Live-action remakes of classic animated Disney projects are no new phenomena. Dating back to 1994’s “The Jungle Book,” the studio has attempted to, with mixed results, double dip into their history. But it wasn’t until 2016’s second attempt at remaking their beloved Kipling adaptation that the advances in CGI technology made it so that no project could be too ambitious to spin the block on. This reviewer distinctly remembers grumbling through a press screening of that Jon Favreau-directed “Jungle Book” and snarking to his plus one about how eager the House of Mouse must be to give this same treatment to “The Lion King.” Three years and one monkey’s paw curl later, 2019’s “The Lion King” felt like a colossal waste of time.

Sure, audiences got a new collection of Beyoncé songs (as well as her visual companion piece “Black is King”), but what did this latest telling of the beloved tale yield outside of $1.6 billion at the global box office? All of these remakes that folks call “live-action” are still primarily animated, albeit eerie, and photorealistic.

In every one of these outings, the exaggerated, cartoon approach to singing and talking animals anthropomorphized into relatable characters is replaced with the uncanny valley of watching a David Attenborough nature documentary with dubbed-over dialogue and musical numbers. 

Much craft and attention to detail are on display to make the animals feel as life-like as possible. 

But “real” or “believable” means nothing without emotional connection. Disney has made trillions off how easy it is for a child to form an emotional connection with a cartoon animal possessing enormous, unrealistic eyes. With this new approach, the result is always a financial success with fleeting cultural relevance. Everyone will take their families out to see a new, shiny, 8K-OLED-HDR-TV-in-the-display-section-of-the-Best-Buy version of the cartoon classics they loved as kids. But once they’ve been subjected to something twice as long and half as resonant, they forget the experience entirely…until there’s a new one.

Enter Barry Jenkins. The Academy Award-winning filmmaker responsible for “Moonlight” had used his newfound critical cache to adapt James Baldwin (“If Beale Street Could Talk”) and Colson Whitehead (Amazon’s excellent series “The Underground Railroad”) and had since reached that zenith all up-and-coming directors reach where they must take a meeting with Disney and get offered their obligatory Marvel or Star Wars project. For whatever unknowable reason, Jenkins chose to take on a sequel to “The Lion King” that would be pitched as “The Godfather Part II” with animals. 

The film was initially reported to split its runtime between continuing the story of Simba (voiced by Donald Glover) and flashbacks to a young Mufasa (Aaron Pierre taking over from the late James Earl Jones.) But after Jones’s passing, it seems that the story hewed closer to the prequel side of things, eschewing the Don/Michael Corleone split for a straightforward framing device where Simba’s daughter Keira (Blue Ivy Carter) is told about grandfather’s origins. This allows the narrative to center around the relationship between Mufasa and his brother Taka (Kelvin Harrison Jr.), who would grow up to be the villainous Scar.

There is something admirable in watching a filmmaker of Jenkins’s caliber try to will a worthwhile motion picture into existence within an otherwise lifeless paradigm. And there are small successes to be found for those with the patience to search for them. While still not particularly distinct, the character designs of the animals themselves allow for more emoting and subtlety. This is highlighted by Jenkins and cinematographer James Laxton’s propensity for portraiture within the fame, bringing the “camera” close enough to each lion’s face that the emotional distance between the subject and the viewer begins to melt away. 

This is best shown when exploring the precarious brotherhood between Mufasa and Taka. The show-stopping tunes penned by Lin-Manuel Miranda try hard to hammer home the more significant ideas and feelings, but Jenkins allows for quieter moments between these two cubs thrust together by tragedy to do the real heavy lifting. In the most touching moment in the picture, Taka, a young prince, tries to take Mufasa into his family after a flood separates him from his people. Taka’s father, Obasi (Lennie James) insists that Mufasa must race Taka for the opportunity. But as Mufasa falls behind, exhausted from traveling through this catastrophe, Taka modulates his pace, telling his new friend, “I’ve always wanted a brother.” 

There are other ideas at play here, with Mufasa unintentionally usurping Taka’s role in the pride and ultimately ascending to being a uniter of the various species. But much of that feels muddled by how big the cast grows and how tedious Timon and Pumba’s (Seth Rogen and Billy Eichner) interruptions feel. It becomes quite clear, in quick succession, that Jenkins’s ambition cannot combat the doomed nature of this endeavor. Despite being gifted young actors, Pierre and Harrison Jr. aren’t particularly strong voice performers. The most enticing element here, the idea of seeing Scar become Scar, is instantly nerfed when Harrison Jr. arbitrarily starts making a truly reprehensible Jeremy Irons impression the moment he’s done performing a song about betraying Mufasa, as if he had the idea to sound more villainous after crossing the chorus.

But even setting aside these gripes, “Mufasa: The Lion King” is a two-hour film that repeatedly devolves into an overactive desktop wallpaper. The sweeping vistas and majestic images of tenderly rendered animals ought to be something to behold, but it feels so repetitive and looks so inert that you would be hard-pressed to differentiate it from one of those new AI models that creates smooth enough video from paragraph-long prompts.

If someone of Jenkins’s pedigree can’t, with all this budgetary power behind him, best some poster on Elon Musk’s X typing “lions fight on mountaintop epic” into Sora, then Hollywood is truly cooked, and there’ll be nothing stopping the fools who think generative AI can usurp traditional filmmaking methods. At this rate, they’re already bent to the will of short-sighted studio groupthink to the point of obsolescence.

“Mufasa: The Lion King” is currently playing exclusively in theaters but will be available to rent or buy from video-on-demand services in February.

The post ‘Mufasa: The Lion King’ highlights the limits of the Disney remake appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

Hit men do not exist. Or rather, the “retail”-level contract killer available to middle-class normies that is essentially a construct of movies and television does not exist. This is how the central, seemingly ridiculous premise of Richard Linklater’s new, loosely based-in-truth film “Hit Man” can function. 

In the film, Glen Powell plays Gary Johnson, a psych and philosophy professor who moonlights as a technician for the New Orleans police department. He assists in handling the surveillance side of sting operations where undercover cops pretend to be professional murderers to capture those who would hire them. Early in the film, Jasper (Austin Amelio), the hothead officer who usually plays the hit man role, is suspended after being filmed assaulting some teenagers in the line of duty. On short notice, Gary is called upon to stand in for him. 

Up to this point, Gary, through his voice-over narration and the sight of his bored students rolling their eyes during his lectures on ethics and the nature of the self, seems like the last person who should be doing a dangerous job like this. Aside from Powell’s chiseled good looks, Gary appears as milquetoast a protagonist as can be. In fact, the film’s general tone would also feel middling and unadventurous if one wasn’t already privy to Linklater’s unassuming gifts as a storyteller. But the second he walks into the sting, Gary and the film instantly come alive. He delivers a believably impressive and suitably fearsome performance as a man who makes his living ending lives. 

