Kirby Howell-Baptiste | www.jaredmobarak.com

TIFF21 REVIEW: Silent Night [2021]

2021/09/172021/11/01 Jared Mobarak

Tonight’s all about truth and love. The easiest way to make sure your child actors are up to swearing on-screen is casting your own. That’s exactly what first-time feature writer/director Camille Griffin does for her film Silent Night—and it’s with good reason. Art (Roman Griffin Davis) and twins Thomas (Gilby Griffin Davis) and Hardy (Hardy Griffin Davis) have made a pact with their parents (Keira Knightley‘s Nell and Matthew Goode‘s Simon) to say whatever comes to their mind without fear of punishment or retribution since they’re all going to die…

REVIEW: Cruella [2021]

2021/05/222021/05/26 Jared Mobarak

There’s lots more bad things coming. I promise. First thing’s first when making a prequel to Dodie Smith‘s One Hundred and One Dalmatians that focuses villain Cruella de Vil as its antihero: ensure that audiences know she doesn’t hate dogs. Better yet, screenwriters Dana Fox and Tony McNamara go one further by making Estella (Emma Stone‘s proto-Cruella’s schizophrenic “good” persona) a lover of dogs. She saves one from the streets (Buddy) and adopts it as her best friend. She subsequently enlists another dog’s services (Wink) upon teaming up with the…

REVIEW: Happily [2021]

2021/03/122021/03/16 Jared Mobarak

I could have made that omelet. I can’t tell you how many times a friend has come up to me with a story that positions their significant other as the proverbial albatross around their neck with a look that screams, “Amirite?” only to have me shrug, smile, and reply, “I don’t know. I actually like my partner.” I only partially say this in jest because I do hope they’ll hear those words and rethink their situation—their refusal to acknowledge their own part in their problems, the possibility that their relationship…

REVIEW: New Year, New You [2018]

2018/12/272020/10/02 Jared Mobarak

I control my own destiny. You cannot talk about Sophia Takal‘s New Year, New You (the fourth episode of Blumhouse Television’s holiday-themed Hulu series “Into the Dark”) without mentioning producer Jason Blum‘s reaction to a Twitter storm in October that stemmed from an interview wherein the low-budget financier relayed an erroneous statement that “there are not a lot of female directors period, and even less who are inclined to do horror.” Blum talked specifically about how he’s offered pre-packaged projects to women in the past who have turned him down—artists…