Authors Posts by Jeffrey Sanzel

Jeffrey Sanzel

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A scene from 'Elio.' Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

In the cinematic landscape, Pixar Studios created many of the most memorable animated features. These include Toy Story, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, and Inside Out, along with their extensive line of sequels. Founded in 1979, Pixar became a cultural juggernaut of fiscal and critical success, in many ways redefining expectations in family entertainment.

In Elio, orphaned Elio Solis lives with his Aunt Olga, an Air Force major. Olga gave up her aspirations to be an astronaut to raise the lonely boy. One day, Elio sneaks into a closed exhibit of the Voyager 1 NASA space probe. The possibility of life on other planets fascinates the boy. Each night, he sprawls on the beach, staring up into the stars, hoping to be abducted by aliens.

A scene from ‘Elio.’ Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar

Meanwhile, conspiracy theorist Gunther Melmac claims there is evidence of extra-terrestrials responding to the Voyager 1, transmitting a message to Earth. Elio uses Melmac’s invention to send a message into space. Eventually, Elio is transported into a spaceship where aliens of the Communiverse mistake him for the Earth’s leader and ambassador. Elio becomes embroiled in their negotiations with a warlord, Lord Grigon, who threatens a takeover of the Communiverse. Through various machinations, including the introduction of cloning, among other science fiction devices, Elio befriends Grigon’s son, the gentle Glordon, who does not want to become part of his father’s violent coalition. 

The story follows a predictable path. The film introduces elements of bullying on Earth and in the far reaches of the galaxy. After an altercation, Elio receives an eye wound, forcing him to wear a patch. Elio has moments of introspection, questioning whether the difficulty is in the world or within himself. “I thought Earth was the problem, but what if it’s me?” 

The film swings at big concepts and grand scope: The statement “Are we alone?” plays on two levels. But, for all this reflection, the film feels shallow, never fully realizing its ambitions. Children’s films have effectively tackled challenging issues. Up, Coco, and both Inside Out films, not to mention the majority of the Toy Story universe, manage to address large topics with integrity and resonance. It’s not that Elio doesn’t try. It’s just that it never quite reaches the targeted feelings.

Like many animated features, this might be a case of too many cooks. Three directors (Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi, and Adrian Molina) worked from a script by three screenwriters (Julia Cho, Mark Hammer, and Mike Jones). Elio possesses an excess of ideas, but nothing is quite finished. Too many on-the-nose statements—“A father always knows” and “I may not always understand you, but I love you”—are presented but not necessarily earned. 

The voice talent does fine with the material. Yonas Kibreab and Zoe Saldaña, as Elio and Olga, respectively, are real and nuanced. Remy Edgerly is sweet as Glordon, with Brad Garrett’s gravelly intonations suitable for the villainous Grigon. Jameela Jamil, Shirley Henderson, Matthias Schweighöfer, Brandon Moon, and Naomi Watanabe bring warmth and humor to the assortment of alien ambassadors. Brendan Hunt captures Melmac’s manic energy.

Elio is populated with a range of creatures that seem Happy-Meal-precious, but they are truly fun and wholly benign. The film’s strength lies in the extraordinary production design (Harley Jessup) in tandem with the visual effects (supervised by Claudia Chung-Sani), which have created the joyous Communiverse, a striking and vibrant rainbow pulsing with life. Sadly, these surrounding elements contain more drive than the story itself, resulting in a case of style over substance. 

The film’s climax shamelessly borrows shades of E.T. Needless to say, everything works out for everyone. Elio probably seemed good, if not great, on paper. And, in truth, the outlines, structure, and themes of a more satisfying film are there. But, in the end, Elio is an interstellar movie that remains earthbound.

Rated PG, the film is now playing in local theaters.

‘Superman’ is one of the most anticipated movies this summer. Photo courtesy of DC Studios/Warner Bros.

By Tim Haggerty & Jeffrey Sanzel

Summer means beaches and vacations. But diversions also include an entire roster of summer movie releases. Here is an overview of some of the more exciting films coming to the big screen.

Materialists 

Dakota Johnson is a professional matchmaker who, ironically, struggles with her own romantic woes. Pedro Pascal and Chris Evans co-star as her potential suitors. Celine Song, Oscar-nominated for Past Lives (2023), helms the film.

Rated R · Release date June 13

How to Train Your Dragon 

DreamWorks joins the live-action bandwagon with Mason Thomas (The Black Phone) playing Hiccup, the brainy teen who tames the titular beast. Credit goes to the digital FX team, who replicated the animated version of Toothless, the winged creature that bonds with the hero in a big way.

Rated PG · Release date June 13

Elio

Pixar’s newest animated adventure focuses on eleven-year-old Elio, whose belief in intelligent life forms in the galaxy proves true. The real twist comes when the aliens decide that Elio is Earth’s one true leader. Coco veteran Madeline Sharafian and Domee Shi co-direct.

Rated PG · Release date June 20

28 Years Later

The third in the dystopian series (28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later) picks up nearly three decades later. The violent, virus-ridden zombies still live among us, making things difficult for dad Aaron Taylor-Johnson and his son Alfie Williams. Jodie Comer and Ralph Fiennes are among the non-infected fighting off the walking not-quite-dead. 

Rated R · Release date June 20

F1 The Movie

Brad Pitt is front and center as a former hotshot driver who left the circuit after an accident left him shaken. For this Formula One drama, Joseph Kosinski (Top Gun: Maverick) directs a cast that includes Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, and Javier Bardem.

Rated PG-13 · Release date June 27

Sorry Baby

The big discovery of this year’s Sundance Film Festival, writer-director-star Eva Victor’s film follows a woman returning to her former alma mater as a professor — the same university that was the site of a trauma with which she has never come to terms. Harrowing, hilarious, and not a little fractured, Victor’s debut makes her an exciting new multi-hyphenate.

