The High Note: The High Note's goal was to be a low stakes, upbeat dramedy about a fading music star (Tracee Ellis Ross) who clashes with her manager (Ice Cube) and label about her next career move, her loyal assistant (Dakota Johnson) who aspires to be a producer and how both of these women end up proving their doubters wrong. Through its likeable cast (in addition to the aforementioned trio of magnetic stars, Kelvin Harrison Jr. also does good work as Johnson's love interest/first serious client as a producer) and the easy warmth of its script, it pulls that mission off without a hitch. Watching a movie where nice people get what they want both personally and professionally with minimal resistance makes The High Note a nice piece of fantasy optimism porn that is especially comforting at this point in time.
Grade: B
Project Power: The Netflix blockbuster machine has churned out another hit. Project Power uses its excellent premise (a mysterious organization begins pedaling a pill in New Orleans called Power that gives its users an unknown superhuman ability for 5 minutes or kills them immediately), stylized, energetic direction from Ariel Schulman and Henry Joost (Nerve, Paranormal Activity 3/4) and charismatic cast (Jamie Foxx, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Dominique Fishback, Rodrigo Santoro) to deliver an adrenaline-fueled take on the superhero genre. There are some slight hiccups in the earlygoing when writer Mattison Tomlin-who co-wrote the upcoming Batman film with director Matt Reeves- attempts to slip in some social commentary about how the government views poor, predominantly minority people in cities as lab rats for secret operations that have a high risk of harming people while also failing to elaborate on the motivations of the powerful group pushing Power, but the film is so slick, well-acted and entertaining that those somewhat awkwardly placed dramatic missteps don't hinder the party much. Following its early success on the platform and open ending, a sequel seems very possible and considering the many possibilities that this team could explore in the future with this concept, expanding on this universe could prove to be a great idea.
Grade: B+
Spree: For the bulk of its runtime, darkly comic thriller Spree feels like a cheap, shallow watch. It's pretty much just a real time stream of a social media fame-seeking rideshare driver (Joe Keery) that starts killing his passengers who all happen to fit on-the-nose online stereotypes (alt-right fanatic, a "Karen", coked-up influencers) to try and amass the following he so deeply wants. Pair that cycle of picking people up/killing them/dumping their bodies/responding to comments from the viewers with a sensory-numbing shooting style that almost solely uses YouTube/Instagram Live interfaces and Spree becomes monotonous really fast. Then the final 10 minutes happen and the true point of the film comes barreling into focus with alarming force. It's a disturbingly accurate commentary on not only how desensitized people are to violence (there's frequent comments questioning the authenticity of what is occurring or calling Keery's character names for not killing people in more graphic fashion), but how the online era has created this disturbing subculture of romanticizing serial killers and given survivors of violent crime the opportunity to shamelessly turn their traumatic experience into fame if they see fit. Clearly commentaries on the vapid, egomaniacal nature of social media become very popular in recent years, but this is the first time I've seen this particular set of internet-driven societal issues addressed with such brutal honesty and potency on screen. While the ride to get there isn't without its bumps, Spree has something meaningful to say about a quietly nasty part of the world we we live in today and is the type of film that could end up greatly benefiting from a rewatch.
Grade: B
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