And do the other things.

Operation Avalanche — 3/5

I'm in a Matt Johnson hole, enamored with 'Nirvanna the Band The Show The Movie', watching the original web series and checking out his earlier movies. I think this movie continues his thread of pure inventiveness. I think there's a theory of making stuff where if you're having fun, the audience will have fun, and that shows, but it also shows how far his tone will take you. The movie wants to at points be a thriller, but resting on his shoulders as the main actor, it can only go so far in that direction (save for a genuinely exciting and apparently improvised car chase scene). It's basically OJ Simpson's "If I Did It" but with the moon landing, and feels about as silly and plausible as that must have felt. 

I recognize myself in you.

Sentimental Value — 4/5

After you have an internal thought, you say it out loud, and then, maybe, for some, you do something with it. Some people don't know how to do that middle part. They skip straight from something happening inside them to needing to explore it in its grandest form. I bet it's frustrating to have them as a parent!!! As executed, the movie feels like a better version of 'Hamnet' and a clearer articulation of someone having an internal life that they can't express but upon the stage. And the kicker being that it still feels like their children aren't quite understanding it — he understands you because he understands himself, and are you not of him? 

Do you feel like something from the past is missing from your future?

The Resort S1 — 2/5

...and final season...? It managed to pick up speed halfway through when it threatened to switch the main character to a charming yet bumbling Mexican man, the Memory Detective, but it only allowed him to become co-lead, forcing him to share screentime with the two people we had already been forced to know, dwelling in grief and no longer in love and making bad choices and jfc what a slog those two were, damn. Yada yada, compelling mystery that goes nowhere and doesn't connect to the main narrative yada yada but listen, on the other side of 'something weird is happening in movies,' something weird is happening in TV: shows that feel like comedies, that star comedians, but are actually just dramas (but still want to dip their toes in comedy). I'd say it started around the time of... 'Better Call Saul'? Heavy things that have the feeling of lightness to them. But, you know, it's that artistry thing again, and mastery of tone is that most untouchable of intangibles. 

A woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet.

The Testament of Ann Lee — 3.5/5

What an interesting movie!!! What's fascinating is that it feels like a genuine religious movie. What I mean by that is that the movie doesn't cynically side-eye Ann Lee's testament. It seems to communicate what's visible (what she says is true, if not what is actually true), and communicates the belief of her followers, without casting considerable doubt on any of them. This is her experience, and that of her flock. I could put this side-by-side with 'The Ten Commandments' as a movie that religious people could love (except that her religion is sillier of course). And it's made in an art house style visited by people who have no interest in religion, and then features scenes that would likely offend the more religiously-minded. It seems to be a movie that caters to no one. And it's a weird-ass musical! Brave!! And the ultimate takeaway for me is — sure, why not? Why isn't she the next Jesus Christ? The only difference between this and 'The Passion of the Christ' is the worldwide belief that He is the Savior. It took time for Him to become that, so sure, why not, maybe Her time will come as well. Just need one believer, and it grows from there. 

Perhaps good to pair with 'The Wonder.' 

And I have wept to see the beauty of the world passing

like a dream behind her eyes.

— James Joyce, writing to (or of) Nora

I have the power.

Masters of the Universe (2026) — 1.5/5

Man, something strange is happening in the world of movies and ^I think I've figured it out.^ First, my memories of He-Man are largely in my family telling me that I loved it, meaning it had done enough to mean something, but not enough to linger. And the trailer looked fun* and a couple people said it was fun and I am telling you all of this so that I can convince you that I went in with the best of intentions. I did not harbor thoughts of what this movie should be, I did not pay $40 for a good time out though secretly desire a reason to thrash and flail. I was only confronted by what it is. And, like 'Project Hail Mary', within five minutes I was assaulted by a tone that I could not overcome. I think there's a section of the internet that refers to this as 'Marvel-ization' of tone, but I don't think that's it at all. I think we're in a new era of tone, which I will call Barbie-ficiation. Marvel's tone I attribute to 'Cheers,' and I attribute it to 'Cheers' because Amy Poehler said if you want to learn how to write sitcoms, watch 'Cheers' and so I watched the first season of 'Cheers', and the secret to 'Cheers' was 'say something serious, and then undercut it with a joke.' (And I'm sure what existed in 'Cheers' existed before then, but that's as far as I can take it.) I think Marvel does that well, and whether that tone simply shaped my upbringing and understanding of humor within storytelling (it premiered in '82 and I was born in '83!), I cannot say, but I think 'Barbie' starts to do something differently. Marvel, at its best, are serious movies with comedy. Barbie is a comedy, with a serious, large, deeply philosophical underpinning. Marvel cuts the tension with a joke. Barbie cuts the comedy with tension. (I can't trace the origins of that, but if I had to guess, I'd wager it's a characteristic shared with the 2010s era of Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network animated shows, which I also saw in 'Nimona', which preceded Barbie to a premiere by one month.) We're dancing, we're having a good time, and "do you guys ever think about dying?" (Trace that to 'Project Hail Mary' and "I put the 'not' in 'astronaut'" while people look at him gravely. Ryan Gosling's playing a deeply unserious character constantly being given reason to take it seriously. He's a comedian in a sober world.) This movie feels cut of similar cloth. Nicholas Galitzine plays a buff buffoon in a world where his mom and dad have been kidnapped and likely tortured, and an evil skeleton has turned his world into a hellscape. With those tangible plot details, it's more of a comedy than I would have expected! With underpinnings of a larger, deeper philosophical point to be made about power and who wields it. Gerwig did not make a perfect movie, but she largely pulled off an ambitious attempt, but her ultimate success was that she unleashed something new into the world. She said of 'Barbie' — “I’m doing the thing and subverting the thing," which is essentially the same here. It's taking the world seriously, while also saying the world is silly, and what comes out of that is comedy comedy comedy violent murder of innocents comedy comedy comedy deep thought comedy comedy comedy violent murder of enemies comedy comedy comedy very adult humor that parents will need to explain to their children** comedy comedy comedy. It's "the thing," and an acknowledgement that the thing is also being watched by a people who have a relationship with another version of the thing. I think the new version of the "four quadrant film" is essentially this precipice where "we must engage new audiences without alienating old audiences." And brother, that precipice is built on fear and it kind of sucks. This movie kind of sucks. 

Then again, I can see the parts of the movie that succeed — well, it's just one thing: Skeletor. (Moviemakers, fiends, you've driven me to tell my audience that the best part of a movie is Jared Leto.) He is both evil and funny. He's not the thing but also the other thing; he is both simultaneously, and that's a tonality that 'Barbie' was largely able to hold onto (the credit of which I think belongs to Margot Robbie who, through good acting, gravitas, is able to keep the movie centered). He-Man, in contrast, looks the part, but has no central core to him. He is either Adam, a man capable of nothing, or He-Man, the man who can do anything. They are not the same, and I can see an intent of this movie in them becoming one, but that doesn't happen. He is just the thing but also subverting the thing, within a dualistic character. 

