CAPSULE MOVIE REVIEWS: 7-25-25

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I enjoy wearing nice pants, but it's HOT, HOT, HOT, so how about some shorts? Some Film Critic Shorts? They fit. They are on, I feel like Buster Poindexter... and I am ready to review four new movies in this week's capsule (short) movie reviews for Friday, July 25th, 2025.

1) THE FANTASTIC FOUR: FIRST STEPS

If you've listened to me on the radio over the years, tuned into The Nick D Podcast, or read any of my reviews here, you know two things about me: 1) I'm not a comic book guy, and 2) I couldn't possibly care less about the multiverse, the Marvel Universe, the DC Universe, or whatever other money-chugging cinematic universe gets rolled out this month.

I didn't grow up with the comics. I don't know the lore. I usually walk into these things cold, am confused for the first 20 minutes, and then increasingly annoyed for the next two hours, especially once the mid-end credit teasers pop up to remind you that none of what you just watched matters unless you shell out $18 for the next installment.

So when I sat down to see The Fantastic Four: First Steps, my expectations were somewhere beneath the Earth's crust. Every Fantastic Four movie up to now has been garbage. The 2005 version? Bland. The 2015 version? Embarrassing. And that Roger Corman one from 1994? So bad it was buried in a cinematic graveyard and became a legend for how not to make a superhero movie.

And yet… somehow… this new one? This retro-futuristic, 60s-tinged, wildly entertaining, surprisingly funny, emotionally rich version of Fantastic Four? It works. In fact, it's terrific. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I enjoyed the hell out of this movie. And I don't even like these kinds of movies.

Credit where it's due: director Matt Shakman, yes, the guy who cut his teeth on It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and WandaVision, makes his big-screen debut with style, flair, and a refreshing lack of pretension.

He wisely skips the tired origin story setup we've seen a hundred times, instead dropping us into a vibrant, alternate-universe New York (Earth-828) where the Fantastic Four are already household names.

They're heroes. They're media darlings. They're symbols of peace and progress. They even have a robot sidekick named H.E.R.B.I.E., voiced by Matthew Wood, and honestly, I'd watch a spin-off starring just him.

The film opens with an old-school, vintage-style ABC special hosted by a hilariously square Mark Gatiss, think The Wonderful World of Disney meets NASA Live. It's clever, fast-paced, and tells you everything you need to know about how Reed Richards and crew got their powers, all in 10 minutes flat. More comic book movies should be this efficient.

Pedro Pascal plays Reed Richards, aka Mr. Fantastic, and he brings warmth, intelligence, and a little bit of that haunted dad energy that's made him a household name. He's perfect.

Vanessa Kirby is Sue Storm, pregnant, powerful, and poised. She brings depth to a role that's often been reduced to "hot blonde who turns invisible." Their chemistry is believable and grounded.

Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things) plays Johnny Storm as a cocky attention-seeker with a good heart, imagine if Human Torch had a touch of social media self-awareness.

Ebon Moss-Bachrach (The Bear) is The Thing, and like always, he crushes it. His gravel-voiced, orange-brick-skinned Ben Grimm is both funny and tragic, rendered beautifully with some of the best CGI I've seen in years.

Visually, this film is a knockout. Think The Jetsons meets Mad Men by way of Jack Kirby. Production designer Kasra Farahani and costume designer Alexandra Byrne create a world that feels plucked from a 1960s comic book ad, complete with glowing tubes, flying cars, and 7-Up product placement that somehow feels appropriate.

The score by Michael Giacchino is bold, brassy, and pure comic-book joy, another reminder that music in these films doesn't have to sound like wallpaper.

Shakman sets this whole movie in a gleaming alt-New York with no strife, no division, no cynicism… until, of course, the Silver Surfer shows up.

Julia Garner shows up as Shalla-Bal, the Silver Surfer. She's mysterious, sleek, almost spectral, riding her cosmic board into Times Square like a celestial ghost. And when she warns that Galactus (played with booming, towering menace by Ralph Ineson) is coming to devour the Earth, the Fantastic Four have to take to space and investigate.

No giant smoke cloud here. This Galactus is faithful to the comics: giant dark armor, planet-sized presence, and a delivery like a cosmic Shakespearean doom machine. And yes, he wants to eat Earth. Unless... the team gives him the unborn child of Reed and Sue.

