In-Theater Releases of the Week 

Mildred Burke, the first female wrestling superstar in the mid-20th century and the first female sports figure to earn a million dollars, is the focus of Ash Avildsen’s highly entertaining biopic: although it skims over some fascinating material, there’s a lot jammed into its 135-minute running time, as we meet Mildred and her protective mother Bertha, her trainer/husband/ex/adversary Billy Wolfe, the women who join her in the ring and even such colorful male wrestling characters as Gorgeous George and Vince McMahon Sr. (father of the McMahon we all know and loathe).

 

 

Avildsen obviously learned from his father, John G. Avildsen (Oscar winner for Rocky), how to shoot action in the ring, but can’t keep melodrama to a minimum outside it. But the energetic cast keeps our interest: Emily Bett Rickards (who could be Margaret Qualley’s twin) is a phenomenal Mildred and Josh Lucas a properly slimy Billy, while the sterling supporting cast is led by Francesca Eastwood, Marie Avgeropoulos, Deborah Ann Woll and Kelli Berglund as the women in Mildred’s corner.

 

 

 

Seven Veils 

For his latest feature, Canadian auteur Atom Egoyan cannibalizes his own stage-directing career for a leaden drama that follows opera director Jeanine as she stages Richard Strauss’ masterpiece Salome ostensibly as an homage to her mentor but also as a way to work out her own personal trauma. Amanda Seyfried’s committed portrayal of Jeanine can’t make her more of an individual and less of a metaphor for Egoyan’s own provocative thoughts about creating art on stage and screen, which end up overwhelming the story.

 

 

And paralleling the opera’s events with what happens offstage doesn’t get much dramatic traction either. There are enticing excerpts from the opera—as staged by Egoyan himself for Toronto’s Canadian Opera Company—but how disappointing that a great singer like Karita Mattila (whom I saw as a sensational Salome at the Metropolitan Opera in 2004) is reduced to a walk-on as Salome’s mother Herodias.

 

 

 

Den of Thieves 2—Pantera 

In this second go-round for Gerard Butler and O’Shea Jackson Jr., an international group known as the Panthers, which brazenly stole a diamond and important files at the Antwerp, Belgium, airport, is planning another major heist in Nice, France. Writer-director Christian Gudegast paces the action decently and there’s a certain fun in watching the complex planning, but trodding very familiar ground for 135 minutes leads to repetition and wheel-spinning.

 

 

Compensations are the attractive European locales and the easy camaraderie of Butler, Jackson Jr. and cohorts including Evin Ahmad and Salvatore Esposito. There’s a fine hi-def transfer; extras are a commentary featuring Gudegast, making-of featurette and deleted scenes.

 

 

 

Red One 

If your idea of a holiday movie is watching Santa get kidnaped on Christmas Eve while the head of his security detail and a hired hacker track down his whereabouts and, after many implausible chases and stunts, rescue him in time for present delivery, then this has your name all over it.

 

 

Although it’s way too noisy and clunky in director Jake Kasdan’s hands, it does have a fun cast, from J.T. Simmons’ sardonic Santa and Bonnie Hunt’s endearing Mrs. Claus to the interplay among the rescuers led by Chris Evans, Dwayne Johnson and Lucy Liu, who trade quips and insults from Chris Morgan’s script incessantly. There’s an excellent UHD transfer.

 

 

 

Wolf Man 

Director/cowriter Leigh Wannell had a hit in 2020 with The Invisible Man, a creepy thriller that made a people anticipate his follow-up, but this attempt to reboot a dormant horror franchise unfortunately suffers from a literalness that obscures whatever effective scares might be lurking in the all too familiar material.

 

 

Wannell concentrates on body horror, display the scale of physical brutishness that results when family man Blake is transformed into a creature preying on his loving wife Charlotte and young daughter Ginger—but that’s no replacement for a lack of sympathy for the victims, something that is almost—but not quite—mitigated by Julia Garner’s usual sturdy portrayal of Charlotte. There’s a terrific UHD transfer; extras comprise Wannell’s commentary and four short making-of featurettes.

 

 

 

Blu-ray Release of the Week

Legendary television interviewer Bill Moyers sat down with legendary author Joseph Campbell—whose books about the universality of myths were best-sellers for decades—at George Lucas’ Skywalker Ranch (Lucas famously admitted he was under Campbell’s influence)—for a series of memorable discussions shown on PBS in 1988, a year after Campbell’s death.

 

 

This two-disc set collects the six hour-long programs that are still among the most popular in public television history as well as a few enticing extras: Moyers’ episode-length interview with Lucas and two Bill Moyers Journal episodes with Campbell. 

 

 

 

CD Release of the Week 

For George Antheil (1900-1959), the American composer known as the “bad boy of music” thanks to his avant-garde compositions of the 1920s and 30s while he lived in Paris and Berlin, it was when he returned to the U.S. that he restarted his career with simpler, more conventional works that still retained a lot of charm. Case in point is this amusing, attractive one-act opera about a couple helped by the ancient goddess.

 

 

While not earthshaking like his earlier Ballet Mécanique or A Jazz Symphony, Venus has a pleasing tunefulness that’s showcased in this recording, with conductor Steven Sloane leading the Bochumer Philharmoniker and a sassy cast of five singers.