Abducted (Limited Theatrical release and Streaming on AppleTV, August)
Indigenous Canadian teens, Derrick (Joel Oulette) and his sister Lakota (Olivia Kate Iatridis), reside in Edmonton. While their grandmother (Helen Calahasen) is away on the reserve, Lakota becomes a drug dealer and is abducted. Beset by visions involving his sister’s disappearance, Derrick uses his investigative instincts and psychic abilities to hone in on his sister’s kidnapper. Inspired by real events, a smattering of women, many indigenous, have been taken and killed in the Edmonton area since the 1970s. Though numerous bodies were recovered, the suspect remains at large. Abduction’s limited budget benefits from exploring the psychology informing its fictional kidnapper/killer. It takes a thoughtful look at challenges confronted by indigenous Canadians, but the film’s action scenes cry out for smart fight choreography. (Lisa Miller)
The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (Arrow Video Blu-ray)
A night stalker preys on women in Rome and Sam (Tony Musante), an American expat writer, falls into the spree when he thwarts a killing. At first the police treat him like a suspect and he becomes obsessed with finding the killer. Eventually, his investigation and the police inquiry converge.
The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970) was the directorial debut by Dario Argento and a high point for giallo, the Italian gothic suspense genre marked by lurid depictions of murderous, unhinged sexuality. Every doorway led to Bluebeard’s castle and every castle contained many chambers. The Bird has much to offer formally, including brilliantly evocative color cinematography as well as inky shades of darkness, tense editing and the geometry of unease in the architectural settings. Ennio Morricone provided a mysterious, unnerving, eclectic score.
The scenario has many Hitchcock touches. Women are objectified but it could be argued that the film displays the worst that can result from that objectification. Not unlike Michelangelo Antonioni, Argento plays with perception and misperception. The Bird with the Crystal Plumage has just been issued in a deluxe box set with lobby cards, a poster and a booklet of informative essays. (David Luhrssen)
A Crime on the Bayou (Screening on all major platforms)
In 1966 a young Black man, Gary Duncan, was arrested for touching a white teenager—on the elbow. It was just another episode in the chronicle of injustice faced by African Americans and would have passed into history unremarked except for the determination of Duncan and his attorney, Richard Sobol. Their dogged pursuit of justice climbed through the judiciary until reaching the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court’s 1969 ruling in Duncan vs. Louisiana finally established the right to a jury trial in state courts.
The Duncan case is reviewed in the new documentary A Crime on the Bayou. The film tells an important and overlooked courtroom story from the civil rights era, a time when courts ventured into places where politicians dared not go. (David Luhrssen)
The Suicide Squad (In Theaters and Streaming on HBO Max, August 6)
Bearing little resemblance to its 2016 predecessor, this reimagined adaptation of the DC comic, is both gratuitously violent and surprisingly funny. Margot Robbie reprises former a psychiatrist, now criminal psychopath, Harley Quinn. Idras Elba appears as Bloodsport, whose abilities arise from his all-powerful armored suit. Bring on John Cena’s chrome-helmeted Peacemaker, along with a half dozen other inmates released to join Task Force X. The recruits belong to government official Amanda Waller (a returning Viola Davis) who uses Col. Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman, back again), to keep their focus on defeating our nation’s enemies rather than killing one another. These fish out of water are pitted against an extraterrestrial starfish that has orchestrated a coup on the fictional island nation of Corto Maltese. Writer/director James Gunn appears to enjoy herding cats, having previously wrangled a motley crew in Guardians of the Galaxy. (Lisa Miller)
