Sundance 2019: Zac Efron, Ted Bundy and a Portrait of a Serial Killer

A man walks into a bar. Hes handsome enough to attract the attention of the ladies in this tavern, including Liz Kloepfer, a single mother whos been dragged to the tavern by her best friend for a night out. He notices her, too. They meet-cute at the jukebox, talk, flirt. He takes her home. She invites him in. They spend a chaste night together. When she wakes up, Liz finds him in the kitchen, fixing breakfast for her toddler. You can see her thinking: Who is this guy? Hes attractive, polite and good with kids. Did I just hit the jackpot?

And then the audience laughs, because the man whos wearing an apron and kissing her gently on the cheek and holding a conspicuously large knife in his hand is well, hes Ted Bundy. Its 1969. Ten years later, hell be convicted in Florida of two murders, three counts of attempted murder and two counts of burglary. Twenty years after that picture of domestic bliss plays out, hell be strapped into an electric chair. And 50 years later, well be watching a biopic about everything that happened between these two people before that switch was pulled.

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An attempt at a dual portrait of both a notorious serial killer and the woman who loved him, Joe Berlingers Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile this was the phrase that Judge Edward D. Cowart used to describe the crimes before issuing the death penalty is blessed with an extremely tabloid-friendly title. It will forever be referred to, however, as The Movie Where Zac Efron Plays Ted Bundy. This is the films casting coup, getting the sexy movie star to play the sexy killer. Its something thats solid gold in conception and leaves something to be desired in the execution (pun unintended) which is a pretty good way to describe the movie as a whole. A colleague referred to it as Bohemian Rhapsody for mass murderers as folks exited the early morning Sundance screening, which is a harsh indictment. Its not quite that bad. But its not what youd call traditionally good, either.

Which is a pity on several fronts. For starters, Berlinger is one of the foremost true-crime documentarians working today; if he didnt invent the genre alongside his co-director Bruce Sinofsky with 1992s Brothers Keeper and the landmark Paradise Lost trilogy, he definitely set the high-bar standards for it. He happened to be working on a docuseries about Bundy for Netflix Conversations With a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes when Michael Werwies script dropped into his lap. The concurrent projects informed and helped one another to be better, hes said, and you can guess that his thoroughly researched, absolutely stellar nonfiction take on the subject helped inform the authenticity of the recreated sequences and greatest-hits moments from Bundys post-arrest public appearances here. (You should definitely check out Conversations, provided you can stomach some genuinely nauseating descriptions of what the killer did to earn such enduring fascination.)

Its tough to think what Extremely Wicked gave to the other work, however, because theres not much its saying about Bundy or Kloepfer past he did a really great job of pretending he was normal and she suspected him but still believed him, until she couldnt. Even the most casually familiar-with-the-case filmgoers know the first part that the dashing guy used his looks to lure victims, avoid suspicion and aid in asserting his innocence is Bundy 101. And while the script draws from Kloepfers book The Phantom Prince (written under the name Elizabeth Kendall), it seems to stall every time it goes back to her story. Lily Collins (Mirror Mirror) does her best to give you a sense of how conflicted this woman is, especially once Liz reveals that she was the person who initially gave her boyfriends name to the cops as a suspect. But you can feel the film sort of counting the seconds until it can get back to Bundy escaping prison, unleashing his charm offensive, denying any involvement in a number of very similar homicides, etc. For a movie that wants to make Kloepfers perspective a big part of the story, the sequences of her getting phone calls and downing tumbler of vodka sure feel perfunctory.

