Believer (2018) A detective looking for the elusive Mr. Lee. He is obsessed and knows he is just about the catch a break. Only every lead, every person, is not quite good enough. And then Mr. Lee's building explodes and he finds a survivor who knows just enough, and knows this elusive Mr. Lee. This is a fun ride, but fairly early for me the plot twist was obvious. Of course, The Usual Suspects is one of my favorite movies. And if you've seen it, you will see the twist as well. Still, the hurdles that were put up, and the obviousness to us, the viewer, are missed by the obsessed detective, who is blinded by that obsession with years of almost, but not quite. I had fun seeing Seung-Won Cha in another role as a bad guy (also in Night in Paradise) and I like how he plays them, so will look for more of him. In the end, though, this is not The Usual Suspects, and the ending of the movie seemed forced, but I liked the movie, nonetheless.
Deep Fear (2023) Dir. Marcus Adams Naomi and Jackson are a couple running a yacht chartering business out of Martinique. One day they split up so Jackson can go fetch their next clients by helicopter, whilst Naomi will sail their boat to the pick-up point. On her way over there, she spots shipwrecked survivors floating on some debris. After saving the pair, they claim a third of their party is still stuck on the sunken boat, within a quickly dwindling pocket of air. Naomi who is an experienced diver goes down to save the man, but then it is soon relieved that the trio she saved aren't as innocent as she first assumed. Then another type of danger shows up in the form of hungry tiger sharks... The 2000s have - perhaps strangely - seen a resurgence of the shark film. Which was probably started by the success of the Open Water franchise, but since then many more have popped up, among others the 47 Meters Down films, or Blake Lively's cat and mouse game with a shark in The Shallows. And then there is the most over the top version of this trend with The Meg and its sequel. None of them a truly great film by any means, all of them entertaining to varying degrees. This low-budget effort was nicely shot, both the underwater photography and the CGI were good for a film of this scale. The Sharks & Narcs tagline concept of the film is a bit silly, including its own Cocaine Bear moment. I wouldn't say any of the cast members left a huge impression, though I suppose Macarena Gomez was decent as the 'brains' among the trio of baddies.
Oppenheimer (2023) Dir. Christopher Nolan Through interweaving time-lines and a jump in perspectives, we are told the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer before, during and after he led the Manhattan project, with extra attention given to his strained relationship with Lewis Strauss. A bit of a mixed bag for me. Very well acted by most of its performers, just about earning its three hour run time (but only just), but ultimately felt like I was watching a good movie with a few weak sequences instead of a truly great feature. The dual perspectives, with color acting like Oppenheimer's subjective perspective (meaning he is in all of those scenes) and the black and white supposedly meant to portray a more objective POV didn't add that much imho, but I can accept it as a story-telling device. I had expected a lot more RDJ, but he is really only in the movie extensively in the third act. And whilst this might be his best post MCU performance, it still doesn't really match the quality of his 2000s work in movies like Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang and Zodiac.There are also some annoying Nolan-esque moments where he ruins basic stuff by not trusting the audience (mentioning the "junior senator from Massachusetts" and then still needing to specify he means JFK felt a lot like the superfluous "That's what that feels like" line in this scene). My overarching experience was of a movie that I kept on thinking was going to launch into a higher level but never did. Speaking of the actors in more minor roles, lots of praise has been given for Rami Malek's one-scene (though he appears briefly in two prior scenes) attention grabber during the senate hearings but I would say that of those in smaller supporting roles, I was most impressed with David Krumholtz (reliably terrific) and Josh Hartnett (very good). This might end up behind Dunkirk for me in my Nolan rankings and it's not like that itself is in my Nolan top three. After all the hype I was honestly expecting a bit more. But I don't regret seeing it.
One other thing I hadn't mentioned in my write-up, I noticed that the sex scene in Oppenheimer was mocked a bit by some critics and viewers. It's true that Nolan does not seem adept at portraying any kind of intimacy on the screen. There is a post-coital scene in there where two characters are facing each other naked, sitting opposite from one another, a scene that reminded me of a very similar one in François Ozon's l'Amant Double. But whereas Ozon uses that two shot to build tension, with Nolan he might as well have shot that scene with the pair of actors in coveralls and sitting in a bowling alley.
