Gideon58's Reviews

[Gideon58]

Somebody Up There Likes Me
After his critically lambasted film debut in The Silver Chalice, Paul Newman made up for it in spades with his second feature length film appearance...playing boxer Rocky Graziano in the 1956 biopic Somebody Up There Likes Me, which is not only a solid piece of filmmaking in itself, but its influence on some films of the future can certainly be glanced here.
https://thenewbev.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/somebody-up-there.jpg
This is the old fashioned kind of biopic that begins with Rocky as a child being bullied by his father and smothered by his mother, moves to years as a street criminal and rebellious army private who goes AWOL and it is during this time, first began nurturing a serious career in boxing.
https://prod-images.tcm.com/Master-Profile-Images/somebodyuptherelikesme1956.90744.jpg
The screenplay by six time Oscar nominee Ernest Lehman is based on a book written by Graziano and Rowland Barber does probably provide the facts but I suspect a lot of what happens in this movie is amped up for dramatic purposes. We are halfway through the film before Rocky actually begins to fight, but it doesn't make the first half of the film any less entertaining, as it does provide some insight into the anger that allegedly made Graziano such a great fighter. This whole angry, rebellious, fly-by-the seat of his pants guy we meet in the first half of the film reminds me of a future Paul Newman character, Cool Hand Luke. I'm also pretty sure that Rocky's romance with Norma (Pier Angeli) inspired Rocky Balboa's romance with Adrian in Rocky.
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/P0FGYD/original-film-title-somebody-up-there-likes-me-english-title-somebody-up-there-likes-me-film-director-robert-wise-year-1956-stars-paul-newman-pier-angeli-credit-mgm-album-P0FGYD.jpg
Whatever might be wrong with this movie though is very easy to forgive because of the explosive performance by young Paul Newman in the starring role. Newman was so embarrassed about The Silver Chalice that he actually put out full page ads apologizing for it, but his apology came much more effectively with this performance. Newman appears in practically every frame of this movie and makes it worth watching all by himself. It is just mind blowing that this was only his second feature film.
https://image.tmdb.org/t/p/w780/u3szUg3v5l70DIyTg9YRvtO2a0d.jpg
Director Robert Wise, who five year later would work with Lehman again on the '61 version of West Side Story provides sensitive, if slightly lethargic direction to the piece, making it seem longer than it really is. Everett Sloane is terrific as Rocky's manager Irving, as are Harold J Stone and Eileen Heckart as Rocky's parents. There's also a brief appearance from a young Sal Mineo as one of Rocky's thieving buddies, but this is Newman's movie where he already starts showing signs of the acting powerhouse he would become. 4

[Gideon58]

Faye
HBO takes a rich and provocative look at Oscar-winning icon Faye Dunaway in a 2024 documentary called Faye.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMWM3MTlhOTgtZmRhZC00MWNkLWI3YjQtMjMxNmNkYTNiMDI0XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
The film offers a very spontaneous beginning as we see Faye pestering the director to get started, deciding upon which angle she wanted to be photographed, and how she needed a glass of water instead of a bottle. Eventually the legendary diva does settle down seated next to her son Liam, who shares a collection of photographs that he would hand to her one by one and she would tell us exactly what was going on in each photograph.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/FAYE.jpg?w=1296
We learn about her childhood with an alcoholic father and a driven mother. Dunaway makes no bones about it that it was her mother who was responsible for all of her drive and ambition and that she wouldn't be the woman she is without her mother.
https://media.tatler.com/photos/6141ca4344f4ad8dcb34851c/master/pass/gucci-faye-dunaway-square.jpg
The film really kicks into gear when Dunaway talks about working with Elia Kazan at the Lincoln Center Theater Company, where her work there led to Hollywood calling. It's revealed that from the beginning of her movie career that Dunaway took her career very seriously and a lot of people who HBO talks to who have worked with Dunaway do say that she is very difficult to work with. Apparently, there were a lot of difficulties with Roman Polanski on the set of Chinatown and a very funny story is shared by the first assistant director of the film about the restaurant scene with Nicholson and why Evelyn Mulray is wearing a hat in that scene. It was interesting that Dunaway was a little surprised that she is considered difficult to work with, but she didn't deny it either.
https://www.indiewire.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Screen-Shot-2024-06-27-at-12.06.45-PM.png
Loved that photograph taken by husband Terry the morning after the Oscars. Was also impressed to learn that her son Liam was adopted and how fiercely protective she was of the whole adoption process and how it came to be, the polar opposite of Crawford adopting Christina in Mommie Dearest.
https://people.com/thmb/SU570zrK6H6OWD-YLjny6Sfn9u4=/1500x0/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():focal(749x0:751x2)/faye-dunaway-tout-051524-736c74d77b084cf7b24a68ce938adba6.jpg
Speaking of which, a large portion of the film is devoted to Dunaway's performance in this iconic film and how it ended up separating her career into pre and post Mommie periods. Liked Dunaway's reply about feeling a kinship to Crawford and I have to agree with Pauline Kael's assessment of the film. The film has its problems, but Dunaway's performance is extraordinary. This documentary is for people who know everything about Dunaway and those who know nothing but want to learn. 4

[Gideon58]

Alvin and the Chipmunks
The creator of Spongebob Square Pants decided that a live action re-imagining of the 1960's cartoon series Alvin and the Chipmunks would be a good idea. I imagine a pretty good idea on paper whose execution to the screen definitely has its problems, but there are scattered laughs.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51z2y3COWVL._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
The 2007 film stars Jason Lee as Dave Seville, an advertising executive who really wants to be a songwriter, who discovers three chipmunks named Alvin, Simon, and Theodore have snuck into his home and right before he is about to throw them out of his house, discovers that they can sing and eventually gets them signed to Jett Records, but the evil owner of Jett Records sees serious dollar signs with the chipmunks and steals them away from Dave so that he can make them stars and line his own pockets.
https://www.album-online.com/photos/prev/OGIxNGJhMA/album_alb31811.jpg
To be honest, I was in grade school when the original cartoon premiered on CBS and don't remember a lot about it. All I remember is that Dave was always trying to make records with the chipmunk trio and Alvin was always screwing things up. The whole thing of Alvin being the troublemaker is pretty much absent here and the chipmunks act as a unit. It actually took three screenwriters to come up with this silly and slightly saccharine story that comes off like a standard musical biopic featuring most of the scenes that we see in a biopic…the rise to fame sequence, the fame going to the stars' heads, and the eventual burn out. The only thing we don't get is the scenes where the star gets hooked on alcohol and drugs, but I guess watching chipmunks snorting cocaine wouldn't really work, though there is a scene where they get recharged at a recording session with coffee topped with whipped cream and shots of chocolate. I was also amused when during their original audition for Jett Records, they can't sing in front of the manager out of fear that reminded me of the classic Warner Brothers cartoon One Froggy Evening.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTI0NjM1NDY1NV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTYwNTU5Nzc4._V1_.jpg
Director Tim Hill, creator of Spongebob, was afforded a big budget for this and, not accidentally, managed to sprinkle Spongebob clips throughout the film, though they had nothing to do with the story at hand. Lee is pretty much phoning it in here, he just looks embarrassed to be involved in this, but David Cross (Arrested Development) steals every scene he's in as Ian, the evil president of Jett Records. Justin Long, Matthew Gray Gubler, and Jesse McCartney provide the voices of Alvin, Simon, and Theodore, respectively, though you really can't tell because the voices are pitched so high they sound exactly the same. It's not Merchant and Ivory, but there are laughs here and there. 2.5

[Gideon58]

Thelma
Oscar nominee June Squibb (Nebraska), who's been stealing scenes in supporting roles for a couple of decades now, finally takes center stage in 2024's Thelma, a delightful black comedy about ageism that goes a couple of dark places, but for the most part, provides first rate entertainment that provides plenty of laugh out loud laughs and might have the viewer fighting the occasional tear.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BM2Q2ZmY1ZmYtYWJlMS00MDJhLTkyYmUtMmU4MTQ5OThlYjQ2XkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTkxNjUyNQ@@._V1_QL75_UX190_CR0, 0,190,281_.jpg
Thelma is a 93 year old woman who was victim of a phone scam that robbed her of $10,000. Embarrassed to admit what happened to her loving grandson, Danny, Thelma finds the address where she sent the money, goes to a nursing home where her friend Ben lives. Despite Ben being five hours away from playing Daddy Warbucks in the nursing home production of Annie, he and Thelma board Ben's scooter and take a road trip to get Thelma's money back.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/nightjarprod/content/uploads/sites/130/2024/03/13213202/thelma-still-05-e1715651008430.jpg
Director and screenwriter Josh Margolin has actually crafted a very topical story here in this world of 24/.7 internet scams we live in today. Of course, this is made all the more heartbreaking because watching these scam artists prey on the elderly is disgusting. Remember in The Beekeeper when Phylicia Rashad lost every penny she had with one keystroke? Mixed emotions are produced as we love to see the gutsy Thelam determined to get her money back.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/it/thumb/f/f2/Thelma2024.png/800px-Thelma2024.png
I alslo found myself completely entranced by the relationship between Thelma and her grandson, Danny. The movie opens so sweetly with Danny very patiently navigating his grandmother through how to work on a computer. It was lovely seeing a teenage who cared so much about a grandparent and loved the scene whn Danny flips out because Grandma has disappeared and he feels completely responsible. There is also one terrifying and heartbreaking moment near the halfway point of the film where she and Ben have a fight and while wondering around in the darkness, Thelma falls and can't get up.
https://www.pluggedin.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/thelma-1024x587.jpg
June Squibb is nothing short of enchanting here, proving that she can command a movie screen at the tender age of 95. Ben is delightfully played by the late Richard Roundtree, in his final film role. Fred Hechinger, who played Steve Zahn's son on the HBO series The White Lotus, lights up the screen as young Danny and his parents are brought to life by Clark Gregg and the long absent from the screen Parker Posey, who is still the scene stealer she always was. There's also wonderful appearance by the always Malcolm McDowell in a small role, but this is Squibb's show and she never makes you regret it. 4

[Gideon58]

Cookie's Fortune
Despite a problematic screenplay, the 1999 black comedy Cookie's Fortune does provide entertainment value thanks to a terrific ensemble cast and a five time Oscar nominee in the director's chair.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTI2MDQ4MTY3OV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMzQyNzEyMQ@@._V1_.jpg
The setting is a fictional Mississippi town called Holly Springs, one of those sleepy southern towns where everybody knows everybody or is related to everybody. Camille Dixon is busy directing the church's Easter production of Salome and goes over to her Aunt Cookie's house to borrow her fruit bowl and discovers that Cookie has shot herself in the head. Feeling that suicide is inappropriate, Camille decides to cover the suicide by making the crime scene look like an intruder came into Cookie's house and murdered her. Of course, the town is turned upside down by this ruse with unexpected consequences, including the arrest of Cookie's best friend and caretaker, Willis.
https://resizing.flixster.com/RGqmhkbLh7fodpiyMlu2MOqARVg=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p22498_i_h9_ab.jpg
Though it's more structured than most of his work, director Robert Altman does provide a lot of the style he has given us over the years that make the film pretty identifiable as classic Altman. Altman has always had an affinity for setting up multiple stories in a single movie and each story is rich with colorful and offbeat characters and here the viewer is given the job of figuring out how all of these characters are going to come together in one story. Unfortunately, the stories here are filled with a lot of unnecessary exposition, making the film about 45 minutes longer than it needs to be.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BOGQ0YjdiMGUtMjg2ZS00YmM3LWFkMjUtYTJiYjcyODhhNGUyXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyOTc5MDI5NjE@._V1_.jpg
The screenplay by Anne Rapp, who made her screenwriting debut here after many years in Hollywood as a script supervisor on films like The Firm, Wyatt Earp, Marvin's Room, and That Thing You do. Rapp does show some talent as a writer, but there are just too many holes in this story that it's hard to just let slide. The most important of which include that a true and proper examination of Cookie's body would have eventually revealed that she shot herself and that during a real criminal investigation, there is no way in hell Camille and her sister, Cora would have been allowed to wander in and out of Cookie's house while they ransacked the place of everything they wanted that Aunt Cookie had. On the positive side, Camille does get what's coming to her.
https://assets.mubicdn.net/images/film/1055/image-w1280.jpg?1481120023
Altman creates an appropriate small town southern atmosphere and gets superb performances from a fantastic ensemble cast including Glenn Close as Camille, Charles S Dutton as Willis, Julianne Moore as Cora, as well as Liv Tyler, Ned Beatty, Courtney B Vance, Donald Moffat, and Chris O' Donnell. Cookie is delightfully played by the legendary Patricia Neal, who would only make two more film appearances before her passing. A kind of bizarre final scene, also a staple of Altman's, doesn't disrupt too much but it could have come a lot sooner than it did. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Fly Me to the Moon
Capricorn One meets Wag the Dog with just a dash of Mad Men in a lavish 2024 epic called Fly Me to the Moon that puts a twist on a historical event that may or may not have really happened.
https://www.flymetothemoon.movie/images/synopsis_poster.jpg
It's the summer of 1969 and NASA is gearing up for Apollo 11, it's first manned mission to the man. Unfortunately, there is a feeling spreading across the country that America is spending too much money on the space program so in an attempt to justify the spending, a man named Moe Berkus, who claims to work for the White House, sends an ambitious marketing executive named Kelly Jones to Florida to snap up the image of NASA by mounting a lavish campaign connecting all kinds of items to NASA and the Apolo11 in order to glamorize the mission. Kelly turns NASA upside down, especially Cole Davis the launch director and just when she has made NASA an advertising dream, Berkus returns and lets Kelly know that this mission is really about beating the Russians on TV and tells her she must set up a fake moon landing in case anything goes wrong with the real one.
https://catholicreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/review-fly-to-moon-768x512.jpg
The screenplay is written in the style of an actual docudrama, but this reviewer just found it a little hard to believe that a lot of the stuff that happens in this movie really happened. For example, upon her arrival, Kelly wants to do interviews with Cole and some of his staff, a request which Cole vehemently refuses. Kelly then goes out and hires actors to play Cole and his staff and does interviews with them. The legal implications of such actions isn't even addressed. And when it's time to direct the fake moon landing, instead of going out and getting a first rate director like they did in Wag the Dog, they hire a gay television commercial director for the job.
https://www.usatoday.com/gcdn/authoring/authoring-images/2024/07/12/USAT/74385781007-2174-eleven-feature-dm-27727-r-2000-x-1333-thumbnail.jpg?crop=997,1330,x699,y0
On the positive side, director Greg Berlanti, who directed a film I loved last year called Red, White, and Royal Blue has been affroded a huge budget for this film and uses it pretty effectively. The film features first rate cinematography, productioni design, and editing. The casting of Scarlett Johansson as Kelly and Channing Tatum as Cole Davis give the film a genuine touch of romance that is not jammed down our throats. We see the chemistry right away, even though they don't kiss until halfway through the film and, of course, just when it's about to come to about to come to fruition, an 11:00 plot twist pulls them apart and has us wondering if we have just been completely faked out.
https://images.seattletimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/07052024_Movie-Fly_Me_to_the_Moon_143908.jpg?d=780x520
There are a few familiar faces in the supporting cast, including Woody Harrelson, who provides the majority of the laughs here as Moe Berkus. Also enjoyed Jim Rash as the hypersensitive director Lance Vesperine, Ray Romano as Henry Smalls, and Anna Garcia as Kelly's assistant, Ruby. Johansson also managed to snag a cameo appearance for hubby Colin Jost as a US Senator. It's a little longer than it needs to be, but there is entertainment value here as long as you don't think about it too much. And I'm not sure why, but I was a little surprised that Sinatra's version of the title tune didn't make it onto the soundtrack. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Popeye (1980)
Have wanted to watch something recently to honor the passing of Shelley Duvall and finally settled on one of her earlier works which featured one of my favorite directors behind the camera, which is hard to believe considering the finished product. I, am, of course, talking about the 1980 musical disaster Popeye.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMDgyNDg0YWUtZjNiMy00NzI1LTgzMmQtOGU5NGQwOTA2NDFkXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNjE5MjUyOTM@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.j pg
It's heartbreaking the iconic Robert Altman was in the director's chair for this live action rendering of the 1930's Max Fleicher cartoons. Robin Williams, pretty much the hottest actor on the planet at the time, was awarded the unenviable task of bringing the title character to life life during the opening scene where Popeye is observed arriving by boat in a small coastal town called Sweethaven, after spending years on the water searching for his long lost father. Popeye drops anchor in Sweethaven and moves into a boarding house run by Mrs. Oyl and finds himself immediately attracted to Mrs. Oyl's daughter, Olive (Duvall) who pretends to be uninterested in anything but her upcoming marriage to Bluto, who keeps the citizens of Sweethaven under control at the behest of someone referred to but never seen known as the Commodore.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/-ncFDuKdgNE/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLA8owcpcQf9d-7oCRnnXxoSHAlboA
Robert Altman does as much as he can with Jules Feiffer's skimpy screenplay but it's difficult to blame Feiffer because, if the truth be told, those Max Fleicher cartoons weren't exactly brimming with storyline possibilities. These cartoons were everywhere when I was a kid, and what I remember of them was variations on a single theme...Popeye and Bluto battling for the hand of fair Olive Oyl and Bluto beating the crap out of Popeye until he would find super strength from consuming the can of spinach that he always had in his pocket.
https://rogersmovienation.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/popeye7-e1587992093254.jpeg
A movie almost two hours has to have a lot more than two guys pulling a girl's arms apart, so Feiffer and Altman created the mythical land of Sweethaven and populated it with a lot of eccentric and supposedly colorful characters who were never seen in the cartoons, outside of Popeye's hamburger-loving friend, Wimpy, the abandoned baby that Popeye raised as his own named Sweetpea, and Popeye's father, Poopdeck Pappy. Altman and Feiffer do bring a lot of new characters to the canvas, but they aren't terribly interesting and just pad the running time.
https://imageio.forbes.com/specials-images/imageserve/5fc69cef33abf6166a5ec5d7/Popeye--anniversary--Disney--Paramount-Pictures--Robin-Williams--Paul-Dooley-/960x0.jpg?format=jpg&width=960
The relationship between the three central characters is also presented in a haphazard fashion. We're never sure exactly where Olive Oyl's heart is. She seems determined to become Mrs. Bluto at the beginning of the film and though confused by her feelings for Popeye, still spends a lot of screentime defending Bluto, though she does seem to be coming to Popeye's side when they take Sweetpea home and she decides that they are going to raise the baby together, no matter what Popeye says.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/C37LAdMQTOk/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLDXzbyZAP2OIeeE9Uc9ZOy9iPrYhQ
The monotony of the story is further heightened by the fact that Altman made this a musical with one of the most bizarre and unlistenable musical scores created for a movie by Harry Nillson. The agonizing score includes classics like "Everyday is Food" and "I am What I am", though I have to admit I did enjoy a bizarre solo by Olive Oyl called "He Needs Me."
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/RN7M5D/shelley-duvall-popeye-1980-RN7M5D.jpg
The late Robin Williams works very hard in the title role, but he works so hard at authenticating Popeye's unusual way of speaking that it's difficult to understand what he's saying during a lot of the film. Paul Dooley made a charming Wimpy though and Ray Walston was a terrific Poopdeck Pappy, but, for my money. it was Duvall's performance as Olive Oyl that made this movie worth watching. Rarely have I seen such a perfect marriage of character and actress, but whenever Duvall isn't onscreen, this one is pretty hard to take. Definitely the nadir of Robert Altman's distinguished career. 2

[Gideon58]

