Author: BRWC

At Capacity: Short Film Review. By Joe Muldoon.

How quickly can a romance form? Within the space of a night, if you’re in a Linklater film. Or even within the space of a conversation, as is the case in Spencer Jamison’s directorial short debut At Capacity. Mia (Jamison, who works a triple shift as co-lead, writer, and director) is sent to a restaurant on the behalf of her sister Maxine (Zainab Bari) to break up with her boyfriend, Andrew. Only, the soon-to-be-single Andrew doesn’t turn up, instead sending his own cousin Ari (Jake Ryan Lozano) to attend dinner.

Quickly realising their predicament, the two hesitantly decide to stay for dinner, though guarded at first. As the two share stories, their walls come down, and they feel the magnetism there is between them. And it never feels unnatural; testament to both the writing and the performances of the co-leads, the mutually brewing fondness doesn’t feel manufactured. There’s a Linklateresque serendipity to their encounter; the two meet, recognise their circumstances, and feed on the excitement of their chance meeting.

Like the short itself, the romance presses along quickly – though there’s no dawdling, it doesn’t feel rushed, either. Their romance is such that it unfolds perfectly organically despite its rapid development. Jamison and Lozano have genuine chemistry and their playful sparring flows naturally, the vibrancy of cinematographer Kunitaro Ohi’s colour grading further elevating the warmth between them.

The short’s tagline, ‘Try a little tenderness’, beautifully encapsulates its philosophy; whilst Audre (Joy Hana Park) stays to comfort and support Maxine, Mia finds herself in a situation in which she would never have otherwise been, and as a result finds herself sharing a reciprocated tenderness with a perfect stranger. And in seeking to protect their sister, they grow closer to those present with them.

Effortlessly charming and deliciously sweet, Jamison has crafted a love story whose implied, ‘to be continued…’ leaves a hopeful taste in our mouths, achieving in 17 minutes what many fail to do in 90.

By Joe Muldoon

Deadpool And Wolverine: The BRWC Review. By Jake Peffer.

Deadpool and Wolverine sees Marvel finally bringing both characters into the MCU. With Phase 4 and 5 both regarded as being hit or miss, Marvel has needed a smash hit and something that will make the fans run out to the theater. Teaming up two of their best characters and banking on nostalgia seems like a sure thing. After all, Spider-Man: No Way Home has been the biggest movie for Marvel since Avengers Endgame and that movie brought out all the nostalgia. So, does the movie live up to the hype or does it fall short of such high expectations?

For me, the movie more than lives up to the hype. Right out of the gate this movie lets you know exactly what you’re in store for. A huge fight sequence including Deadpool killing many different people in very comical ways and spraying mass amounts of blood sets the tone for what’s to come. From there on the movie keeps up with the violence and action as well as being consistently hilarious throughout. Sure, not every single joke works but for the number of jokes that are being thrown around, most of them do land. The story here works better than one would have expected. It does get a tad convoluted with all the multiverse shenanigans, but it ends up having some depth to it and a good amount of heart to keep things grounded.

It is hard to talk about much with this movie without any spoilers. Without spoiling anything, audiences will find themselves with an abundance of cameos throughout. Surprisingly, the larger cameos get worked into the story quite well and aren’t just there for a quick, “Hey, look it’s that character!” kind of appearance. There are so many references to other movies in the universe and the movie plays up plenty of meta moments and fourth wall breaking. By the end, some of the references do get a little tiresome but for the most part they do work.

The biggest shortcoming of the movie is with the villain. Here the main villain is Cassandra Nova and while Emma Corrin does do a great job in the role, the character itself isn’t fleshed out enough. With so much going on and packing in so many characters the story just forgets to give her more motivation for her actions and ultimately, she doesn’t amount to as much as she should. On the other side, both Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman are in top form here. Both guys have played these characters so well in the past and they are able to fall right back into these roles perfectly. Reynolds is hilarious as usual but can play the part well when there are dramatic moments. Jackman has always played Wolverine fantastically and here is no different. He embodies this character with such charisma and aggression, you can easily see why he was chosen for this character twenty-four years ago.

There is a good chance that this will be the biggest movie of the year and as well it should be. Deadpool and Wolverine is what summer blockbusters should be. Great action sequences, hilarious comedic moments mixed with some of the best cameos in any MCU movie to date. The chemistry between Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman is top notch and everyone in the cast is doing their part. This is the best Marvel movie since Avengers Endgame.

