The last couple of years I did my own best of blu-ray releases, but I won't be doing one this time, and anybody doing it is just pulling one out of their a**. It has become a futile experiment. If it's a release from a boutique label (Arrow, Criterion, Vinegar Syndrome, etc...), it's most likely a homerun. If it's a big studio release, it's gonna be light on extras (mostly short promo stuff already released on previous discs) with good (not great) technical specs (they tend to overdo it with the DNR, Aliens was a disaster). It just comes down to if you want the movie enough.
It has become an expensive hobby though, every release is a super-duper-special-collector-awesome edition. While it's cool to have a stacked release, well, as Syndrome said in The Incredibles: "When everything is special, none of it is". Kino seem to be holding it down though, with good enough technicals (though they make big mistakes sometimes), but light on extra features, keeping the price low-ish. 4k is still a costly technology.
That being said, 2026 is going to be another good year. VS is releasing Tank Girl 4k and Warner will do Speed Racer 4k. Fun times.
I avoid those super-duper editions, Kunider, but it is still hard not to think about the prices. I have not adopted 4k so far for that reason. The blu-ray option is not always available, which may be a trend for the future.
Though I splurged a little around Christmas, my purchases this year were less than past years. I was tempted to get some Kino releases during the recent sale, but the pile of unwatched discs already here protested. (There are plenty of sales from Kino to get them later.) I was going through my collection this week to figure out how many things neeed to be watched. It is not a small number. Although many titles are reserved for June, there are plenty that I should consciously be trying to get to for regular viewing.
I visited my local library yesterday and looked at the movie section there. I should be patronizing that more often, and it would probably save me some money, too.
I have to be better at buying stuff. But sometimes, when you know the old blu-ray was crap, whenever they do a super cool 4k restauration, i can't help myself. Or sometimes it's just that i love the movie and i want the best version of it
Have fun JM! Speed Racer plays gloriously on the big screen!!!! I think it was relatively dismissed when it came out but alot of folks have found their way to it. Wildly creative and artistically cool.
Wow did i LOVE this flick. Cant go into too much detail as i want to stay spoiler free. It felt almost like a play with insanely great performances from Stone and Plemons. Wonderful suspense with shades of Misery abound. Most of all i adored the writing as we find out theres alot more to each of the characters and their motivations than meets the eye.
Stranger Things Finale
Zero Spoilers. As with many, i connected strongly to Stranger Things early on. And more often than not i found myself reaching out to old friends and reminiscing on so much of what the show got right about being a nerd in the early 80s. While i found the writing for the final season to be a bit uneven at times, im happy to say, that for me, they totally nailed the landing. I realllllllllllllly liked the finale. Each character got a moment or two to shine, the big bad was dealt with, and a lot of time was spent with emotional reflection and resonance. Well done Duffer bros. Well done indeed.
Im Chevy Chase and You're Not (cnn 2025)
JB/Patrick touched on the large amount of actor/creator docs that came out this year in their last podcast. Ive seen most and found em all to be fine but maybe surfaceish at best (with one exception, the Scorsese series, but even then i wish it was 4x longer). I wasnt even going to watch this as Chase has really seemed like a curmudgeon for a long long time. Didnt want to see something that glosses over that. Turns out the doc doesnt gloss...if anything it spends a LOT of its time on the trials and tribulations of Chase. Weirdly it doesnt really delve much into his movies other than a few passing mentions. And, as he's being interviewed current day throughout, it gives him a chance to present his side. Which he fails to do spectacularly. Either denial or "i dont give a shit" attitude prevails (narrator voice: he does give a shit). Not sure id suggest it other than a bit of a train wreck watch. My takeaway is that as a child of the 70s/80s he was a big deal on SNL and made many many movies i love. That work was a combination of others (directors, writers, etc) finding a way to present him and the humor he was capable of. However in time he viewed his cranky a-hole snarky stuck up persona as a "bit" and others did not...and he never chose to dismiss, course correct, apologize or acknowledge. So be it.
