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Tribeca 2025: THE DEGENERATE: THE LIFE & FILMS OF ANDY MILLIGAN Finally Gives one of the most Underrated Genre Directors his Flowers
The film offers a peek in the metaphorical cinematic glory hole at a divisive 42nd Street director
I have Philly’s own Exhumed Films to thank for my love of the cinema of the 42nd Street auteur Andy Milligan. It was at their 2014 Forgotten Film Festival they screened a rare 35mm print of his batshit crazy monster rally extravaganza that was at the time “lost” – Blood, that forever altered my DNA as a genre fan. The film had the son of a Werewolf, married to the daughter of Dracula, who just moved into a house straight out of a high school production of The Addams Family. There was an undeniable frantic energy to the film, that was amplified by the handmade, DIY quality and the wordy dialog being recited with the bravado of an off Broadway cast. Sure it was far from perfect, but it had a purity to it, because you could tell that Milligan was in his heart – trying with every bit of his person to put the best film he could onscreen.
Needless to say I was hooked. This had me hunting everything down I could find by the director, which was a bit more difficult than it is today. In the years since a modest groundswell has come up around Milligan, culminating in not only the unearthing of previously “lost” films, but a critical re-evaulation of them as well, which allowed Severin Films to make his catalog more accessible by lovingly curating the The Dungeon Of Andy Milligan Collection Blu-Ray box set. This tracks – since they are also the producers behind an excellent and empathic documentary on the filmmaker that just screened at Tribeca – The DeGenerate: The Life & Films of Andy Milligan. Like Severin’s previous genre docs, this works as both a perfect entry point for non fans, while still giving those who know a thing or two about its subject a few tasty morsels to tide them over.
For those not in the know Andy Milligan was an openly gay director that made a name for himself in the ‘60s making 16mm sleazy, no-budget grindhouse fodder, known for their wordy dialog and over the top theatricality. Milligan trafficked in everything from horror, to sexploition, to Shakespearian costumed period pieces (?!) and to keep costs down, they were also shot, written, edited, costumed, and just about anything else you could imagine by the auteur. This doc does a great job at helping us to really try to understand where Milligan was coming from, by first laying the foundation of a childhood where he was bullied and abused by nearly everyone in his life, including his Army Captain father and his overweight alcoholic mother. This trauma growing up instilled an insatiable anger and resentment in Andy, which would fuel his work, and would haunt him, until he died of Aids in Los Angeles in 1991.
Directors Grayson Tyler Johnson and Josh Johnson expertly craft Andy’s tragic story through film clips, interviews with friends and folks in the NY theater scene, and of course the writer of his excellent biography The Ghastly One, Jimmy McDonough. Thankfully everyone is candid in their thoughts and memories of Milligan, who was, and still is a divisive filmmaker and personality. Not simply for his DIY aesthetic, but his nihilistic views and misogyny, that was a direct result of his mother’s abuse. There’s no excuses to be made here, but instead you’re given enough insight to begin to come to terms with the filmmaker. We’re shown how a troubled childhood led to being kicked out of the military, to a successful acting career in New York and through that, discovering his true love – directing. From there due to his temperament and queerness – he was kept in a vicious cycle, frantically crafting no budget exploitation films, for greedy distributors who only paid a pittance of what they made to fund the next one.
Given how Andy is really only recently discovering some sort of respectability and re-evaluation, nearly three decades after his death – with a portion of his work still lost – crafting this doc and building that feeling of intimacy we get here was no easy task. As a controversial personality, the filmmakers here work thankfully to not soften the edges of Milligan, but allow us to view him from a comfortable distance and form our opinions. This aided by only interviewing those that had a direct connection to the filmmaker, as opposed to his newer celebrity fans. And as a fan, I applaud the directors and Severin for taking that direction and this chance to tell his difficult story, while showing a real respect and appreciation for Milligan. The DeGenerate: The Life & Films of Andy Milligan is a thoughtful and empathic peek in the metaphorical cinematic glory hole at a director, who was as divisive in real life as his filmography, and I don’t think Andy would have wanted it any other way.
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TRIBECA 2025: MAN FINDS TAPE is a Frighteningly Inventive Twist on Found Footage Horror
Austin’s own Peter Hall and Paul Gandersman prove there’s plenty of life to reality horror in this Southern slice of cosmic terror
As a lifelong diehard fan of the genre, I believe it’s insane to dismiss faux-docs or found footage as a somehow lesser or exhausted form of horror. In the right hands, these films can be wonderfully intriguing challenges for both new and veteran horror filmmakers, providing incredibly strict limitations in terms of staging and setting that can also serve as a source of limitless creativity. Just look at the entire month Cinapse featured for Two Cents last October! I was intrigued when a new faux-doc popped up as part of this year’s Tribeca lineup–the debut venue of other now-classics like Grave Encounters and The Poughkeepsie Tapes. Naturally, that curiosity only deepened when I learned that Man Finds Tape was made in Austin’s own backyard by a rogues’ gallery of hometown creative luminaries, led by Peter Hall and Paul Gandersman.
I’m excited to share that Hall and Gandersman deliver an exciting entry in the world of faux-doc horror: the film infuses small-town scandals with chilling Lovecraftian dread, leading us to question which monsters are more terrifying: the ones invading from eldritch dimensions, or the all-too-human ones we trust here at home?
After their videographer parents’ mysterious deaths, Lynn Page (Kelsey Pribilski) fled Larkin, Texas, leaving her brother Lucas (William Magnuson) behind. Years later, Lucas finds a miniDV tape in their crumbling barn–with his name on it. The tape shows creepy, glitchy footage of a stranger feeding young Lucas something while he sleeps. This and other tapes propel Lucas to viral YouTube fame, leading to lucrative studio deals. However, Lucas’ public descent into this strange rabbit hole uncovers a bizarre supernatural conspiracy involving local beloved TV preacher Endicott Carr (John Gholson). Carr’s legal actions bring Lucas’ success to a crashing halt. When a new piece of security footage from Larkin reignites his paranoia, Lucas recruits Lynn and his girlfriend Wendy (Nell Kessler) to solve this decades-old mystery.
In a world filled with livestreaming and disappearing physical media, the only thing more challenging than surprising a found footage horror audience in 2025 is establishing a justifiable foundation for the film in the first place. In Man Finds Tape’s case, it pivots into a genre cousin I vastly prefer–the faux documentary. A surprising rarity of reality horror that includes favorites like Lake Mungo and Noroi: the Curse, fake documentaries allow their creatives to get away with more stylish filmmaking tricks typically reserved for straightforward narrative films–musical scores, cross-cutting between disparate sources of footage–that ironically give their fictional stories a greater shot at convincing us of their realism.
