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Possessor

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  • Title: Possessor
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Possessor Blu-ray reviewWriter/director Brandon Cronenberg‘s Possessor is a gory techno-thriller set in a world not unlike our own where a company has devised a method to enter a person’s mind and take control of their body. Rather than use the technology for good, it sells it for profit by making assassins out of anyone they can get their hands on. Andrea Riseborough stars as agent Tasya Vos, although mostly we see other actors playing the bodies she has been given control. As the film opens we can already begin to see the effect of the body swapping on Tasya both in detachment to her real life and during her job which foreshadows larger problems to come.

Possessor is at times a brutal film, and Cronenberg never shies away from gore (even going so far to hold scenes longer than necessary to illicit a response from his audience). Jennifer Jason Leigh also stars as Tasya’s handler, whose team scrambles when something goes wrong with the latest assignment leaving her agent trapped in another body.

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On the Rocks

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  • Title: On the Rocks
  • IMDb: link

On the Rocks movie reviewI’m a huge fan of Sofia Coppola, but On the Rocks is easily her weakest film to date. It doesn’t help that the repairing of Coppola with Bill Murray reminds us of the far superior Lost in Translation. For a writer/director that has most often looked to tackle stories from a dramatic point-of-view, On the Rocks‘s broader comedy is unexpected.

While Coppola was able to pull some terrific comic moments out of social commentary for The Bling Ring, the wacky adventures of a middle-aged woman (Rashida Jones) and her father (Murray) hoping to catch her husband (Marlon Wayans) having an affair sputters along not unlike the ridiculous sports car Murray’s character drives around New York City. Murray certainly provides some charm, and all of it is needed to save the film from completely floundering.

Jones is fine in the role of Laura, but the character is little more than her questionable insecurity. I wouldn’t go so far to call On the Rocks a bad film, but it’s average to the point of being completely unremarkable (something I wouldn’t have expected given the talent assembled here).

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Happiest Season

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  • Title: Happiest Season
  • IMDb: link

Happiest Season movie reviewHappiest Season puts a twist on your typical meet the parents film as Harper (Mackenzie Davis) invites her girlfriend Abby (Kristen Stewart) home with her for the holidays. However, on the road, Harper reveals her conservative parents (Victor Garber and Mary Steenburgen) don’t know that she is gay or that Abby is her girlfriend. This leads Abby to play the role of roommate in need of a place to stay over the holidays. It doesn’t take long for the role to weigh heavy on Abby as the film’s romcom shenanigans also give Harper’s parents the wrong impression of her.

The set-up of a strong conservative patriarch with a family too scared to tell him the truth reminded me of Merry Happy Whatever with Stewart playing a combination of the Brent Morin and Ashley Tisdale characters. Although the film is primarily centered on Harper, her sisters (Alison Brie and Mary Holland) also have their own secrets and resentments. The cast is further filled out by Dan Levy as Harper’s support line, Aubrey Plaza as Harper’s secret high school girlfriend, and Jake McDorman as Harper’s high school boyfriend who Harper’s parents are cluelessly trying to set-up with Harper over the holidays.

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Pieces of a Woman

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  • Title: Pieces of a Woman
  • IMDb: link

Pieces of a Woman movie reviewPieces of a Woman offers impressive performances by Vanessa Kirby and Shia LaBeouf as a couple who lose their baby during a lengthy home birth that kicks off the movie. The extended sequence, like the rest of the film, is too long while putting the performances of its actors over any narrative or plot.

Adapting their own play, director Kornél Mundruczó and writer Kata Wéber attempt to sell us on the situation rather than the underdeveloped characters with the idea that we should feel for the couple regardless of any of their other actions. While it is interesting to see the actors hit their marks, Pieces of a Woman works more as an acting exercise than a film.

The film viscerally explores how both characters deal with their loss. In so doing, it produces several strong individual scenes which are loosely tied together by a lot downtime as the film meanders absentmindedly to the next big moment. While Kirby’s character shuts down, LaBeouf and Ellen Burstyn look for someone to blame starting with the midwife (Molly Parker) who was unable to keep their child alive while waiting for EMTs to arrive.

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The Truth

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  • Title: La vérité (The Truth)
  • IMDb: link

The Truth movie reviewMothers and daughters. La vérité, or The Truth, is your basic wacky family tale involving Lumir (Juliette Binoche), her English-speaking husband (Ethan Hawke), and their daughter (Manon Clavel) visiting her famous mother (Catherine Deneuve) who has just released an autobiography and is now working on an avant-garde sci-fi film (which coincidentally also deals with the relationship between a mother and daughter).

The cast elevates what is otherwise a rather straightforward film from Hirokazu Koreeda about the little moments between family members, the struggles of an actor, familial disapproval, the burdens of living with a self-absorbed celebrity, and the scars of memory. Deneuve is obviously enjoying herself as the over-the-top Fabienne Dangeville and the supporting cast forced to put up with her is solid. So too is the unexpected relationship with her co-star Clémentine Grenier which, along with the publication of a book that plays fast and loose with the truth, forces both confrontation and reconciliation between mother and daughter.

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