Cut Throat City (2020) Dir. RZA Blink is an aspiring comic book artist from New Orleans who cannot get himself published, in spite of his obvious talent and repeated efforts. He is friends with three other local young men who grew up in the city but who struggle for opportunities in the aftermath of Katrina. Eventually they decide to rob a casino, but things go terribly wrong and they end up finding themselves having to run away from both the police and a local crime lord. This has a very good cast but ends up trying to be too many things at once - a crime drama/a parable about racial injustice/a Trojan horse chronicle about the reverberations of Katrina to this day/a surreal remix of all of the above. It ultimately felt more like a confusing mishmash of its separate parts and themes instead of a coherent whole.
Night of the Demon (1957) Dir. Jaecques Tourneur Professor John Holden travels to London from America to attend a psychology conference that will focus on the supernatural, and the debunking thereof. He is meant to meet a British peer of his, Professor Harrington, upon his arrival. Instead he finds Harrington's research assistant waiting for him at the airport, informing him that Harrington has died due to a tragic and strange accident. Holden meets Harrington's niece Joanna shortly thereafter. Based on having read her uncle's diary, she is convinced that his death was not an accident, but in fact the work of a cult of demon worshippers he had been investigating. Holden is too skeptical of the idea of anything supernatural truly occurring to believe her, but he does become intrigued by the cult leader Julian Karswell after the pair meet, seemingly by chance. Atmospheric and fun monster movie, with two good leads in Dana Andrews and Peggy Cummins (both probably overqualified to be in a quirky horror film). Nicely shot, especially the night-time black and white photography in the woods and on the road (the latter of which reminded me a bit of similar scenes in "Les Yeux sans visage").
Holidate (2020) Dir. John Whitesell Sloane is fast approaching thirty and is the only one of her siblings still single, something she is reminded of by her family in general and her mother in particular during each holiday gathering. Jackson has his own bad experiences with holiday dates. The pair meet by chance at the mall and share some of their holiday horror stories with each other, until Jackson proposes that as long as both of them are single, they can be each others holiday dates, no strings attached. This arrangement seems to work out well for the both of them, until the relationship threatens to grow beyond the purely platonic bonds they had agreed upon at the outset. The premise of a rom-com doesn't really matter that much as long as the actors can sell it. The writing here is so and so but Emma Roberts and Luke Bracey are both charming and they have enough on-screen chemistry to make this watchable throughout.
Michael Clayton (2007) Dir. Tony Gilroy Michael Clayton is a fixer for a big NYC law firm. He is sent to Milwaukee to fetch Arthur Edens, one of the firm's most experienced lawyers, after the man has embarrassed himself and the firm in an apparent manic episode in the middle of a meeting about the potential settlement in a class action lawsuit. Michael finds Arthur in a fragile mental state, but Arthur insist the problem is not having gone off his meds but the corrosive moral nature of the case he has been working on for the past six years: the defense of major chemical company against a group of farmers. Arthur is perceived as a huge liability after this incident, both by his own law firm and by the company they represent, whilst Michael is left trying to salvage what he can, whilst he struggles to make sense of Arthur's behavior. I had never seen this at the time of its original release. This was feted at many awards ceremonies at the time, including the Oscars (where it had seven nominations and one win for Tilda Swinton). It's a largely stripped down thriller, somewhat reminiscent (primarily in tone) of something like "The Conversation". Wilkinson and Clooney are both very good in this. An enjoyable film, but I couldn't help but think it also felt a bit dated. Not in terms of the performances or in the visual style, more in the nature of the writing. The ending felt incongruent with the rest of the film. I'm pretty sure that is mostly due to the fact that the world has grown more cynical over the past 13 years.
I enjoyed it back then and I'd have to re-watch it to see if the passage of time has changed it for me. I can accept a movie being of-its-time. Also, this kind of lawyer isn't something most people are familiar with, but the recent fame of (amazingly similarly named) Michael Cohen actually makes this somewhat relevant.
I forgot I actually have seen this film. Don't remember it too well but I remember the ending didn't land.