To that, it is entirely possible that my theorizing here is just a response to a lack of artistry (or my preferred artistry). It's okay for me to not like a movie that others like, I repeat into the mirror. But there's something about this, and "Project Hail Mary," and (to a lesser extent) "Barbie," where I almost feel bad for not liking it as much as I'm supposed to which makes me want to understand why. (These reviews say as much about me as the movie, wow, what a surprise.) I'm thrashing and flailing to put my finger on something intangible. And listen, if you know anything about me, you know I love to discuss philosophical ideas, intercut with jokes, so I would love for this to work out. But I think 'Barbie', for me, and like 'John Wick'***, becomes this miracle of tonality which feels easy to replicate, but incredibly difficult to pull off. But it's a new idea and I expect to see a lot more of it coming around the bend. 

*Watching the trailer again in preparation for this review, I think it largely does not come across as a comedy. It comes across as a fun world that takes itself seriously, with moments of humor, but with a sincerity running through it, but the movie itself feels like a reverse of that tonality.

**Another mark for my conservative streak. Did he need to say 'asses' so many times when 'butt' would have been just as funny? Does he need to say 'goddamn'? Does he need to make jokes about fisting and giving head? I don't even fucking have children and my response to those things is 'sorry for the conversation on the ride home' and also 'it's lazy messageboard humor' and, sir, I was a lazy messageboard humorist, and there's nothing that I hate more than my own kind. 

***...and shit maybe even 'Speed' before it? And 'The Matrix' after that? And 'Die Hard' before both? I think any movie that becomes shorthand for an executive to say '...make it more like [x]' showcases that people can sense there's a new idea here, but they can't quite figure out what it is, so they grasp at the easy descriptors, forming something similar and worse. But, you know, one, artistry, and the ability to actually pull this off and, two, no, it's just the one actually. 

But you always spoke in a whisper,

and I wasn't good at listening.

— Modest Mouse, Third Side of the Moon 

Am I the shade

or the shadow?

— Modest Mouse, Third Side of the Moon 

Some people are not good at things.

Project Hail Mary — 2.5/5
The Martian — 4.5/5 

I rewatched 'The Martian' last year — a banger of a movie. Holds up on repeat. I never got around to writing down my thoughts, but I had some! And then here comes this movie to create a parallel. So let's try to work this out.

I think 'The Martian,' more than just being a great adventure movie, well-told, is probably the most emblematic movie of its particular point in time. It's the height of Obamacore, 'The Audacity of Hope,' Reddit-era politics, Buzzfeed-ification of information, and "science wins" signs peppering lawns in the years before the big science-based kerfuffle which confused half of America. It is our Most Millennial Movie. It is almost, perpetually, corny. Hope is corny! Optimism is a little lame. "We are going to science the shit out of this" is said by either the coolest — or most trying — science teacher you've ever met. Fortunately, tonally, the movie always falls on the left side of that binary. And I think it's because, like a great teacher, the movie's primary goal feels like education (and just hiding it within entertainment). The movie shows the science. You feel like you're with people who are figuring it out in real time, and they're bringing you along with them. They explain it as they go. Not that you can now, like, go to Mars and grow potatoes, but you generally understand you can grow potatoes on Mars, and have a general understanding of everything that goes into it, and why they're doing what they're doing. They focus on the what and the why, and there's less interest in the who who does it. Not that Matt Damon's character is a non-entity, it's just he has no larger personality-based story being told within this. He isn't filled with tragic backstory and is now being faced with an extraordinary opportunity to answer something inside him. He's just a smart, generally amiable, occasionally funny guy in a bad situation who only has the hope of science to get him through it. You grow to care about him and in order for the movie to work, you have to care about his survival — but he's not the story. The science is the story. 

On the other side of that — I love Lord and Miller. I love Ryan Gosling. I loved Andy Weir's last movie (see above). I went in preparing to love this and, five minutes in, could not get over whatever fucking tone was happening here: a tone I can only describe as millennial cringe. I could not, for the life of me, overcome this first hurdle and so, a movie that on face value isn't bad, becomes difficult for me to watch. "Soooo I met an alien" is the same type of line as "we're going to science the shit out of this," only it falls on the other side of the binary. It's Jess from 'New Girl' in space (and I say that insultingly while also being a huge fan of 'New Girl,' so figure that out). And I think the problem, with 'The Martian' in mind, is that the movie tries to make more of a story out of Ryan Gosling's character—and in so doing fails both his character and the science story. The science feels like two people talking to themselves. It's beyond our understanding, and so we're just watching people do random things we surmise as "something important." And so the takeaways from those conversations are the cute asides, and given the science isn't really that important to understanding the movie, the cute asides take up the entire weight of the movie. Have you ever seen two good friends hang out and you're overhearing their conversation and you just kind of think they're both pretty annoying and you're glad you aren't friends with them, knowing full well that if you were sitting at that table, you'd be laughing right along with them? That's me and this movie. The relationship is the whole of it, and I just couldn't buy into it. And then there is a reveal that this story is some larger story about what it means to be brave! Okay! I would have liked that to have been the whole movie! That sounds interesting! It would have created an emotional through-line that connected the first and final scenes, but it only appears at the tail-end, because.... because??? Sigh. It's fine to just be a buddy movie that takes place a million miles away. Just be that. Lose the unnecessary earth-bound characters breaking character to sing karaoke. Lose the larger weight it ties itself to. Just be a guy on a ship on a mission. Or maybe next time I watch it—and I can see myself watching this again—I just go in with a different mindset and the light switch will be turned on, I'll be in the mood to hope, and suddenly I'll love it. But honestly, re-reading the quotes for this thing over at IMDB, trying to find a title for this post? Uhhhh I don't think I will, boss. 

Sanka, you dead?

Cool Runnings — 4.5/5 (rewatch)

Man, I love this fucking shit. And I think, in all honesty, why this little comedy works so well, is because everyone gets a moment to be serious. I mean, John Candy barely even plays into the comedy of it all. He's gruff, with no desire to be liked. It's an understanding that it's enough that he's just such an obvious contrast to the boys, that the comedy will play. The whole movie is built around that contrast: Jamaican men against the backdrop of white snow, a hot tropical island at the Winter Olympics, a fun-loving culture vs a Swiss culture of efficiency, and generally how silly everyone looks in their incongruity—but the sinew that holds it together is sincerity. Everyone here has a story, a goal, a dream, even the enemies. 

I sure don't know how you got down this road.

The Mastermind — 3.5/5

I think essentially a better version of 'Marty Supreme.' Josh O'Connor continues to be my favorite working actor, he has such an incredible lowkey charm. Timothée Chalamet is forceful in his charm, in your face, look at me, making you feel stupid if you don't buy into him, and Josh O'Connor isn't afraid to look a little stupid if it gets you to take your eyes off him. The soundtrack is a great complement to the tone of the story, as it feels jazz-like in the sense that he's got a plan but also feels like he's just figuring it out as he goes. 

We've done nothing wrong, have we?

Adolescence S1 — 3.5/5

"Being a teenager" should qualify as a mental illness. Compelling, well-told, and ultimately leaves me feeling a bit empty. I think because it's a show that tries to trace the whys of a teenage mind, which will never give a fulfilling answer, in the same way that 'they're bipolar' never really answers the question of a mentally ill person. But I enjoy the world it explores as it tries to get to the core of that, people trying to understand the gaps between a changing world and its developing minds, which builds genuine sympathy and tangible grey areas around what guides a grey matter to do a despicable thing. "Who's at fault?" is essentially the question being asked, and the answer is both everyone and no one in particular. It's both easy to point fingers, and hard to point at the exact thing that tips the scale.

I have absolutely no interest in myself whatsoever.

