The Last Man on Earth (1964)
This earliest version of the earliest zombie story -- before The Omega Man and I Am Legend, the movie that used the book's title -- with Vincent Price has the appeal of seeing all this on a more homey level, traipsing around in shabby digs, everything strewn with the catatonic and corpses. Like a Sunday of zombies. RiffTrax joins the host of others with the last man.
This earliest version of the earliest zombie story -- before The Omega Man and I Am Legend, the movie that used the book's title -- with Vincent Price has the appeal of seeing all this on a more homey level, traipsing around in shabby digs, everything strewn with the catatonic and corpses. Like a Sunday of zombies. RiffTrax joins the host of others with the last man.
The thrill of flight
The Voyeurs (2021)
Chloe (2009)
Action and plot tend to be the literal-mindedness of movies, at the expense of more figurative play, and when sex is involved, since it's divided from depiction so much anyway, it tends to the boosted sensation of thriller. At the same time that suggestions, comments, insights about sex get shunted for the action, even the sex itself gets transferred to or translated into the terms of the thriller scheme, that suspense and payoff. In The Voyeurs the lead couple are played so bland and sweet as to suggest something more applicable, but it becomes part of the tonal contrasts along with the absurd plot twists. It's not even so much the premise itself, the basic idea of what happens, as the steps the story takes to get there that make it far-fetched. The manipulation approaches the sort of convenience of genius criminals and villains because of what happens on the way, that you realize retroactively was all to have been perfectly caused. All the implication built up about vicariousness and agency, and even broader implications from the erotic, about identity, privacy, even ethics, are shorted out by the big reveal, the main point of the premise. And at least one big turn that involves sex is washed out by all this, even though it's also the most ludicrous as far as what could've been calculated. Chloe plays out more subtly and is constructed to hit points that have more evocative play -- about titillation and jealousy, insecurity, aging, the cast of all relations in being with and for others -- but even on that scale, it's still primed as thriller. Implication, subtext, even innuendo, may leave a lot unspoken about sex, but just because movies are being more open about it in some ways doesn't necessarily mean they're saying more, in quality if not quantity.
The Voyeurs (2021)
Chloe (2009)
Action and plot tend to be the literal-mindedness of movies, at the expense of more figurative play, and when sex is involved, since it's divided from depiction so much anyway, it tends to the boosted sensation of thriller. At the same time that suggestions, comments, insights about sex get shunted for the action, even the sex itself gets transferred to or translated into the terms of the thriller scheme, that suspense and payoff. In The Voyeurs the lead couple are played so bland and sweet as to suggest something more applicable, but it becomes part of the tonal contrasts along with the absurd plot twists. It's not even so much the premise itself, the basic idea of what happens, as the steps the story takes to get there that make it far-fetched. The manipulation approaches the sort of convenience of genius criminals and villains because of what happens on the way, that you realize retroactively was all to have been perfectly caused. All the implication built up about vicariousness and agency, and even broader implications from the erotic, about identity, privacy, even ethics, are shorted out by the big reveal, the main point of the premise. And at least one big turn that involves sex is washed out by all this, even though it's also the most ludicrous as far as what could've been calculated. Chloe plays out more subtly and is constructed to hit points that have more evocative play -- about titillation and jealousy, insecurity, aging, the cast of all relations in being with and for others -- but even on that scale, it's still primed as thriller. Implication, subtext, even innuendo, may leave a lot unspoken about sex, but just because movies are being more open about it in some ways doesn't necessarily mean they're saying more, in quality if not quantity.
Lovelace (2013)
The cast alone provides interest, with even bit parts turning up juicy choices like Chloe Sevigny and Eric Roberts. Without adding any new insights about the porn industry, this falls to more biopic banality, which if nothing else, serves to show how distressingly common these stories about abusive controlling partners are in real life.
The cast alone provides interest, with even bit parts turning up juicy choices like Chloe Sevigny and Eric Roberts. Without adding any new insights about the porn industry, this falls to more biopic banality, which if nothing else, serves to show how distressingly common these stories about abusive controlling partners are in real life.
Hell of the Living Dead [aka Virus] (1980)
While Jean Rollin took the zombie movie to greater depths of even drive-in cheapness, but also fun badness (Zombie Lake, The Grapes of Death) the Italians, who had already rifled the general horror genre, offered this competition. For exploitation, there's lots of wide-eyed goofiness, absurd pretense for nudity, stock animal footage, even a Goblin score clipped from other movies, and wallowing in cheap gore effects seemingly intended to be more funny than horrific. Ripe for RiffTrax.
While Jean Rollin took the zombie movie to greater depths of even drive-in cheapness, but also fun badness (Zombie Lake, The Grapes of Death) the Italians, who had already rifled the general horror genre, offered this competition. For exploitation, there's lots of wide-eyed goofiness, absurd pretense for nudity, stock animal footage, even a Goblin score clipped from other movies, and wallowing in cheap gore effects seemingly intended to be more funny than horrific. Ripe for RiffTrax.
The Guy from Harlem (1977)
Closing the gap between conception and execution -- which means being as close as possible to just a walk-through of the premise -- for blaxploitation. The title tells you that, and the song of the same does it even better. Er -- better in the sense of most cheaply for effort. The RiffTrax riff on the feckless funk theme song is worth the price of admission. "He's clean!" Like the cheese shop from Monty Python, this movie is certainly not contaminated by any sort of product: sex, action, or quality.
Closing the gap between conception and execution -- which means being as close as possible to just a walk-through of the premise -- for blaxploitation. The title tells you that, and the song of the same does it even better. Er -- better in the sense of most cheaply for effort. The RiffTrax riff on the feckless funk theme song is worth the price of admission. "He's clean!" Like the cheese shop from Monty Python, this movie is certainly not contaminated by any sort of product: sex, action, or quality.
Shrunken Heads (1994)
Directed by Richard Elfman, brother of Danny, who also did the main theme. Richard makes an appearance. Meant to be the kind of sublimation of gore and horror in broader pop, more family, if not kid-oriented, adventure comedy, after Spielberg, Tim Burton, etc., with performances meant to be campy, or at least eccentric -- Julius Harris and Meg Foster especially -- but are mostly just kooky. It never gets out of the sitcom canned quality, and adolescent consciousness and self-consciousness, to make its play with the dark and weird the real twist. Plus the Tonton Macoute and Haile Selassie aren't exactly charmingly dark or eccentric references in any context. More like off comedy monologue jokes. The only real grain comes from some of the effects with the heads in closeup. RiffTrax charges the mojo.
Directed by Richard Elfman, brother of Danny, who also did the main theme. Richard makes an appearance. Meant to be the kind of sublimation of gore and horror in broader pop, more family, if not kid-oriented, adventure comedy, after Spielberg, Tim Burton, etc., with performances meant to be campy, or at least eccentric -- Julius Harris and Meg Foster especially -- but are mostly just kooky. It never gets out of the sitcom canned quality, and adolescent consciousness and self-consciousness, to make its play with the dark and weird the real twist. Plus the Tonton Macoute and Haile Selassie aren't exactly charmingly dark or eccentric references in any context. More like off comedy monologue jokes. The only real grain comes from some of the effects with the heads in closeup. RiffTrax charges the mojo.
Stuart Saves His Family (1995)
The moves that are made: fairly sophisticated observations of family stuff, in the line of the more general character study comedy Saturday Night Live came from in the 70s, avoiding big caper plot sort of action to keep it on that scale (unlike lots of other SNL vehicles, among the bulk of American comedies), and a happy ending made from the good-hearted bone thrown to show the ribbing isn't mean, as in the skits on the show, not exactly the same as the big plot kind of melodrama. Reasons why this didn't appeal for box office. Despite interest beyond the standard for even SNL vehicles, it doesn't exactly pull together, with aspirations that sometimes seem more literary, sprawling in different directions.
5/27/26
The moves that are made: fairly sophisticated observations of family stuff, in the line of the more general character study comedy Saturday Night Live came from in the 70s, avoiding big caper plot sort of action to keep it on that scale (unlike lots of other SNL vehicles, among the bulk of American comedies), and a happy ending made from the good-hearted bone thrown to show the ribbing isn't mean, as in the skits on the show, not exactly the same as the big plot kind of melodrama. Reasons why this didn't appeal for box office. Despite interest beyond the standard for even SNL vehicles, it doesn't exactly pull together, with aspirations that sometimes seem more literary, sprawling in different directions.
Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu (2026)
The comment that this is like an episode of the series has been used as criticism, but on that scale, it actually comes off well, certainly one of the better episodes. At its best it gets into the playground of imaginary environments -- the material fascination of models, props and sets, production design, albeit now much CG -- of the first movie and that peaked with The Empire Strikes Back. Stretches with little or no dialogue make the spectacle more seductive. There's plenty of the more obtrusive spectacle, stuff that makes eyes roll rather than stare, overplaying cutesiness and repeating elements, including references to the franchise, the action piling up fights that become less about context and thus more indistinct and monotonous, and one part of the soundtrack that conjures up images of 80s movies and music videos with synth clap. Night. The city. The Mandalorian and Axel Foley do not get along. Kim Carnes steps out of the smoke.
The comment that this is like an episode of the series has been used as criticism, but on that scale, it actually comes off well, certainly one of the better episodes. At its best it gets into the playground of imaginary environments -- the material fascination of models, props and sets, production design, albeit now much CG -- of the first movie and that peaked with The Empire Strikes Back. Stretches with little or no dialogue make the spectacle more seductive. There's plenty of the more obtrusive spectacle, stuff that makes eyes roll rather than stare, overplaying cutesiness and repeating elements, including references to the franchise, the action piling up fights that become less about context and thus more indistinct and monotonous, and one part of the soundtrack that conjures up images of 80s movies and music videos with synth clap. Night. The city. The Mandalorian and Axel Foley do not get along. Kim Carnes steps out of the smoke.
Middle off the road
Nice work if you can get it.
The Shadow Men (1997)
The Invader (1997)
Before production for streaming, direct-to-video became a new kind of B-movie line, but also, for that reason as well, a refuge for actors getting squeezed out of major movie release work. The makers of these movies produced and distributed by companies such as Multicom, Promark, Spectacor, Videal, Xenon (the bumpers on the movie copy may differ from info you find in other places, e.g. IMDb, due to lots of turnover) wanted stars as draw, recognition factor, so used those who had become stars in the 80s as the 90s emphasis on blockbuster action pics also made other roles more scarce. The result was formulaic stories, often imitating mainstream movie material, with cheaper production means, but more competently executed than the worst kind of cheapies, and especially because of the actors. These two movies demonstrate the difference that actors and emphasis on acting can make for just a minimal level of engagement. While they may not be as fun as really schlocky or campy stuff, they don't make you glaze over or reach for your mobile device either. There may be moments where the pretending is more obvious, because less expense or effort was taken, such as special effects or even fighting scenes -- no big stunts or risks -- but the more general story composition kind of editing and the delivery by the actors hold up even when the story doesn't. It's a good demonstration of investment, getting into or selling the part. You can watch Dean Stockwell and Sharilynn Fenn outside of David Lynch projects, Eric Roberts (whose unpickiness about film budgets has made him one of the most prolific actors ever), and even Andrew Prine running through sometimes tepid business, but drawing us in. The Shadow People is a straight version of Men in Black, that came out the same year and even refers to the same term (the UFO legends were common to both). In the The Invader, Sean Young gets some decent material for a character that she can in turn shape into a livelier, slyer expression of sarcastic resistance to female lot than the plot seems to have time for.
5/19/26
Nice work if you can get it.
The Shadow Men (1997)
The Invader (1997)
Before production for streaming, direct-to-video became a new kind of B-movie line, but also, for that reason as well, a refuge for actors getting squeezed out of major movie release work. The makers of these movies produced and distributed by companies such as Multicom, Promark, Spectacor, Videal, Xenon (the bumpers on the movie copy may differ from info you find in other places, e.g. IMDb, due to lots of turnover) wanted stars as draw, recognition factor, so used those who had become stars in the 80s as the 90s emphasis on blockbuster action pics also made other roles more scarce. The result was formulaic stories, often imitating mainstream movie material, with cheaper production means, but more competently executed than the worst kind of cheapies, and especially because of the actors. These two movies demonstrate the difference that actors and emphasis on acting can make for just a minimal level of engagement. While they may not be as fun as really schlocky or campy stuff, they don't make you glaze over or reach for your mobile device either. There may be moments where the pretending is more obvious, because less expense or effort was taken, such as special effects or even fighting scenes -- no big stunts or risks -- but the more general story composition kind of editing and the delivery by the actors hold up even when the story doesn't. It's a good demonstration of investment, getting into or selling the part. You can watch Dean Stockwell and Sharilynn Fenn outside of David Lynch projects, Eric Roberts (whose unpickiness about film budgets has made him one of the most prolific actors ever), and even Andrew Prine running through sometimes tepid business, but drawing us in. The Shadow People is a straight version of Men in Black, that came out the same year and even refers to the same term (the UFO legends were common to both). In the The Invader, Sean Young gets some decent material for a character that she can in turn shape into a livelier, slyer expression of sarcastic resistance to female lot than the plot seems to have time for.
The Next One [aka The Time Traveller] (1984)
Similar to The Man Who Fell to Earth, but even more curiously to Starman, considering Adrienne Barbeau and John Carpenter. They were divorced in 1984 and both movies came out that year. It's an interesting role for Barbeau, giving her a much less forced character than usual, and Keir Dullea twists the 2001: A Spaced Odyssey ethos for a more human kind of alien. Writer and director Nico Mastorakis uses the unassuming charm of a Greek Island for this version of kenosis, but the pretending remains too sparse even for that to hold up, and then the ending rings a bit more like kitschy Euro pop.