Because like Paradise Lost the Milton one, not the docs the devil gets the best lines in this story. You could not be faulted for thinking that this true-crime biopic had been reverse-engineered in the name of getting Efron to play Bundy, though this wasnt the case (he told Variety the project was already in motion and in fact, had doubts about taking the role). Yet enlisting the Neighbors star to weaponize his drop-dead gorgeousness in the name of playing the handsome sociopath is arguably Extremely Wickeds big saving grace; watch Efron sweep various women off their feet, including his old coworker Carole Anne Boon (Kaya Scodelario) or make various female admirers swoon in the courtroom, and you get why the casting makes sense. Only theres really nowhere for the talented actor to go with the performance, except outrage over these crazy accusations or arrogance while acting as his trial defense lawyer. His scenes with John Malkovichs judge have a nice back-and-forth rhythm, but you still feel like so much is simply being recited per transcripts or barely skimming the surface. Efron gives you a smooth criminal. So why does nothing feel compelling about his criminal behavior or his denials overall?

Thankfully, Berlinger only recreates one of the serial killers murders, waiting for a key exchange between Bundy and Kloepfer at the end to give you a taste of his degeneracy. Its the second best scene after that early shot of the maniac smiling in an apron, and the one moment where you feel Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile lives up to its title. Otherwise, youre left to kill time counting the celebrity cameos (if you didnt already know Metallicas James Hetfield plays a cop, you might miss his brief appearance entirely) and admiring how faithfully they staged press conferences, courtroom outbursts et al., per the requisite credit-roll footage of the real thing. Berlinger already has one extremely eye-opening, shockingly jaw-dropping and vital portrait of the man behind the male model mask. You wish hed just kept things on the strictly vrit level and left it at that.

See Abbi Jacobson, Dave Franco in Chilling 6 Balloons Trailer

In the newNetflix movie 6 Balloons,Abbi Jacobson plays a woman trying to help her brother (played by Dave Franco) combat heroin addiction.

The trailer shows a drugged-out Franco assuring his sister (Jacobson) that he wont use anymore. In a grim overhead shot moments later, Jacobson is caring for his child in a bathroom while Franco shoots up again in an adjacent toilet stall. The trailer comes to a quietly alarming end, as Jacobson whispers one phrase, its ok, over and over.

6 Balloons was written and directed by Marja-Lewis Ryan; it premiered at South by Southwest this week.The drama, which arrives on the streaming service on April 6th, takes place over the course of a single night. It also marks one of the first drama roles for Jacobson, who is best known as a comedian/actress in the hit Comedy Central series, Broad City.

From Psycho to Get Out: A History of Horror at the Oscars

On January 23rd, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced this years Oscar nominees includingGet Out, which earned nominations for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor and Best Original Screenplay. The love for the Jordan Peeles across-the-board hit was a rarity for a slew of reasons, including the fact that the filmmaker became only the fifth black man to ever be nominated for Best Director. But perhaps most remarkable wasthe fact that it nabbed a Best Picture slot: Depending on how flexible you are in defining horror, Get Out is just the fifth (or sixth) fright film in the ceremonys history to ever receive that honor. Yes, lots of genre films get disrespected by the Academy, notably comedies and sci-fi movies. But horror has arguably had the hardest time landing nominations. And when they do, the trick has usually been to fool Oscar voters into not necessarily thinking of them as horror films.

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Scary movies were persona non grata for the first several decades of the Academy Awards, even as they were beginning to assert themselves with the public in the 1930s. Never mind that distinctive directors like Tod Browning and actors such as Boris Karloff and Claude Rains were bringing to life adaptations of works by H.G. Wells, Mary Shelley and Bram Stoker these movies couldnt get Oscars attention. TakeBride of Frankenstein, which remains one of the greatest examples of Universals monster-movie golden age and received only a single nod for Best Sound Recording. (Ironically,Gods and Monsters, a movie about Bride of Frankenstein director James Whale, received two Oscar nominations for acting and a win for Condons screenplay. Clearly, Academy members enjoy biopics about horror filmmakers more than horror films themselves.)

A pattern was set the genre: boffo at the box office, throw them a tiny bone come Oscar time. Having a pedigree helped, somewhat: The 1943 version ofThe Phantom of the Opera, based on the Gaston Leroux novel, won for art direction and cinematography; the killer-kid drama The Bad Seed(1956), which received four Oscar nods (including three for acting), was adapted from the Tony-winning Maxwell Anderson play and featured the stage versions principal actors reprising their roles. Four years later, Alfred Hitchcock already a four-time nominee who was responsible for Best Picture-winner Rebecca released Psycho, which earned him his fifth and final Best Director nomination, as well as three other nods, including one for Best Supporting Actress for Janet Leigh.

