Based on American author and pastor Greg Laurie and his book “Jesus Revolution,” the movie of the same name, now playing in theatres, is a late 1960s period piece starring Kelsey Grammar as a “square” Southern Californian pastor who embraces the era’s love and peace mantra—and the hippies who espouse it—despite the objections of his church’s elders.
When we first meet pastor Chuck Smith (Grammer) he’s very much an older man of his time. He’s befuddled by the new generation, and even his teenage daughter says he is “the very definition of square.” According to Chuck, hippies have “cast off authority, tradition, morals, cast off God,” and he wants nothing to do with them.
“When God walks in here and brings me a hippie,” he says. “I’ll ask him what it is all about.”
No sooner have the words spilled from his lips that the doorbell rings. On the stoop is Lonnie Frisbee (Jonathan Roumie), a long-haired, charismatic hippie street preacher who says he is often told he looks like Jesus.
With Frisbee comes a message of tolerance, love and the seeds of a Jesus youth Movement, which Time magazine called “The Jesus Revolution” in a June, 1971 cover story.
“God is saving the hippies,” says Frisbee, “and it is blowing everyone’s mind because nobody thought the hippies could be saved.”
Meanwhile, a lost teen from a broken home named Greg Laurie (Joel Courtney) is seeking liberation in the counterculture movement of Southern California. His life is revolutionized when his spiritual journey brings him into the sphere of Smith and Frisbee.
Set to a soundtrack of rock hits like “Jesus Is Just Alright with Me,” “Jesus Revolution” is a faith-based movie about embracing outcasts, searching for meaning and stirring up the status quo with love and acceptance. It’s an unabashedly feel-good story that unfolds quickly, without ever missing an opportunity to use a “far out” Boomer cliché to establish the time and place.
“Jesus Revolution” is at its best in the first hour. Once past Smith’s “I hate hippies” phase Grammar has several heartfelt scenes that give the story’s message of acceptance some real gravitas.
The story wanders into the wilderness when dramatic conflict, like Frisbee’s clash of ego with Smith—“Not everything needs to be a spectacle,” Smith scolds.—and Laurie’s romantic and familial issues take center stage. All stories need some sort of clash to maintain interest, but after an hour of peace and love, it feels forced.
“Jesus Revolution” is a very earnest film, with a strong point of view, that values uplift above all else.
I join NewsTalk 1010’s Moore in the Morning with guest host Jason Agnew to suggest some viewing tips for Family Day and tell a story about how Harrison Ford once flattered me!
On this week’s Richard Crouse Show we meet Matt Bauer. He is the director of “The Other Fellow,” a new documentary that asks a simple question, “What would it be like to share your name with legendary movie spy James Bond?” It is the untold story of the real James Bond[s], people like a Swedish superfan who changed his name to James Bond and opened his own James Bond Museum, a South Bend, Indiana man, James Bond Jr. whose life has been marred by several police officers who refuse to believe the name is real and other Bonds in Vancouver, Toronto, London, Denver, Guyana, Europe, the US and Baghdad. All are bound by being in that looming shadow of James Bone and the movie, The Other Guy, explains how it creates an identity crisis like no other.
Then, Darron Cardoza stops by. If that name doesn’t ring a bell, perhaps you know him by his on-line name, The Bitchy Waiter. He is a long time New York City restaurant worker, an actor and a writer. His popular blog and social media sites are the voice for restaurant workers around the world. He says out loud what most people in the restaurant industry are only allowed to think.
Each week on the nationally syndicated Richard Crouse Show, Canada’s most recognized movie critic brings together some of the most interesting and opinionated people from the movies, television and music to put a fresh spin on news from the world of lifestyle and pop-culture. Tune into this show to hear in-depth interviews with actors and directors, to find out what’s going on behind the scenes of your favourite shows and movies and get a new take on current trends. Recent guests include Chris Pratt, Elvis Costello, Baz Luhrmann, Martin Freeman, David Cronenberg, Mayim Bialik, The Kids in the Hall and many more!
Listen to the show live here:
C-FAX 1070 in Victoria
SAT 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM
SUN 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM
CJAD in Montreal
SAT 8 PM to 9:00 PM
CFRA in Ottawa
SAT 8 PM to 9:00 PM
NEWSTALK 610 CKTB in St. Catharines
Sat 8:00 PM to 9:00 PM
NEWSTALK 1010 in Toronto
SAT 8 PM to 9:00 PM
NEWSTALK 1290 CJBK
SAT 8 PM to 9:00 PM
AM 1150 in Kelowna
SAT 11 PM to Midnight
BNN BLOOMBERG RADIO 1410
SAT 8 PM to 9:00 PM
Click HERE to catch up on shows you might have missed!
“Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,” now playing on theatres, kicks off Marvel’s phase five with a talky sci fi story, heavy on the scientific blather. Instead of “Quantumania,” a more appropriate subtitle could have been: More Fun Than Physics Class!
“It’s a pretty good world,” says Scott Lang (Paul Rudd), a.k.a. Ant-Man. He’s a member of the Avengers, gifted with the power of size manipulation and some funny dialogue. “I’m glad I saved it.” Basking in the glow of his heroic contributions to mankind, he’s written a book titled “Look Out for the Little Guy,” and shamelessly drinks in the praise of his friends and fans.
His family, however, thinks he is resting on his laurels, and, in secret, are still working on ways to help the planet. His romantic partner Hope van Dyne, a.k.a. Wasp (Evangeline Lilly), daughter Cassie (Kathryn Newton) and the original Ant-Man Hank Pym (Michael Douglas), have created a sort of satellite for deep space, except it connects them to the Quantum Realm, a subatomic level where the realities of space and time don’t exist.
Having spent 30 years trapped in the subatomic world, Hope’s mother Janet (Michelle Pfeiffer) is horrified by their experiments. “Do you know how dangerous the Quantum Realm is? Turn it off now.”
Of course, Cassie and Co learn too late that the connection to the Quantum Realm goes both ways, and they are all sucked into the satellite and transported to the strange world, a place that looks like a Yes album cover from 1973 come to life.
Separated into two groups, Scott and Cassie are captured by freedom fighters led by Jentorra (Katy O’Brian), while Hope, Hank and Janet are cut loose, on the run from Janet’s old nemesis, a destroyer of worlds called Kang the Conqueror (Jonathan Majors).
Kang needs the Pym Particles, the subatomic particles developed by Hank which can increase or reduce mass as well as density and strength, to exit the Quantum Realm and travel through time and bring havoc to the real world.
Only Ant-Man and his ragtag gang can stop him and his interdimensional threat, but only if they can navigate the Quantum Realm and come together as a group.
There is a lightness of touch to “Quantumania.” Rudd’s charisma sees to that, and he provides some genuinely funny moments in the film. Majors brings the secret sauce as a great cartoon villain, but the talky script and messy action scenes suck away much of the fun.
You may be thinking, “But Michael Douglas talks to a giant ant. How can that be bad?” True enough, it is something I never would have expected to see, and I got a kick out of it, but for every nifty moment like that, there is sea of exposition, as if the filmmakers don’t trust the audience to understand what is happening unless it is spelled out for them.
The loud, CGI-overload climax fills the screen but doesn’t grab the imagination. There are cool creatures and action enough for any two movies, but it all feels thrown at the screen, willy-nilly. There is a lot of it, but none of it is memorable or particularly original.
“Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” is a let-down, a movie that feels more like an introduction to the next batch of MCU movies than a standalone.
There’s an old proverb that reads, “Words have meaning, names have power.” “The Other Fellow,” a new documentary now paying in select theatres and on VOD, examines the power, along with the blessings, curses and the potentially life changing effects, of sharing a name with one of the most famous fictional characters of all time, super spy James Bond.
Like any good 007 film, “The Other Fellow” hops around the globe from Canada and the United States, to Guyana, Baghdad and Sweden, among other exotic locales, to tell its story. But unlike the proper Bond movies, this globe-trotting doc isn’t about high tech gadgets or supervillains. This is a study of identity, of the power of a name, thrust upon the film’s subjects at birth, to influence the path of the bearer’s life, particularly in our digital age.
From the amusing—several “Bonds” complain about hearing the same “shaken not stirred” jokes everyday of their lives—to the sinister—an African American Bond describes being jailed for 60 days for obstruction of justice for “playfully” saying his name to a police officer—director Matt Bauer examines the issue from several viewpoints.
The result is a funny, yet poignant film that entertains as it tackles big societal and personal issues. There’s a murder mystery, a story of abuse and a name change, all woven together to complete a portrait of how the aura of masculinity of the associated name comes loaded with challenges and unwanted attention.
