Thumbnails 8/15/24: Six Must-Reads You Don’t Want To Miss This Week

From an interview with “It Ends With Us” director and star Justin Baldoni to a smattering of four-star reviews, here is a sampling of the articles we know you won’t want to miss this week.

1. “Justin Baldoni Wants You To Believe” by Tim Grierson

“That true-believer attitude starts at the top. Baldoni is nothing if not a man who has faith in his mission to create something new at Wayfarer, preaching a gospel of creating films and series of substance in an age of deadening social-media overkill. That philosophy is embedded in the company’s very moniker. “‘Wayfarer’ stands for the journey of the soul,” explains Baldoni. “It’s named after the Wayfarer in a book called The Seven Valleys and the Four Valleys, which comes from the Baha’i Faith, which is my faith. It’s the journey of the soul, trying to figure life out. Whether you are a believer in God or whether you’re spiritual—whatever you are—it’s that journey of just trying to understand the world around us and yourself in the process.””

2. “It Ends With Us” review by Marya E. Gates

“This story of love, trauma and abuse is wrapped up in the same amber-hued autumnal glow of Lively’s bestie Taylor Swift’s short film for her autobiographical song “All Too Well (10 Minute Version),” which itself is about an abusive relationship. Lily even has the same tousled strawberry blonde tresses as the short film’s star Sadie Sink. So naturally, the film’s most climatic moment of domestic abuse, like the short, takes place in the couple’s kitchen. Later, the moment where Lily comes into her own power as she attempts to rebuild her life is underscored by Swift’s “My Tears Ricochet” (which perhaps counts as a spoiler if you know the topic of the song. Swifties, I’m sorry.)”

3. Chaz Ebert Wants You to Give  A FECK

“Many people get confused about the difference between empathy and sympathy. “Sometimes offering sympathy can seem like you feel sorry for another person,” Ebert says. “Sympathy can have a value judgment and come across as hierarchical like the person offering the sympathy feels superior.” She continues, “With empathy, you are putting yourself in someone else’s shoes. It doesn’t mean you are trying to fix or change them, but that you feel for what they are going through.””

4. “Deadpool and Wolverine” review by Matt Zoller Seitz

“In service of all the tomfoolery and shenanigans that ensue, the movie turns subtext into text and bold-faces it. Wade revels in declaring himself a timeline Jesus. In one timeline-jumping mission we see Logan crucified on a giant X. The movie incrementally becomes the nine-figure-budgeted superhero action movie equivalent of a Chuck Jones-directed Looney Tunes touchstone like “Duck Amuck.” “Keep going,” Wade says when a character starts monologuing, “audiences are accustomed to long run times.” Wade narrates the entire thing, as he always does, and at one point seizes the camera and drags it into another part of the set to tell us something confidential.”

5. “Good One” review by Sheila O’Malley

“”Good One” is intriguing in its disinterest in explanations. The film’s refusal to “satisfy” an audience with easy explanations or even cathartic moments pulls you into its atmosphere, dragging you into the weird dynamic which grows more claustrophobic by the moment. Sam has her period and keeps leaving the path to put in a tampon, as Chris and Sam wait in the background, completely oblivious to her extra burden. She’s got this whole world going on they have no idea about. The period is an intriguing detail (all the details are intriguing in this beautiful film, including its evocative title), highlighting the biological difference, but also highlighting her isolation. The only women in the movie are back home. Sam is on her own.”

6. “Sugarcane” review by Peyton Robinson

“With a triad of personal avenues to unpack the reverb of influence – Noisecat’s relationship with his father, influenced by the latter’s lifelong struggle to cope with his origins (and his own mother’s pain in doing in the same), the religious and ancestral reckoning of the late Chief Rick Gilbert, and the overarching criminal research by investigators Whitney Spearing and Charlene Belleau – “Sugarcane” is deeply human, giving living, breathing faces and families to a history that, even when acknowledged, is too often rendered monolithic and impersonal. It begs the action of accountability, something so frequently symbolic rather than reparative, displayed through thin acknowledgments from Trudeau and a hollow offering of sympathy from Pope Francis (with no apology, compensation, or artifact returns to follow).”