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The pandemic heavily affected last year’s cinema releases, with new movies that went unnoticed upon entering what few theaters remained open now finding an audience on streaming services. Mystery thriller The Vanished is one such offering and is quickly gaining popularity on Netflix, rocketing up the Top 10 list.
It stars Thomas Jane and Anne Heche as a married couple who take their young daughter to an RV campsite for Thanksgiving weekend, only for the girl to disappear soon after they arrive. When the police search turns up no clues, they begin looking for her themselves, with their actions often hindering any answers that might have been discovered.
The pic wastes no time in getting its plot underway, with barely ten minutes having gone by before the cute little blonde is nowhere to be found. The suspect pool is cast wide by an assortment of supporting characters that the spouses encounter, none of whom help their case by all acting as suspiciously as humanly possible without screaming their guilt out loud. As the days pass with no trace of what might have happened being unearthed, things begin looking ever bleaker and increasingly desperate choices are made.
When the story finally begins to wind down, the ending descends into a cascade of increasingly preposterous revelations that threaten to undo the groundwork built up over the rest of the movie, and ultimately treats us to a montage of previous lines given retrospective significance after we’re afforded new information. Overall, the film isn’t nearly as clever as it thinks it is, but the mounting tension of the first three-quarters more than make up for the nosedive into implausibility as it begins wrapping things up.
The Vanished is by no means a perfect pic, but is certainly better than its generic DTV title would suggest, and if you’re after a couple of hours of tense mystery, you could do a lot worse than check it out.
Disney prides itself on a staunch adherence to family-friendly values, something that’s come to define the company as they continue to dominate the pop culture landscape, but it would be fair to say that some of the studio’s older animated classics don’t hold up particularly well when viewed through a modern lens.
Many entries in the Mouse House’s back catalogue are very much products of their time, and in order to avoid any offense, Disney Plus has been slapping potentially offensive titles with disclaimers. Obviously, Song of the South is not going to be added to the library at any point, but it appears as though Dumbo, The Aristocats and Peter Pan have been removed from the children’s section, meaning parents will have to approve kids under the age of seven watching the popular movies.
Clearly, Disney are making sure that anything that comes attached with a disclaimer isn’t available to younger viewers at the push of a button, because it would be safe to assume that people aged seven or under are not going to painstakingly read through a content advisory warning before reflecting on the moral and ethical dilemmas presented by the outdated racial stereotypes in question.
Naturally, this has caused a minor outrage among subscribers who believe the dreaded ‘woke culture’ has once again gone too far, but in theory and practice, any film or television project that comes burdened with a warning should be out of the youngest demographic’s reach. Besides, Disney Plus has avoided purging titles altogether unlike some of their competitors, so at least a compromise has been reached instead of the company simply making a knee-jerk reaction and pulling them outright.
The first trailer for Godzilla vs. Kong dropped yesterday, and the internet was instantly aflame with excited anticipation for the title fight between the world’s two most powerful kaiju. However, it also sparked the mystery of exactly how the titular throwdown will come about.
While Godzilla: King of the Monsters didn’t portray the lizard lord as being exactly benevolent, it did establish him as a force of nature – figuratively and literally – whose presence on Earth balances out the destruction caused by humanity, and he ultimately became an ally in the battle against King Ghidorah. However, this time around he’s embarked on a rampage not unlike how he was portrayed in the original Japanese movies, which completely goes against his character development.
There’s nothing in the trailer that suggests what caused Godzilla to turn against humanity, but it’s most likely that some outside force has affected his judgment or even driven him insane, meaning that Kong has been drafted in to stop him. After all, Kong was the only Titan not shown submitting to Godzilla after he took down Ghidorah (“Kong bows to no one”), which would suggest a greater strength of will than the average monster like Rodan, Scylla or Behemoth.
Perhaps it was even deliberate, turning Godzilla into a mindless force of destruction so that a tech company, perhaps Monarch, would be afforded the funding to construct Mechagodzilla, only for the monster lord’s rampage to get out of hand and the giant ape is instead utilized to put a stop to it before the automaton doppelgänger is ready to come online.
Whatever the reason for Godzilla cutting a swath through a jungle of skyscrapers, it doesn’t change the fact that the devastation needs to be stopped, and Godzilla vs. Kong will certainly feature a battle for the ages regardless of how reluctant each participant might be.
We haven’t even seen the first movie of the planned Walking Dead trilogy starring Andrew Lincoln that AMC has got up its sleeves, but new intel may reveal how the story of Rick Grimes will ultimately wrap up. Lincoln said goodbye to the mainline TV series back in November 2018, and we were promised he’d return in a film soon after. Due to various factors, though, the first outing has still yet to enter production. But the story of the trilogy is likely already mapped out.
With that in mind, insider Daniel Richtman has now revealed what he’s heard the ending will be and according to him, Rick Grimes will die in the third film. He doesn’t say how, and plans can always change, but right now, this seems to be what AMC has in mind for the character.
Of course, Rick’s demise was originally teased in his final TWD episode, before he was rescued by Anne/Jadis and taken away to the CRM. Since that episode aired, however, creator Robert Kirkman finished his comic book and killed Rick off in the penultimate issue. So, it makes sense that the screen franchise would end up following his counterpart’s fate in the source material. In the comics, Rick is murdered by the son of the despotic ruler of the Commonwealth that he defeated and the idea of The Brave Man finally being offed by the relative of a villain he beats is one that’s easy to see being adapted to the films.
Then again, the writers could come up with a completely alternate way for his journey to end. The point of the comics’ death was that it was supposed to be sudden and shocking, but this meant some fans found it underwhelming. As such, the movies may be better off creating some grand, more meaningful farewell for Lincoln’s iconic character.
In any case, it’ll be a while yet before we find out what AMC’s got in store, but looking closer to home, and The Walking Dead returns for new episodes on February 28th.
With the long-held perception of video game adaptations being almost universally terrible finally beginning to fade away thanks to a slew of recent examples managing to buck the trend, Hollywood is seemingly eager to go all-in on the lucrative market. This year alone will mark the release of new live-action Mortal Kombat and Resident Evil films (both of which are reboots), with Uncharted – starring Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg – and Metal Gear Solid on course to arrive further afield.
An eclectic mix, then, though one prolific Japanese institution whose vast array of popular IPs has yet to leave a lasting mark on the box office is Nintendo. The Legend of Zelda, Metroid, Donkey Kong and Super Mario Bros., to name just a few, would undoubtedly prove to be successful on the big screen, and Ninty has reportedly been exploring the possibility of cinematic domination for quite some time.
According to notable insider Daniel Richtman, an animated film based on the company’s overalled mascot Mario is now seeking crowd-drawing names to fill key roles, with Robert Downey Jr. being eyed for a part in the project. Whether the actor has been contacted or, indeed, if he’s even shown interest, isn’t clear, though it’s a pairing we’d certainly be interested in seeing become a reality.
Were Downey Jr. to ultimately score the gig, he could end up being reunited with fellow MCU alumni Brie Larson in the Nintendo universe. The latter, a self-professed gamer, has repeatedly been rumored to play the likes of both Princess Peach and/or Zelda in whatever the Big N has cooking behind the scenes. It’s worth noting, however, that Larson’s role(s) would likely be in live-action, and not animated.
While we wait to learn more about what the gaming giant has planned, let us know who would make your own personal cast list for a Super Mario Bros. movie in the usual place below!