Inside Out 2
The basic premise of Inside Out 2, the sequel to the smash 2015 hit is a good one, but, in the final execution, the story just tries to cover a little to much territory and, like most Disney Pixar work, takes a little too long to come to a foregone conclusion and puts the central character through a wringer she really doesn't deserve.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYTc1MDQ3NjAtOWEzMi00YzE1LWI2OWUtNjQ0OWJkMzI3MDhmXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMDM2NDM2MQ@@._V1_.jpg
In this film, Riley ( now voiced by Kensington Tallman) is now 13 years old and is experiencing the beginnings of puberty, which brings new emotions to the internal counsel which up to this point had been led by Joy (Amy Poehler), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Fear (Tony Hale), Disgust (Liza Lapira) and Anger (Lewis Black) who are confused by the new emotions trying to take over Riley, led by Anxiety (voiced by Maya Hawke) and her group of new emotions battling for Wiley's conscience.
https://media.newyorker.com/photos/66706d0d0c3078c89c1e5f79/master/pass/Chang-Inside-Out-2.jpg
Was really looking forward to this because word was it did not suffer from "Sequel-itis" and was just as good as the first one. The overly complex screenplay spends a lot more time with Riley than it does with the emotions, allegedly to show how her getting older makes her emotions more complicated, but in an attempt to show how the old and new emotions affecting Riley, basically what we see is them basically just ripping this girl apart as she works tirelessly to make the hockey team and get in with "the cool kids."
https://platform.vox.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2024/06/INSIDE-OUT-2-ONLINE-USE-i325_13a_pub.pub16.823.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&crop=18.5791015625%2C0%2C62.841796875%2C100&w=2400
I like the way the screenplay gives physicality to Riley's psyche. I have to admit to being tickled when Anxiety and her crew managed to trap Joy and her crew in a glass bottle and they were briefly referred to as "suppressed emotions." The stream of consciousness where Joy and her crew sailed on a piece of deep dish pizza was a lot of fun as well. What bothered me about the story was the fact that Joy and her crew felt they had to engage in a battle with Anxiety and her emotions for Riley's soul. It never occurs to any of these emotions that they need to all work together for Riley's well being rather against each other. This is what bothered me about the movie...I found what the emotions were putting Riley through was very upsetting.
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-09-at-9.06.55-AM.png?w=1000&h=563&crop=1
Yes, there's the accustomed razzle dazzle that one expects from Disney Pixar, but any great movie begins with what's on paper, and what was on paper here was just a little too confusing for this reviewer's taste. The movie looks great and there is great voice work from Poehler, Black, Hale, White, and Hawke, but the overheated story weighs it down a bit. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Beau James
Bob Hope was the punch line king who was probably responsible for the invention of the rimshot, but every now and then he was offered the chance to prove that he actually had some acting ability. The last example I saw of this was The Seven Little Foys, but he got another chance when he played Governor Jimmy Walker in the 1957 biopic Beau James.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMjhkNDE2OWUtMjQ4Zi00MDY1LTlmMjktNmE4MzUwZTJhYjBjXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMDI2NDg0NQ@@._V1_.jpg
This is the story of former songwriter Jimmy Walker whose genuine affection for New York City became the platform for him to run for Mayor of the city, a position he served from 1926 to 1932. According to this film, Walker agrees to run after a lot of arm twisting and wins by a landslide, but seems to enjoy the perks of being the mayor a lot more than he is interested in doing the work involved. His life is further complicated by the fact that he is in love with a singer named Betty Compton, despite the fact that he is still married to the icy Allie, who refuses to give him a divorce
https://resizing.flixster.com/i5qd6P1oy4WKXR9K0BVvj7nXHvY=/1100x618/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p534_i_h10_af.jpg
Director and co-screenwriter Melville Shavelson, who helmed several of Hope's movies, including The Seven Little Foys, has given Hope a decent showcase for his acting abilities, but if you're really looking for the real story of Jimmy Walker, I seriously doubt this is the place to find it. The whole thing feels whitewashed and watered down. I've seen enough biopics in my day to know when I'm not getting the facts and I'm pretty sure I'm not getting them here. The movie keeps talking about how corrupt Walker was, but during a climactic trial where his administration is being put on trial for various misdeeds. Walker never takes the stand in defense of himself or anyone else. And I have a hard time believing that the Betty/Allie story was as crucial to Walker's downfall as this movie purports not to mention the disgusting way Walker's staff treats Betty. There's actually a scene where the staff talk about putting Betty on a boat to Havana, Cuba!
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/BKG30T/beau-james-1957-vera-miles-alexis-smith-bujm-003foh-BKG30T.jpg
Shavelson pads the running time with several musical sequences that do nothing more than that. Compton's character is an aspiring Broadway actress who is given musical sequences, despite the fact that Vera Miles, the actress portraying Betty, is dubbed by Imogene Lynn. They should have hired someone who could sing for the part of the singer because the rest of her performance was kind of one note and she had no chemistry with Hope. During the final third of the film, Jimmy Durante is brought in to sing three numbers, one with Hope that do nothing but bring the film to a halt.
https://www.cinemacats.com/wp-content/uploads/movies/beaujames07.jpg
What does make the film worth watching is a terrific performance by Bob Hope as Jimmy Walker that stands up proudly next to his work in The Seven Little Foys and Alexis Smith is sophisticated elegance as the bitchy Allie Walker, as is Paul Douglas as Jimmy's #1 aide. If you're looking for the story of Jimmy Walker, I don't think this is it, but if you're looking for Bob Hope in a refreshing change of pace, this is it. I should also mention that I may have missed it somewhere along the line, but I don't remember learning who -the title character is. 3

[Gideon58]

Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F
Eddie Murphy reprises the role that made him an official superstar almost 40 years ago in a serviceable, if slightly overlong, action comedy called Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/3b/Beverly_hills_cop_axel_foley_xxlg.jpg
The 2024 film finds Axel back in Detroit when he receives a call from Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold), who is now a private investigator, that Axel's estranged, 32-year old daughter Jane, now an attorney, has gotten herself involved in a very dangerous case that has gotten her a death threat and not, long after, that Rosewood has disappeared, putting Axel on the first flight to Beverly Hills where he is reunited with Taggart (John Ashton), who refuses to believe that the guy behind Jane's danger is a coked out dirty cop (Kevin Bacon).
https://images.bauerhosting.com/empire/2024/07/bhc-2.png?ar=16%3A9&fit=crop&crop=top&auto=format&w=1440&q=80
I was a little hesitant about approaching this film because I only watched the first movie and never saw the two sequels that followed (only Murphy and Reinhold appeared in all four films), but apparently I did not miss anything in the second and third films, because I found no problem relaxing back into the orbit of Axel Foley, even though the reveal that he had a grown daughter who is now an attorney, was news to me. I don't know if she is mentioned in the second or third films, but the screenplay for this one takes up a little too much screentime with Axel trying to reconnect with his daughter in a cliched manner we've seen in a hundred other films and all it does here is pad the running time. A relationship is also set up between Jane and a young cop named Bobby (Joseph Gordon Levitt) that never provides the payoff we keep waiting for. There is also a pointless cameo by Bronson Pinchot as Serge.
https://static1.colliderimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/beverly-hills-cop-axel-f-eddie-murphy-taylour-paige.jpg
What we do get here is Eddie Murphy comfortably slipping back into a character for the first time in four decades and not looking out of place doing so, like Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter in Bill and Ted Face the Music or Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, who have revisited their Bad Boys characters twice since their characters were introduced in 1995. It was almost hard to tell that 40 years have passed since the story unabashedly puts Foley's reputation at the center of the story and allowing us reminders of the past that do make us chuckle, like the return of Paul Reiser as Jeffrey, who is now Axel's boss in Detroit, or John Ashton's Taggart, who now sits in Bogomil's office in Beverly Hills.
https://i0.wp.com/renonr.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/BeverlyHillsCopAxelF2-scaled.jpg?fit=1200%2C561&ssl=1
Director Mark Mallow displays a real penchant for action sequences....love Foley and his daughter being pursued on a downtown Beverly Hills Street with Bobby behind them and the off the hook finale, which features Axel and Bobby in a helicopter flying at ground level. We've had a lot of actors returning to characters they originated decades ago that really don't work, but this one is not bad. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Freeway (1996)
An eye opening performance by future Oscar winner Reese Witherspoon is at the center of a gritty and disturbing drama from 1996 called Freeway that is supposedly a contemporary updating of a classic fairytale, but that takes quite a chunk of running time to come into focus and by the time it does, any sympathy we might have garnered for the central character is moot.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNTUxMTExODctNTE4Yy00MWNhLWJjN2MtMzcyYjUyZDBkNzM2XkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTk5MjAyMjM@._V1_.jpg
Witherspoon plays Vanessa Lutz, the teenage daughter of a drug-addicted prostitute who is sexually abused by her stepfather, who takes advantage of their arrest and runs away from home after cuffing her parole officer to the bed. Vanessa's car breaks down on the freeway and she is offered assistance from Bob Wolverton (Keifer Sutherland), a serial rapist and pedophile who she manages to escape from by shooting in the neck once and in the back three times, but this is just the beginning
https://www.austinchronicle.com/binary/1443/Webp.net-resizeimage__44_.jpg
This thoroughly unconventional and unpleasant film was written and directed by Matthew Bright, who only has 12 writing credits and 5 directing credits on his resume and his inexperience really shows here. According to the IMDB, this film is supposed to be an updating of Little Red Riding Hood, but Bright's story takes all of the bad out of the Big Bad Wolf and places it on Red instead. Bright really seems confused about how old Vanessa is as well, as in her opening scenes with Bob, she has difficulty saying any words that deal with sex out loud, but words like "anguish" and phrases like "pillar of our community" flow out of her mouth with ease. Do you know anyone under the age of 18 that has ever uttered those words? I also don't understand how Vanessa could shoot the guy three times and he not only gets up and walks to a hospital on his own, but survives the whole ordeal, even if he is disfigured.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/nightjarprod/content/uploads/sites/130/2023/05/19093128/freeway-still-1.jpeg
This is pretty much where the film begins to run out of gas for me, as we then find Vanessa facing the consequences of her actions in a female juvenile facility where she puts the baddest bitch in the place in the hospital on her first day. It was very troubling the way the Vanessa character is initially set up as a victim, but any sympathy for the character gets methodically stripped away as the film progresses.
https://static1.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Freeway.jpg
As frustrating a film experience as this was, I cannot deny that was I never bored and never looked at my watch. Witherspoon commands the screen in a performance that was actually three years before Election and Sutherland adds another slimy bad buy to his character gallery. Amanda Plummer, who appears unbilled, makes the most of her opening scenes as Vanessa's mother and I was also impressed with an eye-opening turn from Brooke Shields as Bob's very angry wife. The late Brittany Murphy also makes a brief appearance as a lesbian juvenile. The low budget look of the film adds to its intensity but the script is just a little too inconsistent for this to work properly. Witherspoon is spectacular though. 3

[Citizen Rules]

1979's All that Jazz is definitely one of my favorite films, a permanent part of my video collection and a film I can watch over and over again without tiring of it.
http://www.movieforums.com/community/attachment.php?attachmentid=13703&stc=1&d=1397747019
This dark, twisted, self-indulgent, musical version of Fellini's 8 1/2 seems to be Fosse's exploration of his own personal demons as he lays his life out there for all to see in a not too flattering light as a career-driven, hard drinking, smoking, womanizing director/choreographer who is only alive when he's on a Broadway stage creating dances or behind a camera lens but is clueless on how to deal with regular life and the little imperfections that most regular folks are able to cope with and accept.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gC0nxU3Llfg/TutDjCN-FyI/AAAAAAAAB8U/fqTGHj-g0go/s1600/All+That+Jazz+Reinking+1979.JPG
Roy Scheider delivers a brilliant performance as the Fosse alter-ego Joe Gideon, who is trying to stage a new Broadway musical and put the finishing touches on a movie he directed and the stress of all this work puts him in the hospital after a heart attack. This story was based on the period in Fosse's career when he was beginning to mount the musical Chicago for Gwen Verdon and was still editing his 1974 film Lenny with Dustin Hoffman and had a heart attack shortly afterwards.
http://www.movieforums.com/community/attachment.php?attachmentid=13704&stc=1&d=1397747076
This film sucks you in from the beginning with shots of dancers warming up onstage as the opening bars of George Benson's "On Broadway" begin to fill the audio. Soon the camera pulls back to reveal hundreds of dancers onstage as Gideon weeds out the dancers he wants to cast in "NY to LA", the fictionalized version of Chicago. This number is just brilliant and is a wonderful introduction into the world of NY theater auditions for the uninitiated. Fosse, is, more than anything, a choreographer, and his dance direction in this film is nothing short of astonishing. I can watch the "Take Off With Us/Air-Rotica" scene over and over again and never tire of it. I also enjoyed when Ann Reinking (as Joe's girlfriend, basically playing herself) and Erzsebet Foldi (playing Joe's daughter, Michelle (Nicole))do a dance for Joe to Peter Allen's "Everything Old is New Again" in his living room. Joe's fantasy production numbers after he enters the hospital are also dazzling, especially long-legged Reinking's rendition of "You Better Change your Ways".
http://www.movieforums.com/community/attachment.php?attachmentid=13705&stc=1&d=1397747163
There are also small quiet moments in the film that are equally effective, in particular a lovely scene in a dance studio with Joe and his daughter where she tries to talk him into getting married and giving her a little brother. This is not a side of Gideon we see much of (Fosse either) and it is a lovely moment. Jessica Lange's ethereal quality was used to great advantage in her small but showy role as Joe's Angelique. Leland Palmer (who starred in Fosse's Pippin on Broadway) registers as Audrey Paris, Joe's ex-wife and Michelle's mother, a fictionalized Gwen Verdon. Her scene with Scheider in the dance studio where she calls him on his constant infidelity is a gem.

Cliff Gorman scores as Davis Newman, the star of Joe's film, THE STAND UP (this film's version of Lenny), who is seen visiting Gideon in the hospital and psychoanalyzing him at the same time.
http://silvervelvetsky.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/all-that-jazz-7.jpg
The "Bye Bye Love" finale is a little over the top and WAY too long but I like the end of it when he says goodbye to everyone before his death (especially loved the looks exchanged with John Lithgow and his hug with daughter Michelle). All in all, All that Jazzis a must for Fosse-ites and fans of musical theater..whether it's stage or screen. Not as good as Cabaret, but still a unique movie experience to be savored. rating_4Excellent review! I just re-watched All That Jazz for the second time and my opinion went way up. Agree with everything you said here and I learned alot from reading your review, for example I didn't know the comic movie being editing was the film's version of Lenny. You really know your theater! BTW I have to ask is your MoFo name Gideon58 in honor of Gideon from All That Jazz?

[Gideon58]

Excellent review! I just re-watched All That Jazz for the second time and my opinion went way up. Agree with everything you said here and I learned alot from reading your review, for example I didn't know the comic movie being editing was the film's version of Lenny. You really know your theater! BTW I have to ask is your MoFo name Gideon58 in honor of Gideon from All That Jazz?

Yes it is

[Citizen Rules]

Yes it is I guessed right! I always wondered what 'Gideon' meant and now I know.

Good movie too, way better than A Chorus Line.

[Gideon58]

Great movie. Fosse’s choreography is incredible…Never get tired of “Take Off with Us/Air Rotica.

[Gideon58]

The Instigators
The story is a little confusing, but the 2024 action comedy The Instigators is worth a look thanks to a terrific cast and the director of The Bourne Identity in the director's chair.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZjRlN2JjN2EtMjRiMS00NGMyLWFkZjEtNDdlYTU0NTY4N2Y4XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
The movie is set in Boston where we meet Rory (Oscar winner Matt Damon) and Cobby (Oscar winner Casey Affleck, a couple of losers who have agreed to participate in a heist at a political benefit for the mayor and his candidate where it costs $500 a seat. Unfortunately, the heist goes terrible wrong,, forcing Rory and Cobby to go on the run, along with Rory's therapist, Dr. Rivera.
https://bdc2020.o0bc.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/The-Instigators-review-matt-damon-casey-affleck-boston-movie-66abe5ead1ee6.jpg
Affleck co-wrote this muddy screenplay with Chuck MacLean that seems to borrow elements from several other films like the Oceans franchise, Dog Day Afternoon, Payback, and The Sugarland Express where we not only find ordinary Joes caught up in extraordinary circumstances, but they are very well protected by the screenplay that throws in everything but the kitchen sink to make our heroes come out that way.
https://static0.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/casey-affleck-in-the-instigators.jpg
The film starts off promisingly as we understand Rory and Cobby's need to be involved in this caper. As a matter of fact, Rory declares an exact amount he needs from this heist. When the guy hiring our boys (Michael Stuhlbarg) is questioned about how much they will be making from this thing, he redefines vague, which should have been a red flag for the guys right there. It's not long before we see Stuhlbarg grumbling about the botched heist and we learn that he's not the boss in this thing anyway and that it seems to go all the way to the mayor (Ron Perlman), but I was never really sure, because before we met the mayor, Stuhlbarg was reporting the mess to a baker (Alfred Molina). And why would police send in Rory's therapist to negotiate with the guys.
https://assets-prd.ignimgs.com/2024/08/09/instigators-blogroll-1723199160705.jpg
The film does remain watchable though because Damon and Affleck,] are so damned likable, producing a chemistry that has to be partially credited to director Doug Liman, who also staged some spectacular sequences. Hong Chau, Oscar nominee for The Whale is a lot of as Rory's therapist, as are Toby Jones, Walter Pau Hauser, Jack Harlow, Andre de Shields, and Ving Rhames, who appears unbilled. No masterpiece, but it will hold your attention for a couple of hours. 3

[Gideon58]

Island of Love
The late Robert Preston was probably the hottest property in Hollywood after his triumphant performance in the 1962 film version of The Music Man and it would be nice to report that his next project, a tepid 1963 called Island of Love was worthy of hm, though there is a slight similarity in the two films that has nothing to do with the fact that both films share the same director.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZmVlYWMwM2EtN2UyZi00YjM2LTljZTctMTIzMWMxYjIwNjUzXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMjUyNDk2ODc@._V1_.jpg
Preston plays Steve Blair, a con man who convinces his BFF, a drunken screenwriter named Paul Ferris (Tony Randall) to write a movie about Adam and Eve so that Steve can sell it to a gangster named Tony Dallas (Walter Matthau) to finance the project for the bargain price of two million. The film is made and it's a disaster and Dallas wants Steve and Paul's hides so they leave the country and travel to the Greek Islands where Steve gets the idea of starting a resort made up of hotels and restaurants and guaranteeing romance for anyone who comes there. But just as things start to fall in place for Steve, including an unexpected romance, it's revealed that Tony is related to Steve's Greek friends and is on his way there.
https://images.mubicdn.net/images/film/132901/cache-117912-1474337026/image-w1280.jpg?size=800xl
It's hard to believe that the similarity to The Music Man is coincidental since both films are directed by Morton DeCosta, a director who had a very small resume, his only other directorial effort was the 1958 screen version of Auntie Mame. Like Harold Hill, Steve Blair is a con man whose hustle is sidelined by romance, but romance makes him want to give up his con man ways; however, this film has no Meredith Wilson music, no Onna White choreography, and a very confusing story.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNmU4MmFkOTItMDAwYy00ZjBmLTlkNjYtN2E0MzgwZjI5Y2MwXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMjUyNDk2ODc@._V1_.jpg
OK, I was with the story up to the escape to the Greek Islands but then all of a sudden we were following Tony and Paul around Greece buying Greek artifacts and fishing them out of the ocean and I know it didn't have anything to do with decorating the resort but it was never really made clear what that was all about. And it's not long before Steve says he has to marry his girl and leave the country immediately and I'm thinking it's because Tony's already in town, but then we learn Tony isn't due in the country for four weeks, so why did Steve have to leave now?
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNDg3Y2VhYTItZTIyYy00MTJmLThlOWQtOTk0ZmQxYzIyMzFkXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMjUyNDk2ODc@._V1_.jpg
There are scattered laughs throughout, mostly from Randall and Matthau. The scene in the restaurant where Paul is doing the Greek towel dance to escape Tony and every moment Matthau shared onscreen with fiancee Cha Cha, played by Betty Bruce was gold. You might remember Bruce as the hilarious stripper Tessie Tura in he '62 screen version of Gypsy, but as a vehicle for the very talented Robert Preston, you really can't tell from this movie. 2.5

[Gideon58]

