King Richard is a biopic of Venus and Serena Williams by focusing on their father, Richard Williams. That is a strange fact, but absolutely true. This movie tells the story of two of the greatest tennis players in history, but does it through the eyes of Richard.

Richard Williams is played by Will Smith and he does a tremendous job. There are times in the film where you are trying to understand why Richard is doing what he is doing and times when you wish he would get his own comeuppance because of things that he does, but, in the end, the character shows what he had been planning the entire time.

The film looks mainly at Venus Williams (Saniyya Sidney) because she started in training and her career before her sister Serena (Demi Singleton) did. Richard had his plan, and it was shaking up the tennis world, which, at times, did not know what to make of Richard Williams.

Tony Goldwyn (President Fitzgerald Grant from Scandal) played tennis coach Paul Cohen, who had some ideas that were different from Richard. Then, Jon Bernthal joined the movie as Rick Macci, who brought the family to Florida and elevated Venus’s training even further.

Aunjanue Ellis played Venus and Serena’s mother Brandy, who had several strong scenes with Will Smith. She brought some power to the role and was anything but a bystander in her daughters’ lives. There was a scene where Brandy confronted a neighbor and it showed the fire in her.

The film does run almost 2 and a half hours, but I never felt the length. The movie flowed extremely well and transitioned impeccably from each scene. Director Reinaldo Marcus Green does a great job with the shots of the film, especially the tennis action scenes which bring a tension to the film.

While Serena does not get the same attention as her sister, the movie does not allow her to fall into the background. Her own story of becoming one of the best players of all time is planted here and showed her dedication and passion. Both young actors who played the Williams sisters do a wonderful job with their performances and have bright futures in acting ahead of them.

King Richard could have been just another inspirational sports stories on the Hallmark Channel, but Will Smith and the rest of the cast, as well as Reinaldo Marcus Green, would not accept that level. The film tackles some major issues such as racism and overbearing parents without making anything judgy and providing an entertaining biopic. Excellent work all around.

4 stars

I remember watching Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker on PTL when I was a kid, watching with my mom. They were a bizarre pair, even at first. This movie focuses heavily on Tammy Faye and her reactions to many of the scandals that happened to the Televangelist and his wife.

Jessica Chastain is imperceivable as Tammy Faye Bakker. I had to look up the actress as the film was underway because I did not know who it was under that excessive make up job. Jim Bakker, however, was easier to tell. This is the second film of the day that I have watched that starred Andrew Garfield, who is having a great year (maybe he’ll wrap up the year appearing in the potentially biggest movie of 2021 in Spider-man: No Way Home). Chastain and Garfield shoulder the weight of this film and their performances are fantastic. Without these, The Eyes of Tammy Faye would not hope to be a success.

Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker are followed from youngsters to the point where their TV show, PTL, was being viewed by 20 million people a day. Along the way there were moments of weakness that manifested itself as affairs and redistribution of pledges from fans that show the dangers of the excessive life lived by the Bakkers.

As it was going, Jim and tammy Faye maintained their likability and their charisma, showing how they could bilk their viewers out of so much money and still not consider themselves sinners.

Cherry Jones was great as Tammy Faye’s mother Rachel. Her old time beliefs and expectations somehow helped to create the fiery and unpredictable Tammy Faye, Vincent D’onofrio was another master class in make up as I did not recognize him in the slightest as he played another crooked televangelist, Jerry Falwell, who attempted to take advantage of the Bakker scandals to further his own ministry.

The biggest issue I had was that some of the plot felt like it was not connected well enough. It felt like a series of events with little crossover. I would have liked to have seen more effects of the choices made by Jim and Tammy Faye.

However, the performance are great and someone who did not know the story would consider this a wild ride.

3.5 stars

Okay, I wasn’t ready for that.

Andrew Garfield is utterly brilliant in the role of real-life music composer Jonathan Larson, who would create one of the great musicals of the last 30 years in Rent.

However, Jon did not explode upon the Broadway scene and take over. He struggled for years on a musical he was writing called Superbia, but he was mere days away from presenting the musical in a showcase for producers. One problem, the musical was missing one key song and Jon was not having success in writing it.

As this is going on, he was having trouble with his girlfriend Susan (Alexandra Shipp), pressure from his best friend Michael (Robin de Jesus) and money issues. He was having challenges with his agent Rosa (Judith Light) who was not calling him back. Still, some constructive words from legend Stephen Sondheim (Bradley Whitford) kept Jon’s hopes alive through the wars.

This was based on a musical written by Jonathan Larson and you can feel the passion and the energy throughout the entire two hour run time. The music was catchy and engaging and built into some of the more powerful songs I’ve heard in a musical in awhile.

As I mentioned, Andrew Garfield has to be considered a shoo-in for an Academy Award nomination for his performance in this film. He performed the songs himself and he imbued them with such a goofy, but sincere energy that you can not help but love him, which only served the film’s emotional beats well.

