I appear on “CTV News at 6” with anchor Andria Case to talk about the best movies and television to watch this weekend, including he strange sci fi of “Mickey 17″ and the suspense of “Seven Veils.”
Watch the whole thing HERE! (Starts at 36:49)
I join CTV NewsChannel anchor Scott Hirsch to talk about the strange sci fi of “Mickey 17,” the kid-friendly “Night of the Zoopocalypse” and the suspense of “Seven Veils.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
I join “CTV News Toronto at Five” with guest anchor Natalie Johnson to talk about the strange sci fi of “Mickey 17,” the kid-friendly “Night of the Zoopocalypse” and the suspense of “Seven Veils.”
Watch the whole thing HERE! (Starts at 15:16)
I sit in with hosts Jim Richards and Deb Hutton on NewsTalk 1010 to play the game “Did Richard Crouse Like This?” This week we talk about the strange sci fi of “Mickey 17,” the kid-friendly “Night of the Zoopocalypse” and the suspense of “Seven Veils.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
I sit in with CKTB morning show host Steph Vivier to have a look at movies in theatres including the strange sci fi of “Mickey 17,” the kid-friendly “Night of the Zoopocalypse” and the suspense of “Seven Veils.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
I sit in on the CFRA Ottawa morning show with guest host Andrew Pinsent to talk about the new movies coming to theatres the strange sci fi of “Mickey 17,” the kid-friendly “Night of the Zoopocalypse” and the suspense of “Seven Veils.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
I join the Bell Media Radio Network national night time show “Shane Hewitt and the Night Shift” for “Booze & Reviews!” This week I talk about “Mickey 17,” a movie with double the usual amount of Robert Pattinsons and tell you the history of double drinks.
Listen to Shane and I talk about the life of Dolly Parton’s dearly departed husband Carl Dean, and what actor won a Guinness Book of World records Award this week HERE!
Have double the fun on Booze & Reviews with my review of “Mickey 17” and a history of double drinks HERE!
Fast reviews for busy people! Watch as I review three movies in less time than it takes to make some toast! Have a look as I race against the clock to tell you about the strange sci fi of “Mickey 17,” the kid-friendly “Night of the Zoopocalypse” and the suspense of “Seven Veils.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
SYNOPSIS: In “Mickey 17,” a new sci fi black comedy from Oscar winning director Bong Joon-ho, and now playing in theatres, Robert Pattinson plays an “expendable worker” who takes on dangerous jobs on the outer space colony Nilfheim. “You’re an Expendable,” he’s told. “You’re here to be expended!” If he dies—which is likely—he is regenerated and sent back to work. When one of his clones, Mickey 17, is replaced before death and makes his way back to the colony, the two Mickeys must fight back or be destroyed.
CAST: Robert Pattinson, Naomi Ackie, Steven Yeun, Toni Collette, and Mark Ruffalo. Directed by Bong Joon-ho.
REVIEW: An almost unclassifiable genre piece, “Mickey 17” has elements of sci-fi, comedy, drama, mystery, social commentary and suspense and more Robert Pattinsons than you can shake a stick at.
Fleeing a loan shark who threatened to hunt them down to the ends of the earth, Mickey Barnes (Robert Pattinson) and his best friend and business partner Timo (Steven Yeun) sign up for an outer space expedition to the human colony Nilfheim. “Nothing was working out,” Mickey says, “and I wanted to get off Earth.”
As Timo trains to be a pilot, Mickey becomes an “Expendable,” a disposable crew member, used for experiments, who when, and if, he dies, can be “reprinted” with his memories intact. “Every time you die,” he’s told, “we learn something new and humanity moves forward.”
As Mickey repeatedly dies and is reborn, all other life and death on Nilfheim is curated by Kenneth Marshall (Mark Ruffalo), a vainglorious politician with sinister intentions for his new society.
When the seventeenth iteration of Mickey is presumed dead—“Even on my seventeenth go around I hate dying,” he says.—and replaced by Mickey 18, Nilfheim’s “no multiples” rule is inadvertently broken. “In the case of multiples,” Marshall says, “we exterminate every individual.”
With dueling Mickeys causing trouble for Marshall, a new threat emerges, an alien big bug life form called “creepers” that may be the key to the survival or destruction of Nilfheim.
Oscar winning director Bong Joon-ho crafts an absurd story with serious messages about identity, survival, and colonization. Based on the novel “Mickey7” by Edward Ashton, it’s a farce, and like any good farce, it aims to give you something to think about once the end credits have rolled.
Buried beneath Pattinson’s charmingly nerdy performance and the film’s sci fi antics are heavy-weight, philosophical questions regarding what makes us human and what it means to really feel alive. Is it our physical being, our memories or our ethics?
From a world building point of view “Mickey 17” ponders colonial cycles of violence and authoritarianism. It may be in the dark outer reaches of the universe, but it is a world Bong Joon-ho has essayed before in films like “Parasite,” “Snowpiercer” and “Okja.” His best works are futuristic cautionary tales that hold up a mirror to current society. No matter how fantastical the setting, the very human follies of class inequality, governmental ineptitude and broken social systems are front and center.
But Boon doesn’t overwhelm with ideology.
“Mickey 17” continues with his pet themes, and while the story gets muddled by times, the movie impresses with its originality and commitment to entertaining while firing up the synapses.