His police handlers Claudette (Retta) and Phil (Sanjay Rao) are blown away, and he begins to do the role more often in Jasper’s absence. Using his understanding of psychology, he puts an absurd level of effort into tailoring each fictional hit man he portrays to whomever they are trying to catch, allowing Gary a creative outlet to be any number of people more interesting than he seems to be. Perhaps the most entertaining section of the film is the series of stings that most viewers would have been comfortable watching for another hour, if not as a dedicated television series. Whether it’s the ginger Tilda Swinton wig he wears or the pitch-perfect Patrick Bateman impression he employs, Gary, and Powell in portraying him, have an absolute blast.

But the film hinges on one sting, where Gary as “Ron” has a surprising meet-cute with Madison (Adria Arjona), a woman trying to have her abusive husband killed. Taken by her vulnerability, Gary botches the sting and suggests she run away and start a new life. The easy chemistry between the two transcends the horrible predicament for their actual meeting, and “Hit Man” ascends into something special here. 

The film is loosely based on the real-life Gary Johnson who did this exact job, albeit less colorfully and less elaborately. Still, the secret to the movie’s special sauce is Linklater’s script that he co-wrote and developed with Powell. The key change they made from reality and the source material, a 2001 article from Texas Monthly magazine, is what happens after Gary lets an abused woman off the hook. In the film, they meet again and begin to date, with Madison knowingly courting a man she believes holds down a day job eradicating people and making their remains disappear. 

Powell and Arjona are magical together as the most toxic and foreboding romantic pairing on screen since Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike in “Gone Girl,” only Linklater’s vision is so much more laidback and less stylized than David Fincher’s. It becomes a tug of war over what’s worse, pretending to be someone you’re not while pursuing love or falling for someone you think is a literal monster, and what it says about both. The structure mirrors a romantic comedy. First, there’s tension about whether or not Madison will find out Gary’s truth and that “Ron” is a construct. Then, worse still, the real tension becomes about whether that construct is his true self.

In an overt move, much of the film’s drama and comedy are interspersed with scenes from Gary’s collegiate lectures, where he and his students have obvious debates about identity and morality meant to blast the film’s themes as loudly as possible. But that blatant device masks the more complex work being done between Powell and Arjona. In a romantic comedy, when one suitor pretends to be something he’s not, he can come clean, and the object of his affection affirms that all they ever wanted was the real him.

“Hit Man” goes in a much different direction. It suggests that whether or not fundamentally changing who you are is a good or a bad thing, it is, in fact, a possible thing. To achieve what you’ve never accomplished as you are, you may need to become someone you are not. But if you pretend long enough? If you genuinely fake it until you make it, what’s the difference?

“Hit Man” is currently streaming exclusively on Netflix.

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“The Pink Opaque,” the fictional mid-1990s television series at the center of “I Saw the TV Glow,“ will feel instantly recognizable on a visceral level. If you’re the target demographic for this film, you have had some parasocial connection to a piece of popular culture echoed in this effective pastiche. With the visual scanlines calling to mind VHS tapes of Nickelodeon’s “Are You Afraid of the Dark?“ and an opening credits font mirroring that of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,“ the show feels like a hazy memory of one’s youth. The outline of an immediately familiar shape, even if the details aren’t quite so clear.

The film centers around teenagers Owen (Justice Smith) and Maddy (Brigette Lundy-Paine) and the friendship they form over their mutual obsession with “The Pink Opaque.“ The show follows Isabel (Helena Howard) and Tara (Lindsey Jordan), two friends who share a psychic connection they use to fight monsters, both in baddie-of-the-week stories and more profound mythology episodes surrounding the show’s big villain, Mr. Melancholy. For Owen, an isolated boy uncomfortable in his skin, and Maddy, a young lesbian with a toxic family life, the show’s protagonists represent strength and resolve neither can find within themselves in daily life.

As the two friends share VHS tapes and printed episode guides, the inner life of the show becomes inextricably bound with their real lives, to the point that Maddy’s eventual disappearance begins to feel as supernatural as the fiction emanating from the bright, striking pre-flat-screen-era televisions that feature in the film so prominently. How much TV is too much?

But there is a crucial moment in the film’s final act some folks seem to be placing too much emphasis on, causing them to miss the deeper portrait being painted. Late in the movie, an adult Owen finds himself revisiting the “The Pink Opaque” as a streaming show which is presented as looking sillier and more childish than it is through the rest of the picture. If earlier, to us, it mirrored “Buffy” and other more “mature” YA bait, here it feels decidedly “Sesame Street”-adjacent.

Out of context, it reads like a pointed, damning critique of the perpetually stunted millennial generation and our borderline concerning addiction to fictional media as a form of medicinal escapism. While this scene, within the context of the larger picture, is gesturing at the truth that there is a hard limit to the efficacy of media consumption as self-care, it is not the fulcrum on which the film’s story rests. For that, one must look much earlier in the film for a more nebulous but no less impactful sequence. 

When we first meet a younger Owen (Ian Foreman) in 7th-grade gym class, he is wandering under the umbrage of one of those giant parachutes teachers would use for easy group activities. While Yeule’s cover of Broken Social Scene’s “Anthems for a Seventeen-Year-Old Girl” plays on the soundtrack, it’s difficult to overlook the parachute’s pattern, which is coded to match the colors of the transgender flag.

Writer/director Jane Schoenbrun is nonbinary (as is Lundy-Paine), but the film’s depiction of gender dysphoria seems to be going over some cis viewers’ heads mainly because the film artfully refrains from making its exploration of trans epiphany within the more explicit language viewers might expect from modern, queer cinema. Owen never comes out and claims any gender identity. The tells are sporadic, from the brief image of a repressed memory involving Owen presenting femme, to his stepfather (Fred Durst), refusing to let him stay up late to watch “The Pink Opaque,“ by asking if it’s for girls. But there’s no broadly telegraphed scene where he tearfully pours his guts out to a friend or loved one and spells it out.

“I Saw the TV Glow” is a heavy rumination on an element of being trans that ought to speak to plenty of cis folks, too: having the sense that something about your life is very wrong, but being trapped at the precipice of doing anything about it. 

Few films in recent memory house visuals that express this specific a sense of unsettling wrongness to the world it captures. Schoenbrun and cinematographer Eric K. Yue name-check “Batman Forever” as an aesthetic inspiration to present a haunted, neon-inflected mid-’90s, something that calls that era to mind, but diffused through disquieting layers of fog and implied malice. Coupled with a powerfully curated soundtrack full of original songs inspired by the film,

everything about this picture captures a unique vibe that feels entirely unto itself, despite the influences it shows freely on its sleeve. (The stars of Nickelodeon’s “The Adventures of Pete & Pete” both make cameos, as does Amber Benson from “Buffy.”)

