Martin's Musings

Watching The Bikeriders, it’s hard to know what writer/director Jeff Nichols had in mind.

The film’s first third is kind of like an unintentionally comedic take on Goodfellas, with Nichols introducing us to a crew of bikers, each with one wacky nickname after another. There’s Cockroach, Funny Sonny, Big Jack, Wahoo … you get the idea. Meanwhile, while classic 1960s tunes play on the soundtrack, Jodie Comer’s Kathy sets up the story in what may be the heaviest Midwestern accent you’ll ever hear — or maybe it just seems that way because nobody else in the film is using one. 

It’s the mid-1960s, and Kathy is telling us about a gang in Chicago called the Vandals, which is led by Johnny (Tom Hardy, The Dark Knight Rises), whose second-in-command, Benny (Austin Butler), Kathy falls for instantly. And who could blame her? As portrayed by Butler, Benny is the coolest one in any of the rooms. Good looking, soft-spoken … the strong, silent type. 

If you’ve ever thought to yourself: Julia Louis-Dreyfus should make a movie about death, then have I got a film for you.

In Tuesday, the erstwhile Elaine Benes plays Zora, a single mother whose teenage daughter, Tuesday (Lola Petticrew), is on the verge of dying of a terminal illness. When Death arrives in the form of a size-shifting, talking macaw (yes, really), Zora begrudgingly learns to let go and accept her daughter’s fate — but not before going on an emotional journey the likes of which I couldn’t spoil even if I wanted to.

Richard Linklater’s latest film, Hit Man, deserved better.

Starring Glen Powell in his umpteenth breakthrough performance, it tells the story of Gary Johnson, a dweeby college professor in New Orleans, who bores his students with lectures about philosophy and psychology. As a side hustle, Gary moonlights as a technical adviser for sting operations alongside police officers Claudette and Phil (Retta and Sanjay Rao).

Then, one day, Gary is asked at the last minute to pose as a hit man after undercover cop Jasper (Austin Amelio) is suspended for misconduct. His assignment is to entrap someone looking to hire him by getting the client to tell Gary their intentions. To everyone’s surprise, Gary is good at it and he settles into the role quite easily. Or should I say roles, since he keeps doing it, and with every job, he adopts a different persona, amusingly changing his name, his attire, his hair, and his attitude. 

Complications arise when, posing as a cool contract killer named “Ron,” Gary immediately hits it off with a hottie named Maddy (Adria Arjona), who’d like Ron to off her abusive husband. Maddy and Ron’s first interaction starts off as a business meeting, but it’s clear they’re both into each other, and somewhere along the way, it turns into a date.

I won’t spoil any of the twists or turns that result from this, but suffice it to say, it’s here that the film’s main premise of self-discovery really takes off. As Gary keeps shifting between personas in order to pursue a secret relationship with Maddy, the lines begin to blur and it’s unclear to him and to others who he is at any given time. Everyone seems to like Ron more than Gary — even Gary. Heck, even his students begin to pay attention more when they realize their professor has gotten better looking and more confident. So, which identity will eventually win out?

In the new film The Fall Guy, a producer character played by Ted Lasso’s Hannah Waddingham describes her formula for making a successful movie. She says you have to surround the meat of the film with “sexy bacon,” those aspects that make the whole thing more attractive.

Here, the sexy bacon is Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt, and it’s that pairing that makes this film loosely based on the 1980s TV show so much fun.

Two of the most underrated films of the last 10 years were The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Ready or Not. Both were released late in the summer and were pleasant surprises that successfully blended humor with classic genre appeal (action and horror, respectively). The latter even made my list of my favorite films of 2019 (it ranked #6).

Coincidentally, both films’ creators are back with new releases this week. While their new movies aren’t as good as these other works, they are still worth checking out.

Here are my reviews.

In Luca Guadagnino’s last film, 2022’s awful Bones and All, Timothée Chalamet played half of a young cannibal couple in love and on the run from a society that doesn’t understand them.

Now, Guadagnino’s followup features Chalamet’s Dune 2 costar playing a man-eater of a completely different sort.

In Challengers, Zendaya is Tashi Duncan, a former tennis prodigy at the center of a love triangle involving her husband, Art (Mike Faist, West Side Story), and Patrick (Josh O’Connor, The Crown), who is Art’s former best friend and Tashi’s ex-boyfriend.

For 50 years, Steve Martin has been different things to different people: For those of a certain age, he was a “wild and crazy” standup comedian, whose shows and albums broke records in the late 1970s. To others, he’s the star of classic films like The Jerk, Three Amigos!, Roxanne, and All of Me. To others, he’s the star of family-friendly movies like Parenthood, Father of the Bride, and Cheaper by the Dozen. To others, he’s a sophisticated writer of New Yorker articles. To others, he’s a musician and composer, who collaborated with Edie Brickell on the Tony-nominated Broadway musical Bright Star. And to others, he’s the co-creator and star, alongside Martin Short and Selena Gomez, of the Hulu TV show Only Murders in the Building. 

Suffice it to say, the man has invented and reinvented and reinvented himself multiple times throughout his career, adapting to the highs and lows — which is why today, he probably has fans of all ages.

However you know Steve Martin, you’re likely to know him a little better after watching Steve! (martin): A Documentary in 2 Pieces, which premieres on Apple TV+ this week. Directed by Morgan Neville (Won’t You Be My Neighbor? and the Oscar-winning 20 Feet from Stardom), the roughly three-hour doc is broken into two parts: “Then,” which traces Martin’s rise through the standup circuit, and “Now,” which documents many things since then.

It’s the middle of March 2024, but moviemakers seem to have their minds on the 1980s. This week, two films are dropping that hope to recapture the fun of much loved movies from back in the day. 

Are they worth seeing?

Read on to learn what I thought of Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire and Road House.