to Amityville sequels, I’d stick to Amityville II: The Possession (1982) and otherwise tread carefully into the depths of the extended franchise. Part II has all the dumb fun you’re looking for with great pacing, but Amityville 3-D (1983) and Amityville Horror: The Evil Escapes (1989) are both boring slogs. I haven’t yet seen Amityville Curse (1990), but it is the 5th in this sequence of non-sequels.
Amityville Horror: The Evil Escapes (1989) continued the Amityville story with a hideous cursed lamp. Now, in this sort-of sequel, director Steve White uses a dollhouse. He never directed anything again, so that may be informative of how well this horror sequel was received.
Having just moved into their new house, recently remarried Bill (Robin Thomas) and Claire (Starr Andreeff; Club Vampire, Dance of the Damned, Vampire Journals, Scanner Cop, Syngenor, The Terror Within, Ghoulies II) unpack with their kids, nerdy preteen Jim (Jarrett Lennon; Highway to Hell), kiddo Jessica (Rachel Duncan; Rumpelstiltskin) and teen Todd (Allen Cutler). Todd and Jim both struggle with their new “family.”
So already I’m confused. We learn that Bill’s ex-wife lives in New York, where the original The Amityville Horror (1979) takes place. But as they move into their new home, Todd’s girlfriend (Lisa Robin Kelly) (because she lives nearby) drives over to the new house on day one. We also learn they live in a western time zone. So how could this possibly be an Amityville movie if there is no connection to Amityville, New York?
Bill built their new house on a property that already had an old shed which spiritually calls to Bill. It’s filled with tools, skulls, old biological illustrations of insects, a newspaper clipping telling the story of the death of the family in the house (with the father as a prime suspect, just like The Amityville Horror), and an old dusty dollhouse. I guess this sequel is ignoring the other sequels entirely, and even the 1979 original. Because this house is in a western state, and the article is not about Amityville, NY, but the house that burned down where Bill built his new house! So guess what, folks? You’ve been lied to! The only connection to The Amityville Horror (1979) is that the dollhouse Bill finds looks just like the house from the original movie. This should just be called “The Central California Dollhouse.”
The cheapness of the movie is harbingered by the first signs of the supernatural, which manifest as simply “turning off/on” the gas fireplace, turning on and moving the car, and the dollhouse lights illuminate on their own. Later, a tarantula “appears” in a pinata, and a bunch of dust and leaves are blown in through a window (like, literally, by a leaf blower). These effects are all manageable on a special effects budget of $0. I was a bit worried during the first third of the movie.
About 30 minutes into the movie, the effects upgrade from $0 to ultra-cheap, when we see a giant, campy rat tail sticking out from under Jessica’s shaking bed. This happened after Jim’s pet mouse wandered into the dollhouse, and under the model bed in the dollhouse bedroom. So the dollhouse actively makes things happen. Moreover, it seems that whatever happens in/to the dollhouse is mirrored in the actual house. Unfortunately, we later find that is not the case.
The supernatural influence of the dollhouse affects everyone differently. Bill has dreams of his daughter calling for help through the fireplace, Jessica is getting increasingly nervous about her dollhouse, Claire becomes obsessed with Todd (yes, in a sexually weird way), and Jim is haunted by his deceased father. Luckily there eventually are some real effects. Jim sees his dead biological father who has dark plans for Bill. Every time he appears, he is more and more decomposed. Todd’s girlfriend Dana’s head catches fire and the result is actually kinda’ satisfyingly gross.
Ultra-spiritual Aunt Marla (Lenore Kasdorf; Starship Troopers) and Uncle Tobias (Franc Ross) sense something from the dollhouse and consult their occult collection. They conduct a séance that goes horribly wrong. It’s dumb, but not unenjoyable. And this segways us to the final scenes, where the finale gets even more clunky. It’s truly as if Jim’s dead father is the evil antagonist, who wants to bring his living wife and son to Hell with him. But why? And what about the dollhouse? Wasn’t the dollhouse important?
We find out that the previous house burned down leaving only the fireplace, which Bill left in place (to save money) and rebuilt his new house around it. Apparently, this fireplace was cursed because of what transpired there, making it a portal to Hell and a portal leading inside the dollhouse. So, of course, if you go through the portal, you are miniaturized to scale. But wait! Does that mean that inside the dollhouse is an interdimensional Hell? Like, actual Hell?
