Tag: Movies

Media Moves: Netflix Backing Out Should Accelerate The Inevitable

Will it be a comedy or a drama when it debuts on Netflix?

There’s no denying that the insane pedophile rampaging through the last decade of our lives has changed things. It’s unfortunate that we let that occur. While many of us may have seen the potential for all the damage he’s caused, you can say not enough did, but I’ll say instead that not enough cared.

Smartphone screen showing the Paramount logo in sharp focus in the foreground, with a blurred Netflix logo and other colorful streaming imagery in the background, suggesting competition between streaming services.

But here we are. Where is that exactly? We’re witnessing almost daily damage to most things around us that I think too many still think will get magically reversed when he leaves office or leaves this planet, whichever comes first. It will take a few generations to get back to whatever we believed normal was, although I’m not sure there ever was a normal because things always evolved, though by and large at a more sanely digestible pace.

Take for example what’s happening in the media landscape. News that Netflix was going to withdraw from a bidding war for Warner Brothers, effectively clearing the field for Paramount to win the deal is being discussed from a number of perspectives by all the usual and unusual suspects.

Those that wanted Netflix to rise to the challenge and succeed, keeping Warner Brothers away from the MAGAt supporting Ellison family, were depressed and angry. Those who see Netflix as just another evil media empire were oblivously happy. Most just want to know when the next and eventual price increases are coming.

Quite a few are quite concerned about what this will do to CNN and the news landscape. They needn’t be. That Punch and Judy network long since turned over the puppet strings to the wrong masters.

You can argue that this might have happened with or without Trump, but there’s no point in that. What you can’t argue is that this kind of wheeling and dealing will never be the same again now that the Oval Office has become the one stop shop for getting ahead.

I happen to think that in the long run, Netflix pulling out of the bidding is a good thing. The trend lines point away from what we have thought of as traditional media and entertainment. Now that news is entertainment and sports is politics, it’s a circle of cannibals feeding on each other.

As for those concerned about CNN and news coverage in the larger scheme, let’s get real. There are only so many corporate knees one can bend. Yes, CBS and CNN will essentially become the same, but that consolidation is going to be an accelerant tossed on two already burning corpses.

For those concerned about the picture beyond the news game, I think we’ll see the same sort of downward acceleration once things settle in, which won’t be for a while yet. Movies and other entertainment will still get made. We’re in an age of content abundance, yet keep in mind the real winner at the moment is probably YouTube, which continues to steal eyeballs from all the other sources. Note also that audio audiences are listening more to podcasts than talk radio according to some statistics.

My hunch is this latest episode will just quicken the decline for the capitulators and accelerate the trend of consumers making other choices. I can’t wait to watch the extended series about it all on Netflix.

That’s my $.02. It might not be worth half that.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

The Roses: A Mini-Review

Black comedy served well done

I often don’t find remakes of films to be worthwhile. That’s not the case with Jay Roach’s reimagining of the 1989 film The War of The Roses, based on Warren Adler’s book of the same name. Titled simply and tellingly, The Roses, this remake worked for me.

I enjoyed this version better than the much beloved original. Perhaps it’s the time or the timing, but the fact that the remake focuses more on the comedy and less on the black comedy is what won me over. Don’t get me wrong. I love black comedy and this film is still in that genre, but the brightness of the comedy is what makes it work.

The star pairing of Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman is sublime. As a couple who seem to have it all before they start tearing everything to shreds, Cumberbatch and Colman deliver as delicious a repartee as the dishes Colman’s character whips up with her cooking. Roach plants the moments for the payoffs perfectly, and even pays homage to the original with a few clever winks. Everything makes sense in the story’s update to our current era including a delightful spin on the perils of having a new home designed from the ground up with smart technology.

Fans of the original know where the story is going, but this time around I found myself almost rooting for a different ending, just to keep the banter going. Scathing wit hasn’t been this much fun since Hepburn and Tracy.

