Palm Springs International Film Festival 2025: Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In & Sacramento

 

Palm Springs was filled with strange and exotic films the starting weekend of the Palm Springs International Film Festival, now in it's 36th year. We had a chance to catch two over this little more than a week festival. You still have a chance to see these two films as part of the festival.

 

Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In

Available Now

Director Soi Cheang

 

Hoo boy, I wasn't sure which theater this was in and so were some late comers. We all knew what it was about though. I asked, "Is this the martial arts movie?," a latecomer asked,  "Is this the Chinese gangster film?" We were both right and probably in the same boat as the name of the film doesn't easily flow off the tongue. Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In is a little much to remember, but befits the story.

What came next was like renting an old school martial arts movie from blockbuster. I mean Sammo Hung is immediately in it, and if you know martial arts films, you know that's a good sign. Insanely spaced out, but reminiscent plot of an outsider, this time an illegal immigrant, played by Raymond Lam as Chan Lok-kwunget. His life sucks and gets the bejezus knocked out of him almost literally at every turn and then is taken in and becomes part of a gang/family. Crisis over land, then comes the revenge. In fact, the only missing by the numbers part of this movie is the usual montage of training or learning a new technique. Everyone is already an amazing fighter.

 

To sum it up we're pretty much with Chan Lok-kwunget as he learns to live and escape another gang in the wonderful backdrop of the now gone Kowloon, walled city. A super condensed place to live, lending itself to some amazing fights. You might also now Kowloon if you played Stray, the third person cat game, which has you transverse a very similar city albeit with robot inhabitants. 

 

Lok's taken under the wing of former gangster Cyclone, played by Louis Koo who steals the show through most of the movie and befriends the gangsters and weirdos Kowloon.

For a martial arts film it takes its sweet time building up how bleak Lok's life is, Cyclone's past and some day-to-day living in Kowloon, starting friendships and for a while we don't have any major fights till the end. That's when the movie goes crazy!

Shout out to a villain you love to hate, King, played by Philip Ng. Obnoxious laugh, ugly attire and that
mullet. What I thought was a run-of-the-mill second-in-command character merely around for a beat down and comic relief  becomes without a doubt, the reason for the best fight in the movie.

The movie alludes to it in the beginning, but keeps it on the down low and we see super-human feats you could chalk up to John Wick action movie logic on why people can even move after going through walls. However, King straight up has magical powers/chi powers that I did not see coming. This straight up super-annoying Starscream jack&ss who gets knocked out early on is amazing in both brutality and power. By the end he's taking on four other accomplished lead fighters at once. When the gave him guns for a second, I was like why, he's already too powerful. It's pure old school action made now and my G-d is it good.

Sacramento

Director Michael Angarano

Being released by Vertical Entertainment

 

This was a funny buddy travel film perfect for Palm Springs in the spirit of one of it's best known residence Bob Hope. Like Bob Hope and Bing Crosby in their Road To movies it's fun to see the two leads bounce off each other as total weirdos. Michael Angarano who co-wrote and directed the film plays Rickey, a free spirit sort of friend everyone has. Michael Cera plays Glenn a tightly bound man about to snap. They're the perfect knew odd couple. After getting to know each character, we find out that Ricky's father has died "and his ashes need to be spread in Sacramento." What follows is a road trip movie to Sacramento not with over-the-top humor, but more great character performances by Cera and Angarano who are having trouble coping being adults. I think Cera steals the show with his inner rage bubbling through. He's gonna be a new Dad and he can't handle it.

 

It take a while, as a 6 hour drive from LA to San Fran is, and you sure could put this as a dramedy, it still has enough laughs to give you a full gas tank.

During a very thoughtful Q&A the audience and myself found out that the Director Michael Angarano created the film as a inside joke with his co-writer Christopher Nicholas Smith. They were struggling actors in LA when writing it and they thought one day, why not actually do it...in conversation only. They did eventually do the drive and didn't seem to recommend it.

 

Also, over the course of the film Michael Angarano casted Maya Erskine as Tallie, who became his wife and mother of two of his children.

Michael Angarano & Maya Erskine