ISIS recruitment and "love story" -- all via the Internet -- in Timur Bekmambetov's PROFILE

Rather reminiiscent of another entirely-online movie, Searching, which was first seen in 2018 -- the same year as PROFILE, the film under consideration here, made its festival debut -- this reviewer's first question is: Why has the latter taken three years to find U.S. distribution? 

Even if the style is not spanking new (a number of previous movies have taken place mostly or entirely online), the content -- online recruitment by ISIS of young women to "serve" in its ranks -- is certainly still timely. 

Further, its director Timur Bekmambetov (shown below) has had his share of success (Night Watch, Day Watch and Wanted), so a three-year wait, even including the current Covid pandemic, seems a bit much.

The film itself, despite its total reliance on what's in front of us on that computer screen, holds up pretty well. Once you buy into its scenario -- a pretty British journalist, to get a good story about how ISIS recruits young European women, goes online and, under an alias, pretends to have converted to Islam and may now be interested in joining up -- the movie will engross you and unsettle you.

Buying into that scenario, however, will mean glossing over moments early on in which our heroine, Amy (played by Valene Kane, below), worries more about looking young enough than whether or not she's wearing too much make-up on the face that her hijab so beautifully exposes.

As co-written by Bekmambetov, Brittany Poulton and Olga Kharina, the screenplay seems computer proficient enough to engage technophiles, while pulling the rest of us along without too much kicking and screaming. TrustMovies found much of the written online correspondence too small to easily read, but he was still able to follow the plot in manageable fashion, as most of the movie is concerned with spoken dialog via video chats between Amy and her "recruiter" (played by Shazad Latif, below) 

and, to a lesser extent, between Amy and her boy friend, Matt, and her boss at the journal (Christine Adams, at right, below). As expected, it takes awhile for the relationship between Amy and her recruiter to bud and blossom, and perhaps the film's greatest strength is that this happens in surprisingly believable fashion, keeping us viewers on edge and uncertain about just how involved -- personally, emotionally -- these two people actually are.

I can understand some viewers feeling that using a still-current and ugly subject like this for entertainment value renders the whole thing specious. (I don't think I've encountered much depth in anything I've seen of Bekmambetov's work.)  Yet the movie holds you fast and, in its fashion, delivers the goods. 

I hope any women flirting with the idea of joining the Islamic State will see Profile before they do. Lest anyone imagine I am only anti-Islam, I would equally try to dissuade any young woman from joining Orthodox Judaiism or any Fundamentlaist Christian sect. They're all anti-woman, but I must admit that, regarding ISIS, the stakes are a good deal higher.

From Focus Features and running 105 minutes, the movie opens in theaters nationwide this coming Friday, May 14. Here in South Florida, you can find it at the following locartions. In Miami: AMC Aventura Dolby Cinema IMAX 24,  AMC Coral Ridge, 10 AMC Hialeah 12 DBOX,  AMC Pembroke Lakes Dolby IMAX 9,  AMC Pompano Beach 18 PLF,  AMC Sunrise 8,  AMC Sunset Place Dolby, Cinema 24 IMAX,  AMC Tamiami 14,  AMC Weston 8,  BRIELL Fusion Superplex 8 4DX/IMAX CINMEX Cinebistro @ Cityplace Doral 7,  CINMEX CMX Brickell City Centre 10 PLF,  CINMEX Dolphin 24 IMAX/DBOX,  CINMEX Miami Lakes 17,  CMARK Paradise Park 24 XD/DBOX COMPFB,  Silverspot Cinema at Coconut Creek 11 COMPFB,  Silverspot Miami 16,  CSRVDL Flippers Cinema 8 IPGCE,  iPic Intracoastal Mall 8,  PARAGO  Coral Square 8,  PARAGO Ridge Plaza 8,  REGAL Broward Stadium 12 RPX,  REGAL Cypress Creek Station Stadium 16, REGAL Falls 12,  REGAL Magnolia Place Stadium 16 REGAL Oakwood 18 REGAL Sawgrass Stadium 23 IMAX REGAL South Beach Stadium 18 IMAX/VIP,  REGAL Southland Mall 16,  SANTI Le Jeune 6, SILVER Landmark at Merrick Park 7.  In West Palm Beach:  AMC Indian River 24,  AMC Port Saint Lucie 14,  AMC Rosemary Square 12 Dolby IMAX,  ASHURS Movies of Lake Worth 6,  CINMEX CMX Wellington 10 PLF,  CINMEX Downtown 16 Theatre,  CMARK Boynton Beach 14, XD CMARK Palace 20 XD,  EPIC Regency Cinema 8 IPGCE,  iPic Delray Beach 8 IPGCE,  iPic Mizner Park 8,  REGAL Royal Palm Beach 18 RPX,  SHADOW Movies at Wellington 8.

