Cocaine Bear (2023)

Score: 4 / 5

It really doesn't get much better than a nature monster or killer animal movie for me. Sharks and cats in summer, crocodiles and spiders in autumn, and bears and wolves as spring thaws the snow. How appropriate, then, for Elizabeth Banks (of all people) to gift us with one of the most exciting entries in the subgenre in years just as March ushers in a new season. Cocaine Bear is solidly what it promises, which is to say a story in which a bear ingests a bunch of cocaine and proceeds to slaughter folks in the Chattahoochee National Forest in Georgia. Inspired by the true story of a black bear that overdosed on cocaine in Tennessee in 1985, and was found dead in northern Georgia (but was not known to have killed anyone), this film takes the story to its goriest and most compelling extremes. Think if a rattlesnake were found in cargo on an airplane and the result was Snakes on a Plane; this movie has similar, raw popular power.

Opening with the death of a smuggler who, after sporadically dumping (and snorting) cocaine for some reason, abandons the plane and fails to open his parachute, the film introduces us to a Knoxville detective (Isiah Whitlock Jr.) who identifies his body. Meanwhile, a black bear in northern Georgia eats some cocaine and, becoming wildly aggressive, attacks two hikers. It's not clear why the cocaine was being dumped, or geographically how this all played out, but it seems that the plane had dropped one shipment in Georgia and taken off -- the real-life story goes that they switched to a smaller, lighter plane that couldn't carry the weight -- heading northwest. Thankfully, the logistics don't really matter, except to provoke more speculation and turn the case into an urban legend, which I fully expect this film will help mobilize.

A wide-ranging and eclectic cast of characters descend on the Chattahoochee National Forest with various goals and outcomes, though most run afoul of the crazed bear. St. Louis drug lord "Syd" (the late Ray Liotta in his final film role) sends two henchmen (O'Shea Jackson Jr. and Alden Ehrenreich) to recover the goods before impatiently joining them. There is also a group of delinquent teenagers, a horny park ranger (Margo Martindale), and an obnoxious wildlife expert (Jesse Tyler Ferguson). A final group -- comprising a single mom (Keri Russell) searching for her young daughter Dee Dee (Brooklynn Prince) and her friend Henry (Christian Convery), who skipped school to hike the park and discovered cocaine as well as the bear. Their adventures intertwine and come to a head in the best ways, organically funny and shockingly violent, emphasizing the grotesque nature of the film.

Speaking of which, let's talk about the bear itself. For a movie monster, the Cocaine Bear isn't generally horrifying. Under the influence of drugs -- and it keeps doing more in almost every scene -- it switches dramatically from contented back-scratching to voracious bloodshed without a moment's notice. For a movie on a budget, the bear really is rendered very well on the big screen; thankfully, it was performed live in motion capture by Weta FX, with no small amount of anthropomorphizing from both the stunt performer and the animators. But even that oddly enhances the visceral terror I experienced during some of the more violent attacks, making the bear move faster and think more like a killing machine, which is really the only way movies like this work. It helps, too, that some of the best violent scenes only marginally involve the bear itself; it occasionally feels like an installment of Final Destination, where people's greed or stupidity lead to their grisly deaths or gruesome injuries.

What else is there to say? Despite its potential for pro-environmental or anti-drug messaging, Cocaine Bear doesn't really have much to say politically, preferring to just poke fun at everybody. Its cheeky, mocking tone extends even to some of the more outlandish sequences, such as the speeding ambulance chase (if you know, you know). The score and soundtrack feel perfectly in line with the already visually established tone of the film, along with costumes and production design, most notably in the park ranger's station. While the film lags a bit in the story of the mother and kids, even that plot strand pays off in the climax, which toys with cloying sentimentalism before giving us a fairly conventional ending. But by then, we're about as elevated as the bear herself, so it's okay for the film to try to ground us a bit before ending. Now let's just hope Banks decides to helm her rumored other films about animals on cocaine!

Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)

Score: 4.5 / 5

The third installment in Legendary's MonsterVerse ushers in a smash-bang summer blockbuster season, and I'm here for it!

Following Godzilla's disappearance after the events of his first outing in 2014, the cryptozoological organization Monarch has redoubled its efforts to identify, locate, and study the race of dormant Titans around the world. One of its scientists, Vera Farmiga (the characters all have names but nobody cares), is present for the hatching of one named Mothra. She has also developed a device called ORCA which uses sound waves to influence or attract the Titans.

As is so often the case, the ORCA device is stolen by eco-terrorists led by Charles Dance, who kidnaps Farmiga and her daughter Millie Bobby Brown. Enter Kyle Chandler, the estranged father, to save the day. Or as much of the day as he can save, considering the massive size of destructive forces he faces. The film has more than a little heart, and at its center is this family drama framed with some surprisingly effective philosophy on the relationship between humans, our world, and the monsters we create vs. the monsters here before us. The story may be basic -- if drawn out effectively -- but its ideas are not, and it strikes a brilliant balance between action and meditation.

Balance is the key word for a film like this, in which so many things are juggled at once. First, there's the sizable cast, not even including the CGI characters. Then there's the monsters themselves, all but two of whom are brand-spanking new to this franchise. We've got the weighty ideas about terrorism and the environment, historical fantasy and geopolitics, dangerous new technology and the responsibilities we have to each other and our world. It's a lot for any movie to handle; the more Avengers movies we see, the easier it is to forget that most films can't perform at the same breadth and scope.

