The latest film releases include Deadpool & Wolverine, Didi, The Fabulous Four, and Made In England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger. Weighing in are Shawn Edwards, film critic for FOX4 News in Kansas City and co-founder of the African American Film Critics Association, and Katie Walsh, film reviewer for The Tribune News Service and The Los Angeles Times.
Deadpool & Wolverine
This comic book crossover pairs Marvel characters Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) and Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds). The duo hops through different universes to save the day from the Time Variance Authority agent Mr. Paradox (Matthew McFayden).
Edwards: “It's like a two-hour-plus … gag reel. The first Deadpool … was snarky, and kind of cool in an R-rated way, and that was okay. The second time around, it all began to get a bit tiresome. Now it's all just completely exhausting. I mean, Ryan Reynolds is basically doing the same thing he's done his entire career. And it's time for him to move on. It's time for him to mature. I mean, the jokes aren't funny, it's all inside baseball. … He breaks the fourth wall like every other second, so literally, he's not breaking the fourth wall anymore. … It's tailor-made for Marvel fans or comic book geeks. But for anyone else … you just won't get it. I mean, this film … left me with a headache. And I just I was begging for just somewhat of a plot, anything of a story. ... They just fight each other for no reason. Nobody wins, and they fight each other again, and they're jabbing and it's bloody. And there's more dumb jokes. And this thing is just stuck in spin cycle. … I was completely frustrated.”
Walsh: “You're either onboard and in the tank for Deadpool at this point, or this sounds like absolute hell to sit through. I am in the latter camp.
I think it's a fascinating case study for Kevin Feige, the producer of all these Marvel films — Marvel is owned by Disney, Disney absorbed 20th Century Fox. Both Deadpool and Wolverine were 20th Century Fox Marvel characters. So this is like a viking funeral for the 20th Century Fox era of Marvel movies, like they're bringing in all these old 20th Century Fox Marvel characters, and giving them a little follies tribute or something. So it's fascinating in this … corporate media analysis way, on a meta level. … Definitely you have to be up on your corporate mergers and acquisitions to get the full effect. But this movie is going to be massive. It's going to make so much money.”
Didi
Director Sean Wang’s (Nai Nai and Wai Po) feature film debut follows a 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy as he navigates adolescence. It won the Audience Award at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival.
Walsh: “This is such an amazing snapshot of coming-of-age in a very specific time and with very specific identity issues going on. … Wai Po is in the movie as a character named Nai Nai actually, his grandmother does play the other grandmother. So it's very personal. He shot it in Fremont, where he's from. … What Sean Wang does is he creates not just the physical landscape of this place, but also the cultural landscape and the digital landscape, the sonic visual time of Myspace top eight, and YouTube videos, and the music of this era, and AOL Instant Messenger.
… This kid Chris … he's navigating this really tricky period from middle school to high school, so it just takes place over a couple of months in the summertime. And it just follows his fumbling attempts at connection with a girl that he has a crush on and with his middle school friends. He ends up falling in with a group of skaters and trying to film stuff for them. And so he's really testing out his identity, and mediating a lot of his social relationships through his online presence. … Ultimately … we realize that family is everything, even though he's rejecting his family and trying to go out on his own. They are all that he has that is going to be consistent.”
Edwards: “We've seen this type of coming-of-age story a million times, but somehow this one feels fresh. And it's not because of the obvious. It’s because it just feels so totally authentic, just the language, their use of technology, their interaction, the settings. I also love it when filmmakers cast actual teenagers to play teenagers. … So the casting was dead on, and the acting just felt so organic. … There's a story here, and it tugs at your heart, and it tugs at your soul…. This captured the complexities of dealing with emotions that's every bit as effective and executed as well as Inside Out 2. There's an innocence to the film, there's a nostalgia to the film. But it all works so well because the attention to detail is so nailed down … that you believe in every aspect of it.”
The Fabulous Four
This raunchy comedy follows a group of life-long friends who travel to Key West to serve as bridesmaids in their college friend’s wedding. It stars Bette Midler, Susan Sarandon, Sheryl Lee Ralph, and Megan Mullally.
Edwards: “My mother and aunt are going to love this movie. It's easily digestible. It's silly without being insulting.
… But I just wish Hollywood would understand one thing: Older women of a certain age are the smartest and most interesting people on the planet. So I don't understand why they can't portray them that way. And they can still let them have their fun without being on the edge of being stupid. Because I mean, Bette Midler is a national treasure. Susan Sarandon, she’s one of the most gifted actresses of all time. Sheryl Lee Ralph is a can-do-everything dynamo who's currently experiencing … the resurgence of a lifetime. And they all want to work. But why not make it worth their while, and give them material that they truly deserve?”
Walsh: “They get four women who are in their 60s or 70s, beloved stars, Oscar-winning actors. And then they send them on a destination. They pick one or two hot older actors. Here it is Bruce Greenwood and an Irish guy. … And then they all have catharsis about their friendships. And there's long-held resentments, and they all come to the fore. And then of course, there's high jinks.
… There is a central conflict where Bette Midler’s character has betrayed Susan Sarandon’s character. She has married her husband from a million years ago, that husband is now dead, and she's getting remarried. But there's this central betrayal. And Susan Sarandon, in the brief moments where she is allowed to convey the hurt … of her character, is so good. … And then it swerves into some wacky moment like a TikTok dance or a male stripper or a boat accident.”
Made In England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger
This documentary tracks the influence of two British cinema giants: Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. It is directed by David Hinton and narrated by Martin Scorsese.
Walsh: “I'm a huge fan of Powell and Pressburger, who are also known as The Archers, which is their production company. They made The Red Shoes … The Life and Times Of Colonel Blimp, A Matter Of Life And Death. A lot of their films were rather fantastical, experimental, beautiful use of technicolor. For me as a film nerd listening to Scorsese talk about Powell and Pressburger for two hours, it’s like a dream.”
Edwards: “I could listen to Martin Scorsese talk all day, every day for the entire year. And he's so deeply connected to these filmmakers, and he's so passionate in it. He talks about the elements that influenced him, and he intercuts that with some of his own films that he directed. … I love every single solitary second of this documentary.”