"Parasite"-lite from South Korea: Kim Yong-Hoon's BEASTS CLAWING AT STRAWS

Most of the characters in the new South Korean movie BEASTS CLAWING AT STRAWS are not just greedy-as-hell but dumb-as-they-come. The couple of lone smart ones are also nasty and vicious enough that you won't at all mind their appropriate comeuppance, while the also lone pair of decent folk, by virtue of that rare decency (this is South Korea, after all), rise above mere descriptions such as dumb or smart.

To call this film "Parasite"-lite, as does my headline, is not meant as a negative. (Few filmmakers reach the Bong Joon-Ho level.) Its director and adaptor (from Japanese writer Keisuke Sone's novel), Kim Yong-Hoon (below), offers us an ensemble thriller about the effects of 

greed on a populace made up of mostly have-nots who've been preyed upon by the sort of low-end haves who are nowhere near the corporate or political level. They're simply better than the have-nots at being evil. 

As usual with South Korean films these days, the ensemble roles are uniformly well-planned and -played. with each actor nailing his/her key characteristic, while remaining believable and human (if not humane).

TrustMovies is proving to be increasingly poor at recalling character names and then matching them to actors' faces (particularly in ensemble-cast Asian movies), so forgiveness is asked for the actors in the photos below not being properly identified. 

Mr. Bong begins his film with the sight (see poster image at top) of what looks like something awfully close to that famous designer travel bag (surely the ugliest symbol of the "elite" ever created; little wonder it was immediately snapped up and knocked off by the equally taste-free lower classes), which one character (above, center) stores in a locker at the local bathhouse/sauna. 

When a bathhouse worker (above) later discovers the bag, along with its contents (which you can easily imagine), and then steals it (slowly, in degrees, which adds to the irony, suspense and humor of the film), we are quickly introduced to a bevy of characters, one more greedy, needy and nasty than the next.  

Soon we've met a brothel madam (above), along with one of her sex workers (below, right) and one of her clients (below, left),

plus a small-time criminal kingpin and his love-to-murder underling (shown on either side of the original depositor of that bagful of loot, four photos above), the worked-to-death wife (below) and increasingly demented mother (two photos below) of the bathhouse worker who steals the bag, along with other sundry and assorted lesser "lights."

Who these people are and how they're connected to each and that mystery bag are eventually revealed as this sometimes obvious, other times surprising, and often grisly, dark and funny film unfurls. Beasts Clawing at Straws will recall countless other movies, better and worse, yet it manages to hold its own (and your interest) amid all the sometimes derivative twists and turns.

Coincidence and convenience abound, as they often do in tales of this genre. Yet time and again we come back for more. Do we love so love to see ourselves, along with the worst aspects of us, up there on the big screen (or, these days, big TV)? Maybe so, and if so, this one's for you, dear reader.

From Artsploitation Films, in Korean with English subtitles and running 108 minutes, Beasts Clawing at Straws hits streaming venues this coming Tuesday, December 15 -- for purchase or rental. Click here for more information.

South Korean mystery FORGOTTEN proves a twisty, fascinating and moving "must-see"

Got to hand it to Netflix, which keeps coming up with terrific movies (along with plenty of duds), some of which you will have never heard. A good friend of mine recommended FORGOTTEN, a what-the fuck-is-going-on-here? thriller from 2017 that packs, at last, an almost unbearable sadness regarding family and loss, along with the socio-economic relevance of Parasite. It's from South Korea, of course, slipping into view almost completely under the critical radar.

Written and directed by Hang-jun Jang (aka Hang-jun Zhang), the movie is a veritable model of smart plotting and pacing, featuring a "mystery" that, as it unravels, keeps us absolutely hooked. Best of all, the explanation, rather than disappoint as so many mystery/thrillers do (the problem is always so much more interesting and fun than the solution), simply explodes here into something that hooks the heart as much as the mind, and results in as damning an indictment of dog-eat-dog Capitalism as you'll have seen.

It helps to know something of South Korean history and its financial crisis that left so much of the population in a horrible state. Forgotten never underscores anything too heavily and so glides easily along on its genre credentials alone. All the rest is gravy -- incredibly tasty and nourishing gravy, at that.

