My inner princess squealed each and every time director Rob Marshall reproduced an iconic scene from the original animated film, but my inner pervert sweated over the sheer eroticism of Ariel (Halle Bailey) and Prince Eric (Jonah Hauer-King) rowing the boat side by side during Kiss The Girl.
What I went into the movie knowing: family wedding, family secrets. What I didn’t know, and would come to understand, was the little unifier between the two: kidnapping. Which tends to ruin the wedding part, or dampen it at least, depending on who disappears, but it’s quite fertile in terms of secrets.
Laura (Penelope Cruz) returns to Spain for her little sister’s wedding, her teenage daughter Irene and young son in tow, husband left behind in Argentina for work.
Laura is happy to reconnect with sisters, parents, and dear friend\ex-lover Paco (Javier Bardem), who is himself happily married. Whatever used to be between them seems to have dissolved to merely friendship, though I’m not certain if everyone else is really convinced of that. At any rate, the wedding in the village church is beautiful and nothing can ruin it – not when Irene mischievously rings the bells in the clock tower during mass, and not when the priest takes the opportunity to hint heavily that Laura’s wealthy (but absent) husband should pay for its repair as he did for the church renovations. A 
reception follows in the courtyard of the family hotel. It is high-spirited, with lots of happy guests drinking, dancing, and making merry. Irene steals one too many unattended glasses of wine and retires to an early bedtime, with her little brother. But then the power goes out and Irene goes missing, which is when things get interesting.
Although I felt the film a tad overlong, Everyone Knows is engrossing thanks to its clever trail of breadcrumbs. A terrific ensemble cast helps pull this off, essential when everyone’s a suspect – even the crime itself is suspicious.
As those all-important first 48 hours tick by, we get to know our characters (or should I say suspects?) at their worst, which is an intimate introduction indeed. Old secrets are unfurled as new ones are forged and kept guarded – soon the whole village is under a dark cloud of tension. And sure, they milk the tension a little longer than is fair. It’s moody and captivating but doesn’t quite know when to call it quits.
Seeing real-life lovers Cruz and Bardem act opposite each other is always a treat, and both get to flex a little – if not to impress us, then each other. Cruz has real fire (her real-life children with Bardem likely help ignite her mama bear instincts), and combined with her seductive beauty, imagine the difficulty I had taking my eyes off her long enough to read the subtitles. The struggle is real – multiplied by however many Penelope-lookalikes hired to play her sisters are on screen at any given time. The film’s got some challenges, you bet, but all obstacles can be overcome given sufficient motivation.
George and Amal Clooney welcomed their twins Ella and Alexander in June (at the same hospital where Kate and William’s royal children were born), so people were ecstatic to see them looking terribly in love at the Venice Film Festival in early September. George was there promoting his directorial effort, Suburbicon, starring pal Matt Damon. Clooney has a home on Lake Como (in Italy) where he retreats from the world every summer. It’s where he brought his newborn twins home this summer, and where a paparazzo snuck in to take surreptitious pictures of the babies at their most vulnerable. He started coming to Lake Como 16 years ago, when he and his friend Rande Gerber (Cindy Crawford’s husband) stumbled on the Villa Oleandra while 
crisscrossing Italy on their motorbikes. After one of the bikes broke down outside its gates, the owners ushered them in and proceeded to sell Clooney their house for $7.5 million. And it was in Italy where George first met Amal and it was in beautiful Venice itself where they later wed. After the Venice Film Festival, Clooney and family flew to his hometown of Kentucky to show off the twins to his father, who’d been 
too ill to travel to meet them overseas. Then, sadly, George had to put down his beloved dog Einstein (who co-starred with him in an ad campaign for Omega watches in 2015) in L.A., before dashing back up to Toronto for TIFF, without wife Amal or darling babies.
Another new mum TIFF goers were eager to 
spot was Carey Mulligan. She made her first public appearance since having her second child in August. Her husband, Marcus Mumford (frontman for Mumford & Sons), stayed home with the kids while she graced TIFF with her presence; she was there for her new film, Mudbound.
Annette Bening, who was the jury president in Venice, was at TIFF to promote her new film, Film Stars Don’t Die In Liverpool in which she plays a Hollywood leading lady who catches the interest of a much younger actor, played by Jamie Bell. Both stars brought their famous counterparts: Warren Beatty and Bening have been married since 1992, whilst Jamie Bell and wife Kate Mara have been married all of 2 months. Incidentally, Bell walked the red 
carpet in kind at the premiere of Mara’s TIFF offering, Chappaquiddick.
