Movie Review - Verity

Director: Michael Showalter
Genre: Thriller
Runtime: 117 minutes
Year: 2026
Starring: Dakota Johnson, Josh Hartnett, Anne Hathaway
 
Description: Lowen Ashleigh (Dakota Johnson), hired to ghostwrite for best-selling author Verity Crawford (Anne Hathaway), uncovers Verity’s autobiographical notes, and becomes involved in what may prove to be a lethal conspiracy.
 
Review: The film adaptation of a gripping bestseller always comes with sky-high expectations, and the psychological thriller “Verity” was no exception. Directed by Michael Showalter and boasting a star-studded cast featuring Dakota Johnson, Josh Hartnett and Anne Hathaway, this adaptation seemed like a guaranteed success on paper. Unfortunately, the film falls well short on the mark. What should have been a nerve-wrecking ride ends up being a slow and uneven disappointment that never quite manages to capture the tension of the source material.

The film follows Lowen Ashleigh, a struggling author who is hired by Jeremy Crawford to finish writing the remaining books in a highly successful series. The original author, Jeremy’s wife Verity Crawford, is at home, seriously injured and incapacitated after a severe car accident. Lowen moves in with the family at their secluded estate to delve into Verity’s notes. She soon stumbles upon a hidden, terrifying manuscript in which Verity makes a gruesome confession about the family’s dark secrets. As the attraction between Lowen and Jeremy grows, Lowen becomes entangled in a web of manipulation, and the line between chilling fiction and dangerous reality begins to blur.

Let’s get right to the point: the book, written by Colleen Hoover, is far better. While the novel keeps the reader in a constant stranglehold with psychological paranoia and a suffocating atmosphere, the film adaptations opts for a pace that can only be described as boring. The film drags laboriously from one dialogue scene to the next, with only a few rare, suspenseful moments. As a result, the thrilling Hitchcock-esque suspense that the filmmaker tried to imitate never really comes across.

The film’s biggest stumbling block, however, is the way the acting talent was handled. The casting of the title role, in particular, is a missed opportunity: Anne Hathaway’s role is painfully underutilized. Hathaway is a world-class actress, but here she is reduced to a passive character. Her character never takes on the terrifying, mysterious menace that the story so desperately needs. Although Johnson and Hartnett fo their best to keep the chemistry alive, they cannot save the movie.

“Verity” lacks the much-needed intensity that the book has and gets bogged down in a drawn-out thriller that leaves fans of the book cold.

Rating: 2/ 5

90s Movie Review - The Virgin Suicides

Director: Sofia Coppola
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 97 minutes
Year: 1999
Starring: Kirsten Dunst, James Woods, Kathleen Turner, Josh Hartnett, Danny DeVito, A.J. Cook, Hanna Hall, Leslie Hayman, Chelse Swain

I WATCHED THIS MOVIE FOR MY 2024 MOVIE CHALLENGE
WEEK 45: A FILM FROM A DIRECTOR KNOW FOR THEIR CHARACTER-DRIVEN NARRATIVE
 
Description: A group a male friends become obsessed with five mysterious sisters who are sheltered by their strict, religious parents (James Woods, Kathleen Turner) in suburban Detroit in the mid-1970s.

Review: Cecilia Lisbon is only 13-years-old when she attempts suicide for the first time. She and her four sisters live a very protected life with their strict and religious parents.

Director Sofia Coppola manages to show the audience what this strict life can do to teenage girls. The five sister all deal with it in a different way, eventually ending in the same fate.

It’s beautifully filmed and it focused on the sisters. The story told from the perspective of the boy next door, twenty five years later.

Rating: 3,5/ 5

Movie Review - Trap

Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Genre: Thriller/ Crime
Runtime: 105 minutes
Year: 2024
Starring: Josh Hartnett, Saleka Night Shyamalan, Ariel Donohue, Alison Pill, Hayley Mills, Johnathan Mills
 
Description: A father (Josh Hartnett) and his teenage daughter (Saleka Night Shyamalan) attend a pop concert only to realize they’ve entered the center of a dark and sinister event.

I WATCHED THIS MOVIE FOR MY 2024 MOVIE CHALLENGE
WEEK 38: A FILM FROM 2024
 
Review: With director M. Night Shyamalan, you never know. Somethins the makes great films that really keep you on the edge of your seat and sometime he makes film that are pretty bad. I have liked most, loved some, hated a few. “Trap” is his latest thriller.