Rated R · Release date June 27

M3GAN 2.0 

She’s back and more homicidal than ever! The sequel to the 2022 horror flick marks the return of the genre’s reigning killer doll (with apologies to Chucky). Amie Donald is back as the title character, and Allison Williams and Violet McGraw reprise their roles as the objects of both M3GAN’s love and wrath.

Rated PG-13 · Release date June 27

Jurassic World Rebirth

Because you can’t keep a lucrative franchise—or a carnivorous dinosaur—down! Scarlett Johansson leads an operation designed to track down the few remaining dinosaurs left after Jurassic World: Dominion.

Rated PG-13 · Release date July 2

40 Acres 

The mighty Danielle Deadwyler (Till, Woman in the Yard, The Piano Lesson) steers a community of postapocalyptic survivors who have managed to turn a patch of farmland into a sanctuary — the kind that one must vigilantly defend from various other parties trying to survive in a scorched-earth world. 

Rated R · Release date July 4

Superman

Clearly, Superman is the most anticipated movie of the summer. David Corenswet dons the red cape to play the Man of Steel and his alter ego, Clark Kent; Rachel Brosnahan is Lois Lane; Nicholas Hoult is arch enemy master villain Lex Luthor. James Gunn’s first big project in the DC Cinematic Universe 2.0 even includes Krypto the Dog.

Rated PG-13 · Release date July 11

I Know What You Did Last Summer

The popular fisherman-with-a-hook 1997 slasher gets a “requel”: meaning a “reboot” and “sequel.” Jennifer Love Hewitt and Freddie Prinze Jr. return along with a host of new faces (Sarah Pidgeon, Chase Sui Wonders, Madelyn Cline, Jonah Hauer-King, Tyriq Winters).

Rated R · Release date July 18

Eddington

The town is Eddington, New Mexico, and the battle is between the Southwestern hamlet’s “law-and-order” sheriff (Joaquin Phoenix) and its mayor (Pedro Pascal). The man behind the camera is writer-director Ari Aster (Hereditary, Midsommar, Beau Is Afraid), so things are likely to get good and weird.

Rated R · Release date July 18

Fantastic Four: First Steps

Once again (or in this case third time’s a charm), Marvel is attempting to turn the popular comic into a top-tier superhero movie. Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach are the famous and fabulous quartet.  

Rated PG-13 · Release date July 25

Oh, Hi 

A Sundance sleeper hit, this old-fashioned boy (Logan Lerman) meets girl (Molly Gordon), boy and girl go away for a weekend, and boy and girl fall apart, has built major rom-com buzz before Sony Picture Classics picked it up. 

Rated PG-13 · Release date July 25

Together

Michael Shanks directs real-life spouses Dave Franco and Alison Brie who become much closer in this body-horror film that takes lending a hand to a whole new level.

Rated R · Release date July 30

The Naked Gun 4: Rhythm of Evil

Lonely Island director Akiva Schaffer directs Liam Neeson (yes, Oskar Schindler) as Frank Drebin, the role indelibly created by Leslie Nielsen in this fourth entry to the ridiculous Police Squad world.

Not Yet Rated · Release date August 1

Freakier Friday

Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan reunite after twenty years for the sequel to the 2003 remake of Mary Rodgers’ Freaky Friday. The body-switching comedy promises comedy, if not nostalgia.

Not Yet Rated · Release date August 8

Honey Don’t!

Filmmaker Ethan Coen and co-writer/editor/life-partner-in-crime Tricia Cooke offer the second of their proposed “lesbian B-movie trilogy,” with Margaret Qualley (Drive-Away Dolls) playing hardboiled detective Honey O’Donoghue, a throwback gumshoe with both moxie and verve. 

Rated R · Release date August 22

Americana

A highly prized Native American artifact leads a host of intriguing characters down a dangerous path in this wildly entertaining present-day western. 

Rated R · Release date August 22

Lurker

Another standout from Sundance, writer-director Alex Russell’s debut takes a well-worn subject — the disparity of power between the famous and the famous-adjacent — and manifesting danger and cringeworthy comedy. 

Rated R · Release date August 22

Caught Stealing

Darren Aronofsky directs this NYC crime thriller, in which several Lower East Side characters —a former baseball star (Austin Butler), his EMT girlfriend (Zoë Kravitz), his punk-rocker neighbor (Matt Smith), and a variety of gangsters and thugs circa 1998 — find themselves involved in missing Mob money.

Rated R · Release date August 29

The Roses

Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman star in a remake of the 1989 dark comedy, which starred Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner. One of the most bitter battles of marital strife, the new outing promises to be as bleak and venomous as the original.

Rated R · Release date August 29

This article originally appeared in TBR News Media’s Summer Times supplement on June 19, 2025.

Dakota Johnson and Pedro Pascal in a scene from 'Materialists.' Photo courtesy of A24

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

Writer-director Celine Song’s feature debut, Past Lives (2024), was an exquisite and near-perfect exploration of the time and space that exist between people, even when they are inches apart. Spanning just over two decades, the film lived in its visceral silences and often awkward but wholly recognizable exchanges. It builds to a painful but tacit triangle, simultaneously satisfying and melancholy. 

Song crafted the film around issues of Korean versus Korean American (or Canadian) culture, discovering what is kept and what must be left behind. Past Lives garnered universal accolades and received over forty well-deserved awards. It received Academy Award nominations for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay.