Amelia Warner walked the TIFF red carpet. She’s the composer for the new Mary Shelley reincarnation starring Elle Fanning. Her famous date: husband Jamie Dornan. Married for 4 years, they have 2 kids together, who were evidently being babysat elsewhere while Mom and Dad enjoy a glamourous night out.
The Mother! premiere was full of famous dates: star 
Jennifer Lawrence is currently dating her director, Darren Aronofsky (they are usually careful to sneak one or more costars between themselves when taking group photos). Â Her co-star Javier Bardem is married to the lovely Penelope Cruz (7 years and counting). Bardem and Cruz star together in a film on offer at the Venice Film Festival, Loving Pablo. And let’s not forget Michelle Pfeiffer and her longtime 
partner, David E. Kelley, who accompanied his wife to her photo call in Venice and then she in turn went to the Emmys with him, where the show he was writing for, Big Little Lies, scored some major gold.
Nicole Kidman always has some heavy weight 
arm candy. Her husband, Keith Urban, was on hand for the TIFF premiere of The Killing of a Sacred Deer, and was also by her side at said Emmys (she was nominated and won for her work on the very same Big Little Lies – it’s very good, you should watch).
Alicia Vikander attended the TIFF premiere of Euphoria solo (she was also there with Submergence), but last year she and her boyfriend Michael Fassbender were all over TIFF red carpets since they starred together in The Light Between Oceans.
Also flying solo this year: Jason Sudeikis, who stars in Kodachrome with Elizabeth Olsen and Ed Harris, and appears in Downsizing alongside Matt Damon as well. His better (and prettier) half, Olivia Wilde, stayed home with the kids.
No word on where Daniel Craig was hiding this year but he wasn’t on the arm of his lovely wife Rachel Weisz, who was there for Disobedience, her new film costarring next to Rachel McAdams, even though Craig himself appeared in another TIFF selection, Kings.
I did get to spot Sam Rockwell on the TIFF red carpet for Three Billboards Outside 
Ebbing, Missouri and of course in Venice, where he posed with his wife Leslie Bibb, even though I didn’t know until I saw them together that they were together. I know her from all the way back on Popular (and on The League, where she plays Mark Duplass’s nasty ex-wife), but you may have seen her more recently in To The Bone. In this photo, Rockwell’s Three Billboards costar Woody Harrelson poses with his wife, Laura Louie.
I spied Dave Franco on the red carpet for The Disaster Artist, a real family affair. His 
brother James directs and co-stars, and their other brother Tom Franco also appears (briefly!). So does Dave’s very new wife, Alison Brie – she plays his sometime girlfriend.
Greta Gerwig debuted her first solo directorial effort at TIFF this year and her partner let her lap up all the attention on her own, but in other years she and beau Noah Baumbach have 
attended together – particularly when they’ve done a movie together, like Mistress America. This year, Greta posed alongside some of her Lady Bird leading ladies: Lois Smith, Odeya Rush, and Beanie Feldstein (left) who has a famous sibling rather than a famous date – Jonah Hill is her big brother.
We’ve had a very crazy month, having attended 3 festivals in as many weeks, and we’re about to do it again in October, so stay tuned. For now, here are a few snaps from Sean and Jay’s big adventure in Venice.
Some stories do not need to be told. Mother! falls squarely within that category. I walked out of the theatre at the end of the movie asking, what was the point? Why did I suffer through two hours of claustrophobic misery to get back where I started? Â And actually, further behind than where I started because at least then IÂ 
was curious about Darren Aronofsky’s latest project. Afterward, I was just tired and dreading this review.
Mother! is not an awful film, I don’t think. It has a stellar cast and is visually captivating (though it’s too harsh and dour to ever be beautiful). Maybe some will even appreciate the crazy downward spiral that is this film, as it goes to soul-devouring depths that most wouldn’t dare to approach. Me? Not one bit. Not even a little. It made me uncomfortable right from the start, and not in a challenging way, and not in a way that offered me anything.
This film is the same as Javier Bardem’s nameless poet: selfish, desiring my affection, and oblivious to anything else. It is art that takes from the audience rather than giving, which also echoes the plot of the movie itself. Is that intentional? If so, that would make Aronofsky our version of the poet, and I would suggest that you not give him your energy in service of his creation. I already gave enough for both of us.