A Quiet Place Day One
Despite it being the third film in the franchise, 2024's A Quiet Place Day One appears to be a prequel to the first two films that does provide some scares, but there are just too many inconsitencies in the story for it be a worthy follow up to the first two films.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNGZmODU3ZDEtMjQwZC00NTA5LThmNWYtYzk5MmY5ZmM4NGIxXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMDM2NDM2MQ@@._V1_.jpg
There are a couple of reasons that this film appears to be a prequel, primarily, the phrase "Day One" in the title, which implies some kind of genesis or beginning. Then there's the fact that this is the first film where we actually see the creatures attacking. The first two films were about the aftermath of their destruction as opposed to this film, that puts the viewer right in the thick of the battle, a battle that begins with little or no motivation and provides little or no insight as to why these aliens allegedly respond to sound more than anything else. There's also the fact that no one from the other two films appear in this one.
https://ew.com/thmb/vgSPBaQ1uM4y_MeqEofxgOQtNCQ=/1500x0/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/A-quiet-place-day-one-062624-2-25fff6760cb1447490e6d0bbebd51434.jpg
The film stars Oscar winner Lupita Nyong'o as Samira, a resident in some kind of hospice outside of Manhattan, who finds herself one of the few patients from the hospice who get trapped in Manhattan when these creatures begin their attack. Samira has a service cat and is obsessed with getting pizza in New York after the field trip and, even after the attack, has no intention of returning to the hospice until she gets her New York pizza.
https://i0.wp.com/awardsradar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/A-Quiet-Place-Day-One-020724-1-0488e3aa581949a8b9dada7428ab28e6.jpg?fit=1500%2C1000&ssl=1
Krasinski does not have the creative control that he did on the other two films, he is only one of three people who put together the rather haphazard screenplay, one of the others being director Michael Sarnoski, who also directed the Nicolas Cage film Pig. For some reason, Sarnoski takes quite a bit of time establishing Samira's life at the hospice, which becomes less and less relevant as the film progresses, especially her obsession about getting pizza after the show they attend, which was also quite bizarre. It was a marionette show where the puppeteer is visible and we see the marionette blow up a baloon that violently explodes. Needless to say, it was a bit confusing that right after the initial attack, Samira finds herself right back at the theater where the puppet show ws and is reunited with her cat, with whom she gets separated from dozens of times during the film but they always reunite, hard to believe considering the circumstances .
https://bloody-disgusting.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/dayone-trailer.png
Of course, there is a lot of noise that the aliens don't respond to and we wonder why and there are times they are inches away from victims and we're not sure why they don't attack, but one theory that does come to mind is that their response to sound might be because they're blind. The end of the film also reveals they have a fear of water, but none of this is confirmed in this unsettling but confusing film that actually sets up a fourth. 3

[Gideon58]

Cheaper by the Dozen (2003)
Fans of either version of Yours, Mine, and Ours might have a head start with Cheaper by the Dozen, the saccharine and predictable 2003 remake of the 1950 Clifton Webb classic, that doesn't bring anything fresh or fun to the original film.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51-L-Jub8aL._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
The film stars Steve Martin as Tom Baker, a football coach, who is married to Kate (Bonnie Hunt), a writer and are the parents of 12 children (the eldest, Nora, lives with her boyfriend), whose lives are turned upside down twice when Tom accepts a new job that forces the family to movie and just when they're getting settled in, Kate learns that the book she has been writing about her life is going to be published and she has to go to Manhattan for a few days, which, of course, turns into a few weeks.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTc5NDIwMTI4M15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMjU0NDczMw@@._V1_.jpg
Screenwriter Craig Titley actually adapted the screenplay for this film from the 1950 screenplay, which doesn't mean a lot because basically this is film is just a very long sitcom episode that offers nothing we've haven't seen before. This story tries to blame Tom and Kate for their children being miserable and, if the truth be told, what we have here is a bunch of children that have been spoiled rotten and pretty much ignore anything their parents tell them.
https://i0.wp.com/midwestfilmjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/CheaperBythe-Dozen.jpg?fit=2048%2C1334&ssl=1
Director Shawn Levy (Date Night) puts a lot of work in presenting a lot of silly slapstick situations for the Baker children, but it all has a familiar air of "been there done that" about it. We get a lot of physical destruction of the new house, including a running gag with a chandelier. We also get a lot of children vomiting and running upstairs without cleaning it up. My mother would have beat me silly if I ever threw up on the kitchen floor and walked away. And don't get me started on the younger kids going to a birthday party they've already been told they can't attend with a snake as a present.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ2Obwmtu7aNiG0bg1_PMhz7InHfGHc3ZW7cBOecGE5lc0nSZpRloQoN6pjo8gDwZde-9A&usqp=CAU
Steve Martin is so subdued in the starring role that he is barely recognizable in a role that plays to none of his strengths, but Bonnie Hunt is a charmer as Kate (whatever happened to her?). Oldest son Charlie is blandly played by Tom Welling, who went on to play Clark Kent on Smallville. Paula Marshall and Alan Ruck are fun as the Baker's neighbors and Wayne Knight is fun as the chandelier repairman. Ashton Kutcher steals every scene he's in as Nora's boyfriend. Fans of Desperate Housewives might also recognize Shane and Brent Kinsman, who played Porter and Preston Scavo on that show. as twins Nigel and Kyle here, but this movie is really a snooze fest that actually inspired a sequel. 2

[Gideon58]

Bad Boys Ride or Die
Hopefully, the 2024 action epic Bad Boys Ride or Die is the final chapter in the Mike Lowery/Marcus Burnett saga because this movie might have been the longest two hours of my life.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/8b/Bad_Boys_Ride_or_Die_%282024%29_poster.jpg
This film actually opens with confirmed bachelor Mike Lowery getting married and his partner, Marcus having some sort off collapse during the reception that lands him in the hospital. We then watch Marcus have an out of body experience where he meets he and Mike deceased boss, Captain Howard (Joe Pantoliano), who tells Marcus it's not his time yet. We then learn that drug cartels have been setting up Howard to look dirty, leading Mike and Marcus to clearing their boss' name, which finds Mike reuniting with his illegitimate son, who we met in the last film.
https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa6f0f554-ed41-4a04-81a1-d81eb68f937b_2000x1333.jpeg
Paying attention as carefully as I could, I was still only able to follow the screenplay by Chris Bremner, Will Beall, and George Gallo about two thirds of the way through the film. The opening scene which finds Mike and Marcus being unable to get to Mike's wedding without breaking up a robbery at a bodega, went on much too long, only to zip through Mike's wedding and movie straight onto about 20 minutes of bizarre behavior from Marcus who because of his outer body meeting with Captain Howard, now thinks he's Superman.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/MCDBABO_CO039-H-2024.jpg?w=1296
I had it up to the point where Mike and Marcus are reunited with Mike's son and have him busted out of jail. This part of the story was appealing because I really didn't like the way things were left between Mike and his son after the last film (which I hated BTW), and was hoping that this was going to be what this film was going to be about, but that wasn't to be either. What it really was about became muddier and muddier beyond the two thirds point, where I really didn't get what was going on and tried to stay awake for the generic action movie conclusion that I've seen a million times.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTRg1LhB2nHdTOVlvmiiT2alHqHEC1cXFw3zQ&s
I'm still working very hard at trying to look at Will Smith objectively ever since he punched Chris Rock, but I can't blame what's wrong with this movie on him. Nor can I blame it on a paunchy and overweight Martin Lawrence who comes off as broaching the road to senility here. The problem here is writers and directors trying to breathe life into a franchise that should have ended with the last film, making for an intolerably long and dull movie experience. Though I have to admit, I really liked Jacob Scipio as Mike's son, Armando, who deserves his own action franchise because it's time for this one to die instead of ride. 3

[Gideon58]

The World of Henry Orient
Despite lovely Manhattan scenery and a handful of terrific performances, the 1964 black comedy The World of Henry Orient is difficult to stay invested in due to a lethargic screenplay that makes a jarring transition from slapstick comedy to sloppy melodrama that doesn't make sense.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/40/WORLDOFH-00AA1-poster_hires.jpg
The film is about a teenage troublemaker named Valerie Boyd who drags her new BFF Marian Gilbert into all kinds of crazy advenures, most of them revolving around a world famous but terrible concert pianist named Henry Orient, who the girls begin stalking which brings out the paranoia in Henry and Stella Dunworthy, the married woman with whom Henry is having an affair.
https://dailyillini.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-22-at-2.08.18-AM-900x520.png
Famed screenwriter Nunally Johnson adapted the screenplay from a book written by his daughter, Nora, that actually starts off a little confusing because it takes a little too much time establishing the relationship between these two girls, making it difficult to figure out which one the story is really about. We're a good 30-40 minutes into the film before it is revealed that Valerie is not only in constant trouble in school, but is also in therapy due to the very troubled marriage of her parents. This film probably stirred up a bit of controversy during its release with the idea of a teenager in therapy at the forefront. An autobographical slant to the story is also suspected since Nora named her best friend in the story after her mother, also named Marian.
https://prod-images.tcm.com/v5cache/TCM/Images/Dynamic/i402/worldofhenryorient_beautifulwhitenurses_FC_470x264_042620160639.jpg
After watching opening scenes of Valerie and Marian running through Central Park and jumping over garbage cans and fire hydrants, the movie starts to kick into gear when, seemingly out of nowhere, we learn that Valerie is obsessed with this neurotic concert pianist, which is when the girls begin stalking him, which is probably the strongest part of the film, thanks primarily to Peter Sellers' hilarious performance in the title role, his first after The Pink Panther, sadly, Sellers' screentime is a little limited and when he's not onscreen the film pretty much screeches to a halt until the appearance of the fabulous Angela Lansbury as Valerie's mother. This is the point where the comic elements of the story begin to drain away, despite the always watchable Lansbury appropriately chewing the scenery.
https://filmfanatic.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/lansbury.jpg
George Roy Hill's direction is a little pedestrian, but this was a decade before he would win a Best Director Oscar for The Sting. Paula Prentiss also garners major laughs as Stella Dunworthy until her character abruptly disappears from the story and Tippy Walker is a revelation as Valerie. Tom Bosley makes an early film appearance as Valerie's dad and he's so young the makeup people actually had to put gray streaks in his hair. it's definitely worth a look for hardcore Sellers and Lansbury fans. 3

[Gideon58]

Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice
Tim Burton's diseased imagination and a crack technical team are in over drive 36 years after the first film forBeetlejuice, Beetlejuice, another trip to the cinematic afterlife that does provide entertainment despite an overstuffed screenplay where the ideas presented are too numerous to get the attention they deserve. Will try to review without spoilers.
https://www.beetlejuicemovie.com/images/share.jpg
In this film, :Lydia Deitz (Winona Ryder) is now the famous hostess of her own television show about the supernatural who has marketed what happened to her in the first film into a commercially successful life despite the death of her husband and the distance between her and her daughter, Astrid (Jenna Ortega) who wants nothing to do with her mother's belief in the supernatural, but that becomes impossible as Lydia begins having flashes of Betelgeuse (Michael Keaton) who, unbeknownst to her, is seeking her help in escaping the wrath of his ex-wife, Delores (Monica Belucci) a ghost who reappears and reconstructs herself with a staple gun before sucking the souls out of everyone she runs into in an attempt to reconnect with her ex.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZGE3YzM4NWUtMDI0ZC00MmNmLTlmYWUtYWZiYzg5NDU4N2ZlXkEyXkFqcGdeQWFybm8@._V1_.jpg
We are also reunited with Lydia's stepmom, Delia (Catherine O'Hara) who is devastated by the death of her husband Charles (Won't be going into why Jeffrey Jones does not appear in this film) and hoping that Lydia can help her find some peace with her loss. The bitter and lonely Astrid, existing in the same void that Lydia did back in 1988. may have found a way to a new life through a new romance and a ghostly police detective (Willem Dafoe) has made it his mission to capture Delores before she destroys the entire afterlife in pursuit of her x-husband.
https://www.instyle.com/thmb/p21tcwznOc2sVDGj5rujtTJrE4A=/1500x0/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/beetlejuice-explainer-810a484772164bc8b32748d651e9886d.jpg
The screenplay by Alfred Gough, Miles Miller, and Seth Grahaeme-Smith offers a story crammed with a lot of ideas that surprisingly don't rehash the first film, but do respect it. We even get a brief, if vague, explanation for the absence of Adam and Barbara Maitland from this story. They do definitely drive home the point about us not seeing Jeffrey Jones here by re-enacting how the character dies with claymation figures. But there's so much to drink in here, that some story elements are given short shrift. The introduction of Delores dominates the first third of the film and then gets unceremoniously shoved to the back burner, and even though he finally receives the top billing that he should have back in 1988, Keaton's Beetlejuice now becomes the supporting character that he was supposed to be in the first film. Ironically, even though the story elements inttroduced here are not developed as they should have been, the film still feels four hours long, but Burton and his production team work very hard to make sure we don't notice.
https://nofspodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/beetlejuice-beetlejuice-2024-movie-review.webp
As with the first film, production design and visual effects teeter on the spectacular and help to distract the viewer from the protracted story. Keaton seems aware that he's not the star here, Ryder is and she fully invests in Lydia even more than she did in the first film. most likely because the character is a mother now and Ortega definitely makes Astrid Lydia's daughter. And In what should be no surprise to anyone, O'Hara steals every scene she's in and a big thumbs up as well to the versatile Justin Theroux as the producer of Lydia's show who proposes to her. Been looking forward to this sequel for a long time, and though it wasn't a home run, there is entertainment to be gleaned here. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Baby Boom
Another vivacious performance by Diane Keaton makes an unremarkable, often overly cute, and very predictable 1987 comedy called Baby Boom worth a look.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTEwMTk2NzQ2NjJeQTJeQWpwZ15BbWU2MDQ4ODI2OQ@@._V1_.jpg
Keaton plays JC Hiatt, a high-powered lady executive who thinks she has everything she wants and is thrown a loop when she inherits a baby girl from a distant relative after her death, changing the entire trejectory of JC's life plan.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTgzMDI0NzMyMl5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMzQ0MTcyNA@@._V1_.jpg
Charles Shyer and Nancy Meyer, the creative forces behind Private Benjamin and the Steve Martin Father of the Bride movies have brought some gloss to the somewhat well-worn topic of "Can Women have it all?", and , as expected, not really providing us an answer, but the story does wade through some very predictable waters to bring us to what is a pretty foregone conclusion.
https://www.fast-rewind.com/pix/babyboom1.jpg
We get a lot of the scenes we expect, especially JC's early adventures into the world of motherhood. I was pleased that we were spared the scene of mom experiencing a stinky diaper for the first time, we've seen that in a million movies, though her first adventures into the world of diapers were kind amusing. I was a little disappointed that JC's boyfriend (Harold Ramis) couldn't deal with being a father and just walked out on her, but I guess that had to leave room for JC's unexpected romance with a handsome veterinarian (Sam Shepherd). The film also contains more than one silly moment where it seems like the baby understands exactly what JC is saying to her.
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/2JRH9HX/diane-keaton-sam-shepard-baby-boom-1987-2JRH9HX.jpg
The movie doesn't offer a lot of surprises and moves like a tortoise, but Keatoon is such an engaging screen presence that we do care about JC and want to see what's going to happen to her. Keaton creates chemistry with both Ramis and Shepherd and James Spader, Pat Hingle, Sam Wanamaker, and Victoria Jackson score in supporting roles. Linda Ellerbee provides the opening narration. Nothing special here, but Keaton is charming enough to hold tviewer attention. Years later, it became a short-lived NBC televison series with Kate Jackson playing JC. 3

[Gideon58]

Longlegs
The Silence of the Lambs meets The Shining with just a dash of Carrie in a 2024 nail biter called Longlegs that takes a little longer to come together than it should but manages to hold viewer attention.
https://www.dvdsreleasedates.com/posters/800/L/Longlegs-2024-movie-poster.jpg
Lee Harker is a special agent for the FBI who is put at the forefront of a hunt for a serial killer when her partner is killed on their first day of the investigation. She eventually unlocks a series of supernatural occurrences that lead to the reveal of a killer named Longlegs and some kind of connection to Harker's mother.
https://ew.com/thmb/GD5KTsG7mLXgON8YM7-1rrImMsc=/1500x0/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/longlegs-3-060224-e04f9f6e099a4299a705b944da537882.jpg
Director and screenwriter Osgood Perkins has crafted a tale that borrows elements from the above referenced films, but the weaving of said elements into a viable story takes way too long and definitely challenges viewer attention span. It actually starts with this central character, Harker, who we really have a hard time buying as an FBI agent, because for the majority of the running time, the character seems to be teetering on the edge of sanity, not to mention having some serious issues with her mother that seem to make it impossible for her to stay focused on what she's supposed to be doing.
https://loudandclearreviews.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/longlegs-header.webp
Despite this, the deeper the FBI gets into the case the more dependent they seem to be on Harker, who is staying very close-mouthed regarding her mother and seems unconcerned that the FBI is getting closer to the truth than she is. We see a slightly more frightened version of Clarice Starling going after her own version of Jack Torrance, but what we are initially led to believe are red herrings regarding Harker's past, it becomes apparent that the answers the story is making us wait for are much closer to Harker's office, as well has her home.
https://i0.wp.com/bloody-disgusting.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/longlegs-header.png?fit=1160%2C684&ssl=1
Maika Monroe is a little one-note as Agent Harker, but Blair Underwood is appropriately creepy as her boss as is an unrecognizable Oscar winner Nicolas Cage as the title character and a surprisingly effective performance from Alicia Witt as Harker's mother. Perkins shows some cinematic storytelling skill here, but he really challenges viewer patience here. 3

[Gideon58]

Do you ever shut off movies when you don't like them? I do, all the time. I give a movie 15 minutes and if I'm hating it, I bail and watch something else.

Just realized I never answered this question. I turned off Gravity and The Social Network four times before watching the films in their entirety and loved both of them on the fifth try.

[KeyserCorleone]

Just realized I never answered this question. I turned off Gravity and The Social Network four times before watching the films in their entirety and loved both of them on the fifth try.


Kinda like me and Radiohead's Kid A. I didn't shut it off four times but I didn't finish every time either.

[Citizen Rules]

Just realized I never answered this question. I turned off Gravity and The Social Network four times before watching the films in their entirety and loved both of them on the fifth try.Thanks for answering Gideon:) BTW I just watched and reviewed Gigi.
https://www.movieforums.com/community/showthread.php?p=2489805#post2489805

[Gideon58]

I agree with a lot of what you said about Gigi, upon closer examination, the story is kind of unseemly and I have to admit that Louis Jourdan doesn't exactly ooze charisma either. Still can't believe it won Best Picture over Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Auntie Mame.