The Killer (2023) Dir. David Fincher The Killer is a methodical contract killer who lives by a simple creed and code of conduct, meant to maximize the success of his missions and minimize the chances of being caught in the act or apprehended afterwards. After a very long wait to take out a target in Paris, he misses his opportunity in rather dramatic fashion. Upon his return to his Dominican Republic home after the failed assassination in Paris, he discovers that professional hitmen have been there to take him out. Realizing that his fixer has set him up, he goes on a more personal mission to take out everyone involved in the failed attempt on his own life. An enjoyable and entertaining genre exercise by Fincher, its two hour run-time flying by as the movie never really lets up after its Paris opening sequence. Tonally quite a weird mix of influences. The opening scene very much reminded me of Melville, not just Le Samourai either, but also Le Cercle Rouge. In fact I think some of the buildings used in this sequence featured in the climax of the latter film, though I would have to rewatch it to be sure. Other movies it reminded me of were The American and the original Belgian version of The Memory of a Killer, both examples of the "unraveling assassin" genre. And to a certain extent also Soderbergh's Haywire. Yet there are quirks in there too that leave the tongue firmly in cheek. The tone of a lot of Fassbender's voice over narration sounds more than a bit ironic. There is the repeated use of The Smiths as a soundtrack for some of his killings. There is the absurd use of old sitcom character names as the aliases on his fake IDs and credit cards. Fassbender's detached performance with a perpetual hint of 'this guy is not quite right' behind his eyes is very well done. Tilda Swinton almost steals the entire movie in a single scene. And the brawl with the Brute was a nice bit of action film-making. This is the best Netflix original I have seen in a while, though I guess that is faint praise considering the average level of their movies.
Ha! I was just coming here to post my own review of The Killer. For me, the opening scene reminded me a bit of The Rear Window. But then I'm not as cinema-educated and have not seen of the other moves mentioned just above. Still, it was a nearly excruciating wait for the opening sequence to complete, and the bit with the heartbeat was both strange and a nice use for explaining the decisions from scene to scene. It was also weird to have this movie be quiet a bit narration, yet have the pivotal scene with Swinton be dialogue. And I agree, it was worth the wait (unexpected in my case). I also agree that the fight scene was quiet just the right touch. In a movie like this, it could have been so much James Bond over the top, or even nearly non-existent, but it was neither and it was very well done. I also liked the slow downhill Fassbender takes the character ignoring his mantras along the way, devolving it from a job into a game. The only real disappointment I have is how it ended. Still, it was enjoyable.
No, you are right, especially the scene right before he takes the shot was shot very similarly to the Hitchcock classic. Checked the locations, it's actually not in the exact same neighborhood as Melville's Le Cercle Rouge, but close. Climax of Le Cercle Rouge was shot north of le Jardin des Tuilleries. The exterior shots in The Killer were largely filmed in Le Quartier Latin, which is South of the river from there. So still around 3 km apart as the crow flies. Still not sure what to make of the ending. It has enough of a surreal quality to it that I am not even certain it is "reality" we are seeing.
While You Were Sleeping (1995) Dir. Jon Turteltaub Lucy is a single and lonely Transit Authority worker in Chicago, who has little more to look forward to during the Christmas holidays than her cat and the unwanted advances of her landlords single son. She has been fantasizing about a handsome man she has seen boarding the train every morning at the station where she is posted. One day she is witness to his mugging, during which he is thrown off the platform and onto the tracks. Lucy is just in time to save him from an oncoming train. At the hospital, there is a mistake in identity in which a nurse assumes she is the injured man's - Peter Gallagher - fiancée. When she is introduced as such to Peter's family, she cannot immediately rectify the misunderstanding. Then she is charmed by the unconscious and now comatose Peter's relatives kindness and warmth, to the point where she keeps on putting off revealing the truth and thus getting increasingly closer to the Gallagher family. Especially to Peter's brother Jack... Hadn't seen this rom-com in its entirety for at least a couple of decades. A very 1990s genre exercise with Sandra Bullock at or near the height of her popularity, wedged into her filmography in between the two huge hits that were Speed and The Net. A very good lead performance by her. This viewing might have been the first time that I appreciated what a sad film this is. At the heart of the central 'misunderstanding' is a incredibly lonely individual who deceives an entire family not out of malice or cruelty but to escape her own extreme solitude. One other small thing I never realized until now is the small supporting role by Monica Keena (of later Dawson Creek's fame) as the Gallagher clan's little sister.
