Despite the similarities in name “Concrete Cowboy,” the new drama starring Idris Elba and Caleb McLaughlin of “Stranger Things” as father and son and now on Netflix, has nothing to do with “Urban Cowboy,” the 1980 John Travolta cheese fest. This is a deeply felt, if slightly predictable coming- of-age story set against the backdrop of the urban cowboy subculture of north Philadelphia.
Fifteen-year-old Cole (McLaughlin) is a troubled kid. Constantly in trouble at his Detroit school, his mother has had enough. “You’re going to drown,” she tells him before sending him off to spend the summer in Philadelphia with his estranged father Harp (Elba), a tough, old-West style cowboy who lives and rides at a century-old African American horsemanship institution called the Fletcher Street Urban Riding Club.
Cole, who is forced to bunk in the stables upon arrival, is quickly put to work, cleaning up after the horses, learning the discipline that comes with hard work. It’s a learning curve for the young man, but as rider Esha (Ivannah Mercedes) says, “Horses ain’t the only thing that need breaking around here.”
Threatening the stability Cole finds at Fletcher Street is Smush (Jharrel Jerome), a low-level drug dealer who points the way to any easier method of making money.
Loosely based on book “Ghetto Cowboy” by Greg Neri, “Concrete Cowboy” is a western but told from a different point of view than we usually see. Director Ricky Staub does a commendable job at building the world Harp and Cole inhabit. Their way of life is an anachronism in the big city but the greater purpose of providing opportunities to the area’s youth is timeless.
It’s an interesting and vibrant subculture that forms the backdrop of the father/son relationship that feels like something we’ve seen before. Cole wants approval from his father, even though he’s not yet ready to forgive him for the absence that has left a gaping hole in his life. We’ve seen that dynamic before but rarely on horseback.
Elba is the above-the-title star but his lived-in depiction of Harp takes second place to McLaughlin. As a young man in need of saving he brings vulnerability and innocence but also the rebellious streak of someone who is still figuring out who he is. It’s nicely crafted work, ably supported by a cast of pros, like Cliff “Method Man” Smith as a local, sympathetic cop and Lorraine Toussaint and non-actors like Jamil Prattis, a wheelchair bound Fletcher Street stables fixture who brings authenticity and charisma to his role.
In the end “Concrete Cowboy” isn’t simply a father/son reunion tale. It’s something more, an ode to a specific way of life with universal messages of the value of community.
“The Glorias,” now on VOD/Digital, is an ambitious retelling of the life of a trailblazer. Women’s-rights icon Gloria Steinem has led such a multi-faceted life it takes four people to play her over the course of the film.
Based on Steinem’s 2015 memoir “My Life on the Road,” the story is told on a broken timeline that uses a bus metaphor to shift through the various aspects of Steinem’s life. From life as a child (played by Ryan Kiera Armstrong) with a transient salesman father whose optimistic motto is, “You don’t know what will happen tomorrow. It could be wonderful,” and former journalist mother Ruth (Enid Graham) to rebellious teen (Lulu Wilson) to magna cum laude graduate and journalist () who went undercover (Alicia Vikander) at Playboy Club to adult activist Gloria (Julianne Moore), the film offers a detailed if somewhat fragmented look at a remarkable life.
To tell the tale director Julie Taymor uses a variety of vibrant colour palettes, newsreel footage, animation, some theatrical techniques—adult Steinem gives advice to her younger self on the aforementioned bus—and biographical notes. Larger than life characters like social activist Bella Abzug (Bette Midler), businessperson and co-founder of Ms. Magazine Dorothy Pitman Hughes (Janelle Monáe) and Lorraine Toussaint as lawyer, feminist, activist Flo Kennedy are brought to vivid life, helping to establish a sense of time and place for a story that hop scotches through time.
“The Glorias” isn’t a standard biopic, but it also isn’t as radical as its subject. It’s an artfully arranged greatest hits package of a remarkable and influential life that dilutes its impact by trying to cover eighty of Steinem’s years. Nonetheless, the four performances fit so neatly together to form a whole that we see Steinem’s growth as she evolves into the person who made history.
When you think of kid’s books wholesome titles like “Captain Underpants” and “Clifford the Big Red Dog” likely spring to mind. But for 1980s children with a darker sensibility who were too old for “The Addams Family” but too young for “Stephen King,” the “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark” trilogy by Alvin Schwartz and illustrated by Stephen Gammell, where must reads. Violent and eerie, the American Library Association reports that the gothic story collections were the most challenged books of the 1990s, which, of course, only made them more appealing to rebellious kids. A new film produced by horror master Guillermo Del Toro and directed by André Øvredal, uses the books as the basis for a new story.
Set in the small town of Mill Valley, Pennsylvania in 1968, the action begins on Halloween. When besties Stella (Zoe Margaret Colletti), Auggie (Gabriel Rush) and Chuck (Austin Zajur) play a prank on the town bully, he looks for revenge forcing them to hide first at a drive-in where they meet new kid in town Ramón (Michael Garza).
The night soon leads them to a spooky house on the edge of town. The decrepit old place was once the grand home of the Mill Valley’s richest family, the Bellows. Now all that remains are dusty ruins and, as the kids discover, a diary of old stories written in blood by Sarah Bellows (Kathleen Pollard), the youngest, cursed daughter of the once powerful family. As strange things happen the kids realize the book is making their worst fears come true. “You don’t read the book,” says Stella, “the book reads you. I’m afraid we woke the book up.”
This movie could be more accurately called “Mildly Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark.” It’s a collection of jump scares and creepy elements—scarecrows, spiders and a severed toe—cobbled together to create a teen-friendly flick that owes a debt to the Halloween afterschool specials of yesteryear. It’s Scooby Doo with courser language and better effects; an entry level horror for teens who find the Garbage Pail Kids too intense.
For any boomers who might take the kids or grandkids the “toe stew“ is gross but the scariest stuff comes in the form of background news reports on Vietnam and Nixon’s re-election.
As an anthology type movie “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark” is slowed by the supernatural sleuthing of Stella and company as they try to get to the bottom of sad Sarah’s story. Repetition of the legend and lots of shots of Chuck’s freaked out face slow the momentum. During one of these longer scenes I wondered, “When is the pacing building suspense and when is it building tedium?“ By the end credits the background mystery has sucked the air out of what could’ve been a tightly crafted fun movie.
