“Death of a Unicorn” - Say no more.

Back in 2011, a friend of mine insisted I needed watch Cabin in the Woods. I asked what it was about and all they would tell me was “bloodthirsty unicorn.” No context. Not even a complete sentence. Just two words that hooked me in and promised everything. Fourteen years later, that promise is back in a new movie. Of course, those two words aren’t really needed when the title of the new movie is Death of a Unicorn, but the promise is as exciting as ever. And if that doesn’t get you excited you should go back to feeding pigeons or watching grass grow or riding elevators because you like the sweet, sweet music. The rest of us will enjoy an utterly bonkers and entertaining movie in your absence.

I realize the title Death of a Unicorn doesn’t automatically mean the movie will feature the death of a literal unicorn. Death of a Unicorn could be the title of a Michael Jackson biopic or the next Game of Thrones spinoff. That’s why I would still respond to the question “what’s this movie about” with “bloodthirsty unicorn.” Actually, that’s not entirely accurate. I’d respond with “bloodthirsty unicorns.” Plural.

Elliot (Paul Rudd) and his daughter Ridley (Jenna Ortega) are driving through the wilderness to meet with a rich pharmaceutical company owner, Odell Leopold (Richard E. Grant), and his family when Paul accidentally hits a unicorn with his car. Yeah, this movie wastes no time. While attending to the injured creature, Jenna touches its horn and connects with the unicorn on a transcendental level. Suddenly, her enrapture is interrupted by Elliot bludgeoning the unicorn’s head in with a tire iron. Yeah, this movie wastes no time.

Not wanting anyone to find the body and possibly derail his meeting, Elliot loads the carcass into his car and drives them to their destination. Upon arrival, they meet Odell, his wife Belinda (Tea Leoni), and their son Shepard (Will Poulter). The meeting goes well at first, but is interrupted by loud noises coming from Elliot’s car. Everyone goes out to investigate and are greeted by an angry, very much not-dead unicorn, trying to smash its way out of the car. As suddenly as the tire iron scene, the unicorn is shot through the head by one of Odell’s security people.

At this point, the movie hasn’t gone full bonkers yet, but it’s only a matter of time. After the initial shock wears off of discovering a literal unicorn, the group also discovers that the unicorn’s blood has healing properties. Since Odell is dying of cancer, he orders his in-house scientists to concoct a serum from unicorn blood and ground up unicorn horn, then ingests it and is cured shortly thereafter. While Ridley is horrified, Elliot can’t resist the temptation of riches to secure their futures, so agrees to a partnership with the Leopolds to monetize the unicorn.

But again, this movie doesn’t waste time. As the group is preparing to move the unicorn body, much larger, much angrier, much eviler-looking mommy and daddy unicorns show up to turn this movie into a home invasion survival flick. Yay!

Clearly, this isn’t supposed to be a serious movie in any kind of way. Once the bloodthirsty unicorns show up for revenge and to reclaim their child, the mild pretense of seriousness coloring the first act is abandoned. And not a moment too soon. While this movie is obviously a satirical take on the insidious and despicable Sackler family (the owners of Purdue Pharma, who bear much responsibility for the current opioid crisis), that’s not why we came to the movie.

While the promise of unicorn-based riches becomes the sole motivation for the Leopolds, Ridley does a bunch of research on the Unicorn Tapestries (these are real thing currently on display at the Met Cloisters in New York City) in an attempt to understand the unicorns. The tapestries depict unicorns slaughtering a bunch of humans. YES! That’s why we came to the movie.

While I really enjoyed the film as a whole, its individual parts had their faults. The plot itself is fine, but it seemed as if they left some cards on the table. For a little while, it seemed like they were going to go further with the effects of the unicorn blood on the humans. At one point, Shepard is literally snorting powdered unicorn horn, which had the potential for some truly insane repercussions. Instead, the movie restrains itself and Shepard just kind of goes still for a minute and has glowy eyes. Same thing with Odell, who seems like he’s going to go completely mad with greed, but stops at about fifty percent. Also restrained is Paul Rudd himself, playing a determined and hapless father with vanishingly few snarky lines to showcase Rudd’s lovable humor. And Ortega’s earnest performance as Ridley, while really good, could have used a couple scenes where she also goes a little bit mad. I can appreciate a movie not letting its content fly off the rails, but this is the kind of movie that practically demands that content run wild.

