CTV NEWS CHANNEL: RICHARD’S SUNDAY MORNING MOVIE REVIEWS FOR AUGUST 24!
I join CTV NewsChannel anchor Renee Rogers to talk about the thriller “Relay,” the neo-noir “Honey Don’t” and the rock doc “DEVO” on Netflix.
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Posts Tagged ‘Aubrey Plaza’
CTV NEWSCHANNEL: RICHARD’S WEEKEND MOVIE REVIEWS FOR FRIDAY AUGUST 22, 2025!
I joined CTV NewsChannel anchor Roger Peterson to have a look at new movies coming to theatres, including the thriller “Relay,” the neo-noir “Honey Don’t” and the rock doc “DEVO” on Netflix.
Watch the whole thing HERE!
YOU TUBE: THREE MOVIES/THIRTY SECONDS! FAST REVIEWS FOR BUSY PEOPLE!
Fast reviews for busy people! Watch as I review three movies in less time than it takes to make the bed! Have a look as I race against the clock to tell you about the thriller “Relay,” the survival thriller “Eden” and the neo-noir “Honey Don’t.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
BOOZE & REVIEWS: “HONEY DON’T…” STOP POURING ME A COCKTAIL!!
I join the Bell Media Radio Network national night time show “Shane Hewitt and the Night Shift” for “Booze & Reviews!” This week I review the hardboiled PI movie “Honey Don’t” and do a toast to the private investigators of old.
Click HERE to listen to Shane and me talk about an expensive pair of shark eyes and how Chappell Roan gave Saskatchewan tourism a big boost!
For the Booze & Reviews look at “Honey Don’t” and some cocktails fit for a character who says she drinks heavily–“It’s a point of pride.”–click HERE!
HONEY DON’T: 2 ½ STARS. “an obvious love for its pulpy style.”
SYNOPSIS: In “Honey Don’t,” a new crime drama from director Ethan Coen, Margaret Qualley is a sultry, small town private investigator whose probe into a woman’s death leads to a religious cult. “You’re fascinating,” Reverend Drew Devlin (Chris Evans) tells her. “And you haven’t even seen the riddle tattooed on my ass,” Honey replies.
CAST: Margaret Qualley, Aubrey Plaza, Charlie Day, Billy Eichner, and Chris Evans. Directed by Ethan Coen.
REVIEW: “Honey Don’t,” part two of director Ethan Coen and co-writer Tricia Cooke’s “lesbian B-movie trilogy,” following 2024s “Drive-Away Dolls,” is a hard-boiled private investigator story; a neo-noir set in sunny California.
Sleek yet aimless, “Honey Don’t” displays an obvious love for its pulpy style but doesn’t show any affection for its story. Co-writers Coen and Cooke craft a series of red herring situations rather than a compelling narrative.
The movie begins with a car crash that takes the life of a woman. The only problem she had, says one of her friends, is “taking curves too fast.” As queer private detective Honey O’Donahue (Margaret Qualley) investigates the case, she also becomes involved with the local cop shop’s no-nonsense Property Room Officer M.G. (Aubrey Plaza), goes head-to-head with a cult leader played by Chris Evans and searches for her missing niece Corinne (Talia Ryder).
Not that any of that adds up to much. The plot U-turns mostly serve a showcase for Qualley’s old-school movie star glamour and way with snappy dialogue. As the title character she’s an anachronism, an echo of the PIs of the past. She uses a Rolodex and doesn’t have a cell phone. “I carry around a bag of quarters for the pay phone,” she explains. Qualley has a knack for the character’s hard-boiled cadence, delivering Honey’s terse comebacks with deadpan flair.
As over-sexed cult leader Reverend Drew Devlin, Chris Evans hands in the most flamboyantly unwholesome role of his career. Whether he’s sleeping with his parishioners or shooting them or delivering a sermon based on a macaroni allegory, there isn’t a hint of Captain America anywhere to be seen.
Qualley and Evans do all the heavy lifting here. The filmmaking is playful, but the wandering story and disregard for any character not played by Qualley makes the title “Honey Don’t” seem less like a name and more like a warning.
MEGALOPOLIS: 2 STARS. “experimental in execution, baffling in its intentions.”
SYNOPSIS: “Megalopolis,” a new fable from legendary director Francis Ford Coppola, now playing in theatres, is a mix of Ancient Roman politics, sci fi, and even a little bit of mime.