But it was 1968 that proved to be a genuinely pivotal year in horror. For one, it saw the release of Night of the Living Dead, George Romeros low-budget, immensely influential zombie thriller, which essentially birthed an entire subgenre of horror films. But it was also the year that Roman Polanskis adaptation of the Ira Levin novel Rosemarys Baby hit theaters, becoming a smash hit. Acclaimed book, direction by a respected European filmmaker the Academy took notice. Polanski was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay, and revered theater actress Ruth Gordon won the Best Supporting Actress statue the first time an out-and-out horror movie had won a high-profile Academy Award. Gordons victory, which happened at age 72 I cant tell you how encouraging a thing like this is, she famously remarked from the podium would set the stage for what would become a curious Oscar phenomenon: actresses earning statuettes for horror films.

Five years after Rosemarys Baby, the genre would establish an even bigger beachhead at the Oscars, courtesy of a gamechanging blockbuster and a vulgar, vomit-spewing little girl: The Exorcist. Based on William Peter Blattys popular novel and featuring gross-out scares, William Friedkins 1973 classicbrought demonic possession, endangered-child drama and supernatural terror to the masses. Again, however, it was the pedigree of the material along with the presence of the Oscar-winning French Connection auteur behind the camera and celebrated Ingmar Bergman cohort Max von Sydow in front of it that helped give The Exorcist a patina of quality. The Academy gifted the film with 10 nominations, including the first Best Picture nod to a horror movie. The film only won two Oscars, including Best Adapted Screenplay for Blatty, But itproved to be such a critical and commercial sensation that the movie overcame the industrys marginalization of stories about things that go bump in the night (and cause heads to do complete 360-degree rotations).

Not that horror films were suddenly treated with the same respect afforded costume dramas, biopics, musicals and other prestige projects. As Vox points out, even when a young turk named Steven Spielberg revolutionized the summer event movie in 1975 withJaws, the Academy acknowledged his achievement with a Best Picture nomination but snubbed the brash filmmaker. (Memorably, Spielberg hired a camera crew to record his live reaction when he received his presumed Best Director nomination which didnt happen, much to his chagrin.)

Still, the momentum intensified. The Omen won an Oscar for Best Score. Alien won for Visual Effects. An American Werewolf in London snagged Rick Baker his first of seven Oscars for Best Makeup. (His most recent was for 2011s remake of The Wolfman.) Poltergeist was nominated for three Oscars. The 1986 remake of The Fly landed a Best Makeup nomination, and that same year, Aliens received seven nominations, winning in technical categories.

But more importantly, that sequel to the Rosetta stone of the modern sci-fi/horror/action film (combining not one, not two, but three maligned genres) also earned Sigourney Weaver an Oscar nomination for Best Actress a confirmation that the Academy could look past a long-held horror bias to celebrate superb genre performances. For all the deserved talk about the dearth of meaningful roles for women in Hollywood, horror has actually done its part to correct that imbalance, earning accolades for actresses starting with The Bad Seed and Psycho and continuing with 1976s adaptation of Stephen Kings Carrie, whose sole nominations were for Best Actress (Sissy Spacek) and Best Supporting Actress (Piper Laurie).

Weavers nomination was followed just a few years later by a Best Actress win for Kathy Bates in another King adaptation, Misery. Before that film, the future Annie Wilkes was known as a beloved, Tony-nominated theater actress. But her portrayal of the crazed super-fan of injured romance novelist Paul Sheldon (James Caan), made the character one of the movies greatest horror villains and turned Bates into a star.

In retrospect, the increase in Oscar nominations for horror films could be seen as an appreciation for the more sophisticated entrees in a genre that was still largely catering to teenagers who werent terribly interested in character nuance or tight plotting. And this rewarding of horrors higher-toned offerings was never more apparent than a year after Miserys triumph.

