Author: Rudie Obias

Reality: Review

Turning a modern play into a movie is easier said than done. In a nutshell, stageplays are rooted in writing and performances, while movies are primarily a visual medium. While both have elements of all three, you have to deliver more than sharp writing and sympathetic performances to make the transition from the stage to the big screen (in the case of Reality, the small screen). While there are good examples, such as Closer, Doubt, and Incendies, there are outright disasters, like The Whale, August: Osage County, and Spinning Into Butter. But good news, Reality on HBO is one of the good ones and it deserves your full attention.

Co-written by Tina Satter and James Paul Dallas and directed by Satter (in her feature film directorial debut), Reality (based on Satter’s play Is This A Room) is a dramatic retelling of the FBI’s interrogation and eventual arrest of Reality Winner (played by Sydney Sweeney), ex-military and NSA translator who leaked unauthorized government information about Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential Election to the media in 2017.

The screenplay is adapted from the actual FBI interrogation transcript in real-time, so there’s an authenticity at this film’s root that’s also brought to life through the stellar performances of Sweeney, as well as Marchánt Davis and Josh Hamilton, who play federal agents Taylor and Garrick—respectively.

From the start, it grabs your attention with just a knock of a car window where we meet the characters. The roles are clear and precise, while the tension escalates with every conversation and interaction. The film is structured in three acts, while Satter seamlessly uses Reality’s house as a clever stage—as the film goes from outside of the house to inside of the house to the backroom of the house with a clear distinction of act breaks. In fact, it feels as riveting as it would be on the stage, while the movie feels more open at the beginning, but as it progresses, it gets more claustrophobic as we move within the house. 

Meanwhile, the key takeaways from Reality are its keen direction from Tina Satter and outstanding performance from Sweeney, who shines. Satter has a command of the material, while making the story cinematic with surreal close-ups, smart editing, and telling point-of-view shots that makes an audience as uncomfortable as the real-life events of the interrogation. In turn, Sweeney delivers a rangy performance that’s full of pathos that goes from “playing dumb” to funny to flirty and then to guilt and worry. It’s a perfect match of director and actor.

While the politics of the film might divide audiences (like most politics in America), Reality breaks through it with humanity, tension, and the search for the truth. If you have HBO (or the streaming service Max), then it’s definitely worth watching—especially for the reality of the situation.

Stay Awake: Review. By Rudie Obias

When you’re dealing with drug addiction, it can get out of hand really fast—but not just for you, but your family too. While rehab and counseling are great options to kick the deadly habit, the chances of relapsing increases when you deal with the symptoms instead of the root causes. The movie Stay Awake tackles the vicious cycle of addiction and going through the nightmare of self-loathing, heavy drug use, overdosing, treatment, and back to self-loathing, and so on and so on, while your family is left to pick up the pieces.

Written and directed by Jamie Sisley (Farewell Ferris Wheel), Stay Awake follows Michelle (Chrissy Metz), a single mother of two teenage boys—Derek (Fin Argus) and Ethan (Wyatt Oleff)—living in a small town in Virginia. Michelle is terribly addicted to prescription drugs, while her sons have to deal with her out-of-control drug use, while they both have their own ambitions to leave town and start their lives after high school. 

Stay Awake is really mixed about setting out its path, while reconciling its themes and story development. Although the characters are well-defined and relatable, it almost feels as if Sisley is in a rush to get through the story to get to the film’s final act.

The film moves at a whirlwind pace going from one character moment to another to move the story along, but it doesn’t give an audience enough time to breathe to really stay with the film. Instead it bounces back-and-forth between character motivations and plot points, while both could’ve been done at the same time to give it more weight. It feels light as a feather in that respect.

Meanwhile, it lacks in its structure and writing, while it feels a bit too twee for this writer’s taste, which is a shame because Sisley has a strong sense of direction and framing. Stay Awake has a real sense of place that feels authentic, especially when it comes to the cycle of rehab and relapsing. It’s tough to break the cycle, but Sisley captures it so well from the family’s point-of-view.

By and large, the performances are the real standout of the film. ​​Metz is sympathetic and grounded, while Argus is properly suited and mannered as a young man stuck between “high school mode” and the real world post-graduation. The shining star in Stay Awake, however, is Oleff, a closeted young man who is anxious to go to college, but can’t manage his family life anymore. There’s a lot of emotional heft that Oleff has to carry throughout the film and he does a very good job straddling between both worlds. Each character is conflicted about life and where things go from here, which is quite relatable.

Overall, Stay Awake is a real mix bag of a movie. It feels torn between its characters’ motivations and the film’s plotting and storytelling. It’s true, there are a number of flubs and missteps along the way, but there’s just enough character moments and pathos to help you stay awake.

Land Of Gold: Review. By Rudie Obias

Being an outsider in America is not easy. You have one foot in American culture, while another is steeped in your family’s culture, language, and religion. It’s tough to tip-toe around social situations and just exist, but millions of people do it everyday with very little backlash or prejudice. However, it just takes one misunderstanding or racially-charged incident that will make you see America in a completely different light. The movie Land of Gold tackles what it means to be a first-generation immigrant in modern America.

Written and directed by Nardeep Khurmi (in his feature length debut), the movie follows Kiran (played by Khurmi himself), an Punjabi-American man dealing with supporting his parents Raveena (played by Riti Sachdeva) and Gurinder (played by the great Iqbal Theba), as well as awaiting the birth of his first child with his wife Preeti (played by Pallavi Sastry) in suburban California. He’s a truck driver by trade and, to his wife’s protest, takes a last-minute job to ship goods from Bakersfield to Boston.

