Seven friends part ways after their last day at school. Some seek their fortune in Tokyo, others remain in their hometown Maebashi. Over the course of ten years, their paths keep crossing, and while they experience losses and broken dreams, they learn about the value of friendship.
Ultra-violent storytelling has never been my thing, but the issues with Scarface go beyond that. The film perpetuates harmful stereotypes about Latinx immigrants and uses gore and misogyny for shock value that never serves any purpose. The whole venture is frustratingly empty, and left me desiring something more.
But what many do not know is that in 2019, a Wonder Woman film was released that had all of the positive qualities of WW84, and remedied many of the negative ones. Wonder Woman: Bloodlines, a direct-to-video animated movie in the DC Animated Movie Universe, perfectly balances the campiness and seriousness of the character.
"65" (2023) is the latest Dino flick to try and answer "what else can we do with dinosaurs?"
Alongside A Drowning Man, I Signed The Petition, 3 Logical Exits, and A World Not Ours, A Man Returned continues to paint a realistic portrait of the Refugee Crisis that eschews the Western gaze and stereotype. These are real portraits painted by a director with lived experience, cultural connection and an amazing eye for visuals.
It was always people for Joe, and he ultimately found them at the end of a long, painful, yet illuminating quest for self-discovery outside of one, confident constant - his bisexuality.