Hardcore genre fans can debate whether The Silence of the Lambs is a legitimate horror movie its really a mixture of the crime thriller and the serial-killer character drama, if were going to nitpick. But the film was so disturbing that most viewers didnt bother quibbling over such fine distinctions. Like many of Oscar-honored horror films, The Silence of the Lambs was based on a decorated novel, crafted by a respected filmmaker (Jonathan Demme) and featured serious actors (Oscar-winner Jodie Foster and veteran Brit thespian Anthony Hopkins). It went on to win Academy Awards for all three artists and took home Best Picture to this day, its the only time a horror film has earned Hollywoods top prize. And along the way, it also introduced the world to the sinister, brilliant Hannibal Lecter, a richer horror creation than your typical knife-wielding, hockey-mask-wearing psycho. (No offense, Jason.)

But even The Silence of the Lambs architects didnt necessarily see it as just a horror movie. As screenwriter Ted Tally, who won Best Adapted Screenplay, told Rolling Stone in 2016, [I]ts been embraced over the years by the horror community, which is fine with me. But I always thought of it as a detective movie or a thriller. I have nothing against horror movies. But to me, horror movies involve the supernatural. Lecter may border on supernatural, but hes not.

Presumably, Tally would have no problem slotting The Sixth Sense as a horror movie. After all, the breakthrough 1999 work from writer-director M. Night Shyamalan is a ghost story about a troubled boy (Haley Joel Osment) who can communicate with the dead. Unlike so many of its Academy-approved horror predecessors, it came from an original screenplay; Shyamalans delicate, muted treatment of the relationship between the child and Bruce Williss mournful psychologist also made it seem more like a drama than a traditionally terrifying supernatural tale. Which may be whyThe Sixth Sense was the most recent horror movie before Get Out to get nominated for Best Picture, with Shyamalan also earning nods for writing and directing.

And some may argue that Black Swan deserves inclusion in this select Best Picture group although this 2010 dance-dance-scarevolution is probably more accurately described as a psychological horror film. Its a key distinction in the world of Hollywood; the term somehow made it classier than your run-of-the-mill Saw or Hostel torture-porn flicks that were the eras dominant horror movies. Nonetheless, Natalie Portmans Best Actress win as a driven, possibly deranged ballerina once again argued that the genre has provided talented actresses with their most celebrated roles. That, or, the fact that Academy has gravitated to honoring women who either play monsters or are brave enough to stand up to them.

Now comes Get Out, which itself is not a pure horror movie a fact underlined by the Golden Globes considering it a comedy (?) rather than a drama for awards purposes. Peeles distributor, Universal, dictated that slotting for the Globes, but its not how he envisions his film. What the movie is about is not funny, Peele insisted back in November about his biting commentary on racism, white privilege and horror movies tendency to kill off their black supporting characters first. Ive had many black people come up to me and say, Man, this is the movie weve been talking about for a while and you did it. Thats a very powerful thing. For that to be put in a smaller box than it deserves is where the controversy comes from.

In that same interview, Peele explained that he had set out to make a horror movie, even though thats not how those close to him perceived it. I ended up showing it to people,he recalled, and hearing, you know, it doesnt even feel like horror. Its in this thriller world. So it was a social thriller. That genre confusion has probably helped sell the movieto Academy members; after almost a century, some Oscar voters still have an aversion to what they consider a straight horror movie. If Get Out wins on Oscar night, the film (like previous horror winners) wont just prove to be a first-rate example of its genre. Itll be deft enough to convince the Academy that theyre not honoring something thats just a horror movie. Otherwise, as history has proven, theyd simply be too easily scared off.

Watch Family Drama, Social Injustice Collide in If Beale Street Could Talk Trailer

A false accusation threatens to tear apart a flourishing family in the powerful new trailer for Barry Jenkins upcoming movie,If Beale Street Could Talk.

