I’ve heard it and thought it several times now: Hollywood plays it too safe. The cost of making movies is so (almost certainly unnecessarily) high now that convention reigns and original or daring works are simply too risky. Unless a filmmaker has enough of a reputation that hearing their name alone will attract audiences, assuming that even holds true anymore (just ask Clint Eastwood), it’s unlikely we’ll see anything new. However, there are occasionally exceptions. If there’s a name that conjures up both beloved films and formal innovation, it’s Robert Zemeckis. While he’s certainly experimented with his last few movies through performance capture animation, his recent work has left a lot to be desired. His latest, Here, promises to be a return to form. Based on Richard McGuire’s acclaimed graphic novel of the same name, itself expanded from a groundbreaking 1989 comic in Raw, it aims to challenge cinematic convention while applying cutting-edge visual effects and telling a story that’s intimate while encompassing the enormity of time and the universal human experience. This is the sort of movie that tries to be unlike anything else, and it was one I was hotly anticipating. Having now seen it, I can tell you that they mostly failed and I’m extremely disappointed.

The story of Here is about a place and the people that inhabit it. The camera stays still but the scenery changes, starting during the age of the dinosaurs, and moving ahead to Native American peoples, colonial times, the 1800s, the entire 20th century, and the early 21st century to the present. A house is built, and a number of key players arrive to inhabit it. There’s an early airplane pilot and his wife and daughter. Then they’re replaced by an inventor and his wife, the former of whom may have stumbled on the perfect invention at the perfect time. However, once they leave, the primary focus of the story begins, as Al (Paul Bettany) and his wife Rose buy the house after World War II and start a family. Later, one of their sons, Richard (Tom Hanks), meets Margaret (Robin Wright), who becomes his girlfriend. He later marries and has a daughter with her, Vanessa. From there, much of the film follows the trials and tribulations of the family throughout the ensuing decades, all against the backdrop of what occurred before them and what will happen after.

First of all, this gimmick isn’t new, and didn’t take long to wear off. Hell, I’d argue that Adult Swim did this better two years ago with their Yule Log special, and that was just because they could. However, I do applaud the effort in translating the comic’s art style to the screen. Essentially, rather than cutting between time periods, windows will show the location as it was in the past or future, much like the original source material, before fading in to the whole frame. This often creates some fun editing opportunities, but many other times it doesn’t work as well as I wanted it to. (Also there’s some really off-putting transitions that appear to be automated.) In addition, the narrative doesn’t live up to the editing flourishes. The story is non-linear, but often jumps around at random, even if to set up a point, and it initially made it hard for me to get invested in the characters as a result. Also, the single perspective occasionally leads to awkward cinematography. Characters will sometimes speak their lines directly into the camera or stand too close to it. It’s like watching a play except instead of seeing it on a theater stage, you’re just standing in a house and the actors are ignoring you as they’re performing.

Once the main story became apparent, I was at the very least engaged. I can’t hate Tom Hanks and Robin Wright in this. Because of the length of time required for the premise, Zemeckis uses real-time de-aging technology to make the two of them look younger, and for the most part, I thought it worked. Yet while I may be a sucker for sentimentality, there’s some decisions in this that feel a bit too on the nose, and at the end of the day, it’s a pretty standard slice-of-life story. While I found it enjoyable in the moment, it was only afterwards when I started thinking about the film that the flaws became clear. Since the story jumps around so much, it’s sometimes difficult to keep track of the timeline. There are clues in the background that let you know the historical vicinity of the events, but other times I was unsure if the main story was even in order. There is a bit of a central conflict, but, without spoiling things too much, portions of the movie even early on flash forward to when the conflict is clearly resolved. On top of that, most of the other characters in this movie aside from the main story are more or less irrelevant outside of the primary theme and gimmick, so there’s not much reason to care about them from a narrative perspective. Despite this, they get a lot of screen time.

