SYNOPSIS: Set four years after the memory-erasing events of “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” sees Spider-Man anonymously protecting New York City as his superpowers evolve. “Spiders have three life cycles. And between cycles, it can leave the spider vulnerable to threats. Those spiders that survive… go through a kind of rebirth.”
CAST: Tom Holland, Zendaya, Sadie Sink, Jacob Batalon, Jon Bernthal, Tramell Tillman, Michael Mando, Mark Ruffalo. Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton.
REVIEW: The fourth standalone film starring Tom Holland as Peter Parker/Spider-Man is a return to the Spidey movies of old. Without a multiverse in sight “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” delivers on the promise of the title and delivers a new, almost streamlined, character driven approach. In other words, you won’t need to check Wikipedia to understand the story and characters.
Last time around in 2021s “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” supervillain Mysterio publicly revealed Peter Parker’s true Spider-Man identity, thus complicating the teen superhero’s life, and placing those closest to him in mortal danger. To protect his nearest and dearest and safeguard the multiverse, Parker convinces Dr. Strange to cast a spell to erase him from the collective consciousness. “Sometimes Spider-Man has to do the hard thing, even if it breaks Peter Parker’s heart.”
Now on his own, he keeps New York City safe, but misses his old life, particularly his former flame MJ (Zendaya). The stress of his new, anonymous existence and fighting against a powerful invisible villain, triggers a dangerous evolution in Peter’s arachnid DNA. “The spider is swallowing up the man.”
“We are faced with a danger we can’t control,” Bill Metzger (Tramell Tillman), head of the Department of Damage Control, a U.S. government agency that handles the cleanup and regulation of superhuman-related incidents, tells Parker. “One we can’t even see. You’re the only one who’s immune to it.”
Big, long and loud, “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” delivers the spectacle you expect from a Marvel Cinematic Universe movie but doesn’t forget that the ultimate appeal of the main character is his relatability. He’s blessed with superpowers—“He’s the hero every grown-up wishes they could be and every kid wants to be.”—but he’s not invincible and unlike many of his contemporaries he’s not a god, eccentric billionaire or soldier.
Instead, he’s an ordinary young man whose powers don’t solve his issues of insecurity, analysis paralysis and yearning. Then there’s the whole “with great power comes great responsibility” thing, a weight the character carries like a mantle. He’s driven to do the right thing, even if it comes at great personal cost.
“Are you Peter Parker,” asks MJ, “or are you Spider-Man?” It’s the question that lies at the heart of “Brand New Day” and the truth is he’s both, and that’s the push and pull that, as he matures, makes the character interesting and enduring.
Tom Holland, in his best “half man, half spider” performance nicely bridges the gap between the personal and physical, embodying the character’s emotional life, with a healthy dose of humor, while delivering the web-slinging action fans want.
The film’s emotional core, the relationships between MJ, Peter’s former best friend Ned Leeds (Jacob Batalon) and Peter, is intact, and it is here director Destin Daniel Cretton pulls off his best trick. MJ and Ned’s minds have been wiped of memories of Peter, and yet the connection between them still feels tangible, even though they spend little time on screen together. The sense of longing is central to Peter’s isolation from normal life, and grounds the story in its more high-flying moments.
A dynamic of a different kind is shared between Peter and Frank Castle a.k.a. the Punisher (Jon Bernthal). Screenwriters Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers shave down some of the Punisher’s rough edges, turning an R-rated character into a PG package, but Bernthal sparks with Holland and provides some of the film’s comedic highlights.
I’m carefully side-stepping a major spoiler, so I won’t make any comments on the future of the MCU, but make no mistake, there is some franchise-building happening here. Luckily it feels organic to the story, mirroring Parker’s own battles with isolation, loss and the internal struggle with the personal, profession and power aspect of having extraordinary gifts.
Recent superhero movies have had a rough time at the box office but with its blend of humanity and superhero antics “Spider-Man: Brand New Day,” even though it falls victim to an overblown final reel, is worth the trip to the theatre.
I wrote about “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” for CTVNews.ca.
“The fourth standalone film starring Tom Holland as Peter Parker/Spider-Man is a return to the Spidey movies of old. Without a multiverse in sight, ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ delivers on the promise of the title, offering a new, almost streamlined character-driven approach…” Read the whole thing HERE!
SYNOPSIS: In “O’Dessa,” a post-apocalyptic musical now streaming on Disney+, “Stranger Things” star Sadie Sink plays the title character, a dirt farmer who follows in her father’s footsteps as a “Rambler,” a musician whose music has the power to “comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.” When he died he left her a “mighty guitar” and a mission. When the guitar is stolen O’Dessa travels to the dangerous world of Satylite City where the power of her music is tested.
CAST: Sadie Sink, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Murray Bartlett, and Regina Hall. Directed by Geremy Jasper.
REVIEW “O’Dessa” builds a cyberpunk world for its characters to inhabit that feels, like the rest of the movie, like a new story built on the foundations of films like “Mad Max” and “The Hunger Games.”
During its 106-minute runtime “O’Dessa” wears its influences on its colorful sleeve.
