A year ago, it really did feel like the world was falling apart and maybe an asteroid hitting Earth would have been a good thing. The world was in the midst of a global pandemic and the US was experiencing the most toxic Presidential campaign in the history of the country. This is on top of the protests against racism and various other issues going on. And in the new film, “How It Ends,” it’s clear the filmmakers were pulling from real life to gain inspiration for the end-of-the-world comedy.

Continue reading ‘How It Ends’ Trailer: Zoe Lister-Jones & Cailee Spaeny Star In This Feel-Good, Apocalyptic Comedy at The Playlist.

For some, Zoe Lister-Jones and Daryl Wein’s “How It Ends” may trigger a bit of PTSD back to the early months of the coronavirus pandemic when stay-at-home orders were in effect. The film was shot in June of 2020. That meant characters were almost universally six feet apart. Almost every scene is outside. There are no cars in the streets. And, notably, no one hugs or touches one another. It might be hard to experience now, but in many ways, it’s a necessary snapshot of that time.

Continue reading Zoe Lister-Jones & Daryl Wein On Their Sundance Pandemic Snapshot ‘How It Ends’ [Interview] at The Playlist.

How “How It Ends” ends: badly, and not soon enough. How it begins is not much better, and has the added disadvantage of being even further from the end than the end. Everything in the middle is great, though! Just kidding. The middle is likely the worst part. “How It Ends,” directed by husband-and-wife team Daryl Wein (“Lola Versus,” “White Rabbit“) and Zoe Lister-Jones (“Band Aid“), who also stars, delivers almost precisely the film you might have feared in darker moments, way back at the beginning of this ungodly pandemic, that someone was going to think was a good idea: a wildly self-indulgent, toothcrackingly twee feature-length therapy session for people whose experiences during this period of isolation and alienation, contrary to the popular notion that we’re all going through much the same shit, are clearly so deeply, existentially different from yours that you end up feeling lonelier than ever.  

Continue reading ‘How It Ends’: The Film You Worried Covid Might Produce Is Here [Sundance Review] at The Playlist.

Every year is a good year to stan female directors, but 2021 has cooked us up a real feast. Acting veterans like Rebecca Hall, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Robin Wright, and Halle Berry are finally claiming their director’s chairs on feature films, while arthouse icon Jane Campion is returning to hers after 12 years. Foreign language directors like Lucile Hadžihalilović and Ildikó Enyedi are making their English-language debuts, and French juggernaut Mélanie Laurent is working on two releases back to back.

Continue reading 52 Films Directed By Women To Watch In 2021 at The Playlist.

Humans seem to be fascinated by the idea of an apocalypse or a doomsday. From the doctrines claiming the world was going to end in 2012 as the Mayan predicted, to theories that the Rapture was supposed to happen earlier this year, there’s always speculation of when our time on Earth will end. Seemingly thanks to this societal obsession, Netflix has brought us a new film titled “How It Ends,” starring Theo James and Forrest Whittaker.

Continue reading ‘How It Ends’ Trailer: Netflix Gives One Last Push For Its Pre-Apocalyptic Drama at The Playlist.

One of the best things about the apocalypse thriller genre is that, most of the time, the films each have a different spin on how the world ends. The typical takes include the classic monster and/or alien invasions or various natural disasters occurring, but some like to just keep the mystery tightly under wraps.  Such is the case with Netflix’s latest film “How It Ends.” What exactly is happening to cause all this mayhem on the roads?

Continue reading ‘How It Ends’ Trailer: Forest Whitaker & Theo James Attempt To Figure Out Why The World Is Falling Apart at The Playlist.