BENEDETTA — CANNES 2021

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Daring, and bristling with bold artistic license, this social satire burns at the stake.

It's dizzying.

Virginie Efira is electric as Benedetta, a 17th century lesbian nun living in a convent in Renaissance Italy.

Fearless.

Catherine Deneuve's baton has successfully been passed down.

Based on Judith C. Brown's book "Immodest Acts: The Life of a Lesbian Nun in Renaissance Italy," "Benedetta" juggles religion, politics, and sexual identity like so many electrons in a social atom attempting to split.

Holy fucking hell.

Paul Verhoeven's cinematic mastery just gets sharper with age.

This is a high-wire act that not many seasoned filmmakers would attempt, lest they fall flat on their blushing faces.

Long live Paul Verhoeven.

No prisoners taken. Many gifts given.

Not Rated. 131 mins.

THE KING OF MARVIN GARDENS — THE CRITERION COLLECTION

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Co-writer/director Bob Rafelson's satirical take on the pathetic state of the American psyche (post Viet Nam) finds its level in the faded glory of Atlantic City.

The brotherly bond between Bruce Dern's conman Jason and Jack Nicholson's radio storyteller David, gets filtered through bi-polar prostitute Sally (Ellen Burstyn) and similarly employed step-daughter Jessica (Julia Anne Robinson).

Atlantic City enjoys a last gasp of now long-ago-destroyed grand hotel casinos.

The nagging demands of capitalism chew and gnaw at the underpinnings of Rafelson's flawed characters.

No apologies are made.

Surreal elements punctuate the drama created by characters doomed to misunderstand one another, and the social pressures they suffer. 

Rated R. 103 mins. 

OZARK: SEASON 4

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This best-loved satirical soap opera takes aim at the Sackler family's Big Pharma crimes that have killed hundreds of thousands of American citizens. Smack!

Providing audiences a crash course in money laundering, with the help of local politicians, Mexican drug cartels and the FBI, is icing on the dramatic cake.

Laura Linney and Jason Bateman are in fine form, as are every single other actor cast in this insanely bingeable series.

The humor is pitch black; it is a black comedy after all.

Watching "Ozark" with the mindset of watching a soap opera opens the whole thing up. Genre and context.

Bon appétit moi petites.