As a youth, I loved seeing movies where the whole point was that grown-ups really don’t have anything figured out, that everyone’s just bumbling through adulthood, taking blind stabs in the dark and hoping they somehow add up to good decisions. The Big Chill is one of my favorites in that category – you’ve got all these well-sweatered adults, seemingly keeping it together with varying degrees of success in their personal and professional lives.
But the minute they’re reunited, everyone safely under the same roof again and kitchen dancing to Motown classics, the masks drop, and it becomes clear that, in one way or another, they’ve all been faking it. Faking their happiness with their families, faking their confidence in their career choices, faking their contentment with how their lives turned out so differently than they had imagined 15 years ago. What I remember so clearly – watching it as a kid who had the whole minefield of growing up still stretched out before her – is that the film doesn’t judge them for their attempts to trick the outside world (and sometimes themselves) that everything’s going better than it really is. Instead, in The Big Chill, we get an acknowledgement that most of the characters are doing what they have to in order to get by. Now, in the thick of adulthood, its complications and let-downs, I can confirm that for most of us, some faking it is necessary, even if its just so we can face the next day of bumbling through it all over again.
There’s a moment late in Matt Spicer’s new film, Ingrid Goes West, that reminded me of that hard truth. In it, a character who’s worked so incredibly hard at presenting her life as perfect, to her circle of hip acquaintances as well as to her thousands of social media followers, is confronted by the title character, Ingrid. Ingrid angrily points to the reality of this character’s situation – that the people closest to her are deeply flawed, that her relationships are built on delusions, that her life is anything but perfect. And what I loved about this moment is that it doesn’t break this character or even seem to upset her. Unlike Ingrid, she knows that creating a gulf between your private truth and your public face isn’t always a betrayal of some truer nature, but rather a survival tactic for the ups and downs of reality.
Of course, for the characters in the The Big Chill, that gulf existed before filters and hashtags came along to put a more curated, but also glaring, focus on its contradictions. Ingrid has gotten plenty of attention for skewering our social media obsession with avocado toast that is also #blessed in the digital age. There’s a frightening accuracy in the way the movies captures that Pavlovian system of desire and reward when your phone dings, and – there it is – another human validating your existence. As Ingrid, Aubrey Plaza takes the social anxiety that comes with constant updates and the dreaded FOMO and dials it up to a level of jittery paranoia that’s uncomfortable to watch. And yet, as scared as you become of what she might say or do next, you can’t look away – an opening shot of her mascara-streaked face, eyes hungrily searching as she scroll and taps, scroll and taps, speaks to anyone who’s ever looked at images of happy people doing exciting things on their phone and wondered, why are they there having fun while I’m here, crying in my car and eating handfuls of cold french fries. So all of us really.
It’s a brilliant performance that holds the film together. Plaza sometimes suffers from being typecast or underrated because she does one thing – dry, acerbic wit – incredibly well. But as in other roles I’ve seen her in, she imbues Ingrid’s emotional life with a kaleidoscope of feelings under its dark exterior. Ingrid is a broken outsider dealing with the emotional fall out from her mother’s recent death, and she pursues an Insta star she stumbles upon online (Taylor Sloane, played by Elizabeth Olsen) all the way to Los Angeles. With the money her mother leaves her, she scrambles to buy the trappings of a life that will launch her into Taylor’s orbit. But only once she lies and cheats her way there – to the status of a new neighbor and then trusted friend, does the real fun/horror show start. Watch Ingrid’s faces as she watches the “normal” people around her laugh and chit chat, and you can see the internal acrobatics she has to go through to try and mimic their interactions. Whenever the real Ingrid slips out, there’s an intensity, a hot need that doesn’t match her new LA friends’ casual coolness – and in those moments you can also see them start to question who this new person is and why she’s sitting among them.
Ingrid doesn’t understand the difference between the white lies and pretty pictures everyone else uses to tell a nice story about their lives and the complete fabrication she creates from her online stalking of Taylor. For most of the film it’s her downfall, though the ending suggests it could also provide a sort of twisted redemption. Ultimately the movie recognizes the absurdity of our current preoccupation with social media without demonizing it. The problem isn’t that our lives aren’t as amazing as we present them to be, because that’s been true long before we started posting pictures of every #OOTD and mimosa. The problem is that a million followers can never equal one household of old friends. However popular you get, you still need someone to share all the imperfection with, someone you can cry about it and laugh about it with, someone to dance through the kitchen with to Smokey Robinson, all the while knowing your adult lives will never perfect, but that this moment comes close enough.