Similar to The Man Who Fell to Earth, but even more curiously to Starman, considering Adrienne Barbeau and John Carpenter. They were divorced in 1984 and both movies came out that year. It's an interesting role for Barbeau, giving her a much less forced character than usual, and Keir Dullea twists the 2001: A Spaced Odyssey ethos for a more human kind of alien. Writer and director Nico Mastorakis uses the unassuming charm of a Greek Island for this version of kenosis, but the pretending remains too sparse even for that to hold up, and then the ending rings a bit more like kitschy Euro pop.
Sliver (1993)
The remedial sex thriller, as if for people who don't get implication or subtext. Almost every scene, especially for about the first half, is setup. It's constant premise statement. But just to give you an example of how any of that adds up, there's that title: in the story it's the name of the building, because -- to get that word in -- for . . . There are no serpent-themed monsters or horrors. Sharon Stone does stroke Billy "William" Baldwin's volcano. Though it's not as fun as The Temp, maybe its biggest sin, Stone's performance is enjoyably ridiculous, though most of that is director Phillip Noyce's blame.
The remedial sex thriller, as if for people who don't get implication or subtext. Almost every scene, especially for about the first half, is setup. It's constant premise statement. But just to give you an example of how any of that adds up, there's that title: in the story it's the name of the building, because -- to get that word in -- for . . . There are no serpent-themed monsters or horrors. Sharon Stone does stroke Billy "William" Baldwin's volcano. Though it's not as fun as The Temp, maybe its biggest sin, Stone's performance is enjoyably ridiculous, though most of that is director Phillip Noyce's blame.
Innerspace (1987)
Fantastic Voyage delivery system for a variation on All of Me. Boisterous, with lots of plot lines, characters, piled on, but with a strange pace that sometimes seems it's waiting for laughs. Martin Short serves as the index. Director Joe Dante wants to make use of Short's comedic flings, but that tends to subsume the more straight characterization moments, as if that's Short's gags, too. That makes the triangle stuff, where Dante wants to leave every implication hanging, more contorted, with Short's ingenue-like wistful reactions outplaying Meg Ryan. Compare the ruddier, more throbbing effects for the human body landscapes to Fantastic Voyage's epic oceanic sweep.
5/12/26
Fantastic Voyage delivery system for a variation on All of Me. Boisterous, with lots of plot lines, characters, piled on, but with a strange pace that sometimes seems it's waiting for laughs. Martin Short serves as the index. Director Joe Dante wants to make use of Short's comedic flings, but that tends to subsume the more straight characterization moments, as if that's Short's gags, too. That makes the triangle stuff, where Dante wants to leave every implication hanging, more contorted, with Short's ingenue-like wistful reactions outplaying Meg Ryan. Compare the ruddier, more throbbing effects for the human body landscapes to Fantastic Voyage's epic oceanic sweep.
Speed (1994)
The movie's a metaphor for itself as trying to hold down the hyperbole of action films. The major obstacle, if not absurdity, of the plot -- how to keep a city bus going above 50 mph anywhere, let alone Los Angeles -- makes for some interesting choices more a game of wits than blasts, save for one complete leap over plausibility and a freeway gap. It has the crisp look and mid to close detail of Die Hard, which it's clearly in the vein of if not trying to repeat. The script and direction, despite the premise, keep it lean and down to business, and that makes for less showy or awkward performances from Dennis Hopper and Keanu Reeves.
The movie's a metaphor for itself as trying to hold down the hyperbole of action films. The major obstacle, if not absurdity, of the plot -- how to keep a city bus going above 50 mph anywhere, let alone Los Angeles -- makes for some interesting choices more a game of wits than blasts, save for one complete leap over plausibility and a freeway gap. It has the crisp look and mid to close detail of Die Hard, which it's clearly in the vein of if not trying to repeat. The script and direction, despite the premise, keep it lean and down to business, and that makes for less showy or awkward performances from Dennis Hopper and Keanu Reeves.
Mortal Kombat II (2026)
The main battle is between a satirical take including on 80s/90s action movies -- why not arcade graphics while we're at it? -- and a straight fantasy set in CG nether realms with the formality of an origin story. Though it takes place way too much in the latter, some of the humor breaks through thanks to Karl Urban and Josh Lawson. What it manages is mid-level Marvel movie, which keeps it moving and competent enough, and which the closing credits cinch as derivation.
5/6/26
The main battle is between a satirical take including on 80s/90s action movies -- why not arcade graphics while we're at it? -- and a straight fantasy set in CG nether realms with the formality of an origin story. Though it takes place way too much in the latter, some of the humor breaks through thanks to Karl Urban and Josh Lawson. What it manages is mid-level Marvel movie, which keeps it moving and competent enough, and which the closing credits cinch as derivation.
Going through the motions
I'll Sleep When I'm Dead (2003)
Trying to be more pensive, this comes off a bit drafty. Writer Trevor Preston has a decent frame, an opening-closing echo that gathers the whole into a more existential rumination. The Clive Owen character doesn't give us anything quite so anywhere else, director Mike Hodges loading up on icy stares and powder keg, like primed revenge hero even before his journey of discovery. It's the 00s gangster movie version of:
The Changeling (1980)
This is an attempt at a more cultured, if not necessarily intellectual, account of paranormal phenomena, since it may not want to be just a ghost story. But it amounts to setting up trappings and markers -- a classical music composer and professor, mansion, historical society, senator -- and a big deal aura that seems derivative of The Exorcist, plot lines that cross but don't really coalesce, and a lot of furniture rattling. George C. Scott and real-life wife Trish van Devere play characters who team up, if not exactly romantically, though they cry and scream together.
Aloha (2015)
And then there's going through the motions like a bomb. It's making motions, all the motions, relentless motions, but nothing lands. It's a weird robot puppet delivery of a movie, every segment, scene, even shot -- that even makes for bad editing -- teased as cute profundity. It's a lesson of how art can be a Frankenstein of parts which don't only fail to make a whole, but impede it. The whole thing is made of darlings that should be killed, including the relentless compilation soundtrack. It's like someone who has a shtick as a crutch, that you can't get through to just talk to them. I wasn't particularly fond of Cameron Crowe's Almost Famous, and this sheds other light, or perhaps casts another shadow.
I'll Sleep When I'm Dead (2003)
Trying to be more pensive, this comes off a bit drafty. Writer Trevor Preston has a decent frame, an opening-closing echo that gathers the whole into a more existential rumination. The Clive Owen character doesn't give us anything quite so anywhere else, director Mike Hodges loading up on icy stares and powder keg, like primed revenge hero even before his journey of discovery. It's the 00s gangster movie version of:
The Changeling (1980)
This is an attempt at a more cultured, if not necessarily intellectual, account of paranormal phenomena, since it may not want to be just a ghost story. But it amounts to setting up trappings and markers -- a classical music composer and professor, mansion, historical society, senator -- and a big deal aura that seems derivative of The Exorcist, plot lines that cross but don't really coalesce, and a lot of furniture rattling. George C. Scott and real-life wife Trish van Devere play characters who team up, if not exactly romantically, though they cry and scream together.
Aloha (2015)
And then there's going through the motions like a bomb. It's making motions, all the motions, relentless motions, but nothing lands. It's a weird robot puppet delivery of a movie, every segment, scene, even shot -- that even makes for bad editing -- teased as cute profundity. It's a lesson of how art can be a Frankenstein of parts which don't only fail to make a whole, but impede it. The whole thing is made of darlings that should be killed, including the relentless compilation soundtrack. It's like someone who has a shtick as a crutch, that you can't get through to just talk to them. I wasn't particularly fond of Cameron Crowe's Almost Famous, and this sheds other light, or perhaps casts another shadow.
The Magnetic Monster (1953)
In my monster movie childhood days, this was a ripoff because the monster was all indirection. A couple of effects that look like radiating sparks in a microscope pass for the "monster," and the later, impressive "Deltatron" was lifted from a 1934 German movie. As a grownup, the concept holds more weight, particularly knowing about radiation and other nuclear risks. And as a B-movie, even with its shortcuts it's competently executed under the direction of Curt Siodmak (The Wolf Man, Earth vs. the Flying Saucers, et al.) and Herbert Strock (How to Make a Monster, speaking of bait and switch). It was also the first of Richard Carlson's horror leads, the most famous being Creature from the Black Lagoon. There's also a RiffTrax treatment with Bridget Nelson and Mary Jo Pehl.
In my monster movie childhood days, this was a ripoff because the monster was all indirection. A couple of effects that look like radiating sparks in a microscope pass for the "monster," and the later, impressive "Deltatron" was lifted from a 1934 German movie. As a grownup, the concept holds more weight, particularly knowing about radiation and other nuclear risks. And as a B-movie, even with its shortcuts it's competently executed under the direction of Curt Siodmak (The Wolf Man, Earth vs. the Flying Saucers, et al.) and Herbert Strock (How to Make a Monster, speaking of bait and switch). It was also the first of Richard Carlson's horror leads, the most famous being Creature from the Black Lagoon. There's also a RiffTrax treatment with Bridget Nelson and Mary Jo Pehl.
Alien Outlaw (1985)
Apart from the conspicuous quality of everything else, this is a lesson in bad script writing, not just for all that is wrought in the premise, but the way the dialogue works over the actors, and everything else. When you've got actors flailing around in the water, bad dialogue -- overworked cutesiness and exposition -- is like loading them with weight. Writer and director Phil Smoot gets the double bill for that. While he packs so much into the characters' mouths, mostly for some reason about getting a trick shooter set up with a talent agency that doesn't do local, it does make it more amusingly curious and inexplicable that the aliens jump in now and then like a paintball team cheaply imitating Road Warrior costumes and grabbing all the real guns for a spree. RiffTrax takes aim.
4/28/26
Apart from the conspicuous quality of everything else, this is a lesson in bad script writing, not just for all that is wrought in the premise, but the way the dialogue works over the actors, and everything else. When you've got actors flailing around in the water, bad dialogue -- overworked cutesiness and exposition -- is like loading them with weight. Writer and director Phil Smoot gets the double bill for that. While he packs so much into the characters' mouths, mostly for some reason about getting a trick shooter set up with a talent agency that doesn't do local, it does make it more amusingly curious and inexplicable that the aliens jump in now and then like a paintball team cheaply imitating Road Warrior costumes and grabbing all the real guns for a spree. RiffTrax takes aim.
Project Hail Mary (2026)
It's competent and affecting enough, even though breaking it down, everything about it seems derived for manipulation. The elision works well to give it a more smooth delivery, but that's also for all those other well-worn elements -- handheld, flashbacks, cinema-within-cinema virtual memory, pop music triggers -- even good, interesting, different choices get lumped into the pile of more obvious uses -- and the jumps in the story that also have to do with so much poetic -- more than just license -- convenience. All that apart from the most obvious, which is then brandished with references to Rocky and Close Encounters, among others. For that former, I'm not referring to just Chicken Spider McNuggets, but to the way this makes the Rocky of the human species (as I said about Alien) explicit. It's like someone took apart forty movie Lego sets and put the parts together as something else. The alien is more interesting at first, but then gets far too much milking and wringing, and ends up The Muppets. And there's a factor with Ryan Gosling going on now in movies, with this following Barbie and The Fall Guy and others, similar to that with his Saturday Night Live appearances, where they just seem to concoct breaking character. It's an appeal that's more assumed than earned, more with how he's used than his performance. Contains gratuitous violence at the cellular level.
It's competent and affecting enough, even though breaking it down, everything about it seems derived for manipulation. The elision works well to give it a more smooth delivery, but that's also for all those other well-worn elements -- handheld, flashbacks, cinema-within-cinema virtual memory, pop music triggers -- even good, interesting, different choices get lumped into the pile of more obvious uses -- and the jumps in the story that also have to do with so much poetic -- more than just license -- convenience. All that apart from the most obvious, which is then brandished with references to Rocky and Close Encounters, among others. For that former, I'm not referring to just Chicken Spider McNuggets, but to the way this makes the Rocky of the human species (as I said about Alien) explicit. It's like someone took apart forty movie Lego sets and put the parts together as something else. The alien is more interesting at first, but then gets far too much milking and wringing, and ends up The Muppets. And there's a factor with Ryan Gosling going on now in movies, with this following Barbie and The Fall Guy and others, similar to that with his Saturday Night Live appearances, where they just seem to concoct breaking character. It's an appeal that's more assumed than earned, more with how he's used than his performance. Contains gratuitous violence at the cellular level.
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954)
For a major live-action picture from Walt Disney Productions, one of its earliest, this attempts to boost the rambunctious quality, perhaps to avoid the starchiness of epics. That might've been for the sake of kids, but the main agent for it is Kirk Douglas as the carousing sailor, introduced hanging on two women, material from the book as well that may be aiming more for adults. Even James Mason plays more caricatural than normal for him, though he brings even that off well, and it's apt for Captain Nemo. The production design and effects are impressive for their day.
For a major live-action picture from Walt Disney Productions, one of its earliest, this attempts to boost the rambunctious quality, perhaps to avoid the starchiness of epics. That might've been for the sake of kids, but the main agent for it is Kirk Douglas as the carousing sailor, introduced hanging on two women, material from the book as well that may be aiming more for adults. Even James Mason plays more caricatural than normal for him, though he brings even that off well, and it's apt for Captain Nemo. The production design and effects are impressive for their day.
Apollo 1 (2025)
Though not the most penetrating review, this is a homage to the crew lost in the inaugural mission of the Apollo phase of the space program, which also serves as a good reminder in view of the Artemis missions. It covers the beginning of the astronaut program and preliminary stages of the moon mission, Mercury and Gemini, particularly as that also traces the progress of the astronauts involved in Apollo 1, Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee. It presents regret and some mea culpa from participants in the space program, but in light of the more general cause of rushing the missions due to politicizing the space race with the Soviets, rather than lots of technical detail about what failed.