The File on Thelma Jordon (1949) Dir. Robert Siodmak Cleve Marshall, an assistant district attorney in California, is drowning his sorrows about his unhappy marriage one night when a stranger shows up at his office. The woman in question, a Thelma Jordon, is there to request a discrete investigation into a supposed attempted break-in at her wealthy aunt's house. Cleve has an immediate attraction to Thelma and she agrees to go out for a drink with him. Their first night together leads to an illicit affair that threatens his already shaky marriage even further. Their romance is complicated when Cleve is called over to Thelma's aunt's mansion one night, only for Thelma to reveal that her aunt was murdered in an apparent botched robbery and that she has tampered with the crime scene in the panic of finding her aunt's body. Cleve reluctantly agrees to help her stage the scene in a way that will not incriminate her, but things don't go exactly to plan when a member of the house staff interrupts them. After Thelma is still arrested for murder in spite of their best efforts, Cleve has no other option but to finagle his way into getting the case assigned to him, with the intention of losing. But as he discovers more about the woman he loves during the investigation into her past, he isn't quite sure any more that she is in fact innocent. Noir time and this was a rather enjoyable one. Stanwyck is her usual terrific self. I was more intrigued by Wendell Corey's character. No real attempt is made to make him very sympathetic, he is more or less presented as a selfish cad and irresponsible fool and it's refreshing that no eleventh hour rehabilitation is attempted.
Archive (2020) Dir. Gavin Rothery George is an robotics engineer who is working in solitude, located in a remote and secure facility someplace in Japan. The company he works for is not happy with his progress and he is threatened with having his funding cut. The reason for his failure to show anything of substance for his work is the fact that he is ignoring the directives of the research he should be doing and instead funneling all resources into a project of his own: resurrecting his dead wife in an A.I., using an image of her consciousness created by a competitor company. As he is working on the third prototype of his design, the one he believes will be successful, time is running out as both his employers are running out of patience and the company whose tech he has hacked to make his project possible is suspecting foul play. Sci-fi drama/thriller that is very reminiscent of Alex Garland's work, specifically his movie "Ex Machina" and his series "Devs". Whilst not terrible, Archive is definitely inferior to those two thematically similar works. Other more minor influences include Duncan Jones' Moon and Westworld (the recent series). Was most annoyed by the ending, which was definitely not earned.
Am I the only one who found Devs to be a vastly overhyped piece of work? Until you mentioned it, I had completely forgotten about it.
Crime Wave (1953) Dir. André de Toth Three men stick up a gas station. When a cop intervenes, he ends up dead, and one of the three criminals badly wounded. The robbers split up, with the wounded man seeking refuge in the apartment of a reformed former criminal he knows from their time together in San Quentin. The man in question, Steve Lacey, is now happily married and leading an honest life. He has no desire to be dragged back into crime, but when the other two men also show up at his apartment, he is forced into another criminal plot, under the threat that his wife will be harmed if he does not join their new illegal endeavor. Noirvember continues! Very enjoyable André de Toth noir, largely shot on location (in and around Los Angeles), with a certain urban grittiness that is not uncommon for noirs of this era. Though arguably not actually the true lead of this film, Sterling Hayden nevertheless steals the entire thing with his powerful screen presence as the tough detective tasked with tracking down the cop killers. Also features the young Charles Bronson (still credited as Charles Buchinsky back then) in a supporting role as one of the hoodlums.
They Live (1988) - A drifter finds a pair of sunglasses that leads him to find that an alien race is taking over the world through subliminal messaging. I loved this movie when I first saw it over a decade ago, and I liked parts of it when I watched it again this time, but some things I could've just done without. The premise is quite intriguing, and harkens back some older sci-fi movies, and in some cases is equally cheesy, but fun, but then the movie basically comes to a hard stop in the middle for 7-minute long fight scene that just never seems to end. Roddy Piper (the former professional wrestler) plays a drifter who wanders into town and happens upon a settlement of homeless people. Inside of a church nearby that is run by a blind man is a secret that he is dying to find out. TV stations are seemingly interrupted with bizarre messages, and the signal jamming seems to affect the viewers. The police raid the church and take a bunch of boxes as evidence, but Piper knows where there was a secret stash of boxes. He opens them to find pairs of sunglasses. When worn, these sunglasses allow him to see aliens and alien messages telling humans to be subservient to everything. He begins to try to take out these aliens, but to everyone else, he comes across as a lunatic. Eventually, he meets a group of people who also know about the aliens, and they all come together to fight them. The last 30-45 minutes of this movie are either completely cheesy or a complete mess, but it's not awful. I would've loved the movie more if it was simply an allegory on consumerism and aliens, but it seems that it was almost fleeting. If it's on TV, I probably wouldn't watch it again, but I'm not really discouraging anyone else from seeing it, especially if you enjoy sci-fi or just hate consumerism.
