“Rust,” a disappointingly slow, brooding, hyper-stylized Western released in theatres last Friday.

Set in late 19th-century Wyoming, the film follows the story of Lucas Hollister, a young orphan charged with the murder of a rancher looking to take his inheritance away from him.

Lucas’ grandfather, Harland Rust, a grizzled outlaw who almost exclusively speaks in cliche tough guy catchphrases, comes to break him out of jail so he can escape to Mexico and evade the law.

The two break for the border as a U.S. Marshal and a cartoonishly evil bounty hunter chase them all the way down to El Paso.

Harland Rust is played by Alec Baldwin, who maintained a constipated facial expression throughout the entire film. In case you forget his character’s name, it gets repeated at least thirty times during its entire runtime.

While the film’s stylized cinematography is very well done and does a fantastic job of showcasing the natural beauty of the surrounding nature, half of the scenes are just wide-angle landscape shots of men on horseback. Much of the action is shot in close-ups with a lot of cutting, so fans of classic Wild West shootout scenes will be very disappointed at the cold and drab action of “Rust.”

Production on “Rust” was delayed for over a year when a prop gun accidentally fired, killing cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. An in memoriam section of the credits honors Hutchins and her role in the film.

Baldwin, who was holding the gun when it went off, talked about the experience and his subsequent legal battles in the trailer for his new hit reality TV series, “The Baldwins.”

Ultimately, “Rust” is an uninteresting genre film that honors the themes and tropes of Westerns without bringing anything new or unique to the table. If it were not for the controversy surrounding the on-set shooting that occurred during production, I doubt anyone would be interested in seeing it.

“No More Turning Away,” a photography exhibit documenting homelessness in the Twin Cities, opened Friday at the Kenwood Burroughs Art gallery in downtown Minneapolis.

Photographer David Fallon said he spent months documenting life on the streets around the Twin Cities for the exhibition. Fallon said his experience of being homeless in the past inspired his work and dedication to shining a light on marginalized communities. 

“I could say I’ve been working on no more, turning away for three months, but in reality, I think I’ve been working on it for 30 years, trying to find an answer to a question that I didn’t even know was a question,” he said. 

Fallon hopes visitors will question and reevaluate the way they see homelessness and the homeless. He said that too often, people see homelessness as the consequence of substance abuse or poor decision-making, not as a sign of pre-existing mental health issues.

“The point of ‘No More Turning Away’ and the title is really to challenge people not to turn away, and by capturing these really striking and oftentimes painful images of the stark realities of homelessness,” Fallon said. “You’re really forcing people to engage in something they’re not comfortable engaging in.”

A former advertising agent, Fallon said he took up art full-time around 10 years ago at the suggestion of a therapist who helped him when he was homeless. He took up photography in 2020, inspired by his journalist mother and the chaos that erupted in the Twin Cities following the death of George Floyd. 

Creating positive change through art is Fallon’s biggest inspiration. He said, “No More Turning Away,” and his other series is his way of giving back.

“A lot of the guys that I spent time on the street with didn’t make it out alive. They didn’t make it off the street alive. So this, to me, is as much a responsibility as anything else,” he said. “I have had a lot of opportunity, a lot of talent, a lot of gifts growing up, and nothing’s free, right? This is how I pay my debt to the social contract.” 

Fallon said keeping a positive attitude was difficult after spending months on the streets photographing homelessness because of how dire the conditions he saw were, but he maintains hope that change will come. 

He said he was coming home on the Green Line one night when he saw a group of teenagers bring a presumably stolen shopping cart full of food and water onto the train and give it out to the homeless passengers onboard.

“I’m thinking these three kids took the risk to steal that just to bring it on the train, because they know who’s here and where the people that need help are,” Fallon said. “I’m sitting there on the train with tears just streaming down my face, not making any sound. And I was like, ‘This is as far as we’ve gotten in America.’ It was a hard thing to watch, but it was really reassuring that there are people like that that still exist in this country.”