Teenager Riley is attending the sold-out concert of world star Lady Raven, together with her dad Cooper. Her dad is acting a bit weird, and somehow that is not strange, since the place is swarming with police. Soon Cooper realizes that they are looking for a serial killer named The Butcher. In fact, the FBI thinks he is at this concert today and they are doing everything they can to capture him.

Josh Hartnett was up and coming in the late 90s, early 2000s. I always loved him as an actor, but he hasn’t done anything major for a while. He was in an episode of the latest season of “Black Mirror”, which was fantastic and where he again showed what he could do. And now he’s starring in M. Night Shyamalan newest film. He plays Cooper and he is kind of perfect for this role.

Night Shyamalan is known for his twists, that, when they deliver they DELIVER! Since the trailer for this movie already showed us a big twist, you would think that there is more to it. I was a bit disappointed that they showed us that twist already, because it really changes the viewing experience. Even though it does have a few surprises, I was still waiting for the final, crazy, unexpected twist. But sadly, that never came. A lot of the things happening in the film, are very convenient for story telling and this way the film loses its credibility a bit. But the first hour of the film is filled with tension and does keep you on the edge of your seat. After that, the tension drops a bit.

Not one of Night Shyamalan’s best films, but it’s certainly not on the list of bad movies. I enjoyed it for the most part, but was disappointed that we didn’t get a better twist. Or any twist for that matter.

Rating: 3/ 5

00s Movie Review - Sin City

Director: Robert Rodriguez, Frank Miller, Quentin Tarantino
Genre: Crime/ Thriller
Runtime: 124 minutes
Year: 2005
Starring: Bruce Willis, Benicio Del Toro, Clive Owen, Mickey Rourke, Jessica Alba, Rosario Dawson, Elijah Wood, Nick Stahl, Jaime King, Josh Hartnett, Carla Cugino, Michael Madsen, Rutger Hauer, Powers Booth, Brittany Murphy, Alexis Bledel

Description: An exploration of the dark and miserable Basin City and three of its residents, all of whom are caught up in violent corruption.

Review: “Sin City” is a film noir-like movie which is very faithful to the graphic novel it’s based on. A perfect job for director Robert Rodriguez, who is accompanied by “Sin City” novel writer Frank Miller and director Quentin Tarantino. 

All these creative minds are a guarantee for an explosive and inventive film. “Sin City” looks breathtaking and is groundbreaking. The graphic novel isn’t just made into film, it looks like the novel actually came to life. De original pictures are used for the story

board and stayed intact. The actors had to film in front of a so-called ‘green screen’.
The presented world and its citizens is shown in black and white. Sometimes things as a red dress, golden blonde hair and blood are highlighted with color. The contrasts look great. 

There are lots of extravagant characters in “Sin City”. Like ‘Yellow Bastard’, a violent pedophile with rubbery skin and unhuman physical forms. And Jackie Boy, a corrupt cop. But most memorable is cannibalistic Kevin, a slick man with a sardonic grin on his face. The anti-hero is Marv, played by Mickey Rourke who you barely recognize. As a storm he rages through the city. For the women, it’s Jessica Alba that catches your eye. As a kid she was rescued by John Hartigan, played by Bruce Willis. Now she is a gorgeous, young woman turned stripper. 

Like I said before, “Sin City” is a groundbreaking film and it amazes me every single time.

Rating: 3,5/ 5

Movie Review - Oppenheimer

Director: Christopher Nolan
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 180 minutes
Year: 2023
Starring: Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, Robert Downey Jr., Florence Pugh, Josh Hartnett, Alden Ehrenreich, Jason Clarke, Kenneth Branagh, David Krumholtz, Alex Wolff, Matthew Modine, Dane DeHaan, Jack Quaid, Josh Peck, Casey Affleck, Gary Oldman
 
Description: The story of American scientist, J. Robert Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy), and his role in the development of the atomic bomb.

Review: The life and work of J. Robert Oppenheimer is the subject and object of Christopher Nolan’s twelfth feature film. Where his “Tenet” already got the brain cells working hard because of the almost inimitable plot and juggling with timelines, the same may be said of this three-hour-long yet satisfying war of attrition. To temper expectations immediately: “Oppenheimer” is driven by dialogue, has a killer pace and an almost endless array of characters played by A-listers.

We are introduced to Oppenheimer who, as a young student at Cambridge, becomes inspired by peers such as Albert Einstein and Niel Bohr. Soon the young scientist turns out to be more drawn to theory than practice. He develops in quantum mechanics, at the time an unexplored branch of physics. In parallel, we see the questioning fire that an older Oppenheimer gets thrown at him because the FBI has been tipped off. The physicist is accused of communist sentiments and poses a danger to national security because of his extreme views.

