Posts Tagged ‘Alison Brie’

Masters of Universe

Director: Travis Knight

Cast: Nicholas Galitzine, Camilla Mendes, Idris Elba, Jared Leto, Alison Brie, Charlotte Riley, James Purefoy, Morena Baccarin, Kristen Wiig, Artie Wilkinson-Hunt, Dolph Lundgren

Running Time: 2 hours and 20 minutes

Film Rating: 7.5 out of 10

If audiences feel like some retro fantasy then catch director Travis Knight’s extraordinary new version of Masters of the Universe, with the buff and blonde 32 year old actor Nicholas Galitzine as He-Man.

If Mattel could approve the Barbie movie then why not He-Man? He was also an action figure and a supreme member of the Master of the Universe which created a range of toys in the 1980’s and 1990s.

The original 1987 film starred Swedish actor Dolph Lundgren who makes a rare appearance in this version in a weird scene in the gym in which he officially gives his approval to the younger actor. But who is Nicholas Galitzine?

He played the seductive lover of King James I in the fabulous historical TV series Mary and George opposite Oscar winner Julianne Moore (Still Alice) as his controlling and determined mother. In that series, I recognized talent and the charisma that an actor would need to play a leading role.

So Galitzine is perfect as He-Man in the meta-sexual world of Masters of the Universe in which as Adam his alter ego, he is propelled as a ten year old boy to earth when his planet of Eternia is attacked by the evil and villainous Skeletor wonderfully played with camp delight by Oscar winner Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club) and Alison Brie (Promising Young Woman) as his wicked sidekick Evil-Lyn.

Adam’s parents King Randor played by James Purefoy (Vanity Fair, John Carter) and Queen Marlena played by Charlotte Riley (London has Fallen) are captured by Skeletor and while the hapless Adam works in HR in a mid-western American city hopelessly looking for a sword that belonged to his father which will give him his masculine strength and power back.

With the help of Teela played by Camilla Mendes, she rips Adam out of the American mid-west and back to Eternia to face Skeletor and his band of evil creatures.

While the narrative is crazy at times with three screenwriters including Chris Butler, Aaron Nee and Adam Nee they do delve into the origin story of He-Man as he figures out his strength, his masculinity and what it means to become a man.

Brilliantly played by Nicolas Galitzine, Adam or He-Man becomes the leader of Masters of the Universe in a strange, cheesy fantasy world complete with robots and green tigers.

The world building is clever and slightly self-reflexive capturing the appeal of the franchise and the related merchandise. Regarding the marketable toys, while Barbie was aimed at young girls, He-Man was an action figure aimed at young boys.

Despite the convoluted script, there is a clear message that in order to be brave, you don’t necessarily require a weapon. He-Man discovers this as his character transforms into a glistening warrior complete with sword and attitude. He-Man is not a superhero, he is more mythical than that.

In terms of entertainment, director Travis Knight (Bumblebee, Kubo and the Two Strings) does a brilliant job of recreating Masters of the Universe for a new generation with sufficient costumes and creatures to inspire cosplay and Comicon outfits until 2030.

Masters of the Universe is cheesy and funny, very garish and filled with fantasy and adventure. This action packed film gets a film rating of 7.5 out of 10 and is worth seeing. Audiences can discover a new hero filled with a heart of gold.

Promising Young Woman

Director: Emerald Fennell

Cast: Carey Mulligan, Bo Burnham, Alison Brie, Adam Brody, Jennifer Coolidge, Laverne Cox, Connie Britton, Chris Lowell, Max Greenfield, Clancy Brown, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Molly Shannon, Emerald Fennell

Actress Emerald Fennell who ironically played Camilla Parker-Bowles on the hit Netflix series The Crown has turned writer and director and created an original piece of cinema, Promising Young Woman with a film’s ending that no viewer will guess.

Casting British actress and Oscar nominee Carey Mulligan (An Education) in the lead role of Cassandra, a young 30 thirty year old gorgeous woman who gets her kicks out of harassing young men after they have tried to pick her up while playing drunk, is a master stroke. Mulligan channels every controversial female role from Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction to Margot Robbie in Birds of Prey.

Set in a nameless Midwestern city, Cassie still lives with her doting yet confused parents played by Jennifer Coolidge and Clancy Brown after dropping out of med school due to her best friend Nina Fisher suffering from a horrific sexual assault incident at the medical school while they were both in their second year.

