"CATCH YOU FUCKERS AT A BAD TIME?"

Posts Tagged ‘Naomi Ackie’

I Love Boosters

Thursday, June 11th, 2026

I LOVE BOOSTERS is a movie with ideas (arguably too many), style (in abundance), attitude (well earned), and an excess of exuberance. It works at a pace and a rhythm that can be challenging, could be annoying, could be hard to lock in on if you were distracted or in the wrong mood. If somebody hated it in the way I hated CRANK and DOMINO back in the day I would get it, though I think I would’ve liked it even then.

For a while it seems like every scene will be a conversation between characters ignoring an insane thing that’s going on that also requires your attention. An early example is the two main characters having a serious talk about their needs in life while shoplifting what I would consider to be an extremely conspicuous amount of clothes. They stuff their shirts so much they look like Klumps, but they continue their talk as they waddle across the parking lot to their getaway van, with little sense of urgency.

This is the second film from Boots Riley (SORRY TO BOTHER YOU), communist rapper turned writer/director who dresses like Paddington Bear. It’s a goofy maximalist comedy overloaded with genre tangents, convoluted sci-fi concepts, bits of stop motion and miniature models, not to mention acidic satire of capitalist exploitation, so it occurs to me now to call it Marxist Savage Steve Holland. But the truth is that what it kept reminding me of was Pee-wee’s Playhouse, Liquid Television, Alex Winter’s FREAKED – those rare pop culture miracles from a bygone era when the occasional gatekeeper saw the wisdom of giving corporate money and platforms to passionate communities of artists to take their swings at outlandish, quirky, wonderful things they really believed in. (read the rest of this shit…)

Shelter

Monday, February 16th, 2026

I enjoyed the extra strength absurdity of THE BEEKEEPER, but man am I happy that Jason Statham can still make his serious movies. SHELTER is his latest, directed by Ric Roman Waugh (SNITCH, ANGEL HAS FALLEN) and written by Ward Parry (THE SHATTERING). This one’s more of a traditional action movie than REDEMPTION, but a little more grounded than HOMEFRONT. Maybe somewhere in the range of WILD CARD or SAFE. To me its familiar Statham tropes make it feel classical, not generic. These movies are like a good song or poem. They hit on themes we’ve explored a million times, but they do it with their own words and melodies.

Statham plays a guy named Michael Mason, but you don’t know that name until pretty far into the movie. He never says it, even when asked. He’s a grumpy loner living on a tiny Scottish island with only his dog (who doesn’t have a name at all). You assume this guy’s a lighthouse keeper until somebody says the lighthouse doesn’t even work. It’s always gloomy and stormy on this island, and when his friend and his friend’s teenage niece Jessie (Bodhi Rae Breathnach, HAMNET) come drop off supplies he never comes down to say hi, he just skulks around on his hill like some weird guy looking out the window of a mansion in an old horror movie. Jessie is such a sweetheart she tries to leave him presents to cheer him up but he won’t accept them. (read the rest of this shit…)

Mickey 17

Monday, March 31st, 2025

MICKEY 17 is one of those lucky breaks humanity gets every once in a while where for some reason some American company gives South Korean master Bong Joon Ho (THE HOST, PARASITE) a whole bunch of money for a big, weird, wonderful English-language goof that they have no idea how to make money off of. The fucking Weinsteins did it as distributors of SNOWPIERCER, Netflix did it with OKJA, now it’s Warner Bros.’ turn with a movie that shares elements with both of those but speaks directly to this specific era of capitalistic exploitation, idiotic cults of asshole personality, and just all-around reckless stupidity. But in a fun sci-fi way. It’s based on the 2022 novel Mickey7 by Edward Ashton, but its sensibilities are unmistakably Bong Joon Ho.

Robert Pattinson (THE ROVER) stars and narrates as the 17th clone of Mickey Barnes, a harmless doofus who, in debt to a loan shark over his failed macaron business, tries to flee by signing up as an “expendable” on a flight to colonize the snowy planet Niflheim. This is not a common line of work – everybody acts shocked when he writes it on the form, and keeps double-checking that he read the paperwork. Basically, nobody’s been stupid enough to sign up before, but he agreed to it out of ignorance and because a lady’s shampoo scent reminded him of his mom. He admits this with embarrassment but also like he’s telling a funny story you might be able to relate to. (read the rest of this shit…)