In Man Finds Tape, Hall and Gandersman are kids in a genre candy store, joyfully collecting all sorts of inventive different media sources to patch the creepy narrative of their film together–whether it’s an entire town’s network of security cameras (installed by the Page parents as a side gig), to invasive livestreams by fans of Lucas’ work amid his lawsuit PR crisis. Lucas’ sincere confusion and public shaming-fueled paranoia also fuel his overwhelming desire to record everything, which only drives further conflict between Lucas and Lynn. Man Finds Tape’s writer-directors skillfully sidestep the usual pitfalls of found footage by not just establishing natural motivations for the characters to record their footage, but also finding organic ways for footage to exist independent of the characters themselves. It’s the best kind of found footage horror film–one that not only justifies its existence in unexpected ways, but also demonstrates that it couldn’t be made any other way and still provide the same exciting impact.
Once Hall and Gandersman get into the horror side of things, it’s clear to see what attracted the attention of its esteemed genre backers XYZ, Justin Benson & Aaron Moorhead (The Endless, Synchronic), and C. Robert Cargill (Sinister, The Black Phone) & Jessica Cargill. Joined by The Stranger (Brian Villalobos), the Page siblings and Wendy’s true-crime investigation becomes unexpectedly vital evidence of a disturbing otherworldly power schism unfurling in plain sight. Larkin’s backwoods Texas charm, filled with hole-in-the-wall BBQ joints and elderly churchgoers in their big-hatted Sunday best, reveals itself to be rotten to the core with grimy, goopy creatures from beyond space and time. Icky practical effects augmented by cursory CGI provide some fun, gruesome visuals, and Hall/Gandersman prove themselves adept at restrained moments of suggestive dread as they are with bloody shock. This skillful balance between what horrors they put on full display versus what’s deliciously teased at the fringes makes Man Finds Tape a satisfying slice of Southern cosmic horror.
This approach also plays deeply into Man Finds Tape’s most effective and refreshingly original conceit: that those most affected by these horrors ironically find themselves supernaturally unable to witness or acknowledge them in the first place. Ordinary people can see these horrors on screen, but the citizens of Larkin literally fall into an amnesiac trance whenever they’re shown such footage. It’s an elegantly simple manifestation of the film’s larger themes of blind eyes turned, scandals permitted, and community trusts well taken advantage of–all without sacrificing Man Finds Tape’s genre thrills at the altars of Capital-M Metaphor. It provides a degree of viewer culpability in eyewitness horror that’s often cited but rarely examined this sincerely; the closest comparison I can draw is Koji Shiraishi’s equally scrappy and disturbing Occult, in which the film’s central leads find themselves as much perpetrators as participants, with plenty of bystanders left in their wake.
The sign of a fantastic found footage horror film lies not just in knowing its limitations, but in using them to its advantage. Peter Hall and Paul Gandersman’s Man Finds Tape not only reverently embraces the tried and true tropes of faux-documentary horror films; it also finds delicious ways to subvert them in hopes of getting at something deeper, terrifying, and real.
Man Finds Tape had its World Premiere at the 2025 Tribeca Film Festival, represented by XYZ Films.
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Digging into V-CINEMA ESSENTIALS Part 2: STRANGER & CARLOS
A bi-weekly deep dive into the world of Japanese V-Cinema courtesy of Arrow Film’s comprehensive set
This week for my Bi-Weekly V-Cinema roundup courtesy of Arrow’s V-Cinema Essentials: Bullets & Betrayals are two very different films that showcase both the depth and breadth of this Japanese sub-genre.
First up is 1991’s Stranger, the sole V-Cinema entry by Shunichi Nagasaki. Right off the bat the film breaks with a few conventions of these films with a female star that’s older than the usual 18-25 year threshold for these films and who doesn’t have a nude scene. That being said, the feminist thriller is the story of Kiriko (Yûko Natori), a young woman who as we begin the film is working at a bank and helping her lover embezzle money, in the first 10 minutes she is also arrested irreparably changing the course of her life forever. We then catch up with her several years later, now working in one of the few professions available to someone with a criminal record in Japan: a night shift taxi driver.
Kiriko is trying to start her life over again, but she is being stalked by someone in a black Toyota Land Cruiser. It’s easy to see that this film loves its metaphors, when Kiriko is being arrested and she drops an expensive new pair of Ray-Bans on the street, that are quickly run over and shattered just like her life in that moment. This film is about the young woman who is now past her prime thanks to her incarceration, who is trying to leave her past behind in a country where not only is she a felon, but a female one. This becomes shockingly apparent when she attempts to get help from the police and the officer’s questioning quickly turns from sympathetic, to suspicious after seeing her record. There’s also the component that she will only drive at night, which appears to be her leaving the light of her former life behind in fear of running into her friends in the dark.
While at first Kiriko appears stubborn in her inability to accept help from those around her, its just to hammer home that she has to let go of her past, which is symbolized by this stalker to truly move on. The fact that this stalker may be just some weird manifestation, that only she can see, is something that shockingly isn’t lost on her. Given the pure shot of testosterone that was Crime Hunter, Stranger is an equally engaging film, but for a much different demographic. While the symbolism is about as subtle as a sledgehammer, it’s a direct to video film that deals out some great scares with a very feminist slant. Stranger is a moody little thriller that knows exactly what its assignment is, manifested by a rather impressive performance, by its no-nonsense female lead.
Next up was 1991’s Carlos, a yakuza film that is touted as one of the best to come out of the sub-genre. The hyper violent gangster flick was no doubt an influence on Takashi Miike who would tackle similar themes in his films with the Yakuza, not only employing, but having to hold their own against foreign killers. Given Japan’s isolationist nature, it’s rare that you see their xenophobia openly portrayed on celluloid in such a way, but Carlos features a rather diverse rogues gallery for a Japanese Yakuza film written and directed by the Mangaka who created the original source material. When a couple of Japanese Yakuza try to shake down Carlos (Naoto Takenaka) and his Brazilian crew, they kill the pair of Yakuza and by doing so incite a gang war that has the sadistic foreigner playing both sides against one another.
Having seen more than my share of Yakuza flicks, Carlos works so well, because similar to Ichi the Killer you have this group of foreigners that don’t have to adhere to Yakuza code. Because of that they have the tactical advantage and it is definitely used to amp up the violence, due to Carlos’ being on the run from Columbian authorities. It’s watching these foreigners operate in this “other” space in Japanese organized crime and culture, I found completely fascinating. Even as a third generation immigrant from Brazil, Carlos is very much treated as an outsider by the Japanese Yakuza around him, which definitely fuels his contempt and eventual rampage throughout the film. A white assassin also shows up played by musician James Fujiki, who is also employed by the Yakuza and further highlights their underestimation and contempt for foreigners that ultimately becomes their undoing.
