Soul (2020) | Pete Docter & Kemp Powers

January 12, 2021 ~ Vince Leo

Jamie Foxx voices Joe Gardner, a middle-aged music teacher at a New York public middle school, frustrated by his lack of success toward becoming a professional jazz club musician. He’s offered full-time status with the school when another door of opportunity opens. A former student mentions that a legendary jazz saxophonist named Dorothea Williams is auditioning for a new pianist in her jazz ensemble. Nailing the audition, Joe is exuberant, failing to notice an open manhole before falling into it. He next finds himself disassociated with his body in an afterlife existence, a soul waiting for its final destination (dubbed “The Great Beyond”).

With dreams unfulfilled, Joe desperately wants his life back, escaping his fate by posing as a mentor for new souls in a pre-life training area called “The Great Before.” Joe’s assignment is to direct a soul called 22 to find her spark that will keep her happy and productive before assuming her role in the living world. However, 22 is a special case, spending eons avoiding the process under other mentors (even Mother Teresa lost her cool with her). When Terry, the accountant for souls, notices one is missing, she pursues Joe after he escapes back to Earth to regain his life.

Wonder Woman 1984 (2020)

January 2, 2021 ~ Vince Leo

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

The prolonged armed raid of the shopping mal reveals a jewelry store used as a front to fence valuable but stolen ancient artifacts brought to the Smithsonian for Diana (Gal Gadot) and her team to identify. That’s where we meet the newly hired Barbara Minerva (Kristen Wiig), a mousy gem specialist with self-esteem issues, particularly around the self-confident and beautiful Diana Prince. In particular, one stands out, a phallic piece identified as the Dreamstone, a crystal of myth once believed throughout ancient history to grant wishes. Cavalierly, Barbara makes her wish to be like Diana, though not knowing that also means like Wonder Woman as a by-product. Diana makes her wish for Steve Trevor to be back in her life to continue the life they never got to spend together.

Overnight, Barbara’s confidence begins to grow, and the men take note of her beauty while she begins to grow in strength and agility. At the same time, Diana is approached by a mysterious strange claiming to be Steve Trevor (Chris Pine). He doesn’t look like him, but after a few words that only Steve might know, she sees the character with Chris Pine’s face and voice henceforth. (This aspect will require audiences not to think too hard about an innocent man whose body will be used nonconsensually indefinitely for Diana to romance, while also having no family or friends in his life to notice he’s completely changed).

Villainy soon enters the scene when Max Lord (Pedro Pascal), a TV infomercial conman who has headed the financially failing oil company called Black Gold Cooperative, enters the scene. Lord discovers they have the Dreamstone, and he’s desperate enough to give it a try, using his charm on Barbara to get his hands on the piece and make his wish – which is to have the stone’s powers. The physical stone disintegrates, and now Max has the power to grant anyone a wish – a power he uses in exchanges for the wealth, power, and fame of others who deal with him directly.

However, what the wish makers don’t know is that there is a catch. Gaining the thing they desire most means losing the thing of most value they already possess. In Barbara’s case, it is her kindness. In Max’s case, it is a good father. And in Diana’s case, it is the superpowers she needs to save the world.

Patty Jenkins directs.

Onward (2020) | Dan Scanlon

March 7, 2020March 7, 2020 ~ Vince Leo

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

In this Pixar film, two teenage elf brothers in a town called New Mushroomton go on a quest that requires them to tap into the long-forgotten magic in the world to have one more day with the father who passed away before his youngest was born. The father left behind a gift for them to have when they both reached the age of sixteen, a wizard’s staff and an ultra-rare Phoenix Gem they can use to bring him back to life, but only for one day. The spell is cast, but the process gets interrupted halfway, leaving only dad’s animated legs to get to know. If they want to talk to him or give him so much as a hug, they’ll have to find another Phoenix Gem before the spell runs out. Voice work by Tom Holland and Chris Pratt. Directed by Dan Scanlon.

Pet Sematary (2019) | Kevin Kolsch & Dennis Widmyer

April 8, 2019April 18, 2019 ~ Vince Leo

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Pet Sematary is the second film adaptation of the Stephen King novel first published in 1983. The premise involves a family of four who relocate from the hustle and bustle of Boston to a small town in Maine called Ludlow on a wide parcel of land that includes many acres of wooded forest. It’s in that forest that their daughter Ellie (Jete Laurence) discovers a cemetery for beloved pets of people in the surrounding area, going back decades, including one belonging to their elderly neighbor Jud (John Lithgow). Turns out they may need the use of the cemetery, as their kind kitty named Church gets run over, causing the father, Louis (Jason Clarke), to have to bury the cat, though he can’t quite bring himself to tell Ellie and break her heart. Jud doesn’t want to see that happen and suggests burying Church in a special place far deeper into the woods. Lo and behold, Church is back with the family the next day, but it’s clear he’s not quite himself anymore.