The film’s emotional climax is one of the most startling and transgressive developments. After Maddy has reappeared into an adult Owen’s life, her explanation of where she has been is terrifying from a horror movie perspective but strangely comforting within the confines of this narrative and Owen’s predicament. Without spoiling the particulars, it poses a quandary that tickles the hero’s journey, which viewers will cry for throughout such an experimental and challengingly paced picture. In the moment, it collapses a film’s worth of difficult thematic ideas into a straightforward solution. But the “easy out” the film offers is anything but. In the film, as in life, real change has a cost, and the choices it requires can be too much for some. The final act trudges on as Owen and the audience have to wrestle with these revelations. At this point, a happy ending seems so unlikely that they’re left to ponder whether one is even possible.

Though the film ends on a down note, there is a lingering image that cuts through the dirge. It’s not coincidentally the first image in the film’s official trailer. It’s the chalk graffiti outside of Owen’s house, big and bold in bright pastel lettering: “there is still time.” 

“I Saw the TV Glow” plays exclusively in theaters but will be available onVOD next month.

The post ‘I Saw the TV Glow’ is transcendent appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

In the world of lucha libre, the unique brand of professional wrestling from Mexico, fighters are primarily split between two warring archetypes. There are the tecnicos, masked “good guys” who look like superheroes and move with a graceful, technically impressive style. On the other side are rudos, brutish, brawling “bad guys” whose primary job is to draw the crowd’s ire. 

These matches are very physical and taxing on the human body. They are also brief morality plays with predetermined outcomes designed to assert a comforting status quo. But the central figure in “Cassandro” is perhaps the most iconic example of a third option for these grapplers: the exotico.

When we meet Saul (Gael García Bernal), a diminutive, bleach-blonde wrestler who works under a mask as “El Topo,” multiple colleagues suggest he shift his career trajectory by becoming an exotico. Night after night, he plays a scrappy runt of a rudo who gets the snot beat out of him by the titanic wrestler Gigantico, while fans cheer at his pain. 

But exoticos are a different type of wrestler. They’re flamboyant, drag queen-esque performers who parade around like a prejudiced police sketch artist’s approximation of homosexuality, their maskless faces covered in makeup so broadly drawn it could be mistaken from afar for clown paint. They are, in practice, little more than a pair of homophobic keys to jangle in the faces of the drunk audience members who chant slurs at the ring with Pavlovian consistency. 

Becoming an exotico could, in theory, provide Saul with the change he’s been looking for. But this career advice does not come from an earnest place. Saul is openly gay. His less-than-accepting co-workers assume it would be an easier job for him, given they believe that cartoonish stereotype is how all gay men are. But Saul’s not against working as an exotico just because he doesn’t want to exploit his sexual identity for a crowd. He wants to be a star, and exoticos always lose. 

But through a series of setbacks and circumstances, Saul does choose to take off the mask and trade it for lipstick, but he does it his own way. He invents the persona “Cassandro” and, through it, expands the limits of what an exotico can be in and out of the ring. 

For a better idea about the real life and storied career of this influential lucha figure, you would do better to watch “Cassandro the Exotico,” a 2018 documentary exploring his history. While entertaining, this sensationalized tale, by writer/director Roger Ross Williams, surrounding the broad strokes of his story feels like a missed opportunity on multiple fronts.

Williams seems largely uninterested in exploring the rich complexity of lucha libre culture beyond the absolute bare minimum necessary for Saul’s story to make sense. For anyone familiar with the world of professional wrestling, seeing Saul’s arc unfold between the ropes is a thing of beauty. 

Saul is able to transform Cassandro from a figure who is booed and met with hateful vitriol to someone who wins over the crowd through his balletic movement and charm. But for a more casual viewer who is given little to go off of concerning the scripted and choreographed nature of the fights, the true breadth of Saul’s gifts is lost. 

While all biographical films have to take liberties with facts to make for enticing fiction, “Cassandro” reorders so many vital points and fudges so much of the timeline that it may as well have been a wholly original story “inspired” by the man it seeks to mythologize. The many departures from reality would be more acceptable if they led to a sturdier screenplay with a clearer structure. Often, filmmakers make fictional adjustments to the facts purely for the unavoidable reason that real life doesn’t always follow the three-act structure. But to make a biopic that still struggles with narrative even after this much revisionism, why change so much to begin with?

So much is left on the table here. It would have been fascinating to see a better exploration of the relationship between the homophobia in Saul’s life that strains his otherwise loving relationship with his mother (Perla de la Rose) and the vitriol from the crowd. Or to better highlight the thematic convergence of luchadors hiding behind a mask to play these larger-than-life characters with the very different duality experienced by Saul’s closeted lover (Raul Castillo), whose wife and children know nothing about his true self. These criticisms don’t even get into the literal crime of casting megastar Bad Bunny in the film only for him to play a flat, barely present side character who occasionally sells Saul cocaine.

For all its missed opportunities, however, “Cassandro” is one of Bernal’s career-best performances. It’s a feat how well he expresses a tortured inner life through physicality and his gaze. Every bit of the tragedy in his origins comes off through the heavy lifting Bernal does. And what Williams may lack as a screenwriter, he luckily makes up for with a patience for filming the spectacle of the ring alongside the more languid side of Saul’s home life.

Aficionados of lucha may get more from “Cassandro” than the uninitiated will. However, it’s still an endearing and engaging portrait of otherness and the way the things about ourselves that hold us back in life can be what propels us forward to the life we’ve always wanted. It’s hard to gripe about a message that is that inspiring.

“Cassandro” is streaming on Amazon Prime.

This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, “Cassandro” wouldn’t exist.

The post ‘Cassandro’ is an exhilarating, if messy, biopic. appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

It all started with Keanu Reeves, a dead dog, a stolen car, and the haunting memory of a lost loved one. But the “John Wick” franchise has stretched its simple tale of revenge into a sprawling epic whose outings grow exponentially more vast and intricate. “John Wick: Chapter 4” pushes the series to its outermost limits, delivering some of the best action in American cinema history. 

That it does so while bolstering its spectacle with surprisingly moving social commentary is a testament to how grand even the most basic popcorn entertainment can be when the creators are most focused on telling the best possible story now, not just saving it for the next installment. The same can’t be said for the bloated “Chapter 3 – Parabellum,” the only film in the series with a pretentious subtitle. Though it only clocked in at 10 minutes longer than the two-hour runtime for “Chapter 2,” “Parabellum” was a slog, but only because it exemplified the worst impulses of a post-“cinematic universe” Hollywood.

