I appear on “CTV News at 6” with anchor Andria Case to talk about the weekend’s best movies and television including kid-friendly Pixar film “Elio,” the ragelicious “Years Later,”
Watch the whole thing HERE! (Starts at 37:10)
I join “CTV News Toronto at Five” with anchor Zuraidah Alamn to talk about new movies in theatres including the kid-friendly Pixar film “Elio,” the ragelicious “Years Later,” and the action-comedy “Bride Hard.”
I join CTV Atlantic anchor Todd Battis to talk about the kid-friendly Pixar film “Elio,” the ragelicious “Years Later,” the action-comedy “Bride Hard” and the 50th anniversary of “Jaws.”
I sit in with host Jim Richards on NewsTalk 1010 to play the game “Did Richard Crouse Like This?” This week I talk about buying Ozzy Osbourne’s DNA, the 50th anniversary of “Jaws” and review Pixar’s latest “Elio,” and the scary “28 Days Later.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
I sit in on the CFRA Ottawa morning show with host Bill Carroll to talk about the new movies coming to theatres including the kid-friendly Pixar film “Elio,” the ragelicious “Years Later,” the action-comedy “Bride Hard” and the gamer documentary “The Hobby: Tales froim the Tabletop.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
SYNOPSIS: The third film in the “28 Days Later” post-apocalyptic horror franchise, “28 Years Later” takes place, as the title suggests, thirty years after the Rage virus devastated the UK. A small group of survivors lives in isolation on a fortified island accessible only by a causeway connected to the mainland. When one of the islanders and his son goes to the mainland, they discover the grim reality of the outside world. “There are strange people on the mainland,” says Jamie (Aaron Taylor-Johnson). “That’s why our home is so precious.”
CAST: Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Ralph Fiennes, Jack O’Connell, Erin Kellyman, Edvin Ryding. Directed by Danny Boyle, written by Alex Garland.
REVIEW: A grisly coming-of-age story, “28 Years Later” has elements of graphic horror, but director Danny Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland focus on the emotional travails of its twelve-year-old protagonist Spike (Alfie Williams) to provide the film’s bleak tone. A mix and match of pulse racing action scenes and earnest introspection, it’s as much about the horror of growing up and learning about the harder edges of life as it is about the terror of the infected zombies.
Divided into two expeditions as Spike ventures into the mainland on a rite of passage with his father Jamie (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) to learn how to kill the infected—“The more you kill,” Jamie tells Spike, “the easier it gets.”—and later, as he goes back on a journey of discovery with his mother Isla (Jody Comer), the storytelling is episodic but bonded by the study of death in all its forms.
In a kill or be killed world, death is around every corner, and young Spike learns to process the existential idea of death as necessary to his own survival. His lessons deepen when death becomes personal and he learns to find meaning in loss, something that transcends the primal urge to survive.
Through death and loss, he learns about life and resilience. It’s this exploration of personal growth that separates “28 Years Later” from the previous films in the franchise which leaned into survival and systemic failures over emotional evolution.
“28 Years Later” features some unforgettable imagery. Partially shot on iPhone 15 Pro Max cameras, Boyle and cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle adopt a guerilla style that adds a frenetic intensity to the action sequences.
An abandoned Shell petrol station with a sign missing the “S,” is a playful reminder of the terrible situation that transpired as the Rage virus turned the area into a living hell.
Later, a long sequence in Dr. Ian Kelson’s (a terrific Ralph Fiennes) “Memento Mori,” a wooded area decked out with bones as a loving tribute to the dead, infected or otherwise, is visually stunning as an eerie reminder of mortality.
Despite some choppy storytelling, and a sequel ready ending, “28 Years Later” is a welcome addition to the franchise. More reflective, it is both intellectually and emotionally intense.
LOGLINE: The 1960s set “The Bikeriders,” a new drama starring Jodie Comer, Austin Butler and Tom Hardy, and now playing in theatres, is about the rise and descent into lawlessness of The Vandals, a motorcycle club founded as a surrogate family for its members.
CAST: Jodie Comer, Austin Butler, Tom Hardy, Michael Shannon, Mike Faist, and Norman Reedus. Written and directed by Jeff Nichols.