4/22/26
Though not the most penetrating review, this is a homage to the crew lost in the inaugural mission of the Apollo phase of the space program, which also serves as a good reminder in view of the Artemis missions. It covers the beginning of the astronaut program and preliminary stages of the moon mission, Mercury and Gemini, particularly as that also traces the progress of the astronauts involved in Apollo 1, Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee. It presents regret and some mea culpa from participants in the space program, but in light of the more general cause of rushing the missions due to politicizing the space race with the Soviets, rather than lots of technical detail about what failed.
Nouvelle Vague (2025)
As audacious, or foolhardy, as the idea is of portraying the French New Wave personae, especially Godard, in their own style, this crew, from writers to cast, directed by Richard Linklater, have made a fun homage and a worthy recall of that time, its significance and spirit. The trick is in the lightness to it, which, apart from not being sanctimonious, reflects the playfulness, insouciance, irreverence of that group around Cahiers du Cinema, and more particularly Godard and the aphoristic style even in his manner. The little turnout pose introductions with titles for the personages makes no bones about it, with the low-key blunt formality of Godard's resistance to polish. Linklater, with this after Blue Moon, is doing some of his most interesting work.
As audacious, or foolhardy, as the idea is of portraying the French New Wave personae, especially Godard, in their own style, this crew, from writers to cast, directed by Richard Linklater, have made a fun homage and a worthy recall of that time, its significance and spirit. The trick is in the lightness to it, which, apart from not being sanctimonious, reflects the playfulness, insouciance, irreverence of that group around Cahiers du Cinema, and more particularly Godard and the aphoristic style even in his manner. The little turnout pose introductions with titles for the personages makes no bones about it, with the low-key blunt formality of Godard's resistance to polish. Linklater, with this after Blue Moon, is doing some of his most interesting work.
Fucking with genre
Touch Me (2025)
By contrast to The Yeti (below), this is more clearly and archly satirical, but it's also more conspicuously comic than Bugonia, which it shares some plot similarities with. It's also similar to Pillion and Twinless in its subject matter of contemporary relations. What it bears out about a lot of current material, movies and series, is bringing subtext to the fore, especially for genre like sci-fi. What used to be implied or imputed or projected now becomes what the sc-fi or horror scenario plays out, more like open parable. Alien world eater gives narcissist guru cult figure, with broad cultural satire flourishes, and even if not subtle, morbidly alluring performances by Olivia Taylor Dudley, Lou Taylor Pucci and Jordan Gavaris.
Nightwish (1989)
Here's a case where a framing device gives a reason for the flailing mess of the plot that changes premise with every new scare turn. But does that redeem it? It jumps from Altered States to Nightmare on Elm Street to Ghostbusters to a guy driving a van with either road or roid rage to seances to alien zombie vampires to cockroaches to a mentor who turns to torture to going right back to work for him. It's like being forced to play a game by a playmate bully who changes the rules on you. And it tries to outbid every 80s movies for neon green. If the explanation for all that at the end makes you like the experience, you may be more a masochist than a horror fan. Perhaps it's most noteworthy for being Robert Tessier's last movie. RiffTrax works better at redeeming.
The Yeti (2026)
The theatrical coziness of the production is admirable for avoiding lots of big effects, CG or otherwise, though it looks more like Yoda's jungle than The Thing, and doesn't have the moxie of the original, The Thing from Another World, despite all the call-outs and the overall attempt. The music -- mainly with the songs, "After You've Gone," "A Ship Without a Sail" -- certainly twists the mood, goes against the grain of horror movies, but adds to more a quilt of qualities. At least one scene makes the gore comical, a waggish grotesque, and a segment at the beginning lines up the characters like a brassy superhero series. Jim Cummings is involved here as a producer and actor, and his The Wolf of Snow Hollow laced the horror movie into social satire to give a more interesting take, and drive, to both.
4/15/26
Touch Me (2025)
By contrast to The Yeti (below), this is more clearly and archly satirical, but it's also more conspicuously comic than Bugonia, which it shares some plot similarities with. It's also similar to Pillion and Twinless in its subject matter of contemporary relations. What it bears out about a lot of current material, movies and series, is bringing subtext to the fore, especially for genre like sci-fi. What used to be implied or imputed or projected now becomes what the sc-fi or horror scenario plays out, more like open parable. Alien world eater gives narcissist guru cult figure, with broad cultural satire flourishes, and even if not subtle, morbidly alluring performances by Olivia Taylor Dudley, Lou Taylor Pucci and Jordan Gavaris.
Nightwish (1989)
Here's a case where a framing device gives a reason for the flailing mess of the plot that changes premise with every new scare turn. But does that redeem it? It jumps from Altered States to Nightmare on Elm Street to Ghostbusters to a guy driving a van with either road or roid rage to seances to alien zombie vampires to cockroaches to a mentor who turns to torture to going right back to work for him. It's like being forced to play a game by a playmate bully who changes the rules on you. And it tries to outbid every 80s movies for neon green. If the explanation for all that at the end makes you like the experience, you may be more a masochist than a horror fan. Perhaps it's most noteworthy for being Robert Tessier's last movie. RiffTrax works better at redeeming.
The Yeti (2026)
The theatrical coziness of the production is admirable for avoiding lots of big effects, CG or otherwise, though it looks more like Yoda's jungle than The Thing, and doesn't have the moxie of the original, The Thing from Another World, despite all the call-outs and the overall attempt. The music -- mainly with the songs, "After You've Gone," "A Ship Without a Sail" -- certainly twists the mood, goes against the grain of horror movies, but adds to more a quilt of qualities. At least one scene makes the gore comical, a waggish grotesque, and a segment at the beginning lines up the characters like a brassy superhero series. Jim Cummings is involved here as a producer and actor, and his The Wolf of Snow Hollow laced the horror movie into social satire to give a more interesting take, and drive, to both.
Dead Man's Shoes (2004)
Dependable spark actor Paddy Considine, who plays the lead, co-wrote this with Paul Fraser and director Shane Meadows. There's an attempt at a more profound approach to revenge, abuse and the reaction and response to it, but the seriousness is still at the level of dramatic action. The portrait of Midlands suburban idleness tempers the thriller. It's also the movie debut of Toby Kebbell.
Dependable spark actor Paddy Considine, who plays the lead, co-wrote this with Paul Fraser and director Shane Meadows. There's an attempt at a more profound approach to revenge, abuse and the reaction and response to it, but the seriousness is still at the level of dramatic action. The portrait of Midlands suburban idleness tempers the thriller. It's also the movie debut of Toby Kebbell.
Chained Heat (1983)
As exploitation movies go, and more particularly women's prison ones, this is fairly tame, meaning also not all that shoddy. When it does try to rev up the action, it gets more laughable. Linda Blair is also an index of this. In the line of her projects after The Exorcist, a string of grindhouse type movies, she's not particularly sensational here, upstaged by Sybil Danning and others for titillation, and by such stalwart character actors as John Vernon, Henry Silva, Nita Talbot and even Stella Stevens. Yawns are exploited more than anything else.
As exploitation movies go, and more particularly women's prison ones, this is fairly tame, meaning also not all that shoddy. When it does try to rev up the action, it gets more laughable. Linda Blair is also an index of this. In the line of her projects after The Exorcist, a string of grindhouse type movies, she's not particularly sensational here, upstaged by Sybil Danning and others for titillation, and by such stalwart character actors as John Vernon, Henry Silva, Nita Talbot and even Stella Stevens. Yawns are exploited more than anything else.
Maximum Revenge [aka Maximum Security] (1997)
Low-rent action movie using mainly one location. It's called a Die Hard scenario, the line of knock-offs makes no bones about it and they're making it a genre. The two most notable things about it: it was filmed in the newly opened Twin Towers Correctional Facility in Los Angeles while it remained empty due to lack of operating funds; and John Lazar, Z-Man in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. Otherwise not even quite noteworthy bad, RiffTrax makes it more enjoyable.
Low-rent action movie using mainly one location. It's called a Die Hard scenario, the line of knock-offs makes no bones about it and they're making it a genre. The two most notable things about it: it was filmed in the newly opened Twin Towers Correctional Facility in Los Angeles while it remained empty due to lack of operating funds; and John Lazar, Z-Man in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. Otherwise not even quite noteworthy bad, RiffTrax makes it more enjoyable.
Breeders (1986)
Amateur style on and under the streets of New York, another knock-off of Alien, making overt the impregnation, and looking more like The Fly (the 50s one -- the Cronenberg hadn't quite come out yet). Watching people play grownup things like models and doctors in echoey rooms has an even more savory contrast when it's supposed to be the most sophisticated city.
Amateur style on and under the streets of New York, another knock-off of Alien, making overt the impregnation, and looking more like The Fly (the 50s one -- the Cronenberg hadn't quite come out yet). Watching people play grownup things like models and doctors in echoey rooms has an even more savory contrast when it's supposed to be the most sophisticated city.
After Dark, My Sweet (1990)
Inadvertently or not, it approximates Jim Thompson's writing in the way that waves in and out of pulpish prosaic and lush, sharp evocation, right down to Jason Patric's dumb boxer act. James Foley, who directed Reckless before and Glengarry Glen Ross after, and co-wrote this with Robert Redlin, concentrates on the atmosphere, and the desperation and folly are more dramatically poised between the frame and subject. That's also with the photography and locations, the way it's shot and paced, and in particular the house, where Rachel Ward's character lives, that is overrun but expansive, half-used and half-abandoned, and the way that bleeds over to the entire landscape of the characters.
Inadvertently or not, it approximates Jim Thompson's writing in the way that waves in and out of pulpish prosaic and lush, sharp evocation, right down to Jason Patric's dumb boxer act. James Foley, who directed Reckless before and Glengarry Glen Ross after, and co-wrote this with Robert Redlin, concentrates on the atmosphere, and the desperation and folly are more dramatically poised between the frame and subject. That's also with the photography and locations, the way it's shot and paced, and in particular the house, where Rachel Ward's character lives, that is overrun but expansive, half-used and half-abandoned, and the way that bleeds over to the entire landscape of the characters.
The Last Shark (1981)
Another Italian ripoff like the one of Alien (see Alien 2: On Earth), though it's hard to believe something could make this one look well made. The makers were actually sued and had to pull this from exhibition in the U.S. They made their own version of a "mechanical" shark -- looks like a fiberglass model you might see in a museum, not so bad if it didn't have to act. They mustered James Franciscus and Vic Morrow as the Americans/stars to head their cast, with Morrow's attempt at an accent one of the glaring features of the movie. Perhaps they were copying that in all respects. If Robert Shaw did a strange Welsh New England accent, why not Eastern European Scottish? All the draggy story business is worth sloshing through for the outrageous highlights, specifically two scenes: a "man" blown straight up in the air from his boat; and a combo dismemberment and helicopter takedown. RiffTrax trawls this one.
Another Italian ripoff like the one of Alien (see Alien 2: On Earth), though it's hard to believe something could make this one look well made. The makers were actually sued and had to pull this from exhibition in the U.S. They made their own version of a "mechanical" shark -- looks like a fiberglass model you might see in a museum, not so bad if it didn't have to act. They mustered James Franciscus and Vic Morrow as the Americans/stars to head their cast, with Morrow's attempt at an accent one of the glaring features of the movie. Perhaps they were copying that in all respects. If Robert Shaw did a strange Welsh New England accent, why not Eastern European Scottish? All the draggy story business is worth sloshing through for the outrageous highlights, specifically two scenes: a "man" blown straight up in the air from his boat; and a combo dismemberment and helicopter takedown. RiffTrax trawls this one.
Sound of the Surf (2022)
Competent to the point of slick assemblage that's more a social history of surf music through other strands of popular culture, such as the movies that exploited it and the later revivals.
4/7/26
Competent to the point of slick assemblage that's more a social history of surf music through other strands of popular culture, such as the movies that exploited it and the later revivals.
Curse of Bigfoot (1975)
There is a Bigfoot movie below the level of Sunn Classic schlockumentary or The Legend of Boggy Creek. In fact, RiffTrax calls this the Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny of horror films! What's more curious to me than even all the spinning of shit for a yarn -- a previous short film made in 1958 reframed, with no less amateurish production; the bad pretending of adult activity by adults; the nested stories and drawn-out banal action delaying the payoff of several kinds of crappy costume that don't make sense; the laughably dufus ghost story tactic of the bad school guest speaker -- is just how this was ever first presented: released, shown, seen. Internet info has it that this is a TV movie, and from somewhere comes the data that it had a premier September 27, 1975, in Tampa, Florida. It's hard to believe that anyone who saw this, even in those days of regional TV stations, and no matter how cheap they would be to fill air time, would then purchase it.
There is a Bigfoot movie below the level of Sunn Classic schlockumentary or The Legend of Boggy Creek. In fact, RiffTrax calls this the Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny of horror films! What's more curious to me than even all the spinning of shit for a yarn -- a previous short film made in 1958 reframed, with no less amateurish production; the bad pretending of adult activity by adults; the nested stories and drawn-out banal action delaying the payoff of several kinds of crappy costume that don't make sense; the laughably dufus ghost story tactic of the bad school guest speaker -- is just how this was ever first presented: released, shown, seen. Internet info has it that this is a TV movie, and from somewhere comes the data that it had a premier September 27, 1975, in Tampa, Florida. It's hard to believe that anyone who saw this, even in those days of regional TV stations, and no matter how cheap they would be to fill air time, would then purchase it.
Daredevil (2003)
Although X-Men and Spider-Man had already made their way, this makes the low end of the progression through Iron Man, The Avengers movies, and then the better Thor entries, for how Marvel got the act down in their own line. There's even Jon Favreau as comic sidekick. The seriousness is still way too soppy -- what's hyperbolic for Spider-Man is just fatuous for Daredevil -- but it's trying to do some things with humor. But there's also the really soppy attempt at humor, such as the meet cute fight with Jennifer Garner. Have no fear: the RiffTrax core team, Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett, took this one on.
