Who's gonna step up when it happens to us?

Severance S2 — 4.5/5

This continues to be compelling television!! I often long for the feeling of watching 'Lost' in its weekly airings—not only must you be there for the water-cooler conversations, but there's a compelling need to be there when it happens. A great thing only happens once: as it's happening. This entire show is Tom Waits' "What's he BUILDING in there?" played on loop. But, despite it only being two weeks since the finale, I've lost the individual threads of what I've enjoyed, which is just a function of my memory. So I can't really add anything useful to any sort of discussion of what I enjoyed. So then I'll probably revisit this when I rewatch it in preparation for season 3. Which is itself perhaps the highest compliment.

Fallen out

of meaning.

What if the most accurate version of me

Is acting like somebody else?

— Petey, The Milkman

I'm not being paid enough for this.

Anora — 2.5/5

I'll insult this movie by saying it would have been better as a more traditional Hollywood movie. It would have been tighter, it would have been funnier. The 30m mark should have been the 10m mark. The 50m mark should have been the 20m mark. It spends a lot of time developing a relationship that has zero chemistry. You never once believe they're in love, and she only comes to life as a character when she is suddenly put in a position to defend that love. I want to call this a lesser riff on Uncut Gems. "Embodying anxiety" has become the definitive movie-maker technique of the past five to ten years, and I think it both requires a lot of work to pull off, while also requiring you to be less thoughtful with your script. They're not saying anything interesting, they're just saying stuff a lot—and loudly. And then Igor appears and is, immediately, the star of the movie that the world is trying to position Mikey Madison as. This is his movie. In a few words, in glances, he is a defined character with a worldview. There is chemistry!!! And so the second half contains multitudes that the first half doesn't have, and does so without the surplus sexuality of that first half. That sexuality, I think, defines that movie, and I think there's a world where you didn't need it to the extent it existed in in order to be effective. The final sex scene contains no nudity, and is the most raw. I feel uncomfortable saying 'there's too much sex' because I don't want to be seen as a convervative moralist!! Sex is freeing! And I think that the movie overdoses on sexuality to paint the portrait that all of Ani's relationships are transactional. You give me this, I give you that. And so within that, it really ladders up to an amazing ending as she realizes what sex and relationships could be. And with that realization, Anora goes from one dimensions to two. But I think, ultimately, what I'm getting at, is that I'd like to have seen her maybe go from two dimensions to three? 

It's been 30 years since I've watched Pretty Woman, and I never watched it seriously then, but I want to revisit it just to see if it is, indeed, the same movie, but with my criticism applied.

Save the world,

don't leave the house.

— Chumbawumba, Pass It Along

No-one got the teeth

to bite the hand.

— Chumbawumba, Coca Colanisation (I think...)

Walking through security was like dying—

the way you had to say goodbye to everyone, the way you became just your name on a paper and gave up your money and your watch and your shoes."

— The Idiot, by Elif Batuman

The water will rise to meet you.

Flow — 4/5

Incredibly engaging to watch, mainly in that it feels like something new, even as it feels like something very familiar—a very long video game cutscene. And beyond that even, the general language of video games. The way the camera moves, often, feels like the janky ways you move your Playstation joystick, imperfect, trying to balance your character within the scenery. Third-person, but with the POV of the God-player who can see all around them. And I think all of that speaks to a growing comfort with the language of video games (re: lower fidelity), and a general comfort that a good movie is good despite its lack of fidelity. And within that, the limitation of your tools becoming the chance to explore new ways of doing things. I think there has been a discussion for many years about how movies can be more like video games, and the end result of that has always been 'be more interactive!,' and I think this movie is more closer to the truth of how to bridge those two worlds together. The style of video games is that it makes you feel as though you are the character; it's immersion, beyond the virtual reality sense of the word. The movie is good because the whole thing feels like you, along with this cat, are being carried away. You feel part of the story. It feels, thirty years later, like the dream of 'Myst' come to life. And then, beyond the mechanics of how it tells its story, it's beautifully simple in its message and how it's conveyed: in a world filled with helplessness and loss, there is the hope that something better can come out the other side.