The film is based on James Baldwins 1974 novel of the same name and tells the story of Fonny and Tish. The young couple is expecting their first child when Fonny is framed for a crime, forcing Tish to enlist her dysfunctional family to help prove his innocence. The new trailer perfectly captures Jenkins mesmerizing style as it moves between Tish and Fonnys passion, the conflict and love that permeates Tishs family and the harsh realities of being black in America.

If Beale Street Could Talk stars newcomer KiKi Layne as Tish and Stephan James as Fonny. The cast also boasts Regina King, Colman Domingo, Teyonah Parris, Brian Tyree Henry, Michael Beach, Ed Skrein, Diego Luna, Dave Franco and Pedro Pascal. Its set to open in select theaters on November 30th.

If Beale Street Could Talk follows Jenkins breakout film, Moonlight, which won Best Picture at the 2016 Oscars.

Tolkien Review: And One Biopic to Bore Them All

J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) wrote The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, so youre probably stoked for the movie version of his life, hoping itll be filled to bursting with adventure, brain-teasing fantasy and rock-em-sock-em action just like the books and the movies Peter Jackson directed into box-office and Oscar glory. Right?

Sorry, fans, here comes the buzzkill. Tolkien pronounced toll-keen as the film takes great pains to inform us is a bit of a stiff as cinema, rich in atmospherics but starved for the human spark that might uncover the man behind the myth. No one can blame the terrific Nicholas Hoult, who invests his considerable talent and searching energy into playing the young John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. Since his days as a child actor (About a Boy) through his mature work in A Single Man and his gonzo explosion in Mad Max: Fury Road, Hoult is up for anything. But his best instincts are muffled in stuffy period details that choke the life out of the film and his performance.

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Director Dome Karukoski (Tom of Finland), working from a convoluted script by David Gleeson and Stephen Beresford, treads so carefully over the formative years of Tolkien, mostly referred to as Ronald, that youd think the authors estate was holding a gun to the filmmakers head. Nothing of the sort. The literary gatekeepers had long ago disavowed any connection to this Hollywood twaddle. With nothing to lose, youd expect the project to leap into interpretive flights of fancy. Instead, it timidly settles for gilding the lily.

The script stodgily sketches in the biopic details. Tolkien, a penniless orphan, lives with his younger brother Hilary (James MacCallum) in an English boarding house, conforming to the will of his guardian, Father Francis (Colm Meaney). The priest does not like the goo-goo eyes his ward is exchanging with frisky fellow boarder and orphan Edith Bratt (Lily Collins), thinking it will hurt his chances to win a scholarship to Oxford. Its in those hallowed halls that Tolkien cements his friendship with three students: Christopher Wiseman (Tom Glynn-Carney), Robert Gilson (Patrick Gibson) and Geoffrey Smith (Anthony Boyle, in the films best and most heartfelt performance after Hoults). The four buddies form a secret society called the T.C.B.S. It stands for the Tea Club and Barrovian Society, where they lads meet to stoke their intellectual curiosity and binge on, yes, tea.

Its here that mention should be made of the films unfortunate framing device that toggles between Tolkiens school days and his horrific time in the World War I trenches during the Battle of Sommes. An invasion of lice led to the future author contracting trench fever, a disease which sent him home to safety while several friends died in bloody combat.

All this would be fine if the film didnt huff and puff so strenuously and wrong-headedly to make every incident call attention to itself as part of what would become Tolkiens magnum opus about Middle Earth. Collect the Easter eggs as our hero takes Edith to the opera to hear Wagners Ring cycle about one ring to rule them all. He even charms his future wife Edith with an invented language that will morph into Elvish. At Oxford, philologist Joseph Wright (Derek Jacobi) cautions Tolkien that his invented words must have meaning as well as music. And it turns out that the T.C.B.S isnt just a society of friends its a fellowship. The most egregious aha moments take place in the trenches where soldiers in gas masks look like the Nazgl and the shell-shocked Tolkien imagines incendiary bombs as the fire-breathing dragons of his soon-to-be classic legendarium. Oh, brother.

