- Love and Monsters: Three Films to Enjoy on Valentine’s Day (February 13, 2026)
Why has horror and romance complemented one another so seamlessly since the dawn of storytelling? It can be scary to put one’s heart on the line, especially when falling for someone whom you don’t know in their entirety. They could be Prince Charming—or a blood-sucking vampire—or, most frighteningly, both.
With Valentine’s Day coming up, I’d like to recommend three movies I’ve recently seen, which could ostensibly be categorized as horror pictures, but on a deeper level, are really about love. Two are re-imaginings of monsters who routinely made guest appearances in my childhood nightmares, “Frankenstein” and “Dracula”. The third contains a more human monster, one who leaves her fiancé, Matt (played by Kevin James), at the altar. (BUT no judgment, is she really a monster?) Though it’s technically a romantic comedy, what could be more horrific in this situation than being the groom-not-to-be?
Sometimes we like our love stories to be sweet, complete with a “meet cute” where a boy and girl fall in love, get married, and have a family, but we know life isn’t always like that. Charles and Daniel Kinnane, the co-directors of “Solo Mio,” begin their picture by showing us all of the pleasant events leading up to the doomed wedding of Matt and Heather (Julie Ann Emery). They appear to be so in love that we are surprised when she strands him on their wedding day. He, however, decides to fly solo to Italy anyway, which was supposed to be their honeymoon destination, and that’s where most of the story unfolds.
Even with the theme of a broken heart, there is a sweetness and a freshness about the movie, perhaps because it largely takes place in Rome and its beautiful surrounding countryside. Perhaps it’s my own memories of watching horse races in Sienna, and listening to opera in the hillsides of Tuscany. Or perhaps it’s simply the fact that I was rooting for Kevin James to come out of this okay. Is it a great film? Not really. This may sound strange for me to say, but for me, it doesn’t matter how one would rate certain movies. Sometimes you just want to see good things happen to good people, and in the case of “Solo Mio,” that alone makes it worth watching.
As a child, I was scared of three monsters—Frankenstein, Dracula and The Wolf Man—in part because they all had human qualities. The least scary monsters for me were the amorphous creatures like the Swamp Thing or the Creature from the Black Lagoon. A character like the Wolf Man, is frighteningly real. The fact he has no control over his evil actions after he sprouts fangs under a full moon makes his plight all the more hellish.
I could never have imagined that after all of these years, I would see new imaginings of Frankenstein and Dracula that were so exciting. But in the hands of master filmmakers like Guillermo del Toro with “Frankenstein” and Luc Besson with “Dracula,” my interest was piqued. Like The Wolf Man, Mary Shelley’s original character of Frankenstein’s monster was a deeply tragic character, brought back to life against his will and branded abhorrent by a world with which he only wanted to connect.
Nominated for nine Oscars, Del Toro’s epic adaptation remains true to Shelley’s text while casting “Euphoria” star Jacob Elordi as one of the most sympathetic—and certainly the most seductive—variation on the monster to date. While treated with cruelty by his creator (Oscar Isaac), the tenderness he receives from Frankenstein’s soon-to-be sister-in-law (Mia Goth) forms the heart of the picture. As in Shelley’s novel, the film’s first half is told from the perspective of Doctor Frankenstein. Once the monster takes over the narration duties midway through, the picture comes to life with even greater passion.
In his four-star review, our critic Glenn Kenny wrote that Del Toro “spins out the tale in ways that make the movie not just jarring and frightening in the best horror tradition, but heartbreakingly poignant, expanding the humanity James Whale achieved for in his classic 1930s “Frankenstein” pictures […] Elordi is marvelous in conveying the monster’s intelligence, sensitivity and, yes, inherent gentleness—a shot of him holding and petting a mouse is quietly wrecking—but he puts across the power and rage beautifully as well.”
The same could be said of Caleb Landry Jones’s tour de force portrayal of the title role in Luc Besson’s new screen adaptation of “Dracula,” which in my opinion, is the most romantic of the three titles in this article. It is romantic in the sense that it highlights the kind of love that you hope you will find one day—you meet a person and they fall for you and you fall for them—and nothing will ever come between the two of you. The kind of love that will last forever and ever—even though you don’t foresee it continuing for centuries. The picture begins four hundred years after Dracula lost the love of his very long life, Elizabeth, in 1480. When two intriguing women suddenly materialize—the saintly Mina (Zoe Blue, daughter of recent Ebertfest guest Rosanna Arquette) and the decidedly less saintly Maria (Matilda De Angelis), the vampire’s appetite goes into hyperdrive.
