Tag: thriller
Event Horizon, Mimic, and the glory of the lowly late-August thriller
Michael Jackson: ‘Thriller’ 40th Anniversary Details Unveiled
Michael Jackson‘s ‘Thriller,’ the biggest selling album of all time, is set to thrill on in celebration of its latest milestone.
Full story below…
As reported, this November brings with it the 40th anniversary of the game-changing LP – which is home to classics such as ‘Billie Jean,’ ‘Beat It,’
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Serena Williams vs Anett Kontaveit – LIVE results: Serena wins thriller to move into third round
SERENA WILLIAMS kept her hopes of a miracle US Open win alive with a thrilling victory.
The 40-year-old beat No 2 seed Anett Kontaveit in a three-set battle in front of an electric Arthur Ashe Stadium.
Serena took it 7-6 2-6 6-2 on another magical night in New York.
Here’s how it all unfolded…
‘Beast’ review: Idris Elba kicks lion butt in fun survival thriller
Whether or not you’ll enjoy Beast depends on how you answer the following question: Do you want to see Idris Elba punch a lion? If your answer is yes (and it should be, let’s be honest), then Beast is 100% the movie for you.
Beast does indeed feature Idris Elba punching a lion, but it’s also got a whole lot more going for it. In the mood for killer tension, immersive set pieces, and compelling family drama? Watch Beast. Searching for the perfect adrenaline rush blockbuster to wind down your summer? Watch Beast. Do you just really want to see Idris Elba punch a lion? (Okay, I may have already mentioned that a few times, but it bears repeating.) Anyway, watch Beast.
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Beast gives us high-stakes man vs. lion action
Beast stars Elba as Nate, a recently widowed doctor on a vacation to South Africa with his daughters Meredith (Iyana Halley) and Norah (Leah Jeffries). They’re staying at a nature reserve run by family friend Martin (Sharlto Copley), who introduced Nate to his late wife. For Nate, this trip is an opportunity to reconnect with Meredith and Norah. They resent him for how he handled the separation from their mother, and for how he handled her later illness.
What starts as a gorgeous safari into the South African bush quickly becomes a nightmare when Nate, Meredith, Norah, and Martin cross paths with a bloodthirsty lion. This is no ordinary lion: He’s on a rampage against humans to get revenge on the poachers who murdered his pride. (Don’t think too hard about this — what matters is that the lion is angry and that a whole bunch of badassery is about to go down.)
Director Baltasar Kormákur casts a suspenseful spell with his use of long tracking shots as we follow our heroes through the bush. There’s a constant sense of movement and immersion throughout the film, whether we’re trailing Nate through an abandoned village or searching for the lion in the undergrowth. The reliance on tracking shots can make the transitions to static shot-reverse-shot conversations feel jarring, but overall they do their job and they do it well.
Credit: Lauren Mulligan / Universal Pictures
And then there’s the lion, a stalking, snarling CGI beast that holds up visually throughout the film. It lurks out of frame, or sometimes in the background, biding its time before it can come back and come after Nate and his family again. It probably helps the lion that his prey are almost consistently making unwise decisions — everyone stop leaving the car! — but the film’s core cast sells every less-than-great choice hard. Sure, Beast has the occasional struggle with clunky dialogue — a discussion about “anti-poaching” is such obvious foreshadowing for a later moment that lands with an awkward thud — but you’ll still be cheering by the time Elba punches. That. Lion.
Idris Elba goes dad mode
Elba is fully in protective father mode for this entire movie. His evolution from “dad having trouble relating to his kids” to “badass action hero who will face down a lion for his daughters” is a blast to watch. It’s made all the better by the film’s earlier scenes, where he mourns his wife and tries to connect with Norah and Meredith.
Halley and Jeffries do great work as Nate’s daughters. Halley nails the balance between Meredith’s fear and her attempts to remain calm in the face of danger. And Jeffries is a ray of light as Norah, delivering some of the film’s funniest lines. Together with Elba, they create a portrait of a dysfunctional yet loving family, and we can’t help but root for them to make it out of the bush alive.
With its core plot of “hunter vs. hunted,” Beast makes for a perfect double feature with this summer’s brilliant Prey. Both are character-driven adventures through the wilderness. Both explore themes of survival and familial bonds. And both feature nail-biting tension and well-executed suspense. Beast scratches the blockbuster itch in a similar way to Prey, and it’s just an all-around good time at the movies. There’s no better way to end your summer than that.
