Tag: robert-pattinson

The Drama (2026)

  • Director: Kristoffer Borgli
  • Screenplay: Kristoffer Borgli
  • Cast: Zendaya, Robert Pattinson, Alana Haim, Mamoudou Athie
  • Cinematography: Arseni Khachaturan
  • Editing: Joshua Raymond Lee, Kristoffer Borgli
  • Score: Daniel Pemberton
  • Genre: Romantic black comedy
  • Runtime: 105 minutes

What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?

For me, it would be neglecting this blog for a hot minute. I was catching some z’s. I digress.

A chance sighting of their wedding DJ smoking heroin on the street results in soon-to-be-wed couple Emma and Charlie (Zendaya and Robert Pattinson, respectively) discussing where to draw the line when it comes to a person’s most shameful wrongdoing. At what point does the unacceptable become the unforgivable?

This conversation isn’t in the privacy of their bedroom either. With their friends across the table goading them and with alcohol rendering them vulnerable, the couple divulge their deepest and darkest deed. Whereas Charlie cyberbullied a classmate when he was younger (quickly dismissed as teenage tomfoolery), Emma’s confession leaves the group reeling. She quite literally spills her guts, her long-buried secret uncomfortably dredged up for an airing.

I won’t reveal what she says. I (somehow) managed to go in blind, avoiding the slightest whisper of a spoiler on X. It sure is dark though. Bear in mind it’s a comedy, one so jet-black, and the humour is intentional.

This truth bomb obliterates any idea of blissful matrimony the pair had prior. Emma pushes it further down; she’s evolved as a person and doesn’t need pseudo-therapy from her partner. Is Charlie’s love for Emma so strong it can surmount this revelation? He spirals downwards. It’s not even his burden to share but the fallout from it causes him to question everything he thought he knew about his potential bride.

Both giving excellent performance, the duo uplift this risky hot-button issue dramedy into something more thought-provoking. With my lips sealed as per the subject matter, I will say this: ‘The Drama‘ is artfully shot.

My rating: 8 / 10

Mickey 17 (2025)

  • Director: Bong Joon Ho
  • Screenplay: Bong Joon Ho
  • Cast: Robert Pattinson, Naomi Ackie, Steven Yeun, Toni Collette, Mark Ruffalo
  • Cinematography: Darius Khondji
  • Editing: Yang Jin-mo
  • Score: Jung Jae-il
  • Genre: Science fiction black comedy
  • Runtime: 137 minutes

‘Oh Mickey, you’re so fine.

You’re so fine, you keep on dyin’.

Hey Mickey, hey Mickey.’

Which Mickey though? Mickey Barnes’ luck has run out on Planet Earth and with no options left, gets recruited to work as an ‘expendable’ in a colonising space mission. With all his memories and personality quirks intact (saved in a high-tech brick), Mickey’s body is merely a tool; used until no longer deemed necessary (upon the point of death), incinerated in a furnace, then printed out by a cloning device ad infinitum. He’s stabbed, gassed, poisoned, used as a guinea pig to manufacture an antidote – you name it. ‘What does it feel like to die?’, pretty much everyone asks him.

With moments of black humour, Bong Joon Ho’s epic science fiction fable (his first feature since ‘Parasite‘) muses on mortality – removing the idea of finality of life makes these expendables (or ‘print jobs’) less human, more akin to recyclable cattle. Mickey is told he’s special when he’s freshly printed but his existence is meaningless and he’s consigned to gruelling labour and eating bland food – what’s so special about it?

In fact, he suffers an accident during an assignment on the icy world Nilfheim and scientists have already generated the next iteration before the previous one has been declared dead, leading to a case of ‘multiples’. They’re not twins, they are the same person in two corporeal forms. As if he’s looking in a mirror.

Robert Pattinson is great in the dual role of Mickeys 17 and 18. The entire cast delivers strong performances; Naomi Ackie as a ballsy security officer (and Mickey’s love interest), Mark Ruffalo as the egotistical head of the colony and Toni Collette as his Lady Macbeth-style wife with an obsession with sauce. The second half delves into the political side of the expedition, with Ruffalo’s character taking centre stage, a little too reminiscent of a certain president. Gorgeously shot throughout, there may be multiple Mickeys, but there’s only one Bong Joon Ho.

My rating: 9 / 10