Movies Extravaganza 22: FLY ME TO THE MOON, A QUIET PLACE: DAY ONE, KINDS OF KINDNESS, THE BIKERIDERS, TUESDAY, BAD BOYS: RIDE OR DIE

I chuckled quite a bit during this summer, semi rom/com, produced by Scarlett Johansson‘s These Pictures production company; shot at the Kennedy Space Center. I wrongly assumed the focus would be on the Moon Landing as a hoax, not so. Johansson’s character Kelly Jones is a cross between “Mad Men” Peggy Olson and Joan Harris, a marketing genius with the figure of a pinup girl. Her assignment is to bring the Moon Landing mission back into focus for the American people who have lost interest by 1969, almost a decade after JFK’s “We choose to go to the Moon” speech. The scenes of Kelly, and her trusty, Nixon hating assistant, Ruby (Anna Garcia), commercializing NASA with Omega watches, cereal, Tang and more, is fun and seems very accurate to the time period, yet perhaps some of this could have been trimmed down for time.

Channing Tatum is just okay as Cole Davis, NASA’s no-nonsense launch director, who feels responsible for the failed, deadly Apollo 1 mission. He doesn’t have time for interviews or media campaigns and although attracted to Kelly, he doesn’t want her on base as a distraction. However, Kelly has the ear of the President of the United States via a Men in Black type, Moe Berkus (Woody Harrelson) who’s having a blast with this slippery character.

Creating a Moon Landing alternate staging, in case the real landing doesn’t go as planned, doesn’t come in until nearly the 3rd act of the movie. “Fly Me To The Moon” is no Damien Chazelle‘s “First Man”, yet it’s obvious accuracy and a reverence for NASA and the Apollo 11 Moon Landing Mission is represented and threaded through as the romance blossoms and the shuttle readies for take-off!  Rating: 3.5 outta 5

Fight AND Flight kicks in for a terminally ill hospice patient (Lupita Nyong’o) on a last excursion into Manhattan. Once the blind, but extremely audit-orally perceptive alien creatures come to wreak havoc; she reluctantly allows a Brit (Joe Quinn), a young Robert Downey Jr type, to accompany her on a mission for pizza in Harlem, before death from one thing or the other consumes her – creating a bond where under different circumstances could have been a romantic first date.

“Day One” is co-written by John Krasinski, “A Quiet Place” writer/director. Co-writer/director is Michael Sarnoski who directed Nicolas Cage in “Pig”, which made my Top 10 in 2021. He is quite good at capturing the small moments between the action. The first of this franchise used anticipation and the audiences ignorance to create amazing tension. The 2nd felt like high stakes throughout. This one can’t sustain any of those things, as we now know these creatures 2x over. So the focus is more on sentiment rather than fear. Although, I think they may have over did it with the cat. Rating: 3.5 outta 5

Yorgos Lanthimos and his writing partner Efthimis Filippou are exploring power dynamics in human relationships, within this triptych of fables (3 short films inside one). Jesse Plemons plays the main character for most of the film. In the first segment, he plays a man whose every move is dictated by his boss (Willem Dafoe), until he’s fired, freed and becomes out of sorts. In the second, Plemons is a cop whose wife (Emma Stone) goes missing at sea and is rescued from a mysterious island; yet he’s convinced she’s not actually his wife. And in the third, Plemons and Stone play members of a strange cult (led by Dafoe and Hong Chau) I love the sandals in this one. The two are sent on a mission to find their new spiritual leader (Margaret Qualley) – the prophecy being she will be a twin, with a deceased sister.

In each, they clearly play with how free will fluctuates, along with the struggle between the freedom of choice and the freedom from choice.

It’s an interesting topic because it’s an unavoidable part of the human experience. We can’t help but have power dynamics in our relationships both professionally and personally. Typically, people tend to either be one who wants to dominate, versus one who is or wants to be dominated. Although, I don’t feel I’m either. I truly despise anyone or anything trying to control me. I’ve always bristled and rebelled against jobs where my autonomy is limited. I developed a case of hives when I dated a person who had possessive tendencies, needless to say, that didn’t last.

On the flip side, I do not want to control anyone. I do wish my sister would clean up her plate after dinner, but really, I’m all about you do you, as long as it doesn’t affect or curtail my freedoms. It’s why, as stated in the past, I don’t understand the debate on abortion. You having a baby or not does not change my life at all, nor does it have anything to do with my personal relationship with God, so why would I care!?!

