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    Cruise Control and Worthwhile Indies this Holiday Weekend

    Nostalgia and the deep desire to believe we are back to normal will drive moviegoers in droves to see Tom Cruise relive his 1986 glory days this weekend. But is Top Gun: Maverick any good? And are there any alternatives for those who remember how sort of terrible that first one was? Read on for answers to these questions and more!

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    Top Gun: Maverick

    In theaters

    by Hope Madden and George Wolf

    Sentimental, button-pushing and formulaic, as predictable as it is visceral, Top Gun: Maverick stays laser-focused on its objective.

    Attract crowd. Thrill crowd. Please crowd.

    Expect bullseyes on all three fronts, as star Tom Cruise and director Joseph Kosinski take a couple cues from the Star Wars franchise in reconnecting with friends and re-packaging feelings.

    After all these years in the Navy, Pete Mitchell’s “Maverick” tendencies have kept him from advancing past the rank of Captain. And when Pete blatantly shows up Admiral Cain (Ed Harris), he’s in danger of being grounded until Admiral “Iceman” (Val Kilmer) rescues him with orders to return to Top Gun and whip some new flyboys and girls into shape for a secret mission.

    One of those young guns is “Rooster” (Miles Teller), son of “Goose,” who resents Maverick for more than just coming home alive when his father did not.

    Against the wishes of Admiral “Cyclone” (Jon Hamm), it is Maverick who will train the 12 Top Gun pilots, and then pick six to take out a newly discovered uranium plant that poses a clear and present threat to the U.S.

    Who’s doing the threatening? We never know. Does it matter?

    Not in Maverick‘s world.

    The screenplay-by-committee doesn’t stretch anybody’s imagination or talent, with early hotshot dialog so phony it feels like a spoof. But nobody came for banter. We came for nostalgia, flight action, and – god help us – Tom Cruise.

    He delivers, in his inimitable movie star way. He cries on cue, runs like his hair’s on fire, and burns charisma. What more do you want?

    Romance? Here’s old flame Penny (Jennifer Connelly), who now runs that famous San Diego beachfront bar and just happens to be a single mother who might be looking for someone as ridiculously good-looking as she is. As both characters and actors, they click.

    Cruise’s chemistry with a mainly underused Teller – who really looks like a chip off the old Goose – finally gets to show itself late in the film, exposing both tenderness and humor in its wake.

    And once we’re in the air, get in front of the biggest screen you can and hang on. Kosinski’s airborne action sequences are often downright breathtaking, every moment in the danger zone moving us closer to that Goose/Rooster/Maverick moment that has no business working as well as it does.

    It’s emotional manipulation, but not nearly as garish an act as Val Kilmer’s thankless role. Still, Cruise and Kosinski know it’s nostalgia that flies this plane, and Iceman is part of the plan that starts right from that original Kenny Loggins tune heard in the opening minutes.

    From manufactured rivalries to shirtless team building to the entrance of a surprise Top Gun instructor from last night at the bar, Maverick sells us back what we first bought back in 1986.

    And dammit, it feels even better this time.

    Grade: B

    The Bob’s Burgers Movie

    In theaters

    by George Wolf

    Some 15 years ago (!), at a critics screening for the movie version of Strangers With Candy, I laughed early and often. I was a fan of the TV show and its particular brand of humor, and I thought the film was hilarious. And then I realized something.

    I was the only one laughing.

    At the recent critics screening for The Bob’s Burgers Movie, a similar thing happened. Only one person was laughing.

    It wasn’t me.

    Series creator Loren Bouchard brings his baby to the big screen as co-writer and co-director, and he promptly puts the Belcher burger joint in jeopardy.

    The family has just seven days to make a loan payment to the bank, and business isn’t exactly booming. And that was before a big sinkhole formed directly outside the front entrance! Meanwhile, the Belcher kids stumble onto a mystery involving the obnoxiously rich Calvin and Felix Fischoeder (voiced by Kevin Kline and Zach Galifianakis) that could reveal a way out of the whole mess.

    Bouchard and his regular cast of voice actors (including H. Jon Benjamin, Kristen Schaal, Dan Mintz, Eugene Mirman and John Roberts) have been at this for over a decade, and their move to the multiplex shows no signs of re-inventing a formula that has clearly worked for years.

    It just doesn’t work for me.

    The songs are spirited, the animation well-crafted, and the dialogue often rapid fire. But it leans on a style of humor that’s often obvious and repetitive, in a cartoon world where nearly every single business has to have a corny name like “It’s Your Funeral Home,” “Sprain Sprain Go Away” and “Weight Weight Don’t Tell Me.”

    But to its credit, The Bob’s Burgers Movie is here to super serve the regulars. There may be too much fatty in the patty to attract many new converts, but if you’ve already memorized the specials, belly up for a deluxe portion.

    Grade: B-

    Dinner in America

    At Gateway Film Center

    by Hope Madden

    It’s not often you watch a film about a fire starting, drug dealing, lying man on the run from police and his romance with a woman with special needs and think, this is delightful.

    But it is. Dinner in America is a delight.

    Writer/director Adam Rehmeier delivers an unexpected comedy, sometimes dark, sometimes broad, but never aimless. Simon (Kyle Gallner, remarkable) is a punk rocker hiding from the cops. Patty (Emily Skeggs) is a 20-year-old punk rock fan who lives at home and isn’t allowed to run appliances when she’s alone.

