No Sudden Move (2021) - Movie Review

And now, for the other Steven Soderbergh feature from this year, and indeed my last proper review of 2021. After how far outside the margins he went with Let Them All Talk, I’ll admit to being somewhat relieved that we’re back in more familiar territory this time around. A crime drama set in mid-‘50s Detroit, it starts out as a small-scale hostage thriller, but ends up ballooning out into a much deeper conspiracy involving industrial espionage and (as is usually the case with Soderbergh) a look at capitalism’s lack of ethics.

A Quiet Place Part II (2021) - Movie Review

In most circumstances, a sequel that’s just more of the same that made the original what it is can be a double-edged sword. On one hand, it serves as one of the only conditions when the advice of Mike Love is a good thing to adhere to ("don’t fuck with the formula"), making sure that what worked last time isn’t tampered with. But on the other hand, if a continuation is going to exist in the first place, there needs to be something new added to the mix, if only to justify the exercise. And with A Quiet Place Part II finally making it to theatres, it feels like a good middle ground between those two ideals, resulting in a film where it being similar to what came before is far from a bad thing.

Honey Boy (2020) - Movie Review

Shia LaBeouf. Actor. Performance artist. Meme in human form. Multidisciplinary plagiarist. Jack of all trades, master of none, not even himself. The man I’ve been calling ‘Shia LaBullshitArtist’ for as long as this blog has existed, out of respect for Daniel Clowes, the Anomalies crew, and pretty much everyone else Shia has ripped off over the course of his career. Is it clear enough yet that I don’t exactly have the highest opinion of this guy as a creative?

Or, at least, I didn’t use to. Between his place as the lead actor in the earlier Michael Bay Transformers movies, the way Hollywood kept trying to push for him as the next big thing with little success, and how much he basically imploded over the course of the 2010’s, he’s pretty much secured his place as everyone’s favourite punching bag. But after seeing him in The Peanut Butter Falcon, in a performance so fucking resonant that articulating my gratitude resulted in some of my best critical work to date, I’m more willing than ever to give the guy his fair due. And once I get into the contents of his latest, hopefully you’ll see why.

A Quiet Place (2018) - Movie Review

The plot: Humanity is on the brink of extinction. An alien species has landed that will attack at the slightest sound, forcing the survivors like Lee (John Krasinski), his wife Evelyn (Emily Blunt) and their children Regan (Millicent Simmonds), Marcus (Noah Jupe) and Beau (Cade Woodward) to be live a literal quiet existence or else they will be killed. As they try to lead as normal a life as one can have in this situation and prepare for the arrival of their next child, the creatures lay in wait for them to make even the smallest of mistakes... and snatch their prey.