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When you sit down to watch a Jason Statham movie, you pretty much know what you’re going to get. You’re going to see Statham’s signature charm, you’re going to see him beat up a whole bunch of bad guys, and…well, that’s pretty much it. As much as I love the guy, his filmography isn’t exactly packed with Oscar winners. In fact, a lot of his films are forgettably generic at best, so I didn’t have terribly high hopes for his latest flick, A Working Man. Sure, I figured the action would be fun, but I had my doubts about the story. Nevertheless, as a big action fan, I decided to roll the dice and give this movie a shot anyway, so I bought a ticket for opening weekend and hoped for the best.
A Working Man was directed and co-written by David Ayer, and it stars Jason Statham, Michael Peña, and David Harbour. In the film, Levon Cade is a former Royal Marine Commando who now leads a peaceful life as the head of a construction team. He doesn’t have much use for his combat skills these days, but that all changes when his boss’s teenage daughter is kidnapped by a dangerous gang of human traffickers. This horrible turn of events compels Levon to unleash his inner Liam Neeson and go after the bad guys who’ve (pardon the pun) taken the poor girl, and as I’m sure you can guess, a whole lot of mayhem ensues. On paper, that sounds like a decent-enough premise for a Jason Statham flick, but unfortunately, the execution isn’t up to par. Like I expected, the action in A Working Man is pretty good, but the setup is so bad it kills the fun before it even starts. The first act briefly touches on the major points we need to know to understand the story, but it stubbornly refuses to do anything more than the absolute bare minimum. It gives us just enough that we know what’s going on, but it’s nowhere near enough to make us like these characters or care about their plight. For instance, there’s a moment when Levon gets to show off his world-class fighting skills before things really go south, and it’s one of the laziest scenes I’ve seen in a while. A group of nondescript hoodlums show up at his construction site to rough up one of his workers, and of course, Levon intervenes and saves the day. He fights off the entire clique all by himself, so there’s no doubt in our minds that he really is the toughest guy in this movie. But there’s just one problem. A Working Man doesn’t bother to explain who these people are or why they’re there. We have no idea what they want with this poor construction worker, so the scene has no narrative weight to it. It’s about as emotionally affecting as a random fight clip on YouTube, so it does nothing to get us invested in these characters or their story. To take another example, the scene where Levon’s boss asks him to rescue his kidnapped daughter plays out in a fairly cliched fashion. At first Levon refuses because he’s left the action hero life behind, but almost immediately afterwards, he changes his mind. It’s the kind of way-too-fast 180 we’ve seen a million times before, but surprisingly, that’s not the worst thing about it. See, Levon has a little girl himself, so when he declines to save his boss’s daughter, we think he’s going to see his own kid and realize how much pain his boss must be in. But that’s not what happens. Instead, Levon goes to visit an old friend of his, and after a conversation the camera mostly skips over, he agrees to take the job. There’s no back and forth discussion, no grappling with the ramifications of his decision, and certainly no compelling drama driving the change. He just decides to say yes, and that’s it. It’s even lazier than the construction site fight scene, so if you care about competent storytelling at all, this amateurish writing is going to make you roll your eyes so hard they might not roll back. To be fair, nothing else in the opening act of A Working Man is quite as bad as those two moments, but none of it is particularly good either. This part of the film feels like it’s just mechanically speeding through a checklist of points it has to hit, so by the time Levon set out on his quest, I had already checked out emotionally. I simply couldn’t bring myself to care about what was happening on screen, so it didn’t matter how good the action was. With no emotional weight behind them, even the best fights in the world will feel like little more than visual noise, and that’s exactly what happens here. Like I said before, A Working Man kills the fun before it even gets started, and not even Jason Statham’s signature charm can salvage it. The inept setup alone makes this one of the worst movies of the year so far, so if you’re in the mood to watch an action hero mete out some much-needed justice, don’t waste your time with this film. Just go back and watch John Wick again.
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Humans love mysteries. They tap into our natural desire to grow in knowledge and plumb the depths of God’s wondrous creation, and they point to our eternal destiny. In heaven, we’ll be able to contemplate the infinite divine mystery forever, but since we’re not there yet, we have to settle for more earthly mysteries in the meantime (outside of prayer, of course!). Sometimes they take the form of real-life riddles, like science or true crime cases, and other times they come in fictional stories like the Sherlock Holmes books. Either way, we just can’t get enough of these brain-busting conundrums, so when I first heard about the new sci-fi horror mystery Ash, I knew I had to check it out. I bought a ticket for opening weekend as soon as I got the chance, and I couldn’t wait to see what mind-melting secrets this movie had in store.
