The Running Man: A giddy, violent sprint

The Running Man (2025) • View trailer

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

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.16.25

This Stephen King dystopian nightmare is an evergreen: It can be re-imagined anew for each generation, thanks to changes in technology, geo-political shifts ... and an increased level of hyper-violence.

 

Ben (Glen Powell, left) has serious doubts when Elton (Michael Cera) invites gun-toting
thugs into his home, believing that his many jury-rigged defense systems will save the day.

The 1982 novel — the fourth and final book initially published under King’s “Richard Bachman” pseudonym — initially hit the big screen five years later, with Arnold Schwarzenegger playing protagonist Ben Richards. It’s an acceptable adaptation, although this new version hews more closely to King’s book.

This film also is directed by Richard Wright, whose snarky blend of thrills ’n’ chills has been evident since 2004’s Shaun of the Dead, followed by equally clever (and sometimes mildly deranged) hits such as Hot Fuzz, Baby Driver and Last Night in Soho.

 

Point being, Wright’s sensibilities are spot-on for this angry high-tech parable. Given the current slide into fascism in the United States, and elsewhere in the world, many of the plot points in this adaptation — co-scripted by Wright and Michael Bacall — feel disturbingly conceivable.

 

The time is the near future, the setting a United States where the gap between the Haves and Have-nots has become a yawning chasm. It’s effectively a police state designed to ensure that the lower classes remain that way. Chances for advancement are restricted to participation in demeaning and barbaric televised “reality game shows.”

 

The worst challenge — and therefore the most popular — is The Running Man, where “contestants” try to stay alive for 30 days, while being hunted by professional gun-toting pursuers. Contestants also must be wary of their fellow citizens, who earn rewards for identifying or even killing them. The longer a contestant survives, the more s/he earns in “new dollars” (with, as a droll inside joke, Schwarzenegger’s photo in the center of each bill).

 

Ben Richards (Glen Powell) lives with his family in a poverty-level district dubbed Slumside. As the story beings, he simply wants work. His infant daughter is quite ill, and his wife Sheila (Jayme Lawson) is exhausted, working multiple shifts as a “hostess” in an upscale club. Ben has lost numerous jobs: branded as chronically insubordinate for his tendency to selflessly assist fellow employees who need help (apparently a no-no in this society).

 

Production designer Marcus Rowland, cinematographer Chung-hoon Chung and a massive sfx crew bring this oppressive futuristic society to persuasively chilling life. (Shades of Blade Runner!)

The Phoenician Scheme: Droll lunacy

The Phoenician Scheme (2025) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for violence, bloody images and mild sexual material

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang

Whether working with actors or animation, writer/director Wes Anderson is his own unique brand of crazy.

 

When everything clicks — as with The Grand Budapest Hotel, Isle of Dogs, Moonrise Kingdom and Fantastic Mr. Fox— the results are imaginatively marvelous.

 

Yet another in-flight assassination attempt forces Zsa-Zsa Korda (Benicio Del Toro, left) to
take control of the plane, while Liesl (Mia Threapleton) and Bjorn (Michael Cera) watch
with mounting horror.

But when Anderson’s signature tics and mannerisms overwhelm the material — see Asteroid City, The French Dispatch and The Darjeeling Limited — we’re left with something dire and (for many viewers) utterly unwatchable.

This one’s somewhere in between.

 

For starters, it’s refreshing to see that Anderson and co-writer Roman Coppola have delivered an actual plot that drives the wacky action (something sorely missed in Asteroid City). Granted, it’s a dog-nuts plot, but it makes sense, and gives the primary characters genuine motivation. 

 

Anderson also tackles some weighty concepts along the way: legacy, mortality and the final reckoning that results from one’s confrontation with God.

 

God, of course, is played by Bill Murray. Who else?

 

The art direction and production design — by Stephan O. Gessler and Adam Stockhausen, respectively — are spectacular. The latter has worked on every Anderson film since 2012’s Moonrise Kingdom, and he won a well-deserved Academy Award for The Grand Budapest Hotel.