The exhibition is a fundraiser for People Incorporated, a non-profit mental health services. Fallon will be holding an artist talk at Kenwood Burroughs on May 31 to close the exhibition.

Saturday was this year’s annual Spring Jam, the University of Minnesota’s end-of-year celebration concert in a parking lot behind Ridder Arena.

Spring Jam had one main stage with eight acts performing, five battle of the bands finalists — Tin Whiskers, Homunculus Rex, Clean Plate Club, Honey Tree and Virgo — and three headliners including Beach Weather, Dizzy Fae and Mad Tsai. It also featured several fairground attractions like carnival games, caricatures, a Ferris wheel and other rides. 

Gates opened at 4 p.m., a half-hour before alternative rock band Tin Whiskers took the stage and kicked off the show. Their soft indie rock with noisy guitars and slow, swinging drums quickly picked up into a more frantic, heavier sound, culminating in a cover of Limp Bizkit’s “Break Stuff” where the band members switched instruments with one another. 

They were followed up by fellow student band Homunculus Rex, another four-piece rock band. Homunculus Rex delivered a set of jazzy, prog-inspired math rock full of breakdowns and pickup-switching, keeping the crowd going as the battle of the bands was underway.

Eight-piece funk band Clean Plate Club delivered a short break from alternative rock, and their dancefloor-inspired setlist opened with a cover of Bruno Mars’ “Locked Out of Heaven.” The band featured a three-man horn section and a keyboardist, adding several layers of texture to their sound.

Indie rock band Honey Tree followed them up with their heavy, yet moody songs, using distorted guitars and basses to contextualize the emotions of their lyrics. Their set was a welcome transition back into the noisy, chaotic sound of alternative rock. 

The Battle of Bands ended with a set by the three-piece band Virgo, an alternative rock band with a more frantic, punk-inspired sound. Thanks to their energetic set, with hard-hitting riffs and drums, they ended the Battle of the Bands victoriously. 

While the student bands rocked the festival’s only stage, most of the attendees this year seemed more concerned with the vendors than the shows themselves. It looked like there were more people in line to buy permanent jewelry and airbrush t-shirts than in the crowd for the concerts.

Hungry guests could eat barbecue, elotes, gyros, egg rolls and ice cream at the food trucks parked in a corner of Lot 37. Bored guests could play Fortnite at a gaming truck parked between the entrance and a Monster Energy tent full of salespeople competing with nearby Red Bull vendors to caffeinate the student body.

I enjoyed watching the battle of the bands, but otherwise, Spring Jam was underwhelming despite the good weather.

“Sinners,” a wild, yet engaging take on supernatural horror directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Michael B Jordan, came out last Friday.

A historical fiction about Jim Crow, blues music, Christianity and vampires, “Sinners” is a historical horror, set in Clarksdale, Miss., during the Great Depression. The movie tells the story of a young sharecropper named Preacher Boy with dreams of being a blues musician.

Preacher Boy, played by Miles Caton, is enlisted to play for his twin cousins, Smoke and Stack, both played by Michael B. Jordan, at their club opening. During the first act, the three go around Clarksdale gathering people to help with the club opening, introducing the ensemble cast.

As opening night gets underway, Preacher Boy’s guitar playing attracts a small group of vampires who become hellbent on drinking the blood of everyone in attendance. After a vampire is let into the club, it attacks and all hell breaks loose.

The club-goers spend the night fending off a swarm of singing vampires who cannot enter the club without an invitation. Slowly, the vampires begin to pick off the survivors who struggle to defend themselves against the horde of undead bloodsuckers. 

“Sinners” incorporates several creative filmmaking elements to set the tone for its scenes, like when the aspect ratio changes partway through the film. 

The contrast between the more realistic scenes of everyday life in the South and supernatural sequences transcends the film beyond its narrative and touches on deeper subjects such as cultural homogeneity and proselytization.  