We lived here.

Here — 2.5/5

The first 15 minutes are awful. Just trash. What an ugly space, what ugly choices. It feels like BTS of a VFX reel, an addendum on some dumb DVD. I could have turned the TV off and never looked back. But I kept watching!! And eventually I got used to the unreality of the spectacle. Which is the rub: here is a place trying to showcase the infinite realities that exist inside of a space, and it's entirely presented with such uncanniness. Robert Zemeckis' fascination with new technology to create movies is his own personal fetish porn, and he's caught Tom Hanks in his unearthly grasp. They constantly remind you that you're watching a movie. Look at the artifice, the wigs, the makeup, the AI, the acting. You look around and see nothing but choices. Eventually, it settles onto a more standard narrative and forgoes all the bits of history that occupy the place and it forms a fine enough narrative to follow—but only also by forgoing its most interesting aspect. I love the book on which this is based. For me, it says, "oh, you've run out of stories? Try harder." There are infinite realities that exist inside of a space. And I think it's a bold attempt to take the same approach to making a movie. But it lacks poetry. It is not fragments of feelings; it's a cascade of weird choice after weird choice. There's some version of this that's closer to Cloud Atlas, or Tree of Life, equally weird and equally awkward—movies made by artists as much as technicians—that I think would sit on top of this movie and make it better. Unfortunately it's not, but all that to say—a fascinating watch.

Who isn't wrought?

A Real Pain — 2.5/5

Compelling characters, connected to a relevant backdrop, and my own personal anger that they didn't manage to make anything more out of it. I think we're all realizing in real-time that Kieran Culkin is more character than actor, blitzkrieg bopping from one emotion to another, ADHD by way of BPD. He's very good at embodying the shithead kid brother; love 'em but hate 'em. But also he embodies my struggle with the characters he plays; stories about people with mental health issues are largely unsatisfying because the thing to be solved is not some external thing. It can't be solved with a conversation, or a slap to the face. His brain is leaking, and I can relate to being around those people, but I'll never be able to relate to those people. Jesse Eisenberg has a lovely emotional speech just after the halfway point that embodies the feelings towards these people who you simply can't help, but the way that it is presented, it feels like a valve opening... that then is quickly closed again. You want to repair them, and they refuse to be repaired, they will not allow you to repair them, so you're just walking around with this broken thing that you can't throw away. I think the truth of those people—a truth that I push against—is that those people know exactly how to create sympathy for themselves: they are in pain. They are, and they aren't, and that creates division in you, making you unable to pick a path, which keeps these people in your life far longer than they should be. You're a good person! A good person doesn't just discard people! And they have so much value! And the cycle continues. Hey, the movie awakens a lot of feelings in me! Good job! At best, it's probably the best story I've seen about those types of people. But at the end, the movie wants me to feel like there's some hidden thing still to be discovered and if you just said the right thing, if you just slapped them in the face, it would awaken them from their terrible slumber. I think it wants me to feel sympathy for the person, and I'm sorry, but I don't and I won't and I can't and I will not.

Last hunt.

Kraven — 1.5/5

Its casting is its best and worst aspect. Ariana DeBose is an embarrassing actor. No redeeming quality. Christopher Abbott looks ridiculous in his role. Aaron Taylor-Johnson is just here to show us how attractive he is and how much water weight he lost. And then Fred Hechinger and Alessandro Nivola are fun! They are such weird actors!! It's like this movie was cast by two different groups, each with their own idea of how to save this movie. It's stupid, and only they know how to play into its stupidity. Beyond that, just a total destruction of an interesting character in a self-serious template of a movie. Its only other redeeming quality is a movements system where Kraven behaves at different times like Captain America, Spider-Man, and Black Panther, and only by copying those other more successful things does it feel fun. Oh, but then he gets a new vest at the end, very exciting!!

If you wish to destroy a people, kill their language.