Stylistically Carlos is also a treat, not just for the action, but It’s very apparent from the use of the frame, that Carlos was directed by the Mangaka. There’s a rather impressive weight put on the composition of the frame and its subjects, and how everything from the violence to the Yakuza meeting are framed to help elevate the material. This is compounded by a rather experimental score that really sneaks up on you with an etherealness that’s unexpected as it is unnerving. Carlos reputation is well deserved, sure it’s hyper-violent, but there’s a lot more going on there than a gang war and for that it’s another great addition to the set.
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Criterion Review: HOW TO GET AHEAD IN ADVERTISING
Bruce Robinson’s farcical assault on the advertising industry is driven by the off-the-wall work of Richard E. Grant
Following on from their recent release of Withnail and I, the Criterion Collection continues to explore the peculiar talents of writer/director Bruce Robinson and actor Richard E. Grant with How to Get Ahead in Advertising, a film that swaps 1960s countercultural malaise for the full-blown consumerist delirium of 1980s Britain. The result is part surreal satire, part body horror, part corporate takedown, all anchored by a off-the-wall turn by its lead.
Grant plays Dennis Bagley, a successful advertising executive whose crisis of conscience begins, of all things, with a pimple cream. Tasked with promoting a product designed to treat boils and blemishes, Bagley spirals into a full-blown existential breakdown. Disgusted by the manipulative foundations of his industry, selling people things they don’t need, or worse, things that might harm them, he tries to sever ties with his former life. He clears out his home, rails against consumerism at dinner parties, and begins to fashion himself as a kind of moral crusader against the capitalist machine. Bagley soon discovers a boil growing on his neck—one that begins to talk, challenge, and eventually supplant him. This grotesque manifestation of his suppressed corporate id becomes both nemesis and successor, pitching products and pithy ad lines with terrifying zeal. As Bagley deteriorates, the boil grows in influence, confidence, and mass until it is in a position to supplant its host.
The metaphor here isn’t subtle. How to Get Ahead in Advertising thrives on a kind of high-pitched absurdity, weaponizing its blunt force satire in a film that’s brims over with vitriolic swipes at Thatcher’s Britain, an era where sweeping privatization and profit came to the fore. The script is heavy on dialogue and Robinson seems less interested in nuance than in detonating every ounce of bile he has for the advertising industry.
At the center of it all is Grant, once again operating at full tilt. His performance is infused with the same manic physicality and venomous wit that made Withnail iconic. He switches between smug confidence, moral outrage, and unhinged mania with frightening speed, and yet manages to anchor the film’s tonal shifts. He even makes even the longer diatribes worth sitting through. Grant lacks a foil beyond himself though, as his wife Julia (Rachel Ward) is little more than a bystander to events.
Visually, Robinson and his team make clever use of prosthetics, Bagley’s transformation is both comical and grotesque, a fitting emblem of the inner rot that comes from selling out your principles for profit. The boil itself becomes the ultimate salesman: brash, confident, and devoid of empathy. As it takes over, it drives home the film’s central thesis, that advertising doesn’t just influence us, it consumes us. Critiques that feel even more pointed today in an era of targeted ads, algorithmic manipulation, and brands that mine our data to better sell us solutions to problems they’ve helped invent.
The Package
The Blu-ray release showcases a new 2K digital restoration, supervised by director of photography Peter Hannan. The image quality is clean, detailed, an free of any signs of over processing. An organic color palette, with stable quality throughout. Having seen this on TV, VHS, and DVD a few times over the years, it’s a really impressive update for the film. The extra features are disappointingly pretty sparse:
- New documentary featuring interviews with writer-director Bruce Robinson and actor Richard E. Grant: The magic of the pairing on screen translates into this documentary, each playing off the other well. Grant in particular bends the interview into something a bit more abstract. Despite this, each adds some great insights about the film (as well as their previous collaboration), with Robinson in particular getting into some political/social commentary that will add plenty of context for non-UK viewers of the film.
- Trailer
- PLUS: An essay by critic David Cairns: Within the liner notes
- New illustration by Jaxon Northon
The Bottom Line
Those seeking out tangential films on the basis of Withnail and I might be a little disappointed by How to Get Ahead in Advertising. It lacks the emotional and narrative depth of Robinson’s first feature. What does work in its favor is the fully committed performance of Richard E. Grant, dueling with himself. A castigation of advertising and commodification of our lives that while a little heavy handed, feels even more pertinent than ever in our current age.
Bruce Robinson’s How to Get Ahead in Advertising is available now via Criterion
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Two Cents: THE DEATH AND LIFE OF MARSHA P. JOHNSON
David France’s 2017 documentary looks into the 1992 death of trans icon and activist and the history of a movement
Two Cents is a Cinapse original column akin to a book club for films. The Cinapse team curates the series and contribute their “two cents” using a maximum of 200-400 words. Guest contributors and comments are encouraged, as are suggestions for future picks. Join us as we share our two cents on films we love, films we are curious about, and films we believe merit some discussion. Would you like to be a guest contributor or programmer for an upcoming Two Cents entry? Simply watch along with us and/or send your pitches or 200-400 word reviews to cinapse.twocents@gmail.com.
The Pick: The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson (2017)
Award-winning documentary filmmaker David France (How to Survive a Plague) explores the history of the gay liberation movement, incorporating archival video into a modern day investigation into the death of transgender icon Marsha P. Johnson. Trans elder Victoria Cruz researches possible suspects behind Johnson’s 1992 death while the current trial of the killer of a young New York trans woman highlights continued violence targeting the transgender community. France’s documentary delves into the exclusion Johnson and sister trans activist Sylvia Rivera faced within the gay rights movement, despite their involvement in the pivotal Stonewall protest.
The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson is currently streaming on Netflix. Trailer below:
The Team
Elizabeth Stoddard
Victoria Cruz is at the center of The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson; we follow her through interviews with aging activists and past friends of Johnson. She makes for a compelling and empathetic figure throughout her investigation. Her story about meeting Sylvia Rivera after years apart had me tearing up (so did her candid talk of the abuse and harassment she faced before coming to work at the Anti-Violence Project).
Johnson’s family and friends speak for her in France’s film, along with a few glimpses we’re shown of her on video. Though a moving storytelling style as archival video is effortlessly woven into the modern day events, we learn about Johnson’s warm, welcoming and friendly nature. I will note, for a documentary about Marsha P. Johnson, this film seems to spend a good deal of time on the life and work of Sylvia Rivera.
