Author Archives: Neil Pond

Jul 03 2026
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Books, DVDs, Movies, Music, Pop Culture

The Entertainment Forecast

What to watch, and more! Week of July 3 – July 9

A teen’s “Last Resort,” America turns 250 & a sizzling Burning Man doc!

FRIDAY, July 3
Summer’s Last Resort
Jerry O’Connell and Sophia Bush star in this summer-shenanigans film (above) about a teen (Violet McGraw) trying to break up romance between her mom and her high school principal (Tubi).

Touch Me
Two codependent best friends become addicted to the heroin-like touch of an alien narcissist who may or may not be trying to take over the world. Starring Olivia Taylor Dudley, Jordan Gavaris and Lou Taylor Pucci (Shudder).

SATURDAY, July 4
America Made in Virginia: 250 Years Together
Live performance, music, historic interpretation and large-scale visual spectacle celebrates the ideas, people, and defining moments that gave rise to the United States (8 p.m., PBS).

Ralph Lauren’s American Icons
Thirty-minute documentary explores the legendary designer’s curation of a collection of 13 United States Postal Service stamps honoring iconic American imagery (7:30 p.m., History Channel).

SUNDAY, July 5
Sharkfest
The 14th year of fin-tastic programming (above) kicks off tonight with Hammerhead Sharks Up Close with Bertie Gregory, followed by more programming through the month across Disney+, Hulu and NatGeo platforms (Disney+ and Hulu).

Sparks of Tomorrow
Animated tale is based inside an alternate reality at the dawn of the 20th century in Tokyo, which has unfolded without electricity and instead relies on steam (Netflix).

MONDAY, July 6
Inspector Ellis
Sharon D Clark returns for season two of the British crime drama and murder mystery series (Acorn TV).

TUESDAY, July 7
Breaking the Deadlock: How to Fix an Election
Panelists explore hypothetical scenarios around election issues and government integrity, against the backdrop of America’s 250th anniversary (9 p.m., PBS).

WEDNESDAY, July 8
Guy’s Grocery Games: Global Games
Guy Fieri hosts eight all-star masters of world cuisines competing in the new five-part tournament for a chance to win the trophy and a $50,000 grand prize (8 p.m., Food Network).

Wardriver
A hacker (Dane DeHaan) lured into a million-dollar cyberheist discovers it’s actually a deadly game of digital-code cat and mouse, above (Paramount+).

THURSDAY, July 9
Five Star Weekend
Jennifer Garner stars in this new drama series about old friends and life that turns out differently that you planned. With D’Arcy Carden, Gemma Chan, Regina Hall, Chloë Sevigny, Harlow Jane and Timothy Olyphant (Peacock).

The Man Will Burn
Documentary about the Burning Man festival and its growth from anarchic counterculture roots in San Francisco to a globally recognized spectacle (HBO Max).

"A young girl draws back on a slingshot and takes aim. "
Alice Halsey as Laura Ingalls in episode one of ‘Little House on the Prairie.‘

Little House on the Prairie
New take (above) on Laura Ingalls Wilder’s iconic semi-autobiographical Little House books, previously made into an iconic NBC TV series of the 1970s and ‘80s (Netflix)

READ ALL ABOUT IT

How well do you know your goddesses? Goddess of the World (McFarland) examines the deities once regarded as humanity’s supreme beings, cultures in which they still hold the throne, and the traces of the feminine cloaked inside major modern religions.

Meet Raymond Hoser, known as Australia’s “snakeman,” a serpent wrangler who later discovered and named thousands of new species, more snakes than any scientist. Snake Men (W.W.Norton) is his story, a fang-tastic tale of a triumph of taxidermy…and accusations that Hoser was a rebellious interloper short-circuiting the tightly coiled scientific process.

In The Future of Bananas (Melville House), professor James Dale explains how the world’s most-eaten fruit is imperiled by disease and climate change, and what’s being done to ensure it sticks around.

Robyn Hitchcock, a self-described rock ‘n’ roll “surrealist” who considers his songs “paintings you can listen to,” recounts the wild ride of his life and career in Stranded in the Future (Akashic), his second memoir. It’s a rollicking trip down memory lane, hinged on the 1970s and his influential alt-rock band the Soft Boys.

If you’ve forgotten about all the scary movies of the previous decade, well, here’s some handy-dandy help. John Kenneth Muir’s Horror Films of the 2010s (McFarland), is loaded with info and insight about, well, just about every horror film of the era, from indie flicks to blockbusters and franchise faves. And it’s also a spotlight on how the anxieties of the times shaped horror movies, and how horror movies responded and reflected their times.

For centuries, clowns have been everywhere—at the circus, on TV, in freak shows, and sometimes in our nightmares. In Beyond Bozo (McFarland), you’ll all about these pop-cultural pranksters and how they’ve excited our imagination across the ages.

We remember all those birds menacing Tippi Hedren, Cary Grant running from a crop duster, and James Stewart peering from his wheelchair out his Rear Window. But how well do we remember what they were wearing? Hitchcock fans and film buffs will love Fashioning Hitchcock (Bloomsbury Academic), in which author Caroline Young examines the clothes carefully chosen for the characters in the director’s classic movies, exploring the larger role of costume design in filmmaking.

BRING IT HOME

A young couple’s wedding plans take a hilariously unexpected turn in The Drama (A24), starring Zendaya and Robert Pattinson, who’ll reunite later this month in the big-screen take on Homer’s The Odyssey! Alana Haim plays a maid of honor.

