Jeff Wells

My God….I was almost shocked by how ineffective and annoying Steven Soderbergh‘s Presence is, and I’m saying that as one who’s generally admired or at least been okay with Soderbergh’s “bauble” flicks.

A friend calls it “the very definition of a B-minus movie.”

It’s obviously wokey in the use of Ryan (West Mulholland), a sickening psycho white kid villain…standard evil toxic paleface syndrome, par for the course. This plus a mostly Asian family of four coping with Mulholland’s initially subtle creepitude…the teenage daughter Chloe (Callina Liang) grappling with his casual-but-aggressive sexuality, and her older brother Tyler (Eddy Maday) triggered by Mulholland at the finale.

I’m sorry but David Koepp’s screenplay is just a flat-out slog to wade through. I don’t know the right term for the exact polar opposite of “sharp and engaging with an interesting subtext”, but that’s what Koepp’s dialogue is. The story also kinda blows.

I had read the Wiki synopsis a couple of times before last night’s viewing, mainly because of shitty sound mixes that sometimes obscure key plot details. I would’ve been completely lost in the thicket if I hadn’t done this.

I’d read a few reviews and found it interesting that no one even mentioned that Presence is basically about a three-quarters Asian-American family, albeit with an overweight, bearded, all-but-hairless Anglo dad named Chris (Chris Sullivan) with a worry-wart personality.

Apparently even a cursory mention of the ethnicity factor (which is obviously anecdotal) makes one a racist MAGA xenophobe, and therefore subject to termination.

Presence is set in a bland environment — a nice older home in a typical suburban town that could be fucking anywhere. It was actually shot in Cranford, New Jersey, which isn’t that far from HE’s hometown of Westfield.

Peter Andrews‘ wide-angle cinematography “lies” in the manner of online real-estate photography, which always tries to make everything look bigger and more spacious with wide-angle or spherical lenses.

And the shadowed under-lighting feels oppressive. The upstairs bedrooms have a fair amount of sunlight but the downstairs rooms appear to have been coated with a blend of turkey gravy and black bean soup. Why does it look so fucking morose?

Pretty Chloe is obviously the most sympathetic character, but she’s dull. Hell, they’re all dull. Right away I said to myself, “These people are an absolute drag to hang with…they exude misery and neuroticism and anxiety and emotional avoidance with every line, every furtive glance or gesture.

Even the protective, flitting-around, good-guy ghost is is a bit dull.

Overweight Chris brings in a similarly proportioned medium, played by Natalie Woodlams-Torr, who immediately senses the presence, and also discerns that “something bad” might happen in the near future.

Chloe shrieks early on when she sees that some books and notebooks have been moved off the bed onto a desk, but when dad asks if she’s cool, she immediately lies. Why?

Tyler is an insensitive, judgmental dick who sees nothing beyond or beneath his own macho arrogance, but at the very last second and after the ghost has woken him from drugged stupor, Tyler suddenly becomes an idiotic superhero avenger…I can say no more but in my eighth-row seat I went “what the FUCK?”

Plus Tyler’s lack of basic decency is off-putting. Right after meeting Chloe for the first time, psycho Ryan indicates to Tyler that she’s hot and he’d like to fuck her, and Tyler is seemingly “whatever” about this. This is how older brothers respond to sexual invasiveness concerning their sisters?

It turns out that laid-back, blonde-haired Ryan is a drink-spiking fiend who’s not only a threat to Chloe but was also…uhm, involved with her late friend Nadia. (Saying no more.) I was muttering to myself, “This is the best plot driver that Koepp and Soderbergh could come up with? A sinister white kid who dopes his victims and has a thing for plastic wrap?”

HE to hip filmmakers: The villain or the serial killer or the corrupt, ethically-challenged guy doesn’t have to be a white male. Creativity and imagination can and should allow for a little diversity in this matter. Go with a gun-toting lesbian on occasion. Or a Glenn Close-resembling Kentucky yokel. Or (gasp!) a black dude. Or a Latino fat-ass. Or an Islamic jihadist. Or a Proud Boys nutter who happens to be a person of color or, let’s say, a Russian gopnik.