While the ending certainly drives the point home and warms one’s heart, it also makes it obvious why I found this movie so disappointing: what is the point of it? Okay, that’s a bit harsh. It’s a slice of life drama about a single location through the enormity of time, mainly focusing on a single family across decades and highlighting major changes, historical recurrences, and human truths. That’s fine. Yet, I don’t think that’s what Zemeckis was going for. As a filmmaker, he’s known for trying to reinvent the wheel visually, having done so with films such as Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Forrest Gump, and it’s obvious why he would be attracted to source material like this. The original comic was experimental with its use of panel art, and he clearly wanted to create something unlike anything anyone has done before. Here’s the problem though: People have done things like this before for thousands of years. It’s called theater. All he did was play around with the editing. As for the real-time de-aging technology, that’s certainly innovative, but it’s not going to carry a film. If you think about it, the story can basically be described as a family living in a house, after other people who lived after other people, before other people still, and in a location that changed massively over thousands of years. That’s certainly a premise with a lot of opportunity for interesting and mind-blowing storytelling, but Zemeckis didn’t seem to do that. However, a comic is different. It doesn’t move. It’s individual pictures that we can stare at for as long as we want, but we expect them to be sequential. Richard McGuire’s Here was actually innovative. It challenges the way we think about comic storytelling, in a way that only comics could do. It just doesn’t translate well enough as a movie.

In the end, Here is a perfectly normal story that really wants to be groundbreaking, as did I, but it simply isn’t. Comic book movies may be all the rage (for now), but some stories should just stay as still art. Incidentally, in the process of writing this review, I discovered a faithful 1991 student film adaptation of the original comic. You can watch it here. It does more in six minutes than Robert Zemeckis did in 104, is actually formally experimental, and drives the point home in the amount of time it takes for the gimmick to wear off.

For animation fans, Memoir of a Snail should be treated like an event. Australian animator Adam Elliot hasn’t done much, but what he has done has been widely acclaimed, and this also his first animation in 9 years as well as the follow-up to his 2009 feature debut Mary and Max. Keeping with his themes of social outcasts and autobiography, and featuring his signature mix of often blunt darkness with an endearingly offbeat sense of humor and art style, it thankfully lives up to the hype. While I don’t think it’s on par with his first feature, it more than avoids a sophomore slump. The film is narrated by Grace, a hoarder recounting her life story. As a child, she’s bullied for her appearance and enjoys collecting snails. Her only comfort is the bond she shares with her twin brother Gilbert, as well as her paraplegic father Percy, a former juggler and animator. When tragedy strikes, the two twins are separated. As Grace adjusts to her new life, she befriends an eccentric elderly woman named Pinky who always manages to find silver linings despite some unfortunate circumstances.

First thing’s first: if you haven’t seen an Adam Elliot animation before, be prepared. His stories are often unflinchingly bleak and deal with subjects like mental illness/disorders, marginalized people, and occasionally taboo subject matter. The fact that they’re always in some way shape or form autobiographical adds to their power. Even still, this is definitely one of the darker productions I’ve seen from him overall, though I don’t want to get into too much detail for the purpose of avoiding spoilers. Yet, like his other films, it’s also hilarious. Elliot has a gift for mixing bleakness with a humor style that’s eccentric, quirky, and absurd, and the tonal balance actually works really well.

Memoir of a Snail is rendered in Elliot’s trademark offbeat stop-motion style, which favors imperfect edges and shapes, and I still find it charming and unique. It’s sort of like watching an alternative comic come to life in three dimensions. In an age of CGI, it’s rare to see a movie where everything is lovingly hand-crafted. The voice acting is superb, with Jackie Weaver’s Pinky being a highlight. As Grace, Sarah Snook (Succession) nails the part, bringing the emotional weight of the character through her voice work. (For fans of Nick Cave, he also has a role.) As for any issues I had, there were parts of the story I definitely saw coming, and the ending I felt could’ve been handled a tad better, but I felt those were minor relative to the film overall.

Anyone who has ever felt detached from those around them will likely be put through the emotional wringer by the end of Memoir of a Snail, and while Elliot’s prior work has gotten accolades, it’s only recently that I believe adult animation has really caught up with what he’s doing. Hopefully, this will get the recognition I think it deserves, because it’s one of the year’s best animated films and a perfect example of how animation for adults can be both for mature audiences only and mature, as opposed to just the former.

Since 1974, more independent film distributors have gone out of business than I could probably fit into this paragraph. Yet against all odds, one scrappy artist-driven studio is still around to celebrate its 50th year in business. I am of course talking about production company, distributor, and B-movie stalwart Troma Entertainment. Last weekend at the Lucky 13 Saloon in Brooklyn, Troma brought the festivities as part of their 24th annual TromaDance Film Festival. Initially created by Troma founder Lloyd Kaufman with inspiration from South Park’s Trey Parker and Matt Stone as an alternative to Sundance (after their film Cannibal! The Musical was rejected), TromaDance serves as a showcase for DIY filmmakers and some of the most out-there shorts and features available. Not only is there no entry fee, but the festival had free admission (though there was a suggested donation box), and while many of the movies featured have the kind of shock-and-shlock attitude Troma is known for, really, anything goes. (My G-rated high school film project made it into TromaDance 2014.)

