Short Takes:  ‘Queendom’ and ‘Knox Goes Away’ 

‘Queendom’ (2023)

“And yet, she persisted” would also have made an apt title for Agniia Galdanova’s gripping and pointedly political documentary about 21-year-old Russian drag performance artist Gena Marvin (birth named Gennadiy Chebotarev), who, alienated, ostracized and worse, never surrenders their identity, and in the process, takes on the draconian social politics of the Putin regime as well as the war in Ukraine. Gena, a striking, lithe figure evocative of Tilda Swinton in “Orlando” (1992) or Bowie as Ziggy or in “The Man Who Fell to Earth” (1976) mode, was born in the far eastern town of Magadan, a place that in lens feels like it would make a good hellish gulag of a work camp in a different movie. For the most, Gena and their art are not well received in the remote town, and when taking to the streets they are often harassed and even assailed. In one scene when strolling a supermarket aisle, pasty white, bald and towering over other shoppers in a fur coat and a loose-fitting bustier (just coming from a shoot to get some essentials), they are asked by security to leave the store and not return. Raised by their grandparents, Gena is often at odds with them – the identity thing, but also money. There’s genuine care and affection in the homestead, but the grandfather, trying hard, is unable to accept his grandchild’s feminine persona and wants to know how they can subsist  on TikTok likes (I did too, something that “Skywalkers: A Love Story,” another recent portrait of Russian artists, never fully plumbed). Identifying as nonbinary and still figuring it out, Gena heads to Moscow for college, where they don’t quite fit in. Meanwhile, during protests against the war and demanding freedom for Putin opponent Alexei Navalny, they take to the street, gliding through the unrest in stark, alluring costumes; like when Bowie made his way to the stage, everything seems to stop and focus on them – the stark difference being the pervasive air of hostility versus Bowie’s adoring sea of fans. While Gena doesn’t launch into particularly political diatribes onscreen, their art is inherently so, especially in light of Putin’s increasing crackdown on trans-queer culture. The access that Galdanova and camera operator Ruslan Fedotov have is immersive, intimate and in the moment. The scenes of performance art executed on the shore of a raging sea or in a muddy quarry pit are breathtaking in composition and framing, and made all the more alluring by Gena’s keen sense of presentation and otherworldly personas.

‘Knox Goes Away’ (2023)

John Knox (Michael Keaton) has a lot on his mind, or so he tries to keep it that way despite recent tests that indicate the onset of dementia. Not a good thing for a contract killer, but Knox is not your ordinary hand of riddance, no, he’s got two doctorates and is super methodical and thorough in his work. He’s never been nabbed; he did do a stint in the slammer, but that was more the way they got Al Capone, a subplot that folds back into the final reckoning. For Knox, waning cognition turns out to be a liability when on a job. He loses track of where he is and who he’s there to shoot. At the core is a botched hit, an ongoing investigation (Suzy Nakamura, scene-grabbing as the lead investigator) and things get get amped up when Knox’s estranged son Miles (James Marsden) shows up one night seeking professional help. To say more about the pieces and how they click and don’t click together would do a disservice to this thinking-person’s thriller helmed by Keaton (his second feature) doing double duty. As the addled, once razor-sharp lead, the versatile Keaton – who’s been Batman; Birdman (in Alejandro González Iñárritu’s 2014 Best Picture winner); Elmore Leonard-written detective Ray Nicolette in films by Quentin Tarantino and Steve Soderbergh; and Beetlejuice (a sequel on the way this year) – does a fantastic job of conveying a failing mind, the cold facade of a calculated killer and the jittery bridge in between. The robust cast includes Marcia Gay Harden as Knox’s ex, Al Pacino as his criminal handler, Ray McKinnon of “Deadwood” as Knox’s sometime partner and Joanna Kulig, so amazing in 2018’s “Cold War” as Knox’s Thursday afternoon lover. The Miles subplot is a little overbaked, as is Marsden’s performance, but overall Keaton and his immersion into a character in transition drive the film confidently.