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‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ Season 11 Review: After 21 Years, Larry David’s Show Remains as Great as Ever

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‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ Season 11 Review: After 21 Years, Larry David’s Show Remains as Great as Ever

Earlier this month, Curb Your Enthusiasm celebrated 21 years on the air, making it the longest-running scripted HBO series. Over the course of 100 episodes and ten seasons, Larry David’s series has been one of the most beloved comedies in HBO’s lineup, and has somehow remained consistently great. Curb Your Enthusiasm has done this by keeping certain elements consistent throughout – notably David’s complete disregard for social norms – and yet remained completely unexpected.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, showrunner Jeff Schaffer said when people ask him how they still come up with ideas, he says, “Well, until society reaches a place where you can walk outside and not be annoyed by your fellow man, I think we’re good.” After 21 years, Curb Your Enthusiasm continues to make this simple idea an effective building block for a great series, and Curb shows no signs of slowing down with “The Five-Foot Fence,” not only proving that this is still a concept ripe for a series, but that Curb is still one of the best comedies on television, two decades running.

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Yet even though Curb isn’t showing its age, the first episode of Season 11, “The Five-Foot Fence,” certainly seems concerned with death and aging. The episode begins with Larry discovering that someone has broken into his house, tried to flee the scene, fell, and hit their head, and now Larry has a dead body floating in his pool, almost like a cringe comedy take on Sunset Blvd.

But this theme of growing older continues through the episode, especially during a dinner party, when Susie (Susie Essman) plops down on the couch next to Larry, causing him to spill wine all over a couch. Moments later, Larry walks right into a glass door, to the shock of Larry’s date, Lucy Liu (playing herself). Leon (JB Smoove) is quick to mention that doing two feeble things in a row could get Larry’s ass sent to the nursing home.

If that’s not enough, Larry runs into Dennis (John Pirruccello), who owes him $6,000, and has early onset dementia, which makes Larry think that he needs to get that money before Dennis forgets his debt. Even Albert Brooks (also playing himself) decides to throw a funeral for himself, so he can see all the kind things his friends will say about him when he’s gone.

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Even Larry is looking back on his life, as he and Jeff (Jeff Garlin) pitch a show to Netflix called Young Larry, in which a mid-20s Larry David moves to New York with his Uncle Moe, as he tries to start his standup career, while also trying to cause premature death in his uncle, so he can inherit the money that will be left to him when he dies. Much like the musical Fatwa! Larry wrote in Season 9, and the “spite store” that Larry started in Season 10, this certainly seems like the creation of this new show for Netflix is set to be the through line for Season 11.

RELATED: 15 Essential ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ Episodes to Watch Before Season 11

But again, even though it’s hilarious to watch how Larry reacts to how the world around him treats him (one rant in which Larry claims that he’s not “a bad guy,” but instead “a very good guy” would fit into pretty much any episode), it’s how Curb Your Enthusiasm subverts expectations that makes it still one of the most brilliant comedies on television.

For example, it seems like writing a season of Curb Your Enthusiasm during COVID would pretty much write itself. The pandemic would’ve given Larry an opportunity to avoid human contact as much as possible, cancel all plans, and validate many of his feelings about society in general. But “The Five-Foot Fence” avoids any predictable COVID story, instead, having Larry discover during Albert Brooks’ faux funeral that Brooks is a COVID supply hoarder, leaving everyone wishing that Brooks was actually dead. It’s unusual to see an angry group of people in Curb for once that isn’t focusing their disgust towards Larry.

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While the friendship between Larry and Leon has become one of the greatest additions to this show late in the game, “The Five-Foot Fence” seems to imply that this season might actually give JB Smoove his own separate story. After breaking up with his girlfriend after the two raised money through a GoFundMe for a vacation to Asia, Leon starts auditioning fake replacement girlfriends to take on his trip. If any character on the show deserves their own B-plot alongside Larry’s story, it’s absolutely Leon.

But like with every season, Curb is already setting up several threads in “The Five-Foot Fence” that will surely tie this entire season together into one extremely satisfying narrative. Already, we’re shown how the brother of the dead criminal in Larry’s pool is affecting Larry’s Netflix show, as the brother demands Larry cast his daughter Maria Sofia (Keyla Monterroso Mejia) as one of the stars of Young Larry, or he will consider legal action against Larry. Already, the show has connected these two seemingly unconnected stories, and only a few minutes after Young Larry has been greenlit, it seems to be already doomed.