Luckily, Leoni and Poulter know exactly what kind of movie they are in. Leoni is hilarious in nearly every line delivery and Poulter absolutely lets things fly. And shout out to Anthony Carrigan who plays Griff, the Leopold’s head servant. Carrigan absolutely steals some of his scenes and brings plenty of laughs to the fray.

Most importantly, the unicorns are awesome. My family and I recently stayed in an Airbnb that was unicorn-themed. Seriously. But not the kind of unicorns that were in this movie. The movie unicorns are the stuff of nightmares, definitely scarier than anything depicted in those tapestries. And the deaths? Just glorious. It’s everything that was promised.

Rating: Don’t ask for any money back because, say it with me: bloodthirsty unicorns.

“Snow White” - Still including all your favorite dwarves.

If you saw a preview of Snow White, you were probably as nervous as I was about seeing it. I saw what the CGI dwarves looked like and my thought was if the filmmakers were willing to make a bizarre choice like using CGI dwarves instead of actual human beings to portray the dwarves, what other bizarre creative choices might they have made?

As it turns out, they made quite a few more creative choices, though they all seemed to work out pretty well. With the exception of purists, who complain when even the tiniest details of things are changed, and who still hate baseball’s designated hitter (DH) with the fire of a thousand suns, people should find the changes to Snow White quite agreeable.

The major storylines are all still the same. After the death of both of her parents, Snow White (Rachel Zegler) lives with her stepmother, the Evil Queen (Gal Gadot). Since one of the changes the writers didn’t make was to give the Evil Queen a proper name - and I don’t want to type Evil Queen a bunch more times - I’m going to call her Barb. Barb is a bitch.

Barb is still obsessed with being the fairest one of all and makes her magic mirror reassure her of this every single day. Barb is also obsessed with shiny things and has hoarded the kingdom’s wealth all for herself, impoverishing the rest of her subjects. Barb has even turned Snow White into a castle servant and hidden her from the kingdom for years. Still, the mirror proclaims Barb to be the fairest of them all because she looks like Gal freaking Gadot.

One day, Barb’s guards catch a man named Jonathan (Andrew Burnap) stealing potatoes from the castle kitchens. Initially, Barb orders Jonathan executed, but Snow White pleads for mercy and that the punishment fit the crime. So, Barb takes Jonathan’s coat and shoes and has him tied to the castle gate to freeze to death. Since this punishment definitely does not fit the crime, Snow White sneaks out and frees Jonathan. Barb witnesses this and immediately asks the mirror who is the fairest of them all. Having just finished its daily Duolingo lesson and learning that the word fair has multiple definitions, the mirror informs Barb that Snow White is now the fairest of them all.

If you are paying attention, you’ll notice the Prince from the original movie has been replaced by Jonathan. Jonathan is not a prince. This small change may anger the DH-haters, but it doesn’t matter to the plot at all if Jonathan is a prince. Aladdin wasn’t a prince and nobody hated him. Well, nobody in the theater audience, at least. Jonathan is just a hungry street rat leading a small group of bandits who occasionally steal food from Barb. The result of Snow White freeing Jonathan is Barb ordering the Huntsman (Ansu Kabia) to take Snow White to the forest, kill Snow White, and bring Snow White’s heart back in a box. See? Story back on track.

And I mean really back on track. The forest animals lead Snow White to the seven dwarves’ cottage, where she falls asleep. Cut to the dwarves singing “Heigh Ho” and working in their mines…yada, yada, yada…they find Snow White in their cottage…yada, yada, yada...”Whistle While you Work”...poison apple...you know how this whole thing goes. The only differences are true love’s kiss and the fight with Barb happen in reverse order and the fight with Barb is completely reimagined, including Barb’s demise. And, of course Barb’s demise still happens. Barb is a bitch.

As you can see, all of the familiar plot points are there and accounted for. The familiar songs, all seven dwarves, the not-prince awakening Snow White with a kiss, the diamond mines, and even the friendly forest animals. In addition, the parts that received updates were almost all updated for the better. Snow White gets a chance to participate in reclaiming her family’s kingdom. The photorealistic animation of the animals is astoundingly excellent. There are some new songs that are quite good, including a new villain song called “All is Fair,” and my personal favorite - “Princess Problems.” You read that right. While Snow White is complaining, Jonathan is mocking her as having Princess Problems. Admit it, purists - you chuckled at least once during that song.