Although X-Men and Spider-Man had already made their way, this makes the low end of the progression through Iron Man, The Avengers movies, and then the better Thor entries, for how Marvel got the act down in their own line. There's even Jon Favreau as comic sidekick. The seriousness is still way too soppy -- what's hyperbolic for Spider-Man is just fatuous for Daredevil -- but it's trying to do some things with humor. But there's also the really soppy attempt at humor, such as the meet cute fight with Jennifer Garner. Have no fear: the RiffTrax core team, Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett, took this one on.
The Fifth Element (1997)
Luc Besson presided over this attempt at pop-pourri, if not blockbuster, which he co-wrote with Robert Mark Kamen (The Karate Kid). The result is a mess of elements that don't mix, something lost in the translation of tones. It affects some grand looks, as in the first sequence, but cuts the sci-fi and adventure epic tone with an oddness or humor that is broader than Star Wars, even in its artistic design, as with the exotic dopiness of the alien guard and gangsters. It's an attempt at grownup cartoonishness that suggests Warner Brothers in clamor, and the 40s shapes on the flying cars -- also following the Blade Runner, Brazil, cyberpunk, yesterday's tomorrows aesthetic, but with a louder palette -- though it's not as sly. Gary Oldman faces a lethal rival in outrageous performance, Chris Tucker. A RiffTrax presentation provides some more earthly humor.
Luc Besson presided over this attempt at pop-pourri, if not blockbuster, which he co-wrote with Robert Mark Kamen (The Karate Kid). The result is a mess of elements that don't mix, something lost in the translation of tones. It affects some grand looks, as in the first sequence, but cuts the sci-fi and adventure epic tone with an oddness or humor that is broader than Star Wars, even in its artistic design, as with the exotic dopiness of the alien guard and gangsters. It's an attempt at grownup cartoonishness that suggests Warner Brothers in clamor, and the 40s shapes on the flying cars -- also following the Blade Runner, Brazil, cyberpunk, yesterday's tomorrows aesthetic, but with a louder palette -- though it's not as sly. Gary Oldman faces a lethal rival in outrageous performance, Chris Tucker. A RiffTrax presentation provides some more earthly humor.
Devil Girl from Mars (1954)
Apart from everything else that's been said about this, its more obvious traits, what stands out for me is the juxtaposition of American-style sci-fi with the inn pub setting and assembly, public in that particular British, and here Scottish, way (it's a British production set in a remote Scottish village). It's like an American 50s B-movie invaded The Old Dark House or The 39 Steps. The RiffTrax crew, Mary Jo Pehl and Bridget Nelson for this one, make similar comment in their treatment. It's a case of the type of "bad" movie where being decently wrought -- the low-budget space ship, Martian woman costume and especially robot are striking in their silly charming way -- only bears out the flamboyance of the premise. And on the matter of the devil and Mars, see Quatermass and the Pit.
Apart from everything else that's been said about this, its more obvious traits, what stands out for me is the juxtaposition of American-style sci-fi with the inn pub setting and assembly, public in that particular British, and here Scottish, way (it's a British production set in a remote Scottish village). It's like an American 50s B-movie invaded The Old Dark House or The 39 Steps. The RiffTrax crew, Mary Jo Pehl and Bridget Nelson for this one, make similar comment in their treatment. It's a case of the type of "bad" movie where being decently wrought -- the low-budget space ship, Martian woman costume and especially robot are striking in their silly charming way -- only bears out the flamboyance of the premise. And on the matter of the devil and Mars, see Quatermass and the Pit.
Crime quirks
Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice (2026)
The quirky crime comedy didn't begin with Pulp Fiction, but it has exploded in number since, and with more of that emphasis on dropping different characters like fish in a bowl to see what happens, or bouncing them off each other like billiard balls. Despite overworking it in a lot of ways, including trying to play cool, this gets some good play off the setup, which is also with a sci-fi twist. Mikey and Nicky it's not either.
Crime 101 (2026)
By contrast, this isn't a comedy, but its interweaving of four characters' paths resembles that kind of plot. The tone is brooding, foreboding -- which, among other things, shows more range for Chris Hemsworth, the kind we already knew Mark Ruffalo had -- and it opens up more complicated everyday matters like the sort of regular business that can seem not so different from crime, but it doesn't dig into that for the sake of its plot mechanics, including resolution, which makes it seem ultimately lighter. In fact, sometimes the comedies can have more resonance, figurative charge, because they have more play, in more than one sense, whereas the serious can be, if not dogmatic, more constricted to follow its straighter path.
Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice (2026)
The quirky crime comedy didn't begin with Pulp Fiction, but it has exploded in number since, and with more of that emphasis on dropping different characters like fish in a bowl to see what happens, or bouncing them off each other like billiard balls. Despite overworking it in a lot of ways, including trying to play cool, this gets some good play off the setup, which is also with a sci-fi twist. Mikey and Nicky it's not either.
Crime 101 (2026)
By contrast, this isn't a comedy, but its interweaving of four characters' paths resembles that kind of plot. The tone is brooding, foreboding -- which, among other things, shows more range for Chris Hemsworth, the kind we already knew Mark Ruffalo had -- and it opens up more complicated everyday matters like the sort of regular business that can seem not so different from crime, but it doesn't dig into that for the sake of its plot mechanics, including resolution, which makes it seem ultimately lighter. In fact, sometimes the comedies can have more resonance, figurative charge, because they have more play, in more than one sense, whereas the serious can be, if not dogmatic, more constricted to follow its straighter path.
Zodiac Killer Project (2025)
Charlie Shackleton's attempt to make lemonade from a failed attempt at a Zodiac killer documentary -- because he didn't get the rights to the book The Zodiac Killer Cover-Up: The Silenced Badge by Lyndon E. Lafferty -- is a staged conversation in which he gives his account of what happened, along with musings on the whole line of true crime documentaries and the obsession with the subject. The reality principle: reflection comes from sour grapes. Shackleton illustrates his account with the sort of "evocative B-roll" tactics he's also calling out, while he's also evoking a lot of what's not going on, with surveillance-like shots of some of his locations zooming in on useless details. The attempt at offhand good humor also comes off as flip, and it might be easy to react with too much enthusiasm or indignation until you realize the ambivalence catches anyone.
4/1/26
3/31/26
Charlie Shackleton's attempt to make lemonade from a failed attempt at a Zodiac killer documentary -- because he didn't get the rights to the book The Zodiac Killer Cover-Up: The Silenced Badge by Lyndon E. Lafferty -- is a staged conversation in which he gives his account of what happened, along with musings on the whole line of true crime documentaries and the obsession with the subject. The reality principle: reflection comes from sour grapes. Shackleton illustrates his account with the sort of "evocative B-roll" tactics he's also calling out, while he's also evoking a lot of what's not going on, with surveillance-like shots of some of his locations zooming in on useless details. The attempt at offhand good humor also comes off as flip, and it might be easy to react with too much enthusiasm or indignation until you realize the ambivalence catches anyone.
No Other Choice (2025)
Park Chan-wook (Old Boy, The Handmaiden) directed, and co-wrote with Lee Kyoung-mi, Don McKellar, Jahye Lee, based on The Axe, a book by Donald Westlake -- with an ingenious title because he set the tale of downsizing in the paper business. There was also a 2005 film directed by Costa-Gavras based on the book. This has a leering, grasping quality of horror films or thrillers and mixes elements that might seem to be jumps in tone or form. In that way, too, the progression of the central character is more reaction, the clatter of billiard balls, though the effect of pitting the benefit of fewer over many isn't lost.
Park Chan-wook (Old Boy, The Handmaiden) directed, and co-wrote with Lee Kyoung-mi, Don McKellar, Jahye Lee, based on The Axe, a book by Donald Westlake -- with an ingenious title because he set the tale of downsizing in the paper business. There was also a 2005 film directed by Costa-Gavras based on the book. This has a leering, grasping quality of horror films or thrillers and mixes elements that might seem to be jumps in tone or form. In that way, too, the progression of the central character is more reaction, the clatter of billiard balls, though the effect of pitting the benefit of fewer over many isn't lost.
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)
John Ford isn't in his element here. Without his usual exterior shooting, using mostly a sound stage, the movie looks and sounds like a TV Western. The setups are similar to his set cross-sections in movies like The Searchers, and there are a few exterior scenes, but without the level of photography of either the black and white My Darling Clementine or the color Searchers. All this was due to budget constraints, so literally to production value, but nonetheless. The story sets up an interesting scheme of the taming of the West with the advent of civil organization, and moreso a parable of law, power, violence and justice between the characters played by James Stewart, John Wayne and Lee Marvin as the title character. The folksy lightness to the social environment characteristic of Ford's movies, even other than the Westerns and regardless of the scriptwriters, comes off more stagey in the TV way, and particularly with Marvin and his henchmen, Strother Martin and Lee Van Cleef, though quite the trio they are. It may be an attempt to portray gleeful malice and corruptibility, but it's more madcap than menacing.
John Ford isn't in his element here. Without his usual exterior shooting, using mostly a sound stage, the movie looks and sounds like a TV Western. The setups are similar to his set cross-sections in movies like The Searchers, and there are a few exterior scenes, but without the level of photography of either the black and white My Darling Clementine or the color Searchers. All this was due to budget constraints, so literally to production value, but nonetheless. The story sets up an interesting scheme of the taming of the West with the advent of civil organization, and moreso a parable of law, power, violence and justice between the characters played by James Stewart, John Wayne and Lee Marvin as the title character. The folksy lightness to the social environment characteristic of Ford's movies, even other than the Westerns and regardless of the scriptwriters, comes off more stagey in the TV way, and particularly with Marvin and his henchmen, Strother Martin and Lee Van Cleef, though quite the trio they are. It may be an attempt to portray gleeful malice and corruptibility, but it's more madcap than menacing.
Send Help (2026)
By contrast to How to Make a Killing, Sam Raimi's sorta kinda version of The Admirable Crichton or Swept Away, written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift, has such broad characterization that it seems at start wacky comedy. But that surprisingly has a fresh sense once we get to the island. The silliness, especially with Rachel McAdams, becomes more workably lifelike, part of sticking to the guns with the characters, their drives and foibles. The escalations also seem to play out formal variations, parody, allegory, surreal, screwball, and McAdams and Dylan O'Brien give relish for the fun of it all.
By contrast to How to Make a Killing, Sam Raimi's sorta kinda version of The Admirable Crichton or Swept Away, written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift, has such broad characterization that it seems at start wacky comedy. But that surprisingly has a fresh sense once we get to the island. The silliness, especially with Rachel McAdams, becomes more workably lifelike, part of sticking to the guns with the characters, their drives and foibles. The escalations also seem to play out formal variations, parody, allegory, surreal, screwball, and McAdams and Dylan O'Brien give relish for the fun of it all.
How to Make a Killing (2026)
This redo of Kind Hearts and Coronets certainly doesn't have the predecessor's various charms -- Alec Guinness as eight characters, Dennis Price, Joan Greenwood -- though perhaps in its way it's more apt as a comedy of manners for current times. The heredity certainly doesn't work the same way as for the British context, but that makes another kind of comment about the U.S. The twist here is more of the knife of the Pyrrhic victory, getting everything you wanted but only after you've learned the cost of that, more like Room at the Top. Writer, director John Patton Ford's Emily the Criminal was better at the cringe factor of the drama, whereas here the more thriller kind of drama flattens the contrast of the original.
3/23/26
This redo of Kind Hearts and Coronets certainly doesn't have the predecessor's various charms -- Alec Guinness as eight characters, Dennis Price, Joan Greenwood -- though perhaps in its way it's more apt as a comedy of manners for current times. The heredity certainly doesn't work the same way as for the British context, but that makes another kind of comment about the U.S. The twist here is more of the knife of the Pyrrhic victory, getting everything you wanted but only after you've learned the cost of that, more like Room at the Top. Writer, director John Patton Ford's Emily the Criminal was better at the cringe factor of the drama, whereas here the more thriller kind of drama flattens the contrast of the original.
Dave (1993)
Director Ivan Reitman delivers a quieter, softer sort of comedy than his usual -- Meatballs, Ghostbusters, Twins, etc. -- written by Gary Ross (Big, Pleasantville, The Hunger Games), and it gives room for the cast to play more delicately, which particularly suits Kevin Kline, Sigourney Weaver and Frank Langella. It's nice to notice other things when the madcap or suspense aren't being constantly cranked up. Even with the Capresque mollification, pandering with the sentiment even if it's otherwise worthy, the ability to play with the material -- government, the workings of office, politics and politicians, behavior and people as characters and types -- is also significant.
Director Ivan Reitman delivers a quieter, softer sort of comedy than his usual -- Meatballs, Ghostbusters, Twins, etc. -- written by Gary Ross (Big, Pleasantville, The Hunger Games), and it gives room for the cast to play more delicately, which particularly suits Kevin Kline, Sigourney Weaver and Frank Langella. It's nice to notice other things when the madcap or suspense aren't being constantly cranked up. Even with the Capresque mollification, pandering with the sentiment even if it's otherwise worthy, the ability to play with the material -- government, the workings of office, politics and politicians, behavior and people as characters and types -- is also significant.
Permanent Midnight (1998)
Some wit and tone get washed out by a tack that's almost too straight, and then towards the end comes a rock ballad kind of soulful. It's not so much that it's like some TV movie earnest prosaic as that it just doesn't have some other take to contribute. Until its epigraph with the talk shows.
Some wit and tone get washed out by a tack that's almost too straight, and then towards the end comes a rock ballad kind of soulful. It's not so much that it's like some TV movie earnest prosaic as that it just doesn't have some other take to contribute. Until its epigraph with the talk shows.
