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SXSW 2025: CLOWN IN A CORNFIELD Watch Out Art, Here Comes Frendo!
Easily, one of my most anticipated films going into SXSW was the premier of the feature length adaptation of Philly writer Adam Cesare’s first book in his hit slasher YA series Clown in Cornfield (2020). Directed by Eli Craig (Tucker and Dale Vs Evil) the film follows Quinn Maybrook (Katie Douglas) a street smart Philly girl who just moved to the small rural farm town of Kettle Springs, Missouri with her dad. Quinn immediately gets the attention of the local bad boy Cole (Carson MacCormac), who’s also the son of the owner of the Baypen Corn Syrup company, which once employed the majority of the sleepy town before burning down.
Cole and the gang’s favorite pastime is crafting mini horror videos featuring the Corn Syrup’s beloved clown mascot Frendo, who they’ve turned into a serial killer in their videos, hunting their friends in their viral scare skits. This perversion of the town’s beloved clown mascot who calls back to a simpler time is an unintentionally sharp metaphor by the kids; that is until life imitates art and Cole’s friends start dropping thanks to a killer on the loose in a Frendo mask. The narrative eventually pits the teens of the town against Frendo, who’s hunting anyone not yet old enough to vote as we soon discover stands for something surprisingly bleak when all is said and done.
My biggest surprise was, sitting down for what I thought would be an edgy YA film – only to get a HARD-R slasher with ample heapings of the red stuff and some TRULY gnarly kills. While the safe bet would have probably been to go with a PG-13 a la most of the horror films at the multiplex, we quickly realize there is absolutely nothing safe about Clown. For a modestly budgeted slasher, I think that was the smartest move they could have made and kept in step with the 80s horror that was always aimed at a much younger audience. While Clown does skirt nudity and sex, for violence, I can’t be mad given how many times Clown made me squirm in my seat with some pretty grisly kills.
The gore is paired with an actual message and a socially conscious script, that is all about subverting the tropes of the subgenre, tied together with thematic tissue that has something genuinely more terrifying to offer than a simple redneck rampage. This is aided by a cast led by Douglas who never quite feels like your a-typical final girl. She’s not the most innocent girl, and she’s never portrayed as helpless, it’s more or less just the wrong place at the wrong time. The film also plays with the other archetypes of the slasher with everyone turning out to be something a bit more than you’d expect. It manages to do this without trying to be meta or looking down the subgenre, or just being mean, which makes it a hell of a lot of fun.
The other thing that struck me about the film is kids in Clown feel unapologetically like kids, and less than simply meat for the grinder. I think that’s something a lot of slashers struggle with is their 13 going on 30 casts, who feel more like caricature sketches than anything else. A symptom of that is, because you’re not invested in the prey, you end up rooting for the hunter. Here that’s not the case and I found myself rooting for the ensemble led by Douglas who together with her co-stars deliver some fun twists while fighting for their lives. This is backed up by a script that is about talking to, rather than down to its YA demographic as the sinisterness behind Frendo’s motives is something that I found myself pondering long after I walked out of my screening.
Simply stated Clown in Cornfield is a blood soaked blast! The film thankfully leaves behind the nihilism of the other clown franchise to use its runtime to explore generational trauma and the hopelessness of small town life through the slasher lens. It’s how the film chooses to leverage those ideas and the film’s kill count that explain the well deserved fandom around the series. That said I think my favorite part going forward and something that’s unprecedented in the slasher subgenre is there are two more books out with another one on the way. So this might be the first slasher who’s ever had this kind of literary blueprint going forward, which judging by the audience only gets better. I honestly can’t wait…
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SXSW 2025: GOOD BOY Sees Pupper Vs. Poltergeist in a Fresh Spin on an Familiar Tale
A film that showcases impressive craft as well as a breakout star
For all of us who have ever had a four legged friend, we know all too well those comical, confusing, and sometimes unsettling moments when they seem to be reacting to something that isn’t there. Staring into a corner, growling at a closet, or hiding from something that we just cannot see or make sense of. Familiar to so many, it’s surprising that fully translating this onto the big screen hasn’t happened already. Enter Ben Leonberg and his trusty dog Indy to deliver a brilliantly creative take on the haunted house genre.
