Review: Going viral with "Not Okay"

by Matt St Clair

While social media can be an outlet for networking and connection, it’s also a place of toxicity. Quinn Shephard’s new satire Not Okay heavily emphasizes the latter. In a digital age where anyone can achieve fame with viral tweets or TikTok videos, Not Okay taps into how some people, like anti-heroine Danni Sanders (Zoey Deutch), go on a demeaning search for internet clout.

Stuck with an unfulfilling photo editor job when she wants to be a writer, Danni Sanders aims to get ahead at the magazine she works for. Seeking fame and validation from everyone around her, including influencer Colin (Dylan O’Brien) who she crushes on, Danni decides to fake a trip to Paris. With just her photo skills and a change in location on her Instagram posts, Danni makes it appear she went away despite being held up in her apartment. But once a terrorist attack occurs in Paris, Danni then pretends to be one of the survivors. As you can guess, thinks get grimmer as they progress... 

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Zombieland: Double Tap

by Michael Frank

Zombieland: Double Tap doesn’t waste time telling you that you’re watching a zombie movie. The Columbia Pictures logo comes to life, fighting off multiple would-be enemies, leading to a Deadpool-esque opening credits sequence. It’s not new by any means, but it reminds you why you like zombie movies in the first place: they’re fun as hell. 

The rest of the film follows its opening: an enjoyable movie-going experience with a lack of plot, a lack of originality, yet just enough movie stars, inside jokes, and heart to make it worthwhile. Double Tap follows our leads from a decade earlier, Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), Wichita (Emma Stone), and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin), as they traverse the new-look world that’s still full of zombies. The actors themselves have aged nicely as well, with Harrelson, Eisenberg, Stone, and Breslin all maintaining prolific and award-winning careers. If anything, they’re more likeable than they were 10 years ago, an difficult feat for a cast to pull off. They bring their full arsenal of charisma to their roles in Double Tap, giving generous performances to a film that cares more about its world than its characters...

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Tribeca 2019: "Buffaloed"

Reporting from Tribeca once more here is Jason Adams...

I am not from Buffalo. I am from Rochester, which is one hour or so east of Buffalo. But I'm from close enough to Buffalo to know that Buffaloed -- a new comedy starring Zoey Deutch and Judy Greer -- knows Buffalo. So much so I had to spend some time googling the people that made it. Director Tanya Wexlermight be from Chicago (the Buffalo of the mid-west) but, sure enough, writer Brian Sacca is a ranch-soaked Buffalonian good ol' boy. And so Buffaloed knows its Anchor Bar versus Duffs chicken wing rivalries, and it knows "Go Bills" is how one expresses a goodbye. Its arteries are clogged with verifiable Upstate-isms. 

This might all seem trivial at the outset, but Buffaloed gets its sense of place, and what's so funny about its sense of place, so right that it builds its own little magical world out of it...

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Three Ways "Set It Up" Succeeds

By Spencer Coile 

Considering Netflix’s constant stream of original content, it's a smaill miracle that their latest original film, Set It Up, is receiving some attention. Set It Up tells the cookie-cutter story of two overworked PA’s (Zoey Deutch and Glen Powell) who decide to set up their overbearing bosses (Lucy Liu and Taye Diggs) only to find love themselves. It follows the familiar beats of your favorite romcoms. It's glossy, quirky, and wrapped up with a cute little bow when the credits roll. 

Set It Up is everything we have come to expect from the genre but which the genre hasn't been delivering of late. Director Claire Scanlon (Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, GLOW, Brooklyn Nine-Nine)and writer Katie Silberman bring sensitivity to a story that feels slight, but is rewarding enough. In many ways, the film is a refreshing run-of-the-mill romcom.

Here are three reasons why Set It Up really works...

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