Celebrate Dev Patel with "Monkey Man"

by Cláudio Alves

Happy birthday, Dev Patel!

The erstwhile Skins actor turned hottest living Oscar nominee is 34 years old today and, as if to commemorate the occasion, Monkey Man just became available on PVOD. The India-set action movie is Patel's feature directorial debut, though he's more than just the guy calling the shots from the director's chair. The multi-hyphenated artist also produced and wrote the revenge flick. Oh, and he stars in it, too, doing most of his stunts, which resulted in a broken hand on the first days of shooting. Overall, it was a challenging project to bring to fruition, made more so when Netflix dropped Monkey Man in response to its political content. Thankfully, Jordan Peele came to the rescue, guaranteeing the film a theatrical release that, if nothing else, confirmed Dev Patel's promise as a bonafide movie star…

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Interview: Composer Michael Abels on "Nope" and "Chevalier"

by Nathaniel R

MIchael Abels photographed for the LA OperaOne of the most exciting film composers to gain prominence in the past decade is Michael Abels. He's received multiple nominations for his work and prizes, too like the Jerry Goldsmith Award and the World Soundtrack Award. We wait impatiently for an Oscar nomination to follow, given his memorable inventive scores that have played such a huge part in the mass appeal of the films of Jordan Peele. We were honored to sit down with him to talk about his diverse interests in musical genres, his history with piano and voice, his Nope score, and what's next.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity...

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Box Office: 'Nope' Flies while 'Marcel' Takes His Sweet Time

by Nathaniel R

Once again Jordan Peele proves he's one of the rare celebrities who is bankable behind the camera. His third film as a director brings him a third #1 finish, as Nope nabs the biggest original film opening weekend since... Peele's own previous hit Us (2019) opened to $71 million. Any win for original filmmaking feels so good, doesn't it? More after the jump...

Weekend Box Office (Estimates) July 22nd-24th 🔺 = new or expanding /  ★ = Recommended links if we've written about it
WIDE (OVER 800 SCREENS)	PLATFORM RELEASES
NOPE	FIRE OF LOVE
1 ★🔺 NOPE $44.3 *NEW*	1  🔺 MARCEL THE SHELL WITH SHOES ON $874k (cum. $2.9)
2 THOR: LOVE & THUNDER $22.5 (cum. $276.6)	2 ★🔺 FIRE OF LOVE [DOC] $133k (cum. $283k)

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Review: Jordan Peele strikes again with thrilling overstuffed "Nope"

by Nathaniel R

We name them. We train them. We live with them. Some people work with them. But do we ever really know our animal friends? Since we can't speak directly to them, their emotions and thoughts are mostly guesswork on our part. Nope takes place largely at a horse ranch. It's run by the Haywood family, Father Otis (Keith David), son OJ (Daniel Kaluuya), and daughter Emerald (Keke Palmer). The Haywoods have been training horses for movie and television shoots for generations. OJ, perpetually tense, quiet, and observant, notices it quickly; something is off with the horses. But what? The answer, without spoilers, is this: they know it's a horror film before the Haywoods do.

What kind of a horror film it is, though, is another question...

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Yes No Maybe So: 'Nope', 'Deep Water', and 'Multiverse of Madness'

by Nathaniel R

No sooner did we get caught up on trailers with Jurassic World and such than the Superbowl hits which brings with it a new wave of teasers and trailers, not all of them airing during the game (that's expensive!) but here are the latest via our Yes No Maybe So™ habit. Join in the trifurcated breakdwon in the comments...

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