Ryan Corr | Scott's Film Reviews-1,450 + Reviews posted!!! COMING SOON-MY NEW TOP 250 FILMS!!

Sting-2024

Director Kiah Roache-Turner

Starring Alyla Browne, Ryan Corr

Scott’s Review #1,436

Reviewed August 18, 2024

Grade: B-

Sting (2024) is a lightweight but suspenseful late-night horror flick. It takes a bit to get going, and at only one hour and thirty minutes, it’s too long for it to take off and have a satisfying effect.

The set designs are the best part as the wintery Brooklyn, New York atmosphere pairs well with the dingy and stuffy walk-up apartment complex where the action occurs, and a family lives.

The dusty rooms, creaking floors, and walls are well-done thanks to dim lighting and a secluded vibe. I bought it because the family lives this way, but it feels cozy, thanks to these trimmings.

As with most modern horror films, the plot makes little sense and is not plausible.

To compare Sting to other films, it plays like Arachnophobia (1990) with a dash of Alien (1979) thrown in, but it is inferior to those films because it lacks either the campy humor or the wonderful special effects.

The film is not scary but, at most, thrilling.

Sting reintroduces a spider as the protagonist with marginal success. The spider starts innocently but grows into a sinister carnivore with human beings as its desired menu item.

Events surround twelve-year-old Charlotte (Alyla Browne), who obtains a pet spider who becomes her pride and joy and whom she names Sting. Once she realizes that Sting plans to eat her entire family, Charlotte goes into protector mode and must fight for their survival.

Directed by Kiah Roache-Turner, an Australian director unknown to me, she uses Australian actors primarily.

Sting starts well with a scene involving an elderly tenant named Helga. She begins to hear noises in the walls and assumes they are rats, so she calls a local exterminator.

Helga has dementia, and the audience quickly realizes she has already called an exterminator but has forgotten. The investigating exterminator is snatched by an unknown force and dragged into the wall canals of the old building.

Then Roache-Turner takes us back to four days prior.

This point immediately made me invested in the film, especially when other characters are introduced, and we learn about Helga’s connection.

What’s going to happen in the next four days?

Unfortunately, Sting loses steam from this point, introducing marginally exciting characters. Charlotte, her overworked stepfather, Ethan (Ryan Corr), her clueless and frazzled mother, Heather (Penelope Mitchell), and her creepy German Aunt Gunter (Robyn Nevin).

Stock characters like a boozy Spanish neighbor, the weird Asian kid upstairs, and the comical black exterminator are included.

Hey, at least diversity was added.

The only likable character is Ethan. He struggles to connect with the bratty Charlotte through graphic novels and the demands put upon him by Heather’s family, who do not like him for some reason.

The poor guy serves as the building superintendent, works a day job, attempts to do creative work by night, and is a surrogate father. Sounds like a hero to me.

The family drama’s point only adds filler to the already slow-paced film and has nothing to do with the main event of Sting eating the family.

Charlotte is quite unlikeable, and I rooted for Sting to turn on her and make her its next victim. She mostly pouts and broods and has a sense of entitlement. I’m not sure why Roache-Turner made the character this way; she should have softened her.

Events do pick up towards the end, when a character is finally killed, and the others are accosted and put into webs, presumably to be dined on later.

This was anticlimactic since Charlotte is the character we are supposed to root for, and I hated her.

Predictably but also clever is how a perfect sequel setup occurs at the end. I’m not sure Sting is good enough to warrant a sequel, but box office receipts will determine this.

Sting (2024) is entertaining and fun, but it’s not much more. I’ve already started to forget about it.

Holding the Man-2015

Director Neil Armfield

Starring Ryan Corr, Craig Stott

Scott’s Review #612

Reviewed January 24, 2016

Grade: B+

Holding the Man (2015) is a brave love story centering on two young men and spanning fifteen years as the men begin as high school sweethearts and progress into adulthood and sadly both contract AIDS.

This is a pivotal aspect of the film as it is set during the 1970s and 1980s- a time when this disease was dreadful and more or less a death sentence.

The film is tender and poignant, but despite these characteristics, I felt something with more vigor was missing. I did not have the exact emotional reaction I thought I might have.

The film is set in Australia and adapted from a 1995 memoir of the same name.

The action begins in 1976 as we meet Tim and John, both high school students. They are from opposite social groups, Tim a theater student, and John captain of his soccer team.

Surprisingly, they connect romantically as Tim asks John out on a date.

The pair receive little hassle and are quite open with their relationship. Certainly, they face a bit of opposition from officials at the school, but this is not the main aspect that the film goes for.

Instead, the main problems come from John’s family- specifically, his father, but this is played safely. Tim’s family is much more accepting.

Over the next fifteen years, the couple encounters death directly when they are simultaneously told they have acquired HIV.

The film is mostly told chronologically but goes back and forth at times. Specifically, we are reminded of John’s youthful good looks in flashbacks, when he is close to death, bald and sickly looking.

The main point is the men’s enduring love for each other, which is a nice message.

Otherwise, the film (2015 and long since the AIDS plague), goes for a reminder of how harsh those times were for gay men, though there is a softness to the film that I felt instead of the brutal reality.

The actors playing John and Tim (Craig Stott and Ryan Corr, respectively) have decent chemistry, but this may have been stronger than my perception was, and the reason I did not feel emotionally invested in the film.

The film was nice and sweet-the romance part, but when one of the men succumbs to AIDS I should have been a puddle of tears and I just wasn’t.

I did enjoy how the film does not focus too much on the opposition by John’s father (Anthony LaPaglia). He would wish his son’s sexuality differently but is more concerned with how his son’s relationship with a male looks to Dad’s friends and neighbors.

The deeper story was the love between the men who knew no barriers.

It was nice to see Geoffrey Rush and Guy Pearce in supporting turns as a drama teacher (Rush) and as Tim’s father, Dick (Pearce). Both do well with limited roles and I adore how the film portrays Dick as a supportive father- even dancing a slow dance with his son at a wedding- free of embarrassment.

Also notable is the sweet ending where a photo of the real Tim and John is shown during a narrative from an interview with the real Tim before his death.

Holding the Man (2015) is a nice film, but does not have the power that other LGBT films in recent decades had. Brokeback Mountain (2006) immediately comes to mind as a similar film, but one that was more emotional and engaged me much more.

An honest effort, though.