Kneecap — 4/5

Surprising little thing that I did not realize was based on a true(ish) story until the credits rolled. Good first time actors, arresting direction, and that secret thing, which is an introduction into a new world that exists inside your own. Surprisingly layered with its talk of Irish independence and words as bullets and also promoting class-A drugs. It's an interesting thing that progress comes within a casing of a lack of progress. Violence and freedom. There's a weird balance to it, no?

Kiss me on my hot mouth.

Emilia Pérez — 2/5

I enjoyed the first half of this. It is absurd (re: it's serious and silly and I think intentional). "Pe-nis to va-gi-na" is high low art. And so I was prepared, for about 60 minutes, to defend this movie from all comers. It was engaging! And then it just discards my willful attention. Who is this movie about? It's not about Emilia, nor is it about Selena's character, nor Zoe's (who is, indeed, good in her role). And before we can find out, it ends, abruptly. It has nothing to say, it's just Things That Happen, with a musical score. And then there's everything else around the film!! So anything potentially good about it just gets lost in the miasma. It just becomes an embarrassment.

What is it to be an alien?

Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story — 3.5/5

Yet another movie that makes me cry, while also leaving me empty. Do I know Christopher Reeve better? Yes. Do I have a better understanding of him? Ehhhh. Often, Dana Reeve feels like the more interesting person here. Christopher Reeve feels compelled by necessity; she feels compelled by love. He must prove something to his father. He must walk again. I believe in my whole heart that to be good, truly good, you must sacrifice something of yourself. His sacrifices are born of pain, of the world that has happened to him. Hers are born of personal choice. At the end, Christopher Reeve tries to sum up being a hero as being ordinary, and overcoming the insurmountable obstacles of everyday existence. I think that's a definition of resilience, not heroism. But I do think it sums up Christopher Reeve: he tried to bring Superman down to earth.

Stray thoughts (I will begin doing stray thoughts):

• I really enjoyed the 3D Christopher Reeve/Superman floating in space that they would often return to. It's a beautifully abstract way to connect the emotional dots of a real life story and just, in general, make a documentary more visually interesting. 

• Given the giant Superman-shaped cloud over the whole proceedings, it would have been fun to intersperse his story with that of Superman's. Namely, he (ultimately) and Dana (especially) seemed to be great parents, and they've got great kids as a result. "Doomed Planet. Desperate Scientists. Last Hope. Kindly Couple." That last one's the kicker. Pa and Ma Kent are integral to the origin of Superman. He was born great, but he was raised to be good.

Nothing about this feels right.

Captain America: Brave New World — 2.5/5

As a Marvel apologist, forgiving most of the sins that others struggle to forgive, I feel like this may actually be the worst thing they've put together. ("Put together" being more of a compliment than this movie may deserve.) At their worst, Marvel movies still float on compelling actors / characters, and unfortunately I just don't think Sam Wilson is all that interesting. Steve Rogers had at least a grandpa energy to him, a stoicism that felt displaced in time, but Anthony Mackie plays it with step-dad energy—"I'm not the dad, I'm just the dad that stepped up"—trying to prove he belongs but never actually becoming someone that we're interested in following. He shows up, but who actually is there? There's a touch of living up to the legacy of what came before, and into a place that white America doesn't necessarily want him to be, but most of that was explored in the preceding show, so it just becomes a very small hint of a character. The rest of the movie wants to be a smart thriller, chess pieces pushed around the board, but all the moves are dumb, resting on a villain who looks dumb, sounds dumb, and frankly, the movie hardly seems to even want to make him the villain. I love Tim Blake Nelson but wow does he not belong here. Thunderbolt Ross is a far more compelling placement for that evil energy, but they've neutered him via the love for his daughter. But within all the bad, there are some pretty good action set pieces, namely the precipice-of-World War 3 missile fight at Celestial Island, I find Shira Haas' height and posture incredibly fun to watch, and Harrison Ford and Carl Lumbly give the movie some of that grandpa energy which I did not, before this movie, realize was so integral to this franchise working. But the damning spike in the center of this is that Bucky Barnes appears for approximately 2 minutes, and infuses the whole affair with a charm that has always befit these movies, and Anthony Mackie, for his part, plays well into. While he's there, you realize what's been absent up until then. And when he leaves, Sam just turns back into Stoicism Man. He's a good man! I'd want this guy to be president! Just not the star of a movie.