Everything from “Phantom of the Paradise” to “Repo! The Genetic Opera” garners a nod, but what writer/director Geremy Jasper’s vision lacks in originality, it makes up for in enthusiasm. This dystopian mash-up is vibrant, often extravagant and may even get your toe lightly tapping along with the folk-rock songs.
Trouble is, while the songs are plentiful, they don’t leave much of an impression, let alone have the power to change the world and bring humanity together.
Visually, Jasper evokes 19809s music videos, with wild splashes of colour and costumes that would make Grace Jones envious but, ultimately, while it may entertain the eye, it won’t engage the brain.
Even a pair of pretty good villains, Regina Hall as wicked Neon Dion and Murray Bartlett (“White Lotus’s” pooping resort manager) as the evil empresario Plutonovich, O’Dessa feels music video stretched to feature length.
Writer/director Jasper’s vision of the future may not be as original, or as engaging, as it could be to really sell the movie’s premise, but there is a sincerity to the idea that music and the arts have the power to change the world.
Despite its dark subject matter, “The Whale,” Oscar nominated director Darren Aronofsky’s latest film, is coloured by a swirl of love, understanding and empathy.
Brendan Fraser, in his first leading role in nearly a decade, plays Charlie, a house-bound, 600-pound online English professor. Agoraphobic and unable to leave his apartment, the only outside contact Charlie has is his nurse and only friend Lis (Hong Chau) and the occasional visit from a pizza delivery guy (Sathya Sridharan). He is large to the point where even simple tasks, like standing up to retrieve a dropped remote from the floor, becomes a Herculean task.
“You will die by the weekend,” Lis says, clocking his blood pressure at 238/134. “Then I have to get to work,” he says optimistically. “I have papers to grade.”
Charlie suffers from a twice broken heart; once by congestive heart failure, the second by the death of his partner Alan. “Someone close to me passed away and it had an effect,” he says with great understatement. “I was always big,” admitting he binge-eats to make himself feel better. “I let it get out of control.”
Now, with just days left to live, he has one wish. He wants to repair the relationship with his estranged daughter Ellie (Sadie Sink), a 17-year-old he hasn’t seen since he left his family after falling in love with Alan, one of his students. “I need to know I did one thing right in my life,” he says.
Ellie, just eight-years-old when he deserted her, wants nothing to do with him—“I’m not spending time with you,” she says. “You’re disgusting. You’d still be disgusting even if you weren’t fat.”—but reluctantly relents when he offers to pay her and tutor her in exchange for spending time together.
As Charlie’s condition worsens, Ellie spends more time at the apartment, uncovering aspects of her father’s life with the help of a new friend, a naïve missionary named Thomas (Ty Simpkins).
Aronofsky brings us into Charlie’s world, a place where grief and forgiveness live side by side to create an intimate and compassionate portrait of a man who allowed his life to spiral out of control.
The specter of death hangs over every frame of “The Whale,” and yet Fraser manages to bring optimism to a character not long for this world. He’s looking to set things straight and make sure Ellie will have the tools to have a decent life after he goes. It is a tremendous performance that soars, transcending the stage-bound nature of the story.
“The Summer of Fear” continues on Netflix with the release of “Fear Street Part 2: 1978,” the second part of their R.L. “Goosebumps” Stine trilogy about the cursed town of Shadyside, where terrible things have been happening for three hundred years.
Moving backwards in time sixteen years from the first instalment, this movie takes place in 1978. Against a classic slasher movie backdrop, a local sleep-away on a lake called Camp Nightwing, a group of teens, half from the Richie-rich town of Sunnyvale, the others from the possibly possessed Shadyside, get ready for a summer of swimming, campfires, secret hook-ups and… murder. As Ziggy Berman (“Stranger Things’” Sadie Sink) says, “bad things always happen to Shadysiders.”
Cue the gallons of blood, masked killer, a pentagram and more clues as to why some Shadysiders just can’t stop killing people. With axes.
In real life 1978 was a pretty good year for horror movies. “Halloween,” “Stranger in Our House” and “Dawn of the Dead” all dropped that year, and all feel like they are paid homage to by director Leigh Janiak. “Friday the 13th” also looms large over “Part 2,” both in vibe and look.
Janiak is faithful to the tropes of vintage slasher films, and despite the young adult label that comes with Stine’s work, doesn’t spare the blood, allusions to sex, the language or the scares. Characters we care about are offed with mighty swings of an axe, blood squirts and the teens react how teens would react, by using language that may make mom and dad blush.
“Fear Street Part 2: 1978” may look in the rear view mirror for inspiration but what is innovative is the way it links with the other two movies, connecting the narrative over the course of the trilogy. They aren’t sequels to one another, but one Shady-verse, bound by a certain set of rules, some of the same characters and lots and lots of gore.
“Fear Street Part 2: 1978” is rated R for obvious reasons, but the rating feels necessary and authentic to the genre. What feels less necessary are scenes of exposition and a drawn-out storyline between Ziggy and sister Cindy (Emily Rudd), but when the rest works so well, these are quibbles.
SYNOPSIS: Set four years after the memory-erasing events of “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” sees Spider-Man anonymously protecting New York City as his superpowers evolve. “Spiders have three life cycles. And between cycles, it can leave the spider vulnerable to threats. Those spiders that survive… go through a kind of rebirth.”
