How to resolve AdBlock issue? Arts & Life
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LAKEPORT, Calif. — Mendocino College/Lake Center is proud to announce that Dual Enrollment Student Ambassador Yaelin Lim has been awarded the Grand Jury Prize for the “Spirit of Lake County” Photography Contest, in this year’s Grand Jury Report.
Her winning photograph, selected from a highly competitive pool of submissions across Lake County, will be featured on the official cover of the 2025 Lake County Grand Jury Report.
The judges praised Lim’s work for its emotional depth, artistic composition, and ability to capture a quiet yet powerful moment that resonates beyond the frame.
Lim, a dual enrollment ambassador for Mendocino College, has consistently demonstrated leadership, service and creativity throughout her time with the program. This award reflects not only her artistic talent, but the heart and thoughtfulness she brings to everything she does.
“Yaelin’s eye for beauty is what stood out for us, besides the obvious technical quality” said a member of the selection committee. “This recognition is deeply deserved, and we’re so proud to have her work honored in such a meaningful way.”
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- Written by: Tim Riley
‘FIGHT OR FLIGHT’ RATED R
The hero of “Fight or Flight” is a bleached-blond washout, usually in a drunken stupor, hiding out in Bangkok because of a botched mission during his time in the Secret Service, but the disgraced agent is now reluctantly pulled back into service.
The film begins with a preview scene of an exceedingly violent mayhem on an airplane which plays like a coming attractions trailer and really sets the mood for the vicious fracas which the former agent must endure once he settles into his first-class seat.
The writers and director James Madigan must have been inspired by the success of the “John Wick” films and Brad Pitt’s Ladybug, an assassin for hire, in “Bullet Train.” The commonality these films have is an abundance of hired killers and violent thugs run amok.
This is what faces Josh Hartnett’s Lucas Reyes, who favors cheap Hawaiian shirts and shorts as if he were going to spend a day at the beach. He would rather stay idle, but then his former colleague and lover Katherine Brunt (Katee Sackhoff) offers him a chance at redemption.
The dissolute life of Lucas is obvious from his love of whiskey for breakfast and his encounter with the local bar owner at lunch when he says, “If I die in your bar, you can sell my organs to pay my tab.”
All that Brunt asks of Lucas is to board a plane from Bangkok to San Francisco to track down a hacker terrorist known as The Ghost, with the inducement of a big payday and getting removed from the TSA’s “no-fly list.”
Once on the aircraft, the chaos that ensues is so intense that the action can only be labeled as bonkers, a description bandied about all over internet reviews with good reason.
Word that The Ghost would be on this flight has gotten around to the entire underworld, leading to the plane being filled with killers like the ones always trying to knock off John Wick.
Soon after takeoff, another passenger spikes Lucas’ drink with a drug before hauling him to a luxury bathroom to kill him, except that Lucas is immune to being rendered unconscious due to heavy drinking and he manages to turn a sprinkler head into a weapon.
Speaking of weapons, one must wonder how every assassin got past security screenings with knives, swords, handguns, machine guns and a chainsaw. Even a seatbelt and broken wine glasses are turned into weapons of death. The only thing missing is a rocket launcher.
While every passenger begins to look suspicious, Lucas finds allies in two flight attendants, the gutsy Isha (Charithra Chandran), showing an abundance of courage, and the amusingly nervous colleague Royce (Danny Ashok).
For all his goofiness and knack for physical comedy, Josh Harnett is delightfully committed to the insanity that his role demands. In that respect, his nonchalant attitude results in an enjoyably charismatic performance.
Forget any logic about the over-the-top wackiness of “Fight or Flight.” The film is an action-packed thrill ride filled with humor and carnage. This adds up to a lot of fun on a primeval level.
‘THE STUDIO’ ON APPLE TV+
Critics almost certainly would enjoy “The Studio” series on Apple TV+ more than the general audience, only because so much of the humor is like inside baseball, familiar mostly to those who cover the industry for a living.
The premise is quite funny. Seth Rogen’s Matt Remick is an ambitious executive at the troubled Continental Studios, which is desperate to create a box office hit that might just cover the losses endured with stinkers.
With bitter studio head Patty Leigh (a funny Catherine O’Hara) pushed aside, Remick, who has long coveted the position, has taken over, even though he lacks the killer instinct to squash anyone’s pet project.
Producers like Ron Howard and Martin Scorsese appear as themselves to seek support for their vanity projects, only to end up being humiliated by Remick because of his innate inability to be a straight shooter.
A lot of amusing studio intrigue is packed into the first episode, presaging good things to come. Bryan Cranston’s Griffin Mill, ruthless owner of the studio, has no vision for filmmaking other than to make huge profits, cinematic art be damned.
