‘Eddington’ Says: “Remember This? Oh, You Do? Well, How About THIS?”

July 22, 2025

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What would you do, if this Eddington-ed to you? (CREDIT: A24)

Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Pedro Pascal, Emma Stone, Austin Butler, Luke Grimes, Deirdre O’Connell, Michael Ward, Amélie Hoeferle, Clifton Collins Jr., William Belleau, Matt Gomez Hidaka, Cameron Mann

Director: Ari Aster

Running Time: 149 Minutes

Rating: R

Release Date: July 18, 2025 (Theaters)

My cycle of reaction to Eddington was pretty similar to my response to Don’t Look Up (2021). With the latter, I found myself going, “Yes, I know climate change is a looming disaster,” but then by the end, it got a little loopier, and I was like, “Oh, what’s this now?” As for Ari Aster’s latest, it pummeled me into an internal monologue of “Yes, I remember that 2020 was a volatile time, and yes, I know that young people fighting against injustice can be insufferable.” But then it takes a turn about halfway through, and I was like, “Oh, this is what you were building up to?” And then when it zooms into its unpredictable conclusion, I was like, “Okay, when did we get off this exit?” Maybe it could have sped up to driving off that cliff a little sooner, although perhaps Aster also wanted us to feel that like that frog in the boiling water first for a little bit.

Grade: 3 2020s out of 5 Conspiracy Theories

‘Beau Is Afraid,’ But Maybe He’ll Be Less Afraid If You Go See His Movie

April 14, 2023

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Beau Afraid, Beau Very Afraid (CREDIT: Takashi Seida/A24)

Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Zoe Lister-Jones, Nathan Lane, Amy Ryan, Patti LuPone, Richard Kind, Parker Posey, Kylie Rogers, Denis Ménochet, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Hayley Squires, Armen Nahapetian

Director: Ari Aster

Running Time: 179 Minutes

Rating: R for Sex, Naked Stabbings, Giant Testicles, Peer Pressure, and Just an All-Around Disturbing Odyssey

Release Date: April 14, 2023(New York and L.A. Theaters)/Expands April 21

What’s It About?: Beau Wasserman (Joaquin Phoenix) is just trying to get home to visit his mom Mona (Zoe Lister-Jones in flashbacks, Patti LuPone in the present day). He’s really, really trying to! But you wouldn’t believe the obstacles in his way! She’s skeptical that he’s making the most honest effort, but we get to see what he has to deal with. He lives in the most outrageously dangerous part of town, which leads to his apartment being broken into and then epically destroyed. Then a series of comically violent misunderstandings concludes with him being plowed down in traffic. Luckily, the people who hit him are a seemingly lovely couple (Amy Ryan, Nathan Lane) who take him into their home while he’s healing. Not so luckily, their teenage daughter (Kylie Rogers) is an absolute nightmare, and their late son’s Army buddy (Denis Ménochet) is seriously disturbed. Beau eventually breaks free enough to go on a spiritual journey of sorts and eventually arrive at his childhood home. But will it be too late for him to get his mother to confess what really happened between them when he was growing up?

What Made an Impression?: When dealing with a 3-hour movie like Beau Is Afraid, we all of course want to know: is it possible to make it through the whole thing without nodding off or losing patience? I can confidently say that writer-director Ari Aster and his totally game cast held my attention the whole time, though your results may vary. There are gonzo left turns around every corner, which some might find profoundly exhausting. But if you can get on the right wavelength, it’ll be quite fulfilling and invigorating.

The whole film dances on the precipice between real and surreal. Just when I think I can come up with a logical explanation for how this could all possibly happen, suddenly a giant phallic monster shows up. It’s biblical, I must say. This might as well have been called Ari Aster’s Old Testament.

I think the skeleton key might lie in the opening scene, as Beau meets with his therapist (Stephen McKinley Henderson) and gets a new, somewhat dangerous prescription. Everything that follows might be a trip through Beau’s subconscious, and not exactly of the most ethical variety. The doc may very well be in cahoots with Mona, and they may have cooked up a fantastical scheme to test Beau’s love. I hope that this isn’t a metaphor for Aster’s relationship with his own mother, but if it is, I pray that it can serve as an opening for them to heal their own wounds. (And that same sentiment holds true for anyone who’s had a rough relationship with a parent!)

Beau Is Afraid is Recommended If You Like: The Game, The Book of Job

Grade: 4 out of 5 Guilt Trips

Movie Review: Agony and Catharsis Fight for Prominence in the Emotional Turbulence of ‘Midsommar’: Which Makes It Out on Top?

July 1, 2019

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CREDIT: A24

Starring: Florence Pugh, Jack Reynor, William Jackson Harper, Will Poulter, Vilhelm Blomgren

Director: Ari Aster

Running Time: 140 Minutes

Rating: R for Graphic Pagan Rituals

Release Date: July 3, 2019

Plenty of horror movies have served as metaphors for emotionally turbulent life events (Don’t Look Now, The Babadook, and director Ari Aster’s own Hereditary, to name a few), but never before have I been so relieved by that fact than in the case of Midsommar. Because if it weren’t a metaphor, its ending would be way too distressing to bear. The conclusion is about as terrifying as one could imagine given the premise, but it’s leavened with a sense of relief, as a breakup that really needed to happen has finally happened. If that sounds like a spoiler, rest assured that I’m just stating the inevitable.

Midsommar opens with Dani (rising supernova Florence Pugh) and Christian (Jack Reynor, aka Seth Rogen’s long-lost Irish cousin) looking like they are both about to realize their need to split up, but then Dani experiences a sudden family trauma, and dumping her is fully out of the question at this point as she really needs someone to lean on. If nothing else, Midsommar is about the importance of having a reliable network of emotional support, and the danger of how that need can be manipulated. That fact is unavoidable when Pelle (Vilhelm Blomgren) takes Dani and Christian and their other friends Josh (William Jackson Harper) and Mark (Will Poulter) to the Swedish commune he grew up in. It’s summer in Scandinavia, which means that the sun seemingly never sets, thus providing the perfect setting to confirm, or perhaps exceed, our worst suspicions of what a “commune” in a horror movie really means.

Ultimately, I am not quite sublimely thrilled by Midsommar; not quite underwhelmed, but perhaps just whelmed. It delivered what I expected, based on the trailer and Florence Pugh’s unrestrained agony on the poster. In that vein, it reminds me quite a bit of Get Out, which was similarly groundbreaking in its concept but rather straightforward in its accomplishment once I got onboard with its premise. But Get Out has proved ripe for revisiting and benefited accordingly, and I imagine that the same might be true in the long run for Midsommar once it is less weighed down by expectations. It certainly has the indelible imagery to make repeat visits worthwhile.

Midsommar is Recommended If You Like: The Wicker Man, Hereditary, Emotional Turmoil Raising the Stakes of Horror

Grade: 3.5 out of 5 Unexplained Bears

This Is a Movie Review: Hereditary

June 8, 2018

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CREDIT: A24

I give Hereditary 4 out of 5 Decapitations: https://uinterview.com/reviews/movies/hereditary-movie-review-an-unforgettable-toni-collette-performance-is-one-of-many-disturbing-attractions/