A House of Dynamite: A chilling nail-biter

A House of Dynamite (2025) • View trailer

Five stars (out of five). Rated R, for profanity and dramatic intensity

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.02.25

This is our generation’s Dr. Strangelove ... but it’s deadly serious.

 

Director Kathryn Bigelow is right at home with intense, white-knuckle geo-political thrillers, having kept us glued to seats with 2008’s The Hurt Locker and 2012’s Zero  Dark Thirty. Even so, I suspect most viewers won’t be prepared for the deeply unsettling events of this disturbingly probable scenario.

 

Even as matters grow increasingly dire, and the atmosphere in the White House Situation
Room becomes more tense, Capt. Olivia Walker (Rebecca Ferguson) calmly
orchestrates and oversees all the necessary procedures.

As some of the film’s posters warn, “Not if ... when.”

Noah Oppenheim’s clever script is divided into three chapters, each of which concludes at a screaming point ... whereupon the clock rolls back, and we witness the same events through the eyes of different key players: folks at the other end of telephones, in situation rooms elsewhere, scrambling to replace somebody missing at a meeting. In each case, the second and third go-rounds expand upon details, amplify the tension, and minimize reasonable options.

 

The time is a reasonable extrapolation of our near future. Despite inroads made back in 1969, thanks to the Strategic Arms Limitations Talks and subsequent Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, nuclear proliferation once again has ramped up (as it already is, in our real world).

 

Part One, titled “Inclination Is Flattening,” focuses primarily on two sets of characters: the personnel at the White House Situation Room, supervised on this particular morning by Capt. Olivia Walker (Rebecca Ferguson); and the 49th Missile Defense Battalion at Fort Greely, Alaska, under the command of Maj. Daniel Gonzalez (Anthony Ramos).

 

Walker is informed of potentially troublesome recent events, notably an uptick in chatter between Iran and its proxies, and uncharacteristic silence from the DRPK (North Korea), following a ballistic missile test.

 

Then, suddenly, an sea-based early warning X-band radar station detects an unidentified intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launch: not at point of origin — as should have been the case, thanks to orbiting Defense Support Program (DSP) satellites — but in mid-flight over the northwest Pacific Ocean. The initial assumption is that it’s simply another of the many DRPK test flights that’ll terminate in the Sea of Japan...

 

...but then the ICBM’s trajectory enters low orbit, with an updated strike target of Chicago.

 

In 19 minutes.

 

Hastily assembled phone and videoconferencing is established between the Situation Room, the Pentagon, various armed forces commands, and the President. Secretary of Defense Reid Baker (Jared Harris) initiates the continuity of governance protocol, which alerts armed soldiers to scoop up numerous “designated evacuees,” — willing or not — including Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) official Cathy Rogers (Moses Ingram).

 

Forced calm prevails, thanks to Walker’s steady hand at the tiller; we’re prepared for this sort of thing. Gonzalez and his team launch a pair of ground-based interceptors (GBIs), specifically designed to knock ICBMs out of the sky.

 

The countdown advances ... and advances...

The Baltimorons: Quirky and adorable

The Baltimorons (2025) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated R, for profaity

Available via: Amazon Prime and other VOD options

By Derrick Bang

Director Jay Duplass’ offbeat little charmer isn’t merely a rom-com focused on two lonely people who deserve better out of life; it’s also a love letter to Baltimore ... specifically, Baltimore on Christmas Eve.

 

Having navigated a string of minor crises, if not always gracefully — with more to come —
Cliff (Michael Strassner) and Didi (Liz Larsen) take a few minutes to stroll along a
gaily decorated neighborhood street.

No surprise, since Duplass co-wrote the script with Michael Strassner, who regards the city as his home turf.

As one-half of Duplass Brothers Productions, Jay and sibling Mark have delivered a string of off-beat indie films and television series, wearing multiple hats as directors, producers, writers and even actors. This is the first film Jay has directed in more than a decade.

 

He certainly hasn’t lost his touch.

 

The Baltimorons has echoes of Martin Scorsese’s darkly comic 1985 farce, After Hours, but with several key distinctions. Duplass’ touch here is much kinder and gentler, and the two primary characters are warm and relatable.

 

If not necessarily right away.

 

The saga opens with a fleeting prologue shocker, as an obviously inebriated Cliff (Michael Strassner) clumsily attempts to take his life. 

 

Flash-forward half a year, to early Christmas Eve, as a now-sober Cliff makes plans to spend the day with the family of his fiancée, Brittany (Olivia Luccardi). She obviously has the patience of a saint, having nurtured and stood by him after the earlier crisis; that said, she’s also the worst sort of helicopter companion, monitoring his every choice and move, ensuring that he never again gets near any alcohol.