Pamela Baywatch Anderson shines in The Last Showgirl (Lionsgate Home Entertainment) as a past-her-prime Las Vegas dancer facing the end of her career. Can she make a comeback…or accept her “new” life? With Jamie Lee Curtis. Buy it HERE.

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Jul 02 2026
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Movie Review: “Minions & Monsters”

Latest in the hit franchise series is a gonzo hooray-for-Hollywood nod

Minions and Monsters
With voices by Allison Janney, Christoph Waltz, Jeff Bridges, Jesse Eisenberg, Zoey Deutch &  Bobby Moynihan
Directed by Pierre Coffin
Rated PG

In theaters Friday, July 1

The clownish little yellow, banana-loving, babbling nubbins—which first appeared in the animated Despicable Me in 2010—go Hollywood in this wildly creative, fantastically whimsical, gonzo alternative history of the silver screen.

According to a modern-day movie-museum tour guide (voiced by Allison Janney) in the opening scene, there was no greater creative force in Tinseltown than the Minions. And this is a museum that has George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars, as one of its displays!

For movie lovers, it’s all chock-full of cinematic Easter eggs, beginning when we see the opening logos “rewinding” through the years to Universal Studio’s fledgling days. It’s followed by a montage of the Minions incorporated into of some of the earliest silent “moving pictures,” including the Lumière brothers’ groundbreaking short from the late 1800s of a train pulling into a station.

We learn how the Minions—after eons of serving “evil” overlords, including a cyclops, pirates and a mummy—stumbled into Hollywood stardom by scene-stealing a Western and upstaging cowboys, a runaway train, Keystone-ish cops and a biplane. Soon they’re all the rage, and two Minions, James and Henry, become movie moguls.

Then they hit upon the idea of movie monsters, a parallel to Hollywood’s real-life era churning out tales of Frankenstein, the Wolf Man, Dracula, the Invisible Man and other creatures.

But the Minions’ monsters—a trio of ghoulish goofballs summoned from a book of sorcery swiped from one of their previous gigs—don’t want to be in the movies. They want to create havoc, destroy things and gobble people. Uh-oh! Can the Minions return the creatures to the book of spells before it’s too late?

Pierre Coffin—who also co-directed three of the four of the Despicable Me flicks and does all the Minions’ gobbly-gook voices—fills the screen with detail. Minions & Monsters is a rare film made to appeal to kids as well as their parents, and especially to moms and dad who grew up watching movies. It’s a cinematic treasure trove, with blink-and-you’ll-miss-‘em nods to dozens of movie pioneers and Hollywood touchstones.

There’s Charlie Chaplin…Buster Keaton…Citizen Kane… a Three Stooges’ eye poke… Bogie and Bacall… a gelatinous monster obviously related to The Blob… a scene that recalls 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea… another with a wink to the pew-pew of Star Wars lasers. It’s a loving crash course in movie history disguised as a kid-friendly rumpus.

Listen for some familiar voices. Jeff Bridges is both Frank and Elwood, a pair of oversized movie-studio fat cats. Jesse Eisenburg is a dorky space-alien robot who lives in a shabby apartment, dreaming of taking over the world. (The robot’s name is Dort, a spin on Gort from The Day the Earth Stood Still in 1951.) Zoey Deutsch provides the sweet voice of Debbie, a suffragette who takes a shine to Dort and corrals the Minions into a Hollywood march for women’s rights. Trey Parker, the creator of South Park and Broadway’s The Book of Morman, obviously has fun as Goomi, a green mush-mouthed mini version of a horror icon H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu, a legendary ancient cosmic creature. Christoph Waltz is a studio director who accidentally “discovers” the Minions.

In a meta twist, the Minions become so successful, they launch a film franchise and a merchandising line of goggles and little blue overalls. In real life, the Minions and Despicable Me franchise is one of the highest-grossing film properties in history, an international hit with its own universe of clothing, figurines and other do-dads. That’s no Hollywood fantasy!

This is the first movie in the franchise to not feature Steve Carell, who provided the voice of Gru, the wannabe criminal mastermind central to the stories. But even Gru gets his due in the closing credits.

But whatever you do, don’t strain your brain trying to decipher the Minion’s babble of gibberish, a comical stream of nonsense with smatters and splatters of English, Spanish, Italian, French, Japanese and other dialects. I’m sure I heard the words “miso soup” in there once.

The Minions and their infantile banter remind us of childhood innocence and gleeful play. Add funny monsters and Hollywood to the mix and you’ve got a recipe for a movie about movies, with Minions in the middle, muddling and making another madcap mess before saving the world—and reminding us that hey, it’s only a movie! But it’s their movie! Hooray for Hollywood!

—Neil Pond

Jul 01 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Young Washington”

Rah-rah biopic about the militia man who’d become our first president

Young Washington
Starring William Franklyn-Miller, Andy Serkis, Ben Kingsley, Mary-Louise Parker & Kelsey Grammer
Directed by Joe Erwin
Rated PG-13

In theaters Thursday, July 2, 2026

Long before he was the “father of our country,” leading the fledging continental army, George Washington was an ambitious young Virginia militia leader fighting alongside the British on the brutal colonial frontier.  

With its release date strategically timed just ahead of America’s 250th birthday, Young Washington is a historical biopic centered on Washington’s disastrous early military failure in the 1750s, one that ignited the French and Indian War—but steeled the leadership skills that would later galvanize his pivotal role in the birth of America’s rebellion against England.

London-born British actor William Franklyn-Miller, a former teen model, stars as Washington. You may have seen him previously on TV (Medici, Jack Irish) or in smallish films (Spring Breakaway, Donji Rescue). If you were a teen girl on social media a decade ago, when he was 12, you might remember that he was voted the most beautiful boy in the world after a pic of him went viral online.