[Gideon58]

Mary, Mary (1963)
The 1963 alleged romantic comedy Mary, Mary barely holds viewer attention thanks to its definition of the phrase "photographed stage play" and some questionable casting and performances.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMjJlZjViOWItYzM2MS00ZmEyLWE2YmEtMzdhNGMyYmE3OTA1XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Bob (Barry Nelson) is a publisher who is nervous about reuniting with ex-wife, Mary (Debbie Reynolds) after nine months in order to resolve some tax issues. The troubled reunion is complicated by the fact that Bob is engaged to marry sexpot Tiffany (Diane McBain) and Mary has caught the eye of Bob's ;latest client, movie-star turned author Dirk Winsten (Michael Rennie).
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/hD4hyz77YSc/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwE7CK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAy0IARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD8AEB-AH-CYAC0AWKAgwIABABGFcgZSghMA8=&rs=AOn4CLAs9c_OAZYCnaetEpjPGIuDoQvLoA
The movie is based on a play by Jean Kerr, who wrote Please Don't Eat the Daisies, opened in March of 1961 and ran for over 1500 performances, with Nelson and Rennie playing the roles they played in the film and Barbara Bel Geddes originating the role of Mary.
That's a pretty impressive Broadway run and I'm scratching my head trying to figure out what went wrong in the translation to the big screen. Bel Geddes not only originated this role, but was also the original Maggie in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, but didn't really make a name for herself until she started playing Miss Ellie on the CBS drama Dallas, so my initial theory was that the casting of Debbie Reynolds had to have something to do with why this film just doesn't work.
https://s1.dmcdn.net/v/EKN7u1MxsXgmqXbCL/x720
I cannot deny that I found Reynolds' performance in this film beyond annoying. Research revealed that at the time this role was offered to her, Reynolds was contemplating retirement, but director Mervyn Le Roy, whose previous film was the Rosalind Russell/Natalie Wood version of Gypsy, refused to direct unless Reynolds did the role. Reynolds' contempt for the project comes through in her performance, which is shrill and affected and seems to be an attempt to give Reynolds a more sophisticated image but it just didn't work, but it's not all on her Reynolds. Despite the fact that they reprise the roles they originated on Broadway, Nelson and Rennie are just as unfunny as Reynolds is. The fact that the film never leaves Bob's apartment doesn't help either, making it feel pretty claustrophobic.
https://s2.dmcdn.net/v/JCR-71Y5fGjPrSPz2/x1080
Frankly, I expected more sparkle to the direction, considering Le Roy's resume and the story is too predictable to take as long as it does to get to the extremely foregone conclusion. The only completely satisfying performance comes from the sparkling Diane McBain as Tiffany, but her screentime doesn't merit wading through the rest of this cinematic muck. 2

[Gideon58]

Blink Twice
Zoe Kravitz makes a surprisingly strong impression as the director and co-screenwriter of a cringy and confusing 2024 psychological thriller called Blink Twice that requires undivided viewer attention and takes its sweet time getting there, and when it finally gets there and you think you've figured out exactly what's going on, we get a twist we definitely don't see coming.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/5/56/Blink_Twice_poster.jpeg/220px-Blink_Twice_poster.jpeg
A cocktail waitress named Frida and her best friend and co-worker, Jess, meet a tech billionaire named Slater King at a fundraiser, where we learn King has recently returned to the reins of his company after a leave of absence due to something that got him in a lot of trouble but no details are provided. After the fundraiser, Slater and his circle of friends are headed to a dream vacation on an island Slater just bought and he impulsively invites Frida and Jess to join him and his friends. The vacation seems like a dream come true until Jess confides to Frida that she thinks there's something very strange going down on this island, and, not long after that, Jess disappears.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZTBhY2U5ZDQtZWExYi00NmY5LWJlYjAtZDJiYjczMTMwZjY5XkEyXkFqcGdeQWFybm8@._V1_.jpg
Kravitz and co-screenwriter ET Feigenbaum, who worked together on the 2020 TV series High Fidelity have crafted a story that is initially very confusing. If the truth be told, this reviewer didn't figure out what was exactly going on until 16 minutes before the end, and even then, I was only partially right. The story establishes mystery almost immediately when no details are offered about Slater's leave of absence from his company are offered. We are further confused when this circle of friends who Frida and Jess on this vacation, don't know each other and are only connected through Slater. And most confusing of all, is a running bit about everyone on the island needing to borrow Jess' lighter in order to smoke blunts...why would a group of almost a dozen potheads not have a lighter among them?
https://i.abcnewsfe.com/a/c13dddbd-9592-4c6e-8336-1372892e417d/blink-twice2-ap-ml-240822_1724336339229_hpEmbed_3x2.jpg
The story further confuses as we watch the relationship that Slater has with each of these people in his circle has nothing to do with any of the other relationships, even though they don't seem to know that. They all seem to be vying from King's attention and none of them really get it as he focus seems to be primarily on Frida and, for most of the running time, we're never sure why, but just when it comes into a focus, we're thrown twist during the violent and bloody battle that commences between Slater and his entourage.
https://i.abcnewsfe.com/a/0792ac7c-d150-4045-bfe9-0bbfa76d5934/blink-twice-group-ht-jt-240423_1713898222643_hpEmbed_2_12x5.jpg
Kravitz makes maximum use of her $20,000,000 budget, providing a beautifully photographed nightmare that does rivet viewer attention. The cast is really interesting too...I don't think Channing Tatum has ever been better as Slater King and Naomi Acki, who played the title role a couple of years ago in Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody is an effective damsel in distress and manages actual chemistry with Tatum. Also enjoyed Christian Slater, Alia Shawkat, Simon Rex, Kyle MacLachlan, Geena Davis, and Levon Hawke, the son of Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke. Kravitz, doesn't knock it out of the park, but she definitely proves to be a filmmaker to watch. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Superman III
Richard Lester was in the director's chair for one of the best sequels ever made, Superman II, and it's hard to believe that he was also in charge of the disastrous Superman III, but the fault is not entirely his.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYjcyN2E4NzQtYmUwZC00NmQ5LWJkMWUtMThjZGIwZGIwYzZmXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
This 1983 textbook example of going to the well once too often finds Clark (Christopher Reeve) traveling to Smallville for his high school reunion, where he hooks up with his high school sweetheart Lana Lang (Annette O'Toole), who is now a single mom. The rest of the film revolves around an eccentric billionaire named Ross Webster (Robert Vaughn) who uses a wimpy computer operator who works for him (Richard Pryor) to realize his own evil plans, which include controlling the weather and eventually, the world.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BOTc0M2IxZjAtNWNiOS00NzZkLTk1MzctNmU0ZTU4ZjZlNDI5XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
As stated, Lester cannot be blamed entirely for this hot mess of a movie because we know it is not the movie that Lester probably intended, mostly because of Margot Kidder, who played Lois Lane in the first two films. Kidder demanded more money that the studio was willing to pay, so a drastic re-thinking of the screenplay was necessary, which found Kidder's role reduced to two brief appearances at the front of the movie and at the back, but what they came up with for the middle just didn't work for this reviewer.
https://www.historyforsale.com/productimages/large/275914.jpg
Things look bleak from the opening credits that resemble something out of a Keystone Cops or Three Stooges comedy rather than the legacy created by the first two films. The whole reunion of Clark Kent and Lana Lang was a total snooze, Reeve and O'Toole had no chemistry. As for the rest of the film, Lester and the screenwriters seem to be trying to revive the spirit of Gene Hackman's Lex Luthor with this Ross Webster character but Vaughn never really captures the spirit of what going on here and neither does Pryor, who has never been less funny, in an odd character whose loyalty seems to change from scene to scene, not to mention a lot of the manufactured drama which springs from Pryor's character. As the film opens, Pryor's Gus Gorman has been unemployed for three years and now a billionaire maniac is completely dependent on this guy to help him take over the world.
https://i0.wp.com/jackedinmovies.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/SUPE3.jpg?fit=1280%2C720&ssl=1
The winner of biggest waste of screentime though has to be when Gorman somehow manages to drug Superman and he and his alter ego Clark Kent split into separate entities leading to a one on one battle in a junkyard that causes unintentional giggles and adds about twenty minutes to the running time. There are a few laughs provided by Annie Ross as Webster's sister and Pamela Stephenson as his girlfriend, but the viewer has to wade through a lot of crap to get to them. And as bad as this movie was, somehow a fourth one actually got made. 2

[Gideon58]

Wolfs
Oscar winners George Clooney and Brad Pitt are the producers and stars of a pretty solid piece of entertainment called Wolfs that is an often intoxicating combination of action, crime thriller, film noir, and black comedy that, despite a pretty serious story, had this reviewer laughing and smiling throoughout.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNWI2MzdiM2ItMTg2Zi00MTYwLThlZmItM2FkNWI4NjE3ZjRhXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
The 2024 film opens with Margaret (Amy Ryan), who we soon learn is a district attorney, is on the phone with a man (George Clooney) who is a fixer. For those unfamiliar with the term, fixer, think of Harvey Keitel in Pulp Fiction or Olivia Pope on the ABC series Scandal. Margaret thinks she can exhale when the man ariives to take care of business, but she is then totlally thrown when a second fixer (Brad Pitt) arrives on the scene to take care of business. The business is an 18 year old kid who Margaret planned to have sex with but now is dead. Margaret then receives a phone call from Pam, the manager of the hotel, who informs Margaret that she sent the second fixer to make sure the first one does what he's supposed to.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZjRjODM4OTMtY2FhNS00MzZmLTgwM2MtMTUyMDY0Y2RlMWM2XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Of course, immediate distrust is established between Margaret's man and Pam's man that gets further mucked up by two major complications: One, the boy is discovered to be in possession of two bricks of heroine, which Pam orders the men to find out who it belongs to and return it to them, and number, two, the dead boy is not dead after all.
https://decider.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/wolfs-austin-abrams.jpg?quality=75&strip=all&w=1284
Clooney and Pitt have put their pet project into the capable hands of director and screenwriter Jon Watts, whose credits include Spider-Man: No Way Home and the Jeff Bridges limited TV series The Old Man who establishes unbearable tension almost immediately with the appearance of the second fixer and I actually found myself amused when Margraet takes a phone call and excuses herself to answer it and then returns to the men with the phone on speaker, where Pam explains what's going on, an explanation that obviously has holes that even Pam isn't even aware. I also found it kind of a classy storyline move that we never meet Pam.
https://decider.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Wolfs-austin-abrams-3.jpg?quality=75&strip=all&w=1284
The humor comes into the story when the distrust between the two men is given further clarification by revealing that the men are completely paranoid about each other learning exactly how they do their jobs, so they try to do them together, but separately, which naturally is going to work for so long. They are forced to work together when they find out the boy is alive and temporarily escapes and the boy's explanation of his involvement in this story absolutely had me on the floor. Loved the guys chasing the boy through the city streets, who is only clad in jockey shorts and socks. I also loved the reverence to the story by the characters being billed non specifically with names like "Margaret's Man", "The Kid", "Chinatown Lookout", and "Coughing Woman."
https://www.nme.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Wolfs_Photo_0107.jpg
Watts takes a bit longer than necessary to get to the climax, or so we think, because the climax doesn't really come until the final scene. With Clooney and Pitt's pursestrings behind him, Watts has been afforded a huge budget for this story and it is well utilized, with expensive production values, with standout music, sound, and sound editing. Clooney and Pitt, as expected, a well-oiled machine and there is a star making performance from Timothee Chalamat-lookalike Austin Abrams as the boy, who is actually billed as "The Kid". Clooney, Pitt, and Watts have come up with a winner here. 4

[Gideon58]

Eyes of Laura Mars
Technically, it would probably be considered a psychological thriller, but there's just too much dumb stuff that happens in 1978's Eyes of Laura Mars to take what's going on here seriously.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81FMterKq5L._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
Fresh off her Oscar-winning performance in Network, Faye Dunaway inhabits the tile character, a world famous fashion photographer who is reputed for unsubtle images of sex and violence in her work, who one day during a photo shoot, sees a murder being committed through the lens of her camera , a murder that actually happens minutes later. This is only Laura's first vision and after people she actually knows start dropping, it is assumed that Laura is next.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTU4MzAzMjYxMl5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMDc2NzYyNA@@._V1_.jpg
John Carpenter (not the Halloween director), leading man Tommy Lee Jones, and David Zelag Goodman, the author of Straw Dogs collaborated on this convoluted screenplay that actually starts off quite promisingly. The idea of a woman seeing murder through her camera lens was a good one, but she only sees the first one that way. The rest of story just finds murders randomly flashing in front of her We are also provided red herrings like a psycho ex-husband and allegedly coincidental work of Laura's that just happens to resemble actual crime photos. Laura also makes some pretty stupid moves throughout this story. After the first murder she sees through her camera lens, Laura drops everything and runs to the scene of the crime and tells them she saw it happen. There’s no logical reason she would do that and why would we see everyone involved in the fashion shoot, at the police station in the next scene preparing to be questioned. Also wasn't surprised that Jones' character, seemed to lose focus of the case after sleeping with Laura.
https://celluloidsorceress.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/eyes-2.jpg?w=1200
Believe it or not, even before the first murder occurs, a suspect came immediately in focus for this reviewer but I was wrong. Sadly, the journey to the 11:00 twist is way too long. Faye Dunaway is too strong strong a presence for the damsel in distress route, but Tommy Lee Jones is terrific as officer John...I had forgotten that back in the day, Tommy Lee Jones was undeniably sexy. Rene Auberjunois and Brad Dourif score in supporting roles and that is producer Jon Peters' then girlfriend, Barbra Streisand, singing the love theme "Prisoner." 3

[Gideon58]

Easy To Love
MGM bigwigs put a lot of work, money, and imagination into turning Esther Williams into a star, despite the fact that she really didn't sing or dance, but one of their strongest efforts was deliciously entertaining water-themed romp called Easy to Love.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BOWYxYjA0MjEtYmJhZC00ZjY0LTkzMDctZDZkYjE4YTdhODE1XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
The story begins in Miami where Esther is playing Julie Hallerton, the star of an Aquatics Show (duh) who also works part-time as a model, who is engaged to her hunky co-star, Hank (John Bromfield) and is tired of her slave-driving boss, Ray Lloyd (Van Johnson) working her to the bone and tells him she's going to quit the show and marry Hank. In order to distract her, Ray offers to take Julie on a trip to New York, where she meets a slick nightclub singer named Barry Gordon (Tony Martin}, who fall in love at first sight with our heroine.
https://blogs.iu.edu/establishingshot/files/2020/02/8.png
This movie was such a pleasant surprise because it wasn’t just barrage of water ballets, which we had come to expect from Williams, but this was an actual musical comedy with song, dance, clowning and romance. The story reminded me a bit of films like The Philadelphia story or Tom, Dick, and Harry, where we find the leading lady actually has feeling for three different men and we have to wait to the very end of the movie to find out who she really loved.
https://theblondeatthefilm.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/easy-to-love-esther-williams-213.png?w=640
Williams really gets a chance to show off her comedic chops in this film between changing bathing suits. Julie's behavior in New York borders on tramp-ish, but we never stop liking her and are not surprised when all three guys stay in the battle until the final scene. Williams also got an unexpected opportunity to clown in a bonkers water ballet which feature Esther in full clown makeup, playing catch with a real seal and romping through the water with a mechanical alligator. This was foreign, but very welcome territory for Williams. Martin is no Olivier, but his singing voice is dreamy and director Charles Walters (Easter Parade, Summer Stock) takes full advantage of that giving Martin Six solos in the film with "Didja Ever" "Coquette", and "That's What aa Rainy Day is For. There's also a brief appearance from Martin's future wife, the legendary Cyd Charisse.
https://resizing.flixster.com/eDRaKgQUdCIuORCkhu9JmxVIHlg=/1100x618/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p7789_i_h10_ab.jpg
MGM spared no expense here, the MGM gloss is all over this one, including the best water ballet finale I've ever seen in an Esther movie, which, if you couldn't tell, was staged by Busby Berkley. Van Johnson works really well with Esther and, if you don't blink, you'll also catch appearances by Carroll Baker, Sandra Gould. and Benny Rubin. All you Esther Williams fans out there, this is appointment viewing. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Will & Harper
Hands down the best film of 2024 that I've seen is Will and Harper, a sweet, funny, cringy and heartwarming look at a movie star helping a friend navigate a new and sometimes frightening fork in his life journey that provides a lot of questions for the movie star.💫
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYjAwODVjM2QtNmVhNy00NjYwLWJhMzgtM2FlZjY0ZGJjZjQ2XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
This extraordinary cinematic journey is bought to us by Will Ferrell, Ferrell is the movie star in this scenario and the friend is Andrew Steele, a former writer for SNL who wrote some of Ferrell's most memorable sketches. Apparently, while Ferrell was filming Spirited with Ryan Reynolds, Ferrell received an email from Steele, coming out to him that he has transitioned into a woman and has changed his first name to Harper, after Harper Lee. The friends hook up and Harper wants to revisit people and places he knew as a boy and a man, so he and Will pack their bags, throw them in a jeep for a cross country road trip.
https://awardsradar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/will-harper-documentary-still.png
Will, Harper, and Tina Fey collaborated on the script and intimate and sensitive direction is provided by Josh Greenbaum, who also directed Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar that provides an intimacy to the story, which is difficult to do when you're trying to do a very personal story but a movie star is involved. It's so much fun that no matter where Harper and Will go, we always see people in the background. and sometimes in the foreground, who recognize Will immediately but never get in the way of the project at hand. There is only one moment in the film where Will and Harper confront a commoner and the person doesn't recognize Ferrell.
https://dnm.nflximg.net/api/v6/BvVbc2Wxr2w6QuoANoSpJKEIWjQ/AAAAQV7_s7zGWGkjiZhz1VTP9C0zrmvBdM2tRvpil0N_snK7yx-31_8wnwGhgZu-PMSOkJ_eSdrUh1wPuf0jEgbhxt77nEg2l30C4qAhCqzOvM4T_FzKVwvP3BObAeWE2AGJQQF4vls8Lzbb2md5_A.jpg?r=fe0
Through the farewell breakfast with Harper's daughters, the farewell luncheon with former SNL cast members Fey, Seth Meyers, and Tim Meadows, through the drive through, the film is peppered with Will asking all of the questions he has wanted to ask Harper ever since learning the news and the honesty from both of them in terms of questions and answers is surprisingly candid. There is one heart stopping scene where Harper wants to enter a redneck bar he used to hang at. asking Will to wait outside for a minute and we see Will genuinely worried for Harper's safety and there's a later scene where Will feels he has dropped the ball regarding Harper’s safety.
https://uproxx.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/will-ferrell-top.jpg?w=1024&h=450&crop=1
I don't know why it surprised me, but even though she was dressed like a woman, Harper never attempts to walk or talk like a woman. I feel bad that this was a surprise to me. This film was a joy from start to finish. In addition to the above referenced, there are also appearances by Kristin Wiig, who they ask to write a theme song for their trip, Will Forte, Colin Jost, Molly Shannon, and Lorne Michaels. A very special movie experience. 4.5

[Gideon58]

Capote
An extraordinary performance by Phillip Seymour Hoffman that earned him an Oscar for Best Actor is the heart of the 2005 biopic Capote, which is not a biopic in the true sense of the genre, but is an often cringeworthy look at Capote's passion about his most famous work.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTczMzU0MjM1MV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMjczNzgyNA@@._V1_.jpg
This is, of course the story of the world famous author who learns of an entire family being murdered in Kansas and decides he wants to write an article about for the New Yorker, but upon learning what happened and the relationship he develops with Perry Smith, one of the men sentenced to Death Row for the crime, decides instead of writing a magazine article that he wants to write a non-fiction novel about the crime that eventually became known as "In Cold Blood."
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTg3Mzk1NjQzNF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNDczNzgyNA@@._V1_.jpg
Dan Futterman, who played Robin Williams' son in The Birdcage is actually the co-screenwriter on this film, which is not the birth to death chronicle the title implies, but a look at a particular period in Capote's life. In fact, the only period of Capote's life that filmmakers seem to think we care about. In Cold Blood is not the only thing Capote wrote. Breakfast at Tiffany's is actually referenced here and Capote is even observed talking to people at a cocktail party about Marilyn Monroe, who was his choice to play Holly Golightly. That part of Capote's career would have been interesting to look at.
https://emmakwall.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/capote-081.jpg
Don't get me wrong, this is a great film that doesn't just spurt out a lot of facts, but allows the viewer to come to their own conclusions about what happens here. We watch Capote and good pal Harper Lee begin a legitimate investigation into the murders but everything seems to change once Capote lays eyes on Perry Smith, As the film progresses, everything else becomes background as the film whittles down to the relationship between Capote and Smith. Capote seems almost obsessed with Smith, but it's never really made clear why because Capote doesn't really care that Smith is guilty, but spearheads an appeal for the man. We're never really sure if Capote believes that Perry Smith is being wronged or if he is falling in love with the man, but at one point, Harper Lee asks Capote if he's in love with Perry and his answer is very telling.
https://images.ecestaticos.com/7ZdVnqqo5toiY29Bb8ReFGuw_bw=/0x0:1599x956/1200x900/filters:fill(white):format(jpg)/f.elconfidencial.com%2Foriginal%2F5d7%2F32d%2F7f6%2F5d732d7f6a9f924afe80147c788f901c.jpg
I was surprised as the film began to boil down to the relationship between Capote and Smith, that Smith is not portrayed as an ignorant thug. The Perry Smith in this film is intelligent and sensitive, but also fully aware of who he is. On the other hand, it was a little odd that whether or not Smith was aware that Capote was attracted to him is never even broached. As a ,matter of fact, any evidence of homophobia is whitewashed here, which was not the case the following year in Infamous, where Toby Jones played Capote.
https://resizing.flixster.com/z888xXrZJydQoVvWINCPbhuxNC8=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/rV6u7cW-RI_3P0GDJlKx1vvpaII=/ems.cHJkLWVtcy1hc3NldHMvbW92aWVzLzFjYTdiOTEwLWU5Y2MtNDJjNC05OWQ0LTIxNDE5ZWNiNjRhMC53ZWJw
Director Bennett Miller (Moneyball) has mounted an absolutely gorgeous film filled with painting-like imagery. Phillip Seymour Hoffman completely disappears inside Capote and his Oscar was well deserved and mention must also be made of Catherine Keener as Harper Lee, Clifton Collins Jr as Perry Smith, and Oscar winner Chris Cooper as Alvin Dewey. Appointment viewing for Hoffman's performance alone. 4