 

She even tracks his phone, and immediately calls if he’s not where she thinks he should be.

 

Luccardi plays her as compassionate and well-meaning, but also much too pushy. We understand her concern, but at the same time wince at her smothering attentiveness.

 

Poor Cliff, still guilty over what he put her through, accepts this hovering because he feels it’s the right thing to do ... but he’s clearly miserable. As introduced, Strassner makes him a large, forlorn teddy bear: shoulders slumped, morose expressions, forced smiles and wisecracks rather than serious conversations.

 

He comes by the latter naturally, since his longtime love is improv comedy. But Brittany has made him give that up, since it went hand-in-hand with his alcoholism; by way of catering to the demand that he find something else to do, Cliff is studying to be a mortgage broker. (Like that’ll ever happen.)

 

The point is, she’s forcing him to become something he finds alien ... and that isn’t a recipe for lifetime happiness.

Blue Moon: Waning

Blue Moon (2025) • View trailer

Three stars (out of five). Rated R, for frequent profanity and vulgarity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.26.25

Director Richard Linklater obviously loves the flow and rhythm of meticulously crafted dialogue, along with the challenge of a “talking heads” premise that involves very few characters, most memorably achieved in 1995’s Before Sunrise and its two sequels.

 

Lyricist Lorenz "Larry" Hart (Ethan Hawke) is foolishly besotted with the much younger
Elizabeth Weiland (Margaret Qualley), who is kinder to him than he deserves.

He attempts the same with this biographical snapshot of a single evening in the ultimately tragic life of famed American lyricist Lorenz “Larry” Hart, who teamed with composer Richard Rodgers for 26 musicals during a collaborative relationship that lasted more than two decades in the early 20th century.

The result isn’t entirely successful, in part because it’s hard to endure the first half hour spent with this unpleasant, potty-mouthed narcissist, and also because it’s impossible to get beyond Ethan Hawke’s fake hair, and the trick shots employed to depict Hart’s shorter stature. Both are distracting.

 

That said, the film gets more interesting during its final hour, when the story expands to include several more characters equally adept at trenchant commentary and occasional bon mots.

 

Events take place during the late evening of March 31, 1943, following the debut of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! (their first collaboration, and the first show the former created without Hart). The setting is the bar at the famed theater district restaurant Sardi’s, where the cast soon will gather, to await the reviews.

 

Production designer Susie Cullen and costume designer Consolata Boyle establish a persuasive sense of time and place.

 

Hart arrives first, having just watched the show. He pontificates to the mostly empty room, and also to Eddie (Bobby Cannavale, excellent as always), the tolerant, good-natured barman who will spend the next several hours trying not to serve drinks to Hart, who struggles with alcoholism. 

 

Hart’s stream-of-consciousness commentary is alternately witty, conceited, outrageously vulgar and self-deprecating. He waxes eloquent about the overall perfection of the 20-year-old Yale student with whom he’s currently smitten.

 

He also rails about the new play’s “corniness” and its clichéd presentation of old-fashioned American values, but — to paraphrase Shakespeare — the gentleman doth protest too much. It quickly becomes clear that Hart is both jealous and frightened: fully aware that he’s in danger of being replaced permanently.

 

(As we eventually learn, Rodgers was forced to write some of the final lyrics for their most recent collaboration, By Jupiter, because Hart’s alcoholism and terrible work ethic had become completely unmanageable.)

 

Frankly, these early scenes are quite tedious, because Hart is so unsympathetic and self-absorbed, and because he’s talking at Eddie, rather than chatting with him.

The Twits: An overcooked disappointment

The Twits (2025) • View trailer

Two stars (out of five). Rated PG, for rude humor and mild dramatic intensity

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang

Roald Dahl has been treated remarkably well by filmmakers over the years, whether his charming children’s classics (Matilda, the various versions of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory), his slightly grimmer kid-lit novels (Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Witches) and even his sardonic, adult-oriented short stories (The Wonderful World of Henry Sugar and Three More).

 

Beesha and Bubsy are horrified to discover, via a television news broadcast, that they're
accused of stealing the blue-furred Muggle-Wumps ... when, in fact, the children freed
the creatures from inhumane captivity.

I therefore approached this one with enthusiasm, particularly since co-director Phil Johnston brought us the cleverly entertaining Zootopia and Wreck-It Ralph.

Sigh...

