Hello, and welcome to the Geeky Brummie Film Roundup! Each week, we take you through the most exciting cinema releases and discuss why you should be excited for them. This week brings us a biker gang, an exorcist, and a very hungry fish…
Usual disclaimer: unless otherwise stated, I haven’t seen these films. All of my opinions are based on trailers, early reviews and other rumours and buzz.
The Bikeriders
In The Bikeriders, Jodie Comer’s Kathy falls for Austin Butler’s Benny – a young member of biker gang the Vandals, which is led by Tom Hardy’s Johnny (presumably one of the pre-requisites for joining the gang is a name ending in -y…). As the Vandals’ exploits become darker and more violent, Benny has to choose whether his loyalties lie with his girlfriend or his gang. This is based on a book by Danny Lyon, the author being represented in the film by Mike Faist as he documents the bikers’ journey. It also stars Michael Shannon, Norman Reedus (because you can’t have a film about bikers without Norman Reedus), and Boyd Holbrook.
The cast has a lot of actors whose stars are very much on the rise. Austin Butler’s last couple of roles have been his Oscar-nominated turn in/as Elvis and the psychopathic Feyd-Rautha in mega-blockbuster Dune 2. Benny appears to be a combination of those two characters – brooding like Elvis but prone to sudden acts of violence like Feyd. Mike Faist was very impressive in Spielberg’s glossy West Side Story remake and in the recent Challengers. And Jodie Comer has had huge success in Killing Eve, which is only just starting to translate to some well-deserved lead roles on the big screen (her last ones being 2021’s The Last Duel and Free Guy). The more veteran actors are great too – Hardy is perfectly cast as the leader of a biker gang, with the role being a combination of the Krays in Legend and fellow motorcyclist Eddie Brock in Venom, and Michael Shannon is almost always a sign of a good movie.
I’m not sure there’s much here that we haven’t seen before plot-wise, but it looks gorgeously shot, and the writer-director Jeff Nichols has a good track record of films that evoke the distinct brand of Americana found on an open road (see also: Midnight Special).
- The Bikeriders on IMDB
- The Bikeriders on Rotten Tomatoes
The Exorcism
The Exorcism is not to be confused with The Exorcist (which is directly referenced in the trailer) – a classic film about a priest performing an exorcism. Nor is it to be confused with The Pope’s Exorcist, in which Russell Crowe played a priest who performs exorcisms. No, in this film, Crowe plays Anthony Miller – an actor who, while playing a priest who performs an exorcism in a horror film, becomes possessed and has to have his demons exorcised by a priest.
Confused? Let me put it more simply. This is a film that definitely isn’t The Exorcist, in which a priest performs an exorcism on an actor, played by an actor who played a priest who performs exorcisms, who is playing a priest who performs exorcisms in a film that definitely isn’t The Exorcist.
This also stars Ryan Simpkins as Miller’s daughter Lee, David Hyde Pierce as the priest, plus Sam Worthington, Chloe Bailey and Adam Goldberg. It looks like slightly naff fun – the reviews haven’t been great (currently it has 4.7 on IMDB and 44% on Rotten Tomatoes), but at least Russell Crowe isn’t attempting an Italian accent this time, and it should be entertaining watching him play a bit of an anti-hero.
- The Exorcism on IMDB
- The Exorcism on Rotten Tomatoes
Something in the Water
While on a tropical holiday to celebrate a wedding, five friends (Hiftu Quasem, Natalie Mitson, Nicole Rieko Setsuko, Lauren Lyle and Ellouise Shakespeare-Hart) take a boat out to a remote island, where one of them is bitten by a shark. In their rush to get her back to civilisation and a doctor, they drive the boat over a coral reef which rips a hole in the keel. Stranded in the open water and with one of their number still bleeding profusely, the sharks return…
Again, this feels like we’ve been here before (Jaws, The Shallows, etc etc etc), but when the premise is this much fin (sorry, fun) you can’t complain too much. It’s actually quite refreshing to have one of these films where the aquatic antagonist is just a regular shark, and not hyper-intelligent or a primordial giant or stuck in a tornado. The idea of being stuck in the middle of the ocean, even without any big fish to worry about, is innately terrifying, and sharks are just naturally scary killing machines, so even if the execution isn’t great (its ratings on IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes are about the same as The Exorcism on average) this should still be a pretty entertaining thriller. Some of the acting in the trailer is a little irritating, but that will just make it all the more satisfying when the chomping starts.
- Something in the Water on IMDB
- Something in the Water on Rotten Tomatoes
If you only see one film this week…
Fans of a cheap scare are spoilt for choice this week, but for filmmaking quality the film of the week has to be The Bikeriders.
Still in cinemas and worth a watch
- Inside Out 2
- Furiosa
- Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
Trailer of the week
Cheating slightly, both because this trailer actually came out last week, and because it’s a TV show rather than a film, but this looks so awesome I had to go with it. Those About To Die is an epic new show set in Ancient Rome, starring the legendary Anthony Hopkins as Emperor Vespasian and Iwan Rheon (from Misfits and Game of Thrones) as a Master of Ceremonies at the Colosseum. It looks like a cross between Gladiator and Game of Thrones. Definitely looking forward to this one.
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