It’s been seven years since a new Star Wars movie has released in theaters. The beloved franchise has steadily grown via animated and live-action streaming series, novels, video games, and so on. But for those of us who love seeing “The Galaxy Far, Far Away” on the big screen, it has been a painful drought. That changes in three months with the release of “The Mandalorian and Grogu”. This feature film follows three seasons of the popular Disney+ series “The Mandalorian”. And judging by the new trailer, we fans have a lot to look forward to.
Director Jon Favreau’s excitement over making his first Star Wars movie has been evident since it was first announced. And you can see it in the new trailer. “The Mandalorian and Grogu” looks to be a sprawling adventure, set upon some new planets and introducing some new characters to the universe. To LucasFilm’s credit, they’re still leaving the story details under wraps. But it looks as if Mando and Grogu are in for plenty of action and some unexpected threats. The trailer is full of new faces and some deep cuts for hardcore fans. I can’t wait!
“The Mandalorian and Grogu” soars into theaters on May 22nd. Check out the trailer below and let me know if you’ll be seeing it or taking a pass.
There’s a throwback quality to writer-director Bart Layton’s “Crime 101” that you start to notice in its earliest moments. It’s hard to avoid comparisons to Michael Mann classics like “Thief” and “Heat” or Willian Friedkin’s “To Live and Die in L.A”. You can even see the DNA of some the great paranoia thrillers of the 1970s. Layton’s movie may not reach those lofty heights, but you can feel the pulse of those crime genre gems racing all through his latest.
“Crime 101” is based on a 2020 novella by crime novelist Don Winslow. It follows a Los Angeles jewel thief named Mike (Chris Hemsworth) who has successfully executed a string of high-end heists along the busy 101 freeway. After every completed robbery, Mike turns over the haul to his fence (Nick Nolte) who finds a buyer before helping Mike organize his next job.
Image Courtesy of Amazon MGM Studios
Much like De Niro’s Neil McCauley from “Heat”, Mike keeps a low profile and intentionally has no personal attachments. And when working, he operates by a very strict set of rules. It’s what has made him a seasoned professional. But also like Neil, Mike breaks his own rules when he becomes involved with a charming young woman (wonderfully played here by Monica Barbaro) who has him second-guessing the life he lives.
Staying with the “Heat” similarities, Mark is furiously pursued by a police detective Lou Lubesnick (Mark Ruffalo) who instantly calls back to Al Pacino’s Vincent Hanna. Like Vincent, Lou’s fixation with his job has wrecked his home life. But he’s a good cop, and he’s hellbent on learning Mike’s identity and stopping his crime spree, no matter how much his lone-wolf obsession puts him at odds with his department.
But Layton tosses in several key characters of his own who add some interesting layers to his story. Tops among them is Sharon Combs (Halle Berry), a broker for a prominent insurance company who finds herself stuck in a VP position while her colleagues are being made partners. Then there’s Ormon (Barry Keoghan), a violently unhinged dirt bike-riding ruffian who begins stepping in on Mike’s action. Both end up playing significant roles in Layton crime movie web.
As its name so clearly implies, “Crime 101” is a straightforward crime thriller – the kind we don’t get as often as we used to. And much like those past crime thrillers, it’s stringently character-driven. Yet despite their similarities, “Crime 101” is no copy-and-paste of “Heat”. It takes its characters in its own distinct directions. It also dabbles in a range of themes involving class, corruption, greed, wealth gaps, childhood trauma, workplace inequality, etc. Not every character thread or thematic interest gets the time it needs, but it does open up some compelling paths for Layton to explore.
Image Courtesy of Amazon MGM Studios
Layton’s script finds a healthy balance between action, drama, and suspense. He confidently crafts a compelling story that sustains tension on its way to an inevitable big finish. It has a few too many moving parts, but (for the most part) Layton keeps them corralled and working in unison. And it doesn’t hurt to have such a talent-rich cast that includes six Academy Award nominees. A grounded and restrained Hemsworth gives one his best performances while Berry, Ruffalo, Barbaro, and Keoghan are perfect fits for their roles.