Planes, Trains, and Automobiles (1987) I watch it every year around Thanksgiving. Everything from the small Kevin Bacon cameo to the reveal about Del's wife is better each time I see it. The odd couple routine works so well with two fantastic actors and a deluge of absurd scenarios that make their trip from NY to Chicago a challenge along the way. The key to the film is John Candy making the socially inept Del come across as a likable character despite his seeming obliviousness to everyone and everything around him. This is my Thanksgiving go to film and it will be until my physical copies stop playing and I can't get any new ones.
The key to a good rom com from that era is something larger driving the film. Whether it's the inherent sadness or While You Were Sleeping or Sleepless in Seattle, the long term and well ingrained opposing worldviews of When Harry Met Sally, or the financial insecurity and infidelity of It Could Happen To You, the romance itself had to be no more than an equal part of the story for it to work.
Are you there God? It's me, Margaret (2023) Dir. Kelly Fremon Craig In the early 1970s, Margaret Simon returns home from Summer camp to unhappy news: her dad's promotion means they are moving out of their NYC apartment and into a suburban house in New Jersey. The move will take her away from her school and friends, as well as her beloved grandmother Sylvia. Afraid of what is awaiting her, Margaret starts to talk to God, expressing her wishes and sharing her fears. Even though her home life does not feature religiosity itself. Her parents are a lapsed Christian and Jew respectively. Grandma Sylvia has been gently trying to get Margaret to go to Temple with her, whilst her parents want to leave religion as a personal choice of Margaret's, one she can make once she reaches adulthood. Her other grandparents are not in her life. Soon after moving to New Jersey, Margaret joins a small 'club' started by a popular girl at school who lives in her neighborhood and through it she is confronted with the adolescent realities of boys, bras and her future womanhood... Coming of age comedy/dramedy based on a book of the same name that I did not read, so I cannot judge how faithful or not this adaptation is. Abby Ryder Fortson is a delightful screen presence and a young actor of obvious talent (especially in some of the more emotional scenes). Though it is Rachel McAdams as Margaret's sweet and kind mother Barbara that left the strongest impression on me. Some people think McAdams should get some awards recognition for this film and whilst I cannot see that happening (this is not the kind of film the Academy tends to reward), it would definitely not be undeserved. McAdams' career in general is kind of odd. Her obvious talent and pleasant screen presence has meant she has had a solid career for the past 20+ years. Yet she never truly had a moment where she was "it", not like her contemporaries Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, Jessica Chastain, ... Even though there is no obvious reason why not. And I have to mention Kathy Bates as well, utterly delightful as Margaret's grandma Sylvia.
We've all seen lots of movies where a societal change or a new technology would upset the whole plot. But this is the only one I know where concussion protocol is what would upset it: "Heaven Can Wait." It's one of my all-time favorite movies, and I watch it every couple of years.
Weird, I rarely venture in here. Two comments on movies above. The Killer is on my list, guess the last scene (or scenes) were shot near where my brother lives in St Charles, IL. While You Were Sleeping is my wife's all time favorite Christmas movies. Exterior of the church where Lucy's parents got married is around the corner from where I am typing and the Callaghan's house is a few blocks in the other direction. Definitely exteriors shot there, not sure about interiors. Anyways, saw this one over the weekend It was ok. I liked Phoenix's performance, thought it was too jumpy (not sure how you condense Napoleon's life into one movie), and needed more battle scenes.
From the little I have read about it so far, I have seen some suggestions it is told primarily from the POV of his relationship with Josephine. Is that accurate?
Yes, as my wife (high school history teacher, teaches Advanced Placement European History) noted, they almost try to make it a love story. Movie spoiler, you'd think he left Egypt to return to France because he found out Josephine was having an affair. Real spoiler, I mean she was (and so was he) but it wasn't the reason he left Egypt. He really was obsessed with her and everything but the movie shouldn't really have tried to hang its hat on the love story. Plus, they didn't even mention any of the dirty letters!
