"Across the Spiderverse" - Review

Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) is living as Spiderman in his Universe, trying to juggle his life as a superhero with that of a teenager. However, he is swept up into an adventure when Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld), his counterpart from another parallel universe, comes to his world once more. Though told to stay out of it, he has nothing better to do than to beat up aspiring supervillain "The Spot" (Jason Schwarzmann) and get in trouble with his sweet as pie dad Lt Jeff Morales (Bryan Tyree Henry, always welcome) and sassy but competent mother Rio (Luna Lauren Velez, whom I'm glad has recovered from "Dexter") - so he finds himself thrust into a multi-universe spanning adventure, meeting various other Spiderman along the way...

The animation is spectacular, I shall start there.
As expected, the creative, wild, weird use of this kind of imagery is nothing short of spectacular. A version of "The Vulture" from Renaissance Italy shows up, entirely in papyrus and sketchbook drawings (an illustrated contrast to the world he has entered) - coincidentally a better version of "Morbius" than "Morbius" - one moment, whilst Gwen Stacy's conversations with her father are done as living mood boards, the atmosphere and colours around her leaking out and changing and morphing to reflect the characters and who they are (culminating in an excellent draining use at the end, and her father being shown with a pink tie in his otherwise black and white attire); and a particular favourite part of mine was a villain being done as pen and pencil drawings at first, then literally developing into an all absorbing, morphous oil painting style.
It's stunning.
It's also a bit much, it's an utterly overwhelming celebration of animation and animation for animation's sake, which I loved but was feeling exhausted by. Do not take any overwhelmed autistic kids or relatives to this, I'm serious.
It thrives in moments of silliness and wild mayhem (a chase invlving literally scores of Spider-Folk is absolutely the highlight, and I lost my shit at "Peter Parked-Car"), and is stuffed to the brim with references and cameos and jokes. It stumbles with its reliance on them in some cases ("the power of the Multiverse in the palm of my hand", "Hello Peter...") but has a rapid fire pace and adoration of the source material. Where "No Way Home" was the death of art and a vampiric state of unlife, this feels like a belt of hand grenades unleashed in a paint factory one after the other by a bunch of comic book addicts.
It's exhilirating to watch.
But...
I was waiting for an emotional impact, a gut punch or a plot which never came together, unlike other efforts like "The Lego Movie" (though there is a fun use OF Lego in it), "The Mitchells and the Machines" and "Kubo and the 2 Strings". Though there are some fun moments (the idea of "canon" and the Spiderman mythos being something binding and unyielding and the be shaken off and ignored was interesting) and the scenes with Gwen and her dad and Miles and his parents are the ones which come closest to soaring; the film flags in the middle, and never reaches the emotional heights I wanted or it was aiming for.
The Indian-inspired sequence is an unedeniably fun time, but does pad the runtime, and by the time Oscar Isaac arrives (though Papa is MOST welcome), it only then feels like the plot is coming into its own, belatedly. Still, the madness and creativity keep it going.
It's still a marvellously pretty and funny and engaging film, with a gag for every kind of fan.
Daniel Kaluuya steals the show.

"Nope" Review

Otis "OJ" Haywood Jr (Daniel Kaluuya) has inherited the ranch of his legendary horse-trainer father (Keith David) after the latter's unlikely, unusual death one day, and struggles to follow in his footsteps alongside his more outgoing sister Emerald (Keke Palmer), whilst just across the valley they live in is a successful theme park "Jupiter's Claim" run by former child star Ricky "Jupe" Park (Stephen Yuen), with whom OJ does business to keep afloat.
One night, OJ sees something in the sky, and the siblings get an idea...

Jordan Peele is a fun director.
He makes solid, excellent horror movies which hark back to the classics, but this time actually respected by critics, and always with a fun sense of humour throughout. Here he has gone for an underrated, underused genre: the alien invasion movie, crossed with an old school monster movie. There's a long, intricate build up which sets an ominous tone, and the camerawork and groundwork for the mystery are some stirling stuff. Yeah it's not exactly subtle (one character's co worker is called "Nessie"), but it's fun and exceedingly effective stuff: a personal highlight for me is a supremely tense sequence involcing the use of, all things, "Sunglasses at Night" and a van. The build up is sinister and great, and when the film introduces its versions of Hooper and Quinn from "Jaws" (here a tech-specialist named Angel, played by Brandon Perea, and a documentarian named Antlers Holst, a name as cool as the fact that he is played by Michael Wincott in 2022), right down to Holst singing an acapella version of a song ("The Purple People Eater", kind of chilling here) round a table, it amps up the ante to some wonderfully bizarre madness.
Fuck I've missed Michael Wicott in movies, and he's great here. Recognisable instantly, he growls his way through a performance as Antlers Holst best described as "deranged". I like that they implied he's dying in it: a man obsessed with spectacle and finding the imposible, even if it destroys him...
This movie is fantastic fun (check out this straight up "Akira" shot below), and when the monster movie kicks in it is a wild ride: blood, mayhem, chaos and raining blood.

(That's the good shit)
But there are also references to "Neon Genesis Evangelion" of all things.
Above and beyond, however, this is also a movie wearing its messaging on its sleeve of ambition, for good or for ill. It's about the consuming need for spectacle and the belief that we can tame and humanise the monsters we see. OJ respects and understands the creatures he interacts with whilst Jupe (in a genuinely horrifying plotline) has monetised trauma and profited off of tragedy, and belives that his survival is because he is special or that he had a connection with a rabid animal.
God there is just so much to love about it (perfect use of Daniel Kaluuya's "there is something untoward going on over there, but it is none of my business" face, his performance where he doesn't make eye contact with people, that first "nope, fuck that" in the barn, the quite humorous thing he does in the van, Stephen Yuen's sleazy Jupe who can be read in different ways such is the nuance of his performace, the fucking NUTS creature design, Michael Wincott, and the bugnuts ending) but other parts which may grate on some (the long build up, the humour, the bugnuts ending); though one thing remains: it's still very much its own thing, should be applauded, and is fantastic fun. I love it.
Also thank you to Peele for reminding people that chimps can go fuck themselves.