Buzz Blog

Asteroid City ***1/2
See feature review. Available June 23 in theaters. (PG-13)

The Last Rider ***
Biographical documentaries often suffer from a certain shapelessness, so it’s always satisfying to find one that demonstrates a sense for the drama created by a specific story within that life. Director Alex Holmes profiles celebrated cycling champion Greg LeMond, the first American ever to win the Tour de France, with LeMond himself and his wife Kathy as the primary narrators. But while there’s some material here about LeMond’s California childhood and his early years on the pro cycling tour, the focus is squarely on a very specific arc: LeMond’s victory in the 1986 Tour; the hunting accident shortly thereafter that nearly cost him his life; and the three-year recovery process leading up to his dramatic “comeback” during the 1989 Tour. Holmes certainly gives time to the actual medical emergency, but doesn’t dwell too long either there or on how specifically LeMond built himself back up to world-class status. He understands that the strongest material comes in the ’89 Tour, including the subplots surrounding competitors like defending champion Pedro Delgado and two-time champion Laurent Fignon, as well as conveying the tactics and details of the event in a way easily understandable for a layperson. Content involving LeMond’s history as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse feels somewhat awkwardly incorporated, but it does emphasize the sense that what could have been a standard sports doc is indeed the triumph of a survivor, in every sense of the word. Available June 23 at Broadway Centre Cinemas. (PG-13)

No Hard Feelings ***
As was true of his feature debut, 2019’s Good Boys, co-writer/director Gene Stupnitsky uses the veneer of a bawdy R-rated comedy to smuggle in a thoughtful and sensitive story. Jennifer Lawrence plays Maddie Barker, a lifelong resident of Montauk in danger of losing her family home when she can’t continue as an Uber driver after the repossession of her car. But a lifeline appears in the form of a Craigslist ad, with wealthy parents (Matthew Broderick and Laura Benanti) offering a car in exchange for someone to “date” [wink, wink] their deeply introverted college-freshman-to-be son, Percy (Andrew Barth Feldman). It’s almost tragic that no one before now has really made the most of Lawrence’s natural skills as a physical comedian, and she’s clearly having a blast with Maddie’s open contempt for most of the privileged people around her. But she also never steamrolls Feldman, who finds some wonderful shades in Percy beyond a stereotypical Gen Z nerd. The chemistry between the two leads proves more compelling than any of the ostensibly outrageous situations Stupnitsky concocts, with the title serving as kind of a sly reference to people wanting to avoid difficult emotions. While this might not be the raucous belly-laugh comedy that some viewers could be expecting, and struggles with pacing near the finish line, the pleasant surprise is that it’s so … well, sweet. Available June 23 in theaters. (R)

Past Lives ****
Writer/director Celine Song’s debut feature isn’t just a remarkably assured love story; it’s one of the wisest screenplays I can recall about how the whole idea of “love stories” as a narrative convention affects what we expect and experience from our romantic relationships. In circa-2000 South Korea, crushing-on-each-other 12-year-old school friends Na Young and Hae Sung are separated when Na Young’s family emigrates to Canada; 12-years later, Na Young/now Nora (Greta Lee) and Hae Sung (Teo Yoo) reconnect remotely, and again years later after that when Nora has married Arthur (John Magaro). It’s not surprising that the decades-spanning structure has earned comparisons to Richard Linklater’s Before trilogy, and there are some similar themes of dealing with the regrets and realities of a relationship that has taken on mythical dimensions. But it’s no coincidence that both Nora and Arthur are written as professional storytellers, or that the introductory prologue finds people at a bar speculating on the nature of the relationship between our three main characters. With a lovely low-key honesty and terrific performances, Song explores how we gravitate towards great stories of how romantic partners came together, believing it indicates some sort of “destined” connection. The cultural specificities of the characters’ experience matter, to be sure, but this is less an immigrant story than it is a tale about why we in the audience find ourselves rooting for certain people to end up together, and what it means to their ultimate happiness. Available June 23 in theaters. (PG-13)

Rise ***
The original French title of Cédric Klapisch’s drama—En Corps—offers layers of meaning that Rise doesn’t really suggest, providing more subtext for its character study of artists at work. It starts with Paris-based professional ballet dancer Elise Gautier (Marion Barbeau) suffering a potentially career-ending foot injury during a performance, and suddenly finding herself adrift and searching for purpose. While helping a friend with his catering business at a seaside artist retreat in Brittany, Elise connects with a company of modern dancers, and finds a potential new avenue for expression. As is typical for Klapisch’s films, there’s a bit of sprawling messiness to the narrative, including tensions between Elise and her pragmatic lawyer father (Denis Podalyès), and romantic entanglements/complications that don’t really connect (though there is an amusing recurring “if this truck’s a-rockin’” motif). The story is much more successful at capturing artistic creation as an almost physical need that manifests itself in many ways. Klapisch spends a lot of time on rehearsals and performances themselves, and on the way that Elise is in some ways healed by continuing to do the thing she loves. It’s a tale of a “corps” as both an individual frail human body and a body of artists working together, and the “encore” of needing to know that the end of one creative work isn’t really the end. Available June 23 at Broadway Centre Cinemas. (NR)

The Stroll **1/2
Important conversations are taking place regarding who should get to tell certain stories; it should be just as okay to acknowledge when those choosing to tell those stories overplay their hand. Kristen Lovell, a Black trans woman and former New York City sex worker, co-directs with Zackary Drucker this documentary focusing on the experience of being a Black trans sex worker in New York City—more specifically, during the period in the 1980s and 1990s in Manhattan’s Meat Packing District, before the gentrification of the neighborhood. Not surprisingly, Lovell gets trusting access to a bunch of terrific interview subjects, laying out the details of life on the street for those who had very few other options for gainful employment, and who formed tight bonds for their survival. Along the way, the filmmakers explore the history of police and government officials responding to sex work—spoiler alert: not compassionately—as well as the often-contentious relationship between trans activists and a cisgender gay community that for many years tried to distance itself from them. The primary downside: Lovell is so personally intertwined with this story, and with her interview subjects, that she tends to draw too much attention to herself. And while she is absolutely a part of this story, it’s one that could have stood on its own without frequent reminders that we’re getting the story from the source. Available June 21 via HBO and Max. (NR)