The film’s amazing design features a ton of incredible blues guitar playing to punctuate its sequences. As the film progresses, the soundtrack deviates from delta blues to rock and dance music. 

One important scene in particular shows Preacher Boy playing the blues as the crowd suddenly begins to disperse, as musicians from the past and future of Black music enter to play alongside him. A West African griot playing a drum and a man in a Funkadelic-esque disco-inspired costume shredding an electric guitar both play with Preacher Boy as other characters, like rappers, DJs and traditional Chinese dancers come in. 

“Sinners” is a refreshing break from the relentless onslaught of slasher remakes and jumpscare horror films polluting the box office. Through its incredible directing and acting, the story of “Sinners” will resonate with anyone, no matter how unfamiliar they are with its premise.

The St. Paul Art Crawl, a multiple-weekend public art festival organized by the St. Paul Art Collective, starts April 25 and goes until May 11.

Each weekend, a different St. Paul gallery, restaurant, venue or other participating location will host showcases of local art. More than 42 venues across St. Paul are participating in the event, up from 30 last year, according to SPAC Executive Director Mariusz Kujawski. 

This year’s art crawl will feature a variety of exhibitions, workshops, food trucks, live music and art markets.

Melissa Critchley, an artist at F-O-K Studios, said more than a thousand people have come through to see the work on display in past years. This year, 30 artists in F-O-K’s six-story building will open their studios to the public, accompanied by food trucks and performance art throughout the weekend. 

“It’s always a big bash at our building,” Critchley said. 

The first weekend is in St. Paul’s Lowertown, Westside and West 7th neighborhoods. Kujawski said the art crawl began in Lowertown in 1991.

As the event grew and artists began to open galleries in other parts of the city, the art crawl grew as well. This year’s edition will cover the whole city of St. Paul and the city’s east and northwest sides will host the second and third weekends, respectively. 

“It’s amazing how the artists come together,” Kujawski said.

Since making membership free in January, SPAC has nearly doubled in size, Kujawski said. Having more members makes it easier to get sponsors and partners for programming and events like the art crawl, he said.

32 non-profit organizations are participating in this year’s crawl, up from eight last year. Kujawski said those partnerships have helped SPAC recoup the costs of cutting membership fees, so artists no longer need to worry about the financial burden of participating in crawl.

“Everyone’s a little more relaxed this year,” Kujawski said. 

Metro Transit is offering free bus passes for the art crawl on April 26 and 27. More information can be found on the St. Paul Art Crawl website.

“A Minecraft Movie” is a 100-minute catastrophe with an incoherent plot, an awful script and almost no character development consisting mostly of Jack Black saying things from the game in a funny voice. 

The movie, released April 4, follows a forgettable cast of characters who find themselves trapped in the Minecraft world, called the “overworld,” and need to escape back to reality. Much of the story is rushed over in favor of action sequences or comedic bits, and many scenes felt so unconnected, it was almost like watching a series of random scenes rather than a continuous story. 

The film leans heavily on nostalgia for turn-of-the-century adventure blockbusters like “Jumanji” and “Back to the Future” with its retro-styled opening credit graphics. Unlike those yesteryear classics, “A Minecraft Movie” hilariously fails to be interesting in any way, instead relying solely on childish humor to tell its story. 

And yet, I enjoyed every second of it.

Jack Black plays Steve, the game and movie’s main character, but really, he just plays himself. Every line that comes out of his mouth was uttered in Black’s over-the-top and operatic delivery. 

At one point, he literally says, “Let’s minecraft.”

There are even several musical segments where Black sings in a very theatrical falsetto, parodying the high-pitched vocalists of heavy metal bands like Iron Maiden, a staple of pretty much every movie Jack Black is in.

