Page 3 - Newspaper RZ Times

27 August 2025 | Wed THE RZ TIMES Issue 007

CULTURE natured fun. Mission: the beginning of the

Impossible – The Final film, and then we’re
Reckoning is not that subjected to shots of
kind of blockbuster. missiles launching and
The eighth instalment cities being obliterated.
in Tom Cruise’s In place of snappy
globe-trotting action- banter, there is cod
adventure franchise, philosophy about
The Final Reckoning destiny and choice,
is a miserable, and in place of Lalo
apocalyptic tract Schifrin’s adrenaline-
which is fixated on pumping classic theme,
the subjects of how there are orchestral
close we are to nuclear minor chords on the
armageddon, and how soundtrack. What’s
quickly civilisation can disappointing about all
collapse. Yes, you get this doom and gloom
to see Cruise having a is that the franchise
fight in his underpants, has made the kind of
and doing another of whiplashing U-turn
his hanging-off-a-plane you might see in its
routines, but even so, car-chase sequences.
‘They’re inviting a movement to the main stage’: it could be the feel-bad The last Mission:

Kendrick Lamar’s road to the Super Bowl Source : BBC NEWS film of the summer. Impossible film, Dead
“Truth is vanishing,
Reckoning, was a
Ahead of Kendrick city experience within morose wit, these documentarian than war is coming,” funny, frothy Euro-
Lamar’s headline a racially-divided US raw, confessional an MC. Kendrick someone intones at caper sprinkled with
performance at the tends to be based lyrics signify why the chooses to rap about
Super Bowl half-time around constantly Compton, Los Angeles everything and
show in New Orleans, grappling with feelings rapper is regarded as everyone across the
we explore the rapper’s of impending doom: one of hip-hop’s great social strata.
journey from the a toxic cycle that’s est ever songwriters. People might call
unforgiving streets difficult to break The esteemed North it ‘woke’ or ‘deep’,
of Compton to pop free of. Filled with Carolina rap producer but I think of it as
culture ubiquity. straight-up reporting.
“I’m not sure why “Kendrick Lamar is more like Some rappers leave
I’m infatuated with a documentarian than an MC. out a certain section of
death?” ponders a fiery Kendrick tries to rap from everyone’s people in their lyrics,
and fed-up Kendrick perspective – 9th Wonder” right? Well, Kendrick
Lamar on fan-favourite tries to rap from
song Sing About Me, everyone’s perspective.”
I’m Dying of Thirst. chest-deep empathy; 9th Wonder – who The Pulitzer Prize-
Sounding like he’s on a combination of composed arguably winning artist – who
his knees pleading to hyper-animated the 20-time-Grammy- will perform as the
the man in the sky, the lyrical perspectives winning MC’s most half-time headliner for
always-probing rapper (including a hopeless experimental song this Sunday’s Super
finally answers his own young man lost in with the three-act Bowl at the New
question: “Maybe it’s gang activity as well psychodrama of Orleans Superdome,
because I’m a dreamer as a sexually-abused DUCKWORTH with R&B star SZA
and sleep is the cousin girl damaged due to – told me back in confirmed as a capable mischief, figuratively. Interminable.
of death!” The song the foster care system); 2023: “Kendrick for salvation. glamour and It devotes an Usually, these
considers how an inner- and an underlining Lamar is more like a
romance – or inordinate scenes are
‘A miserable, apocalyptic tract’: Mission: as close to amount of punctuated
with flashbacks
its almost-
romance as
Impossible – The Final Reckoning could be you’re ever three-hour to what’s
happened
going to get
running time
‘the feel-bad film of the summer’ Source : BBC NEWS in a Cruise to scenes of before, flash-
forwards to
production
people sitting
The opposite of an – and the in shadowy what might
escapist blockbuster, follow-up rooms, happen in
the eighth and has the same explaining the future,
apparently final outing writer-director, the story to and flash-
for Tom Cruise’s Ethan Christopher each other sideways (if
Hunt is the doomiest McQuarrie. in gravelly that’s a term)
and gloomiest yet in Yet whispers. to different
the action-adventure The Final Again and people, in
franchise. Reckoning, set again, we different
With so much almost entirely have to sit shadowy
tension and conflict in tunnels and through these rooms,
around the world, it caverns, and in ponderous, explaining
can be a relief when a the depths of portentous the same
Hollywood blockbuster the ocean, is mutterings: story in the
distracts audiences the dullest and the title same gravelly
with some escapism, darkest film in might as well whispers.
some optimism, and the series, both have been we might
some rollicking, good- literally and Exposition: not notice.

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