‘The Continental’ Review: Firing Blanks

Guy Lodge Film Critic The grand-scale Biblical epics that midcentury Hollywood churned out to roaring box-office returns had many drawcards as (so to speak) mass entertainment — brawny action, transporting spectacle, then jaw-dropping effects — but a sense of humor, by and large, wasn’t one of them. That’s something British musician-turned-filmmaker Jeymes Samuel attempts to rectify in his offbeat messiah story “The Book of Clarence,” a newly invented tale that runs parallel to the life and death of Jesus in ways both blithely blasphemous and sincerely Christian.

the 1954 big-screen classic starring Humphrey Bogart as Lieutenant Commander Philip Queeg, he of the nervously-twirled metal balls and questionable sanity.The movie premieres Oct. 6 on Paramount+ with Showtime (paramountplus.qflm.net/9WG5D0) — and Oct. 8 on Showtime (9 p.m.) — and features an all-star cast, including Kiefer Sutherland as Queeg and the late Lance Reddick, all of whom deliver bravura performances.

Todd Gilchrist editor In “Caligula: The Ultimate Cut,” absolute power corrupts absolutely, but even using absolutely all of the footage shot for the notorious production back in 1976 does not necessarily result in a better film. The most expensive independent film ever produced until that time, “Caligula” was conceived by late Penthouse founder Bob Guccione as a sexually explicit film that also featured real actors and high production values; hiring bestselling author Gore Vidal to write a script for Italian avant-garde director Tinto Brass (“Salon Kitty”), Guccione subsequently attracted such respected thespians as Malcolm McDowell, Peter O’Toole, John Gielgud and Helen Mirren to star.

his 2018 “Halloween” reboot with Jamie Lee Curtis. And, on paper, his plan doesn’t sound so bad. Running time: 121 minutes.

Owen Gleiberman Chief Film Critic The sequels — or, in two cases, prequels — to “The Exorcist” have all been unqualified turkeys. There is now a movement at hand to declare that John Boorman’s crackpot insect-swarm fantasia “Exorcist II: The Heretic” (1977) was some sort of misunderstood masterpiece, but that’s an act of revisionism every bit as loony tunes as “Heaven’s Gate” revisionism.

“We missed so much [during the last five months] that it would take a whole new version of Billy Joel’s We Didn’t Start The Fire to cover it,” said John Oliver as he returned to the Last Week Tonight desk.

Trish Deitch Before Melissa Etheridge became a stadium rock star, she spent four years playing lesbian bars in and around LA. That atmosphere—a small, rowdy roomful of happy drunken ladies—changed the way she wrote music and performed.

Alexandra Grant made some rare but glowing comments about her boyfriend Keanu Reeves during a recent red carpet appearance.

Alexandra Grant spoke highly of her relationship with Keanu Reeves as she opened up about the pair’s union in a rare interview.

Jordan Moreau The “John Wick” movies are known for their high-octane, guns-blazing action on the big screen, but now the franchise is heading to Peacock — and about 50 years in the past — to explore its origins in “The Continental.” Across three episodes, the ’70s-set series dives into how a young Winston Scott (played by Colin Woodell) became the proprietor of the titular hotel, which is famous for throwing lavish parties and being a safe haven for assassins. But, as “John Wick” fans know, not everybody abides by the no-killing rule on Continental grounds. The show, which premieres on Peacock Friday, starts with a bang — actually, a lot of them — thanks to stunt coordinator Larnell Stovall.

Sequels, and sequels of sequels, have trouble differentiating themselves from their brethren from time to time. But Expendables 4 (or Expend4bles, as this fourth and final entry in the mercenary-based action series has been marketed), indisputably takes the cake for recycling previously used material in a not exactly fresh context. At least the final third — and maybe more — of this jokey, fight-filled and increasingly effects-driven last hurrah is nearly a twin brother to the climactic stretch of last year’s waterlogged Jason Statham extravaganza Meg 2: The Trench, wherein the rugged Brit takes on — and once again prevails over — a sea monster that makes Moby Dick look like a backyard swimming pool pet. It really is a shameless “borrowing” that’s impossible to ignore if you’ve seen Meg 2, as the tireless former male model with perfectly maintained facial stubble once again earns his status as master of the seven seas.