Almost any version of “Dracula” would make for appropriate Valentine’s Day viewing since the Count embodies, at his core, the forbidden sexuality that his puritanical targets strive so desperately to suppress. What I appreciated about Landry’s performance, and the film in general, is how it makes his lovesick-ness so tangible, so relatable, that one can almost taste it.
“Frankenstein” is on Netflix; “Solo Mio” and “Dracula” are in theaters.
- Willing Participants: Harry Lighton and Harry Melling on “Pillion” (February 13, 2026)
In a Valentine’s Day season where Emerald Fennell’s “Wuthering Heights” seems the go-to date night movie for most couples, along comes A24 with some curiously fitting counterprogramming: Writer/director Harry Lighton‘s brazen, thorny, but deceptively sweet kink romance “Pillion.” Described as a “dom-com” in most of the studio’s marketing materials, “Pillion” charts the furtive romance between a leather-clad dominant, played with smoldering Tom-of-Finland assertiveness by Alexander Skarsgård, and a timid, inexperienced submissive played by Harry Melling, in modern-day London.
It’s tempting to reduce “Pillion” simply to its raunchier, more transgressive sexual elements: More than lurid scenes of Melling’s Colin kneeling in front of Skarsgård’s Ray in a dark alleyway to use his tongue in more ways than one, or a sexually-charged wrestling bout in assless singlets, so much of Lighton’s film expresses the curious normality of the D/s relationship Colin and Ray find themselves in. Colin quickly discovers, as Ray describes, an “aptitude for devotion,” which means that all of the acts of service and submission Ray demands (from sleeping on the floor to cooking all of his meals) are things that Colin deeply enjoys.
As with its source material, Adam Mars-Jones’ melancholic 2020 novella Box Hill, “Pillion” isn’t shy at poking holes at the flaws in Colin and Ray’s kink dynamic: There’s little discussion of boundaries, no safe words, and little healthy communication. And yet, in Skarsgård and Melling’s tender, unconventional chemistry, and Lighton’s deftly light touch, there’s a warmth to be found among all the padlocks and leather jackets and sleeping on the floor. It’s not the kind of love story that lasts, necessarily. But it’s one that Colin, and potentially even Ray, need to go through to find what they truly need.
Sipping tea in a hotel room before an advanced screening in Chicago, Harrys Lighton and Melling sat down with RogerEbert.com to discuss the challenges in adapting the caustic “Box Hill” to a sweeter incarnation, the psychological hurdles inherent in depicting the dynamics of a dubiously-toxic dom/sub relationship, and the one prop that gives us a clue into Skarsgård’s interior life.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
I’m really curious about the process of adaptation from the novella to the film, as there are a lot of differences, not just in time period, but in tone. What attracted you to the book, and how did you want to adapt it?
HARRY LIGHTON: Two things: The first was the subject of an innocent going into a world of transgressive sex, I think. But I made a couple of shorts which touched on similar areas, and I was looking for something else in that space. Then, the film’s tone is undoubtedly different from the book’s, which whiplashes between humor and sincerity, sometimes from sentence to sentence. I thought that was an interesting cocktail to try to translate into film.
But I knew I wanted to warm up the novel a bit. The novella is probably slightly crueler to Colin, both in terms of the way it describes him and the experiences it puts him through. There’s a categorical rape scene in the novella, which I think colors the rest of the narrative. The question I really wanted to ask was, is this relationship good or bad for Colin? In the novella, I firmly came down on the ‘no’ side, because of the fact that there was a higher element of Stockholm Syndrome, there.
Harry [Melling], when you got this script, and you built your own understanding of Colin as a character, how much did that process of adaptation hit you? Was it the case of building a more transformative experience for Colin than the explicitly abusive one in the novella?
HARRY MELLING: I read the novella after the script, obviously, and read it quite soon after, if I remember correctly. As Harry said, there are differences in terms of tone. But what was useful was that the novella is in the first person; it’s in Colin’s head. So there are certain aspects of an interior life I could steal, for lack of a better word, and transpose that into Harry’s script.
Whenever I’m working on something, I find that those things sometimes start out very useful and then become less so. In this, I found a really good starting point: using the book alongside the script soon drifted into the backdrop of what I was exploring.
The thing that made me leave the novella behind a bit was the movie’s comedic world. As Harry said, I think the film is warmer; the novella is funny, too, but in a different way. So my homework was really to get my head down and honor the narrative beats Harry had set out in the script, and try to make them as good as possible.