“Crime 101” is a sleek, impeccably crafted, and thoroughly entertaining heist thriller that proudly embraces its ancestors while feeling surprisingly fresh at the same time. The action is exhilarating, characters are given plenty of room to bloom, and Los Angeles is brilliantly rendered through DP Erik Wilson’s evocative lensing. But it’s the script that anchors it all, with its high stakes, gripping suspense, and moral quandaries that push the story into some unexpected territory.
Emerald Fennell follows the empty shock value and cheap psychosexual spectacle of her previous film, “Saltburn” with an overheated and underdeveloped reimagining of a literary classic. Fennell’s new spin on “Wuthering Heights” is more in love with itself than with anything Emily Brontë put to page in her highly regarded 1847 novel. Sadly, it results in a surprisingly hollow and frustratingly scattershot exercise in overindulgence.
Fennell significantly reshapes Brontë’s story in a number of peculiar ways. So fans of the novel shouldn’t go in expecting a faithful adaptation. It starts with Fennell’s decision to transform the book’s dark, haunting, gothic tale into a soapy, sexually charged, period romance. Pseudo-eroticism is more of a focus than the raw dysfunction that Brontë explored. Also, any hint of the supernatural is erased. And main characters undergo jarring dramatic changes, often to fit within the film’s bawdy vision.
For the entirety of it unnecessarily long running time, Fennell’s story remains fixated on the relationship between Catherine (Margot Robbie) and Heathcliff (Jacob Elordi), essentially cutting out the entire second half of the novel. As a child, Catherine lived with her alcoholic and cartoonishly abusive father (Martin Clunes) in the family’s remote estate on the Yorkshire Moors. One day her father brings home an orphan boy he rescued from the street. The bossy and possessive Catherine names him Heathcliff and treats him as her pet. But over time the two children develop a close yet vaguely defined relationship.
Image Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
From there the film lurches forward several years with Catherine and Heathcliff now young adults yet still playfully cavorting around the neglected estate like children. That is until Catherine lays eyes on their wealthy new neighbors, the Lintons. With her father having gambled away the family’s fortune, Catherine maneuvers herself into the arms of Edgar Linton (Shazad Latif). When he overhears her plans to marry Edgar, a heartbroken Heathcliff rides away and doesn’t return.
More years pass. Catherine is now married to Edgar and living a life of luxury at the Linton’s villa. But everything changes when Heathcliff suddenly returns, now mysteriously rich and more dapper than ever. Suddenly the emotions she never expressed come rushing to the surface and the two begin a torrid affair. But outside of rampant sex, Catherine refuses to commit to Heathcliff due to her marriage to Edgar and the child they’re expecting which she keeps a secret.
The rest of the story erratically bops from point to point, force-feeding us a wild array of emotions that always feel more contrived than organic. Following along is never easy because there’s never a steady measurement of passing time. Worse are the gaps in the story that lead to bizarre character shifts with little buildup, as well as undercooked relationships that never make sense. This is especially true for the increasingly mopey second half.
Image Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
But while she leaves her characters and her stories begging for more attention, Fennell finds the time to inject her kinky fascinations, often to the detriment of her movie. Pointlessly crude flourishes are thrown in, seemingly to jolt the audience more than anything else. Meanwhile character work gets back-burnered to satisfy some lusty appetite. Take Edgar conveniently vanishing without a mention so that Catherine and Heathcliff can repeatedly and openly hook-up. As for Robbie and Elordi, they’re mostly served up as rain-soaked eye-candy, doing their best with what they’re given.
Whatever the goal, it’s hard to see 2026’s “Wuthering Heights” pleasing longtime fans of the novel or drawing new fans to it. But even if you take away its literary inspiration, Emerald Fennell’s latest even fails as a simple melodrama. The choppy storytelling impacts everything, including the characters who are left shuffling through ambiguity and absurdity. This despite the efforts of Robbie and Elordi, and great supporting turns from Alison Oliver and Hong Chau.