The supporting cast that includes among others Andy Samberg, Allison Janney, and Kate McKinnon is superb though a bit underutilized. Even so, they do deliver a delightful ensemble turn as Americans enjoying and being seduced by their own growing, yet completely naive awareness of the lead couple’s Britishness.

The Roses was released late in the summer of 2025 and I just caught up with it on streaming (Disney+) and I’m glad I did. Whether you’re a fan of the original or not, this remake is a good and funny diversion amidst all of the bad times we’re living through. To top it off, Colman and Cumberbatch deliver a master class in comedy.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Train Dreams: A Review

“Every least thing’s important.”

So much can go wrong in life. Big things. Little things. Depending on your station in life what goes wrong determines so much of what comes after, it often tears at hope in our search for a peaceful existence. Train Dreams, directed and co-written by Clint Bentley, set in a more challenging era than our own, focuses on the big things and little things that shape us, in a revealing and poetic story of the life of one man.

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In its small singular focus the film expansively embraces the life of an Idaho man who has never traveled far from home, through tough times, tragedies and the moments that define a life in the way trees populate a forest. If that sounds depressing, it’s the exact opposite. The cinematography by Adolpho Veloso and the acting take flight and lift the story far beyond the gritty and tangled undergrowth of the life it inhabits.

It’s a gorgeous film to watch that beautifully captures the mountainous northwest as it follows this lumberjack plying his trade, clearing trees to make lumber for the construction of the Spokane International Railway. It’s a dangerous life and one that takes him away for stretches of time from the family he eventually builds. The mostly peaceful vistas and views contrast with the travails seemingly necessary for this man to build a simple life, at times as sharply shocking as a gunshot in a quiet wilderness.  Yet we’re reminded that all of that work literally is overtaken as the years go by with new growth replacing old.

The cast is superb. Joel Edgerton plays the lead, Robert Grainer, in a brilliant performance proving less is always more. Felicity Jones plays his wife, breathing life into him and the story. William H. Macy is exquisite as an older logger in the camps dispensing well worn wisdom. Much of the story is accompanied by the best use of narration I’ve heard in a movie, voiced by Will Patton. It comes and goes like a breeze through the trees seemingly perfectly natural and undisturbing each time it wafts in.

This movie is not going to be for everyone simply because its success requires participation in an almost passive vein. It doesn’t propel us into story telling, it lays it out for us to observe like viewing a valley unfolding beneath from a mountain perch. It’s not fast paced. It’s revelations come in a visual poetry that astounds, capturing the complexity of nature and how simple our small part of it really is, no matter how large or important we view the roles we play in the dramas we create for ourselves.

In the insanely paced tumultuous times we now find ourselves it offers a moment of exquisite reflection exemplified by two mirroring lines of dialogue. “The world is intricately stitched together, boys. Every thread we pull, we know not how it affects the design of things,” says Macy’s character around a campfire. That echoes back again towards the end, when a Forest Service worker reminds Grainer and us that “every least thing’s important.”

Both challenge the wisdom behind the cliché that tells us we can’t see the forest for the trees. But then the bigger picture of a life is always made of smaller moments stitched together if we pay attention.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

My Viewing and Reading Picks for 2025

Another year of complex viewing and reading

Another year comes to an end. A new one gets ready to begin. 2025 felt less complex than 2024. Lines weren’t as blurry with one exception that I’ll get to later. In a year when the rush to redefine and compete for the lowest common denominator felt like a three-legged sack race over broken glass, complexity again drew my attention and stuck with me. There’s a great leveling happening, whether intentional or not. But as long as we can advertise against whatever the content is, it seems to matter less and less what the content is or how it’s made.

When it comes to viewing entertainment it was a year when the quality line between movies and streaming TV blurred even more as excellent series work competing with the big screen for some of my favorite viewing. The Pitt and Adolescence were two of the finest things I watched this year.