Pillion (A24)
This isn’t your first recent role in which your character explores queerness for the first time; in “Please Baby Please,” your character is on a similar journey of sexual and queer discovery. What attracts you to those kinds of characters?
HM: I think there’s obviously some crossover. When I come to a role, I always look at it as a separate beast; I don’t have that strategic sort of brain. So what attracted me to both those roles was that they’re completely unique. I hadn’t read anything like “Please Baby Please,” and he’s an interesting character navigating the complex negotiation between the masculine and the feminine, which I found fascinating. And [Colin] is very much on the road to discovering what love means to him. They both felt like very unique, powerful stories. But I don’t think “I’ve done that, so now I should do this.”
I was also thinking, especially in the parts where you get to perform in a barbershop quartet, of the segment of “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs” where you, too, are performing for tips to unsuspecting audiences. So many of your characters are performers in a lot of respects.
HM: That’s true. Something I thought about recently is that, when my character is performing in “Buster Scruggs,” it’s bold; it’s committed. And the barbershop quartet is certainly something [Colin] feels comfortable in. This is a world he feels he can excel in. But then, off that, he’s a very different creature. That’s the same for the “Buster Scruggs” character; when he’s alone, he’s very muted. I don’t think he says anything other than the speeches. So those contrasts, those differences, have always interested me as an actor—how someone could be one thing in a particular environment, but in another environment be something else.
Of course, there’s another entity not here who’s a major element of the film’s fabric: Alexander Skarsgård as Ray. Going back to the novella, his Ray is a departure from that version. He’s a decidedly non-British Ray, which lends him a strange exoticism. How did you approach building the character around him and acting alongside him?
HM: It was amazing. We had no time whatsoever beforehand; we’d shot a week of the family stuff, and then Alex flew in. I think he was in Toronto doing “Murderbot,” but he flew in on the following Sunday. We had to rehearse the wrestling scene to be shot the following day. So we literally shook hands, started jumping on each other, and got to it.
In hindsight, albeit not by design, it was a fantastic way of entering the process: You’re not establishing a backstory, or going, “You know the scene where I’m by the piano, and you’re playing it? Maybe we should think about this!” Which means that, two weeks later, you have that conversation in your head and you’re trying to reach for something that might not be there. It was a great way of working, and with someone like Alex, who is fearless and always going to change things up, and will always be there with you in the scene, it’s just very easy. You can very much keep it alive and keep testing each other on the day, and hopefully get some good stuff for Harry to use in the edit.
Harry [Lighton], how did you work to build that chemistry with them?
HL: I didn’t, really. I thought long and hard about the casting, as that’s most of the work. To try to create the right environment. Part of creating chemistry is perhaps not letting things stultify when you’re shooting, so making sure there’s enough room to stay in the present tense during filming is important. I tried to encourage an environment where they could change things up from take to take and tweak things to keep it feeling live.
Pillion (A24)
When it comes to filming the more intimate scenes of sex and kink with Colin and Ray, there are so many different ways to express what are fairly transgressive acts for cinema. You’re not letting Ray hang hog on screen, necessarily—
HL: Hanging hog, does that mean dick out? Because we see some hog.
Well, yes, but there are some strategic cutaways, as it were.
HL: My strategy was that I never wanted it to feel like we were panning away from the explicitness of the material. I wanted it to feel committed to honoring the truth of this type of sex. But I also didn’t want to remove the audience from that sex, but not beat them over the head with the shock of it. One shot, which I’ve talked about quite a lot and did shoot, was a super close-up of the hog, as you’d say.
The Prince Albert.
HL: Exactly. And once we were playing around with it in the edit, the test audiences kept laughing when we cut to it, in a moment where I wanted them to be concentrated. The same with Colin holding his breath as he gives Ray a blowjob. It was always a question of how to thread the needle between diluting the sex and being emptily provocative.
Harry [Melling], on that note, playing those scenes as a submissive, it must be an interesting exercise to play submission and even the physicality of giving blowjobs and bottoming.
HM: I think so, especially when it’s so new. That’s the thing I found so fascinating, Colin’s courage to do everything for the first time, which is what I really wanted to get across. Whether it’s a blowjob in an alleyway or licking a leather boot, all of these things are new territory for him. So I just wanted to make sure that was alive, as well as the want to do it, to get it right. Because that was very important, you know, to make sure that Colin is a willing participant. He really wants to do a good job at this. All those sprinkles of narrative moments were important—the glee, the thrill he gets from it.
You always get the sense, too, that Colin is trying to figure out Ray a bit. And as viewers, we’re also trying to figure out Ray. What was the negotiation from a writing and directing standpoint, for how much you wanted us to know about Ray?
