Venice 2023: "The Killer" and "Hit Man"

by Elisa Giudici

Venice's most sought-after job this year? The sicario. Professional assassins are trending. Today David Fincher's The Killer and Richard Linklater's Hit Man. 

THE KILLER by David Fincher
The real mystery here is whether The Killer's lack of ambition stems from production during the COVID years and a tight schedule due to Michael Fassbender's busy agenda, or if Fincher simply wanted to have fun. While it may not be a masterpiece or top tier Fincher, The Killer is still a thriller directed by Fincher, a master of the form.

This time, Fincher designs the movie around the protagonist's voiceover, setting the rhythm for the entire story and influencing the cinematography and editing choices...

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Split Decision: Top Gun: Maverick

No one feels the same way about any film. Thus, Team Experience is pairing up to debate the merits of each of the big awards season movies . Here’s Chris James, Travis Cragg and Cláudio Alves duking it out over Top Gun: Maverick.

CHRIS: I couldn’t think of a better movie to have reignited the box office this summer than Top Gun: Maverick. The sequel arrived 36 years after the first became a blockbuster in 1986. Personally, I never loved the original. Despite fun, pop-culture defining moments, it often felt like a scattershot action movie with nauseating jingoism. My expectations for the sequel were low, but the film blew past them like a fighter jet passing Mach 10.

Central to my enjoyment of Top Gun: Maverick is the renewed focus on character over spectacle...

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Awards Season Catchup: "Devotion"

By Abe Friedtanzer

While Top Gun: Maverick has been enjoying a warm reception from audiences and awards bodies alike, another film about daring pilots is flying around in theaters. Based on the 2015 nonfiction book Devotion: An Epic Story of Heroism, Friendship, and Sacrifice by Adam Makos, Devotion is about a powerful friendship between two Navy pilots during the Korean War. One of them is Jonathan Majors, the only Black member of the unit. In the film's other Top Gun: Maverick connection, the other one is played by Glen Powell, who portrays Hangman in the present-day film. 

Devotion opens on Tom Hudner (Glen Powell) arriving to join Fighter Squadron 32, which already includes Jesse Brown (Majors), who faces routine racism from his fellow Navy officers and the neighbors who believe that his mere existence is stirring up trouble...

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Would you rather?

We haven't looked at Instagram in ages. Let's play the game. Would you rather...

...go to the movies with Glen Powell?
...hike Topanga with Richard Madden?
...california dream' with Jennifer Tilly?
...get ready for summer with Beanie Feldstein?
...wrangle puppies with Olivia Newton-John?
...kiss a pig with Miles Heizer?
...get a headcast with Harry Shum Jr?
...read a new novel with Natalie Portman?
...or travel incognito with Octavia Spencer?

The photos are after the jump to help you decide...

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YNMS: Top Gun Maverick

We're way behind on movie trailers. So here's another Yes No Maybe So courtesy of Tony Ruggio...

The interwebz collectively threw shade a year or two ago when Tom Cruise, Jerry Bruckheimer, and director Joseph Kosinski (Tron Legacy, Oblivion) announced the twenty-years-too-late sequel to Top Gun, complete with some premise about sons and legacies and an aging Maverick. Sounded like the same ol’ routine any time a long-dormant brand or franchise suddenly decides to reboot or, in the case of Top Gun, sequelize for the very first time. It’s somethin’ else what a good trailer can do...because all of that is here and more in the first trailer which dropped on Thursday, and yet it’s one of the best teasers this year...

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