Ash was directed by Flying Lotus, and he also stars in the film alongside Eiza González, Aaron Paul, Iko Uwais, Kate Elliott, and Beulah Koale. The story follows Riya, an astronaut who wakes up on a distant planet with no memory of who she is or why she’s there. To make matters worse, as she explores the space station, she finds that all her fellow crew members are dead, so she has no idea what kind of danger she might be in. Eventually, she runs into Brion, another astronaut who says he received a distress signal from her location, but in typical horror movie fashion, it’s not entirely clear if Riya can trust the guy. Is he really who he says he is, or does he have sinister ulterior motives connected to the death of Riya’s crewmates? As you might be able to guess from that plot synopsis, Ash drops us right in the middle of this head-scratching mystery. Sure, the film eventually fills in all the gaps for us, but that information only comes in flashbacks. When the story begins, we know nothing about these characters or Riya’s dire situation, and in a lot of movies, that lack of connection to the protagonist would be fatal. But not here. Director Flying Lotus uses every trick in his arsenal to make up for that deficiency, and the man succeeds brilliantly. He employs trippy visuals, unconventional lighting, and ethereal background music to craft an almost dreamlike atmosphere that pulls you in right away, and lead actress Eiza González completely sells the mystery. From the moment Riya first wakes up, you totally believe that she’s just as lost as you are. She’s a perfect proxy for the audience as she explores her surroundings and slowly discovers the aftermath of whatever horrific event happened there, so despite not having a preexisting connection to the woman, you identify with her almost immediately. You feel like you’re right there with her as she struggles to wrap her head around everything she’s seeing, so you can’t help but get caught up in the puzzle yourself. You desperately want to know what evil befell these poor people, and that question fuels the entire film. See, soon after Ash begins, Riya starts experiencing flashbacks to the time before she fell asleep, and these flashbacks give you an inkling of what really happened to her and the rest of the crew. But it’s only an inkling, as the movie takes a number of unexpected twists and turns that will keep you guessing the whole way through. Every time you think you have it figured out, the film will pull the rug out from under you, so you’ll have to start your theorizing all over again. It’s like a cinematic onion that just raises new questions every time you pull back another layer, so as a mystery, this movie is top-notch. And as a fun sci-fi horror flick, Ash knocks it out of the park as well. For starters, the aftermath of the horrific incident and Riya’s flashbacks to it can get pretty bloody, but these images are never gratuitous. The victims’ gruesome fate makes the mystery that much more puzzling, so the gore has genuine narrative purpose. On top of that, there are also a number of times when Ash ratchets the action up to eleven, and Flying Lotus infuses these scenes with a frenetic energy that will instantly put you on the edge of your seat. He finds the perfect combination of score, editing, and camera movements to make the intensity of these moments palpable, so you’ll almost be able to taste the characters’ anxiety as they fight for their lives. Last but not least, I have to mention the ending. I obviously can’t get into any specifics, but I can say that the last five minutes or so of the film are great. They add another kind of super fun horror into the mix, so if you’re a fan of the genre, you’re almost guaranteed to enjoy this “final boss.” All that being said, I don’t want to give the impression that Ash is a perfect movie. It’s not. It has a lot going for it, but thematically, the film is rather thin. I can’t fully explain why without spoiling some of the surprises, but this story just doesn’t say much. There’s a line towards the end that hints at a possible message about colonialism or the flaws inherent in our broken human nature, but those ideas aren’t prominent enough to constitute genuine themes. The best we can say is probably that this is a basic good vs. evil story, but even that message comes through as little more than a faint whisper. The mystery is just so prominent it drowns out any deeper meaning the story might contain, so as much as I enjoyed that mystery, I wish the filmmakers had added in a bit more thematic substance to balance it out. Thankfully though, that one flaw doesn’t even come close to ruining the entire experience. Ash is still an excellent sci-fi horror mystery brought to life by a unique, creative voice in the genre, so if this sounds like something you’d enjoy, I highly recommend that you give the film a watch. Before we begin this review, I have to give a bit of a disclaimer. Magazine Dreams star Jonathan Majors has been in the news a lot lately, and not for good reasons. I’m not going to rehash the court case against him and the new evidence that recently surfaced (a quick Google search will tell you everything you need to know), but I have to mention it because his presence in the movie is going to make a lot of people uncomfortable. And that’s okay.