The first “John Wick” introduced us to its titular figure of doom. Calling him a hero would be both generous and deceptive. John Wick (Keanu Reeves) is a retired hitman turned reclusive widower, left alone with the emotional support dog posthumously gifted to him by his dead wife. But some feckless crooks killed that pet and stole his car. The ensuing path of revenge drew him back into a Byzantine world of underground assassins. Because audiences enjoyed watching a depressed Keanu murder nearly a hundred people, we were given a sequel. 

“Chapter 2” expanded the sneaky worldbuilding of its first outing, elaborating upon this fascinating neo-noir society in new and intriguing ways. John Wick’s world is not dissimilar to the fantasy role play of tabletop gaming, only with all the magic wands replaced with Glocks and all the chainmail replaced with Brioni suits. Rather than just a simple tale of one man’s revenge, “Chapter 2” transformed the franchise into the story of the High Table, the organization ruling this criminal underworld. In my review of the film back in 2017, I called it “a depressing approximation of capitalist society made literal with video game mechanics and flashy carnage.” That film left audiences expecting Wick to wage an all-out war against the overlords who wanted him dead in what could have been the most thrilling labor-versus-capitalist narrative since the ’90s, when WWF’s “Stone Cold” Steve Austin laid hands on his billionaire degenerate boss Vince McMahon.

But seeking surplus value for the shareholders isn’t only the root of all evil within Wick’s fictional world, but also here in reality for the business that decides his fate. “Parabellum” saw the franchise ditch its original screenwriter, Derek Kolstad, in favor of a writer’s room responsible for seeding television tie-ins. The result was a movie that still hit similar heights of action and thrills but was bogged down by moving further away from Wick’s central journey. I’ll never turn down seeing Halle Berry and a small army of dogs fighting bad guys, but it’s clear the series was losing its way trying to keep up with the MCUs of the world when its origins lay in clear counterprogramming to that kind of brand synergy. 

Thankfully, “Chapter 4” learns from all the mistakes made in “Parabellum.” Director Chad Stahelski, Keanu’s former stunt double on the “Matrix” films who has helmed every entry here thus far, was adamant that they needed to make a movie that delivered what fans wanted from a John Wick film. These movies are, at their core, exercises in showcasing the best fight choreography, the best car chase staging, and the most balletic shootouts. Rather than get hung up trying to expand the lore, Stahelski and his team focused on strengthening what has worked historically and jettisoning whatever didn’t serve Wick’s arc. It’s all about John Wick trying to get out from under the High Table, cutting a path of destruction in the feeble hopes of ending his life as a man free from physical debts, if not karmic ones.

The result is a film that borrows from the scale and tone of Sergio Leone’s “Dollars” trilogy, while homaging the sweep of David Lean’s epics, the bravura camera work of Brian De Palma, and the cartoon physics (and comic relief) of “Looney Tunes.” Oscar-nominated cinematographer Dan Laustsen has clearly been let off some chain. Pushing the film’s visual palette harder than ever before, he unleashes a smorgasbord of colors and vistas, making every frame of the film a feast for the eyes. 

There are more new players than ever, but they all fit the proceedings better than those in the previous films. The film is full of fun supporting turns from the likes of Hiroyuki Sanada, pop star Rina Sawayama, direct-to-video action icon Scott Adkins (in a fatsuit, no less), and martial arts legend Donnie Yen as a blind warrior Wick considers a close friend. Returning cast members Ian McShane and Laurence Fishburne continue to chew up any available scenery not already littered with bullet holes. But Bill Skarsgård is perhaps the biggest surprise as the over-the-top face of the High Table’s aristocratic arrogance. In a franchise with 400-plus casualties, never before has one man made an audience yearn for his death this effectively..

At nearly three hours, “Chapter 4” is the longest in the series, but it’s got the least fat. Where “Parabellum” felt overlong and overstuffed, this one moves at a deliberate pace, taking long, luxurious breaks for suspense and breathing room before transitioning back into one of the film’s three interconnected set pieces. Yes, the movie makes you wait half an hour for the first real action, but that sequence is so ornately arranged and so impressively paced that when it’s over, the audience needs that time to get ready for the next heart-stopping bit of violence. 

But if this was all empty calories, even the truly mind-blowing fights and shootouts would grow tiresome eventually. “Chapter 4” lives on the pathos of Reeves’ understated and melancholic performance. In the first film, a bartender asks him how life is on the other side of the world. He tells her, “It was good. Far better than I deserved.” Four movies deep, and with more evidence than ever that John Wick will never get a happy ending, we still watch and pray for one. 

This one also nourishes the soul with countless examples of solidarity and brotherhood as a defense against the all-consuming authority of the ruling class. There are scenes where men Wick has known for years exchange brutal aphorisms about loyalty and what it means to be a real comrade. The brusque but quotable nature of these one-liners would not look out of place on an Instagram page run by men’s rights activists and hustle culture enthusiasts who parrot talking points about having a “Sigma Grindset.” It’s all oversimplified and written in the terse poetry of Guy Movie Grit, but it’s delivered with a sincerity that cuts through the cliche.

The pandemic took a lot from the film industry. Still, one benefit of such a long drought with nothing to sustain and entertain us but streaming platform nonsense and superhero chicanery means that, every few weeks, a movie like “John Wick: Chapter 4” blows the doors off of a packed house. It leaves us grinning and sated with no more cogent thoughts than “the movies are back, baby.”

I look forward to reciting that mantra many more times this year. 

“John Wick: Chapter 4” is in theaters nationwide Thursday, March 23.

The post There’s Beauty in the Bloodshed of “John Wick: Chapter 4.” appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

The closer we get to the Academy Awards, film critics like myself tend to find ourselves doubling back over the previous year’s releases to see if we skipped any gems in our week-to-week grind. The two most glaring omissions for me were Gina Prince-Bythewood’s historical epic “The Woman King” and Chinonye Chukwu’s biopic “Till.”

“The Woman King” had a lot going against its box office hopes. First, it predominantly stars Black women. It’s ostensibly an action film, a genre those same women are woefully underrepresented in. To top it all off, it’s directed by a filmmaker most known for romantic dramas like “Love and Basketball.” But Prince-Bythewood spent years developing a Black Cat movie for Sony’s fledgling Spider-Man villain universe before directing “The Old Guard” for Netflix, so she was up to this difficult task. 

