The End of Oak Street Review

"The End of Oak Street" succeeds where so many in the "Jurassic Park" franchise have stagnated for so long: this is a tense action thriller disguised as a blockbuster, creating individual moments so fresh and so exciting that you often end up forgetting the aggressive silliness of the actual plot and astonishing stupidity of so many of the characters.

False Mesozoic era purists might scoff at the lack of people standing in awe at the majesty of these warm-blooded reptiles, but that's because here, they're too busy ripping people to shreds, and I appreciate that.

It all begins with a scene that only exists in the minds of boomer parents, where the entire block is out having a block party. The adults all drink Schlitz beer together while the kids play balloon toss, regardless of age or middle school social stature. This opening would be hilarious if not for its stone-cold sincerity.

Yet not all is right in this 1980's community bliss: we see young Brian (Christian Convery) ride bikes with his friends, dote over his doggy Starbuck and make googly eyes at the new girl Jeannette, played by Jordan Alexa Davis, who just moved in nearby. But that's not all: in an offscreen accident, he shoved a stick through the spokes of a classmate's bike, resulting in a kid breaking his arm, and boy is his older brother out for vengeance. This sort of adolescent shenanigans must run in the family, as his older sister Audrey (Maisy Stella) is seen struggling to fit in. See, she reads books! And not just any books- science fiction books! What a nerd!

Anne Hathaway plays their mother Denise, a hypocrite housewife who's been plotting to leave her husband Greg (Ewan McGregor) since their honeymoon, chronicling a hypothetical "how to" in a novel she writes in secret in the basement. He is a good sport though, maintaining a positive attitude throughout, much to the chagrin of the wannabe writer. She fears Greg's been drinking again, which he has, and is embarrassed that he's delivering pizzas to make some extra money. While she doesn't know he's been laid off (again) from the Chrysler plant, she knows he's keeping something else from her and that is apparently enough to put into practice that newfangled no-fault divorce she must have seen Dan Rather report on from their wood grain CRT TV.

This is a lot of backstory for what ultimately amounts to a simple monster movie. But then I remember that this was produced by J. J. Abrams, who's entire career can be defined as wanting so desperately to be Steven Spielberg that it all makes sense.

But I digress, because once the dinosaurs appear, the picture picks up such momentum that I almost forgot the awkward corner seat I for some reason decided to sit in. I say almost not because it wasn't uncomfortable, which it was, but because man, these people make some dumb choices. Brian's dog is missing since the creatures appeared, but after seeing it being chased by a raptor, he climbs down from the second-story window and goes after it! In the dark! Armed with, get this, a bow-and-arrow. His sister spots him, and instead of telling their parents, goes after him. In the dark! Armed with, get this, a pocket knife. Yeah sure, I'm sure "Jurassic Park" would have ended a lot differently had Alan Grant had a folding blade in his jeans.

Then things get lively again, like a scene where Denise and Greg's car is smashed into a house by a sharptooth. There is an intensity to these pleasantly feathered behemoths, showing up out in the open, in houses, from the sky and even out of pools, and they're shot cleanly so that we the audience can clearly see them.

Dinosaur films have hardly had any competition ever since "Jurassic Park" ruled the world back in 1993, and writer/director David Robert Mitchell knows exactly what kind of movie it wants to be, but it lacks the nerve to achieve those gnarly ambitions. Why bother putting kids into a dinosaur movie, dangle them in constant danger only for the worst thing to happen to them, physically at least, is a few cuts and I think a broken leg. The whole thing wraps up too cleanly with a nonsensical happy ending that isn't anywhere near as clever as the filmmakers thought.

I should also mention that, while Starbuck does live, a random cat scene in the background does not. Obviously David is a dog person.