Indy knows something his owner Todd (played by Shane Jensen & Leonberg) doesn’t. That something dark lingers at the periphery of their lives. After recovering from a bout of illness, Todd drags his canine companion out into the wilderness to move into the dilapidated home left to him by his recently deceased grandfather (Larry Fessenden). Todd’s sister Vera (Arielle Friedman) is concerned that isolation isn’t best for his rehabilitation, but they’re not alone. Indy is all too aware that this force has followed them out to the house. As the presence starts to manifest itself more strongly, Todd gets weaker and starts to succumb to a recurrence of his illness, leaving Indy alone with this force that threatens them both.
The dog perspective is a fantastic device to leverage into horror. Indy does those things that dogs do, staring into dark corners, refusing to go into certain rooms, or barking at unseen threats. This is in addition to the affable activities you’d expect. It’s an emotive performance that would put many of our A-listers to shame. More than a gimmick, channeling things through the dog’s perspective and reactions only amplify events as they unfold.
The film is beautifully lit and smartly shot, leveraging shadows and reflective elements, as well as standout sound design to build genuine tension and afford a few effective jump scares. Indy’s dreams explore more abstract imagery, including an echo of the previous dog who lived in the house. It’s compelling fare, leaving you truly invested in his experience. From the tiniest whimper to more intense sequences as he jumps through windows or charges into a forest you know is laced with animal traps. The camera panning at dog height adding to the immersion. The tilts into action feel a little at odds with the overall tone of the film, but do a good job of adding energy and impetus as the concept enters its endgame. A little more problematic is how underdeveloped Todd is. Dialing back the human element to allow the canine component to come to the fore is understandable, but the film feels like it has the capacity to handle both. There are also conversations and old home videos being played seem to allude to Todd’s grandfather befalling a similar fate, but this inherited curse aspect is glossed over, missing another opportunity to add a little depth and intrigue.
These issues aside, Good Boy is a treat for fans of the haunted house genre. The script from Leonberg and co-writer Alex Cannon breaks conventions, not in an edgy way, but in one that is immediately resonant to us. Leonberg, alongside his real life partner/producer Kari Fischer patiently spent 3 years and over 400 days of shooting to wrangle Indy and the footage they captured or randomly ended up with into a captivating narrative. The result is a film packed with charm, creativity, and enough classic horror elements to put you on the edge of your seat. All this while serving as an admirable tribute to man’s best friend.
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SXSW 2025: ZODIAC KILLER PROJECT Turns a Failed Film Into a True Crime Examination
Zodiac Killer Project is a lemonade-from-lemons documentary that covers both the chronicling of a movie that never was (and never will be) and the true crime genre writ large. In exploring the tropes and tricks of the genre, director Charlie Shackleton reveals the homogenization of true crime documentaries. In doing so, he lovingly pokes fun at the genre, while also raising interesting questions along the way.
For Shackleton, Zodiac Killer Project springs from his failed attempt to adapt Lyndon E. Lafferty’s book “The Zodiac Killer Cover-Up: The Silenced Badge.” After negotiations for the book rights fell through, Shackleton couldn’t quite let the project go. From what we hear about what he intended, it may be better that this is where he ended up. In his narration, Shackleton describes many scenes that would’ve appeared in his film while the camera lingers on shots of empty parking spaces, various buildings that would’ve been locations in the film, and nature.
Shackleton is an engaging and affable narrator. He brings a conversational tone that is inviting. It’s easy to picture yourself sitting across the table from him, having coffee while he tells his tales. Shackleton, and the film, is at his best when he talks about the nuts and bolts of true crime filmmaking: how to stage scenes for maximum impact, shading elements of the story to build drama and/or dance around potential legal land mines. He also notes the use of “evocative B-roll” to help establish key info the most generic way possible (such as old home footage of kids playing in front yards) or the use of “back-tors,” the faceless people who walk across rooms (often obscured by shadow and fuzzy focus). Shackleton accompanies these descriptions with examples from a litany of the most popular true crime documentaries of the last 15 years.
Seeing all of the shows and films side by side calls into question the whole true crime enterprise. There has always been an insidiousness to the genre, with the best examples tapping into larger themes (like the societal and systemic failures that lead to the documented crimes). When a documentary leads to an arrest, an acquittal, or some other real world change, it feels like the whole endeavor is worth it. But too often the result is exploitation at the hands of amatuer sleuths.
