The Electric State

 My View:  The Electric State  (2025)  PG-13  The Electric State takes place after a robot uprising. Following their defeat, robots were sent to a fenced-in area known as The Electric State in the American West. Michelle (Millie Bobby Brown) is determined to find her long-lost brother in The Electric State and is helped by a low-rent smuggler (Chris Pratt) and a wisecracking robot named Herman (Anthony Mackie). The duo are about to discover that maybe the world was mistaken about the robots. This film might have half-way worked on the big screen, with all the robots milling around, either in a mall or in the big, what was meant to be a big, spectacular battle scene at the end. However, as a streaming movie, it fails because we don’t care about any of the characters, including the robots. Ok, maybe I cared a little about Mr. Peanut (yep, that one), the leader of the robots, who is voiced by an almost unrecognizable Woody Harrelson. The Electric State is an alternate past movie, where Walt Disney created robots for Disneyland, which became a thing where the robots started doing all our grunt work, got fed up, and rebelled. This two-hour and eight-minute film directed by the Russo Brothers (Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: End Game) shows what happens when you get an unlimited budget where none of the money went into making the script or the characters work. The three main human characters are all such one-dimensional cartoon characters that we never get to know them; only they are full of quips that don’t work and a storyline that expects us to understand their relationships without giving us a way to do that. Pratt looks ridiculous, and his character is such a throwback to his Guardians character that he must have gotten whiplash. Brown is asked to carry the emotional aspect of the film, first with her long lost younger brother, who she tearfully remembers at almost every moment, so much so we want to shake her to snap her out of it. Then there is the evil scientist/Musk-like character played by Stanley Tucci, who is right out of a DC comic book from the 50s; so wooden and way too easy to figure out that he is evil and behind everything. Oh, and the message of the film? Robots are people, too. Boy, they spent a lot of money to get over that notion. Regrettably, it wasn't spent on the script.  My Rating: Cable  The Electric State Website  Now playing on the Netflix platform. 

My View:  Black Bag  (2025) R  In Black Bag, Kathryn (Cate Blanchett) and her husband, George (Michael Fassbender), have a perfect marriage. Except for the fact that they are both intelligence agents that can’t talk about their jobs. When Kathryn is suspected of betraying her nation, George faces the ultimate test: loyalty to his loving wife or his country. Steven Soderbergh gives us a spy caper that lets two extraordinary actors perform at their finest. Black Bag is not your ordinary spy film, full of action sequences, but a film filled with smaller moments that are clever and exquisitely done, keeping you guessing on just who is guilty and who is innocent. It’s a game of cat and mouse, reminiscent of the great spy novels of Le Carre and Herron. Blanchett and Fassbender work together so well on screen that you believe that these two spies could save the world just by their charisma and wit. Black Bag is a polished, almost silky smooth spy caper where you don’t know who to trust or who to even suspect; you just know that George will figure it out. The only question is whether George’s love for his wife means that he will have to betray his country. The great thing about Black Bag is that you will find out in the end and thoroughly enjoy the mystery all along the way to that end. Black Bag is one of the best spy films of the past ten years, and anyone who loves watching a spy film that isn’t easy to figure out will love this film as much as I did.  My Rating: I Would Pay to See it Again Black Bag Website Now playing in theaters. 

My View:  Novocaine  (2025)  R  Novocaine is about Nathan Caine (Jack Quaid), who has finally found the courage to ask Sherry (Amber Midthunder) out, and their date was incredible. Now, right in front of Nathan’s eyes, the bank that she works at is held up, and she is taken hostage. What’s a guy to do but go to her rescue? What her kidnappers don’t know is that Nathan has a condition where he is incapable of feeling pain. To bring her back, he will need it. I want to warn you that this film is filled with broken bones, blood splatters, gunshot wounds, and people getting hurt in horrible and also amusing ways. And most of those things happen to our hero, Nathan. I had so much fun watching this film, though I will admit I had to look away a few times because of the savage and cruel ways that Nathan gets the crap beat, shot, stabbed out of him. Jack Quaid is perfect as the everyman who isn’t quite one because he can’t feel pain. That means Nathan has to be careful, even confining himself to a liquid diet because just about anything could be deadly, including biting his own tongue. There is a great running gag that his watch alarm goes off every 3 hours to remind him to pee, because he can’t feel the pain that we all feel when we have to go. I loved the chemistry between Quaid and Amber Midthunder, and the film sets up why Nathan is so quick to go to her rescue, even though he knows he could get hurt. Now I will admit the story does paint Nathan and Sherry into a corner that it doesn’t quite figure out how to get out of, but the film has a great time putting Nathan into situations where he can get really hurt and still survive to keep going on the chase. So get ready to advert your eyes a few times and go on adventure with Nathan as he slowly, surely falls apart as his body takes a beating and a few, ok, a lot of broken bones, to save the girl of his dreams.  My Rating: Full Price  Novocaine Website  Now playing in theaters. 