Officially subtitled Dead Men Tell No Tales (or Salazar’s Revenge, depending where you live), this bloated paycheque party is only the fifth in the franchise though it feels more like the 25th. In truth I’ve never ventured into this franchise before, never had even a pique of interest despite Sean proclaiming some love for the first, but it’s what was playing at the drive-in this weekend, so we all but must.
Now, keeping in mind that watching a movie from the comfort of your own car does 
have its advantages, I present to you my official synopsis of the film: Orlando Bloom has boils. His son vows revenge. Cut to: his son is now old enough to assemble a proper rescue, and it somehow involves the Johnny Depp pirate who is a drunken lout (does this feel less funny now that Johnny Depp’s an actual abusive drunk?) and Geoffrey Rush who is a greedy lout, and Javier Bardem who is a dead lout with floaty hair. Because these three old dudes demand such hefty paycheques, the production has no money left and hires two unknowns in the lead. Orlando Bloom’s son (“the traitor”) and a random curly-haired wench (“the witch”) somehow decide their fates are entwined and they both have to use Johnny Depp to get what they want. Buzzfeed, Buzzfeed, Buzzfeed, lots of boats, gruesome ghost sharks, creepy CGI young Johnny Depp, Buzzfeed, Buzzfeed, Buzzfeed, everyone lives happily ever after, except those who don’t.
So yeah, you caught me. I spent a lot of time on my phone during this movie, just trying to quell the boredom. This was not a great entry point into the series. Actual Buzzfeed 
articles I deemed more worthy of my time than this film: Literally Just A Bunch of Queer Tweets That Will Make You Proud AF, 17 Photos of Weddings So Disastrous They’ll Make You Laugh Until You Cry (I did neither), 19 Hilarious ‘Worst Summer Job’ Tweets That Will Make You Cringe and Laugh (I did neither), Here’s Why I Could Never Be A Server, This Family Threw A Quinceañera For Their Cat, And It’s Everything (it’s not, but it’s pretty good and I don’t even like cats), This Guy’s Genius McDonald’s Hack Has People Shook (I felt relatively unshaken myself, but I guess I just have a pretty high threshold for creating my own secret menu items).
Which is not to say that you won’t enjoy the movie. If you’re a swashbuckler, I think you can manage to be entertained. Sure it’s hollow and derivative, but it’s the best damn 5th installment of a franchise based on a mildly popular amusement park ride that I’ve ever seen. The CGI looks expensive as hell and that dead shark sequence would have been really cool had it not been entirely spoiled in the trailers. Plus there’s a needless cameo by Paul McCartney and some blatant sexism and transphobia. What’s not to love?
It’s probably never a good day to be a cab driver, but Max is having an exceptionally bad day: he’s just trying to put in his time until he can get his own limo business going, minding his own business, when by a stroke of bad luck, Vincent climbs into his backseat.
Vincent (Tom Cruise) turns out to be a contract killer. We know this because he intends to use Max (Jamie Foxx) as the getaway driver in a series of murders across L.A. The first 
unlucky victim takes Max by surprise when he crashes through his windshield. That fearsome windshield crack will be a thorn in Max’s side, but it’s just a small obstacle in a rather wild ride. Max is a hostage but under surveillance by the cops he looks rather like an accomplice. Good thing Detective Fanning (Mark Ruffalo) is on the case! He’ll save him!
But not before Max realizes he’s the only one who can save Annie (Jada Pinkett Smith), an attractive lawyer who coincidentally gave him her number earlier that day. Turns out she’s working the wrong case, and her name is on Vincent’s hit list. Yikes.
Director Michael Mann once drove cabs; so did his father before him, and his grandfather owned a taxi company.
Considered to play the role of Vincent: Russel Crowe, Edward Norton, John Travolta, Leonardo DiCaprio, Colin Farrell
Considered to play the role of Max: Adam Sandler, Cuba Gooding Jr, Robert De Niro, Johnny Depp
I’m glad we got the Cruise-Foxx combo because they made such a great pair. It’s refreshing to see Cruise as the villain and he channels sinister very well. I’m sure Foxx felt it, particularly in those tense scenes in which Cruise is sitting right behind him, leaving Max vulnerable and twitchy. Collateral may be a but formulaic but it’s a highly polished thriller with some great performances. Michael Mann stylishly serves up heaps of tensions, and the performances are great, never overcooked.
ASSHOLES WATCHING MOVIES 