Something to watch tonight: Thursday 1 May
Avengers: Endgame (Russo Brothers, 2019)
I’ve spent far too long today looking for an “on this day” title that is actually readily available online and have had to settle for this relative obscurity that I reviewed on At the Movies on 1 May 2019.
This is the time of year when Marvel tends to release their big tentpole film of the year and, sure enough, six years on from a film called “Endgame”, Thunderbolts* is arriving in cinemas this weekend.
I did produce a hastily written but enthusiastic for the RNZ website (after a midnight screening!) but the more considered audio from ATM is my preferred version:
Endgame attempts to cash in all the chips the Avengers series has been accumulating over the 22 films since the first Iron Man and mostly succeeds. Some characters – and I’m sorry to say the victims of this are mostly the women – don’t get a fair shake and if history has anything critical to say about these blockbusters it will be that Marvel got way too much credit for way too few attempts at decent representation.
But the main male characters – Downey Jr as Stark, Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Chris Evans as Captain America and Mark Ruffalo as Hulk – all get a chance to show off their considerable chops and deliver satisfying conclusions to their arcs. (Interestingly, the word arc used to be reserved for film nerds and screenwriters but now, thanks to content like Avengers and Game of Thrones, everyone can bandy it around with abandon.)
This is a film I’ve actually gone back to a couple of times – once while it was still in cinemas and once at home. It’s a great crowd-pleaser and also an excellent test of your home entertainment system.
Also in that episode of At the Movies: a documentary about nuns growing marijuana called Breaking Habits and Unicorn Store, a Netflix film starring (and directed by) Brie Larsen. No one wanted to open a film up against the Marvel juggernaut.
This film also showed up in the search today and clearly doesn't deserve to be the main feature but I enjoyed the rereading the review despite having no memory of it whatsoever:
Our own Karl Urban gets his name above the title for the first time as a Viking Red Indian in the stylishly photographed nonsense Pathfinder. Looking like he’s spent more time in the gym than the actors’ studio recently, Urban plays Ghost, a Viking boy left behind to starve when their first attempt to conquer North America fails (inexplicably). When the Vikings return, Ghost has grown and is the only brave who knows how to wield the iron blade and save the tribe until the bullets come hundreds of years later to do the job properly. The violence isn’t particularly well directed and there isn’t much apart from violence in it, so it’s ultimately very hard to recommend.
If you’re interested, Pathfinder is streaming on Disney+.
We get requests
Local filmmaker Peter Webster reached out to me over Facebook a few weeks ago to ask me if I could review his independent feature, Green Angels. I told him what I tell everyone who asks – I’ll take a look but I’ll only review it if I think there’s something there for an audience. I don’t see the point in bagging a movie that someone has committed so much time and effort into.
So, it says something that I’m mentioning it here.
Auckland entrepreneur Ange (Siobhan Marshall) is widowed suddenly and attempts various schemes to keep their son Jack (Johnny Morell) in the upper middle-class conditions she believes that he expects, not realising that she’s actually putting distance between them at the very time that he needs her attention the most.
Jack and his schoolfriend Ella (Hannah Koumakis) have an idea for one of those fancy online disrupter-type businesses – selling fresh herbs to restaurants and delivering by drone – but are struggling with their own finances, not to mention the attentions of the law.
Green Angels is a film of two halves and I think I liked the first – the more grounded for want of a better word – half than the more fantastical second, but the characterisations are strong and the relationship between Ange and Jack is recognisable to anyone who knows teenagers and their parents.
The film opens today at The Vic (Devonport), Monterey (Howick) and tomorrow at Hawkins Theatre (Papakura). Audience response will decide how much further it goes but if you are in any of those neighbourhoods your curiosity will be rewarded.
Where to watch Avengers: Endgame
Aotearoa, Australia, Canada, Ireland, USA, UK: Streaming on Disney+
India: Streaming on Hotstar