When I was writing about VILLAINS the other day I looked up its writing/directing team of Dan Berk & Robert Olsen, and realized I’d already seen 3/5 of their filmography (including BODY and STAKE LAND II). I’ve been meaning to get to their latest, NOVOCAINE, but I’m in horror mode this month, so I went for the other one remaining: SIGNIFICANT OTHER (2022). This one went straight to Paramount+ which, like so many parts of our society today, is now owned by a fascist billionaire currently buying up and destroying our institutions to try to make life shittier for everybody. So I understand if you want nothing to do with that service. But as far as the movie itself this is a good one, I think my favorite by this team.
It’s another one about a young couple, the lady once again played by Maika Monroe (INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE), but it’s more like her usual downbeat characters, and it’s a much more serious movie. She plays Ruth, whose boyfriend Harry (Jake Lacy, CAROL, BEING THE RICARDOS) has convinced her to go on a hiking trip through a forest somewhere in Oregon. He doesn’t seem like a horrible monster or anything, but tends to dance around the line between charming and condescending, and he doesn’t seem very sensitive about how nervous she is. She’s a surfer girl, she didn’t grow up camping like he did, and she suffers from panic attacks. She intellectually understands that yes, going way out into nature with him should be safe, but that doesn’t mean she’s gonna be all relaxed about it. You gotta give her some leeway and understanding, dude. Jesus. (read the rest of this shit…)
BEING THE RICARDOS is a straight-to-Amazon movie, the latest from playwright turned TV show creator turned screenwriter turned director Aaron Sorkin. It tells the story of one week in the lives of ‘50s sitcom icons Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, when a radio show had reported on Ball registering to vote as a communist in 1936, and they went ahead preparing an episode of I Love Lucy thinking their careers might be over.
