Quick Hits: August 2026

Although I saw more total new releases in July, I saw more unique ones in August: just two rewatches, as opposed to last month's six. The Odyssey and Spider-Man: Brand New Day scared off most studios for the surrounding weeks, leading to a log jam in the back half of August while dominating screens in the first half. So I didn't have the chance to see everything I'd have liked to catch in theaters, never mind stuff I'd already seen: Colony and It Ends will have to wait until VOD or streaming.

But as none of that impacts how much time I had to write, that means more entries here. Enjoy!

• In the Blink of an Eye
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• The Samurai and the Prisoner
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• Nimrods
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• The Magic Faraway Tree
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• Hot Spot
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• The Dog Stars
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• Idiots

In the Blink of an Eye

Andrew Stanton continues to provide a perfect case study in how directing animation and live action are very different skill sets.

Not that his directing is the biggest problem with either this or 2012's John Carter. But both are huge miscalculations, albeit in wildly different directions. John Carter's sword and planet excess made for a fun time amongst the undeniable nonsense. Meanwhile, In the Blink of an Eye is so incredibly self-serious, so convinced of its own importance and profundity, that its embarrassing whiff is even more painful.

Its three story lines across three time periods (pre-historic man, modern day, and 200-ish years in the future) have only the most tenuous connections. None stand strongly on their own, partially due to horribly uneven pacing that also insists on spanning the whole lives of someone in each period. It's joyless, lacks insight or emotion, and flounders for purpose.

That said, Daveed Diggs is quite good opposite an adrift Rashida Jones, and Kate McKinnon proves that she has solid dramatic chops.

The Samurai and the Prisoner

Running counter to writer/director Kiyoshi Kurosawa's usual horror fare, this is a unique and engaging slow burn of a period piece, based on historical events from the time of warlords and samurai. It overstays its welcome a bit, and ends in a somewhat unsatisfying way despite fitting with what came before, but is largely engaging, nonetheless.

While bracing for attack form his former ally Oda Nobunaga (Shingo Bando), Araki Murashige (Masahiro Motoki) captures and refuses to execute his envoy (Masaki Suda). This is decried as dishonorable by his council of elders, and is further tested across the next three seasons: each sees a strange event the civilians are convinced is evidence of the gods' displeasure. With little use for superstition, Araki seeks understanding with the help of Kuroda, forming a Hannibal Lector/Clarice Starling dynamic.

The narrative takes its time picking up steam, even as you track the shifts in power and engage with each mystery in turn. But even in those lulls, the film is so gorgeous and tactile that you're never without something to hold on to. It's just a question of whether it's enough. To which I say: most of the time!

Nimrods

I grew up a fan of Green Day in their late 90s pop punk era, and stuck with them into their emo 00s period, so I was looking forward to indulging my nostalgia. But Nimrods was so nakedly pandering and cringe-worthy that I involuntarily wrinkled my nose more often than not.

The biggest problem is that Tommy and Fred (Mason Thames and Kylr Coffman) suck, thinking that being entitled brats and treating everyone they meet like total shit is "punk". Their band's drummer Chad (Ryan Foust) gets the worst of it, and since this is a road trip movie, we're stuck with their boring, unwarranted, occasionally homophobic insults for well over an hour as they head to the Green Day show that will make up the final act. The only reasonably fun part is the backyard show they stumble into, although it ensures Tommy will be rewarded for being a shithead with romance (Mckenna Grace as Olivia).

It plays out full Green Day songs over its many montages, and is so uncreative that the Green Day movie ends with "Good Riddance". Come on.

Against all odds, Lee Kirk's best movie remains The Giant Mechanical Man. Oof.

The Magic Faraway Tree

For most of its runtime, The Magic Faraway Tree is a charming enough magical children's adventure tale. It borrows a lot from Narnia, but there's a reason that series is so beloved. But here, it's rendered flat by the lack of conflict. Problems are resolved with relative ease in the next scene, imposed time constraints mean almost nothing, and the overriding comic tone further reduces any sense of danger.

The characters aren't very well realized, either. The child performances are all fine: neither special nor disastrous. The screenplay, on the other hand, is a frustrating mess. Beth (Delilah Bennett-Cardy) gets the shortest shrift, as the slightly older sister who just snarks and shouts and scolds a lot, resisting the reality in front of her face every step of the way. But all of them are oblivious and fairly dumb, exactly enough to get into and out of trouble as needed.

The final message of the importance of holding on to your childhood sense of wonder, but also allowing yourself to not need it any more, is solid. Too bad you must endure the previous one hundred minutes to get there.

Hot Spot

Aggro Dr1ft meets The Pit from The Dark Knight Rises, Equilibrium but make it cyber, The Matrix but make it a boring police procedural. And every performance is Tahir Rahim in Madame Web. That's the experience of Agnieszka Smoczyńska's Hot Spot.

This movie has a handful of intriguing offers, but can't figure out what to do with any of them. Their internet-enabled non-verbal communication means more than half the dialog occurs while we stare at a face devoid of emotion, which makes for a surreal, confusing experience. That's before considering all the strange, abstract imagery of our protagonist's soul as a (possibly real?) tiger.

In theory, it's about a cop investigating the murders from a spiritual movement seeking to overthrow their AI overlords. In practice, it feels like a head wound.

The Dog Stars

I'd have totally been down for a chill, laid back, sad boy post-apocalypse movie (disease this time, in case you forgot about COVID). Jacob Elordy as Hig just kinda drifting along, occasionally in the skies, butting heads with Josh Brolin (as Bangley) as they scavenge and defend the airfield they live on. I'm not even opposed to him encountering other survivors (Guy Pearce and Margaret Qualley), although the specifics of it in Ridley Scott's realization of Mark L. Smith's Peter Heller adaptation was not very inspired.

But there are two major action elements of the film, both far more extended than necessary, both of which feature a bunch of build up and incredibly limp payoffs, and both of which are tired subplots in movies of this type. Meanwhile, although I enjoyed the vibe of everything else, the characters and dialog are middling at best, the sights nowhere near as beautiful as they should be given the frequency of views for miles around.

Inside this movie are two wolves, one depressed, and the other an overexcited teenage boy. Neither work.

Idiots

I'm becoming convinced that writer/director Macon Blair just doesn't have the juice.

Both of his recent features pitch themselves as over-the-top comedies, but neither comes close fully delivering on that promise. While they have their moments of excellent humor and bananas set pieces, he cannot help but undercut them with an incredibly weak attempt at emotional storytelling that rings quite hollow.

To wit, Idiots sticks together two archetypes lost in opposite directions, and while both Dave Franco and O'Shea Jackson Jr. imbue as much life into the protagonists as possible, they cannot alleviate just how grating the writing is. Mason Thames is having a blast playing little stinkers this month (see Nimrods above), but the movie never figures out what exactly to do with him outside of a few key moments. It doesn't help that a late turn which is supposed to trigger epiphanies in all parties is based on complete and utter nonsense that takes you out of the film.

It's not without merit, there's just not much of it.