The Devil's Mouth Review

"Shark Week" continues on So I Went to the Movies, and after April's dismal "Thrash" from Netflix, I had my hopes that a different streaming service would finally make a competent monster movie. Amazon Prime's "The Devil's Mouth" is no such film. A group of obnoxious young adults get devoured one-by-one by a bull shark in a Thailand cave. In essence, it's "The Descent" only without the tension, memorable characters, creative creature design or just about anything that keeps people talking about it. The only time this flick will ever come up in conversation is "hey, did you see that awful shark movie on Amazon this weekend?"

The plot is really as simple as I described: five friends are out on vacation, renting the kind of boat that reeks of overprivileged Gen-Zers with unstable relationships with their rich parents. Early on, the timid Sara (Kathryn Newton) is left behind in the ocean by the others and attacked by jelly fish. Her best friend, the senselessly aggressive Max (Lana Condor) was the only one who knew she was out for a swim. By the time they remember and rescue her, she's covered in scars and sores that we fortunately don't see anyone pee on. Max and Sara exchange passive-aggressive remarks but Max's boyfriend James (Nico Hiraga) is able to nudge them into forgiving each other. Which is a shame, because if they just cancelled their next-day plans they'd all still be alive, but whoa hey, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Morning comes and it is off for the band to take a smaller boat to an island, and then canoe into a cave. From there, they take to their bathing suits, don some snorkels and make their way towards "the devil's mouth." Made famous for its jagged stalagmites and stalactites, as if making a toothy jaw of an apex predator: like a shark. Or devil, I suppose. The party also includes their friend Adrienne (Tommi Rose) and her new boy toy Greg (Gavin Casalegno). Her personality is one of simply existing, and his is that of a jock. Screenwriters Aja Gabel and Myung Joh Wesner never provide an answer as to why anyone would ever enter an underwater cave system called "the devil's mouth," but they clearly haven't ever met a stereotype that they didn't like.

Now inside the twisted system of caverns and probably forty minutes in, we finally get to meet the real star of the movie, the shark. The water inside is fresh, despite being surrounded by ocean, so the group deduces it is a bull shark, surprise surprise. Just once I'd like to see a movie about an irritated nurse shark or something, but I digress.

With a threat now obvious, the pack quickly begins to panic, despite their guide Wat (Tayme Thapthimthong) desperately trying to lead them to safety. He's my favorite character actually- he looks at the hysterical folks and just leaves, saying to follow him if they want to. Wat has no time for drama and I respect that.

Once the party of five realizes they're now guideless, Max decides the best course of action is to wait for help. Sara wants to try and escape through the ocean view gap nearby, arguing it's probably how the killer fish got in in the first place. Then someone dies and Max changes her plan. Not to what Sara proposed, oh no, that wouldn't do in a silly movie like this. She wants to go through a cave they didn't swim through, hoping the paths are too narrow for the shark. Others die and well, you can see the pattern here.

I'm not against dumb plotting or dumb characters in creature features, but if it decides to give me both, then it better damn well deliver the goods with monster mayhem. Sadly, we get only the briefest glimpse of the euryhaline carnivore. The times it's actually visible, it's clearly generated by computers, and generated poorly. This is also rated PG-13, so the most gore we get is some blood in the water. But come on, why PG-13? It's not like Amazon Prime is going to be ID-checking folks. If a kid really wants to watch this, they're gonna figure out how. Kids are pretty smart, though maybe less so if this is what they seek for entertainment. 

The grotto never becomes a character itself, director Jeff Wadlow has this annoying little habit of shrouding the entire film in near total blackness. Possibly to cover up the lack of decent sets, he zooms the camera up into these awkward closeups that belittle any sense of scale or immersion. I never for a moment believed anyone was in any danger- everyone just looks like soggy actors squatting in a dark swimming pool.

Jackass: Best and Last Review

"Jackass: Best and Last" is doubtfully the last and definitely not the best film in the surprisingly resilient franchise. Much of the same cast returns, including those who only just joined from the previous entry, "Jackass Forever," all up to the same old tricks. People get hit between the legs, shocked by a stungun, covered in poop and generally get all sorts of roughed up. 