I’ve enjoyed plenty of true crime books, movies, podcasts, and shows over the years, so I definitely felt seen by Shackleton and I suspect others will too. I can’t remember when, but at some point I had a bit of a reckoning with myself and realized I needed to be a more discerning viewer. I needed to get away from the salaciousness of it all. While the Zodiac Killer Project doesn’t really go deep on this topic, Shackleton gets close enough to make me consider, again, my relationship to true crime. All told, Zodiac Killer Project keeps things fairly light. Given Shackleton’s obvious affection and knowledge of the genre, I’m left wishing he had been more critical of the genre. As it is, his film is entertaining and worth thinking about. I saw it last night, and today SXSW is premiering a documentary about one of Austin’s most notorious crimes (the Yogurt Shop Murders). There’s a message there.
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“Murdered By Pirates is Good” – A Triple-Feature Pirate Podcast
Talking Captain Blood, The Pirates, and The Princess Bride for Swashbuckler Month
1935’s Captain Blood, 2014’s The Pirates, and 1987’s The Princess Bride Resident Brendans Foley and Agnew have been chatting movies and sundries on the podcast “Make Me Watch It” for the past year and change after years of working the TWO CENTS beat, and decided to do something special for Cinapse’s March Swashbuckler Madness. Having long established a shared love for adventure and derring-do, we raise the Jolly Roger to a trio of buccaneer films that revel in high seas adventure and swordplay. Aside from simply enjoying movies where people in fancy clothes swing swords at each other all fancy-like, we were fascinated to examine how this sub-genre evolved from the page of pulp adventure novels to the silver screen. Not only did it prove a cornerstone for early Hollywood’s capture of public imagination, this potent combination made waves across international cinema as well.
Captain Blood was already the focus of the most recent TWO CENTS Column, and we go into spoilerific detail on why it’s assured its place in film history both for its own quality as well as for its near century-long influence on action and adventure films. We also cover South Korea’s The Pirates, a story of the great hunt for the Royal Seal of Joseon after it’s swallowed by a whale, and the unlikely team of pirate captain and bandit leader who cross paths in their pursuit. Finally, we go long on Rob Reiner’s The Princess Bride, a film that found a moderate audience on release only to evolve from cult favorite to bone-fide classic in the years that followed. Join us for a rollicking time of dashing rogues, swashbuckling seafolk, dastardly villains, and jovial giants in Episode 37: “Murdered By Pirates is Good.”
May the wind be ever in your sails.
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SXSW 2025: BOXCUTTER An Aspiring Rapper Battles Self-Doubt
The intersection of preparation and opportunity is luck, as the saying goes. In Reza Dahya’s Boxcutter, luck is something else for young Rome (Ashton James), an aspiring rapper. Rome’s luck manifests in the form of a robbery where he loses his laptop and all his music. And thus, kicks off Boxcutter, and the hectic day that follows for Rome as he races against time to get his stuff before a potentially life and career-altering meeting with a famous producer.
But what Rome doesn’t expect, and where Boxcutter shines brightest, is the existential reckoning coming his way. As we’re introduced to Rome at the start of the film, he seems like he’s on the come up. He’s got tracks, confidence, and he’s ready for the chance to get his name out there. He’s a real artist, “my shit is cinematic,” he says to his friend Jenaya (Zoe Lewis). He’s not interested in the flashy singles or freestyles or what he perceives as shortcuts to getting traction. He makes albums. It’s clear early on that Rome has ambition. What he lacks, however, is the courage.
Rome and Jenaya go from one stop to the next in the quest to recover Rome laptop, but what they find is Rome’s deep well of self-doubt. A standout scene finds Rome and Jenaya at a club, Rome on stage being told to rap to help facilitate a soundcheck. Jenaya is the only person in the crowd, and Rome completely blows the moment, fumbling through his phone for the right verse. It’s reminiscent of the early scene from 8 Mile where Jimmy (Eminem) balks during the battle and vomits mom’s spaghetti in the bathroom. The image of Rome standing onstage, unable to say anything in front of a nearly open room is potent.
