
Freeze Frame
Freeze Frame: "Mayday" (PG-13), "Virginia Woolf's Night and Day" (PG-13), "The Sun Never Sets" (Not rated), "The Runner" (PG-13)
In the Apple TV action comedy "Mayday," Ryan Reynolds plays a Navy pilot shot down in Soviet territory during the Cold War. An ex-KGB agent and America-lover, played by Kenneth Branaugh, works to help Ryan avoid certain death and escape the country. “Mayday” is mindless and silly but is a lively and amusing buddy flick bolstered by its charismatic stars. Virginia Woolf wrote her 1919 novel, "Night and Day" while recovering from a nervous breakdown. She despondently described the book as "flat" and a "complete failure." The new cinematic version, "Virginia Woolf's Night and Day," isn't a complete failure, but it is a bit flat. Haley Bennett is fine as a young Victorian woman who wants to be an astronomer at a time when women aren't allowed advanced education. “Virginia Woolf’s Night and Day” is well-meaning, well-produced…and a little dull. Fine performances by Dakota Fanning and Jake Johnson help elevate the low-key love triangle "The Sun Never Sets." It’s from cult mumblecore filmmaker Joe Swanberg. A loving couple decides to take a brief break in their relationship, but things get complicated when an ex-boyfriend shows up. You may be compelled to yell, "Hey, get a counselor," but “The Sun Never Sets” is a thoughtful comic drama that avoids most romantic drama cliches. The Amazon Prime action thriller "The Runner" is not to be confused with the action thriller "Runner" that opens in theaters next Friday. In "The Runner," Gal Gadot plays a lawyer who, while on a morning run, learns her son has been kidnapped and she’s blackmailed into killing a witness in a murder trial. Gadot gives it her all in a cliched and overly familiar potboiler.