Yes, that's the moral dilemma. And it's not just lip service, there's tension here. The world freaks out. Diplomats debate. Civilians panic. There's even a swipe at the media's role in spinning the story.

But ultimately, Reed and Sue refuse to hand over their kid (thankfully), and the world has to trust the Four again. These moments actually carry weight, which is something I can't say about most Marvel movies.

This movie tackles a lot without ever feeling bloated. It's about family. About legacy. About the way society turns heroes into commodities and saviors into scapegoats.

Sue's pregnancy isn't just a plot point. It's the emotional core. The decisions she and Reed face are grounded in love, fear, and hope, not just comic-book melodrama.

And yet, the film never gets too heavy. It zips along, with sharp editing, kinetic setpieces, and the best use of special effects in a Marvel movie since Infinity War.

Paul Walter Hauser steals every scene as Mole Man, and there's even a moment late in the film where you genuinely think a major character might die. There are sacrifices. There are consequences. For once, it's not all just CGI fluff.

I walked into this movie expecting a trainwreck. What I got was one of the most refreshing, visually inventive, and emotionally satisfying comic book movies I've seen in years. It's smart, funny, action-packed, and, here's the shocker: original.

Yes, there are obligatory teases for the next Avengers movie and hints of Doctor Doom in the post-credits scene, but for once, those moments don't define the film. They don't overwhelm it. This is a self-contained, well-told story. Imagine that.

The Fantastic Four: First Steps isn't just a solid entry into the MCU. It's the first Fantastic Four movie to actually get it right. It might be the best comic book movie of the year. And for someone like me who doesn't care about these universes, that's saying a hell of a lot. Surprising. Satisfying. Fantastic. - ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

2) OH, HI!

You know the feeling when a movie hits you with an opening that actually works, gives you hope, maybe even charms you a little, and then spends the rest of its runtime slowly unraveling every ounce of goodwill it earned?

That's Oh, Hi!, a hipster indie rom-com that wants to be edgy and sweet and insightful and dark and satirical and emotional... and ends up being a mess of all those things in a 100-minute bottle of indie-movie confusion.

It's a film that wears its hipster identity like a thrifted jean jacket covered in ironic patches: it knows it's a Sundance darling. It knows it's clever. It's proudly mumblecore 2.0, and not in the good way. We're talking handcrafted, micro-budget, Wes-Anderson-meets-Girls-by-way-of-Aubrey-Plaza indie cinema.

And while that might be a positive for some audiences, for me, it was frustrating, because underneath all the self-conscious quirk, there's a really good short film in here, begging to be let out.

Iris (Molly Gordon) and Isaac (Logan Lerman) head off on a weekend road trip to a remote rental in the woods. They're in that early, not-quite-defined relationship stage, the "Are we something?" purgatory. Things get steamy. Some consensual light bondage happens. And then, while he's still chained to the bed, Isaac casually mentions he's not looking for anything serious.

Iris doesn't take that well.

She leaves him cuffed. Overnight. Then for the next 12 hours. She brings in her best friend, Max (Geraldine Viswanathan), and Max's boyfriend, Kenny (John Reynolds), and that's when things really go off the rails.

The group decides they're essentially guilty of kidnapping, so they turn to a "witch's memory-erasure brew" to fix the situation. Isaac drinks it. There's a naked ritual. It appears to work... until it doesn't.

Cue many more unnecessary complications, misunderstandings, flashbacks, and a little bit of poorly edited car action. That's right, this thing starts like a dark Before Sunrise and ends somewhere between Misery, Strange Darling, and a high school improv sketch.

If this sounds stylistically a bit like Sorry, Baby (another recent indie that wandered off a mumblecore cliff), you're not wrong. Oh, Hi! fits squarely into the genre that made its mark in the late '90s and early 2000s: small casts, talky scripts, low budgets, character-driven awkwardness.

The difference is, the original mumblecore films knew their limitations. This one throws in memory-erasing potions, witchcraft rituals, and bad parental advice as if it were a Netflix genre mashup.

Some moments work. The early scenes between Iris and Isaac—just the two of them, emotionally misfiring, testing the edges of their not-relationship—feel real.

Logan Lerman, who's been a solid actor since his Percy Jackson days and was terrific in The Perks of Being a Wallflower, brings charm and vulnerability to Isaac.

