I join CTV NewsChannel anchor Marcia MacMillan to talk about the winners and also rans at the Critic’s Choice Awards and why Timothée Chalamet is working at a ‘different level’ in ‘Marty Supreme.’
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Deb Hutton is off this week so I sit with Mark Twohey on NewsTalk 1010 to go over some of the week’s biggest movies playing in theatres. Today we talk about “Marty Supreme,” the zombie flick “We Bury the Dead” and the psychological thriller “The Plague.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
I join the CTV NewsChanel to talk about the gameplay of “Marty Supreme,” the slithery charms of “Anaconda” and the tuneful “Song Sung Blue.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
I join the CTV NewsChanel to talk about the gameplay of “Marty Supreme,” the slithery charms of “Anaconda” and the tuneful “Song Sung Blue.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
SYNOPSIS: In “Marty Supreme,” a new drama now playing on theaters, Timothée Chalamet plays an ambitious table tennis player who will stop at nothing in his pursuit of success and a lost dog. “Losing doesn’t even enter my consciousness,” he says.
CAST: Timothée Chalamet, Gwyneth Paltrow, Odessa A’zion, Kevin O’Leary, Tyler Okonma, Abel Ferrara and Fran Drescher. Directed by Josh Safdie.
REVIEW: I might normally be skeptical about a movie that gives Kevin “Mr. Wonderful” O’Leary billing, just under names like Timothée Chalamet and Gwyneth Paltrow, but “Marty Supreme” is such a blast of pure energy I’m willing to let it go.
Set in 1952, “Marty Supreme” begins with the title character brash New Yorker Marty Mauser (Chalamet) working as a show salesman to finance a trip to the British Table Tennis Open. He’s a prodigy, a world class ping pong player who believes the sport is the next big thing, and he wants to be part of that wave.
His quest for fame and fortune, however, is more unpredictable than a no-look serve in a ping pong match.
Equipped with only his talent, determination and arrogance, Marty’s rise, fall and redemption put him in contact with actress Kay Stone (Gwyneth Paltrow), her cruel business mogul husband Milton Rockwell (O’Leary), a violent dog owner (legendary filmmaker Abel Ferrara) and the irate husband of his childhood best friend Rachel (Odessa A’zion).
At 2 hours and 29 minutes “Marty Supreme” is an epic, Sammy Glick-style story of a guy who feeds off confidence and daring. Marty’s a fast talker in a propulsive movie that zips along as quickly as the quips that spoil effortlessly from his lips. It’s an exhilarating ride, a pedal to the metal—or paddle to ping pong ball—experience that showcases Chalamet’s career best performance. A bundle of desperation and inner struggle hidden under a veneer of overt confidence, Marty is pushed to extremes by ambition and Chalamet gets every sweaty, eager beat exactly right.
But it’s when things aren’t going Marty’s way that Chalamet shines. A squirmy, humiliating encounter (NO SPOILERS HERE), reveals both defiance and vulnerability, and it is that push and pull, that duality, that illustrates Marty’s determination into high gear. Like all good sports movies, it’s not about the big match at the end, it’s about the journey to the match and with chaotic scenes like this, and many others, “Marty Supreme” is a hell of a ride.
Chalamet is supported by a top-notch cast, including Odessa A’zion, who, in a breakout role, is the warming element that keeps the stratospheric story earth bound.
No story about the American Dream on steroids would be complete without a money-grubbing meanie, a character who values cash and power over Marty’s ambition and talent. Safdie didn’t look much beyond “Shark Tank” when he cast Kevin “Mr. Wonderful” O’Leary, who lends his smarmy reality show energy to the film. He delivers but delivers exactly what you would expect in a movie that defies expectations at every turn.
“Marty Supreme” is exceptionalism both in its story and execution. A grand tale of aspiration and consequences, à la “Boogie Nights” and “Goodfellas,” it’s one of the year’s best films.
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 gameplay of “Marty Supreme,” the slithery charms of “Anaconda” and the tuneful “Song Sung Blue.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
The fourth and final instalment of the “Hotel Transylvania” franchise, which began in 2012, comes to Amazon Prime minus Adam Sandler, but with the addition of some monstrously heartwarming messages for kids.
When the animated action begins, Count Dracula (once voiced by Sandler, now played by Brian Hull) is on the brink of retirement. His daughter Mavis (Selena Gomez) and her husband Johnny (Andy Samberg) are poised to inherit the hotel, but Johnny senses that Dracula doesn’t want him, a human, running things. Professor Abraham Van Helsing (Jim Gaffigan) and his Monsterfication Ray offers an answer. It turns Johnny into a winged monster, but when things go sideways, the ray also transforms Dracula and his monster friends into humans. “Being a human is the worst,” Drac complains of the movie’s “Freaky Friday” twist.
“You don’t recognize me?” asks Griffin (David Spade), the invisible man, after his human reveal.
“I have literally never seen you before,” says Mavis.
Mavis, Johnny and the Drac Pack head to a place deep in the Amazon, the only place where the transformations can be reversed, in search of a cure for their situation. “If we don’t fix you guys soon,” says Mavis. “You’ll be like this forever.”
