Nudity, sex, dance (and a little psychology) combine in Boaz Yakin's unusual fim, AVIVA

If I can help it, I will never miss a film by Boaz Yakin. This fascinating, accomplished director and writer (not always within the same film) has given us a raft of good movies, with each of his directorial efforts in a different genre. What his films have in common, seems to me, is their placing an outsider at the center and having him/her eventually -- often at great, if not pyrrhic, cost -- win the day. His latest, AVIVA, as per usual, is not simply in another genre; it mashes up several into something that seems pretty much sui generis.

Mr. Yakin, shown at right (some years back), is always as interested in content as in visuals, but Aviva may be the most visual of all his films, even if not nearly his best.

There's a stunning shot of hands on mugs on a table early on followed by several of the kind of memorable images that, when you think of this film later on, you will probably call to mind -- one of which appears just below. (His cinematographer this time around is Arseni Khachaturan, with film editing by Holle Singer.)

For a good while during this film, thanks to everything from the very hot looking men and women, the copious amounts of nudity (often male and full-frontal, prudes be warned), the sex scenes, the openness to both hetero-and homosexuality and the enormous contribution of dance (much of it quite good) to the film, this seemed to TrustMovies to be the most fun he has had at the movies all year. Then, somewhere around the midway point, repetition begins to set in (along with the nagging sense that there is less here, content-wise, than meets the eye and mind), and Aviva comes subsequently only fitfully to life. Though when it does, it can still prove pretty magical, off and on.

The problem, to my mind, is that the movie's strengths and weaknesses go hand in hand with its director's own, because, I suspect, this film is giving us Yakin's own story and struggle. Although there are four actors credited with playing, sort of, two roles -- that of the titular Aviva (both the female and male versions) and Eden (again, the male and female) -- really, I think, these are all just sides of Yakin himself, who wrote and directed the piece and who is clearly struggling with identity, sexuality, commitment, growth and all the rest of it. (Who of us is not? Though some of us maybe don't realize this yet.)

The biggest problem here is that Yakin seems to identify most, and understandably so, with the male version of Eden (played by a most attractive and nicely hung actor/dancer named Tyler Phillips, above, who is making his movie debut) and who has to deal throughout with a kind of hang-dog attitude in which guilt, coupled to the inability to rise above this and grow up, leads to his growing tiresome and beginning to bore the bejesus out of us. He waffles and he wavers and he can't commit and he's pretty much of an asshole, overall.

While the female Eden, played by Bobbi Jene Smith (above, center left) rather echoes her male counterpart, Ms Smith at least supplied the choreography and some of the fine dancing, she also supplies a lot more energy and pizzazz than does Mr. Phillips, and so watching her is not such a drag. She, along with her companion and co-choreographer Or Schraiber (see below) also appeared together in the 2017 documentary, Bobbi Jene.

The title role, female version is essayed by an attractive and appealing Russian-born actress, Zina Zinchenko (above), while the male version is played by hottie, dancer and co-choreographer (the aforementioned Mr. Schraiber, below), who brings a vast quantity of sex appeal and dance knowledge to the proceedings. (Don't worry if all these sexes and characters seem confusing. Eventually they run together into a kind of sameness, some of which is no doubt intentional on the part of Yakin; the rest of it simply follows.)

Dance is just about everywhere here, and sex is, too. (To his great credit, the filmmaker does not stint on the homo over the supposedly more important role of the hetero, the point being that it is all one.) The production design is spectacular, with locations in Paris, New York and Los Angeles. Unfortunately, the word love is tossed about so carelessly and often that you'll realize the filmmaker -- like so many of us -- is perhaps vamping, while he learns the meaning of the word.

And when, toward the end, a character screams out, "Please! We can't do this anymore," you'll probably agree. At a near two-hour running time, shorter would have been better. Particularly when that male version of Eden is, to use Bill Maher's description of Donald Trump, such a "whiny little bitch." Still, as with just about everything Yakin has given us, when it's good, it is so good, that I would watch it all over again.

From Outsider Pictures and Strand Releasing, Aviva, in all its too-long glory, will hit virtual theaters this coming Friday, June 12. Click here and then scroll down to find the virtual theaters across the country in which the film will play. (There will be a free live-stream Q&A on Saturday, June 13; Sunday June 14; and Saturday, June 20. Click here for more information.)

BOARDING SCHOOL: As usual with a Boaz Yakin film, much more than meets the eye

For TrustMovies, a new Boaz Yakin film is always a joyful occasion. (Even if the movies themselves are not always so joyful.)  From Fresh through A Price Above Rubies, and on to Death in Love, Safe and now his latest genre offering, BOARDING SCHOOL, Yakin continues to give us visually commanding movies with themes that resonate and reverberate tellingly in ways both expected and not so.

With each new film he has written and directed, Yakin has tackled a new genre -- effectively making it his own in the process -- from coming-of-age, Jewish orthodox feminism, and the Holocaust to chase thrillers, dog stories and now, with his latest, the horror film.

The movie-maker (shown at right) is also consistently interested in "the other"; his characters, for many different reasons, don't easily fit it to the "normal" world.

In Boarding School, the protagonist is a teenager named Jacob, played with remarkable precision and depth by young actor Luke Prael (shown on poster, above, and below, right), who is also to be seen in the current indie hit Eighth Grade, who has very odd nightmares stemming from even odder relatives, particularly a grandmother who seems to have had an awful and bizarre Holocaust experience.