[Gideon58]

In This Our Life
Some spectacular performances and uncompromising direction make a slightly cringy 1942 melodrama called In This Our Life more than worth the time of fans of the genre.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZjA0ZDk1NDUtMjNiOS00MjZhLWExM2EtMTBjYjUzOTliM2ExXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
The film stars two time Oscar winners Bette Davis and Olivia de Havilland as sisters named Stanley and Roy Timberlake, respectively, heiresses to a tobacco company co-owned by their father and uncle. The family is preparing for Stanley's upcoming wedding to Craig (George Brent) while Roy is trying to deal with the end of her marriage to Peter (Dennis Morgan). The sisters' Uncle William (Oscar winner Charles Coburn} gives Stanley a check to help finance her wedding and not long after that, Stanley and Peter run off together. And while healing their wounds, Roy and Craig start developing feelings for each other. Unfortunately, while this is happening, a couple of tragedies begin to derail Stanley's life.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTgxZGUwOGQtZGU0NC00OTVkLWEzYjYtYzg5NzE2NDY1YjUwXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Howard Koch's screenplay, based on a novel by Ellen Glasgow, features everything classic soap opera fans want, but there are some creepy undercurrents to the story that give this story a little more edginess than we get from the average 1940's melodrama. The first thing that quietly emerges is the almost incestuous relationship between Stanley and her Uncle William. It reminded me a bit of Elizabeth Taylor and Burl Ives in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Even though it isn't overt, it is clear that Uncle William would do anything for Stanley and that she is aware of it and not above using it to her advantage. It is kind of odd that we can this, but Roy is the only character onscreen who sees it.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMmJjMTE4NzItYjkxNS00NmY5LTg5NjYtMzUwNTMxZDFiMDU3XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
It's the performances of Davis and de Havilland that really make this one sizzle. In a dynamic that sort of resembles the Hudson sisters in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, we see a toxic relationship between two sisters who have lived with it for so long that they try and pretend it doesn't exist. Davis' ferocious scenery chewing is sometimes frightening to watch here and de Havilland beautifully underplays without ever letting Davis blow her off the screen. de Havilland's Roy is so subservient at the beginning of the film but by the end, has no desire to protect her sister, who becomes downright evil as she goes into pure self-preservation mode.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYjdkZTEwYjgtYjgxNi00MDcxLWE5NTQtZGY4ZWUwMjAzN2I0XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Research revealed that Davis was miserable during the making of this film. She hated the script and did not get along with director John Huston, having him replaced by Raoul Walsh, though Huston is credited as the sole director onscreen, but Huston and Walsh successfully created one of the creepiest melodramas of the 1940's. Davis and de Havilland are both Oscar-worthy as Stanley and Roy and Charles Coburn is appropriately greasy as Uncle William. Shout-outs to Frank Craven as the girls' father, Billie Burke as their bed-ridden mother, and Lee Patrick as Stanley's girlfriend. Mention should also be made of Oscar winner Hattie McDaniel as the Timberlake maid and a young actor named Ernest Anderson as company clerk Perry and McDaniel's son. Anderson was discovered personally by Davis and made sure he got this part. Another nearly forgotten gem on Davis' resume that will not disappoint her fans. 4

[Gideon58]

Lonely Planet
Despite a lovely performance from Oscar winner Laura Dern, 2024's Lonely Planet, is a picturesque, but beyond dull romantic drama that doesn't work because of lack of chemistry between the stars and a story that takes WAY too long to get where we know it's going about 15 minutes into the film.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BOTc4YmQ4ODctNjQ5YS00YmNjLTk3MjctZjIwMGJlMDdhNzc1XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
The setting is a writers' retreat in Morocco where we meet Katherine Lowe (Dern), a renowned writer who is in the process of ending of a 14-year old relationship and is experiencing writer's block who comes to the retreat for the solitude she thinks will help her complete her book. She accidently meets Owen Brophy (Liam Hemsworth), a high powered businessman who has come to the retreat to support his girlfriend, Lily (Diana Silvers) who is flush in the success of her very first novel and we see how Owen gets Katherine to look up from her computer and drift into an affair.
https://static1.cbrimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/lonely-planet-photo.jpg
Director and writer Susannah Grant, who wrote the screenplay for Erin Brockovich, has mounted a story on an absolutely gorgeous canvas. The Moroccan setting is appealing but the film spends way too much time depending on scenery to entice the viewer. It reminded me a bit of the Katharine Hepburn drama Summertime that spent way too much time just creating a cinematic postcard that becomes tiresome after twenty minutes and when you have a movie with a running time of 1 hour and twenty-eight, minutes, we really don't need to spend so much time on atmosphere.
https://lonelyplanetstatic.imgix.net/marketing/best-in-travel/2024/campaign/hero-bit-2024.jpg
The first meeting between Katherine and Owen is a little contrived, but I liked the way the way Owen and Lily do begin to drift away. Lily's unintentional pushing Owen away is quite realistic as she spends more and more time with these pretentious and boring writers who are all in love with the sounds of their own voices . The scene where it climaxes at a party game where participants have to guess literary items and Lily ridicules Owen for not knowing who the character is might be my favorite scene in the film. Oddly, it's still another 30 minutes before Katherine and Owen begin to get physical and after all the waiting we've been doing, this too gets stalled, not to mention a really stupid 11:00 twist that appears to pull Katherine and Owen apart permanently.
https://www.highonfilms.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/LP_20220521_05995_R2_f-scaled.jpg
Laura Dern works very hard at keeping the film watchable, even with the economic running time, has a hard time doing so, a lot of it having to do with the fact that she and serious eye candy Liam Hemsworth have absolutely no chemistry. As long as we wait for something to happen between these two, when it finally does, it's just not as interesting as we hoped it might be. For hardcore Dern fans only. 2

[Gideon58]

Springtime in the Rockies
The queen of 20th Century Fox musicals, Betty Grable, had one of her best vehicles with a splashy 1942 piece of musical fluff called Springtime in the Rockies.
https://hollywoodposters.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/SpringRock3SLB.jpg
Grable plays a musical comedy star who is tired of her womanizing boyfriend and dance partner Dan Christy (John Payne). Vicky decides to end things with Dan and reunite with her former dance partner, Victor Prince (Ceasar Romero). Vicky and Victor get a job at a resort in the Canadian Rockies while Dan discovers that his career is going to go down the drain without Vicky. After a drunken stupor, Dan wakes up in the same resort where Vicky and Victor are performing, accompanied by a bartender (Edward Everett Horton) who claims Dan hired him as his valet and a spitfire named Rosita Murphy (Carmen Miranda) who claims Dan hired her as his secretary.
https://theblondeatthefilm.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/springtime-in-the-rockies-76.jpg?w=640
It actually took three screenwriters to come up with this featherweight musical that not only serves as an effective showcase for Grable, but also allowed Fox to showcase a lot of up and coming talent, particularly Miranda, whose broken English, electric hips, and musical prowess allow her to steal every scene she's in. Miranda also stops the show with her rendition of "Chatanooga Choo Choo", which she performs in Portuguese. Of course, it goes without saying that any musical with Grable, Harry James and his orchestra won't be far behind, who are allowed to take up a healthy amount of screentime, including a dreaming rendition of "You Made Me Love You."
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/aPFwemYuB2M/hqdefault.jpg
Other musical highlights include Grable and Payne's duet "Run Little Raindrop Run" and big band singer Helen Forrest's take on "I Had the Craziest Dream." A couple of surprises are provided on the dance floor as Romero impresses being very light on his feet in his dance numbers with Grable and a cute comic dance performed by a tipsy Charlotte Greenwood who goes the Eve Arden/Mary Wickes route as Vicky's best friend.
https://theblondeatthefilm.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/springtime-rockies-miranda-costume-2.jpg?w=412&h=412
Fox poured a lot of money into this film, rich with lavish and settings and costumes, lovingly supervised by director Irving Cummings. who also directed Gable in Down Argentine Way. And if you look closely, you will notice an uncredited appearance from a young Jackie Gleason as a character called The Commissioner. Appointment viewing for Grable fans. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Brothers (2024)
Peter Dinklage has proven to be an actor who is always worth watching and the proof of this cinematic pudding is in a silly and confusing road trip comedy called Brothers where I experienced the occasional laugh despite myself and most of them were because of Dinklage.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/72/Brothers_2024_film_poster.jpg
Dinklage and Josh Brolin play Jady and Moke Monger, respectively, twin brothers who were raised to be criminals by their mother, Cath, who spent most of her life playing Bonnie and Clyde with the boys' stepfather, Glen. A high speed chase after Cath and Glen stole some expensive emeralds ended in Glen's death and Cath leaving the country. Many years later, Jady is in jail and is offered an early parole by a sleazy corrections officer and his retired judge father if he can retrieve those emeralds. Unfortunately, it is revealed during the opening scenes that the emeralds were swallowed by Glen before he died and are still in his stomach, buried under ground, which we learn later is now a golf course.
https://dl.moviesr.net/images2/x4Qct.jpg
The screenplay by Etan Cohen and Macon Blair is rich with a lot of very unpleasant characters who happen to be family. It's been awhile since I've seen family members throwing each other under varied buses in the name of greed and self preservation. It's a little maddening watching poor Moke trying to start a new life with a new job and a pregnant wife and Jady just not giving a damn. Further tension is created as Moke's love for his twin motivates him to help his mother despite a lot of buried resentment regarding their mother and who do you think their next is a reunion with?
https://statcdn.fandango.com/MPX/image/NBCU_Fandango/801/482/thumb_BBB43B3D-0CC7-4E91-B7AB-CDCF524C2338.jpg
I did like the fact that the love between these brothers gets strained but never disappears through the closing credits. The relationship between this corrections officer and his dad is a lot more squirmy-worthy, but being the villains, that was okay. There was a storyline detour involving Jady's prison pen pal (Marisa Tomei) and her pet orangutan that just seemed to pad the running time. I liked he fact that the story only addressed Jady being a little person once. The finale in a deserted mall, was extremely confusing and requires a score card to keep track of what's going on.
https://static1.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/farful-in-brothers.jpg
Director Max Barbakow, who directed a movie I really liked called Palm Springs could have applied a little more discipline to the story, letting a lot of scenes go a lot longer than necessary. On the other hand, this was the longest movie under 90 minutes long that I have ever seen. Brolin works hard as Moke and we get two ridiculously over the top performances from Glenn Close and Oscar winner Brendon Fraser as Cath and the corrections officer. This film also marks the final feature film appearance of M Emmett Walsh as the slimy judge. I also wish a little more imagination had been put into the title. But if you're a hardcore Peter Dinklage fan like myself, this film is worth a look. 3

[Gideon58]

A Streetcar Named Desire (1995)
The four lead performances make the 1995 TV version of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire worth a look.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTQ3OTQwMjQ5NF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNDcwNTY0NA@@._V1_.jpg
This is the story of a mentally fragile southern belle named Blance DuBois who travels to New Orleans to visit her sister and finds her self in a battle of wills and sexual tension with her brutish brother-in-law Stanley Kowalski.
https://assets.mubicdn.net/images/film/121520/image-w1280.jpg?1476265439
In 1992, a revival of Williams' play came to Broadway with Jessica Lange playing Blanche, Alec Baldwin playing Stanley, Timothy Carhart playing Mitch, and Amy Madigan playing Blance's sister Stella. CBS decided to bring this revival to television three years later but only Lange snd Baldwin reprise their Broadway roles. For this television version, John Goodman was cast as Mitch and Diane Lane was awarded the role of Stella.
https://media.gettyimages.com/id/83009436/photo/american-actress-diane-lane-helps-actress-jessica-lange-to-dress-in-a-scene-from-the-television.jpg?s=612x612&w=gi&k=20&c=598Rgo5gYMIA1R6RKqFcq7-vLAy4mklg42Mr73D7wVU=
Williams play first hit the Broadway stage in 1947 with Jessica Tandy playing Blanche and Marlon Brando creating the most famous role of his career as Stanley Kowalski. The Broadway show came to the screen in 1951 practically intact except for Vivien Leigh playing Blanche and it was remade for television in 1984 with Ann-Margret playing Blanche and the late Treat Willaims playing Stanley.
https://i.okcdn.ru/videoPreview?id=814378912303&type=32&idx=10&tkn=AiuTc-JgtN5LKpsJu8b2H8ayyg0&fn=external_8
Stanley Kowalski is one of those roles that has become associated with a single actor, like The King in The King and I or Harold Hill in The Music Man and any actor who attempts the role is ripe for comparison. Baldwin works very hard to bring his own charisma to the role of Stanley without imitating Brando. He does bring the sexy that Brando brought to the role, but not the brutality, though he comes pretty close during Stanley's final confrantation with Blance. Lange is no stranger to playing mentally unbalanced characters, but her Blanche is more suited for the stage than the televison screen. I wish director Glenn Jordan had reined her in a bit. But it doesn't change the fact that when she's onscreen, you can't take your eyes off of her. John Goodman brings the same sensitivity to Mitch that Karl Malden did. Diane Lane is absolutely supernb as Stella, bringing a strength and sense of sexuality I have never seen in other intepretations of the role.
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/HDB7BA/a-streetcar-named-desire-from-left-john-goodman-jessica-lange-1995-HDB7BA.jpg
This television poduction suffers a bit from Jordan's sluggish direction that makes the movie a lot longer than it needs to be, though there are certain chartacter interactions that are less subtle than other versions of the play. The sexual tension between Stanley and Blanche leaps off the screen here...Stanley seems to sense where Blance is coming from here more quickly than previous versions. It should also be mentioned that when the movie first came to the screen in '51, studio executives insisted that the ending be changed and have Stella leave Stanley to legitimize what he did to Blanche, which diluted the power of the ending. The original ending was restored for the Ann-Margret version and it is utilized here as well. Lange, Baldwin, Goodman, and Lane were all nominated for Emmys and Lange won a Golden Globe. If you've never seen the previous versions, this one is worth a look. 3.5

[Gideon58]

21 Jump Street
The surprising chemistry between Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill actually makes 21 Jump Street, 2012 satire of the crime drama that ran on Fox from 1987-1991, worth a look. This review is coming from someone who did not watch the television series.
https://fr.web.img2.acsta.net/medias/nmedia/18/73/46/24/20086654.jpg
In this film, Schmidt (Hill) and Jenko (Tatum) are introduced as guys who went to high school together where Jenko was the most popular guy in school and Schmidt spent the entire four years being the butt of everyone's jokes. Flash forward a few years and we find that both guys have enrolled in the police academy where Schmidt is the star and Jenko only graduates because of Schmidt's help. The guys are then assigned to a special force called 21 Jump Street because of their youthful appearance to take down a high school drug dealer and his supplier.
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/RajxnqpXuiYgqkQyzGHEr7-1200-80.jpg
Hill was one of three screenwriters on this slightly complux but always engaging comedy that, for some reason, this reviewer senses didn't have a lot to do with the television series, but was used as a basic canvas for an idea of Hill's, who, at the time, had the juice to get a passion project greenlighted. Be forewarned that if you're looking for a movie that has any connection to anything resembling realism, you've come to the wrong movie.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTQwNTYxNTA1N15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNzA3OTUyNw@@._V1_.jpg
Co-directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are not looking for anything but straight-up laughs, with the possible exception of the relationship between Schmidt and Jenko. I liked the fact that Schmidt was miserable in high school but with this second crack at high school, he finds himself shining and Jenko is the one struggling and even finding himself a little bit jealous of Schmidt. The scene where Hill auditions for the school's production of Peter Pan with his rendition of "I've Gotta Crow" had me on the floor as did the pair's final rendition of the Miranda Rights.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTczMjgyNzc3Ml5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMzU4NTc0Nw@@._V1_.jpg
Hill and Tatum create terrific chemistry and get solid support from Dave Franco, Oscar winner Brie Larson, Rob Riggles, and Ice Cube steals every scene he's in as the boys' boss. And it goes without saying, like most films of this ilk, there are cameo appearances from the stars of the original television series. This film was a lot more fun than I expected. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Reagan
Despite a solid performance by Dennis Quaid in the title role, the 2024 biopic Reagan is an overblown and overlong look at our nation's 40th President that takes a little too long deciding what kind of biopic it wants to be, jumping back and forth in time and presenting Reagan as just this side of a saint.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNDg3NjY2ZGUtNzcwNy00NjFhLWJhZDMtNmIyM2JkYzE5YTI1XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
The film is a childhood to adult look at Reagan, though it doesn't start with his birth. The film actually begins at the assassination attempt where Jim Brady took a bullet to the head and bounces around a little before settling into Reagan's childhood, a brief look at his acting career and his time as President of the Screen Actor's Guild, his first meeting with Nancy Davis, and into his presidency, concentrating on his passion regarding communism and his willingness to start a war that he really didn't want to start.
https://statcdn.fandango.com/MPX/image/NBCU_Fandango/74/483/thumb_45F61903-4063-4FF2-8EE9-50395A9D4CAD.jpg
The screenplay requires a pogo stick to keep up with, especially during the first half hour or so. The film starts with the assassination attempt and then bounces back and forth through pertinent events in Regan's life for about 15 minutes before settling back into his childhood. His marriage to Jane Wyman is briefly touched on where it's implied that his interest in politics destroyed their marriage. Ten minute later, he meets Nancy Davis and their supersonic romance leads to a forever marriage. There is a definite bias in this story, Reagan is painted as somewhere between a saint and a god here and it's a little hard to swallow sometimes. And why was the entire film narrated by a Russian spy named Viktor Petrovich (well played by Oscar winner Jon Voight))?
https://static.wixstatic.com/media/4a23df_fdf0d308ab71498985454c1262a69bd6~mv2.jpg/v1/fill/w_320,h_568,fp_0.43_0.36,q_90/4a23df_fdf0d308ab71498985454c1262a69bd6~mv2.jpg
Director Sean McNamara, whose IMDB page revealed a lot of stuff I've never heard, takes an Oliver Stone/JFK tac at approaching this story, providing a blend of archival footage along with live actors that lends some authenticity to some scenes, but his seemingly deep-rooted respect for the subject results in sluggish direction that gives the film way too leisurely pacing about a lot of stuff that he and the screenwriters seem to think provide entertainment value but this reviewer, not so much. A good chunk of screentime could have been trimmed eliminating the story of Dana, a war protestor who supposedly slept on Reagan's lawn one night and it is later revealed that Reagan hired him as a speechwriter. The guy shows up for his first day of work at the White House wearing Bermuda shorts and a Hawaiian shirt.
https://www.awardsdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/reagan.jpg
McNamara must have some juice in Hollywood because he was afforded a huge budget for this film that was effectively spent, especially the breathtaking cinematography. Quaid is superb here, just about disappearing into Reagan and making this film a lot better than it really is. Penelope Ann Miller's Nancy Reagan was a little sugary for my tastes but loved the brief turn by Mena Suvari as a very bitchy Jane Wyman. Also enjoyed Mark Moses as Judge Clark, Xander Berkley as George Schultz, Dan Lauria as Tip O'Neil, Lesley-Ann Downe as Margaret Thatcher, and especially Robert Davi as Leonid Brezhnev. A tighter screenplay would have definitely helped here, there was no reason for this movie to be this long. 3

[Gideon58]

40 Carats
With the director of Butterflies Are Free and the screenwriter of Cabaret as one of the writers, we should have gotten something a lot funnier than the 1973 rom-com 40 Carats, whose actual problem is the miscasting of the leading lady.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTkwOTU4OTg2MF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNzQ3NjkxMQ@@._V1_.jpg
This is the story of a 40 year old real estate agent who, while vacationing in Greece and with a lot of coaxing, spends an incredible night in Greece with a 22 year old man named Peter Latham (the late Edward Albert). Ann enjoys her evening with Peter and decides it's history as she returns to life in New York, not long after which, Peter shows up on her doorstep and begins dating her 17-year old daughter, Trina (Deborah Raffin).
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZGZlY2U4YjQtZWFlNy00M2JmLWIwOTAtNWY0ZDA4ZWMwZDM0XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Jay Presson Allen, who wrote the screenplay for Cabaret. was actually one of three screenwriters who it took to come up with this totally predictable comedy that offers no surprises and asks us to accept a lot. Every time Ann and Peter run into each other, they stare at each other way too hard and stutter and stammer and we're supposed to pretend that the rest of the characters in the movies don't notice it. Of course, we also have Ann's rakish ex-husband (Gene Kelly) and a Texas millionaire (Billy Green Brush) to make Ann and Peter re-think what's going on between them, but all they do is pad the running the time.
https://cache.diomedia.com/diocomp/01/B9/JJ/comp/01B9-JJB2.jpg
The real problem with this film is casting acting goddess Liv Ullmann in the role of Ann Stanley. This was a big mistake and I know why. Circa 1973, Liv Ullmann was the hardest working actress in Hollywood earning Oscar nominations for The Immigrants and Face to Face, as well as Cries and Whispers and Scenes from a Marriage, making her the flavor of the 1970's, seemingly incapable of giving a bad performance. Unfortunately, this movie is a romantic comedy, a genre that was completely foreign territory for Ullman and that is evident from the opening scene. Ullman doesn't display anything that even resembles comic timing and half of the time it seems she's not even getting the joke. With the Ann Stanley character being in practically every scene, the film invariably bogs down in the cinematic mud.
https://i.okcdn.ru/videoPreview?id=1110399846939&type=37&idx=12&tkn=0WSRPZRoPZqZc2w24ltZ4QMdkxY&fn=external_8
Milton Katselas' wooden direction doesn't help either. Albert is appropriately pretty as Peter and Kelly steals every scene he's in (no great feat), but this was pretty uninspired movie making. 2.5

[gbgoodies]

40 Carats has been on my watchlist for a while because of Gene Kelly, but I just haven't found the time to watch it yet. It sounds like it might not be worth making the time to watch it any time soon.