Described by festival organizer Sabrina Mendoza as “a culmination of everything Tromaesque”, the festival consisted of a number of short film blocks and two feature films, Sweet Meats (as a work-in-progress focus group screening), and Murdaritaville. Unlike most of the times I’ve attended, the shorts were grouped by subject matter, with themes such as “Animation Nation”, “Shrooms ‘n’ Shit”, “Komedy Korner”, “Spooky Scary” and “Monster Madness”. Animation Nation was a particular highlight for me, not just for the obvious reason that I love animation, but because I was impressed with the quality of the techniques used. Considering the amount of effort animation takes, it was surprising how much the filmmakers were able to pull off with limited resources, including a number of shorts done with well-done cutout puppetry. The standout was easily Orchid, a short mixing stop-motion with chalk-like drawn animation that tells a story of drug addiction, murder, and monsters in a world populated by skeletons.

As mentioned, while a lot of the shorts did fit into the standard “Tromatic” aesthetic (I.e. sex, gore, and a lot of stuff that isn’t for the squeamish), there’s usually quite a lot of diversity on display, and this year was no exception. Last Day for Videos, for instance, was a melancholy documentary that focused on the closing of a Family Video in Kalamazoo, as the employees talk about what is lost from the communal video store experience in an age of streaming. The Triangular Door from experimental filmmaker Dylan Mars Greenberg was an anarchic, psychedelic work shot on Super-8 in which “the last survivors of an obliterated culture search for spiritual bondage in a reality show from hell”, narrated by noted Canadian art filmmaker Guy Maddin (which unintentionally created a link between TromaDance and the New York Film Festival, where Maddin’s new film Rumours is showing). Komedy Korner especially had a great deal of highlights, such as police procedural spoof Tornado County and Clownie Verses The Internet, an unhinged DIY short in which a clown gets his “revenge” on social media. Mendoza also had a short of her own in the festival, Coast to Coast AM, a re-enactment of an infamous phone call during Art Bell’s radio show.

Night 1 ended with a performance by Detroit-based band Fishfly, while Night 2 brought the arrival of Troma co-founder and head honcho Lloyd Kaufman, who took pics with fans. Meanwhile, Mendoza raffled off props from Kaufman’s upcoming movie The Power of Positive Murder, fresh off the shoot in upstate New York. The third day also had a Troma “Power Hour” showcasing the best and bloodiest moments from Troma’s 50 year history. Yet it wasn’t all fun and games, and Michigan video stores sadly weren’t the only thing being mourned that weekend. Earlier this year, Doug Sakmann, a longtime mainstay of the Troma crew and their events, died unexpectedly, making this the first TromaDance without him. He was memorialized in a heartfelt montage played during both nights, and as someone who knew Doug, his absence was definitely felt.

Mendoza told me that what separates TromaDance from other festivals is “the feeling of just wanting to be part of a greater community that is Tromaville” with “a bunch of people that have just shot things on iPhones [and] professional cameras…all here together to celebrate the power of filmmaking and disrupting media for 50 years.” Overall, TromaDance was a lot of fun, and if you’re in the New York City area (and have a strong stomach), I’d definitely encourage you to check it out next year. I’d also recommend that if you have a film to submit, do so. I mean, it’s free, and who knows? You might even make it in.

The program guide for the New York Asian Film Festival began its description of this film with the following statement: “If you’re still on the fence about whether animation is a genre or an art form, The Missing is here to smack some sense into you.” Those are bold words, but ones that should resonate with anyone tired of animation being considered “kids’ stuff.” An independently made feature and the first animated film to be submitted for the Best International Feature Oscar by the Philippines (which is how I first heard about it), The Missing is an example of animated drama that uses the medium, and its association with and capabilities for the fantastical, in masterful ways to discuss some very dark subject matter. While I don’t think it 100% works, this should still be one to keep an eye on.

