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Tag: Charlize Theron

  • ‘The Old Guard’ has new tricks | Netflix review

    ‘The Old Guard’ has new tricks | Netflix review

    The Old Guard follows a group of immortal mercenaries as they find themselves as the targets of a nefarious plot

    Quick cut: Director Gina Prince-Bythewood uses her keen sense for character to make The Old Guard a one of a kind groundbreaking Hollywood blockbuster that feels like a new, exciting direction for the action genre.

    Chloé Zhao makes Nomadland‘s melancholic but hopeful story of nomads traversing the American West a stunningly complex character study of life on the margins of society.



    ★★★★

    The Old Guard feels familiar. It follows the typical Hollywood action blockbuster formula, has the archetypes we’ve come to expect and even has a premise that isn’t completely unique. However, director Gina Prince-Bythewood—she’s best known for Love & Basketball—finds moments to give The Old Guard a completely singular flair that feels as invigorating as it is groundbreaking.

    The idea of an action movie led by a group of immortals out of their time is not new. In The Old Guard, we follow Andy (Charlize Theron), a centuries-old warrior who uses her endless amount of time to help people. However, it’s the team around her—also consisting of immortals she’s found—that gives the movie its much-needed lift. There’s alcoholic Booker (Matthias Schoenaerts), new recruit Nile (If Beale Street Could Talk‘s Kiki Layne), and, most importantly, gay couple Joe (Marwan Kenzari) and Nicky (Luca Marinelli).

    Each character, some centuries years old and aware of the labors and joys of their immortality and some newly struggling with it, is finely carved out to have a past that informs their present motivations. They’re the definitions of lived-in.

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    In particular, it’s Nicky and Joe’s story that feels most impactful. Despite the uniqueness as a gay couple in a major action blockbuster, Prince-Bythewood treats them with normalcy, which adds to their impact. Though it isn’t specifically hinted at in the script, their centuries-long love story has importance in their part of the narrative. Their love today adds to the stakes and our attachment to the characters. It’s through their adversity that we also find their moral drive.

    The movie begins with “the old guard,” Andy, Booker, Joe and Nicky, receiving a rescue assignment from James Copley (Chiwetel Ejiofor). That assignment turns out to be a setup to prove the group’s immortality so that pharmacy giant CEO Steven Merrick (Harry Melling) could target the group to study. However, after being killed in a gruesome ambush, the guard resurrects and proceeds to destroy the assailants with ease. Their time-forged skill, especially Andy’s with an ancient axe, is apparent.

    The Old Guard
    THE OLD GUARD (L to R) MARWAN KENZARI as JOE and LUCA MARINELLI as NICKY in THE OLD GUARD. Cr. AIMEE SPINKS/NETFLIX © 2020

    Discovering that Copley has crossed them, the guard sets off to find Nile, the first addition to the guard in centuries, and stop Merrick. And while the premise seems like it begs for endless action, The Old Guard instead is more interested in character moments. Moments that eventually make those action scenes more impactful.

    That’s not to say that the action isn’t polished, enthralling, and punishing. Though Prince-Blyethwood hasn’t tackled an action movie, it’s clear she has a handle of capturing and communicating combat. If anything, her penchant for strong character work makes her more successful in creating action scenes that are narratively and emotionally important.

    It’s difficult in a high-concept fantasy like this to feel like you have the agency to pause and explore the adversity that Nicky and Joe faced or the losses that Booker and Andy had to endure. However, it’s that attachment to the characters that makes the physical pain they go through on their mission hard to stomach. The added rule that any of the immortals can find that they will not resurrect again heightens the stakes.

    The Old Guard *is* a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster, even if it was released directly on Netflix without a theatrical release. However, it’s a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster that’s unafraid to play within the formula given to it. Yes, one of its largest assets is putting a gay couple unabashedly at the center—and without feeling self-congratulatory—however, it does so with every character. It unabashedly explores their inner workings, which just makes their physical feats of action even more delicious to watch. To say I’m obsessed may be an understatement.

    The Old Guard is now streaming on Netflix.

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    More movies, less problems

    Hey! I’m Karl. You can find me on Twitter and Letterboxd. I’m also a Tomatometer-approved critic.