Blue Moon — 2.5/5

Overall, I walk away thinking the movie feels loud. Ethan Hawke is a dirtbag boyfriend of a different color. He's a small man in a quiet bar, playing to an audience that isn't there, an empty rafters. I honestly can't tell if he's a good actor or a bad actor in this. He disappears in the role, yes, but by virtue of shouting himself down. It's a movie where a guy tells stories about himself to build sympathy for a guy who's so obviously done it to himself. He's trying to convince you of something, because if you can believe it, then it must be true. It's an interesting character, but I don't know if he's my ideal version of a main character. The whole movie feels hopeless.

Are you aware of Garfield?

Cloverfield — 3/5

A cultural curiosity for me, finally explored. Feel like the conversation around this movie bubbles beneath the surface as "a somewhat important movie," but also never really manages to break that bubble. And that sort of plays out in the movie—a genuinely great idea (even if the great idea is just the mechanism by which its told) that sort of gets waylaid by its characters. It feels like a war zone—and you're unfortunately stuck with who you're stuck with, oh well. 

How do you feel about war?

Invincible S4 — 3.5/5

Ugh, waited too long, forgot my thoughts. This is the season I realized this show was just Dragonball Z taken seriously. Train, get stronger, only to fight someone stronger. I kind of love it. And then, just such a serious, earned sadness that runs through the center of it all, driven by legitimately hard choices, made and not made. This is the weight of power.  

Looks like you've already dug one.

Margo's Got Money Troubles S1 — 3/5

An odd combination of lightness within a subject that can polarize. I think, though, a signal of the changing times, because of the subject matter but particularly because of the lightness with which it's handled. Not just the 'OnlyFans' is called out explicitly, name brand recognition, but that the show largely doesn't feel judgemental towards her choice, despite characters being shocked here or there. We get naked now, we show our penises and vaginas, what's it to you? Could you imagine this as a plot on 'The Patty Duke Show'? And I say 'lightness' and there's overdoses and custody battles and serious conversations but still, the tone doesn't dig in too deep. Elle Fanning seems like she's having fun. 30 minutes, and then put on a smile and we're on to the next hot topic. The bouts of seriousness don't carry over, they don't penetrate. I think, unfortunately, the show shows off a bit more of the conservatism I have in me about certain topics. I do kind of think doing porn can fuck up your life. I agree that sex work is work, but I'm not sure I can celebrate it all the same. 

This is the way.

The Mandalorian and Grogu — 2.5/5

For the record, I did not watch the TV show, because I had no interest in it. But I also watched this without having much interest in it, and that's just how life works out sometimes, don't make a big deal out of it. And hey, the big takeaway: the little alien is cute. His janky-ass puppetry is fun, it's human. And then, aside from a hand up its ass, there is nothing inside that little thing. He has no story. He's only just a cute thing, beginning and end. Which is the crux of the problem: this movie has no characters. Every time Mando faintly speaks, he just showcases why bullets can't hit him: he's barely there. He's air; you can walk right through him. A great mystery of Hollywood is how a man who became known via an incredibly charming character in 'Game of Thrones' was then made to play self-serious sad-sacks in every other property he's cast in. That's essentially the movie: here's a bunch of fun things, do nothing with them. I'd almost prefer the movie went entirely silent, I think that would have been a lot more interesting choice. But it's fine. You can turn it on halfway through and wash your dishes with it on in the background. But the beautiful appeal of those types of movies is that at least there's a scene or two that grabs your attention, and you just let the water run, enraptured, before returning to your task. Nothing of the sort here. I almost want to give this a lower score just because at least in the slew of recent things I've given a 2.5, I can at least see ambition in them. Nothing of the sort here. 

I believe in nothing.

But its my nothing.

— Manic Street Preachers, Faster 

P-p-p-p-preach!

The Boys S5 — 2.5/5

"On the other hand, the show is at its worst with everyone else, scrambling to find purpose when we only really care about the two people who will inevitably meet in the final issue to finish it off." And here we go, continuing to ride that train of thought. The show keeps trying to tell us Hughie is the central character and, sure, no offense to the boy, he's got a place here, but it's not his show. It is, as with every season, a show that belongs to Anthony Starr and Karl Urban who are so good at embodying the worst of us. Anthony Starr's Homelander and Urban's Billy Butcher go from defiance to evil to childlike to petulant to funny, turning on a knife's edge. They're every reason we fall in love with narcissistic people, because they are so charming and so compelling and that knife just hanging above our heads is so dangerously seductive, because surely it will fall on anyone but me. (They are the Chosen Ones, but at least they've chosen me to stand by their side.) Their smile is perilous. And so, finally, as foreordained, they meet in the end for an epic battle and... it's fine. This season should have been a downhill race to a conclusion but plot device after plot device, go here, do this, find that, oops find this other thing, oh hey there's a new character, created a circuitous path to its predestination. How exactly it would play out was left to be seen, but we all had a pretty good idea of how the final battle would go. But, unfortunately, it doesn't end with them. It keeps going, cooling down and then trying to heat the scene back up, but by then one half of the team was missing and it couldn't quite recover from that.  

Compared to my husband, he's nothing.

No Other Choice — 3/5

Had this been a tighter movie, it would have been a better movie. Asian Mads Mikkelsen is a surprisingly gifted comedic actor, but the beats play out for far too long. It's trying to be some version of 'madcap' but the added energy just slows things down. And so it fails to just be a fruitful "dark comedy." So more then is put on its psychological weight, and two interesting points that the movie makes, but points which start to push at each other: 1) capitalism will do us all in, but not before setting us against each other and 2) how we all just fall apart at the prospect of learning new skills and perhaps going down a rung in our class position. People are stubborn, and capitalism is destructive. I think the second point is easy to make, and I think the movie makes it easily and clearly and obviously. ("We fucked, fam.") The first point is more important, and harder to convey: we don't have to throw our bodies on the churning gears, but, when the hour strikes, we can choose to be nowhere near those gears. We have to lose something; but we may at least have a choice in what we lose. It's that choice to maintain what we've accumulated that fucks us in the ass. Anyway, I'm not even sure the movie was trying to make that point but I think that's the point that I would have liked it to make. 

I'm of the belief that certain people are cursed.

Euphoria S3 — 2.5/5

And thus ends what feels like a contractual obligation. Y'know, I never watched this thing for the story. It's a fun watch, and I think it's the closest perhaps we've gotten to a music-video-as-movie. It's full of color and music and standout images but never felt like it got lost in its art direction; it's vibes (and thus definitive of the late 2010s). It had extreme highs and extreme lows—you can't say it didn't swing for the fences! I appreciate that!! Now — which fence? And on what side? And in whose yard? Indeterminate. I think with this season, the show unfortunately will be remembered as a celebrity grab bag and 'a point in time' for a selection of famous actors and actresses. At some point during these episodes, I thought, cynically, that Sam Levine, former addict, was maybe making a point that though we look down on drug addicts, there are other addictions that we don't think as little of: addiction to attention, rage, power, and class aren't nearly as bad. But do some heroin? Aw, man, ur fucked. I say I looked at this cynically because I think in that view it becomes a bit of "yOu dARe pOINt yoUr fiNgERs aT mE??" which is maybe unfair to him, I don't fucking know the guy. But then the last episode ends and nothing leading up to it really comes together to achieve epiphany, so it really ruins the opportunity to try to say all of it was about anything. The show ends with a showdown between two people we have not followed across multiple years. Fair enough—by this point, the rest of the cast had just became a bunch of people who used to share a space now leading scattered lives. They moved beyond the need for the show, so the show moved beyond a need for them.