The language

in which to look away.

- Omar El Akkad, talking to Chris Hedges about his book 'One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This'

Dumpster-fire of a world.

Borderlands — 1/5

This movie only makes sense if Cate Blanchett is living out a real-life version of Lydia Tár. It's bad, like everyone says, and worse, it's boring. What a fun world to be just tossed in the trash.

Wak wak.

The Penguin S1 — 1.5/5

This was bad. Colin Farrell disappears into the role, and no one stepped up to take his place. A star-fueled vehicle with zero star power. The whole show's just adding a fat-suit to a nothing premise, a nothing character. It's all talk talk talk, wak wak wak, jesus, everyone explaining themselves because everything lacks inherent characterization. At least in comic books, the rules are that you are allowed to talk, but you must do so under the guise of a fight scene. Maybe—maybe—there's a solid two hour movie inside of the fat-suit padding. If the whole show were building towards how Oz treats Victor at the end, maybe. But in its bloat, the muscles and skin just peel off. Two seconds after saying he can't afford to have family, he returns to the arms of his mother, and to his lover. It's just a lot of effort put in to barely trying.

The lost boy.

La Chimera — 3/5

It's both better and worse than the 3/5 I've given it, mainly in that it creates a compelling world but takes way too fucking long to get going. I believe I remember Alan Moore saying he wrote 'Jerusalem' to be a bit of a slog to confront and drive away casual readers. As such with this movie, and these movies in general. They challenge us to keep watching, and my constant opinion of them is "if I just force myself to finish it, it will be worthwhile" and it is worthwhile enough times to keep putting myself through it. But man, fucking, get a move on. As the last half comes around, things start to feel like something. Josh O'Connor is a star, self-evident, and even more particularly Carol Duarte is something unique. In less than 60 seconds, as she starts dancing, he, and I, fall in love with her, and the whole movie turns on its head. Alice Rohrwacher knows how to be poetic, which I'll define as being able to piece together a feeling through fragments. I can't really pinpoint what the movie's about, other than being lost with the occasional malady of not being lost, but it feels like something, something untouchable, but there in front of you all the same. It's a world of lost souls, digging through graves, trying to find something worth keeping.

You, who looks like you, but you're not yourself.

A Different Man — 3.5/5

I struggle with this one. I enjoyed it, particularly in contrast to the body-horror-in-a-different-way 'The Substance' which also plays with stylistic flourishes, though overdone and more celebrated, while this one had a humanity to it absent from that one. The first half, or even three-quarters, is a banger of low-key surrealism, centered around a sympathetic lead. Sebastian Stan does a great job of splitting himself between the before and after, feeling like the same person, but different, but the same. He does a good job of mucking up his good lucks, bringing it to a place of a guy who could be hot but doesn't know how to put himself together. By the time Adam Pearson shows up, the movie's riding high on petty jealousy that someone didn't need to change what they were to become who they were. But then that ending! Your disability doesn't make you who you are? It doesn't matter if you've changed your mask if you live inside a shell? I mean... yes? But no? It feels like telling a shy person "have you tried talking to other people?" Fuck you, friend. Or fuck me for placing too much pity on them to think that the disability does mark their life. Shit, maybe I'm in the wrong here, fuck.

But if you lick it, it costs a quarter.

Saturday Night — 2/5

There's an excitement running through the thing, a constant threat that something good might happen. But there's a paper thin line separating anxiety from excitement, and only in the last 15m does it finally cross over into the latter. For the rest of the movie, it's just an Aaron Sorkin riff, and friends, Aaron Sorkin isn't funny. And despite what the movie wants to do, when we tune in to watch a movie about the first episode of Saturday Night Live, we expect there to be humor. But, you know, real life, and too many people are miserable dicks (though at least some of the impressions were notable). I think the movie's main mistake is placing the narrative burden atop the shoulders of Lorne Michaels. As much as he plays himself as mysterious, I think it's just a cover for how less interesting he is than the world around him. His smarts, and his success, is recognizing that he isn't the star. I think Garrett Morris would have been a more interesting focal point; someone who didn't belong, but was there, watching the chaos unfold and trying to figure out what part they had to play in it.