Ingrid Goes West is playing in theaters now.
The Big Chill is available to rent on Amazon Video.
After the daughter of county magistrate is betrayed by those she trusted the most, she takes on a new identity and returns to the capital to mete out her own brand of justice!
Quite a bit is said about Jiang Li, the daughter of the Minister of the Central Secretariat, and how she suffered at the Temple her father sent her to after a blowout at home, with not a single person coming to visit her, or send any kind of letter, in more than ten years. But I think the banked rage of Xue Fang Fei, our heroine who takes Jiang Li’s place, is also entirely worth exploring. And so, prepare your best drugged tea for the Spoilers about to follow!
We begin more or less, on a stormy night with a hole dug in the ground, a garbled confession that mentions a woman in power who could crush them both like ants apparently and a knockout shot via shovel, all at the hands of her own beloved husband Shen Yurong, that culminates in the death of Xue Fang Fei (Jinyan Wu). Except, she didn’t die. Betrayed by the one person she gave up like everything for, Xue Fang Fei escapes and washes up on the shore, to be found by Jiang Li and her faithful friend and servant Tong’er (Ai Mi).
Jiang Li (also Jinyan Wu), despite being the neglected daughter of the Minister of the Central Secretariat Chancellor Jiang (Su Ke), or perhaps because her stepmother is one jealous horrific hag but we’ll get to that later, is not well treated at all at the Temple. And when that mistreatment finally manages to culminate in her actual death, it provides an opportunity for the newly-resurrected Xue Fang Fei. The new Jiang Li wins the loyalty of her lifelong friend Tong’er, the silence of the Abbess of the Temple, and the attention of a very powerful man, Duke Su, all in the space of like a few days. She even gets the silent approval of the ghost of the real Jiang Li, and willingly takes on the mission of her spirit – to avenge the real Jiang Li, to set right the things in her life that were wrong, that lead to her accidental death far from home, alone with none of her blood family to save her. Since this is a Chinese show, we know that is a mountainous burden to take on.
First, we have to get out of the Temple. And the arrival of Duke Su (Wang Xing Yue) and his men, investigating a salt smuggling scandal along with other sordid things the Temple is accused of, is the perfect vehicle to do it, even if Jiang Li has to get arrested for it. Then we have to get back to the household of her father, the Minister of the Central Secretariat or Chancellor Jiang, and the hell of stepmother Ji Shu Ran and stepsister Jiang Ruo Yao’s bickering, backbiting both hidden and blatant, with only the impotent Grandma as a friend. Oh, and also, to get embroiled in palace drama, royal guard investigations, a pretty forbidden romance with a certain very stoic-seeming commander, and mete out plans, and justice, of her very own.
The show does an excellent job at showcasing strong women in various forms of power, exercising it in very different ways, and more often than not, the pain and suffering they deliberately cause to those around them. That’s not to say that they each don’t have their reasons, justifiable or not, but the power they wield is often only tolerated if not outright ignored by the men around them. The new Jiang Li defies these conventions, with a mind like a steel trap and the sheer fortitude to power through whatever the current test is – a qin performance that leaves her fingers bleeding and her audience weeping; whether or not she allergy-poisoned her stepsister, come on; allegations from the Emperor himself – Jiang Li makes careful, detailed plans, and carries them out with the patience and cunning of a spider, calm and deadly.
The shows villains are mostly women, come to think of it, with Elder Princess Wanning being at the foremost of the pack, she likes torturing her playtoys, and some time ago she decided Shen Yurong was going to be one of them. Which actually kicked off this whole mess, of conspiracies and deaths and cover-ups, all because Xue Fang Fei’s ex husband has no balls whatsoever. Or perhaps he’s the Empires biggest hidden masochist, who knows. Even Shen Yurong’s actual attempts at true villainy towards the end were poorly planned, badly executed, and almost lackluster, despite his purported desperation to win for once.
