The latest film releases include Inside Out 2, Treasure, Ghostlight, and Tuesday. Hear from freelance film critic Monica Castillo, who writes for The New York Times, Village Voice, and RogerEbert.com, as well as Shawn Edwards, film critic for FOX-TV in Kansas City and co-founder of the African American Film Critics Association.
Inside Out 2
This is the follow-up to the 2015 Disney film centered on a young girl named Riley. Its main characters are personified emotions inside of her mind, including Joy, Sadness, Fear, Anger, and Disgust. In the sequel, Riley is now a teenager dealing with new emotions, including anxiety and envy.
Castillo: “We find Riley a few years later, where her emotions were originally working together, and then now, thanks to puberty, not so much. I do find that it's relatable, but I don't think that it's hitting the same way that Inside Out did for me back in 2015.
… I was so thrilled that they made a movie entirely about anxiety … coming in to really mess things up, and how in trying to optimize things, you might end up accidentally making things worse for yourself. … I would say this is a good, not great, sequel.”
Edwards: “Inside Out 2 is great second-tier Pixar and not nearly as clever or original as the first one. And I think that's the problem because you need connectivity between Inside Out and Inside Out 2 for the audiences to buy in. But what's missing is they really didn't take it to a different place. … Structurally, the narrative is a bit stronger. But Inside Out 2 is not as emotionally satisfying or moving as the first. But I thought they played it a little bit too safe. I mean, Riley is going into puberty. She's a teen girl. I have two teen girls, and Riley is boring.”
Treasure
Stephen Fry and Lena Dunham star in this film set in the 1990s. A young woman travels to Poland with her father to visit his childhood home. It is based on the 1999 novel Too Many Men by Lily Brett.
Edwards: “This is a father-daughter movie, which essentially evolves into a road trip. … There's a lot of bickering, there's a lot of misunderstanding. I almost thought the emotions from Inside Out 2 were going to show up in the film because they were much needed. I mean, there's so much emotional baggage in this film, it really makes this road trip movie a bit of an uncomfortable ride. … You get frustrated as a viewer because there's a story here, but they never really get to it. And they seem to just get sidetracked a lot on the road trip until they finally landed [on] the concentration camp, which adds a bit of an emotional wallop to the film and draws you in. But … the beginning, the middle, and the end just aren't stitched together well enough to make this a compelling story.”
Castillo: “I could not get past Stephen Fry's accent. I'm so sorry. … I couldn't get into … this antagonistic relationship between Lena Dunham's character and Fry’s character. … I wanted to leave this trip 20 minutes in.”
Ghostlight
This indie film stars real-life parent and child duo Keith Kupferer and Katherine May. He is a middle-aged construction worker in Chicago grieving the loss of his son, who finds comfort in a community theater production of Romeo and Juliet.
Castillo: “This one is going to be my four-star movie of the week. I can't recommend it highly enough. … I think this is all about the healing power of storytelling, of theater, of opening yourself up to the arts. … I'm so in awe of the directors … of how they're able to thread the family drama and the on and off-stage drama. I mean, it's just incredible acting all the way. … It goes through some really complex and complicated emotions and conversations. But it doesn't feel so heavy that you're a wreck by the end.”
Edwards: “It's so authentic. You almost feel like you're watching home videos of your own family. … The incredible thing about this film is that the premise is actually pretty razor-thin and tailor-made for a family sitcom that's in its next-to-last season after a nine-year run. But I believe everything about this film works. The way they deal with grief, the way they deal with redemption. I mean, the father-daughter relationship is completely honest. The husband and wife relationship is completely relatable.”
Tuesday
Julia Louis-Dreyfus stars as Zora, an American mother struggling with the impending death of her terminally ill, British daughter named Tuesday. In the film, death arrives as a big macaw.
Edwards: “It's so original. It's so brilliant. And it's one of the best movies that I've seen all year. I mean, it's basically an allegory about death. But it's about so much more. … Julia Louis Dreyfus, who's the mom, I mean, her performance is incredible. … I've never really seen her do anything like this, and she does it so well. And the young daughter, who terminally ill, she's fantastic as well.”
Castillo: “I also adored Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ performance. I mean, that is the soul of the movie. … This is going to be a divisive film. There are some people who are really going to be moved by this. And then there's some people [who] are going to really have a hard time with the macaw talking to us about death.”