HL: I knew that I didn’t want there to be any explanation in Ray’s background for the way that he is. I didn’t want to pinpoint, “Okay, this is something that happened to him when he was sixteen or nine or whatever that explains the way he is.” I wanted it to be perfectly possible that he’s just kinky because he’s kinky.
But I did want there to be moments where we see beneath this hard, macho embodiment of a sexual fantasy to something more vulnerable. So my conversations were with myself, but also with Alexander when we were shooting, about how we could provide those chinks in Ray’s armor. So the audience knows there’s something psychologically complex at work beneath this performance.
The one real indicator we get for Ray’s interior life, so to speak, is the [Karl Ove] Knausgård book [My Struggle], which he’s reading when he’s with Colin. How did you pick that tome?
HL: There’s definitely an insight to be read into that. I think that Colin probably reads an insight, for sure. I like the idea that, in addition to indicating his geographical roots, “My Struggle” is a famous work of autofiction. So it seems to me a fun irony that Ray was reading a book in which someone has laid bare their life, warts and all, even though he’s so resistant to that kind of autobiography in a personal context.
HM: I also love the fact that halfway through the film, Colin’s reading “My Struggle” too, in bed with him. He’s probably reading it to glean anything about this guy. “Does Ray also do that?” Because information from Ray is obviously not forthcoming, he’s looking into any clues about this person.
It also gives an indicator of Colin’s occasional desire for some of the elements of a more traditional relationship—being able to share interests, that kind of thing. Which feels like the ultimate journey Colin goes on, being the tale of a sub who figures out his boundaries and how to express them. As you said, it’s a lighter and sweeter film, but one that’s honest about the difficulty of first loves, even in this kink context.
On that note, I want to ask about the “day off” sequence, which, for me, is the most psychologically charged of them all. There’s a feeling that Ray is potentially getting back at Colin for all of his prodding for normalcy by saying, “Okay, you want a day off, you’re getting a day off.” What was it like to play the joy and tension of that sequence?
HM: I love the way you saw it, and I think it can be a big “Fuck you, Colin.” But I love that the day off, for so many people, can be so many other things. Some people think it’s very genuinely Ray trying it out to see if it will work for him, as opposed to being something he’s planned to make a point.
I love that the sequence houses all those things alongside, the finale of it, where they’re on the hill, and you have the kiss. Again, that moment can be so many different things. The whole day-off sequence, albeit leaning into some romantic tropes, also contains so many different definitions of what’s actually going on. Is he scared? Is he trying to prove a point to Colin?
What do you hope audiences get out of this kind of transgressive take on a love story, whether they be gay or straight, kinky or no?
HL: I hope they just find it a great ride. Above all else, I think the film is one you can have fun watching. It’s a film that generates a loud audience; when you watch it, people like laughing and crying and gasping and doing all the things I like watching movies together with people for.
HM: I hope people who don’t know much about this particular subculture can understand what it is. I’m just super proud that a movie like this exists, and people want to watch it.
“Pillion” comes to select theaters February 13th, and expands February 20th, courtesy of A24.
- We Give It Absolutely Everything: James Van Der Beek (1977-2026) (February 12, 2026)
James Van Der Beek often felt like he was fleeing the ghost of Dawson Leery. As with so many actors who become known for playing teen heartthrobs, that breakthrough role sometimes felt like it defined Van Der Beek, who died this week after a two-year battle with colorectal cancer. He occasionally found ways to disrupt that stereotype, sometimes even going directly at the All-American image he had engendered in both the TV hit and “Varsity Blues” in roles that poked fun at his persona, like “Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23” and “The Rules of Attraction.”
One of the many things that’s so disheartening about his passing this week, which includes that he had medical bills so extreme that a GoFundMe has been started to ensure his six grieving children aren’t kicked out of their home, was that it felt like his number would eventually be called for a comeback. He’d get just the right part–he’s easy to picture in a Nolan ensemble or even a lead in a high-profile thriller–and we’d all talk about how his talent was underestimated by the lowered expectations that come with teen dramas. We’ve all been robbed of the JVDB comeback.
Van Der Beek is one of many actors who caught the bug at a young age, appearing in a middle school production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. He not only caught it, but his parents supported it, taking him to Broadway to find an agent, who landed him a role off-Broadway in the New York premiere of an Edward Albee play. He did some small work from here while trying to be a student, but he dropped out after landing a role in the pilot for a WB series called “Dawson’s Creek,” which became an instant hit. It ran for six seasons and made all of its stars into household names, including Katie Holmes, Michelle Williams, and Joshua Jackson.