Eric works as an animator, and for whatever reason can’t speak—he doesn’t have a mouth. He communicates with a whiteboard he hangs around his neck. One day, his mother asks him to check in on his uncle, only for him to find that he’s been dead for several days. At the same time, an alien from his past has returned to Earth in order to finish something that started years ago. In the wake of his uncle’s death, Eric begins losing more and more of himself—literally, yet nobody seems to notice any of the strange happenings going on with him. It’s up to his fellow animator Carlo (who he’s also in love with) to help Eric figure out the mystery of the alien and what’s happening to him.

The film is rotoscoped–shot in live-action and then animated over. While some may consider this a cheat to “actual” animation, the truth is that this was really the best way to tell the story. The combination of the realistic art style and fantastical imagery perfectly set the tone for what’s about to follow. Meanwhile, in contrast, Eric’s childhood flashbacks are presented in cartoony, crudely drawn 2D animation, which I also thought was fitting, especially with how it’s used in the premise.

While the plot description may make it sound like a sci-fi movie, it eventually becomes apparent that there’s more happening than what can be taken at face value. This is a much darker movie than it initially lets on, and I really appreciated the use of animation to tell that story in a way that makes it stand out. Granted, i didn’t feel it entirely worked well in execution, but by the film’s ending, a scene that will probably stay with me for a while, I understood what this movie was trying to do and I really admired it. Some of the film’s best images are when the animation and production mediums themselves actively revolt against the protagonist, in ways I don’t want to spoil, but also don’t think can be conveyed with words.

A great and creative example of animation being used to discuss difficult subject matter in ways that purely live-action films simply can’t, The Missing is a genre-defying drama that often must be seen to be believed. It’s not perfect, but still should be of strong interest to adult animation enthusiasts. With recent play on the festival circuit, I hope it gets more exposure soon, as well as US distribution. For now, though, all I can do is spread the word.

With a title like How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies, you’d probably expect this to be a dark comedy or a drama with enough gallows humor to laugh before you lightly dab your tears by the end. However, I had heard the stories about this film going into this. Weepy out-of-theater TikToks. Ushers handing out tissues. Even the person introducing my screening warned us “If you don’t have a tissue, you’re gonna have an issue.” Sure enough, what starts out seemingly innocent becomes an emotional sledgehammer that’ll have more than a few viewers turning on the waterworks. It’s worth it though, because this is one of the best movies of the year so far. After topping the Thai box office and breaking records in Southeast Asia, I was one of the first Americans to see this film for myself, and now I want to spread the word.

M, a slacker from a dysfunctional family, believes he’s just one gaming livestream away from never having to work a day in his life (despite his viewership saying otherwise). One night, his mother drops some devastating news to him: his grandmother has Stage 4 cancer and likely only has a year left. When his grandfather dies soon after, he decides to become his grandma’s caregiver. Not because he’s suddenly realized the gravity of the situation, mind you, but because his cousin was the caregiver for his grandpa and she inherited his house. All he has to do is win his grandma’s favor over the rest of his family and he’ll be set for the foreseeable future. Of course, that ends up being far more work than he imagined…

While Putthipong “Billkin” Assaratanakul is an established star in Thailand and does a great job as M, the real breakout star is Usha Seamkhum as the grandmother. Tough yet caring, in opposition to M’s laziness and apathy, the two play off each other extremely well. This made it especially shocking when I learned that not only was she not a professional actor, but actually pulled off the most intense moments in the film often in one take (though everything else apparently required up to 20). Even with the subject matter, this is still a very funny film, and probably the hardest I’ve laughed at a movie in a while.

However, while the laughs are plentiful, the drama is absolutely devastating. I’ve seen a lot of movies like this that tackle this subject with a light touch that’s funny and sad. This is not one of those movies. What everybody said about this film was true. As much as you’ll be laughing at it, you’ll be crying just as hard. It’s extremely impressive that this was a first-time filmmaking effort for director Pat Boonnitipat (after a career in television), because it feels so raw and real. While it certainly hits some of the standard notes for a story like this, though extremely well, what shocked me was how many parts of the story I didn’t expect. For example, a conversation between the grandmother and her brother ends up being an absolute gut-punch that made me look at her, and the story, in a whole new light.

As someone who’s had similar, if not worse experiences with their own grandparents, the theme of how we treat our elders in their final moments really resonated with me hard. I typically wait longer to say things like this, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this becomes a major contender in the Oscars this year, as the film’s quality and publicity make it a likely choice for Thailand’s submission for Best International Feature Film. As of this writing, the film does not have US distribution yet, so I want to spread the word as much as possible. It also won the audience award at the festival, so that should help raise its profile here even more. With strong character development, incredible performances, laugh-out-loud dialogue and drama that’s heartwrenching but nevertheless engaging, How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies deserves being named the top film of the New York Asian Film Festival 2024, and I hope you all get to see it soon.