Whereas, the smiling tyranny of Ji Shu Ran back at the Prime Ministers household, using her children as weapons against Jiang Li, the love and hey guilt of her father to gently nudge him the “right” way towards getting Jiang Li out of the house by means fair or foul, is all to be expected. Her stepmother had been doing very bad things since Jiang Li was a very little girl, and the hidden knowledge of one of those atrocities in particular, is what led to tiny Jiang Li being maligned, punished, and sent away to the Temple. So of course taking care of the wicked stepmother, or rather, allowing her to fall into the self-same trap of her own making from so long ago, is high on the list of stuff in Jiang Li’s life that needs addressing.
The best male performance inevitably come from the lead love interest, Duke Su Xiao Heng, though his two main men, Lu Ji and Wen Ji, come as a close and often comedic second, and the emotions invoked from Jiang Li’s fathers acceptance of her return run the whole gamut of spectrum – especially when her father finally reveals that yes, he knew that the Jiang Li that returned wasn’t the one he originally left, that Xue Fang Fei managed to take vengeance for his beloved daughter and in doing so, finally actually become her, once and for all.
It’s long and complicated and fraught with excitement and danger, featuring an absolutely ruthless female lead who lets nothing not even family ghosts stand in her way, and a perfect story to enjoy the 2024 spooky season to! Cheer on The Double on Netflix now!
A struggling couple with their young daughter are invited to spend an idyllic weekend at a newly made friend’s country house, that hides a whole bunch of nasty secrets!
Normally, a review consists of a few paragraphs of expounding on the movie and then the ranted opinion itself, closing with a recommendation as to whether or not Moxie recommends going to see said film. Speak No Evil is a very weird exception, for there is very little in the way of plot to follow, and the would-be horror devolves into cheap scares and dumbassery for us to laugh at. When the theater audience has cat-callers hooting and calling out the protagonist dad figure of the film and there is no censure from anyone else, you’re doing something wrong. But, let’s attempt a dive anyway!
So Ben (Scoot McNairy) and Louise (Mackenzie Davis) Dalton are struggling, with life, with career and money trouble of course, and perhaps most importantly but less often spoken of, with each-other. Whilst trying to hide it all from their sensitive bunny-stricken daughter Agnes (Alix West Lefler) too, of course. They somehow took a vacation runaway of sorts to Tuscany of all places, where they stay in a villa with a few other vacationers, bonding over the one annoying couple no-one else likes with new friends Paddy (James McAvoy) and Ciara (Aisling Fraciosi) and their apparently nonverbal kid Anthony or Ant (Dan Hough). Later, after a reminder postcard with the extended offer of a weekend stay at their country home is again extended to the Daltons, the two parental units decide it would be a good idea to run away some more and off they go, with Agnes and Hoppy in tow!
It’s amazing that the Dalton parents know so little about Paddy and Ciara and still decide to spend a weekend with them at their run-down country house. And just as soon as they do finally find the place, Paddy goes from the amiable fellow-dad to sympathize and bro-mance with, to an opinionated antagonistic competitor, who has to have his way about absolutely everything. It begins with the named goose he cooked for their first dinner there, despite being well aware Louise is vegan, and escalates to trying to instigate Ben into being more manly and take-charge, to serious disagreements in the way Paddy tries to raise his not-quite-mute kid, and finally the Dalton parents begin to realize perhaps this wasn’t such a good idea.
It’s often the children in these stories who provide the horrific reveal of what the villain, or villains, have been up to, and Speak No Evil is no different in this regard. Little Dan Hough gives a striking and ghastly performance as Ant, chop-chop-chopping his way through a silent explanation of what actually happened to his poor tongue. The brilliant way Agnes gets her parents alone to inform them of Ant’s new information is one of the few bright, smart spots of the entire movie. And after the Daltons have finally understood the true nightmare of their situation and their very real need to escape, the film basically degenerates into a kind of reverse home invasion horror flick, as the Daltons try to hide amidst the country house of our baddies trying to hunt them down!
