‘Obsession,’ ‘Blue Movie’ and ‘LifeHack’ all his theaters this week — and all are worth seeing.
Bear wishes that his major crush Nikki would love him back in "Obsession.
"Here are our takes on “Obsession,” “Blue Movie” and “LifeHack,” which are all being released in the same week asDirector/screenwriter Curry Barker’s first major studio film is one of the year’s best horror films, doing something special with a simple premise. It follows a single sad-sack guy Bear who wishes that the object of his misguided affection Nikki , a music store coworker, would adore him to death. That wish gets granted but comes with a cost.
Initially, we root for Bear, the awkward, cute lonely guy deluded into believing that if he lands his fantasy woman, life will be complete and happy. Obviously, he’s never watched a horror film. Instead of endless bouts of killer sex and lovey-dovey days and nights, the relationship collapses into a clingy nightmare with a climbing body count.
And it’s there where Barker’s gory horror comedy attempts something different, relaying how this fatal attraction is the consequence of a guy’s unrealistic desire to possess someone who could never satisfy his needs. Bear knows nothing about what a legit loving relationship is all about; he just craves the idea of being the guy with “that” girl. Johnston is well-cast as Bear, whose likeable presence hints at a darker side.
His Bear shrugs off advice from friends and co-workers Ian and Sara who notice that Nikki seems to get more unhinged by the minute. Things get messier from there. Barker’s storytelling dusts off an old horror trope, but it’s hard to mind that it’s a “Monkey Paw’s” tale that has been told many, many times.
Not when Barker employs it to strip the male psyche down to its basics, illustrating how deep-seated insecurities can swallow us whole. Right after director/screenwriter Elliot Tuttle’s skin-crawler of a debut premiered at the 2025 Edinburgh International Film Festival, it became a distributor hot potato, with one major studio after another passing on it. Thankfully Obscured Pictures saw the merits of the controversial and provocative first feature and snagged it.
It is by no means an easy watch as it settles on a convicted pedophile who dons a mask to hide his face and shells out $50,000 for tough-acting camboy Aaron Eagle to spend the night with him at an Airbnb near L.A. All the guy wants, or so he claims, is for his hire — known by his eager followers for hurling homophobic insults — to answer a barrage of nosy questions, while being filmed.
Tuttle refuses to sugarcoat a disturbing, squirmable scenario as each character defends and deflects about who they even as their actions betray them.
“Blue Film” is a chamber piece where the audience becomes a voyeur to this unsettling metaphysical journey — often filmed in chilly, effective blues — that’s constructed around intimate confrontations and shocking revelations. Tuttle pushes our tolerance to the breaking point and makes both men’s back and forth conversations raw, real, even moving. The performances drive it all with both stars pushing and stretching themselves. Moore takes full ownership of the screen, and demands our attention.
For almost all of its running time, the “Boots” costar stays stripped down to snug white briefs and undergoes the most changes as the night progresses, his smoldering swagger giving way to confused, wounded vulnerability. It’s a star-making performance in a brave first feature designed to provoke while it excavates taboo topics and gives us an uncensored seat to observe how trauma chews us up.
When 2018’s “Searching” – a South Bay-set thriller that relied on an array of tech screens to tell its neo-noir story – came out, it was a novelty. And it poured the foundation for this spring surprise, director/ co-screenwriter Ronan Corrigan’s invigorating crypto heist thriller. The fast-paced nailbiter uses various screens and cameras too, and while its wrapup tests credibility to the max, who cares? This is made with skill and style, and it simply doesn’t matter.
Four tech-savvy teens – the mastermind Kyle , the artist Alex , the troll Sid and the brains Petey stumble into a plan to bilk shady San Francisco tech entrepreneur and billionaire Don Heard out of crypto bucks. Their cyber hacking uncovers more than just corrupt money and that propels them into bamboozling Heard’s model daughter .
It also puts them into the crosshairs of danger.
