3/12/2023 0 Comments Uncut gems![]() Not since Gems has a festival movie increased my heart rate by so much. It’s nearly impossible to sum up Julia Ducournau’s body-horror epic - and any attempt would probably ruin it - so I’ll just say that this is a movie in which the main character fucks her car, and things only get weirder from there. And visually, the film doesn’t stay in Gems mode: Whenever Mikey’s with the girl he thinks is his meal ticket, the cinematography switches to the creamy, colorful look of Baker’s last film, The Florida Project. It’s a dead-end town, and Baker’s film shares the sweaty, languid vibe of an AC-less summer in the South. Plus the setting, on Texas’s Gulf Coast, is a million miles from Uncut Gems’ frantic 42nd Street. ![]() The film takes place with the 2016 election playing out in the background, and it’s clear Baker wants us to see in Mikey shades of a different New York businessman. If “grooming a high schooler” didn’t tip you off, it turns out that Mikey lacks even Howard’s single iota of decency: The film is a slow burn from “this guy’s pretty annoying” to “he might actually be the worst person alive.” Or maybe the second worst. And on a meta level, Red Rocket and Uncut Gems are both A24 auteur projects that allow a preciously underrated comedic actor to show he’s got real chops. (In this case, a high schooler he attempts to groom into the next Sasha Grey.) The cinematography often shares a similar look as well: gritty, cool, and shaky. He, too, is juggling two relationships: one with his high-school girlfriend, the other with a younger woman caught up in the dream. Mikey is a charming asshole in the Howard Ratner vein, sucking up all the oxygen in the room, always convinced that the universe is about to reward him with the comeback he knows he deserves. Sean Baker’s latest is a star turn for Simon Rex, in which the VJ/rapper/ Scary Movie actor plays Mikey Saber, a down-and-out porn star who returns to his Texas hometown in search of a fresh start. By the end, Rahim hasn’t jumped toward ruin as much as he’s been pushed, and part of the tragedy comes from seeing those who eagerly exploited him cut ties once the backlash sets in. And while Howard was very much the architect of his own destiny, Farhadi makes a point to note how Rahim becomes a puppet for larger forces - from the prison, which needs a PR boost after a recent scandal, to a charity, which knows that his feel-good story is better for fundraising than the depressing tales it usually deals with. ![]() A Hero’s morality play works at a more deliberate pace, with none of the rat-a-tat kinetic energy of Gems. And just like in Uncut Gems, when bad luck strikes, he’s forced into a series of increasingly reckless moves, all to access the new life that feels tantalizingly within reach.įarhadi and the Safdie brothers are not exactly artistic fellow travelers. The only problem: He’s told one little white lie. When news gets out, he’s hailed as, well, a hero. Rahim considers selling them, but decides instead to return the purse to its owner. Salvation appears, not in the form of a rare opal, but as a lost purse full of gold coins. He can’t get out of jail unless he pays the debt, but with his record, he can’t find a job that will advance him the money. Like Howie, Rahim’s also in massive debt to an in-law, and he’s stuck in an even tighter bind. But as he’s trying to cash in on his newfound fame, social-media scrutiny threatens to upend his life. While out on leave, he performs a good deed that turns him into a viral sensation. The latest film from Oscar-winning Iranian director Asghar Farhadi, A Hero follows Rahim (Amir Jadidi), an unemployed man in prison for debt.
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