Yeah, i can't deal with those end-of-career documentary. I don't care about their life anymore, just talk about the movies you made. It's always the same: where they grew up, what the parents did, their first break, it's getting boring to me.
I caught the Chevy Chase doc on CNN because someone had it on the TV. I found it interesting enough to finish it. That a-hole side of this personality I picked up on seeing Caddyshack in recent years. I do not find Clark Griswold a warm character, either. There was a time when Chevy had a place in the entertainment business, and then it passed.
The doc is a certainly far from being a routine life retrospective, Kunider. Some interviewees gush over how great Chevy Chase was to work with, but there are more who express there frustration or outright hatred from working with him. I kept thinking about Klaus Kinski, though Kinski was on another level of difficulty.
I went through the Blu-ray commentary and extras for FANTASTIC FOUR FIRST STEPS (2025), and I have to admit I’m real impressed with this Matt Shakman guy. He’s way more of a Christopher Nolan than he is a Russo brother. A lot of what I assumed was CGI was built on set, with incredible attention to detail.
VOYAGE OF THE ROCK ALIENS (1984) This was as good a movie as any to ring in the new year.
LORD OF THE RINGS: FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING (2001) and LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS (2002) Did Gollum’s loincloth need to be that tiny?
THE CHRONICLES OF RIDDICK (2004) Show this to anyone who says DUNE was too confusing.
NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS (2007) There you are, sitting at home and minding your own business. And then… Nicolas Cage bursts through the door!
Finally, the STRANGER THINGS finale. I thought it was a solid ending, paying off everything that needed to be paid off in a satisfactory way. But, wow, the online comments have been so hateful and vitriolic, it’s THE LAST JEDI all over again. Just overwhelming.
Though it is many years since I saw Voyage of the Rock Aliens, the Pia Zadora song with Jermaine is still in my head. "And when the rain begins to fall..."
I rang in 2026 pet sitting and having a full night of movies. This was the marathon.
AND GOD CREATED WOMAN (1956, dir. Roger Vadim) on MAX – The film that launched Brigitte Bardot into worldwide fame. It also pushed the envelope regarding the depiction of sexuality for the time. Bardot is a young orphan who inspires the lust of three men, including two brothers. AND GOD… does not try to be anything other than popular cinema, and the Cote d’Azur locations are nice to look at.
The rest of the night I watched random things I found on Roku.
FORBIDDEN WORLD (1982) – When a genetically engineered life form starts killing the staff of a research installation on a distant planet, it is up to a visiting military officer to end its reign of terror. Forbidden World is better than it really deserves to be. Ripping off both Star Wars and Alien, it is 77 minutes of blood, b**bs, and cheap but effective special effects. I believe the sets were built for Galaxy of Terror. Easily one of the best low-budget productions of Roger Corman’s career. This was a re-watch.
HONEY (1981, dir. Gianfranco Angelucci) – The writer of an e-r-o-t-i-c novel forces a publisher to read her novel at gunpoint. The action of the novel, a woman’s voyeuristic adventures at a hotel, then plays out on the screen. I will give Honey credit for having a more artful style than most films of this kind, reminding me of a Tinto Brass film in some ways.
DAMES AND DREAMS (1974) – Stumbled upon this without having any idea it was an unfinished 1970s soft-core production completed forty years later with some very obvious modern scenes and music. Coming at the end of a long night, the lack of cohesion in the film did not matter much. Truly an artifact.
JO JO DANCER, YOUR LIFE IS CALLING (1986, dir. Richard Pryor) – As a film, you can say Jojo Dancer is disjointed. What it is not is a routine film. There are not many examples of studio films in the 1980s with a black entertainer having creative control. Though there are plenty of comedy bits, Jo Jo Dancer shines when the film delves into Richard Pryor’s demons. He had permission to get extremely personal. I liked the storytelling in the scenes of Jo Jo’s youth and early career, too. The cast is great.