His portrayal of a dashingly handsome Washington, with piercing blue eyes, a messy shock of dark hair and a chiseled jawline, certainly ranks high on the historical hunk-o-meter. He definitely creates a dishy new visage for the guy on our one-dollar bills. And he rocks that tricorn hat.

The supporting cast is rounded out by some familiar faces. Mary-Louise Parker (from Showtime’s Weeds) plays George’s mom, Mary. Kelsey Grammer (TV’s Frasier) is Lord Fairfax, an upper-class land-baron muckety-muck. Ben Kingsley (who won an Oscar for Ghandi) adds to his extensive list of character roles as Robert Dinwaddle, the governor of Virginia. And Lord of the Rings fans might recognize Andy Serkis (he was Gollum!) as Edward Braddock, a decorated British officer who leads his soldiers on a bloody battlefield charge.

Speaking of battlefields, there’s a lot of those in Young Washington. Cannonballs kaboom, bullets fly, bodies fall, blood spurts. But there are softer moments too, as when young George courts a comely socialite, Sally (Mia Rodgers, who played Taylor on HBO’s The Sex Lives of College Girls). But like Washington’s first military excursion, that romance also ends in disappointment.

Young Washington reminds viewers that America wasn’t always America. It was a wilderness patchwork of colonial settlements and British overlords, French excursionists, Native Americans holding onto what was once their land, and slaves. One soldier eyes a couple of slaves, sent to fight in the “stead” of their landowner, and wonders why the militia doesn’t give them guns, so they could help in the battle. “They might shoot us,” his fellow militiaman replies. “Wouldn’t you?”

Young Washington is the newest movie from Angel Studios and the Wonder Project, which typically focus on Christian themes. Director Jon Erwin’s previous films include House of David, I Still Believe, a miniseries about Moses, a doc on the Christian band Casting Crowns and a drama, I Can Only Imagine, based on a song by Mercy Me. There’s an undergirding of faith, divine purpose and redemption in Young Washington as well, like when Mary sends her boy off to war with a blessing and a balm; “Go, as God’s servant,” she tells him. George says he’s guided by the hand of “providence.” A group of Native American warriors, awed when he survives a vicious battlefield encounter, solemnly tells him he’s been chosen for protection “by the spirit.”

I guess the French commander chopped to pieces earlier by tomahawks wasn’t chosen. As they say in France, c’est dommage.

The movie’s messaging extends to its overriding theme that losers can become winners, failures can lead to success, and small players can become big leaders. “Even a pawn can take a king,” George’s father (John Foss) tells his young son over a game of chess.  

As the movie ends, Washington’s army is newly bedecked in the colors of America: uniforms of red, white and blue. It’s a fitting close to this rip-roaring slice of rah-rah American history carved by war, wrapped in Sunday school homilies and served up as an Independence Day appetizer for audiences primed for red-meat patriotism, rousing underdog tales and real-life heroes.

—Neil Pond

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Jun 28 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Jackass: Best & Last”

Johnny Knoxville and crew fire a final salvo of gonzo stupidity

Jackass: Best & Last
Starring Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O, Preston Lacy & the rest of the Jackass crew
Directed by Jeff Tremaine
Rated R

In theaters Friday, June 26

It’s so painful, you gotta laugh. The new Jackass movie—the fifth film to spin off the gonzo prank series that started two decades ago on MTV, later becoming a pop-culture franchise—is a final-bow salvo of slaps, slams and other shocks that fans of the show have come to expect.

It is—supposedly—the parting shot from creator Johnny Knoxville and his cast of Jackass collaborators, mixing new material with stunts that never aired in previous movies or on TV. And ending with a giant grocery cart, filled with the cast, rolling slo-mo through explosions, pelted by debris, and ultimately plunging over a cliff to the tune of Frank Sinatra singing “My Way.”

It’s a ballsy move to open the same weekend as Toy Story 5, but Jackass has always been ballsy—in more ways than one. Like the bit when Knoxville, in a clip from his 2013 movie Bad Grandpa, airs out his alarmingly distended (artificial) “old man” parts in a male strip club. And speaking of toys, there’s a bit from 2011 with a little toy car that becomes, ahem, lodged in the colon of Ryan Dunn, one of the show’s original collaborators.

Jackass has always courted discomfort, built on a foundation of dangerous, pointless and sometimes unhinged—and frequently scatological—setups meant to surprise, shock and awe. Like strapping Steve-O into an overly “full” porta potty and sloshing it up and down on bungee cords suspended between two massive cranes, or a group of Jackasses bottoms-upping mega-doses of laxative, then playing a game of Twister. In another moment, we watch Sean “Poopies” McInerney trying to walk on a balance beam with a shock collar attached to his, well—it’s inside his underwear.

Oh, and there’s a four-foot-tall robot, giving a rectal exam.

The barrage of self-inflicted abuses includes an early staged clip that caused MTV to temporarily cancel the show, as Knoxville, dressed in escaped-convict orange, goes into a hardware store and begs for help to saw through his handcuffs. It ends up with a confrontation by Los Angeles police.

There’s something perversely entertaining in watching other people willing to abuse themselves strictly for entertainment—especially when they look like they’re having such a great time doing it. Part of the appeal is being “in on the joke,” unlike a lot of the onlookers while they’re filming—like the customers at a L.A. food stand who watch as “guest star” Brad Pitt is whisked into a black van, apparently kidnapped. Cut to the inside of the vehicle, with Pitt and the Jackass crew laughing hysterically at the disruption they’ve just caused.

