CINEMA | 'The Souvenir Part II' Revisits A Bad Romance

"Did you avoid the temptation to be obvious?"

A24 / BBC Film

British filmmaker Joanna Hogg's unlikely follow-up to her early '80s London-set, semi-autobiographical bad romance, 2019's The Souvenir, reimagines what a film sequel can be dramatically. The Souvenir Part II sees the still effervescent Honor Swinton Byrne's affluent film student Julie recovering emotionally from the sudden death of her heroin-addicted first love, Anthony (Tom Burke), from an overdose in Part I.

CABLE | Keeping the 'Peacemaker' – John Cena Shreds

"Eat peace, motherf*ckers!"

Warner Bros. Television / DC Films

Wrestler turned actor John Cena reprises his standout The Suicide Squad role as a sadistically twisted riff on the patriotism of the Captain America archetype in the James Gunn-created television series spin-off, Peacemaker. Filmed in Vancouver and based on the somewhat obscure DC Comics superhero, the show picks up right after the film where the eponymous character was supposedly left for dead after betraying our ragtag team of anti-hero mercenaries.

VIFF 2021 | 'The Scary of Sixty-First' Possesses Conspiracy Horror

"We're already in hell."

Vancouver International Film Festival

VIFF 2021—Belarusian-American Succession actress and "dirtbag leftist" Red Scare podcast co-host Dasha Nekrasova, who also co-stars as "The Girl", makes her feature directing debut in the lo-fi microbudget supernatural horror film, The Scary of Sixty-First. Set around the premise of roommates renting a spacious Upper Eastside Manhattan apartment for less than market value because it was once owned by notorious pedophilic sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, the film's hyper-topical premise exploits genre thrills by falling down a conspiracy theorist rabbit hole.

SCREEN | Vanessa Kirby Wanders – 'Italian Studies'

"Does memory even matter?"

Magnolia Pictures / Mongrel Media

New York indie filmmaker Adam Leon writes and directs Vanessa Kirby in a dreamlike character piece filmed on the streets of London and New York City. Their film, Italian Studies, follows a hazy trip down a dissociative rabbit hole of fractured identity—not totally dissimilar to Alice in Wonderland.

GENRE | 'Scream' 5 – A Craven Stab at Horror Nostalgia

"I've seen this movie before."

Paramount Pictures / Spyglass Media Group

Ready or Not directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett take over for the late Wes Craven in the numberless meta "requel" (a remake/reboot legacy sequel) simply, but confusingly, titled just Scream despite very much being the fifth entry in the diminishingly self-referential horror franchise. For some very inexplicable reasons amounting to remaking the first Woodsboro murders because the last few were underwhelming, this Scream annoyingly refashions the film to Gen Z's tastes for so-called "elevated horror".

TREAT | Machi Machi x Bubble Tea Shop x Richmond

Richmond—Famous for being Taiwanese Mandopop superstar Jay Chou's favourite global bubble tea brand, Machi Machi expanded to Canada's frosty shores a couple years ago—first in Toronto before opening up shop on Robson Street then another location in the boba-rich area of Golden Village last year.

VIFF 2021 | Rehearsing 'Drive My Car' – Grieving Theatre

"Chekhov is terrifying."

Vancouver International Film Festival

VIFF 2021—Japanese auteur Ryûsuke Hamaguchi adapts famed novelist Haruki Murakami's short story of the same name from his collection, Men Without Women, in the hypnotizing road drama Drive My Car (aka Doraibu mai kā), a three-hour mediation on grief, loss, and the healing power of theatre.

SCREEN | Maggie Gyllenhaal Finds 'The Lost Daughter'

"Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity."

Endeavor Content

Actress Maggie Gyllenhaal makes her impressive filmmaking debut in the haunting screen adaptation of the Greek Island-set psychological drama based on pseudonymous Italian author Elena Ferrante's novella of the same name. The Lost Daughter (aka La figlia oscura) gives us two carefully filmed, sunkissed hours revealing the silently crushing burdens of motherhood.

CINEMA | Top 10 Films of 2021

Each film reviewed where linked below:

1) Licorice Pizza (dir. Paul Thomas Anderson)

2) Petite Maman (dir. Céline Sciamma) *

3) The Power of the Dog (dir. Jane Campion) *

4) West Side Story (dir. Steven Spielberg)

5) The French Dispatch (dir. Wes Anderson)

6) The Worst Person in the World (dir. Joachim Trier) *

7) Drive My Car (dir. Ryûsuke Hamaguchi) *

8) Passing (dir. Rebecca Hall) *

9) Red Rocket (dir. Sean Baker) *

10) The Green Knight (dir. David Lowery)