The film takes place in the West African kingdom of Dahomey in the early 1800s, following Nanisca (Viola Davis), the general of an all-woman army called the Agojie. Nanisca is in the unfortunate position of trying to convince King Ghezo (John Boyega) to leave the slave trade and find alternative methods to keep the kingdom’s coffers full. Dahomey is on the brink of war with their larger rival, the Oyo Empire, so they must recruit more warriors. That’s where the audience’s heroine Nawi (breakout actress Thuso Mbedu), comes in. Through her training and indoctrination, we see that the Agojie are a near-utopian oasis of feminist strength nestled at the forefront of a society built on the subjugation of others. 

Say what you will about period pieces or the flattening of historical fact, but if you populate a movie with talented actresses like Davis, Mbedu, and Lashana Lynch, and have those amazing women murder slavers in exciting and thrilling ways, you’re going to have a winner on your hands. But if “The Woman King” is a film that had to, by necessity, cast historical complexity to the wayside to achieve its populist escapism, “Till” was fighting that battle in reverse. 

“Till” centers around a performance from Danielle Deadwyler as Mamie Till, Emmett Till’s mother. This film’s tragic core and harsh subject matter were not suited to the post-COVID marketplace. Moviegoers want to be wowed, soothed, frightened, or amused. They do not want to devote hours of their strained lives to exploring generational trauma and Black pain. Even those still open to such storytelling would generally prefer to do so later, at home, on-demand, where they can take copious breaks or look at humorous TikToks in between the pathos. But it’s a credit to Chukwu’s considerable gifts as a filmmaker that the film is anything other than a torturous slog.

“Till” opens with Mamie (Deadwyler) driving her son Emmett (Jalyn Hall). The camera drifts back and forth between the two, observing the sheer mirth Emmett’s excitable presence brings and tethering it to the shining light in his mother’s eyes. But as they reach their destination, a shop in downtown Chicago, that light slowly drains from her. She shifts into every Black mother’s omnipresent worry for her child in this country. After some “light” racism from a shop guard, she ponders the raw, uncut hatred awaiting Emmett down South for the Mississippi trip he’s bound for. We, the audience, already know the violence in store for him, but from this point and through the rest of the film, she already knows herself.

Deadwyler’s performance is astonishing. Her screen presence helps the film walk a tightrope between facing the cruel reality of injustice head-on and celebrating the beauty of life and its most resonant relationships. The film itself begins to feel a bit too long past the emotional climax when Mamie demands an open-casket funeral for the unrecognizable remains of her dead son. However, it finds some fire still in its wretched and infuriating depiction of the trial of the boy’s murderers. Chukwu tells a broad story about how Black folks have had to set aside their grief to focus on the greater good of affecting change for our people.

Deadwyler, at multiple points in the film, delivers the impactful dramaturgy we’re so used to seeing excerpted during the Oscars telecast. Still, no such examples will be shown on ABC this year. She and “Woman King” star Davis campaigned dutifully  throughout awards season. They went to all the parties. They schmoozed with all the right people. But both were shut out from the nominations.

Ignoring that those detractors also seem to ignore Ana de Armas and her surprise nomination for “Blonde”, voters likely ignored these films for similar reasons I took so long to seek them out. White voters do not care about Black stories, so no amount of social lubrication will make them sit down to watch these films. 

I care very deeply about Black stories, but I have grown so tired of how many in the mainstream do little more than regurgitate Black pain or recycle bland white narratives with the same four trendy Black performers swapped in. Over the years, I have had to review many movies that are centrally and proudly about Black pain, and with every passing year, I find less reason to be enthusiastic about such content.  

I incorrectly pegged “The Woman King” and “Till” as more of the same, but both films surprised me in different ways. They ultimately make for a fascinating double feature as two tales about Black women and the indestructible bonds they can form with their progeny. If more Black films hit the big screen every year, pushing boundaries and making lasting impressions as these two did, we wouldn’t keep talking about snubs every year or the establishment’s canonizing approval.

We’d be too busy enjoying our embarrassment of cinematic riches to care.

“The Woman King” is currently streaming on Netflix. It and “Till” are available to rent or purchase on Amazon, Apple TV, YouTube, et al.

The post These Two Black-led, Black-starring Films Transcend The Oscar Race appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

For a variety of sociocultural reasons, year over year, the average moviegoer seems to be increasingly oblivious to the films that get nominated for the Academy Awards. There was once ample room in the marketplace for prestige dramas to be both critically celebrated and commercially viable enough to be on the radar of everyday folks who don’t read Variety on the daily. But in the case of the little-seen indie “To Leslie,” even industry insiders and Oscars prognosticators have been scratching their heads as if to say, “…her?”

The low-budget film, starring chameleonic character actress Andrea Riseborough as the titular Leslie, a down-and-out single mother trying to salvage her life after blowing her lottery winnings, grossed less than $25,000 during a short theatrical run this past October. The directorial debut from TV veteran Michael Morris (he’s worked on “Billions,” “Shameless,” and “13 Reasons Why”)  is one of those meaty character dramas that only currently exist as underfunded independent productions or glossy throwaway pictures for a digital streamer. It’s competently written, well-performed by a colorful supporting cast (featuring Marc Maron, Andre Royo, and Allison Janney), and features much of the intelligent staging and composition Morris brought to shows like “Better Call Saul.” 

It is not, however, a movie anyone predicted would generate Oscar buzz. Outside of an Independent Spirit Award nod and an award from the Chicago Critics Association, none of the usual earmarks of future Oscar success were lining up for the film. That was until Riseborough started a grassroots campaign powered by word of mouth from her peers, including Kate Winslet, Jane Fonda, and Sarah Paulsen. Many fellow actors and actresses took to social media to call attention to Riseborough’s leading performance. Noted lifestyle influencer Gwyneth Paltrow called the film a “masterpiece” and said Riseborough should win “every award there is.” 

Normies, who are typically only tangentially aware of awards campaign mechanics, began conspiracy theorizing all over Twitter. Not understanding how much more pernicious the average awards campaign bankrolled by a movie studio with a healthy advertising budget tends to be, their suspicions turned to tough questions. Was this some MLM scheme in the making, like the cinephile equivalent to Forex or Amway? Could this actress most folks have never heard of be this good? Was this movie even real?

It’s entirely possible that you do not know that you already know Andrea Riseborough. This past year she was in two high-profile releases, as Christian Bale’s cruel wife in “Amsterdam” and Mrs. Wormwood in “Matilda The Musical.” Since 2006, she’s been in a diverse array of films in various role types. From a supporting turn in a 2013 Tom Cruise blockbuster (“Oblivion”) to a lead performance in Brandon Cronenberg’s underrated 2020 sci-fi thriller “Possessor,” Riseborough has done it all. But she rarely sounds or looks the same in any two movies. Not because she drastically alters her appearance or has careening weight fluctuations — instead, she has one of those indistinct faces capable of subtle metamorphosis. 