A young man (lovely actor Ha-Neul Kang, shown on poster, top, and above) and his family move into a house that, to him, looks oddly familiar. Strange things begin happening and we question for a bit if these are real, hallucinations or supernatural. Quickly, all this changes into something quite other, then changes again and again, as we race along with the thriller conventions to keep up as, all the while, Forgotten grows ever stranger and darker.

Performances are as expert as usual in South Korean cinema, while the technical aspects of the film are also first-rate. Dark as it is -- literally and metaphorically -- Forgotten is always a pleasure to view. And the final scene, which arrives just after the end credit title is shown, is maybe as glowingly beautiful as anything I've seen in a long while. This finale posits the question, What is it that defines our character? The film does not provide the answer, but the manner in which it does the asking is exemplary. 

This one's a keeper.

Streaming now via Netflix, the film runs 108 minutes, relatively short by South Korean standards, every one of which pleases (those minutes and those standards).

Blu-ray debut for John Farrow's delightful genre-mashing original, THE BIG CLOCK

Anyone who's never seen THE BIG CLOCK, the 1948 film that, while successful enough it is own time has since become what one might call a second-tier classic, should avail him/ herself of any opportunity. It's a keeper -- under just about every criteria. And just because you might have seen the so-so would-be remake from 1987 titled No Way Out, don't think you've even begun to  have discovered the genre-jumping/mashing charm of the original.

As directed by the under-rated journeyman filmmaker from Australia, John Farrow (shown right), with a screenplay by Jonathan Latimer (from the novel by Kenneth Fearing), the film begins with what TrustMovies thinks is an unnecessary prolog in which we learn that our hero is a man on the not-quite-run (only because he can't escape his surroundings).

Had the film simply begun at the beginning and moved along as it soon does, the audience might have imagined they were in for -- not the thriller it partially is -- but either a workplace satire or a comedy of manners, morals and art appreciation.

The Big Clock is all three of the above, as well as a lot more, too, mashing and jumping genres in a manner that would spin the heads of many of today's moviemakers. Plus, it offers a plot that has our hero (Ray Milland, above, right) forced by his evil boss to investigate himself for the very murder that boss has commited. (No spoilers here: most of the fun and multi-surprises come as that "investigation" occurs.)

As the hero, Milland proves his usual adept self at garnering our sympathy, even as he holds us back from fully embracing this somewhat flawed and slightly distanced man, while the great actor Charles Laughton (above) makes a magnificent meal out of the villain, a nasty media mogul named Earl Janoth. Watch the subtle (then not so) changes in Laughton's amazing face in the memorable murder scene for a lesson in fine film acting.

The supporting cast is full of familiar faces, with the wonderful Elsa Lanchester (above, left, and Laughton's real-life wife) a hoot-and-a-half as the artist whose work and bizarre personality figure heavily into the plot machinations. If everyone else were not so splendid, Ms Lanchester would have walked away with the movie. The unveiling of her portrait of the murder suspect is one of the film's highlights -- as is her final line.

A nice surprise, too, is the use of famed character actor Harry (Henry) Morgan, above, playing a masseuse/right-hand man you definitely would not want manhandling your vulnerable body. But then everyone here, including an uncredited Noel Neill as a smart and sassy elevator operator, is first-rate.

Director Farrow's handling of the plot and the melding of genres are also classy indeed. Note how swift and shocking is the murder scene, and how deft and fast-paced is the climax. These days, a filmmaker might drag out scenes like these well past their believability or entertainment quotient. Oh, and that titular clock is used well, too.

All in all as old movies go, this one's a don't miss. From Arrow Academy (distributed here in the USA via MVD Visual) and running just 96 minutes, The Big Clock hits Blu-ray (the transfer seems adequate but nothing to shout about) -- along with several worthwhile Bonus Features, including an appreciation of actor Laughton by Simon Callow, and a fine analysis of the film by Adrian Wootton -- this coming Tuesday, May 14, for purchase and I would hope rental, too.

Lee Jong-suk’s debut film, THE NEGOTIATION, makes its home video debut this Tuesday

If TrustMovies goes too long without seeing a new film from South Korea, he begins to get a bit antsy for the smart pacing, classy look, action, suspense and envelope-pushing plot twists so many South Korean movies provide. If one of that country's films manages to makes its way over here, chances are it'll be worth a look, and so it is with THE NEGOTIATION, which marks the directorial debut of Lee Jong-Suk. This is a hostage/conspiracy/ corruption/betrayal thriller that, though packing in its share of silliness, also offers maybe ten times that in sheer fun.