Knoxville and his cohorts (including co-creator, and longtime director Jeff Tremaine) know that their creative anarchy fills a certain niche and a need, lodged deep in our primate brains. Like Maximus (Russell Crowe) taunting the cheering arena crowd in another movie, Gladiator: “Are you not entertained?

Jackass: Best & Last opens with Knoxville, in a 1998 bit that never aired, shooting himself in the chest point-blank with a handgun and padded only with a T-shirt and a Kevlar vest. A warning comes onscreen: “Do not attempt this. It’s extra stupid and could kill you.”

Knoxville survived that early brush with danger, and death, and stunts of jaw-dropping stupidity became the show’s calling card. And Jackass became a kind of institution, a daring dose of unruly chaos to spice up the pedestrian mundanity of modern life, a vicarious way to live outside the prim and proper, watching others do what we’d never dare.

“The worse an experience is,” says Steve-O watching Knoxville get flipped into the air and knocked unconscious by a bull, “the better it looks onscreen.”

Laughter may be good for the soul, but Jackass: Best & Last gives us a final reminder that it can be hell on a body. Especially when toy cars, bulls and porta potties are involved.

—Neil Pond

Jun 26 2026
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Books, DVDs, Movies, Music, Photography, Pop Culture, Sports, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to Watch, and More! Week of June 26 – July 2

The return of Enola Holmes, Paul Simon in concert & America’s top female athletes!

The new ‘Enola Holmes’ adventure streams this week on Netflix.

FRIDAY, June 26
Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Un-Happiness
Larry David’s new sketch show stars a host of guest stars (including Barack Obama, who’s one of the producers!), a bunch of Curb Your Enthusiasm cohorts…and Larry David. Those who don’t know history are doomed…to watch Larry David repeat it (9 p.m., HBO).

Little Brother
A well-organized real estate agent’s carefully curated world is upended when his eccentric wild-card “little brother” unexpectedly reappears. Starring John Cena and Eric Andre (Netflix).

Paul Simon: The Quiet Celebration Concert
Live concert film recorded during the legendary singer-songwriter’s “A Quiet Celebration” Tour, an intimate evening spanning his vast career and celebrating new arrangements of timeless classics, deep cuts and new musical discoveries (Disney+ and Hulu).

SATURDAY, June 27
Single Black Tenant
Tia Mowery stars in this true-crime story as a woman who begins to suspect that the home she thought would save her may ultimately destroy her (8 p.m., Lifetime).

In the Eye of the Storm
New season begins of the high-stakes drama at the epicenter of recent natural disasters, as told through firsthand accounts and mobile phone footage filmed by everyday people caught in the maelstrom (10 p.m., Discovery).

SUNDAY, June 28
The BET Awards
Lauryn Hill will receive the Living Legend Icon Award at tonight’s live annual event honoring Black entertainers in film, music and other arenas (8 p.m., BET).

Black Americans and the Revolutionary War
Documentary that follows the stories of enslaved and eventually freed Black Americans who believed, exercised and fought for democracy for themselves, their families and their communities (10 p.m., PBS).

MONDAY, June 29
Adventure Time: Side Quests
Animated series about a young hero and his magical dog best friend as they embark on adventures across the fantastical land of Ooo. With voices by Sasha Knight and John DiMaggio (Disney+).

Disney Celebrates America: The Pursuit of Happiness
Two-hour event honors American “firsts” by turning Disney World into a portal for American stories, triumphs and traditions (8 p.m., ABC).

TUESDAY, June 30
The Crown Prince and the President
Examines the alliance between Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and President Donald Trump, and how Trump and Jared Kushner opened doors to arms deals, investments and personal profit, despite Saudi abuses (10 p.m., PBS).

Lexi Minetree stars as Elle Woods in the prequel to “Legally Blonde.”

WEDNESDAY, July 1
Elle
This prequel to Legally Blonde follows young Elle Woods (Lexi Minetree) in high school as she begins to become the young woman we met in the 2001 film. Reese Witherspoon, who starred as grownup Elle in the original film, is one of the producers (Prime Video).

Enola Holmes 3
Adventure chases detective Enola Holmes (Millie Bobby Brown) to Malta, where personal and professional dreams collide on tangled and treacherous case. With Henry Cavill and Helena Bonham Carter (Netflix).

THURSDAY, July 2
Gamechangers: America’s Top 25 Female Athletes
Interviews with star athletes, sports media voices and celebrities, celebrating the legacy and impact of the greatest female athletes in American sports history (Roku Channel).

Independence Day
1996 sci-fi action film about an attack by extraterrestrials stars Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman and Vivica A. Fox (8 p.m., ABC).

READ ALL ABOUT IT

In Sisters, Saints and Sybils (Thames & Hudson), photographer Nan Golden presents a highly personalized portrait using old family snapshots, her own photos and hospital reports to present the life story of her late sister. It’s visual tapestry exploring addiction, abuse, trauma and the medical community’s mistreatment of female mental health in the 20th century.

How have humans sought to predict the future? Prophesies (Thames & Hudson) traces the long—long—history of prediction and fortune telling, from ancient Egyptians to Roman augers, animals, supernatural signs, Aztec omens and Japanese divinations. I predict…you’ll dig it!

American music has often glorified “outlaws” and rule-breakers.  The Midnight Special (W.W. Norton) by Colin Asher tells the true story of the criminal-justice system’s impact on music makers, from Lead Belly to Johnny Cash and Tupac Shakur and many others who transcended their grim, dehumanizing existence with sounds of joy, rebellion and righteousness.

