Quick takes on Shiva Baby and other films

Cruella is an origin story for the delightfully evil villain of the old 101 Dalmatians film. Even as a child, Cruella is always an outcast, and the film instantly gets the viewer to be on her side, which is much different than how she was portrayed in the old cartoon! When her mother dies, Cruella is left an orphan in London, and her only way to survive is to team up with a couple thieves. The film really picks up 10 years later, when she and the other child grifters are now young adults. Cruella has always wanted to be a fashion designer, and she finally gets a chance, only to end up working for an egotistical and demeaning fashion boss, the Baroness. When Cruella learns her family had a dark history with the Baroness, Cruella decides to give in to her darker side in order to bring the Baroness down. The movie itself is fairly average, with underwhelming direction (from normally reliable Craig Gillespie), but Emma Stone (Cruella) and Emma Thompson (the Baroness) are wonderful, and well worth the price of admission. Their performances alone bring a 2 1/2 star up to a solid 3 1/2. There are moments that may be a bit scary for younger kids (the movie deserves its PG-13 rating), but “young-at-heart” moviegoers will find plenty to like, especially if you grew up on the classic Disney cartoons. ★★★½

I’m breaking my movie-only rule, but again, only for a short miniseries. And I’ll just give you the setup from the first episode or so, and let you watch from there if you are interested (it’s only 7 episodes in length). Mare of Easttown stars the superb Kate Winslet as Mare, a detective living in a tiny town outside Philadelphia, the kind of town where everyone knows everyone. Mare has lived there all of her life, and is a bit of a local legend after sinking the winning basket to win the high school basketball state championship 25 years ago, the only thing of import that ever happened to Easttown. Though a detective and not a beat cop, the inhabitants all call Mare’s cell when something goes down, since they know her and she knows them. She’s mostly liked by everyone, even the criminals, except for one person: Dawn. Dawn was a member of that basketball team too, but the animosity comes because her daughter, Katie, has been missing for a year, and Dawn blames Mare for not finding her. Mare did (and continues to) try to find some clue, but Katie was involved in bad stuff and Mare fears her body is out rotting in some field and will never be found, obviously not what Dawn wants to hear. Into this scenario, another young girl is found murdered one morning. Erin was a teen mom and had some enemies, like her baby daddy’s new girl. Mare has to navigate this as well as personal issues, such as her ex-husband remarrying, her ex-daughter-in-law (from her son’s suicide) trying to get custody of her son (Mare’s grandson), and other things, all while trying to solve Erin’s murder. You’d be surprised at how many secrets can survive in a little town, although, if you’ve ever lived in one, maybe you won’t be. The series becomes a whole lot more than solving a single murder, and Kate Winslett is great as always. However, by the end, it had a few too many twists for my tastes. Seems like every episode brought a new suspect, and it got too gimmicky by the end. But strong acting and a solid first half of the series didn’t ruin it for me. ★★★

The Tomorrow War is a futuristic action film, starring Chris Pratt as a former soldier turned teacher, who’s been raising a family with a crisis hits the Earth. A military unit warps in from 30 years in the future, announcing that they are at war with an alien species, and are losing. They need soldiers from the present to zap to the future to keep the fight going. The limited time traveling technology hasn’t been perfected, so they can’t just go to a point before the invasion and stop it before it gets bad, they can only get to a certain moment in 2051, where their drafted soldiers fight for 7 days, and then, if they survive, they are sent back to the present. Pratt’s character, Dan, is drafted after a year or so, and sent off to the future to fight. Once there, he learns that they aren’t fighting to win, they are fighting to bide time until a virus can be found to kill the aliens when the invasion starts. Sounds great right?! For the most part, it’s not. It is a low budget hokey film hiding behind big budget special effects. Really bad dialogue, completely unbelievable (even for a sci fi film!), and it features every cliche in the genre. And even when they supposedly get what they needed, it drags on for another 30 minutes! 1 star for the movie itself, but another 1 1/2 for the action sequences (which are really the only reason to watch). ★★½

Hutch Mansell (Bob Odenkirk) is nobody: an average man with a boring job, a wife and two kids, who lives in a cookie cutter house on a cul-de-sac. That is, until his house is robbed one night by a couple amateurs. While he doesn’t stand up for his family that night, the event does awaken feelings that Hutch had buried deep down. Afterwards, on a city bus, Hutch stands in to protect a young woman being harassed by some thugs. He beats them all to within an inch of their lives. Unfortunately for Hutch, one of them was the younger brother of a Russian gangster, Yulian. Yulian sets out to get revenge, sending a whole slew of killers to Hutch’s house. Thankfully Hutch is much more than meets the eye, and he’s got some serious training in his past. As we learn more about who Hutch was before he settled down, we start to wonder if it isn’t the Russians who should be worried. If it sounds a lot like John Wick, it shouldn’t surprise you that Nobody has the same writer and producer. No offense to Keanu Reeves, because he’s got his schtick down cold and he’s good at it, but Bob Odenkirk has a lot more range as an actor, even if he doesn’t get to show it all here. It’s an outrageous over-the-top film, and like the John Wick films, the actions sequences are superb. There are a whole lot worse ways to kill 90 minutes, and any movie where Christopher Lloyd gets to be a badass on screen is worth checking out. ★★★½

Shiva Baby is a great little comedy, about a Jewish college student named Danielle, who’s life is anything but on track. The film begins with her having sex with a man named Max in his apartment. She leaves afterward (but not before getting some money out of him, which she claims she needs for school), attesting she has to meet a client. Really, she’s going to a shiva with her parents, who still pay for everything for her. At the shiva, Danielle runs into her ex-girlfriend Maya, who does have a career path lined out and is entering law school. Maya and Danielle were childhood friends before becoming romantic in high school, but have recently split, much to the relief of their parents, who believe the girls were just experimenting and now ready to find good Jewish men to marry. Guess who else shows up to the shiva? Good old Max, who is a former colleague of Danielle’s dad. The embarrassment doesn’t stop there, because it turns out Max is married to a beautiful woman (non-Jewish, oh the shame!) and has a baby in tow as well. All of this is a shock to Danielle of course, and the interplay between her and Max, and Danielle and Maya, is only half the fun. A very funny movie, which nails the modern Jewish family without resorting to stereotypes, Shiva Baby is an excellent comedy/drama, with even some suspense rolled in. ★★★★

• TV series currently watching: Calls (season 1)
• Book currently reading: The Elfstones of Shannara by Terry Brooks