Reviewed: ‘Rust,’ ‘Thunderbolts*’ and ‘Another Simple Favor’
‘Rust’ (2024)
After four years of headlines about the tragic on‑set shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, “Rust” finally arrives in theaters for a limited run and on streaming platforms with something of a whimper. There’s plenty of gunplay to be sure, and the film’s evocative of Clint Eastwood’s “Pale Rider” (1985) and the Coen brothers’ 2010 remake of the John Wayne classic, “True Grit,” without reaching those lofty heights. Star Alec Baldwin’s now notorious shooting death of Hutchins – and wounding of director Joel Souza – clouds nearly every scene, something underscored by Baldwin’s Harland Rust being a stone-cold killer more than able with a six-shooter. The Wyoming-set Western begins with a bit of a “Little House on the Prairie” preamble as Lucas Hollister (Patrick Scott McDermott), a parentless 13-year-old protecting his younger brother from bullies, inadvertently shoots and kills the ruffians’ father (the eerie tie-ins to real life are endless). Hanging is in order, but before the execution can be carried out Harland shows up, wipes out the jail watch and absconds with the boy. On the trail, conversations between Harland and Lucas are terse. If Lucas asks too many questions, Harland dishes out some of Wayne’s slap-first tough love. Of course the law and a horde of scummy bounty hunters are after the two, with plenty of blazing shootouts along the dusty path. Baldwin looks the part of gruff gunslinger, but his avuncular, wispy voice undercuts his character’s bravado where a Wayne, Eastwood or Jeff Bridges would have tonal command of a scene. Another unavoidable reminder of Hutchins: The film is stunningly shot, with dark and muted texturings and rich, opulent framings of the amber plains akin to the camerawork by Ari Wegner that made “Power of the Dog” (also shot in 2021) jump off the screen. “Rust” makes for a passable Western sojourn that will forever be steeped in tragic ignominy.
‘Thunderbolts*’ (2025)
Asterisks typically signal indecision or suggest something that doesn’t quite meet official standards. In this latest – and seemingly endless – Marvel Universe entry, it’s both, as well as an inside joke about a girls’ soccer team and a pair of soiled shorts. “Thunderbolts*” is along the lines of the “Avengers” franchise with a different set of heroes to save us sheep on the street. Given their skill set, the Thunderbolts* are a JV squad, but a much more affable lot to spend time with. At the end of “Avengers: Endgame” (2019), we were promised a restart to take us through new (and infinite) spinoffs and spin-ups, but none of that, but little has come to fruition save Anthony Mackie taking on the Captain America role in this year’s indelicately laid turd, “Captain America: Brave New World.” That last MCU chapter, which featured an angry, red-faced menace as president, bared political fangs but never drew blood. Here the politics have more bite with Julia Louis-Dreyfus endowed with a pronounced shock of white hair and looking somewhere between current national intelligence head Tulsi Gabbard and Cruella De Ville as CIA head Valentina Allegra de Fontaine and arguably something of a proxy for the power grab going on in D.C. today. It takes a while to get to Valentina, as the film’s main focus is Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh, “Midsommar,” “Little Women”), a “black widow” trained super spy and younger sister of Scarlett Johansson’s departed “Avengers” character. We met Yelena in “Black Widow” (2021); here, she’s an operative doing dirty work for de Fontaine, who’s on the impeachment hopper for illicit ops and side-gig operations; with a hearing and trial on tap she wants to tie up loose ends – namely expunging Yelena, some low-rent Captain America named Walker (Wyatt Russell), a supe with a teleport suit (Hannah John-Kamen) and a barefoot dude named Bob (Lewis Pullman) who was the subject of lab experiments in Malaysia and the film’s de facto X factor. Pullman’s Bob endears in insecure, nebbish mode; not so much later when donning a gold Superman suit. The burly, overly jolly David Harbour of “Stranger Things” returns as Yelena’s father, who, in his time, was Russia’s answer to Captain America, known as the Red Guardian. Speaking of enhanced super-soldiers, old friend Bucky (Sebastian Stan), aka the Winter Solider, is back, and as good as Stan was in his Oscar-nominated turn last year as the young Donald Trump in “The Apprentice,” his Bucky has always been a side dish, necessary for the plot but otherwise forgettable. As with the earlier “Avengers” films, it all comes down to a giant smackdown in the middle of Midtown Manhattan. The film’s heartbeat is Pugh, who brings plenty of vim to the part, helping “Thunderbolts*” get a step up from that “Brave New World” bungle and insufferably bland “Eternals” (2021), but not leap forward. It’s entertaining and witty enough, but it won’t make you forget the glory days of Marvel before Disney and box-office bean counters put a chokehold on die Übermenschen.
‘Another Simple Favor’ (2025)
“A Simple Favor” (2018) was a bit of WTF under the guise of a Jennifer Aniston rom-com. It was comic, yes, but darkly so, and went to surprising places – incest, adultery and murder. The Mutt and Jeff chemistry between alpha gal Blake Lively and the plucky, dour Anna Kendrick was reason enough to be smitten, and the film was helmed by Paul Feig, who showed us with “Bridesmaids” (2011) how one could color outside the lines, bending and blurring genres without blowing them up. All three are back. Last we left it, Emily (Lively) was in jail for the murder of her twin sister (Emily’s birth name was Hope, her sister was Faith, and here we learn there was a third named – wait for it – Charity) and attempted murder of her husband Sean (Henry Golding) and Kendrick’s single mom, Stephanie. I would imagine it would be hard to make sense of “Another Favor” without seeing “A Simple Favor,” so a few quick notes: Emily was assumed dead, Stephanie helped care for Sean and Emily’s son Nicky (Ian Ho) and became Sean’s lover. “Another Favor” begins with Stephanie under house arrest in Capri, Italy, where, via one of her “Hi Moms” vlog posts we get the rewind: Stephanie has a book out about her ordeal as the bestie of a murderess (Emily) and Emily walks into a signing, statuesque as ever and in a killer outfit. It’s a dramatic entrance that has jaws on the floor. How is she out, and what does she want with Stephanie now? In front of the fans, Emily asks Stephanie to be maid of honor at her wedding to a rich Italian. The fiancé (Michele Morrone) has an army of attorneys that have sprung Emily from jail on a technicality; did I mention he’s part of a major mob family and that the wedding is something of a peace accord to bring rival families together? Not much of it makes sense – not that much did in the original either, but that earlier take had natural charm and was driven by the edgy “sorry, not sorry” dynamic between Emily and Stephanie. The hammer to get Stephanie to Capri is the threat of a lawsuit for not getting permission for the book. Sean shows up too, pickled and making endless dick jokes, as well as being the butt of them. He’s also there under legal duress. Along the path to matrimony several murders happen, and Stephanie’s accused of one of them. How the story wraps up is pure poppycock, lacking enough of the ribald vigor of the original to stick and going on at least 20 minutes too long. The key to any small success lies in the leads. Kendrick ups her passive-aggressive edginess as Lively grabs scenes with commanding bravado and showstopper outfits. Most all the supporting players from the original have cameos, but nice additions are Elena Sofia Ricci as the fiancé’s mob mom, Elizabeth Perkins replacing Jean Smart due to a filming conflict as Emily’s own boozy, not-quite-all-there mom, and Alison Janney as Emily’s bubbly and deviously manipulative aunt. “Another Favor” tries to push boundaries, but feels forced. Many of the concluding plot twists feel slapped on. The one thing I learned from this “Favor” is that it’s bad form to jerk off in a shower just before the nuptials.
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