A third storyline, shot in black and white, revolves around a former soldier and director of the renowned Princeton University. A hard-to-recognize Robert Downey Jr. shapes Lewis Strauss, who enlists Oppenheimer after the war. before a Senate committee, Strauss must prove his suitability as Secretary of Commerce in President Eisenhower’s administration.

Only in the last hour does it become clear how these matters relate to each other. Here, some knowledge of the McCarthy era and his pursuit of communism, would come in handy. Director Nolan provides little to no context and focuses entirely on his characters. Oppenheimer and his immediate colleagues have the hopeful but naïve attitude that with the detonation of the atomic bomb, wars will be a thing of the past. In reality, the theoretical physicist created a weapon of mass destruction, opening the door to the Cold War.

If you intend to watch it, be aware that “Oppenheimer” is a long sit that requires you to constantly keep your head up. The intelligent, thoughtful writing makes this anything but a punishment, but Nolan feeds us so much that this alone warrants a second viewing. Truly magisterial is the build-up to the aforementioned trial under the name Trinity. We all know the direction the experiment took world history. Nolan builds it in such a way it feels like we are learning about it for the first time.

Nolan sees himself backed by a large list of big names, with lead actors Cillian Murphy and Robert Downey Jr. not only getting the most screen time but also leaving the biggest impression despite sharing few scenes. The female characters, such as Oppenheimer’s wife Kitty, are sidelines. Their relationship is touched upon, not explored.

“Oppenheimer” is a perfect blend of an actor’s drama and political thriller, like Oliver Stone used to make them. Nolan’s twelfth movie requires considerable investment, constant attention and patience. It is impossible to fathom everything in detail. Damn, what a good movie.

Rating: 5/ 5

Top 5 : "Black Mirror" Episodes Season 6

“Black Mirror” is back after a long absence. The sixth season seems to be deliberately breaking away from what the series is supposed to be. Maker Charlie Brooker takes Netflix to task on several occasions. Instead of writing a full review for the season, I will rank the five episodes worst to best, with mini reviews for each episode.
 

5. Mazey Day
Director: Uta Briesewitz
Starring: Zazie Beetz, Danny Ramirez, Clara Rugaard, Robbie Tann, David Rysdahl
This episode charges against unscrupulous, old-fashioned paparazzi terrorizing stars. Rather a look back to the past than an extrapolation of the present, where everyone uses their smartphone to take photos. This episode is set in the 2000s. Bo (Zazie Beetz) is one of these paparazzi photographers, struggling with her conscience when a celebrity caught on camera commits suicide. At the same time, movie star Mazey Day is involved in a hit an run and doesn’t seem to be able to forget about it. Bo sees on the news Mazey hasn’t been seen in a while, making it her mission to find her. And she ends up finding something unexpected. I believe this was the shortest episode and they have more to tell than can fit in 40 minutes. This way, the story feels rushed and unfinished. I did like the unexpected turn the story took, but this episode really suffered from the runtime.
 

4. Joan is Awful
Director: Ally Pankiw
Starring: Annie Murphy, Salma Hayek, Michael Cera, Himesh Patel, Avi Nash, Ben Barnes
The dull, cowardly routine life of Joan, a mid-level tech executive, is thrown into disarray when a streaming service airs a popular show about her life: Joan is Awful. Salma Hayek plays her and re-enacts her daily life. Real-life Joan becomes an outcast and everything goes downhill. This is a very meta and self-mocking mindfuck. It’s funny and crazy and very entertaining. Although poop-jokes are never funny. Only downside.
 

3. Loch Henry
Director: Sam Miller
Starring: Samuel Blenkin, Myha’la Herrold, Daniel Portman, John Hannah, Monica Dolan
Filmmaker Davis (Samuel Blekin) visits his mother in his hometown near Schotland’s Loch henry: he wants to shoot a documentary about an environmentalist. Tourists in his hometown dropped stopped visiting after serial killer Ian Adair kidnapped and tortured people to the death in his basement. Davis’ father Kenny, the local policeman, was injured trying to arrest Adair and later died. Together with his girlfriend Pia, he decides to make this crime story their topic for the documentary. A story with deeper layers and secrets revealed as you go along. It has a slow start, but eventually has some great WTF-moments. Probably the darkest and most disturbing episode of this season.
 