Owen Gleiberman Chief Film Critic In “Expend4bles,” the action is more digitally propulsive than it was in “The Expendables” (2010), “The Expendables 2” (2012), or “The Expendables 3” (2014). Yet the preferred mode of killing is reassuringly primitive.

The Continental marks the first spin-off in the John Wick franchise.Led by showrunners Greg Coolidge and Kirk Ward, the three-part series is a prequel spin-off revolved around a young Winston Scott (Colin Woodell), who was played by Ian McShane in the mainline John Wick films.Alongside Woodell, the show’s cast includes Mel Gibson, Hubert Point-Du Jour, Jessica Allain, Mishel Prada, Ben Robson, Peter Greene and Nhung Kate.The Continental follows the story of Winston Scott and his journey to becoming the proprietor of the New York branch of the Continental hotel chain, which acts as a safe haven for assassins.The show is a prequel to John Wick set in an alternate history depiction of the 1970s, offering different spins on real-world events including the rise of the American Mafia.A synopsis reads: “The series will explore the origin behind the iconic hotel-for-assassins from the John Wick universe through the eyes of a young Winston Scott, as he’s dragged into the Hellscape of 1970’s New York City to face a past he thought he’d left behind.“Winston charts a deadly course through the hotel’s mysterious underworld in a harrowing attempt to seize the hotel where he will eventually take his throne.”Along with a younger version of Scott, the show features a younger version of Charon (Ayomide Adegun), who was portrayed by the late Lance Reddick in the films.The first spin-off film, titled Ballerina, is scheduled to be released on June 7, 2024.Ana de Armas will play the lead character Rooney, a ballerina who seeks revenge on those who murdered her family.

If you haven’t seen “John Wick: Chapter 4,” then you should probably skip this article. Long story short, there’s still no decision about whether or not a fifth film is being made.

“The Continental,” subtitled somewhere in the marketing as, “From the World of John Wick,” is indeed what it advertises: a series that spins off from the kinetic assassins action-thriller franchise starring Keanu Reeves and now on its fourth installment, possibly going on a fifth. “John Wick” has its own intricate mythology filled with codes and currencies— the High Table, The Bowery King and The Bowery Boys, The Operators, Adjudicators, and of course, The Continental, the opulently noir-ish underworld assassin-friendly hotel where “No business can be conducted on the neutral premises.” Aka, you may be a contract killer, but you cannot kill within The Continental grounds, such is the strangely gallant “honor among thieves” conduct ideologies and rules the hotel and its murderous guests abide by.

Alison Herman TV Critic I’ll give “The Continental” this: of all the reasons the “John Wick” prequel frustrates, underwhelms and disappoints, the involvement of Mel Gibson barely manages to rank. That, at least, is a major accomplishment.

Keanu Reeves’ master assassin may have been left for almost dead at the end of the fourth John Wick film, but things are still alive and kicking in the franchise, at least retroactively.

Michaela Zee Welcome back to Camp Half-Blood. Disney+ has released the official trailer for its “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” series, starring Walker Scobell as the titular 12-year-old boy, Leah Jeffries as Annabeth Chase and Aryan Simhadri as Grover Underwood. The official logline reads, “‘Percy Jackson and the Olympians’ tells the fantastical story of a 12-year-old modern demigod, Percy Jackson (Scobell), who’s just coming to terms with his newfound divine powers when the sky god Zeus accuses him of stealing his master lightning bolt.

Walker Scobell embarks upon an epic quest in the newly released teaser trailer for the Disney+ series Percy Jackson and the Olympians.

Courtney Howard The “PAW Patrol” franchise is now 10 years old — 70 in dog years — and with each installment, children and their parents have been treated to exciting adventures, wholesome characters and cool new merchandise. What began as a preschool TV series in 2013 got the silver-screen treatment in 2021 with the inventively named “PAW Patrol: The Movie,” broadening its scale and reach but sacrificing none of its lesson-learning or toy-slinging.