On Blu-ray & DVD July 30 from Well Go USA
12-year-old Charlotte finds and raises a spider that grows at an incredible rate. Soon, people in her building die in mysterious ways, something Charlotte needs to face and deal with before her family becomes the next victims.
Having had its world premiere at the LA Shorts International Film Festival, Dennis Flippin and Doug Wyckoff’s short comedy is a bizarre tale of being careful what you wish for. “Flatters” excels a lot at weird, absurdist comedy that lampoons the whole system of conspiracy theorists, while also putting its main character in to a hole that he might not be able to escape any time soon.
Two men go on a forest hike where it’s soon obvious that this is not a simple hike, their goals are more than sightseeing and communing with nature.
There’s a great movie desperate to be set free with Stephen Sawchuk’s “Hell is a Teenage Girl” and sadly it’s only a pretty good movie when all is said and done. There’s so much lore and back story hinted at that the movie, at fourteen minutes, barely scratches the surface of. And we’re told that protagonist Parker is blamed for her dad being the Springsboro Slasher. But why? There are a lot of “But Why?’s” that will be spouted during the short. Although it is a neat, creative (if not wholly original) short, there’s just so much more tinkering and glossing up that needs to happen before/if a feature is ever greenlit.
Premiering at the LA Shorts International Film Festival, “Belief” directed by Christian Loubek is a very good short film about mothers. Christian Loubek’s drama is a great tribute to the big things and little things that our mothers make for us. Whether it’s the big things we see, or small things we don’t see, mothers sacrifice a ton and give up a lot of themselves to ensure enrichment for their children.
Selected to screen at 2024 CAAMFest, Lina Suh constructs what is easily one of the best films of the year. “Meeting You, Meeting Me” is a wonderful chamber piece about two kindred spirits that meet under the most unlikely circumstances. So much of “Meeting You, Meeting Me” is based on whether or not the pair of stars Annika Foster and Sam Yim can spark any kind of chemistry, and lo and behold they have it. “Meeting You , Meeting Me” felt very much in the tradition of masterpieces like “Before Sunset” where circumstances put two people together who didn’t know they needed they each other.
Now Available from Warner Home Entertainment.
Luca Guadagnino is a talented filmmaker, one that knows how to handle genre films well, but so far he feels so out of his element with “Challengers.” For all intents and purposes, “Challengers” is a very good movie, it’s just so ill fitted for Guadagnino’s abilities as he struggles between directing a film that bounces back and forth between dark suspense and darkly comedic drama. “Challengers” is a lot of ways about the passion of sports and the lengths we’re willing to go through to remain married to it, even when our prime has passed. “Challengers” isn’t so much a love triangle, as it is a dark drama about three people willing to be as cut throat as possible to remain in the game.