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Fantastic Fest Review: THELMA

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The term slow-burn is no stranger to Fantastic Fest’s audiences. A lot of films push the envelope in terms of using interesting ways to put a spell on the audience, while also working in some dynamic character development. Thelma is one of those films. It takes its time to make its point, but like a lot of these slow-burn films from the fest, it utilizes that approach to create a totally standalone emotive experience and one that will leave you breathless.

Thelma follows a young girl by the same name, who is heads off to University. Like most young folks headed to the high frontiers of parental free living, she is reaching a point of change and exploration. With a heavy religious background, her inner angst and first view of true freedom begins to wake things within her long left dormant. So, along with discovering her first love, she also begins to awake something powerful and possibly sinister within herself.

The film is absolutely beautiful in its scope and wears its heart on its sleeve for cinematic experience. A number of wide shots are used emphasizing use of negative space to mirror Thelma’s mostly icy world. The actresses in this are so good that the sometimes-glacial pacing is acceptably 100% overlooked. Their onscreen chemistry works and is alluring and provocative. The film could have entirely been about these two girls eating a sandwich and drinking coffee for an entire two-hours and I would have still been onboard and engaged. Director, Joachim Trier obviously brings his unique blend of character focus from his previous work on films like Oslo and Louder Than Bombs. His eye and ear for blending his actors in with a swirling narrative is at the forefront of all his work and is extended to Thelma here. I’m hoping to see him work on more genre stuff in the future as he appears to have a natural comfort level in doing so.

The film plays out like an antihero Marvel comic character over the course of its runtime. If you could picture a completely grounded origin story for Jean Grey’s Dark Phoenix, this would be it. And in a world where FX’s Legion and the upcoming New Mutants are charting new paths in comic book movies/shows realm, this would easily have fit right in. Thelma’s transformative nature and awakening powers lend themselves to a dark past that unfurls over the course of the film.

Thelma left me thinking. Its careful use of its runtime to establish its characters and their relationship sets up the dominoes in the second half to fall with precise operatic choreography. Its narrative holds its cards close to its chest as revelation after revelation is unfurled, while it is all while simultaneously wrapping its tendrils of dread around you. Thelma is smart, haunting and utterly fucking awesome.

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‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

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It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.

We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.

Evil Dead Rise

“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”

That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”

Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:

High Desert Hell
The Gemini Project

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‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening

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Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.

Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.

Happy Sad Confused

Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.

Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.

Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.

The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.

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Jake Gyllenhaal’s Thriller ‘Presumed Innocent’ Series Gets Early Release Date

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Jake gyllenhaal presumed innocent

Jake Gyllenhaal’s limited series Presumed Innocent is dropping on AppleTV+ on June 12 instead of June 14 as originally planned. The star, whose Road House reboot has brought mixed reviews on Amazon Prime, is embracing the small screen for the first time since his appearance on Homicide: Life on the Street in 1994.

Jake Gyllenhaal’s in ‘Presumed Innocent’

Presumed Innocent is being produced by David E. Kelley, J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, and Warner Bros. It is an adaptation of Scott Turow’s 1990 film in which Harrison Ford plays a lawyer doing double duty as an investigator looking for the murderer of his colleague.

These types of sexy thrillers were popular in the ’90s and usually contained twist endings. Here’s the trailer for the original:

According to Deadline, Presumed Innocent doesn’t stray far from the source material: “…the Presumed Innocent series will explore obsession, sex, politics and the power and limits of love as the accused fights to hold his family and marriage together.”

Up next for Gyllenhaal is the Guy Ritchie action movie titled In the Grey scheduled for release in January 2025.

Presumed Innocent is an eight-episode limited series set to stream on AppleTV+ starting June 12.

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