[Gideon58]

Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes
A deep dive into the unprecedented life and career of two time Oscar winner Elizabeth Taylor has been provided in a delicately crafted documentary by HBO called Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes that might not completely deliver on its premise, but is does provide surprises for newcomers to the life of the actress and surprises for hardcore Taylor fans.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/S/pv-target-images/718406a50253786002bb81f160a688ca184f6ae4462fbe34e5b17ffa939287cc.jpg
Apparently after almost a dozen years after her death, a series of tape recorded interviews with a writer named Richard Beryman, allegedly conducted circa 1964 were discovered and brought to the screen with linking footage displaying a tape recorder being turned on and off and pairs of hands smoking cigarettes and drinking whiskey. The 2024 documentary finds Beryman asking Taylor everything that he can possibly think of about the iconic superstar and getting some brutally honest answers for almost everything he throws at Taylor.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMGYyM2RhNGYtZGIwZi00ODI5LTgwOWUtNzNmZGQ1NmE1N2RlXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
The most intriguing thing about this documentary is that we are getting the answers to the questions from the lady herself. That voice cannot be duplicated and it was fascinating listening to her talk about her life while tons of archival footage flooded the screen, a lot more that I had never seen than expected. A couple of things come through about the actress almost immediately. First, the fact that this actress has lived her entire life in front of cameras and microphones since she was a teenager and that she always hated being thought of as a "sex symbol." Though she also admits that she wasn't pushed into the business by her parents, she wanted to do this.
https://resizing.flixster.com/f0BSAq8vN8ydaMN8duHq8NFP0BI=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p27372525_i_h9_ab.jpg
She made it clear that she wasn't happy with the beginning of her career and was very unhappy with the direction of her career until she made A Place in the Sun with Montgomery Clift, who became one of her best friends during this period, along with a couple of other secretly gay actors, Rock Hudson and Roddy McDowell. She also shares some very special memories of James Dean during the filming of Giant . Also loved hearing that everyone in her life tried to talk her out of doing Suddenly Last Summer which earned her a third Oscar nomination and her misery during the making of BUtterfield 8, which won Taylor her first Oscar.
https://i.abcnewsfe.com/a/8fa407b1-a364-44db-b611-6929515bd687/liz-taylor-ht-jt-240731_1722469090831_hpMain_16x9t.jpg
Needless, to say most of her marriages were discussed in detail, though she was clearly uncomfortable talking about her first marriage to Nicky Hilton. On the other hand, her thoughts about her marriage to Eddie Fisher provided some surprises and needless to say, talking about Mike Todd's death wasn't easy.
https://aarp.widen.net/content/w7apaa52uq/jpeg/GettyImages-3239825.jpg?crop=true&anchor=18,27&q=80&color=ffffffff&u=2xkwh0&w=2016&h=1512
Once we got past her backstage dirt regarding Cleopatra, the interviews with Beryman ceased and archival footage was offered up to and through her second marriage to Richard Burton. Archival commentary is provided by Burton, Debbie Reynolds, George Hamilton, and Roddy McDowell, but hearing about her life and career from her own lips was worth the price of admission alone. 4

[Gideon58]

Walking Tall (2004)
Despite a charismatic performance from Dwayne Johnson in the starring role, 2004's Walking Tall is a contrived and predictable crime drama where the story and characters are drawn strictly in black and white, offering no surprises and making the movie seem a lot longer than it is really is.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51+XiWL4QhL._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
This film is, of course, a re-imagining of the 1973 classic about a real life sheriff named Buford Pusser that made a movie star out of the late Joe Don Baker. In this film, Johnson plays Chris Vaughn, a vet who has returned home to the small milling community where he grew up and finds the mill is closed and that the town's primary source of income is a casino owned by a former schoolmate named Jay Hamilton, who not only employs half the community at his casino, but apparently has the police department in his pocket as well. A couple of violent encounters motivate Chris to clean up the drug dealing and police corruption in his town.
https://images2.vudu.com/background/889093-3840a.jpg
It actually took three writers to come up with the corny screenplay for this movie that is so predictable he viewer can practically recite the dialogue along with the characters. The story makes no attempt to provide some mystery regarding who the white hats are and the black hats. Everything is in dull primary colors here...the Chris Vaughn character is painted as just this side of sainthood and Jay Hamilton's control over this town is pretty much established in the first ten minutes of the movie.
https://resizing.flixster.com/QQQRlTqPn8gbWIAXmR91zs-766E=/620x336/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p34259_i_h10_ad.jpg
There are a couple of viable action sequences here, one motivated by Chris' baby brother overdosing on drugs that sends him on a violent rampage at the casino where he single-handedly takes out six casino employees. He is then sent to jail, goes to court, and is declared not guilty and is then elected sheriff...seriously? Even the alleged love story with an ex who now works as a stripper for Hamilton falls flat.
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/2K5EN5K/the-rock-walking-tall-2004-2K5EN5K.jpg
Director Kevin Bray, did have the sense to cast The Rock in the starring role, who almost provides enough distraction to the viewer to keep them from noticing how simple and silly this movie. Neil McDonough is effectively slick as Jay Hamilton and Johnny Knoxville steals every scene he's in as Chris' BFF and eventual deputy. For hardcore Rock fans only. And they had the nerve to dedicate the film to Buford Pusser. 2.5

[Gideon58]

Joker: Folie a Deux
As I suspected when I first heard about the film going into production, 2024's Joker: Folie a Deux might be one of the most pointless sequels ever made, an overblown, illogical, cringy, musical, that suffers primarily from an all over the place screenplay that can't decide if it's a sequel or a prequel, not to mention after forcing to return to the world of Arthur Fleck where a lot of stuff is thrown in the air, but none of it really lands. It also seemed about 14 hours long.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNTRlNmU1NzEtODNkNC00ZGM3LWFmNzQtMjBlMWRiYTcyMGRhXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
As the film opens, we learn that an incarcerated Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix) is still the folk hero he was at the end of the first film. A TV movie was even made about him. we also learn that Arthur is about to go on trial for the five murders he committed in the first film, working with an insanity defense. Arthur is not putting a lot of assistance into building his case, partially because he is being distracted with a patient from another wing named Harley Quinn (Lady Gaga) a sort female variation on Arthur who worships the ground he walks on.
https://platform.vox.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2024/10/joker-folie-a-deux-courtroom.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&crop=7.75,0,84.5,100
The screenplay by director Todd Phillips, Scott Silver, and Bob Kane kind of jumps all over the place as it waffles between providing justice for the people who suffered at Arthur's hands in the first film and trying to actually legitimize what he did. An underlying theme emerges as people seem to think Arthur and the Joker are separate personalities, but no one is buying that, not even Arthur and that's the most disturbing element of this movie is that Arthur doesn't possess a scintilla of remorse regarding his actions in the first film and this lack of remorse is only intensified by the presence of Harley as his cheerleader.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/rev-1-JFAD-07288-SGr_High_Res_JPEG-H-2024.jpg?w=1296
As for these musical numbers, not sure what Todd Phillips was thinking here. There is an imagination in the presentation, but instead of driving narrative like a musical numer is supposed to , they just bring the film to a halt and that's a serious problem for a film with a two hour and fifteen minute running time. The musical numbers don't drive the narrative or provide any answers for us, thereby making the whole Harley Quinn character pointless.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRzZMJXydhlQYp4_dmxS7B4tYWRp1puLEmrAg&s
It takes about 45 minutes for the film to kick into gear ( it actually begins with a weird animated short featuring the title character that has nothing to do with the rest of the film) and the trial definitely provides some of the film's highlights. It was no surprise that halfway through the trial, Arthur fires his attorney (Catherine Keener) and wants to defend himself, but it's never really clear why or, why once he's defending himself, he's allowed to wear his joker makeup in the courtroom. And don't even get me started about the confusing conclusion, which left this reviewer unsatisfied.
https://media.them.us/photos/66fff3ee9b0195222f21afca/16:9/w_2560%2Cc_limit/joker.jpg
Phillips does provide imaginative direction and Phoenix once again loses himself in this character and even shows he has a way with a song. It was good to see Kenner onscreen again and I also loved Brendan Gleeson as a corrections officer and Bill Smitrovich as the judge, but this movie is still an overlong and overblown mess that we could have lived without. 2

[Gideon58]

The Family that Preys
Despite the strong performances he pulls from two of the best actresses in the business, Tyler Perry draws a swing and a miss with a soapy melodrama called The Family That Preys.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51ie8Bi6G4L._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg
Oscar winner Kathy Bates and Alfre Woodward play lifelong friends whose lives are forever interwined because of their children who have personal and professional connects with them, making it difficult when Charlotte, Bates character, convinces Woodward's character, Alice to take a cross country trip with her while Charlotte's son plots to take over Charlotte's company and Alice's daughter begins an affair with the man in order to advance her own career.
https://resizing.flixster.com/UOWm9QcunUzHhHE5Vs864uhT0jY=/620x336/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p178495_i_h10_ac.jpg
Perry's screenplay can pretty much be attributed to any of the writers on The Young and the Restless or General Hospital as this is pure soap oepra, though it is a bit contrived the way several of the characters have had their brains removed in order for the plot to have forward motion. Charlotte and Alice's children are pretty unlikable for the most part and their part of the story barely holds viewer attention.
https://www.essence.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/images/2008/09/41481-the_ties_that_bind.jpg
The film is fun though when it stays focused on Charlotte and Alice and their cross country adventure. It's fun watching Charlotte wanting to have an adventure and trying to coax Alice into joining in on the fun, who is, of course, fighting her every step of the way. As a sort of elder variation on Thelma and Louise, Charlotte and Alice's part of the story is a lot of fun and frankly, if the film had just been about them, it would have been a lot better film, but the formulaic soap suds provided their rotten children really drag the film down.
https://resizing.flixster.com/fOHpvXmJAV7_NtufeOYuENPtkvs=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/EWUzLVU0Npot-VQUNUZmCvfd4Bw=/ems.cHJkLWVtcy1hc3NldHMvbW92aWVzL2Y4MDhiZWIwLTFjNTItNGNmYy1iOGI1LTM2NTk5MTlkODM4My53ZWJw
Bates and Woodward are watchable as always and help to sustain interest. Sanaa Lathan plays one of the most unlikable character of her career as Alice's ambitious, social climbing executive, ashamed of her marriage to a hunky construction worker (Rockmund Dunbar). Cole Hauser is kind of one-note as Charlotte's weasely son and Taraji P Henson, Robin Givens, and Perry (sporting a dreadful wig) try to make something out of thankless roles. Hardcore Bates fans might find some entertainment here, others, be forewarned. 2.5

[Gideon58]

Sebastian
Despite some off-color and graphic subject matter, the 2024 Scottish import Sebastian is a sensitive and often surprising character study centered around a young man leading a double life that seems to be working for him until the inevitable collision of said lives.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYjljNWNiZjMtOWFlZC00ODBmLWFiOTYtNjljMzc5MmE4Zjg5XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
This is the story of Max, an aspiring gay writer who works freelance and is currently working on an interview with Bret Easton Ellis and his own novel about a sex worker named Sebastian. He has told his editor that he is doing research through interviewing male sex workers but, in reality, Max is a sex worker, using the name Sebastian, and then reproducing what happens during his sexual encounters, onto his computer as part of his novel.
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/07/31/multimedia/sebastian1-lfqm/sebastian1-lfqm-mediumSquareAt3X-v2.jpg
Director and screenwriter Mikko Mäkelä has come up with intriguing subject matter, a lot of which hasn't been addressed in mainstream films before. As a matter of fact, something tells me the only reason this film got greenlighted is because it's not an American film. The story brings into question a lot of moral, ethical, and legal issues that this central character Max doesn't seem to be concerned about. It was surprising that most of Sebastian's clients were much older than he was and that it isn't until much later in the film that one of his clients finds out that he's a writer and his reaction is not pretty. There's also a scene about halfway through the film, where Max's mother reveals she has read a lot of Max's writing, but she clearly knows nothing about Sebastian. As a matter of fact, there isn't a character in the movie who isn't aware that Max and Sebastian are the same person.
https://images.mubicdn.net/images/film/397634/cache-928020-1721962197/image-w1280.jpg?size=800x
Watching what happens here brings up a lot of interesting questions. Most important of all, is what the legal ramifications might have been if any of Sebastian's clients knew their encounters were being reproduced on paper, but Mäkelä effectively skirts those issues when Max learn his book is not going to be published because Max's final draft begins to focus on Sebastian's growth in his world as a gay man and less about the sex, but the editor wanted the book to be about sex.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSAFhBAnM7uTRGq4lFhgBh5fTFQJKPe32qXOA&s
It should be noted that there are more than one scene of graphic gay sex in the film and if you are offended by that sort of thing, please be forewarned. These scenes are done with a modicum of taste, but they do go on a little longer than really necessary. Ruaridh Mollica gives a star making performance as Max/Sebastian and mention should also be made of Jonathan Hyde as Nicholas. It's definitely not for all tastes, but there is some very brave filmmaking going on here. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Foxes
Two time Oscar winner Jodie Foster works very hard at keeping an overripe coming of age nelodrama called Foxes watchable and she almost succeeds.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BOTc3MGU2ZjgtNDJkNC00Yjg2LTlhOWItZjBjZTNkYzRlMzBhXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Foster plays one of a quartet of high school girlfriends who are trying to grow up too fast, thanks to neglectful parents and peer pressure. The story, such as it is, finds the girls waking up in the same bed every morning after an evening of drinking, drugs, and unprotected sex, swearing they'e never going to do it again and going right back out there the next night.
https://www.austinchronicle.com/binary/1108/Still_Foxes_1_758_426_81_s_c1.jpg
Writer Gerald Ayers (The Last Detail) and director Adrian Lyne (Fatal Attraction) seem to work very hard at making the way these girls live look glamorous and sexy, but, in an almost mechanical fashion, we watch most of the girls suffer pretty serious consequences for their behavior and Jeannie, Foster's character, has appoionted herself the leader of the group and takes it upon herself to try and get her girlfriends out of trouble, but never does anything to get the girls to stop their behavior.
https://80smovieguide.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Foxes-Kandice-Stroh-Jodie-Foster-Marilyn-Kagan.jpg
One girl, Deirdre, meets a bag boy at a grocery store and is all over him at a concert a few hours later, while the virginal Madge, is later on in the story revealed to be involved with a man (Randy Quaid) old enough to be her father. As for Jeannie, her rock star father is divorced from her neurotic mother and she still has some deep-rooted fantasies about them reconcilng when it's obviouos this is never going to happen, thouogh Jeannie seems to think she has all the answers for her BFFs problems. Of course as the film progresses, so do the severity of their circumstances and though there are meant to shock the viewer, they never really do.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMzM3NDIxMjg2M15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNTIyMDgzNA@@._V1_.jpg
Despite overheated direction from Lyne, Foster is completely winning in the starring role and Sally Kellerman's flashy performance as her mother is also a lot of fun. Foster is also reunited with her Bugsy Malone co-star Scott Baio as a horny teen who is dying to lose his virginity with one of these girls and doesn't seem to care which one. Foster, Kellerman, and Baio seemed to keep their careers going after this, but the three actresses who played Jeannie's girlfriends disappeared from Hollywood after this film. And if you don't blink, you will notice the third film appearance of future Oscar winner Laura Dern, but this film is strictly for Jodie Foster fans. 3

[Gideon58]