I think the length of the fight is important metaphorically. It's showing how much effort people expend to not know the truth around them.
I always took it as a reason to show a pro wrestler getting into a fight, so wrestling fans would watch the movie. I hadn't thought about it that way. Interesting indeed.
Chinatown (1974) - A private detective is hired by a woman to run tabs on her husband that she believes is having an affair. The detective gets more than he bargained for when he tries to unravel the mystery after the husband turns up dead. My god, what a picture. I had never seen it before last night, so the only thing I knew about were the last words at the end "Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown." I was so glad I knew less than I thought. Such an intriguing and captivating mystery, all brilliantly acted and shot. Nicholson plays Jake Gittes who is a private dick who was a former cop who became apathetic after a woman he tried to save (presumably) dies in Chinatown, where he walked a beat. Corruption was apparently so bad in Chinatown that the district attorney told him that his job was to do as little as possible. Now more cynical, he spends his days trying to prove that his clients have cheating spouses. "I'm in matrimonial work. It's my metier." Jake just wants to do an honest job for an honest day's pay. That's his philosophy, and even when he confronts trouble, he just wants it to go away because he doesn't want to lose his license. He's genial, even charming. He's done being a cop. After he discovers that someone's been releasing water from the Los Angeles reservoirs, he begins to find himself embroiled in one mystery after another, and he can't tell who's being honest, and who's hiding something. But people involved in this mess keep wanting to pay him to find information crucial to their needs, and he accepts. It's just a job after all. In the end, the mystery is finally unraveled, and you're about to leave feeling satisfied, but that's not the point. The point is you can't change the way things are. Jake tried that when he was a cop, and even as an honest citizen, he still can't do it. "Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown." That's just how things go. Brilliant script. Brilliant actors. An absolutely wonderful movie. After the movie ended, I went through my usual routine of looking up the movie, and seeing what reviewers and others thought of it. On TV was the last thing my kids were watching before bed, which happened to be Peppa Pig. My wife comes down and sees that Peppa is on TV and asks if that's what I had been watching the last three hours. I informed her that I had watched Chinatown, and that's what showed up after. I then said, "What? Do you think Jack Nicholson was down here on Peppa Pig?" Then I did an impression of Jack Nicholson saying "Mrs. Mulwray, I believe your husband was murdered, but first I'm going to be jumping up and down in these muddy puddles."
I watched it again on a longhaul flight in March Love the film - watched the Big Sleep again at the same time.
The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (2004)-Bill Murray stars in this Wes Anderson flick as a Cousteau-like character. Pretty good movie.
Bill and Ted Face the Music (2020)-Pretty good addition to the Bill and Ted trilogy. Samara Weaving is good in her role. I rented it on Amazon Prime. Cheaper than watching it in a theater.
So i slowly got through season 1 of Miami Vice Love all the old references and influences - as a kid at the time, this show was super exciting. What's interesting is how dated some of the construction is. The show had epic spend in terms of art department and large casts etc. So many outdoor shots. It was not cheap to make. But the action in particular is very dated by modern standards. Many of the fights and shootouts feel completely fake compared to films of the era. Also the acting is variable. Don Johnson obviously sticks out as a real star with some great supporting actors. Philip Michael Thomas on the other hand is frequently awful - completely over acting his lines. As I was aware from researching this in advance, there are a hell of a lot of filler episodes. Many of the best are the classic drug deal capers, but there is a also a lot of rehashing of memes - how many women get their lives destroyed or die by handing out with Sonny or Tubbs? Best to check out highlight shows, as there is no real need to watch this stuff sequentially. Also - the old 4:3 aspect ratio really sucks. It is not so long ago it began to die out, but feels like the dark ages!