AUTOMAT (2021) – Thank you for the recommendation, J.B. There is so much emotion in this doc about a restaurant chain that revolutionized food service early in the 20th century. The love of the Horn & Hardart automats, almost more as societal institutions than restaurants in some cases, is very touching. The list of interviewees is very impressive.
My laptops have been in the fritz for several weeks,. So l'm stuck on the phone for these mini-reviews, pulling a 'Mac McEntire' for these month-long reviews: 😉😛
THE TESTAMENT OF ANN LEE: "Brutalist" filmmakers tackle real European religious cult's migration to America as heartfelt musical. Well-made and acted, but joyless outside of academic exploration of "300"-like myth making.
MARTY SUPREME: Josh Safdie sure knows how to make compelling, well-made narratives about self-destructive a-holes l never want to rewatch. This one pays lip service to character redemption with an unearned ending, but there's no denying Timothée Chalamet is on beast mode here in pursuit of Oscar gold.
KILL BILL: THE WHOLE BLOODY AFFAIR: loved it. Even the "Fortnite"-sponsored, never-filmed scene that closes the 4.5 hr. show has its charms. Having the House of Blues battle in color and uncensored, the Bride learning of his daughter's existence at the very end and extra bits of anime/dialogue allow the whole thing to breathe at QT's deliberate pace. Not a great-loooking 70mm print (too soft and dark), but this is the only way to experience "Kill Bill" going forward.
LETHAL WEAPON ('87): even though l've seen it before (only a couple of times though) this is the first time that the greatness of Donner's direction (what an opening!), Gibson's acting prowess (that gun eating scene! 😳), Glover's thankless partner/family man/sidekick role and hiss-worthy bad guys (Gary Busey before the bike crash) hit me like a bus on an L.A. main street. 😅 Really want to see the extended version now.
ETERNITY ('25): an A24 unicorn, a PG-13 afterlife comedy with likable characters and no a-hole villains tied to a moving story and genuine pathos at its core.
IS THIS THING ON? ('25): amateur "Funny People" stand-up as therapy tool as adult yuppies' marriage-on-the-rocks falls apart. Bradley Cooper's competent direction is on auto-pilot.
SONG SUNG BLUES ('25): l don't care for Neil Diamond (sorry), but by the end of this inspiring real-life tale of family love and redemption even l wanted Hugh Jackman (excellent) and an unrecognizable Kate Hudson to sing 'Sweet Caroline' together. 🥲
DIE HARD 2 ('90): 4th out of the 5 "DH" movies IMO, but that's a testament to how great 1, 3 and 4 are (and what a drop-off in quality 5 is).
ANACONDA ('25): The "Jaws 3, People 0" of meta comedies. Its harmless and sometimes funny (the Sony crew filming their own reboot 🤣) but my tolerance for Jack Black and Paul Rudd hijinks has limits.
SENTIMENTAL VALUE ('25): old filmmaker tries to reconnect with his estranged adult daughters by filming his latest (last?) masterpiece in the centuries-old family home with a script mixing truth and fiction. Its heart is bigger than the competent-but-distant execution, but actress Renate Reinsve is a talent worth watching.
DUST BUNNY ('25): Bryan Fuller (TV's "Hannibal," which explains Mads Mikkelsen in the cast) makes his own twisted, fantasy version of "Leon The Professional." Sigourney Weaver almost steals the show from lil' Sophie Sloan... almost.
THE SECRET AGENT ('25): Wagner Moura is worthy of "No Country For Old Men" comparisons as a civilian trying to survive deeply entrenched 70's Brazilian corporate/police/govetnment corruption. A little too long but full of local color, wrapped in a quietly powerful denouement.
BILL AND TED'S BOGUS JOURNEY ('91): it's a testament to William Sadler's comedic acting chops that his 'Death' character steals a comedy sequel overstuffed with creative wild swings. The first "Bill and Ted" remains a crowd pleaser, but "Bogus Journey" is where the duo let their freak flag loose.
SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT ('25): the '84 original is referenced and paid homage, but this contemporary remake (clearly inspired by the recent "Dexter" revivals) is worth seeking out IF you keep expectations in check.
Really good! I enjoyed it more than I thought I would based on the mixed reviews I read upon release. Maybe my favorite Wright movie since Hot Fuzz. I have a Michael Cera allergy (weakest actor in SAG? I kid) and I think his sequence could have been fully removed and the movie would have been better off. Well worth watching.
U-571 (2000) which I had seen before. Pretty entertaining submarine movie about them hijacking an enemy sub to steal a code breaking machine. Which of course was a British achievement, but Hollywood decided to retell it with the Americans being the heroes. USA! USA! USA!
The Dam Busters (1955) was about a (historically accurate) mission to bomb several dams in Germany by the British. This movie was awesome, and the whole 3rd act (the bombing run) is intense and thrilling. The "trench run" from Star Wars apparently pulled a lot from this movie, and some of the dialogue is the same.
Afternoons of Solitude (2024) was a doc about one of the top bullfighters in the world. There is no narration or interviews, and it's nearly all just great footage of the bullfighting, presenting it all quite non-judgmentally. It doesn't shy away from anything, the brutality and cruelty of the sport, as well as the athleticism and showmanship.
Another example is The Great Escape. There were not any American servicemen involved in the actual event, but Hollywood had to put some American characters into the film. Sadly, Steve McQueen's motorcycle ride through the German countryside is pure fiction.
The last couple of years I did my own best of blu-ray releases, but I won't be doing one this time, and anybody doing it is just pulling one out of their a**. It has become a futile experiment. If it's a release from a boutique label (Arrow, Criterion, Vinegar Syndrome, etc...), it's most likely a homerun. If it's a big studio release, it's gonna be light on extras (mostly short promo stuff already released on previous discs) with good (not great) technical specs (they tend to overdo it with the DNR, Aliens was a disaster). It just comes down to if you want the movie enough.
ReplyDeleteIt has become an expensive hobby though, every release is a super-duper-special-collector-awesome edition. While it's cool to have a stacked release, well, as Syndrome said in The Incredibles: "When everything is special, none of it is". Kino seem to be holding it down though, with good enough technicals (though they make big mistakes sometimes), but light on extra features, keeping the price low-ish. 4k is still a costly technology.
That being said, 2026 is going to be another good year. VS is releasing Tank Girl 4k and Warner will do Speed Racer 4k. Fun times.
I'm seeing "Speed Racer" at IFC Center as a midnight feature tonight, my first time seeing it on the big screen. 😍😁
DeleteI avoid those super-duper editions, Kunider, but it is still hard not to think about the prices. I have not adopted 4k so far for that reason. The blu-ray option is not always available, which may be a trend for the future.
DeleteThough I splurged a little around Christmas, my purchases this year were less than past years. I was tempted to get some Kino releases during the recent sale, but the pile of unwatched discs already here protested. (There are plenty of sales from Kino to get them later.) I was going through my collection this week to figure out how many things neeed to be watched. It is not a small number. Although many titles are reserved for June, there are plenty that I should consciously be trying to get to for regular viewing.
I visited my local library yesterday and looked at the movie section there. I should be patronizing that more often, and it would probably save me some money, too.
I have to be better at buying stuff. But sometimes, when you know the old blu-ray was crap, whenever they do a super cool 4k restauration, i can't help myself. Or sometimes it's just that i love the movie and i want the best version of it
DeleteHave fun JM! Speed Racer plays gloriously on the big screen!!!! I think it was relatively dismissed when it came out but alot of folks have found their way to it. Wildly creative and artistically cool.
DeleteBugonia (2025 Peacock)
ReplyDeleteWow did i LOVE this flick. Cant go into too much detail as i want to stay spoiler free. It felt almost like a play with insanely great performances from Stone and Plemons. Wonderful suspense with shades of Misery abound. Most of all i adored the writing as we find out theres alot more to each of the characters and their motivations than meets the eye.