Familyfaire:  The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie  (2024) PG   In The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie, who does Earth turn to when there is an alien invasion? Porky Pig and Daffy Duck, of course. Looney Tunes cartoons have always been a favorite of mine, having grown up watching them. While I feel that The Day the Earth Blew Up isn’t up to the standard of the cartoons of the past, it still is better than many of the weak animated films of the past few years. I kept waiting for a few other characters to show up from the Warner Brothers vault, but it’s solely the pig and the ducks’ picture, with some help from Petunia Pig. The plot is fun, with a couple of cool scenes that were right out of the old Superman animated films of the 40s, and the film moves along with the two getting into lots of trouble. I had a good time and laughed out loud a few times, but I felt like I needed more sight gags and jokes that had some wit. Still, kids will have fun, and adults will enjoy seeing a couple of old friends to go down memory lane with.  My Rating: Bargain Matinee  The Day the Earth Blew Up Website  Now playing in theaters.

Indiefest:  Opus  (2025)  R  Opus is about Ariel (Ayo Edebiri), who has been picked to attend the first concert by iconic musician Alfred Moretti (John Malkovich), who is going to perform for the first time in thirty years. The only problem: Ariel may have to join Alfred’s cult before he will perform. Opus is worth a bargain matinee ticket to see John Malkovich have so much fun in the part, playing a whacked-out musician. Unfortunately, the rest of the film isn’t worth even that price after a fun 30-minute start, as the film never feels scary, and the plot starts advancing at a too-quick pace, leaving us gasping for breath that never comes. Opus is one of those films where you question whether you have seen a movie with a plot like this or even the movie itself. About halfway through the hour and forty-three-minute runtime, I felt trapped just like Ariel does. And Opus has an ending that feels just too smug, but then again I guess Alfred Moretti was too.  My Rating: Cable  Opus Website  Now playing in theaters. 

My View:  The Parenting  (2025) R   In The Parenting, Rohan (Nik Dodani) and Josh (Brandon Flynn) are hosting their respective parents in a weekend country house rental. Things go downhill quickly when they discover the presence of a 400-year-old evil entity. The Parenting doesn’t know what it wants to be: a horror film that’s a comedy or a comedy that’s a horror film. Either way, it doesn't work, which is too bad with a cast that includes Brian Cox, Edie Falco, Lisa Kudrow, Dean Norris, and the always amazing Parker Posey. The movie seems like a bad Saturday Night Live skit, which is not unusual given that the screenwriter is a long-time writer of the late-night show. The Parenting never finds its way unless you think prolonged vomiting is funny or a dog being crushed by a cabinet is hilarious. Along the way, there are horrible jokes about parenting, slurs about homosexuality, and an ending that feels like the writer decided to take an easy way out of a plot that wasn’t working. So, along the way, you won’t laugh at the comic bits, and you won’t get scared by the horror bits. So what do you have left? A movie that fails from the outset. My Rating: You Would Have to Pay Me to See it Again    The Parenting Website  Now playing on the Max format.

My View:  Control Freak  (2025)   Control Freak revolves around Val (Kelly Marie Tran), a motivational speaker whose TED talks have become legendary for inspiring thousands to take control of their lives. Val’s fans are unaware that she is a tangled mess of anxiety that has caused her scalp to itch constantly. What Val at first chalks up to stress, the constant itching becomes something evil, an evil that will take Val onto the edge of madness. Val is a woman who, on the surface, appears to be in control but is actually losing control on the inside. I liked Kelly Marie Tran’s performance, but the film takes too long to establish that there are possible forces other than stress that are getting a hold of Val. It’s hard to tell from the storyline if all of this is in Val’s head or if there really is an evil force that has been living inside of Val since her birth. The film starts with an interesting idea of a woman who tells the world how to fix their problems by taking charge of them but can’t/won’t take charge of her own problems. However, the film goes too far into the horror aspect and blames everything on that evil being. By the end of the film, I just wanted it to be done with, but even with the film’s last shot, we see it will continue. I am just glad that it didn’t.  My Rating: Cable  Control Freak Info  Now playing on the Hulu platform.