Every time you find yourself here, it's because you chose to come back.

Severance S1 (rewatch) — 4.5/5

When a piece of art feels too overly designed, too much a director's vision, I get turned off (a decent amount of Wes Anderson, for example). Here, for whatever reason, I don't have that problem. Here, let's examine that: it feels the design goes all the way down, deeper than just a pretty still. There is a compelling mystery built on top of compelling characters who feel peculiar to their core. To my point about 'Wicked,' that movie dressed up the edges in fantastical costumes and hairdos to ascribe peculiarity, but as with the original 'Wizard of Oz,' this show features characters who have distinct, familiar characteristics but also have an uncanny unfamiliarity. They're not exactly the person they are on the show when they leave the set, but they are still someone. They don't need to try to be; they are. And their peculiarity helps to create a believable world that feels like our own, but more interesting, but colder. They feel like perfectly slotted puzzle pieces. And the show's central mystery is a puzzle where you don't have the full picture, just the corner you're working on. Each episode reveals new pieces, which only confuses you more as to what picture is being assembled. I think a good mystery feels like a maze. You know there's a center but you can only ever see the walls in front of you. Each turn could lead to a blank wall or illumination. The show has the feeling of the first season of Westworld, which itself was built around a maze, of human consciousness. I think similar work is being done here, just, unlike that show, I hope it can sustain its feeling of importance beyond the first season. And with two episodes into the new season, it thus far remains entertaining!! But also my hope is that it goes beyond human consciousness into spiritual consciousness. Here are people playing at God, creating new lives beneath old lives. What we learn down here might help us learn something about what's up there.

I'm sexy, I'm cute, I'm popular to boot.

Bring It On — 3/5 (rewatch)

Watched it many years ago and hated it, but the cultural discourse always suggested to me that I was wrong. I was! It's a fun, trifling thing. It's cheesy, but knows it's cheesy, and leans in to it. It's halfway poorly made, but with enough genuine star power and interesting bits to elevate it beyond what it could have been. Towards the end, as we get to a wider view of the competitive cheering world, it opens up in a wonderful way that could have lent itself to a 'Drop Dead Gorgeous' or 'Best In Show' vibe, but I'm comfortable with just the hint.  And to the larger cultural expose I'm doing on why I love 'Not Another Teen Movie' so much, and building on the point I made in the 'Can't Hardly Wait' review, the success of NATM rests on not making fun of bad things, but making fun of good things. With that in mind, and with this movie added to the pile, you can see NATM as much a parody as a pastiche movie—somewhere between 'Willy Wonka' and 'Scary Movie.' It's all the best parts, laid out before you.

You can't escape from yourself.

The Substance — 2/5

I think this is the signal we're in a new era, friends. Every frame is potential for some other director's future pitch treatment. It's all overdone, highly stylized to the point of not needing an actor's performance to carry the story as the camera and hyper-pop set design will communicate the feeling and editing will piece it together in post. Nothing can be boring, let there be no rest. I'm half-disappointed in myself for disliking this movie because the premise is fun and it's devolution into body horror should be fun, but at 2 hours and 20 minutes, it's mostly just tiresome. Demi and Margaret are good enough in their roles, but there's nothing to them, they're mostly empty shells, no interiority. In many ways, the movie feels like a 1920s silent movie in how BIG everything is. You don't need words to understand who the bad guys are, the visuals and wild gesticulations tell the story. And much like Emerald Fennell, the movie points you towards 'the male gaze is bad', creating an exciting villain for the leftists, only to not much do anything with that and instead focus on how women will defeat themselves in order to chase love and adoration.  "The executioner's willing citizens." They're not wrong, but the denouement could have brought those two threads together towards epiphany vs. gross-out humor. Like 'Death Becomes Her,' it'd rather be silly than say something.