You'd better take the subtitle literally, however, because much of the film's runtime are old clips. Some are introduced as "never before seen," but I doubt anyone could tell you with a straight face they hadn't seen this guy get kicked in the gonads this time before.

I never quite understood "Jackass" as a media property. A group of dummies get together and do incredibly dangerous stunts just to laugh at each other during it. But there is an unspoken aura of twisted creativity these skits demand, not to mention blind courage, and after, checks internet, twenty six years, the folks here kinda are running on fumes. By showing new footage with outtakes and scenes from earlier movies, things get a bit more labored.

Take, for example, the moment when "Danger Ehren," "Dave England" and "Wee Man" are suspended by wires in a shoddy play. There's cross-dressing, pineapples thrown and firecrackers, but what's the joke? Are pineapples intrinsically funny?

Maybe it's because these guys are getting old, that there's only so much hammering they can take? But wait, you say, what about all those new young members? They hardly appear in part five. And when they do, it almost always involves electricity or an obese person's butthole.

What the hell am I supposed to say here? Did I laugh? I did, actually, and, against my better judgement, the casts' joyful stupidity is rather infectious. I'm not against potty humor, I was a kid once after all, and even under the facade of an adult, I can willingly enjoy the lesser brows of comedy. "Jackass: Best and Last" might not be the team's best effort, but as a celebration of their idiocy, it scratches that itch we all have in our groins.

Disclosure Day Review

The marketing for Steven Spielberg's latest film, "Disclosure Day," has been nothing short of masterclass. You're left wondering what the film's even about, but then you see it and realize its plot is both somehow too simple and too complicated for its own good.

In short, it's about Daniel, a computer geek turned whistleblower of the US' knowledge, exploitation and coverup of extraterrestrial life. Only there's too many characters and plot-points that I stopped wondering about the amazement of aliens and instead focused on why this person said what they said so cryptically.

Dan is given chase by chief baddie Noah (Colin Firth), who runs the evil Wardex corp., which is sorta-kinda a government entity that it has henchmen all over the country and whose goons can drive recklessly. He needs to make sure the files Dan stole don't leak, though it never seems to occur to anyone that he could have made copies somewhere, but I digress.

Noah also has his eye on Margaret (Emily Blunt), a weatherwoman who suddenly speaks with pops, bubbles and gurgles like a shaken soda bottle. She faints and is taken to the hospital for examination, but she too breaks out when she sees who identify as FBI agents there wanting to ask her questions.

Our villain also wields some sort of alien device, a sort of symmetrical puck that can allow for him to pilot others, as well as appear as a sort of avatar in faraway places. There are three of these devices, one of which Hugo has. Why only three? I surmise that is probably the max amount the audience can keep track of at any given time. These space rocks also enables certain others the ability to turn invisible, power on lights, etc., but how this ties into the greater story isn't ever followed up on.

Then there's the religious parables, where Sister Maura (Elizabeth Marvel) quotes the bible by suggesting that just because god made us on Earth does not necessarily suggest the deity didn't do the same elsewhere. This, the mind-control and extraterrestrial espionage could make for three different films, but there isn't enough time to flesh out any. The film confuses clutter for intelligence.

 

Much of the nebulous exposition comes from Colman Domingo as Hugo, a coworker of Dan who's actively aiding his escape and evidence disclosure. Early on, Dan remarks over the phone to Hugo that he should just dump all the info online; Hugo says not to do that under any circumstance. Why not?! I think it's a pretty good question.

I can't delve into spoiler territory, the film at least deserves that much, but this artifical conflict means we need person A to be found by person B, they both need to do X and Y first, then we need to travel to location 1 and then location 2. Then, and only then, can everyone travel to location 3 before villain 0 gets them.

At first, the slow, drip-feed of plot had me invested, but the movie doesn't make time for all the wonder it introduces. My initial intrigue eventually became frustration, and then finally disenfranchisement.

