george.schmidt

SISU: ROAD TO REVENGE (2025) *** Jorma Tommila, Stephen Lang, Richard Brake. Tommila returns in his iconic role as the silent yet deadly warrior turned farmer/WWII survivor who seeks vengeance upon the Russian officer (Lang in full villain mode) responsible for the travesties bested upon his family enduring the legacy of bloodshed and violence in full transition. Filmmaker Jalmari Helander sets up the action with unique skill and calculation that come across as Wile E. Coyote/Road Runner on acid with one increasingly cartoonish sequence after another with bruising brutality and drenched in blood by the gallons which will make the gorehounds pleased as punch.

SPRINGSTEEN DELIVER ME FROM NOWHERE (2025) *** Jeremy Allen White, Jeremy Strong, Paul Walter Hauser, Stephen Graham, Odessa Young, David Kruoltz, Gaby Hoffmann, Marc Aaron. Scott Cooper's adaptation of Warren Zane's book about rock star Bruce Springsteen's (White in a low-key effective turn) difficulties of stardom is examined during the period of his writing his magnum opus record album 'Nebraska' while struggling with depression and demons from his past (namely his troubles relationship with his addled father Graham, also equally good as a rock hard man whose barely keeping it together under the surface) while pursuing a loving relationship with Faye (comely Young, nicely done as a compendium of Bruce real-life loves of the past), a local girl back in Asbury Park, NJ. Interesting take on how an artist's progression from one stage to the next with all its pitfalls (audience expectations superseded by visionary excellence with the risk of losing it all in the process) and benchmarks. Strong makes a fine parallel as Jon Landau, Bruce's manager and bestie, who thinks he knows what's best even though he is not sure of the outcome.

THE RUNNING MAN (2025) **1/2 Glen Powell, Colman Domingo, Josh Brolin, Jayme Lawson, Lee Pace, Sean Hayes, Michael Cera, Debi Mazar, William H. Macy. Edgar Wright's propulsive remake of the Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicle and Stephen King (nee Richard Bachman) adaptation about a dystopian 2025 (hello!) which provides struggling family man Ben Richards (Powell on the way to movie stardom in full force as a leading man) who finds himself enlisted in a lethal TV game show (the title; literally) providing a jackpot if he survives being hunted for 30 days, with the odds stacked against him. While Wright uses his filmmaking skills to the hilt (including the co-writing of the script with Michael Bacall) the overall conceit of being invested is stillborn only in the fact we can all know our protagonist will be triumphant. A crowd-pleasing popcorn film for sure (the game of chicken on a bridge is a dilly).