 

This adaptation of Dahl’s 1980 children’s novella is a mess: poor pacing, dumb songs (by David Byrne, no less), a cavalier approach to the source material, protracted filler sidebars, and the bewildering — and wholly inappropriate — insertion of a contemporary American political message, all of which make the film’s 98 minutes feel like an eternity.

 

On the positive side, the animation style definitely suits the material, and the voice talent is fine. Too bad Johnston and co-scripter Meg Favreau didn’t give the actors better dialogue. The inane butt jokes quickly wear thin.

 

The saga emerges as a bedtime story, told by mother bed bug Pippa (voiced by Emilia Clarke) to her young son, Jeremy (Sami Amber). The boy occasionally interrupts the narrative to ask a question, or express concern about what will happen next. It’s a cute framing device ... and, arguably, the film’s strongest asset.

 

Credenza S. Twit (Margo Martindale) and James T. Twit (Johnny Vegas), an ill-kempt, spiteful and mean-spirited married couple, are united in mutual hatred. They gleefully pull pranks on each other, such as hiding a frog in their bed, or making a spaghetti dinner with worms. They live in the otherwise bucolic community of Triperot, in a gadget-laden house (a shameless lift from Wallace & Gromit).

 

But the otherwise misanthropic couple share a devotion to their passion project: a theme park dubbed Twitlandia, laden with outrageously dangerous rides such as flying outhouses and a rickety Ferris Wheel. Everything is powered by the tears of three exotic, blue-furred simians known as Muggle-Wumps: magical creatures long ago captured from Loompaland, named Marty (Timothy Simmons), his wife Mary (Natalie Portman) and their young daughter Mandy (Israa Zainab).

 

When stressed — which is frequent — Marty barfs up ambulatory furry stress balls, known as Florbnorbles, which cause all manner of mischief.

 

The Lost Bus: A harrowing journey

The Lost Bus (2025) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated R, for profanity and dramatic intensity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.19.25

Back in 2006, director Paul Greengrass unveiled the docudrama United 93, about the harrowing events of 9/11, and many of us wondered ... too soon?

 

With traffic backed up for 15 miles (!) on the primary escape road to Chico, school bus
driver Kevin McKay (Matthew McConaughey) and grade school teacher Mary Ludwig
(American Ferrera) seek an alternate route to get themselves and 22 children to safety.

Apparently not. Viewers flocked to theaters, absorbed and horrified by the as-accurate-as-possible depiction of that heinous terrorist attack, and the selfless sacrifice of the passengers aboard United Flight 93.

Now, not quite seven years after the calamitous firestorm that leveled Paradise, Ca., Greengrass has responded with this docudrama ... and, again, is it too soon?

 

Absolutely not, thanks in part to a timely “message line” delivered by Fire Chief Martinez (Yul Vazquez), toward the end of the film: “Every year, the fires gets bigger. And there’s more of them. We’re being damn fools. That’s the truth.”

 

(Probably more of a 2025 sentiment than one from 2018, but still persuasive.)

 

That’s merely an incidental moment in a mesmerizing drama that begins at 4 p.m. on November 7, 2018, as recently hired Pine Ridge School Unified Transportation District bus driver Kevin McKay (Matthew McConaughey) drops his busload of children at their various stops, following a day at school.

 

Kevin’s life has gone completely to hell. He has returned to Paradise, following his father’s death from cancer, and taken the bus-driving job in order to deal with the lingering medical debt. He has moved his mother, suffering from stage 4 melanoma, into his home; his teenage son Shaun (Levi McConaughey, the star’s actual son) also lives with them. And — icing on the cake — Kevin’s beloved dog just had to be put down, also due to cancer.

 

(That may seem like Greengrass and co-scripter Brad Ingelsby are exaggerating this poor guy’s misery, but in fact those details are accurate.)

 

McConaughey, always at his best playing the sort of blue-collar, working-class bloke who makes this country run, delivers a shattering performance in these early scenes. His features are grim, resigned, frustrated and even frightened, his eyes haunted. Trying to juggle all these responsibilities has made him unreliable at work, to the dismay of his boss, Ruby (Ashlie Atkinson, in an excellent supporting role). 

 

These scenes are intercut with frequent news announcements — 210 days with no rain, rapidly accelerating wind gusts — and unsettling images of PG&E cell towers and cables swaying back and forth.

The Woman in Cabin 10: Mystery at sea

The Woman in Cabin 10 (2025) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated R, for profanity and violence

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang 

Although this engaging thriller’s core premise owes a nod to Alfred Hitchcock’s The Lady Vanishes, the story — co-written by Emma Frost, Joe Shrapnel, Anna Waterhouse and director Simon Stone, loosely based on Ruth Ware’s best-selling 2016 novel — moves in an entirely different direction.