From left, Chris Evans, Dakota Johnson and Pedro Pascal star in ‘Materialists’. Photo courtesy of A24

In her sophomore offering, Materialists, Song tells the story of Lucy (Dakota Johnson), a former actor who now works for Adore, a New York City-based matchmaking service. At the outset, the plot appears simple, with Lucy deciding between her ex, the actor John (Chris Evans), and the wealthy financier, Harry (Pedro Pascal), whom she meets at the wedding of her ninth fruitful match. Harry, the brother of the groom, begins actively courting Lucy, taking her on expensive, high-end dates. Meanwhile, the chance encounter with John, who is a cater-waiter at the wedding, causes Lucy to reflect on her current choices.

The matchmaker-who-can’t-find-love is an old and well-worn trope seen in innumerable rom-coms and television shows. Along with Christmas movies, the clichéd setup ranks high as a Hallmark staple. The idea is generic, much like a painting of a bowl of fruit. But therein lies the difference. A million miles exist between a freshman art student’s first-time rendering and Picasso’s vision—whether realistic or cubist. And the same could be said of Song’s Materialists, a riveting delve into not just marriage but skewed expectations of a modern world.

The story remains basic, but the storytelling is rich, layered, and unflinching. The eloquent Lucy easily sells her work as a blend of fantasy and business. The several sequences in which she negotiates with clients reveal her insight, yet her personal absence from the feelings she keeps suppressed. She promotes the idea that these desperate people seek “a nursing home partner and a grave buddy”—that they want partners for the long run. Whether she believes this or not is a matter that comes in and out of focus. For her and agency, a “successful” marriage reduces to a deal. For herself, she admits that her priority is for a rich man. The fact that she states this almost tongue-in-cheek is even more powerful. (The source of this drive is shown in an ugly breakup scene with John on their fifth anniversary.)

The film is basically three-handed. It follows Lucy’s new romance with Harry and her conflicted feelings for John. What they offer is clearly contrasted with Harry’s twelve-million-dollar penthouse and John’s appalling eight-hundred and fifty-dollar rent-controlled apartment, shared with two roommates, one of whom would put a pig to shame. But the differences are not nearly as simple as that.

While Lucy struggles with her personal path, her client, Sophie, in whom she has invested many hours and setups, is assaulted on a first date. The horrific incident forces Lucy to confront her motivations, complicity, and responsibility. 

Dakota Johnson and Chris Evans in a scene from the film. Photo courtesy of A24

Song has constructed a highly literate script, witty and insightful, but allowing the characters to each speak in their own voices. She evokes exceptionally dimensional performances from her three leads. 

Dakota Johnson is flawless in creating someone who is both formidable and fragile, self-deluding and self-aware. She presents herself as a woman who puts on a strong, active front, but is plagued by issues regarding the true meaning of value. She is the heart of the film and never misses a beat. 

Chris Evans’ John is literally and figuratively a mess. Slightly rough around the edges, his John is earnest, genuine, and kind, but the manchild common to those chasing a dream that seems out of reach.

Pedro Pascal makes Harry more than just a foil for the central romance. He brings sweetness and a desire to make the best of his life, even if he is unaware of what he truly wants and needs. A late film revelation only serves to further his unspoken doubts.

Materialists is a more-than-worthy follow-up to Past Lives. Both films are shot in a desaturated world (almost as if light and joy are synonymous); they live in the painful pauses, unusual and erratic rhythms, and the ability to show truth with raw honesty and an occasional splash of humor. Materialists mines the situation, exposing the cynicism but eventually landing on a well-earned note of hope. While not a thriller, Song maintains a breathtaking and unflagging intensity. With Materialists, the filmmaker—the artist—this unique talent—has once again found a tale that will resonate with audiences long after the screen goes black.

Rated R, the film is now playing in local theaters. 

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

Author Michelle Young

“Her job, her life calling, was about celebrating the beauty in art, and presenting it to the public, but now she was witnessing the wholesale theft and secreting of the world’s finest creations to unknown locations.”

The Art Spy [HarperOne] is Michelle Young’s account of Rose Valland’s heroic efforts in Paris of the 1940s to save some of the world’s most famous artwork from the Nazi invaders. Born in 1898, Valland earned degrees from the École des Beaux-Arts in Lyon and studied at the École des Beaux-Arts as well. She attained additional degrees from the École du Louvre and the Sorbonne. Overall, Rose spent nine years accumulating higher education and acquiring vast knowledge and skills. 

Even though she was a denizen of the “crazy” Paris of the 1920s, the closeted Valland struggled to overcome a serious demeanor, most likely rooted in her sense of being out of place. She was a blacksmith’s daughter in the art world. Opinionated and articulate, she could remain seemingly humorless in social situations. “Rose had a reputation for being overly serious and too blunt for her own good, but her unflappability had proven useful in the war. She had learned to play the role of a nobody to the Nazis — not important enough to notice, not congenially enough to be flirted with, and too grave to be easy friends with.”

While highly schooled and exceptionally intelligent, she faced misogynistic setbacks, forcing her to work at Paris’s Jeu de Paume Museum as a volunteer. It was here that she was able to take a stand. No hurdles stopped her from doing her work and eventually saving hundreds, if not thousands, of paintings and sculptures. 

Young’s thoroughly researched and engaging book follows Valland from the late 1930s to the mid-1940s in a world populated by the creations of luminaries like Salvador Dali, Max Beckman, Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Paul Cezanne, Claude Monet, and many others. The Art Spy traces the early days of World War II throughout Europe, the anticipation of the incursion into Paris, followed by the exodus, and the ultimately desolate and abandoned city. Grounding her descriptions in detailed research, she evokes the visceral tensions of the time.