29th Street (1991)
The directorial debut of George Gallo who wrote Midnight Run (and later wrote and directed Trapped in Paradise), based on a story by Frank Pesce and James Franciscus about the former winning the first New York state lottery, has its own cozy little charm of the kind Danny Aiello and Anthony LaPaglia could deliver (in Italian neighborhood style before it was largely known the latter is Australian). Pesce, himself an actor, claimed this was a true story, except the part about actually winning the lottery. In the movie, there's a kind of nice, modern version of "The Gift of the Magi" -- it's a Christmas twist movie, too -- which is then given a further twist that winning the $6 million prize provides, because Pesce wanted a happy ending.
3/17/26
The directorial debut of George Gallo who wrote Midnight Run (and later wrote and directed Trapped in Paradise), based on a story by Frank Pesce and James Franciscus about the former winning the first New York state lottery, has its own cozy little charm of the kind Danny Aiello and Anthony LaPaglia could deliver (in Italian neighborhood style before it was largely known the latter is Australian). Pesce, himself an actor, claimed this was a true story, except the part about actually winning the lottery. In the movie, there's a kind of nice, modern version of "The Gift of the Magi" -- it's a Christmas twist movie, too -- which is then given a further twist that winning the $6 million prize provides, because Pesce wanted a happy ending.
The Associate (1996)
Strawman feelgood vehicle for Whoopi Goldberg at the height of her fame (this was one of four 1996 films with her), about a black woman running into the white man ceiling of Wall Street. Despite the predictable melodrama gyrations, this is interesting for not trying to be quite too serious nor quite too wacky, carrying along with some spirit nonetheless. As with her character in the movie, it puts off doing too much in the disguise of the invented person, but when she does appear in that, there's a strangely Marlon Brando quality, which is also remarked by another character in the movie. Perhaps most interesting is seeing this as reflexive of Goldberg's own career, having to get along in precisely this sort of package, keeping her cool gliding through all the contortions around her. This also has Tim Daly, of Diner notably, in a more rare film role, as the main weasel.
Strawman feelgood vehicle for Whoopi Goldberg at the height of her fame (this was one of four 1996 films with her), about a black woman running into the white man ceiling of Wall Street. Despite the predictable melodrama gyrations, this is interesting for not trying to be quite too serious nor quite too wacky, carrying along with some spirit nonetheless. As with her character in the movie, it puts off doing too much in the disguise of the invented person, but when she does appear in that, there's a strangely Marlon Brando quality, which is also remarked by another character in the movie. Perhaps most interesting is seeing this as reflexive of Goldberg's own career, having to get along in precisely this sort of package, keeping her cool gliding through all the contortions around her. This also has Tim Daly, of Diner notably, in a more rare film role, as the main weasel.
Lady in Cement (1968)
Sequel to Frank Sinatra's Tony Rome vehicle of the previous year, this may be striking for some of the frankness for its time, but it's also in a woozy, if not sleazy, vibe of trying to be hip and funny. Despite headliners Sinatra and Raquel Welch, Dan Blocker of Bonanza fame makes the biggest mark, not just literally.
Sequel to Frank Sinatra's Tony Rome vehicle of the previous year, this may be striking for some of the frankness for its time, but it's also in a woozy, if not sleazy, vibe of trying to be hip and funny. Despite headliners Sinatra and Raquel Welch, Dan Blocker of Bonanza fame makes the biggest mark, not just literally.
Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die (2025)
Starts out well, with a good opener for Sam Rockwell, and the cast performs its task well even when that's not the best asked of them by the script and direction. Rockwell is fun throughout, but that's part of the way it's strangely light and deft, but then heavy-handed. Backtracking paths become Black Mirror-like as vignettes and tone, and then the ending becomes even more heavy, unsubtle and simplistic.
Starts out well, with a good opener for Sam Rockwell, and the cast performs its task well even when that's not the best asked of them by the script and direction. Rockwell is fun throughout, but that's part of the way it's strangely light and deft, but then heavy-handed. Backtracking paths become Black Mirror-like as vignettes and tone, and then the ending becomes even more heavy, unsubtle and simplistic.
War Machine (2026)
The army's entire official disposition is hardass drill sergeant. All the radio and PA announcements sound that way, all the brass are like that, and Dennis Quaid's major scowls at everything. Despite that, and an opening scene that's mawkishly macho, this settles down and accomplishes two things that are no small feat: it actually doesn't punch up the squad characters shtick, in the long line of hackneyed derivation of Aliens, and it sticks to its guns of having no guns. The ordeal is one of being badly outmatched and barely surviving. Granted it's another Predator for that, but it actually manages decent drama of that sort of courage. With the twist on commandos from that source, I wonder how many will think of the reversal here of an invading military on civilian populations.
3/10/26
The army's entire official disposition is hardass drill sergeant. All the radio and PA announcements sound that way, all the brass are like that, and Dennis Quaid's major scowls at everything. Despite that, and an opening scene that's mawkishly macho, this settles down and accomplishes two things that are no small feat: it actually doesn't punch up the squad characters shtick, in the long line of hackneyed derivation of Aliens, and it sticks to its guns of having no guns. The ordeal is one of being badly outmatched and barely surviving. Granted it's another Predator for that, but it actually manages decent drama of that sort of courage. With the twist on commandos from that source, I wonder how many will think of the reversal here of an invading military on civilian populations.
Beaches (1988)
Some weird run-through register that's not comedy or drama. It's that constant pizzazz pitch of Bette Midler, but turned into mechanical storytelling by Gary Marshall. It reaches a pitch and falls into a rhythm of blazing through time where it becomes a better shtick of this view of the foibles of relations, the pricks that are not just tolerance but fondness, but it's more by default, and not having set it up and doing it consistently. And it has too much sentimental manipulation to make it something more artful like that. The Randy Newman song, "I Think It's Going to Rain Today," is the perfect example of the sort of touch this uses without getting.
Some weird run-through register that's not comedy or drama. It's that constant pizzazz pitch of Bette Midler, but turned into mechanical storytelling by Gary Marshall. It reaches a pitch and falls into a rhythm of blazing through time where it becomes a better shtick of this view of the foibles of relations, the pricks that are not just tolerance but fondness, but it's more by default, and not having set it up and doing it consistently. And it has too much sentimental manipulation to make it something more artful like that. The Randy Newman song, "I Think It's Going to Rain Today," is the perfect example of the sort of touch this uses without getting.
Pillion (2025)
Like Twinless also of last year, this has implications beyond sexual orientation, beyond even specific kinds of relationship -- the love ones, not just the dom-sub ones. Jacques Lacan's "il n'y a pas de rapport sexuel" (most often translated as "there is no sexual relationship") might as well be: there is no rapport. Harry Lighton here manages to skirt enough in a useful way -- not make it too much of one thing or another, although this also has some inadvertently comic effects, perhaps also in a dreamlike or absurdist way -- that we can see this, not just allegorically or as parable, but more broadly even about what it involves. In the dom-sub here we can see the orientation of the idealization of the other as the subject, and the orientation towards the other as the object. Just as Lacan, like Gilles Deleuze, was keen to note that the masochist was the master of the sublimation, or manipulation at least, of the lack, and the sadist is at the mercy of the notion of control, Lighton makes a nice twist with both romance dramas and this apparently more unconventional line with a moment that shows where the greatest weakness is, and even though it might be pressing it as any sort of flush realistic representation, it has its parable kind of significance. Twinless cleverly works its discourse into the play, while this shows more than tells.
Like Twinless also of last year, this has implications beyond sexual orientation, beyond even specific kinds of relationship -- the love ones, not just the dom-sub ones. Jacques Lacan's "il n'y a pas de rapport sexuel" (most often translated as "there is no sexual relationship") might as well be: there is no rapport. Harry Lighton here manages to skirt enough in a useful way -- not make it too much of one thing or another, although this also has some inadvertently comic effects, perhaps also in a dreamlike or absurdist way -- that we can see this, not just allegorically or as parable, but more broadly even about what it involves. In the dom-sub here we can see the orientation of the idealization of the other as the subject, and the orientation towards the other as the object. Just as Lacan, like Gilles Deleuze, was keen to note that the masochist was the master of the sublimation, or manipulation at least, of the lack, and the sadist is at the mercy of the notion of control, Lighton makes a nice twist with both romance dramas and this apparently more unconventional line with a moment that shows where the greatest weakness is, and even though it might be pressing it as any sort of flush realistic representation, it has its parable kind of significance. Twinless cleverly works its discourse into the play, while this shows more than tells.
The Prince of Tides (1991)
So prefabricated it's like a dramatic declamatory, or perhaps popular movie dramatic declamatory, and that's even Nick Nolte's performance, though it falls to Barbara Streisand as director. It sets up its own distinction of the idyllic facade of a Southern life and what that hides, so it's not all quite as resoundingly cloying as the opening, but it's hard to even settle into interest of the matter. And after the most serious revelation, scenes that might've been farce turn it to addled melodrama.
3/5/26
So prefabricated it's like a dramatic declamatory, or perhaps popular movie dramatic declamatory, and that's even Nick Nolte's performance, though it falls to Barbara Streisand as director. It sets up its own distinction of the idyllic facade of a Southern life and what that hides, so it's not all quite as resoundingly cloying as the opening, but it's hard to even settle into interest of the matter. And after the most serious revelation, scenes that might've been farce turn it to addled melodrama.
Scream 7 (2026)
The reflexive stuff is more and more a bad projection of horror fans, like commercials portraying customers raving for their products. The lead-in sequence lathers that on with the death house attraction, and then the obligatory sequence -- for this franchise -- of characters throwing down horror movie discussion as exposition and vice versa. Apart from that, there's lots of dry setup with Neve Campbell that seems to play on the appeal of the franchise history, or I don't know what. Once the actual slasher mechanics start up, there are, typical of the whole series, some interesting, sometimes bluntly funny turns even with gore, the perps never too super-human to get some blows of their own.
The reflexive stuff is more and more a bad projection of horror fans, like commercials portraying customers raving for their products. The lead-in sequence lathers that on with the death house attraction, and then the obligatory sequence -- for this franchise -- of characters throwing down horror movie discussion as exposition and vice versa. Apart from that, there's lots of dry setup with Neve Campbell that seems to play on the appeal of the franchise history, or I don't know what. Once the actual slasher mechanics start up, there are, typical of the whole series, some interesting, sometimes bluntly funny turns even with gore, the perps never too super-human to get some blows of their own.
Shelter (2026)
The story is a patchwork of so many others, even the girl that Jason Statham's dark operator is protecting, but it's done with a style, even if overdone -- music is good but used too much, handheld gets just ridiculous sometimes -- that makes it compelling, sometimes for just the images. It feels a lot better than some of his others that are more straight thrillers, even though there's lots of similar silliness. There's a dash-off about it, like not taking it too seriously, even for the seriousness, but there are some good touches with the action, some change-up moves on it. But Statham also helps with that.
2/25/26
The story is a patchwork of so many others, even the girl that Jason Statham's dark operator is protecting, but it's done with a style, even if overdone -- music is good but used too much, handheld gets just ridiculous sometimes -- that makes it compelling, sometimes for just the images. It feels a lot better than some of his others that are more straight thrillers, even though there's lots of similar silliness. There's a dash-off about it, like not taking it too seriously, even for the seriousness, but there are some good touches with the action, some change-up moves on it. But Statham also helps with that.
Robert Duvall tour
To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)
It plays better than the more declamatory nobility of some of the 40s message movies, notable also by comparison with Gregory Peck to Gentleman's Agreement, as with the opening credits sequence, and the charmed childhood recollection. But in some ways that makes it more devious, as with the encounter at the jailhouse, where the children manage to cast conscience on a lynch gang -- the power of good conscience, at least in fiction. It compares well to modern day well-meaning prestige pictures because it doesn't have that kind of bluster, though its composure also at times has a kind of TV show theatrical rote quality, but it amounts to that kind of prestige of its day.
To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)
It plays better than the more declamatory nobility of some of the 40s message movies, notable also by comparison with Gregory Peck to Gentleman's Agreement, as with the opening credits sequence, and the charmed childhood recollection. But in some ways that makes it more devious, as with the encounter at the jailhouse, where the children manage to cast conscience on a lynch gang -- the power of good conscience, at least in fiction. It compares well to modern day well-meaning prestige pictures because it doesn't have that kind of bluster, though its composure also at times has a kind of TV show theatrical rote quality, but it amounts to that kind of prestige of its day.
Happyend (2024)
Written and directed by New York born Neo Sora, who also made a documentary about Ryuichi Sakamoto, this slight projection into the future of earthquake alert and surveillance technology also takes the pulse of Japanese students in reaction to these effects on social conventions as well as politics. It's similar to Bright Future. The loose stance gives an interesting approach to the characters -- more surprising when they speak up out of groups, and not signaled or pushed with the presentation -- but sometimes this just seems like general slackness, and with incongruous effects as with the music.
2/19/26
2/18/26
Written and directed by New York born Neo Sora, who also made a documentary about Ryuichi Sakamoto, this slight projection into the future of earthquake alert and surveillance technology also takes the pulse of Japanese students in reaction to these effects on social conventions as well as politics. It's similar to Bright Future. The loose stance gives an interesting approach to the characters -- more surprising when they speak up out of groups, and not signaled or pushed with the presentation -- but sometimes this just seems like general slackness, and with incongruous effects as with the music.
Burning Man (2011)
This goes so far with chronology cut-up, despite whatever value it would have in the psychology of grief, it's not even so much the confusion of where your anchor is -- from where are we flashing back or forward -- as that it just becomes an affectation. Watching this movie also made me realize that sometimes the embarrassment at the intimacy that's being portrayed is about the conceit of it, not as if we've stumbled into someone's bedroom while they're having sex -- the bare event of it -- but as if we've stumbled into the parlor of their mind where they're in full sway of some idealization, the whole air of their conceit.