From that point on Boxcutter takes on a different vibe. It becomes about Rome’s crippling self-doubt and figuring out what it takes to actually chase your dreams. Rome’s done the work from the safety of anonymity. All that’s left is to take that final step and put himself out there, open himself up to failure or success. James’ performance is strongest when playing Rome’s insecurity.
Set in Toronto, Dahya and writer Chris Cromie are out to tell more than just Rome’s story. While Rome is the primary focus, the film makes time to spotlight the city and other artists. It creates this kaleidoscopic image of the Toronto art scene and the ways the artists overlap with each other. Boxcutter starts off like an underdog story about one young man but ends up being a story about the perseverance and dreams of a community.
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SXSW 2025: DEAD LOVER Imagination Over Everything
Grace Glowicki’s Dead Lover pulses with the energy of your favorite punk song. It’s fast, plays by its own rules, and wears its DIY bonafides on its sleeve. This is all to say that Dead Lover may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but the people who can groove with it are going to love it.
Glowicki stars as Gravedigger, a lonely woman who reeks of the corpses that surround her as she digs graves. A chance encounter brings love the Gravedigger’s way, only for her lover to meet an untimely end soon after. Then she tries to bring him back to life and the fun really begins.
Dead Lover is the kind of movie that gets by on sheer force of will. The cast, including Glowicki, Ben Petrie, Leah Doz, and Lowen Morrow, all play multiple roles, Glowicki directs the script she co-wrote with Petrie. Everyone’s wearing so many hats that it becomes increasingly amusing to see the same faces popping up over and over in new costumes. And the cast is Going For It at all times. It’s an utter delight to watch everyone bounce off each other in one ridiculous scenario after another.
Despite its lo-fi trappings, Dead Lover is visually striking all the way through. The film has a black box theater aesthetic, and cinematographer Rhayne Vermette lights the hell out of their set. The contrast between the black of the background and the colors of the minimalist sets is breathtaking at times. The film was shot on 16mm, which gives the film a lived-in and tangible feel. There’s a depth to the imagery within the small spaces they’re working with.
At a brisk 83 minutes, Dead Lover moves along quickly and maintains its momentum all the way through. Something this aggressively silly, horny, and imaginative thrives with the breakneck pacing, creating an exhilarating “what’s going to happen next” tone. With Dead Lover being only her second feature, the potential of what comes next for Glowicki is exciting.
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SXSW 2025: GLORIOUS SUMMER Exposes the Cracks in a Perfect Life
Glorious Summer is a carefully composed slow-burn with an unmistakable anger coursing just under the surface. Set in an idyllic palace, Glorious Summer explores the inherent limits of a “perfect” existence. It follows three women through the day-to-day lives, doing what they’re told by a…surveillance system? AI program? A person lurking somewhere? The women are provided with everything they need for a luxurious life in exchange for giving up their ability to think for themselves. Seems like a stress-free way to live but, I mean, is idyllic ever used in a positive way to describe a movie’s setup?
The only catch is that the women are not allowed to cross the wall the separates the palace from the outside world. Tensions rise when the group begins to test the limits of the situation, finding ways to potentially escape. This includes devising a nonverbal way to communicate and learning to play dead. It’s clear early on that these women are already playing opossum with their lives by the initial agreement to go along with it.
As the allegory comes to the fore, the film becomes more provocative. The writing and directing team of Helena Ganjalyan (who also stars) and Bartosz Szpak grapples with the personal responsibilities that come with being human and being part of a society, even when that society could care less about you. It’s about asserting yourself, seeing the value in yourself and others, and the foolishness of allowing a system or government to dictate the terms of your life.
At times the film’s deliberate pace will test viewers. The runtime is only about 90 minutes, but Ganjalyan and Szpak want you to sit in the moment with these women, to feel a small modicum of what they’re going through. It’s a tactic that proves frustrating in the moment, but in hindsight feels like the right choice for the material.
The film’s minimal cast, which includes Magdalena Fejdasz-Hanczewska, Weronika Humaj, and Daniela Komedera, play off each other well. Each actress finds small ways to inject their characters with the personality that the overseeing program aims to mute. Given the narrow scope of the setting and script, there is a cleverness necessary for the performances to convey the larger points.