Mr. Lee (shown at left), his writer Choi Sung-hyun and crew give us a very fast-moving tale that begins with a police officer (Son Ye-jin, at right below), who is just beginning her vacation, being called back into service due to a sudden hostage crisis. That one goes quickly south, but wait.

The higher-ups now request her services on a new and very different case -- one that keeps expanding and changing the more our heroine probes and learns.

The fact that we're talking about uber-dirty dealings involving the very highest reaches of government, military, police and (or course) the business community should come as no big surprise.

Yet how the filmmaking team puts it all together, unveiling one small surprise at a time, proves exemplary fun. And casting two of Korea's currently most popular performers in the leading roles is smart, too. As the chief villain facing off against our negotiating heroine, that very rangy, handsome actor Hyun Bin (below) is knock-your-socks-off sexy. His character is clever and funny, too, so the pas de deux that goes on between the two is generally quite delightful.

If the movie starts well enough, it grows even better as it continues, until we see a bunch of lying, devious and very powerful men aligned against one quiet but smart negotiator and another perhaps even smarter young man. If we've seen this sort of thing before (and, oh, have we!), the pacing, plotting and very classy filmmaking makes it seem new enough to pass muster as first-rate entertainment.

And if you find yourself asking, But how, against such huge odds, will justice ever triumph?, the movie has an oddball ace up that sleeve, too. No spoilers here, but I think the ending is just different enough that, though you might wish for something more, you'll be willing to buy into the if-only scenario that you're given.

Welcome comic relief is provided by Kim Sang-ho (above, left), while the rest of the cast is, as usual in Korean cinema, certainly up to snuff. But it is Ms Son and Mr. Hyun who carry the film, bringing with them surprising weight and not a little emotion, as the sweet/sour finale approaches.

From CJ Entertainment and running 113 minutes, The Negotiation makes its digital home video debut this coming Tuesday, November 13, on Amazon, iTunes and Google Play -- for both purchase and/or rental.

Tip-top giallo: Dario Argento's DEEP RED gets deluxe Blu-ray treatment in an uncut version

When DEEP RED, the fifth full-length film from Italian horror-meister Dario Argento, was first release in the USA back in 1976, 23 minutes were hacked out of it to better make it fit the usual horror-film length. Now that the new Arrow Video Blu-ray is here, in a rich and sparkling transfer that makes the film look considerably better than TrustMovies has ever seen it, we can now assess a film that, even in its bowdlerized version, clearly seemed to be Argento's finest work.

Never one to make too much of plot credibility and depth of character, Signore Argento (shown at left during the time of the film's production) still managed to bring to the fore a certain amount of psychological depth, as well as some social concerns of the time period.

This is particularly true of Deep Red, as shown via this uncut, 127-minute version in which the male fear of gender equality and the under-cutting of machismo entitlement are on full display.

Argento's facility with camera angles and widescreen composition -- his cinematographer was Luigi Kuveiller -- is constant and compelling. How gorgeous and often breath-taking is just about everything we see here -- including the adeptly staged murders!

His star in this film (David Hemmings, below) is once again -- as with his antagonists in Bird With the Crystal Plumage, Cat O' Nine Tails and Four Flies on Grey Velvet -- an "outsider" working in Italy, this time as a jazz pianist and teacher named Marc Daley.

Marc hears and then sees a murder being committed in the building above him and begins to do his own sleuthing to discover some answers, thus putting in danger himself, along with a lot of other folk.

These would include his eventual girlfriend (nicely played by Daria Nicolodi, above and below) and oddball best friend (Gabriele Lavia) plus just about anybody/everybody involved in this twisty tale that begins with a family murder and ends with that family completely wiped out.

The film begins with a nod to the paranormal involving a sleek and still quite beautiful Macha Méril (below, center, of Une Femme Mariée), which gives the plot its initial push -- after which paranormal turns merely murderous.

For a change with Argento, the plot twists build nicely and relatively believably, along with the suspense, and there are fewer jaw-dropping, nonsense moments. The finale, too, comes with a shock and a jolt, and for once does not rely on coincidence or any last-minute rescue by the cavalry. The final shot, too, is a keeper: bloody awful -- and precisely enough.