Thats too stupid, isn't it?

Nirvanna The Band The Show The Movie — 4.5/5

What a fucking delight. The more I write about it, the more I'll remember it, and I'd rather just go in to my next viewing having forgotten my thoughts on this, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

Shit, man, just reading the wiki on the filming of this thing is so fucking fun. 

I have a purpose. You don't.

Marty Supreme — 2.5/5

For about an hour, I was into it, I think maybe because I just really like ping pong, but at just over the hour mark, as Marty does yet another terrible thing that he must get out of, it occurs to me — I think they want me to think this is a comedy? "Look at this trial of errors that this confident/ce man operating on pure self-belief gets in and out of, what a silly compelling life." It is at this point that I realize that Marty Supreme is a fucking dick, and I'm following an asshole. I think in this way, Josh Safdie is the heir apparent to Martin Scorsese, making movies about people which can be viewed by some as a warning, except they make their lives seem so appealing. "Being a bad man's bad, except for all that fun we had." And so, to cut to the end, I think that final scene is basically a Rorschach test for what you think of Marty. Do you like him, find him a fun funny character? Then that new child is salvation, a path towards forgiveness and turning your life around, around it. Do you aspire to be him (you fucking hustle-bro)? Then those tears are for the renewed motivation to keep on hustling, to hustle even harder because now you're not just doing it for yourself, you're doing it for an other. Do you dislike Marty? Then that baby is an excuse, and whatever path you choose next, you get to credit / blame that child for sending you on that path. Leave that life? "I have a baby at home." Continue on? "I'm a father, a father has to provide." I don't like Marty, so I think that baby is just a new way out of a jam. If you can't win, then find a way to escape cleanly.

Just walk with me a little longer.

The Long Walk — 2.5/5

Reading the wiki on 'The Running Man' >>> written by Richard Bachman née Stephen King >>> who also wrote this >>> sure, I'll bite. People tend to make good movies out of Stephen King's writing, if they choose to keep the premise and throw away everything else. I think the premise, unfortunately, doesn't quite feel updated enough to be relevant. I want to say it's unbelievable but, then again, it's everything Mr. Beast does, isn't it? And so could have used a bit more of that spectacle rather than just sort of the lonely sadness of doing the walk without the ostentatious television presenter to make it work. Richard Dawson that shit, my brothers. As is, it's a fun enough way to stick philosophically-hued conversation between bouts of violence, which I'm not mad at in theory, except I don't really think the conversation is forceful enough to have changed the character at the conclusion.

I cannot live without my life.

Wuthering Heights — 4/5

Well, well, well, look who's been shitting on Emerald Fennell for the past year, who now has to eat said shit. It's me! Man, this movie looks and sounds fucking great. Flesh-covered walls, blood red skies. "I think I'm going to die in this hoooouuuse." I thought this story was some 'Jane Eyre' shit, but man — Guillermo del Toro wishes he could capture this kind of gothic atmosphere. This movie feels dangerous. It feels like a distant world; I am compelled by the people in it. Jacob Elordi continues to embody the worst boyfriend you could ever have. At some point, I've told someone that he'd make a better Frankenstein than a Frankenstein's Monster, and here you have it, proof positive. And I think here Emerald Fennell is still doing that contrarian shit, except unfortunately I am also a contrarian, oops, and I happen to share a sentiment here — love is a destructive force. Love turns people into monsters. Love kills people. There has to be a force greater than that, because I don't think it's the answer everyone is thinking it is. 

This is America, goddammit.

The Running Man (2025) — 2.5/5

"Whatever Happened to Edgar Wright?" is a book I'd like to read one day. This movie has so many bad decisions in it. Ugly character designs, a character that feels important introduced 30 minutes before the ending, a host and producer who should be the same character for the sake of *taps wristwatch*, and a main character whose defining trait is as 'the angriest man in the world' who never gets to fulfill that rage in an act of pure catharsis. And yet, the premise of this movie is one I love so much that I still kind of enjoyed watching it. Fuck me. 

I don't care if I never get back.

Eephus — 3/5

An 'Eephus,' as the movie explains, is a ball thrown by the pitcher that goes so slow that the hitter loses all sense of time. And, of course, if you're going to name yourself after the smallest thrown pitch in baseball, you're probably searching for the same effect. It succeeds in that! But also, I'd say, it never quite reaches the meditative timeless state I'd have hoped for. I really wanted this to be some 'Perfect Days'-esque Zen account of baseball, only I think it lacked the beauty of a painting in its presentation. Good idea, heart's in the right place, but I think it never quite stops feeling small; it never really makes a case for baseball as the beautiful game.

I see no value in you.

Send Help — 2/5

I read a stray comment calling this 'mean-spirited' and that was stuck in my head as I watched this. I think it's a good read on the situation. This is a movie with a great premise. I hope they remake it someday! Make it into a romantic comedy. Make it a reluctant buddy adventure. Make it a 'Misery'-like thriller. I would watch and enjoy each of them. Just please, for the love of god, pick a fucking path. This movie's trying to be all of these things, and that's the tangible problem that can be touched, but I think it's that 'mean-spirited' that underlines it all: this movie doesn't like its characters. The boss is an irredeemable asshole. Rachel McAdams (who I really enjoy in the role!) is a loser. Both are the villain. Okay, so who do I root for? 

Sisu manifests itself when all hope is lost.

Sisu: Road to Revenge — 2/5

Motherfucker, I am tired of sequels not enumerating. This is the second time I'm on a plane watching the wrong fucking movie. Sigh. I did not like this movie very much and unfortunately it has killed any desire to watch the original. It feels like it means to be a comedy, except it's, like, got a serious sadness in the heart of it? I would not describe that as a great combination, my brothers. Imagine Jackie Chan in 'Drunken Master,' except his drinking is motivated by the fact that his family was chopped up into little pieces. I unfortunately need my comedies to not take themselves so seriously. I would have loved for this movie to be made by the guy who made 'Hundreds of Beavers.' 

Look for the blood and the smoke.

Warfare — 2/5

First of all — every five to ten years, every promising young male actor in Hollywood should be made to star in an ensemble war movie together, so that we may pinpoint a moment in time, and separate the wheat from the chaff. Secondly — with this, I think I have to give up on being excited for Alex Garland movies. 'Annihilation' and 'Ex Machina' and '28 Days Later' have engendered a great deal of appreciation for him at his best, and we can't always be at our best, can we. This movie feels like a counterweight to 'Civil War' — a movie I really enjoyed! That movie felt like 'there can be no objectivity in journalism,' we are choosing sides by what we choose to show. And this movie feels like 'this is what objectivity looks like' and boy howdy is objectivity pretty fucking boring. All there is is people in a place at a time, disconnected from larger history, separated from who they were and will be. I'm not against that fundamentally, it can have value. It's just I don't know that I disliked this movie so much as I didn't gain anything from it. I don't remember the characters' names. I don't have a larger takeaway. I don't think the characters have a larger takeaway, other than a loss of legs. It's never that exciting, never that tense, never that comedic, never that dramatic. 'This is a thing that happened.' Sure, but can you tell me your reason for choosing this thing that happened over the myriad of things that happen? Why is this one so important to you? The movie lacks authorial intent. It's objectivity as the height of mediocrity.