“LifeHack” is produced by Timur Bekmambetov and he’s a champion for this “screen”-based style of storytelling “LifeHack” is one of the best examples of the sub-genre and should open more doors for a promising new filmmaker and a versatile young cast. Don’t miss it. Details: 3 stars; opens May 15 in theaters.
Ildikó Enyedi’s nearly 2½-hour award-winner is a cinematic variation on forest bathing – a sensory experience that reminds us how special it is to be in the company of a tree. It addresses a popular theory that plants and trees do possess a soul and require just as much handholding and appreciation as humans do.
While that might sound like a topic suited best for a documentary, Enyedi’s creative exploration is a stunner and the anti-thesis of a stiff, staid lecture even though it moves at a relaxed pace. In fact, his film is rapturously alive with the lulling sounds and intoxicating sites of the natural world, artfully expressed through its soundtrack and sensual cinematography.
As ambitious and original as a film it is, it falters in its third act as two of three interwoven stories– each set during a different time period at a German university near a botanical garden – fail to wrap up to our satisfaction. The primary story on a visiting Hong Kong neuroscientist expanding his research and developing an intense connection to a lonely ginkgo tree during the COVID shutdown does further the film’s heady ideals.
Its counterparts – one detailing the sexism that the university’s first female student contends with as she pursues a passion for photography and another about a farm boy student reigniting his appreciation for plants as he cares for a female student’s geranium, feel, after a promising build up, incomplete, failing to deliver an emotional payoff the 2020 storyline so effortlessly. Still, there’s much to admire and to revel in up onscreen.
Jude Law couldn’t be better as Vladimir Putin and Paul Dano does a credible job as low-key Putin advisor Vadim Baranov, but it’s not enough to save Olivier Assayas’s disappointing take on the novel “Le Mage du Kremlin. ” Even with a 2 hour-plus running time, it comes up short. The pacing is erratic and the sonorous voice-over narration doesn’t help either.
Still, the snapshot of Russian history and how Baranov went from reveling in a revolution that flung open locked doors for creative expression and segued into benefitting from when those same doors got shut again due to the iron-fisted rule by Putin and his cronies, holds your interest even if the storytelling lacks cohesion. Dano’s static line delivery gets used for a chilling but laconic effect as his character’s cunning political negotiations lead to deadly outcomes.
Assayas is a great filmmaker, but seems hamstrung by this being a film, not a series. Scenes run on too long and sometimes not long enough. As his “Carlos” proved, an expanded runtime meshes well with his deliberate approach to creating meatier characters and tense situations. Tom Sturridge, though, sweeps in to devour the screen as fictional oligarch Dmitri Sidorov, a flashy sort who drives a wedge between Baranov and his romantic interest Ksenia .
Ksenia is an interesting character but doesn’t get enough screen time to seem like a real person. Ditto Jeffrey Wright as a reporter interviewing Baranov. He too needs more screen time. Before it runs out of gas near the end, Bobby Farrelly’s throwback to John Hughes teen comedies makes you smile.
The reason is its cast of veterans and younger actors . The screenplay is no match for them and hits too many potholes the more miles it tracks. The plot is simple and silly. High school senior Jeremy spirits away his three driver’s ed cohorts on an unauthorized trip to visit his disinterested college girlfriend .
That theft of the driver’s ed car doesn’t sit well with a stressed-out, foul-mouthed principal but it doesn’t bother the unorthodox and accident-prone substitute driver’s teacher . The interactions between these bumbling characters spark laughs due to the cast’s impeccable comedic timing rather than the script itself – in particular any scene with LaPrete as the slacker who cares more than he acts like he does.
Too often it takes a worn-down road well traveled or the lazy way out A cute cat gets thrown in because well why not? Everyone in the cast is up to the task here.
Now if only they could have been handed a set of keys to a smoother ride geared to show off their talents. Details: 2½ stars; opens May 15 in theaters. Review: Pop star fails to impress in so many ways with latest concert tourStabbed in a Safeway, shopper pulls out a gun and shoots, Redwood City police sayLake Oroville, California's second-largest reservoir, is 99% full and risingDear Abby: My feelings are hurt, and I won't attend my granddaughter's wedding
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