2. Demon 79
Director: Toby Haynes
Starring: Anjana Vasan, Paapa Essiedu, Katherine Rose Morely, David Shields
In this thrilling, at times hilarious episode, a lonely Indian shoe saleswoman (Anjana Vasan) brooding internally over her racist co-worker Vicky (Katherine Rose Morely) cuts her finger on an amulet with runic characters, summoning demon in-training Gaap (Paapa Essiedu). He takes the guise of her idol, Boney M singer Bobbby Farrell, and explains to her that she must kill someone each day for the next three days to prevent an apocalypse. Dark comedy with a bittersweet twist. And I loved Vasan in her role, she was so good.
 

1. Beyond the Sea
Director: John Crowley
Starring: Aaron Paul, Josh Hartnett, Kate Mara, Auden Thornton, Rory Culkin
This was a stand-out for me, what a fantastic episode. Astronauts Cliff (Aaron Paul) and David (Josh Hartnett) are on a years-long space mission in an alternate 1969. To combat loneliness and cabin fever, the duo uploads their consciousness to a replica: an android copy living on Earth with their family. Until David’s family is murdered before his eyes and his replica is set on fire by a Charles Manson-like cult that wants to restore the natural order. Concerned about David’s possible suicidal depression, Cliff occasionally grants him use of his replica. This leads to psychological complications. Josh Hartnett and especially Aaron Paul are very strong on their roles. I was invested in this story from start to finish and the ending went in a different direction then I expected it would go.  
 

 

00s Movie Review - 30 Days of Night

Director: David Slade
Genre: Horror/ Thriller
Runtime: 115 minutes
Year: 2007
Starring: Josh Hartnett, Melissa George, Ben Foster, Danny Huston, Manu Bennett, Mark Boone Junior

Description: After an Alaskan town is plunged into darkness for a month, it is attacked by a bloodthirsty gang of vampires.

Review: Comic books are perfect source material for film makers. Off course superhero movies, but films like “300” and “Sin City” were based on craphic novels. The dark comic “30 Days of Night” caught the interest of director David Slade and producer Sam Raimi. A story of vampires that haunt a Alaskan town that lives in total darkness for 30 days.
The town is called Barrow. Most citizens leave Barrow before the last sundown. But there are people left behind. On the evening before the 30 days of darkness begin, dog are brutally killed, cellphones are burned and computers are disconnected. The vampires know what to do to cut the people of from the rest of the world.
The vampire look not like your every day blood suckers. And they don’t just bite your neck to drink your blood, they rip their victims apart with their knife sharp teeth. And you can’t kill them, unless you cut off their head. And they speak a language we don’t understand. The leftover citizens, led by sheriff Eben, have to either avoid or beat the vampires to survive.
Although “30 Days of Night” is seen as a mediocre horror film and doesn’t get raving reviews, I always thought that it was an underrated film in the genre. The premise is really terrifying. A town in total darkness, being terrorized by creatures of the night. And it being a distant town makes it even scarier. This is a movie that genuinely scares me, what a horror movie should do.
Off course it has its flaws. The characters lack depth and the story overall is a bit thin. But there is enough to see and the film is visually very well done. And those flaws are easily forgotten. “30 Days of Night” is, in my eyes, an excellent film in the vampire horror genre.

Rating: 4 / 5

Video of the Week (4)

This week another clip from Jimmy Fallons talkshow. He played charades against Charlize Theron and with Josh Hartnett. Especially Jimmy take on the song "Private Dancer" is hilarious!

 

 

In the Picture: The Characters from "The Faculty"

I have seen this movie many times. Robert Rodriguez directed and I think this is one of his better films. Today I'm going to focus on the characters in this movie.

Casey Connor
Played by: Elijah Wood
Casey is an outcast and he loves photography. He’s the one that finds the weird organism and starts to suspect that something is wrong. Casey secretly has a crush on Delilah, who is way out of his league.

Zeke Tyler
Played by: Josh Hartnett
Zeke is a rebel and he’s repeating his senior year because he didn’t care about graduating. He is very intelligent but he doesn’t use it the way he should. Instead he created a home made drug and sells illegal video’s to classmates.

Stokely Mitchell
Played by: Clea DuVall
Stokely is a very exentric girl, though very timid. She dresses in black so that she doesn’t stand out in a crowd and she is a sci-fi fan. Stokely is the first one to believe Casey and together they go over the theories by using the science fiction novels she read. Stokely has a crush on Stan and she sees he is not just another sportsjock.

Delilah Profitt
Played by: Jordana Brewster
Delilah is the most popular girl in school and editor in chief for the school newspaper. She can be very vindictive and Stokely is her main target. Delilah is Stan’s girlfriend, but she doesn’t treat him right and actually thinks he’s stupid. She first doesn’t want to believe Casey’s theory, eventhough she saw what happened.