Actresses like Cate Blanchett (who shouted Riseborough out at the Critics Choice Awards, where she won for “Tár”) and Tilda Swinton are known for their versatility, but whenever they have a new film out, you know it’s them. Riseborough is one of the hardest-working actresses whose contribution to a film rarely comes into focus until you see her name in the end credits. 

So, maybe her peers are getting behind her so vociferously because “To Leslie” is the first time she’s ever been front and center to this degree. The film opens with Leslie celebrating winning $190,000 in the lottery before the camera cruelly cuts to six years into the future, where she is getting kicked out of the hotel room she lives in for not having the rent to stay. What follows is a difficult and grating film about a woman who squandered a lucky opportunity, abandoned her child, and has been ravaged by alcoholism to the point that everyone in her hometown treats her like an archvillain. 

Through her tortured relationship with her mother (Janney) and the burgeoning romance with her new employer (Maron), Riseborough plays a wide range of emotions and temperaments, from the extreme shouting people tend to associate with “good acting” to the more subtle and quiet work that allows her performance to linger in the mind long past the end credits. While every over-the-top on-screen argument is clearly auditioning to be the clip they play on Oscar night before cutting to a rapturous clapping audience, they can’t touch the film’s finest sequence. 

Around the midway point of the film’s admittedly bloated runtime, Leslie sits at a bar alone, at her rock bottom, while Willie Nelson croons on the jukebox, asking the listeners if they’re sure this is really where they want to be. There’s no dialogue, no scene partners for her to rage against, and no petty distractions to get caught up in. She’s just a woman, alone with herself and her past, realizing, maybe too late, that she doesn’t want it to resemble her future.

It’s truly stirring work. And maybe all those stars lining up to give Riseborough her flowers are actually doing so because they all happen to be repped by the second largest talent agency in LA, and Hollywood is nothing if not an industry built on mutual back-scratching. But perhaps that’s what it takes these days for viewers to take a chance on an earthy little indie-film-that-could, when pictures like this get pushed further and further into the margins every year. 

Hollywood is all about theatrics. If it takes a lot of smoke and mirrors to get a good film and a willing audience in the same room together, then so be it.

“To Leslie” is available to rent and purchase on Amazon, iTunes, VUDU, Youtube, et al. 

The post Here’s “To Leslie,” an out-of-nowhere, unlikely Oscar contender. appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

When the public learned of Darren Aronofsky’s new film “The Whale,” there was a groundswell of enthusiasm for the project. That early support had little to do with this adaptation of Samuel D. Hunter’s 2012 play being the first Aronofsky feature since 2017’s “Mother!”. Nor was this hopeful energy the result of another successful A24-branded marketing campaign. Five years was not enough time for the masses to forget the laughably bad fable Aronofsky foisted upon audiences the last time, and the only real advertising A24 had to offer for this film was a lone image of lead actor Brendan Fraser in a cartoonish fat suit, hair thinning, his iridescent blue eyes dewy from the threat of future tears. 

Any early excitement “The Whale” fostered was owed entirely to being the theoretical centerpiece of “The Brendanaissance,” a much-desired comeback narrative for a once-beloved ’90s movie star abandoned by Hollywood and left to obscurity. Fraser was once the industry’s premiere on-screen himbo, before age and time altered his shape as he packed on some perfectly natural pounds. But for whatever reason, no one seemed to be troubled by that same performer exaggerating that real-life weight gain through elaborate prosthetics to play a 600-pound man.

“The Whale” sees Fraser play Charlie, a morbidly obese recluse deep into the process of slowly, guiltily, and dutifully eating himself to death. The only people Charlie interacts with are the students in his online writing course (he hides his face and body on Zoom) and his loyal pizza delivery man (Charlie leaves his payment in the mailbox to avoid any interpersonal confrontation). His only remaining friend, Liz (played by Hong Chau), is a nurse doing her level best to keep Charlie alive.

Sensing the end is near, Charlie attempts to reconnect with his estranged daughter, Ellie (played by Sadie Sink), a teenage malcontent still rightfully bitter at being abandoned at a young age. When Ellie was eight, Charlie left her and her mother (Samantha Morton) to be with his lover Alan, a man whose suicide from religious guilt over his homosexuality began the spiral Charlie is presently trapped in. Charlie offers his life savings to Ellie in exchange for spending time with him. 

There’s also a subplot about a missionary obsessed with “saving” Charlie after walking in on him having a heart attack while attempting to masturbate to gay pornography. That unintentional meet-cute is how the film opens. It’s an awkward moment that also introduces the film’s pet motif: in moments when Charlie thinks he is about to die, he asks whoever is nearby to read him an essay about Moby Dick that holds a special place in his heart. 

The film itself has a claustrophobic quality, both from the cramped, theatrical staging that keeps us within the confines of Charlie’s abode and the squarish aspect ratio bringing the borders of the image itself in against our protagonist’s considerable girth. Aronofsky makes the viewer an unwitting voyeur into Charlie’s self-destructive routines, depicting the challenges of his daily life using plausibly deniable storytelling techniques that belie how exploitative and off-putting these sequences actually are. 

There’s a moment where Charlie opens a drawer full of granola bars, thinks about eating one, then, sullenly, shuts that drawer and opens the one beneath it, packed to the brim with candy bars. He eats several of them in one go. Every scene in the film showcasing Charlie’s binge eating has the relative sneering sleaze of your average “My 600-lb Life” episode. Still, in interviews, Aronofsky and his collaborators repeat the same mantras about the film’s dedication to empathy. But—as any cursory glance at photos from any of the play’s real-life productions will show—each image resembles a still frame from a Farrelly brothers comedy; the source material has a deluded and pompous sense of self-righteousness to mask its ugliness. 

On the surface, the closest cinematic kin to “The Whale” might be “Leaving Las Vegas,” the maudlin 1995 film about an alcoholic drinking himself into oblivion that won Nicolas Cage an Oscar. But for all of that picture’s foibles, it has an honesty and an earnestness that doesn’t try to deceive its audience into thinking the film is anything other than what it is: an ornately arranged trainwreck for bystanders to gawk at.

“The Whale” prizes Brendan Fraser’s considerable talent, yes. But it leverages the general public’s adoration for him and their ache to see him made whole from the struggles he’s weathered. Aronofsky weaponizes the viewer’s ferocious desire to see Fraser either receive the financial windfall that comes with once again being the talk of the town or, better still, the gravitas that might come from getting a golden statuette of his own.

But there is no empathy on that screen. Aronofsky seems interested only in grafting Fraser’s lovable eyes and endearing visage onto an otherwise judgmental view of obesity. And in watching “The Whale,” a fatphobic audience might temporarily disabuse themselves of the derision and disgust they hold for the heavyset just long enough to pat themselves on the back for emotionally connecting with a cartoon for roughly two hours. 