There’s impressive footage from a 1994 interview where Rivera talks about Johnson and the night of the riot at Stonewall, the gay club operated by the mob which wouldn’t allow women. Rivera speaks lovingly of Johnson and their founding of Star (Street Transvestites Action Revolutionaries) House for young trans folks in the early 70s. One of the most powerful moments in the doc is the archival clip of an irate Rivera taking down a booing crowd at a 1973 gay rights protest for leaving out trans voices: “I will not forgive the movement.” I ended the film far more aware of Rivera’s impact and activism than that of Johnson. Perhaps this is because the video footage of Johnson is so limited, but it seems worth mentioning.
This isn’t a documentary with easy answers, and we share Cruz’s disappointment and exasperation as the end of her search nears. France’s film becomes clunkier in its last third, losing the momentum that drove the earlier chapters. Still, Cruz’s determination and desire for some justice, as well as the incredible archival footage involved, make the work worth the watch.
Ed Travis
This Pride/Riot theme at Cinapse’s Two Cents this month is one of true exploration for me as I’ve seen none of the titles my teammates have programmed for us! I’ll also admit that not only had I never heard of Marsha P. Johnson before, but upon watching this documentary, I’ve realized I know almost nothing about the iconic Stonewall incident that is so crucial to the gay rights movement. I hope my confession here isn’t judged too harshly, as I see this month of angry LGBTQ cinema we’ve programmed as an opportunity to learn, uncover works of art and experiences I know little about, and hopefully come away a little wiser and more connected to the hopes and dreams of the gay community.
While this documentary was informative and revealed some of the history and culture of the NYC gay scene in the early 1990s, the film itself isn’t structured like an informational doc, but rather as an investigation into whether trans activist Marsha P. Johnson was murdered like so many other trans folks from that time and place. There’s a bit of a true crime, track down the answers vibe with a couple of other “main characters” emerging in the story like the woman doing the investigation, Victoria Cruz, and trans activist Sylvia Rivera.
Honestly, the great takeaway of the film for me, and what most tugged at my heartstrings, is the sheer amount of violence and vitriol our trans brothers and sisters have leveled at them, from society, from authorities, and even from within the wider LGBTQ movement. Marsha’s death isn’t conclusively solved, but the investigation opens our eyes to the massive amount of trans deaths and murders that happen and promptly go unsolved, and sometimes even uninvestigated. And yet, the profound community that emerges as individual people reach out and help one another, is moving. Marsha herself lived with a roommate for 16+ years that seemed to have been a loving and supportive friend who kept her off the streets. And Victoria, a prominent activist, does find herself on the streets and is loved and restored back to a place of belonging through individuals in their community.
We see much joy being spread by Marsha in footage of her, and yet the film is tinged with the tragedy of moments when there wasn’t an ally there to save so many from violent or under-investigated deaths.
Frank Calvillo
This documentary was one of those titles I had often heard about, yet for whatever reason, had always escaped my grasp. It’s a real shame since The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson is one of the most compelling documents about the struggle for trans rights that, unfortunately, is still just as relevant today as it was back in 1992. Mixing vintage footage from the 90s with that of present day to give as complete a portrait of Marsha’s life as possible was not only a stroke of editing genius, but proved the only way to give this icon her proper due.
The story of Marsha P. Johnson proved to be as involving a documentary experience as one could hope to have, thanks to the many narrative threads that make it up. Going into the film, one would expect to be thrust into Marsha’s world and the force of nature that she was in the years leading up to her death. Her presence at the forefront of the gay liberation movement and an unflinching willingness to be totally herself everywhere she went, no matter the cost, helped to make her the revolutionary figure she remains to this day.
But at a certain point the film expands to be something beyond Marsha and the quest to find out what led to her untimely death. Along the way we are introduced to Sylvia Rivera, Marsha’s close friend and co-founder of the movement (a figure so intriguing and inspiring she deserves her own documentary) and Victoria Cruz, a victims’ rights advocate leaving no stone unturned in the search for truth regarding Marsha’s death, which she is determined to solve in her final months before retirement.
As director David France’s film moves between the three storylines, this trio of women emerge as the true stars of The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson, each one with her own dogged desire for the truth, no matter what it looks like. It would be easy to shake one’s head at how the film shows the many strides that still need to be made in the decades following Marsha’s death. Yet Marsha, Sylvia, and Victoria each prove to be pioneers in their own ways, giving their all to a fight that is still ongoing and making sure that voices like Marsha’s remain loud and clear.
Victoria Cruz in The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson. Julian Singleton
I feel fortunate to have grown up in a generation of Queer Youth where Marsha P. Johnson wasn’t a forgotten or little-known piece of history. They’ve become a vital staple of LGBTQ resistance alongside the Stonewall Riots, an icon spotlighting how Trans and gender non-conforming people have always been a part of our fight for equality. Still, I’m ashamed to admit that beyond that iconic status, I knew little about Marsha’s personal history–something I looked forward to rectifying with The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson.
The doc’s strongest asset is the wealth of archival footage (with sound!) of Johnson in their element: a force for low-key goodness. Dressed like an absolute Queen in a mishmash elegant frayed finery, they give away everything they have and partner with fellow icon Sylvia Rivera to found STAR, both doing what they can to to break a cycle of violence forced upon them by the indifference and cruelty of cis heteronormative society. In a documentary that explores some incredibly dark places, David France doesn’t let the weight of unjust tragedy stamp out the light that Johnson and Rivera provided to countless others.
It’s an important doc because it recognizes that the fight for LGBTQ+ equality, trans rights in particular, isn’t over–and that getting justice for past misdeeds can be an insurmountable task when faced with an ever-growing avalanche of atrocities that continue into our present. By paralleling Victoria Cruz’s investigation into Johnson’s death with the case of Islan Nettles, France highlights the enduring apathy toward violence against Trans people. His critique of post-Obergefell LGBTQ+ complacency is sharp and necessary, exposing how some parts of the community seem content to assimilate rather than continue the fight for equality, abandoning those still most vulnerable. It’s especially vital we watched this film now, as a social tide seems to further accept the marginalization and dehumanization of Trans people in society as a method of averting the spotlight of hate from themselves, whether one is part of the LGBTQ movement or not.