I could use a tuny fish sandwich.

Big Business — 3.5/5

I've got too much history with this movie to do anything but build it up. My sister watched it a hundred times, and love is created through repetition. Everything in the movie is familiar like family, so what I say can't be trusted. I want to give it a 4, if not for the fact that it's a perfect 3.5/5 movie. 

Also I think Fred Ward might be one of my favorite actors?

Letting everyone down would be my greatest unhappiness.

Marie Antoinette — 2.5/5

I've no real interest in Sofia Coppola, but I watched this movie because I was interested in exploring my view of her as 'a person who makes movies about princesses stuck in castles' vis-à-vis an actual princess, in an actual castle. Coming out the other side of it, I now harden my dislike for her and think of her as more of an Emerald Fennell of a previous generation. For a large part of this movie, it paints a portrait of Marie Antoinette that I can forgive. She has no idea what goes on in the outside world, a princess in a castle, protected from what is actually happening and thus with no idea what questions to ask of it, nor what she is doing wrong within it. She exists for others within her sphere, always on display, and she becomes what they expect of her — a thing to talk about. She gets fancy clothes and candies and she wants what anyone wants, which is to entertain our way out of boredom, and there's no one to tell her no and give her the reasons why. So, my bad, I thought the movie was leading towards a "let them eat cake" moment that became the punchline to a joke of a life where she truly does not know why they can't, you know, just pivot from bread. Instead, the movie ends with these sad scenes of her bowing to a crowd and being driven away by carriage. The feeling of those scenes is 'aw, poor princess' and the movie quickly goes from 'she isn't innocent, but she's ignorant, made that way by others, and I can acquit her of any larger crime' to 'I think this movie legitimately wants me to feel sympathy for her?' which brings upon me the fellow-wealthy Emerald Fennell connection, and the general 'we must forgive the privileged amongst us' right-leaning centrist-ass view that I've seen in her films. But whereas I think Emerald is trying to push us all a bit further to the right, away from the class consciousness which would throw her against the wall, I think Sofia Coppola keeps making movies where she wants us to console her for her position within the upper-tier. She wants us to feel bad for Marie Antoinette and me, personally, I can find a way towards forgiving her, but I draw the line at trying to feel sympathy towards her.

The things that are that are not.

The Secret Agent — 4/5

According to the internet, the Brazilians have a culture of not wanting to bring up the past. This was helpful to fully understand the movie! But also, to the movie's credit, it created in me that curiosity to seek out more information. At its core, it's a serious movie, but completely surrounded by these curious and compelling choices. It's not a mystery movie, but it arouses mystery in me. It makes me want to learn more! Why is there a severed leg murdering people?? What is happening in the north vs the south of Brazil?? So, on a surface level, I was able to enjoy the movie despite not fully getting it, but learning what the culture is about helped me understand what the movie is about. At the end, when Wagner Moura appears in his second role, both clearly his father's child and totally removed from his father, there is this sense of hope that quickly becomes muddled. I didn't understand it while watching it, but later, upon learning, did it register. There is a hope that the past leaves a legacy: a son takes on his father, a nation is better for what came before... and the disappointment of that being both true and not true. The American axiom of "those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it" kind of flipped on its head, with the opposite also being true — we can't hold all of history in our head, it gets scattered, becomes unfinished fragments, barely remembered thoughts, we can't recollect how all the pieces came together, and so we are destined to do it all over again. 

When I pray no one answers. I only pretend he does. Then I do whatever I think god probably would've suggested. Usually, it's obvious.

The Phoenician Scheme — 1.5/5

Wes Anderson is just making French comic books at this point. Fantagraphics-ass shit. I don't think this movie means anything, and I'm not really a particular fan of how he handles humor. It's too staged. Humor, for me, needs a feeling of unpredictability, and he's far too controlled for that. 

Do people enjoy your company?

Minx S1 — 3/5

A worthy successor to 'Glow,' in that it's a clothing-caricatured depiction of a time and place where I want everyone's furniture and outfits, there's lighthearted humor with mostly good-meaning people, a wily but goodhearted businessman, a disrespected industry, a feminist who's expanding her ideals to others while loosening her own hard-line views, and the occasional titty. Shit, writing it out, it is just 'Glow,' isn't it? It's fun, a perfectly light watch, though at times the priggish nature of the leading lady tends to amount to 'watch 18 minutes of her being wrong before realizing there are other perspectives.' 

Where the fishes are frightening.

Shrinking S3 — 3/5

I think the show has returned to its beginning-of-season-1 lulls, namely in that the comedy either just stopped working, or that the show has forgotten it's a comedy? There were a lot of things that felt like jokes that I did not laugh at. Fortunately, the emotion works! I do like these characters, and their fumbles along the way to growth. Everyone would be better if everyone just said their problems aloud, and then friends neighbors co-workers all collectively helped them overcome it!! It's the 'Ted Lasso' idealism that everyone grew to hate and both marks and stains Bill Lawrence's work. But I think the longer his shows go, the more an irony appears: despite doing the work to overcome your problems, there continue to be new problems. Which, yes, I know, is life and sitcoms, but it feels like the idealistic POV of the show suggests that we may Some Day attain The End of Problems, but as the end of Ted Lasso, Scrubs, and this season show, it usually means that when you're in a good place, you just up and fucking leave. What's the use of building a community if everyone acts like it's optional????? The unintended thesis of Bill Lawrence's work is that it teaches us that moving forward means leaving people behind. Which, I think, is sort of a summation of the American mindset: this battle and balance between needing others and needing to be okay on your own. 

Howzat?

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple — 2.5/5

"I didn't really like this movie, but I'm also curious to watch the next," I said about the previous one. I think the appeal was essentially "what a weird corner they've painted themselves into, I wonder how they'll paint themselves out." And that is indeed the appeal. When it's at its weirdest—like when Ralph Fiennes is doing his best satan karaoke—it is something wonderful. "The end of the world isn't sad or depressing, it's just fucking weird" is a Mad Max-esque sentiment that I can absolutely buy into. It's unfortunately too little of that. It feels like it's trying to be a TV show, as a movie series, characters coming in and out and intersecting at just the right time, but ultimately saying nothing beyond continuing to move the plot forward. Unfortunately, by the end, there's no one really worth following, all of the interesting characters are now gone. 

It's true,

through you.

— Kim Gordon, NOT TODAY 

Are you sure?

It Was Just An Accident — 3.5/5

Feels like a one-room play, except there's a car! So they keep driving to new locations!! I liked this and let me see if I can figure out why I didn't love it: At the end, Eghbal sits tied to a tree, legitimizing himself via his belief system. If he is right, justice is served. If he is wrong, God will give them justice in the afterlife. In his mind, both paths are essentially equal. And this, after an hour and a half of questioning whether they have the right person, and whether it's worth hurting that person in vengeance, stands the ideological divide that paints one as winner and the other as destined to look over their shoulder. They are a believer. They have justified themselves through religious doctrine. And so I think this divide is the most interesting aspect of the movie, but I don't think this is the thing the movie is questioning. I think the movie just sort of upholds the liberal agenda of being morally pure in the singular, constantly questioning whether it is right to take righteous action if it hurts your soul, while leaving the collective without someone willing to sacrifice their soul for the greater good. We can't keep saying we're better than them while accepting that we'll never be better off than them. As I get older, and move ever closer to excusing violence, I no longer think it's good enough to ask these kinds of questions—we have an answer, repeated 1000x throughout history: no revolution occurs without violence.

