Reel Review Roundup

One Battle After Another (MA)

Directed by: Paul Thomas Anderson

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Penn, Chase Infiniti

Review by: Julian Wright

When hardened military man Col. Steven Lockjaw (Sean Penn) apprehends spicy revolutionary Perfidia (Teyana Taylor), who has caught his eye, she rats out her fellow French 45 mates and goes on the run, leaving behind her husband Bob (Leonardo DiCaprio) and infant daughter Willa.

The father and daughter duo go into hiding.

Sixteen years later, Bob is a paranoid alcoholic and pot head, whose brain is fried from his substance abuse and teenage Willa (Chase Infiniti) is often forced to be the parent in the relationship.

But Lockjaw starts tracking them down, forcing them to go on the run with the help of surviving French 45 members.

What a ride.

One Battle After Another tells a full and timely story about ideals, and wonderfully realised characters taking politically charged action, with precision and confidence.

While the entire film is consistently highly entertaining, balancing a range of tones, it builds to an eye-popping climactic sequence that is a cinematic stand-out on its own.

Paul Thomas Anderson has assembled a stunning cast – Taylor is a force, DiCaprio is hilarious, Penn is solid and Infiniti is a standout.

There is a passion coming from One Battle After Another that has been missing from Anderson films recently – he seems to really relish telling this particular story.

This is sure to be featured on many “best of” lists at the end of the year.

A Big Bold Beautiful Journey (M)

Directed by: Kogonada

Starring: Colin Farrell, Margot Robbie

Review by: Julian Wright

David (Colin Farrell) and Sarah (Margot Robbie) are two strangers that meet at their mutual friends’ wedding.

They share a couple of meet-cute moments before finding themselves on a fantastical journey home together.

Some unplanned pit stops at a range of strangely positioned doorways, which when they enter, allows them the opportunity to relive and face key moments from their respective pasts.

Could these insights bring them closer together or drive them further apart?

A Big Bold Beautiful Journey takes a big bold swing in the way it tells its story.

This curious and existential film is certainly something we have not seen before, but it is at times fascinating and dream-like, then at other times, dances dangerously close to amateur performance art with a budget.

It starts off strong and endearingly quirky with a great sense of comedic timing, thanks in large part to a scene-stealing Phoebe Waller-Bridge.

The world we are plonked into is off kilter just enough to draw us in – and if you are up for the ride, you will likely be grandly rewarded.

For others, the sluggish pace and mind-bendy visuals could be detrimental to one’s enjoyment, particularly if they are expecting a traditional rom-com.

Farrell and Robbie are endlessly watchable – a pair of big screen beauties that an audience would follow blindly through any kind of journey – even one as unfulfilling as this.

Fight or Flight (MA)

Directed by: James Madigan

Starring: Josh Hartnett, Katee Sackhoff

Review by: Julian Wright

Former teen heart throb Josh Hartnett take on a plane full of assassins in this amusingly violent John Wick wannabe (not derogatory).

When an infamous hacker named Ghost escapes captivity in Bangkok, they are tracked to a flight heading to San Fransisco.

The only nearby option to apprehend them is disgraced former secret service agent turned alcoholic Lucas Reyes (Josh Hartnett).

He reluctantly takes the job offered to him by his former boss Katherine Brunt (Katee Sachhoff), with whom he has a messy past.

But not only will it be hard to identify the ghost – the only information eh has to go by is a bullet wound – he shares the flight with a plane full of assassins hired to kill the Ghost.

The scenario is a little familiar but James Madigan, making his feature film debut, is dead set on delivering a fun piece of escapism, which he achieves with a touch of style.

Those that like their action as graphic as the Saw and Hostel films combined will get a kick out of the bloodshed as Reyes and company use various plane related tools as weapons – and even manage to get heir hands on a chainsaw.

Hartnett delivers one of his best performances, demonstrating his athleticism with the fight choreography but also his on-point comic timing – his physicality is reminiscent of the rubbery Jim Carrey.

Fight or Flight is a plane ride from hell but a wild cinematic experience that will have you cheering at every snapped bone and impaled body part.

Superman (2025)

Directed by: James Gunn

Starring: David Corenswet, Nicholas Hoult, Rachel Brosnahan

Review by: Julian Wright

After 30 years on Earth and several years of using his superpowers to save lives, inspired by a recorded message from his biological parents, Clarke Kent/Superman prevents a war between two countries to create peace.

But without going through diplomatic channels, his actions are questioned.

Meanwhile, megalomaniac Lex Luther, hellbent on taking the superhero down, uncovers more of that recorded message that Superman never saw, that reveals his parents instructions to him are to conquer Earth.

When he releases this recording, public opinion of Superman changes drastically.

Superman 2025 thankfully skips the origin story and drops us right in the middle of an unfolding saga, which works to its benefit.

By this point, there is no reason to get bogged down in how Superman came to be – we already know.

With James Gunn at the helm, there is more of a fun, comic book vibe around this film (compared to other DC offerings), but there is an apparent struggle between Gunn’s Marvel-like sensibilities and applying it appropriately to the DC universe.

He has a great sense of humour but can’t run free with it, leaving us with a somewhat mish-mash of Guardians of the Galaxy with DC sensibilities.

Superman 2025 starts out great, with wonderful chemistry between the leads, and giving Superman a moral dilemma – and this is where this particular version soars.

The addition of super dog Krypto is the freshest element this version presents its audience.

But by the end, this devolves into seemingly endless sequences of buildings crashing and fists bashing – it’s all noise and sensory overload.

Clown in a Cornfield (MA)

Directed by: Eli Craig

Starring: Katie Douglas, Aaron Abrams, Carson MacCormac

Review by: Julian Wright

The title succinctly captures what gore fans are in for with this rural slasher based on the book of the same name.

After experiencing a devastating loss, Dr Glenn Maybrook (Aaron Abrams) moves his teenage daughter Quinn (Katie Douglas) from the city to small town Kettle Springs, Missouri for a new job and fresh start.

It is a small, boring town with a checkered past and dwindling economy after its booming corn syrup factory (with a clown mascot named Frendo) burned down.

Against everyone’s warnings, Quinn falls in with a misfit group of trouble-making YouTube pranksters who have ruffled the feathers of the town’s older generations.

In the lead up to the town’s 100th festival celebrations, a killer clown begins targeting the group members one by one, before striking at a night time farmhouse party.

Carnage ensues.

Clown in a Cornfield has all the delicious horror genre cliches we have grown to love over the past several decades, while putting a fresh modern spin, with a fun cast, fleshed out characters, wit and some social commentary.

Director Eli Craig spends time building characters we care about, angling towards more of a dramatic tone when establishing the plot and characters, before treating us to the gore and funny one-liners.

Couple minor quibbles: the killer reveal is one of the least surprising in a slasher in a long time and Craig doesn’t take the carnage quite far enough.

It is all silly fun – Craig could have benefited from letting loose a bit more.

But in a time when the beloved slasher installment is few and far between, Clown in a Cornfield satisfyingly scratches an itch.