'Bodies Bodies Bodies' Explains Gen Z And Delights Along The Way
#189: "Bodies Bodies Bodies," "Day Shift," "In The Line Of Fire," "Untold: The Girlfriend Who Didn't Exist"
Edition 189:
Hey movie lovers!
As always, you can find a podcast version of this newsletter on Apple or Spotify. Thank you so much for listening and spreading the word!
In this week’s newsletter: Brad Pitt leads a loaded cast on a bloody train ride to hell, the Predator franchise goes full native, and it’s time to honor two recently passed legends with our streaming suggestions. In this week’s “Trailer Watch,” is it coincidence or was Timothy Chalamet trolling his former co-star with this teaser drop?
Bodies Bodies Bodies
If I were to rank movies from this year in terms of how likely it is that they will be talked about in five, 10, perhaps even 20 years from now, the No. 1 pick is obvious: Top Gun: Maverick.
No. 2 would probably be Bodies Bodies Bodies. This claustrophobic horror comedy is the first grand sweeping statement about Gen Z that actually rings true, and will be looked back upon both for sociological study and for its cast of soon-to-be-famous young actors. We could look back at this lineup one day and compare it to The Outsiders, Dazed and Confused or Wet Hot American Summer in movie history as a project that launched a half-dozen stars.
You may not know their names (yet), but this is an Avengers-level team-up of niche TV and movie darlings — the girl from “The Hate You Give,” the girl from Borat: Subsequent Moviefilm, the girl from “Industry,” the girl from Shiva Baby, the girl from On The Rocks, the guy from “Halt and Catch Fire,” and the guy who just dated Kim Kardashian (we all know Pete Davidson by now).
The premise is simple and bullet proof, unlike the remote mansion where this group of well-to-do young people goes for a “hurricane party.” When the power and internet go out, and with it their access to their smart phones, things quickly descend into chaos over a game of “bodies bodies bodies” (think “mafia” or “Among Us,” it’s a game where one person in the group is the “killer” and the rest of the group must figure out who it is).
It’s Agatha Christie’s “And Then There Were None” mixed with the TV Show “Euphoria,” steeped in the Gen Z malaise I once described as “authenticity in the spirit of almost nihilism.” Our young women might pretend not to care about anything, but the most brutal violence in the movie is not the murders (a few of the kills are pretty gruesome), it’s the verbal character assassinations that these lifelong friends exchange as tensions are ratcheted up.
It’s smart to be wary of all “old people explain young people” movies, but here the humor and sensibilities are perfect and presented in the actual native language of the people around my age. Characters weaponize therapy terminology and trauma buzzwords, in ways that are serious to the characters but played for laughs with the audience.
That’s what separates this from other Gen Z stories. The movie’s ability to make fun of the things it’s pointing out — privilege, racism, drug use, reliance on technology, whether we can “outgrow” our childhood friends — while also generating empathy for its characters is a very fine line it walks well.
Despite the ample material for critical appraisal and analysis, the movie isn’t much of a thinker. It’s funnier than it is scary, and everything you need to enjoy it is right there on the surface.
I happened to see the movie in front of a packed-out, live wire audience of people either actually young or at least “LA young” (and not for lack of trying). So I’m not sure whether every joke can and will connect when the movie inevitably goes to streaming. But I would say, adamantly, that this movie is not just made for the generation it’s dissecting.
Gen X is represented here by Lee Pace, the aforementioned “guy from ‘Halt and Catch Fire’” (and, I’m told, the MCU), as a 40-something boyfriend of one of the girls. He’s able to express so well the anxious feeling of being unable to tell when younger people are laughing with you or at you, and his presence is absolutely electric every moment he’s on screen. He almost steals the movie — if not for Rachel Sennott, who comes out of this movie on a Melissa McCarthy-like trajectory at minimum.
Fun, all-in-one-night chaos movies are a dime a dozen, but finding one that actually pays off in its third act and conclusion is extremely rare. That’s why I couldn’t put this movie any lower than No. 6 on my running 2022 rankings. It might be the most surprised I’ve been by a movie in a couple of years, because the trailers were so heavy on their Pete Davidson usage and convinced me the movie was going to be bad. But hey, in A24 we trust, both to get butts in seats and to present them with content that elevates above the muck!
Something New
Day Shift (Netflix): Netflix’s reputation for star-studded, action-packed, half-baked Frankenstein movies certainly wasn’t disproven by this action comedy starring Jamie Foxx, Dave Franco and Snoop Dogg about a pool cleaner in the Valley who moonlights as a vampire hunter. By now these Netflix joints have developed a house style — explosions every five minutes and dumb jokes every two, with a CGI budget that seems limitless and a production budget that seems to be about $20 flat. I respect this one a little bit more because I can imagine myself liking it if I were a tween who just got done binging “Stranger Things” and therefore had developed a numbness to horribly written dialogue.
I still maintain my belief that Foxx is one of the most talented performers on the planet, and his comedic timing and delivery are capable of carrying the movie through its predictable plot points and tension-free climax. It’s watchable, if not entirely enjoyable. How many Netflix movies must I say that about before they try a new approach?
Something Old
In The Line of Fire (1993, Netflix, Hulu): I promise I’m not going to make this into a permanent obit section, but another week brought another big loss to the Hollywood community in filmmaker Wolfgang Peterson — director of dad-movie extraordinaire Air Force One, the oddly prescient Outbreak, a movie I watched a million times as a kid Troy, The Perfect Storm, and one of the most underrated Clint Eastwood movies in his long career.
It’s about a secret service agent racked with guilt about his inability to save JFK, who now must protect another president from a would-be assassin played by the great John Malkovich, getting a little help from early 90s icon Rene Russo. If you’re a fan of those earnest, real-world 90s thrillers like me, this is one you absolutely have to check off your list.
Something to Stream
Untold: The Girlfriend Who Didn’t Exist (Netflix): You all know how big of a fan I was of a few previous Untold documentaries, including Breaking Point, which was among my favorite movies of last year. But in terms of pure source material, nothing that the series has ever done matches the promise of their latest release: the story of the Manti Te’o catfishing scandal. Surely you’ve heard of it. A college football superstar dedicates his Heisman trophy finalist season to his dead girlfriend, who turned out to not exist.
The real steal of the film is the first known interview with Naya Tuiasosopo, the perpetrator of the hoax. So for the first time we’re able to find out how the seemingly unbelievable “love story” happened from both sides of the account. Still, this is Te’o’s story, and we walk away with nothing but empathy for him. Part one of the series explains how he fell for the catfish, and part two details how reporters broke the story that led to the media firestorm, changing the trajectory of his life forever. For a story that is on its face so insane, there are actually a few extra crazy twists in store here, making it a must-see documentary not just for sports fans but for everyone.
Trailer Watch: The Greatest Beer Run Ever
In an undeniable case of truth being stranger than fiction could ever be, this movie is based on the preposterous true story that a civilian in the late 1960s voluntarily flew to Vietnam just to deliver his friends beer.
I have no idea how you take that idea and make a two hour feature film out of it, but I do know that they convinced Zach Efron to play the guy and convinced him to try out a thick New York accent for the part — the first accent Efron has ever played in his career, I believe.
The comedic touch of director Peter Farrally (Dumb and Dumber, Hall Pass, Green Book) and the sheen of the AppleTV+ make this definitely worth keeping an eye on, and if anything its ridiculousness could work in its favor by keeping expectations low. Either way, I’m in!