 

While scanning the many photos that Ben (David Ajala) has taken thus far during their
voyage, Laura (Keira Knightley) spots something unexpected.

Seasoned investigative journalist Laura “Lo” Blacklock (Keira Knightley), traumatized by a previous assignment that ended horribly, is given a softball story by her editor: tag along during a cruise hosted by gazillionaire Richard Bullmer (Guy Pearce) and his wife, Anne (Lisa Loven Kongsli), on their obscenely extravagant luxury superyacht, the Aurora Borealis.

It's something of a farewell trip, because the terminally ill Anne isn’t expected to live much longer. 

 

For the most part, the Bullmers’ guests are an insufferably privileged lot: notably condescending Heidi Heatherley (Hannah Waddingham) and her equally pompous husband, Thomas (David Morrissey); hard-partying Adam Sutherland (Daniel Ings); and long-ago rock star Danny Tyler (Paul Kaye). Even Anne’s physician (Art Malik, as Dr. Robert Mehta) and hovering security consultant (Sigrid Nilssen, as Amanda) are oddly chill.

 

Laura feels like an outsider, an uncomfortable position nobody attempts to correct.

 

She’s further irked when the on-board photographer turns out to be Ben Morgan (David Ajala), with whom she has uncomfortable personal history. Reflexively trying to avoid him, she accidentally backs into Cabin 10 — the one adjacent to hers — and sees a young woman with bright blond hair: a guest who wasn’t present during earlier gatherings.

 

Following dinner that evening, Laura is surprised — and intrigued — when Anne seeks a private audience, and explains that she and her husband have decided to donate their entire fortune to charity.

 

Later that night, Laura is awakened by what sounds like a noisy struggle in the adjacent cabin, followed by a splash. Rushing to her balcony, she sees a woman sinking beneath the waves. She alerts the crew; the yacht stops; Richard and the captain conduct a head-count.

 

Nobody is missing.

 

Worse yet, Richard and several crew members insist that Cabin 10 has been empty the entire time.

Roofman: True crime writ lite

Roofman (2025) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated R, for profanity, nudity and sexual candor

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.12.25

Truth genuinely is stranger than fiction.

 

When these events went down, back in 2005, one of the Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department sergeants told a reporter, “This would make a great movie.” (Check out this detailed recent article in The Charlotte Observer ... after you watch the movie.)

 

Having clandestinely invaded a Toys "R" Us store late one night, and ravenously hungry,
Jeff (Channing Tatum) tries to snatch some candy from an aisle display, mindful of
avoiding detection by the overhead roving security cameras.

He didn’t lie ... and now, two decades later, director Derek Cianfrance has made that film.

He and co-scripter Kirt Gunn boldly assert that “This is a true story.” Credit where due, their film follows the saga’s unbelievably outrageous details with a level of authenticity that’s rare in cinema today (allowing for a few speculative enhancements concerning details never revealed).

 

The wild ’n’ wooly result is anchored by an endearing, awkwardly charming and mildly foolish performance by Channing Tatum, note-perfect as a resourcefully clever guy who’s also a complete idiot.

 

Our first glimpse of Jeffrey Manchester (Tatum) shows him running hell-for-leather through a field, trying to evade we-don’t-yet-know-what, as Tatum’s voice-over explains that — in order to understand what’s happening — we need to back up a few years. Tatum continues to offer narrative commentary as events proceed (and the reason for this confessional also is a brilliant touch, when the film concludes).

 

As introduced properly, in 1998, Jeff is a despondent family man, separated from his wife (Melonie Diaz, as Talena), their 8-year-old daughter (Alissa Marie Pearson, adorable as Becky) and infant twin sons. He doesn’t earn enough to give Becky the bicycle she wants for her birthday, and his “instead of” gift is totally clueless.

 

He later laments the uncomfortable result with longtime best friend and former war buddy Steve (LaKeith Stanfield), who scoffs at Jeff’s inane get-rich-quick schemes, insisting that he play to his strength.

 

“You’re an observer,” Steve points out. “You don’t miss details.”

 

So Jeff observes that all McDonald’s franchises are built to identical specifications, down to where everything is located behind and in front of the order counter. He therefore hammers his way through the roof of one outlet, waits patiently in the restroom for the workers to arrive, and then — masked — orders them into the walk-in refrigerator at gunpoint, before emptying the vault. His manner is polite and cordial.

 

(The actual Manchester estimates that he pulled off between 40 and 60 such robberies throughout the United States.)