Stranger Things Finale
Zero Spoilers. As with many, i connected strongly to Stranger Things early on. And more often than not i found myself reaching out to old friends and reminiscing on so much of what the show got right about being a nerd in the early 80s. While i found the writing for the final season to be a bit uneven at times, im happy to say, that for me, they totally nailed the landing. I realllllllllllllly liked the finale. Each character got a moment or two to shine, the big bad was dealt with, and a lot of time was spent with emotional reflection and resonance. Well done Duffer bros. Well done indeed.
Im Chevy Chase and You're Not (cnn 2025)
JB/Patrick touched on the large amount of actor/creator docs that came out this year in their last podcast. Ive seen most and found em all to be fine but maybe surfaceish at best (with one exception, the Scorsese series, but even then i wish it was 4x longer). I wasnt even going to watch this as Chase has really seemed like a curmudgeon for a long long time. Didnt want to see something that glosses over that. Turns out the doc doesnt gloss...if anything it spends a LOT of its time on the trials and tribulations of Chase. Weirdly it doesnt really delve much into his movies other than a few passing mentions. And, as he's being interviewed current day throughout, it gives him a chance to present his side. Which he fails to do spectacularly. Either denial or "i dont give a shit" attitude prevails (narrator voice: he does give a shit). Not sure id suggest it other than a bit of a train wreck watch. My takeaway is that as a child of the 70s/80s he was a big deal on SNL and made many many movies i love. That work was a combination of others (directors, writers, etc) finding a way to present him and the humor he was capable of. However in time he viewed his cranky a-hole snarky stuck up persona as a "bit" and others did not...and he never chose to dismiss, course correct, apologize or acknowledge. So be it.
Yeah, i can't deal with those end-of-career documentary. I don't care about their life anymore, just talk about the movies you made. It's always the same: where they grew up, what the parents did, their first break, it's getting boring to me.
DeleteI caught the Chevy Chase doc on CNN because someone had it on the TV. I found it interesting enough to finish it. That a-hole side of this personality I picked up on seeing Caddyshack in recent years. I do not find Clark Griswold a warm character, either. There was a time when Chevy had a place in the entertainment business, and then it passed.
DeleteThe doc is a certainly far from being a routine life retrospective, Kunider. Some interviewees gush over how great Chevy Chase was to work with, but there are more who express there frustration or outright hatred from working with him. I kept thinking about Klaus Kinski, though Kinski was on another level of difficulty.
their, not there
DeleteI went through the Blu-ray commentary and extras for FANTASTIC FOUR FIRST STEPS (2025), and I have to admit I’m real impressed with this Matt Shakman guy. He’s way more of a Christopher Nolan than he is a Russo brother. A lot of what I assumed was CGI was built on set, with incredible attention to detail.
ReplyDeleteVOYAGE OF THE ROCK ALIENS (1984)
This was as good a movie as any to ring in the new year.
LORD OF THE RINGS: FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING (2001) and LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS (2002)
Did Gollum’s loincloth need to be that tiny?
THE CHRONICLES OF RIDDICK (2004)
Show this to anyone who says DUNE was too confusing.
NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS (2007)
There you are, sitting at home and minding your own business. And then… Nicolas Cage bursts through the door!
Finally, the STRANGER THINGS finale. I thought it was a solid ending, paying off everything that needed to be paid off in a satisfactory way. But, wow, the online comments have been so hateful and vitriolic, it’s THE LAST JEDI all over again. Just overwhelming.
I just did a LOTR marathon. Always a cool time.
DeleteAnd i freakin' love Chronicles of Riddick
Though it is many years since I saw Voyage of the Rock Aliens, the Pia Zadora song with Jermaine is still in my head. "And when the rain begins to fall..."
DeleteJermaine Jackson...