With the amount of talent behind the camera, you'd think they'd know better. I suppose we need to fit in a car chase, another capture, another escape and a few more close calls for good measure.

I lay much of the blame is on screenwriter David Koepp, who's also penned the aggressively underachieving "Jurassic World Rebirth" last year. There's some rough concepts of characters and an occasionally clever piece of dialogue, but so much is left unsaid for no reason outside misleading the audience. And when it is time for the big finale, you realize he doesn't have anything new to ask about the genre.

But let's move on and talk about another weak point: our protagonist Dan. He's played by Josh O'Connor with all the personality of a doorknob. He lacks chemistry with his failed nun and oft-kidnapped girlfriend Jane (Eve Hewson), and is missing the intensity that a young Richard Dreyfuss displayed effortlessly in a similar kind of picture. His voice remains monotone and disinteresting, and its especially egregious early on when the film jumps between him and Margaret's boyfriend, portrayed by the magnetic Wyatt Russell.

The two males both spend a majority of their time in a bewildered panic, but where as Russell engaged me, O'Connor bored me.

Then there is the xenophobes themselves: their mild screen time is a disappointment. You've seen these exact creatures before. I was hoping for something more alien, and instead, I just got more aliens.

I appreciated "Disclosure Day" more for its ambition, even though it buckles under its own weight. Spielberg's technical ability remains firm throughout, with lense flares and a grand sense of adventure; the soundtrack by his frequent collaborator John Williams is a sight for sore ears. (Or should I saw sound?). I just wish they channeled their energies into a tighter picture.

Scary Movie Review

The showbiz Wayans family returns to the "Scary Movie" franchise for the first time since part two, but don't let that nostalgic marijuana smoke blind you: this new one (shamefully titled simply "Scary Movie") is just as dumb as all the rest. Sadly, it is also probably the worst of the bunch.

Using "Scream V" and "Scream VI" as its narrative through-line, the plot is nothing but a clotheline to hang loose skits based on it and others. It is also an excuse to bring back much of the original cast. This means we get two of Hollywood's most underrated comedic actresses in Anna Faris and Regina Hall (reprising their roles as Cindy and Brenda, respectively), but they are relegated to supporting characters in this bloated cast. This includes no fewer than five members of the Wayans family, but I'm pretty sure even my family would generate more laughs.

Newer films that blew up the horror box office, like "Backrooms" and "Obsession," are still too recent to be bastardized here, and that's a shame because the genre has been reinvigorated. The closest this film gets to recent is probably its brief parody of 2025's "Weapons," though its immediately followed by a riff on "E.T.," so who knows?

 

I laughed more at those lousy three "The Strangers" remakes than I did laughing with this flick- a fact that's scarier than the trilogy too.

But its scattershot approach to parody comes at the expense of character development, which I admit is never really a goal in this kind of movie. This means everyone is defined by their trope, be it a pot head, overprotective mother, transgender person, mentally handicapped, shady, and so on. But because we can't identify with anyone, the only farce left is what absurd thing they say or crazy thing they do, you need to have very strong writing and a very game cast to make a feature length film work. Well, they at least got half right. 

The only gag that did land was an unexpected cunnilingus bit that went in a direction I should have known it was going. There are a few other amusing parts, but I've chuckled more often scrolling through my phone in the bathroom. Oh, don't like potty humor? Then what the hell are you doing reading a review for "Scary Movie?"

But don't just take my word for it: my crowded theater had a handful of muted chortles, but the place never erupted. The biggest laugh? A silly cameo at the end, but it wasn't as loud as the size of the audience was. This just isn't as hilarious as the film thinks it is, and a comedy dead-zone is a bad place to be for a comedy.

Not helping the situation is how well last years' "The Naked Gun" reboot ended up being. That film set its sights low and moved so quickly that you never really noticed the jokes that didn't land. This new "Scary Movie" somehow sets its sights even lower and moves without that film's energy that you painfully notice how unfunny almost all the jokes are.

As much as I hate to think that Seth MacFarlane and company are funnier today than the Wayans family, but here we are.