Extrapolating the story’s themes to the real-world makes me wish Ganjalyan and Szpak had opted for a blunter commentary. With women’s rights forever under attack all over the world, subtlety is overrated. Alas, Glorious Summer makes for a solid feature debut for Ganjalyan and Szpak that reminds me a bit of the high-concept/low-budget films by Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij. Hopefully Ganjalyan and Szpak’s partnership proves just as fruitful.
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SXSW 2025: THE ACCOUNTANT 2 is Fueled By Old Fashioned Chemistry, in Divergence From the First
There IS a plot to The Accountant 2. But it’s not primarily what the film is selling.
2016’s Bill Dubuque (Ozark) written, Gavin O’Connor (Warrior) directed film The Accountant introduced us to the complicated world of Ben Affleck’s Christian Wolff. That film established a complex kind of hero that only exists in the movies (complimentary) who is indeed an accounting phenom, an off the grid dark web financial operative, as well as a trained killer. The twist is that our hero is also neurodivergent, which is where the character and the film really begin to single themselves out as something unique. The Accountant is essentially autistic Jack Reacher. A drifter with borderline superhuman intellect and physical prowess, complete with a mysterious “girl at the desk” handler who researches for him and backs him up from afar. Drama is squeezed out of Wolff’s struggles to relate to other people and break free from a primarily isolated existence. Spoilers for that first film ahoy: By the end Wolff has set up somewhat of an “Xavier’s School For Gifted Youngsters” ala the X-Men, where his mysterious “girl at the desk”, herself neurodivergent and non-verbal, can safely aid in Wolff’s efforts and also provide somewhat of a home and hive to nurture others who are similar to them. He’s also rekindled a relationship with his brother Braxton, played by the uber-talented John Bernthal (The Punisher).
I spend that much time relaying the plot of the first film here because what’s glorious about The Accountant 2 is that it gets all of that set up from the first film out of the way and picks up almost a decade later free to tell a new tale, with both Dubuque and O’Connor returning. There’s a detective (Rings Of Power’s Cynthia Addai-Robinson as Marybeth Medina) trying to locate and rescue a missing immigrant family. She ends up being our audience avatar, pulling us back into the world of Wolff. They’re ostensibly trying to find this family, which interests Wolff for a variety of reasons. But in reality, The Accountant 2 plays out like a romcom for brothers, spending its runtime working through the various resentments and barriers between these killer action hero brothers resolving their issues with their father who trained them, and figuring out how to connect as adults and push past their traumas to just be bros again. The effect is surprisingly charming, charismatic, and kept our world premiere SXSW audience in stitches throughout. The emphasis on these two stars riffing and teasing each other and making attempts at finding love for Wolff (there is speed dating in The Accountant 2) cannot be understated. And for the most part it works. It’s just tonally wildly different than the first film, which might throw some people off.
I think it might have thrown me off, to some extent, though I did have a blast with The Accountant 2. It’s just that if you’re coming to this for the action, that is taking a big back seat up until the final balletic showdown. O’Connor made a plea to our audience, seeing the film early, to hold on to the various twists and turns of the story. To which I thought: which twists are you even referring to in the film I just this moment finished watching? It’s occurred to me that the action movie Affleck and Bernthal are in, the borderline X-Men Jack Reacher hybrid, took such a backseat to the brotherhood and character and comedy beats that the “twists” such as they are didn’t even feel all that consequential to me. I don’t think this is a bad thing, for what it’s worth, but it’s a strong divergence from the first film and those seeking rip roaring action will need to be patient. But if you’re intensely curious as to whether Bernthal’s killer for hire little brother is more of a dog person or a cat person, or whether we think Affleck’s Wolff will ever be able to score a date (It’s me, I was intensely curious about these things), then The Accountant 2 very well might be your speed. Mileage may vary, but returning to this world all these years later and putting all your eggs in the basket of “interesting brothers reconnecting relying largely on star chemistry” was apparently a gamble worth taking.
Dubuque has crafted something that feels innately Hollywood and barely even attempts to take place in the real world. And I wonder how neurodivergent people feel about this whole franchise and characterization. I can’t speak to that personally, but I will say the film doesn’t feel exploitative, and the humor doesn’t feel at first glance like it’s directed AT Wolff for being who he is. Indeed, Wolff’s ability to self-actualize AND do that in connected community with others seems to be the great storytelling arc of The Accountant franchise thus far, and that matters far more (to me, at least) than the various mystery threads that drive the “whodunnit” elements of The Accountant 2. But once those brothers do get around to the balletic, almost preternaturally synced gunplay of the finale, action fans should find themselves satisfied as well.
