Watch as I review three movies in less time than it takes to shuck an oyster! Have a look as I race against the clock to tell you about the supremely silly “Minions: The Rise of Gru,” “Marcel the Shell with Shoes On,” the tiny mollusk with a huge heart, and the period rom com “Mr. Malcolm’s List.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Richard sits in on the CFRA Ottawa morning show with guest host Matt Harris to talk the new movies coming to theatres including “Marcel the Shell with Shoes On,” the tiny mollusk with a huge heart, “The Forgiven,” a drama of privilege and wealth and the period rom com “Mr. Malcolm’s List.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
Richard joins NewsTalk 1010 host David Cooper on the coast-to-coast-to-coast late night “Showgram” to play the game “Did Richard Crouse Like This?” This week we talk about “Marcel the Shell with Shoes On,” the tiny mollusk with a huge heart, “The Forgiven,” a drama of privilege and wealth and the period rom com “Mr. Malcolm’s List.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
The petticoats may be more pronounced and the dialogue right out of Jane Austen, but make no mistake, “Mr. Malcolm’s List,” a new romance now playing in theatres, is the kind of rom com that kept Drew Barrymore and Kathryn Heigl busy for years. The only thing missing is the traditional rom com run through the airport and into the arms of the beloved, an omission brought on by time period, not for lack of trying.
Based on a best-selling novel of the same name written by Suzanne Allain, the movie begins with a bad date between London’s most eligible bachelor, Mr. Jeremiah Malcolm (Sope Dirisu) and the eager but dim-witted (“Thinking too deeply causes forehead furrows,” she says.) Julia Thistlewaite (Zawe Ashton). She has her hopes set on a marriage proposal, but he seems more inclined to talk politics, a subject she knows little about.
Despite her best efforts, the night ends with them going their separate ways. The next day, to Julia’s horror, the newspaper carries a caricature of Mr. Malcolm waving her off with a curt, “Next!”
Turns out, Mr. Malcolm has a list of requirements for his potential new bride. Candidates must be able to converse in a sensible fashion, exude an elegance of mind, have a forgiving nature and genteel relations from good society, among other prerequisites. Julia’s sin? Not knowing about the newly enacted Corn Laws and fluttering her eyelashes too much.
Julia is horrified by the publicity. “I would love for Mr. Malcolm to receive the comeuppance he deserves,” she says. To that end she enlists Selina Dalton (Freida Pinto), a country mouse from out of town, gives her a crash course in high society, and sets her off to seduce Malcolm. When he falls for her charms, she will produce a list of her own and he will be “judged and found wanting in front of the whole of good society” just as she was.
You know the rest and if you don’t, you’ve never seen a rom com before. This is a gussied-up Kathryn Heigl movie with high-brow accents and the promise of a ripped bodice or two. Mix in jealousy, trickery, a handsome alternate love interest in the form of Captain Henry Ossory (Theo James) and comedic relief from giggly Mrs. Covington, wonderfully played by Broadway star Ashley Park, and you have a diverting but rather predictable movie.
“Mr. Malcolm’s List” succeeds mostly because an engaging, diverse cast who breathe life and loads of personality into a well-worn genre.
Richard speaks to “CTV News at 11:30” anchor Andria Case about movies on VOD and in theatres to watch this weekend including the childhood horror of “Come Play” (in theatres), the haunted house terror of “His House” (Netflix) and the new documentary “Jimmy Carter Rock & Roll President” (In-Cinemas and Virtual Cinemas).
Watch the whole thing HERE! (Starts at 23:41)
Richard and CP24 anchor Cristina Tenaglia have a look at the childhood horror of “Come Play” (in theatres), the haunted house terror of “His House” (Netflix) and the new documentary “Jimmy Carter Rock & Roll President” (In-Cinemas and Virtual Cinemas).
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Richard sits in on the CTV NewsChannel with host Marcia MacMillan to have a look at the new movies coming to VOD, streaming services and theatres including the childhood horror of “Come Play” (in theatres), the haunted house terror of “His House” (Netflix) and the new documentary “Jimmy Carter Rock & Roll President” (In-Cinemas and Virtual Cinemas).
Watch the whole thing HERE!
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 the childhood horror of “Come Play” (in theatres), the haunted house terror of “His House” (Netflix) and the new documentary “Jimmy Carter Rock & Roll President” (In-Cinemas and Virtual Cinemas).
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
Haunted houses and Halloween go hand in hand. Fairground ghost houses, with their flickering lights and carnies dressed in store bought costumes, have been making hearts race and teens scream for decades but a new movie, “His House,” now streaming on Netflix, brings those cheesy thrills into a terrifyingly real world.
Bol (Sope Dirisu) and Rial (Wunmi Mosaku) are refugees from war torn South Sudan. Their journey to freedom is fraught. They’re crammed into busses and pick-up trucks, then loaded on to a leaky boat in rough waters. At sea they lose their young daughter who drowns when the boat flips.
They survive and land in an English detention centre, living there until temporary permission to stay in the U.K. is granted. While they wait on their claim of asylum, they’re moved into a dilapidated community housing. “You will be sent to a home of our choosing,” they are told. “You must reside at this address. You must not move from this address. This is your home now.”
The filthy fixer-upper (to put it mildly) has holes in the walls, garbage piled out front and an evil secret, possibly a spirit from their former country. “There is a great beast in this house,” says Rial. “It followed us here. It is filling this house with ghosts to torment my husband.”
What follows is a classic haunted house film with a deep subtext that breathes new life into the genre’s desiccated old lungs. Set against a background of cultural displacement, survivors’ guilt, and the psychological wounds of a life spent in trauma, “His House” is no “Amityville Horror.” Sure, strange things happen in the home. Voices come from behind the drywall, a spirit appears and dreams manifest themselves in the most horrific of ways, but the context is different.
British writer-director Remi Weekes knows his way around a supernatural thrill but he also weaves in real life experiences of racism, otherness and genocidal suffering into the story, forming a rich tapestry of chills—some from beyond our mortal coil, some not—that move the tired old haunted house horror story to new, deeply felt places. It may drag in spots but “His House” is a thrilling rethink of what the genre can be.