The most recent seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm have been about building the threads of the season towards an epic conclusion, and if there’s any flaw with “The Five-Foot Fence,” it’s that it feels like a lot of setup for down the line, without too many major laugh-out-loud moments within this particular episode. Larry’s scenes with Susie and Leon always work beautifully, and Larry’s “feeble” moments lead to some of the episode’s biggest laughs, but especially with the Dennis scenes and the casting of the Young Larry show, the wheels are simply moving for bigger moments later on in the season.

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Yet at this point, Curb Your Enthusiasm is a well-oiled machine that knows how to tell effective and ingenious stories on an episodic level, while also building to the culmination of an entire season. “The Five-Foot Fence” gets Season 11 started on the right track with a season that is still surprising, engaging, and hysterical after all these years. At this point, Curb Your Enthusiasm isn’t just prettay prettay good, it’s prettay prettay damn near flawless.

Grade: A-

Curb Your Enthusiasm premieres October 24 on HBO, with new episodes airing on Sundays.

KEEP READING: ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ Season 11 Trailer Shows Larry David Hates People Individually, But Loves Mankind

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Bullet Train Review: A Wickedly Funny, High-Octane Thrill Ride

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Bullet Train Review: A Wickedly Funny, High-Octane Thrill Ride

Brad Pitt leads a wickedly funny ensemble in a high-octane actioner loaded with twists. Adapted from the 2010 Japanese novel by Kōtarō Isaka, Bullet Train has a bevy of disparate assassins manipulated by a mysterious criminal mastermind. Stuntman turned action director, David Leitch (John Wick, Atomic Blonde), stays true to form with unrelenting bloody and flamboyant violence. The codenamed characters get downright verbose before beating, stabbing, and shooting each other to bits. The loquacious banter tends to run long, but the narrative always bounces back with sharp reveals. Strap in for a helluva ride.

Ladybug (Pitt) boards the overnight bullet train to Tokyo with a newfound sense of self. He’s chock-full of philosophy after recovering from a near fatal ambush. Ladybug ignores his unseen handler’s advice to take a gun. Surely any issues can be resolved peacefully. The job seems straightforward enough. Steal a briefcase with a sticker and exit at the next stop.

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Also on board are Lemon (Brian Tyree Henry) and Tangerine (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), ruthless “twins” known for their brutal methods. Lemon is obsessed with the British children’s show “Thomas & Friends”. He reads people by comparing them to the anthropomorphized trains. The twins are escorting the previously kidnapped son (Logan Lerman) of a powerful gangster, the White Death (Michael Shannon).

None of the hired guns are aware of the Father, aka Yuichi Kimura’s (Andrew Koji), mission. He’s out for vengeance but foolishly runs into a deceptive figure. The Prince (Joey King) has a score to settle with the White Death. Meanwhile, the Wolf (Bad Bunny) joins the fray after his truly horrific Mexican wedding. He’s also ready for serious comeuppance. Ladybug quickly realizes they’re all unwitting pawns in a dangerous game. Someone has packed the train with killers for an unknown purpose. He desperately wants to get off but can’t seem to escape the carnage.


Related: I Love My Dad Review: Patton Oswalt’s Delightfully Cringeworthy Catfishing Comedy

Cast of Bullet Train

Bullet Train introduces the cast with splashy entrances that flashes back to their dark pasts. The murderous montages are informative but don’t fill in every gap. The script doles out more critical information as the bodies pile up. Alliances bounce back and forth as everyone wonders who’s actually pulling the strings. The whodunit element works well as the audience becomes embroiled in a series of betrayals. You don’t have a sense of the plot’s true trajectory until the third act. The film builds to a showdown that delivers a huge action payoff.

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Bullet Train has complex characters that each contribute slices of devilish humor. Brad Pitt preaching self-help and understanding is an effective gag throughout. Brian Tyree Henry’s constant comparisons to Thomas & Friends aren’t as comical but play an important role in the story. There are a lot of moving parts. Leitch, who worked as Pitt’s stunt double for years, is clearly fond of his players. He gives everyone a chance to babble incessantly. I would have trimmed the dialogue to be more incisive.


The action scenes are worth the price of admission. Leitch has a great eye for mixing stylized set pieces with intimate fights. He knows when to go big and small. You never feel let down by his pacing. There’s always the right amount of adrenaline to keep your pulse pumping. Bullet Train is another feather in a skilled filmmaker’s cap. Watch out for A-list cameos and a mid-credits scene.

Bullet Train is a production of Columbia Pictures, Fuqua Films, and 87North Productions. It will be released theatrically on August 5th from Sony Pictures.

