It’s the weekend again, and that means Film Focus. Here’s Mike Laidman with what’s new in local theaters.



Report]

Another week, more movies. That’s how the wheel turns. But this week, even more so than last, we find only smaller movies, and no big names releases, coming to theatres. Studios are waiting for Star Wars to drop, and giving it a wide berth. For, unless the unthinkable happens, and it tanks, it’s best to just wait it out.

This week, we take a look at American Assassin and Slumber - one of which will keep you up at night. Care to guess which?

[Slug CG]

Mike Laidman

Welcome to another edition of Film Focus. I’m Mike Laidman.

[Slug CG]
American Assassin (2017, Michael Cuesta)
A man is drawn into the world of counter-terrorism.

After the death of his girlfriend at the hands of terrorists, Mitch Rapp becomes a CIA black ops recruit under the instruction of Cold War veteran Stan Hurley. The pair is then enlisted by CIA Deputy Director Irene Kennedy to investigate a wave of apparently random attacks on both military and civilian targets. Together the three discover a pattern in the violence leading them to a joint mission with a lethal Turkish agent to stop a mysterious operative intent on starting a World War in the Middle East.

American Assassin comes at an interesting time for movies. Moviegoers are looking for complex characters at the cinema, whether they’re seeing a simple comedy or a psychological drama. So when an action movie comes along with a focus on espionage and counter-terrorism, we’d expect a little more. Unfortunately, that’s not what we end up with here; the characters aren’t given enough development to stand out from the crowd, and missed opportunities abound.

It is possible, of course, that someone who has never seen a spy thriller might be impressed, but in a day and age when even superheroes have complex emotions, there just isn’t enough water to properly float this boat.

[Slug CG]
Slumber (2017, Jonathan Hopkins)
A sleep doctor tries to protect a family from a sleep demon.

Alice is a rational-minded sleep doctor, haunted by the mysterious nocturnal death of her younger brother. While performing a routine examination on a traumatized family with sleeping problems, Alice is attacked by the father in his sleep. But when he is thrown into jail and the problems get progressively worse, Alice is forced to abandon scientific rationale and accept that the family is being terrorized by a parasitic demon who feeds on the weak while they sleep: the Night Hag.

Slumber lands squarely in B-level horror territory. The build-up is promising, although it relies a little too heavily on transparent jump scares. Later in the movie, when the dam finally breaks, things get a little too cheesy too quickly. Queue the campy horror movie tropes, for the last third of Slumber dives too deep into the rabbit hole to come back as a respectable horror movie.

An interesting premise with predictable action means a middling entry, and one that’s maybe best left to a rainy night at home.