Director Austin Peters makes his narrative feature debut with “Skincare,” a slice of nasty L.A. noir set within the beauty industry, starring Elizabeth Banks as a celebrity aesthetician whose reputation crumbles around her over the course of two weeks. The film calls to mind other dark, salacious thrillers that satirize a city seemingly obsessed with image — think of “Nightcrawler” or even “American Gigolo” — and Peters wields the style and tone of this subgenre with skill.
The sunbaked Los Angeles of “Skincare” is not the glowing, golden fantasy that we often seen on screen, an impossibly beautiful escapist fantasy. No, the light in “Skincare” is harsh and revealing: bright UV rays, fluorescent bulbs and neon signs beating down on the face of Hope Goldman (Banks), a facialist with a high-profile client list who’s on the verge of breaking through to the big time with her own skincare line.
Hope has been desperate to keep up appearances with her product launch, taping a TV segment that she expects will catapult her into fame and fortune, but as we come to find out, her finances are in disarray. She’s behind on the rent for her storefront and spa in the iconically kitschy Crossroads of the World complex in Hollywood, and when a competing aesthetician, Angel (Luis Gerardo Méndez), sets up shop on her turf, an already frazzled Hope begins to unravel.
But Hope’s undoing isn’t entirely her fault: A mysterious stalker simultaneously starts to interfere with her reputation, sending creepy texts with videos of Hope attached, hacking her email and slashing her tires. Hope turns to her only allies, a group of lecherous men that includes a TV news anchor (Nathan Fillion), her mechanic (Erik Palladino) and a new friend, Jordan (Lewis Pullman), a young, amped-up life coach.
Elizabeth Banks and Lewis Pullman in the movie “Skincare.”
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(IFC Films)
“Skincare” becomes a two-hander, alternating between the floundering Hope and the equally flailing Jordan, who desperately wants to be seen as a hero to her. Pullman is delightfully slimy as an unhinged delusional narcissist, high on his own supply of motivational word salad that he spews into his laptop camera. He’s a descendant of Tom Cruise’s “Magnolia” character Frank T.J. Mackey, but with all the wits of one of Michael Bay’s lunkheaded “Pain & Gain” crew.
Banks, on the other hand, brings a flinty mean streak to the striving Hope. Though she’s a victim here, she’s not entirely sympathetic and Banks tiptoes that fine line carefully. There’s a dash of schadenfreude here, since she cares more about what people think and how she looks than anything else. Her own assumptions and accusations add to the pile-up of miscommunication that lead to destruction in “Skincare.”
Banks’ and Pullman’s deliveries of these tragicomic characters elevate what could have been merely a genre exercise into something more fascinating and satirical. The script, written by Peters with Sam Freilich and Deering Regan, is less interesting. The coincidences and twists fit together, but there’s no deeper reason why this story had to be set in the beauty industry except that it’s a business built on facade, fantasy and seeming frivolity. “Skincare” doesn’t dig into any of these themes in a significant way. There is also no discernible reason why this story is set in 2013, except that it makes it feel slightly dated and cheesy; the diegetic Maroon 5 and Katy Perry songs that weave throughout the movie give it an ironic humor and sense of time, but this film did not have to be a period piece.
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Despite his screenplay’s limitations, Peters (like Hope) is a master of aesthetics and with cinematographer Christopher Ripley and editor Laura Zempel, he‘s crafted a compellingly sleazy ‘80s-style thriller — or at least a convincing facsimile of one. The story may be only skin-deep, but Banks and Pullman find something truthfully hopeless in these surface pleasures.”
Katie Walsh is a Tribune News Service film critic.
‘Skincare’
Rated: R, for sexual content, graphic nudity, language throughout, some violence and brief drug use
Forget the “video game movie” curse;The Mortuary Assistantis a bone-chilling triumph that stands entirely on its own two feet. Starring Willa Holland (Arrow) as Rebecca Owens, the film follows a newly certified mortician whose “overtime shift” quickly devolves into a grueling battle for her soul.
What Makes It Work
The film expertly balances the stomach-churning procedural work of embalming with a spiraling demonic nightmare. Alongside a mysterious mentor played by Paul Sparks (Boardwalk Empire), Rebecca is forced to confront both ancient evils and her own buried traumas. And boy, does she have a lot of them.
Thanks to a full-scale, practical River Fields Mortuary set, the film drips with realism, like you can almost smell the rot and bloat of the bodies through the screen.