Another one of the main characters is a flamboyant manchild, Garrett Garrison, played by Jason Momoa. Momoa and Black have great on-screen chemistry, their shared sense of humor made even funnier by the contrast between Momoa’s imposing size and tough-guy appearance and Black’s wild eyes and dad-bod. 

Unfortunately, the rest of the main characters were not given the same depth or even the screen time that Steve and Garrett had. Sebastian Hansen and Emma Myers gave great performances as siblings Henry and Natalie, but their characters were so annoying and uninteresting that they came across more as human macguffins than as actual characters to care about. 

Dawn, played by Danielle Brooks, was given a colorful outfit and featured heavily in comedic sequences, like Black and Momoa’s characters, but no backstory or development other than a brief introduction. Her character felt severely underutilized, especially given how much screen time she was given.

There was also a subplot between Jennifer Coolidge’s character and a villager from the Minecraft world, which was shown in full but had no consequence on the outcome of the film at all. While funny in its own right, the uncomfortable side story felt very unnecessary.

Despite being a bad movie, “A Minecraft Movie” has been a smash hit, raking in over half a billion dollars at the box office since its release. The film was guaranteed to find success because Minecraft is one of the best-selling video games ever, and this was its first ever live-action film adaptation. 

Before it even came out, clips of its horrible dialogue went viral and people began memeing the film without having seen it. The movie itself became a joke, and its popularity skyrocketed from that virality. 

At the screening I attended on opening day, several audience members were quoting the film during the trailers. People clapped and cheered whenever funny moments came up, especially during the infamous chicken jockey scene. 

Like almost all other video game adaptations, “A Minecraft Movie” was clearly made to capitalize on the popularity of the video game, not to create an artistic statement through visual storytelling. Its massive budget and A-list actors were not enough to save it from its fate of being another so-bad-it’s-good video game movie like “Mortal Kombat” or “Resident Evil.” 

Anyone seeking to watch a movie with a memorable plot, interesting characters or a unique setting should steer away from this film. But, if you are like me and will laugh at anything, this cinematic abomination is perfect for you.

Comedian Sam Morril is performing at the Pantages Theatre in downtown Minneapolis on Friday, April 18.

The New York native’s fifth special, “You’ve Changed,” came out on Amazon Prime last year. In an interview with the Minnesota Daily, Morril talked about the Karl Anthony-Towns and Julius Randle trade, classic cocktails and his cameo in “Joker.”

Minnesota Daily: What’s new about this new set? 

Morril: “Well, the jokes are new. I have a lot of good new jokes. You know, I’m trying to add to it every day. That’s kind of how I tour. I have the base, and then you kind of add to it. It’s like making a big pot of chili. You just keep adding one thing, okay, here, one thing there. And by the end, just, hopefully, it’s pretty good.”

Daily: Do you have any memorable moments touring in Minneapolis that you’ve used in your set?

Morril: “I mean, I’ve done ACME a bunch of times. I’ve done some of the C rooms, even coming up. I’ve been there so many times. So, yeah, I’ve had a lot of good memories from the crowds in Minneapolis. Nothing that stands out in particular, but I mean, it’s consistently great crowds. And I’ve always felt like I can trust them with jokes, like, if it works in Minneapolis, that’s a good that’s a good sign.”

Daily: I know you’re a big Knicks fan. There was a pretty famous trade last season. Now that the season is coming to an end, how do you feel about the KAT-Randle trade?

Morril: “You know, it’s complicated because, you know, I’m not a general manager, I’m a fan. So you grew attached to the players. Obviously, I think Karl Anthony-Towns is an incredible talent. I miss Dante’s grid a little bit. Randle really had a toughness about him. I always really respected him. But, you know, I don’t think the Knicks are done making moves. I think there’s some more moves, and I think you guys probably aren’t done either. But, I mean, how do you feel? Do you like the move or not?”

Daily: Oh, man, we miss KAT. Do you guys miss Julius Randle?