Goodrich
Despite the accustomed splendid performance from Michael Keaton in the starring role, a 2024 character study called Goodrich never quite works as it should due to a confusing screenplay that offers backstory but doesn't really explain a lot of what's going on in this guy's present.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMWVkNDNmYjEtNDZiYS00NjcyLWJiMWYtZTc2Y2FhMzc4NTE0XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
Keaton plays Andy Goodrich, a gallery owner who gets a call from his wife, Naomi in the middle of the night stating that she has checked into rehab and is leaving him. Naomi begs Andy to take care of their kids, Billie and Moze, and finds himself leaning a lot on Grace (Mila Kunis), his grown, pregnant daughter from his first marriage,
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Goodrich.jpg?w=1000&h=667&crop=1
The creative force behind this film is a relative inexperienced director and writer named Hallie Meyers-Sheyer, who has provided us with a really likable central character involved in some squirm-worthy situations and making some squirm-worthy decisions. Even though I understand the impulse, I was troubled with Andy lying to his twins regarding their mother being in rehab, the way they found out was a little hard to swallow. He also keeps expecting Grace to drop whatever she's doing tp help him with Billie and Moze. We're not surprised when it's revealed that Grace is harboring resentment with her father because she never saw him as a kid. I love the scene where she is babysitting Billie and Moze and she doesn't have a clue what to say to them, but works very hard not to let her resentment toward her father to spill over to her step siblings.
https://imageio.forbes.com/specials-images/imageserve/672a68f1cce0e699b0fae00d/Michael-Keaton-and-Mila-Kunis-in--Goodrich--/0x0.jpg?format=jpg&crop=3424,1925,x92,y662,safe&width=960
The first half of the film is spent thoroughly establishing the fact that Andy doesn't have a clue what's going on with his children because he's always at the gallery. It's assumed that his business must be going gangbusters, but it's not. He has accrued some major debt and employees are quitting on him right and left. That's what was confusing about this movie. We understand that he was a neglectful dad, so why didn't all that neglect manifest an amazing career? His attempts to mend fences with Grace and his accidental friendship with a gay single dad were pretty much a waste of screentime.
https://resizing.flixster.com/hWN-5rb3aRVdj6TbG1nwIvKA75o=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/9Q1Mqbh22vPyuVHyqVaxXXaEh_s=/ems.cHJkLWVtcy1hc3NldHMvbW92aWVzLzY4ZDg5YzUzLTY3MGEtNGU0YS1iOWNhLTYyNzhjZTU4OTQxZi5qcGc=
Michael Keaton is always watchable and this movie is no exception and really liked the way he worked with Mila Kunis. Kevin Pollak and Michael Urie also make the most of their screentime as a co-worker of Andy's and the gay single dad he meets at Billie and Moze's school. There's also a lovely cameo by Andie McDowell as Grace's mother. McDowell reunites with Keaton for the first time since Multiplicity. If you're a Keaton fan, it's definitely worth checking out. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Barefoot in the Park (1981)
For those whose only exposure to the piece was the 1967 film version, you might want to check out HBO's 1981 production of one of Neil Simon's most famous plays, Barefoot in the Park.
https://manhattanrarebooks.cdn.bibliopolis.com/pictures/584.jpg?auto=webp&v=1354507293
For the uninitiated, this is the story of newlyweds Paul and Corrie Bratter, who have just moved into a fifth-floor walk-up in Greenwich Village after a memorable six- day honeymoon at the Plaza Hotel. As we watch Paul and Corrie deal with their furniture arriving late, Corrie' ditzy mother and their eccentric upstairs neighbor, Victor Velasco, we watch Paul and Corrie
decide that they are two very different kind of people who should never have gotten married.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZWZkNjA0ZjItY2QzNS00NDI2LWFmYTktZGJiZmE0ZmE0ODM0XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Filmed live at the Moore Theater in Seattle, Richard Thomas and Bess Armstrong are absolutely enchanting taking over the roles originated by Robert Redford and Elizabeth Ashley on Broadway and then by Redford and Jane Fonda in the 1967 film version. The 1967 film version was always on my list of films that I felt should never be remade, but technically this isn't a remake, it is a filmed production of the original play in front of a live audience and what we get here is Neil Simon's original play the way it was intended...as a live theater experience that still provides consist laugh out loud for three acts. The production runs a hair over two hours, but I didn't feel the length a bit.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYzVlZDg3NjYtODFkOC00MDcyLTljMzQtOWIyYmU2YjBiNDdkXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Director Harvey Medlinsky, whose experience has been primarily in television, shows a real flair for stage directing, providing colorful and entertaining version of this story that stands up proudly to the 967 fiim. Richard Thomas plays it a little broader than Redford did, but he still erases all memories of John Boy Walton with his take on stuffed shirt Paul and Bess Armstrong is enchanting as the free-spirited Corrie, bringing her own warmth and sexy to the role of Corrie. Jamie Cromwell is very funny as phone installer Harry Pepper and though he might be a little old for the role, Hans Conried is an acceptable Victor Velasco, but if the truth be told, the fabulous Barbara Barrie steals the show as Corrie's mother, Ethel Banks. A wonderful evening of theater reduced beautifully for the small screen. 4

[gbgoodies]

Barefoot in the Park (1981)
For those whose only exposure to the piece was the 1967 film version, you might want to check out HBO's 1981 production of one of Neil Simon's most famous plays, Barefoot in the Park.
https://manhattanrarebooks.cdn.bibliopolis.com/pictures/584.jpg?auto=webp&v=1354507293
For the uninitiated, this is the story of newlyweds Paul and Corrie Bratter, who have just moved into a fifth-floor walk-up in Greenwich Village after a memorable six- day honeymoon at the Plaza Hotel. As we watch Paul and Corrie deal with their furniture arriving late, Corrie' ditzy mother and their eccentric upstairs neighbor, Victor Velasco, we watch Paul and Corrie
decide that they are two very different kind of people who should never have gotten married.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZWZkNjA0ZjItY2QzNS00NDI2LWFmYTktZGJiZmE0ZmE0ODM0XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Filmed live at the Moore Theater in Seattle, Richard Thomas and Bess Armstrong are absolutely enchanting taking over the roles originated by Robert Redford and Elizabeth Ashley on Broadway and then by Redford and Jane Fonda in the 1967 film version. The 1967 film version was always on my list of films that I felt should never be remade, but technically this isn't a remake, it is a filmed production of the original play in front of a live audience and what we get here is Neil Simon's original play the way it was intended...as a live theater experience that still provides consist laugh out loud for three acts. The production runs a hair over two hours, but I didn't feel the length a bit.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYzVlZDg3NjYtODFkOC00MDcyLTljMzQtOWIyYmU2YjBiNDdkXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Director Harvey Medlinsky, whose experience has been primarily in television, shows a real flair for stage directing, providing colorful and entertaining version of this story that stands up proudly to the 967 fiim. Richard Thomas plays it a little broader than Redford did, but he still erases all memories of John Boy Walton with his take on stuffed shirt Paul and Bess Armstrong is enchanting as the free-spirited Corrie, bringing her own warmth and sexy to the role of Corrie. Jamie Cromwell is very funny as phone installer Harry Pepper and though he might be a little old for the role, Hans Conried is an acceptable Victor Velasco, but if the truth be told, the fabulous Barbara Barrie steals the show as Corrie's mother, Ethel Banks. A wonderful evening of theater reduced beautifully for the small screen. 4


I've seen this version of "Barefoot in the Park" several times, and it's a pretty good version, but there's one line in it that I hate the way it's said.

When Corrie says "Six days does not a week make", I hate the way Paul replies "What does that mean?". Not the actual words, but the way he says it.

Other than that, I enjoyed this version.

[Gideon58]

The Substance
A practically unknown filmmaker named Coralie Fargeat is the director and writer of what just might be the most talked about film of 2024, an edgy, repellant, and logic-defying blend of psychological thriller and black comedy called The Substance that borrows from other films and leaves dangling plot points and unanswered questions, but had me riveted to the screen and just might earn its star her very first Oscar nomination.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/ff/The_Substance_poster.jpg
The film stars Demi Moore as Elisabeth Sparkler, a celebrity whose career is circling the drain. In a desperate attempt to save her job on the exercise show that she hosts, she decides to order an elaborate black market drug that she has to pick up at a secret location and is delivered refills of the elaborate concoction every couple of weeks. It's not long before this complex medication seems too make Elisabeth pass out in her bathroom and we see a younger version of herself come out of her back, stitch Elisabeth's back together and take over her life under the identity of Sue, going back every other week to replenish herself with the substance, which she can only retrieve through the use of Elisabeth' body.
https://hollywoodtheatre.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/TheSubstance_Still_04.jpg
There's no denying that Fargeat's story found a whole bunch of movies flashing through my head like Death Becomes Her, Looker, The Skin I Live In and Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, but the elements from these and other films definitely blend into something unique, even if it's not an always credible story, it's never a boring one.
https://compote.slate.com/images/c20ca4ac-2077-4b4e-8b16-03d85173691c.jpeg?crop=1560%2C1040%2Cx0%2Cy0
Fargeat's screenplay seems to waffle regarding committing to the theory that Elisabeth and Sue are the same person, even if they have to depend on each other to replenish and continue, even though Elisabeth's attempts to regain control of her life become more futile as the story progresses. And despite what is happening to her, Elisabeth is given the option of bringing what is happening to her to a halt and she doesn't want to do that, she just wants Sue reined in a bit and we're not sure why. The expected battle between Elisabeth and Sue does fuel a bloody finale, which defies logic but never fails to keep the viewer completely engrossed, even though it does go on longer than it should.
https://www.withashleyandco.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/xThe-Substance-Review.jpg.pagespeed.ic.dxGsaTEWtY.jpg
Moore turns in a spectacular performance that has been generating Oscar buzz for a genre that rarely gets recognition from the Academy, but the fact that Moore has never received a nomination could work in her favor and I wouldn't be shocked if she got a nomination. Margaret Qualley as Sue is a lot better than she was in when she played Ann Reinking in the FX miniseries Fosse/Verdon. Dennis Quaid is fun as Elisabeth's boss and the film features first rate film editing, sound, and sound editing. We haven't seen anything like this, even if it takes a little too long to get where it goes. 4

[Gideon58]

The Preacher's Wife
1996's The Preacher's Wife is a syrupy and overly sentimental Christmas melodrama with music that suffers from a cliched and over stuffed screenplay (from another source) and lifeless direction, despite chemistry between the stars.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/915tQRItMVS._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
This remake of the 1947 film The Bishop's Wife stars Courtney B Vance as Rev. Henry Biggs, the minister at a financially strapped black church that has him so busy that he has been seriously neglecting his beautiful wife, Julia (the late Whitney Houston) and their young son. The water heater in the church is about to blow up and a wealthy real estate mogul (the late Gregory Hines) wants to buy the church so he can tear it down and rebuild. One night at the end of his rope, Henry looks up to God and asks for help, and, seconds later, an angel named Dudley (Denzel Washington) literally drops out of the sky and lands in a snowbank next to Henry's son. He tells Henry that he has been sent there to help him, but, of course, Dudley finds himself more than distracted by his immediate attraction to Julia.
https://d23.com/app/uploads/2015/07/preachers-wife-1180x600.jpg
First of all I have never seen The Bishop's Wife, which starred Cary Grant as the Angel, David Niven as the Preacher, and Loretta Young as the wife, but I have a feeling that the story worked better then because of its suspected simplicity. This story suffers almost immediately because Dudley the Angel informs Rev Henry that he is there to help him save his church, but he forgets all about that once he meets Julia and starts sending her all kind of mixed messages because he has now decided he is going to save the Biggs marriage. There are also a couple of silly subplots like Rev Henry trying to help a troubled teen on his way to jail, the Biggs' son upset because his friend Hakeem can't live with him anymore and Dudley playing the Ghost of Christmas Present to Hines' Ebeneezer Scrooge.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/resizer/v2/KOBJNKI54BIXPDT4B3GUHCUC3Q.jpg?smart=true&auth=b1177e58db943339ab63fff0ba160266c311e106c915fd32cd2da0e7f0ed93c4&width=3000&height=1687
Of course, with Whitney Huston playing Julia, we expect some glorious musical moments, but don't get as many as we expect, though her rendition of "I Believe in You and Me" had my eyes filled with water. The scene where she performs this song also features Lionel Ritchie, in a thankless role as an old friend of Julia's and he doesn't get to sing either. The film seems to be leading somewhere that it never really gets.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/bukaA1szoMQ/maxresdefault.jpg
Penny Marshall's static direction doesn't hep, but the chemistry between Denzel and Whitney is solid and Courtney B Vance makes the most of his role as Rev Biggs. Jenifer Lewis also plays a variation on at least half a dozen other characters she has played as Whitney's mother. Considering the talent involved in front f behind the camera, a bit of a disappointment. 3

[Gideon58]

Saturday Night (2024)
With the 50th season of Saturday Night Live underway, it was no surprise that we would get some sort of big screen salute to the iconic television show; unfortunately, director and screenwriter Jason Reitman (Up in the Air)) only has partial success with 2024's Saturday Night, which starts off promisingly but eventually dissolves into a disturbing mish mash of SNL history and an endless parade of celebrity impressions, not all of which work.
https://resizing.flixster.com/Z_aTWkpj0ODrHF-A0kZpphxigdU=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p28031116_v_h9_ab.jpg
The films opens about 90 minutes before the premiere episode of SNL on October 11, 1975, where we see producer Lorne Michaels running around like a chicken with his head cut off trying to put out the expected multiple fires that were probably going on at the time, like incomplete sets, an unhappy cast member who refuses to sign his contract, standards and practices wanting to rewrite the whole show, and Michaels' inability to explain to NBC hotshots exactly what this show was supposed to be.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMmRhNDc1NDUtNWE0MC00OTkzLWEyZTEtZDM3NDlmZjE4NmYwXkEyXkFqcGdeQVRoaXJkUGFydHlJbmdlc3Rpb25Xb3JrZmxv dw@@._V1_.jpg
Reitman has the same problem with this film that Aaron Sorkin had with Being The Ricardos a few years ago. That film was supposed to be a look at the filming of season 2, ep 4 of I Love Lucy, but it ended up being about Lucy's romance with Desi and her entire B movie career. Here, this film was supposed to be an up close and personal look at the premiere episode of SNL, but what we get is bits and pieces of SNL's long and dirty history wrapped up in this look at the show's premiere and anyone old enough to do the math, can figure out pretty quickly what's going on here. In the first fifteen minutes of the film, we Dan Aykroyd introduce himself to a girl on the set as Fred Garvin, Male Prostitute, a character who would not appear on the show for another four years. We also see prop people trying to figure how to make Aykroyd bleed for the skit where he played Julia Child, which was not part of the premiere episode either.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ6C0FOYr8LV0lMxt-qbXq2GWv6IT5duTmP1g&s
Not only is history just thrown into a big pot and stirred around, there are characters and events that happen in this movie that I'm not sure ever existed or occurred. According to Reitman and Gil Kenan's screenplay, Michaels had overbooked the show and promised standup bits to Billy Crystal and Valeri Bromfield, that were cut the last minute.
https://static1.colliderimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/gabriel-labelle-saturday-night.jpg
As for the performances, loved Gabriel LaBelle (The Fablemans) as Lorne Michaels and Cooper Hoffman (Licorice Pizza) as Dick Ebersol, who took over the show when Michaels quit the first time, but, according to this film, was at Michaels' side on opening night. Loved Corey Michael Smith as Chevy Chase and was very impressed by Nicholas Braun, who played Greg on HBO's Succession, very impressive in two different roles, Andy Kaufman and Jim Henson. Reitman definitely gets an A for effort, but this one should have just concentrated on October 11, 1975 and not try to give us the entire history of SNL. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Wicked
The long awaited screen version of the Broadway musical, 2024's Wicked is a technically dazzling, if slightly overlong look at the relationship between The Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda the Good Witch of the North, before The Wizard of Oz took place, features a somewhat confusing story, but the superb musical numbers and some terrific performances distract effectively. It should be noted that this review is coming from someone who never saw the Broadway musical. It should also be mentioned that I saw ths in an actual theater.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BOWMwYjYzYmMtMWQ2Ni00NWUwLTg2MzAtYzkzMDBiZDIwOTMwXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
The film opens with a formal declaration of the death of the wicked witch (cause of death is reported as being doused by a bucket of water by a little girl). Glinda is quickly dispatched to Munckinland to make the formal announcement of the witch's death, but during her announcement, a Munchkin wants her to confirm or deny a rumor that she and the wicked witch were once friends. Glinda decides to be honest and the story of how Glinda and the wicked witch (whose real name is Elphaba) met, through elaborate flashback.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/M8JBVI6WR0U/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLDMwBE0OXDTuBwBJtQCJGdhwKtCSA
The Broadway musical upon which this movie is based opened on October 30, 2003 and is still running on Broadway today, having done over 8000 performances (though there was a break during the pandemic), so a movie version was just a matter of time. As much as I enjoyed this film, the basic concept of the story is just a little muddled to me. Exploring whether Elepheba was born evil or whether evil was thrust upon her is never really answered here. As a matter of fact. I didn't see Elpheba make an evil move throughout this story. Her fish out of water story is very easy to empathize with because she had always been treated like an outsider because she has green skin, something for which no explanation was offered but it made her childhood a living hell, even worse than her wheelchair-bound sister, Nessarose.
https://www.nbc.com/sites/nbcblog/files/styles/scale_1280/public/2024/11/2551_d133_00142r.jpg
Elpheba accompanies Nessarose to Shizz College where she first meets the pampered Princess Glinda, who treats her like dirt until Elpheba somehow begins charming everyone at the school, especially Madame Morrible (Oscar winner Michele Yeoh) and suddenly, Glinda finds herself having to work for what she wants, and somehow their initial antagonism does blossom into friendship.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/2551_D008_00538R_CROP-H-2024.jpg?w=1296
As we watch the story progress, Elpheba is clearly the story's heroine, which seems to basically re-write the history of The Wizard of Oz, because we don't see anything evil about Elpheba and even though she and Glinda go their separate ways at the end, they part as friends. Though director Jon M Chu (In the Heights) never lets us forget the source of the story either. There's a lovely moment near the beginning of the film where the camera is towering over the yellow brick road and in the corner of the screen, we see a tiny image of Dorothy and her friends on the road. If you blink, you'll miss it.
https://images.foxtv.com/static.livenowfox.com/www.livenowfox.com/content/uploads/2024/05/932/524/5c1f3164-GCT-00007.jpg?ve=1&tl=1
The problems with the story are effectively camouflaged by some dazzling musical numbers and some superb performances, I was particularly blown away by the opening number "No One Mourns the Wicked", Glinda's "Popular", Elpheba's "Defying Grafity" (the best female driven musical finale since Streisand belted out "My Man in Funny Gir) and my personal favorite "What is this Feeling?". Cynthia Erivo delivers a beautifully modulated performance as Elpheba that works in tandem with her monster pipes and Ariana Grande is richly funny and entertaining as Glinda. Shout-outs as well to Jeff Goldblum as the Wizard, SNL's Bowen Yang in a thankless role as a college student, and Peter Dinklage as the voice of the horse Professor Dillamond. This movie runs almost three hours I can't imagine what's left for part two, but part one was pretty damn strong. 4.5

[Gideon58]

Memories of Me
Despite the presence of Billy Crystal and the late Alan King in the starring roles, the 1988 comedy-drama Memories of Me suffers from cliched writing and lethargic direction that makes the film seem four hours long.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNjg5ZGNiNDktNDZkZC00ODU4LTk4MTYtYmQ3MTIzYjViZjBiXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Crystal plays Abbie, a workaholic surgeon who actually has a heart attack in the middle of performing surgery on someone else. The incident frightens him more than he will admit, but with a little nudging from his girlfriend (JoBeth Williams)), decides to fly to LA in an attempt to patch things up with his estranged father (King), a failed actor who is still working in Hollywood as an extra.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZGQyNzUyZmEtNmFhYi00M2JmLWExYjItYzc0YTFjYzdkOTdjXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Crystal's screenplay with Eric Roth (Forrest Gump) seems to be the primary problem here. First of all, because the basic story is about an estranged father and son, which had to be foreign territory for Crystal who, if anyone who saw Crystal's comedy concert 700 Sundays know, had an amazing relationship with his father and was devastated by his death. Number two, King's character is a show business veteran who tells a lot of stories about old Hollywood and makes references to a lot of Hollywood stars that the 1988 movie demographic never heard of and could not relate to.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ENSAfMpK540/mqdefault.jpg
The story also features all those cliched scenes that you expect in such a film like Abbie's initial denial about what happens to himself and then having to admit his feelings to his girlfriend. The scene where father and son finally reunite starts off promisingly and then predictably morphs into a fight that has everyone in the restaurant turning their heads. There's even a beyond ridiculous scene where father and son are driving through an LA tunnel, pull the car over, and decide they are going to have a fist fight. We also get a bucket list scene that is also kind silly and pointless.
https://resizing.flixster.com/ER1hr4BcIKg7UXGKR_GY5Q0YBjs=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/-XZAfHZM39UwaGJIFWKAE8fS0ak=/v3/t/assets/p11130_i_h10_ad.jpg
Henry Winkler made a less than impressive feature length film debut as a director here. The film's lack of pacing can only be blamed on him and probably had a lot to do with the film feeling four hours long. Crystal, King, and Williams work very hard to keep their roles viable and there is a cameo by Sean Connery, who was working on a neighboring set doing The Presidio during production of this film. For hardcore Crystal fans only, who would bounce back very nicely the next year with a little something called When Harry Met Sally. 2.5

[Gideon58]