And I’m Out.
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SXSX 2025: O’DESSA Is A Sprawling, Glorious Mess
Never has the term “instant cult classic” felt so apt.
Sometimes a movie knocks you out with its audacity. The pure sheer of will to exist, to be something honest and true in the world. That audacity unfortunately does not always align with capacity. You can have all the wild ambition in the world, mixed with best intentions, and the end result can be mired by your eyeline not quite meeting the horizon. And there is a different kind of beauty to that. O’Dessa, the new folk-rock dystopian musical from Geremy Jasper, is such an object.
O’Dessa has all the subtlety of a bag of sledgehammers, a giant day-glow tribute to righteous anger at the current state of the world. It is in terms knowingly silly but also painfully earnest, a big bleeding heart movie about how the forces of love are big enough to smash authoritarianism. It’s attempting to create a large-scale world for you to get lost in, but then fills with a shallow, thuddingly obvious mythos that also rewinds and repeats itself over and over and over again. Themes that are sung in one scene are spoken plainly in another. I suspect Jasper, who directed, wrote and composed for the movie, is meaning to create echoing themes, but the impact sometimes is that it feels like he forgot he already said something in the edit.
Set against a post-apocalypse straight from mid 90s graphic design, O’Dessa unfolds the fairy tale journey of the titular character, played with all her effort and pouty eyes by Sadie Sink. Born on a depleted oil farm that feeds a distant metropolis, O’Dessa has since childhood know of her destiny. Her father, the last of the Ramblers (think folk singing drifter Jedis), told her that one day she would take up her family’s mantle and defeat the evil forces of the world. Specifically the world has been over taken by Plutonovich (Murray Bartlett, understanding the assignment), a fascist dictator who uses endless streams of reality television punishment and public humiliation to keep the downtrodden public in line.
As O’Dessa explores deeper into the hell of Satelyte City, she discovers songbird and sex worker Euri (Kelvin Harrison Jr.) and quickly falls in love. Together they take on limits of Plutonovich’s power, always punctuated with acoustic folk songs and rallying cries.
For those classics scholars, you may notice the source material Jasper is pulling from her, riffing of a gender-swapped Orpheus and Eurydice into low-tech sci-fi tropes. But the tone is more akin to cinematic genre fables such as Star Wars or Wizard of Oz. O’Dessa’s daring journey into hell can often feel sluggish, but also never quite picaresque enough to find discernable segments. Rather it moves in starts and stops, and mostly sings it way between increasingly repetitive lore dumps. For long stretches of the film, characters both speak and sing in almost exclusively exposition, making sure you know the parameters of the world.
The musical segments are the strongest parts of O’Dessa, lifted by a talented cast of musicians and singers, and Jasper’s grasp on creating emotionally gratifying and fulfilling musical segments is a nice carry over from his debut film, Patti Cake$. But while that film benefitted from having a simple, humanistic core of relational drama and comedy, O’Dessa’s sprawling mythology doesn’t often play to Jasper’s strengths. He clearly has ambitions for a quirky mythological update, and his aesthetic choices evoke the most radical 90s, Millennial-coded end times.
The problem is his stylistic touch doesn’t quite add up to an emotional depth. Another clear reference point for Jasper is the Mad Max films, but George Miller traditionally knew to always allow the viewer to fill in the emotional margins. By contrast, Jasper fills the entire frame, finding subtext to be a detriment to the totemic mythology. So for all the appealing visual flash and a soundtrack that is loaded with effective earwormy folk rock, O’Dessa never quite trusts its audience to “get it”, and instead insists and insists and jams elbows in the ribs constantly to make sure they get it. By the time it reaches its genuinely cathartic conclusion, the viewer is completely outside the work itself, appreciating it for craft and camp. It’s the kind of thing that screams “cult classic”, and will likely have people who lock into its admittedly winning vibe, especially those that enjoy it’s nonconformist gender fluidity. But as a piece of pop culture myth making, it just falls short of the ambitions of the things it is trying to stand beside.