Ever wonder how a little faux-documentary frolic helped four lads from Liverpool make the leap from music to movies—and forever changed the way the world saw pop music? Find out in A Hard Day’s Night (Bloomsbury/British Film Institute), BBC broadcaster Samira Ahmed’s fascinating rewind to the 1960s and a black and white film that became a cinematic landmark.

NOW HEAR THIS

Calling all Deadheads! The Grateful Dead’s classic Steal Your Face live album from 1976 has been remastered for a special 50th anniversary edition. It’s full of road-tested rockers and then-new material from members’ solo projects—and it marked the return of the iconic group after a long self-imposed touring hiatus. (Order at dead.net).

BRING IT HOME

Paranoia has a new home in A Yard of Jackals (IndiePix Films), a gripping psychological thriller set in Chile about isolation, moral decay and a spirit being crushed under authoritarian rule. Includes commentary from director Diego Figueroa and filmmaker Inti Carrizo-Ortiz.

In the heist thriller Crime 101 (Alliance Home Entertainment), a jewel thief (Chris Hemsworth) lands the score of a lifetime but must evade a relentless detective closing in on his string of heists. With Mark Ruffolo, Barry Keogan, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Halle Berry. And a bit part by Nick Nolte!

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Jun 25 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Romería”

Spanish coming-of-age drama follows a young orphan’s deep dive into her murky past

Romería
Starring Llúcia Garcia, Mitch Martin & Tristán Ulloa
Directed by Carla Simón
Unrated

In select cities Friday, June 26; wide release to follow

A young orphaned woman journeys to her ancestral home in Spain seeking answers about her deceased parents in this poignant coming-of-age drama about family, fate, falsehoods, memories, misinformation, deceit, shame—and the sea.

In the opening scene, as Marina (Llúcia Garcia) arrives on a boat from Barcelona, from Spain’s opposite side, she tells us—in a narrative voice-over—about the temperament of the ocean, and how it can be “calm and peaceful” or “wild and choppy.”

She finds a bit of both of those conditions as she connects with long-estranged aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents. She’s trying to uncover her roots to find out why, on her father’s death certificate, she’s not listed as a descendant. And that lack of documentation makes her feel rootless and restless, and also prevents her from getting financial assistance at a university.

Marina’s quest was sparked by reading her late mother’s journals. But there are still some missing pieces of the story. What made her mother and father die so young? Why did they never come visit her as a child, after she had relocated, across the country with an adopted family? Why do her younger cousins tell her they’ve been warned to stay away from her if she starts bleeding? What about the mysterious attraction to her hunky cousin, Nuno (Mitch Martin)?

Her icy, detached grandmother (Marina Troncoso) is obsessed with dying, and with keeping her swimming pool clean of debris; she lays down a stern warning for her grandchildren to shower before jumping in.. But when it comes to family, things sometimes get messy, just like outdoor swimming pools.

The Spanish word romeria means a pilgrimage, a sacred journey, and that certainly applies to Marina’s quest as she treks into her past to retrace—and reclaim—her bloodline. The filmreminds us that she’s on hallowed ground with several scenes that feature religious iconography, including a worship service in the bay on Ria de Vigo, an estuary in the Spanish oceanside community of Galicia.

Estuaries are where freshwater from mountains and streams meet saltwater in the oceans, creating thriving biosystems. In much the same way, Marina is an outsider from afar, now come to “mix” and meet with her family, itself a teeming ecosystem of history, traditions, relations—and secrets Her cousins also tell her that for the last few years of his life, her father was “hidden” away by his parents in their home. An uncle discloses tales of drugs, needles and wild bacchanalia partying. “What didn’t they do?” he tells Marina about her mother and father. “Love and drugs aren’t a good thing.”

The film is richly autobiographical for acclaimed director Carla Simón, who lost both her parents when she was just a child, just as Marina did, and under the same circumstances. And Marina carries around a movie camera, filming everything, declaring that she wants to study cinema at college—just like the director really did. At one point, Marina even tells a boating companion, who tries to snatch her camera, “I’ll film, you sail!”

The movie’s real discovery is Llúcia Garcia as Marina. This is her first movie, but she’s a natural, perfect in the role of a girl on the cusp of womanhood and discovery, finding out who she is and how she got there. Her smallest gestures—a bashful smile, a suppressed shock—convey the surface ripples on the choppy waters Marina is navigating. It’s no surprise she’s already received a Goya Award, Spain’s equivalent of the Oscars, for Top Newcomer.

In the film’s third act, Marina leaves a local celebration to follow an alley cat down a darkened street, leading her into a surreal extended flashback in which she gets to “see” her parents before she was born, her father as a sailor, her mom a languid party girl. (In an inventive twist, shaded by subtle differences in appearance and composure, Garcia also plays Marina’s mom.) Marina finds her mom’s secret journal, one she was never supposed to read, and we discover, along with her, the connective cycle of past and present, shedding new light onto things we’ve seen and heard previously.

And finally, Marina admits, “I really like the sea here.”

Don’t be put off by the Spanish subtitles. This sweet, finely nuanced dive down into the murky past is a trip well worth taking, as young Marina embraces her roots, gets her answers and sets sail in a new, steadier and more hopeful direction.

—Neil Pond

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Jun 19 2026
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Books, DVDs, History, Movies, Music, Photography, Pop Culture, Sports, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to watch, and more! Week of June 19 – June 25

Butch & Sundance, Marilyn Monroe’s crime scene, Tom Hanks on America & the rising tide of human migration

FRIDAY, June 19
The Clash of Nations: Joe Lewis vs. Max Schmeling
Documentary about one of the most iconic rivalries in boxing history and how their late 1930s bouts came to symbolize the coming showdown between freedom and fascism (8 p.m., History Channel).