This goes so far with chronology cut-up, despite whatever value it would have in the psychology of grief, it's not even so much the confusion of where your anchor is -- from where are we flashing back or forward -- as that it just becomes an affectation. Watching this movie also made me realize that sometimes the embarrassment at the intimacy that's being portrayed is about the conceit of it, not as if we've stumbled into someone's bedroom while they're having sex -- the bare event of it -- but as if we've stumbled into the parlor of their mind where they're in full sway of some idealization, the whole air of their conceit.
Marty Supreme (2025)
It starts out great, like Uncut Gems, and even seems to be making of that rolling bustle a sort of epic American portrait, a tableau of life moving too fast to be caught still, spilling over. That's for about half, then the scene with Penn Jillette is exactly where it goes wrong. After that it's just pile-on concocted, which then works retroactively, to make the whole that way. There was a scene of catastrophe, itself a culmination of the orchestrated chaos, just before, and then the scene with Jillette does that again. The pile-up of all these pile-ups then becomes less like trying to keep up with the material, as in Uncut Gems, and more blown-up, embellished, flighty. And it ends up being so little about ping pong and then even about the character's hustling (it's loosely based on Marty Reisman and his book The Money Player). Director Josh Safdie uses music that's not of the period portrayed, and manages to bring it off in a way that's better than Dirty Dancing -- 80s stuff like "The Order of Death," "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" (well worn though they are for movies) and "The Perfect Kiss" -- and the fact it's music from the 80s makes it even more like, or like a reference to, that movie, than if he'd used modern music. In fact, the way this works, as an interesting material portrayal that nonetheless becomes more fanciful even in its ultimate use of all that, makes it even more like Dirty Dancing, analogous.
It starts out great, like Uncut Gems, and even seems to be making of that rolling bustle a sort of epic American portrait, a tableau of life moving too fast to be caught still, spilling over. That's for about half, then the scene with Penn Jillette is exactly where it goes wrong. After that it's just pile-on concocted, which then works retroactively, to make the whole that way. There was a scene of catastrophe, itself a culmination of the orchestrated chaos, just before, and then the scene with Jillette does that again. The pile-up of all these pile-ups then becomes less like trying to keep up with the material, as in Uncut Gems, and more blown-up, embellished, flighty. And it ends up being so little about ping pong and then even about the character's hustling (it's loosely based on Marty Reisman and his book The Money Player). Director Josh Safdie uses music that's not of the period portrayed, and manages to bring it off in a way that's better than Dirty Dancing -- 80s stuff like "The Order of Death," "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" (well worn though they are for movies) and "The Perfect Kiss" -- and the fact it's music from the 80s makes it even more like, or like a reference to, that movie, than if he'd used modern music. In fact, the way this works, as an interesting material portrayal that nonetheless becomes more fanciful even in its ultimate use of all that, makes it even more like Dirty Dancing, analogous.
Fight Club (1999)
It's a blizzard of satirical jabs at modern lifestyle egoism and soul-searching, with director David Fincher showboating, but it piles up premises before even getting to the main one of the title and without making much connection between them. It may be a satire of the phase cycle, of impressionably jumping from one thing to another in search of salvation, and that might be even the humor of the fight club itself, the self-destruction it more than implicitly amounts to. But even that doesn't play as humorous and seems to be as much its own muddled conceit as anything it would be a comment on.
It's a blizzard of satirical jabs at modern lifestyle egoism and soul-searching, with director David Fincher showboating, but it piles up premises before even getting to the main one of the title and without making much connection between them. It may be a satire of the phase cycle, of impressionably jumping from one thing to another in search of salvation, and that might be even the humor of the fight club itself, the self-destruction it more than implicitly amounts to. But even that doesn't play as humorous and seems to be as much its own muddled conceit as anything it would be a comment on.
Honey Don't (2025)
The next installment of Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke's collaborations of lesbian B-movie camp. See Drive-Away Dolls. The overall plan is more playful, but the dry, mordant quality comes off rote. It does have Wanda Jackson's rendition of Carl Perkins's song of the title.
The next installment of Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke's collaborations of lesbian B-movie camp. See Drive-Away Dolls. The overall plan is more playful, but the dry, mordant quality comes off rote. It does have Wanda Jackson's rendition of Carl Perkins's song of the title.
Queen of Chess (2026)
A documentary about chess grandmaster Judit Polgar, the greatest female player, traces her history and development also through her matches with world champion Garry Kasparov. Neither too flashy, nor too drab, with interesting interviewees, including Polgar and Kasparov, and some plucky soundtrack additions to suggest exuberantly bucking against the male-dominated field.
A documentary about chess grandmaster Judit Polgar, the greatest female player, traces her history and development also through her matches with world champion Garry Kasparov. Neither too flashy, nor too drab, with interesting interviewees, including Polgar and Kasparov, and some plucky soundtrack additions to suggest exuberantly bucking against the male-dominated field.
Dirty Dancing (1987)
This movie isn't what you might think, until the ending, which is everything you might think it is from stills, trailers and reputation. It's actually a grainier -- looking and feeling -- portrait of the early 60s along the lines of Diner or The Wanderers, and the title isn't referring to just some speciously derived romance performance, but to the popular forms of music and dancing, like rock 'n' roll, in the context of social and class tensions at a resort in the Catskills. Although it has a bit of after school special message earnestness to it, it manages some fairly evocative spread. But then there are the modern songs, of the era the movie came out rather than what it portrays, such as "The Time of My Life," which aged worse than the period music, and the finale is completely a flourish like that in a tone outside the period frame.
2/16/26
2/12/26
This movie isn't what you might think, until the ending, which is everything you might think it is from stills, trailers and reputation. It's actually a grainier -- looking and feeling -- portrait of the early 60s along the lines of Diner or The Wanderers, and the title isn't referring to just some speciously derived romance performance, but to the popular forms of music and dancing, like rock 'n' roll, in the context of social and class tensions at a resort in the Catskills. Although it has a bit of after school special message earnestness to it, it manages some fairly evocative spread. But then there are the modern songs, of the era the movie came out rather than what it portrays, such as "The Time of My Life," which aged worse than the period music, and the finale is completely a flourish like that in a tone outside the period frame.
Side Effects (2013)
From the period, at least since Magic Mike where Steven Soderbergh became a more composed director, this unfolds in an intriguing way, and has a nice tactic of relaying the involvement and suspense from one character to another -- a kind of who done what to whom - even though when it's all over and you have the whole picture, there's some pretty wild leaps involved.
From the period, at least since Magic Mike where Steven Soderbergh became a more composed director, this unfolds in an intriguing way, and has a nice tactic of relaying the involvement and suspense from one character to another -- a kind of who done what to whom - even though when it's all over and you have the whole picture, there's some pretty wild leaps involved.
Top Secret (1984)
This was the next project of the spoof sketch gag style comedy of writers, directors Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker, started with Kentucky Fried Movie and after their big success with Airplane, and it was Val Kilmer's debut. There are some good bits, like the inspired lunacy of skeet surfing and the deep focus joke, but it doesn't have the structure or pace of the airplane disaster movie parody and shows the difficulty of stringing together gags that have to work on their own without a stronger spine.
This was the next project of the spoof sketch gag style comedy of writers, directors Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker, started with Kentucky Fried Movie and after their big success with Airplane, and it was Val Kilmer's debut. There are some good bits, like the inspired lunacy of skeet surfing and the deep focus joke, but it doesn't have the structure or pace of the airplane disaster movie parody and shows the difficulty of stringing together gags that have to work on their own without a stronger spine.
The Doors (1991)
The movie where Oliver Stone's swaggery style may be most appropriate, so the match going on here isn't just Val Kilmer with Jim Morrison, but Stone as well. Even following Morrison's conceit, this comes off as a tilt on biopic, but still within that ambit. That works as much to situate the pretension.
The movie where Oliver Stone's swaggery style may be most appropriate, so the match going on here isn't just Val Kilmer with Jim Morrison, but Stone as well. Even following Morrison's conceit, this comes off as a tilt on biopic, but still within that ambit. That works as much to situate the pretension.
Next of Kin (1989)
This is the movie where Adam Baldwin kills Bill Paxton while Ben Stiller watches -- in case you need to know. It's also an attempt to make Patrick Swayze a serious action movie lead, which may have been part of the wrong-headedness of the concept, but it's certainly too wrong-headed to pull it off. Hillbillies versus wiseguys is the premise, but it doesn't waste any time on incisive or poetic comparison. And Liam Neeson is cast as an Appalachian. Only that and Swayze's getup approaches the zestier cheese of Road House or Point Break.
This is the movie where Adam Baldwin kills Bill Paxton while Ben Stiller watches -- in case you need to know. It's also an attempt to make Patrick Swayze a serious action movie lead, which may have been part of the wrong-headedness of the concept, but it's certainly too wrong-headed to pull it off. Hillbillies versus wiseguys is the premise, but it doesn't waste any time on incisive or poetic comparison. And Liam Neeson is cast as an Appalachian. Only that and Swayze's getup approaches the zestier cheese of Road House or Point Break.
JFK (1991)
Oliver Stone made the blockbuster movie version of being accosted by an assassination buff. I don't think there's ever been a movie built so entirely on exposition. With the sledgehammer artsiness that culminated in Natural Born Killers, he adds visual aid assault, propaganda-like rifle-cutting to images that materialize whatever point to make, superliminal, while otherwise shooting from dozens of angles, shifting the photographic scheme, roving the camera like a caged cat, and in case you don't get it, adding a soundtrack that mounts up like a jet plane arriving at your gate, especially over the drone of Kevin Costner in the last-act trial sequence. A barrage of stars confers the proper reverence, a la The Greatest Story Ever Told, you know, like who John Lennon said they were bigger than, but JFK.
2/2/26
Oliver Stone made the blockbuster movie version of being accosted by an assassination buff. I don't think there's ever been a movie built so entirely on exposition. With the sledgehammer artsiness that culminated in Natural Born Killers, he adds visual aid assault, propaganda-like rifle-cutting to images that materialize whatever point to make, superliminal, while otherwise shooting from dozens of angles, shifting the photographic scheme, roving the camera like a caged cat, and in case you don't get it, adding a soundtrack that mounts up like a jet plane arriving at your gate, especially over the drone of Kevin Costner in the last-act trial sequence. A barrage of stars confers the proper reverence, a la The Greatest Story Ever Told, you know, like who John Lennon said they were bigger than, but JFK.
Sentimental Value (2025)
With Joachim Trier's direction we don't get the sense we're watching these people's lives because it's too posed and swoony, especially when he's showing people in the theater for stage productions. The moments of drama, father writer director coming to terms with his life for his daughter and actress daughter coming to terms with that -- Trier doesn't get us to that point, certainly not in the first 40 minutes to an hour. And the clever trick with the frame at the end only bears out that problem by contrast.
With Joachim Trier's direction we don't get the sense we're watching these people's lives because it's too posed and swoony, especially when he's showing people in the theater for stage productions. The moments of drama, father writer director coming to terms with his life for his daughter and actress daughter coming to terms with that -- Trier doesn't get us to that point, certainly not in the first 40 minutes to an hour. And the clever trick with the frame at the end only bears out that problem by contrast.
Puzzle (2018)
Good execution by director Marc Turtletaub and his cast, especially Kelly MacDonald, Irrfan Khan and David Denman, and it builds up its situation and the tensions nicely. In going for the bigger drama stuff the emphasis is shifted to the metaphorical sense of the title, despite some nice lines about how much jigsaw puzzles were doing psychologically. We know the weight love affairs can have. Might be nice to see how the puzzling itself could create the same ripples and awakening.
Good execution by director Marc Turtletaub and his cast, especially Kelly MacDonald, Irrfan Khan and David Denman, and it builds up its situation and the tensions nicely. In going for the bigger drama stuff the emphasis is shifted to the metaphorical sense of the title, despite some nice lines about how much jigsaw puzzles were doing psychologically. We know the weight love affairs can have. Might be nice to see how the puzzling itself could create the same ripples and awakening.
Anaconda (2025)
The cloying way this tries to sell us back affection for the 1997 movie is a double sin, and makes the wrongness apparent every step of the way. The forerunner is a blockbuster version of a B movie, big-budget trash that's fun not because it's comedy, but because it's played seriously. This is a fanboy fawning processed version of Goonies for grown-ups mashed up with Saving Silverman and Jumanji.
1/30/26
The cloying way this tries to sell us back affection for the 1997 movie is a double sin, and makes the wrongness apparent every step of the way. The forerunner is a blockbuster version of a B movie, big-budget trash that's fun not because it's comedy, but because it's played seriously. This is a fanboy fawning processed version of Goonies for grown-ups mashed up with Saving Silverman and Jumanji.
The Secret Agent (2025)
Remarkably similar to One Battle After Another, but in the way that those and also Bugonia and Weapons are meditating on the times. Writer, director Kleber Mendonca Filho and his Brazilian cast, especially the lead Wagner Moura (who played Pablo Escobar in the series Narcos), give a more sober bearing, one that makes American films seem much more affected, though it's notable, too, that Benicio Del Toro comes off more like this in One Battle After Another, as he does elsewhere. The non-actorly style is plainer than neo-realism, but in Mendonca Filho's composition, it's also fascinating, watching things unfold naturalistically. It strikes as incongruous with some of the more fanciful flourishes, influenced as much by American movies themselves -- Jaws and The Omen among others -- and the jumping leg sequence. But even this is cited as fanciful reporting the characters are laughing at, and not without real-life reference.