Reptile (2023) Will Grady is a real estate agent looking to close big. Tom Nichols is a seasoned detective in a newer town with a past that isn't on up and up. Grady's wife ends up dead, and Nichols is the one on the investigation. And just about everybody is not quite on the up and up. I really liked Benicio Del Toro in this, doing his moody bit, this time as a detective. Of course, he was a co-writer, so the part seems to be written for him. Matched is Justin Timberlake. He does moody parts like this fairly well, though his range was not challenged, here. Eric Bogosian, the captain to Del Toro, played a part not too dissimilar to his time on Law & Order: Criminal Intent (the best of the L&O universe). There are others in there as well, such as an underwhelming part for Alicia Silverstone (Del Toro's on-screen wife) - in this case, I think the part was miscast, and Domenick Lombardozzi (Herc from The Wire) in another police role. But the stars are Del Toro and Bogosian, particularly when they are on screen together. Overall, this is not a bad movie, and among the better Netflix movies. A couple of twists that are somewhat expected, but not exactly predictable as it is clear from early on that there will be twists somewhere, the only question is which set up leads to the twist. I enjoyed this, for all the holes in the script, and it was never as slow moving as "moody" suggests.
One review I heard was kind of scathing about the Scott's portrayal of the Napoleon/Josephine relationship - a lot of Napoleon's decisions were in some way because of Josephine, and thus she was was blamed for all of his failures. Oh, that same review said it should have had more war scenes since the ones that were there were so good.
Confession (2022) Jong-seok Yoon Yoo Min-ho finds himself accused of murdering his former mistress after he was found in a locked hotel room with her body, with the cops bursting into the room only minutes after the killing had occurred. As CEO of a successful IT company, he has the resources to buy the best defense and thus his company counsel arranges for expert criminal defense attorney Yang Shin-ae to defend him. A woman with a reputation for never losing a case, she visits her client at the remote cabin where he has been holed up after his temporary release. There she demands from Min-ho to tell her the whole truth, especially since his own story, that another individual was in the room with him and his former mistress, an unidentified man who committed the murder and then escaped unseen, is a defense that she knows the prosecution will easily discredit. After some insistence on honesty on his part, he reveals that he thinks the murder might be related to a traffic accident that him and his mistress were in months earlier, right before their break-up. The nature and dramatic aftermath of said accident gives him ample reason to believe that the murder might be its sad consequence... Very entertaining South-Korean thriller, told in a series of flashbacks, recounted by several unreliable narrators, with the framing of the entire story the lawyer interviewing her prospective client at a remote location. With a very good Yunjin Kim (of Lost fame) as the lawyer and So Ji-seob as her not entirely honest client. I don't know what it is about Korean cinema that makes it so incredibly adept at this specific type of thriller.
Obliterated (2023) A special task force lead by a CIA agent and involving assets from the NSA, air force and special forces are tasked with finding a nuke that is supposedly being put on the market by a Russian arms dealer. We join the team on the eve of their success in Las Vegas, as they manage to secure the device and eliminate or apprehend most of the individuals involved in both the sale and purchase of the nuclear weapon in Sin City. With their months long operation now concluded, the team members decide to unwind a bit and throw a end off mission party in which they go wild on booze, drugs and sex. Only a few hours later, they are informed that the device they retrieved is a decoy that only contains small amounts of nuclear material to pass a cursory examination. The real device is thus still somewhere in Las Vegas and the team is forced back into the field, in spite of their extremely drunk and drug-addled state. A very over the top action comedy from the same creative team that made Cobra Kai. And like the Karate Kid spin-off, I think this will probably be a show you hate or love. If you cannot get into the very silly tone of it all, it will probably be something you loathe. If you can embrace it, it is quite enjoyable, even if all of the jokes don't land. I fell into the second category. The main ensemble is a lot of fun. Especially Eugene Kim as the usually straight-laced team pilot who ends up having to deal with a very bad long drug trip and his opposite, EOD expert Haggerty, a bomb tech with an extremely hedonistic life style played by veteran C. Thomas Howell. Kind of shares 24s real time gimmick, as the eight episodes more or less comprise a single night and morning. Checking some critic aggregator sites, this was very poorly received by critics. Though skimming through some of the reviews, I think a lot of it is down to people expecting a very different kind of show.