When they do, we smile.

Mo S2 — 3.5/5

I like the show, as I am a sucker for very normalized looks at cultures that are not my own. As with season 1, sometimes fun, sometimes sad, and overall a casual look at the violence that otherwise regular people have to navigate in order to achieve some level of normalcy. Always a gun to their head, always a wall to be thrown up against.

Sham and hokum.

Wicked: For Good — 1/5

Awful. What is this dark, hopeless shit? Why is Glinda-With-The-Big-Lips a bad guy? Why does Anorexaba become a bad guy? Why does her sister seem genuinely evil? Why are love interests turned into dark, tormented, vengeful versions of the Scarecrow and Tin Man? Seeing this nightmare play out, you see even more clearly the cash intentions of splitting this into two movies: you retain the first as a light, fluffy, fun reimagining, built for infinite rewatches, and you get to toss its foul ending into a dungeon of unwatchability that need never be mentioned again, while also generating +$500M of additional revenue shat out behind the wagon trail of its lead-in. It is awful. It is the apotheosis of the fan fiction need to connect everything, a corporate slop bowl where nothing can be new, only a combination of previously existing ingredients, rearranged. It cannot be redeemed, so it is separated. It becomes not satire, not parody, but a worse thing—a piece of work that makes the fucking 'Wizard of Oz,' an eternal classic, actively worse. It does not build on top, it builds a tunnel underneath from which sinkholes can collapse whole worlds. This movie is genocidal.

Do two overlapping shadows become darker?

Perfect Days — 4/5

I think not only is life fragile, as stories like to remind us, but also our view on life is fragile. We create routines, our perfect days, and once something disrupts that, the control you've inserted onto your life in terms of personal narratives is set on fire. O, your life might be better. O, your life might be worse. To the left and right of you, as inconsistencies set in, is a more perfect day, or a lesser one. Over here is judgement; over there is connection. (Both carry potential to be the same thing.) Do you choose a consistent life, or a more curious one? They both carry light and shadow, and we get to choose how much of each we want in our life, but we don't get to choose either's absence. I see myself in Hirayama's chosen life; beautiful, until it's skewed by those forces beyond our control, and from there, we must find our way back to center, and whatever new routine is waiting on the other side.

Strange trails, hidden paths.

Train Dreams — 3/5

Joel Edgerton stars as A Decent, Hard-Working Man Whose Love Was Pure And Whose Life Was Marked By Loss. It aims to be be Pretty™, and achieves it, sure, even if the result is just one large dead girlfriend montage. But as a resonant, emotional movie, it fails on its two recurring themes. "Does this act of innocent ignorance curse my life?" haunts him until it disappears totally. "Does this man's life in totality have meaning?" is only really brought up by the narrator, who gives the movie a feeling that it wants to be more whimsical than it is. Where it succeeds, though, is operating at that place between "this is the old world" and "this is the new world." Old tools, hard times become new tools, easier times, in a blink. You could have told me this movie was based in the 1850s until suddenly we're in the 1920s. It's that feeling of "gradually, and then suddenly." You're in a forest, and then the forest is gone, and you were too busy chopping down all the trees to notice. And in the way the movie moves you through that forest, you can understand how people get lost in the world. Take your eyes off of it for a second, and it's gone.

The places I would be

if I wasn’t me.

— I Wanna Feel Pretty by Greg Mendez 

What is given may be taken away at any time.

Hamnet — 3/5

Shit, guys, I went a full fucking year of questioning this movie's title without anyone telling me that Hamnet's the name of the fucking kid. I guess I should have watched the trailer? And now I know, and a weight has been removed from my shoulders. Life blooms. 

The last 45 minutes is a good movie. The power of narrative to process powerful emotions? Putting ourselves into our art as a way to let go? A good story as pathway to immortality? Bro, sign me up, let's fucking go. And then the first hour and 15 minutes is a love story between a manic playwright dream boy and a... (re-reads notes)... a witch? Okay, she's a witch. It's a weird fucking love story, bros. Willy Shakespeare doesn't come across as tortured so much as flighty, a flirt, a flake, until the end when he's, uh, placed his emotions into this play. Had this been 'a story of a man who can't express himself except in his art,' I'd be like "good on you." But no, this is a story about the wife who's left behind, who barely knows what's inside her husband other than that he accepts her, who was strong until love's attachment weakened her, and then he gets forgiven because he's placed all the things he could not give her into a powerful work. The movie feels like a forgiveness of a wayward partner because they are an artist, which I can buy, except the portrayal of him for much of the runtime is kind of just "shitty guy."

And now we're off on another journey.

Man on the Run — 2.5/5

Given a fairly new interest in Paul McCartney [cough cough, looks at Alex], I watched this. It feels like the attempt of this movie is to reframe Paul McCartney as not the soft boi that he very much superficially appears to be. Behind those puppy dog eyes: He disappeared! He disagreed! He dissolved the legal entity known as The Beatles! If that was the movie's attempt, I guess it successfully does that. So while this movie feels like a movie licensed and approved by the official estate of Paul McCartney, a chance to raise the idea of Wings in anyone who might view them disparagingly, I'm also not really sure I understand why he'd like to come across as very talented, and also a bit cold and oblivious. I think the movie, in its way, showcases very clearly what he was and wasn't without the three other people whose names will always be connected with him: very talented, preternaturally so when given the right box.

And gatekeepers, and norms.

Bugonia — 3.5/5

Do I like this? I think it's interesting. I think for 4/5s of its running time, it accurately captures the faith of knowing without not quite knowing; trying to hold on tight to a barely graspable idea. I think the ending is much bolder and less ambiguous than most people might have gone for; I think others would have chosen an easier way out. I think it proves that Yorgos Lanthimos is always a compelling director worthy of being watched. But also I'm not sure what to think. It reminds me of when I watched 'Poor Things,' where there was this feeling that there should be something bigger here, a larger analysis to be gleaned, a thing to take out of the theater into conversations. But it all felt like it was right there on the page? They both are movies that makes not obvious choices while also feeling obvious. 

Also the alien spaceship was shaped like a jellyfish and I saw a jellyfish, bro, it was in my dream, bro, we saw the same thing, bro, the collective consciousness, bro.

Like a knight, but sadder.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms — 4.5/5

I am such a fucking sucker for kind-hearted people, "so shines a good deed in a weary world"-type shit. I am touched profoundly when I watch the things that execute this well; I have a cosmic feeling coursing through me, something in my core starts vibrating, indicating to me that above all things, in a world of middle paths and grey areas and unknowns and both sides have a point, that there is a right choice and a true path that cuts straight down the middle, like a knife in the heart of man. This show brings me to that, while also being charming and funny!! Peter Claffey has such a gentleness to him, the spirit of Andre the Giant if not the inherent idiosyncrasy. It is a thing that is so good that I don't really need any more of it, lest the purity gets stained.

A straight line

speeding through a world of middles.

Pretty sure he used to be a terrorist.