I’ll be catching Steven Soderbergh‘s Presence this evening, but why does it have a lousy C-plus rating on CinemaScore and a 54% ticket-buyer rating on Rotten Tomatoes? I know that general audiences don’t tend to like elevated horror. Too subtle or cerebral? Not enough in the way of standard-issue jolt moments?

I’ve read the Wiki synopsis twice, and it seems at least psychologically intriguing.

Friendo: “It’s your kind of creepy cool. Cold and sterile. Well done.”

From Owen Gleiberman’s 1.20.24 Sundance review:

Matt Zoller Seitz:

Deadline‘s Anthony D’Alessandro:

…are not “wrong ones.” There is very little public support when it comes to deporting people in the country illegally who have not been convicted of a crime. The Trump plan will reportedly initially focus on immigrants who’ve committed crimes. To what extent will ICE agents start rounding up illegals with a clean record? No telling.

Ancient Chinese movie director’s curse: “May you peak during your first six years, and then experience a long, very gradual, mostly erratic decline over the next 25 years.”

Friendo: Did you ever get to meet/interview Michael Ritchie? Yes, he made stinkers like The Golden Child and The Island. but don’t you miss the guy who directed The Bad News Bears, Smile, The Candidate and Downhill Racer?

HE: Downhill Racer, The Candidate and Smile comprise Ritchie’s masterful trio. In late ’23 I finally saw and had an okay time with The Bad News Bears, but I don’t swear by it. Plus I was agreeably amused by Semi-Tough (’77).

Friendo: You don’t think BNB was his masterpiece?

HE: No — Downhill Racer and The Candidate, both starring peak Robert Redford, are the top two. Smile is a close third.

Friendo: Disagree, pal. Ritchie’s best, in the correct order, are BEARS, SMILE, CANDIDATE, FLETCH, RACER, DIGGSTOWN and SEMI-TOUGH. I might add AN ALMOST PERFECT AFFAIR to the mix as Monica Vitti is my #1 time-travel crush.

HE: Diggstown?

EW‘s Chris Willman on 4.26.01: “It’s difficult to think of any director, ever, who had a more consistently uneven career.”

Ritchie died of cancer in 2001, at the age of 62.

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Just about everything that ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith said last night was incisive, spot-on, brilliant.

Posted on Axios on 1.19.25: “The $TRUMP memecoin — a financial asset that didn’t exist [last] Friday afternoon — now accounts for about 89% of Donald Trump’s net worth.

“Why it matters: The coin (technically a token that’s issued on the Solana blockchain) has massively enriched Trump personally, enabled a mechanism for the crypto industry to funnel cash to him, and created a volatile financial asset that allows anyone in the world to financially speculate on Trump’s political fortunes.”

Posted on The Byte, also on 1.19: “The whole thing reeks to high heaven. Trump’s crypto isn’t shooting up in value because of any intrinsic technical or business acumen; it’s doing so because investors believe — rightly, in all likelihood — that it will be a lucrative conflict of interest over the next four years.”

Just saw it minutes ago…”Buster!”

1.25.25 update — posted this morning in below comment thread:

The idea behind yesterday’s “Anguished, Scowling, Bitter” post was not hate per se. I was mostly okay with Emilia Perez, remember, when I first saw it in Cannes eight months ago, and I don’t hate it now.

But it certainly DOES flirt with mediocrity during the second half. And the bottom-line truth is that if not for the trans signpost factor, Perez would simply not be a Best Picture nominee.

This is a plea for Academy voters to emerge from the cultural woke cocoon of the past six or seven years, and to finally put aside sexual-identity or gender issues as deciding criteria. Enough with the social justice warrior crap.

Please consider voting for the Best Picture nominee that doesn’t do the woke two-step (please give that nagging “revolutionary” ethos a rest) while actually fulfilling and delivering a certain kind of high on its own emotional and cinematic terms. Which is what Anora, Conclave and A Complete Unknown manage to do, handily.