From Arrow Video and released here in the USA via MVD Entertainment Group, Deep Red (Profondo rosso in the original Italian) hit the street last week, September 4, on Blu-ray -- for purchase and/or rental. As usual with Arrow Video, there is a host of terrific Special Features, including Profond Giallo, a very interesting and intelligent half-hour visual essay on the film by Michael Mackenzie; an interview with Argento about this and others of his films; an interview with star Daria Nicolodi; and another with Claudio Simonetti of the group Goblin who did the music for the movie.

Best film of the year (so far): Paul Weitz's beautiful, brilliant, moving BEL CANTO

What a surprise is BEL CANTO, the new movie directed by Paul Weitz (and which could hardly be farther away in subject, tone and skill from his first film, American Pie!), with a screenplay adapted by Anthony Weintraub and Weitz from the award-winning novel of the same name by Ann Patchett. Mr. Weitz, shown below, has now directed in so many different genres that he is can certainly not be pigeon-holed -- which is undoubted as he wants it. Still, I would in no way have expected to be this strongly engulfed by and then finally moved -- not to tears; at least, not right away -- to the kind of deep, profound sense of possibility, joy and then loss that the performing arts so rarely provide. (Several hours post-viewing those tears unexpectedly arrived; the movie sticks with me, even now, days after viewing it.)

When we finished the film, my spouse at once remarked how much it reminded him of Our Country's Good, that great play by Timberlake Wertenbaker that had a too-short Broadway run back in 1991. In Bel Canto, the humanizing force, rather than residing, as in the play, in the power of theater, is instead found in music, specifically opera. The result is the same: the bringing together of diverse people and ideas into the kind harmony that progressives so desire, and that those in power so often deliberately prevent.

What genre of a film is Bel Canto? Without giving away much of the wonderfully imagined and executed plot, the movie's a mash-up. Part love story(ies), thriller, social/political critique, art-about-art, terrorism (but by whom?) and lots more, the movie puts you in touch with characters who grow and change, finally becoming as memorable as any you're likely see this year (or for that matter last year or next).

Not having read the novel (which is probably better than the film because novels almost always are), I can only judge this movie. What Weitz and Weintraub especially excel at lies in their ability to create the illusion of time passing both artfully and believably so that everything we see here seems viable, given the circumstances and characters.

That sense of days and weeks passing is vital to the tale's credibility, and it is handled here as well as I've ever seen it. The film has been cast exquisitely, too. Though its lead actors -- Julianne Moore (above) as a world-famous opera singer (we hear Renée Fleming on the soundtrack doing the singing) and Ken Watanabe (at left on poster, top) as an uber-wealthy and successful businessman -- are maybe not the most memorable of the characters, Ms Moore smartly captures both this singer's entitlement and her humanity, while Watanabe's eastern reserve and inscrutability slowly, effectively crumble.

The film's most interesting character -- the likes of which movies so seldom bring to life this well -- belongs to the Japanese translator (beautifully played by Ryô Kase, shown above, center), fluent in several languages, who accompanies Watanabe and discovers so much new about himself during the "siege." Also in the fine international cast are Sebastian Koch (below) as a harried Red Cross worker and Christopher Lambert (in the penultimate photo, below) as a hostage who proves multi-talented.

The "terrorists" are almost equally memorable. There are quite a few of these, and each is brought to fine and specific life with a few smart brushstrokes by actors who make the most of every one of their moments. Especially strong are Tenoch Huerta (as the Commander) and Maria Mercedes Coray, shown at right in the photo at bottom (who plays the young female recruit named Carmen).

The film is full of little ironies, sometimes involving language and translation. One of the richest and funniest is what most unites the film's missing dictator with some of the terrorists in this Latin American country. Of course, it's a telenovela.

As it moves along, the movie takes on almost the quality of a long-hoped-for fantasy -- one into which, from it outset, we know that reality must finally intrude. Until then, a wondrous little society is created that may take a permanent place in your mind and heart. TrustMovies found Bel Canto the most beguiling, appealing and finally moving piece of cinema he's seen in a long while. No other film has made him think, feel and care this much about such a diverse set of characters living through such a singular event.

From Screen Media Films (by far the best movie I've yet seen from this particular distributor) and running just 102 minutes, Bel Canto opens this Friday, September 14, in New York City (at the Cinepolis Chelsea) and in Los Angeles (at Laemmle's Monica Film Center). Here in the Miami area, the film opens the following Friday, September 21, at the Bill Cosford Cinema and in the weeks to come will hit another 25 cities and theaters nationwide. To see all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters, click here and scroll down.