Smash Cut

Tag: Netflix Original

  • ‘The Mitchells vs. The Machines’ is a winning match | movie review

    ‘The Mitchells vs. The Machines’ is a winning match | movie review

    A quirky less-than-perfect family finds themselves as humanity’s last hope as robots take over the world in Netflix’s new animated film The Mitchells vs. The Machines

    No one is doing animation quite like Phil Lord and Christopher Miller. From the pure audacious laugh-a-minute humor of The Lego Movie or the inventiveness — and reinventive-ness — of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse, the pair constantly challenges and subverts what an animated movie can be while still being completely reverent and masterful. Basically, they punch you in the face with graphics and color and then put you in a chokehold with profound explorations of real issues we find in our relationships. However, unlike some other studios *cough* Pixar *cough* The Mitchells vs. the Machines is unapologetically for kids and it’s all the better for it.

    The Mitchells are your run-of-mill dysfunctional family that aspiring filmmaker Katie (Abbi Jacobson) is eager to get away from as she goes to film school across the country in California. Her mother Linda (Maya Rudolph) tries to be supportive of her dream as she tries to keep the family together, but Katie’s father Rick (Danny McBride) can never seem to get the “supportive parent” role right. The relationship between Katie and Rick is a central throughline throughout the movie that shows an understanding of the psychology between parent and child so well. McBride’s vocal acting of a father trying not to assume he’s always right is priceless.

    In an effort to patch things up, he takes it upon himself to plan a cross-country journey to take Katie to school — yeah that’s going to work. However, in the middle of their travels, tech tycoon Dr. Mark Bowman (Eric Andre) mistakenly causes a robot uprising led by a Siri-like personal assistant called Pal (Olivia Colman). Finding themselves as the last humans on Earth capable of stopping the apocalypse, the family, including dinosaur-obsessed younger son Aaron (director Mike Rianda), have to work together to shut Pal down. The movie’s then set out into an action-packed, color-splashed unrolling ball of hilarity that maintains its poignancy throughout.

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  • ‘I’m Thinking of Ending Things’ is a long lonely road | movie review

    ‘I’m Thinking of Ending Things’ is a long lonely road | movie review

    I’m Thinking of Ending Things is a twisting psychological thriller about a couple road-tripping during a snowstorm to meet their parents

    I’m Thinking of Ending Things combines a darkly comedic tone with a bleak atmosphere to make for a haunting portrait of a relationship on the rocks.

    ▶ Streaming on Netflix

    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.



    Loneliness is a prison. The memories, regrets, and what-ifs of life become trapped on repeat in your head forming a blend of reality and fantasy in your psyche in an effort to fill the void of silence that it creates. In the time of the coronavirus pandemic that feeling may hit closer to home, which is why Charlie Kaufman’s newest film I’m Thinking of Ending Things—now streaming on Netflix—feels so effective.

    Each of the film’s three acts takes place largely in isolated locations—a car on a snowy country road, a remote farmhouse, and an empty high school nestled far from the road in the woods—with only stream-of-consciousness-like conversations to disturb the peace. Those conversations happen between the movie’s four players. At the center is an unnamed young woman (Jessie Buckley) who is road tripping with her new boyfriend Jake (Jesse Plemmons) to meet his family for the first time.

    On the road there, the pair engage in conversations both mundane and philosophically complex. And like any road trip, there are moments of silence which is when the woman’s internal monologue admitting she’s thinking of ending things with Jake fills the space. There are moments where we’re led to believe that something more is afoot. However, more than anything it’s a stunning piece of atmosphere that is equal parts unsettling and irresistibly engrossing.

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    Kaufman, who won an Oscar for writing Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, has only directed three movies—roughly one per decade. His two prior films, Synecdoche, New York and Anamolisa, both leveraged his surrealistic style to explore different crises of identity and the existential quandaries they create. To that end, I’m Thinking of Ending Things may be the most Kaufman-esque of the three. When the pair arrive at Jake’s parents’ farmhouse we become certain that this isn’t just a melancholic take on Meet the Parents. 

    Instead, we’re treated to an ever-twisting environment where things aren’t quite as they seem and, more interestingly, a step away from reality. That begins with Jake’s mother (Toni Collette) and father (David Thewlis) who are almost too eager to share the embarrassing specifics of Jake’s past… and present. From their demeanor, we’d assume they haven’t been out of the house and in contact with other humans in years. It’d account for the mother’s compulsive habit of doing something and then chastising herself for doing it wrong and the father’s inability to say something unproblematic.

    Then, the film furthers the ante by playing with space and time. The young woman drifts from room to room finding different scenes of the three family members at different ages and stages of life. At times, she herself becomes a part of the scene. Still, Kaufman plays his cards close to his chest—that is until the final act where reality is bent even more.

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    I'm Thinking of Ending Things Netflix
    Jessie Buckley as Young Woman, David Thewlis as Father, Jesse Plemons as Jake, Toni Collette as Mother in I’m Thinking Of Ending Things. Cr. Mary Cybulski/NETFLIX © 2020

    That’s in opposition to the Ian Reid novel it is based on. The book, which I admittedly found to be obtuse, both had too much foreshadowing of its final twist and too many red herrings that when its final reveal was made all I could think was, “what’s the point?” The film strips the book of all the elements intended to distract us and instead shrouds the mystery in opaqueness but doesn’t completely shut us out.

    There is a way to read the film. Kaufman didn’t set out to trick or confuse the audience. He has a specific story to tell. One about relationships, identity, regret, longing, and even more. He gives you the tools to solve the mystery, like the moments the movie cuts away to a janitor (Guy Boyd) going about his daily routine, though it may take more than one attempt to understand it all.

    That’s not to say it’s not completely satisfying on a first viewing. The darkly comedic tone and bleak atmosphere make for a haunting portrait of a relationship on the rocks. However, the layer just beneath the surface is as complex as the human mind when it’s put under stress. Few people have been able to communicate the non-linear way our minds work, but Kaufman has come damn close. And for that, it’s worth a watch. Then, it begs you for another. Or are you begging for another?

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    Best Thrillers of the Decade (a running list)

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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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