 

The wildly distinctive look of an Anderson film has become legendary. His characters inhabit often static environments that sometimes feel like gigantic doll houses, with theatrical-style backdrops and finely tuned details that don’t quite exist in our workaday world: more like hyper-reality. Anderson favors color schemes in earth tones and soft pastels, which — in this case — occasionally are interrupted by Heaven’s blindingly white monochrome.

 

Cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel constantly plays with cockeyed camera angles and forced perspective; one early sequence is entirely a ceiling’s-eye view.

 

All of this establishes another of Anderson’s highly mannered, theater-of-the-absurd narratives: a style you’ll either embrace as cheerfully silly ... or dismiss as ludicrous.

 

The time is the 1950s. Zsa-Zsa Korda (a hilariously deadpan Benicio del Toro), a notorious plutocrat industrialist loathed throughout the world, is introduced mid-flight, as a bomb explodes in the rear of his private plane. He survives the subsequent crash: the sixth recent attempt on his life by unknown parties.

 

His gargantuan business empire also is under threat via financial scrutiny and political pressure, most particularly — at the moment — his complex “Phoenician Scheme”: an interlocking series of railway, shipping, mining and agricultural ventures designed to dominate a (fictitious) Middle Eastern country. This venture has been jeopardized by the U.S. government’s market-manipulating act to exponentially increase the cost of the “bashable rivets” necessary for all elements of Korda’s complicated plan.

 

He therefore must persuade each of his investors to accept less profit than contractually promised; each meeting becomes its own distinctive chapter.

Gloria Bell: A toneless ring

Gloria Bell (2019) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated R, for nudity, sexuality, profanity and drug use
By Derrick Bang

Director Alfred Hitchcock famously observed that “drama is life with the dull bits cut out.”

This film is nothing but life’s dull bits.

When Arnold (John Turturro) and Gloria (Julianne Moore) check into a fancy Las Vegas
hotel/casino, she expects they're about to enjoy a romantic weekend. She really should
know better, by this point in her own movie...

As therefore should be expected, it’s slow, tedious, monotonous and unrelentingly boring.

Director/co-scripter Sebastián Lelio’s approach is no-frills cinéma vérité: We essentially eavesdrop on a fiftysomething woman going about a longstanding routine involving work, family, down time and all the other minutia of a (more or less) average life. Singing to the car radio, while driving to and from work. Efficiently doing her job. Enduring an upstairs neighbor from hell. And so forth.

It feels very much like real life. Indeed, totally feels like real life. Which is rather silly, because most folks go to the movies to escape real life. Why spend money to endure 102 insufferable minutes of stuff that confronts us on a daily basis?

Nor does it help much, that our character — Gloria Bell — is portrayed by an actress as incandescent as Julianne Moore. The subtleties of her performance are sublime; numerous little moments convey a stunning wealth of emotions. Even so, it’s hard to do more than admire her talent and craft: “Wow, that’s a terrific bit of acting from Julianne Moore.”

We still don’t give a damn about Gloria Bell.

Particularly since this slice of her life — an American remake of Lelio’s 2013 Chilean film, Gloria — manipulates her in a manner that seems wholly inconsistent with how she’s introduced.

Gloria, 12 years divorced, lives alone in an apartment beneath the unit occupied by the landlady’s clearly unstable adult son, who shrieks incoherently at all hours of the day and night. (Nothing ever gets done about him.) Gloria occasionally returns home to find that a cat — always the same cat, of unknown origin — has somehow sneaked inside again. (We never learn how.)

She works as an insurance claims adjuster; her phone manner is calm, soothing and helpful. We imagine she gets terrific customer service ratings. She has a co-worker (Barbara Sukowa, as Melinda) who frets about their company’s meager retirement plan, and worries that she’ll have to work until she’s 80. Late in the film, Gloria helps Melinda exit the office. (Has she been fired? Departed of her own volition? We never know.)

Molly's Game: All in!

Molly's Game (2017) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated R, for profanity, drug use and brief violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.5.18

Truth isn’t merely stranger than fiction; sometimes it’s flat-out astonishing.

Molly’s Game is the mesmerizing study of Molly Bloom, who — in a parallel universe — might have been the gold medal-winning Olympics skier that she was trained to become, from an early age.

Having become master of her own high-stakes poker domain, Molly (Jessica Chastain)
strides confidently through the room, fully aware of the impact she has on her all-male
clientele.