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Bullet Train Review: Brad Pitt Has A Blast In The Silly And Badass Action Comedy

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Bullet Train Review: Brad Pitt Has A Blast In The Silly And Badass Action Comedy

If orchestrated properly, with adjusted stakes, tone, and atmosphere, there can be a beautiful, symbiotic relationship between intense action and comedy. A hero pulling off a rapid and vicious series of blows against an opponent can be savage and dramatic in one context, but it can also be so deliriously awesome that an audience’s first reaction is to laugh. Fast paced martial arts can be used for wonderful physical humor (see: the legendary career of Jackie Chan), and the best examples provide dual layers of entertainment: you marvel at the skill in all the ass-kicking, and cackle at the creativity in the choreography.

This is a sweet spot that filmmaker David Leitch knows well. After peppering funny moments in John Wick and Atomic Blonde at the start of his directorial career, he brilliantly utilized the action/comedy weapon that is Ryan Reynolds in Deadpool 2, and crafted some excellent physicality with the unique styles of Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham in Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw. His latest, Bullet Train, is another effort that takes aim at that particular tonal target, this time with his most expansive ensemble yet, and it’s another success. With a sensibility that could be described as early Guy Ritchie with more specific action focus, it’s a movie that is both silly and skilled and inspires its primary star in particular to do energetic and engaging work.

Based on the novel Maria Beetle by Kōtarō Isaka, the film weaves multiple narrative threads through the cars of the titular bullet train as it speeds through the country of Japan – all of the protagonists being killers with their own particular reason and motivation for being aboard. Ladybug (Brad Pitt), for example, is a hired gun who has been tasked by his handler (Sandra Bullock) to perform what sounds like a simple job: find a briefcase marked with a train sticker and steal it. What he doesn’t know, though, is that said briefcase belongs to a pair of British hit men named Lemon (Brian Tyree Henry) and Tangerine (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), and that the contents include the recovered ransom for the kidnapped son (Logan Lerman) of a powerful crime lord known as The White Death.

Meanwhile, Kimura a.k.a. The Father (Andrew Koji) is on the bullet train because he is on a mission of vengeance – hunting down the person responsible for nearly killing his son by pushing the boy off of a building. What he doesn’t expect is that the individual he is looking for is a young woman identified as The Prince (Joey King), and that she has purposefully gotten him on the high speed rail with the intention of forcing him to execute an assassination attempt.

And while five killers sharing the space would be enough for most movies, Bullet Train actually has even more that pop in and surprise throughout the film’s runtime – and their roles are worth keeping as a secret pre-release.

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Bullet Train has a chaotic storyline, but the pieces properly connect as a fun puzzle.

Narratively speaking, Bullet Train is a messy movie to put together, as focus briskly ping-pongs between the different players, but everything stays in harmony as the film persistently finds ways to build on each protagonist’s arc. This is particularly cool later in the movie as different characters are drawn together from individual angles and instant conflict is generated from their simple interaction.

The film is at its best when it keeps things simple, but it does let things go off the rails at times (if you’ll pardon the pun). This is especially true as it gets into the third act and it tries to pull off stunts like one of the leads leaping from a platform on to the back of the train as it leaves a station; it’s both a problem for the “rules” of the universe and in its strained use of visual effects. The movie also frequently tries to get a bit too cute and Tarantino-esque with what are admittedly familiar-but-not-quite-stock characters – the most prominent example being an ongoing and quickly tiresome gag with Lemon explaining that he understands people through the lens of Thomas The Tank Engine.

Primarily, though, it’s a movie that is able to generate its entertainment with engaging and quippy dynamics between the members of the ensemble, both when they are talking out their issues and trying to kill one another.

David Leitch puts a lot of exciting and weird fights in a confined space, and is at its best when working with a “less is more” philosophy.

Coming from a stunt background, both as a performer and a coordinator, David Leitch’s bread and butter remains deftly and specifically choreographed action sequences, and Bullet Train proves to be a terrific challenge and opportunity for his skills. Regardless of where you are in the titular transport, space is not a luxury, and the best fights in the movie are those that are being fought only between the characters, but against the limitations provided by the location.

There are guns, knives and explosives in the mix, but Bullet Train also has some terrific “found item” moments that add spice and humor to the various showdowns, whether it’s a pocketed cell phone saving a character’s life from a blade, a laptop making for a solid cudgel, a water bottle making for a useful projectile, or a venomous snake showing up at a perfect moment.