The Fallout (2021) Vada (Jenna Ortega) is in high school, with an average family. She gets an emergency text from her younger sister, Amelia (Lumi Pollack) and leaves class. She ends up in the bathroom with Mia (Maddie Ziegler), from the better part of town...and they end up huddled in the stall as a school shooting takes place in the hallway outside. Vada doesn't know how to deal as she watches her friends process and respond. But Vada has nothing, and can't give anything. The only person who understands is Mia. This is what happens after a school shooting takes place, and how different people deal with it in different ways. It's tender in the way it lets characters test out who they have become and what it does to their relationships, and what they need to do to go forward. And it looks at how the shooting effects not just the students, but a family (Vada's family) as well. In particular, Amelia spends most of the movie trying to connect to Vada - Lumi Pollack is wonderful in that role. And when Vada decides to get high at school...hilarious.
Nobody (2021) Hutch seems like a normal Middle America kind of guy. Assistant manager at a machine shop, wife and two kids, nice house, likes jazz vinyl, finds out that he needs a cat. Nobody special. His home gets invaded by some thieves who aren't very good at it, but he takes the peaceful path to keep the violence to a minimum. Everyone, including the cops, rib him about it. They have no idea how much he really wanted to got to town on them. They also have no idea how capable he was of doing it. A black comic version of John Wick for the 50-year-old set (and the 80-year-old-set it turns out). A power / revenge fantasy about a everyman with secret knowledge and ability and resources and justification to take down the irredeemable worst of the worst. A simple enough theme that's hard to screw up. But this is elevated by getting the tone just right. Part of what makes the trip so effective is the wry but felt opening that a lot of guys can connect to. Nobody never forgets it's a fantasy, and there's never a sense of tragedy or danger but simply a building and smile-inducing sense of knowing those who FA are going to FO. The series of convenient coincidences that make up the plot were inconspicuous in the watching. Odenkirk is great, shifting from emotional to deadpan when needed. The musical choices are excellent, well known and fitting but never cliché. Christopher Lloyd was a hoot.
Foyle's War (2002-2015) Christopher Foyle is a veteran Detective Chief Superintendent in Hastings, England. As the second world war starts, he tries repeatedly in vain to get an assignment in the war office. Resigned to instead having to focus on his old job, he soon finds out that his now understaffed constabulary still has to deal with its fair share of often times violent crime, in spite of the existential war that is raging all over Europe. Helped by his loyal driver Sam (detached from the MTC) and Detective Sergeant Paul Milner (a war invalid who joins the Hastings police force soon after getting badly wounded at the war's start), he has to navigate law enforcement in a time of great tragedy, all the while having to juggle his personal reality of having a son who enlists in the RAF and becomes a fighter pilot. It was @Val1's post in this topic that reminded me of this series, so I finally started watching it. This is also why I have posted fewer films in the last weeks, as the Foyle series are British mysteries in the feature length format, like say Poirot and Endeavour. Each clocking in at +/- 90 minutes. So watching the entire series is the equivalent of 28 movies in terms of the time consumed. A solid genre exercise in the best British tradition, I found the first six seasons to be the most enjoyable. Those span the era from May 1940 until August 1945. Much of the dramatic tension in those seasons is garnered from the war that is always raging in the backdrop. So crimes committed for motives like greed, jealousy, lust, revenge, anger... get extra poignancy in the knowledge that so many people are already dying in combat duty or in bombing raids. The final two seasons (set from August 1946 until January 1947) deal with the nascent Cold War, after Foyle has transferred to MI5, and thus also moved to London, following his retirement from the Hastings police force. These are still definitely worth seeing but they miss something of the war-time story lines. Anthony Horowitz writing is definitely very good throughout but the shows greatest asset is Michael Kitchen's understated performance as Christopher Foyle. Sparse of words, economic in his emoting, his performance is one that can command with a raising of an eyebrow or the twisting of the lips. Making his occasional outburst of righteous anger all the more effective.
Couldn't have said it better myself. I agree about the post-war stuff, but you know, after the 50 Ships episode, the notion of Foyle's post-war activities probably sparked the drive for two more seasons. Apparently the actor who played the guy who stole the synchro mesh gear had passed away, because that would have made a fabulous episode. I also think that Horowitz was much less involved after season four and he turned much of his attention elsewhere. I'm glad you liked the show.