Thibodeaux wants to honor Andrea Grover's work at the house.
Photo by Steven Thomson
When CultureMap spoke with Aurora Picture Show founder Andrea Grover in May, her Sunset Heights home (and the original home of the microcinema) was still on the market. This afternoon, a buyer named Cressandra Thibodeaux closed on the property.
The local art film community will heave a sigh of relief with the news of the purchase, as Thibodeaux has ensured the theater's use as a creative space. With an MFA in filmmaking from Columbia University and experience as a studio artist and in documentary film in Los Angeles, she will utilize the space with continued collaborations with the Aurora Picture Show and experimental film workshops.
A native Houstonian and alumna of the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, Thibodeaux already holds a plethora of fresh ideas for the space - and she's open to the community's input. Taking a cue from the early days of the Alley Theatre, she will host an open forum for the creative community ("or anyone who likes free beer") on August 28 at the property, which has been renamed 14 Pews.
The interior of 14 Pews, which hopes to bring in not just artists, but Thibodeaux's new neighbors too.
Photo by Steven Thomson
The interior of 14 Pews, which hopes to bring in not just artists, but Thibodeaux's new neighbors too.
Director Sam Raimi has gone through different phases as a filmmaker, including leading the first Spider-Man trilogy and joining the MCU with Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. But he first gained notice with the gory and funny Evil Dead movies, a sensibility he’s returning to with his latest film, Send Help.
Linda Liddle (Rachel McAdams) is a meek and eccentric middle manager at a financial firm that’s just named Bradley Preston (Dylan O’Brien) as its new nepo CEO. Bradley’s dad had promised Linda a promotion to vice president, but she gets passed over in favor of one of Bradley’s frat buddies, sending her into a mild rage. Still, she gets invited along on a planned business trip to Thailand, during which she hopes to prove her worth.
Unfortunately for most of the passengers on the private plane, it crashes into the ocean, leaving only Linda and Bradley alive on a deserted island. Linda, who has privately developed survival skills, adapts quickly to the forbidding environment, while Bradley tries to revert to bossing her around. But Linda quickly understands the power dynamic has shifted, and she uses this knowledge to try to keep Bradley in line, turning their stranding into a battle of wills.
Directed by Raimi and written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift, the film is the classic “so bad it’s good” kind of experience. McAdams, inarguably an attractive and charming person, is given stringy hair, an antisocial personality, and quirks like eating tuna fish at her desk to make her as off-putting as possible. Bradley, along with almost everyone else at her office, is stereotyped just as hard in order to set up the twist of fate.
When the action shifts to the island, things get even more over the top. The audience has already been primed for Linda to demonstrate her survival expertise, but the film does way more than just show her making fire. Whether it’s flawlessly building a shelter or hunting a wild boar, everything Linda does is portrayed in a slightly off-kilter manner. Then they turn everything up to 11, indulging in gore that is so unnecessary that you can’t help but laugh.
The filmmakers prove they’re in on the joke the rest of the way, including a variety of preposterous but hilarious scenarios that would cause massive eyerolls if they were actually trying to take the film seriously. While they do a great job of showing Linda’s ability to handle herself in the wild, they also show that she is somehow the only person in the world who could get a glow up after a plane crash and weeks living in nature.
McAdams, an Oscar-nominated actor for Spotlight, is way too high class for a movie like this, which makes her presence here all the more interesting. She is all-in on whatever Raimi wants her to do, and she’s at her most fun when she goes the animalistic route. O’Brien, who was great in the recent Twinless, doesn’t get as much of an opportunity to show his range, but he still proves to be an interesting foil for her.
Were it released in any other month, Send Help might be looked at as bottom of the barrel material. But with the movie year just getting started, it’s easier to forgive its outrageous plot twists and just have fun, especially since Raimi and his team put the rest of the film together so well.
