Author: Rudie Obias

Rally Caps: The BRWC Review.

A rally cap is a baseball cap worn inside-out to will a team to a come-from-behind win. It’s a baseball superstition that has been going on for fans and players for generations. While there is no scientific basis for a rally cap to work, if there are enough people who wear them, then maybe the losing team will get some sort of inspiration and dig really deep inside to find something to get a win. Sometimes rally caps do work, otherwise fans and players wouldn’t wear their baseball caps like inside-out to begin with. In the movie Rally Caps, a boy finds something within himself to triumph against his opponent… his anxiety.

Written and directed by Lee Cipolla (The Shift, Know Thy Enemy), based on the novel of the same name by Stephen J. Cutler & Jodi Michelle Cutler, Rally Caps follows Jordy, played by Carson Minniear (Palmer, Leo), a young baseball player who dreams to make a Little League team, but gets brutally injured during his very first tryout. After months of recovery, he becomes disillusioned with baseball.

However, when his mother, played by Amy Smart (Just Friends, Crank), and grandfather, played by Judd Hirsch (The Fabelmans, Independence Day), send him to a baseball summer camp, he learns to fall back in love with the game and re-connect to his older brother Rob, played by Ben Morang, in his feature film debut, who left the family after their father’s untimely death and coaches the ragtag team of misfit baseball players. 

Although Rally Caps is predictable and cliché (what sports movie isn’t?), there’s a lot of joy and fun to be had while watching this movie. From the loveable group of misfits, led by deaf catch Lucas, played by Colten Pride, to the oddballs who run the summer camp, led by camp director, played by James Lowe (Holy Ghost People, The Thompsons), and camp owner, played by Cathy Ladman (Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead, White Oleander), the movie features those elements in summer camp movies that’s enduring.

But, the big takeaway from the film is Jordy’s dealing with his anxiety in a positive way. He almost seems obsessive compulsive, no doubt stemming from his father’s death. He searches for control in a world without control and dealing with those imperfect moments through baseball was refreshing to watch.

Throughout the film, he learns to cope and overcome his fears, either by swimming in a lake with “monsters,” or pitching a game of baseball again without getting violently hit in the face. Jordy seems to handle his shortcomings with persistence and patience, which are the keys to obtaining any goal. In other words, even though he seems down-and-out, he can make his way to victory with the help of his friends and family via rally caps.

Although it was released 40 years ago in 1984, Beverly Hills Cop is one of the most important movies of the ‘80s — thanks to its wide appeal, quick wit, heart-thumping action, and genre defining notes. While it didn’t invent the action comedy, the movie gave the genre a shot in the arm and a winning formula that’s replicated throughout the decades. In fact, 40 years later, there’s a new entry in the franchise with the straight-to-streaming release of Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F. Eddie Murphy, now 61 years old, has even returned to the franchise — reprising the titular role. But does the original hold up? In this current era of intellectual properties, sequels, and reboots, does the first Beverly Hills Cop movie still have some bite, or is it a relic of a bygone era of Hollywood? Let’s find out.

Written by Daniel Petrie Jr. (The Big Easy, Turner & Hooch), in his screenwriting debut, with a story credit for Petrie Jr. and Danilo Bach (April Fool’s Day) and directed by Martin Brest (Midnight Run, Scent of a Woman), Beverly Hills Cop follows Axel Foley, played by Murphy (Coming To America, The Nutty Professor), a police officer from Detroit, Michigan who travels to Beverly Hills, California to investigate the murder of one of his childhood friends who got caught up with the sinister Victor Maitland, an art dealer who moonlights as a cocaine trafficker and  German bearer bonds thief.

Once in Beverly Hills, Foley is arrested by local law enforcement for disturbing the peace after he reunites with another childhood friend, Jenny Summers, played by Lisa Eilbacher (Never Say Die, Leviathan), who works for Maitland’s swanky art gallery. After processing, he’s on the Beverly Hills Police Department watch list by order of Lieutenant Andrew Bogomil, played by the great Ronny Cox (RoboCop, Total Recall), while two of the department’s police officers, Sergeant John Taggart, played by John Ashton (Some Kind of Wonderful, She’s Having a Baby) and Detective Billy Rosewood, played by Judge Reinhold (Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Vice Versa), reluctantly help him solve the case.