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SXSW 2025: WE ARE STORROR: Michael Bay’s Parkour Documentary Will Be One of 2025’s Greatest Docs
I’d never heard of parkour super group Storror before watching this film. That didn’t matter.
I was hooked by this invigorating documentary from the title card, and found myself crying as the credits rolled and the crowd rose to their feet to applaud the Storror crew and the master of Bayhem himself, Mr. Michael Bay. Apparently when Bay decided to add some parkour elements into his action film 6 Underground, he sought out the best in the world and found them in the Storror crew, who have achieved a global following through their YouTube channel. Their working relationship got on so well that they linked up during the COVID era and after years of work, churned out this remarkable documentary We Are Storror.
The pitch was easy for me. Michael Bay directed a documentary about parkour? In other words, the frenetic and groundbreaking camera work of, say, Ambulance, combined with the anxiety-inducing energy of climbing doc Free Solo? Count me in without any further details needed. (Although, in Free Solo, you kind of knew you weren’t going to see this guy fall. That’s not always the case here!) And yes, there were moments of extremely thrilling and harrowing stunts, captured by the Storror guys themselves (they’re accomplished content creators), as well as some (what else can I call them but:) action set pieces that feel engineered for a level of Bay energy that befits the man himself. But above and beyond the sometimes nauseating and always spectacular parkour stunts, which were born for the YouTube era and have innate cinematic qualities to them, there’s a fascinating beating heart at the core of the film. And believe it or not, even if you’ve never even heard of parkour, much less done it, the film is highly relatable and emotionally resonant.
Storror are a squad of 7 guys who started messing around as children together in London, filming various pranks, stunts, and daring acts of tresspassing. There are two sets of brothers in the crew, and together they have a lifelong bond formed that’s so far lasted 16 years and led them to being one of the premiere YouTube channels in the United Kingdom. The film isn’t just a flashy capturing of their daring exploits. It’s a genuine look at the pure pursuit of art, damn the consequences. It’s a portrait of growing up, growing older, and growing apart. It’s a reflection on the fleeting nature of our lives and the limitations of our bodies. It’s men pursuing a passion, together, and being remarkably open, honest, and skeptical of the paths they’ve chosen. It also jumps around in time covering roughly 16 years that endears you to the guys, and grounds you in their journey (all of which is masterfully edited).
You’re watching these guys risk their lives over and over again, and sometimes you feel like their mother, wanting to “tsk tsk” them and tell them to get down from there before they hurt themselves. But then you’ll see them prepping, planning, choreographing, and doing all the safety work they can. And then the drones take off, the needle drops, and you watch pure, unbridled beauty in motion happen on the big screen and you understand that these are artists and athletes, pushing the boundaries of the human experience in a way that is instantly meaningful, nay profound.
I can’t relate to jumping from rooftop to rooftop, and I never will. But I can connect with having to make a choice between your family/career/safety and your art. I can resonate with what it means to have to commit so fully to something that you’ll be letting down your team if you half ass it. We can all relate to searching for meaning, connection, and purpose. And that’s central to the experience of We Are Storror.
But it also kicks incredible amounts of ass. These guys are showmen. They’re visual artists. This doc takes us with them to exotic locations as they design stunning parkour sequences and then we see them. Clear as day. With popping color and soaring aerials. They see cities from an entirely different perspective than we do and James Gunn or Matt Reeves’ Batman teams would do well to hire these guys to give us the most breathtaking rooftop chases we’ve ever seen. It’s a remarkable cinematic experience and I’ll be forever grateful I was able to see this on a big screen. The film has not scored distribution yet and I’m hopeful that a theatrical distributor will snatch it up and show this on the biggest screens in the world. (Cough, IMAX, cough).
Bay is a proven master of spectacle with really little left to prove at this stage of his career. And as much as we all love his gloves off excess, this Bay fan tends to connect most with some of his more grounded (for Bay) offerings, like the aforementioned Ambulance, or Pain And Gain, or even 13 Hours. At Bay’s direction here, the Storror crew opened up, stripped down (sometimes literally), got vulnerable, and made this film about pushing boundaries, seeking purity, and understanding when to change. It’s a character study filled with humanity, even when flirting with superhuman capability. It’s a singular cinematic experience viewers won’t soon forget.
And I’m Out.