Morril: “Well, Randle really made us relevant again. So we have to have love for Julius. You know, he came here when no one wanted to come here. We thought we were going to get Kyrie and Durant, and we got Randle, and Randle gave us everything and made us a playoff team again. So we have a lot of love for Randle in New York. And he always seemed like a good guy, too. So always, always rooting for him. We have a phrase in New York, ‘Once a Knick, always a Knick.’ And, yeah, that’s how we feel. It was tough to lose Dante, just to bring up that Villanova core, too. It’s like we think we didn’t get one game of the four Villanova boys. That kind of was tough.”

Daily: I know you have a whiskey company. What goes into making a good whiskey?

Morril: “Well, you want it to be smooth. I want a good whiskey that stands on its own, like, if you drink it neat, but also is great for cocktails. So I always like Manhattans with rye as opposed to bourbon. I just thought it was kind of a better match. Yeah, I’m a big fan of whiskey with a second liquor. I like the old-fashioned cocktail, like a Manhattan, or if I’m doing like, maybe, a martini Negroni. I like, kind of the old-time-y drinks. I think they’re classics for a reason.”

Daily: Were you upset to hear you weren’t in “Joker 2?”

Morril: “You know what? I was grateful just to be in the first one. I think Todd (Phillips) is a really cool guy, and he was, he was very nice to meet always. And I mean, the fact that they kept my name in the first one made no sense. It was just Todd being cool. The fact that they just kept in ‘One more time for Sam Morril,’ I think it’s hilarious that I exist in the DC universe.”

Daily: Why should people come see your show?

Morril: “You know, it’s, I got some new jokes. I try to be one of the more prolific comics. I try to keep turning out new stuff. And I hope they like it. I try to put a lot of work into my stand-up. And, you know, it’s a little bit on current stuff, a lot of personal stuff, and has some stories in there. I think it’s getting there as an hour, so still building, but that’s how I tour.”

This interview has been edited for length, clarity and style.

Twin Cities United Performers (TCUP), an organization seeking to ensure better working conditions and communications with venues for musicians and other freelance performers, celebrated the rollout of their official work advance at Icehouse on Friday, March 28.

Over 500 artists have pledged to use TCUP’s work advance when booking shows. A work advance is a written statement from either party outlining the details and conditions of a job, like payment and scheduling. 

A copy of TCUP’s advance is available on their Instagram page. 

The document is meant as a guide on how to ask about working conditions and to help performers adapt the advance to their personal needs, said TCUP founder and Gully Boys drummer Nadirah McGill.

“As a musician you can advance your show yourself, you can ask for these things,” McGill said. “We believe that all artists deserve to know at least the basic information that our advance includes.”

Artists are left on their own to make sure they have everything they need and details like ticket splits, green room availability and time for sound checks are often not finalized until long after a show has been booked, McGill said. They added that local venues do not have a standard process for collecting the basic information required for an advance, and it is often unclear who is responsible for gathering said information. 

“Ideally it would be awesome to live in a community where venues are advancing their shows and we go into our workspaces knowing exactly what we need as performers, just like any other person who walks into their job,” McGill said. 

McGill said some smaller venues, like Pillar, Green Room and Icehouse, have been supportive of TCUP’s mission, and they hope to continue working with other larger venues, like First Ave, on advancing shows. 

The TCUP campaign officially launched last December when organizers held an announcement rally at Green Room. They held a concert at Mortimer’s in February to raise support for their pledge to introduce a work advance for local performers. 

Now that the work advance is official and public, McGill said TCUP is focusing on holding workshops and offering support for artists.

“Knowledge sharing and resource sharing is one of the best forms of mutual aid,” McGill said.

Correction: A previous version of this article listed Mortimer’s as a smaller venue that is supportive of TCUP, when it is actually Pillar. 

“SEEN,” an exhibit showcasing works by currently incarcerated artists, is on display at the Weisman Art Museum on East Bank until May 18. 