Rating: 9/10

Twisters – The BRWC Review. By Daniel Rester.  

Twisters spins into the summer season with a big helping of disaster movie porn. It’s a belated sequel to Twister (1996), which was directed by Jan de Bont and starred Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton. While Twisters only has a sprinkling of nods to the original, the sequel from Lee Isaac Chung captures the fun spirit of that film. It also works as a good platform for rising stars Daisy Edgar-Jones and Glen Powell. 

Edgar-Jones plays Kate Carter, a former storm chaser brought back into the game by her friend Javi (Anthony Ramos). He needs help with testing a new tornado scanning system in Oklahoma. Kate and Javi’s team not only have to face the storms, but a cocky Internet personality named Tyler Owens who calls himself a “tornado wrangler.” 

Like with Twister, Twisters uses a simple plot, likable characters, and ludicrous science babble to hang a series of crazy set pieces on. Chung and writer Mark L. Smith do attempt to point out the effects the storms can have on everyday people, and how real estate vultures can swoop in, but for the most part the action scenes and Kate’s story are the focus. Because who wants to worry about real-world outcomes when visual effects are going wild and Powell is wearing tight shirts in the rain? 

Edgar-Jones, Powell, and Ramos all have believable chemistry, and Smith does manage to give their characters arcs as well. The supporting cast is stacked with familiar faces too, including Sasha Lane, Kiernan Shipka, and David Corenswet. Most of the side players only get a few lines to work with, but they all bring effort to the table. Lane is fun as a drone pilot named Lily, while Maura Tierney brings heart to the material as Kate’s mother Cathy. 

Chung and cinematographer Dan Mindel smoothly capture the farmland settings in the film while being aided by an army of visual effects workers for the storms. The visuals and sound design are all believable throughout. Less believable is that Tyler gets away with using copyrighted songs while doing YouTube live streams. Some of the song choices, mostly country, do become distracting at times; a Spielbergian tone with the music would have been a wiser choice, like Twister did with its music score.   

Twisters does not change the disaster movie formula in really any way, and it’s not quite as good as the 1996 original. But it’s a fun piece of summer escapism with a diverse cast and plenty of thrills. For those wanting an old-school Hollywood blockbuster, Twisters checks the box. 

Rating: 7/10

The Serena Variations: Review. By Christopher Patterson.

A Display of Talent Deeply Hidden Behind It’s Wasted Runtime and Execution

I recently had the chance to see a short called The Serena Variations. It is quite an artistic short. I would compare it to the film Tár in its ambition and cinematography style.Though, not for positives. My issue with this short’s style is its lack of life. The intention behind the direction seemed to be to reflect an almost meditative and quiet atmosphere. But instead, it makes the short look dreadful. Even worse, I feel as though this short would work much better as a film; instead, thanks to how evident it is, this director’s style would much better suit the big screen.

The Serena Variations I would call a respectable short, and one that if it clicks with you, you will probably love it; that just didn’t work for me. Directing-wise, it was too pompous and overly influenced yet deeply reflected potential. Writing-wise, the script felt choppy to me and tiring. And the worst of all, pacing wise, it was as if making each minute more boring than the last was a requirement, and for a short, which usually, one could argue, should be short enough to intrigue, not bore, for most of the time it’s on screen, but The Serena Variations exceedingly fails at that.

If I had to better describe the symptoms of this short, think of an HBO drama. Okay. Now, think of one where the direction feels exactly the same as twenty-seven other shows and has this boring pompousness to it that turns you off. Yeah. That is what The Serena Variations embodies, never feeling free to itself and understanding its boundless limitations as a short, but rather feeling repulsed by itself and hiding behind veils of boring drama that are as good as background noise when one is cleaning their house, but even that might greatly annoy someone.

Or, if I had to be more direct, it would be a college student’s short film who has a great camera and understands how to direct a scene. Essentially, a very full of itself short that, while basking in potential for greater possibilities, provides nothing but a dull and trying to be witty experience that agonizes the mind. It is a fear, in my opinion, to really do something that becomes apparent and a jump into artsy that feels made with the influence of ten boring art films and has no true detailed understanding as to why they exceeded and guesses thanks to it feeling artistic rather than actually just doing anything.