My View:  Chaos: The Manson Murders  (2025) The documentary Chaos: The Manson Murders is a look into alternative theories surrounding one of the world’s most famous murder cases. Could there be unexpected connections to government agencies involving mind control experiments or a major coverup? The film is from Earl Morris, who won the 2004 Academy Award for his documentary The Fog of War, and is based on CHAOS: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties, a 2019 nonfiction book written by Tom O’Neill. This is a documentary that throws out a lot of theories against the wall of true-crime, hoping some of them will stick long enough for you to think that they might be true. The film is mostly O’Neill being interviewed by Morris, with one theory after another being presented in front of us. The most significant theory of the film is that Manson was part of the CIA mind control experiments and that he was allowed to carry on because he either knew too much or was part of their continuing experiment. What Morris gives us are just guesses and very flimsy ideas, which O'Neill presents to us as facts. At no time does anyone say that Manson wasn’t behind the killings, and in fact, a few of the facts show he was behind even more. Are you going to learn more about Manson and the reason for the murders? It will depend on whether you want to go down a deep, very sketchy rabbit hole of even sketchier facts or just go with the fact that Manson was a deeply troubled person who was able to brainwash young men and women with lots of drugs and paranoia. You choose. My Rating: Bargain Matinee  Chaos: The Manson Murders Website  Now playing on the Netflix platform. 

My View:  Last Take: Rust and the Story of Halyna  (2025)   Last Take is a documentary that looks at what happened on that fatal day when Alex Baldwin accidentally shot and killed celebrated indie cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the film Rust in 2021. Last Take is a thoughtful and touching tribute to an up-and-coming cinematographer who had not only a promising career but a family, both of her own and of the people she worked with. Sadly, all was lost on that film set that day, and while the film doesn’t give you all the answers you want, it shows how talented Halyna was and how much she was loved. Last Take shows just how badly mistakes were made and kept being made up to the shooting, things that could have been prevented, including disharmony on the film set. We see that the accident didn’t have to happen, but most of the camera crew left the shoot short-handed after they voiced concerns about safety and working conditions. The film does an excellent job with behind-the-scenes photos, footage, and interviews with all except Baldwin and the armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed. The movie they planned to make was doomed from the beginning, including the fact that Gutierrez-Reed was a last-minute choice after two more experienced armorers refused the job. Last Take does an excellent job of letting us see what it is like working on an Indie film, where everyone is overworked, sometimes having to do two or three jobs at once, and always worried about costs and if the money will hold out. While part of the title is ‘the Story of Halyna’, I wanted more about the woman and a little less about the movie she was making. I wanted it to be more of a tribute to someone who didn’t deserve to die because of negligence. The film doesn’t give answers to why live ammunition was on the set or why the gun went off, things we may never know, and that’s a frustrating part of this film. However, maybe that’s the point. We don't always get the answers we want, and even if we did, it wouldn't change a life that was lost. My Rating: Bargain Matinee Last Take Website  Now playing on the Hulu platform.

Forgotten Film:  Hunger  (2008)  The story of the Irish republican inmates of a prison in Northern Island who go on a hunger strike to protest the conditions and the belief that they are political prisoners, not criminals. The strike is led by Bobby Sands (Michael Fassbender), who believes that the only way he can get the world to pay attention is to die from hunger. This was the first feature film from filmmaker Steve McQueen, who has since created an incredible body of work, including the Oscar-winning film 12 Years a Slave. Hunger is the film that put both McQueen and Fassbender in the spotlight, as Fassbender gives a stellar and moving performance of a man whose body and mind are pushed to the limits. Sands, along with nine other prisoners, died for the cause, and we are given an inside look at how horrible life was in the prison both before and during the hunger strike. Hunger is an unforgettable film that will stay with you long after the last scene. My Rating: I Would Pay to See it Again  Hunger Info The film is available on BluRay/DVD disc. 

Weird Credits:  From the credits of Novocaine:  Breakdown Trainees

Coming Soon to a Screen Near You:  A Working Man  (2025)  R  Levon Cade (Jason Statham) is a man who left his profession to work a simple construction job and take care of his daughter. But when his boss’s teenage daughter vanishes, Levon uses his skills as a former legendary figure in the world of black ops to go on the hunt. Levon soon learns that his search for the missing college student will take him deep into a sinister criminal conspiracy. The film is directed by David Ayer, who also directed Statham in the fun and bold 2024 film The Beekeeper.  A Working Man Website  The film will be in theaters on Friday, March 28, 2025. 

Until Next Time!