I’ve heard enough from Jessica Chastain to believe she simply wants to be treated like one of the guys. The problem with that is if your only goal is to be like everyone else, you’ll never be better than anyone else. “Ava” (2020) retraces the steps of “Atomic Blonde” by building a mediocre spy thriller around the novelty of a female assassin. Chastain’s subplot (complicated family and substance-abuse baggage) is also somewhat novel, but it’s a slight variation on a role her co-star, Colin Farrell, could have played in 2006, or Burt Reynolds in 1986 or Gene Hackman in 1976.
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The Christopher Nolan “Batman” trilogy was a work of cinematic art, but there’s money to be made, so nobody thought the franchise would end there. “The Batman” (2022) continues to emphasize the dark in the Dark Knight while supplying a brooding millennial update. Robert Pattinson is our new prince of Gotham City, teaming with trusty cop Gordon (Jeffrey Wright) to chase a riddle-rendering serial killer. It’s a solid, middle-of-the-road procedural if not for the all the bat-related accoutrements attached to the man and the story, providing sometimes unwelcome weight. John Turturro is sublime as a mobster in a twisty subplot.
Is mankind worth saving? It’s one of the many profound things you’ll have time to ponder during “Voyagers” (2021), a slow-paced, space-based reenactment of “Lord of the Flies.” With their home succumbing to climate change, earthlings plan an 86-year mission to the nearest inhabitable planet. The eerily quiet spaceship is populated with test-tube babies turned twentysomethings who’ll need to produce two successive generations and won’t live to see touchdown. Colin Farrell plays their astronaut guidance counselor until the kids (finally) start getting a little fidgety and arise from their chemically assisted calm. Hormonal hijinks ensue, hitting all the predictable notes.
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