Visionary artist Cesar (Adam Driver) has plans to build a utopian city to inspire hope within the rotting framework of New Rome. “When we leap into the unknown,” he says, “we prove that we are free.” He’s up against the corrupt Mayor Franklyn Cicero (Giancarlo Esposito), agent of chaos Clodio Pulcher (Shia LaBeouf) and the threat of partisan warfare.
CAST: Adam Driver, Giancarlo Esposito, Nathalie Emmanuel, Aubrey Plaza, Shia LaBeouf, Jon Voight, Laurence Fishburne, Talia Shire, Jason Schwartzman, Kathryn Hunter, Grace VanderWaal, Chloe Fineman, James Remar, D. B. Sweeney, and Dustin Hoffman. Directed by Francis Ford Coppola.
REVIEW: As idiosyncratic a movie as we’re likely to see this year, “Megalopolis,” the forty-years-in-the-making passion project from Francis Ford Coppola, is equal parts hammy and hopeful, dense and dazzling. It’s the work of a filmmaker with nothing left to prove, and brims with imagination, ambition and, unfortunately, self-indulgence.
Coppola, who says he rewrote the script for “Megalopolis” at least 300 times, empties out the idea drawer, producing a script that overflows with his thoughts on legacy, survival and hope for the future. Using lessons learned from the intrigue of Roman history, he throws in a dollop of sci- fi—Cesar Catalina (Driver) can stop time with a flourish of his hands—to tell a story of utopian values pitted against city hall.
It’s a mix of Ayn Rand and Marcus Aurelius, and not unfamiliar ground for the director. He has essayed the effects of power, political paranoia and the bloom of love in previous films like “The Godfather,” “The Conversation” and “One from the Heart.” The difference is, those movies, while often epic in scope, didn’t take a kitchen sink approach to the storytelling.
“Metropolis” is overstuffed to the point of bursting. The grand vision of warring billionaires and politicians is rendered almost incomprehensible by scenes that never lift off or, worse, feel randomly inserted into the narrative.
Coppola sets his story against a city in a fall of the Roman Empire decline, which should bring along with it very high stakes, but there is never a sense of danger or tension.
Instead, head-scratching line readings, spontaneous Shakespearean monologuing, and unintentionally funny, heightened performances distract from the actual story. “Megalopolis” is operatic in its ambition, experimental in its execution and rather baffling in its intentions.
Perhaps the film’s most telling line is a quote from Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius: “The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority.”
And so it goes with “Metropolis.” Despite the presence of big-name talent like Adam Driver and Aubrey Plaza, this is a deliberating non-commercial film. Coppola’s vision is experimental, difficult to penetrate, impossible to pigeonhole, and occasionally thrilling, but mostly a slog.
MY OLD ASS: 3 ½ STARS. “surreal coming-of-age story stays anchored to reality.”
SYNOPSIS: “My Old Ass,” a coming-of-age dramedy starring Maisy Stella and Aubrey Plaza, and now playing in theatres, asks a simple question: Would you like a sneak peak of your adult life complete with all the good, the bad and the ugly the future will offer? Maisy Stella plays Elliott, an eighteen-year-old whose future self guides her through the landmines of growing up and falling in love with one vital piece of advice, “Avoid anyone named Chad.”
CAST: Maisy Stella, Percy Hynes White, Maddie Ziegler, Kerrice Brooks, Aubrey Plaza. Written and directed by Megan Park.
REVIEW: Despite a title that suggests a 1990s teen comedy, “My Old Ass” is a surreal coming-of-age story that stays anchored to reality with natural, heartfelt performances and a great deal of humor. In her second feature film, writer/director Megan Park displays an empathetic hand as the movie morphs from a standard(ish) teen comedy opening to a heartfelt finale.
The appearance of 39 nine-year-old Elliott suggests “My Old Ass” will be a fantasy, a “Peggy Sue Got Married” style riff on growing up, but it stays earthbound as an examination of the first blushes of new love touched by melancholy.
The film’s heart is Stella, who, as young, optimistic Elliott wrestles with real life situations and feelings about her sexuality, her future and the notion of leaving her teen years in the rear-view mirror. Her charismatic presence gives “My Old Ass” a bittersweet but never sentimental edge that elevates its love story above and beyond a Nicolas Sparks style romance, or a teen comedy trope.
As older, world-weary Elliott, Plaza, who only appears in three scenes but whose presence informs the entire movie, uses her trademark snark like a sword, but here her sarcasm feels like the shield that protects her from the ups and downs of a complicated life. It’s great work, and while the two actors don’t resemble one another, they share an energy that binds the two halves of the character together.