Once again we see David Leitch work a special magic turning dramatic and comedic actors into badasses with slick and stylish moves, and while everyone shows off some terrific skills, it’s very much the Brad Pitt show at the end of the day.

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Brad Pitt’s joy in the role of Ladybug is palpable.

At the nexus of everything good in Bullet Train is Brad Pitt, who very clearly had a blast reuniting with David Leitch (who performed the actor’s stunts in films including Fight Club, The Mexican, Mr. And Mrs. Smith and Troy). He’s a joy to watch in action not just because of the talented craft he demonstrates in his physicality, but how he channels the psychology of the character. As we meet him, Ladybug is reluctantly getting back into his business following a number of important breakthroughs with his therapist, and Pitt does a fantastic job conveying that he doesn’t ever want to choose violence as a first answer – both via verbal pleas and defense-heavy moves. Action/comedy is a genre he should revisit a lot more often.

Bullet Train doesn’t aim to revolutionize hitman movies, but instead plays with a tongue-in-cheek vibe that lets you recognize the tropes and appreciate how the film plays with them. It’s a slick/goofy action movie that is both contained and wild, and a satisfying late summer release.

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Luck Review: A Spectacular Debut Film from Skydance Animation

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Luck Review: A Spectacular Debut Film from Skydance Animation

The world’s unluckiest woman enters a magical land to change the fortunes of a fellow orphan. Luck will make you smile and possibly shed a few tears. The big-budget, CGI animated fantasy shines a spotlight on needy children while telling a truly original story. An assortment of lucky critters and creatures dazzle in a spectacular setting. The highly imaginative narrative gives age-old superstitions a dynamic new spin. Luck is a brilliant first film from Skydance Animation.

Sam Greenfield (Eva Noblezada) reaches her eighteenth birthday with trepidation. She’s finally aged out of the foster care system. Sam never found her “forever family”. She spent her entire life living in orphanages. It doesn’t help that Sam has the worst luck. Everything she does or touches ends in abject disaster. Her only thoughts are for young Hazel (Adelynn Spoon), Sam’s roommate at the girls home. Sam has been set up with a job and tiny apartment. She has to stay in school and employed to remain housed.

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Sam’s first day at Marv’s (Lil Rel Howery) floral shop goes exactly as expected. She sadly eats dinner sitting on a sidewalk. Sam learns that Hazel’s weekend trip with a foster family was canceled. She gives half of her sandwich to a curious black cat. It scampers away but leaves a strange penny behind.

The following day is a revelation. Sam’s lucky penny changes everything. Her ecstatic mood sours when she loses the penny in spectacular fashion. Stewing on the sidewalk, Sam’s surprised when the black cat returns. She’s astonished when Bob (Simon Pegg) asks for his penny. The “travel penny” is the only way a creature from the Land of the Luck stays safe in the human world. She follows an unnerved Bob back through the portal to the Land of Luck. Sam has to find another lucky penny to help Hazel. Bob reluctantly agrees, but they have to be careful. Misdeeds end up in banishment to Bad Luck.

Related: Bullet Train Review: A Wickedly Funny, High-Octaine Thrill Ride

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The Land of Luck

The Land of Luck is an absolute joy to behold. Leprechauns, cats, pigs, and rabbits, lucky creatures, are the bureaucrats tasked with spreading good fortune. Bringing Sam in such a place is a recipe for absolute chaos. Bob, and his leprechaun assistant Gerry’s (Colin O’Donoghue), efforts to contain Sam’s bad luck will have audiences in stitches. I’m still chuckling at Sam’s “Latvian leprechaun” disguise; their harebrained excuse for why she’s so much bigger than everyone else.

Luck’s serious themes are artfully addressed. Sam’s lonely childhood, and her desperate efforts to change Hazel’s, brings a melancholic touch to the narrative. The film reminds us to not take love and family for granted. Every kid deserves care, nurturing, and a safe place to grow. It shouldn’t take luck or chance for a child to find a “forever home”.

Insert sigh here. Recent headlines concerning John Lasseter (Toy Story, Cars) will undoubtedly cloud this film’s release. The genius storyteller and animator behind Pixar’s success left to head Skydance Animation after awful “Me Too” allegations. He’s brought his incredible talent to Luck, and it shows. This wonderful film deserves to be judged on its own merits. Sometimes we must divorce ourselves from art and the personality of the artist.

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Luck is a production of Skydance Animation and Apple Original Films. It will have an exclusive Apple TV+ premiere on August 5th.

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