The best statement Fennell makes is that the perpetrators of sexual assault are not necessarily wealthy and powerful old men, but they can also be young professional men who behave badly at university and still manage to maintain a lucrative postgraduate career. Cassie witnessing her friend Nina’s life falling apart due to sexual assault, decides to blame all young men and tricks them into taking her home, only to turn on them in their own environment.

Cassie’s revenge really starts getting going when she meets Dr Ryan Cooper, wonderfully played by Bo Burnham, who appears to be a sweet, charming and humorous paediatrician and is attracted to Cassie. Ryan mentions to Cassie that he still sees a lot of their old medical school classmates including Al Monroe and Madison, played respectively by Chris Lowell and Alison Brie, both of whom were directly and indirectly responsible for Nina’s sexual assault.

The beauty of Emerald Fennell’s script is that there is not a lot of details given to the viewer, so Cassie’s actions and her peculiar relationship with men hints at a feminist revenge fantasy. The garish costumes adds to the dark psychology of this thriller, which leaves viewers intrigued.

One by one Cassie hunts down all those responsible for the sexual assault of her best friend and finally lands up at the foot of the bed of the real perpetrator Al Monroe on the night of his bachelor’s party dressed as a kinky nurse.

Promising Young Woman is a tour-de-force of acting for Carey Mulligan who effortlessly transcends from a demure blonde girl behind a coffee counter to a vicious sociopath who is on the hunt for vengeance.

For its sheer originality, Promising Young Woman gets a film rating of 7.5 out of 10 but as a feminist revenge fantasy it’s going to be divisive and controversial especially with its shocking ending.

The Post

Director: Steven Spielberg

Cast: Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, Sarah Paulson, Jesse Plemons, Carrie Coon, Bob Odenkirk, Bruce Greenwood, Tracy Letts, Michael Stulbarg, Matthew Rhys, Bradley Whitford, Alison Brie

Before Julian Assange, before Edward Snowden, there was the Pentagon Papers.

A top level government study on how the Americans had been involved in Vietnam way before the infamous Vietnam War and how during that bloodletting fiasco, the Americans realized that they were losing the war in South East Asia, yet still continued to send troops in to fight the Viet Cong.

The leaking of the Pentagon Papers, firstly by the New York Times and then more pertinently by The Washington Post during the Nixon administration is the source of Oscar winning director Steven Spielberg’s fascinating film The Post starring two Oscar winners, Meryl Streep (The Iron Lady) as owner of the Post, Katherine Graham and Tom Hanks (Philadelphia) as Ben Bradlee, the executive editor of The Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/ who seizes on the story of a decade and pushes for his newspaper to release the classified documents despite the possible legal or financial consequences.

Streep as usual, is superb as the doubtful and affluent socialite Katherine Graham who inherits her father’s newspaper The Washington Post upon her husband’s death and then is forced into an invidious position when she is called upon to make the critical decision on whether to let the newspaper publish the Pentagon Papers at a time when New York investors are eagerly awaiting The Washington Post Company’s IPO (Initial Public Offering) on the American Stock Exchange, which could hugely benefit the fortunes of the struggling newspaper.

Spielberg packs a lot into The Post, and it would be advisable for viewers to read up thoroughly about that crucial historical period in 1971 which was so decisive and widely regarded as the turning point of American press freedom. All these events occurred prior to the Watergate scandal.

The publication of the Pentagon Papers ultimately changed the American public’s sentiment on the viability of troops in Vietnam and the legal outcome after the Supreme Court ruling elevated Katherine Graham to a media doyenne, a feminist and a massively influential woman who changed the business world’s view on how a single woman can influence and transform a media empire.

There is a solid supporting cast of actors in The Post to add gravitas to a riveting tale of journalistic bravery, including Sarah Poulson as Bradlee’s wife Toni who gives her own feminine perspective on why what Katherine Graham was doing was vitally important and brave. Other supporting actors include Bob Odenkirk, Matthew Phys, Carrie Coon, Jesse Plemons and Tracy Letts.

In the age of the Internet, Fake News and a 24 Hour news cycle, The Post is a critical film to watch and be discussed and is especially relevant in 2018 as back then in 1971, which basically implies that at every historical junction, the media must always hold the country’s government accountable. After all, the news is History’s First Draft.

My only criticism is that screenwriters Liz Hannah and Josh Singer should have contextualized the dramatic events more efficiently so that a 21^st century audience could appreciate the bravery of publishing critical information without fear or favour.

The Post is brilliant viewing and a highly recommended film about press freedom under a sinister government which makes the film’s ending all the more relevant. The Post receives a film rating of 8.5 out of 10.

Read more on Katherine Graham – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharine_Graham

Read more on Ben Bradlee – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Bradlee