Beast is in theaters Aug. 19.
‘Fall’ review: Vultures are the sharks of the sky in wobbly thriller
From the producers of 47 Meters Down comes another horror movie that urges audiences to feel smugly superior for choosing channel surfing over extreme sports.
This time, our pair of plucky heroines aren’t swimming with sharks. They’re scaling a dilapidated 2,000-foot tall radio tower. Why? Oh, there’s plenty of backstory. But come on now — you don’t come to Fall for the pathos. You come for the scares, suspense, and sheer stupidity of human intrepidness. Fall delivers on some of these things.
As a devoted indoor kid, there’s nothing in this whole world that would convince me to scale a massive pole with nothing but a rusty ladder and a pushy bestie to help me. But such instant aversion is what makers of movies like 47 Meters Down, The Shallows, Adrift, and even The Descent expect of much of their audiences. We’re not meant to relate to the gutsiness or hubris of the heroes who dare to swim with sharks, set sail, or spelunk. We’re meant to be wide-eyed with tension, drop-jawed with terror as these models of beauty and athleticism chuck themselves toward the brink of death, while bleeding out sob stories.
Fall is a high-stakes movie about besties in extreme sports horror.
Credit: Lionsgate
In Fall, accomplished climber Becky’s (Grace Caroline Currey) sob story begins with a rockface climb where her handsome husband makes an abrupt and deadly descent. Cut to a year later, Becky’s lawman father (Jeffrey Dean Morgan in a brief Hopper-like appearance) begs her to put down the endless bottles of booze and find something else to cling to besides her departed partner’s cremains. Enter bestie Hunter (Virginia Gardner), an ever-plucky and impetuous blonde whose climbing exploits have made her a fairly famous Youtube vlogger. Naturally, she insists that the best way to move through the overwhelming grief is to climb something stupidly tall and dump the husband’s ashes from it. Let him be memorialized as he died, falling from a great height!
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Though earnestly performed by a grit-toothed cast, the emotional setup is a chore, as no one choosing a movie called Fall is looking for poignant drama. Soon enough, the girls are skittering up to scary heights, and yep, the ladder falls and they’re stuck atop a platform with no phone reception, no tools, and circling vultures. Screenwriters Jonathan Frank and Scott Mann (who also directs) attempt to flesh out the thin concept with a creeping conflict between the besties, the source of which is painfully predictable. Also tiresome are the tedious archetypes of femininity presented by the not-so-dynamic duo of serious, good-hearted brunette and selfish, fun-chasing, sexy blonde.
How does Fall compare to 47 Meters Down?
Credit: Lionsgate
Look, 47 Meters Down may have been a movie of cheap thrills. But the vibrant sisterly bond — plus fully game performances from its leading ladies — made the movie’s emotional stakes cut as ferociously as shark teeth. Fall falls short of recreating that sense of sorority, in part because Hunter is clearly out for herself on some level from the start. But moreover, Mann’s direction seems to have left Currey stranded in a performance that is one-noted sadness or screaming. Gardner has more fun with the role of the risk-taker, brandishing a reckless charm that’s glancingly reminiscent of the chaotic whimsy of Florence Pugh. So, when the film finally reaches its third act, it’s Gardner and her performance that comes out on top, even if the script fails them both.
To the script’s credit, however, Frank and Mann do find a surprising amount of ways to make “stuck on top of a tower” more than meets the eye. Scrambles for falling equipment, desperate attempts to signal for help, and a surprisingly frenzied battle with a vulture deliver the kind of ghoulish and suspenseful thrills these kinds of movies are made for. Amid the miseries these embattled buddies endure, you might begin to wonder, would you rather fall to your death? Die of exposure? Or be eaten alive by a bird of prey? Fall gives you plenty of time to ponder that. But the most bonkers bits are the third act call-backs, where formerly flawed escape plans are given a new, more dramatic, or downright gruesome twist.
In the end, Fall is a movie that’s emotionally shallow, but more clever than it needs to be, and as grisly as your dark heart is likely hoping. This is not a good movie. But it is a movie that made me cry out, “Oh good god!” And that’s something.
Fall is now in theaters.