There are a number of titles in these lists that would qualify for what is being called Resistance Cinema. Each one is deserving of inclusion in that list for immediacy. Any lasting impact will only be determined with the passage of time and all of what we’re currently resisting either cements or cracks.

I don’t believe in “best of” lists. There’s good stuff being created amidst all of the mediocrity and my judgement on what’s good is probably not yours. I pick what attracts and holds my attention. I also don’t see or read everything and the holiday release schedule geared to coming in under the wire for awards recognition is a silly game for insiders and not for me. There also may be a title or two that I didn’t catch until 2025 even though it was released in previous years. Goodness knows there are books waiting to be read.

If there’s a link with a title, I took the time to write about it. I should have done that more. So here’s a list in no particular ranking order of what I found most intriguing throughout the year.

Movies
Streaming TV
Books
  • 1929 by Andrew Ross Sorkin
  • The Mission by Time Weiner
  • Apple In China by Patrick McGee
  • The Director by Daniel Kehlmann

Have a Happy New Year!

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

The Netflix Paramount Media Money Muddle

Stay tuned

It was quite comedic to watch the reaction to the news at the end of last week that Netflix had won the bidding to take over Warner Brothers. There was indeed much celebrating. There as also quite a bit of consternation. The celebration was primarily because there is an abundant school of thought that no one wanted Paramount, now essentially another tentacle of the Trump administration, to win.

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I didn’t bite on the news celebrations or the consternation being the final chapter then. Of course it wasn’t. The Netflix bid parlayed out to $72 billion. On Monday, Paramount Skydance launched a hostile all cash takeover bid of $77.9 billion.

There’s only a roughly $5-6 billion difference between the two bids, but the Paramount bid seeks to swallow up the pieces of Warner Brothers/Discovery that Netflix apparently wasn’t interested in, including media properties such as CNN, TNT Sports, and Discovery. Netflix’s bid was for Warner’s Studio and HBO’s streaming business only. Note that Warner Brothers had previously announced that it planned to split up the combined businesses in just that vein.

So, what does it all mean?

First, it means a lot of lawyers and lobbyists are going to make a lot of money. There are political, marketplace, and money pieces moving around the board in what looks to be quite a saga that I imagine Hulu will end up making a series about within a couple of years.

Netflix is after the content. And the control. Ben Thompson has an excellent run down on that, and why Netflix’s delivery system makes it make sense. Netflix has created quite a war chest for its bid (which is both cash and stock), by building a relatively slick distribution system to deliver its already abundant content, plus whatever it continues acquiring. (How many TV remotes are there without a Netflix button these days?)

Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison’s all cash bid includes quite a few players including his pop, Larry Ellison, both of whom are Trump supporters, as well as outlays from sovereign wealth funds of Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, Qatar, and also Jared Kushner’s Affinity Partners. Without those partners Paramount, valued at around $15 billion, would have a hard time competing with Netflix’s roughly $400 billion war chest. (The Wall Street Journal has a decent rundown on more of the money specifics.)

Second, it means what was already a muddle the way most of these kind of things are, will get muddled up even more due to the politics of the moment. I’ll disagree with Ben Thompson’s analysis that points out that the President doesn’t have final say on this. That may have indeed been true in a past we’re no longer living in. Those old rules no longer apply. As we’ve been learning everyday since January 20, 2025.

Third, Hollywood also has its concerns. The traditional studio power structure is not enamored of Netflix and its heretofore disdain for theatrical releases, which also brings movie theatre owners into play. I’m not sure if the Netflix bid means the death of Hollywood as some claim, but it certainly would shift the pieces, the game board, and the power structure as what began as a tech company could end up controlling much of what we see on our smaller silver screens.

Big money is at stake obviously. But when big egos get involved the costs for everyone increase. Including those flipping through content consumption choices with their remotes.

Stay tuned. I’m guessing that Hulu series will be quite a watch when all is said and done.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Filmmakers, Storytellers and The Resistance

Storytelling in conflict

Writing for Bloomberg, Mark Leydorf makes a case that movies are taking up the whistles of resistance in The Rise of Resistance Cinema in the Era of Trump. He’s right but he shortcuts the great history of storytelling.

