Posts Tagged ‘Mary Elizabeth Winstead’

CTV NEWS AT SIX: NEW MOVIES AND TV SHOWS TO CHECK OUT THIS WEEKEND!

Richard speaks to “CTV News at Six” anchor Andria Case about some TIFF highlights and the best movies and television to watch this weekend including the intense Oscar Isaac drama “The Card Counter,” now playing in theatres, the shoot ’em up action flick “Kate” on Netflix.

Watch the whole thing HERE! (Starts at 36:43)

RICHARD’S WEEKEND MOVIE REVIEWS FROM CP24! FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 10, 2021.

Richard joins CP24 to have a look at new movies coming to VOD, streaming services and theatres including Paul Schrader’s austere drama “The Card Counter,” the kick ass “Kate” and rom commy “Finding You.”

Watch the whole thing HERE!

CFRA IN OTTAWA: THE BILL CARROLL MORNING SHOW MOVIE REVIEWS!

Richard sits in on the CFRA Ottawa morning show with host Bill Carroll to talk the new movies coming to theatres, VOD and streaming services including Paul Schrader’s austere drama “The Card Counter,” the kick ass “Kate” and rom commy “Finding You.”

Listen to the whole thing HERE!

CKTB IN NIAGARA: THIS WEEK’S MOVIES REVIEWS AND A LOOK AT TIFF!

Richard and CKTB Niagara morning show host Tim Denis have a look at Paul Schrader’s austere drama “The Card Counter,” the kick ass “Kate” and rom commy “Finding You” and what TIFF feels like in its first “hybrid” year.

Listen to the whole thing HERE!

KATE: 3 STARS. “Mary Elizabeth Winstead delivers some high velocity action.”

In “Kate,” a new action thriller now streaming on Netflix, Mary Elizabeth Winstead plays the titular character, a ruthless killer with just twenty-four hours to get to the bottom of a murder—her own.

When we first meet Kate she’s in Japan. Her handler and mentor, played by Woody Harrelson, has arranged a hit of a high-level yakuza. She takes the shot, hits her target, leaving his young daughter Ani (Miku Patricia Martineau) in tears over his body.

Later, on another gig, just as she’s about to take a shot her eyes blur. Unable to aim, she misses, takes another shot and misses again. After a wild chase she lands in the hospital where she is told she’s been poisoned and has just twenty-four hours to live.

Her quest for vengeance leads her to an unlikely ally, Ani, the daughter of one of her victims.

“Kate” is a fast-paced riff on “D.O.A..” the seventy-year-old Edmond O’Brien movie about a victim who tries to figure out who poisoned him and why. French director Cedric Nicolas-Troyan amps up the action, staging everything from wild car chases through the streets of Tokyo to up-close-and-personal fight scenes, all focused on Kate’s ability to jump, punch, shoot and generally lay waste to all comers. Winstead, who proved her action bona fides as Huntress in “Birds of Prey,” brings the kick assery in fight scenes that are fleet-footed and plentiful.

Set against the background of the ticking clock, “Kate” delivers some high velocity action, even if the premise isn’t exactly new.

CFRA IN OTTAWA: THE BILL CARROLL MORNING SHOW MOVIE REVIEWS!

Richard sits in on the CFRA Ottawa morning show with host Bill Carroll to talk the new movies coming to theatres including the wild “Birds of Prey,” the #MeToo drama “The Assistant” and the giddily gory “Come to Daddy.”

Listen to the whole thing HERE!

RICHARD’S CTV NEWSCHANNEL WEEKEND MOVIE REVIEWS FOR FEB. 07!

Richard sits in on the CTV NewsChannel to have a look at the weekend’s big releases including the boundary pushing “Birds of Prey,” the #MeToo drama “The Assistant” and the giddily gory “Come to Daddy.”

Watch the whole thing HERE!

CTVNEWS.CA: THE CROUSE REVIEW ON “BIRDS OF PREY” & “THE ASSISTANT”!

A weekly feature from ctvnews.ca! The Crouse Review is a quick, hot take on the weekend’s biggest and most interesting movies! This week Richard looks at the emancipation of Harley Quinn in “Birds of Prey,” the timely messages of “The Assistant” and the father complex(ities) of “Come to Daddy.”

Watch the whole thing HERE!

BIRDS OF PREY (AND THE FANTABULOUS EMANCIPATION OF ONE HARLEY QUINN): 3 ½ STARS

As “Joker” sweeps through Awards Season, scooping up a motherlode of Best Actor gold for Joaquin Phoenix, along comes the standalone story of the Clown Prince of Crime’s former female sidekick. “Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)” sees Margot Robbie revisit her unpredictable “Suicide Squad” character in an R-rated film that is part action, part comedy and all attitude. More in tune with the antics of “Deadpool” than the serious tone of “Joker,” “Birds of Prey” is a fourth-wall-breaking story that doesn’t feel like other superhero movies.

Picking up after the events of “Suicide Squad,” Gotham City has become a cesspool of crime. Batman has flown the coop leaving the city unprotected from the likes of crime lord Black Mask (Ewan McGregor). The baseball wielding Quinn has rid herself of her former “partner in madness,” the Joker—” I am so over clowns!” she says—and now travels with a new squad of vigilantes. “As it turns out, I wasn’t the only dame in Gotham looking for emancipation,” she says. Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell), Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez) come together to help Harley protect Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco), a young pickpocket who had the bad luck of coming into possession of a diamond ebcoded with a valuable secret, a secret Black Mask desperately wants. “I’m back on my feet,” Harley says, “ready to embrace the fierce goddess within.”

“Birds of Prey” is a story of survivors, of feminism, of tough women out on the town and it is the most fun DC has offered up at the movies. The stripped-down story sheds “Suicide Squad’s” nihilistic nonsense in favor of empowerment and general kick assery.

It gets off to a slow start, establishing the characters and situation, but erupts in the last third with bombastic action choreographed by director Cathy Yan and “John Wick” fight maestro Chad Stahelski. Forget the CGI finales of the Marvel Universe, this is blood-soaked up-close-and-personal stunt action with a wicked sense of humour.

Robbie has a gleeful, cheeky commitment to the character that sets the tone for the movie’s 80s new wave kaleidoscopic aesthetic. With a habit of settling disputes with a baseball bat to the groin she isn’t a role model but is unpredictable, scrappy fun to watch on screen. Ditto McGregor who actually seems to be having fun wearing Black Mask’s hyped-up wardrobe after a series of movies that have left his charisma relegated to the backroom.

“Birds of Prey” is loads of fun but manages to weave some serious ideas about not needing men to survive into the chaos. Most of all, though, it feels like a welcome antidote to the monotony of so many comic book inspired films.