Mubi Monday: The Last Showgirl (2024)

There are many times when others praise things that make it easy for me to agree with them, be it a piece of art or an artist, or something that occurs in the world outside of my entertainment/art bubble. I would say that most of the time I tend to find my views aligning with the majority. Not all of the time though, and The Last Showgirl is one of those times when I am very much at the opposite end of the general consensus.

Pamela Anderson plays Shelly, a showgirl who finds herself with a big problem when the show that she has been part of for decades is due to close forever. Despite the dwindling audience numbers and various struggles, this news seems to be a huge shock to Shelly, Mary-Anne (Brenda Song), Jodie (Kiernan Shipka), and the other women in the show. Not sure of what she will do in the future, Shelly starts to also consider what she has given up in the past, including a relationship with her daughter, Hannah (Billie Lourd). 

The first screenplay feature credit for Kate Gersten, The Last Showgirl is a disappointing and muddled look at choices made in youth that reverberate through an entire lifetime, as well as being an obvious exploration of how anyone racing against the clock of natural ageing is always going to be in danger of losing their place in an industry that values youth and beauty above almost everything else. While not a great film, it also has the misfortune of being released very close to the much superior The Substance, which explores similar themes in a much more interesting, and a much smarter, way. It's hard not to keep comparing the two, considering how they also position a "past their prime" actress in the lead role, surround them with one or two relative newcomers, and underscore the main narrative with a mixture of sadness and disappointment in the lack of progress made in the two main industries being looked at.

Director Gia Coppola obviously believes that casting Anderson in the lead role is a great way to play into the material, but that would only work if Anderson was good enough. Sadly, she is not, and the fact that she plays her character with some constant faux-Marilyn Monroe affectation in her speech doesn't help her show a big enough difference between her stage persona and her personality when not performing. Song and Shipka aren't given enough to do, with the latter also unable to make her character work when required to perform a dance that is supposed to get close to something sexy, and the only moments worth your time involve either Dave Bautista (as Eddie, a producer who has a past with Shelly), Jamie Lee Curtis (as Annette, a former showgirl now working as a cocktail waitress), or Billie Lourd (as Hannah, Shelly's daughter).

There are some parts of this that are admirable, but they're overshadowed by a lead actress who cannot make the most of her role, a couple of trips into fantasy sequences that derail the central narrative focus, and a third act that is equal parts unsatisfying and surprisingly empty. I'm not going to say that the whole thing ultimately lacks enough . . . substance, but that wouldn't be an incorrect summary. I don't know who to blame - writer, director, or star - but surely they didn't want people to watch this and just wish they had rewatched Showgirls instead.

3/10

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Red One (2024)

If you're going to be responsible for kidnapping Santa Claus (played here by J. K. Simmons) then you would probably hope to avoid being pursued by Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans. Okay, wait, I know some people would dream of that scenario, but let's just say that no villain wants to be caught by powerful heroes, especially if they're trying to make up for decades of Santa's apparent leniency towards those who should be, or are, on the naughty list.

Johnson is Callum Drift, the head of security for Santa. Which makes it a terrible time for him when the big guy is kidnapped. Who would do such a despicable thing? Drift doesn't know, nor does Zoe (a capable higher-level boss, played by Lucy Liu), but there's one person who might be able to help. He's a lost cause though, a "naughty-lister" of the highest order who also happens to be very good at tracking people down. That's Jack O'Malley (Evans).

Written by Chris Morgan, who has taken some ideas from Hiram Garcia and sprinkled them with the kind of muscular moments that you'd expect from someone who has been in the writer's room for at least half a dozen Fast & Furious movies, Red One is loud and ridiculous in a way that may well cause some to love it, but didn't really work for me. There are one or two fun set-pieces (you'll know them already if you saw the trailer), but not enough to make this truly worth the runtime that clocks in at just over 2 hours. And it doesn't help that Johnson is armed with a gadget that allows him to pull some Ant-Man maneuvers. Very little of the humour works (especially in the earlier scenes), the action gets messier and harder to keep track of in the third act, and there's a general sense of being underwhelmed throughout the finale.

Director Jake Kasdan obviously found this premise appealing - some more Johnson silliness after their work together on the Jumanji movies, but with lots of seasonal trimmings - and I don't begrudge him giving it a try, but he seems to have been distracted by the idea of presenting a modern and cool new yuletide "classic" that he failed to spot the many weaknesses. Things don't flow well, the tone lacks a sweetness and innocence that the best Christmas films keep at their core, and the best bits don't necessarily feel as if they need to be grounded in a Christmas movie. 