Wonder Man — 3.5/5

Feels fresh, feels distinct, feels smart to bring back Ben Kingsley in his delightful role as Trevor Slattery. It builds a unique world. And I'm not sure I like the guy in the middle of it? He's anxious, he's selfish, and, like, not in a fun way. You can see the seeds of 'typical movie star as superhero,' but it lacks the overt charm for that to work. He's too serious. You kind of need a Marvel-styled characterization to anchor this, a Chris Pratt-styled 'talented idiot at the center.' But it's just 'wounded boy at the center' — he's an actor, not a star. So then Trevor becomes the much-needed partner for that personality. By the penultimate episode, as Trevor starts to take a backseat, I realized that I'm not sure I really care to see this guy again. Which is kind of inverse to the Marvel experiment, no? Not even the movies, just the entire character-driven industrial complex of their entire organization. Stories as vehicles for characters you want to return to over and over again. And while this was good, and enjoyable, I'm not really that excited for where Wonder Man shows up next.

Ay shawty, let me holler at you.

The 2026 Oscar-Nominated Animated Shorts — varied/5

The Three Sisters — fine, 2.5/5
Forevergreen — bad, 2/5
Butterfly — bad, 2/5
The Girl Who Cried Pearls — beautiful, good, and then bad, 3/5
The Retirement Plan — good, 3.5/5

and then a special airing of Eiru, which I enjoyed well enough, 3/5

Overall, and as usual, amazed that these chosen movies are deemed the best we have to offer. 

 

When he do the wiggle.

Burlesque — 2.5/5

A silly little thing where a woman of indomitable self-belief enters others' orbits, makes their lives better against their will, makes admirers of enemies, lets bad men down gently, and apologizes for nothing. Why would she? Everyone is better for having known her, so as long as that continues to be true, bad actions are then turned good and no questions need be asked of herself. In my future treatise on the Age of Assholes in which we currently reside, 2010 may have been the starting point.

Failed in respect of fellowship.

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World — 3/5

Exciting Adventures At Sea. Tbf, it made ocean combat seem thrilling, and it made me feel that if I were to be living in the 1800s, reading something like this by candelight, I would be absolutely compelled. But also somewhere between now and when it came out in 2003, I feel like this movie has built a slow burn of cultural appreciation that led me to watch it in the first place, but also led me to believe there was something more here. Not really. It feels like a series of short stories that altogether form a larger story, and I guess that's fine enough 4 me.

Second chances to the elderly.

F1 — 3/5

All these years later, Hollywood figured out that we like Brad Pitt when he's charming. It's fun! For the first half anyway. But then you start to think that the movie's about more than him, like maybe about teamwork and mentoring new talent, but nah, he outweighs everyone, Kerry Condon the only one who can keep up with him in the charm offensive. He's a movie star, that's what movie stars do, they anchor a big production; sometimes that means slowing it down. 

Who would want to survive on their own?

Predator: Badlands — 3/5

Five minutes in, and I realized I had very strong opinions about what this franchise should be. I don't like that they have a name ("Yautja," dafuq), I don't like they have cultural traditions. All I need to know is that these are the baddest dudes alibe (sic). They have cool masks. They hunt for sport. And you are the target. Tell that same story over and over again, and I will keep showing up. But you know what, guys, it won me over!! Broken android and a broken alien trying to be better than what life has dictated for them. It's woke Predator with a manic pixie synthetic girl and it's a little annoying and a lot of fun. The fuck do I know.

So that I can find this later.

Keywords: Peter Pan, poem, Wendy, mom

 

But good people? No.

Fallout S2 — 2.5/5

The beginning of the season, I was struggling to remember the plot of S1, where we were, why we were. I kept going and new characters popped up and I didn't really know why, new greater enemies just around the corner, a wider world just out of view. By the season finale, the ending of one mystery was just the beginning of another, the show stuck in a perpetual second act, new reasons to put this character here and this character there so that they can meet back up at this third place to go this other place entirely. But it was fun enough to watch? My absolute favorite aspect of this show is its casting, Ella Purnell and Justin Theroux at the center of that. Big eyes and moustache twirls. The promise of the show is a profound mix of silly people in serious times, but it's only really successful in the art direction. 

It's gonna be messy, but let's shoot it.

One Last Adventure: The Making of Stranger Things 5 — 2/5

Do I review things like this? Is this part of my remit? I'm here, so I guess so. Listen, I only really watched this because I'm obsessed with the notion that certain people on the show hate certain other people on the show, which is altogether very natural when you view this as a world of coworkers instead of friends, and if you consider the naturally occurring mistakes of growing up in private, much less public. And I sort of got what I wanted, except with the wrong people; instead of focusing on a cast I'd grown attached to, it focuses on the brothers behind it in what feels like something almost like a hit piece. (I'm not sure I even knew what they looked like before this movie? I did not need to know them.) Both seem both involved and detached, busy making plans and then just going through the motions of fulfilling them. A long and boring goodbye not to the show, but to the creators who have abandoned the network that made them famous and must thus be made to look a little unprepared.

O-kay.

Heated Rivalry S1 — 4/5

An associate once made the point that regular people are bad actors. Meaning, if you were watching a conversation play out in public, looking at them as though you were watching TV, you'd only believe it to be real because you see it taking place in reality. Take that conversation to a stage, with the exact dialogue, with those exact people, nothing changes, except it now feels false. On the flip side — there's absolutely an amateurish quality to this show, but that doesn't hurt its believability. Shane Hollander feels both like a bad actor, and a believably boring, stiff person. Part of me questions why Ilya would be in love with him, this man who he constantly calls boring, and the other part of me sees that they are clearly in love. I was amazed at how quickly the show jumped into explicit sex scenes, and then slowly draws emotional connection out of that. It starts as a silly show about hockey players that kiss and, by the fifth episode, becomes something transcendent. I ultimately watched this show not because of the chatter, but because Jacob Tierney was behind it, and he was capable of similar moments of greatness in how he portrayed the cast of 'Shoresy'; there's something undeniable in his ability to make you care about a relationship. He's really good at extracting the most from what he's got. 

And hey, guys, the sex scenes didn't give me a boner, so I can officially say I'm not gay. Yay! 

They like the blues just fine. They just don't like the people who make it.

Sinners — 2.5/5

If we are to judge how much I like a movie by how much I like talking about it, this would be a five out of five. Unfortunately, my line of conversation drifts towards "this movie sucks ass, wtf." I shouldn't write a review in anger, but in my planned cooldown time, it got nominated for a record-breaking amount of awards. I went down, down, down and the flames went higher. I should be excited that a 'From Dusk Till Dawn'-esque vampire flick is nominated for our nation's most prestigious honor, and instead I'm just sad it wasn't 'From Dusk Till Dawn.' 'Sinners' takes an hour to gather its characters, its long length meant to imply that the connections between them would form the pillars of some larger tent. This is not true. You would also assume that each character may have needed that time for us to understand their characterization. This is not true. Each character, essentially summed up as 'a cool dude,' is in their own story, tenuously connected. The movie then touches on a couple of bigger ideas. Preacherboy's intro/outro, and one interesting (and also a little cheesy?) scene in the middle talk of music that pierces the veil, that connects past and future, and of gifts that should be pushed aside lest they invite in the devil. That's interesting! Unfortunately it's not what the movie is about. Maybe it's about white people stealing from black culture? That's interesting! Unfortunately it's not what the movie is about. The white person also kills other white people and isn't all that interested in the black culture so much as they are interested in The Chosen One and his larger gifts; and also eating people. But there's really just one scene that breaks me, and it makes me feel like an idiot because it feels like the "BuT tHe PloT HoLe' crowd, but it really took me out of the movie and allowed me no entry back. Smoke has to kill someone who has asked that they be killed before they turn; this person has gifts; but different gifts than the other gifted one; the vampires have not to then been interested in this person. Once this person is killed, their plans are ruined? And they all collectively leave the barn? Frightened? Even though they outnumber the survivors 10:1? And showed no care for this person? And then Delroy Lindo (always a pleasure) opens his arms with a broken bottle and invites them back in as a distraction so the others can escape? Even though the vampires had left? Disconnected storylines and bland characters and large holes in movies are just bad fucking writing, people, what the fuck. It makes no goddamn sense. This movie is fine enough, it's fun enough, I enjoyed the vampires!, but jesus fucking christ, in no way in no world is this special. In a larger sense, this just makes me look harder at the past and I don't think I really love anything Ryan Coogler's done? I like his accent but Fruitvale Station was fine, The Black Panther 1 and 2 were fine, and 2 significantly worse, I couldn't care less about the Creed franchise, and now this. What the fuck am I missing? In some other world, I'd feel crazy, but you know what, I like my life and where I've ended up: y'all the motherfuckers that are crazy.