However, the film’s legacy is complicated by its proximity to another project, Happy Birthday Marsha, created by Trans filmmakers Tourmaline and Sasha Wortzel. While circumstantial allegations of plagiarism have been largely debunked, I do find myself returning to the very valid question of who gets to tell Marsha’s story and why. France deserves credit for assembling a diverse production team of POC, Trans, and Queer filmmakers and using his platform as an established documentarian to amplify Johnson’s story on a major streamer such as Netflix. Yet it’s also fair to ask whether the film would have been even more resonant had it centered the vision of a Trans filmmaker of color, allowing such a definitive telling of this icon’s story to be more directly informed by deeper lived experience. That said, it would be unfair to dismiss France’s own lived perspective as a gay man—or the care with which he amplifies the voices closest to Marsha: her family, close friends, roommates, and especially her sister-in-arms, Sylvia Rivera. Ultimately, I believe France’s film honors both Johnson and Rivera. Most importantly, it shines a light on the Trans and GNC individuals still fighting today—those who, like Marsha, deserve to be heard and protected in return by the community they dedicated their lives to.
I’d be amiss if I didn’t close out this post with a more substantive call to action–so if you can, pitch in a donation to organizations like Trans Lifeline who are putting in active work to aid Trans individuals.
Justin Harlan
While the life of Marsha P. Johnson is fascinating and exploring the circumstances surrounding her death is compelling, I have to admit that this is a film that I struggled to be captivated by. For me, this was a case of the type of documentary where the subject matter was the main reason to keep watching, rather than the type of documentary where the presentation of that subject matter shined – in other words, Marsha’s life and death were far more interesting than this film made them feel.
To be clear, this is simply a personal preference for me, as the documentary is certainly competently made. For me, it simply didn’t do justice to the power of the story itself.
With this said, I still appreciated this as a jumping off point for the rabbit hole that it led me on in reading up and watching more on Marsha, her death, and other key figures touched on in the film. It also coincided with a post from an Instagram account I follow that highlights examples of “Christians who don’t suck” that sent me further down said rabbit hole.
Two Cents Celebrates the month of June with Pride/Riot
Join us all month long for a collection of titles that spotlight the LGBTQ+ community with a mix of heart, edge, and defiance.
June 16 – Velvet Goldmine (Internet Archive)
June 23 – Stranger By The Lake– (Criterion Channel, Kanopy)
June 30 – BPM (Kanopy, Pluto)
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The Archivist: Bernie Casey and Pam Grier in HIT MAN (1972), Finally on Blu
The indomitably bad and effortlessly cool Bernie Casey stars in an early blaxploitation film that was not only one of his first major roles, but one of Pam Grier’s as well.
Following the sudden death of his brother, Tyrone Tackett (Casey) returns to L.A. hungry for justice and thirty for blood. He doesn’t believe his brother’s fatal car crash was an accident, and his suspicions are immediately confirmed by an icy welcome. It’s not long before shady cats start hitting him with unsubtle advice to get out of town. Tyrone may be a dapper fellow, with his stylish afro and fabulous wardrobe of suits and hats, but not afraid to get his hands dirty. He’s also not particularly scrupulous in his own dealings or shy about laying down the hurt on his enemies, especially after multiple encounters and betrayals wear down his patience.
It’s a relatively mean-spirited film, and while Tyrone occasionally stops to make time for some lovin’ and some spots of comedy, he’s mostly raising hell. His dogged trek through the underbelly of L.A. is an escalating shakedown in a world of prostitutes and porn magnates, and motel rooms and high-rises, and even mixes things up with some forays into the animal violence – an underground dogfight and a wildlife sanctuary that hosts some hungry lions (who aren’t picky about what kind of meat they can get).
Oh, and lots and lots of phone calls.
Casey and Grier are supported by a solid cast of character actors, including some familiar genre and TV actors like Edmund Cambridge, Roger E. Mosley, and one of the most expressively grizzled and recognizable “that guy” faces of the 70s, Sam Laws.
Like many blaxploitation films, this Americanized remake of Get Carter is narratively heightened and stylized, but physically a window into a real time and place, in this case shot on location in early 70s L.A. – from the grittiest street level hovels and porno theaters to mansions and developments of the elite and powerful, and seemingly everywhere in between. In a bit of a trope for 70s action films and exploitation pictures, the film’s climax takes place in the towering steel conveyances of a big industrial shipping yard.
The film was produced by Gene Corman, whose brother Roger had just given Pam her start. With her terrific qualities immediately evident while working in Roger’s Philippines-shot women in prison productions, she was quickly tapped for supporting roles in Gene’s Cool Breeze and Hit Man, her first appearances in the emerging blaxploitation genre. (Her third, Coffy, would make her a star). At the helm was George Armitage (Vigilante Force), a member and later graduate of the Corman circle who’s arguably better known for his 90s films, Grosse Pointe Blank and Miami Blues.
The Package
At long last, Hit Man is now available on Blu-ray as part of the Warner Archive Collection. The film has long been part of Warner Archive’s catalogue as an MOD DVD and has finally made its long-anticipated (by me) Blu-ray debut.
The release is part of a recent effort to bring Warner’s Archive’s blaxploitation DVD back catalogue – including Black Belt Jones, Black Eye, Three the Hard Way, and the upcoming Melinda – to Blu-ray.
While not particularly known for being a beautiful film, it’s quite nicely shot by Andrew Davis, who got his feature film start working on Gene Corman productions including Cool Breeze, Private Parts, and The Slams – if that name sounds familiar, it’s probably because he went on to become one of the biggest action directors of the 90s (The Fugitive, Above the Law, Under Siege).
This Blu-ray does a terrific job of showing off his eye, especially pertaining to some of the film’s low light cinematography and more striking compositions.
This Blu-ray edition’s sole supplement is an okay-quality Theatrical Trailer. While more supplemental features would have been appreciated, this output isn’t particularly surprising as the DVD release was a Warner Archive MOD, rather than a standard release.)
A/V Out.
Get it at Amazon: https://amzn.to/43CBdJA
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Family Legacies are Waking Nightmares in BEST WISHES TO ALL
Yuta Shimotsu’s unsettling debut unearths the ritual brutality at the heart of generational loyalty
In Yuta Shimotsu’s Best Wishes to All, Kotone Furukawa (Cloud, Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy) plays an unnamed nursing student who returns to her remote village to visit her elderly grandparents. With the rest of her family delayed due to her little brother’s illness, she’s forced to make the trip alone, allowing her time to reacquaint herself with the picturesque hamlet and her loving relatives. However, it’s not long before their home reminds her of a childhood phobia–an upstairs room, shut off from the rest of the house, where creaking noises emanate at night. The student also observes her grandparents’ increasingly odd behavior, whether inexplicably snorting like pigs at the dining room table over freshly cut pork, staring off into space in the middle of midnight hallways, or sleepwalking into door-crashing runs. Are these signs of dementia, a homegrown conspiracy, or something far more sinister?
