Trailer of the movie "The Bee"/Red Cape
"The Beehive": Jason Statham's new action hit
Jason Statham is one of Israel's favorite action stars.
No wonder then that his new movie "The Bee" has been breaking box office here in recent weeks.
As usual with him, it is an "agricultural film" - an expression from the 1950s that means a film with a corpse on every acre.
The film could also be called "The Undertaker", a play on words that probably only works in Hebrew.
His original name, "The Beehive", has three meanings: Statham plays a former special agent, whose elite unit he previously served in is called "The Beehives".
Now he is retired, taking care of bees, and the hive in which she works serves as a metaphor for civilization and the entire social fabric.
Yes, there are such pretensions in the film, as well as quite a bit of criticism of capitalism, and a discussion of the difference between law and justice.
The film follows the usual route in such action thrillers.
The hero is enjoying his retirement, and the friendship he developed with an elderly woman played by Felicia Rashed, remembered as the mother from "The Cosby Family".
His best friend turns out to be innocent and too good for this world, and falls victim to a network scam that leads to tragic results.
The beekeeper finds it difficult to contain his rage, and sets out to avenge her, which will lead him to uncover an unusually branching hive of crooks and cheaters, and he will not rest until he kills them all.
Action movie or wild comedy?
From "The Beehive"/Red Cape
Despite the presence of an action star like Statham and a respected actor like Jeremy Irons as the bad guy, and even though behind the camera was a veteran action director like David Ayer, the best way to enjoy "The Bee" is to treat it as a wild comedy.
Its plot is horribly far-fetched: it's been a long time since we've seen a movie script that starts with such a minor point and goes so far.
It has Pantheon lines of dialogue, such as "You've turned sleaze into art, and your latest flop is the Mona Lisa" (and forgive me if I'm not quoting exactly), and its villains are a particularly pathetic collection of wretches.
Regarding the weight of what Prof. Shkolnik once said to his student in "Footnote", we can say this: what is not ridiculous in this film is a cliché, and what is not a cliché is ridiculous.
Still, and perhaps because of that, it provides a fun viewing experience, and when Statham is in the field you can be sure that the good guys will win - and that's exactly the message we need right now.
In any case, the film is now showing in cinemas in Israel and is expected to remain there for a long time.
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"The Boy and the Heron": the new film of the master Miyazaki
There are few directors whose every new film is a celebration.
The Japanese master Hayao Miyazaki, who entered the pages of history with modern classics such as "The Incredible Journey", is one such.
After a short break, the wizard returns with "The Boy and the Heron", which may also be his last film - the reports on this are conflicting.
What is certain, the film has already become a huge hit in its homeland and around the world, and stands as a clear favorite to win the Oscar for the longest animated film (while the short "Letter to a Pig" by Tal Kantor is favorite in the short animated film category).
The film is released in Israel this weekend, and note that it is screened exclusively in the original version - that is, in Japanese with Hebrew subtitles.
It is not dubbed into Hebrew.
As the name implies and like most Ghibli classics, the film deals with the experience of childhood.
His hero is a motherless orphan, who at the age of 11 moves with his father to the hometown of his deceased mother, and meets there the water fowl that this piece is named after.
The heron promises that she can help him meet his mother, and for that he will of course have to go through a wonderful journey, which will allow Miyazaki to prove once again and perhaps for the last time his ability to build a whole world, with its own language and laws, and with dizzying beauty and wealth.
This may be Miyazaki's last film, it's certainly not his best film - and still, it's a rare experience for the whole family.
"Bad Girls": The remake that almost surpasses the original
In the beginning there was the movie from 2004, which became a cult and to this day provides a lot of memes and gifs - even Simcha Rothman used one not long ago!
Then came the musical version on Broadway stages, and now there is a film adaptation of the musical.
The plot remains the same: the story of a girl who transfers to a new high school, discovers that the queen of the class Regina King rules it with a heavy hand and arbitrary rules, and fights her and her dark powers only to find that she has become just like her.
The new version adds to this musical numbers and technological updates like Tik-Tok, and as the spirit of the times also takes care of more ethnic diversity, although the heroines are still white.
