Some Light Spoilers Ahead

This past weekend, I had a Double Feature day. #BlackMovieSaturday, if you will. I went to see both You, Me & Tuscany and They Will Kill You. Possibly an odd combination, but I’ve been wanting to see the latter since it came out, and I wanted to support the former because many black creatives are admitting their future opportunities ride on box office performances like this one—and black creatives don’t often get the chances they deserve.

If we can make YM&T succeed and get similar movies like it in the pipeline, I’m more than happy to contribute.

You, Me & Tuscany

I’m not much of a romance or rom-com person, but I enjoyed this movie. It was a fun escape from the real world for a couple hours (ironic, because that’s what Anna tries to do throughout the narrative). Some of the dialogue is very sweetsy, but I went into the theater knowing exactly what type of movie I was going to see; I don’t think you can disparage a rom-com for being what it is. YM&T fits into its genre conventions, provides the familiar plot beats, and does what it needs to do to satisfy its viewers who want a dreamy fairytale love story with a hot guy. There’s nothing wrong with that.

It doesn’t hurt that both male love interests are attractive, either. (Matteo’s actor lowkey kinda looks like Aaron Taylor-Johnson.)

Anna (Halle Bailey) is a former chef-in-training who dropped out of culinary school after her mother died, giving up on her dreams of flying to Tuscany and owning a restaurant with her mom. She now works as a house-sitter but is pretty tight in the money department and basically homeless, relying on the kindness of her friend Claire.

Anna meets Matteo at the hotel Claire works at, they hit it off, and he tells her about his abandoned villa in Tuscany. Her encounter with Matteo gives her the insane idea that she can fly out to Tuscany with the plane ticket her mom bought before her death because it must be “fate” to go there. However, homegirl only has $500 in savings and no accommodations because every room in the area is booked out for a festival, so she breaks into Matteo’s villa and stays there.

His family comes in for their usual upkeep/cleaning, they find Anna wearing Matteo’s ex-fiancée’s ring (because she loves trying on other people’s shit), she lies about them getting married, and chaos ensues as the family starts planning the upcoming wedding.

It’s fun to watch Anna and Michael (Regé-Jean Page) get closer during the preparations for Anna and Matteo’s supposed ceremony, which includes Michael serenading her with Let Me Love You and a shirtless scene in the vineyard. Anna also gets the chance to revive her culinary dreams and address some of the trauma of losing her mother, which brings her closer to the family.

The side characters are the cherry on top. Matteo’s sister Francesca is absolutely hilarious, super fun, and one of my favorites, and the cab driver Lorenzo plays the role of dependable older gentleman without making it creepy. (Personallyyyyy…I might’ve tried it with him if I were Anna, but I’m currently in rehab for being an Older Man Liker™️, so pay me no attention.)

This movie really made me miss the time I went to Italy and Greece in high school on an educational ambassador trip. I’ve wanted to return for years, but where do you find the time and money? Maybe I’ll get to go back someday.

They Will Kill You

The movie starts with Asia (Zazie Beetz) and Maria Reaves (Myha’la, though the part is played by a younger actress at the beginning), two sisters on the run from their abusive father. He finds them in a convenience store, and a confrontation occurs in the parking lot. Asia shoots him, and the police arrive almost immediately after. (Were they just hanging around nearby? Because getting the police to show up when you actually “need” them is like pulling teeth.) To try to avoid being taken in—though it happens anyway—Asia runs and leaves behind her little sister.

Move forward to 10 years later, and Asia is now looking for work as a maid at a hotel after getting out of prison. I clocked the weird shit immediately—99% of the maids at the hotel are black women. Something is amiss. On her first night there, Asia is attacked in her room by a group of masked freaks, who she takes out one by one with an array of weapons she brought. So she knew to come prepared, at least.

Doesn’t matter though. They’re all immortal thanks to making some satanic deal, and they quickly resurrect.

We then find out Maria is working at this hotel and Asia has shown up to get her out. Things are more fucked up than Asia could’ve predicted, because the hotel itself is essentially Satan’s lair. This takes us on a wild ride of Asia fighting this same group of Satan worshippers, killing and re-killing them, until she finds her sister—who initially doesn’t want to leave with her. I mean, ole girl did abandon her when they were young.

They do achieve reconciliation, though, and work together to get out. The Satan worshippers hunt them all the while, with Asia thinking she’s going to be their sacrifice for that night’s event, but in the end, Maria is the one who lands on the chopping block.

I suppose this movie is more of a horror comedy than anything else, because it’s pretty unserious at times. Probably doesn’t help that a lot of the fight scenes are filmed like a video game, though I love the shot of Asia chopping a dude in half with a fiery axe. There’s an underground tunnel scene where one of the immortal hotel employees crawls toward Asia after having their head blown off, and while this shot would be nightmare fuel in any other film, it gives me absolutely nothing here. Feels wasted. And I have to wonder if that’s because the overall tone of the movie is facetious.

This movie is also another case where the dialogue isn’t the greatest. The cursing feels a lot like some corny white person wrote it (stuff like “What the fucking fuck”), and I’ll be terribly surprised if that isn’t the case.

Spoilery, but: The last 30 minutes or so with the satanic pig’s head are…something else. Might’ve been terrifying in a different context, but again, I don’t really think this movie is going for the scare factor. It does lean happily into the gore.

Ultimately, I’ll add it to my list of Unhinged Black Girl Media I reference for inspiration. Because black women should be able to freak the fuck out and kill a bunch of people like everyone else gets to do in horror films, books, and TV shows.