Bill travels through a portal that brings him inside the dollhouse to save his daughter from… the tiny slimy roaring demons that live in the dollhouse. WHAT!?!? Tobias joins him and sacrifices himself while casting spells to hold off the diminutive fiends that kind of look like discount rack Cenobites. These fiends have no further explanation than the fact that they exist, they are evil, and they must be stopped. But what about Jim’s dead dad? He didn’t want to take everyone to Hell. He only planned on bringing his living wife and son. He seems to be a completely mutually exclusive antagonist! So, it seems like there were two very different plots that got mixed together and never fully clarified during a rewriting process. And that is how we get solid gold bad movies! In the end, then they just burn the dollhouse inside the fireplace that was a portal into itself… so they imploded Hell? I guess.
I watched this wanting and expecting bad, and boy did I get what I wanted. This movie is awful, yet somewhat pretty fun to watch as long as know what you’re in for. This was definitely more enjoyable than parts 3-4, not that this was in any form “good.”
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A Family Affair (2024) – Review
Quick Thoughts: Grade – B- – Powered by solid performances from Joey King, Zac Efron and Nicole Kidman, the romantic comedy provides several laughs and unique twists on the rom-com formula. It’s a bit overstuffed with subplots and supporting characters but enough charm and personality to make it an enjoyable comfort food watch.
After spending the last six months putting together a data piece on romantic comedies, I realized that the best romantic comedies don’t avoid genre tropes – they embrace them. The nice thing about A Family Affair is that it utilizes rom-com tropes (lies, miscommunications, rich people, writing as a profession, rich people, it takes place in California, dancing, singing, happy endings) well and happily leans into the fact that it’s a PG-13 romantic comedy. It’s been knocked for not having enough passion and Joey King’s character being a third wheel, but if you look at it as a welcome heaping of comfort food you’ll find enjoyment.
A Family Affair focuses on a personal assistant named Zara (Joey King – very likable) who spends her days and nights working for an A-list actor named Chris Cole (Zac Efron). Her job is miserable as she’s forced to buy earrings for the women he breaks up with and go on late night shopping trips to purchase whey protein (Cole is very needy). Zara lives at home with her single mom Brooke (Nicole Kidman), a Pulitzer Prize winning writer who is still reeling from the death of her husband 11 years prior. Things start going awry when after a work argument, Zara quits working for Chris and when he comes to her home to apologize he ends up striking up a relationship with Brooke. So, Zara’s womanizing boss starts a relationship with her widowed mom. It’s not a great situation and it leads to a bunch of PG-13 rom-com shenanigans involving day drinking, bruised heads, and a really cool pink AT-ST that I want in my home.
Efron and Kidman got memorably intimate in the gnarly 2012 film The Paperboy (the jellyfish scene is very memorable), so their chemistry is believable. However, they aren’t allowed to spend too much time together because of the other storylines involving Zara’s relationship with her best friend Eugenie (Liza Koshy) and her coworker Stella (Sherry Cola – watch Joy Ride now). Toss in Kathy Bates, who plays the mom of Brooke’s deceased first husband, and A Family Affair finds itself loaded with too many characters. Overall, it doesn’t hurt the enjoyment of the film because there’s enough to like and it’s fun watching Joey King acting silly for 111 minutes.
After spending so much time with romantic comedies I’ve learned to expect the expected and just enjoy what they bring to the table. The best bits of A Family Affair are the comedic moments between King and Efron who bicker endlessly and have a relaxed chemistry that carries the film. The romance aspect is underwhelming, which typically isn’t good for a rom-com, but I don’t think this movie was ever meant to be Anyone But You or Forgetting Sarah Marshall. In the end, I was expecting a breezy rom-com and I got a breezy rom-com. That’s enough for me.
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The Movies, Films and Flix Podcast – Episode 568: The 2024 Mid-Year Random Movie Awards
You can download or stream the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker (or wherever you listen to podcasts…..we’re almost everywhere).
If you get a chance please make sure to review, rate and share. You are awesome.
The 2024 Mid-Year Random Awards! Mark and Megan hand out awards to their favorite 2024 movies, performances, moments and scenes. In this episode, you’ll hear them talk about In a Violent Nature, Challengers, Dune: Part Two, One More Shot, Civil War, Lisa Frankenstein, Hit Man, Late Night With the Devil and Hundreds of Beavers. Enjoy!
