Toy Story 4– As good as this movie is, it feels like this has to be the last Toy Story movie. There’s nothing left to do with these characters. Thankfully, I think with the way it ends, everyone who makes it agrees with that idea.
Andy’s little sister, Bonnie, is off to kindergarten and on her first day, she makes a new toy, Forky out of bits and bobs of junk. Woody, the perennial control freak, stows away in Bonnie’s backpack to make sure she’s okay. In spotting for her, he basically co-creates Forky and Woody takes this confused misfit under his wing to shepherd him into this new, important role of a child’s toy.
The movie hits all the familiar Toy Story beats. Identity, purpose, family, and love. Cue another road trip for a series of rescue missions, new toy characters, and escalating shenanigans. It’s been a while since I’ve seen 1-3 but it felt like the autonomy of the toys was out of control in this one. They barely try to hide that they are alive to people. They move around and affect so much out in the open it’s nearly impossible that no one notices them.
As much as it sounds like I’m casting shade all over the place, it is a really good movie. Yeah, it’s familiar, but it’s doing all of it really well. There’s a lot of funny moments with a ton of heart and a great message. The new (Ducky and Bunny!) and reoccurring characters (Bo Peep!) are great. I also really like what they do with the antagonist, Gabby Gabby. A big step up from 2 and 3 where those were way darker and less redeemable. As a whole, this entry feels way more optimistic and dour than 3 (which is my least favorite in the series).
It’s rather obvious to talk about how good Pixar animation is but it has to be said how stunning this movie looks. Especially the backgrounds. They figured out some new technology with lighting and the way they make the movie look like it was shot with real-life cameras that continue to bring this craft to the next level. Great finale to a beloved series.
Venom– This entire movie rides on the shoulders of Tom Hardy, it’s pretty amazing to watch him hold the whole thing together. The last time Venom was in a movie, it was way back in Spiderman 3, which was awful. Shoehorned into a sloppy movie was a meaningless move so it barely counts as a cinematic appearance. So here we have a stand-alone movie for Venom, not even a mention of Spiderman, which is a bold and rather dangerous move. With no web-slinger to immediately draw people in, it was a gamble that more than diehards of 90s comics would show up. Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) is our main man, so that part of the comics was kept intact. Venom is all origin–how the symbiote landed on Earth and how it manages to attach to Brock. This turns into an anti-hero story where the vicious creature takes a liking to its host and decides to help save Earth and stick around.
With no Spiderman, they needed to cast some serious star power as Eddie Brock to get eyes on what would otherwise be a direct to home video animated movie. Going with, and ultimately Tom committing 100% to this script paid off. Venom made a shocking amount of money at the box office, nearly a billion worldwide. Hardy makes Eddie Brock his own character, giving him a weird accent and a very distinct mannerisms.
When Venom infects Eddie, Hardy gives a wild physical performance that completely sells that his body is being taken over. The first bursts of Venom’s powers are wild and powerful and when he completely takes form, the monster looks awesome. It’s funny, weird, and kinetic energy from there to the end of the movie. Action is very good until the finale. The apartment brawl evokes the creativity of a Spiderman fight and the motorcycle chase is really unique and fun to watch (much better than what was done for Black Panther’s street chase). Despite the overall carnage of the finale, it’s not effective because it’s clearly one shiny black CG blob mushing into a grayish CG blob, at night, on a CG set. It’s frequently too hard to see what’s going on or it has no weight to it. It’s hard to feel engaged despite a good villain set up.
This turned out better than I thought and I’m curious to see where they go for the next one. As much as I liked it, I can’t say it’s worth watching more than once. And if you don’t like the genre, there’s nothing here to change your mind.
I, Tonya– In the early 90s, the women’s figure skating world in the US was led largely by three competitors: Nancy Kerrigan, Tonya Harding, and Kristi Yamaguchi. In 1994, just weeks before the Olympics in Norway, Kerrigan was attacked at practice for the US Nationals by a man hired by Harding’s ex-husband Jeff Gillooly. Kerrigan was the defending national champion and a favorite for the Olympics. I, Tonya is the bio-pic of Tonya’s life leading up to that point and few years after.
Harding is played by Margot Robbie and the movie mostly sticks to her perspective. I really liked the storytelling technique used as it’s different from most documentary and investigative pieces you usually watch. Real interviews of the principal participants (Jeff, his friend Shawn, Tonya’s mother LaVona) are recreated by the cast members to fill in the narrative between life events. Each one of them more or less giving their story of what really happened. As you watch Tonya’s childhood until she’s 15 years old, Tonya’s life is told in the traditional way and then Tonya and Jeff start breaking the fourth wall. You’ll be watching them argue in their home, for example, and then Tonya will stop, look at the camera and speak directly to you (“This did not happen”) and then the scene will snap back into motion. It makes the picture feel more like someone is letting you watch their memories and they are interjecting when they feel like they need to make sure you stay on their side. It’s an interesting approach and fosters the constant notion of the unreliable narrator. How much of this is true? How much of this actually happened and if it did, did it really happen like this? Tonya, Jeff, and LaVona have a lot to say about things. LaVona at one point jumps in via an interview segment where she basically feels left out of the story and wants back in…and she does.
What’s shown is years of chaos. Tonya was physically and emotionally abused for years on end starting with her mother. LeVona started Tonya in skating at the age of four and put the weight of the world on her daughter’s shoulders to be the best in the world. Working as a waitress, LeVona put all her spare money into paying for Tonya’s skating career and you guess how many times she would bring that up anytime Tonya “talked back” to her. Tonya had a natural talent for figure skating and she grew by leaps and bounds with the proper training.
Tonya never fit into anything, an outsider who struggled to be noticed and appreciated. Her dad left her mom when Tonya was young, she grew up poor, she was never accepted into the figure skating world. She didn’t look the part, act the part, talk like the other girls. She was counter to the very stuffy and wealthy culture of competitive skating. She painted her nails wild colors, chose rock and metal music instead of classical to skate to. She never had the money to buy the proper costumes, so she made a lot of them. One of the best parts is when they show Tonya hunting rabbits with her dad and they make a fur coat out of the pelts. All the 9-year old girls around her had real mink coats and just to try to fit in, she did what she had to do. When that got her sneers and side looks, up went her middle finger. What drove everyone really nuts is that this misfit couldn’t be ignored or dismissed on her skills. She could compete with anyone, a 1988 first-place finish in Moscow marking the start of her making her mark. In 1991 she won her first National (the US Championships) and put her name in the history books as the first woman to land a triple axel in competition. None of her peers would even try to do it. She made into the 1992 Olympics, placing 4th behind Nancy Kerrigan.
And then the “incident” in 1994 happens. I, Tonya depicts Nancy Kerrigan’s attack largely outside of Tonya’s input and control. More guilty by association than anything else (she ended up pleading guilty to hindering the investigation). What is clear, is that she was surrounded by blithering idiots.
This was a hell of a movie that is crafted remarkably well. It constantly moves in terms of story, drama, emotion, and direction. Margot Robbie is awesome, as is Allison Janney playing LaVona. I knew nothing about the details, I only remember seeing the footage of Kerrigan right after she was hurt and Harding showing the Olympic judges her broken skate laces in Norway. It’s up to you to decide if you think Tonya is an awful person (or a liar or both) after watching this. I think I, Tonya is a good example of someone being put through the wringer of a life they were born into. The journey is often marked with ugly and uncomfortable struggles.