DeleteI rang in 2026 pet sitting and having a full night of movies. This was the marathon.
ReplyDeleteAND GOD CREATED WOMAN (1956, dir. Roger Vadim) on MAX – The film that launched Brigitte Bardot into worldwide fame. It also pushed the envelope regarding the depiction of sexuality for the time. Bardot is a young orphan who inspires the lust of three men, including two brothers. AND GOD… does not try to be anything other than popular cinema, and the Cote d’Azur locations are nice to look at.
The rest of the night I watched random things I found on Roku.
FORBIDDEN WORLD (1982) – When a genetically engineered life form starts killing the staff of a research installation on a distant planet, it is up to a visiting military officer to end its reign of terror. Forbidden World is better than it really deserves to be. Ripping off both Star Wars and Alien, it is 77 minutes of blood, b**bs, and cheap but effective special effects. I believe the sets were built for Galaxy of Terror. Easily one of the best low-budget productions of Roger Corman’s career. This was a re-watch.
HONEY (1981, dir. Gianfranco Angelucci) – The writer of an e-r-o-t-i-c novel forces a publisher to read her novel at gunpoint. The action of the novel, a woman’s voyeuristic adventures at a hotel, then plays out on the screen. I will give Honey credit for having a more artful style than most films of this kind, reminding me of a Tinto Brass film in some ways.
DAMES AND DREAMS (1974) – Stumbled upon this without having any idea it was an unfinished 1970s soft-core production completed forty years later with some very obvious modern scenes and music. Coming at the end of a long night, the lack of cohesion in the film did not matter much. Truly an artifact.
The HTML went a little haywire there.
DeleteI saw a couple of other things during the week.
ReplyDeleteJO JO DANCER, YOUR LIFE IS CALLING (1986, dir. Richard Pryor) – As a film, you can say Jojo Dancer is disjointed. What it is not is a routine film. There are not many examples of studio films in the 1980s with a black entertainer having creative control. Though there are plenty of comedy bits, Jo Jo Dancer shines when the film delves into Richard Pryor’s demons. He had permission to get extremely personal. I liked the storytelling in the scenes of Jo Jo’s youth and early career, too. The cast is great.
AUTOMAT (2021) – Thank you for the recommendation, J.B. There is so much emotion in this doc about a restaurant chain that revolutionized food service early in the 20th century. The love of the Horn & Hardart automats, almost more as societal institutions than restaurants in some cases, is very touching. The list of interviewees is very impressive.
My laptops have been in the fritz for several weeks,. So l'm stuck on the phone for these mini-reviews, pulling a 'Mac McEntire' for these month-long reviews: 😉😛
ReplyDelete3-IN-A-ROW 2025 70MM SCREENINGS (because NYC rulz! 😃).
THE TESTAMENT OF ANN LEE: "Brutalist" filmmakers tackle real European religious cult's migration to America as heartfelt musical. Well-made and acted, but joyless outside of academic exploration of "300"-like myth making.
MARTY SUPREME: Josh Safdie sure knows how to make compelling, well-made narratives about self-destructive a-holes l never want to rewatch. This one pays lip service to character redemption with an unearned ending, but there's no denying Timothée Chalamet is on beast mode here in pursuit of Oscar gold.
KILL BILL: THE WHOLE BLOODY AFFAIR: loved it. Even the "Fortnite"-sponsored, never-filmed scene that closes the 4.5 hr. show has its charms. Having the House of Blues battle in color and uncensored, the Bride learning of his daughter's existence at the very end and extra bits of anime/dialogue allow the whole thing to breathe at QT's deliberate pace. Not a great-loooking 70mm print (too soft and dark), but this is the only way to experience "Kill Bill" going forward.
LETHAL WEAPON ('87): even though l've seen it before (only a couple of times though) this is the first time that the greatness of Donner's direction (what an opening!), Gibson's acting prowess (that gun eating scene! 😳), Glover's thankless partner/family man/sidekick role and hiss-worthy bad guys (Gary Busey before the bike crash) hit me like a bus on an L.A. main street. 😅 Really want to see the extended version now.