Johnson plays the kind of character he always plays (tough and mean, but with a heart of gold), although he deserves some praise for being able to move around in this onscreen world in a way that makes him feel as if he does belong there. Evans has fun being someone with a much wobblier moral compass, but it's a fun inversion (another one) of his clean-cut image that is never fully committed to. Simmons is a surprisingly good, if also surprisingly muscular, Santa, Liu does perfectly well with her small role, Bonnie Hunt is a pleasant Mrs. Claus, and Kristofer Hivju is a lot of fun whenever his Krampus character appears. Other familiar faces include Mary Elizabeth Ellis, Nick Kroll, Marc Evan Jackson, and Kiernan Shipka, all doing just fine, and Wesley Kimmel is decent enough in the role of Dylan, the son of Jack O'Malley, and the one main child who ends up seeing some of the magical battle to return order to things in time for Christmas. I'll also mention the work from Reinaldo Faberlie as Agent Garcia, a large and intimidating polar bear. Overall, the cast isn't bad. I'm just not sure that the leads couldn't have been replaced by better choices, which could have then led to a screenplay being tweaked and improved to fit different personas.

I could sit through this again. I didn't hate it while it was playing. Nothing stands out though. It's the movie equivalent of the overdone musical Christmas tree. Bright, loud, somehow seeming to miss the point of the season while bathing the whole room in flashes of red, green, and gold light. But sometimes you can still look at it and enjoy the temporary distraction.

5/10

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Longlegs (2024)

I started to "raise the fences" as soon as I heard the praise being heaped upon Longlegs. A lot of people were effusive about it in a way that made me think I should keep my own expectations in check. When people start comparing a crime thriller to The Silence Of The Lambs then I know that hyperbole is usually in play.

Written and directed by Osgood Perkins AKA Oz Perkins, who impressed me enormously with his first two features (February AKA The Blackcoat's Daughter and I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House), Longlegs is a dark and disturbing thriller that deserves a lot of the praise it has received, but it's unsurprisingly not quite the masterpiece that some claim, although I am happy for those who feel that way.

Maika Monroe plays Agent Lee Harker, a young woman who ends up being used by the FBI to crack a difficult and disturbing case involving a killer nick-named Longlegs (Nicolas Cage). Harker has some strange ability, call it an over-developed sense of intuition, which may help, but she also ends up being somehow connected to the case in a way that may hinder things. Agent Carter (Blair Underwood) worries about Harker, but is also impressed by her. Meanwhile, Harker's mother (Ruth, played by Alicia Witt) may need to be questioned about past events that could help our lead in the current investigation.

With an impressive mix of unsettling shot composition and equally unsettling sound and music, Longlegs is a film that aims to keep viewers on edge for the majority of the runtime. There are very few scenes that allow you to feel completely relaxed, and that's before you start to notice the many small details that either foreshadow or link to a backstory revealed on the way to a very dark and tense third act.

Much has been made of Cage's performance here. He's good, but he still gets to indulge in some familiar Cage-isms. This isn't a complete transformation, although the make up and his changed voice do a lot to keep him feeling much more like Longlegs than "CAGE does Longlegs". Monroe is finally in another film that is at least worthy of her talent and presence, and she does a very good job of being awkward and struggling in every moment. Underwood is very good, often playing his part in a very obvious way until the one or two moments that allow him to break out from the stereotype, but the real standouts, for me anyway, are Kiernan Shipka and Alicia Witt, both delivering some of their very best work. Shipka gets to be more serious and dark than usual (although I've only seen some of her movie work, maybe she gets to be serious and dark in the Sabrina show . . . but I'll always be thinking of Melissa Joan Hart), and Witt is the person who delivers a performance that is truly transformative. I don't mean this to sound dismissive or insulting, but Witt has been doing work over the past few years that I never expected after she seemed to enjoy spending so much time in the lucrative Christmas TV movie market. Then again, looking through Witt's filmography makes it clear that she hasn't stopped working in a variety of projects over the past few decades, but it's the Christmas TV movies that get the guaranteed airtime and marketing.