Or, maybe, she’d have blossomed into the high-profile lawyer being nurtured by her academic talents.

In our world, derailed by a freak accident and occasionally hampered by a rebellious spirit, she applied her preternatural intelligence to become — of all things — the “Poker Princess” known in upper-echelon circles for running weekly, invitation-only games for some of the wealthiest high-rollers in Los Angeles and New York.

Her rise and fall — and rise and fall, and rise and fall — is detailed with supernova intensity by famed scripter Aaron Sorkin, also making a splashy directorial debut in this adaptation of Bloom’s page-turning 2014 memoir, Molly’s Game: From Hollywood’s Elite to Wall Street’s Billionaire Boys Club, My High-Stakes Adventure in the World of Underground Poker.

And yes, the film is as breathtaking as that title.

Perhaps too breathtaking.

As Sorkin’s longtime fans are well aware, his rat-a-tat dialog sizzles with the manic incandescence of classic Hollywood screwball comedies, albeit on a far higher level of dramatic gravitas: often laden with information dumps that demand not only one’s full attention, but (couldn’t hurt) a college graduate’s vocabulary.

There’s a reason Sorkin’s best-scripted episodes of TV’s gone but still much-beloved West Wing clocked in at a fast-paced 45 minutes; most viewers probably couldn’t have endured more. The same narrative ferocity can be found in any isolated 15 to 20 minutes of Molly’s Game, particularly as anchored by Jessica Chastain’s hypnotically alluring starring role, and Idris Elba’s equally powerful supporting performance.

Taken as a whole, though, this 140-minute film is exhausting. Even too many chocolate milkshakes can overwhelm the most enthusiastic palate, and — as director — Sorkin has over-indulged his writing sensibilities. (Tellingly, this fate that did not befall his Academy Award-winning script for 2010’s The Social Network, when his efforts were carefully modulated by director David Fincher.)

Molly narrates her own unlikely saga, Chastain giving these events the stream-of-consciousness passion of a seasoned sportscaster. As is his frequent custom, Sorkin eschews a conventional linear approach for a three-pronged attack divided mostly between the “present” — April 2013 through May 2014 — and the whirlwind events that began a decade earlier. Occasional deeper flashbacks illuminate the childhood training sessions under her disciplinarian father, Larry (Kevin Costner), by profession a clinical psychologist and Colorado State University professor.

The LEGO Batman Movie: A delightfully sassy genre mash-up

The LEGO Batman Movie (2017) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG, for mild rude humor
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 2.10.17

This film doesn’t merely break the fourth wall; that invisible structure between viewer and on-screen action is virtually shattered ... into thousands of little LEGO bricks.

When newly minted Gotham City Police Commissioner Barbara Gordon suggests teaming
up with Batman, the resolutely lone-wolf vigilante is at a loss for words ... but only
brieftly. His answer: "No."

Rarely have a genre, franchise and stable of characters so cheekily, hilariously and relentlessly indulged in winking, nudging and self-parody. In its own gleefully warped way, this may be the best big-screen Batman movie ever made. It’s certainly the funniest and most consistently entertaining.

That said, the approach taken here by director Chris McKay — and a veritable army of scripters — is vastly different than the gentler touch that characterized 2014’s The LEGO Movie. That first film charmed audiences, in great part, because of its unexpected innocence and sense of discovery: a tone that was essential to the story’s climactic “surprise reveal.”

The first film also was instructive, in the sense of establishing its LEGO universe, the structural rules therein, and the unexpected quest that gave humble construction worker Emmet Brickowoski his opportunity for greatness.

This sequel takes all that for granted ... meaning, for starters, that you’d better already know the significance of being a “master builder.” More to the point, aside from the chuckles constantly prompted by the brick-y look of these characters and their surroundings, McKay and his writers don’t really exploit the “LEGO-ness” to any significant degree; this film probably would have been just as much fun in any animation style.

The first film was more intimate, at an individual brick level, which made it rather sweet. This sequel is more cinematic, operating on a much larger scale that frequently obscures its LEGO qualities.

Instead, the story gets its momentum from colorful pizzazz, warp-speed editing, self-referential gags, bad puns and an irreverent sense of humor: all qualities that I’d expect from an animation director who made his rep on snarky Adult Swim TV shows such as Robot Chicken and Titan Maximum.