Backrooms Review

I have a rule: that I will only watch one film's trailer once whenever possible. Now, I know a common practice among film critics is to avoid trailers. But although here I slap away at my keyboard, putting digital words to digital paper about films for you the reader to read, I am a fan first and foremost. I love all kinds, and that includes horror. So when I first saw the preview for "Backrooms," the cinema buff in me perked up with unreasonable levels of excitement. I created expectations that no movie probably could satisfy. Then I actually saw it.

In a packed, rowdy theater, where even the nosebleed section was filled, I admired "Backrooms" for its ambition, it's spectacular premise, evocative set design and general sense of mystery, but I can't recommend it. Then again why can't I? Just because it is filled with idiotic characters, offers absolutely no explanation, is somehow both ten minutes too long and too short, and overall frustrating? How could I be frustrated if it didn't tickle that little film freak in me?

Set in the 90s, for no particular reason other than to possibly remove the problem of characters having cell phones, this is a movie that, yes, is about big, empty rooms. Walls colored an olive green, rooms connect with no rhyme or rhythm and they go on and on. You can hear the fizzing of the fluorescent lights and practically can smell the cigarette smoke baked into the carpet: the whole thing is innocent in theory but unsettling in practice.

Chiwetel Ejiofor stars as Clark, a loser owner of a discount furniture store who is still struggling with his wife leaving him. He has no real friends, unless you count his therapist Mary (Renate Reinsve) or his two, dating, employees, Bobby and Kat (Finn Bennett and Lukita Maxwell, respectively). Mary has her own baggage (probably could use a shrink herself), told through flashbacks of her abusive upbringing by her paranoid mother, but at least she has any development: our poor staff lover pair, um, well she wears flip flops and him shoes, I guess?

Clark's shop isn't doing too well, never a customer ever in sight, and to make matters worse, the lights keep flickering, sometimes going out entirely. An electrician notices some baffling breakers in the downstairs, which seemingly do nothing. But then one night, Clark is drinking, watching TV while lounging on his own merchandise (maybe it's used furniture?) when the TV shows what looks like security footage of some strange place, then turns off. The lights flicker too, so the inebriated business owner marches back down to the breakers, flipping them indiscriminately. Them all off now, he ends up walking past a wall when he notices something: a chartreuse mist barely poking through a seemingly solid wall.

It turns out that the wall isn't a wall, but a sort of doorway to the titular labyrinth. You can freely walk in and out as well, which doesn't really make any sense considering no one has ever even accidentally bumped into the portal. Unless Clark really never has any patrons, but I digress. 

What exactly is in the backrooms? On the first night, Clark senses something, seeing things crash about once he's further inside and needs to escape back to his store. But the surprising discovery and possible threat aren't enough for him to like, you know, call the police or the Ghostbusters or something. Instead, he spends several off-screen days crudely mapping it out on paper. He presents this to Mary, who understandably doesn't believe him, so he offers Kit and Bobby overtime to help him delve even deeper inside. Specifically, this one hallway that's at too steep a decline to traverse without a sort of rope or something. Armed with a video camera, Bobby goes down and well, I should probably skip past this.

Later on, and by reasons never defined, Clark leaves a message on Mary's answering machine, ultimately saying he won't be able to see her again. Then, in an obvious breach of the Tarasoff rule, she heads into his store, right as he described, and enters herself. Alone, without contacting anyone first. Now, I am no therapist, nor do I have one, but someone really should check this lady's credentials.

More things happen, then even more things, but there's less here than the sum of its parts. I appreciated the light touches of comedy (especially Clark's local commercials early on), but with moments of thrillers, science fiction, psychological and body horror, but to what end? Why are their security cameras? What exactly is inside these rooms, and why are they here? How has no one ever noticed them? You'd think construction workers or something would have stumbled into them by mistake.