The best kinds of horror films take their time revealing just what kind of horror lies at their core. The Exorcist, for example, spends much of its time as a slow-burn medical thriller before diving full deep into possession, as does Hereditary with its exploration of Faustian bargains. Part of the joy of these films is the dreadful thrill of discovery, realizing alongside the characters what’s at stake, what rules must be followed, and how our heroes fit into the terrifying scheme of things.
It’s an element that first drew me to Japanese horror films as an impressionable preteen in the early 2000s, dazzled by the idea that horror films could evoke powerful dread without a central antagonist like Michael Myers or Jason. Although the genre eventually leaned towards prominent yurei ghosts like Ring’s Sadako and Ju-on’s Kayako, many films still drew from the depths of horror in ordinary life, transforming even the simplest scenarios into threats with a perfect blend of menace and impending doom. Influential J-Horror figures like Kiyoshi Kurosawa and Takashi Shimizu have quietly fostered the next generation of Japanese Horror. Consequently, it has been intriguing to observe the transformation of Japanese horror beyond the archetypes that once fascinated global audiences, as creatives like Mari Asato, Koji Shiraishi, and Yoshihiro Nakamura forge distinctive visions of horror that resist such broad classification.
Winner of the Scariest Film Award at this year’s Overlook Film Festival, Yuta Shimotsu’s Best Wishes to All marks another exciting leap forward for Japanese horror. Supervised by Ju-on creator Takashi Shimizu, Shimotsu’s feature adaptation of his award-winning short film is a magnetic slow burn, whose true nature remains elusive to its increasingly disturbed audience until a captivating and chilling third act unveils unsettling consequences for the world at large. At its core, Best Wishes to All is a film that doesn’t just induce dread, but also evokes a crucial, timely anger. Rather than drawing from ancient folklore or a detached supernatural force as sources for terror, Shimotsu emphasizes pressing real-world anxieties about generational dynamics and the immeasurable burdens the old normalize for and weaponize against the young.
Running a concise 88 minutes, Shimotsu’s bleak vision is both aggressively and methodically paced. Furukawa’s return to the village and many moments afterward are illuminated with dappled sunshine, evoking a pastoral nostalgia that swiftly turns to decay. Its horrors are not immediately evident as Furukawa takes detours reconnecting with childhood friends or witnessing other quaint village matters, cultivating an illusion of Best Wishes as more of a slice-of-life drama. Those familiar with the pacing of films by Kiyoshi Kurosawa or his contemporary Ryusuke Hamaguchi will be well-prepared for Shimotsu’s Best Wishes, as his moments of silence are often interrupted by jarring instances of surreality. These unexpected breaks feel completely out of place yet entirely organic to the preceding situations, leading us to doubt the normalcy we’ve taken for granted. Ironically, the horror of Best Wishes is altogether relative – playing into an acknowledged phobia of this writer, these scenarios often go unacknowledged by the students’ relatives and other strangers, rendering Furukawa’s bewilderment or terror as isolating as it is relatable.
This alienating approach creates a chameleonic tone that Shimotsu and co-writer Rumi Kakuta can shape into whatever genre directions they choose. Initially, Best Wishes to All resembles a Japanese interpretation of something like The Visit or Get Out, with the perplexing actions of these diabolical grandparents seemingly confined to the claustrophobic house until a dramatic shift propels Best Wishes to All into a gleefully grim and expansive new emotional register. Shimotsu’s scope broadens to capture the essence of something like The Wicker Man without any reliance on religious framing, and the film’s sardonic humor aligns more with Ari Aster’s Beau is Afraid rather than the expected Midsommar–but with much more successful outcomes due to its sharp, focused brevity.
However, Best Wishes to All’s opacity and power of suggestion represent both a weakness and a strength. Some emotional beats are quickly glossed over as Shimotsu pushes Furukawa from one emotional extreme to another, and moments of understandable and much-needed action are deliberately delayed for slice-of-life scenes that end up feeling out of place, provoking viewers’ impatience. Your mileage may vary regarding the effectiveness of Shimotsu’s plotting here–as a fan of Kurosawa and Hamaguchi, the palpable frustration only underscored the banal evil of what Furukawa faced; however, I understand how this may irritate other genre fans expecting more exciting J-Horror-esque fare.
While the film’s story delightfully zigzags away from its audience’s expectations, Shimotsu and Kakuta remain firmly connected to the significant societal issues that create fertile ground for their series of scares. Declining birth rates, economic unpredictability, and other societal anxieties in Japan have strained traditional values of filial piety over the past few decades. With Best Wishes, Shimotsu channels these issues into a universal sense of existential, nearly cosmic terror throughout the film, even before Furukawa discovers her relatives’ central secret, one she initially resists but is pressured to take a culpable role in. Furukawa’s relatives and acquaintances downplay her horrified reactions as childlike naïveté toward how the world truly works, further underlining the eroding generational gap at the film’s core as part of a disturbing, society-wide dystopia. There are interesting thoughts on what Shimotsu refers to as the “urban legend concept of The Law of Conservation of Earthly Emotions”–that there is a finite balance between happiness and unhappiness; here, the world Furukawa’s elders have created in their children’s name only makes chattel out of future generations, fueling a disturbing sense lopsided hereditary unease. Over time, the terrors of Best Wishes evolve and recede the longer she and the audience are immersed in this world, leading us to contemplate what we’re willing to accept to achieve and maintain the lives we and our loved ones deserve. It’s less about escaping or changing the world we inhabit, and, even worse, more about accepting our place in the world into which we are born.
This sense of futile acceptance, shaped by the past two decades of Japanese horror, becomes even more energized by Best Wishes’ bitter social relevance. In witnessing how this woman seeks to rebel against the realities of her everyday world, we may find the strength as a society to question the values that have placed its audience in similar circumstances. It’s an excellent utilization of passive acceptance as a clarion call for change, even if Shimotsu doesn’t aim to provide many (if any) answers to the intriguing questions he raises.
Best Wishes to All premieres exclusively on Shudder on June 13, 2025.
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DIABLO: It’s Marko Zaror Versus Scott Adkins in a Killer Showdown
Chilean director Ernesto Díaz Espinoza has been reliably cranking out action films for almost 20 years now, not to mention also writing and editing many of them, and kind of single handedly putting Chilean cinema on the international stage. Much of his work has been in collaboration with another rising star of the international action scene, Mr. Marko Zaror. Together they’ve brought us Mirageman (2006), Kiltro (2006), Mandrill (2008), Redeemer (2014), and Fist Of The Condor (2023). I’ve personally seen and enjoyed all of those titles to varying extents, and probably rank Fist Of The Condor as their best collaboration. So they’re on a roll, even as Zaror continues to shine in top notch action projects like John Wick Chapter 4.
