Category: Reviews

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Movie Review: “Glass”

A couple years ago, I watched Split. It was a very engaging movie. I walked away quite thrilled by the psychology of the entire situation. One of the people I saw the movie with mentioned it was a spiritual successor to a movie made about fifteen years prior, Unbreakable. It wasn’t clear there was any connection, other than the main character of Unbreakable having a short cameo at the very end of Split. Beyond this brief mention, the movies largely left my mind and I don’t recall talking with anyone else who saw Split.

Over the past few months, I’ve been frequenting the movie theater. During the twenty minutes of previews, Glass kept coming up. I immediately recognized James McAvoy’s cast of characters in the preview, and really wanted to see it. However, I wanted to perform my due diligence of preparation, so last night I watched Unbreakable. That is another excellent movie, but obviously not the point of this review. Feeling caught up with the story as it stood–Elijah Price in a mental institution, David Dunn moonlighting in the security business with his adult son (played by the same guy who played the kid in Unbreakable), and Kevin’s body inhabited by a split personality still abducting young girls to satiate the Beast–I proceeded to the theater to watch Glass.

To make things clear, I am far from a movie aficionado. In particular, I hold no feelings either way toward M. Night Shyamalan. I believe he’s made some great movies, and some not great movies. The idea of a Shyamalan Twist was not on my mind, and I just wanted to enjoy a movie featuring a cast of three characters I found very intriguing. My goal is not to spoil the movie in any major way.

I would say the characters were as expected. Elijah Price continued to be devilishly witty, David was the “reluctant hero”, and Kevin & co. had severe issues, and everyone was treated to another superb display of character acting by James McAvoy. I find no fault in their performances, nor their character’s motivations. Of course, one gets a free pass on motivation when the characters are institutionalized.

The character that bothered me the most was Dr. Staple, the psychologist who took over the treatment of the three main characters. If anything, it was a roller coaster; she started out just bothering me. The actress herself just wasn’t my cup of tea. Then, I started to notice a manic look in her that played well throughout the rest of the movie.

There was little payoff at the very end. It left things open for another movie, but I’m not sure I want it. However, I do value that Shyamalan had the courage of his conviction to finish the movie in a way super hero movies refuse to in most cases.

I think the most praise I can give this movie is that it had me invested in the characters, and believing the unreliable witnesses we had available to us. The movie was set distinctly in our world, and the ambiguous state throughout kept me engaged. I say see the movie, but only if you can be bothered to watch both Unbreakable and Split, and like them both, and want to see an interaction between those two movies. However, I believe they may be better on their own, as spiritual cousins with shared inspirations.

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Spongebob is Back

I recently discovered that Spongebob Squarepants is available on Amazon Prime Video. Since I am still a subscriber to said service, I enjoyed a fun weekend night watching the first couple of seasons. I’ve always had such positive nostalgia for the show, in large part due to how quotable it is. Little did I realize that nearly every line in the show is quotable, and how good each episode was in the early seasons. Even today, they have a certain innocent charm to them, yet the jokes still have enough depth to be legitimately funny now.
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Book Review: “Tribe” by Sebastian Junger

In preparation for an upcoming (not soon) episode of Operation: Have a Conversation, I read the book Tribe by Sebastian Junger. Its description tends to focus on how it explores the way American soldiers who come back from war have trouble integrating themselves back into modern society, as being in the military provides a significant unifying bond that is not felt in today’s Western culture.
While I’m not sure what exactly we’ll get into when recording our episode about this book, I’d like to give a couple of thoughts that have lingered with me since I finished reading it earlier today.
First, this book is important. I think it would be good for everyone to read. It frames much of how we look at modern society very differently than I had ever perceived. It discusses how panic attacks and depression are evolutionary traits, and how society has developed in such a way to make these afflictions more prevalent. It thoroughly discusses our misunderstanding and mistreatment of PTSD, particularly among those who participated in violent conflicts.
This book can be very challenging in certain ways. It opens one’s eyes to a certain hypocrisy with which we live our lives, and also points out reasons to be somewhat afraid for the future of America. It gives some specific ideas about where we tend to fail as a culture and society, and gives some implications for how we can all work toward getting better.
It is hard for me to do this book any sort of justice. My thoughts are still unformed and not particularly cohesive. But after reading it, I’m very excited to discuss it with Mikhail and Jack, and hope you’ll take a chance to read it as well.
The book is less than 100 pages, and the audiobook (if that’s your style) is only around 3 hours. Yet there is a lot that happens. I highly recommend it.

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Movie Review: BlackKklansman

I saw this movie a little over a week ago, and have been trying to work through how to write a review of it. It is the type of movie that is funny, but speaks to something much broader; as such, I want to make sure the comedic elements do not overshadow the intention of the movie, but also want to commend the way the movie inserts comedy in such a way that goes against modern comedic sensibilities.
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Movie Review: "Christopher Robin"

The other day my girlfriend and I went to see the film Christopher Robin, all about the titular character outgrowing his friends in the 100 acre wood, and slowly finding his way back to childhood. After leaving the movie close to tears (my girlfriend did cry multiple times), here was my one line review:

The entire movie was super predictable, but it was so well-done and moving that I didn’t even care.