If there is anything to complain about (and some definitely did), it’s the appearance of the dwarves. They definitely inspire an uncanny valley feeling (a nearly-identical resemblance to humans, but just off enough to cause a sense of unease), especially the close-ups of Dopey, Happy, and Grumpy. I’m with the little people actors on this one. Why not just cast little people in the roles? If nothing else, it would have saved a ton of money on the CGI. That’s not to say the dwarves weren’t good characters in general, but who doesn’t love Peter Dinklage and Martin Klebba (Klebba at least got to voice Grumpy)?

All in all, Snow White is arguably the best live-action remake to date of a Disney animated feature. It was much better than I was expecting it to be and I enjoyed myself far more than I thought I would. I know there is a lot of controversy around this movie, but ignore all of that noise. Whether you are a purist or progressive, you’ll come out of the film more happy than grumpy.

Rating: Worth your money, even if you still hate the DH.

“Black Bag” - If I tell you, I don’t have to kill you.

Who is going to be the next James Bond? It’s been four years since Daniel Craig’s Bond died in No Time to Die and the 007 wheel of who’s-the-next-Bond is still spinning with no end in sight. And even after the new Bond is cast, we have no idea what the future of the franchise looks like now that Amazon has full control of it. The good news is we have a new spy thriller called Black Bag to fill the spy thriller void left by Bond’s explosive demise. What? Too soon?

Unlike Bond films, Black Bag isn’t an action spy thriller. If you’re looking for one of those, you only have two more months to wait until Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning releases. Black Bag is directed by Steven Soderbergh and his films tend to lean more toward the cerebral side than the action side. That doesn’t mean it’s completely devoid of action, just that you’re going to have to engage your brain for a lot more of the film’s run time than you are watching Bond or Ethan Hunt.

One thing Black Bag has in common with Bond films is that its spies all work for Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), a.k.a. MI6. We don’t know if any of them are double-Os, probably because if they told us they’d have to kill us.

Agent George Woodhouse (Michael Fassbender) is tasked with investigating five fellow agents to determine which of them is leaking classified information. Among the five is his wife Kathryn S. Jean (Cate Blanchett), making the investigation that much more awkward. The other four are agents Dubose (Marisa Abela), Smalls (Tom Burke), Vaughn (Naomie Harris), and Stokes (Rege-Jean Page). After receiving his assignment, Woodhouse invites the four agents to his house for dinner (obviously, his wife will be there as well) to surreptitiously begin his investigation.

The dinner scene is quite good but, as I said, you have to engage your brain. The scene is quite long, the British accents are thick, and a lot of information is put forth. The scene introduces the characters, providing us with a bunch of details about their various jobs within the agency as well as some personal details that could incriminate them as the leak. The information also serves to get the plot moving, as well as drop hints as to what’s to come. It’s a fantastically written scene, underscored by equally fantastic performances. To beat the dinner metaphor a bit, the scene is the appetizer whetting our palate for the main course.

As the film progresses, the intrigue piles on thick, secrets are revealed, and everyone’s a suspect. Even intelligence boss Arthur Steiglitz (Pierce Brosnan) is pulled into the case when the stakes of the leak are revealed. There are twists and turns, false leads and red herrings. There are moments when we think we’ve solved the puzzle, only for the movie to throw another wrinkle at us, dashing our solution. And the whole time we’re enjoying the sharp dialogue and killer performances that feature heavily in Soderbergh flicks.

When the movie reaches its climax, rather than feature a car chase or shootout or nuclear explosion or sky beam, the film gives us...wait for it...another dinner scene. Symmetry, baby! Soderbergh definitely paid attention in film class. Except, in this scene, the only thing served is the big reveal of who and why and a pistol for that who to make a grab for. It’s a scene every bit as good as the opening scene, the dialogue and performances as sharp as ever. It’s the kind of scene that has us on the edge of our seats in anticipation, but without the sensory overload better suited for the Imax. As we eagerly await Ethan Hunt’s finale and the announcement of who will be drinking their martini shaken not stirred, Black Bag is a wonderful film to fill the time.

Rating: Don’t ask for any money back and feel free to tell everyone about it because this film should not be kept secret.

“Novocaine” - About a Boy (or Pain and Gain).