The references are relentless. Never mind that its insulting to think that the movies subject would tolerate seeing the essential moments of his life reduced to mere building blocks in a literary origin story. Those who advocate for Tolkiens true genius will be uttering the same three words long before the credits roll: Make. It. Stop.

Revisiting Hours: Confessions of a Dangerous Mind and the Dick Biopic

Every Friday, were recommending an older movie thats available to stream or download and worth seeing again through the lens of our current moment. Were calling the series Revisiting Hours consider this Rolling Stones unofficial film club. This week: Craig Lindsey on the Chuck Barris biopic Confessions of a Dangerous Man.

So, theres this guy, and he spends most of his youth knocking back drinks, getting into barfights and, of course, trying to get laid. As he gets older and more established, this guy, still hobbled by the arrogance and hotheadedness of his callow days, finds himself fraternizing with a sinister crowd who involves him in something he may not be emotionally equipped to handle. Eventually, this man becomes haunted by the sins hes tried to keep hidden, ones that turn him into an erratic, paranoid, screaming mess in front of others.

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You may be thinking of a certain, calendar-keeping crybaby right now. This piece isnt about him. This piece is about Chuck Barris.

Barris was the TV impresario (he died last year of natural causes at age 87) who gave boob-tube audiences The Dating Game, The Newlywed Game and that crown jewel of mediocre, amateur-talent shows The Gong Show, where he also served as the unruly host. He was also an assassin or so he claimed.

In 1984, he wrote an unauthorized autobiography called Confessions of a Dangerous Mind. In that book, he divulged that he was a contract killer for the CIA, using the trips he gave to his game-show winners as covers to go overseas and take out Cold War targets. While the intelligence agency has denied that Barris ever worked for them and the one-time applicant himself once admitted that the story was nothing more than a what-if fantasy people in Hollywood thought it was entertaining enough to snap up the film rights.

Confessions passed through a lot of hands after it was optioned in the late 1980s, back when Jim McBride (The Big Easy) was attached to direct and Richard Dreyfuss passed on it because he thought the material was too vulgar. Directors (David Fincher, Sam Mendes, Curtis Hanson) and stars (Johnny Depp, Mike Myers, Ben Stiller) showed up and dropped out over the years. If it wasnt for the reality-TV boom of the early aughts, where cutthroat competitions like Survivor and celebrities-at-home shows like The Osbournes enthralled and amused home audiences, the movie probably wouldve still been in development hell. George Clooney, who was attached to co-star, eventually made it his directorial debut.

After hed finished the film, Miramax yes, the House That Harvey Built via Years of Intimidation, Harassment and Sexual Misconduct dumped it into theaters in the winter of 2002 with little fanfare. (The movie didnt even have a proper, Flash-heavy website that was all the rage back then.) Despite premiering at Cannes earlier that year and getting some decent reviews upon its release, Confessions came and went real quickly, only making $33 million worldwide. And for some like screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, who later voiced displeasure over how Clooney handled his script not soon enough. (It makes sense that Kaufman would be the guy who wrote the script. After all, he has made it his career to spin bizarre tales about neurotic, narcissistic creative types and their quest to achieve some sort of notoriety.)

Although Barris is known on-camera as that goofy, shaggy-haired guy who always promised more stuff on The Gong Show, behind the scenes, he was one of the first to recognize that real people can give you some great entertainment if you just put a camera in front of them. He also understood how most regular folk would kill their mommas for a chance in the spotlight, even for a fleeting moment and even if they didnt have any talent. Barris practically made it OK for talentless people to be TV stars. The Kardashians should send flowers to his grave every day.

And, yet, being known as an crude, exploitative film-flam man-of-the-airwaves didnt sit well with him. In his more legitimate, 1993 memoir The Game Show King, Barris wrote how being known as one of the most hated public figures in America he recalled how a sporting-event crowd immediately started booing when it was announced he was at the venue wasnt exactly a source of pride. After ruling the Seventies with his controversial brand of television, he moved to the south of France and wrote Confessions, where Chuck the Badass Assassin was born because its a far more fascinating persona than being the guy who introduce the world to The Unknown Comic, Gene Gene the Dancing Machine and the Popsicle Twins.