    Their stories collide, but by that time Rehmeier and his cast have crafted memorable, believable characters with their own fascinating worlds. Where they go together becomes a little unnerving at times, but Dinner in America surprises with warmth as often as it does with profanity-laced edginess.

    Rehmeier’s film calls to mind other misfit romances — Buffalo 66, Eagle v Shark — but sidesteps cliché at every turn. More importantly, or at least delightfully, it embraces the punk rock ethos rather than seeing a coming-of-age opportunity to grow out of it.

    Gallner’s magnetic. Whether stalking through suburbia or surrendering to love, he delivers buzzing vitality and surprising depth. Skeggs offers a brilliantly unselfconscious counterpoint. Her awkward, endearing performance is an absolute blessing.

    A top-to-bottom impressive ensemble including Pat Healy, Mary Lynn Rajskub and Lea Thompson buoy the central performances. Rehmeier’s sharp yet somehow tender script doesn’t hurt, offering startling opportunities for castmates to shine.

    By the time the film digs into its musical numbers, you’re already hooked. In a nice turn of events, the songs are absolutely worth the wait.

    Rarely does a film feel as genuinely subversive and darling as Dinner in America, the punk rock rom-com you never knew you needed.

    Grade: A-

    Mondocane

    At Gateway Film Center

    by Hope Madden

    Mad Max: Beyond ThunderdomeThe Girl with All the GiftsThe Girl with No MouthTigers Are Not Afraid — world cinema is littered with post-apocalyptic tales focused on how children will survive and determine the trajectory of humanity.

    Is it wish fulfillment? I mean, presumably, adults caused the apocalypse, so maybe the kids can do better. Or is it just that putting kids in jeopardy automatically increases tensions?

    Either way, it’s a proven vehicle for heart-tugging action and adventure, something co-writer/director Alessandro Celli drives quite well in his first feature, Mondocane (Dogworld).

    We follow two boys, Dogworld (Dennis Protopapa) and Pissypants (Giuliano Soprano), through their trials to impress the Ants, a gang of orphaned children led by an enigmatic adult named Hothead (Alessandro Borghi, remarkable). Pissypants earned his name due to the unfortunate side effect of seizures. Dogworld got his name as a result of what he was willing to do to be accepted by the Ants.

    Once they’re in, though, there’s no going back.

    Borghi makes a stunning central figure. A cross between Dickens’s Bill Sikes and Fagin, Hothead leads this band of mercenary children because he was once one of them. He plays and caresses like a caring father, punishes — even kills — without malice for the good of the clan. Borghi finds the zealot, parent and child in the character and leaves quite an impression on the screen.

    Celli’s dystopian world only borders on science fiction. This is honestly what the apocalypse is likely to resemble: more and more people living lawless, filthy existences while a handful chug along as they always have and even fewer continue to live the high life. The unnerving nearness to modern reality sets Mondocane apart from the earlier, clearly futuristic fables.

    It’s a fierce first feature from Celli, much aided by Guiseppe Maio’s cinematography. Maio can veer from paradise to post-apocalypse in a single shot. His camera straddles the edge of the unmanageable fantasy of prosperity, hideous reality poisoning the edges of the frame. In the next moment, they infuse every moment straight out of Thunderdome with youthful hope.

    Like maybe, without adult interference, the kids can do it right next time.

    Grade: A-

    A Taste of Whale

    On VOD
    by George Wolf

    Filmmaker Vincent Kelner knows you don’t want to see what he has for you.

    But while his documentary A Taste of Whale doesn’t shy away from blood in the water, his ultimate goal lies beyond the killing grounds.

    In his feature debut, Kelner takes us to Europe’s Faroe Islands, where every year some 700 pilot whales die in a traditional slaughter known to locals as the “Grind” (pronounced like “grinned”). Though the Faroes is a constituent country of Denmark, the people live under their own constitution, just one of the reasons many natives believe it’s a privilege to call the Faroes home.

    And Kelner lets many Faroese defend the Grind with conviction, pointing to mischaracterizations and misunderstandings, while labeling visiting activists as “tourists.”

    But there are some on the island that are willing to admit their hunting methods have strayed far beyond the traditional, and that maybe some of the protesters have a point.

    Kelner does an admirable job tackling the issue from opposing sides, even drawing a subtle parallel between pragmatic approaches to behavioral change and recent pandemic mandates here at home.

    But Kelner’s understated hand begins to apply more pressure once someone comments on the disconnect between not wanting to see things die, but still wanting to eat things that are dead.

    If you turn away in horror at Kelner’s graphic footage from the Grind – and later, from slaughterhouses – A Taste of Whale stresses that this bloodshed will always exist “wherever you have meat for food.”

    It is a bit of rope-a-dope from Kelner, but he wants you to be horrified. And when you are, he’s waiting to challenge your convictions with a lifestyle change that’s framed as the only logical choice.

    Grade: B+

    Follow George, Hope and Schlocketeer Daniel Baldwin for a week in movie reviews and news on THE SCREENING ROOM podcast.

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    George Wolf
    George Wolf
    George Wolf is a member of the Columbus Film Critics Assoc. and a freelance contributor for Columbus Underground covering film. George can also be heard on Columbus radio stations Rewind 103.5, Sunny 95, QFM96 and Mix 107.9.
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