On a positive note, “Wuthering Heights” isn’t as galling or insufferable as “Saltburn”. And while its attempts at eroticism often feel silly and performative, the movie is visually sumptuous in ways that highlight Fennell’s impressive technical savvy. But overall it does nothing to recreate the excitement we felt with her debut film, “Promising Young Woman”. Instead it demonstrates a concerning trend where her expression is overwhelmed by excess.
Well Go USA Entertainment is bringing “Frontier Crucible” to home video. Directed by Travis Mills, this gritty frontier Western captures much of what has made the genre so beloved while adding its own distinct flavor. Anchored by compelling character work, stunning cinematography, slow-simmering suspense, and bursts of unflinching violence, this is a modern day Western that excels as both an intriguing character study and full-blown genre entertainment. Read my full review of the film [HERE].
This edition of “Frontier Crucible” will be available on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray, and DVD this Tuesday, February 17th. See below for a full synopsis of the film as well as release information including a list of special features.
About the Film:
Year: 2025
Runtime: 124 Minutes
Director: Travis Mills
Screenwriters: S. Craig Zahler
Cast: Myles Clohessy, Thomas Jane, Mary Stickley, Ryan Masson, Armie Hammer, Eli Brown, Zane Holtz, Eddie Spears, William H. Macy
Rating: R for strong/bloody violence and grisly images.
From the producer of Bone Tomahawk. A desperately needed wagon full of medical supplies falls victim to an Apache attack. The only man who can guide it through to its destination is Merrick Beckford, but in order to get there he’ll need to enlist the help of a trio of dangerous outlaws hell-bent on survival. When they accidentally kill an Apache scout, all bets are off and survival is the name of the game in director Travis Mills’s western thriller.
Director Daniel J. Phillips takes us into the unsettling world of religious horror with “Diabolic”. It’s a well-traveled subgenre that has been approached from nearly every angle imaginable. Yet when done right, filmmakers have shown that there are still some good frights to be found, even if we’re in well-travelled territory. Sadly, that isn’t the case with the underwhelming “Diabolic”.
“Diabolic” is a slow-moving supernatural chiller that hits many of the same thematic and subgenre beats that we’ve seen in numerous other movies of its kind. That said, it still would have worked if the film could have added just a little more of its own original flavor. Yet none of its efforts at doing so are all that compelling.
To their credit, the screenwriters (Phillips, Mike Harding, and Tricia Madsen) attempt to build a foundation that we’re told is inspired by true events. But the perfunctory buildup quickly leads to a glaringly ill-advised trip that soon devolves into another story about weird, rigid religious people and one malevolent evil spirit. And from the movie’s perspective, one is just as bad as the other.
Elizabeth Cullen plays Elise, a young artist suffering from debilitating blackouts. As her episodes become more frequent, they grow longer and more violent. Desperate for help, Elise’s psychiatrist offers her one more option before admitting her to the hospital. He believes her blackouts are the result of buried trauma from growing up in the Fundamentalist Latter-Day Saints – a fringe offshoot of the Mormon Church. He suggests exposure therapy. More specifically, that she travels to the church and seeks help from their healers. Yikes.
So Elise, her supportive husband or boyfriend Adam (John Kim), and her self-invited best friend Gwen (Mia Challis) load up and travel deep into the forest, well away from civilization to the off-the-grid fundamentalist compound. There they meet the homely Hyrum (Robin Goldsworthy) and his stern mother, Alma (Genevieve Mooy). Together they all engage in a warped, hallucinogenic drug-induced ritual at the site of her worst trauma. What could go wrong?
As the baffling character choices mount up, the story branches out in a couple of directions. One involves a series of clunky flashbacks as Elise begins recalling her relationship with a fellow church member, Clara (Luca Sardelis). The other introduces the vengeful spirit of a cursed witch (Seraphine Harley) that is inadvertently released during the healing ritual. Neither leave much of an impression. The Clara bit is an angle we’ve seen countless times before. And the witch isn’t established enough to be as threatening as she needs to be.