ETERNITY ('25): an A24 unicorn, a PG-13 afterlife comedy with likable characters and no a-hole villains tied to a moving story and genuine pathos at its core.
IS THIS THING ON? ('25): amateur "Funny People" stand-up as therapy tool as adult yuppies' marriage-on-the-rocks falls apart. Bradley Cooper's competent direction is on auto-pilot.
SONG SUNG BLUES ('25): l don't care for Neil Diamond (sorry), but by the end of this inspiring real-life tale of family love and redemption even l wanted Hugh Jackman (excellent) and an unrecognizable Kate Hudson to sing 'Sweet Caroline' together. 🥲
DIE HARD 2 ('90): 4th out of the 5 "DH" movies IMO, but that's a testament to how great 1, 3 and 4 are (and what a drop-off in quality 5 is).
ANACONDA ('25): The "Jaws 3, People 0" of meta comedies. Its harmless and sometimes funny (the Sony crew filming their own reboot 🤣) but my tolerance for Jack Black and Paul Rudd hijinks has limits.
SENTIMENTAL VALUE ('25): old filmmaker tries to reconnect with his estranged adult daughters by filming his latest (last?) masterpiece in the centuries-old family home with a script mixing truth and fiction. Its heart is bigger than the competent-but-distant execution, but actress Renate Reinsve is a talent worth watching.
DUST BUNNY ('25): Bryan Fuller (TV's "Hannibal," which explains Mads Mikkelsen in the cast) makes his own twisted, fantasy version of "Leon The Professional." Sigourney Weaver almost steals the show from lil' Sophie Sloan... almost.
THE SECRET AGENT ('25): Wagner Moura is worthy of "No Country For Old Men" comparisons as a civilian trying to survive deeply entrenched 70's Brazilian corporate/police/govetnment corruption. A little too long but full of local color, wrapped in a quietly powerful denouement.
BILL AND TED'S BOGUS JOURNEY ('91): it's a testament to William Sadler's comedic acting chops that his 'Death' character steals a comedy sequel overstuffed with creative wild swings. The first "Bill and Ted" remains a crowd pleaser, but "Bogus Journey" is where the duo let their freak flag loose.
SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT ('25): the '84 original is referenced and paid homage, but this contemporary remake (clearly inspired by the recent "Dexter" revivals) is worth seeking out IF you keep expectations in check.
Later. ✌️😄
The Running Man (2025, dir. Edgar Wright)
ReplyDeleteReally good! I enjoyed it more than I thought I would based on the mixed reviews I read upon release. Maybe my favorite Wright movie since Hot Fuzz. I have a Michael Cera allergy (weakest actor in SAG? I kid) and I think his sequence could have been fully removed and the movie would have been better off. Well worth watching.
A few things I watched:
ReplyDeleteU-571 (2000) which I had seen before. Pretty entertaining submarine movie about them hijacking an enemy sub to steal a code breaking machine. Which of course was a British achievement, but Hollywood decided to retell it with the Americans being the heroes. USA! USA! USA!
The Dam Busters (1955) was about a (historically accurate) mission to bomb several dams in Germany by the British. This movie was awesome, and the whole 3rd act (the bombing run) is intense and thrilling. The "trench run" from Star Wars apparently pulled a lot from this movie, and some of the dialogue is the same.
Afternoons of Solitude (2024) was a doc about one of the top bullfighters in the world. There is no narration or interviews, and it's nearly all just great footage of the bullfighting, presenting it all quite non-judgmentally. It doesn't shy away from anything, the brutality and cruelty of the sport, as well as the athleticism and showmanship.
Another example is The Great Escape. There were not any American servicemen involved in the actual event, but Hollywood had to put some American characters into the film. Sadly, Steve McQueen's motorcycle ride through the German countryside is pure fiction.
Delete