Confessions finds its ideal Chuck in Sam Rockwell, his first, lead performance in a major film. Like so many characters the actor has since played, his Barris is crass, selfish, sleazy and ultimately sad and miserable. As much as his search for celebrity, sex and power gives him, well, celebrity, sex and power, it doesnt make him content or complete. Even when hes at his notorious peak, hes still confused, fearful, ashamed of who hes become. Hes the embodiment of self-loathing.

It isnt until Barris starts climbing the ladder to TV success that secret-agent man Jim Byrd (an icy, no-nonsense Clooney) shows up and lures the game-show host into doing some independent wetwork. It would be easy to write off these espionage-filled escapades as figments of his imagination. Every time life gets too real for Chuckie Baby, like when his longtime love Penny (Drew Barrymore) pressures him to settle down, here comes Byrd out of nowhere all the better to slip him a new assignment, giving him an excuse to leave the country, wipe out bad guys and get busy with fellow killer operatives like Patricia (Julia Roberts). Its up to the viewer to decide if these chilly, noirish adventures are all in his head. However, as the movie progresses and Barris realizes that taking lives is just as unfulfilling and anxiety-inducing as creating trashy TV shows, youll find that Barris is like so many of us: self-destructive, self-centered and really just trying to do something thatll make his whole godforsaken life worth living.

Confessions is worth a second or first look, even though its a movie where everyone who was involved in making it (which includes Michael Cera and Maggie Gyllenhaal in bit roles and Clooney pals Brad Pitt and Matt Damon in silent cameos) has barely talked about since. Its certainly the actor-directors most experimental, least grandiloquent film as director, and with the exception of his Oscar-nominated, sophomore effort Good Night, and Good Luck, Clooneys behind-the-camera filmography mostly consists of heavy-handed message movies that usually, embarrassingly miss their marks. (What up, Suburbicon?)

The only message here, really, is: Not all biopics have to be about heroes. They can also be about dicks flawed, insecure, occasionally insensitive dicks (usually hopped up on white privilege and entitlement) who are in denial about how hard and rough being a Respectable, Responsible Adult can be. Instead, they choose to live a life fueled by danger and delusion. In their minds, theyre cool, awesome, guys you shouldnt fuck with. In actuality, theyre scared, pitiful man-children who are driven by their egos more than their wits.

And if these past couple of years have taught us anything, there a lot of dicks are out there and theyre usually, unfortunately the most powerful people in the room. Celebrities, studio execs, TV chairmen, Washington politicians even when they royally fuck up, they still manage to get away with their douchebaggery because, well, they can. Some of them might be gunning for a Supreme Court justice seat; some of them might already be President. Its one reason that Confessions of a Dangerous Mind is just as inspirational, if not moreso, than your garden-variety, conventional biopic right now. It reminds the viewer to steer away from dicks, so you hopefully wont turn into one in the process.

Previously: The Manchurian Candidate

The After Party: Kyle Stars as Aspiring Rapper in First Trailer for Netflix Comedy

An aspiring young rapper seeks redemption in the trailer for the new Netflix comedy The After Party, arriving on the streaming service on August 24th.

Young O, played by iSpy rapper Kyle, is an artist on the verge of his big break when he takes a hit of Wiz Khalifas powerful joint backstage, causing the rapper to suffer a seizure onstage before projectile vomiting on Khalifa.

After the incident, his rap career is effectively canceled as Young O becomes a viral sensation dubbed SeejzahBoy, but his friend/manager convinces him to redeem himself by dropping a record contract-worthy verse at an industry after party.

The After Party also features cameos with established artists like DJ Khaled, Pusha-T, Jadakiss, Desiigner, Tee Grizzley, French Montana and Teyana Taylor, who plays a stripper in the comedy. The film was written and directed by Ian Edelman, the creator of the Kid Cudi-starring HBO series How to Make It in America.