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  • ‘Bombshell’ fizzles out despite strong performances — movie review

    ‘Bombshell’ fizzles out despite strong performances — movie review

    Bombshell tells the story of how the women of Fox News banded together to take down one of the most powerful predators in media

    Quick review: Bombshell has a terrific performance by Charlize Theron as Megyn Kelly and an interesting story worth telling. However, the muddled tone, hollow characters, and awkward pacing make it a forgettable watch.

    There’s been a trend in the film industry of tackling serious topics and difficult people — that’s being kind — with a heavy dose of comedy and satire. In particular, Adam McKay seems to have cracked the code with the 2008 financial crisis movie The Big Short — which is good — and the Dick Cheney biopic Vice — which is bad. Then there was Craig Gillespie’s Tonya Harding biopic I, Tonya. Other than a shared style, these three movies had tremendous Oscar success. Keep that in mind when watching Bombshell — a new movie by Jay Roach following the demise of Fox News CEO Roger Ailes at the hands of several women at the network. 

    Truthfully, it feels like Bombshell is the worst version of this kind of movie because it feels like the story doesn’t justify the style — characters talking to the camera, punchy graphics popping up on the screen. Though, maybe it does. The Big Short’s Oscar-winning screenwriter Charles Randolph penned the script, so maybe it’s Roach that went wrong with the equation. The uneven tone shows just how much control someone like McKay had over his movies. 

    We follow three women working at Fox News. An eerily transformed Charlize Theron as Megyn Kelly, Nicole Kidman as Gretchen Carlson, and Margot Robbie as the fictional Kayla Pospisil — an upstart keen on greatness at the network. The movie starts with a promising look into the fallout following the first Republican Primary Debate in 2016 where she confronted Donald Trump about his long history of harassment of women and misogyny.

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    After the brush-up, she gives us a to the camera tour of the Fox News offices where we learn about the setup of the organization. Ailes and the VPs that serve him are on the second floor while the owners of the network, the Murdochs, are on the eighth. While she’s dealing with harassment from angry Trump voters, the media, and even people within the network, Carlson is preparing for war. 

    After showing her lawyers a reel of misogynistic comments and moments on-air — she assures them that worse happened behind-the-scenes — she gets ready to be fired and subsequently sue Roger Ailes for sexual harassment. Meanwhile, Kayla, who was recently promoted to working on The O’Reilly Factor, maneuvers her way into meeting Ailes to be considered for on-air work explaining that Fox News is like a religion to her conservative family. However, during an uncomfortable meeting with Ailes, he asks her to slowly lift her dress as he “assesses” whether she’s fit to be in front of the camera.

    Bombshell poster

    Theron is pure electricity as Megyn Kelly — and it’s not just the makeup job like some recent Oscar winner. While the physical transformation helps, it’s the physicality that she imbues her with that makes it remarkable. There are subtle ways she captures Kelly — the way she carries herself, the cadence and deliberateness when she talks, her almost slow-motion movements. Without that central performance, the movie would fall apart. 

    The other woman are solid too. Kidman is a seasoned pro and does the best that she could with Carlson. However, the character is shamefully underwritten, which is a key problem with the movie. Because we split our time between Kelly, Carlson, and Kayla, we never get time to understand them outside of this particular situation. They’re reduced to vessels rather than actual people — maybe it’s because the actual people aren’t that great either. As for Robbie, she does great work, but her character feels like a construction for the story.

    That shouldn’t detract from the message. It seems to have been made with good intentions. Powerful men can be stopped when we support victims and when victims support each other. However, I don’t think Roach was equipped to tell that story. Rather than one about the victims, he focused on the intrigue. Instead of coalescing around Carlson’s crusade and the other woman around her, he’s more interested in Kelly’s journey to speaking out, as well. The issue there is that that journey isn’t entirely compelling either. 

    There are more layers to Bombshell than I am equipped to go into. So, I’ll leave you with this. More than being bad, it’s forgettable. Other than the scenes where Theron is giving room to flex her characterization, the rest of the movie feels is awkwardly paced, unevenly toned, and, to be frank, a slog. For a movie called Bombshell, it really has no impact. The news might even be more interesting.