The Art Spy is also the story of heinous oppression and vicious destruction at the hands of the most tyrannical regime in history, the Nazi party. The confiscation of great works of art is almost a minor crime in the pantheon of the evil that was the German government of World War II. However, the preservation of art speaks to universal humanity, just as the unlawful acquisitions reflect the dark and greedy nature of the perpetrators.

Young explores Hitler’s war on “degenerative art,” contrasting with the constant and unbridled theft by the Nazis. Among those Valland encountered on multiple occasions was Hitler’s second-in-command, the brutish Herman Göring, who, along with many Party members, stole untold numbers of paintings and invaluable works. Young gives insight into the destructive effect of authoritarianism on the freedom of art. 

The author presents evocative, detailed descriptions of art evacuations, depicting empty walls with frames leaning against them, and the titles of the removed paintings hastily scrawled in chalk in the blank spaces above. She is unflinching in her assessment of the collaborationist Vichy government and the many who took advantage on both sides to loot France’s artwork. And, always at the center, is Valland, whose world is one of curators, collectors, and artists, but simultaneously one of constant danger. (This includes the arrest and imprisonment of her partner, Joyce Heer.)

Young wisely introduces the French art dealer, Paul Rosenberg, and traces his fate along with his family’s, including the son, Alexandre, who served with the Allies in Africa. By doing this, she puts a face to the horrors of the looting of Jewish property and the oppression and destruction of an entire community. She juxtaposes tracing the confiscation and “re-distribution” of Jewish possessions with the mass arrests and deportations, most of them ending in the gas chambers of Auschwitz, the notorious German death camp in occupied Poland.

“Never once in four years did Rose let any concern for her own safety override her commitment to her mission. Not once did she allow her emotions to get the better of her or cloud her judgment [….] At great risk to her own life, she spied and documented, stole information, was subjected to degrading searches, and was expelled from the museum on multiple occasions. Each time, she returned and skillfully convinced the Germans to let her back in. In a war where resistance took many forms, she and her loyal guards at the Jeu de Paume fought to retain the humanity of those whose possessions, family histories, identities, and sometimes their lives were violently stolen from them. She did it all, as she put it, simply ‘to save a little beauty of the world.’”

Valland worked tirelessly after the war, recovering artwork and restoring it to its proper owners and museums. To this day, many works have not found their way back to the proper people, but Valland fiercely pursued justice late into her life. 

“… No matter what atrocities take place, they’re always those who were willing to fight for what is right, no matter what the cost.” The life of Rose Valland—and Michelle Young’s important, astute documentation—is tribute to this powerful and necessary truth.

—————————————–

Author Michelle Young is a former resident of Setauket and 2000 graduate of Ward Melville High School where she was the salutatorian. She now divides her time between New York and Paris, and is an award-winning journalist, author, and professor of architecture at Columbia University. The Art Spy: The Extraordinary Untold Tale of WWII Resistance Hero Rose Valland is available at Barnes and Noble and Amazon.

From left, Ben Yang, Jackie Chan and Ralph Macchio in a scene from 'Karate Kid: Legends.' Photo courtesy of Columbia Pictures

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

The Karate Kid was the sleeper hit of 1984, grossing $100 million in the United States and Canada. The film received mostly good reviews, was deemed a “feel-good” movie and made the film’s star, twenty-two-year-old Ralph Macchio, into an international teen idol. 

A scene from ‘Karate Kid: Legends’. Photo courtesy of Columbia Pictures

The Karate Kid  spawned multiple sequels: The Karate Kid Part II (1986), The Karate Kid Part III (1989), The New Karate Kid (1994), and The Karate Kid (2010), a remake of the original. An animated series, action figures, video games, comic books, a board game, and even an unproduced Broadway musical (in the works in 2020) are just part of the Karate Kid’s descendants. The most interesting addition is Cobra Kai (2018-2025), a streaming series of sixty-five episodes that included original stars Macchio and William Zabka. The exceptional show picked up thirty-four years after the first film. Cobra Kai was a worthy successor and addition to the franchise legacy.

Unfortunately, Karate Kid: Legends, the sixth big-screen entry, is, at best, on the level of direct-to-video. The basic, well-worn plot concerns Li Fong (Ben Wang) moving from Beijing to the United States when his mother (Ming-Na Wen), a doctor, lands a position in a New York City hospital. Dr. Fong does not approve of martial arts due to the death of her older son, who was stabbed to death by thugs led by his defeated rival. Li has studied kung fu with Mr. Han (Jackie Chan) and now must abandon his training in the wuguan (dojo).

On his first day in the City, Li “meets cute” Mia Lipani (Sadie Stanley), daughter of Victory Pizza owner Victor (Joshua Jackson), who is in debt to loan sharks. Quickly, Li runs afoul of Conor Day (Aramis Knight), a karate champion who also happens to be Sadie’s ex. What follows is a simplistic yet somehow convoluted plot whereby Mr. Han arrives to prepare Li for a major tournament with a $50,000 prize. Mr. Han also recruits California-based Daniel LaRusso (Macchio) to co-train Li in a blend of kung fu and karate. The connection between kung fu and karate is part of a refrain of “two branches/one tree” from the prologue—a clip with Macchio and his teacher, Mr. Miyagi (Pat Morita), snagged from The Karate Kid II. 

Director Jonathan Entwistle does little with Rob Lieber’s by-the-numbers screenplay. Events are presented, but with little conflict, as the film meanders toward its predictable conclusion. The film relies on sitcom jokes and obvious montages, saccharine encounters, and often trite, strained dialogue. Peripheral elements of Chinese culture are given short shrift. Themes of guilt and responsibility barely register and then are quickly dismissed. 