“My Old Ass” is an entertaining, and often funny look at the importance of embracing life fully, in all its joy as well as its disappointments and agonies.
OPERATION FORTUNE: RUSE DE GUERRE: 2 ½ STARS. “glow is a bit dimmer this time.”
All the Guy Ritchie trademarks that made so many of his other films so much fun are visible in “Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre,” a new action adventure now streaming on Amazon Prime. Jason Statham comes back for a fifth kick at the can with the director, bringing with him the gravelly voice and fisticuffs first made famous in Ritchie’s “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.” There’s also some comedy, outrageous crime, slick cameras moves and a bangin’ soundtrack.
Why then, does it feel been there done that? Is it that familiarity has bred a certain kind of contempt, or is Ritchie coasting on his merits?
All-round action man Orson Fortune (Statham), tech genius Sarah Fidel (Aubrey Plaza) and sniper J.J. Davies (Bugzy Malone) are members of a top-secret British government agency run by Nathan Jasmine (Cary Elwes). Their latest assignment involves retrieving something called “The Handle,” a gewgaw—we’re not really told—that could cause a rift in the world order.
“We don’t know what’s been stolen,” says Nathan. “That remains a mystery for you to solve. But we need to stop it from getting onto the open market. Threat’s imminent.”
Before it can be sold on the black market, the crew must infiltrate billionaire arms dealer Greg Simmonds’s (Hugh Grant) inner circle. Their ticket in? International movie star and Simmonds’s favorite actor Danny Francesco (Josh Hartnett).
“The best agents are stars,” says Orson, “and the best actors are movie stars.”
“Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre” feels like a Xerox copy of the movies that made Ritchie and Statham famous. The world-ending stakes are a bit higher, and there is more lifestyle porn—like private jets and global locations—but the fast pace, the late movie reveal (we eventually find out what The Handle actually does) and the “colourful” characters that have populated his movies from the get go all return but the glow is a bit dimmer this time.
Hugh Grant’s Michael Caine impersonation is a blast, and Ritchie still knows how to move a camera during the action scenes, but because we are so familiar with so many of the elements in play here, “Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre” almost feels like a sequel to a reboot of a sequel. It’s the law of diminishing returns. The further away you get from the source, the less effective the movie will be. In this case, the sum of all the parts is a bland espionage story that is, at best, serviceable.
EMILY THE CRIMINAL: 4 STARS. “reveals vulnerability and steeliness.”
“Emily the Criminal,” a new crime drama, now playing in theatres, and starring Aubrey Plaza, uses ripped-from-the-headlines topics—student debt, the terrible job market and the gig economy—to fuel a story of a search for liberation.
Plaza plays Emily, a young woman whose criminal record, although minor, and short temper make it difficult for her to advance up the job ladder. Stuck in a dead-end restaurant job, she barely scrapes by, let alone put a dent in her $70,000 student debt.
Desperate, she takes a job working with the slick-talking black-market thief Youcef (Theo Rossi). The scam is simple. She’ll be a “dummy shopper,” someone who buys merchandise with stolen and forged credit cards. A quick $200 payoff later, her cool and calm demeanor impresses Youcef who offers her a bigger, though more dangerous job for the next day.
Seduced by the money, she goes into business, personally and professionally, with Youcef. She begins earning good money, and, as their relationship blossoms, finds love. But when she gets sloppy, scamming the same store more than once in a week, she learns the easy money can disappear as quickly as it appeared. Unless she does something about bit.
“Emily the Criminal” is a hard-boiled look at the intersection of desperation and opportunity.
Director John Patton Ford and Plaza craft a portrait of Emily, a millennial fighting for her piece of the American Dream, even though it remains just out of her reach. She is a complex character, edgy yet sympathetic, messy but focused. Plaza gives voice to Emily’s frustration of being forever punished for a mistake, but never panders to the audience in an attempt to be likable. She has lost faith in the polite society that hasn’t afforded her opportunity, so she steps outside it, and doesn’t look back. We may not make the same decisions as she, but her motivations, under the weight of a future filled with student debt and crappy jobs, come off as understandable. That is a credit to Plaza’s performance that reveals both Emily’s vulnerability and her steeliness.
Thanks to Plaza, “Emily the Criminal” is a fascinating character study, but crime aspects of the story are just as compelling. Like its main character, the movie is a mix of elements. Social commentary, crime drama, a hint of romance and character work, whose sum fit together like puzzle pieces.
