Tag: Waitress

BLINK TWICE – Review

Naomi Ackie stars as Frida in director Zoë Kravitz’s BLINK TWICE, an Amazon MGM Studios film.
Photo credit: Carlos Somonte. Courtesy of Amazon MGM Studios. © 2024 Amazon Content Services LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Zoë Kravitz’s directorial debut BLINK TWICE starts out with a great deal of promise but ultimately fails to live up to its promise. The target Kravitz appears to be aiming for is a GET OUT-style smart horror thriller, with a set-up the recalls both KNIVES OUT and THE MENU, where a select group of beautiful people on a private island with wealthy types, an island where things go very wrong. In this case, the island is owned by tech billionaire Slater King (Channing Tatum), who invites a pair of waitresses who have dressed up to crash his posh cocktail party, Frida (Naomie Ackie) and Jess (Alia Shawkat), to join him and his friends for a couple of days on his private island. It’s a dream come true for Frida, the reason she had dressed up to crash the party to catch the billionaire’s eye.

What starts out like a Disney-ish meet-cute romantic fantasy, with Frida and Jess whisked away on a private jet, plied with champagne, and then ensconced in little bungalows filled with clothes and luxurious supplies, has some creepy foreshadowing. There is some scandal around Slater King, dealing with something that happened at parties with a #MeToo vibe followed by a unconvincing public apology. Nonetheless Frida is enamored with the handsome billionaire, although when Frida is introduced at the cocktail party to King’s therapist, played by Kyle MacLachlan, she jokingly says “blink twice if I’m in danger” and the therapist pauses before he smiles. On the island, they are expected to give up their phones, and Jess jokes about whether the human sacrifice is before or after dinner.

Despite all that, the women quickly settle into a pattern of lounging around the pool, night spent dinning on fine cuisine and never-ending champagne, as host Slater King asks “Are you having a good time?” to which they invariably reply “I’m having a great time.”

And that’s where the film bogs down, going through iterations of that party scene a few too many times without any thing much happening. It works less to build suspense than to dissipate the little threat that had been created. When the horror/thriller finally gets underway, the events that unfurl are far-fetched and it really doesn’t make sense, or even hold one’s interest. Yes, horrible things happen but we see them coming from far off, which dispels any suspense, and the explanations really don’t hold up, sometimes in eye-rolling inducing fashion.

Naomie Ackie plays the central character, Frida, and on screen most of the time but the character is surprisingly underwritten, with little if any backstory and a romantic innocence that seems more fitting for a teenager. Ackie works hard to make the most of this thin material, while Alia Shawkat as Jess provides comic commentary, as well as an every-present yellow lighter whose true purpose is eventually revealed, to balance Frida’s romantic view, a view that circumstances upend. Channing Tatum is charmingly oily as the tech billionaire hosting this sinister party.

The film features a good supporting cast that includes standout Geena Davis as Slater King’s sister and assistant Stacy, his high-strung assistant, who combines a hyper-competency with a tendency to drop things as she runs around handling all the practical matters of having an island full of guests and more. Christian Slater plays Slater King’s right-hand man Vic, while Haley Joel Osment plays Tom, a bitter, washed-up star and gourmet meals are prepared by chef-guest Cody (Simon Rex). On the female side of the guests, another standout is Adria Arjona as Sarah, a “Survivor” winner who is a beauty with a special set of skills, while Trew Mullen plays stoner-girl Heather, always up for smoking fat blunts. Liz Caribel plays Heather’s pal and Levon Hawke plays handsome Lucas.

Adam Newport-Berra provides stylish cinematography heavy on quick cuts, visuals supplemented by heavy-handed sound design.

Zoe Kravitz deserves credit for aiming high, for a stylish, high-concept thriller with a have and have-not commentary, blended with a feminist one. The film is certainly stylish to look at, with great costumes and sets. While the cast is good, the script, co-written by Kravitz and E.T. Feigenbaum, just doesn’t achieve its ambitions.

BLINK TWICE opens Friday, Aug. 23, in theaters.

RATING: 2 out of 4 stars

In Case You Missed It Monday… ‘Waitress’

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I love quirky dramedies and yes, I also love baking. So what? Laugh if you want, but home-baked goodies are like heroine to me. Anyway, how do these two seemingly irrelevant things have anything to do with one another? They have everything to do with each other when speaking about the 2007 movie ‘Waitress’.

‘Waitress’ was written and directed by Adrienne Shelly, who also co-stars as Dawn in the film, which stars Kerri Russell as Jenna Hunterson. Jenna is a waitress and “pie genius” working at Old Joe’s Pie Shop. Jenna loves making pies and that’s all she wants in life. Well, that and… to get rid of her mentally and verbally abusive a**hole of a husband Earl (Jeremy Sisto) once and for all. No, she doesn’t want him killed, just gone out of her life.

Her fellow waitresses and best friends, Becky (Cheryl Hines) and Dawn (Adrienne Shelly), help her to cope with her selfish, emotionally draining loser of a husband, especially once she discovers that she’s pregnant as a result of letting him get her drunk one night. Now, with her well-laid plans to escape Earl for good at risk, Jenna struggles to decide how she’ll restructure her plans while keeping the baby.

‘Waitress’ is filled with quirky characters, but none of them are bizarre to the point of being absurd. The entire story occurs in a subtly strand little universe that seems to exist just outside the normal boundaries of real life. Nearly the entire film takes place in the little pie shop, which is in a small rural town that might as well be on Mars. Nathan Fillion (Slither) plays Dr. Pomatter, Kerri’s replacement gynecologist and short-lived secret love interest.

Kerri Russell (August Rush) does a fantastic job as the talented pie-maker Jenna with the quiet and polite exterior, but whom hides emotions that boil and churn just under the surface like a molten eruption of frustration just waiting to explode. Jenna feels trapped, evenclaustrophobic by her husband Earl, who is played with a creepy unlikable effectiveness by Jeremy Sisto (May). Dawn and Becky are pinned as stereotypical characters with quirks of their own and even Old Joe is given some pleasant life as a horny old multi-divorcee played by Andy Griffith.

‘Waitress’ is a charming tale of a woman who yearns to break free of her failed marriage and start her life over on her own terms. The movie is filled with emotional lows and truly sells Jenna’s determination and justification for wanting out of her marriage, but also plays wonderfully on Jenna’ssensibilities to her own ethical concerns regarding her pregnancy, her marriage and her life.

Jenna uses her odd and unique pie creations as a creative outlet for her varied emotions, giving them strange names like “Bad Baby Pie” or “Pregnant Miserable Self Pitying Loser Pie”. Jenna and her pies are the life-blood of the pie shop and everyone realizes that but Earl, whose whole world revolves around himself and expects Jenna to put him on a pedestal without any reasonable return of sincere affection or gratitude.

‘Waitress’ can be seen as having a negative tone towards marriage, but it’s the extent to which Earl is a lousy and unworthy husband that confirms Jenna’s intentions and places her goals within the realm of acceptability. Jenna does keep the child, whom she names Lulu and the movie does ultimately result in ahappy ending, but not necessarily as one might have planned. The small ensemble cast is great, the story is heart-felt and original with a healthy mix of gentle but quirky comedy and genuine drama. ‘Waitress’ is a great pick-me-up film to watch that leaves a resonating residue of relief after enduring Jenna’s daily plight.