Organized by non-profit group We Are All Criminals, the exhibit pairs incarcerated artists with artists on the outside who work with them to realize their ideas for the exhibit. A total of seven multimedia installations make up the exhibit, divided into two galleries, one focusing on experiences of being incarcerated, “inside,” and the other focusing on freedom, “outside.”

Through artistic collaboration and exploration of sound, space, movement and languages, the works in “SEEN” show the experiences of incarcerated artists contrasted to their liberated counterparts. Most of the incarcerated artists are Black, Indigenous or men of  color, reflecting the racial inequality in the criminal justice system. 

One of the most impactful installations comes from writer Erin Sharkey and incarcerated artist Lennell “Fresh” Martin, whose work with prison property bins showcases what people leave behind when incarcerated. The work features two gray, plastic property bins, one with a small tree inside, the other full of possessions the artists were not able to take with them into prison. 

Prisoners are only allowed to bring with them as much as they can fit in the property bin, often needing to leave behind personal belongings in order to save room for essentials. The items left behind on display feel like a representation of the lives the artists left behind when they were incarcerated. 

In an installment called “Cage[d], Black Label Movement,” dancer Cheng Xiong performs incarcerated artist Sarith Peou’s exercise routine in a faux cell. Xiong has performed the routine monthly, and his final performance will be on May 3.

University of Minnesota art professor Diane Willow and incarcerated artist Ronald “Bino” Greer II worked to create a poetry garden where Bino’s own poetry is displayed alongside a variety of plants. Documentary filmmaker Kevin Yang worked with incarcerated artist Fong Lee on an installation inspired by khi tes, a Hmong ritual where people tie white strings to each others’ wrists while wishing them well.

Other works on display include paintings, poems and sculptures, all inspired by life on the inside.

Fellow Gopher and host of “Subway Takes,” Kareem Rahma’s feature film debut “Or Something” screened at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival last Thursday. 

Co-writing, co-producing and co-starring in the film alongside actress and comedian Mary Neely, Rahma said the film is a classic mumblecore, New York walk-and-talk movie inspired by genre greats like “My Dinner With Andre” and “Before Sunrise.” 

The plot of the film centers around Olivia and Amir, two unrelated New Yorkers who show up at the same time to collect $1,200 from their mutual friend Teddy, an unreliable slacker played by comedian Brandon Wardell. 

Amir, an advertising agent who dreams of publishing a graphic novel, is played by Rahma as a neurotic, yet down-to-earth millennial with the comedic quirks of both Harold & Kumar. Olivia is a younger grocery store clerk proud of her individuality and strength.

During a post-screening Q&A, Rahma and Neely said Wardell showed up to shoot without knowing the script, and they were genuinely frustrated with Wardell like their on-screen counterparts. Wardell still gave a hilariously great performance, despite not knowing the script. 

In the film, Teddy sends Olivia and Amir on a wild goose chase after a man named Uptown Mike, who he says will have their money. The pair end up spending the day together as they search for Uptown Mike, played by David Zayas. 

Most of the film revolves around Olivia and Amir’s conversations on topics like feminism, religion and family. The pair frequently share conflicting viewpoints and spend a lot of time exchanging witty remarks. 

Based on Rahma and Neely themselves, Amir and Olivia’s differences complement each other, a dynamic that drives much of the movie’s action. Neely and Rahma wrote the script by meeting up and having arguments they would later write into the film’s dialogue, and much of it feels very natural. 

Amir and Olivia take turns monologuing and arguing about their views on sex, gender, race, class and what Rahma calls the millennial condition. The film perfectly blends the heavy drama of its more introspective and philosophical themes with great comedic moments through the constant banter between characters. 

By the end of the film, Amir and Olivia’s connection feels very real, making its drawn-out twist ending all the more moving. 

“Or Something” is a must-see for fans of films with intimate conversations, deadpan comedy and mythical depictions of New York City.