None of it is enough. No reason was ever given as to why Paddy the purported former doctor is like this, why he needs to OCD his trophies to the point of an incriminating evidence locker, why Ant was the one to finally find the courage to fight back, why the hell Ben is such a freaking milquetoast of a human one can’t even consider him the head of the Dalton family, why Louise is still putting up with all this nonsense over the safety of her beloved daughter, and why hasn’t the authorities or the families of other victims kicked up any kind of ruckus by now? Why is the neighboring handyman type Mike (Kris Hitchen) in league with our villainous couple to the point where he takes to hunting the Daltons with shotgun in tow, too? The film is apparently a remake of a 2022 Danish film of the same name, and we have to ask, why did anyone think the film market needed such a thing? Well, whatever.
Cover your mouth to keep from yelling common-sense advice to the deplorably naïve characters on the screen and catch Speak No Evil in theaters now!
Here’s a full list of last night’s Primetime Emmy Awards winners.
Outstanding comedy series
WINNER: “Hacks”
“Abbott Elementary”
“The Bear”
“Curb Your Enthusiasm”
“Only Murders in the Building”
“Palm Royale”
“Reservation Dogs”
“What We Do in the Shadows”
Outstanding drama series
WINNER: “Shōgun”
“The Crown”
“Fallout”
“The Gilded Age”
“The Morning Show”
“Mr. & Mrs. Smith”
“Slow Horses”
“3 Body Problem”
Outstanding lead actress in a drama series
WINNER: Anna Sawai, “Shōgun”
Jennifer Aniston, “The Morning Show”
Carrie Coon, “The Gilded Age”
Maya Erskine, “Mr. & Mrs. Smith”
Imelda Staunton, “The Crown”
Reese Witherspoon, “The Morning Show”
Outstanding lead actor in a drama series
WINNER: Hiroyuki Sanada, “Shōgun”
Idris Elba, “Hijack”
Donald Glover, “Mr. & Mrs. Smith”
Walton Goggins, “Fallout”
Gary Oldman, “Slow Horses”
Dominic West, “The Crown”
Outstanding limited or anthology series
WINNER: “Baby Reindeer”
“Fargo”
“Lessons in Chemistry”
“Ripley”
“True Detective: Night Country”
Outstanding lead actress in a limited anthology series or movie
WINNER: Jodie Foster, “True Detective: Night Country”
Brie Larson, “Lessons in Chemistry”
Juno Temple, “Fargo”
Sofia Vergara, “Griselda”
Naomi Watts, “Feud: Capote vs. the Swans”
Outstanding lead actor in a limited anthology series or movie
WINNER: Richard Gadd, “Baby Reindeer”
Matt Bomer, “Fellow Travelers”
Jon Hamm, “Fargo”
Tom Hollander, “Feud: Capote vs. the Swans”
Andrew Scott, “Ripley”
Best directing for a drama
WINNER: Frederick E.O. Toye, “Shо̄gun”
Stephen Daldry, “The Crown”
Mimi Leder, “The Morning Show”
Hiro Murai, “Mr. & Mrs. Smith” “First Date”
Saul Metzstein, “Slow Horses”
Salli Richardson-Whitfield, “Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty”
Governors award
WINNER: Greg Berlanti
Best directing for a comedy series
WINNER: Christopher Storer, “The Bear”
Randall Einhorn, “Abbott Elementary”
Ramy Youssef, “The Bear”
Guy Ritchie, “The Gentlemen”
Lucia Aniello, “Hacks”
Mary Lou Belli, “The Ms. Pat Show”
Best writing for a limited series or TV movies
WINNER: Richard Gadd, “Baby Reindeer”
Charlie Brooker, “Black Mirror”
Noah Hawley, “Fargo”
Ron Nyswaner, “Fellow Travelers”
Steven Zaillian, “Ripley”
Issa López, “True Detective: Night Country”
Best writing for a drama series
WINNER: Will Smith, “Slow Horses”
Peter Morgan and Meriel Sheibani-Clare, “The Crown”
Graham Wagner and Geneva Robertson-Dworet, “Fallout”
Francesca Sloane and Donald Glover, “Mr. and Mrs. Smith”
Rachel Kondo, Justin Marks, “Shōgun”
Rachel Kondo, Caillin Puente, “Shōgun”
Supporting actor in a limited or anthology series
WINNER: Lamorne Morris, “Fargo”
Jonathan Bailey, “Fellow Travelers”
Robert Downey Jr., “The Sympathizer”
Tom Goodman-Hill, “Baby Reindeer”
John Hawkes, “True Detective: Night Country”
Lewis Pullman, “Lessons In Chemistry”
Treat Williams, “Feud: Capote vs. The Swans”
Best talk series
WINNER: “The Daily Show”
“Jimmy Kimmel Live!”