While I would still be hesitant to immediately place it in a conversation with the absolute greats in this sub-genre (one from Demme, two from Fincher, plus one or two others), Longlegs is a meticulous and quite brilliant journey into darkness that may well leave even the hardiest of viewers slightly rattled by the time the end credits start to scroll. Perkins shows that he has been on an upward trajectory ever since his feature debut, becoming more confident and skilled with each outing, and I cannot wait to see what he does next. I also cannot wait to rewatch this, scouring every inch of the frame for the details that offer astonishing verisimilitude and indicators of how everything is due to play out.

8/10

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Prime Time: Totally Killer (2023)

While I completely understand the shorthand that people have used to describe Totally Killer - most people refer to it as Back To The Future crossed with Scream - I have to start this review by saying that it's also being slightly oversold by people who are keen to recommend it to other horror fans. This is a fun film, and should be enjoyed by anyone who enjoyed the likes of Happy Death Day and Freaky, but it's not quite as sharp or clever as it could be.

Kiernan Shipka plays Jamie, a young woman who is fed up of her over-anxious mother (Pam, played by Julie Bowen) and uncool father (Blake, played by Lochlyn Munro). Pam has good reason to be anxious though, especially around Halloween. She is the lone survivor of a killing spree 35 years ago that left her friends dead. And the killer may still be looking to get "the one that got away". One thing leads to another, and Jamie ends up making use of a time machine to head back to 1987, where she hopes to help the teenage version of her mother (Olivia Holt). It turns out that her mother was quite a Mean Girl type in her schooldays, which makes it tougher for Jamie to befriend her and save some lives. She also needs the help of Lauren Creston (Troy Leigh-Anne Johnson) to fix what is now a broken time machine. How will Lauren known what to do? The machine was based on her own ideas, made by her future daughter (Amelia, played by Kelcey Mawema).

Directed by Nahnatchka Khan, her second film after the excellent Always Be My Maybe, the emphasis here is on entertainment. Everything is bright and lively, and any excuse to highlight the '80s aesthetics and attitudes is pounced upon. Although the script was written by three people - David Matalon, Sasha Perl-Raver, and Jen D'Angelo - it feels like everyone worked together well and knew what to do with the tone of the whole thing. It still surprises me, however, that there wasn't a bit more to this, either in terms of the joke count or the potential time-travel repercussions. While perfectly enjoyable in the moment, Totally Killer is almost instantly forgettable. And I am not sure the final scenes actually work, but I would probably need a large whiteboard and a week with Christopher Nolan to try properly piecing it all together.

Shipka is decent enough in the lead role, although she feels quite interchangeable with a number of other potential actresses, and the film spends most of the runtime with her and the excellent Holt. Johnson does well, and should be thankful that she gets to do enough to make an impact, which is more than can be said about so many of the other supporting players. While nobody is bad, it’s hard to always match them up with their apparently predestined role in the unfolding chain of events.

I should say that one of my gripes with the film is somewhat addressed by the script, with the main character able to convince people of her time-travelling mission simply and quickly enough to get back to the slasher plot strand. This is not a complex sci-fi movie. It is a film aiming to make the most of a great concept, and it does a decent job of that.

There could have already been more though. More tunes from the ‘80s, more wonderful fashion choices, more bloodshed and kills, and more jokes layered throughout each scene (few things made me laugh more than our lead’s first encounter with an ‘80s mother, inconsiderately hotboxing her kids with cigarette smoke as she drives around town).

Most people should enjoy this. It’s a good time. It’s just not the total success it could have been.

7/10

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Netflix And Chill: The Silence (2019)

I left it too long to watch The Silence, but also maybe didn’t leave it long enough. Because this is a movie I could quite happily have gone through my life without seeing. The main draw for me was Stanley Tucci (damn you, Tucci), and he once again does great work, despite this being one of the worst movies he has starred in.

Some pesky people break through into a cavern, unleashing a flock of creatures that go on to cause havoc and carnage in our world. The creatures are like man-eating bats, and they react to sound. That should be okay for the Andrews family (headed up by Hugh, played by Tucci). The Andrews family have been learning sign language since their daughter, Ally (Kiernan Shipka), lost her hearing in a bad accident. Everything quickly goes from zero to the collapse of society, and you also get a cult (led by a preacher, played in full creep mode by Billy MacLellan).