The intangibles.

The Materialists — 3/5

I think I like the ideas behind this movie more than the movie. It reminds me of 'Fleishman Is in Trouble', which is an all-timer of a piece of art, and more explicitly speaks to the underlying themes of that show — love as a relationship with money. However. Doesn't this feel like it should have been a romantic comedy? Honestly, I think it is a romantic comedy. Imagine Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey going tit-for-tat with how much they make, a pitter-patter back-and-forth as they match wits and compare bank accounts. It's a 2005-era romantic comedy. Shit, it belongs to any era, it's an eternal conversation; it could have been Harry and Sally or Nick and Nora. It's just not filmed like a romantic comedy. Celine Song was absolutely the worst choice to direct this shit (but also the fact that she's there makes it at times better than it would have been though mostly it's worse for her presence). Take the script, exactly as it is, and it works better in a comedy director's hands. Each actor here is doing some of the most mediocre work of their career, but they're all incredibly funny. Let Dakota Johnson be sarcastic, let Pedro be charming, let my boy Jake Wyler be, and let's roll. But Celine is still aiming for 'Past Lives', and would rather her frames be beautiful than tonally correct. [editor's note: I am saving this for a different review, but comedies can't be pretty.] And since the actors have to play into the director's sensibilities, they all become stilted and boring and blah despite the conversations they are having being interesting! (So it's not just that she chooses love, she chooses a more boring guy!) And as it approaches the end, you also realize that in order for this movie to work as scripted, it needs to be a Hollywood movie. She chooses love! Wow! But the conversation this movie is having is that money complicates the affection between two people, so it tries to achieve a simple lovely ending based on pure emotional appeal, but ignores the walls it's been framing up between them. And I liked the ending!! It was the most 'Past Lives'-ass part of the movie. The cave-people work! The final speech works! As emotional appeal. But it doesn't work as logical appeal, and I think the movie needed to find the thread that crossed between the two. It needed Harry running to the New Year's Eve party to tell Sally what he's figured out: not just an appeal, but revelation. And the speech has to come from her, not him. Love has cost. What are you willing to pay?

We just want to make you happy.

Pluribus S1 — 3.5/5

This show is about AI. 

Hey, guys, I did it. I cracked the code. Where's the party? What's my prize? 

Watching this show right after playing 'Baby Steps' — an exceptional 5/5 game, one of my favorite gaming experiences of all time — was a nice two-fer. Both deal with people who refuse to ask for help or participate in the world in a correct manner, but 'Baby Steps' deals with that in the most silly and difficult-to-play way possible, while Carol Sturka is just difficult. She's a difficult person! She's stubborn! She's self-righteous! It makes it hard to watch!!! 

And it's also slow sometimes. (Sorry, I guess I'm the difficult one???) 

So I guess what I'm saying is that I think I can only really enjoy the show with a meta-textual analysis I'm placing on top of it. Listen, this is pretty common with me. Welcome to my blog, I'm a big muffin.

I suppose it's about any sufficient world-changing technology—the automobile, the printing press, the Apple iPhone, etc.—any technology that sufficiently changes the world for better and for worse, but here specifically: the aliens are all agreeable. They cater to your whims. They know everything, and just want to use that knowledge to make you happy. They are agents of ChatGPT psychosis. They are both good, and bad. They are both helpful, and uninteresting. They flatter, and they flatten us. We want to be seen as sexy and interesting, they see us as sexy and interesting. We want to be a good mother, they see us as a good mother. We want to be loved for who we are without change, difficult as we are, and they will love us fully. And if we want it to fix our sentences to sound clearer, it will fix our sentences.We have the sum total of human knowledge at our fingertips, and instead of asking about the secrets of the world, we ask them to take out our trash. They are incapable of creating anything new, and now here, we can't go back to the way it was before. But what strikes me most about the show is how incurious Carol is, which I then reflect back on to the whole of us. She is shocked, surprised, dismayed, deeply concerned, but also happy that there is something that will love her as she is. It's the good and bad of these things, but the shittiness of us. Given the Library of Babel, organized neatly, politely arranged, and we will just search for our own reflection, begging it to tell us that we are good enough. "Give me what I want," you ask into the wishing well, hoping it will give you what you have absolutely no idea how to express.

They're probably the most free.

The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia — 3.5/5

Not trying to amount to much, but the whole thing feels like a lot. I was intrigued by this years ago because Johnny Knoxville's name was attached to it, and I liked the overall world of 'Jackass,' and you see the aesthetics of that world here. Lo-fi videos capturing people who are not usually seen on screen, being themselves, and that self is something that is so totally antagonistic to what you are. There's that pre-Nathan Fielder are we laughing at them or with them feeling to it, but they all carry themselves with zero shame, so they become a thing to admire just as much as a thing that you are glad that you are not. Briefly the movie touches on how coal companies behave, and why the father set the branch of this family tree in its direction. He saw how owners take advantage of the things they own, and fuck it, if you can get away with it, why not take advantage of them right back? There's a fatalism to that community; you'll die sooner than most, and you'll never be able to escape, so why work hard? The movie doesn't make an argument for taking that path, but it's hard to argue: we can have it all if we settle for less.

Your childhood was taken from you.

Stranger Things S5 — 3/5

To its credit, it felt like an event. A bunch of characters we like, at the end of the line. And the problems here are that it's just... fine? It's just fine. As with the last season, they have accumulated too many characters, and they have put them in too many different places, creating this needlessly complex plan just so that each character can have a moment, accompanied by an emotional speech with the worst possible timing. The last hour of the series is one extended ending, which felt more like throwing darts to sum up what this show was actually about, struggling for an emotional connection. In its suburban sprawl, it forgot its core—four best friends being thrust into a world beyond childhood, trying to find their way back to each other. Oh well. Scrutiny aside, it was fun to watch this show, and first season aside, I don't think there's any reason to revisit it. But also, man, the conspiracy theory about the secret final episode would have been a whopper. It ain't always the case, but the fans could have made it better. 

Jesus? What the fuck?

The Black Phone — 3/5

A silly little premise that works out surprisingly well. Buoyed by a spunky sister who doesn't really play into the ending as much as you'd be led to believe. Could have been more. Could have been less.