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He’s correct that there are a number of films being released, along with those already past their big screen sell by dates, featuring stories and themes that can’t help but strike resonant chords for those repelled by and rebelling against the current political moment we’re living in.

He doesn’t have to reach too far beyond his initial example of Wicked: For Good to create a long list of titles to support his thesis. A thesis I buy, even though I think it serves cinema history, and storytelling in general, a bit short in the end.

In compiling his list, Leydor says:

The list goes on:

Eddington, Bugonia, Sirāt— there’s a reason directors are digging into stories of conflict, paranoia and cataclysm. Taken together, these films, most of which were conceived and went into production during Donald Trump’s interregnum, between the insurrection of Jan. 6, 2021, and MAGA’s triumphant return to power, have coalesced into a troop of cinematic resistance amid the conflicts and crises defining his political era and the rightward, nationalistic turns happening broadly around the globe.

I’ll reach into that quote and point out that all successful storytelling, on the screen, on the page, on the stage, around campfires, or told sitting on bar stools involve some form of conflict, paranoia, and cataclysm. Even top rated fare on the feel good Hallmark Channel features conflict. Heck, they have to make it up on Reality TV. Without conflict you don’t really have much of a story. Goodness knows we’re overripe with enough conflict to tell thousands of stories at the moment.

While focusing on this current crop of films, Leydor is spotlighting a point in the long timeline of story telling. These current storytellers are doing what storytellers do, bringing their near term reactions to whatever is in the zeitgeist at the moment, following traditions established long before Hollywood executives ever got involved in a script conference or endings became focus group fodder.

Frankly, I’m glad to see such a strong list of filmmakers telling these stories at this moment. We need to see ourselves reflected back in the mirror we hold up to nature, before it’s all AI generated. The same is happening on stages, in late night television comedy, and from the keyboards of many authors. Given how none of us knows how this moment is going to play out, it’s fascinating.

Note that Leydor points out that most of these films were conceived and green lit after the first Trump administration and prior to this second one.

I had the privilege in the Fall of 2022 to direct three one-act plays from Ukrainian playwrights about the effects of the Russian invasion that had begun earlier that year in February. The writing was alive, fresh, and as urgent as the wounds were then. That writing still is today, even though now those stories are snippets of a longer story still unfolding to an end no one knows.

Historically few stories springing up in any current conflict, regardless of medium, retain staying power beyond almost artifact curiosity. It’s usually the stories told after the moment passes that last and define with more resilient resonances, even as their lessons are forgotten by those too eager to write what they think will be a different ending.

What will be more fascinating to watch is how many of these current films are remembered years or decades from now, once this historical moment does pass.

Whatever that turns out to be.

(Image from Skylines on Shutterstock)

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Review: A House of Dynamite

Shear terror in the face of madness

When you live in Chicago, a city under siege by ICE, I’m not sure, but I guess it a strong bent of masochism to watch a movie where your city gets nuked by an unknown enemy. That’s sorta how I felt when my wife and I cued up the excellent Kathryn Bigelow film, A House of Dynamite over the weekend. We debated back and forth, and decided to give it a go. I’m glad we did.

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It’s certainly not an easy movie to watch, regardless of where you live. Yes, a city gets nuked. But that’s not the strength or the point of this movie. Nor should it be a spoiler at this point. The strength lies in watching otherwise steely individuals wither when their shields of confidence dissolve into vulnerable realizations as a horrible what-if scenario becomes all too real to contemplate, yet alone live through, even though they’ve contemplated them over and over again in training.

We don’t get the disaster movie special effects explosions and carnage. They aren’t necessary for this film to work. What we do get is far more terrifying. We get holes ripped through the souls of the characters we’re allowed to meet as they do their jobs. We get belief in systems and protocols developed by smart people shattered, leaving us all wondering if any of it was worth it in the end. It’s a parable of the moment.