Some have capitalized on the name. A New York theatre director reluctantly does a Bond style commercial for a casino, even though he has nothing in common with the character except the name. “He has a six-pack. I have a keg.”
Gunnar Schäfer, a Swedish man abandoned by his Nazi deserter father, filled the familial gap in his life with Bond, changing his name and adopting a 007 lifestyle and even opening a James Bond museum. In the embrace of the name, his story differs from the rest, but his obsession sheds light on the way a name can change the path of a life.
“The Other Fellow” isn’t a James Bond film, or a film about James Bond films. Instead, it is an intriguing and well packaged look at what it is like to be James Bond, or at least carry his name.
For years there was a shorthand used in movies and television. If the character was a good person, they had a pet dog. If they were evil, treacherous or otherwise up to no good, they had a pet cat. For instance, “Legally Blonde’s” Elle Woods had Bruiser the Chihuahua. The Queen of Hearts, however, hung with the Cheshire Cat. John Wick had the late, lamented Daisy, while Dr. Evil had the slinky feline Mr. Bigglesworth.
A new documentary aims to break that stereotype by portraying a different take on man’s new best friend, the cat.
Director Mye Hoang cobbles together disconnected stories of cat lovers from all over the United States—an actor, a stunt performer, an unhoused man, firefighters, a truck driver, a software engineer, an influencer and an advertising executive—to create what may be the ultimate cat video.
The thing that binds the stories is the sense of community that the cats provide, whether it is the story of David, an unhoused man whose cat Lucky was the catalyst to friendships and a better life, or trucker David Durst, who arranges meet-and-greets with his social media star cat while he is on the road.
In each of these stories, the felines are the glue that binds their owners to a larger community and while there is loads of cute cat footage, it is the human aspect of each that resonates. It’s about compassion, a trait that seems to flow easily back-and-forth between owner and pet. In other words, the owners get as much out of their feline relationships as the cats do.
“Cat Daddies” is a beautiful looking film—a cut or three above the usual YouTube cat video—but, for all its amiability and empathy, it is a slight piece of work. The stories vary in poignancy and aren’t all equally captivating. Still, for cat lovers there is enough heartwarming feline action to earn a recommend and if you’re a dog lover, this just might change your catitude.
“I intend to ask questions,” says detective Philip Marlowe (Liam Neeson) in the new gumshoe thriller “Marlowe,” now playing in theatres. And ask questions he does. This revisiting of the classic hardboiled 1930s P.I. Philip Marlowe, made famous on the big screen by Humphrey Bogart, isn’t so much a story as it is a very long series of questions strung together to tell the tale. Screenwriter William Monahan, adapting “The Black-Eyed Blonde,” a 2014 authorized Marlowe novel by Irish writer John Banville, must have burned out the “?” key on his typewriter.
Set in Hollywood, in 1939, the same year Raymond Chandler published “The Big Sleep,” his first Marlowe novel, the movie begins when Clare Cavendish (Diane Kruger) hires the detective to find her missing lover, Nico Petersen (François Arnaud). A prop master at one of the studios, he makes extra cash smuggling drugs into the United States in the props he imports from Mexico.
The police say Nico was killed in a hit and run outside a fancy private club, Cavendish thinks he is still alive and Marlowe has questions. Lots of questions.
When “Marlowe” isn’t in Q&A mode, it has, if nothing else, a collection of interesting characters. Jessica Lange makes an impression as a secretive former movie star who just might be her daughter’s love rival, Danny Houston redefines creepy bluster as a pimp at the upmarket Corbata Club but it is Alan Cumming who leaves a lasting impression. He is businessman, philanthropist and gangster Lou Hendricks, a chewer of scenery who delivers lines like, “I am entirely composed of tarantulas,” with the gusto of a Marvel villain.
Neeson gives the title character a world weariness that borders on ennui. In the Raymond Chandler books he is portrayed in his 30s and 40s. Neeson is 70 and, as Marlowe, is still able to take on a room full of bad guys with his fists and his wits, but he’s seen too much of the underside of life, and it has left him cynical, disengaged to the evil that men do. “I’m getting too old for this,” he says after dispatching a group of baddies, and given Neeson’s listless performance, he may be right.
“Marlowe” has the look and feel of an old time Hollywood noir, but is a pale imitation of the real thing. The golden haze that hangs over every frame can’t disguise the fact that this is a movie comprised of a series of questions with unsatisfying answers in search of a meaningful story.