When the credits have rolled and Aronofsky’s unearned catharsis has drawn to a close, the doctors in the audience will continue to misdiagnose patients and blame their every ailment on BMI. Gym rats will continue leaving abusive comments on Lizzo’s Instagram posts. Skinny folk worldwide will continue to speak of gaining weight with the same frightened tone a rational person might reserve for being chased with a knife. 

And, somewhere, another actor will take measurements for his tailored fat suit for his local production of Hunter’s play. The cycle will repeat itself. 

“The Whale” is currently playing at The Charles Theatre.

The post “The Whale” is insincere and exploitative treacle. appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

Thursday, Sept. 22

Bromo Art Walk: Experience the Bromo Arts District during a night of artistic performances, exhibits, and open studios. Artwork will be available for purchase throughout the event at galleries, artist studios, and pop-up markets. 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. in Bromo Arts District (Multiple Locations), 218 West Saratoga Street. (Free) RSVP recommended. For more information, go to: www.bromodistrict.org/bromo-art-walk or call 410-244-1030 ex 713.

Bromo Art Walk After Party: After the Bromo Art Walk, keep the party going at Current Space’s outdoor courtyard. This event will feature a performance from Eze Jackson and a live DJ set by Trillnatured. Current Space’s Garden Bar will be open with late-night food available from Vegan Juiceology. 9 p.m. at Current Space, 421 North Howard Street. Registration required. For more information, go to: www.currentspace.com.

The Stoop Storytelling Series: Hidden In Plain Sight: The Stoop Storytelling Series and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, in partnership with Enoch Pratt Free Library, present “Hidden in Plain Sight: Stories about the powerful—and often invisible—public health forces that shape our lives.” 7 p.m. at Enoch Pratt Free Library Central Branch, Wheeler Auditorium, 400 Cathedral Street. (Free) In-person and virtual. For more information, go to: www.eventbrite.com/e/hidden-in-plain-sight-tickets-379954372757 or call 410-396-5430.

Psyche A. Williams-Forson presents “Eating While Black”: Psyche A. Williams-Forson is one of the leading thinkers about food in America. In her new book, she offers her knowledge and experience to illuminate how anti-Black racism operates in the practice and culture of eating. 7 p.m. at Red Emma’s, 3128 Greenmount Avenue. For more information, go to: www.redemmas.org/ or call 410-601-3072.

Brandi Collins-Dexter presents “Black Skinhead”: In “Black Skinhead,” Brandi Collins-Dexter explores the fragile alliance between Black voters and the Democratic Party. Collins-Dexter will be in conversation with Lisa Snowden, editor-in-chief and co-founder of Baltimore Beat. 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Greedy Reads Remington, 320 West 29th Street. For more information, go to: www.greedyreads.com/ or call 410-878-0184.

Friday, Sept. 23

It Ain’t Nothin’ But the Blues: From African chants and Delta spirituals to the urban electricity of a Chicago nightclub, from dusty backroads bluegrass to the twang of a country juke joint, “It Ain’t Nothin But the Blues” is a stirring retrospective of blues classics that summon the true soul of African American music. 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. at Arena Players Incorporated, 801 McCulloh Street. For more information, call 410-728-6500.

Saturday, Sept. 24

BLK ASS FLEA MKT 106 + BLK: Gather to experience a day of blackness, music, culture, and vibes, all while circulating the black dollar, The BLK ASS FLEA MKT is a radical movement of BLK JOY. Expect some of the hottest DJs from Baltimore and the DMV. Noon to 7 p.m. at Eager Park, North Wolfe Street. For more information, go to www.eventbrite.com/o/blk-ass-flea-mkt-39175813423.

Baltimore Boiler Room X Dark Room: The international live music showcase returns to Baltimore, this time featuring the sounds of Amy Reid, Feroun, Jordan Pope, Karizma, Life on Planets, and Pangelica. 10 p.m to 2 a.m. at Le Mondo, 406 North Howard Street. For more information, go to boilerroom.tv/session/boiler-room-x-baltimore. 

Gwynn Oak Food and Music Festival: Tell your family and friends to bring a blanket or chair and come out to enjoy good music and the region’s best food, retail, and service vendors. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Gwynn Oak Park, 6010 Gwynn Oak Ave, Gwynn Oak, MD. For more information, go to houseofotem.com/gwynnoakfoodandmusicfestival.

Remfest 2022: The third annual RemFest is taking over Remington Avenue with more bands, more vendors, more food, and more family-friendly fun. Featuring Dave Heumann, RoVo Monty, Manners Manners, Bali Lamas, Josh Stokes, Leisure Sport, Wifty Bangura, Kotic Couture, darsombra, Midnight Sun, Tionesta, DJ Mills, and more. Noon to 9 p.m. at Remington Avenue. For more information, email info@remfest.org or go to: www.remfest.org.

VERSION, A Queer Dance Party: VERSION is back with sounds by Trillnatured, hosted by Kotic Couture, and documented by Sydney Allen. 10 p.m. at The Crown Baltimore, 1910 North Charles Street, second floor. ($10) Tickets must be purchased at the door. For more information, email thecrownbaltimore@gmail.com or call 410-625-4848.

Sunday, Sept. 25

Juke Joint: A summer day party featuring live music, vendors, and good vibes. It’s a networking event celebrating house music and medical cannabis. What more could you ask for? 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Sound Garden, 1616 Thames Street. For more information, go to: www.crucialculture.net/ 

Thursday, Sept. 29

Adult Back To School Nite Fundraiser: A night of stationary, fun, and drinks. Come grab a desk supply list for those returning to the office or living the remote life. A portion of the proceeds will be donated to support adult education. 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at The Paper Herald, 702 Saint Paul Street. 21+ with ID. For more information, go to: www.paperherald.com/ or call 443-835-1402.

Artists Talk: Tawny Chatmon and Stephen Towns: Artists Tawny Chatmon and Stephen Towns will be in conversation with Molly Warnock, historian and critic of the visual arts, and Joaneath Spicer, The James A. Murnaghan Curator of Renaissance and Baroque Art at the Walters. The speakers will discuss themes in the show Activating the Renaissance, and how each artist draws from the past to comment on the present. 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Walters Art Museum, Graham Auditorium, 600 North Charles Street. Registration is required. For more information, go to: www.thewalters.org, or call 410-547-9000.

Friday, Sept. 30

Creative Mornings/Baltimore with Evan Woodard: Salvage Arc’s Evan Woodard speaks on this month’s topic, Depth. Woodard is a Baltimore-based historian and relic hunter who has worked with countless homeowners and local organizations to preserve historical artifacts buried in privies beneath the city. 8:30 a.m. at Open Works Baltimore, 1400 Greenmount Avenue. For more information, go to: creativemornings.com/talks/evan-woodard.