It’s certainly not a Halloween movie, but I can’t think of a scarier film to watch as it strips away every possible security blanket and myth we might have become just too comfortable imagining, and realize just how much we’re in the hands of human beings just like us when horrible things unfold.

That’s more than frighteningly true with an utterly incompetent administration running the U.S at the moment. Noah Oppenheim’s script subtly, deceptively, and brilliantly lays that out as it carries us deeper into unfolding and inevitable danger that may be too horrible to watch, but is certainly more terrifying not to.

Bigelow and Oppenheim’s characters all seem more than capable of the sensitive jobs they hold. The filmmakers dispense with the tropes typical of these kind of disaster flicks that feature the usual array of martinets, incompetent and insufferable fools, and even heroes, sung or unsung. Sure, we see some of the personal traumas and trivia some may be dealing with as they come to work on the morning in question. But we initially watch each of these men and women of strong character knuckle down to perform when the unthinkable moment presents itself.

We then watch as they ultimately come face to face with that horrible moment of realization that there is nothing they can do to stop the inevitable. We watch as the enormous personal toll alters their breathing as they have no choice but to carry on with psychic wounds bigger than any smoldering crater before the missile even hits. Bigelow’s camera work and the cast’s strong acting gives us searing glimpses into those moments of horror and devastation as she catches her characters when each crushing realization occurs.

In three parts and an epilogue, the movie repeats the same horrible 18 minutes or so from missile detection to impact, presenting the scenarios in different government locales and viewpoints. We see a missile interception station in Alaska communicating with the White House Situation Room, the STRATCOM headquarters in Nebraska, FEMA headquarters as they have to pull out the plans for the inevitable, and the president who is attending a basketball camp event and then whisked away, while his aides work to inform him from the White House.

Those parts overlap using much of the same dialogue presented from these different points of view via video or audio conferences as the government tries to formulate its response. The repetition of dialogue serves as a better tension builder and reminder of the time before impact than any of the countdown clocks we might see on the screen. As does the sudden departures of those who need to be taken to secure locations as events unfold.

Bigelow’s cast includes some big name actors in a cast headed by Idris Elba and Rebecca Ferguson, that also includes Anthony Ramos, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Jason Clarke, Greta Lee, and Tracy Letts among a host of others. Some of that host provides some of the most telling reactions on the periphery of the action as they watch their bosses try to handle the situation.

To my mind, nothing procedural happens that we haven’t seen or read about in countless Cold War thrillers of the past. With one exception. I was left with the same sort of existential dread after viewing A House of Dynamite as I was when I first read Tom Clancy’s Sum of All Fears and realized the weapon was going to explode. The only difference is that there was a hero in the Clancy novel to pick up the pieces and help us move beyond the horror.

In A House of Dynamite there are no heroes. Only humans. Trying to do their best. Not failing. But having to face the reality that sometimes your best is simply not enough in the face of madness.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Final Trailer for Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein Released

Looking forward to this

I’m looking forward to the release of Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein on Netflix perhaps more than any other film to be released this fall. The movie hits theaters on October 7 and streams on Netflix beginning November 7th. The official trailer has now been released. 

Mary Shelly’s tale of the monster who created a monster has been so twisted around in so many different incarnations it’s hard to separate the takes from the original fiction. That’s not a complaint, it’s just what it is. I can imagine this one will offer up a unique twist or two given Guillermo del Toro’s previous films. 

I’m really looking forward to this and hope it lives up to its promise.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Chicago’s Uptown Theatre Hits 100 and is Still On The Skids

Decaying majesty

They certainly don’t make movie theatres like they used to. That’s not surprising or new, and long ago signaled a passing of a time when building special places for people to gather became less of a priority than so many other concerns. Chicago’s Uptown Theatre was one of those special places back in the day. It’s been decaying and shuttered since 1981 and every now and then efforts surface to try and bring it back to life.