Directed by John R. Leonetti (responsible for such masterpieces as . . . Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, The Butterfly Effect 3, and Wish Upon, ALL films I enjoyed more than this), The Silence is one of those movies completely hampered by the contrivances thrown into the plot. That might have something to do with the script, written by Shane and Carey Van Dyke (names I know from their work with The Asylum, as well as them being part of the Van Dyke family, and they also wrote Wish Upon). It’s uniformly terrible, from the depiction of the main characters to all of the plotting that puts them in increasingly deeper peril.

Tucci, as mentioned, is great, and there aren’t too many reasons to complain about Shipka, MacLellan, Miranda Otto (playing the mother of the family unit), or anyone else involved. In fact, a lesser cast would make this much more painful. 

There are so many things here that don’t make sense, from the spiralling devolution of society to the fact that so many characters opt to use sign language and still speak some of the words, albeit at a low volume, at a time when silence is the most important thing. I was so irked that I even disagreed with Shipka having to deliver dialogue explaining how she has learned to live in silence, and therefore being equipped to deal with the current circumstances. She has had to adapt to a loss of hearing, which is actually no help at a time when you need to be wary of every noise that you might make.

The premise could have worked, if the writers had put a lot more effort in, and the director had better material to work with, but this isn’t anywhere near being the best way to make a movie around the core idea. Supporting characters don’t make much of an impression, the set-pieces are clumsy and ineffective, and none of the main acts have even one highlight (the beginning is flat, the middle is infuriating, the end is laughable at times).

The saying goes that if you don’t have anything nice to say then you should just say nothing. I still really like Tucci. Unfortunately, that may be the only good thing I have to say about this.

2/10

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Netflix And Chill: Let It Snow (2019)

Three people wrote the book that this screenplay, written by another three people, was based on. That's six people altogether. Okay, the book is three thematically-linked stories, but it still seems like six is an awful lot of people to come up with a film that feels very much like something John Hughes should have come up with over twenty years ago. Just with much better representation.

Anyway, let's rattle through some of the storylines. It's snowing. On Christmas Eve. Julie (Isabela Merced) bumps into Stuart (Shameik Moore) on a train that then grinds to a halt. Stuart is a famous singer trying to enjoy some time not being recognised. He and Julie end up heading to a nearby waffle house. Also at that same waffle house is Keon (Jacob Batalon), hoping to get his shift done and then throw a great party for anyone who decides to stick around. Dorrie (Liv Hewson) works at the waffle house, and is upset when she has to serve a girl (Kerry, played by Anna Akana) that she had an amazing date with, only to find that her attitude seems completely different while she is surrounded by her friends. Dorrie is also infuriated by her friend, Addie (Odeya Rush), who is having her standard relationship issues that seem to stem from her own insecurities. And Tobin (Mitchell Hope) hangs out with Angie (Kiernan Shipka) without being able to tell her how he really feels, which becomes harder for him as she enjoys the company of JP (Matthew Noszka). They are also eventually heading towards the waffle house. 

Director Luke Snellin has a number of credits to his name already, all of them being shorts or TV show episodes. This may not be the most sophisticated material for a feature debut, but he knows how to handle it, and how easy it is to forgive the more cheesy moments when everything is so well put together.

The script is chock full of teen angst about very teen issues, but that doesn't mean they're all light and easy to dismiss. The characters with the less painful situations (wanting to throw a great party, wanting to spend some time out of the spotlight) are played by actors who help them remain just as appealing as those dealing with more serious issues (unrequited love, an ill parent, struggles with people who may resent their sexual orientation). Which isn't to say that the latter characters are portrayed by any lesser players, it just highlights the great casting all around.

Moore is someone I have enjoyed since seeing him in the excellent Dope, and he gives a winning turn here, working well with Merced (who I last saw in the enjoyable Dora The Explorer movie . . . yes, it IS enjoyable). Hewson shines in her role, and Hope and Shipka have you rooting for their friendship to turn into something more, while Batalon continues to be a fun and enjoyable onscreen presence. Rush and Akana are a little bit hampered by how their characters act for most of the runtime, but that's just how the script treats them until the expected changes in the finale. You also get an enjoyable supporting turn from Joan Cusack, as a woman who drives a tow truck while wearing a lot of tin foil (she's actually credited as Tin Foil Woman).

This is not a film for cynics, and not a film for those who cannot remember how painful it can be to not be spending time with the love of your life as a teenager (because you're obviously going to have a romance that lasts forever). It's a light and lovely comedy drama that serves as an enjoyable seasonal distraction, despite not focusing on the Christmas trimmings we normally get in a movie set at that time of year.

7/10

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