"Backrooms" sets up all these interesting ideas but is ultimately untrustworthy with the power it wields. And just when you think it's going to settle down and fully explore one of the many different paths to take it's shockingly fun idea, the filmmakers pivot to yet another underexplained area. And I would be fine with an exercise in the philosophical, but you can't expect your film to deserve such mental gymnastics to comprehend when you only tackle such topics when you can come up with interesting ways to film it.

But then I remember that this is director Kane Parsons and writer Will Soodik's first feature film, made with a reported budget of just ten million. This is not some sleazy, exploitative cheapie but a thought-provoking and thought-aggravating work of pure and blind enthusiasm.

Passenger Review

The new movie "Passenger" is tawdry, nonsensical, frustrating and boring, when it's not funny for all the wrong reasons. It tells the story of a young couple who live out of their RV when, one night after witnessing a car accident, are "marked" by a mysterious folk demon who terrorizes travelers under the moonlight. In other words, it's "The Hitcher" with ghosts.

Jacob Scipio and Lou Llobell star as Tyler and Maddie, respectively, a young couple of very different upbringings. He comes from a broken home, and she the foster system, and for some reason they decide that the best way to find some form of stable life is living out of an RV. The two have packed up their belongings and quit their cushy New York City jobs as, something- ohh I'm sorry, did I say quit? I meant "retired." I mention this only because it's about the only other character development either receive.

On their first night on the open road, a speeding car pulls up next to them, their windshield smashed and the driver in a frenzy. They slow down to let them pass, thinking maybe it's a drunk or road rager, but a few miles up, they see the car in a ditch. It's crashed into the neighboring trees, so the two pull over to make sure the driver is alright. (These must be the nicest New Yorkers ever on film.) He's not and soon the cops arrive, but not before Maddie notices scratch marks on the back of the car. She then thinks she sees someone hidden in the woods, but even when they notice their van now has the same scars, she shakes it off like any good heroine in a horror movie would.

They then attend a nomad gathering for other people who live in their van, and boy, is Tyler in his element- he even finds someone who can buff out the scratch. Maddie, however, is fixated on a missing peoples board (she must be fun at parties), when she soon bumps into a fellow van-lifer (Melissa Leo), an old woman who warns never to drive at night and never stop for anything as if it's common knowledge. You'd think it'd be in the car's manual.

But Maddie keeps seeing things, a man specifically, dressed in black with his face obscured in the shadows, but only when she's near the vehicle. Inside a motel room? Shopping in an antique shop? Working out at a 24/7 gym? No strange visions. You would think she could simply stop living in the RV, but she explicitly discards that idea as "not how she thinks this works." I dunno, I thought it was at least worth a shot.

Anyway, at first it's only Maddie who is being stalked by the unseen stranger, but eventually Tyler begins to see it too. Now both of them are in a panic, and the two decide to hightail it to where they know that elderly vagabond from before was heading (you'd think they'd belong to the same Facebook group or something). Driving only under sunlight, they eventually track her down, where she lore-dumps what's going on. Yup you guessed it, they're being hunted by an ancient evil spirit and their only possible way out is, well, you get where this is going.

"Passenger" runs out of steam well before its final act, asking characters to do dumb things only dumb characters do in dumb horror movies, like crawling under an RV for lug nuts or wandering away from each other with the only light being the blinking red flash of taillights. You can tell exactly when something is going to jump out and yell "boo," by the way the music stops and the camera gets real close to someone's face, and that pattern is detected early on and never deviated from.

Then there's the villain himself, the "Passenger" as it were. He is chronically goofy looking, like an aging Cory Feldman with his face painted white. It's a laughable excuse for a horror movie icon. He looks more smelly than scary.

Seen in a relatively packed theater, the audience sat in total silence throughout its ninety some odd minute runtime, the myriad of painfully telegraphed jump scares failing to elicit any emotion from the crowd. I, for one, laughed a few times, rolled my eyes even more, but mostly, I tried with all my vigor not to fall asleep. (Movie tickets ain't cheap, ya know?)