Sean Wang’s first feature, Dìdi, not only won two awards at Sundance including the audience award, but also premiered right when he was nominated for an Oscar for his documentary short Nai Nai & Wài Pó. As I said at the time, while he didn’t win, he was still one of the biggest contenders for his short, a hilarious and heartfelt look at facing old age with dignity. For a feature debut, that’s certainly the kind of publicity money can’t buy, and thankfully, it doesn’t disappoint. A brutally frank yet compelling look at identity and the horrors of teenage life, Dìdi is a top-notch example of a coming of age story.

In 2008, 13-year-old Tawainese-American Chris Wang is referred to by his mother and grandmother as Dìdi (“little brother” in Chinese), and “Wang Wang” by his circle of friends. His older sister is finally going off to college, which means he won’t be fighting with her anymore. It’s the summer before high school begins and Chris is doing what kids his age do: making YouTube videos where people’s mailboxes get blown up, hanging out with friends, and trying to get the attention of the girl he has a crush on. However, it isn’t long before his social life begins hitting a few snags, and Chris desperately tries to find a way to fit in, learning more than a few life lessons in the process.

Dìdi is, for the most part, a standard coming of age story, but it’s a rough one. I remember my screenwriting professor once called Bo Burnham’s Eighth Grade a horror film for its unflinching look at the modern experience of growing up in middle school, and that kind of movie is definitely an inspiration here. Sean doesn’t tone down the edgy cringe of mid-2000s youth in the slightest, and while those who can relate may be laughing, it’ll likely be through closed eyes. Yet while a lot of it’s played for laughs, it’s when it’s not that the film really becomes effective. There’s some devastating moments in this movie that really capture the feeling of adolescent alienation.

That said, what really elevates this movie above others like it is the film’s commentary on identity. Despite his efforts to fit in, Chris gets constant reminders of a sense of otherness, some playful, some definitely less so. Chris’ family life is also given a sense of depth, as his mother, an artist struggling to achieve recognition, feels pressured by the achievements of her friends’ kids, as well her own mother (who is Sean Wang’s actual grandmother, as seen in Nai Nai & Wài Pó). Characters that feel like they’re archetypes eventually change as the story goes on. It’s a movie that uses tropes while surpassing them, in a way that makes it feel fresh.

The movie is set in 2008, but doesn’t indulge in it. It’s not a nostalgia piece, but one that tells it like it was Sure, there are references to shock sites from the era and plenty of MySpace pages, but it feels natural. A lot of the story is told through the characters’ screens: YouTube videos, AOL messenger chats, and social media, and it’s utilized in a way that makes it feel part of the story as opposed to just watching someone’s monitor (more Searching than Unfriended).

Sean Wang isn’t interested in sugarcoating anything, and without giving anything away, I respected the film’s ending. Being a teenager can be hell, and Dìdi combines that knowledge with a story of the immigrant experience that puts it above a lot of coming-of-age movies. It’s a film that feels personal yet accessible. Just be prepared to cringe. A lot.

Combining science fiction and supernatural forces is a common occurrence in a lot of genre fiction, but in Kalki 2898 AD, well, the title says it all. Kalki is the name for the prophesied final incarnation of Vishnu, said to usher in a new epoch of existence. Suitably, this film, one of the largest productions in Indian history and the start of a cinematic universe, takes place at the end of the world. It has a cast of the nation’s biggest names, and a production that pulls out all the stops for visuals and set design. It’s also a pastiche of some of sci-fi’s biggest franchises with actual religious mythology thrown in. In short, it’s nothing less than one of the year’s most epic films by definition, but is it any good? As it turns out, yeah, it is. It’s not great, but I was really pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.