How to Make a Killing
Glen Powell and Margaret Qualley star in movie about a man disowned at birth by his obscenely wealthy family, now seeking to reclaim his inheritance—at any cost (8 p.m., HBO).

SATURDAY, June 20
Don’t Trust the Girls Upstairs
Remy Ma stars as a woman forced to confront her past when her life begins to unravel and she opens her home to her orphaned teenage niece (8 p.m., Lifetime).

SUNDAY, June 21
Celebrity Crime Scene: Marilyn Monroe
Re-examining the evidence to the enduring mystery of the screen goddess’ death in August 1962 (8 p.m., Fox).

House of the Dragon
Tonight begins season three of the series, above, set centuries before the events of Game of Thrones. With Matt Smith, Emma D’Arcy and Olivia Cooke (HBO).

MONDAY, June 22
Harry Wild
Fan-fave murder-mystery series starring Jane Seymour as a British crime-solver returns for its new season (Acorn TV).

The Last Ship
Eric Dane and Adam Baldwin star in this series (originally on TNT) about the crew of a U.S. Navy destroyer that has somehow avoided a global pandemic that’s wiped out most of the world’s population. See seasons 1 to 3 streaming on Netflix.

TUESDAY, June 23
Movies by Director George Roy Hill
Get your Paul Newman and Robert Redford fix on with a trio of classic flicks from the late director: The Sting, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Great Waldo Pepper (8 p.m., TCM).

The Welcome Table
Documentary about climate change causing massive migrations of humans across the globe. Where will all those people go? (9 p.m., HBO).

WEDNESDAY, June 24
Expedition Unknown
Global explorer Josh Gates returns for an all-new season, exploring far-flung jungles, remote waters and vastcaves hunting for vanished civilizations (9 p.m., Discovery). 

The American Experiment
Tom Hanks is part of this sweeping five-part documentary series reexamining the improbable achievement of America’s founding and the radical question at its center: Can a people govern themselves? (Netflix).

THURSDAY, June 25
CMA Fest Presented by SoFI
The music event of the summer, filmed in June at CMA Fest in Nashville, features all-star performances and surprise collaborations from country music’s hottest acts, including Blake Shelton, Keith Urban, Jelly Roll and Carly Pearce (8 p.m., ABC).

Avatar: The Last Airbender
Season two begins of the animated TV spinoff of the hit sci-fi movie series, about a future world broken into warring kingdoms based on the elements of water, earth, fire and air (Netflix).

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Steve Martin and Edie Brickell join The Steep Canyon Rangers for Next Act (Yep Roc Records), which reconnects the acclaimed group with its bluegrass roots. Tracks include “Circling the Drain,” “Hard Times” and “Babylon Stone.”

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Now you can own the entire first season of the hit HBO prequel to Game of Thrones. A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms stars Peter Caffey as the lowborn titular knight, and Dexter Sol Arsell as the young prince he takes as his squire. The DVD features exclusive behind-the-scenes and bonus content.

Mira Sorvino, John Savage, and TikTok phenom Jessica Hosam star in The Goat (MVD Entertainment), an Arabic-Italian drama about a 11-year-old girl fleeing a forced marriage and making a perilous journey across the desert—with a goat.

The classic “slasher flick” franchise I Know What You Did Last Summer (AV Entertainment) was turned into a TV series by Amazon. Now you can scare yourself silly with all episodes of its first (and only) season in 2021, about a group of friends stalked by a brutal killer. Starring Madison Iseman, Bill Heck and Brianne Tju. Buy HERE.

A 1996  Ah-nold classic gets a 30th anniversary salute in the new 4K restoration of Eraser (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment), about a U.S. Marshal (Arnold Schwarzenegger) tasked with “erasing” the identities of people in the witness protection program. Then things get complicated when a witness (Vanessa Williams) uncovers a plot to unleash a weapon of mass destruction.
 

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Author George Tsakiridis, a professor of philosophy and religion at South Dakota State University, looks at a famous superhero through a religious prism in Spider-Man and the Sacred (McFarland). It shows how we can glean from comic books about the webslinger the broader themes of morality, sin, guilt and redemption and even resurrection.

Take a sweeping journey through the Big Apple in Harry Gruyart New York (Thames & Hudson), a spectacular photographic trek with the photographer who’s spent more than half a century chronicling the city’s wide spectrum of people, places, peculiarities and scenes.

Learn about the genesis of hip-hop in Bust a Move by Peter Relic, which traces the rise of the record label Delicious Vinyl and its vital role in vaulting hip-hop music into the pop mainstream with artists like Tone Loc, Young MC and Def Jeff.

Jun 19 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Leviticus”

Conversion ritual has horrific consequences in this ‘queer horror’ terror tale

Leviticus
Starring Joe Bird, Stacy Clausen & Mia Wasikowska
Directed by Adrian Chiarella
Rated R

In theaters Friday, June 19, 2026

When a church tries to “pray away the gay” from two teenage boys, it unleashes a monstrous supernatural entity that terrorizes them in this masterfully grim new entry into the genre of queer horror.

Horror has deep roots in the queer experience, all the way back to the 1930s and movies like Frankenstein and Dracula, in which the “monsters” became metaphors for outsiders and other-ness, creatures who can’t help the way they are. Now, in the modern era, horror “speaks” to LGBTQ viewers in multiple ways as victims of a society that often rejects them, treats them as freakish abominations and even tries to change their sexual orientation to align with conservative religious edicts.