The movie is 40 years old, but it holds up surprisingly well. Brest sets the tone pretty quickly with the first scene introducing Murphy’s Axel Foley. He’s a loudmouth fast-talker, but he’s just so damn charming. We first meet Foley, as an undercover cop trying to sell a stolen truck of cigarettes to low-level mobsters, only to be foiled by the police, which starts a thrilling chase scene through the mean streets of Detroit. It’s really refreshing to watch a chase scene with actual cars getting into actual collisions.

After he gets in trouble and properly chewed out by Inspector Douglas Todd, played by actual police officer-turned-actor Gil Hill (Beverly Hills Cop II, Beverly Hills Cop III), Foley goes to his apartment where an old childhood friend Mikey is back in town from California. Mikey wants Foley to return to a life of crime, only to be murdered by shady tough guys moments later. This brings Foley to go on “vacation” to California to investigate his friend’s death. All of this story beats happen within the first 15 minutes of the movie. In about 15 minutes, we get a thrilling chase scene, we meet Axel Foley and know his personality and character, and is in Beverly Hills with a purpose.

If Beverly Hills Cop was made in 2024, it would take 45 minutes before Foley gets to California. The storytelling and the way it unfolds is so economical that it’s surprising that filmmakers don’t make movies like this nowadays, considering our shorter attention spans. Instead we get six-hour long BS like Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon that is very painful to watch. Brest does more in 15 minutes than what Snyder can do in six hours.

Boys Like You: The BRWC Review

Short films are tricky. They’re calling cards for directors and actors to show off what they can do behind the camera without a lot of resources. They’re also a tough thing to review because they either work or they don’t. Move on to the next one. Admittedly, this writer has never reviewed a short film, although he’s seen quite a bit throughout his movielife. However, one comes along and feels like it should’ve been a featured film instead. It has potential.

Written by Lindsay Bennett-Thompson and Paul Holbrook, and directed by Holbrook, Boys Like You is a slice of life, a rather small slice, but a slice nevertheless. It follows June, played by Bennett-Thompson (Greatest Days, Coronation Street), a middle-aged wife and mother who’s deeply depressed and anxious about her life. She clearly has something going on and doesn’t have an outlet to share her worry or thoughts. Her husband Martin, played by Louis Emerick (Layer Cake, Zapped), is well-meaning, but completely in the dark about her inner secrets.

After work one day, June stops by a local pub to have a drink of wine before heading home when a roughneck named Chris, played by Liam Collins (Coronation Street) joins her for a drink. She obviously doesn’t belong there and he’s more than willing to “wind her up” for being so out of place. However, a seemingly chance encounter quickly turns their lives upside down.

At just over 17 minutes in length, Holbrook conveys a wide range of emotions through his camera and staging. It’s quite impressive to see so much confidence and point-of-view in such a short period of time. Although Boys Like You isn’t Holbrook’s first short film, it appears that he’s very comfortable creating short segments rather than tackling a feature film. It would be good to see a longer version of this story. The characters feel real and alive (well played by Bennett-Thompson and Liam Collins), while the settings and relationships feel rich and in-depth. It seems very assured.

Boys Like You is a short film about what we present to the world in front of us and what we keep hidden away. Our past is a very powerful thing and the decisions we make could be the end of us and the people around us. And once those things come to light, all hell could break loose in a blaze of glory.

Our Mothers: The BRWC Review

Searching for your past may inform who you are as a person today. However, it’s when you confront where you came from, only to overcome the past, then you might have a shot at some understanding about who you are. And with movies — like Past Lives, Good Will Hunting, Wild, Beautiful Boy, and Slumdog Millionaire — can be a great way to face that pressure, but only if the director has a keen eye for storytelling and empathy.

Although the film is short, it only has a running time of 76 minutes, Our Mothers takes a nuanced look at coming to terms with a nation’s faults and how to overcome your own personal origin story. Written and directed by Cesar Diaz (Territorio liberado, Pourquoi les hommes brûlent-ils?), Our Mothers follows Ernesto, played by Armando Espitia (Heartbeat, My Father’s Mexican Wedding), a forensic anthropologist searching for the remains of his deceased father, who was brutally murdered by military guerrillas in Guatemala during the early ‘80s.