If you’ve ever wondered what typecasting is, I give to you Jack Quaid. Quaid is one of the stars of Amazon Prime’s series The Boys. In The Boys, Quaid plays a nerdy, lovesick man putting himself in harm’s way for the girl he loves. He’s affable, well-meaning, and even gets superpowers for a short time. In the new movie Novocaine, Quaid stars as Nate Caine, a nerdy, affable, well-meaning, lovesick man putting himself in harm’s way for the girl he loves. Nate even has a quasi-superpower - congenital insensitivity to pain and anhydrosis (CIPA). In layman’s terms, he can’t feel pain. CIPA is actually a real and extremely rare genetic disorder, though I’m not sure anyone afflicted by CIPA has thought about a life fighting crime.

Nate is an assistant manager at a bank and has child-proofed his entire life. Tennis balls covering desk corners, putty covering pencil tips, and a little do-it-yourself stopper on his shower handle to prevent the water from becoming too hot, and eating nothing but pureed food smoothies to avoid potentially biting through and swallowing his own tongue. He can still play computer games in his spare time though, so he’s doing juuuust fine in life.

Nate’s life becomes a whole lot more dangerous when two things happen. The first is his crush, a bank teller named Sherry (Amber Midthunder), asks him out on a date, which he nervously accepts. After Nate describes his condition to her, she convinces him to try a bite of cherry pie (subtle, no?), then takes him back to his place to find out if he can feel sensations other than pain, if you know what I mean (subtle, no?).

The second thing that happens is Nate’s bank gets robbed and Sherry is kidnapped by the bandits. After a bunch of cops are gunned down by the bad guys, Nate determines that Sherry is his only hope. After strapping a tourniquet on a bleeding cop, he grabs the cop’s gun and car and takes off after the fleeing robbers. At this point, the question isn’t what injuries will happen to Nate, but what injuries won’t happen to Nate?

The beauty of the can’t-feel-pain concept is it allows us to suspend our disbelief that Nate can keep going whenever he takes a hit. All of us have been annoyed during one action movie or another where characters endure injuries that would incapacitate them in reality, but which barely slow them down in the film. Take John Wick, for example, who can be shot multiple times, thrown down two hundred feet of concrete stairs, and fall from multiple stories onto parked cars with barely more than a scrape and still at 100% fighting strength. With Nate, we accept why he can keep going as the injuries stack up, cringe at the damage being done to him, and laugh at the jokes that come with that damage. Yes, it’s okay to laugh, that’s part of the fun of this movie.

Even better is that the filmmakers (written by Lars Jacobson and directed by Dan Berk and Robert Olsen) don’t let the entire movie just turn into a funhouse of doom that Nate must survive. To be fair, there is a scene where Nate must navigate and survive a literal house filled with booby traps. How else are they going to fit a crossbow and medieval mace into this movie? But after Nate chases down and fights the first of the three bad guys immediately after the bank heist, Nate has to track down where the other two have taken Sherry. This slows the movie down between the action scenes, allowing both Nate and the audience to catch their breath and Nate to patch up his wounds.

While some viewers may tire of the conveyor belt of injuries, the film does a really good job of not going completely overboard with them. The film doesn’t go full Deadpool or Wolverine by chopping off Nate’s body parts, though it does toe the line occasionally. But when it does, it’s usually to wring comedy out of it, like when Nate pretends to be in pain while being tortured by a bad guy, or to induce a collective cringe from the audience. I won’t spoil any of those for you, but if you’ve seen The Boys, it’s like that but without the sexual stuff.

Overall, I really enjoyed the film. The pacing is good, the practical effects and stunts are great, the plot is simple without being rote, and the actors are all game for making this thing work. The only criticism I have is the film is being partially distributed in 4DX theaters. What’s 4DX, you ask? Great question. I didn’t know either until my seat punched me in the kidney. That is not an exaggeration. The first time Nate gets punched, I thought the person behind me kicked my seat. Then it happened again and realization dawned on me. The whole movie was going to be like that. The seats (connected on platforms in sets of four) gyrated and shook around like a carnival ride. All this while fans blew air in our faces from our seats and from large fans attached to the walls. Thankfully, the water sprayers in the seats were unneeded for this particular movie (or they were dry). While the 4DX was a little fun at first, the novelty quickly wore off and the ride just became distracting. At one point, I legitimately wondered if I needed a lap belt and if a small speaker in my seat was going to advise me to keep my arms and legs inside the ride vehicle at all times. Unlike Nate, if my seat ejected me, I’d feel some pain.

Rating: Don’t ask for any money back unless the seats made you spill your concessions.

“Captain America: Brave New World” - A much needed reset.