When Jacob's behavior grows worse, his surprisingly kindly step-father (David Aaron Baker, center above) and his much less kindly mother (Samantha Mathis, at left, above) send him away to the titular boarding school, where -- he is told -- "clarity" will be achieved in just a couple of weeks. If only.

The other students proves quite the assortment of strange characters, and Mr. Yakin sees to it that each one of them is brought to fine and sympathetic life (and sometimes, death). These young kids are never simply creepy or used for the standard, oddball special effects, and the young actors who play them are remarkable indeed.

The school's headmaster and his wife are portrayed with great zest and skill by Will Patton (above) and Tammy Blanchard (below), and by the time we have uncovered what is really going on here, the movie takes on about as dark a palette as you will have seen in some time.

Visually, Mr. Yakin proves as skilled as ever, giving us some simply gorgeous interior vistas (the boarding school itself is a visual knockout) and a number of set pieces as original as they are creepily fraught with buried meaning.

The talented Prael spends maybe the entire last third of the film dressed in drag, which he pulls off quite beautifully, even as his character grows in intelligence and strength. His is an impressive performance, and the film that surrounds him is even more so. Yakin has given us the most unusual, effective and memorable film in the horror genre so far this year. (And also one of the better, if darker, coming-of-age movies.)

From Momentum Pictures and running a surprisingly lengthy but consistently compelling 111 minutes, Boarding School opens today in theaters (in Los Angeles, see it at the Arena Cinelounge Sunset) and simultaneously on VOD and digital HD.

SAFE is anything but -- and Boaz Yakin's "chase" thriller is one of the genre's best

SAFE is a knockout, better even than 2010's Taken, and if there's justice in the movie world -- hah -- the film will be this year's genuine sleeper. As good as anything coming from the Luc Besson stable, the movie is tight and swift, fun and funny -- and nasty as hell. It should also put its filmmaker, Boaz Yakin (shown below), permanently on the map as a first-class genre director, though I somehow doubt Mr Yakin, shown below, wants to be pigeon-holed quite like that. He's talented enough but too versatile. His career jumps from genre to genre (Death in Love, anyone?), with only a rare misstep (Uptown Girls), and I suspect that's the way he wants it. Safe should prove his most successful movie since Remember the Titans.

An action thriller, with emphasis on chase, Safe offers one of the best and most intriguing beginnings that the genre has given us. We're in a dank and dreary New York subway station, following a little Asian girl, who is clearly frightened. Something's amiss. Then we go back only a short time to the same girl being threatened by Russian mobsters. Then back even farther in time to her schoolroom in China, where she embarrasses her teacher and makes her class -- and us -- laugh. Then comes a kidnapping.

All this takes place in the first few minutes. But so cleverly has Yakin, as writer and director, set things up that by now we know fully well why this child is so important and why she's being sought by the Russian mob (below), Chinese gangsters (above) and dirty New York City cops. And it ain't, praise be to Boaz, all about human trafficking. At least, not in the manner we're most often served up.

Yakin understands how much more fun it is to have several sets of bad guys, and he's outdone himself here. These are some of the nastiest creeps you'll come across (that's Robert John Burke, below, as the cops' venal Captain), and the sense you get from the film that all -- and I mean everyone and everything -- has gone corrupt is very nearly enveloping and hard to shake. In any case, whatever happens to these villains down the line, Yakin makes sure that we won't give a shit. His actions scenes are crackerjack, and so are his (very few) quieter moments.

The filmmaker is also smart about how much carnage he should show us; he gives us more sudden shocks of violence, impressive in their spontaneity and terror (one such moment, as guests are being herded out of a swank restaurant by a Chinese crime lord, brought an audible gasp from the screening audience), but he never overdoes the blood and gore. The most horrific event is not shown at all. His star -- a very well-used Jason Statham (below) -- simply walks into a room, then comes out of it, broken.

Statham pretty much holds the action-hero crown right now, and he deserves it. He brings the usual and necessary reserve, strength and fighting skills to the table -- but he leaves his own, singular imprint on the proceedings. If I'm not mistaken, the guy looks a little pudgier in this role, but that's fine, as his character has been through a rough time and is only now starting to come out the other side.

Staham's co-star, who sweetly steals the movie without a moment of undue pushing, is a little Chinese actress named Catherine Chan (above). This is her first American film, but I can't imagine we won't see her again soon -- maybe in the sequel to Safe, which is set up nicely at the film's conclusion, so there surely ought to be one. Ms Chan combines intelligence, fear and humor in a unique combination that is as much of a knockout as the movie itself. She keeps nearly everything up her sleeve, giving us but a tiny glimpse now and then, and so we root for her all the more.

At 95 minutes, the movie seems just the right length. I don't know that I'd have cut anything here. And while there are no doubt a few things that don't quite make sense, so fast and furiously does the movie move that you'll have no time to question until it's over and you've caught your breath. If you're looking for solid, stylish, non-stop action tagged to an enticing plot, Safe is the best bet around.

We'll see how the movie, from Lionsgate, does with audiences and critics, when it opens tomorrow -- Friday, April 27, all over my town (NYC) -- and probably yours. You can check out the nationwide playdates by clicking here, entering your zip code, and accessing GET TICKETS NOW.