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The Uptown celebrates its 100th birthday on August 18. Built as a grand show palace by Balaban & Katz and the architectural firm Rapp & Rapp, it was hailed as spectacular, and a “splendiferous palace of a place.” The Uptown sat 4,320 in what was called “an acre of seats.”

Offering movies and live entertainment it was billed as a “shrine to democracy where there are no privileged patrons. The wealthy rub elbows with the poor — and are better for this contact.” It also had air conditioning.

Obviously a lot changed throughout the years, talkies took over from silent films, the Great Depression, and the advent of TV changed the dynamic. The Uptown part of town itself fell on hard times and saw big changes, and during much of my time in Chicago was the last section of the lakefront resisting redevelopment. The final act on the Uptown stage was a concert by the J. Geils Band in 1981.

Robert Loerzel has a terrific piece looking back at the Uptown Theatre in the Chicago Tribune that’s more than worth a read as we approach the show palace’s centennial. There’s also an excellent gallery of photos, which the photo above is from. The link should be a gift link, although I don’t know how long that lasts. Loerzel has also authored a new book, The Uptown: Chicago’s Endangered Movie Palace

When I first moved to Chicago in 1999 there were still a few of these show palaces in operation around the city, but the Uptown had long since shuttered. I got to take a tour of the place in the early 1990’s and the scale of what it once offered was impressive to see, only dwarfed by the decay and disrepair.

There are still efforts to try and find funding to restore the Uptown, but I’m sad to say I think priorities have shifted in such a way that we won’t see that happen.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

Sinners: A Review

Worth sinking your teeth into.

I saw Ryan Coogler’s Sinners in a movie theatre when it was released in April. I rarely go to movie theaters these days, but in this one instance I was certainly glad I did. Now that Sinners has reached streaming on the 4th of July, I hope anyone who didn’t have a chance to see it on the big screen will take time to view the fireworks it provides at home. I’m looking forward to a second watch. It is excellent. It’s not perfect. But it is sublime in its imperfections.

Sinners01 978x652.Ryan Coogler knows how to tell stories. He knows how to tell stories in big ways. He knows how to tell stories that entertain and unsettle. He knows how to weave the various strands of history, culture, and popular story tropes together in ways that spin out a fresh new cinematic delight that redefines the old and refreshes the tired. He may get a bit carried away here and there, but in the end he delivers as a filmmaker of note.

In Sinners he ties Southern-gothic, vampire horror, and depression era gangster styles together along with a musical storyline that literally burns down the house. Working with his familiar actor collaborator, Michael B. Jordan, playing a set of twins, Coogler creates something brand new, dangerous and in the end just damn dandy. I fully expect Sinners to be quite popular in the Best Picture categories when awards season rolls around. Even with its imperfections, it’s at the top of my list for best films of the year.

Jordan and all of the actors are superb. The music is red hot. The vampire gore is plenty gory. There’s a raw, violent, sexual tension throughout that’s heightened by the rawness of the blues music that infuses the storyline. The sequence when the fateful evening’s dancers are intermingled with ghosts of African and African-American pasts and premonitions of musical genres of a future yet to be is a highlight, even if it is a bit too precious.

Coogler also plays with some larger themes among the music, horror, and history. Questioning why Blacks cleave to Christianity (“Blues wasn’t forced on us like that religion,” and who counts as Black when everyone doesn’t have the same black skin or heritage, cut through many of the myths so easily consumed and assumed about the Black South.

As to the flaws, perhaps the biggest is also its biggest strength. Coogler stretches out a wide canvas to paint this story on.  Perhaps too wide, and even so he often paints outside the bounds of that canvas. And once the delicious and setup is accomplished, the violent confrontation we all know is coming at times feels more rushed than we want it to, certainly when it consumes characters we’ve invested in.

Even with those flaws, Sinners yields a bounty that often borders on the rapturous. It is more than worth your time.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.