To me, the worst feats of art are the ones attempted out of ambition to be artsy rather than just doing something. The reason The Serena Variations hurts to watch is not for its dull and overly influenced narrative, but because behind it all there is true brilliance that is masked behind pretentious gimmicks. I would find a short in which we see a family go to celebrate a son’s birthday, and it is not some deep representation of problems that occur in a family but rather just a celebration that enforces the beauty of getting up every day, a possible interesting premise, and one much more than The Serena Variations.

Get where I’m getting at. You don’t have to try and spectacularly fail to deliver a tirelessly emotional picture; rather, just be yourself and not care what others think. Instead, The Serena Variations feels heightened by the prospect of discussion rather than the convenience to a viewer, and the short itself is boring, slop, and nothing more. If you want a short that feels as though it tries to make you feel smart by watching but rather just bores you the entire time, this is it. It would be something someone would cut on to impress someone who calls themselves a quote on quote artist but is rather someone who saw their first art film for the first time and doesn’t have the slightest idea of what art is.

The performances are solid, with them generally being performances built on the little moments you notice that show their range. But, overall, I can’t help but be bored by it all. While great, the performances are hindered by a pretentious script that does them, clearly, no favors.

Aside from that, there isn’t much else to The Serena Variations. It is a very uninteresting short film, plain and simple, since it feels stuck up, takes too long for what it accomplishes, boring for even a short, and downright sad to see. While a vision is here that may have lingered too long on the possible brilliance of its premise to have accomplished anything as such, it is the vision nonetheless that has me to believe this director will do something great. That great thing, though, is certainly not right now with regards to this short.

VERDICT

The Serena Variations felt like a short that attempted too much and never just tried to make a story that would work much better as a short. As this is a display of talent, our director Warren Fischer really delivers in the use of possibility rather than ability to make anything watchable. Though, whoever made the shots and chose the lighting in this short truly has a road ahead of them even if I personally despise the baldness I felt from it. Aside from that, I would call The Serena Variations a boring mess that may only help put some future talent on your radar.

2/5 

The Echo: Review. By Joe Muldoon.

From the heart and mind of widely celebrated filmmaker-documentarian Tatiana Huezo comes The Echo, a meditative docufiction that centres itself around a small rural village in Puebla, Mexico. Slow, unrushed, and shot over the course of 18 months, Huezo documents the lives (and, occasionally, deaths) of the community members – a community tight-knit and irrevocably bound, not only by familial and communal ties, but also by one unstoppable force: weather.

As the locals cycle through the seasons, each change offers up a fresh set of challenges; bitter frost in the winter, drought in the summer, and various vegetative hardships scattered across the lot. Virtually plotless, we weave amongst the many generations of Pueblans and see how they combat their circumstances and interact with the wider world. The youngest seek education, their parents go to work (the men further afield and the women domestically), and the elders are cared for by the youth.

With its unconventional approach to documentary filmmaking, it’s easy to overlook the fact that The Echo is actually grounded mostly in reality. Ernesto Pardo’s cinematography style is gorgeously cinematic, and the breathtaking Mexican landscape is truly brought to life with real care. With a distinct lack of any narration, talking heads, or overt narrative, the Huezo fosters a pleasantly tranquil atmosphere.

The presence of the cameras never feels obtrusive or driving; we’re simply passengers to the residents’ lives. There’s a quiet but noticeable feminism underlying the film; as the Pueblans’ lives echo those of their forebears, so do their oftentimes patriarchal expectations and restrictions.

As instructed by her mother (Luz María Vázquez González), teenager Montse (Montserrat Hernandez) tenderly cares for her infirm grandmother, expected to bathe and aid her wherever needed. Montse’s own aspirations aren’t of great import to her elders – she has a responsibility bestowed upon her and she fulfils it, an echo of how her mother was expected to act with her own grandmother.

Directed, written, produced, and edited by the multi award-winning Huezo, the documentary is a triumph in originality. Though warm and gentle with its direction, The Echo eschews sentimentality, instead doing right by the community of El Eco through honest, fair observation. Though there’s plenty of beauty to witness, there’s also enough tribulation, some unavoidable, and some societal. For an echo to be made, there must be a genesis to the sound; Huezo urges that if the villagers hope to realise their dreams, they must make new noise and create their own echoes.

By Joe Muldoon