While loading his truck at a local distro, a 10-year-old Mexican-American girl named Elena (played by Caroline Valencia) stows away in his truck to get a free ride to Boston to be reunited with her uncle. However, along the way, the unlikely pair learn about their lives, ambitions, and families, while trying to evade Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers.

Although Land of Gold is a bit clunky and cliché at times, the movie overall is a very touching tale about two people coming together and connecting through their common values of family. Kiran is Punjabi-American and Elena is Mexican-American, but the two find a way to see themselves in each other because they both value their respective cultures and family, so in turn, become a new family in and of itself.

The chemistry between Khurmi and Valencia make this film worth watching, while you can see the sort-of father and daughter relationship on the screen. You can also see the director and actor relationship between the two of them, as Khurmi and Valencia play a game of “Follow the Leader” throughout the duration of the film. However, who’s the follower and who’s the leader? The dynamic shifts from scene-to-scene, while Khurmi was smart to have the film play out in this way. It shows that the relationship is more dynamic and heartfelt, while it feels like the American immigration version of Lone Wolf and Cub or James Mangold’s Logan.

The movie is also a road trip movie, of sorts, while we see how the pair gets treated from coast-to-coast and each one’s trauma in American society comes out more and more. You really do develop a sympathy for the characters, while Homeland Security is a heavy presence throughout. But overall, Land of Gold is a fantastic film from Khurmi—especially for a debut feature. It has the weight and pathos that carries you from beginning to end, while it has something to say about being an immigrant in a country that’s built on immigration, but somehow, makes life tougher and harder on immigrants as a whole.

On The Edge: Review. By Rudie Obias

While the crime film genre is full of tropes (just like any genre), a filmmaker can make it more than the sum of its parts. Believe it or not, but most people want to watch something familiar rather than strange and obscure (this writer included), but it takes something special to make a movie that’s comforting, as well as re-assured. However, the Belgian-French-Spanish thriller On The Edge (Entre la vie et la mort) delivers on the whiz-bang action and hard-boiled suspense of a crime movie, but falls short of breaking through all of the genre’s clichés.

Written and directed by Giordano Gederlini (Samouraïs), On The Edge follows Leo Castañeda (played by Antonio de la Torre), a Spanish ex-cop living in Brussels as a subway conductor who witnesses the death of a young man who throws himself on subway tracks in an apparent suicide. When it’s revealed that the young man is his estranged son Hugo (played by Noé Englebert), Castañeda is caught in the middle between the underground crime world and Belgian police. He must now find out who really murdered his son, while avoiding professional criminals and the cops.

Even at 100 minutes, the film is a slow burn, while it draws out information at a deliberate rate. There are bursts of action and excitement, but a good chunk of the movie deals with Castañeda grieving his son. He lost his wife and family. And after a failed suicide attempt at the beginning of the film, Castañeda tries to re-build his life alone in Brussels. Although there are good and thrilling moments in the film, it just doesn’t come together. Instead it feels like the film is in search of an identity without creating one for itself.

In some ways, On The Edge could be a direct-to-video movie starring Liam Neeson, or Tim Roth or Sharlto Copley’s attempt to make a Taken-type of “old man gets revenge” movie (only Roth or Copley because Antonio de la Torre looks a lot like them). But that’s about it. And while there are some very good action scenes (a fantastic bus sequence) and moments of suspense (there’s a grenade in a jar scene that is brilliantly executed), there’s not much else here because of its familiar territory—there’s even an angry police chief who tells a police inspector that she’s off the case because she’s too close to it.

But as it stands, you’re not going to see much new in this film and there’s not much to hold on to either—unfortunately. It’s right down the middle for this reviewer, or maybe it’s just “on the edge” between mediocre and good.

Sisu: Review. By Rudie Obias

Going to the movies is supposed to be a fun experience. You get your friends together. You get your popcorn. You pick the perfect seats in the theater. And then you wait for the lights to dim and get magically whisked away on a ride. However, sometimes the movie is a dud and it disappoints, despite what trailers might lead you to believe. And sometimes the movie lives up to all the hype and then completely exceeds it. Good news, the movie Sisu is a bloody good time!

Set in rural Finland during World War II in 1944, Sisu follows Aatami Korpi (played silently by Jorma Tommila), an old man who tries to find gold in the wilderness. But when he finds a very large deposit of gold, he has to trek hundreds upon hundreds of miles back to civilization to cash it out.

However, along the way, he runs into a rogue platoon of Nazi soldiers, who kidnapped a group of women as they try to flee out of the country to Norway. And when the Nazi’s discover Korpi’s golden nuggets, he now has to fight off enemy soldiers, so he can transform his life.

“Sisu is a Finnish word that cannot be translated. It means a white-knuckled form of courage and unimaginable determination. Sisu manifests itself when all hope is lost.”

These are the opening title cards for Sisu and they stay with you throughout the film. While outlandish and over-the-top, the movie is wildly awesome—as Korpi finds new and inventive ways to survive and kill Nazis. And who doesn’t want to see Nazis brutally and hilariously perish one after the other?

There is no sympathy for Nazis, which is why they are the ultimate villains in movies, so there’s just a lot of glee taken in all of the bloodiness. The Nazis are doubly odious when they plan to steal an old man’s gold, even when they find out that Korpi is a former military commander, who is considered “immortal” and a “one man death squad.”

The film is separated into seven chapters, which lends itself perfectly with Sisu’s genre heavy tone. Each set piece is brilliantly staged and executed by the film’s writer and director Jalmari Helander (Big Game, Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale). There is no fat on this film at all, while it’s a lean 91 minutes long.

In the end, Sisu is one of the best action movies of the year, while it leans heavily into the “man on a mission” and World War II film genres. It’s just a fun time at the movies for just about anyone—except if you’re a Nazi.