The result is akin to a Mystery Science Theater 3000 feature, if mocking commentators Tom Servo, Crow T. Robot and Gypsy were, themselves, part of the film they were dissing.

On top of which, this film’s primary story credit goes to novelist Seth Grahame-Smith, who was responsible for the genre-mangling mash-up Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. About which, no more need be said.

This Is the End: Out with a whimper

This Is the End (2013) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rating: R, and quite generously, for pervasive profanity and drug use, violence, gore, relentless crude and sexual content, and impressively graphic nudity (not all of it human)
By Derrick Bang

The devoutly religious are certain to disagree, but this tiresome vanity production is too stupid to be blasphemous.

After Emma Watson re-thinks her ill-advised decision to place her safety in the hands of
half a dozen self-centered horn dogs, she mounts an escape with the help of a handy
axe. Unfortunately, this may be a classic case of leaping from the frying pan and
directly into the fire...

It’s relentlessly vulgar, however, in the arrested adolescent manner that we’ve come to expect when Seth Rogen, James Franco and their homies assemble for “something fun.” In this case, the “fun” comes from playing themselves — no stretch there, since most have been doing that all along — and behaving badly when God proves that the Book of Revelations wasn’t mere biblical filler.

Like so many of today’s limp-noodle, man-boy comedies, This Is the End stretches a mildly amusing concept far beyond the average viewer’s patience. Actually, we know this to be true, since this film is “expanded” from a 9-minute 2007 short titled Jay and Seth Versus the Apocalypse. Honestly, beefing up the cast and adding another 98 minutes (!) did nothing to improve the material.

Although Rogen and Evan Goldberg uncork an impressively apocalyptic third act — they collaboratively wrote and directed this case study in wasted celluloid — one must wade through nearly an hour of tedious, contrived and self-indulgent “banter” in order to get there.

Riffing the stoner culture may have been novel and slightly daring when Cheech & Chong made Up in Smoke way back in 1978, but I’d like to think film comedy has progressed a bit since then. Rogen and Goldberg apparently didn’t get that message, since they clearly believe that merely showing a baggie of weed is enough to prompt a belly laugh.

By the same toke(n), it’s time to declare a moratorium on the faux homoeroticism that seems to pass for “cool” among some of today’s Hollywood types. When Rogen and his fellow “reality stars” aren’t chortling over how blasted they’ve gotten, they trade barbed comments apparently intended to demonstrate their hip, quasi-gayness, while nonetheless retreating to safer hetero territory whenever the tone threatens to become emasculating.

“Safer territory,” in turn, emerges in strained one-liners that make sport of bodily functions: the sort of lowest-common-denominator crudeness that once remained the province of little boys trading bad words behind the woodshed, but now has become something of a badge of pride among today’s lazy comedy writers. It’s apparently shorthand for rugged manhood.

This overworked 21st century cliché hits low ebb here during an ejaculation exchange — merely verbal, I’m happy to report — between James Franco and Danny McBride, which goes on and on and on and on. Constant Companion and I exchanged glances, and the unspoken message was obvious: Seriously? This is what film comedy has descended to?

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: Chaos Rules

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010) • View trailer for Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Three stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, for loopy violence, mild sensuality and drug references
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.13.10
Buy the DVD: Scott Pilgrim vs. the World • Buy Blu-Ray: Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (Two-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + Digital Copy)

The lunatics aren't just running this particular asylum; they've obviously infiltrated civilized society. 

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is as deranged a fantasy as I've seen in awhile, and that's no small statement. Bryan Lee O'Malley's graphic novels are pretty out there to begin with, and director Edgar Wright — who with Michael Bacall also adapted the material — has retained the wild 'n' crazy exaggeration while pushing the outer boundaries of conventional filmmaking. 

Wanting only to help his garage band qualify for a competitive play-off, Scott
Pilgrim (Michael Cera, center) is astonished when a menacing stranger literally
drops from nowhere onto the stage, and then attacks him. This would be "Evil
Ex No. 1," the first of seven lunatic ordeals Scott must face, thanks to his
rising interest in a mysterious girl with cotton-candy hair.

