PFL 2018 #6: Regular Season - Cooper III vs. Kusch (2018)

The film's storylines read as allegories for the queer experience and that's a source of solace for LGBTQIA+ fans!

When a powerful church leader is found dead, Benoit Blanc enters a tight-knit community where everyone has secrets, but not everyone is fully developed.

Him is visually stunning—all concrete cathedrals and bone-rattling impact shots that look like a nightmare highlight reel. Marlon Wayans is magnetic as this legendary quarterback who's basically selling salvation with a smile that never quite reaches his eyes. But the story keeps running in circles: more tests, more cryptic pep talks, more ritualistic drills. The sports-as-religion metaphor beats you over the head when subtlety would've been more effective. The middle drags, and that finale chooses spectacle over substance. It's undeniably stylish, but left me cold. Also worth noting: despite the Monkeypaw connection, this isn't actually a Jordan Peele film—he didn't write or direct.

Over the last several years, I have had the privilege of being one of the critics having the opportunity to watch and review several films from writer/director/producer Marcellus Cox, whose efforts are never anything less but grounded, relevant, and steeped in unflinching glimpses illustrating the gripping, inspired, and ever-vacillating realms that make up the human condition.

Life may find a way, but is it worth testing its fierceness and how far it will go?

21 Bridges isn’t going to revolutionize action cinema. However, its action components are respectable. Every act is visibly clear, and as time moves forward, the film changes its conflictual rhythm.