Cat Person (2023)

Starting with a quote from Margaret Atwood about how men fear that women will laugh at them while women fear that men will kill them, Cat Person is a film about dating, sex, and the different ways in which situations can be viewed, depending on your gender and whether or not you are wearing rose-tinted glasses of romanticism. 

Emilia Jones is Margot, a young woman who ends up developing a relationship with Robert (Nicholas Braun). Robert is older, and seems a bit brusque at times, but he’s intriguing and good company in text message form. He also claims to have a cat, which is a good sign. Everything is turned upside-down when things don’t go very well on a date though, leading Margot to start questioning everything she has gone through, helped in changing her perspective by her friend, Taylor (Geraldine Viswanathan).

Based on a short piece of writing by Kristen Roupenian, Cat People is a film that could have gone in any number of different directions, from twisted rom-com to intense thriller, or even outright horror. The fact that it jumps nimbly between elements of so many different genres is testament to the fantastic script from Michelle Ashford and the direction from Susanna Fogel. While both of these women have quite varied and lengthy careers, there’s not much in their respective filmographies that rivals this, as far as I’m concerned, because what you get here is a thought-provoking look at the minefield of modern dating, as well as the smallest glimpse into the mindset of a woman struggling to enjoy relative normality while dealing with the stress and fears that men don’t have to consider. Brilliantly, however, there are also one or two moments that show issues very specific to men who are wary of being mistaken or misinterpreted.

Although everyone onscreen is excellent (and both leads now have a sizeable sample of superb onscreen work to explore, in films and TV), both Jones and Braun complement one another beautifully, the former often aiming to please and stay composed while the latter emphasises the clumsy and abrupt nature of his character in almost every scene. Viswanathan may seem a bit overly cautious and cynical at times, but she’s right to be that way, and viewers go into the finale of the film, a finale that will lose some viewers, armed with that knowledge.

Often keeping viewers locked in to Margot’s POV, the style of the film is one of heightened realism. It may not be an exact replication, but this is how the world can look as seen by a young woman taking a chance on developing a relationship with a stranger. It’s intense at times, and I am sure any woman you mentioned that to would roll their eyes and say “duh”.

Will this get through to the “not all men” people who keep missing the bigger picture whenever another news story breaks or another set of shocking statistics is revealed? I don’t know. I hope so, but I just don’t know. Much like one or two other movies released in the past year though, this at least serves as an opening for an important conversation that everyone should be part of. That’s more than some films do.

8/10

If you have enjoyed this, or any other, review on the blog then do consider the following ways to show your appreciation. A subscription/follow costs nothing.
It also costs nothing to like/subscribe to the YouTube channel attached to the podcast I am part of - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCErkxBO0xds5qd_rhjFgDmA
Or you may have a couple of quid to throw at me, in Ko-fi form - https://ko-fi.com/kevinmatthews
Or Amazon is nice at this time of year - https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/Y1ZUCB13HLJD?ref_=wl_share

Mubi Monday: Booksmart (2019)

Booksmart is a fun film, full of energy, that easily sits alongside a number of other teen comedies from the past few decades. Unlike many of those, it was directed and written by women, and also features two wonderful female lead characters (played by Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever).

The set-up is quite simple. Molly (Feldstein) and Amy (Dever) have made a number of sacrifices as they aim to get the grades required for their favoured colleges. But Molly hears a number of people talking about their future plans, which leads her to the realisation that a lot of people had the same aim, they just managed to maintain a better life-work balance throughout high school. Determined to use their last night to make up for years of missing out, Molly and Amy set out to find the location of the hottest party being attended by everyone else in their school year. And so begins a night that will see the young women test their limits, test some drugs, and test their friendship.

Although very much female-centric, Booksmart works brilliantly because it is very much focused on the teen experience, the years spent under intense pressure to please so many people (peers, parents, teachers) before you learn that it's best to just please yourself. Molly and Amy start the movie thinking that they have to live their lives a certain way, which becomes less and less true as they become more comfortable just being themselves.