It’s the year 2898, and Earth is a hellscape run by the 200-year-old totalitarian Supreme Yaskin. A war has left only the city of Kasi, and the planet’s resources are dominated by The Complex, a large structure of the world’s elite that has been forcibly taking fertile women for the deadly and consistently failed experiment Project K to extend Yaskin’s lifespan. The forces of Yaskin, the Raiders, have been searching for the hidden city of Shambhala, whose rebel residents foretell the coming of Kalki. Meanwhile, one of the kidnapped women, SUM-80, has managed to remain pregnant longer than any of the other women, which may be a sign of Kalki’s coming. Also meanwhile, Bhairava, a bounty hunter, longs of the day when he can enter The Complex and make a new life for himself. Also also meanwhile, Ashwatthama, who has spent the last 6,000 years cursed by Krishna with immortality, realizes the prophecy of Kalki may be at hand. All of these people ultimately converge when SUM-80 manages to escape The Complex, as it becomes extremely apparent that something bigger than anyone can fathom is about to happen.

First of all, I don’t normally say this, but seeing as how this has a major release in the US, I feel like I need to. If you don’t know anything about the plot of this movie, I would look it up first. While heavily inspired by pre-existing franchises, the backbone of the plot is the actual mythology and epic poetry of Hinduism, specifically, the Mahabharata. The film opens not with a future dystopia, but with a lavish recreation of the events of the poem, which are key to the story as a whole. However, as someone who isn’t versed in the mythology, it was pretty easy to follow along. It’s a combo of science fiction and faith that actually ends up working pretty well.

Speaking of lavish production values, this is also among the most expensive Indian movies to date, and you can see where they put the money in. The production design is incredible, and really wears the film’s influences on its sleeve. There’s visual splendor on full display, from hellish desert dystopias, to beautiful mythical cities, to a musical number set in the elite corners of the Complex where greenery and opulence abound. There’s even a devastating hand-drawn animation sequence of the historical events leading up to the film. It looked great on the big screen.

However, visuals only go so far, especially if your film runs a full 3 hours, but for the most part, I was entertained. I can’t ignore that this movie feels like several major sci-fi franchises thrown into a blender, but as a pastiche applied to scripture, it works really well. It does drag at a certain point though, but never to the extent where the length felt too much, and there’s a lot of plot here. The cast is great, but Prabhas steals the show as bounty hunter Bhairava. Like a combination of Han Solo and Spike Spiegel, he’s a clear comic relief in an otherwise dismal world. As in other films I’ve seen with him, he has a charisma and screen presence that, based on audience response alone, Hollywood’s biggest celebrities wish they could have. (The film also contains a hilarious and unexpected meta-cameo involving him that I won’t spoil here.) The action sequences are top-notch overall, with an absolutely epic climax and a lot of emotional weight.

Without spoiling the movie, some last-minute plot twists did feel a tad out of nowhere (even in-context), and some scenes could’ve been heavily trimmed, but overall, this one impressed me. As the first part of a cinematic universe, it does a great job of setting up an epic story based on real-life mythology that actually made me anticipate the next installment. While cliched and a tad long in the tooth (there is an intermission, but my screening didn’t include one), I’d recommend this to people looking for epic genre cinema they might otherwise not seek out.

When Josh Margolin’s grandmother Thelma got a call from a phone scammer, they were thankfully able to stop her before any money was taken. Most of us would move on. Instead, he made it into one of the year’s best independent films. Serving as the first starring film role for June Squibb after a more than 70-year acting career, Thelma is a funny, heartbreaking movie about never letting age stop you from accomplishing something, even as you come to terms with mortality. Also, it’s partially an action movie. Yes, Squibb shows us that you’re never too old to be an action star.

93-year-old Thelma Post lives alone when she isn’t being visited and helped by her grandson Daniel (Fred Hechinger) for things like figuring out how to use computers. One day, the unthinkable happens: she gets a call from Daniel saying he’s in jail for vehicular manslaughter and he needs $10,000 bail. The good news is, it’s just a phone scammer and Daniel is fine. The bad news: She already sent them the money. With the police of little help, and her family considering whether or not she can live on her own, Thelma decides this sweet old lady isn’t going to be another victim. Inspired by Mission: Impossible, she runs off with Ben (Richard Roundtree, in his final role), an old friend now in an assisted living facility, to track down the scammers and get her money back.

In the wrong hands, this could’ve been a joke that got old fast. Thankfully, Margolin knows exactly what he’s doing. He turns what could’ve been just a mere series of action movie cliches with old people into a hilarious and often wrenching dramedy about the experience of aging, as well as how we view our elders. There’s real emotional weight to this story, and for obvious reasons, the stakes are extremely high. The rest of the family aren’t just the ones trying to stop her. Their concerns are treated as genuine, and the audience cares for them as well. The family also gets their own fleshed out arc, specifically through the parents’ (Clark Gregg and Parker Posey) overprotectiveness of Daniel and his guilt about the situation.