Lin-Manuel Miranda makes his feature film directorial debut with tick, tick…Boom and he stands out a he always seems to do. Some of the shots he got during the music were amazing and he was able to move the story along between songs breathlessly. He used Jonathan on stage as a framing devise to help movie the story forward while still being completely entertaining.

Robin de Jesus was given one of the most powerful of scenes and he nailed it. I loved Judith Light’s performance too, avoiding the clichés of the entertainment agent and embracing the realness of the character. Alexandra Shipp is a damn star. You cannot take your eyes off of her while she is on screen. She and Andrew Garfield share remarkable chemistry and it shows.

This is the second amazing musical of 2021 that has had Lin-Manuel Miranda attached to it. In the Heights was a rollicking good time, and I think tick, tick…Boom matches the spark, the vitality of that work.

It’s been a great year to be a musical. This movie is debuting this week on Netflix.

5 stars

The 1984 Ghostbusters is one of my favorite films of all time. I remember seeing it in the theater downtown with my friends. My friend Darin made the “They go up” joke about the stairs before Bill Murray did. I’ve rewatched it a ton of times and love it every time.

Now, the sequels and reboots have not been as great, although I do believe that Ghostbusters 2 is better than people remember. It is not up to the first film, for sure, but if you are not comparing it to the original, Ghostbusters 2 is not bad. I also did not hate the 2016 Ghostbuster reboot that received so much hate for the sin of casting a whole team of female Ghostbusters that it barely had a chance. It was okay.

So when the announcement came about a new Ghostbusters movie, Ghostbusters: Afterlife, I was happy, but cautious. Then the pandemic pushed the film back several times and there were moments when it seemed as if we would never see the new film, a sequel to the original films, set in the 1984 universe.

I am happy to announce that Ghostbusters: Afterlife, directed by Jason Reitman, the son of the first two Ghostbusters movies, Ivan Reitman, is a lot of fun and takes the series in a new direction while showing love to the original film and the characters from within it.

Life has been hard for Callie (Carrie Coon), as she is having money problems and faces eviction. She then discovered that her father, who had deserted her when she was but an infant, had passed away and left her an old, spooky house in Oklahoma. Callie packed up her son Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) and daughter Phoebe (Mckenna Grace) and headed for the small town in Oklahoma.

Turned out that Callie’s father was Egon Spengler and he had apparently deserted his friends and family and retreated to this farm where nothing ever grew, a place where people around town called his the Dirt Farmer. Although, as it always was with Egon, there was more to what was happening than we saw, and supernatural occurrences once again began to occur.

Phoebe went to summer school, where she met teacher Gary Grooberson (Paul Rudd) and they hit it off over the strange happenings of earthquakes in a city where there should not be earthquakes. Gary was also a fan of the 80s Ghostbusters and geeked out over a ghost trap that Phoebe had discovered in her grandpa’s house.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife felt like the Star Wars: The Force Awakens of the Ghostbusters franchise. There are several beats that are similar or homages to the original Ghostbusters movie. tweaked just a little with the new cast of kids that are now involved. There are plenty of returning things/story elements in Afterlife, which I thought might bother me, but honestly felt nicely organic in its uses.

Mckenna Grace absolutely carries the new film on her shoulders. Her Phoebe is a wonderful character, the outcast girl who has trouble making friends but loves the ways of science. She could have easily been a cliché but the film takes it time introducing us to Phoebe, her quirks and her personality. Later in the movie, you totally believe in every minute of her story because you care so much about her.

I also loved her new friend, Podcast (Logan Kim), who is making his feature film debut, and he does a tremendous job. He is very funny and works with Phoebe beautifully.

Finn Wolfhard was fine too, but he was honestly the one who had the least to do as Phoebe’s older brother Trevor. He does maximize his screen time and does what he can to build his character. He has some chemistry with Celeste O’Connor, playing on screen potential girlfriend Lucky. They do not get enough time together to really focus the film around them, but Afterlife does not push them to the forefront.

I loved the Paul Rudd character in the first half of the film, but he becomes a stand in for the Rick Moranis role.

This was an example of the film trying to recreate too much of the same beats as the first film. There are some things that I don’t mind about reusing the ideas, but this almost felt like Paul Rudd doing an imitation of Rick Moranis, and that betrayed the interesting character that he was at the beginning.

The tone of Ghostbusters: Afterlife is somewhat different than the original. This played more serious in many ways, with less straight up comedic bits as the first one did. I did not mind that either, since there were some solid humor involved. And yes, the dad jokes by Phoebe neve failed to get a sincere laugh out of me.

The final half hour or so was utterly fantastic and surprisingly emotional. I never expected to get misty-eyed in a Ghostbusters movie, but I did experience some “feels” in that third act. Something happened in the third act that could have felt desperate, but worked surprisingly well. No spoilers.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife looks great, with some fantastic CGI. It is filled with moments that border on nostalgia for the original Ghostbusters film. It has some wonderful moments of fan service that goes extremely well with the story that they were telling.

At this point, Ghostbusters: Afterlife is my second favorite Ghostbusters movie and I hope that there is more of this to come.

4.2 stars