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Abducted: A 24-Hour Musical

This past weekend I had the fantastic experience of playing drumset in a musical put together in only 24 hours. My friend Tim, along with his friend Adam, wrote the entirety of the show. We showed up at Friday on 7pm, with nobody having seen the script or music except the writers. We then performed the musical — lines memorized, music rehearsed, choreography and blocking complete — at 7pm (and 9pm) Saturday evening.
I had an extremely good time. The music was engaging and written with some interpretation allowable, as all the members of the pit were experienced in this musical scenario. We had a lot of fun putting things together quickly, and were quite successful in performing our parts within a few hours.
The show was broadly a satirical take on the characters from Scooby-Doo. In addition to the normal gang (whose names are never explicitly stated at any point in the show), there is the scapegoat Brian, who is Daphne’s current boyfriend. He is verbally abused throughout the show, with some light slapping. In addition, Scooby-Doo is just a man in a Scooby-Doo outfit (naturally), although an old Hermit we meet at the beginning addresses this fact:

Velma: Oh, that’s our anthropomorphic dog. He loves food, and hates ghosts. So, we keep him on a leash and force him to solve crimes!
Hermit (Cooper): That’s not a dog! That is clearly a man in constant pain!
Fred: (Firmly, maintaining eye contact.) It’s a dog.

The fact that the gang keeps a man in a suit on a leash, and is either indifferent to this fact or somehow unaware of its humanity, is repeated throughout the show. Every time a character (normally Brian) goes to take his leash, Scooby screams in terror. At one point, a completely silent scene opens with Scooby alone on stage. Scared by the audience, he slowly stands on both legs, moves forward, and proceeds to intently say Help me! to various members of the audience.
What I hope to show with these descriptions, as well as the plot description to follow, is the creativity and fun that Tim and Adam bring to the shows they write, as well as some interest in watching their other shows online.
Now for the plot. The aforementioned hermit opens the show, describing to Fred and Velma how he was abducted and probed by aliens. Once all the characters were quickly introduced, they were subsequently abducted. During the musical sequence, a small creature, reminiscent of the chest-bursting alien from Alien, kills Fred during the “probing” procedure. We then meet the head of the ship, Marvin.
Shaggy accuses him of working too hard, so he takes Marvin away to “relax”. We later learn their natural high is Captain Crunch.
Daphne falls into a motherly love, with a bit of sexual tension, with the alien in Fred’s chest, much to Brian’s dismay. Velma proceeds to look for clues, until she meets another female alien with the exact same disposition and actions. Some innuendos occur.
Brian sings his heart out to the audience, beautifully I may add.
We finally learn the Hermit is on the ship. His plan was to run everybody out of town with talk about aliens, so he could have the oil deposit he discovered entirely to himself. Of course, he is now abducted by aliens so there is not much to do. Brian and Scooby were within earshot, and attempt to tell the rest of the gang.
Daphne appears, crazed, yielding a gun, rounding up the aliens and, as Marvin put it, “Yelling lines from Alien 3.” Of course, the alien in Fred’s chest talks her down, at which point another chest-bursting alien emerges from Daphne. Those two aliens go to town.
Brian explains to Velma that he solved the crime, and attempts to remove the mask (as is customary). Of course, being Brian, he takes some other alien and nearly chokes it. At this point, Scooby goes up to the Hermit, who is wearing a very obvious mask, and removes it. It is revealed the culprit is none other than D.B. Cooper.
At this point, we have “A case with no loose ends”, as Shaggy puts it. Of course we then realize the characters are still on an alien spaceship. Brian asks Marvin if they can be dropped off on Earth. Marvin declines, but makes an allowance that they can stay another day, until they are eaten.
Due to the inevitability of their demise, Brian removes Scooby’s collar. Scooby rises to his foot, removes the dog head from his head, and embraces Brian. The show ends on this scene.
 
It was an incredible show. Things weren’t perfect, but they were as imperfect as the musicals I did pit for that had weeks of rehearsal. It was a great experience, and while Tim and Adam have just graduated college, making another musical unlikely in the near future, I am excited to hear about whatever creative endeavors they have moving forward.

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Review: "Dry Land", A Play

DRY LAND is a play about abortion, the harshness and sweetness of young womanhood, and the sticky ambience of a high school locker room.

I decided to go see a play last weekend, based solely on the fact that I knew one of the leads, and one of my friends who participated in theater was interested in going. The Facebook event told me the play was called Dry Land, with the promotional picture being two girls in swimsuits (presumably of a racing variety) lying down next to each other.
Every so often, with the event upcoming, I would see some pictures from rehearsals. It seemed the set consisted solely of a fake pool locker room with benches. The racing swimsuits were confirmed. Upon buying my ticket, that was all the information I had.
I showed up alone, to a small theater on campus, and received my program from what I later learned was one of the producers of the play. The first one in the theater, I sat on the far end of the second row of black chairs. There were only four rows in total, perhaps seating about 20 each. I was within 30 feet of the illuminated set: the same pool locker room floor I had seen online.
Opening the program, I scanned the cast and read the biographies printed inside. There were a mix of recent graduates, and those still going to the University of Minnesota, involved in the theater department. Soon I made my way to the summary, where I was met with the description this review begins with.
I realized I was at this play alone, mostly to see someone who I had met over a few weeks when I was a pit member for another musical, but who I had hardly seen since. I was feeling a bit uncomfortable, but I realized this was a rather immature feeling. So I settled in for what would likely be an engaging play.
I was completely blown away at the end, fairly close to tears. I won’t give much of a plot summary, but let it suffice to say the how we view friendship was questioned, and there was a very long scene where an aborted fetus was being passed, complete with copious amounts of fake blood. Mixed in were fights, complete silence, lonely scenes where a character was on stage for minutes without speaking. Altogether it was a fantastically beautiful play, exploring the dynamics of relationships we have with each other and ourselves at a time period — between high school and college — where we are transitioning our lives and determining who will remain as we move forward.
While the run of the play is over at this point (it was only on for a weekend) I highly recommend finding other performances online (if available) or locally. I was deeply affected, in a way I can’t quite replicate via writing a few days later. While the play was uncomfortable at times, an audience who can take it quietly will come out with a greater sense of empathy.