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Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘The Plague' Review: Boys Will Bully Boys in a Stylish if Schematic Summer-Camp Psychodrama
The idea of adolescence as a horror story is not new, but it's given a splashy workout in Charlie Polinger's queasily stylish debut feature, in which the swimming pools, lockers rooms and bunk-bed dormitories of a boys' water polo camp are a puberty petrie dish livid with sinister bacteria. Drawn from experience and benefiting from some standout performances among its well-selected young cast, 'The Plague' has a familiar coming-of-age narrative, but stranger, subtler undercurrents of creeping dismay at the men these boys will become when, at this formative age, cruelty chlorinates the water they swim in. Sensitive, 12-year-old Ben (Everett Blunck) comes to the Tom Lerner Water Polo Camp in the summer of 2003 as an outsider twice over. He's not only joining after the second session has started, he's also a new arrival to the area. And, as we understand from an early conversation with his affable but ineffectual coach (Joel Edgerton, who also produces) a reluctant one: there's hurt in the studied neutrality of his tone when he describes how his mother uprooted their lives to be with her new lover. Perhaps the wrenching change-up of father figure fuels Ben's anxiety to fit in, but also maybe that's just the way he is. When one of the kids' endless games of would-you-rather makes him choose between 'not fucking a dog but having everyone think you did, or fucking a dog and no one knows,' Ben opts for, well, screwing the pooch. More from Variety Meet The Space Program, the Producing Collective Behind Buzzy Cannes Film 'The Plague': 'For Indie Movies, It's Not One Size Fits All' Joel Edgerton and Toni Collette to Star in Black Comedy 'Fangs,' Cornerstone and CAA Selling Lucy McKendrick's Directorial Debut (EXCLUSIVE) Charlie Polinger's 'The Plague,' Starring Joel Edgerton, Boarded by AGC, Cinetic and UTA Independent Film Group Ahead of Cannes Premiere (EXCLUSIVE) In any wolf pack, the Alpha is obvious and even among these cubs, Jake (a superb Kayo Martin) is easily identifiable as the ringleader. Deceptively cherubic beneath a shock of tousled strawberry blonde hair, and wearing a surprisingly adult expression of skeptical watchfulness, Jake is initially friendly enough to the newcomer — at least once Ben begins answering to the nickname 'Soppy,' devised after Jake picks up on his very minor speech impediment. There's an easier target for Jake's lazy but keen-eyed ridicule. Eli (Kenny Rasmussen) was presumably already an oddball — into magic tricks and solo flailing dance moves and lurching non-sequitur conversation — even before he developed a disfiguring skin complaint. The angry-looking rash that covers his arms and torso is probably some sort of eczema or contact dermatitis, but the boys are still of an age to be fascinated by lepers and curses and so Jake declares it 'the plague.' Eli is ostracized, to the point that all the kids dive for another cafeteria table if he so much as pulls up a chair. Good-natured Ben, in the throes of a panicky uncertainty that from the outside is sweetly poignant, if only because it will be gone in a year or a month or a minute, feels for Eli's predicament— possibly more than the quite contentedly peculiar Eli does for himself. But as he barely has enough social capital to guarantee his own acceptance into Jake's circle, Ben befriends the outcast cautiously, away from prying eyes. It's fine to make taboo transgressions if nobody knows about it. DP Steven Breckon punctuates 'The Plague' with interludes of woozy underwater photography, in which the boys' bodies dagger into the pool and then tread water, resembling so many headless sea horses. Sometimes, while Johan Lenox's excellent, '70s horror-inflected, nightmare-choir score reaches a bombastic crescendo, the girls of the synchronized swimming class who share the pool and fire the boys' crude erotic imaginings, are shown inverted, so they appear to be dancing floatily across the water's underside surface. These subaquatic symphonies give a touch of the phantasmagoric to a milieu that's otherwise cleverly recreated from the banal remembered details of an early noughties childhood: the Capri-Suns, the pop tunes, that brief phase where kids believe that smoking kitchen-cupboard nutmeg will get them high. Perhaps too the subjective nature of Polinger's memory of a time when the peer-group dynamic was so much more influential than any peripheral authority figure, accounts for why these kids are so often unconstrained by adult supervision. Jake naturally takes advantage of that freedom to continue his offhand reign of terror, one he can maintain without ever really lifting a finger. Almost all of the violence in 'The Plague' is self-inflicted and therefore easily disavowed by this tweenaged tyrant – a character so vivid that it's tempting to imagine a more provocative movie told from the bully's perspective. But as 'The Plague' ramps up to an impressively eerie, body-horror-styled finale, it takes a rather more expected turn toward a significant, if hardly triumphal moment of personal growth for unhappy camper Ben. Teetering on the brink of adult society with its own bewilderingly insidious notions about masculinity and conformity, you can dive in or you can be pushed, and it's only then you can know if you'll sink or swim. Best of Variety The Best Albums of the Decade