Early in the run of “Dawson’s Creek,” Van Der Beek landed his most impactful film role as the lead in “Varsity Blues,” which was a huge hit in 1998, landing at number one for two weeks and making over $50 million on a budget that was less than a third of that. It’s held up well, even if one just enjoys it as a time capsule of the era in which it was made, especially in its cast of future stars like Paul Walker, Scott Caan, Amy Smart, Ali Larter, and Jesse Plemons.
He worked regularly in the early ‘00s, popping up in everything from “Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back” to “The Rules of Attraction,” a controversial semi-sequel to “American Psycho” in which Van Der Beek played Patrick Bateman’s brother Sean. Largely discarded at the time, it’s become something of a reappraised cult classic over the years. It’s evidence of how Van Der Beek was interested in stretching his acting muscles, playing a drug dealer that’s about as far from Dawson as possible.
Sadly, movies weren’t as interested in a grown-up JVDB. Film roles were tough, but he did appear more consistently on TV, popping up in arcs on “One Tree Hill” and “How I Met Your Mother” before landing a lead role in NBC’s “Mercy” and then ABC’s “Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23,” in which he played a version of himself. Despite strong reviews, that comedy was canceled quickly, and “CSI: Cyber” didn’t do much better. Still, Van Der Beek never really walked away, appearing in guest roles on stuff like “Modern Family” and “Overcompensating,” and a lead role in the first season of the critically adored “Pose.”
In August 2023, Van Der Beek was diagnosed with cancer, although he didn’t make that public until over a year later. In November of last year, Van Der Beek was auctioning items from the prime of his career to help pay his exorbitant medical bills. That we live in a society in which someone who was as adored as he was for years can’t pay for the treatment to keep him alive is shameful. Imagine what non-celebrities go through every day with bills that derail not only their futures but that of their children. One hopes that this tragic loss shines a light on how medical costs shackle people to impossible debt, even the famous.
As of this writing, the GoFundMe for Van Der Beek’s family has shattered its original goals as it crests $1.5 million. It’s an indication of how much James Van Der Beek was loved and admired as a person; many who probably have bills of their own just want to do something for the man who did so much for them.
- FX’s “Love Story: JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette” Is A Stunning Exploration of Public and Private Life (February 12, 2026)
The myth of the Kennedy family is as ingrained in American culture as it is in modern pop culture. From the closeness Jackie Kennedy sought to cultivate after her husband’s death to Jack Schlossberg’s online persona, over the course of more than half a century, generations of Americans have been given an in-depth look at this family’s lives. Or so they think. With this closeness comes the inevitable tailoring of the Kennedys’ lives, which have been marked by tragedies more so than any other famous family. Yet this closeness they have with the American people is manufactured, tailored so perfectly that one can’t help but feel like they’re a part of their weddings, the birth of their children, and, of course, their mourning processes.
Created and largely written by Connor Hines, “Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette,” opens in 1999, with Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy (Sarah Pidgeon) getting her nails done as paparazzi wait outside and shout her name. The flashes of their cameras shine through the windows of the nail salon, and their voices eventually blur into a singular buzzing drone. Carolyn reacts with despondency, looking down at her freshly painted red nails before asking her stylist if they can start over with a neutral color. This act makes it immediately clear that, down to the shape and shade of her nails, Carolyn’s life has become one that is not her own.
We flash back seven years earlier, before she was hounded by the press at every turn, and before she knew John F. Kennedy Jr. (Paul Anthony Kelly). While she works her way up at Calvin Klein, John has made headlines for failing the bar exam for a second time. Though they exist in separate worlds, they both operate in the same ways: he works out rigorously; she is meticulous in how she dresses; he is obsessed with becoming a lawyer; she is driven to work her way up at her job. Yet, despite the similarities, once the two meet, it becomes clear they couldn’t be more different. This difference aids their attraction to each other, but, as we know, it also threatens to drive them apart.
Together, Pigeon and Kelly have fantastic chemistry. At the beginning of Carolyn and John’s relationship, they tentatively make eyes at each other across parties and galas, gazes flitting away quickly when the other makes eye contact. As their relationship progresses, the two actors ignite a heated passion, and their arguments become so intense that the paparazzi can’t help but capture them. Yet, it’s not the central pair who deliver the show’s most captivating performances: it’s the women who surround John F. Kennedy Jr. who take the cake as this series’ most interesting players.
Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette — Pictured: (l-r) Sarah Pidgeon as Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, Paul Kelly as John F. Kennedy Jr. CR: FX
Gummer enters each scene she’s in with an air of despair, one that grows as the show progresses, and the Kennedy children begin to realize that, eventually, they will be the only people on earth left to organize the mark this family will leave on the country they’ve given so much to. She stares at the people around her as if she feels like she doesn’t belong, often lashing out in a desperate attempt to unveil just how much she wishes to exile herself, not from the Kennedy name, but from the openness its previous members have held with the press and the American people. If anything, “Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette” doesn’t feel like a seedy exposé of one of the most famous relationships of the 20th century; it becomes a fascinating unveiling of the relationship between public and private life.
There have been many women to portray Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, but none so deftly as Naomi Watts does here. As the aging matriarch whose health steadily declines over the show’s first few episodes, Watts’ physicality does most of the talking. She is obsessed with her son’s love life, not because she wants to control him, but because she wants to control the narrative surrounding him and their family’s legacy. John is ultimately drawn to Carolyn because she understands who she is, something that he himself is unsure of. His mother and his sister, Caroline (Grace Gummer), seem to understand this more than he himself does, and they surround him like two women desperate to hold onto any semblance of control they can.
Nothing about this series feels cheap, which is surprising given that Ryan Murphy produces it. Instead, the show coveted writers and craftspeople whose dedication bleeds into every monologue delivered by Pidgeon and Kelly, every piece of clothing they wear, and every fantastic needle drop ranging from Cocteau Twins’ “Heaven or Las Vegas,” to The Velvet Underground & Nico’s “Venus in Furs.” As the different worlds Carolyn and John belong to slowly begin to collide, the series displays this clash by cracking open the mythology surrounding these two figures, as well as the tragic curse that seemed to doom them from their first meeting.
The spectacle that unfolded in our reality was one that both Carolyn and John came to loathe, and instead of reveling in it, this series keeps its viewers at a startling distance. By the end of “Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette,” there is still so much left unsaid, forcing the viewer to reckon with whether we ever truly knew these people at all. It feels as if the show’s portrayals of these figures have been shrouded in a purposeful mystery, which by the end of the eight episodes screened for critics doesn’t feel like an oversight, but an admirable creative choice that works in the series’ favor.
Eight episodes were screened for review.
- It All Starts With the Meditation App: Bart Layton on “Crime 101” (February 11, 2026)
LA is the city of dreams, both broken and fulfilled, in director Bart Layton’s crime thriller “Crime 101.” From “The Incomer” to “American Animals,” Layton’s films have always focused on grifters, con men, and everyone in between; characters who try to find opportunities provided to them by human oversight and error. Even while he uses the glittery, gritty, and grimy lights of LA to heightened effect, his “Crime 101” is refreshingly grounded, focusing on the personal and professional lives of a master thief (Chris Hemsworth), police detective (Mark Ruffalo), and insurance broker (Halle Berry), and the ways their complicated lives intersect.
“These characters are people who are trapped by the choices that they’ve made, and a lot of those choices are dictated by the pressure to have money and status,” Layton shared. It’s thrilling to witness the ways their stories intersect and diverge throughout the film, the ducking and weaving mirroring the motion of speeding through LA traffic.
Before speaking with Layton in person, “Crime 101” was pre-screened in Chicago to a packed theater. Layton shared in a Q&A with Michael Philips that it was the first time an audience had seen the film in a premium format, and thanked everyone for being gracious (albeit unwilling) guinea pigs.
The next day, Barton spoke with RogerEbert.com at the St. Regis Chicago and thoughtfully skewered the LA wellness culture, shared how his documentary skills influenced his approach to narrative features, and discussed how his early interest in visual art shaped the incorporation of art pieces into the film.
This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
You give a lot of screen time to people in the film getting ready and “suiting up” for the day. What fascinates you about depicting people in the throes of preparation?
It all comes down to character. I think: what’s the most economical way of telling an audience all they need to know about someone without necessarily spelling it out explicitly for them, and doing this in a way that feels not only compelling, but also drives the story and builds tension and anticipation. Some of those routines that I developed were more specific than others. With Halle, we discussed how when we first met Sharon, she was not wearing a shred of makeup. If you’re Halle Berry, that’s a big thing to ask.