Molly Gordon (also a co-writer here), a mumblecore veteran herself (Shiva Baby, Theater Camp, The Bear, You People), is compelling and funny, and nails that jittery, confused energy of someone who thinks they've been promised more than they've received.

Together, they have chemistry. They click. The scenes where it's just the two of them, talking, flirting, and unraveling emotionally, work best. And that's what makes the rest of the film so frustrating.

Because once Max and Kenny show up, the movie pivots hard into wacky indie sitcom territory. The tension dissolves into weird magic recipes, half-baked comic relief, and plot turns that feel like they wandered in from a different movie.

Geraldine Viswanathan and John Reynolds are talented, no doubt. She was sharp in Blockers and Bad Education. He's like the younger, Brooklyn-dwelling Jason Segel. But their characters feel like distractions. Their presence derails the emotional core.

And then there's "Islands in the Stream."

Look, I don't know what memo went out to filmmakers this year, but "Islands in the Stream," the aggressively corny Dolly Parton/Kenny Rogers duet, is now everywhere.

It shows up three times in this movie, prominently. It was also in You're Cordially Invited, another 2025 comedy. Coincidence? Geraldine Viswanathan was in that movie, too. Maybe she travels with a playlist. Either way, please… stop.

The good:

• The opening act is strong. Gordon and Lerman have chemistry. There's a real conversation here about miscommunication in modern relationships.

• The emotional ambiguity is interesting. Is Iris unhinged or just hurt? Is Isaac a jerk or just emotionally honest? These are fascinating questions, the kind that lead to actual post-film conversations.

• David Cross has a weird, semi-amusing cameo as a neighbor who exists for no reason other than to be... well, David Cross. But he's always welcome.

The bad:

• The tonal shift. Once the friends arrive, the film becomes a confused stew of dark comedy, failed thriller, magical realism, and rom-com satire. It doesn't work.

• The pacing. At just over 100 minutes, it feels like 130. This story could've easily been told in 40 minutes. Or better yet, as a two-character stage play.

• The ending. It's unsatisfying. All the ideas—about consent, communication, relationship expectations—fizzle into a non-committal shrug.

Oh, Hi! wants to be a quirky, darkly funny exploration of intimacy and emotional expectation. And in its best moments, it almost gets there.

But it can't decide what kind of movie it wants to be. It tries to be funny, tense, thoughtful, and magical all at once, and it ends up watering down every genre it touches.

That said, the performances are solid. Lerman and Gordon are compelling leads. There are scenes, isolated, thoughtful scenes, that do land.

And for couples watching together, it may spark some real-world "So who was right?" debates afterward. That's something.

But overall? It's another too-cool-for-itself hipster indie that overreaches. Not a disaster, but not one I'll revisit either. And if I never hear "Islands in the Stream" again, it'll be too soon. - ⭐️⭐️

3) THE HOME

The Home is a dumb horror movie. It's also a lazy mystery, a half-baked psychological thriller, and a deeply idiotic conspiracy flick, all wrapped up in a smattering of shock cuts, cheap jump scares, gooey gore, and nightmare sequences so frequent they feel like filler for a movie that has absolutely no idea what it's doing.

And yet…

The last 10 minutes of The Home? Glorious. Batshit. Insane. Blood-soaked horror fan payoff that almost justifies the rest of the movie's mediocrity. Almost.

But let's rewind.

Pete Davidson is Max, a brooding ex-foster kid with a criminal record, an art hobby, and the hoodie of someone who just wandered in from his own stand-up set.

After some vague brushes with the law and a conveniently caring foster father, Max ends up doing community service as the sole janitor at a suspiciously massive retirement home.

The guy mops exactly one stain throughout the entire film and spends the rest of his time staring confused at "creepy, old people" and poking around the dreaded, forbidden fourth floor.

Up there? Well, let's just say the residents are receiving special care, which is horror movie speak for "weird experiments, missing body parts, and people screaming behind locked doors."

As Max sneaks around and starts planting cameras (yes, there's a full-on spy center in his room at one point), he uncovers a conspiracy involving the facility staff, some gnarly medical torture, and, surprise, a personal connection to his own traumatic past and missing brother.

It's part Shutter Island, part Saw, and part Scooby-Doo, but dumber than all of the above.