If you are a fan of the podcast, make sure to send in some random listener questions (we love random questions). We thank you for listening, and hope you enjoy the episode!
You can download the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker.
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The Movies, Films and Flix Podcast – Episode 567: Sh*thouse, Cooper Raiff, and Pet Turtles
You can download or stream the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker (or wherever you listen to podcasts…..we’re almost everywhere).
If you get a chance please make sure to review, rate and share. You are awesome.
Mark and Joey (@soulpopped on X) discuss the 2020 comedy-drama Sh*thouse. Directed and written by Cooper Raiff, and starring Cooper Raiff, Dylan Gelula, Logan Miller, and a pet turtle, the movie focuses on a lonely college freshman having a simultaneously excellent and terrible weekend. In this episode, they also talk about IFC movies, walking and talking, and the excellence of Cooper Raiff.
If you are a fan of the podcast, make sure to send in some random listener questions (we love random questions). We thank you for listening, and hope you enjoy the episode!
You can download the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker.
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The Movies, Films and Flix Podcast – Episode 566: The Holdovers, Paul Giamatti, and Hormonal Vulgarians
You can download or stream the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker (or wherever you listen to podcasts…..we’re almost everywhere).
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Mark and DJ Valentine discuss the 2023 comedy The Holdovers. Directed by Alexander Payne, and starring Paul Giamatti, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Dominic Sessa and some hormonal vulgarians, the Academy Award winning movie is absolutely delightful. In this episode, they talk about excellent screenplays, trampoline injuries, and Paul Giamatti. Enjoy!
If you are a fan of the podcast, make sure to send in some random listener questions (we love random questions). We thank you for listening, and hope you enjoy the episode!
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Kinds of Kindness (2024) – Review
Quick Thoughts – Grade – B+ – This pitch-black triptych anthology is loaded with big laughs and wild moments that harken back to director Yorgos Lanthimos earlier films Dogtooth, The Lobster, and The Killing of a Sacred Deer. It will turn off many with its violence, nudity and offbeat humor, but if you are a fan of storytelling that doesn’t hold your hand and takes you to unique places – you will love it.
Made up of three tales featuring Jesse Plemons, Emma Stone, Margaret Qualley, Hong Chau, Willem Dafoe, Joe Alwyn and Mamoudou Athie, Kinds of Kindness exists because of the award-winning success of The Favourite and Poor Things. While they are far from mainstream, they are more accessible than the revenge-driven theatrics of The Killing of a Sacred Deer, or the fenced-in compound shenanigans in Dogtooth. I love both films but it’s easy to understand why they are critical darlings and not box office blockbusters. It wasn’t until Lanthimos adopted a more mainstream aesthetic (which is still incredibly non-mainstream) that he found worldwide success and this afforded him the chance to reunite with co-writer Efthimis Filippou (Dogtooth, The Lobster, The Killing of a Sacred Deer) to make Kinds of Kindness.
The first story (The Death of R.M.F.) focuses on a man (Jesse Plemons) trying and failing to take charge of his life by denying an extreme request given to him by his controlling boss (Willem Dafoe). The second story (R.M.F. is Flying) is about a police officer (Plemons again) becoming suspicious of his wife (Emma Stone) after she returns home from a boating accident. The final story (R.M.F. Eats a Sandwich) involves a water-loving cult member (Stone) who is searching for a messiah while also dealing with a family she left behind.
All three stories find humor from bodily harm, orgy watch parties, and the sight of Jesse Plemons is a brightly-colored turtleneck. You can tell Lanthimos enjoyed stepping away from the period piece aesthetic, and creating something in a contemporary world that is home to water cults, broken tennis racquets, and doppelgangers. I think he’s done his best work in modern environments (that are incredibly heightened) and I don’t think I’ll ever forget about the animal death in The Lobster and Dogtooth, or anything Barry Keoghan does in The Killing of a Sacred Deer. The early reactions to Kinds of Kindness have been interesting because they seem to be coming from people who are only familiar with The Favourite and Poor Things. I don’t think anything in Kinds of Kindness is shocking because I know what Lanthimos is capable of, and I know that Lanthimos and Filippou excel in creating uncomfortable situations because “life itself makes people uncomfrotbale.”