“Late Night with Seth Meyers”
“The Late Show with Stephen Colbert”
Writing in a comedy series
WINNER: Lucia Aniello, Paul W. Downs, Jen Statsky, “Hacks”
Quinta Brunson, Abbott Elementary”
Joanna Calo, Christopher Storer, “The Bear”
Meredith Scardino, Sam Means, “Girls5eva”
Chris Kelly, Sarah Schneider, “The Other Two”
Directing limited series or TV movie
WINNER: Steven Zaillian, “Ripley”
Weronika Tofilska, “Baby Reindeer”
Noah Hawley, “Fargo”
Gus Van Sant, “Feud: Capote vs. the Swans“
Millicent Shelton, “Lessons in Chemistry”
Issa López, “True Detective: Night Country”
Outstanding writing for a variety special
WINNER: Alex Edelman, “Alex Edelman: Just For Us”
Jacqueline Novak, “Jacqueline Novak: Get On Your Knees”
John Early, “John Early: Now More Than Ever”
Mike Birbiglia, “Mike Birbiglia: The Old Man And The Pool”
“The Oscars”
Best scripted variety series
WINNER: “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver”
“Saturday Night Live”
Supporting actress in a limited or anthology series
WINNER: Jessica Gunning, “Baby Reindeer”
Dakota Fanning, “Ripley”
Lily Gladstone, “Under The Bridge”
Aja Naomi King, “Lessons In Chemistry”
Diane Lane, “Feud: Capote vs. The Swans”
Nava Mau, “Baby Reindeer”
Kali Reis, “True Detective: Night Country”
Outstanding reality competition program
WINNER: “The Traitors”
“The Amazing Race”
“RuPaul’s Drag Race”
“Top Chef”
“The Voice”
Outstanding lead actress in a comedy series
WINNER: Jean Smart, “Hacks”
Quinta Brunson, “Abbott Elementary”
Ayo Edebiri, “The Bear”
Selena Gomez, “Only Murders in the Building”
Maya Rudolph, “Loot”
Kristen Wiig, “Palm Royale”
Supporting actress in a drama series
WINNER: Elizabeth Debicki, “The Crown Netflix”
Christine Baranski, “The Gilded Age”
Nicole Beharie, “The Morning Show”
Greta Lee, “The Morning Show”
Lesley Manville, “The Crown”
Karen Pittman, “The Morning Show”
Holland Taylor, “The Morning Show”
Supporting actress in a comedy series
WINNER: Liza Colón-Zayas, “The Bear”
Carol Burnett, “Palm Royale”
Hannah Einbinder, “Hacks”
Janelle James, “Abbott Elementary”
Sheryl Lee Ralph, “Abbott Elementary”
Meryl Streep, “Only Murders In The Building”
Outstanding lead actor in a comedy series
WINNER: Jeremy Allen White, “The Bear”
Matt Berry, “What We Do in the Shadows”
Larry David, “Curb Your Enthusiasm”
Steve Martin, “Only Murders in the Building”
Martin Short, “Only Murders in the Building”
D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, “Reservation Dogs”
Supporting actor in a drama series
WINNER: Billy Crudup, “The Morning Show”
Tadanobu Asano, “Shōgun”
Mark Duplass, “The Morning Show”
Jon Hamm, “The Morning Show”
Takehiro Hira, “Shōgun”
Jack Lowden, “Slow Horses”
Jonathan Pryce, “The Crown”
Supporting actor in a comedy series
WINNER: Ebon Moss-Bachrach, “The Bear”
Lionel Boyce, “The Bear”
Paul W. Downs, “Hacks”
Paul Rudd, “Only Murders In The Building”
Tyler James Williams, “Abbott Elementary”
Bowen Yang, “Saturday Night Live”
The Double: Ghostly vengeance upon you!
‘Speak No Evil’: Chop-chop-CHOP
And The Emmy Goes To
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