Davidson, a fine ex-cast member of SNL, has carved out a solid career in comedy films (The King of Staten Island, Dumb Money, Big Time Adolescence), is a bizarre choice for the lead in a horror-mystery-conspiracy movie about elder abuse and scientific torture.

And for the first 75 minutes, he's barely present. Literally. He walks through scenes like a guy trying to find the craft services table. Hood up. Eyes glazed. Zero engagement.

For most of the runtime, he looks and acts like he doesn't know why he's in the movie. And that's because he probably didn't, until he read the last few pages of the script. More on that in a minute.

James DeMonaco, the writer-director behind The Purge films (which, let's face it, are about as subtle as a sledgehammer to the skull), co-writes and directs here with the same lack of grace or nuance.

He's the kind of filmmaker who thinks loud = scary, quick cuts = suspense, and dripping blood = character development. Every other scene is a sweaty Pete Davidson waking from another nightmare (you'll lose count after the sixth one), intercut with extreme close-ups of eyeballs, fingernails tearing off, needles in flesh, and blood pouring out of mouths, ears, and other assorted orifices.

It's horror-by-template. Nothing original. Nothing atmospheric. Just gore and sound design turned up to 11. It's numbing, not scary.

Oh, and in case you're wondering why Davidson's even in this thing? It's a Staten Island connection. He and DeMonaco are hometown pals, introduced by a mutual friend who owns a restaurant. They've been writing scripts together. Staten Island loyalty runs deep, apparently, even if it runs right into cinematic mediocrity.

We've seen a wave of horror films recently that exploit fear of the elderly, dementia, and assisted living homes: The Taking of Deborah Logan, The Manor, The Rule of Jenny Pen, and even another movie also called The Home (a Swedish one).

It's a trend that's growing more tired by the minute, and The Home adds nothing fresh. In fact, it doubles down on some pretty gross exploitation of both aging bodies and foster children. Every fear, every stereotype, cranked up for shock value. Not great.

Veteran character actor John Glover shows up, one of the few bright spots here. He's been brilliant as a delicious villain in 52 Pick-Up and Gremlins 2, and he does what he can with a role that may or may not involve sinister acting classes and vague trauma.

Bruce Altman is here too, playing the evil doctor in the most obvious, paint-by-numbers way imaginable. The whole thing plays like a SyFy Original Movie with a much better cast than it deserves.

Just when I was ready to write this one off entirely, bored, annoyed, and frustrated, The Home goes full bananas.

Suddenly, Davidson wakes up from his 32nd nightmare, grabs a weapon, and unleashes absolute chaos. Blood spurts. Heads roll. Arterial spray paints the walls. Max (Davidson) becomes a blood-soaked avenger, tearing through the facility like Ash from Evil Dead II on a vengeance bender.

It's gory. It's hilarious. It's over-the-top in a way the rest of the movie should've been. For 10 glorious minutes, The Home becomes the kind of grindhouse carnage fest that horror fans can cheer for. No subtlety. No pretense. Just full-blown slaughter-mayhem. Davidson finally shows up, and he's clearly having the time of his life.

It's not enough to save the movie, but it is enough to keep me from completely trashing it.

The Home is a lazy, predictable, jump-scare-heavy, derivative mess. The satire doesn't work, the performances are phoned in, and the direction is amateur hour. It's another strike for DeMonaco, whose filmography continues to look like a graveyard of wasted potential.

But those last 10 minutes? Oh man. For horror freaks, it's a total splatter-candy blast. You'll laugh, you'll cringe, and you might even rewind it just to see Pete Davidson carve up a few more heads. It's glorious nonsense, the kind of ridiculous bloodbath that belongs in a midnight screening lineup at a drive-in.

Too bad you have to suffer through an hour and fifteen minutes of hot garbage to get there. - ⭐️⭐️

4) HOUSE ON EDEN

House on Eden is a movie that's not only stuck in the past, it's stuck in a past that no one ever asked to revisit. It's the cinematic equivalent of someone pulling out their flip phone in 2025 and proudly announcing, "Let's make a movie!"

You could have told me this was a lost relic from 2009, forgotten in a dusty hard drive next to Grave Encounters and Paranormal Entity, and I would've believed you. In fact, this movie might've felt dated even then.

Clocking in at a merciful 77 minutes (which somehow still manages to feel like four hours), House on Eden is yet another cheap, lazy, uninspired entry in the already-overstuffed genre of found-footage paranormal horror.

