Spin Me Round is the latest collaboration between Alison Brie and Jeff Baena, whose other films include The Little Hours and Horse Girl. Often, as with The Little Hours and Spin Me Round, Baena’s spouse Aubrey Plaza also stars. Alison Brie’s character is Amber, a young manager in the Exemplary Manager program at Tuscan Garden who finds there may be in Italy for reasons other than her potential in restaurant management.
Golden Space Needle winner The Territory brings indigenous activism into focus
The title of The Territory refers to a large swath of rainforest inhabited by the dwindling population of Uru-eu-wau-wau people, who first came into contact with non-Native Brazilians in 1981. Until recently, strict protections have made this land one of the few remaining bulwarks against the rampant clear-cutting that threatens to fundamentally erase the lush and biodiverse Amazon river basin.
Alex Pritz’s documentary juxtaposes life among the Uru-eu-wau-wau with those of indigent farm workers seeking to establish their own settlements within the untouched lands as a way of elevating themselves from poverty.
Girl Picture is a dramatically beautiful story of first love and teen angst
Rönkkö and Mimmi are best friends, the kind of buddies that tell each other everything, wear each others’ clothes, and support each other through thick and thin. Throw in more than a few hormones, discovering what your body wants, and how to even talk to someone you’re interested in and you’ve got the jumbled pile we call puberty; that’s exactly where we find these two women.
Emily the Criminal is Ocean’s 11 for gig workers
It’s not difficult to have sympathy for Emily, the character Aubrey Plaza plays in the great new movie Emily the Criminal. She understands that a person in her circumstances (loaded with debt from student loans for an expensive art school education and a permanent record that includes some legal infractions) has no shot at “the American dream.”
Medusa: A Feminist take on Slasher-flicks that asks WWJD?
By day, best friends Mari and Michele are devout women in a Christian pop group called Michele and the Treasures of the Lord. They sing bubblegum pop songs about Jesus and Michele runs a YouTube channel that tells young, God-fearing women how to take the most holy selfies. By night, they channel their Christian devotion into a girl gang that menaces the streets of Brazil, eager to attack any woman that they perceive to be sinful.
Bodies Bodies Bodies is an Agatha Christie whodunit for Generation Z
Bodies Bodies Bodies involves a group of zoomers who plan on spending a weekend at the home of their rich friend David (Pete Davidson). A hurricane knocks out the cell signal and everything quickly goes to hell.
DC League of Super-Pets is less about super heroes and more about friendship
As baby Superman is quickly pushed into a spaceship by his parents to save him from their crumbling world, we find out that he wasn’t alone on his trip to Earth. His best bud, a pup named Krypto, stows away and offers company in the strange new land. Jump forward a few years and we see Superman as we know him. As per usual, he has the major hots for Lois Lane and as he readies himself to pop the question, Krypto freaks out thinking he’s being replaced…
In Vengeance, B.J. Novak’s aspiring podcaster seeks West Texas justice one episode at a time
Is there any sadder fate than being the last (rich) white man in Brooklyn without a hit podcast? Sure, Ben Manalowitz (B.J. Novak) has a plum job at the New Yorker (not New York magazine), a huge apartment with a view, no shortage of rooftop party invites, and a phone that’s constantly blowing up with messages from the half-dozen women he’s simultaneously casually “dating”. But he (feels that he) has (somewhat incongruously given his actual job) no platform by which to prattle his ideas about the true source of America’s divisions — not by geography or politics, but by asynchrony and self-curation — into the ears of millions of captive listeners. Such is the central challenge facing Ben in Novak’s debut as a feature film director.
Yep, Jordan Peele’s Nope is the most fun you’ll have at the movies this summer.
After a topsy-turvy couple of years in which big films tiptoed back into cinemas, Nope, the third feature from Jordan Peele lands in theaters this weekend. In a bombastic blockbuster season of big planes and superhero bloat, Peele’s cryptic tale of weird happenings in a lonely gulch of inland California might just be the best time you can have at a movie theater all summer. Chase and I saw a promo screening this week and couldn’t wait to talk about it.
Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris is a charming fairy tale for adults
The adjective I can’t escape when thinking about the new movie Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris is “delightful.” It’s a charming little mid-century, working-class, romantic comedy led by the wonderful Lesley Manville that is just a joy to watch.