The movie’s title refers to an Old Testament book with a passage that condemns homosexual relations, one that many modern scholars argue has been widely—and woefully—misinterpreted.

Director Adrian Chiarella makes a most impressive feature-film debut with this effectively unsettling coming-of-age story about high schoolers Niam (Joe Bird) and Ryan(Stacy Clausen), whose roughhousing leads to more intimate encounters. When the pastor at their church—in their backwater Australian town—finds out, he hires a “deliverance healer” (Nicholas Hope) to convert them.

But the tortuous “conversion” has horrifying consequences, as Niam and Ryan each become stalked and victimized by something only visible to them, something that takes the form of what they each want most in the world—each other. And it’s trying to kill them.

That imagery sets up the story about a dreary, hopeless world that wants to destroy them, one whirring with hate and loathing. And the many shots of their drab, decaying little town—with abandoned sweatshops and factory smokestacks belching into the sky—suggest that the piety of their community church, in the shadow of shabby modernity, is similarly outdated and noxious.

Mia Wasikowska (from Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland and Guillermo del Toro’s Twin Peaks)plays Niam’s stern church-going mom, who doesn’t exactly sympathize with his plight, even when she becomes aware of the curse that’s been unleashed on him. “We need fear,” she dismissively tells him. “It’s how we survive.”

Speaking of fear, there are a couple of “gotcha” jump-scare jolts and a bit of body horror, but mostly this is a movie that conveys the dread, the chill, the stifling fear of not knowing when the next attack is coming. (And that itself might be especially resonant with gay viewers who feel the same anxieties in their own lives.)

Repeated scenes of the boys throwing rocks at each other, a macho exercise in who can stand the most pain, is a reminder of the abuse that homosexuals still face around the world, where same-sex activity can be punishable by death.

The “monsters” of Leviticus might remind you of It Follows, the acclaimed 2014 horror film about a stalking menace that could look like anyone—and then tear you to pieces. But there’s a sweet intimacy too, in scenes where Niam and Ryan find their bliss, canoodling and caressing. Can they, and their relationship, survive the weight of the forces now unleashed against them?

Leviticus takes a Bible verse, guts it and spins it into a resonant, richly relevant tale of forbidden love—and a crushing indictment of weaponizing some harsh ancient words against others following what their hearts truly want.

—Neil Pond

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Jun 12 2026
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Books, Humor, Movies, Photography, Pop Culture, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to watch, and more! Week of June 12 – June 18

A girls’ trip goes sideways, fighters gonna fight and spooky stories come to life

The Mexican stop-motion film ‘I Am Frankelda’ is a gorgeous ode to scary storytelling.

FRIDAY, June 12
I Am Frankelda
Animated tale of a gifted writer in Mexico whose dark tales full of monsters come to life (Netflix).

Find Your Friends
A girls’ fun trip to a boozy bacchanalia in the desert takes a nasty turn when they run into some very inhospitable locals, below. Starring Bella Thorn (Shudder).

SATURDAY, June 13
My Adventures with Superman
Season three begins of the animated series about Clark Kent (voiced by Jack Quaid) as he begins working as an intern at the Daily Planet with Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen (midnight, streaming on Adult Swim on Max).

The Jealous Bride
Amber Stevens stars in this twisted tale of love, jealousy, and obsession based on bestselling novel My Sister’s Daughter by Liv Constantine (8 p.m., Lifetime).

SUNDAY, June 14
Patience
Season two of the crime drama about an autistic woman who works in criminal records tackling puzzling crimes begins tonight. Starring Ella Maisy Purvis (8 p.m., PBS).

The Ultimate Fighter
UFC Hall of Famers compete as coaches as former champs Daniel Cormier and Michael Bisping mix it up in the ring (Paramount+)

MONDAY, June 15
The Last Twins
Liev Schrieber narrates this gripping story of an unsung hero of the Holocaust who defied the Nazis to protect dozens of young boys, many of them twins, targeted by Dr. Josef Mengele for brutal medical experimentation (10 p.m., PBS)

TUESDAY, June 16
Becoming Katherine Graham
Documentary about the woman who took over the Washington Post newspaper after her father and husband, leading to a new era of acclaimed investigative journalism (9 p.m., PBS).

WEDNESDAY, June 17
Alone
Season 13 begins of the extreme-survival series, this time bringing contestants from all over the globe to the Arctic Circle—and its freezing temps, intense isolation and dangerous wildlife (9 p.m., History Channel).

The Kimberley: Australia’s Wild West
New series about Australia’s remote northwest region, from a First Nations perspective, chronicling a year of extreme tropical seasons to reveal the stories hidden within the rugged landscape (10 p.m., PBS).

THURSDAY, June 18
The Capture
Holliday Grainger stars in this series about deepfakes, a government exposé and a geopolitical crisis (Peacock).

I Will Find You
A father wrongly imprisoned for his son’s murder receives evidence that his child may be alive. Series stars Sam Worthington (above), Milo Ventimiglia and Britt Lower (Netflix).

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Just in time for Father’s Day is Fun Intended from the Chicago-based band DadJoke. It’s the brainchild of award-winning composer Dave Remmick, who blends rock, punk, post-punk, funk, metal, jazz, folk, Broadway/Disney and R&B on silly, bone-tickling tunes like “I Hope Nobody Drops a Big Rubber Horse on My Head,” “You Have to Go Potty Too,” “What Did the Dinosaurs Say” and many more.

