I thought that CCXP, the Brazilian answer to Comic-Con, had already happened this year, but CCXP is held every December and it’s only just December now, so I think I’m just remembering December 2022 as, like, two months ago. Time really is a construct, and the pandemic definitely didn’t melt my brain. Anyway, pretty people showed up to hawk their wares!
First up is Ana de Armas, promoting John Wick spin-off Ballerina, which is really sticking with the horrid title From the World of John Wick: Ballerina. Why are so many franchises hellbent on terrible naming conventions? What is this bad naming worm eating everyone’s brains? At least the movie looks cool. The focus at CCXP was behind the scenes, hyping the action sequences in the film:
I don’t think any film is going to promote action better than Atomic Blonde did, but this is still a solid approach to convincing people to go see “John Wick but a girl”. Of course, they address that in the video, stating that Ballerina ISN’T “John Wick but a girl”, but you know that’s how people will think of it. At least until the film comes out, and it does or does not carve out a space for itself—if “Eve” becomes even half as culturally ubiquitous as John Wick, Ballerina will cease existing as “the girl John Wick” and will become its own thing.
I like the look of Ballerina a lot but reminding me that Len Wiseman directs this film is not a good idea. He’s the director responsible for the early Underworld films, that totally unnecessary Total Recall remake, and the worst Die Hard movie (sorry Timothy Olyphant). Len Wiseman is not a confidence builder. Still, maybe Chad Stahelski has better quality control than the Die Hard or Total Recall producers. We can only hope.
Speaking of Ana de Armas, though, this came up on a Squawk chat recently—she’s currently dating Manuel Anido Cuesta, stepson of Cuban president/dictator Miguel Díaz-Canel. Back in 2020, Ana’s brother, artist Javier Caso, was questioned by Cuban State Security in part for criticizing Decree 349, which Díaz-Canel signed into effect in 2018, and which requires all artists to obtain the approval of Cuba’s Ministry of Culture in order to display/perform in public. Amnesty International calls Decree 349 a “dystopian prospect” for artists in Cuba. This is a super interesting look for Ana de Armas and I’m sure no one will ever ask her to account for dating the stepson of a dictator whose government questioned her brother. I just hope Javier Caso is doing okay.
Another film on display at CCXP is The Gorge, which stars Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy as a pair of snipers tasked with defending the world from monsters. I saw the trailer for this over the weekend and thought it was a fake trailer made for SNL.
But no, The Gorge is a real movie that exists, and Miles and Anya turned up at CCXP to promote it. This movie has to be more comical than the trailer makes it look, right? Because it looks like a dystopian romance, and it’s streaming on Valentine’s Day, so somebody somewhere has a sense of humor. How seriously am I supposed to take The Gorge? Because right now, I’m not taking it very seriously.
