Running Man

Actors: Glen Powell, William H. Macy, Lee Pace, Michael Cera, Emilia Jones, Daniel Ezra, Jayme Lawson, Sean Hayes, Colman Domingo, Josh Brolin.

Rating: 8 out of 10, The original Governator film was high camp but they play this newer one closer to a possible reality. That allowed some well thought out satire to inject itself into the plot. Glen Powell, once again, proves decisively that he has graduated from supporting roles. He plays an angry husband/father who enters the game to rescue his family, cue the evil corporation. Instead of a defined game arena, he must navigate through a future society where everyone, including a highly trained team of assassins, is scouring the info-nets to locate and kill him. This was a nice update to the concept and, again, Powell is a super-star on the cusp.

MVP: Powell as Ben Richards effortlessly carrying movie

Weapons

Actors: Josh Brolin, Julia Garner, Alden Ehrenreich, Austin Abrams, Cary Christopher, Toby Huss, Benedict Wong, Amy Madigan

Rating: 9 out of 10, Weapons is awesome. A spooky premise of 17 elementary school classmates all disappearing on the same night, scarily all running with arms extended behind them towards an unknown location. The director takes an interesting route by exploring the disappearance from the viewpoints of several different characters including the teacher of the class where all but one student disappeared and also the parent of a missing child. The tension slowly builds as we learn more about the situation and it culminates with the final twenty minutes of absolute mayhem as the source of evil is revealed. It was a satisfying climax as all the loose threads were answered in a satisfying manner. There were also some needed light moments; the best being when Josh Brolin wakes from a scary dream and says the line every audience member is thinking. I’m usually not brave enough to see a horror movie by myself (pointed out to me by my son) but I’m glad I did, because Weapons is excellent.

MVP: Madigan as the wholly evil Aunt Gladys

Sisu Road to Revenge

Actors: Jorma Tommila, Richard Brake, Stephen Lang

Rating: 8 out of 10, An excellent follow up to the surprising first film. Our hero, once again, without saying a single word in the movie, plows his way through a horde of enemies trying to kill him. He sneaks into the Soviet Union in 1946 to visit his old homestead where his family was killed. He dismantles the house and attempts to sneak it back into Finland. The Soviets, a bit put out by the more than 300 Soviet soldiers he killed during early WW2, decide to send the man who killed his family after him. Big mistake. Jorma Tommila is truly a force of nature as the Soviets don’t do any better than the Nazis did in the first film. You have to suspend a lot of disbelief to make it work but this is an eminently watchable, non-stop action flick as he wades through the Russians. Stephen Lang is the head bad guy as he seems to have made a career out of scarily competent villains. The cinematography is fantastic as the filmmakers don’t depend, too much, on CGI. A great movie.

MVP: Who else could it be but Tommila reprising his role as Aatami Korpi