The script, written by Emily Halpern, Sarah Haskins, Susanna Fogel, and Katie Silberman, is arguably the best work that any of them have done. It's smart, full of scenes that have an honesty at the heart of them, and very funny. And one sequence involving a pair of Barbie dolls is hilariously surreal in a way that recalls the anarchic silliness of Better Off Dead... (an '80s teen movie that remains woefully underseen).

Olivia Wilde does a great job in her feature directorial debut. She has a number of shorts to her credit, and has obviously been able to observe the film-making process during her many acting jobs, but this is an accomplished and assured first feature, undoubtedly helped by her industry connections (it's hard to imagine the likes of her partner, Jason Sudeikis, or Will Forte and Lisa Kudrow taking on supporting roles otherwise, although you could also argue that a good enough script would have won them over).

Feldstein and Dever are great in their roles, with the former bringing more of the energy into most scenes while the latter is having a more difficult time adjusting to a new level of social interaction and self-identity. Molly Gordon does great work in her small role, Skyler Gisondo and Billie Lourd are wonderfully over the top as two rich kids who find it easy to buy company, but not so easy to make real friends, and Diana Silvers has a couple of very funny scenes as a partygoer who ends up seeing Dever in a more vulnerable state than either would have wanted, and Jessica Williams gets to play a supercool teacher who is rooting for our leads throughout.

Although this is typically rambunctious stuff on the surface, Booksmart excels, like all of the best teen movies, because there's a lot more to it. And a large part of it is truth. As silly as many moments seem, it also nails the maelstrom of feelings that can rush through any teenager's mind every time a major decision has to be made. That decision could be about higher education, or it could about what to wear to a party. It could be about love or lust, or it could be about how far you go to support a friend. Every one is just as important as the other. Well, that is how it feels at the time. Booksmart nails that feeling, and more.

9/10

The movie will be available here.
Americans can get it here.

The Spy Who Dumped Me (2018)

Mila Kunis plays Audrey, a young woman who is upset on her birthday when she is dumped by her boyfriend (Drew, played by Justin Theroux) through the callous medium of text message. This leads to a chain of events that see Audrey and her best friend, Morgan (Kate McKinnon), getting drawn in to a plot that includes spies, violence, death, and lots of comedic banter between the two out-of-their-depth ladies.

We've had a few action comedies in the past few years, and Melissa McCarthy has given us some big laughs in two of them (Spy and The Heat). The Spy Who Dumped Me tries to give things another twist, but it ultimately relies on the two leads more than the script or direction, and that's not enough to make this memorable.

Director Susanna Fogel, who also co-wrote the movie with David Iserson, may not be an absolute first-timer here but you could be forgiven for assuming that she is. This is a film riddled with amateur errors, although it has enough weight behind it, and polish, to keep it as an enjoyable disappointment, as opposed to a complete disaster. The script doesn't have enough laughs (I probably laughed aloud at about two lines, and they may have been in the same scene - an interrogation sequence), the action feels a bit carelessly planned out, and it's hard to care about any of the twists and turns that occur.

Kunis and McKinnon are two great actresses, but neither of them are well served by the script that they're given here. McKinnon suffers more, with her character often coming across as annoying and unhelpful throughout (bar a couple of moments that make her useful out of the blue), but Kunis just never feels like the best fit for the character that she's supposed to be playing. The men generally fare better, perhaps because they're all being made to look arrogant and shifty most of the time, with Theroux decent fun, and Sam Heughan and Hasan Minhaj just fine as the other agents who may be good or bad. Paul Reiser and Jane Curtin are a welcome addition, and could have done with some more screen time, and there are good performances from Gillian Anderson and Ivanna Sakhno (playing, respectively, an agency boss and an ex-gymnast turned assassin).

The Spy Who Dumped Me isn't a bad film. It's just not a very good one. And the fact that it has too few laughs, action scenes filmed quite badly, and leads who don't feel quite right in their roles make it a  bad action comedy. I REALLY hope someone makes another great vehicle for McKinnon soon, because I tend to enjoy her performances, even when she's given weaker material, and it would be a sin if we were denied her comedic talent because nobody figured out how to make the best use of her in movies.

5/10

You can buy the blu here.
Americans can get it here.