Vengeance (2022)

Jack and I liked a lot this dark comedy about a New York writer and would-be podcaster who goes to Texas to pursue a story about a woman he hooked up with briefly who has since turned up dead. B. J. Novak stars, directs, and wrote the script and is ably backed by, among others, Boyd Holbrook and J. Smith-Cameron as relatives of the deceased, Ashton Kutcher as a mysterious music producer, and Issa Rae as the podcast producer.

The neo-Western score by Billie Eilish's brother Finneas O'Connell can be streamed on Apple Music and probably elsewhere.

This is Novak's feature film directing and writing debut (though he wrote and directed several episodes of The Office and The Mindy Project, to name a few) and he was last blogged for acting in The Founder. Holbrook was last in these pages for Logan, Smith-Cameron for Nancy (she's best known for 29 episodes of Succession), Kutcher for Annie, and Rae for Coastal Elites.

Rotten Tomatoes' critics' average of 81% and its audiences' of 86 reflect our satisfaction with this one. We streamed it on September 21 with our subscription to Peacock but it's also available to rent on Amazon and Apple TV.

In a Better World (Hævnen - 2010)

What a masterpiece! This story of two interconnected families dealing with bullies and retribution (hævnen means vengeance in Danish) on two continents has great acting, a top-notch screenplay, and magnificent visuals, and Jack, Judy, and I didn't even mind the absence of laughs. Oscar and Golden Globe winner for Best Foreign Film, it delivers on all levels. Director Susanne Bier (I haven't seen any of her work, which includes Brothers (Brødre - 2004) on which the American remake Brothers was based) is quoted in imdb, "My first job as a filmmaker is not to make a boring film." With her regular collaborator, writer Anders Thomas Jensen, she has succeeded. Mikael Persbrandt (many credits, none that I've seen) plays Anton, a Swedish doctor who lives in Denmark (Bier often has one Swede in her Danish movies) but works for weeks at a time at a refugee camp in Kenya. His wife, also a doctor, played by Trine Dyrholm (Celebration (Festen - 1998), more), and two boys Elias (newcomer Markus Rygaard) and Morten (11 year old Toke Lars Bjarke has 13 titles to his credit) have their own issues at home. Claus, played by Ulrich Thomsen (was also in Celebration, Brødre, lots more) and his son Christian (newcomer William Jøhnk Nielsen) have moved from London after the death of their respective wife/mother, and Elias and Christian, about 12 years old, become friends. The boys Rygaard and especially Nielsen are outstanding.

As I said above, the cinematography by Morten Søborg is by itself worth the price of admission. The lighting, whether in Kenya or Denmark, has extremes of light and dark, sun and shade, and I was particularly gratified that the focus Wednesday afternoon was as crisp and sharp as I've seen in months in any of our local theatres. Even the subtitles were perfectly legible. Moody music by Johan Söderqvist (previous work with Bier and others) complements the images beautifully. Clips are available on youtube. I suggest pausing until the clip has loaded so you can listen all the way through.

Sad to say, this closed today in our town (we were alone in the room yesterday), but I hope it returns on a big screen for your maximum enjoyment. If not, put it in your netflix queue and watch it in the best home theatre you can buy or borrow.