Are you ready for the full return of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) to a theater near you? It’s been well over a year since the release of The Marvels and sitting through three crappy Sony Spider-Verse movies made it feel like ten years. To be fair, Deadpool & Wolverine is also an MCU movie and it was freaking amazing. But it’s also not one that had any interest in pushing forward whatever the overarching storyline is that’s leading us to the next Avengers movie. In fact, does anyone know what is the overarching storyline? This is why the MCU needed to return.

But the MCU needs to return with some sort of coherence and clarity on that overarching storyline. That’s where Captain America: Brave New World comes in. With the Infinity Stones and Thanos in the past, what new MacGuffins will we get and who is the supervillain that is chasing them? Brave New World doesn’t reveal the supervillain, but the first MacGuffin is a new super-metal called adamantium. Before you correct me that adamantium isn’t new, it is to the MCU. Before you correct me again, Deadpool & Wolverine occurs in a different branch of the multiverse than the rest of the MCU. Yes, I’m aware I’m a nerd.

Brave New World opens with Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie), a.k.a. Captain America, a.k.a. Falcon intercepting an illegal sale of some stolen adamantium. Along for the ride is his sidekick, Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez), a.k.a. Falcon, a.k.a. Robin. Ok, so Wilson doesn’t go by Falcon anymore, despite still featuring his advanced falcon wings and jetpack. And Torres doesn’t go by Robin because this isn’t a Batman movie.

The adamantium comes from the dead celestial sticking out of the Indian Ocean. You remember the celestial, right? From Eternals? You don’t? That’s okay - I don’t blame you for expunging that garbage film from your memory. Luckily, you don’t need to know any of the backstory. Just know that freshly elected President Thaddeus Ross (Harrison Ford) is negotiating a treaty to share mining rights to the adamantium with the rest of the world. You remember Thaddeus Ross, right? A U.S. military general from multiple previous MCU movies? No? That’s okay - William Hurt will haunt you from his grave for forgetting him so quickly after his passing (less than three years ago in March 2022).

The plot of this movie has nothing to do with adamantium. It’s actually about Dr. Samuel Stearns (Tim Blake Nelson) seeking revenge against Ross for imprisoning Stearns and lying about setting Stearns free if Stearns helped Ross win the Presidency. Captain America and Robi…er, Falcon try to stop Stearns. Simple, right?

One of the issues bogging down recent MCU movies is how convoluted the plots were getting, with the fate of the world/galaxy/universe/multiverse always being at stake. Brave New World smartly scales back all of the grandeur to deliver a basic political thriller. That’s not to say Stearns’ revenge plan isn’t somewhat convoluted, but that’s how the villain’s plan is in every James Bond, Mission: Impossible, and Tom Clancy movie. And refreshingly, the climax doesn’t feature a sky beam or spaceships or every superpowered being in the universe facing off. It’s just Cap vs. Red Hulk at the end.

The film also features some really good performances. Mackie’s Wilson continues to evolve, embracing the role of Captain America as an inspiration for people, while not letting the fame and power go to his head. Ford does the late-Hurt proud by pushing Ross into a conciliatory frame of mind, while still maintaining Ross’ hard-nosed attitude. The supporting actors are nearly as good, from Shira Haas as an ass-kicking former black widow and current security chief for Ross...to Nelson’s very convincing angry, yet calculating Stearns...to Carl Lumbly’s emotional performance as Wilson’s friend Isaiah Bradley...to Giancarlo Esposito clearly having a blast letting loose and chewing scenery as a lethal mercenary called Sidewinder. Even Ramirez’s uneven and campy performance worked in a holy-vibranium-wings-Captain kind of way.

While some will find things to complain about, it’s safe to ignore them. Brave New World feels like a really good reset to the MCU while still feeling like a Marvel movie. True, it doesn’t have the feel of a big, bombastic, epic superhero movie, but that’s a good thing. It’s a movie that allows its characters to breathe again instead of swamping them with a hurricane of colors and action sequences. It pulls the comic relief back to subtle instead of Taiki-Waititi-pie-in-the-face levels. And, it points us back towards rebuilding the Avengers team, which is the reason we all showed up seventeen years ago to begin with. And if you’re a nerd like me, the mere mention of adamantium is enough to get you excited for where this is all heading. Adamantium, a.k.a. Wolverine, was arguably the best thing in Deadpool & Wolverine.

Rating: Don’t ask for any money back - it was the worth months-long wait.