Yahoo
09-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Godzilla x Kong' gets new title and teaser; Independent Spirit Awards set new venue; Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson set for Mubi horror movie; and more top stories today
Gold Derby's for May 9, 2025. Warner Bros. announced the official title for its next MonsterVerse film: Godzilla x Kong: Supernova, along with a fun teaser offering a phone number to call to report a Titan sighting, (240) MON-ARCH. The film is starting production now for a 2027 release. Grant Sputore (I Am Mother) is directing, with Kaitlyn Dever, , , , , Alycia Debnam-Carey, and starring. More from GoldDerby 'American Idol' renewed for Season 24 'Poker Face' Season 2 - instant Emmy predictions for the acclaimed Peacock comedy Marvel's 'Thunderbolts' to cross $100 million, while 'Clown in a Cornfield' slashes into top 5 Film Independent, the organization that puts on the Independent Spirit Awards, announced that the 41st edition of the award show honoring the best of indie film will take place on Sunday, Feb. 15, 2026. The organization also announced a new venue for the show, the Hollywood Palladium. The show usually takes place in a big tent on the Santa Monica beach, but the area is undergoing renovations in preparation for the 2028 Olympics. Television superproducer David E. Kelley will receive the inaugural Showrunner Award at the ATX TV Festival, honoring his singular impact on the medium. The award presentation will include a screening of the first episode of his Apple TV+ series Presumed Innocent, followed by a conversation with Kelley about the series (which has been renewed for a second season), as well as a retrospective look into the many influential series that he has helmed over the course of his career, including The Practice, Ally McBeal, Big Little Lies, and more. Indie powerhouse Mubi has found its next The Substance in Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma. The company will distribute writer-director Jane Schoenbrun's (I Saw the TV Glow) horror movie Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, with Plan B producing. Hannah Einbinder (Hacks) and Gillian Anderson (The X-Files) will star. The film is described as "an insane yet cozy midnight odyssey that beckons to unsuspecting viewers from the horror section at the local video store" about a director who becomes obsessed with casting the "final girl" for a horror movie. Golden Globe nominee Joel Edgerton (Loving) and Academy Award nominee Toni Collette (The Sixth Sense) will star in black comic thriller Fangs alongside writer-director Lucy McKendrick, who is making her directorial debut. McKendrick will play Teddy (McKendrick), the daughter of a private prison mogul, who becomes obsessed with a charismatic inmate who goes by Fangs (Edgerton). "Consumed with desire for the self-proclaimed 'psychopath,' Teddy risks everything as her life spirals spectacularly out of control," per the official description. Ted, Seth MacFarlane's dirty talking teddy bear franchise, is expanding again, with an animated sequel series set up at Peacock. (Peacock also has a live-action prequel series, which has been renewed for a second season.) MacFarlane, , , and Jessica Barth will reprise their movie roles for the series, which is set after the events of Ted 2, with Kyle Mooney and Liz Richman joining. Carrie Coon (The White Lotus) and Lily James (Pam and Tommy) are set to star alongside previously announced (The Last of Us) and (The Order) in cult thriller Harmonia. The film is directed by Best Live-Action Short Film Oscar nominee Guy Nattiv (Skin) and based on his grandmother's own experience with a cult. Coon will play a troubled woman who meets a charismatic spiritual leader (James) who runs an all-female commune called Harmonia and abandons her life to join it. Ramsey and Young play her daughters, who go to rescue their mother and find themselves caught up in the cult. Aaron Eckhart (The Dark Knight) will star in "inspirational thriller" The Old Man in the Dunes for faith-based producer Angel Studios (The Sound of Freedom, King of Kings). The film tells the story of "an enigmatic old man living in the dunes who is unjustly accused of killing a local. His only hope is a steadfast public defender determined to unearth the truth." The film is written and directed by Christian Guiton in his feature debut and based on a short of the same name. The film will shoot later this year for a 2026 release. Best of GoldDerby 'I've never been on a show that got this kind of recognition': Katherine LaNasa on 'The Pitt's' success and Dana's 'existential crisis' How Charlie Cox characterizes Matt Murdock through action scenes in 'Daredevil: Born Again' 'Agatha All Along' star Joe Locke on learning from Kathryn Hahn, musical theater goals, and the 'Heartstopper' movie with Kit Connor Click here to read the full article.