Godzilla: King of the Monsters works well on its own terms, though, and remains fabulously entertaining throughout. Drenched in a wet, gritty imagery and suffused with thick lighting, the film veers away from the realism of its predecessor -- and avoids they hyper-stylizations of Kong: Skull Island -- to craft its own brooding atmosphere. In fact, it seems that director Michael Dougherty is more in awe of these creatures than other filmmakers in this series; the grandeur inherent in calling them Titans and the dramatic flourish of lighting and effects frame them as almost godlike. Case in point: as the final showdown commences, Ghidorah poses regally atop a volcano while other Titans bow to him, and silhouetted in the foreground is a giant cross.

Dougherty seems to want us to feel a religious attraction to these creatures, a sort of sublime draw toward that which is great and terrible and utterly unconcerned with us. It's a delicious change in tone from the other films, and one that isn't necessarily more or less effective so much as a showcase for another artist's attitude toward the same subject matter. Gareth Edwards wanted his film shot primarily from the human perspective, and its realism meant there would be less direct access to the monster itself. Jordan Vogt-Roberts layered his film under lurid imagery, psychedelic colors, and period rock music, making it feel like a jungle fever dream. Here, we get a cold, wet vision of a world at war with forces of nature more than monsters running amok.

It's just a lot of fun, which is really all a Godzilla movie should be.

Ingrid Goes West (2017)

Score: 4.5 / 5

Ingrid Goes West is the darkest comedy I've seen in a long time. Naturally, I loved it!

Ingrid Thorburn is a product of our culture. Can we call her mentally unstable? Legally, sure, as she's seen to stalk people via Instagram. Well, one person, initially, named Charlotte. Charlotte has a large following, and apparently once commented on one of Ingrid's posts. Ingrid took that as a declaration of intimate friendship, which climaxed in violence when Charlotte did not invite Ingrid to her wedding. After showing up and macing her in the face, Charlotte is sent to a mental hospital. Even there, she has access to her phone and magazines, and soon learns about Taylor, another social media "influencer" (celebrity is far too strong a word) who lives in sunny California. Thanks to the unexpected death of her mother (yes, it's a shady, shady world) and a sudden inheritance, Ingrid packs up and indeed goes west.

Aubrey Plaza plays Ingrid with lots of gumption, not shying away from the chilling stalking episodes but imbuing honesty and compassion into a character we would say is a freak, a weirdo. She's the definition of a creep, but Ingrid is also all of us. Plaza gets us to root for her from the get-go, even as we watch her cross line after line in the sand. She's a nearly perfect antihero, and she owns every second. And why shouldn't she? We get her. Everyone who uses social media is a kind of stalker, or someone who encourages stalking, right? Which is worse? Can we blame people for getting so invested in the lives of others, when they're splashed on screens we carry in our pockets? When all they post is the sweet, sexy, lovable images of their seemingly perfect lives? How can we defend the Instagram/Facebook/Snapchat media when, by definition, it invites envy and greed and discontentment into our lives?

This film doesn't answer that, but it certainly provokes those thoughts. It's a hilarious film, bubbling over with whip-smart comedy that strikes smack in the middle of young adult culture. It's also deeply disturbing, and more than once I expected it to take a horrific turn. Taylor (played to perfection by Elizabeth Olsen) is the sweet icon of grace, and her innocence begs for disaster to approach. Not unlike Cate Blanchett's character in Notes on a Scandal, she allows the unbecoming predator into her intimacy, disregarding all the warning signs, and is subsequently forced to enact extreme damage control. Her savior -- in the form of a magnificently pseudo-naked Billy Magnussen -- keeps his eye on Ingrid, though even that isn't quite enough to spare her humiliation and some fear.

Writer-director Matt Spicer knows exactly what he's about here, and the greatest pleasure of the film is watching his total control over the proceedings. He allows the actors to play, the scenic beauty to enchant, and the humor to wax and wane naturally. He exhibits time and again his uncanny knack for pure awkwardness, an unconventional but highly effective form of cinematic humor like we saw in the sixth Harry Potter, and the pauses in dialogue when people have said or are trying not to say something are absolutely squirm-inducing. I nervously giggled my way through the entire film, because while little is laugh-out-loud funny, the whole damn thing will trigger any latent social anxieties you have.

Of course, it does drop a few guffaw-worthy gimmicks, mostly delivered by O'Shea Jackson Jr., who plays Ingrid's boyfriend née landlord Dan. An aspiring screenwriter, Dan loves Batman. In fact, he loves Batman so much, that during their unexpected but highly entertaining first sexual encounter, he has Ingrid dress up as Catwoman, call him "Batman" as he repeats it, and recite to him "Gotham needs you." That scene took the cake, though there are plenty more belly-laughs where it came from.

The ending is of particular interest to me, because I think it can be read a couple ways. After her unrequited friendship-affair blows up in her face, Ingrid confesses her loneliness and reveals her true self on an Instagram video, after which she overdoses on pills. Dan's intervention saves her, and following the attempted suicide Ingrid awakes to find herself a star. Her video has gone viral and supporters are lauding her honesty. As she scans the comments on her phone, she smiles. And that's the end. At first, I wanted to read it as her finally becoming content, expressing her pure joy that she is finally loved. And that would be a lovely sentiment, especially since the last twenty minutes or so of the movie work so hard to make her sympathetic and tragic. But I'm not convinced. The whole film before that showed her to be desperate, creepy, and downright dangerous. I think her smile is a sort of falling-off-the-wagon moment, realizing the high she has been denied her whole life. She won't rest now. If her attempted suicide got her this much attention, what will she possibly do to one-up that? It's a sly ending, one that deftly skewers the issues the film had been juggling up to that point, and one that will prompt good conversation at dinner after the screening.

IMDb: Ingrid Goes West