Pushing? No, that's not strong enough. Wright and Bacall have punched through completely, delivering an eye-popping hybrid that's equal parts movie, comic book and video game. The colorful result is entertaining and bewildering by turns, although ultimately undone by a running time that's at least 20 minutes too long. 

Mere mortals can safely absorb only so much ferocious intensity. 

At its core, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is just another saga of youthful angst and unrequited love. Or, more precisely, love that has been requited a bit too frequently, with painful consequences. It's a familiar tale: boy meets the girl of his dreams — in this case, literally — but finds the path to her heart rather complicated. 

That this timeworn scenario unfolds in the Day-Glo, smash-thud universe of comic book sensibilities is, in Wright's view, merely an acknowledgment of an ordinary nerd's tendency to over-dramatize and succumb to his hyperactive imagination. "When teens or twentysomethings describe the events of a night out," Wright explains, in his press notes, "they're usually blown out of all proportion." 

And so, as a result, is Wright's film. 

Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera at his whiny, self-deprecating best) is between jobs and filling time as the bass guitarist for a slacker garage band dubbed Sex Bob-Omb. As befits a Cera character, the 22-year-old Scott has been pining too long for his former girlfriend, Envy Adams (Brie Larson), who abandoned the band and hit it big on her own. 

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist: Play this baby!

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist (2008) • View trailer for Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
3.5 stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, and rather generously, for profanity, sexual content, drinking and other bad behavior by teens
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.2.08
Buy DVD: Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist • Buy Blu-Ray: Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist (+ BD Live) [Blu-ray]


Hollywood, forever trying to cannibalize past triumphs, often thinks this way:

In order to generate another teen-oriented hit, pair the hot young male lead (Michael Cera) from last year's Juno with the up-and-coming young female lead (Kat Dennings) from February's Charlie Bartlett — both of which were public and critical, teen-oriented successes — and voila ... another picture certain to draw that prized youthful demographic.

After Caroline (Ari Graynor, center) lives down to expectations by having way
too much to drink, it appears as though Nick (Michael Cera) and Norah (Kat
Dennings) won't have a chance to get to know each other after all. Fortunately,
Nick's friends ride to the rescue, although the results of their good intentions
turn the evening into an odyssey of Homeric proportions.

Sadly, that often isn't a winning recipe.

Happily, it is this time.

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist is a charming, often hilarious and occasionally poignant misfit romantic comedy set in New York's world of late-night living and very loud live music. Toss in just enough gross-out comedy to leave an impression without becoming tiresome, and the result is as lively and engaging as the mix-CDs produced by Cera's woebegone Nick.

The poor guy can't get over being dumped by his shallow ex-girlfriend, Tris (Alexis Dziena), and has taken "mental health days" away from high school in order to hibernate in his New Jersey bedroom while making a seemingly endless stream of mix-CDs to "commemorate" their break-up. These are ignored by Tris, who tosses each into the trash without a second glance ... an act of casual spitefulness that horrifies Norah (Dennings), who with best gal-pal Caroline (Ari Graynor) tolerates Tris as a frenemy.

One wonders why. The oh-so-hot Tris is a self-absorbed little witch who misses no opportunity to bad-mouth the plainer and quieter Norah, going so far as to suggest that Norah wouldn't even have any friends, were it not for her high-profile family connections (a secret left unrevealed for awhile).

Truth be told, Norah's too inherently kind to rip Tris' eyes out, particularly with good-time Caroline acting as peacemaker.

Besides, hanging out with Tris maintains Norah's access to these mix-CDs, which she adores; they seem to reflect the heart and mind of an unknown somebody who seems her ideal musical soulmate.

On this particular day, Nick is dragged away from self- indulgent moping by best buds and band mates Dev (Rafi Gavron) and Thom (Aaron Yoo) for a gig that night in the city. As the only straight member of The Jerk-Offs, Nick is something of an anomaly, but he certainly knows his music. And, reluctantly, he agrees to go.

The performance goes well enough, although it ends badly when Nick spots Tris in the audience with a new guy in tow. For her part, Tris has been hassling Norah over her apparently lack of a date (true), which she "proves" wrong by throwing her arms around the first halfway palatable guy she spots and giving him a wet one.