Station North Art Walk: An evening of exhibits, performances, and special events in the Station North Arts District. This is the final Station North Art walk of 2022. 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at 1400 Greenmount Avenue, multiple locations. (Free) Eventbrite registration recommended. For more information, go to: www.stationnorth.org/news/2022/7/6/station-north-art-walks-2022 call 410-244-1775.

First Annual Kotton Klub Gala: Dust off your flapper dresses, zoot suits, and your finest party attire, and come experience the roaring ’20s with the Kappa Alpha Psi Foundation of Metropolitan Baltimore. Pay homage and party with a purpose. There will be a VIP open bar, general admission cash bar, a buffet, and dancing. DJ set by DJ Tanz with performances by Ms. Larzine and Dr. Phil’s Big Band. 8 p.m. to midnight at Martin’s West, 6817 Dogwood Road. Must be 21+ to attend. ($80 – $150) For more information, contact Wayne Pulliam at 443-690-9146 or Chuck Harris at 410-917-4090.

The Vibes: SYS Fundraiser Event Series: Welcome to the SYSMVMT. Come vibe with Share Your Soul at our first Night Brunch fundraiser event. Music, raffles, food and drinks. Vibes produced by DJ Sole, performances by Anwvr, Jarreau Williams, TheNasa8, and Kente! Proceeds are to raise funds for SYS’s first commission-free silent disco art gallery on 10/21. 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. at Cahoots Brothers, 300 West 29th Street. For more information email sharde.hoff@sysmvmt.com.

Saturday, Oct.1

Birthday Fundraiser to Benefit Sankofa Children’s Museum: Enjoy African cuisine, traditional African dance, raffles, music, and more. You can support the Sankofa Children’s Museum of African Cultures by purchasing your ticket today. 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. at Sankofa Children’s Museum of African Cultures, 4330 Pimlico Road. ($70) 

Hilton’s Private Stock Plant Sale at Green Neighbor: Hilton Carter has said the unimaginable: “I have too many plants.” With the arrival of his beloved daughter and the need to make necessary space in his home, he has decided to give you the chance to own plants that he has personally cared for and styled in planters that are ready for you to bring into yours. 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. at Good Neighbor, 3827 Falls Road.  For more information, go to: goodneighborshop.com/ or call 443-627-8919.

Youth Leadership Cohort Kick-Off Party: Join Afro Charities and New Generation Scholars for a free open house and launch party hosted by Legacy Scholars Naima and Kyan. This event marks the 15th year of Muse 360’s New Generations Scholars program and will include: activities, music, and brunch. Parents & youth are welcome to come to learn about the program and to apply. 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. at NoMüNoMü, 709 N Howard Street. For more information, go to  https://www.afrocharities.org/events or email diamon@afrocharities.org.

Read Street Jam: After 37 years, the Read Street Jam is back, continuing its history as a free and welcoming event for all. Celebrating all the artists, musicians, vendors, shops, and cafes who make Mt. Vernon special. The Jam will feature a local house band, vocalists, street performers, and DJs. Noon to 8 p.m. at 200 West Read Street between Tyson Street and Park Avenue. For more information, email ReadStreetAssociation@gmail.com or call 443-255-5497.

Sunday, Oct. 2

One Maryland One Book 2022 Author Naima Coster at the Lewis Museum: The award-winning author of “What’s Mine and Yours” will discuss her novel, answer questions, and sign books. This event is coordinated in partnership with the Enoch Pratt Free Library, Maryland State Department of Education, BMORE Me, and Baltimore City Public Schools. 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum, 830 East Pratt Street. For more information, go to: onemarylandonebook.org/ or call 443-263-1800.

The post Baltimore Arts and Culture Listings 9/22/22-10/5/22 appeared first on Baltimore Beat.

The Charles Theatre, 1711 N. Charles St., (410) 727-3464, thecharles.com.

“A Fantastic Woman” (Sebastián Lelio, Spain, 2017), now playing.

“Lady Bird” (Greta Gerwig, U.S., 2017), now playing.

“Phantom Thread” (Paul Thomas Anderson, U.S., 2017), now playing.

“The Shape Of Water” (Guillermo del Toro, U.S., 2017), now playing.

“Get Out” (Jordan Peele, U.S., 2017), Feb. 22.

“The Insult” (Ziad Doueiri, Lebanon/France, 2017), opens Feb. 23.

“Boudu Saved From Drowning” (Jean Renoir, France, 1932), Feb. 24, Feb. 26.

Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave., (410) 276-1651, creativealliance.org

“Miss Kiet’s Children” (Peter Lataster and Petra Lataster-Czisch, Netherlands, 2016), Feb. 22.

Gallery CA, 440 E. Oliver St., (410) 528-9239, facebook.com/GalleryCA.

Secret Psychic Cinema presents Roger Beebe: Films for ONE to EIGHT Projectors, Feb. 23.

The Parkway Theatre, 5 W. North Ave., (410) 752-8083, mdfilmfest.com.

“Double Lover” (François Ozon, France, 2017), through Feb. 22.

“Along With The Gods: Two Worlds”, (Kim Yong-hwa, South Korea, 2017), through Feb. 22.

“Maigret Sets A Trap” (Jean Delannoy, France, 1958), through Feb. 22.

“The Cage Fighter” (Jeff Unay, US.. 2018), opens Feb. 23.

“Have A Nice Day” (Liu Jian, China, 2017) opens Feb. 23.

“Golden Exits” (Alex Ross Perry, U.S., 2017) with director Q&A, Feb. 23.

“A Touch Of Sin” (Jia Zhangke, China, 2013), Feb. 23.

Gunky’s Basement: “American Psycho” (Mary Harron, U.S. 2000), Feb. 28.

The Senator Theatre, 5904 York Road, (410) 323-4424, senatortheatre.com.

“Black Panther” (Ryan Coogler, U.S., 2018), now playing.

“Call Me By Your Name” (Luca Guadagnino, U.S/Italy/Brazil/France, 2017), now playing.

“Darkest Hour” (Joe Wright, U.K., 2017), now playing.

“I, Tonya” (Craig Gillespie, U.S., 2017), now playing.

“The Post” (Steven Spielberg, U.S., 2017), now playing.

“Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri” (Martin McDonagh, U.S., 2017), now playing.

“Warner Brothers Cartoon Show,” Feb. 25.

“Once Upon A Time In America (Extended Director’s Cut),” (Sergio Leone, U.S., 1984), Feb. 28.

The post Movie Screenings: Feb. 21-28 appeared first on Baltimore Beat.