2020 – Page 13 – PopCult Reviews

SXSW Short Film Festival @ Home – Midnight

Heat **
Directed by Thessa Meijer

This short is visually and technically fantastic, however, that’s about it. Heat is a joke with a set-up and a punchline. It definitely doesn’t overstay its welcome but I don’t particularly enjoy it. It happened and then it ended. I can imagine director Thessa Meijer doing a great job on music videos but I look for short stories when I watch a short film.

How I Read a Poem: The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats

So why should you spend any time reading poems? Isn’t the world in a state of crisis so severe that we don’t have time for such frivolousness? Or, shouldn’t I numb my brain with endless streams of Netflix binging? Well, I mean suppose. You don’t have to read poetry. I am sure you could go your whole life and never feel like you missed much by not reading poetry. But that could be said of lots of things like traveling abroad or eating at a fancy restaurant, but those things are nice to do, and they add richness to your life.

Movie Review – The Invisible Man (2020)

The Invisible Man (2020)
Written & Directed by Leigh Whanell

Once upon a time, Universal Pictures wanted some of that sweet cinematic universe money, and they introduced The Dark Universe, a rebooting of classic monsters from their film catalog but modern and basically like superheroes. The opening film, The Mummy, was released, performed terribly, and received scathing reviews, and thus the Dark Universe died. Now Universal has pivoted and handed the reins to Blumhouse, a company quite skilled at coming way under budget and making lots of money with gimmicky B-horror movies. I’ll admit, I found the first Insidious to be pretty good, but the rest of their films are not my particular cup of tea. So, how does The Invisible Man stack up?

TV Review – Tales From the Loop Season One, Episode Three

Tales from the Loop (Amazon Prime)
Season One, Episode Three – “Stasis”
Written by Nathaniel Halperin
Directed by Dearbhla Walsh

We’ve all had those moments in our life that we wistfully drift back to from time to time. There’s a very distinct emotion we feel when thinking about them, a yearning to go back there, and our senses recalling smells and sounds that further recreate the scenario. More likely than not, if we were to have a way to be in that moment perpetually on closer examination, we would discover flaws & incongruities with our memory. Emotion has such a strong ability to cloud the mind and create false pasts that feel better, editing the problematic parts.

Movie Review – Extra Ordinary

Extra Ordinary (2020)
Written and Directed by Enda Loughman & Mike Ahern

The Conjuring meets Edgar Wright would be one of the best ways to describe this hilarious horror-comedy. Wright has such a distinct visual style, and it’s clear these filmmakers are great fans of his, putting those little touches without becoming a knock off. There is still enough of a distinct comedic voice that it differentiates itself but remains firmly in the same subgenre where these two types of films meet. There are some missteps along the way and some underused cast members, but overall it’s a refreshing break from the typical comedic pablum seen in theaters most weekends.

TV Review – Devs

Devs (FX)
Written & Directed by Alex Garland

How do I know I am making a choice to type these words right now? How do I know that I chose to watch all eight episodes of Devs? Are these actions free choices of my own making or merely preprogrammed behaviors, following a path I was set on by some cold, indifferent force of nature? Devs explores these ideas in its roughly eight hours and is my favorite of filmmaker Alex Garland’s work to date. I’m reasonably positive about Ex Machina but found myself underwhelmed by Annihilation. I think long-form mini-series may be the structure that best suits Garland’s style of pacing and cerebral storytelling.

SXSW Short Film Festival @Home – Narratives Part 3

Father of the Bride ****
Directed by Rhys Marc Jones

Right off the bat, I loved how this short film looks. It has the color textures of a David Fincher film, those sorts of browns and yellows he heightens in things like Benjamin Button. The story is nuanced and ambiguous in fantastic ways. It’s told from the perspective of a young best man who is getting ready to give a speech at his brother’s wedding. He’s in the bathroom when the father of the bride enters, also about to give a speech. There is a very tense confrontation that frames the rest of the story, leaving us questioning what the father of the bride’s intents are in this setting. The ending leaves us wondering and it’s really great moody stuff.

Comic Book Review – X-Men by Jonathan Hickman Volume One

X-Men by Jonathan Hickman Volume 1 (2020)
Reprints X-Men v5 #1-6
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Francis Lenil Yu, R.B. Silva, and Matteo Buffagni

After Jonathan Hickman’s magnificent House of X/Powers of X reboot of the X-titles’ status quo, it was clear the classic Marvel characters were headed in a brand-new direction. The mutants had finally dropped their petty squabbles and coalesced into one community, relocating to the living mutant island of Krakoa. Now with their new-found sovereign nation status and the ability to grow medicinal plants that could change the survival rates of numerous diseases, they leveraged a place at the tables of power. We also learned in that mini-series how the mutants have overcome death, using Professor Xavier’s Cerebro computer and Krakoa’s regenerative properties to regrow dead mutants complete with all their memories. This is where the fifth volume of X-Men opens, a brand new world.

SXSW Short Film Festival @Home – Narratives Part 2

The Voice in Your Head ****
Directed by Graham Parkes

A man wakes up to the living embodiment of his anxiety standing over his bed, berating him. This continues through his shower, breakfast, the commute to work, and throughout his workday. A man in a green suit standing over him, reminding him of all the things he does wrong. A very interesting twist happens after you think you’ve figured out the premise, and depending on how you feel about that moment, it will color how you feel about this whole short. I personally found it pretty funny.

TV Review – Tales from the Loop Season One, Episode Two

Tales from the Loop (Amazon Prime)
Season One, Episode Two – “Transpose”
Written by Nathaniel Halpern
Directed by So Yong Kim

The second episode of Tales from the Loop delivers an interesting surprise that while this is an anthology series, the stories will revolve around the same set of characters. Where episode one focused on Loretta, episode two shifts to Jakob, her eldest son. The first episode was about destiny using the conceit of a time loop, and this one is about envy of another person’s life and uses more of the esoteric technology of the Loop to go deeper. It’s a smartly written story that puts its focus purely on the human elements and doesn’t get caught up in the hard science fiction.