"Bad Girls" comes to our cinemas after it turned out to be a surprising box office success in the United States, and you can understand why it was so successful.
Everything that was good about the original movie still works well, especially the social satire.
The additions do not detract, and sometimes also upgrade.
Sorry for the blasphemy, but Angauri Rice and Renee Rapp in the main roles give a respectable fight to the original team, and maybe even better than it.
The intrigues are juicy, the jokes are funny, and the content is incredibly relevant.
It is easy to see "Bad Girls" as escapism, because it is so entertaining and fun, but it has important statements about social hierarchies, about ethics and morality, and about what is between a person and his friend.
It's a movie that will make your heart feel good but will also teach you to be better and better.
"Stop Making Sense": One of the greatest performance films ever
One of the best concert films ever celebrated its forty-year anniversary this year.
On this occasion, a new copy of it circulated around the world and is now coming to Israel as well, for special screenings at Lev Cinema.
The film was directed by Jonathan Demme, who is remembered by the general public mainly for being the director of "The Silence of the Lambs".
But beyond that, he was also a gifted creator of musical docu-films "Neil Young: Heart of Gold" is a shining example of this, but the most amazing of all is this film, which documented a performance of the Talking Heads at the height of their glory.
The filmmaker, who was still relatively at the beginning of his career, expresses his concept, which is based on net photography of what is happening on the stage, without any kind of intervention on his part.
A lot happened on the stage - because David Byrne, the lead singer of the Talking Heads, is one of the film musicians these days, and from the beginning he built what was happening on it like in a movie.
Demi, for his part, is gifted with a wonderful talent to look at what is in front of him and always know how to catch the right point at the right moment.
Contrary to what its name implies, the cinematic language of "Stop Making Sense" has a lot of logic, which never stops.
"Such poor people": the most Oscar nominations, except for "Oppenheimer"
A week and a half ago, "Such Poor People" was honored with no less than 11 Oscar nominations, more than any other film except "Oppenheimer", and with representation in all the main categories - film, director, leading actress and so on.
Last weekend, it hit the cinemas in Israel.
The film was written and directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, the Greek director who since "Teeth of the Dog" and "The Lobster" has become one of the hottest names in the world of cinema, and he returned to collaborate with Emma Stone, who starred with him in "The Favorite" The celebrated one as well. The actress, who also made waves this year in the series "The Curse", here plays a pregnant young woman living in the Victorian era and ends her life. Style scientist Dr. Frankenstein, played by Willem Dafoe, collects her, takes the brain of the fetus that was in her womb and implants it inside her
11 Oscar nominations.
From "Such Poor People"/Courtesy of Searchlight Pictures.
© 2023 20th Century Studios All Rights Reserved
And so, the film's heroine comes back to life, but with the brain of a baby girl, so that now she has to discover the world anew.
She embarks on a cross-continental journey, during which she will learn the wonders of the body and the lust of the flesh, but also the dark side of the world - the injustice and inequality between classes and genders.
The world will change her, but she will also change him.
As usual these days, the enthusiasm surrounding the film is a bit exaggerated, yet it cannot be denied that it is a cinematic event.
The artistic design requires viewing on a large screen, the cinematic expression is virtuosic, and the entire process is impressive and invested.
Emma Stone sinks her teeth into the bold role, which provides her and the rest of us with some of the wildest sex and nudity scenes we've seen in commercial cinema in recent years.
Unlike most Oscar movies, "Poor People Like That" also has a sense of humor, so you won't come out of it as poor - you'll probably enjoy it.
And if "Such Poor People" made you want to watch the previous collaboration between Stone and Nathymus - great, the film appeared this week in the Israeli catalog of Netflix and is available there.
And here's another bonus: our interview with Lanthimus about one of his first English-speaking films, "To Kill a Sacred Reindeer".
More on the same topic:
Mi-Ran Manx
Yorgos Lanthymus
Such poor people
Jason Statham
Mean Girls
Hayao Miyazaki
David Byrne
Jonathan Demmy
Emma Stone
Oscar