The question of whether to separate the art from the artist has no easy answers, so if you’d rather not see Majors on screen, you have every right to give this film a pass. But my job isn’t to make that decision for you. It’s to judge the movie on its own merits, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. I’m going to review this film simply as a piece of art, and it’s up to you to weigh that judgement against the real-life drama involving the movie’s lead star. With that brief caveat out of the way, let’s get the ball rolling. Magazine Dreams was written and directed by Elijah Bynum, and it stars Jonathan Majors, Haley Bennett, Taylour Paige, Harrison Page, Harriet Sansom Harris, and Mike O’Hearn. In the film, Killian Maddox is a bodybuilder with dreams of making it big. He wants his picture to be on magazine covers (hence the name), but as you might be able to guess, his quest for stardom has a dark side. The guy has given up just about everything–his health, his social life, and eventually, even his mental stability–to achieve his goals. Nothing is going to stop Killian from becoming the next big thing in the bodybuilding world, but soon enough, the sacrifices he’s made are going to catch up to him. Like a lot of dramas, Magazine Dreams isn’t really about the plot. It’s more about the main character and the ups and downs of his life as he pursues his dream, so this movie rests almost entirely on Jonathan Majors’s shoulders. It’s a lot to ask one man to carry, but thankfully, he’s more than up to the task. Right from the start, this guy pulls off a pitch-perfect blend of utter determination and almost total brokenness. Whenever Killian is working on his body, he exudes a single-minded resolve that makes you believe he can and will rise to the top, but when he’s doing just about anything else, you can see how broken he really is. It’s most notable in his interactions with Jessie, a grocery store worker he’s had a crush on for a while. After finally building up the courage to ask her out, their first date is an absolute disaster. Killian’s lack of social skills reach nearly The Office-esque levels of cringeworthy awkwardness, so after just a few minutes, you might find yourself squirming in your seat. To be fair, a lot of that is due to the great writing, but even top-notch dialogue is worthless if it’s not brought to life by a skillful performer. And like I said before, Majors completely knocks it out of the park. He nails every side of this complex and fascinating character, and when Killian’s ailments and actions begin to catch up with him, the actor doesn’t skip a beat. To take just one example, there’s a scene where the guy faints on stage during a bodybuilding competition, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d think Jonathan Majors really did pass out on camera. From the obviously painful grimaces to the full-body trembling that precedes the fall, this guy perfectly mimics the way your body will slowly give out on you if it takes enough punishment. That acting masterclass alone is worth the price of admission, but it’s not the only thing Magazine Dreams does well. The movie also uses Majors’s top-tier performance to highlight the thin line separating ambition from obsession. It’s good to have goals, and it’s good to dedicate yourself wholeheartedly to your craft, but if you’re not careful, those dreams can take over your life and become a form of idolatry. Granted, it’s not always clear where that line is, but when you start sacrificing your health and injecting yourself with drugs that turn your temper into a raging fire, you’ve probably gone a bit too far. All that being said, Magazine Dreams isn’t just a simple cautionary tale. Especially in the second half, this film also highlights the roots of Killian’s single-minded pursuit of bodybuilding perfection, and they’re quite tragic. This guy just wants to be loved, but he thinks he has to earn it by doing something extraordinary. Otherwise, in his mind, he’s simply another worthless nobody. That deep emotional wound leads him to do some crazy things just so people will like him, but the real tragedy is that he already has the love he so desperately desires. Killian lives with his grandfather, and there’s a scene where he tells the old-timer he’s going to win a competition and make him proud. In response, the man tells Killian that he’s already proud of him, but Killian just keeps walking as if he didn’t even hear it. All he needs to do is accept the love his grandfather wants to give him, but instead, he searches for validation in all the wrong places. It’s a genuinely heartbreaking dynamic, and it contains a number of important lessons we’d all do well to heed. For instance, it highlights the vital importance of love and human connection, and it shows that we don’t need to be extraordinary to be worthy of love. We deserve it exactly the way we are, so we don’t have to go to unhealthy extremes to justify our existence. Together with Majors’s great performance, that rich thematic substance makes Magazine Dreams a great watch, but I can’t say it’s a perfect film. No matter how bad life gets for Killian, he doesn’t seem to face any consequences. Sure, he experiences a number of genuine hardships, but every time he does, the movie just mentions them once or twice and then seems to forget they ever happened. Even when he gets into serious legal trouble, nothing appears to come of it, and while your mileage may vary, I simply can’t suspend disbelief quite that much. Along similar lines, this film also ends on a slightly confused note. I obviously can’t spoil the details, but I can tell you that the final scene suffers from a bit of thematic ambivalence. It takes the lack of consequences to a head-scratching extreme that appears to dilute the movie’s message, so if you ask me, the story should’ve ended a few minutes earlier. Thankfully though, those problems aren’t nearly egregious enough to ruin the entire experience. They’ll take the movie down a few spots in my end-of-year ranking, but I still had a great time with it. I found Magazine Dreams to be a moving exploration of the dangers of obsession and the emotional scars that cause us to seek validation in what we do rather than who we are, and if you’ve ever experienced similar struggles in your own life, I think this film will resonate with you on a deep level. |
Jp Nunezis a longtime film buff and theology nerd with master's degrees in theology and philosophy from Franciscan University of Steubenville. His favorite movie genres are horror, superheroes, and giant monsters. Archives
April 2025
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