TORNADO (2025) is not a disaster movie, and the title isn’t even (primarily) a metaphor. It’s the name of its protagonist, played by Japanese singer and actress Kōki, (yes, according to the credits there is a comma in her name). It’s set in Scotland in 1790, and she’s the disaffected daughter/assistant to Fujin (Takehiro Hira, HARA-KIRI: DEATH OF A SAMURAI, SNAKE EYES), an ex-samurai turned traveling marionette performer.
We’ll find that out later in flashbacks. But for a while we just see her in a wind storm (not tornado), running from a mob of scary thugs led by Sugarman (Tim Roth, THE MUSKETEER), slipping into a mansion and hiding as the goons storm in, pushing the occupants out of the way to search for what they say is a girl about this high and a boy about this high. We don’t have to know who she is or what they want from her to know fuck these guys, and to be thrilled by the well-executed cat-and-mouse sequences involving rotting floorboards.
It was the samurai aspect that got me to rent this on VOD, but it largely feels like a western, and it has a slow burn revenge angle to it. Don’t worry, it’s a 91 minute slow burn, not a torturous one, and it has a real strong mood and atmosphere that made it captivating to me. Director John Maclean (SLOW WEST), cinematographer Robbie Ryan (THE FAVOURITE, MARRIAGE STORY) and production designer Elizabeth El-Kadhi (ONE SHOT) have somehow concocted endlessly pleasing imagery within a grey and barren landscape. And it has a really effective score of menacing percussion, folksy strings and eerie organ by the Australian musician Jed Kurzel, who scored all the movies directed by his brother Justin (THE ORDER) as well as THE BABADOOK, ALIEN: COVENANT, THE NIGHTINGALE, OVERLORD, THE POPE’S EXORCIST and MONKEY MAN. But I wouldn’t underestimate the power of all the quiet scenes where you can hear the wind, so shout out to sound designer Alexej Mungersdorff. (read the rest of this shit…)
OFF LIMITS is a couple different genres – serial killer thriller, buddy-cop action, Vietnam War movie. It centers on two military police detectives, Sergeants First Class Buck McGriff (Willem Dafoe between PLATOON and THE LAST TEMPTATION OF CHRIST) and Albaby Perkins (Gregory Hines between RUNNING SCARED and TAP).
After catching up with 
Remember the 2013 movie 
HONEY DON’T! is Margaret Qualley lesbian crime comedy #2 from Ethan Coen and his wife/editor Tricia Cooke. When the first one, 
On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck the greater New Orleans area.
I had not seen this one before. It’s not quite my type of movie, but it’s a good one. The stylish Brazilian crime saga 
SOVEREIGN is a very solemn and creepy true crime movie about a doomed father and son. We know from the opening flash-forward (with what sure sounds like real 911 recordings) that they will be involved in a shootout with police. A traffic stop gone wrong, small time end-of-the-road shit, nothing spectacular, but just as final as if it was.
August 26, 2005
Man, a Hollywood remake of 