Like the other, big screen entries in the “Hotel Transylvania” series this movie is loud and frenetic. The goofy, colorful action feels like it could be from almost any other animated movie but the characters and the fun voice work (from actors like Steve Buscemi, Kathryn Hahn, Jim Gaffigan, Molly Shannon, Keegan-Michael Key and Fran Drescher) cut through the noise.
They are all unusual characters, but they’ve found their community. They accept one another, like family does. “Transformania” highlights the family feel by allowing the Drac Pack and Johnny, characters we’ve been watching for three other films, to learn what it is like to see the world through one another’s eyes. It’s a lesson in tolerance and acceptance that feels earned, no matter how outlandish the story may be.
The life lessons are wedged between a monster mash of laughs and action, some of which parents may find headache inducing, but, like Dracula, kids should be able to sink their teeth into it.
The Invisible Man, Frankenstein, the Mummy and let’s not forget Dracula all make appearances in “Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” but the new, animated Adam Sandler movie isn’t about the monsters, it’s about the importance of kindness and family.
At the beginning of the film Dracula (voice of Sandler) is feeling down, stressed out from the pressure of running his luxury hotel. On top of that, seems even the Prince of Darkness has trouble meeting women. He’s forlorn, hasn’t had a date in 100 years and his voice-activated dating app is no help. “I’m lonely,” he says. “You want bologna?” it replies.
Noticing her dad is depressed daughter Mavis (Selena Gomez) arranges for a special treat; some time away with family and friends. “I figured you need a vacation from running everyone else’s vacations,” she says. She books passage on the monster cruise of a lifetime, a journey into the heart of the Bermuda Triangle.
Once onboard Drac immediately falls for Captain Ericka (Kathryn Hahn). The heart knows what it wants, even if it is a cold, un-beating heart. They hit it off, but it turns out Ericka might have an ulterior motive for returning Drac’s advances.
“Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” is filled with the easy sentimentality that mars Sandler’s live action films. Good messages about acceptance—“We’re here, we’re hairy and it’s our right to be scary!”—tradition and finding your own way in the world—“ You have to honour the past but we have to make our own future,” says Drac.—are hammered home like a stake through the heart.
Surrounding the family friendly clichés are an untraditional cast of cute monsters and that’s the movie’s strength. The fun of “Hotel Transylvania 3” is in the details not the story. The kid friendly creepy crawlies, deadpan fish cruise ship staff, Grandpa Dracula’s (Mel Brooks) skimpy withered green body and Captain Ericka’s underwater craft that looks like it just floated in from “Yellow Submarine” are all a hoot. Come for the creatures, stay for the silly fun.
“Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” doesn’t add up to much story-wise—music and dance numbers, though inventively staged, pad out the running time to feature length—but the messages of tolerance and kindness are important themes in today’s increasingly serious world. “Gotta be great-a than the hatas,” says one monster. That’s advice you can take to the (blood) bank.
“We don’t have time for zingers!” says Count Dracula (Adam Sandler) midway through “Hotel Transylvania 2.” No time for zingers, indeed. The sequel to the 2012 kid friendly animated horror comedy is short on laughs but long on sentiment.
Like all of Sandler’s movies—no matter how outrageous the characters—the new one is all about family. It picks up after Drac’s daughter, vampiress Mavis (voice of Selena Gomez) married human Jonathan (Andy Samberg). In a twist on “Twilight,” the vampire mother and human father soon have a child, Dennis (Asher Blinkoff). The question is, which side of the family will it take after, the monster or human?
“Human. Monster. Unicorn. As long as you’re happy,” Drac says to his daughter, while secretly hoping the child will inherit the vampire genes. On the eve of the child’s fifth birthday the boy still hasn’t shoed any signs of vampiric behaviour—“He’s not human,” says the Prince of Darkness, “he’s just a late fanger!”—so Drac and friends—Frankenstein (Kevin James), Wayne the Werewolf (Steve Buscemi), the Invisible Man (David Spade) and Murray the Mummy (Keegan-Michael Key)—take Dennis to their old haunts to teach him their scary skills.
“Hotel Transylvania 2” features great kid friendly monsters designs (that will make equally cool toys) like zombie bellhops and Blobby, a gelatine creature that looks like Grandma’s Gazpacho Aspic come to life but the creativity that went into the creatures didn’t extend to the script.
It’s a sweet enough, amiable story about acceptance and family, but the jokes barely rise to the level of the “101 Halloween Jokes for Kids” book I had when I was ten-years-old. If calling Murray the Mummy “talking toilet paper” makes you giggle, then perhaps this is for you, but by the time they have explained why Drac is called “Vampa” for the second time, you get the idea that Sandler and co-writer Robert Smigel know they should have driven a stake through the heart of this script.
The appearance of Mel Brooks as Great Vampa Vlad simply brings to mind “Young Frankenstein,” one of the funniest horror comedies of all time.
The biggest laughs come from the background, the sight gags that keep things visually frenetic in the first hour.
“Hotel Transylvania 2’s” family friendly scares won’t give kids any nightmares, but it won’t make them laugh either.