Roman Holiday (1953) - A princess escapes for one night after taking a sedative, and a reporter who doesn't recognize her finds her sleeping in a park, agrees to watch over her for one night, until he realizes she's a missing princess, and goes for the story of a lifetime. I've said it a thousand times: a story makes the movie, and this story is ADORABLE. Audrey Hepburn plays Princess Anna who runs away from her throne, looking for fun while in Rome. She takes a sedative, falls asleep in a park, and Gregory Peck finds her, and tries to send her home, but she's out of it, and has nowhere to go, so he agrees to take her into his flat. Peck is a reporter with the American News Service who was supposed to cover the princess' visit to Rome who overslept and missed his interview. Once he realizes that he brought the princess to his home, he tells his boss that he can get an exclusive interview with the princess in exchange for a huge bonus. When Hepburn wakes up, she decides to leave Peck and wander around Rome, experiencing adventures, meeting funny locals, and seeing the sights. Peck gets his cameraman involved too, following the princess around, and together they secretly get the story of a princess enjoying life like a commoner, but their single day together begins to turn into something special; a day neither will soon forget. This is about as G-rated a movie one could watch. Absolutely harmless in every aspect, and adorable as hell. My kids watched this with me and my wife, and we talked about our time in Rome, and the sites we saw, and things we did. It evoked a lot of great memories of how we missed Rome, and how we'd love to get our kids there someday. My daughter liked that there was a princess, and my son liked the scene where they tried to escape the secret service. Such a magical little movie. Highly recommend this one. Also, seeing and hearing Gregory Peck reminded me of this:
Miss Scarlet and the Duke - season 1 (2020) Eliza Scarlet is the daughter of Henry Scarlet, a retired Scotland Yard Inspector turned private detective. When her father dies of an apparent heart attack. Eliza chooses to take over his business instead of doing the proper thing for a Victorian era lady in her situation, which is to find a suitable husband to marry and support her. Business is tough at the start, though she can occasionally depend on the help of William Wellington, nicknamed the Duke, a Scotland Yard inspector whom the late Henry had mentored. I like British detective shows and I especially like period British detective shows so obviously I was going to check this out. I thought it was merely alright. Kate Phillips is a very charming lead. By contrast her foil Stuart Martin and his one-note dourness gets a bit annoying after a while. I think this more a problem of the writing than his acting, since I did find his performance very enjoyable in Jamestown.
Leave No Trace (2018)-A father and his daughter live in the woods and have adventures. Ben Foster and Thomasin McKenzie star. Pretty good and critically acclaimed.
The Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice ~ Y. Ozu A fun family melodrama from Ozu. A little more comedic than Late Spring, say, but still with some emotional weight. There were a few instances of the camera pulling in or out that were very un-Ozu in style. If you like Ozu, though, you'll like this film.
Wayne - season 1 (2020) Wayne is a 16-year old loner whose only family is his seriously ill father. At school, he is known for his short fuse and a disposition for extreme physical violence, though a precious few (among them his best friend as well as the school's misanthropic principal) see that there is a moral code and a strong sense of justice hiding underneath the violent outbursts. When he meets Del, a girl who is equally troubled in a different way, he falls in love. After cancer finally does take his father, he decides to go on a mission of vengeance to Florida, where his mother now lives with her new boyfriend, as well as the car they stole from his dad. He takes Del along for the ride, which means they soon find themselves followed on their cross-country trip by Del's father and Del's two brothers, two strange but well-meaning off-duty cops and the principal along with Wayne's best friend Orlando, all of whom have made it their mission to bring either Wayne or Del back home. Action comedy that I thoroughly enjoyed. It's very much over the top, especially in its depiction of Wayne's violent outbursts. Mark McKenna is very good as Wayne, a sort of comedic Charles Starkweather who is styled to look vaguely like Sid Vicious. He has good chemistry with his fellow lead Ciara Bravo. Mike O'Malley is also hilarious as the long-suffering and depressed principal. Also has a guest starring turn by the always terrific Abigail Spencer.