The most delightful moment is the brief tag in the final minutes—a tease of what the entire outing could have been. Legacy only manages to achieve a level of “fine” because of the assembled actors. The cast is pleasant, and the performances are uniformly more than acceptable. Wang channels a Michael J. Fox vibe, making him charismatic and easy to root for. His chemistry with the likable Stanley is believable. Jackson plays her father like a low-rent George Clooney, but not without a certain appeal. 

Wen tries to find dimension in the grieving mother but is given few colors to play with and saddled with pedestrian lines: “You practice violence; you get violence in return.” The screenplay gives Knight’s sadistic bad boy zero background and no definition, flattening any possible wrinkle to the story: He is a stock psychopath, set up to be knocked over like a villainous bowling pin. Wyatt Oleff’s geeky tutor, Alan, seems like an afterthought.

Macchio, as always, owns Daniel and tries to bring both depth and lightness to the flabby proceedings. Chan is absolutely charming as the kung fu school’s shifu (master), and he and Macchio have an easy give-and-take that is the film’s highlight. Chan’s comic timing and smooth delivery enhance the underwhelming film.

It would be unfair to say the franchise is tired. Cobra Kai reinvented The Karate Kid surprisingly and engagingly, elevating and even surpassing the original films in many ways. Sadly, the Legends experience is cotton candy—but not in the festive carnival of memory and nostalgia. Instead, Karate Kid: Legends is muted and overly sweet, lacking substance and, ultimately, unmemorable.

Rated PG-13, the film is now playing in local theaters.

From left, Lorraine Bracco, Talia Shire, Brenda Vaccaro and Vince Vaughn in a scene from 'Nonnas'. Photo by Jeong Park/Netflix

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

At Enoteca Maria we celebrate cultural diversity by serving cuisines from around the world, but we do it in the most uniquely authentic way possible. Real grandmothers from every country across the globe are invited and hired as chefs to cook the recipes handed down to them that they cook at home for their families, that make up the fabric of the culture they were born and raised in. We aspire to build cultural connections through the universal language of cooking […].

Culture is a resource worth preserving. After all a tree can’t grow and change without its roots. 

— from the Enoteca Maria website

In Nonnas, Netflix offers a highly fictionalized but loving celebration of Joe Scravella’s Staten Island restaurant, Enoteca Maria. Novelist-turned filmmaker Stephen Chboksy leaves his edge behind in directing Liz Maccie’s by-the-numbers screenplay and presents a heartfelt but wholly predictable salute to family and food.

The film opens with young Joe (Theodore Helm) and a Sunday dinner in Brooklyn, watching his mother and grandmother in the kitchen, while the extended clan eats, sings, and dances in the living room. Observing his grandmother add ingredients to the sauce pot, the boy asks, “How do you know how much to use?” His grandmother responds: “You feel it in your heart. You put in your heart.” The rest of Nonnas’ two hours fall along the same line in simplicity and intent.

The story fast forwards several decades. The grown Joe (Vince Vaughn) has lost his mother to cancer. Saddened and more than a little broken, he stares into the emptiness stretching before him. After some emotional struggle, he uses the two hundred thousand dollars inherited from his mother’s insurance policy to open a restaurant to honor her memory. His concept is simple: he will hire “nonnas” (Italian grandmothers) as chefs.

He first recruits his mother’s best friend, the irascible Roberta (Lorraine Bracco). He then runs an ad in Craig’s List, garnering a “retired” nun, Teresa (Talia Shire), and Antonella (Brenda Vaccaro), the neighbor of Joe’s high school prom date, Olivia (Linda Cardellini). His mother’s hairdresser, Gia (Susan Sarandon), rounds out the staff, serving as pastry chef. His childhood friend, Bruno, with a touch of strong-arming from Bruno’s wife, Stella (Drea de Matteo), reluctantly serves as contractor. 

Nonnas follows this rag-tag crew as they benignly bicker and quickly join forces to open the restaurant. They face predictable challenges—code issues, building violations, a kitchen fire (from an incinerated sheep’s head used for Capuzzelle), opening in a thunderstorm to no business, a snobbish food critic (Campbell Scott), etc. The problem is that the hurdles feel artificial; therefore, nothing plays on two levels—whether grief or goals. No point is allowed to simmer; everything must come to an immediate boil, then taken off the stove. There is a brief food fight, a makeover montage, and a vague drinking scene with personal revelations, but no surprises.

The dialogue is a string of clichés and aphorisms: “The tomato is the heart of your dish. If you don’t have heart, you don’t have nothin’.” “You make the food. People eat the food. You make people happy.” “Food is love.” “Age is not a disease.” And, stated more than once, “One does not grow old at the table.” 

Vince Vaughn is not plumbing any depths; his performance falls into his long line of likable everymen. But his wide-eyed charm and easy earnestness hold center. The same is true of the entire cast. The quartet of kitchen cooks play to type but are delightful as they do so. Cardellini’s widow is just the right romance-light that Joe—and the story—needs. Everyone seems to be in on the celebration and having a terrific time. 

While Nonnas could easily be accused of overly sentimental (tipping occasionally into saccharine), its genuine sincerity comes through. The combination of food-porn-with-a-point and making the family you need synthesize in this Italian Valentine. Borrowing from another culture’s cuisine, Nonnas is pure schmaltz.

Enoteca Maria opened in 2007 and, unlike as portrayed in its cinematic counterpart, was an immediate success and continues to thrive. If Nonnas is not quite art, it cannot help being a boon for the restaurant and its mission.

Rated PG, the film is now streaming on Netflix.

See trailer here.

 

The cast of 'Miss Austen'. Photo courtesy of PBS

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

The following is based on viewing Part One of Masterpiece’s presentation of ‘Miss Austen.’

