MOVIE OF THE WEEK (6/1)
College football hit its breaking point this week when a judge granted an injunction allowing Texas Tech QB Brendan Sorsby to play this season. He was in court because he had been caught gambling on his own team when he was riding the bench at Indiana in 2022. Let me reiterate that, HE BET ON HIS OWN TEAM, and a judge said, "Sure, I agree with your lawyer that you will be irreparably harmed if you do not play this year at Tech.” Never mind the fact that he could have gone to the NFL supplemental draft and made money there. Never mind the fact that this is the one thing in sports that should be a death knell. The floodgates have opened.
It’s disgusting.
What a week of movies it was. Four films, two documentaries, two incredible horror flicks. I’ll start with the two docs, which have been on my list for a very long time. Fire of Love, directed by Sara Dosa, is a wonderful archival-driven exploration into two volcanologists, Katia and Maurice Krafft, who found each other, found volcanoes, and never looked back. Narrated by Miranda July, who brings a wonderful level of emotional depth, the film utilizes the thousands of hours of archival photographs and video that the Kraffts amassed over their years of getting up close and personal with some of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world. Through their footage, we are taken right up to the edge, experiencing the explosive magma from feet away. It's unbelievable to think that they were there, close enough to feel the intense heat. It’s mesmerizing on a television screen decades in the future from when they recorded it. I can only imagine the awesome power they felt on that day.
While the film's visuals are stunning, the piece wouldn’t be the same without the understated and contemplative voice-over that tells a beautiful story of finding your person and doing what you love together until it literally kills you. The film never feels melancholic despite knowing at the start that the Krafft’s true love will one day take their life. It’s the natural order of things and as they say, they wouldn’t want it any other way. I would highly recommend this one after an edible. Sink into the couch and be privy to some of the most marvelous acts of nature from a court-side seat.
Another archival-heavy doc, Val, was next on the docket. It is the auto-documentary (I don’t know if that is a term, but it is now) of Val Kilmer, his career and the legacy he wants to leave behind. We’re thrown into the doc with poignant narration written by Kilmer himself and recorded by his son, Jack Kilmer. The words are heavy with both hope and sadness. They’re the words that Kilmer wished he could speak himself, but no longer could due to throat cancer, which would later take his life a few years after the release of the film.
The filmmakers, Leo Scott & Ting Poo, dug through hundreds of hours of footage that Kilmer had shot over his career, and found the right pieces to provide a lovely portrait of an actor who cared so deeply, sometimes to his detriment, about the craft of acting. Expertly crafted with creative and artistic era transitions, this will be a lasting piece that actors of any generation can turn to when they need inspiration or hope that what they are doing is important.
The documentaries were the bookends to two horror films. One, currently in theaters, that is just shy of $250m worldwide, and the other an inventive A24 feature that explores isolation through a young woman stuck in her childhood home while taking care of her dying mother.
Obsession came first, directed by YouTuber Curry Barker. It’s about a young man, Bear (Michael Johnston), who just wants a girl, Nikki (Inde Navarrette, who steals the show), to love him as much as he loves her. When he makes a wish on what he believes to be a novelty toy, his dream comes true and Nikki becomes obsessed with him. It’s not the most inventive subject, but it is a strong exploration fear and the lengths we will go to have what we want, no matter the consequences. Bear is terrified of telling Nikki how he feels about her, even when he’s confronted by her pointedly asking if he has feelings for her. In the film, it feels like if he just says yes, things might go his way. Instead, he balks and makes a wish that she loves him more than anyone else in the world. And then, she does.
One element I loved that I wish had been explored more is how the original Nikki, the one we meet in the first act of the film before the wish, is still inside the body that has been taken over by this new obsessed Nikki. We see it come through in little blips where she will scream bloody murder, coming too in a weird situation, then quickly, the wish will regain hold and she will turn back into the obsessive self. We can feel the pain that she is in when these moments happen and it comes to a head later in the film when normal Nikki speaks to Bear in what becomes a fascinating and terribly sad character moment for him.
On the flip side, the movie at times feels like vignettes instead of a story that builds on itself. But it’s enjoyable enough that that doesn't detract from the ultimate takeaway, which is that Jason Blum has done it again and Curry Barker has chops in the horror world. He’s slated to helm the Texas Chainsaw reboot, and I sincerely hope that with this feature under his belt and A24’s guiding hand, he will do something great with it.
Which leads us into A24’s 2026 feature Undertone. A young podcast host, Evy (Nina Kiri), is stuck at home in an unknown town caring for her dying mother, only connected to the outside world through her co-host, Justin (Adam DiMarco), whom we hear but never see. We are thrown into the fire when Justin receives an email with ten audio files. As they listen, some very strange and unsettling events occur that make us question reality. I don’t want to say too much more because this was such a fun movie to take in knowing next to nothing when going in.
What makes this film so fascinating is that Evy and her mother are the only two people seen on screen. Justin is portrayed solely through his voice, which Evy interacts with as they record their latest episode and debate the merits of all things spooky. The very slow pan is the greatest tool in this film. Scenes are purposefully long as the camera might pan from Evy at her computer into a dark hallway where we might just see something strange going on before it pans back to Evy, now framing her creatively through a mirror.
For her role, Nina Kiri is a force. We’re sympathetic to her plight, but as the movie builds, we’re unsure whether she’s going crazy, in part because there are no other people around to account for some of the strange occurrences, or if there really is a supernatural element to the whole film. I don’t typically get chills anymore when watching horror movies, not because I’m some tough guy who isn’t scared of anything, but because the tropes are evident and the concepts are oversaturated. There’s not enough new, interesting horror that breaks boundaries and makes you think, “Fuck I haven’t seen that before; what’s going to happen? I’m spooked.” But this accomplishes that mostly because our main character is thrown into such deep isolation. We are trapped in this house alongside her and constantly question what could happen because we’re hardly able to recognize what is and is not true.
I am not a fan of the Paranormal Activity movies, but Undertone director Ian Tuason is helming PA8, and I'm now immediately intrigued.
If you haven't already and are a fan of horror, go see Obsession so studios can see that movies made for under a million can actually make money.