The One and Only Ivan (2020) | Thea Sharrock

The story centers around Ivan, a silverback gorilla who lives in a cage as the star of a struggling animal show at a suburban shopping center called the Big Top Mall & Video Arcade at Exit 8. Ivan’s main schtick is to roar and look intimidating, but behind the scenes, he is a thoughtful and sensitive soul. Other talented animals under the care of beleaguered ringleader Mack include a baseball-playing chicken, a sassy poodle, a bunny, a seal, a parrot, and an elderly elephant named Stella, plus a stray mutt called Bob.

Ivan befriends the young daughter of the mall cleaner who hands him supplies to draw, and it becomes something he takes an interest in doing, which has Mack seeing dollar signs to save his floundering circus attraction. An adorable baby elephant named Ruby arrives to become the latest attraction, under the tutelage and loving guidance of Stella. The drawing and painting, plus Ruby’s arrival, trigger Ivan’s memories of his childhood of freedom in the wild with his family, and Stella doesn’t want Ruby to live a sheltered life as she has had. Ivan plans to break free and deliver Ruby to a life of freedom.

Featuring Bryan Cranston, Ariana Greenblatt, Ramon Rodriguez, Owain Arthur as live actors. Voice work by Sam Rockwell, Danny DeVito, Brooklynn Prince, Angelina Jolie, Chaka Khan, Ron Funches, Helen Mirren.

Vice (2018) | Adam McKay

Written and directed by Adam McKay, who impressed in his last effort from 2015, The Big ShortVice is specifically a biopic of sorts about former Vice President of the United States under George W. Bush, Dick Cheney — both of whom were seen as responsible for the policies that brought about the stock market crash covered so well in McKay’s prior film.  McKay covers Cheney’s rise from drunken slob, to shaping up by entering Wyoming business and politics, to becoming a power player in the Republican party in Washington (Chief of Staff under President Ford), to his failed ambition to become president, to becoming the CEO of Halliburton.  However, some would say that, after a successful bed on the bottom of the ticket for the 2000 and 2004 elections, he found a way, dubbed the Unitary Executive Theory, to become the most powerful nation in the world from the number-two position despite it being seen as a do-nothing office.

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017) Film Review

Frances McDormand shines in this potent dark comedy from Martin McDonagh, playing a grieving mother who goads the local police force to action when they haven’t found any leads to her daughter’s grisly death. Woody Harrelson and Sam Rockwell support.