Stan Rosado
Played by: Shawn Hatosy
Stan is a sportsjock but decides to quit football and focus on his academics. He thinks he can do more than play sports and is sick of being favoured by teachers. At first he doesn’t really care much for Stokely, but he discovers that she’s the only one to see past the sportsoutfit.

Marybeth Louise Hutchinson
Played by: Laura Harris
Marybeth is new to Herrington Highschool and moved from Atlanta to live with relatives after her parents died. She befriends Stokely, because she feels left out like her. Marybeth shows interest in Zeke and is attracted to his rebelious lifestyle.

Coach Joe Willis
Played by: Robert Patrick
Coach Willis is the gymteacher and football coach at school. He’s your typical sportsfanatic. Stan is his best player and he can’t understand why he would leave the team. Coach Willis is the first teacher who shows strange behaviour.

Miss Elizabeth Burke
Played by: Famke Janssen
Elizabeth is the English teacher and very shy. She can barely controle her class, who is mainly bullied by Zeke, but she does love her job somehow. When she turns, she becomes a sexy, assertive woman and she wants to teach Zeke a lesson.

Principal Valerie Drake
Played by: Bebe Neuwirth
Valerie is a real autorithy figure and the principal at Herrington high. She’s someone who’s respected by her students and her staff, but she also turns and becomes insidious and the students think she’s the leader.

Favorite Character: Zeke Tyler

In the Picture: The Characters from "Sin City"

"Sin City" is one of the best movies of its decade. I was blown away by it when I saw it for the first time and there are so many interesting characters in the film. So that's why I decided to take a closer look at them. Here are the characters from "Sin City".

Marv
Played by: Mickey Rourke
Marv is a 7 foot tall, scarfaced man with an incredible level of strenght. He suffers from an unnamed mental condition which causes him to get confused. Marv doesn’t think he has a particular high intellect, but he shows some suprising amount of intellegence when needed.

Dwight McCarthy
Played by: Clive Owen
Dwight has a history of violence, bad tempers, drinking and wild romances. He is known for his chivalry and treats all the woman with the utmost respect and he offers the prostitutes of Old Town his protection. Dwight is a man who simply wants to do the right thing and find his place in this world.

John Hartigan
Played by: Bruce Willis
John is a veteran police detective in Basin City. He is brutal, stoic, cynical and completely selfless. It doesn’t care about his own well-being in order to take care of his fellow citizens. John is willing to risk his own life to save someone elses.

Nancy Callahan
Played by: Jessica Alba
At age 11 Nancy was kidnapped by Roark Jr. and then saved by John Hartigan. He’s Nancy’s hero. She keeps writing him letters when John’s in jail. Now, Nancy is a stripper and in love with John. Because of the age difference, John doesn’t want to give in to his feelings for her, but she is in fact the only person who ever cared for him.

Gail
Played by: Rosario Dawson
Rosario is a prostitute and one of the autorithy figures of Old Town. She has a love-hate relationship with Dwight McCarthy. You don’t want to mess with Gail, because she can handle a machine gun very well.

Jack Rafferty aka Jackie Boy
Played by: Benicio del Toro
Jack is a cop, but ended up being corrupted and worn down from the job. While cops are forbidden to enter Old Town when on duty, Jack is often found there but he’s not loved by the girls. He’s a threat to Dwight McCarthy.

Goldie/ Wendy
Played by: Jaime King
They are the twin prostitutes who are currently in charge of Old Town. Little is revealed about Goldie, but she physically is an exact copy of her sister Wendy. Goldie was murdered after spending the night with Marv, who fell in love with her and is destined to find her killer. Even he is fooled when he mistakens Wendy for the late Goldie.

Kevin
Played by: Elijah Wood
Kevin is a sadist. He sneaks up to people and kills them in all sorts of cruel ways. He likes to torture people, sometimes eats them and he keeps their heads as a souvenir. He was the one who killed Goldie.

Roark Junior aka Yellow Bastard
Played by: Nick Stahl
Roark has the physical appearance of a handsome young playboy but he is in fact a sadistic pedophile and a rapist of young girls. After kidnapping young Nancy Callahan, John Hartigan shoots of his hand, ear and genitals. Due to the surgeries, Roark is left horribly disfigured with yellow skin and a penetrating stench.

The Man
Played by: Josh Hartnett
The Man seems very charming and plain, but he’s a ruthless hitman. He does his job without feeling any remorse.


Favorite Character: John Hartigan