Remarkably similar to One Battle After Another, but in the way that those and also Bugonia and Weapons are meditating on the times. Writer, director Kleber Mendonca Filho and his Brazilian cast, especially the lead Wagner Moura (who played Pablo Escobar in the series Narcos), give a more sober bearing, one that makes American films seem much more affected, though it's notable, too, that Benicio Del Toro comes off more like this in One Battle After Another, as he does elsewhere. The non-actorly style is plainer than neo-realism, but in Mendonca Filho's composition, it's also fascinating, watching things unfold naturalistically. It strikes as incongruous with some of the more fanciful flourishes, influenced as much by American movies themselves -- Jaws and The Omen among others -- and the jumping leg sequence. But even this is cited as fanciful reporting the characters are laughing at, and not without real-life reference.
Train Dreams (2025)
This seems influenced by Terrence Malick, but it's also studied that way, which makes it sometimes seem more derivative, and sometimes more likes its own thing. There are some confident, well-observed strokes from the script, dialogue, in one case giving William H. Macy an interesting variation of a character. The drift of it is a kind of dispersal, with time and spirit, but that comes to seem as much an unintended effect as thematic.
This seems influenced by Terrence Malick, but it's also studied that way, which makes it sometimes seem more derivative, and sometimes more likes its own thing. There are some confident, well-observed strokes from the script, dialogue, in one case giving William H. Macy an interesting variation of a character. The drift of it is a kind of dispersal, with time and spirit, but that comes to seem as much an unintended effect as thematic.
Rental Family (2025)
Brendan Fraser has an obliging quality that comes across in all his work, but this more modest production makes it apparent in a way other than that of the big popular vehicles he's been in. Which is also to say, uses it to a fault. The rental family idea in Japan holds lots to mine, and the movie opens up the question about the difference between that and acting, what that would be like for an actor, and larger questions about acting, lies and white lies, promise in the different contexts of those frames, obligation and deference. But it doesn't exactly track those questions. The various cases Fraser's character takes on with the job are treated with a more gliding montage style in an overriding sense of the fullness of experience, somewhat presumptive and redundant.
Brendan Fraser has an obliging quality that comes across in all his work, but this more modest production makes it apparent in a way other than that of the big popular vehicles he's been in. Which is also to say, uses it to a fault. The rental family idea in Japan holds lots to mine, and the movie opens up the question about the difference between that and acting, what that would be like for an actor, and larger questions about acting, lies and white lies, promise in the different contexts of those frames, obligation and deference. But it doesn't exactly track those questions. The various cases Fraser's character takes on with the job are treated with a more gliding montage style in an overriding sense of the fullness of experience, somewhat presumptive and redundant.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992)
If you take out an overriding attitude or mood, tone down any sharpness or swerve, what you have left is business, in at least two senses. Neither comedy nor horror, as if afraid being too much one would detract from the other, this is a sort of leisurely hum, banking too much on just the formula of Valley Girl meets The Lost Boys. It's amazing how the sitcom Halloween party tone washes out such a cast, even Rutger Hauer and Paul Reubens.
If you take out an overriding attitude or mood, tone down any sharpness or swerve, what you have left is business, in at least two senses. Neither comedy nor horror, as if afraid being too much one would detract from the other, this is a sort of leisurely hum, banking too much on just the formula of Valley Girl meets The Lost Boys. It's amazing how the sitcom Halloween party tone washes out such a cast, even Rutger Hauer and Paul Reubens.
Barton Fink (1991) ♠
Before their more wily approach to the mundane with Fargo, the Coen brothers turned to the uncanny. This movie is as remarkable, especially in the market of American popular movies, as anything by David Lynch, for not being literal. It's a surreal parable, but the great thing about it, too, is that it doesn't really announce or proclaim this. It goes about it in an offhand way, as in the manner of its humor. The sardonic view of Hollywood doesn't leave us with comfortable ground either. As the plot twists it also drifts -- imagination, perspective, dream, framing story or story within story -- and Barton neither is nor has an outside. The theater, New York, a greater view or purpose, even for the common man that Hollywood would exploit, also get pulled into the drift and the satire, just as any sober view that would be Barton's or other. In this way, it even makes a set with Mulholland Drive as a loop of the fantastic involving Hollywood and the movies.
Before their more wily approach to the mundane with Fargo, the Coen brothers turned to the uncanny. This movie is as remarkable, especially in the market of American popular movies, as anything by David Lynch, for not being literal. It's a surreal parable, but the great thing about it, too, is that it doesn't really announce or proclaim this. It goes about it in an offhand way, as in the manner of its humor. The sardonic view of Hollywood doesn't leave us with comfortable ground either. As the plot twists it also drifts -- imagination, perspective, dream, framing story or story within story -- and Barton neither is nor has an outside. The theater, New York, a greater view or purpose, even for the common man that Hollywood would exploit, also get pulled into the drift and the satire, just as any sober view that would be Barton's or other. In this way, it even makes a set with Mulholland Drive as a loop of the fantastic involving Hollywood and the movies.
Raise the Red Lantern (1991) ♠
Red Sorghum and Ju Dou had been released outside of China, and this was already the fourth movie he'd made with Gong Li, but this established director Zhang Yimou as one of the best in the world. He had been a cinematographer before, such as on Chen Kaige's Yellow Earth, and that part of his movie making was never more apparent than here. But the sumptuous quality, rather than just a superficial sense of lush photography, also works with the shrewd observation of bodily comforts as part of the conditioning in this parable of divide and conquer, in the drier, blunter delivery with darkness more than just undertone. Based on a novella Wives and Concubines, the portrait it gives of a situation of women in a certain place and time is even more significant. The problem of calling it the plight of women, or even feminist, bears out the problem with that more generally: taking it as not pertinent to all. It's such a definitive breakdown of any sort of hierarchical system, let alone racket, where each is pitted against the other so that none really see the plight of all, it seems archetypal, like a fable. It also has a great score combining traditional Chinese opera with modern composition.
1/23/26
Red Sorghum and Ju Dou had been released outside of China, and this was already the fourth movie he'd made with Gong Li, but this established director Zhang Yimou as one of the best in the world. He had been a cinematographer before, such as on Chen Kaige's Yellow Earth, and that part of his movie making was never more apparent than here. But the sumptuous quality, rather than just a superficial sense of lush photography, also works with the shrewd observation of bodily comforts as part of the conditioning in this parable of divide and conquer, in the drier, blunter delivery with darkness more than just undertone. Based on a novella Wives and Concubines, the portrait it gives of a situation of women in a certain place and time is even more significant. The problem of calling it the plight of women, or even feminist, bears out the problem with that more generally: taking it as not pertinent to all. It's such a definitive breakdown of any sort of hierarchical system, let alone racket, where each is pitted against the other so that none really see the plight of all, it seems archetypal, like a fable. It also has a great score combining traditional Chinese opera with modern composition.
Annie Hall (1977) ♠
The peak of Woody Allen's work and one of them for American movies, at all but also because for comedy. While Allen would follow with great inventiveness, with at least a decade of great work before declining returns, he never matched the full stroke of this. It was also the first movie he made with Gordon Willis as cinematographer, which played no small part even in Allen's account of his movie making. As well as The Godfather movies, All the President's Men and Pennies from Heaven, among others, his projects with Allen, including Manhattan and Zelig, would add more range and impressive accomplishments for Willis. As Nietzsche said about great tasks as play (see comments for Le Million), this take serious matters comically, but comedy seriously. The dash of the play with form comes from the comic sense. When this won the Oscar for best picture in 1978 (at the ceremony for the films of 1977) a lot of people still didn't even know what it was. Now it's as iconic for the 70s, if less imposing, as Star Wars, which was also nominated that same year, and holds up even that time well for being such a great expression of it, also the end of an exceptional period of American movie-making when the Academy Awards largely reflected that.
The peak of Woody Allen's work and one of them for American movies, at all but also because for comedy. While Allen would follow with great inventiveness, with at least a decade of great work before declining returns, he never matched the full stroke of this. It was also the first movie he made with Gordon Willis as cinematographer, which played no small part even in Allen's account of his movie making. As well as The Godfather movies, All the President's Men and Pennies from Heaven, among others, his projects with Allen, including Manhattan and Zelig, would add more range and impressive accomplishments for Willis. As Nietzsche said about great tasks as play (see comments for Le Million), this take serious matters comically, but comedy seriously. The dash of the play with form comes from the comic sense. When this won the Oscar for best picture in 1978 (at the ceremony for the films of 1977) a lot of people still didn't even know what it was. Now it's as iconic for the 70s, if less imposing, as Star Wars, which was also nominated that same year, and holds up even that time well for being such a great expression of it, also the end of an exceptional period of American movie-making when the Academy Awards largely reflected that.
Colors of Time [La venue de l'avenir] (1995)
Despite laying out such an absurd array of paths to follow -- maybe they're shooting for a series -- and for how that also diffuses the significance of the jumps in time (the French title translates more literally as "the coming of the future") this manages to have hooks thanks to some of the performances and because, if even in its own more commonplace way, it manages to be about life styles, choices or phases we don't always treat fairly.
Despite laying out such an absurd array of paths to follow -- maybe they're shooting for a series -- and for how that also diffuses the significance of the jumps in time (the French title translates more literally as "the coming of the future") this manages to have hooks thanks to some of the performances and because, if even in its own more commonplace way, it manages to be about life styles, choices or phases we don't always treat fairly.
To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (1995)
Admirable game effort from Wesley Snipes, Patrick Swayze and John Leguizamo. In the case of Swayze, this shows even better range for him, with his lovable cheesy movies, than the few attempts at serious action lead, and even than Ghost. But, for example, this isn't nearly as campy as Road House or Point Break, whether on purpose or inadvertently, because of too much setup of melodramatic good conscience.
Admirable game effort from Wesley Snipes, Patrick Swayze and John Leguizamo. In the case of Swayze, this shows even better range for him, with his lovable cheesy movies, than the few attempts at serious action lead, and even than Ghost. But, for example, this isn't nearly as campy as Road House or Point Break, whether on purpose or inadvertently, because of too much setup of melodramatic good conscience.
Hammett (1982)
Francis Ford Coppola's Zoetrope produced this, and Coppola got Wim Wenders to direct it, but then when he wasn't satisfied with Wenders' work, reshot much of it, with the kind of studio movie reflexive approach of One from the Heart. The contrast can still be seen in the few remaining external shots Wenders supervised, the different view of Dashiell Hammett's San Francisco they suggest. The canned look and concoction of it all, recooking lots of Hammett bio material as one of his own stories, has a broad presentation, like a parody -- The Cheap Detective or Murder by Death -- that's trying to be serious. Coppola's own attempt at popular movie postmodernism, through also Rumblefish, had the effect of leaving out what he'd particularly been so good at, as if formalism or meta-movie-making were only more layers of icing with no cake.
Francis Ford Coppola's Zoetrope produced this, and Coppola got Wim Wenders to direct it, but then when he wasn't satisfied with Wenders' work, reshot much of it, with the kind of studio movie reflexive approach of One from the Heart. The contrast can still be seen in the few remaining external shots Wenders supervised, the different view of Dashiell Hammett's San Francisco they suggest. The canned look and concoction of it all, recooking lots of Hammett bio material as one of his own stories, has a broad presentation, like a parody -- The Cheap Detective or Murder by Death -- that's trying to be serious. Coppola's own attempt at popular movie postmodernism, through also Rumblefish, had the effect of leaving out what he'd particularly been so good at, as if formalism or meta-movie-making were only more layers of icing with no cake.
A Scam Called Love (2025)
A taste of South Africa via a culture clash, and one with a twist on the couple's introduction to the family, how they pass themselves, is interesting, but this builds up like so many forks of the story, and those like so many bits, often with flighty effects, like heavy suspense music during a seduction scene.
A taste of South Africa via a culture clash, and one with a twist on the couple's introduction to the family, how they pass themselves, is interesting, but this builds up like so many forks of the story, and those like so many bits, often with flighty effects, like heavy suspense music during a seduction scene.
Nebraska (2013) ♠
The paradox of realism or naturalism, besides of course the glaring one of not acknowledging the pretending, is that it will still have a stroke, a bent, a tone. Every story you decide to tell straight will still have accent, context, perspective, an emphasis just by context or situation or difference. Take for example The Straight Story, David Lynch's attempt, which is even "straight" by reference to his other work, compared to this. The way both of these movies play it straight is also not a purely documentary or kitchen-sink kind of realism, more a sort of plaintive but comic frankness. Alexander Payne goes more into the petty squabbles, grudges, gossip and banal nastiness, as if turning over the rock to reveal that with the process, a casual discovery of what's beneath the casual or faded. But there's also a lightness and gentleness to that, or an airiness like the sparse environs between Montana and Nebraska, mostly around the highways. After Payne's The Descendants, this seems even straighter, more unflinching, if just the accent of its gruffer denizens. But Payne also gives us with this a portrait and expression that are fuller for being slower, quieter, and about the commotion that goes on even that way.
The paradox of realism or naturalism, besides of course the glaring one of not acknowledging the pretending, is that it will still have a stroke, a bent, a tone. Every story you decide to tell straight will still have accent, context, perspective, an emphasis just by context or situation or difference. Take for example The Straight Story, David Lynch's attempt, which is even "straight" by reference to his other work, compared to this. The way both of these movies play it straight is also not a purely documentary or kitchen-sink kind of realism, more a sort of plaintive but comic frankness. Alexander Payne goes more into the petty squabbles, grudges, gossip and banal nastiness, as if turning over the rock to reveal that with the process, a casual discovery of what's beneath the casual or faded. But there's also a lightness and gentleness to that, or an airiness like the sparse environs between Montana and Nebraska, mostly around the highways. After Payne's The Descendants, this seems even straighter, more unflinching, if just the accent of its gruffer denizens. But Payne also gives us with this a portrait and expression that are fuller for being slower, quieter, and about the commotion that goes on even that way.