On the other hand, Remick is a film lover interested in making films, as opposed to Mill only wanting to make movies, a distinction that rests with the belief movies can be commercial box office winners and films turn up in art-houses yielding meager returns.
A general audience might miss the humor of an executive dismissively referring to a film producer as a “dime store Bob Evans.” The laugh comes from knowing Robert Evans, as the successful head of production at Paramount, delivered classics like “The Godfather” and “Chinatown.”
Seth Rogen, and his associates Ike Barinholtz and Chase Sui Wonders, lead a cast that delivers plenty of laughs, as the machinations of everyone jockeying for position is amusing and inventive, because it’s easy to appreciate the absurdity of workplace dysfunction.
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
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Filmmakers and special guests are coming to the beautiful coast from far and wide! Tickets are selling fast, so be sure to snap yours up today.
For insiders, lots of notable locals will be on hand. Directors Ana Blanco and Natasha Benjamin will be attending along with other Noyo Harbor community members to celebrate the local premiere of their fascinating documentary about kelp forests entitled Sequoias of the Sea, showing Friday, May 30, at 1 p.m.
Will Hawkes, local boy made good and the co-writer of the Oscar-nominated short film “The Last Ranger,” will attend with his film in the “Making a Difference” short film program on Friday May, 30, at 10 a.m.
A dozen more local creatives will be celebrated on the festival’s closing night event on Sunday, June 1, “Reel Mendo.” This showcase of local talent is a yearly festival favorite.
This year includes a collection of 11 terrific short films by the very own Mendocino County filmmakers. Topics run the gamut from art and architecture to mushroom foraging to bootlegging to murder — with a host of subjects in between.
The festival — which runs May 29 to June 1 — will feature an eclectic selection of 67 local, American independent and international films from 20 countries — all of them riveting, with several made by Oscar and Emmy winning directors and producers.
Moviegoers will have the rare opportunity to meet and chat with filmmakers following screenings and learn about their inspirations and challenges.
Come and learn about “Women Who Dare,” which showcases six powerful films about visionary and determined women who pursued their passions and defied the odds. For the first time, 55% of the slate of films are directed by women.
Calling all art and music-lovers! The program includes 17 films having to do with the arts, several resonant documentaries about the power of music, ranging from the songs of John Lennon to Giuseppe Verdi to Afro-Cuban jazz, and others focused on several facets of the arts — tapestries, photography, filmmaking, literature — compelling stories conveyed in both documentary and narrative form.
On Friday night, in the Festival’s signature tent, we will feature Coastal, a riveting documentary about one of the greatest rock musicians of all time — Neil Young. The film is directed by Young’s wife, actor/director Daryl Hannah.
The movie will play Friday, May 30, at 7:30 p.m. and will be followed by a ’70s rock and roll party with five-piece band Moon Rabbit.
Animal and nature lovers will enjoy storytelling featuring sled dogs in the Norwegian Arctic, grey wolves in Yellowstone and flocks of sheep in the Pyrenees. And for all the gourmets and gourmands out there, we have a trio of culinary-themed documentaries — covering cheese, pastries and Italian cuisine — that you surely won’t want to miss.
The festival proudly features 16 environmental and social justice films this year. Current pressing sociopolitical issues like climate change, immigrant rights, LGBTQ freedoms and the Gaza-Israel conflict are an essential part of the programming lineup.
And if you just want to spend an evening laughing — and who doesn’t enjoy a good chortle — come to the Festival Tent on Saturday, May 31, at 7:30 p.m. to hear hilarious Bay Area comedian Natasha Vinik preceding the showing of the perceptive and funny documentary, Anxiety Club.
On Sunday, June 1, the festival offers its Fourth Annual Native Cinema event, one of the fest’s most popular screenings. This year features the Hawaiian film “Standing Above the Clouds” and a short film about the Kashia band of Pomo called “Our Ocean, Our Future.”
Satisfy your most pressing grammar questions and meet grammarian Ellen Jovin at her Grammar Table outside Gallery Bookshop in Mendocino from 10 a.m. to noon on Saturday, May 31. Don’t miss her film Rebel with a Clause screening on Saturday and Sunday, May 31, and June 1.
Perhaps watching delicious pastry being baked in “The Sweet Story” (Saturday at 10 a.m. and Sunday at 1 p.m.) has whet your appetite? Then come for "Coffee with the Filmmakers” Saturday, May 31, and Sunday, June 1, at 9 a.m. at Cafe Beaujolais Garden and have a chat and a snack with the creative forces behind your new favorite movies.
