Maggie Moore(s) (2023)

Maggie Lee Moore (Mary Holland) fled in terror while screaming for help.  She ran down a dead end and her assailant approached.  In the morning, Sheriff Jordan Sanders (Jon Hamm) and Deputy Reddy (Nick Mohammed) examined the corpse.  When her name is mentioned, both look surprised.  Cut to 10 days earlier.

Maggie Moore (Louisa Krause) screamed at her husband, Jay (Micah Stock), so loudly that the neighbor, Rita (Tina Fey) heard some of it.  Maggie kicked Jay out of the house and threatened divorce and exposure to the police.  Jay hired a goon, Mike Kosco (Happy Anderson), to scare his wife straight.  Instead, Kosco killed her.  Now Jay was in the crosshairs of Sheriff Sanders.  However, he learned by happenstance that there was another Maggie Moore in town.  What if she was murdered?  He went back to Kosco to make arrangements.

There is no mystery here, just dark comedy that is not funny.  There are a lot of cringy interactions, where people humiliate themselves in awkward conversations.  The deputy frequently makes inappropriate comments regarding the sheriff's love life.  The budding romance between the sheriff and Rita had all the chemistry of a flat soda.  Jay Moore practically screams "I'm guilty" in every scene, though the sheriff happily goes down the wrong path.  Micah Stock makes Jay amazingly pathetic and unsympathetic.  Fine.  However, he's somehow got money to burn on a hitman and payoffs but can't afford to keep his restaurant stocked with non-moldy food.  Was moldy food meant to be funny?  Why are there customers here when the mold is beyond obvious?  Really, the sandwiches are polka dotted with mold.  The normally smooth and suave Hamm is here a man without moves.  Okay, so he's a widower and out of practice, but women are tossing themselves at him and he's got no game.  Yeah, this was not the role for Dan Draper.  Ditto with Tina Fey.  Her character has lots of undesirable traits, from busybody neighbor to self-loathing.  She says her ex-husband broke her, but she still has sex with him regularly.  Is that dark humor?  Why is the sheriff attracted to this woman?

The movie was inspired by the murder of two women named Maggie Moore in Houston within a week of each other.  Those murders were never solved and may have no relation other than the coincidence of the victims' names.

Skip this one.

Landman

Tommy Norris (Billy Bob Thornton) managed a small oil company in the Permian Basin of West Texas.  He was a landman, which is another title for an oilman.  The series opened with an unpleasant interaction with drug runners.  Such was just part of the job in the modern world.  His daughter, Ainsley, came to stay with him during Spring Break.  She brought a handsome football player with her, much to Tommy's consternation.  Tommy's son, Cooper, just dropped out of college to work as a "worm" on a crew of four men. A worm was just the new guy.  On Cooper's second day, a derrick exploded from a gas leak, killing the rest of his crew and putting him in the hospital.  So it was that Angela (Ali Larter), Tommy's ex-wife, came to Midland.  Angela decided to stay, which further complicated Tommy's already hectic life.  Monty (Jon Hamm) owned M-Tex Oil and kept in frequent contact with Tommy.  Tommy's housemates, Dale and Nathan, were none too keen on Angela and Ainsley moving into the house.  To make matters worse, Rebecca Falcone (Kayla Wallace) was hired to resolve legal issues.  She and Tommy quickly clashed.

This is a standard drama with all the standard dramatic twists and turns.  What makes it special is that it defends the way the world works.  Where most shows offer lip service or even encourage green energy, this hammers the point that oil runs the world and it isn't changing any time soon.  Tommy's monologues regarding this are the magic ingredient that makes this show fun.  This is the anti-woke show.  Tommy speaks his mind, damn the consequences.  Who else would threaten a cartel thug while bound to a chair with a gun to his head?  This is a man who has no Fs to give.  Let's hope season 2 can keep this up.

Highly recommended.