She was on board with it because she understood what I wanted to do with that character. In the next scene, where we see Sharon put on her makeup, it’s as if she’s putting on war paint. She’s operating within a system where she has to compromise some of her principles, whether it’s wearing makeup that lightens her skin or wearing an outfit that shows off her boobs really prominently. She’s operating in a male-dominated world where she’s being used and slightly exploited. She’s not totally comfortable, but she’s been forced to deal with that, and her routine is her trying to transform herself before she goes out into the world, a way to sort of get used to how she has to compromise, and internalize that she’s being used as bait.
With Chris’s and Mark’s characters, it’s also about communicating tone. When you see Chris getting ready, you know he’s up to no good, and you also know that he has a methodical process. At the end of that montage, there’s a crosscutting shot also with Mark and Chris, where for a beat, you don’t know who is who. They’re not dissimilar in many ways.
Mentally, I’m still thinking about how you and Cinematographer Erik Wilson captured the specks of dry skin falling off of Chris’ body and how you all bathed that sequence in these vibrant blues. One of the first films you worked on, the TV movie “Becoming Alexander,” was about a character undergoing an intense season of preparation, so these scenes in “Crime 101” were seemingly an extension of that earlier fascination.
(Laughs) That might have been the second thing I’ve ever made. I’m all about the detail. I do a massive amount of preparation before a project. I think showing that suggests building a sense of tension and expectation towards something about to happen. As an audience member, I think that’s a nice feeling to have in the cinema. That feeling of “I don’t know where we’re going, but I know we’re in good hands, and I know it’s going to be exciting.”
Halle Berry stars as ‘Sharon’ in CRIME 101. (Photo Credit: Merrick Morton)
Sharon’s meditation app is also a recurring voice that serves as a kind of spirit haunting the film. How did you arrive at utilizing that particular permutation of meditation app? It feels very LA-coded …
There’s this woman who runs a very successful app called Boho Beautiful. She’s the real deal. I was interested in building a sense of what the stereotypical LA existence is like. In LA, there’s a real prevalence of wellness culture and a sense that you should have everything: looks, wealth, beauty, and money. All of that is part of this illusion of the “perfect LA existence.” I wanted to demonstrate that both visually and sonically. I certainly think that kind of meditative affirmation, where you’re being told that success is your divine right, is very LA-specific.
In the opening, I’m still thinking about the line where the voice says: “You hold the power to create all that you desire out of nothing.” There’s a mythological, almost spiritual significance.
There’s this idea that permeates that all these mantras about success create false expectations, that somehow if you don’t have the trappings of wealth and success, then maybe you’re failing on some level. These characters are trapped by the choices they’ve made, many of which are driven by the pressure to have money and status. That voice is part of the LA wellness myth.
Chris Hemsworth’s Mike sums it up well: when you don’t have money, your options are limited. The aggregation of capital is really a means to an end to increase your options.
These characters have reached a point where they realize that becoming overly concerned about what other people think can get in the way of their own goals.
He’s imperfect, but that’s why Ruffalo’s character, Lou, stands in contrast to the people around him who are all striving for “more.” He’s this foil where he’s willing to remain content when the voices around him are telling him to desire more.
At the same time, though, his character is also feeling the pressure of the fact that he’s not getting rewarded for being a public servant, so even for him, he’s being corrupted by the message of “This is what you need to do to be a success.” It all starts with the meditation app.
A cursed soundtrack to our existence. You’re from South London, and what’s striking about this film is that it’s such an LA-specific story. Even the “101” is a fun double entendre, referencing the highway. Do you think being an outsider and not a part of the LA machine enabled you to comment on its foibles more truthfully?
I definitely think it’s easier to observe certain cultural specifics if you haven’t grown up in a place. I love LA, but I also have an awareness of how much anxiety that city can generate and how that anxiety affects you. If I go on holiday anywhere else, I don’t think twice about what kind of car I’m hiring, right? I’m probably going for the cheapest one. If I go to LA, though, I’m thinking, “Wow, if I rock up in a really shit car, are people going to judge me, and are they going to see me in a way that I don’t want?” I am aware of how some cultural pressures affect the psyche. You observe things differently as an outsider, or you at least look twice at things other people don’t even consider.
Maya (Monica Barbaro) and Davis (Chris Hemsworth) in CRIME 101.
Jude Law said something similar when I spoke with him for “The Order.” The irony wasn’t lost on him that he, a Brit, and director Justin Kurzel, an Aussie, were the ones telling a story about white supremacy in America.
My good friend, Nick Fenton–who also edited “American Animals”—edited “The Order.” I haven’t had a chance to see it yet. With this film, while it is a love letter to LA, there are hopefully some observations and suggestions that make you question the illusion, in some respects, of having everything. These are people trying to get at something that doesn’t exist. It feels like everyone has everything, but that’s not necessarily true. There’s this Arthur Miller quote in Death of a Salesman where Willy Loman’s character says that the fatal flaw of everyone operating in a capitalist society is that people get their self-worth not from within, but from what other people think about them. That was very much in dialogue with this film.