Back to the movie, there’s a lot of food and drink talk, some of the violence and blood feels Tarantino-esque. Nice, small visual moments, not broad like “Poor Things” but the locations and character shading give your brain a lot to take in. Each short story is just so intriguing I couldn’t help being hooked, despite each being way off-kilter. Jesse Plemons is the Sean Penn of today, he can do so much quietly & Margaret Qualley has that “it girl” quality in everything I’ve seen her in so far. I enjoyed this weird ride, but I don’t think the general public is gonna know what to do with it.  Rating: 4 outta 5

I was disappointed with the tone and pacing of this movie, despite the strong performances from leads Tom Hardy, Austin Butler and phenomenal in her ability to morph into a character, Jodie Comer. The trailer for The Bikeriders gives no indication that it’s based on “The Bikeriders” coffee table book (1967) by Danny Lyon, and therefore, much of it is told from the perspective of how the book came to be. The loyalties and bonds of friendship are believable, yet by the same token, I wasn’t able to get fully invested in the building and destruction of this motorcycle club, because I don’t feel I witnessed enough firsthand moments.

What I did relate to is Hardy’s character having created something from an idea, dream, inspiration, having it take off with others fully onboard, only to feel the weight of the thing so strongly you want to pass it off or close it down. I’ve worked for at least 4 startups where the leader is visionary and passionate in this respect at the start, only to abandon the helm after the ship sets sail. Rating: 3 outta 5

I haven’t seen it, but I hear there’s talk of a talking bird in the recently released “The Watchers”. I remember in 2022 there were 3 movies released close together that prominently featured donkeys. Odd the way the collective unconscious can show up in films. Before seeing this film, TUESDAY, I only skimmed the synopsis and didn’t watch the trailer; so, an ornithological Grim Reaper, growing and shrinking (Arinzé Kene), totally took me off guard. It’s one thing when you know you’re in for magical realism, another when it just inserts itself in the form of a menacing yet thoughtful and wise macaw.

In the beginning I found myself questioning in my head, is this working? I was also worried about Diane, the friend I invited to see the movie, based on the fact that it starred Julia Louis-Dreyfus, whom she likes, however, Diane does not gravitate at all to fantasy, sci-fi, superhero or speculative fiction. Thankfully, for her, this movie is more of a fable. The writer/director Daina O. Pusić (directorial debut) classifies it as a fairy tale, but I don’t feel that fits. Fairy tales involve more adventure and questing and typically take place in another world. Whereas this Bird of Death has always been a part of our earthly existence, you just don’t know it until you’re dealing with imminent mortality. Although, I got the sense that he only reveals himself to the dying under certain circumstances or perhaps to people he finds intriguing or deserving of knowing death exists in a physical presence. Otherwise, I feel he just flies over people, places, events to bring about death. There’s a slightly apocalyptic B plot that I feel is entirely unnecessary. When dealing with magical realism it’s often a good idea to keep the scope of people it affects relatively small.

As great a part the bird of death plays in the film, it’s not the true focus. That would be the mother/daughter relationship, which has many sides. Zora (Louis-Dreyfus) is a dedicated and fiercely loving single mother, but we are catching her at a moment of breakdown where she just needs a little separation from her daughter and all that comes with caring for someone who has been seriously ill for a long, long time. One indication of the amount of time both have been dealing with this sickness is Zora referring to the home health aide (Leah Harvey) as Nurse 8. Tuesday (Lola Petticrew) nearly welcomes death, her only concern is that her mother won’t be able to cope once she’s gone and at the same time questions whether or not she is truly loved by Zora. Then there are moments when the tables turn, and you come to understand how often Tuesday is the one parenting her mother.

It’s definitely a departure for Julia Louis-Dreyfus, although she has done two Nicole Holofcener films “Enough Said” and “You Hurt My Feelings” both of which deal with some dramatic elements, but still, at the center of both of those films beats a comedy. This dealing with the inevitability of losing your child and trying desperately to beat death is no laughing matter and yet Pusić is great at creating humor in the absurdity, and no one can better deliver that than Louis-Dreyfus. And yet, no matter what I see her in she’ll forever be Elaine just reacting to different situations.

At any rate, ultimately, I decided all of it, strange as it may be, does work, and Diane agreed. Rating: 3.5 outta 5