That said, the film is also an absolute gut-buster. The action movie stuff works, and a lot of the comedy is carried by Squibb herself. This is a great script, but Squibb’s delivery is absolutely perfect for this role, and for her first (belated) star vehicle, she does an amazing job. The cast overall is top-notch, and while Roundtree’s inclusion certainly fits the premise, it also helps elevate the themes. He serves as a voice of reason to the proceedings, as someone who knows he probably can’t do something like this anymore, and delivers some of the most emotional gut-punches of the film. The fact that this is Roundtree’s last role makes this all the more heartbreaking of a performance.

I will absolutely not spoil too much of this movie here, but overall, this is independent filmmmaking at its best. Margolin turns a personal anecdote into what is equally one of the best comedies and yes, action movies of the year. By the time it ends, maybe you’ll even look at your own grandparents a little differently. In her first starring movie role, Squibb gives one of the best lead performances of 2024, and as an unexpected action hero to boot. It’s been a long time coming, but I can’t think of a better honor than that.

The Hollywood idea of “fake it till you make it” is taken to horrifying extremes in the new documentary Bad Actor: A Hollywood Ponzi Scheme. It’s a true-crime documentary that should be of interest to film aficionados like myself who follow the industry and pay attention to its many wheelings and dealings. As a movie, it’s fairly standard in execution, but does have a few added twists that not only enhance the central themes, but also may leave you thinking long after the film ends.

Perhaps if you frequent the dark corners of film libraries that I do, you may have heard of or even seen a film starring Zach Avery (whose real name is Zachary Horowitz), an aspiring actor whose output never really rose above the D-list, which raises the question of how he ended up in some of these movies in the first place. However, his film career hid a ponzi scheme of massive proportions. Roping in his friends and others though a web of lies and deceit, he had them invest in his enterprise to buy the rights to independent films through his company, 1inMM (One in a Million) Productions, and sell them to Netflix and HBO. Everything seemed legit. Documentation was provided. Contracts had been made. The films were certainly real. Yet, it eventually became apparent that they were the only things real about any of this, and by the time the scheme fell apart, it was worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

As a true crime documentary, it makes an effort to stand out from the typical talking-head-and-re-enactment fare. Since getting Avery to be in the movie was a borderline impossibility, the filmmakers obviously had to resort to re-enactments, but the process of casting them is a part of the film itself. As the main theme of this movie is the slippery nature of truth, the experience of actors getting inside the head of someone who used their talent for acting for nefarious purposes is an interesting detail that elevates this. Granted, Avery’s talent for acting applies solely to his crimes. The footage of Avery’s filmography makes it obvious why he never made it legitimately. However, the archival footage of Zach doing interviews is chilling in just how believable he is even as he’s lying through his teeth. There’s seemingly not much that sets him apart from any other aspiring actor talking about their potential big break.

There’s a lot of details to this story I won’t spoil, and the filmmakers do a decent job putting everything together. As someone with a pretty extensive knowledge of film, The extent of Avery’s criminal enterprise did shock me, as his influence spreads to more legitimate projects than I anticipated. This is a story of a top-shelf fraudster, and a number of the reveals of how he pulled some of this off I legitimately did not see coming. In addition to the re-enactments and footage of Avery’s career, the filmmakers incorporate heavy use of famous film clips to get their points across, but I did think they used this device a bit too much at times. I feel like this story will definitely appeal more primarily to film buffs compared to a lot of other true crime fare. As a film buff myself, though, i was pretty stunned for the whole thing.

Despite seeming like a pretty standard movie structurally, there is one last trick the film has up its sleeve before the credits roll. I won’t reveal what it is, but it’ll make you question everything you just watched, and give you pause on the nature of documentary filmmaking in general. Overall, I’d say that if you’re into movies, it’s worth a watch. It’s the tale of a despicable yet fascinating actor that, while devastating, is certainly thought-provoking.

Side note: In an unexpectedly niche example of industry competition, shortly before the film’s premiere at Tribeca Film Festival, Amazon MGM Studios announced their own documentary on this story, Hollywood Ending. Whether Neon’s or Amazon’s documentary ends up being superior is yet to be seen, and it could just be a total coincidence that the announcement was made when it was. It’s not like competing documentaries on the same topic is a regular occurrence, but it does happen. Regardless, I saw this one first, and maybe I’ll review the other one when it comes out.