After The Favourite and Poor Things, Emma Stone continues to excel while working with Lanthimos (she calls him her “muse”), and her performance in Kinds of Kindness proves that after winning multiple Academy Awards she’s still down to act in films that require her to cut off her thumb and feed it to Jesse Plemons. The MVP of the movie is Jesse Plemons, who portrays characters who range from manic to paranoid to petty. His deadpan delivery and death stare are perfect as he’s begging Wilem Dafoe for forgiveness or asking his friends to watch a sex tape while his wife is missing. I’d love to work on a Lanthimos set because it would be cool to see how he creates an atmosphere of absolute trust in which Hong Chao feels comfortable licking sweat off bodies or Joe Alwyn agrees to play a date-raping husband.
While leaving the press screening I heard several people mention that the movie doesn’t have a point and were wondering why it exists. This seems a bit unfair as anthologies rarely change the world (very few movies do), and exist to tell condensed stories that are largely hit or miss (the cult short in V/H/S 2 is a big hit). If you’re looking for supreme meaning with Kinds of Kindness you are out of luck, but if you’re looking for a film that features Margaret Qualley jumping into an empty swimming pool (twice), then it’s the movie for you.
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John’s Horror Corner: Inbred (2011), an ultra-gory, pretty cheaply made British horror comedy.
MY CALL: This British “hillbilly horror” may just be the bad movie you’re looking for if you enjoy insufferably awful writing complemented by ambitiously very graphic, low budget gore. But frankly, this movie just didn’t give me enough recommend it.
On a team-building weekend trip, a group of teen delinquents (including Chris Waller; Fright Night 2) and their chaperone caretakers (James Doherty and Jo Hartley; Slaughterhouse Rulez, Prevenge) clean up a condemned cottage and salvage valuable from an abandoned train depot in the remote village of Mortlake. The Mortlake locals include some horrendously toothy mouths. Truly, these fake teeth are ill-fit and look laughably stupid. And just as stupid, the acting and writing is pretty rough. The first 40 minutes is a brutally boring slog. And even once the violence and gore kick off, the scenes in between just drag.
A hostile interaction with some of the locals results in an accidental injury which spirals out of control into murder and really weird abduction. These inbred hillbillies restrain and torture their victims as part of a literal “performance” for the locals. Produce is jammed into one victim’s nostrils as a thonged organist scores the live act. There’s a completely lackluster death by “casually walking horse” and the derpy locals applaud by clacking rocks together like cavemen. Another victim is orally pumped full of farm feces until he literally explodes on the elated audience. And yes, some of these moments were enjoyable. But they were just that—“moments.” Moments amid long stretches of “why am I watching this?”
The gore highlight for me was a silly mangled hand, mutilated from a gunshot. Or perhaps the simplicity of the landmine explosion of one of the delinquents. These amounted to more than just moments, but hardly qualified as anything more than brief scenes. I wanted more of this, but I suspect budget was the limiting culprit here.
When there is violence, it transpires entirely on-screen, it’s brutally abrupt and graphic, and quite gory. The special effects rely noticeably on CGI. But the CGI is more to its complement than its detriment. Again, budget and brevity are what hamstring my enjoyment. Too bad. Even the very best screen grab that got me to watch this movie was on screen so briefly that you could blink and miss it entirely (below).
To call this movie stupid would be a gross understatement. However, its efforts in the gore department must be commended. When things get shot or explode, they really do so in graphic fashion. Some of you may appreciate this kind of bad movie fare. But this one just didn’t do it for me “enough” to recommend.
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The Movies, Films and Flix Podcast – Episode 565: Timeline, Trebuchets, and Michael Crichton
You can download or stream the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker (or wherever you listen to podcasts…..we’re almost everywhere).
If you get a chance please make sure to review, rate and share. You are awesome.
Mark and Erik discuss the 2003 science fiction film Timeline. Directed by Richard Donner, and starring Paul Walker, Gerard Butler, Frances O’Connor and several trebuchets, the movie focuses on what happens when a group of archaeologists travel back in time and get involved in some historical shenanigans. In this episode, they also talk about Michael Crichton adaptations, trebuchets and Paul Walker. Enjoy!
If you are a fan of the podcast, make sure to send in some random listener questions (we love random questions). We thank you for listening, and hope you enjoy the episode!
You can download the pod on Apple Podcasts, Tune In, Podbean, or Spreaker.
Movies, Films & Flix 