To purchase tickets, go to MendoFilm.org/tickets. They can also be purchased at Festival Headquarters: Mendocino Film Festival Office, 45062 Ukiah St. To stay up to date all the Festival news, and to peruse this year’s complete program, please visit MendoFilm.org. Connect with us on Facebook and Instagram for announcements, radio interviews, film updates and more.
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- Written by: Tim Riley
‘HAVOC’ RATED TV-MA ON NETFLIX
If you ever had the chance over a decade ago to watch the Indonesian crime films “The Raid” and “The Raid 2,” both directed by Gareth Evans, you will have a good idea of the mayhem in store with the film “Havoc” on Netflix.
Brutal fast-paced action scenes and nicely choreographed fights are the trademark style of Evans, and since he wrote as well directed “Havoc,” he’s almost like the Welsh version of Michael Bay (“Bad Boys”) or John Woo (“Hard Boiled”).
It’s not even five minutes in before the action jump-starts with a slew of police cars chasing a stolen semitrailer racing through the streets of a generically dingy metropolis and on to a freeway.
The truck is carrying washing machines loaded with cocaine, and this could be the first time that a major appliance has been used as a weapon, which is something to behold as an expedient utility of destruction.
Much is going on with action from Triad gangsters muscling in on narcotics smuggling; dirty cops seizing drugs for themselves; a corrupt businessman running for mayor; and power struggles in the criminal underworld.
Enter Tom Hardy’s Walker, a dirty cop having second thoughts on his shady dealings, who treats his young daughter as an afterthought on Christmas Eve when shopping for a last-minute gift. Not surprisingly, he’s also estranged from his wife.
Walker is the catalyst for most of the extremely volatile shootouts, and honestly the body count gets so high at times that it’s hard to know who is on what side. The action is so stylized that it verges on losing significant meaning.
Aside from the overly amped-up action, “Havoc” is also a bloody redemption story for Tom Hardy’s Walker, a police officer growing no longer hardened to the systemic corruption that pervades the dystopian landscape he inhabits.
The film benefits also tremendously for its casting of Forest Whitaker as the politically ambitious businessman trying to reconnect with his wayward son; Timothy Olyphant’s ringleader in a band of corrupt officers; Jessie Mae Li’s only honest cop in a crooked system; and Luis Guzman doing his usual thing.
There’s a lot to like with the thriller style of “Havoc” but the downside being not enough character development and a bit too much of some bloody, gory shootouts that might make certain Hong Kong action directors flinch.
At least “Havoc” is streaming so that one could decide either to bail out, hang in for the duration, or take periodic breaks to recover from any sensory overload. Yet, Tom Hardy’s conflicted cop might be the best reason to watch.
‘DOVEY’S PROMISE’ Not Rated
A riveting courtroom drama that brings to life the extraordinary true story of civil rights attorney Dovey Roundtree (Joy White) proves to be of interest, among other reasons, for a footnote in history related to our 35th president.
“Dovey’s Promise” features Black attorney Dovey Roundtree (Joy White) as one of the few women in the legal profession at the time, taking on the case of Raymond Crump (Terrence Mombrun), a poor Black laborer accused of murdering Mary Pinchot Meyer.
Seemingly, Crump was in the wrong place at the wrong time when Pinchot Meyer was taking her daily walk along the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal towpath in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C.
Known in the upper crust social circles in our nation’s capital, Pinchot Meyer was allegedly the secret lover of President John F. Kennedy, a romantic involvement that was apparently confirmed years later after her death by various sources.
The death of Pinchot Meyer was not that long after the assassination of President Kennedy. The murder of a well-connected socialite draws the United States Department of Justice into the fray.
The prosecution of Raymond Crump, backed by the federal government, became a flashpoint in American legal history, and Dovey Roundtree found herself in the thick of a momentous civil rights case.
The prosecution presented Crump as the obvious suspect, despite a complete lack of physical evidence tying him to the crime. Against the odds, Roundtree saw the case as a racially motivated attempt to frame an innocent man.
Roundtree took the important case of “United States v. Ray Crump” for a fee of one dollar. With a case that appeared stacked against the defendant, Roundtree was supposedly initially dubious about his innocence.
The government had witnesses and exhibits with so-called facts that were abjectly persuasive. Nevertheless, Roundtree won the case with painstaking dismantling of the evidence, particularly that of the eyewitnesses who apparently never had a solid look at the suspect.
A credible claim could be made that Dovey Roundtree was the Rosa Parks of the legal profession, at a time when civil rights violations were epidemic and landmark cases for desegregation resulted in a push for equal treatment under the 14th Amendment.
“Dovey’s Promise,” if for no other reason, may be of interest for a historical perspective of the civil rights struggle and the connection to President John F. Kennedy.
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
