Sovereign

I gave it an 8/10, and I do think it's a compelling and interesting film. I'd go so far as to say it's one of the best indie films of 2025 so far. But holy moly is it hard to watch. Watching the treatment of the teenage character by his father should give anyone with a pulse a strong sense of discomfort, and it's not out of line to say that much of what we see her is abusive, even as the teenager takes clandestine steps to disentangle himself from his father's web and pursue a more normal adolescence. This isn't something you want to watch on a beautiful, sunny day as it might just …

I think everything about this is good. I didn't really like it, though. Performances were great. Some good yelling. A little too much yelling. I feel like this is an Oscar attempt. Or a lot of wreathed indie festival badges. Poor kid. Interesting things happen. The ending is unnecessary. Who is this about? I don't care about that man at all. Beautiful minivan. Bit of a shame they blow their load on the cover. Sovereign 2 will feature the baby. Baby has grown up and is mostly focusing on boss level scammer sovereigns and the corrupt preachers they have joined forces with. They operate und…

In a time when it has become increasingly more prevalent to mistrust what those in officialdom have to say, it’s understandable how hardened resistance would arise in response, especially in light of recent events. But does this give individuals the right to willfully disregard widely accepted, reasonable social and legal standards in favor of their own questionable interpretations of these matters in the name of personal freedom? It’s a divisive issue, to be sure, one where opposing forms of extremism come into heated conflict with one another, often with disastrous consequences. That’s the i…

The Fixate & Binge Podcast, w/ Joe Curdy

2026-07-29

⭐ 8

More unsettling than what is depicted on screen in writer and director Christian Swegel's debut **SOVEREIGN**, is the horror of realizing that I personally know people who embrace the nationalist, sovereign ethos. A long and ignominious line of homegrown American malcontents from Timothy McVeigh to Ted Kaczynski remains a worrying trend on our society -- and we would be wise to pay closer attention. In Swegel's film, we are given, frustratingly, very little knowledge of why the film's protagonist Jerry Kane (played brilliantly by Nick Offerman) would gravitate towards an anti-tax movemen…