Good Omens (Season 2)

The Woke is Strong in this one!  Aziraphale (Michael Sheen) and Crowley (David Tennant) return to London and the latest issue from Heaven.  Rather than the forthcoming apocalypse with the arrival of the anti-Christ, we have Archangel Gabriel (John Hamm) arriving naked and with a severe case of amnesia at Aziraphale's book shop.  Now, both Heaven and Hell want to get their hands on Gabriel while Aziraphale and Crowley must not only protect him but discover why he has amnesia.

As in the previous series, we are shown several incidents through history where Aziraphale and Crowley crossed paths.  One of these is the Book of Job.  It turns out that Job's wife was black.  Oddly, his three children by her prove to be a lily-white son, a mixed-race daughter, and an Iranian daughter.  What is this casting?  The makers want it to be abundantly clear that they cared not a whit about race or ethnicity during casting.  Genetics worked differently in Biblical times.  Then we have the vinyl record seller who is crushing on the coffee shop lady.  Yes, here's a relationship that will check off the mixed-race box and the lesbian love box.  Sigh.  Oh, and God's pronouns are 'they/them' for those who are curious.  In the middle of the 19th century while visiting Scotland, Crowley and Aziraphale come across grave robbers who sell bodies to the local surgeon.  Of course, the body snatchers are a pair of waifish girls.  Um, they have no other means of supporting themselves.  Really?  Digging up bodies is just the sort of work for 100 lbs. girls.

As I strongly advise against seeing this travesty, spoilers follow.  It turns out that the Archangel Gabriel had been meeting secretly with Beelzebub (Shelley Conn) to agree never to have Armageddon.  During these meetings, they fell in love.  Yep, by the end, they run off together to spend eternity on Alpha Centauri.  Crowley gets inspired by this and, at the end of the finale, kisses Aziraphale passionately and proposes that they too run off together.  Sigh.

Skip.  Do not waste time on this disaster.

Bad Times at the El Royale (2018)

It is 1959.  A man checks into a motel and commences to rearrange the furniture, pull up the carpet, remove the floorboards, and drop a bag into the resulting hole.  He then neatly replaces the boards, reinstalls the carpet, and puts the furniture back in place.  Then there is a knock on the door.  He opens the door and let's the other man in.  The man shoots him and searches the room but fails to find the bag.

Ten years later, several people arrive at the El Royale, a motel near Lake Tahoe that happens to be right on the state line.  Half the rooms are in California, and half are in Nevada.  Father Daniel Flynn (Jeff Bridges) appears to be absent-minded but is quite friendly.  Laramie Sullivan (Jon Hamm), a vacuum salesman, has stayed at the motel before and offers some background while they wait for the mysteriously absent motel staff.  Darlene Sweet (Cynthia Erivo), a singer, clearly wants to have no interaction with the others.  Lastly, a woman with attitude (Dakota Johnson) arrives and refuses to give her name.  Miles Miller (Lewis Pullman), the motel's only employee, finally appears in a disheveled state.  He offers a description of El Royale that is mostly a repeat of what Laramie offered.  After that, each person is given a key to various rooms.

When the action kicks off, the story is told from the point of view of each character, often referred to by their room number.  This always involves overlapping, so that the same event might be viewed several times from different points of view.  Also, the switch from character to character often begins with a flashback that explains what happened prior to arriving at the El Royale.  Though there was trouble enough with those already at the hotel, Billy Lee (Chris Hemsworth) and his band of goons arrive.  One of the people at the motel crossed him and he has arrived to settle that account.

Of course, the coincidence that all of these people should arrive at this motel on the same day is ludicrous.  Also, based on what we learn when Miles' backstory is revealed, earlier events don't make sense.  Likewise, the actions of some characters are obviously stupid as that is what the plot requires: I'm looking at you, Jon Hamm.  I guess that goes for Jeff Bridges too; you couldn't wait until tomorrow to just rent the other room yourself?  What's the hurry?  The point of view filming allows characters to misinterpret events and take detrimental action, thus triggering bad times.

Overall, an entertaining movie.  Good popcorn fun.

