Hi folks and welcome to the The Friday Film Club where both myself and Elwood will be highlighting a film which we feel is worth checking out. At the same time we would love to hear your own selections whether you’re choosing to just name them in the comments section or join us in arguing the case for your film on your blog, let us know and we will share it below.
Elwood’s Pick – Taxi Hunter
Released bizarrely the same year as Joel Schumacher’s Falling Down in which Michael Douglas’ engineer went on a rampage across L.A. there is a similarity to be found in the plot of this film from Herman Yau which sees Anthony Wong’s mild mannered insurance salesman Ah-Kin carrying out a vendetta against the scumbag Hong Kong taxi drivers after his wife is killed by a taxi driver when he nightdress is caught in the door of a cab.
Anthony Wong perfectly plays both sides of the coin first as the nice guy and once his wife dies as the grieving vigilante finding an outlet for his pain by hunting down the taxi drivers overcharging for fares or being generally disagreeable. At the same time his best friend and supercop Chung (Yu Rong-Guang) has been tasked with hunting down the killer preying on taxi drivers.
Unquestionably Wong is the real draw here as we see his evolution over the course of the film and how he chooses to process his grief aswell as the frustration he attributes to the local Taxi drivers who don’t especially help themselves due to being so awful to begin with so you can’t help but root for him when he starts making them pay.
The partnership between Herman Yau and Anthony Wong is certainly one of the great over overlooked director / actor partnerships with the pair making some of the most memorable CAT III cinema of the early 90 and certainly it’s a partnership which pays off here even if it’s noticeably lighter than some of the films being made in this era.
Kim ‘s Pick – The Mitchells vs. The Machines (2021)
Most known for his work on Gravity Falls as creative director and writer, Mike Rianda’s debut directorial feature film is one that combines his personal family experiences with his childhood love for robots. The Mitchells vs. The Machines, which was once titled Connected but retitled back to its original name upon its shift to a Netflix distribution due to the pandemic, tells the story of the dysfunctional family The Mitchells who are all a bit odd in their own ways who embrace their quirky daughter Katie’s departure to university by going on a family road trip to take her there however, they collide with a robot takeover as the leading tech company PAL Labs loses control over his virtual assistant who ends up exacting revenge by using the newly designed robots to capture all humans. The Mitchells try to escape together and with their odd ideas and surprisingly lucky twists and turns try to save the world together.
The Mitchells vs the Machines is pretty balanced in all its elements. Its comedy is one of the standouts especially since it features a dysfunctional family on a road trip during a robot apocalypse especially when it includes their silly dog Monchi. Driving in an old car and each of them wielding their gifted tool, the Mitchells bond together in the oddest way and yet embraces their oddities while learning about each other a little more. The story never rests on the drama too long and remembers constantly that its a dangerous robot takeover and that they are on the run. The constant moving keeps the film quick-paced and entertaining as it throws in different obstacles, solutions and things going wrong constantly which adds to the entertainment level.
That’s not to mention that the voice cast also is pretty decent. Maya Rudolph voices Linda, the mother character who is a wild ride while Danny McBride voices Rick, the father character. Katie is the main character and the focus of the show as her relationship with her family is the biggest element here along with her knowledge of technology and social media along with her imagination and creativity. She is voiced by Abbi Jacobson. Her younger brother Aaron is voiced by director Mike Rianda himself. The villain is a virtual assistant voiced by Olivia Colman who also captures a nice villain for an animated film which is has this comedic villain sort of feeling, still a little threatening but very entertaining as the whole thing unfolds. The voice cast also includes these cameo characters of a perfect family that Linda envies secretly The Poseys where the parents are voiced by Chrissy Teigen and John Legend.
The Mitchells vs the Machine is a fun little animated film which plays well with its premise. While the story layout itself isn’t completely unique as most comedic family adventures, animated or not, usually include some type of dysfunctional family but the whole film is constructed really well from the voice cast, comedy and pacing while tackling the themes pretty well.
So you’ve seen our picks for this week’s double feature but what are your movie watching plans this weekend?
Let us know in the comments section below.
Movies and Tea 