For their latest collaboration, they brought in the hardest working man in modern action cinema, Mr. Scott Adkins, to be the leading man in Diablo. Adkins is a talent I follow just about anywhere, having seen virtually every single project he’s ever starred in. Lately I’ve slowed down a little and haven’t caught all of his most recent work outside of stellar turns in One More Shot and John Wick Chapter 4. Here in Diablo he plays Kris Chaney, a guy who seems to be our protagonist and hero, but who also kidnaps a teenage girl (Alanna De La Rossa as Elisa) in the first act to spark our curiosity and keep us on our toes. As Kris and Elisa form a bit of an understanding amidst repeated attempts at Elisa’s life, the landscape is cleared for a major showdown between Adkins’ straight man Kris and Zaror’s frightening and flamboyant hired killer El Corvo (“the crooked”).
The bones of Diablo are quite solid. Adkins, Zaror, and Espinoza assisted on story with Mat Sansom writing. It seems clear the story was honed to highlight some of the stars’ best talents and capabilities. Kris is a bit of a square, but as his back story is unveiled we come to root for him to win over Elisa and rescue her from Vicente, the drug dealing kingpin who has also raised her as a loving father. Kris and Vicente (Lucho Valesco) have a past, which complicates things. But El Corvo is a mystery to Kris, and it’s Zaror’s crazed serial killing hitman who is the absolute standout of Diablo. Zaror pulls out all the stops to create what is hands down one of his most memorable characters to date. Bald, bespectacled, and bewildering, El Corvo is like a martial arts practicing Anton Chigur from No Country For Old Men. He’s disciplined, unsettling, and he absolutely will not stop. Ever. Until you are dead. So you’ve got equal parts Chigur, the Terminator, and even a little Han from Enter The Dragon with his interchangeable prosthetic hands that sometimes serve as assets in his murderous toolkit.
I will say that Zaror’s psycho killer is far and away the best and most entertaining part of Diablo. Zaror’s performance is dialed in, the writing is chilling, and the realization of this character through the fights and set pieces is wildly entertaining. To some extent, Zaror far outshines everyone else and runs away with the movie. I think 10 years from now El Corvo will be the element audiences generally remember from Diablo. That said, there’s genuinely a lot to like beyond Zaror. Espinoza is a clean-as-hell action director and Adkins comes off looking fantastic in his various fight scenes. Composer “Rocco” infuses the film with a catchy electronic score. And ultimately the bond between Kris and Elisa is pretty well done.
But beyond Zaror’s frightening killer character, the second most standout element would have to be the final action setpiece. I won’t spoil many of the dynamics at play in this epic conclusion, but I will say it’s set in an old factory (where most self-respecting DTV action films wrap up if we’re being honest). And there’s an absolutely mental ticking clock working against our heroes that you have to see to believe. Diablo thrives not on wads of major studio cash for a spectacle-laden CGI finale, but rather harkens back to the literal silent film days, with a damsel in distress tied to railroad tracks and a mustache twirling villain cackling as our hero desperately tries to save the day. As a lifelong action fan, even I will say that one the genre’s biggest faults is its samey-ness. There’s only so many ways to kick and punch someone, or to save the damsel, or to outfox the villain. Here in 2025, Diablo thrives on finding ways to make itself stand out with solid essential bones and successful theatrical flare harkening back to the earliest days of cinema.
And I’m Out.
Diablo hits theaters, on demand, and digital on June 13th, 2025 from Lionsgate
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The Archivist – Bring Home TOM & JERRY’s Best with The Complete Cinemascope Collection
The duo’s cinematic widescreen shorts are collected on Blu-ray
Tom and Jerry are one of television and cinema’s most enduring duos, still regularly featured in a never-ending parade of slapstick-packed movies and television shows.
They’re been through lots of different iterations, from their origins as human characters at RKO, to modern feature films, from their re-invention as cat and mouse by Hanna-Barbera, to my personal favorite version, the Chuck Jones era.
But I think if you ask most animation fans about the most classic or iconic version of the duo, they’ll likely conjure up mental images of the 1950s toons as the golden age versions these characters.
Warner Archive’s new Cinemascope Collection collects 23 classic Tom & Jerry shorts from the 1950s, specifically all the theatrical in the widescreen theatrical Cinemascope format. It’s not a complete collection of all the shorts of the era; which also saw the release of other shorts in standard aspect ratio.
This era of the cartoons series represents the height of Hanna-Barbera’s gorgeous theatrical animation (which would later be cheapened for television as the more familiar version of their “house style”), and featured some wonderful recurring characters like Spike the bulldog and his puppy son Tyke, Tom’s neighborhood rival cat Butch, the adorable Quacker the duckling, Nibbles the mouse, and Jeannie the teen babysitter. Tom and Jerry are usually natural rivals, but if you like the episodes where they team up (I do), there are some of those gems here.
In addition to the Tom & Jerry cartoons, the disc also includes are also a couple of bonus shorts featuring spinoff characters Spike and Tyke, as well as a very unusual holiday-themed sort, Good Will to Men.
Some of the highlights from this collection:
Blue Cat Blues
Probably the greatest Tom & Jerry toon of all time, and certainly one of the most unusual. It’s narrated by the usually non-speaking Jerry (voice of Paul Frees), who relates the sad story of his friend Tom. Tom squandered away his life savings and went into debt trying to impress his love interest, only to lose out to his rival Butch. It’s an iconic episode that’s sad, hilarious, and more adult than the usual subject matter.
Pet Peeve
Tom’s Photo FinishIn Pet Peeve, upset by the high cost of feeding their pets who eat non-stop, Tom and Spike’s owners contemplate giving one of them up, sparking an intense rivalry as each tries to be the ideal pet while sabotaging the other.
Tom’s Photo Finish is another story that focuses on the rivalry between Tom and Spike as pets of the same owners. Tom plants incriminating evidence on Spot to shift his own blame, but Jerry took a photo of the deed, and is now posting copies all over the house while a panic-stricken Tom tries to stop him.
Southbound Duckling
That’s My Mommy
Happy Go DuckySeveral shorts feature Quacker the baby duckling (whose voice resembles a cuter Donald Duck), a little fella whose naivete tends to get him into trouble. My favorite among these is That’s My Mommy, which features him as a brand new hatchling who imprints Tom – who is plotting to eat him – as his mother.