Ghost (1990)
Such a pastiche of plot points and popular movie airs it's like several movies collided. The setup of flaunty yuppie movie lifestyle, the pottery wheel scene that's already a spoof before it was spoofed so many times, the thriller thread, the comedy shtick with Whoopi Goldberg as a medium who finds out she's not fake, the extra supernatural stuff with the ghost training and the schmaltzy heavenly special effects -- lots of business piled on, and for all that a surprising amount of Patrick Swayze reaction shots that don't make much of his character and give him little to do. There's little actually clever or inventive and the biggest can of worms is a metaphysical variation on vicariousness and agency in intimacy or sexuality that shunts its implications for only the straightest melodramatic romance resolution.
Such a pastiche of plot points and popular movie airs it's like several movies collided. The setup of flaunty yuppie movie lifestyle, the pottery wheel scene that's already a spoof before it was spoofed so many times, the thriller thread, the comedy shtick with Whoopi Goldberg as a medium who finds out she's not fake, the extra supernatural stuff with the ghost training and the schmaltzy heavenly special effects -- lots of business piled on, and for all that a surprising amount of Patrick Swayze reaction shots that don't make much of his character and give him little to do. There's little actually clever or inventive and the biggest can of worms is a metaphysical variation on vicariousness and agency in intimacy or sexuality that shunts its implications for only the straightest melodramatic romance resolution.
Irresistible (2006)
Independent Australian production, written and directed by Ann Turner, brings together Susan Sarandon and Sam Neill, and Emily Blunt in an early role to show off her talent with accents and ambivalent mien. The variation on gaslighting has some subtler twists, and the outrageous thriller turns aren't quite as outrageous as other cases. It manages to be interesting and give some mood, if more tilted toward the furnishings.
Independent Australian production, written and directed by Ann Turner, brings together Susan Sarandon and Sam Neill, and Emily Blunt in an early role to show off her talent with accents and ambivalent mien. The variation on gaslighting has some subtler twists, and the outrageous thriller turns aren't quite as outrageous as other cases. It manages to be interesting and give some mood, if more tilted toward the furnishings.
Impulse (1984)
Tim Mattheson and Meg Tilly tried to parlay their recent fame into starring roles, and Bill Paxton and Hume Cronyn, one very young, the other not, also appear. The mysterious cause of strange behavior, people acting without inhibition, connected to an apparent earthquake, makes for more drama and suspense than horror effects, and there's no shyness about how characters will be affected, creating some twists on any pure melodramatic outcome. What they use for background material, however, that gets dredged up, adds to a scattered quality other than intended, no less because of the unevenness of dramatic weight.
1/8/26
Tim Mattheson and Meg Tilly tried to parlay their recent fame into starring roles, and Bill Paxton and Hume Cronyn, one very young, the other not, also appear. The mysterious cause of strange behavior, people acting without inhibition, connected to an apparent earthquake, makes for more drama and suspense than horror effects, and there's no shyness about how characters will be affected, creating some twists on any pure melodramatic outcome. What they use for background material, however, that gets dredged up, adds to a scattered quality other than intended, no less because of the unevenness of dramatic weight.
The Princess Bride (1987)
A begrudging fairy tale as if from the perspective of adults who may be a bit weary of the material from having to read to children. That's what the frame of Peter Falk reading to grandson Fred Savage sets up in part, but the humor of the whole is more mature wry and parodic if also affectionate. This is mostly due to the script and performances, that part of the execution. Rob Reiner had this project in mind after his directorial debut This Is Spinal Tap, but did The Sure Thing and Stand by Me before he got this off the ground. He didn't have the greatest attention to production design and photography (compare Monty Python and the Holy Grail which looks fantastic on a fraction of the budget). In a fun cast with interesting people popping up even in bit parts (like Peter Cook), Manny Patinkin most deftly carries the playful seriousness.
A begrudging fairy tale as if from the perspective of adults who may be a bit weary of the material from having to read to children. That's what the frame of Peter Falk reading to grandson Fred Savage sets up in part, but the humor of the whole is more mature wry and parodic if also affectionate. This is mostly due to the script and performances, that part of the execution. Rob Reiner had this project in mind after his directorial debut This Is Spinal Tap, but did The Sure Thing and Stand by Me before he got this off the ground. He didn't have the greatest attention to production design and photography (compare Monty Python and the Holy Grail which looks fantastic on a fraction of the budget). In a fun cast with interesting people popping up even in bit parts (like Peter Cook), Manny Patinkin most deftly carries the playful seriousness.
The Fortune Cookie (1966)
Billy Wilder brought Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon together, but this social comedy about insurance fraud though light in tone follows a pretty straight plan. It doesn't have the comedic punch of Wilder's own Some Like It Hot or The Odd Couple, nor the bite of Ace in the Hole (maybe a reason he played lighter with the satire), and it certainly doesn't have the sweep of The Apartment, though much of it looks like it was filmed in the same apartment. It does have an appearance by sports announcer Keith Jackson, his biggest in movies.
Billy Wilder brought Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon together, but this social comedy about insurance fraud though light in tone follows a pretty straight plan. It doesn't have the comedic punch of Wilder's own Some Like It Hot or The Odd Couple, nor the bite of Ace in the Hole (maybe a reason he played lighter with the satire), and it certainly doesn't have the sweep of The Apartment, though much of it looks like it was filmed in the same apartment. It does have an appearance by sports announcer Keith Jackson, his biggest in movies.
Primitive War (2025)
A mashup of dinosaur and Vietnam movies isn't so cockamamie -- well, novel -- if you remember Kong: Skull Island. While this doesn't aim for quite that budget level of blockbuster, it comes in somewhere between higher end B movie and lower level niche production company efforts. It's an Australian production with Jeremy Piven as the most familiar in a cast of lesser known actors, American and Canadian among Australians, giving the sort of intensity that makes this more serious than it should be, especially Piven. The CG ranges from impressive to more like what you'd expect for its budget, sometimes in the same shot. And there's definitely an extended interest in seeing dinosaurs chomp humans, so if you've wanted that from your dinosaur movies, you might be able to wade through all the exposition and business about Soviet experiments gone wrong, although this is probably more gory than most folks would want for the dinosaur appeal to children.
A mashup of dinosaur and Vietnam movies isn't so cockamamie -- well, novel -- if you remember Kong: Skull Island. While this doesn't aim for quite that budget level of blockbuster, it comes in somewhere between higher end B movie and lower level niche production company efforts. It's an Australian production with Jeremy Piven as the most familiar in a cast of lesser known actors, American and Canadian among Australians, giving the sort of intensity that makes this more serious than it should be, especially Piven. The CG ranges from impressive to more like what you'd expect for its budget, sometimes in the same shot. And there's definitely an extended interest in seeing dinosaurs chomp humans, so if you've wanted that from your dinosaur movies, you might be able to wade through all the exposition and business about Soviet experiments gone wrong, although this is probably more gory than most folks would want for the dinosaur appeal to children.
Tron: Ares (2025)
Tron: Legacy tried to be more chic, and this goes in -- well, another direction, if not quite opposite. It's so streamlined for action that it's thin on development, making it seem simplistic if it's not anyway. But, hey, it's got a Nine Inch Nails soundtrack.
1/1/26
Tron: Legacy tried to be more chic, and this goes in -- well, another direction, if not quite opposite. It's so streamlined for action that it's thin on development, making it seem simplistic if it's not anyway. But, hey, it's got a Nine Inch Nails soundtrack.
The Odd Couple (1968)
A happy balance that works out for all concerned, not least for Walter Matthau and Jack Lemon. It's a case of a theatrical play working well for the movie version, not because of opening up -- there's some of that, here, and it does add some New York City flavor, such as the night photography with the flashing signs at the beginning, and buses and Shea Stadium -- but because everything Neil Simon's play does well also keeps it from movie foibles. It's situation comedy in the truest, best sense, not firing gags or one-liners, or setting up punchlines like tee-ball, but creating a portrait of these characters from their situation and rolling that along through dialogue that always flows with its context.
A happy balance that works out for all concerned, not least for Walter Matthau and Jack Lemon. It's a case of a theatrical play working well for the movie version, not because of opening up -- there's some of that, here, and it does add some New York City flavor, such as the night photography with the flashing signs at the beginning, and buses and Shea Stadium -- but because everything Neil Simon's play does well also keeps it from movie foibles. It's situation comedy in the truest, best sense, not firing gags or one-liners, or setting up punchlines like tee-ball, but creating a portrait of these characters from their situation and rolling that along through dialogue that always flows with its context.
Nuremberg (2025)
This starts out almost as if it's too flip about the subject. But there are two qualifications of that, one in the movie itself, the other from the situation outside it. The movie sets up a progression that's a recreation of how it occurred then: the revelation of the full extent of the holocaust. So there is definitely a contrast, a setup for a scene at the Nuremberg trials that involves archival footage. The other matter is just how difficult it is to play this sort of thing, especially when everything this message works against has returned and is being normalized. A certain amount of mollifying good conscience has come with the warmed over lessons of World War II, and even the well-meaning rehearsals like Judgment of Nuremberg. But as much as there needs to be room for other types of reaction, there doesn't need to be concession made to unregenerate denial. This movie is also not just the trials, despite the title, but a related story, another route to them, that of a psychiatrist who interviewed Hermann Göring. Despite a somewhat slick, expedient approach, it manages to get its points across.
This starts out almost as if it's too flip about the subject. But there are two qualifications of that, one in the movie itself, the other from the situation outside it. The movie sets up a progression that's a recreation of how it occurred then: the revelation of the full extent of the holocaust. So there is definitely a contrast, a setup for a scene at the Nuremberg trials that involves archival footage. The other matter is just how difficult it is to play this sort of thing, especially when everything this message works against has returned and is being normalized. A certain amount of mollifying good conscience has come with the warmed over lessons of World War II, and even the well-meaning rehearsals like Judgment of Nuremberg. But as much as there needs to be room for other types of reaction, there doesn't need to be concession made to unregenerate denial. This movie is also not just the trials, despite the title, but a related story, another route to them, that of a psychiatrist who interviewed Hermann Göring. Despite a somewhat slick, expedient approach, it manages to get its points across.
Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere (2025)
Like Bruce Springsteen himself, with his music, this walks the line between popular cliche and anything it would be or be about otherwise: original music, more profound contemplation, folk or ballad or rock that is popular without being hackneyed or pandering. Further twists ensue with artistic integrity or authenticity, since even what is true, deep, natural, soulful, etc., can be a pat or trite idea, itself conventional or cliche, or without understanding of the complexity of artifice. Scott Cooper, who directed and wrote the script, based on a book by Warren Zanes and Springsteen's autobiography Born to Run, tries to make this more about the creative process, which is admirable, but it's also another kind of hazard. Trying to show how artists create often reduces processes of the mind to literal-minded depiction, biopic cliches. The movie starts out looking like that, but becomes more interesting where's it about the particular project and process of Nebraska. For related movie interest, the title track of that album was inspired by Badlands. Springsteen watching a movie or looking up articles on Charles Starkweather provides more pithy and interesting practical action, tracking away from melodramatic swells. I was also wondering if Jeremy Allen White would avoid the smoldering of either the beleaguered artist or the Carmy variety, and he does a good job of giving us a tack that's not just impersonation or derivative.
Like Bruce Springsteen himself, with his music, this walks the line between popular cliche and anything it would be or be about otherwise: original music, more profound contemplation, folk or ballad or rock that is popular without being hackneyed or pandering. Further twists ensue with artistic integrity or authenticity, since even what is true, deep, natural, soulful, etc., can be a pat or trite idea, itself conventional or cliche, or without understanding of the complexity of artifice. Scott Cooper, who directed and wrote the script, based on a book by Warren Zanes and Springsteen's autobiography Born to Run, tries to make this more about the creative process, which is admirable, but it's also another kind of hazard. Trying to show how artists create often reduces processes of the mind to literal-minded depiction, biopic cliches. The movie starts out looking like that, but becomes more interesting where's it about the particular project and process of Nebraska. For related movie interest, the title track of that album was inspired by Badlands. Springsteen watching a movie or looking up articles on Charles Starkweather provides more pithy and interesting practical action, tracking away from melodramatic swells. I was also wondering if Jeremy Allen White would avoid the smoldering of either the beleaguered artist or the Carmy variety, and he does a good job of giving us a tack that's not just impersonation or derivative.
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Entries by Greg Macon for the Facebook group Movie Brains, related to film comments on this website, Fixion. Text for movie comments this page © 2026 Greg Macon. Banner image and quote from Earth vs. The Flying Saucers.
Contact: mail@fixionsytes.net
On the Brains
- Nouvelle Vague
- After Dark, My Sweet
- Send Help
- Chloe
- Stuart Saves His Family
- Touch Me
- The Voyeurs
- The Guy from Harlem
- Shrunken Heads
- Lovelace
I don't think you go to a play to forget, or to a movie to be distracted. I think life generally is a distraction and that going to a movie is a way to get back, not go away.
-- Tom Noonan, IMDb
There's no point in being there for research and not being prepared to shoot. At least if I'm not there, I don't know what I've missed. But if I'm there and not prepared and something great happens, I'll tear out what's left of the hair on my balding head because I missed a good sequence.
-- Frederick Wiseman, The Paris Review, Fall 2018
The last Broadway play I did, Mamet's American Buffalo, that and Lonesome Dove were the greatest reviews I've ever gotten. It was like I wrote 'em myself. But I get superstitious, even though they were good. I don't collect 'em, good or bad.
-- Robert Duvall, interview with Bill DeYoung
I don't care about stories. I never did. Every story is the same. We have no new stories. We're just repeating the same ones. I really don't think, when you do a movie that you have to think about the story. The film isn't the story. It's mostly picture, sound, a lot of emotions. The stories are just covering something.
-- Bela Tarr, Indie Wire, 2/9/12