Jane Austen’s correspondence was vast, with an estimation of her penning thousands of letters: Only 160 remain. For reasons unknown, years after Austen’s death, her sister, Cassandra, burned the bulk of Jane’s letters.

Gill Hornby’s intriguing and entertaining Miss Austen: A Novel of the Austen Sisters (2020) speculates why. Hornby’s fictional explanation captures Jane Austen’s style, tone, and diction, with Hornby remarkably echoing Austen’s sly wit and keen observations. Hornby’s book could be seen as a seventh novel in Austen’s sadly small canon. 

A scene from ‘Miss Austen.’ Photo courtesy of PBS

Played in two timelines, the story follows the older Cassandra, in 1830, traveling to Kintbury on the pretext of helping Isabella Fowle, who is mourning her father’s death. However, Cassandra’s true motivation is retrieving the letters written by Jane and herself to Eliza Fowle, Isabella’s mother. Hornby uses Cassandra’s discovery and reading of the cache to flashback to the late 18th and early 19th century. 

In the teleplay, Andrea Gibb puts Isabella’s father, Reverend Fowle, on his deathbed (flickering candles and soft focus), imparting Cassandra a dying wish for Isabella. In this moment, the series sets itself at odds with the source—darker and leaning into the drama (or even melodrama)—rather than the edgier, droller, but more inspired world of the novel. Both touch on the themes of women in society, family obligations, and the pressure for marriage and children. But the approaches are distinctly different, with Gibb’s version trodding heavily, highlighting the romantic elements. The teleplay’s tone (and Aisling Walsh’s direction) departs from Hornby, and in essence, Austen: the author’s brilliance was balancing heartbreak with humor, satire with a sense of humanity. Lacking these vital elements, the filmed version seems bleached and untextured. 

Keeley Hawes is particularly effective as the older Cassandra, conveying thought with subtlety and presenting the older Austen sister as a woman missing nothing but keeping her own counsel. Synnøve Karlsen easily matches her as the young Cassandra, giving an equally rich performance. Patsy Ferran makes Jane quirky and likable and easily drops the few bon mots expected of the witty writer. However, along with Madeline Walker’s pleasant Eliza Fowle, the relationships feel more Little Women than Mansfield Park. 

Rose Leslie’s Isabella is lovely if reinvented as a more traditional heroine. Jessica Hynes’ waspish sister-in-law, Mary, is more ominous than necessary due less to her choice than the approach to her plotline. The same is true of the always wonderful Phyllis Logan, who plays matriarch Mrs. Austen. The book’s Mrs. Austen possesses more than a few shades of Mrs. Bennett; instead, she is given a less colorful portrait to create. Mirren Mack, in her brief appearance, manages the right blend of “respectful impudence” as the Fowles’ maid, Dinah. As for the men, they do little but respond or spout platitudes. 

Ultimately, the major point is legacy. When clergyman Mr. Dundas (Thomas Coombes, in a delightfully wicked cameo suggesting Pride and Prejudice’s unctuous Mr. Collins) suggests to Cassandra that the world is lacking a definitive biography so the public could know the real Jane Austen, she rebukes him. “Everything one needs to know about Jane Austen is to be found in the pages of her novels. There is nothing more.” In essence, this is the thesis. Jane’s life should be defined only by what she offered the public, and her private life and thoughts should remain just that—private. 

Miss Austen offers an interesting—if fictional—glimpse into one of the great literary figures of all time. That said, it is clearly the old saw: “The book was better.” 

The four-part series streams Sundays on PBS.org through May 18.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

The prolific Ellen Meister’s tenth novel, Joyride, offers a fascinating portrait of the (almost) unflagging optimist Joybird Martin, whose desire to help leads her to create a hybrid of Uber and life coaching. The unique premise—and Joybird’s dream—is more than a gimmick. Her genuine drive to heal is a passion rooted in her history. 

Author Ellen Meister

Joybird’s parents divorced when she was a child. Her father, Sid, moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career as a television writer, and she remained in Brooklyn with her mother. When she was eight, her mother died, and Joybird spent a short time living with Sid on the West Coast. After the cancellation of his television show, he and Joybird relocated to his family home in Connecticut. With a career turnaround, he moved back to L.A., leaving her with her maternal grandparents in Queens, where she remained until she left for college. After his third marriage collapsed, he failed to keep in touch.

When Joyride opens, Joybird is thirty-one and living alone in Brooklyn. Due to an implied #MeToo incident, Sid shows up jobless and homeless. Simultaneously abrasive and hyper-sensitive, Sid devolved into a perpetual victim, incapable of self-care. He has moments of acerbic reflection—“like most barbarians, I have strong opinions”—but remains a work in progress.

Like her pale-blue Honda Accord, Joybird is “earnest and dependable.” She is easily judged by her perpetually upbeat outlook. “People underestimate[ed] her because of her cheerfulness. But it was her philosophy that you don’t have to be stupid to be happy.” Her father lives in direct contrast. “Sid Marcus had been quick to feel victimized, insisting that life dealt him a crappy hand, skimming the best cards for someone else.” His long-rooted cynicism dates to his earliest days in Hollywood: privileged Connecticut-born John Martin changed his name to Sid Marcus because he felt it was the only way he could get ahead in the entertainment industry.

Equity analyst Devon Cato, an Uber rider, inspires Joybird to embark on a mobile office. He quickly becomes smitten with her, creating a romantic triangle with a Bohemian poet, Noah Pearlman. The contrast between Cato and Pearlman is not as simple as it initially appears, and Meister wisely lets the dueling relationships unfold throughout the narrative.

