3 Foot Ball & Souls

Four members of an internet chat room decide to commit suicide together. One of them acquires a giant firework ball that they’ll use to blow themselves up, and they all meet at a remote shed. But when they see that one of them is a schoolgirl, they try to convince her to back out. Undeterred, she presses the button, only to have things reset to a few minutes before the blast so they have to go through everything again. And again, and again. It’s quite funny at first, then turns serious. The ending could be a lot less sappy, but it’s pretty good overall.

 

Anyab (aka Fangs; repertory film from 1981)

While driving in the middle of nowhere on a rainy night, a couple gets a flat tire with no spare. They make their way to the nearest house to use the phone only to discover that it doesn’t work and they must spend the night. And it’s a house with vampires and people who break out into song. If it weren’t clear from the bare premise that this Egyptian movie is a knock-off of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, you could probably guess when one of the main characters puts on a Rocky Horror T-shirt. Although even then you could be forgiven for overlooking that since the movie also has musical cues from The Munsters, The Pink Panther, Jaws, and James Bond movies, and also Batman-style exclamations in fight scenes. The movie may not make much sense, and the subtitles are laughably terrible, but it’s still far better than the original version of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

 

The Square

Christian (Claes Bang) is the head curator at a large museum in Stockholm. They’re getting a new exhibit called “The Square”, which is simply a square on the ground whose perimeter is framed in lights. It’s supposed to represent a “be nice to each other” zone, and they’re having trouble figuring out how to market it. Meanwhile, he’s also confronted with other problems, like having his wallet and phone stolen, having a one-night stand with a reporter (Elisabeth Moss) who doesn’t think it was a one-night stand, coordinating a performance art installation featuring a man acting like an animal, and being a part-time father to his two daughters. It’s the latest comedy by Ruben Östlund, and it’s both funnier and more effective than Force Majeure.

 

Revenge

Richard, Stan, and Dimitri are rich white guys who have planned a desert hunting trip together. Richard came early and brought his girlfriend Jennifer, expecting her to be gone before the other guys get there, but they’re early, too. One thing leads to another, and Jennifer gets raped. Richard tries to buy her off, but that doesn’t go over well, and there’s an altercation in which she’s left for dead. She isn’t, though, and she’s mad. This is a very fun movie, but there isn’t anything about it that is even slightly believable. Starting with the aforementioned altercation, just about everything done to advance the plot depends on something that is utterly implausible or downright impossible. You really have to suspend your disbelief if you want to enjoy this one to the fullest.

Cold Hell

Özge is a taxi driver who can take care of herself. One night after getting home from a shift, she sees a killer in the act through her window. Except she can’t make out his face, and now he knows where she lives. What follows is an intense thriller with no downtime in which each hunts the other and Özge just can’t catch a break. The premise has been done before, but rarely this well.