Confess, Fletch (2022)

Fletch (Jon Hamm) is exploring the house he rented in Boston when he discovers a dead woman.  Soon, detectives Monroe (Roy Wood Jr.) and "Griz" (Ayden Mayeri) are on scene to investigate.  Monroe says it will be much easier if Fletch just confesses.  Fletch counters by offering to assist since he was a somewhat famous investigative reporter.  When asked why he is in Boston, he claims it is to research a book.  In fact, Count Clementi Arbogastes De Grassi (Robert Picardo) hired him to locate several stolen paintings, two of which were resold by Mr. Horan (Kyle MacLachlan), a Boston art dealer.  To further complicate matters, Countess De Grassi (Marcia Gay Hardin) arrives in Boston to demand a progress report on 'her' paintings.  Additionally, Fletch is having an affair with the Count's daughter, Angela (Lorenza Izzo).

Though a surprisingly faithful adaptation of the novel, the most noteworthy change is the lack of Inspector Flynn.  Flynn's appearance in the novel launched a series of Flynn mysteries and those rights were not available.  Thus, Detective Monroe is his replacement.  However, Monroe is overshadowed by his partner, Griz.  Whereas Flynn's sidekick was mostly a mute notetaker, Monroe's is the brains of the operation while Monroe is literally asleep in many scenes.  Though I was skeptical of Jon Hamm as Fletch, he is quite good in the role.  In fact, he is much closer to the literary Fletch than Chevy Chase.  He doesn't do goofy disguises and slapstick silliness.  He's got the smart aleck comments and the clever social engineering to convince strangers to talk to him.

The movie ends with talk of Walter March, a character from Fletch's Fortune; clearly, there is a path to a sequel.  Sadly, that looks unlikely.  It only opened a week ago and yet is only playing in one theater here.  The box office is unimpressive, and I've seen no ad campaign for it.

Good popcorn fun!

Baby Driver

The movie opens with a band of bank robbers in the getaway car.  Baby (Ansel Elgort), the driver, wants to know how long they will take at which point he chooses a song on his iPod that will take that long (reminded me of Hudson Hawk, which had burglars who also kept track of time by song lengths).  Griff (Jon Bernthal), Buddy (Jon Hamm), and Darling (Elza Gonzalez) rob the bank and jump back in the car.  And then the chase begins.  Baby is a magician at the wheel of a car, able to drift through the narrowest of gaps and perform hairpin turns that leave pursuers in the dust.  After successfully dodging the police, the crew meet Doc (Kevin Spacey) and the money is split.  When the others have left with their cuts, Doc confiscates the majority of Baby's cut and says they will be even after one more heist.  Orphaned before he was 10, Baby lives with a deaf cripple named Joe.  At this point, he mostly takes care of Joe though Joe serves as a constant conscience for Baby to go straight.

 

The movie is non-stop fun.  All the driving stunts were done by actual drivers rather than through CGI animation.  As Baby is constantly listening to music, the soundtrack is front and center through most of the movie.  The humor is great but not forced.  The bit with the Michael Myers mask was awesome.  Jamie Foxx is outstanding as a crazy, violent criminal.  Even so, his over-the-top performance did not diminish the calm certainty of Jon Hamm, who proved to have less bark than Foxx but a lot more bite.  Kevin Spacey was good but he just had a supporting role.  He managed to be friendly, funny, and menacing at the same time, a neat trick.  Lily James positively glowed as the love interest.  She had that same effect on Downtown Abbey, where she became the center of any scene thanks to her vibrant smile and joy of being.  Paul Williams as a weapons dealer who lists the various guns like they were tender cuts of pork was quite funny; there's a character that would be fun to see in another film or a TV series.  For as much action as it had, the movie does an excellent job of storytelling and character development.  Nothing feels rushed.

 

In most movies about criminals, I have little sympathy for any of them and thus don't much care if they are killed or not.  Not so with Baby.  Here's a troubled youth who might have turned out fine but for taking the wrong car for a joy ride.

 

This is Edgar Wright's best movie since Shaun of the Dead.  Fun movie.  Go see it.