Fantasy Life (2025): This is a bit of a type already, isn’t it? Writer-director-star of indie movie tells a story that’s irreverent and doesn’t follow the familiar rhythm and character types we’ve grown to know and identify. In FL, it’s Matthew Shear, who plays a law-school dropout struggling to get a handle on his anxiety attacks. He somehow becomes a manny (doesn’t really make sense) and he meets an aging actress (Amanda Peet) who, it turns out, has had her own mental health battles. They connect, but there’s never a clear path for them. I don’t really think the movie tries to convince you there might be, either. It does however offer settings in which we get to know and appreciate their challenges and you grow to accept that not everything makes perfect sense, that everyone has struggles, failures and successes with varying degrees of visibility. I have a soft spot for movies that manage to make the odd and unusual feel real and acceptable and I think FL does just that. 7
Forbidden Fruits (2026): I’m starting to feel that shopping-mall-commercialist-horror-stories are a genre unto themselves. From this one, to Slaxx (2020), to In Fabric (2018), there is already a range of films tackling the subject matter. Does Forbidden Fruits work? Thanks to its slick look and tunes, cartoonish gore and recognizable cast, better than Slaxx, but nowhere near the irreverence of Strickland’s movie. It is set up as a group of saleswomen for a couture fashion brand who turns out be running a little witch cult of their own. When they have to induct a new member, their dark secrets are revealed (insert maniacal laughter here). It’s often silly, but it defines a certain vibe for itself that’s worth sticking around for, even when the plot falters. 6
Not Another Teen Movie (2001): Having watched so many Y2K movies recently, I have to wonder whether on some level we’ve come to the point where they have been bestowed with…value? Sure, most of them aren’t good, but since the death of the raunchy comedy, they fill a gap that I never knew needed filling. Heck, any straightforward comedy, really. Take NATM, which is ripe with bad humour and scatological spectacle, but it’s not absolutely unfunny. Heck, it even had some laugh out loud moments. For the most part though, it just tries to outdo itself, chaining one joke after another, which simply can’t work consistently. Clearly, in no way a masterpiece, no matter how much you like gratuitous nudity. Yet…it stars some cool early 2000 actors, including Chris Evans, Jaime Pressly, Lacey Chabert and Mia Kirshner, as well as the introducing Chyler Leigh, who strangely didn’t get much love elsewhere on the big screen. And there’s even some sweet cameos added to the mix. I don’t know what to say, other than nostalgia does things to the brain, man. 5
The Wedding Banquet (2025): Andrew Ahn’s remake of the 1993 Ang Lee, dare I say, classic turns the gay-wheel up a notch, making a convoluted story even moreso. Two same-sex couples in loving, but not unchallenged, relationships have to engage in complicated foolishness to a) set one of them up for a green card and b) set the other one up with an IVF treatment. To its credit, TWB admits to this foolishness, through the only character that warrants any kind of serious emotional response – the ultra-rich grandmother of a homophobic gazillionaire, who goes to check on said foolishness her grandson is involved in. Played by Youn Yuh-jung, of Minari (2020) fame, she brings an unexpected warmth and honesty to the film, which otherwise is a competently assembled, but emotionally vapid checklist of set-ups and conflicts. To me, the balancing act that succeeded in the original, is strained without giving anything else in return. 5
They Will Kill You (2026): A fairly generic gore-filled movie set in a devil-owned hotel, TWKY tells the story of two sisters who are (for all intents and purposes) separated by their brutal father. One ends up in prison and when she gets out, her immediate goal is to find and save her sister from whatever ominous fate has befallen her. Which is how she ends up at said hotel and the action commences. It’s sometimes amusing, often violent, but never particularly visceral. The big name actors that show up (Zazie Beetz in the lead, Patricia Arquette, Tom Felton and Heather Graham in support) don’t have that much to work with, as Kirill Sokolov’s movie is content to sticking with the gist it quickly establishes. Maybe I would have liked it more on a different day, but on Friday I thought it was distinctly mid, despite some more imaginative moments. 5
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