Joe and Jane Popcorn voted for Trump in order to get rid of the crazy wokey or at least keep it on the sidelines. For the love of God, smell the coffee. The woke point has been made, and now it’s time to set that bird free.

HE commenter K. Bowen: “It seems like the Academy is about to hand the trophy to a movie no one actually likes.”

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I sympathize with owners of burnt-to-the-ground homes who want to clean up and remove debris as quickly as possible. I’m no Trumpie but The Beast telling L.A. mayor Karen Bass that residents should be allowed to start clearing out rubble with all due haste…that’s a good thing. Don’t keep them from doing so because of this or that nickle-and-dime regulation…regulations which always slow things down by weeks if not months.

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From Zack Sharf‘s 1.24.25 Variety story about Sophie Hyde‘s Jimpa, a story about “queerness and queer joy and trans joy,” according to costar Aud Mason-Hyde, Hyde’s non-binary son.

Mason-Hyde plays the gender-ambiguous Frances, Olivia Colman portrays Frances’ mom Hannah, and John Lithgow becomes Jimpa, Frances’ Amsterdam-residing gay granddad.

Sharf: “One of the most notable aspects of Jimpa is that it features full-frontal nudity from Lithgow, who is 79 years old.

“The actor says that ‘nudity is an extraordinary tool in creating an impact…it’s the one thing all of us hide from the rest of the world…it’s the one thing we keep guarded and very much to ourselves [but] if you’re willing to expose that for a good reason in the telling of a story, then there’s nothing more powerful.’”

Thanks to Scharf and Lithgow for their candor. I wasn’t all that interested in seeing Jimpa, frankly, but now I’m really not interested.

Three years ago Hyde’s Good Luck To You, Leo Grande (’22), which also featured an older actor (i.e., mid 50-ish Emma Thompson) performing a nude scene, played Sundance. I wrote a piece about the film on 1.26.22, and here’s one of my comments:

“I wouldn’t want to see a nude scene with anyone who’s too old or saggy or out-of-shape. There are very few older actors whom I’d be willing to watch without clothing, but think about the possibilities. Imagine, for example, if Neil Young or Jack Nicholson decided to star in a film that called for full-frontal schlongola. My reaction would be filled with terror.

“Even a nude scene with a muscular, rugged-looking old actor like Harrison Ford…even that might be a problem.”

If Joe Biden had kept his word about being a one-term “bridge” president and encouraged a competitive Democratic Party primary process to start in the summer of ’23, a strong candidate (possibly Kamala Harris, possibly someone better) might have emerged…a candidate who might have defeated Donald Trump on 11.5.24.

But of course, Joe turned arrogant and decided that God wanted him to successfully run for re-election, and that decision basically doomed democracy in the U.S. of A., and here we are. Joe caused it, Joe did it…Joe is the bad guy. Which is precisely what James Carville said to Al Hunt a couple of days ago.

Penned by Sasha with significant Jeff edits: The film industry and the Oscars have dug themselves into a hole, and that hole is called “not celebrating movies for normal people.” They celebrate movies made for themselves. They make movies to look good to define who they are…their utopian diorama.

In the late teens they brought in international voters, who don’t care about the film industry here. They don’t care about movies that we care about. Or if our movie theaters survive. That’s not their ultimate goal. They like to pick movies that they like, which is fine. Nothing wrong with that.

But the Academy basically made its bed when they invited in all those international voters, which they did to solve the problem of the screeching activists who were coming at them for Oscars So White and all that.

Oscar voters have shown “not just their disdain for the public but also the American studio system. This is the second year in a row in which two films from the International Feature category hav also landed in Best Picture, taking slots away from A Real Pain, September 5 and Sing Sing. Why? Why can’t there be any way to recognize American studio films to help, you know, salvage a collapsing empire? Revive a corpse? Save movie theaters? Just spitballing here.

So the Oscars are going “international” and on streaming, specifically Netflix, which is also international. How convenient for them, eh? Shame about Hollywood though. Shame about movie theaters. Shame about all of us who love them.

I don’t think there is any bringing back the industry we all knew and loved, and I mean one that was somewhat vibrant and semi-humming along as recently as ten years ago.