Everybody does it in America.

A Fish Called Wanda — 1/5

I find the whole thing mean-spirited. Stutter jokes, gay jokes, everyone lies to each other. Does this make me a prude? I've always held Kevin Kline up to be an actor I enjoy, but this movie makes me wonder if I only want to like him.

Sometimes I'm gonna have to lose.

Somebody Somewhere S3 — 3.5/5

As Sam grows, the show grows less interesting. Sam is often left alone, left by herself to navigate the world. She wants to live in a world without romantic love, which is difficult when that's the world everyone else wants to live in. As Sam's entourage gets busier with seeking the other parts of their selves, they leave her behind—and there's a difference in choosing to be alone, and being left alone. And that second option only comes into being when you introduce people into your life. By the time she finds someone, I can't tell if it's because she wants to, or because she has no other choice but to give in. The show, at its best, is about the gentle pull of friends into a wider world, and this season felt more like a shove. That's also necessary, but in this final season as with the last season, the show separates us from the chemistry that makes the show spark. Eh, I'm nitpicking. I believe the best compliment to give someone is to miss them when they're gone, and I will now miss this show now that it's come into my life and gone.

The Coliseum is closed.

Squid Game S3 — 4/5

What a fun show to watch!! I think what the games allow for, more than a typical drama, is for you to explore the extremes of a person very quickly. Most entertainment work up towards scenes of catharsis, of character exegesis, and here they are, thrown into intense situations where they must quickly reveal who they are. Desperate, afraid, coward, decent, awful. And still more of them to discover in the rollout from there, confronted now with those things. The first couple of episodes of the show, I was worried that it couldn't retain the highs from season 1. Gi-hun does that thing that I fucking hate which is a character you love becomes dramatically different the next time you see them. Usually you see it in kids aged up, like in Slumdog Millionaire or Cinema Paradiso, the latter half of the movie showing young men with only a faint outline of the previous version you once loved. Here, similarly, he's dark and depressed, far removed from the desperate silliness he once was. But, while the show spends maybe too much time trying to find the island, once there it quickly enough introduces new people to surround him, each unique and interesting, and in only 7 episodes manages to successfully build a new world atop the old one.

And though, of course, that's not important to me, all right, why not?

Wicked — 3.5/5

A perfect 3.5/5 movie. Very flawed, but with extreme highs that make for great repeat background viewing. It's highs: Ariana's a gifted physical actress, and the handful of songs that really pop. The flaws: nothing wrong with Cynthia's performance, but Elphaba is a boring character. She's only interesting in everyone's reactions to her. In trying to pinpoint why she's boring, I think it's this: she doesn't change. In the beginning, she's a strong character. At the end, she is the same person she was then. The movie tries to make her feel bad for who she is, but she never shows anything but strength and resilience, even if just spite. The movie, briefly, tries to change her to make her more popular, but as soon as that four minute song is over, her love interest tells her she doesn't need to change. Okay! Thanks! It's a movie about acceptance, and movies about acceptance aren't about how the main character changes, it's about how everyone around them changes. Ahhhh! It was us all along! I understand why people get attached to notions like that—the world is wrong, not me. They're not wrong! But also, maybe, they're not right. And the curse of life is that you will never know which is true. The story and the music don't tell the story of Elphaba being pushed down, and thus needing to retreat from herself. But it needs that in order for the final number to work on an emotional level. The ending—the song drawn out to a dramatic 15 minutes—is a sequence that I both love, and also doesn't work dramatically. She has to have felt the weight of gravity dragging her down before she can, uh, you know.
--
I WILL ALSO ADD that, top to bottom, the original Wizard of Oz is filled with characters. Not just people who look funny, but who seem to be peculiar to their core. Here, it's funny costumes and hairdos that are made to do the work of creating a character.

Remember this feeling. It's like the first time you fell in love.