The animated shorts program returned to Tribeca this year, which as always was curated and hosted by Whoopi Goldberg. The shorts varied from the sweet to the devastating, from thought-provoking to utterly bizarre. The Mayfly was by Sue Perroto (an alum of several Cartoon Network shows) and featured a mayfly who, in her short day of life, breaks off from her family to pursue her own path in music. The animation is adorable and the film is sweet and sad, but I can’t say too much aside from that. Nate & John is about the long form friendship between a barber and his customer over decades. It’s a beautiful and touching story that ends on a note that will melt your heart. In LUKi and the Lights, LUKi is a robot whose joints are powered by lightbulbs. Don’t be fooled by the cute art style—this is easily the most devastating short of the set. One day, LUKi’s lights start shorting out, and a trip to the doctor reveals he has ALS. What brought me to tears more than the premise was the reveal that the creator of this short has ALS and made it so that his kids could understand what their father was going through. It was easily one of my favorite shorts of the set.

Another short that rose above the rest was In the Shadow of the Cypress. Made in Iran, it’s about a father with PTSD who is struggling to be a good parent to his daughter in their house by the sea. The use of animation in this film is utterly superb, with a lot of surrealist elements to complement the grounded storyline. I felt like it may have been a bit too abstract in execution, but it was still one of the better selections. It also won the award for Best Animated Short at the festival, which puts it on track for the Oscar race. Scrubby tried to evoke the feelings of a children’s book, and it accomplished that, but not much else. It’s about an adorable furry creature who wants to live in his mother’s fur forever, but it starts to fall out. There’s not much here, to be honest, and was one of the weakest shorts for me. In Budō, a widow finds a pair of shoes given to her by her husband, and while going for a walk, takes home a hungry stray cat. I thought this would be another sweet story, but I was wrong. This is actually the most bonkers short film of the bunch, and ended up being a total laugh riot by the end. I honestly don’t wanna say too much about this one, as it’s that good. Finally, Ruthless Blade is an action short about a white tiger fighting its archenemy…or is it? This one had the best animation of the bunch (it was created for a Chinese streaming series), and ends on an unexpectedly amusing plot twist.

Finally, here are some of the other things I saw at the festival this year. The restaurant renovation documentary gets a stranger-than-fiction twist in ¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor! Casa Bonita is the Mexican restaurant famous in Denver, Colorado for its massive scale, wealth of attractions, and comparatively lackluster food, but when the pandemic closes its doors, the establishment ends up on the verge of bankruptcy. Enter some unlikely investors: Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of South Park, who famously featured the restaurant on the show. Purchasing Casa Bonita allows Trey and Matt to realize a childhood dream, but those dreams turn into nightmares fast when they discover the restaurant is in far, far, far more dire need of repair than originally thought. As the renovations costs balloon, and the community becomes more and more eager to return to Casa Bonita, Trey, Matt, and the team are determined to see things through and, yes, serve some food that’s actually good. The documentary is a must-see for South Park fans (Trey admitted that Casa Bonita is responsible for the lack of output for the show recently), and Trey and Matt’s sense of humor brings an edge to the proceedings. At the same time, the idea of a television celebrity going headfirst into the restaurant business creates tension that carries the project, especially as conflicts within the employees begin to rise. Funny and heartfelt, it should be a welcome watch for fans of the show. This movie also won the Audience Award for Best Documentary.

Sacramento is the feature debut of Michael Angarano, and it ended up being a pleasant surprise. Michael plays Ricky, who suddenly re-enters the life of his former friend and father-to-be Glenn (Michael Cera) for an impromptu road trip from LA to Sacramento. There’s a lot of laughs in this movie, mostly coming from Ricky’s often reprehensible behavior. It’s not a great movie, but it was better than I expected, and near the end takes a turn that I legitimately not anticipate. Sacramento also has theatrical distribution and should be hitting the big screen soon. I also attended a screening of an untitled docuseries about Tim Burton. Coming from the angle of Burton’s outsider nature, it delves deep into his rise to fame with plentiful examples of his art and even a few revelatory details (such as Tom Cruise being considered for the lead in Edward Scissorhands). With 3 more episodes yet to be seen, I hope this gets picked up by somebody. So far, as a Burton fan, this was a real treat. Well, I hope you enjoyed my coverage of this year’s Tribeca Festival. Here’s hoping you’ll get to see all that I talked about soon.