Among her clients are the catfished Althea and the fifteen-year-old Riley, the latter struggling with indifferent parents and teenage angst. Again, Meister chooses not to shy away from easy roads or facile solutions. Guiding Joybird as a voice of reason is the upstairs neighbor, the youthful septuagenarian Betty, whose perfume “was an old-fashioned scent that made Joybird think of movies from the 1970s and big hoop earrings.” Betty functions as a friend and mother figure, advising the impossibility of always making people happy: “That’s a burden no one should have to carry.” The simple statement resonates deeply as Joybird’s newfound career presents unexpected landmines.

Meister weaves Joybird’s efforts to reunite Sid with his high school crush and her own romantic challenges, along with the trials of her clients. She writes with the ease and brightness of Armistead Maupin, giving her New York and its boroughs a vibrant energy. Her characters are not standard “quirky” but richly detailed and fully realized. 

Like with her protagonist in Take My Husband (who settles her nerves with an initials word game), Meister fleshes out Joyride’s ensemble with textured, believable personalities. Whether describing the dress of one of Sid’s wealthy clients—“indigo jeans with cognac-colored loafers and no socks”—or the fragrance of a dissipated cologne that leaves Joybird with a “lingering undertone of regret”—Meister possesses an evocative, visceral sense of detail. 

Just as in her outstanding Farewell, Dorothy Parker, Meister writes with wit and warmth, creating complex characters whose ability to change is through a combination of adversity, choice, and personal reflection.  

Ultimately, Joyride addresses a world where one must navigate between support and exploitation. 

“Joybird knew exactly why she hadn’t seen it — her sunny faith in people sometimes blinded her to bad behavior. But she shrugged it off as a small price to pay for the privilege of living her life in the bright, white light of optimism.” Ellen Meister’s Joyride is an engaging, brisk, humorous, and satisfying journey of a person who genuinely believes “we all deserve a chance to become our best selves.” 

Pick up a copy of Joyride at your local bookseller or online at www.amazon.com or www.barnesandnoble.com. For more information, visit ellenmeister.com.

Actor Laura Dern, center, with 'Common Ground' directors Rebecca Harrell Tickell and Josh Tickell.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

According to the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, regenerative agriculture “describes holistic farming systems that, among other benefits, improve water and air quality, enhance ecosystem biodiversity, produce nutrient-dense food, and store carbon to help mitigate the effects of climate change. These farm systems are designed to work in harmony with nature, while also maintaining and improving economic viability.” Regenerative agriculture includes practices like no-tillage, planting cover crops, reducing chemical use, and planned grazing. 

In 2017, Josh Tickell published Kiss the Ground: How the Food You Eat Can Reverse Climate Change, Heal Your Body, & Ultimately Save Our World. The book purports that climate change is reversible through changing diets based on harvests from soil-nourishing, regenerative agriculture. 

Tickell (along with Rebecca Harrell Tickell) produced and directed the documentary Kiss the Ground (2020), which explored the issues raised in the book. The film shares interviews with farmers, scientists, and environmentalists. The focus is the power of healthy soil and its healing powers for humanity and the earth as a whole. Narrated by Woody Harrelson, the film features the well-known {model/ U.N. Good Will Ambassador Gisele Bünchden, NFL quarterback Tom Brady, etc.) along with authors and environmentalists. Kiss the Ground was lauded for its good intentions but received criticism for an often simplistic approach to the solution, especially concerning climate change. 

The follow-up, Common Ground, which launched globally on Amazon Prime on April 22 in honor of Earth Day, covers some of the same territory, with a spotlight on preservation of the soil. Again, central is the importance of properly cultivating the soil through regenerative agriculture. 

Common Ground opens with a letter “written” by various celebrities. Each is presented with a sonorous voiceover steeped in gravitas. The letter ends with, “It’s a matter of life and death.” If the information presented in Common Ground is even twenty percent accurate, this dark statement is harbinger of long-term and perhaps irrevocable damage. The film begins with a detailed explanation of regenerative agriculture, comparing it to the other less environmentally-friendly approaches. 

The film is most interesting and effective when it addresses agribusiness issues driving the market. Following the money trail exposes the private sector’s influences on government and education, with money filtered through land grant universities. Larger corporations have suppressed scientists and pressured the USDA, influencing the Farm Bill and driving subsidies into soy, wheat, and corn—all commodity crops. Agribusiness possesses the largest lobbying industry with twenty-three registered lobbyists for every member of Congress.

An exploration of the rise of industrial farming in post-World War II highlights the uses of chemicals in the forms of pesticides and toxic herbicides, labeled “the Green Revolution.” Most notably, Monsanto Company’s glyphosate product, Roundup, led to the 1980s genetically engineered crops—“ready grains”—that could resist Roundup. Gradually, revelations held Roundup responsible for damaging the health of thousands, leading to multiple successful lawsuits. (Monsanto sold the company to the German Bayer AG for sixty-three billion dollars.)

Common Ground gives a bleak picture of the small farmer who lives in hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt. The Farm Bill Cycle of Debt is a cyclical trap of the system dictating what (and how) to grow, boosting corporate profits, consumer illness, and farmers’ debt. Suicide rates among farmers are five times higher than the general population. Additionally, Common Ground touches on the racial disparity in farming, with the system showing an overwhelmingly biased preference towards white people. The discriminatory nature of the industry has only increased over the years.

While the film emphasizes much of the negative, it celebrates those who have succeeded in abandoning industrial farming. The alternatives are shown to have health and economic benefits—all linked back to regenerative agriculture.