The skin effects are hauntingly accurate. The way the flesh moves during surgical scenes is so visceral. I’ve seen a lot of flesh wounds in horror films and in real life, and the bodies, skin, and organs. The Mortuary Assistant (especially in the opening scene) looks so real that I skipped supper after watching it. And that’s saying something. Your girl likes to eat.
Co-written by the game’s creator, Brian Clarke, the movie dives deeper into the demonic mythology. Whether you’ve seen every ending or don’t know a scalpel from a trocar, the story is perfectly self-contained. If you’ve never played the game, or played it a hundred times, the film works equally well, which is hard to do when it comes to game adaptations.
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Nailed It
This film does a lot of things right, but the isolation of the night shift is suffocating. Between the darkness of the hallways and the “residents” that refuse to stay still, the film delivers a relentlessly immersive experience. And thankfully, although this movie is filled with dark rooms and shadows, it’s easy to see every little thing. Don’t you hate it when a movie is so dark that you can’t see what’s happening? It’s one of my pet peeves.
The oh-so-awesome Jeremiah Kipp directs the film and has made something absolutely nightmare-inducing. Kipp recently joined us for an interview, took us inside the film, discussed its details and the game’s lore, and so much more. I urge you to check out our interview. He’s awesome!
The Verdict
This isn’t just a cash-grab; it’s a high-effort adaptation that respects the source material while elevating the horror genre. With incredible special effects and a powerhouse cast, it’s the kind of movie that will make you rethink working late ever again. Dropping on Friday the 13th, this is a must-watch for horror fans. It’s grisly, intelligent, and genuinely terrifying.
A former executive at Live Nation, the world’s largest live entertainment company, is suing the company, alleging that he was wrongfully terminated after he raised concerns about alleged financial misconduct and improper accounting practices.
Nicholas Rumanes alleges he was “fraudulently induced” in 2022 to leave a lucrative position as head of strategic development at a real estate investment trust to create a new role as executive vice president of development and business practice at Beverly Hills-based Live Nation.
In his new position, Rumanes said, he raised “serious and legitimate alarm” over the the company’s business practices.
As a result, he says, he was “unlawfully terminated,” according to the lawsuit filed Thursday in Los Angeles County Superior Court.
“Rumanes was, simply put, promised one job and forced to accept another. And then he was cut loose for insisting on doing that lesser job with integrity and honesty,” according to the lawsuit.
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He is seeking $35 million in damages.
Representatives for Live Nation were not immediately available for comment.
The lawsuit comes a week after a federal jury in Manhattan found that Live Nation and its Ticketmaster subsidiary had operated a monopoly over major concert venues, controlling 86% of the concert market.
Rumanes’ lawsuit describes a “culture of deception” at Live Nation, saying its “basic business model was to misstate and exaggerate financial figures in efforts to solicit and secure business.”
Such practices “spanned a wide spectrum of projects in what appeared to be a company-wide pattern of financial misrepresentation and misleading disclosures,” the lawsuit states.
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Rumanes says he received materials and documents that showed that the company inflated projected revenues across multiple venue development projects.
Additionally, Rumanes contends that the company violated a federal law that requires independent financial auditing and transparency and instead ran Live Nation “through a centralized, opaque structure” that enables it to “bypass oversight and internal checks and balances.”
In 2010, as a condition of the Live Nation-Ticketmaster merger, the newly formed company agreed to a consent decree with the government that prohibited the firm from threatening venues to use Ticketmaster. In 2019 the Justice Department found that the company had repeatedly breached the agreement, and it extended the decree.
Rumanes contends that he brought his concerns to the attention of the company’s management, but his warnings were “repeatedly ignored.”
At the centre of Madhuvidhu directed by Vishnu Aravind is a house where only men reside, three generations of them living in harmony. Unlike the Anjooran household in Godfather, this is not a house where entry is banned to women, but just that women don’t choose to come here. For Amrithraj alias Ammu (Sharafudheen), the protagonist, 28 marriage proposals have already fallen through although he was not lacking in interest.
When a not-so-cordial first meeting with Sneha (Kalyani Panicker) inevitably turns into mutual attraction, things appear about to change. But some unexpected hiccups are waiting for them, their different religions being one of them. Writers Jai Vishnu and Bipin Mohan do not seem to have any major ambitions with Madhuvidhu, but they seem rather content to aim for the middle space of a feel-good entertainer. Only that they end up hitting further lower.