REVIEW: “The Bikeriders,” based on a 1967 photo-book of the same name by Danny Lyon, wants to be an ode to individuality, but lacks the grit and spirit of rebellion required to feel authentic. It does do a good job of essaying the evolution of motorcycle clubs from groups of outsiders who didn’t belong anywhere—except with one another—their loyalty and camaraderie, to criminal organizations that used fear and illegality as currency.
As a timeline of how male bonding turned toxic within this subculture, the sociological history lesson is interesting, but director Jeff Nichols allows the biker aesthetic and posturing to overshadow the nitty gritty of biker gang life. It’s more effective in its portrayal of how this shift in culture affects the leader of the gang, Johnny, played by Tom Hardy. He becomes a tragic figure when he realizes his club is out of control, and legacy is not what he intended.
Using the chatty narration of Jodie Comer as Kathy, wife of the sensitive but rebellious rider Benny (Austin Butler), as a framework, Nichols injects a different and welcome point-of-view to the story. Biker movies often treat female characters as afterthoughts, but Kathy is the hub from which the story emanates. This is essentially a love story, a story of the platonic love between the bikers, and Kathy’s almost unquestioning love of wild child Benny. It’s a showcase for Comer and her plain-spoken mid-western accent, allowing the “Killing Eve” star to reveal the personality layers of someone who says, wistfully, “I used to be respectable.”
The episodic “The Bikeriders” plays it by the rules to tell a story about people who don’t.
Richard joins Jay Michaels and guest host Deb Hutton of the NewsTalk 1010 afternoon show The Rush to talk about the morbid history of the Sourtoe Cocktail and some new releases in theatres, the Ryan Reynolds action comedy “Free Guy” and the Aretha Franklin biopic “Respect.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
“Free Guy,” the new Ryan Reynolds action comedy now playing in theatres, has its philosophical moments but no one will confuse its search for the meaning of life with the explorations of Joseph Campbell or Socrates. This is pure pop philosophy that breathes the same air “The Truman Show” and “Edtv,” movies about men who yearn for more than life has offered them.
Reynolds is Guy, a bank teller in Free City, a video game metropolis where the main characters wear sunglasses, have devil-may-care attitudes, cool hair and treat laws as suggestions, not hard and fast rules. Everyone else, including Guy and his best friend Buddy (Lil Rel Howery), are NPC, non-player-characters, who exist simple to give the Sunglasses People someone to rob, beat down, or, in rare cases, flirt with.
They are set decoration in the grand video game of life. “People with sunglasses never talk to people like us,” Buddy says.
One day Guy’s orderly life is thrown a curve when he spots Molotov Girl (Jodie Comer), a gunslinging sunglasses person, who also happen to be the woman of his dreams. Consumed with feelings he has never had before; his behaviors change as he looks for love and meaning in his life. “Maybe I’ll get some sunglasses of my own,” he says.
IRL (In Real Life) Millie (also played by Comer) and Keys (Joe Keery) are former coding superstars whose idea for a videogame that would actually change and grow independently of its users was stolen by evil video game developer Antoine (Taika Waititi). Keys now works for Antoine, while Millie is obsessed with infiltrating the game as Molotov Girl to get evidence for her lawsuit against the obnoxious tech giant.
Soon the line between Guy’s algorithmic life and Millie’s quest blend as “Free Guy” asks, “Do you you have to be a spectator in your own life?”
You need a lot of hyphens to describe “Free Guy.” It’s a video game-rom com-satire-action-comedy that tackles, in a lighthearted way, questions that people had grappled with for thousands of years. “What is the meaning of life?” Guy asks. “What if nothing matters.” But don’t fret, this isn’t Camus. The nihilism that usually goes along with big questions about life is replaced with video game action and brewing romance.
Reynolds brings his trademarked way with a line to play man child Guy. He’s the definition of bright-eyed-and-bushy-tailed, able to give Guy the naïve quality he would have as someone just coming to consciousness, driven by feelings he doesn’t understand, as it slowly dawns on him that he is free to make his own decisions.
Comer, best known for her Emmy Award winning work in “Killing Eve,” deftly hops between real life and Free City, creating two characters with a shared goal. She’s mostly present as a sounding board for Guy’s awakening, but Comer brings personality to both roles.
Ultimately “Free Guy” doesn’t teach us anything about life we couldn’t have learned from any number of episodes of “Oprah,” but the message that life doesn’t have to be something that just happens to us is delivered with a heaping helping of humor, heart and Reynold’s brand of irreverence.