In terms of horror, “Diabolic” puts most of its effort into creating a creepy atmosphere. And that’s possibly the movie’s biggest strength. It also does some pretty cool things in the practical effects department. But outside of one lone gloriously gruesome slaying, none of the few kills we get stand out at all. That, along with a story that often seems at odds with itself, leaves us with a movie that has the right setting and develops the right tone, but that lacks the narrative freshness or genre punch to stand out from the crowd.
When a highly contagious, mutating microorganism with world-ending capabilities threatens to escape a decommissioned military facility, the unlikely trio of Joe Keery, Georgina Campbell, and Liam Neeson are the only thing standing between our planet and total annihilation. If that sounds crazy to you, then you get the vibe of “Cold Storage”, a comedy horror film that is utterly bonkers in the best ways imaginable.
You would never know it, but “Cold Storage” is only the second feature film from director Jonny Campbell and his first since 2006’s “Alien Autopsy”. Here he gets some terrific material to work with from screenwriter David Koepp, who is adapting his own 2019 novel of the same name. Just as good is the all-in cast who fully embraces the film’s horror and comedy elements. Keery, Campbell, and Neeson take center stage. But they’re surrounded by great pieces including Leslie Manville, Vanessa Redgrave, and Sosie Bacon.
Some opening script tells us the government once stored top-secret scientific experiments on the Skylab space station. When it fell out of orbit in 1979, some of its debris crashed to earth. Most fell in the Indian Ocean, but other parts hit land, including an oxygen tank near the small village of Kiwirrkurra in Western Australia. When all contact with the village is lost, bioterror agent Major Robert Quinn (Neeson) and his partner Trini (Manville) accompany Dr. Hero Martins (Bacon) to investigate. The trio discovers a rapidly mutating parasitic fungus that is highly contagious and lethal to its carrier.
Jump ahead eighteen years to the remote Atchison Mines in Missouri River Bluffs, Kansas. It was once the home to a high security top-secret facility ran by the U. S. Department of Defense. But years passed and the DOD decommissioned the facility. After remaining abandoned for years, it was finally purchased and turned into a 24-hour self-storage business.
Enter the chatty and slightly neurotic Teacake (Keery) and his new co-worker Naomi (Campbell). They work the night shift at the storage company which usually consists of long boring evenings where nothing happens. But that quickly changes after the overly curious pair track a mysterious beep to an old console behind the walls. It leads to the duo discovering the once sealed military base and more specifically its lower sublevel where the parasitic fungus had been isolated for decades.
As you can probably guess, the deadly fungus spreads and wrecks havoc throughout the complex. Meanwhile, alarms secretly go out to the Department of Defense who immediately contact the retired Major Quinn. He’s sent to the Kansas location to contain the fungus before it escapes the facility. But he’ll need some specialized equipment, and maybe a little help from some old and new friends if he’s going to head off a potential apocalypse.
“Cold Storage” manages to surprise in so many different ways. First is the effortlessly playful chemistry between Keery and Campbell. Together they mine as many laughs as scares from Koepp’s gleefully outrageous script. Then there’s the lights-out supporting characters. In addition to Neeson and Manville’s special agents, we get Teacake and Naomi’s slimeball boss (Gavin Spokes), Naomi’s obsessive ex (Aaron Heffernan), a stubborn DOD Colonel (Robert Brake), Quinn’s inside ally (Ellora Torchia), and the elderly Mrs. Rooney (Redgrave) who comes to check her storage unit at the worst possible time.
Just as fun are the film’s visuals which feature a healthy helping of practical effects with some well incorporated digital enhancement. I don’t know if decaying flesh or bursting bodies ever looked so good. So as you can tell, “Cold Storage” has a little something for everyone. It doesn’t lean too far one way or another – striking that pitch-perfect balance between straight comedy and gory horror. And as a proud genre film lover, it delivered on its potential in ways that I ever expected.