Keeping on that love letter note, Chris had mentioned on a podcast that this was filmed pre-fires and that some of the locations featured in the film aren’t even there anymore. How are you processing this idea that your film exists as proof for some places that these locations existed?
Yes, I mean tragically, those places, especially in the Palisades, shockingly, are no longer there. I’m honestly still processing and trying to understand that the last time I was in those locations, we were filming certain spots, but now they’re gone.
You’ve talked previously about how the highest aim of documentary filmmaking is truth-telling. With fiction, you’re manufacturing the truth to some extent. I’m curious what it was like to go against some of those instincts you initially cultivated, or if you felt those philosophies clash?
No, it’s a really good question. I never felt those instincts clashing, but if there’s anything that has served me well from being a documentary maker, it’s that sense of not letting go of the real world, of not wanting to make a movie that you are no longer really emotionally connected to, because the characters become movie tropes, the situations become movie clichés, and the car chases don’t feel reel. I never want what I make to feel part of some heightened reality.
What I try to bring from the doc space is this idea of not suspending disbelief. I love that when you watch a documentary with a big group of people–particularly in a theater–they are so invested because they’re not suspending disbelief. They know that whatever happens in this story really happened. So what I’m trying to do is bring some of that authenticity to my narrative features, while still delivering what you want from a fun night out at the cinema.
Davis (Chris Hemsworth, right) and Lou (Mark Ruffalo, left) in CRIME 101.
It’s not lost on me either that at least four of the actors you’ve assembled–Chris, Mark, Halle, and Barry–have appeared in superhero films. You’ve previously spoken about how you were excited for people to see Chris embody a more vulnerable protagonist in Mike, which stands in contrast to the hero types he’s played. How consciously were you thinking about deconstructing the audience’s relationships with these actors, particularly those whom we may have seen in a more heroic, unblemished light?
It’s funny because I’m not a big superhero fan–although when I was a kid, “Superman” was my favorite movie of all time–so I never really thought about it. It wasn’t until the trailer came out and everyone commented, “Whoa, you have Thor, the Hulk, Joker, and Storm,” that I became more aware. I’m ashamed to admit I’ve not seen some of these films.
Hopefully, for fans of those franchises, it will be fun to see familiar actors in a different universe. I think it was interesting watching Mark and Chris come together on set in a very different environment. They got quite nervous around each other because they were both on set as real actors. If you’re going toe-to-toe with Mark Ruffalo in a very dramatic scene, and you’re Chris Hemsworth, you’re going to bring your absolute A-game.
Both of your parents are artists, and at one point, you considered pursuing painting or sculpture before your pivot to moviemaking. I’m struck by the art pieces you feature here, particularly in Monroe’s (Tate Donovan) house. I’d love to give you space to talk about the art you chose to feature in the film and its significance, not just to the story but to your love for visual art.
Back to your earlier question, I was trying to find a shorthand to help us get to know our characters. Monroe is a guy for whom art is an investment commodity. He’s chosen slightly inappropriate and culturally insensitive pieces to have prominently displayed in his house, which tells you something about who he is. I have a friend, Ossian Ward, an art historian, whom I roped into helping me curate all the art because I wanted Monroe to have things he shouldn’t have in his house.
There’s that famous painting called Thérèse Dreaming, which is of this prepubescent girl in a slightly inappropriate kind of pose where you can see her underwear and all the rest of it, and yet he’s oblivious to it. He’s also got the Gauguin paintings. There’s also obviously the painting of the Black washing woman. This was all in service of painting a picture of the beginning of Halle’s journey and the struggles she faces. The very first thing we see her do is suppress her emotions and bite her lip in the presence of this guy, from whom she needs something.
The art is not intended to necessarily make you dislike Monroe expressly, but to paint a sense of what might make Halle crack. You’ve seen her put on clothing that reveals her plunging neckline, you’ve seen her put on her war paint, and now she’s dealing with this guy who’s moving too close to her and making her fire a gun, and now she has a painting of this Black slave. The only thing Monroe can say about the painting is, “This will go up in value.” All of those things are supposed to be the kind of beginnings of the stepping stones for her character, getting to a point where she’s going to say, “Fuck it, I’m not going to do this anymore.”
“Crime 101” opens in theaters on February 13th from Amazon MGM Studios.