The Flying Sorceress
Tired of his home life, Tom answers a want ad seeking a cat – but it turns out his new job is a position as a witch’s familiar. Tom being Tom, makes the mistake of swiping her broomstick.
Busy Buddies
Tot WatchersIt’ll take all of Tom and Jerry’s wits to try to mind the ornery baby as it crawls through increasingly dangerous scenarios while Jeannie, the inattentive teen babysitter, gabs on the phone. The Roger Rabbit shorts with Baby Herman, produced forty years later, were clearly inspired by these shorts.
Touche, Pussy Cat
Tom and Cherie
Royal Cat NapThese Musketeers-themed short feature Jerry as a French kingsguard trying to train up a young d’Artagnon-esgue Nibbles. The same duo also features in a similar Robin Hood-themed episode, Robin Hoodwinked.
The Package
Tom and Jerry: The Complete CinemaScope Collection features 23 Tom and Jerry , plus 3 bonus shorts, on a single Blu-ray disc.
If you’re a fan of the material this is an easy recommend, as these are among the best shorts from the Tom and Jerry catalogue and of the era.
But you’ll want to weigh it against the digital option. On digital platforms like iTunes, you can purchase a massive super-collection called Tom & Jerry Volumes 1-6 , a massive set of 119 shorts for only $40 (and I’ve seen it priced as low as $20, which is what I paid for it). It includes all 23 of the Tom and Jerry shorts in this collection – but not the 3 bonus shorts.
A/V Out.
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THE PHOENICIAN SCHEME, Wes Anderson Returns With Another Pitch-Perfect Period Comedy
Filmmaker Wes Anderson’s (Asteroid City, The French Dispatch, Moonrise Kingdom) latest film, The Phoenician Scheme, a typically brilliant period satire, centers on the mid-20th-century embodiment of corrupt, late-stage capitalism, an unscrupulous, megalomaniacal titan of industry (aka, an oligarch), Anatole “Zsa-Zsa” Korda (Benicio del Toro), as he faces all manner of existential, personal, and professional crises, up to and including multiple attempts on his life by assassins known and unknown, an uncertain, fraught relationship with his daughter, Liesl (standout Mia Threapleton), and the potential failure of his life’s work, a massive infrastructure project long on egomaniacal ambition and potentially short on the necessary funds.
The Phoenician Scheme opens on a predictably comic note, with Korda’s near-demise as his private airplane suffers an emergency decompression followed by a rapid unscheduled disassembly courtesy of a well-placed bomb. Korda’s unnamed assistant doesn’t survive, but Korda and his pilot (Stephen Park) do, the latter via parachute moments after his unceremonious firing. In unmistakably Andersonian fashion, an on-the-spot news crew assumes Korda didn’t survive the airplane’s crash in a cornfield. An out-of-frame Korda, gingerly holding what he drolly describes as an errant “vestigial organ,” strides into view, definitely worse for wear, but even more eager to conquer what’s left of the mid-20th-century world.
Except, maybe not, at least not in Korda’s complicated case. Between the annoyances, setbacks, and obstacles associated with repeated attempts on his life and frequent forays into a medieval black-and-white dream world where the Powers-That-Be have put Korda’s immortal soul on trial for a multitude of venal and mortal sins, Korda begins an essential, introspective journey, reflecting on his failings and failures as a parent to Liesl, a novitiate nun in the Roman Catholic Church weeks away from taking her final vows. In Korda’s eyes, she’s a paragon of virtue — and not just virtue-signaling — in a fallen world, and thus his exact opposite in every way. Liesl represents a rare second chance for a man who seemingly has everything (e.g., wealth, power, influence), but who starts to question the relentless, unyielding capitalistic ethos that’s defined his life until now.
Like practically every captain or titan of industry before him (fictional or otherwise), Korda has constructed his life around amassing wealth, palatial estates in far-flung countries, and classical European art. But even that’s not enough for Korda. He wants to be remembered long after he’s departed this mortal plane for the next. Korda wants to build a gargantuan monument to match his equally gargantuan ego, the kind of monument monarchs and dictators tend to build for — and to — themselves: A project so massive, so mammoth, and thus, undeniably memorable well beyond the capacity for Korda to fund himself; in turn creating a potentially ruinous “Gap.” Filling that gap drives The Phoenician Scheme’s otherwise episodic, cameo-rich plot set in various corners and quadrants of the fractious, fictionalized, Middle Eastern-inspired nation-state of Phoenicia.
Increasingly mindful of his impending mortality, Korda makes Liesl his sole heir (his 9 sons, some adopted, some biological, get yearly stipends, apparently) and the provisional executor of his affairs if an assassin’s bullet finds him before he completes his life’s work. She understandably balks, preferring the pious, unadorned life of a nun to the far more complicated, materially focused life of a capitalistic entrepreneur. That, in turn, sets in motion, The Phoenician Scheme’s central conflict and through-line: Korda’s gradual humanization, not to mention evolution into a human being no longer obsessed with material acquisition or social status, through his interactions with the steadfast, loyal Liesl, and his newly hired administrative assistant and tutor, Bjørn Lund (Michael Cera).
The various in-film stops essential to filling in the funding “gap” allow Anderson, a singular auteurist without parallel, to indulge his usual playfulness (aka whimsy, a dirty word to some, the opposite to others) in settings, tone, and humor. The first interlude involves a pick-up game of basketball inside a train tunnel, the second at a Moroccan-inspired nightclub, the third aboard a steamer, the fourth in the proximity of a dam construction, and the last at a cheekily garish, Egyptian-themed hotel where the various characters, subplots, and themes happily devolve into physical comedy and a literally farcical explosion to the proceedings and the central, overarching storyline.
It’s all, of course, eminently satisfying, pleasing, and ultimately entertaining as only Anderson’s films can be, benefitting from Anderson’s signature visual style (centered compositions, traveling or tracking shots, etc.), Bruno Delbonnel’s picture-perfect cinematography, Adam Stockhausen’s geometrically oriented production design, and Milena Canonero’s impeccably tailored, complementary costumes, and an earworm-worthy score courtesy of Alexandre Desplat.
As with most of Anderson’s decades-spanning filmography, artifice reigns supreme in The Phoenician Scheme. Not just the usual, mostly invisible artifice typical of traditional, realist filmmaking, but on artifice front and center, first and foremost, both for the aesthetic pleasures surface-level artifice provides and for its seamless merging with theme, story, and character until Andersonian authenticity, emotional more than narrative, emerges: Once examined through The Phoenician Scheme‘s fanciful permutations, Korda’s life becomes all the more worth living.
The Phoenician Scheme opens theatrically on Friday, June 6th, via Focus Features.
