It might be a disservice to video games, themselves a burgeoning medium for complex storytelling, to say that a certain less-thinky genre of TV and movies has a unicursal simplicity reminiscent of the gamers’ drug. Having made this disclaimer, however, we (having grown up in the ’90s) may proceed with the comparison anyway: sometimes a show has the intellectual depth of, I don’t know, Mario Kart. But that’s okay!
Damsel (2024)
Type of movie: Fantasy with a touch of violence and whatnot; best for teens and older.
Where have I seen her before? Stranger Things.
Worm trigger: Behold, the most gorgeous lampyris noctiluca ever depicted on screen.
Has anybody coined a word for the cinematic conceit in which pieces of clothing are gradually ripped off an attractive heroine over the course of a prolonged action sequence--you know, running through an alley to motorcycle chase to rooftop showdown--usually on the same trajectory by which she becomes, like, sweatier (though rarely less made-up)? That would be a useful word to apply to Damsel, whose sisters-before-misters energy is a little sapped by this type of “underwear-and-tear” that occurs during 60 solid minutes of Millie Bobby Brown getting chased around by an angry dragon.
Take that lattermost clause as a plot summary, and although it sounds like children’s nonsense, the film actually coheres around a carefully modulated if uncomplicated script (wisely, in this case, clean of inside-the-genre jokes) and a bizarrely high calibre of acting. Still, I wasn’t sure who was going to die first, Brown (from the dragon) or me (from being beaten with the movie’s message), which isn’t to discount the importance of the message, only to comment that the filmmakers have taken the creative low-ground by dramatising the intensity rather than the complexity of present-day feminism: women are so blindingly badass that even the damn dragon might get on board. The girl power is intoxicating and fun, but its highs depend on the lows of the movie’s menfolk, who, disappointingly for overthinkers, are plotted along the well-worn gamut of self-centred violent criminal (worst) to moron-whose-only-redemption-is-to-die-for-his-sins (best).
As such, the best survival technique for the viewer is to go in hip to the film’s best foot, which is the tension achieved--think of an old side-scroller on GameBoy--in beautifully rendered action sequences, plus, to boot, some very lovely landscape shots.
Fool Me Once (2024)
Type of show: Mystery/thriller.
Reason to watch: Your brain wants to enjoy jerky plot twists instead of, you know, dwelling on social issues, political elections, the amount of time we have until the sun explodes, etc.
Sibling shows: Safe (2018), The Stranger (2020), Stay Close (2021).
Jigsaw puzzlers who are a little flexible on the artistic depth of the resultant image might be in luck with Harlan Coben’s Fool Me Once, i.e. the eight-episode Netflix adaptation of the 2016 thriller novel. Indeed, the primary joy available is in watching an unseen hand dangle one piece over another piece that looks like a match, only to (eventually) stick it someplace else where it was always going to fit more neatly. What is so dastardly about Maya’s discharge from the military? Why is her mother-in-law trying to gaslight her? Who really killed her husband Joe? Or Joe’s brother, back in the day? How did Joe appear on a nanny cam after being shot and killed? Once all the questions are answered, you can pack up the puzzle and never, ever think about it again. Bliss!
One struggles to hold grudges against these action-grade projects for equipping a bunch of 2D characters with clear motivations and then having them engage each other in battle; the show knows what it is (unlike the higher-shooting Damsel) so one only has oneself to blame for making it to the ultimate episode. Were you angered by the last Harlan Coben adaptation you binged? Then, please, don’t be fooled twice.