Somebody Somewhere S2 — 4/5

This show always hints at a wider world—who is Holly, where did Sam go before she came back—and while they are tantalizing mysteries, the show has zero interest in exploring them. I like that about the show! It becomes about the low-stakes gambles of day-to-day life, the easy chemistry of hanging out. It's the difference between calling up a friend and asking them to tell you everything they've been up to the past six years (and them not knowing where to start), and just wondering what they're up to today. Things will reveal themselves in pieces until eventually it forms a whole. It's casually funny and it's sad in a way that sneaks up on you. And the show, for drama's sake, feels the need to break your heart. I love when a piece of art builds up a point (friendship can save us) only then to undo that point (one person alone isn't enough to fill the god-sized hole), and this season worked towards those purposes. However, core to that attempt is breaking up the foundation of the show, which is the incredible chemistry between Sam and Joel—and thus, in parts, the show loses the true spark of why it's special. But in her hurt, you see Sam grow, because change is the only way to keep from losing something this beautiful.

Art isn't for everyone.

It's for one person.

How are you so strong!

Shrinking S2 — 3.5/5

Man, as much as I want to push against it, I fucking love Bill Lawrence's brand of schmaltz. Everything works out well for everyone! If we only made room for new people, they can expand our heart. How lovely. This season, Ted McGinley's Derek stood out as the center of the show. Always genial, always understanding. He is an everyday version of Jason Segal's Jimmy—not forcing people out of their shell, but gently coaxing, pushing here and there, a casual introduction, a piece of advice. If everyone had a Derek, they wouldn't need a therapist. Extending outwards from there, the larger cast continues to come into their own, and it's particularly become a joy to watch Harrison Ford look like he actually enjoys being there.

Ain't I a stinker?

Hundreds of Beavers — 3.5/5

I don't know if I like this movie as much as I admire it. It's so fucking silly, and the force of mind to create something so silly, so throwback, so borderless—and to do it for the length of an entire movie—is a force I admire. I will admit that I got tired of some of the hijinx, in the same way I might have tired of Bugs Bunny beyond a 10 minute segment, but the movie kept me watching out of pure appreciation for what they were doing, and then I was rewarded with a final 20 minute set piece that kept escalating the silliness further and further until I, finally, was able to give in to it totally. It feels bold to claim that a movie with a 1920s sensibility can exist and prosper in a modern climate, and here it is! All art from all time is still applicable. Glory be.

Welp ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

A total acceptance of things you can absolutely change.

Who's afraid of the big, black bat?

Batman Forever — 3/5 (rewatch)

I left the theater when I was 12 years old thinking this was my favorite Batman, and cultural commentary from the schoolyard indicated to me that that was the wrong opinion to have. Here, now, retribution. If you can go full in, embracing Joel Schumacher's 1930's serial vision: it's stupid, and it's fun. This is a fun movie. It's built like an amusement ride and serves its purposes to that end. It, like Mortal Kombat, is the boyhood id, separated from the need to make it worthwhile for adults as well. Why do we like our Batman serious? Because we are adults, and adulthood is for serious people who need to rationalize their childhood interests. It's not a great movie, but it is a playground brawl, smooshing action figures together to see who comes out on top, each figure clearly articulated. Val Kilmer's got the lips, Riddler's got the costumes, Chris O'Donnell's got an earring. Everyone plays their part, though notably I'll call out Tommy Lee Jones for the thing that works the least. He's having fun—the point of the movie—but conveying fun isn't just laughing maniacally; it's taking the role seriously. As anyone who plays with kids knows—childhood games are serious business.

As sick as our secrets.

Juror #2 — 2/5

Once again, I am here to tell the American people that their opinion is wrong. What is the fucking interest in this movie, holy shit. Compelling story synopsis, to be sure, but what lack of artfulness in its creation. No tension, bland performances on top of thin characters, no case to be made for a person's worth or lack thereof. This movie is a surprise to people who haven't watched the past 20 years of Law and Order so think they've found something novel. It's a fun movie to watch and say 'oh, what would you have done?' and I would suggest you go do that instead. Or go instead watch the much superior 'Paranoid Park.' All apologies to Toni Collette and Nicholas Hoult who I continue to enjoy 🙏