You know the kind. A group of underqualified "ghost hunters" heads into an abandoned building with cameras, bad attitudes, and zero charisma, and what follows is shaky cam, loud noises, and cheap jump scares.

But this one, oh boy, takes it a step further. It barely qualifies as a movie. It feels more like a bad YouTube upload you'd scroll past on your way to watching people react to trailers or cook pasta blindfolded.

The plot, and I use that word generously, involves three paranormal investigators: Kris, Celina, and Jay. They're out on a case, filming the usual supernatural nonsense for whatever channel or audience is willing to watch, when they get rerouted to a spooky, abandoned house in the woods.

Supposedly by a malevolent force. Or maybe by GPS error. Who knows. The film doesn't care, and neither should you.

They get there. Equipment starts failing. Tempers flare. Shaky cams commence. And somewhere, a ghost goes, "Boo."

Kris Collins writes, directs, and stars in the film. Here's her bio... seriously:

"KallMeKris is the social media handle of Kristina Lee Halliwell Collins, a Canadian comedian and content creator. She's known for her short skits, reaction videos, and taste-testing segments. Before becoming a social media star, Collins worked as a hairdresser from home and on television sets."

That just about explains everything.

A good chunk of this 77-minute runtime is devoted to, get this, the characters struggling with their own cameras. That's right. The primary conflict for the majority of the movie is that the ghost-hunting equipment keeps breaking down. Instead of building tension, this movie builds frustration.

We get long, tedious scenes of batteries dying, microphones cutting out, and characters arguing about how to reboot something or whether the red light is blinking.

It's like watching the behind-the-scenes footage of a high school AV club, but without any of the charm or, you know, functioning tech.

This is the kind of movie that uses its own incompetence as a plot device. "Oh, the shots are out of focus?" Don't worry, it's part of the lore! "Why is the audio blowing out in the scariest part?" That's just the evil spirit interfering! It's the oldest low-budget horror trick in the book: when you don't have the skills, just write the shortcomings into the story.

Eventually, they get to the actual haunted house. There are a few fleeting moments that hint at something scary: a door slamming, a shadow darting across a hallway, a creepy sound in the distance. But nothing lands.

Every attempted scare is telegraphed from a mile away. Every creepy hallway leads to a whole lot of nothing. The movie finally shifts into horror mode about 60 minutes in, but by then, it's too little, too late.

And even then, the scares are cliché and uninspired. If you've seen The Blair Witch Project, and let's be honest, if you've ever stepped into a Spirit Halloween store, you probably have, then you've seen every idea this movie borrows and dilutes.

Blair Witch is still the gold standard for found footage horror: raw, immersive, terrifying. House on Eden is the dull, derivative shadow that reminds you how hard it is to do that kind of movie well.

Kris, Celina, and Jay, our trio of bland ghost chasers, are as interesting as a busted EMF reader. Their interactions are flat, their personalities nonexistent, and their dialogue sounds like it was improvised during a late-night Taco Bell run. There's zero chemistry, zero development, and zero reason to care what happens to any of them.

Listen, I've seen plenty of low-budget horror films that work (The Battery, Evil Dead, even Lake Mungo), but this isn't one of them. It's not about the money, it's about craft, and House on Eden has none.

The cinematography is muddy. The sound design is headache-inducing. The editing is sloppy. Even the basic blocking of scenes feels like it was done five minutes before shooting.

You'd think that a found footage movie in 2025 would come with some innovation. Maybe a new twist. A fresh take. Something. But no — this thing acts like nothing has changed since Paranormal Activity 2 limped into theaters 15 years ago.

Honestly, the most horrifying thing about House on Eden is the fact that it somehow got a theatrical release. This is the kind of movie that should be buried deep in the "horror" tab of your least-used streaming app, somewhere between "student film" and "footage accidentally uploaded from a trail cam."

It's derivative, incompetent, and dead on arrival. Nothing about it works — not the scares, not the characters, not the pacing, not the format. And even at just over an hour, it feels like a chore.

If you're looking for found footage done right, go rewatch Blair Witch. Or REC. Or Hell House LLC. Or even Cloverfield. Just steer clear of House on Eden. The only thing it's haunted by is the ghost of better movies.

Avoid it like a cursed VHS tape. - 1/2

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