Don't Say Good Luck: A poignant character drama

Don't Say Good Luck (2026) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five); rated PG-13, for thematic material, fleeting profanity, teen drinking and mild sexual references

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang

Sunny Sandler’s delicately nuanced starring performance fuels this charming little character drama, although — in fairness — director Julia Hart draws finely shaded work from every member of this carefully assembled cast.

 

Sophie (Sunny Sandler, left) and her mother Elizabeth (Melanie Lynskey) make the most
of a mall outing designed to help the young woman improve her stage confidence.

As I well recall from her handling of 2020’s equally captivating Stargirl, Hart excels at depicting the bond between adults and teenagers, whether parents and their children, or — also, in this case — drama coaches and their nervous young actors.

The setting is a contemporary suburban community — principle filming took place in New Jersey — with much of the action centered at Westridge High School. Sophie (Sandler) wakens on a typically bustling morning in the Birenbaum household, due to her irrepressibly mischievous younger twin brothers, Caleb and Ethan (Matan and Eitan Friedman), barely controlled by harried parents Ted (Max Greenfield) and Elizabeth (Melanie Lynskey).

 

Today is a big day for Sophie: tryouts for the annual school play. Elizabeth shares some encouraging words with her daughter, before Sophie heads for school; they’re both amused when Ted accidentally butt-dials his phone, allowing them to hear his downstairs hijinks with the boys.

 

That narrative gimmick is a clever ongoing touch in the script by Hart, Laura Hankin and Jordan Horowitz.

 

Once the school day concludes, Sophie, bestie Carolyn (Scarlett Estevez) and all the other members of the school drama club gather in the multi-purpose room. Because the selected play is the musical version of Waitress, adapted from the 2007 film of the same title, the drama club’s regular advisor, Mr. Stuart (Joel Waggoner), has surrendered the reins to musical theater coach Ms. Parker (Stephanie Beatriz).

 

All the students know that resident drama club diva Mallory Sinclair (Elyse Bell) is destined for the starring role of Jenna; Sophie hopes to get the quirky supporting role of Dawn.

 

Elsewhere, though, this also is a fateful day for Sophie’s parents, who have an appointment with Elizabeth’s oncologist. The news is bad: The cancer that she and Ted hoped had gone into remission, has returned ... with a vengeance.

 

And as this awful verdict is delivered, Ted’s phone once again butt-dials Sophie ... just as Ms. Parker calls her to the stage.

Avatar: Fire and Ash — Smoke and murk

Avatar: Fire and Ash (2025) • View trailer

2.5 stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for action violence, bloody images, profanity and dramatic intensity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.21.25

James, James, James.

 

Why give editing credits to five people — not including you, as the sixth — if you won’t let them do their jobs?

 

Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña) and Jake (Sam Worthington) realize that their sky-faring Na'vi
clan may not be enough to combat the newest assault by Earth's Resources
Development Administration forces.

Calling this film tedious, at a butt-numbing 195 minutes, isn’t sufficient. This slog also is repetitive, insufferably boring and — as we ultimately approach the climax — completely predictable.

Meaning, no dramatic tension.

 

As was the case with 2022’s second film in this ongoing series, director/co-scripter James Cameron spends far too much time on tight close-ups of slow, thoughtful takes; and half-baked lines delivered with artificially measured, melodramatic pauses and intensity.

 

Granted, the production design and SFX work continue to be jaw-droppingly amazing; this truly is a marvelous example of imaginative world-building, down to the tiniest detail of flora and fauna. 

 

The underlying environmental message also continues to be welcome, and increasingly timely. It’s impossible to watch Pandora’s massive, ocean-going tulkun — pursued and killed by rapacious Earthers, in order to harvest amrita, a substance in the creature’s brain with the medical power to halt human aging — and not think about how our own Earth’s whale population has been hunted to near-extinction.

 

Events resume where the previous film concluded, with Jake (Sam Worthington), Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña) and their family — Lo’ak (Britain Dalton), young Tuk (Trinity Jo-Li Bliss) and adopted mysterious daughter Kiri (Sigourney Weaver) — now fully embraced by the ocean-going Metkayina clan headed by Tonowari (Cliff Curtis) and his wife Ronal (Kate Winslet), the Shamanic Matriarch.

 

Lo’ak is haunted by the recent death of his older brother Neteyam (Jamie Flatters), who perished during the previous film’s climactic melee. In typical teenage fashion, Lo’ak disobeys his father’s orders, chafes at often being left behind, and also has distanced himself from Tonowari and Ronal’s daughter, Tsireya (Bailey Bass), much to her sorrow.

 

The latter is a shame, since the developing relationship between Lo’ak and Tsireya was one of the previous film’s high points.

 

Everything's Going to Be Great: Well ... not quite

Everything's Going to Be Great (2025) • View trailer

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

Available via: Amazon Prime and other video-on-demand options

By Derrick Bang

Folks passionate about All Things Theater — amateur or professional — are guaranteed to adore this modest Canadian dramedy.

 

Everybody else ... likely not. 

 

After a particularly trying day at school, Les (Benjamin Evan Ainsworth) receives some
encouraging — if typically quite unusual — advice from his father, Buddy (Brian Cranston).

Director Jon S. Baird’s flamboyant touch approaches burlesque at times, and mainstream folks may find star Bryan Cranston’s character totally annoying. It’s also hard to forgive the unexpected midpoint hiccup in Steven Rogers’ script, after which the film loses considerable steam, never to be regained.

The year is 1989, the initial setting Akron, Ohio. Carefree Buddy Smart (Cranston) has led his family through a series of temporary theater management jobs ever since marrying his wife, Macy (Allison Janney), two decades ago. Everybody pitches in, whether serving as stage manager, prop handler, ticket seller or accepting roles in the current production.

 

Trouble is, they’ve never been successful enough to remain in one place for long, after which it’s on to the next small-town theater seeking new management.

 

The indefatigable Buddy is a relentless cheerleader nonetheless, insisting that this time will be different; they’ll finally make it; and so forth. Every time the clearly overwhelmed Macy points to the grim result from their failure to put enough warm bodies in theater seats, Buddy brushes her off by insisting, “Everything’s going to be great.”

 

In a word, he’s exhausting ... but Cranston, so adept at body movement and well-timed dialogue, makes him endearingly exhausting. Most of the time.

 

Younger son Les (Benjamin Evan Ainsworth), who worships his father, is fully on board; he’s a pretentious kid given to exaggerated outfits, with a tendency to quote lines from plays. During moments of confusion or crisis, he receives advice from dead thespians and playwrights such as Noël Coward, Ruth Gordon, Tallulah Bankhead and William Inge (each amusingly played by, respectively, Mark Caven, Chick Reid, Laura Benanti and David MacLean).

 

To say that Les stands out from his classmates is the worst of understatements; he may as well have the word “nerd” tattooed on his forehead.

 

“They don’t get me,” he glumly says to his father, at one point. No kidding.