Through his job, he takes a case to search for the missing remains of an elderly woman’s husband, who was also murdered in a very similar way. Ernesto believes this case might shed some light on his own search. But once he travels to this woman’s remote village, he soon learns that the women in this far-off community are also dealing with grief, loss, and a larger mystery for closure.

Our Mothers is deeply subtle, while character moments are what make this film rich and refined. In its short running time, Diaz conveys ideas about family, genocide, and a country’s ugly and bloody history, as well as the after effects of a civil war nearly 40 years later.

In its structure, there are two things going on: Ernesto’s pursuit of his missing father and Guatemala’s past. Both things have resonance with modern-day people, culture, and point-of-view. Oftentimes, Ernesto expresses a distaste for his own country because it’s surrounded by death in nearly every facet of his life — including in his work as a forensic anthropologist and his own mother who appears to be zoned out or removed from reality altogether. If anything, sleepwalking through it, while dealing with grief.

The movie shows all of this with its wide views of action and landscapes, as if the audience is just peering into this world for a brief moment. However, it’s only when the camera moves in closer to the characters when they’re interacting with others, then we really do find the compelling and heartbreaking story of the past. We’re not distant anymore, we’re engaged.

Although the film isn’t violent itself, Our Mothers feels that brutality from the stories these women tell about losing their loved ones and the overall mise-en-scène of the picture. It’s a simple movie, but with a massive scope of history and the human experience — the kindness and the cruelty that come with it.

Although it was delayed for seven months, thanks to the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike, Luca Guadagnino’s Challengers is a film that was certainly worth the wait, as the moviegoing season closes out the spring. Guadagnino, an Italian-born filmmaker, is known for his emotionally complex melodramas and rich stories with a touch of flair and heightened realism with the likes of Bones and All, Call Me By Your Name, Suspiria (2018), A Bigger Splash, I Am Love, and others. His new movie Challengers takes those character complexities and introduces them into the tennis world with a spicy love triangle as its centerpiece.

Written by Justin Kuritzkes (in his feature film debut) and directed by Guadagnino, Challengers follows the friendship turned heated-rivalry between Patrick, played by Josh O’Connor (The Crown, Emma) and Art, played by Mike Faist (West Side Story 2021, the upcoming Bikriders) two tennis pros vying for the love and attention of Tashi, played by Zendaya (Dune, Spider-Man: Homecoming). While Patrick and Art wrestle with feelings they have for each other and the object of their affections, Tashi focuses on her budding tennis career until a horrific injury puts an end to her dreams.

Challengers is told in a number of flashbacks, while keeping the main continuity of a tennis match. Over the years, Patrick struggles to become a successful pro, as he grinds it out for prize money on the tennis circuit, while Art marries Tashi, as the two build an empire together as one of the top professionals in the tennis world. The film goes back and forth (much like in tennis) between the match and how all three got into this position, as the stakes and power dynamics from each part of the story grows more and more.

It might sound complicated and complex, but you don’t need a flowchart to understand the story or the drama — which is a compliment to the writer and director for making it all understandable, relatable, and dynamic to watch. And boy, what a watch this movie is!

First of all, it’s just so sweaty. You can really feel the passion these characters have for tennis and each other (whether good or bad) in nearly every scene. The sexual tension is palpable, while the story is told with closeups to really get the nuances of the characters’ faces and expressions. It’s a fantastic mix between subtle and over-the-top, which is a balancing act in-and-of itself.

This is in part to the great performances from the film’s trio. O’Connor and Faist play their characters as sympathetic, but dim doofs, while Zendaya has such a cool streak throughout. She’s always in control and well-managed, as O’Connor and Faist are more than happy to be pushed and abused in a bizarre sub-dom relationship that builds and builds until the pressure breaks the characters in an unforgettable climax. 

Guadagnino’s approach to Challenger’s storytelling and camerawork (the final 10 minutes alone features some of the best cinematography and visual panache of the year) that really elevates the film into something really special.