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The groundbreaking mid-20th century American photographer Helen Levitt, known for her street photography around her home of New York City, is the subject of this chronicle of her wide-ranging work. Take a trip back in time to the teeming street life of Gotham, as documented through her lens (Thames & Hudson).

She was a blonde goddess of the silver screen. And now, on what would have been her 100th birthday, The Marilyn Monroe Century (Abrams) celebrates her life, her transformation from Norma Jeane Mortensen into a 1950s blonde bombshell. Packed with photos by Bruno Bernard, the most sought-after shutterbug of Hollywood’s Golden Age (he was known as “Bruno of Hollywood”), it’s a tribute to the iconic, one-of-a-kind movie star, who died in 1962.

It’s a dirty job, but someone’s gotta do it. In Trash (Melville House), “trashman” Simon Pare-Poupart spills the, ahem, dirt—as well as a few good yuks—about his 20 years in waste management…and why he’s still on the job, because of his love for the physical rush, his rough-and-tumble colleagues, and an honesty and freedom that no other job has given him.

Today we can pick up a phone and make a call to just about anywhere in the world. But it wasn’t always that way. In Lightning Beneath the Sea (W.W. Norton), author James M. Tabor tells the almost unbelievable tale of how the first 2,000-mile cable was laid—in the mid-1800s—across the Atlantic Ocean, beset by storms, freak accidents and even sabotage—to usher in a new era of global communication.

How do animals, ahem, have sex? And what can we learn from it? You might be surprised, in Perrin Roosevelt Ireland’s illuminating Poking the Squid (W. W. Norton), to find out the many ways and means critters go about reproducing. It’s a wild illustrated ride through a spectrum of behaviors, including queerness, infidelity, consent, cannibalism and gender fluidity.

BRING IT HOME

Attention, horror fans! Scream 7 (Alliance Home Entertainment) slashes its way onto home video this week, with Neve Campbell, David Arquette and Courtney Cox returning for more mayhem with the supernatural villain known as Ghostface.

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After surgery for lung cancer, Barry Manilow is back, baby! His new What a Time, his 33rd album, features a set of 13 eclectic and reflective songs, including “Once Before I Go,” “Touched by an Angel” and “Don’t Trouble the Water.”

Jun 10 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Disclosure Day”

Director Steven Spielberg’s eye-popping new sci-fi drama about a decades-long government coverup of alien encounters

Disclosure Day
Starring Emily Blunt, Josh O’Connor, Colin Firth & Colman Domingo
Directed by Steven Spielberg
In theaters Friday, June 12

Emily Blunt and Josh O’Connor take the leads in Disclosure Day, director Steven Spielberg’s new epic sci-fi thriller about the unraveling of a massive government conspiracy covering up evidence that we are not alone in the universe.

The top-notch cast also includes Colin Firth, Eve Hewson, Colman Domingo and Wyatt Russell.

Blunt gives a performance that’s among her all-time best as Margaret Fairchild, a Kansas City meteorologist who suddenly develops amazing and alarming abilities, like speaking in foreign languages and reading minds. O’Connor is Daniel Kellner, a mathematics whiz turned whistle-blower determined to reveal what he knows about a covert global cybersecurity force that’s quashed nearly 80 years of proof about extraterrestrial “close encounters.”

They both become targets of a massive, rip-roaring manhunt to round them up and shut them down. What else do they have in common? Well, you’ll find out—but I won’t spoil it here.

Colin Firth is Noah Scanlon, the head of the coverup, convinced that the mind-blowing reality about aliens would “tip the balance” of a world already on the precipice of nuclear self-destruction. Eve Hewson (Bono’s daughter!) is Kellner’s girlfriend, a former novitiate in a monastery who plays a significant role in helping spread, well, another kind of word from on high. Colman Domingo, who makes almost every film he’s in better by just being in it, is the head of the movement to rip open decades of secrecy, to have a reckoning, a day of disclosure when the truth will be made known to everyone. Wyatt Russell is Jackson, Margaret’s romantic partner, who doesn’t understand—at least at first—what’s going on.

Spielberg, who launched the very idea of “summer blockbusters” back in 1975 with Jaws, has made some of the top-performing, most widely beloved and critically lauded movies of all time. Sometimes it feels here, with his first film in four years (since The Fablemans), that he’s looking into the skies and beyond the way he did in E.T. The Extraterrestrial and Close Encounters of the Third Kind—with awe, empathy and hope.

And the soundtrack, by his longtime collaborator John Willams, drives home the gamut of emotions. It’s no wonder Williams has received more than two dozen Grammys and five Oscars.

Disclosure Day has it all—thrills and chills, danger and derring-do, and the beating heart of a love story. It’s got a pulse-pounding train scene that can match anything Tom Cruise has done in the Mission: Impossible world, and its heady thoughts on how the existence of extraterrestrials might mesh with the Bible will certainly stir some discussion. (Plus, three main characters are named Noah, Margaret and Daniel.)  

Its suggestion that communication with aliens is closely aligned with music, mathematics and nature will likely mean you’ll never look at that bright red cardinal at your bird feeder, or on your windowsill, the same way again. It’s a movie that makes you think about what’s up here, what’s down here, and how it might all be connected. About childhood and crop circles, secrets and lies, the past and the future, and the multi-faceted experience of our very existence.

Spielberg has crafted another cinematic triumph, a moving picture that’s moving in more ways than one, one that reminds us again of the eye-popping, jaw-dropping magic and the majesty of a big story playing out on big screen, pulling us in, making us feel. Head down to the multiplex, folks, because it certainly feels like blockbuster time again.

—Neil Pond

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