The tone and style—and much of the documentary—shift from dark shadows to pastoral sunshine to peripatetic imagery. At times, Common Ground feels like clumsy public service announcements; at other points, it plays with the jarring cuts of a music video, with blaring, on-the-nose lyrics. The “behind the scenes” look at the stars — Laura Dern, Jason Momoa, Woody Harrelson, Ian Somerhalder, Donald Glover, Rosario Dawson, and many others recording their narratives is oddly and ineffectively “meta.” But Common Ground is well-paced and presents a clear path to transformation. 

Documentaries habitually select their focus as the greatest existential threat. Whether AI, plastics, water pollution, corporate manipulation, or conspicuous consumption, each sees its topic as the direst and the most important to be solved. Many point to the destruction of the environment, but each selects a different “demon” as the most dangerous. Common Ground is no different in this respect, and therefore, even in its specificity, it lands as a generic call-to-arms (or farms, as the case may be).

“The quality of what you eat determines the quality of your health. And a living soil is where it all begins.” While it might not convert the doubters, Common Ground is another reminder that through commitment and collaboration, environmental change is possible. 

The documentary is now streaming on Amazon Prime.

Charles Hller (Rami Malek) takes revenge after his wife (Rachel Brosnahan) is murdered. Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios

Reviewed by Jeffrey Sanzel

Revenge is a favored plot devices of the thriller genre. Studios release dozens, if not hundreds, of films each year, drawing from this seemingly endless well. Cinema is populated with tales of the average (usually) man retaliating for the abduction or death of a loved one (spouse/parent/child). The hero, discovering new-found or dormant resources, overcomes evil, destroys their opponents, and allows the audience a vicarious sense of justice. 

Robert Littell worked for many years as a Newsweek journalist during the Cold War, serving as the magazine’s foreign correspondent from 1965 to 1970. Beginning with The Defection of A.J. Lewinter (1973), the award-winning Littell wrote over twenty spy novels, many concerning the CIA and the Soviet Union, the most recent A Plague on Both Your Houses: A Novel in the Shadow of the Russian Mafia (2024). 

Rami Malek in a scene from ‘The Amateur’. Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios

With Diana Maddox, Littell co-adapted The Amateur (1981) for the screen, starring John Savage and Christopher Plummer. Director James Hawes helms the current remake, with a screenplay by Ken Nolan and Gary Spinelli. Taking the novel’s basic story but eschewing many of the more interesting details, they have fashioned a by-the-numbers thriller that, for all its drive, never builds momentum. 

Low-key (almost somnambulic) Charles Heller (Rami Malek) works as a CIA cryptographer. His wife, professional photographer Sarah Horowitz (Rachel Brosnahan), travels to London on business. She is taken hostage and murdered during an illegal arms deal gone wrong. 

Grief-stricken, Heller decides to kill the four terrorists. Leveraging information he uncovered about a drone strike cover-up, he blackmails Special Activities Center Director Alex Moore (Holt McCallany) for information. Furious but cornered, Moore buys time by sending Heller for training with Colonel Robert Henderson (Laurence Fishburne). Once in Europe, Heller methodically hunts down his wife’s killers. He teams up briefly with an anonymous source, Inquiline (Caitriona Balfe), but most of his work is done solo, with Heller harnessing his genius rather than his limited physical skills.

The film travels from Paris to Marseilles, Istanbul to Madrid, and finally Constanta (Romania) to the Baltic Sea, where the climax is a low-grade confrontation between Heller and the mastermind, Horst Schiller (Michael Stuhlbarg).

While The Amateur contains little original, the novel touched on a few insightful pieces, particularly connections to the Holocaust. With the story updated to the present, these aspects and one of the most interesting characters, a shadowy figure known as the Professor, have been eliminated. Even Heller’s fascination with the identity of the author of Shakespeare’s plays is absent, leaving Heller a one-note character.

If anything, the film highlights technological change, with a world run by computers and monitored in every corner by thousands of cameras. However, these devices have become central rather than tools for telling the story.

Rami Malek in a scene from ‘The Amateur’. Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios

Rami Malek rose to prominence with the USA Network’s Mr. Robot, for which he received an Emmy for Lead Actor in a Drama Series. His big-screen work included the Night at the Museum trilogy, Larry Crowne, The Master, and Need for Speed. But his breakout came with his Oscar-winning performance as Queen’s singer-songwriter, Freddie Mercury, in the biopic Bohemian Rhapsody. 

Malek is unquestionably an unusual and gifted actor, capable of complexity, variety, and style. But his performance as Heller is so subdued as not to register. Except for one beautiful moment when he opens Sarah’s suitcase, he seems to play Heller without a heartbeat. For Malek, The Amateur will be remembered as an in-between film, a bland undertaking contrasting with better and more textured work. 

Brosnahan is relegated to two short scenes, a handful of flashbacks, and a couple of “visions” that do little to show her range or talent. The always watchable Fishburne barely appears; there is a sense that he was shot for expediency, getting his scenes filmed in as few days as possible. 

Balfe is fine as Inquiline but saddled with sharing her history rather than revealing character through action (and the screenplay does her no favors, ignoring the more complicated background introduced in the book). McCallany does the best he can with a stock political villain. It is left to Jon Bernthal, as an operative known as “The Bear,” to provide an off-beat glimmer. 

Unfortunately, The Amateur offers no growth and certainly no catharsis. The resolution lacks a final of energy or surprising revelations. 

The final ten minutes wrap up the big picture, followed by a vaguely uncomfortable exchange meant to be humorous, ending with a simplistic final image unsubtly telegraphed earlier. 

For two hours, everything happens, and nothing happens. The constant movement possesses motivation but no sense of internal purpose. The film is both literally and figuratively bloodless. In the end, The Amateur provides a generic espionage drama with perpetual action but little intrigue.

Rated PG-13, the film is now playing in local theaters.