Juror No.2
Despite some absolutely superb performances, Clint Eastwood's latest film Juror No 2 is an overheated courtroom melodrama that suffers from some cliched writing and a lot of hard to ignore questionable handling of courtroom and law procedures that distracted me from the primary story.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/be/Juror_No._2_%282024%29.jpg
The 2024 film stars Nicholas Hoult (The Favourite; The Gentleman; The Menu) as Justin Kemp, a recovering alcoholic with a pregnant wife, who finds himself selected as a juror for a high profile murder trial, even though he tried to get out of it. As the trial begins and witnesses begin taking the stand, we see Justin having flashbacks that reveal he was at the bar where the murder victim was seen having an explosive argument with her abusive boyfriend and was dead hours later. Justin then flashes back to driving home and hitting what he thought was a deer. When Justin was unable to find the deer, it occurs to him that he might have run over this girl and not the abusive boyfriend who is facing life in prison for the crime.
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Juror-No.-2.jpg?w=1000&h=667&crop=1
OK, I don't even know where to start with all the ridiculous places the screenplay by Jonathan A. Abrams takes us. First, the case is being prosecuted by a tough as nails prosecutor (Toni Collette) who is running for DA and has based her case on the fact that the defendant has an extensive criminal record and that the autopsy report concluded that the victim was struck by a blunt object. Now let's talk about that autopsy report...wouldn't a competently done autopsy report be able to be a little more specific than a blunt object? Are we supposed to believe that a thorough medical exam of a corpse couldn't determine whether or not this girl was hit on the head with a shovel or was run over by a car?
https://robsmovievault.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/juror2.jpg
Then there's the jury room. Of course we get the expected Twelve Angry Men opening where most of the jurors have already convicted this man without even a discussion. Then one of the jurors (Oscar winner JK Simmons), who is a former cop, has a gut feeling that the guy is innocent and decides to conduct his own investigation, outside of the courtroom, with Justin's help, that reveals that the girl was a hit by a car and Justin's car is determined to be the possible vehicle. But when the judge (Amy Aquino) finds out about this independent investigation, she kicks the former cop off the jury and keeps Justin? Seriously?
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Juror-No-2-Nicholas-Hoult-Trailer.jpg
The screenplay offered so little respect for actual law and courtroom procedures that I actually found myself laughing out loud in places, but I have to hand it to Eastwood for the performances he gets out of his cast, who somehow manage to get through this with straight faces. Hoult adds another impressive performance to his resume and Collette is always worth watching as are Chris Messina as the defense attorney, Cedric Yarbrough as a very angry juror and a thankless cameo by Keifer Sutherland as Justin's AA sponsor, who also happens to be a lawyer. Eastwood's work here is sincere, but you can drive a truck through the plot holes here. 2.5

[Gideon58]

I Ought to be in Pictures
Considering the talent in front of and behind the camera, the 1982 film version of the Neil Simon comedy I Ought to be in Pictures, somewhat funny and cliched comedy that suffers from a really annoying central character.
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/YAYAAOSwDNdVn-Zm/s-l400.jpg
Libby Tucker (Dinah Manoff) is a 19 year old girl from Brooklyn who talks to her dead grandmother all the time and has decided that she's leaving Brooklyn to go to California to look up her father, Herb (Walter Matthau), a screenwriter who can't find work and has some monster gambling debts, a situation that is beginning to create a gulf between him and his girlfriend, Steffy (Ann-Margret), a hairdresser at 20th century fox and single mother.
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/H882K9/eigentlich-wollte-ich-zum-film-i-ought-to-be-in-pictures-usa-1978-H882K9.jpg
The stage version of the Neil Simon comedy opened on Broadway in 1980, running an unimpressive 324 performances, so I'm not sure what the rush was bringing the movie to the screen. Manoff is allowed to recreate the role she created onstage that actually earned her a Tony Award. I utilize the word "actually" because it's been awhile I've witnessed a movie character who grates on the nerves the way Libby does here. Even with Simon's golden word processor and director Hebert Ross, who were so effective five years earlier with The Goodbye Girl, really needed to rein in Manoff here. Don't get me wrong, I loved Manoff as Marty in the film version of Grease and as the broken Karen in Ordinary People, but she works my last nerve. She spends most of the movie screaming her lines at the top of her lungs in a very broad Brooklyn accent, but around the halfway point of the film where she has bullied her way into father's life, there is a scene of her rehearsing The Belle of Amhearst, the accent is gone.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/i6h_I4so9tI/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLAfYPpPpdQ97CL2rC9XtxEQMk3nbA
And it's not just the technical aspects of Manoff's performance, but it's Simon's establishment of who this character is. Her talking to her dead grandparents for the first ten minutes of the running time is creepy. Not to mention when she does finally hook up with her father, she overwhelms the man and is not happy with the way it goes because, frankly, no matter how hard the guy tries to connect with Libby, she's not happy with the way it's going. She thinks she knows everything and she's really hard to like. Herb doesn't handle the situation perfectly, but I've seen a lot of movie fathers way more rotten than Herb. The fact that she wants to talk to a man she hasn't seen since she was three about sex was ridiculous.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNmFiNDE0MTAtYjAyOC00YTc4LWJiNTEtYzhjYjg2OWFhNzFlXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
On the other hand, Walter Matthau gives his accustomed expert comic turn as Herb but the real surprise here is Ann-Margret, turning in one of her most thoughtful and intelligent performances as Steffy, Herb's girlfriend who get a lot further with Libby than Herb does. I expected better from Ross and Simon, but fans of Walter Matthau and Ann-Margret do keep the viewer awake. 3

[Gideon58]

The Sugarland Express
His first assignment in the director's chair was directing the legendary Joan Crawford in the pilot for an NBC anthology series called Night Gallery. He really put himself on the map when he directed a now classic ABC movie of the week called Duel which led to his feature length directing debut, a sweeping and emotionally charged fact-based adventure called The Sugarland Express which, even back in 1974, showed Oscar winning director Steven Spielberg's skill at cinematic storytelling.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81TUz7v0WcL._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
This is the story of a woman named Lou-Jean Poplin (Goldie Hawn), who has just been released from a Texas jail after eight months and has decided to reunite her family. With a little assistance, she manages to bust her husband, Clovis (William Atherton) out of jail and convinces him to drive to a neighboring town called Sugarland, where their son, who has now the foster son of an elderly couple, nd get him back. At the beginning of their journey, they are confronted by a state trooper named Maxwell Slide (Michael Sacks), who they manage to get his weapon from and take as hostage, initiating a gargantuan yet methodic chase across Texas, headed by a principled but determined police Captain (Ben Johnson), who wants to resolve this situation with as little bloodshed as possible.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTg4NzA3MDQ1NF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwMDEyOTA0NDM@._V1_.jpg
The screenplay by Spielberg, Matthew Robbins, and Hal Barwood reminds me a lot of the screenplay for Ron Howard's Apollo 13 in that the story is presented from all possible points of view. We understand Lou-Jean's desire to reunite her family and Clovis' initial reluctance. We understand Slide's cooperation with his captors, not just in terms of his won safety, but their safety as well and we actually understand the bonding that begins to happen between Slide and the Poplins. We understand the police Captain pretending to have sympathy for the Poplins merely as an instrument to get the Poplins' sympathy in order to protect his frightened trooper. Best of all, we have Mr. and Mrs. Looby, the baby's foster parents, who have no intention of handing this baby over to the Poplins.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTU2NjUxMjk5OF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwNTEyOTA0NDM@._V1_.jpg
The parade of police cars traveling slowly behind the Poplins was expected, but the film really comes alive whenever the Poplins needed to stop for anything, whether it be food, another vehicle, or for Lou-Jean to go to the bathroom. That scene where they drive a port a potty into the middle of a field so that Lou-Jean can relieve herself provides Hitchcock-calibre suspense and that scene where three rednecks stumble onto the Poplins and decide to take them out themselves was awesome.
https://www.cinematheque.qc.ca/cdn-cgi/image/format=auto/workspace/uploads/projections/sugarlandexpwa-cl2-shoes-fr-1721077886.jpg
The performances are first rate down the line. Goldie Hawn shocked audiences with a powerhouse performance that was done during the final season Laugh In[/I. Far superior to her Oscar-winning performance in [I]Cactus Flower and despite the long and distinguished career he would have after this, I don't think William Atherton has ever been better than he is here. Michael Sacks is terrific as Slide and I've always thought it was odd that I never saw him in another movie. But it's Spielberg's cinematic eye that is the real star here. 4

[Gideon58]

Dope Sick Love
HBO Documentaries knock it out of the park with an ugly and unflinching look at the power of addiction and where it can take a person in a 2005 documentary called Dope Sick Love that, more precisely than anything I have seen actually documented, shows what an addict's "bottom" is..
https://simkl.in/fanart/14/14023633ecb90bd5f2_w.jpg
This claustrophobic, frightening, and heartbreaking film follows two couples. Matt and Tracy and Michelle and Sebastian, in cinema verite style, as they drag the streets of Manhattan doing whatever they have to do in order to feed their addictions to crack and heroine. Tracy is first observed at Western Union office picking up money that she asked her father for and Michelle is observed trying to pick the lock on an apartment building entrance door so that she and Sebastian can sit on the steps or get in the elevator and get high.
https://static1.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/a-man-with-his-tongue-out-looking-at-a-needle-in-dope-sick-love.jpg
We observe Matt prostituting himself with men in order to make drug money and we see Michelle employ multiple hustles in order to make money other than prostitution, most notable getting into cars with men and then pretend to be a cop by flashing fake badges at them. There's also a scam regarding store receipts dug out of trash cans that really shouldn't work but it does.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/nW7GQmNPd6U/hqdefault.jpg
The most amazing thing about this documentary is the logistics that had to be involved in following these two couples all over Manhattan getting high. In my wildest imagination, I cannot figure out how movie cameras were able to follow these two couples into vestibules, stairwells, abandoned buildings and actually film them getting high. How this film was made without the stars or the crew members getting arrested is a total mystery. I couldn't believe the clerk who fell for the receipt scam wasn't the least bit suspicious about these people coming into their store being followed by cameras. it should also be mentioned that this film is rich with actual drug use from the two couples and I would recommend addicts think twice before watching this film, because it could be what addicts call a "trigger."
https://images.mubicdn.net/images/cast_member/512547/cache-639827-1612062651/image-w856.jpg
The pathetic factor increases with every scene, especially when Michelle decides she has had enough and wants to go to rehab. She calls Belleview but can't get a bed until the morning, so what do she and Sebastian do until the morning? Somehow Matt and Tracy end up moving into an apartment by the film's conclusion. I don't know how that happened, but they are seen joyously moving into their new apartment, still smoking crack. Research revealed that Michelle might have OD'd seven years after this film was made, but these are rumors. This is a harrowing and squirm worthy film experience unlike anything I have ever seen. 4.5

[Gideon58]

Dear Santa
From the creative forces behind Dumber and Dumber, There's Something About Mary, and Me, Myself, and Irene comes Dear Santa, a 2024 comic fantasy that suffers from a ridiculous screenplay and perhaps the dumbest central character in cinema history.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMDNjMzcxNTEtODRjYi00MGQ4LWE3YjAtNjllYzE1OThmZmRhXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
The film is about a chubby twelve year old named Liam, who has learning disabilities, socialization problems and parents who are fighting all the time who writes a letter to Santa but misspells the word Santa and after he mails the letter in a pretend mailbox and before you know it, Satan (Jack Black) appears in Liam's bedroom and even though he can't prove to Liam that he's not Santa, he ignores Liam's letter and, instead decides to grant him three wishes.
https://i0.wp.com/bloody-disgusting.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-07-090426.png?fit=1394%2C744&ssl=1
The Ferrelly Brothers have a pretty solid record making slightly raunchy comedies that always bring the funny, but there's just a lot of stupid stuff going on here that I found hard to believe. First of all, this kid misspelled "Santa" on his envelope? Who misspells "Santa"? I don't care how dyslexic a person is, I'm pretty sure everyone knows how to spell Santa. I also didn't understand why, when asked to prove to Liam that he's not Santa, he makes himself look like what we all think Santa looks like. And i wasn't crazy about the fact that Satan appeared in the bedroom of a twelve year old boy with the mission of taking away his soul.
https://www.rogerebert.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/DearSanta_16326R_RT-jpg.webp
The story takes a little too long with exposition, we pretty much understand Liam about five minutes in, except for the fact that he's a twelve year old and still writing Santa. It's also about 30 minutes into the film before Liam actually realizes that Satan is not Santa and for some reason, feels trapped into making three wishes. I also didn't understand why Satan needed to put a spell on Post Malone making him worship Liam. I have to admit though, as dumb as Liam appears to be here, it's kind of hard not to like him.
https://legendary-digital-network-assets.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/07162216/Jack-Black-Dear-Santa-1.jpg
With all that said, Jack Black is terrific in the title role and does bring the funny and Robert Timothy Smith is a total charmer as Liam, but the laughs are a little too scattered to provide consistent laughs, but hardcore Black fans might want to give it a look. 2.5

[gbgoodies]

Dear Santa

The Ferrelly Brothers have a pretty solid record making slightly raunchy comedies that always bring the funny, but there's just a lot of stupid stuff going on here that I found hard to believe. First of all, this kid misspelled "Santa" on his envelope? Who misspells "Santa"? I don't care how dyslexic a person is, I'm pretty sure everyone knows how to spell Santa.


You obviously don't know anyone who is dyslexic. I know several people who have Dyslexia, and they have trouble with many simple words. One person even had trouble writing his own name when he was a kid, and his name only has three letters.

"Santa" may be an easy word for most people, but it's very possible for someone with Dyslexia to mistakenly spell it as "Satan".

[Gideon58]

That might be so, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg of the problems with this movie

[Gideon58]

A Real Pain
Jesse Eisenberg impresses as the director, screenwriter, and star of 2024's A Real Pain, an edgy and often emotional look at a broken relationship attempting to heal against an unusual and haunting backdrop.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BODY2YWYwM2YtZTVlNC00MjgyLTgzYTgtNmFmYWE5ZmY1MDM5XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
David (Eisenberg) and Benji (Kieran Culkin) are cousins who have been brought together for the first time in six months by the death of their grandmother. Grandma left them money for the specific purpose of traveling to Poland, her birthplace, as part of a tour group honoring the Jews who survived the holocaust and those who didn't, a tour which includes a visit to an actual concentration camp.
https://media.newyorker.com/photos/67293e2c1ecf315c67d8c809/master/w_2560%2Cc_limit/Brody-Front-Row-A-Real-Pain.jpg
A co-production of the United States and Poland and what felt like a real passion project for Eisenberg, there's a lot of care and sensitivity utilized in the crafting of this story, almost to the point of over complexity but at the heart of this story is a compelling and completely believable family tension that bubbles beneath from the beginning of the film that takes longer to come to the surface than it should have, but we still want to know what exactly is going on with these cousins who are clearly avoiding something from their past or trying to forget it but just can't.
https://i.abcnewsfe.com/a/65ee85b9-3944-4e15-b42c-f5642c0476b4/pain-2-ht-er-241021_1729546206614_hpMain_16x9.jpg
While we wait to find out exactly what is going between David and Benji, we are treated tp a glorious postcard dedicated to a rare setting for a film. Pretty sure this was my first exposure to a film shot entirely on location in Poland, but it actually made for an attractive and historical backdrop for this story. Even though Benji found it annoying, the constant information provided by the tour guide (Will Sharpe) was fascinating and I found a genuine chill coming over me as the tour group entered an actual deserted concentration camp.
https://www.kveller.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/arealpain.jpg
Once the family secrets begin to unfold between Benji and David, I found myself wishing that Eisenberg gotten to it a little sooner because there was such an air of familiarity to it. Looking at it from David's POV, I think everyone has a Benji in their life...someone they love and hate and worry about and envy and want to punch in the mouth.
https://deadline.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/011_ARP_240206_JS_G2-72746.00_21_04_22.Still054_rgb.jpg
The performances by Eisenberg and Culkin light up the screen. Culkin won a Best Supporting Actor Golden Globe for his flashy Benji but Eisenberg's quietly angry David is equally as effective. He nails that scene at about the halfway point where he finally breaks down about Benji. It takes a little longer to get where it's going and the ambiguity of the ending is a bit of a heartbreaker, but this is compelling entertainment. 4

[Gideon58]

Nightbitch
I thought I had seen everything that cinema had to offer after watching The Substance, but found out I was wrong as I still collect my thoughts regarding another 2024 oddity called Nightbitch whose inexplicable 180 turn from black comedy to science fiction is almost legitimized by a performance from the leading lady that could earn her a seventh Oscar nomination.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNjI2NzNjMDAtMjI3NC00YzJhLWIyYTktNzZhMzg0MmRkNDM3XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
Amy Adams commands the screen as a woman who has gone into a complete meltdown since the birth of her son. Post partum depression is a masterpiece of understatement regarding what this woman is going through. She absolutely adores her son and wants to be the best mother she can possibly be, but she resents the sacrifices she has had to make in order to become a mother. She resents she had to give up her job, she resents the inability to lose the baby weight, she resents the 24 hour demands that motherhood requires, and probably most of all, the lack of support she is getting from her husband. Frighteningly, the emotional turmoil that this woman is going though has manifested a physical transformation within her that is literally turning her into something that is not human.
https://i0.wp.com/awardswatch.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/NB_13152.jpg?resize=640%2C427&ssl=1
Director and screenwriter Marielle Heller, who directed Melissa McCarthy to an Oscar nomination in Can You Ever Forgive Me? and Tom Hanks to a nomination in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, has crafted a story that starts off as what could be a thoughtful and detailed look ag the effects of post partum depression, a subject that hasn't been addressed a lot in mainstream cinema. Unfortunately, like a 2018 film called Sorry to Bother You, the film starts off as a near brilliant black comedy and then takes a dramatic turn into what can only be referred to as science fiction as no other explanation is offered to this reviewer's satisfaction.
https://www.rollingstone.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/NB_10887_1.jpg
We get subtle hints to what is going on through this mother's inner dialogue which, despite being from her gut, is not always heard by the other characters in her orbit. We see childhood flashbacks that don't really offer any clues to what's going on either. We do get to see the first actual transformation, which reminded me of David Naughton's first transformation in An American Werewolf in London, but it's only temporary as we see her return to human just as quickly with no explanation, not to mention her attracting all of the animals in the neighborhood, who are not only drawn to her but seem to have appointed her their grand poobah. We're at a loss though when she starts raising her son like an animal and we're not sure whether he's transforming too or just accepting what's going on.
https://www.themarysue.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Nightbitch.jpg?w=1200
Despite the bizarre story, we stay invested because Amy Adams delivers an absolutely dazzling performance in the starring role that could work her way to an Oscar nomination the same way The Substance might for Demi Moore, though this film is not nearly as good as The Substance, we remain invested because Adams demands it of us. 3

[Gideon58]

Paddington
Despite some minor issues with logic and continuity, the 2014 comic fantasy Paddington provides solid entertainment thanks to first rate production values and a central character you instantly fall in love with.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91kF7jWoRXL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg
The story revolves around a family of bears living in Peru who are discovered by an explorer named Montgomery Clyde. After a hurricane destroys his home and kills his parents, the cub stows away on a ship bound for London where he has been informed the explorer is there and will provide him with a home. Alone at the train station, the cub is befriended by the Brown family, headed by Risk analyst, Henry (Hugh Bonneville) and his writer, wife Mary (two time Oscar nominee Sally Hawkins) and their two children. As the bear, who the family name after the train station where they found him, Paddington, begins adjusting to life with the Brons, we are introduced to an evil taxidermist named Millicent (Oscar winner Nicole Kidman), who has her own agenda regarding Paddington.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTYxOTQ2MzE0Nl5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwNTg2MTEwNDE@._V1_.jpg
The screenplay takes a little too much time providing backstory for Paddington, but once we get into his fish out of water existence with the Browns, the film does kick in, there are laughs watching Paddington adjust, but some things that just didn't make sens. Paddington has his first encounter with a bathroom and has no idea how anything in there works, yet, twenty minutes later, we see him lookng up infromation about Montgomery Clyde on a computer...he doesn't know what a toothbrish is but he knows how to use a compyter. I also found it curious that, despite the fact that Paddington speaks perfect English, when he is asked hi sname by Mr. Brown, he can only respond with a noise, like Daryl Hannah did when asked her name in Splash. One thng I did love about this CGI cutie pie (delightfully voiced by Ben Whishaw) is that he had impeccable manners.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTQ5MTgyODg0NF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwOTg2MTEwNDE@._V1_QL75_UX388_.jpg
Paddington is definitely one of those movie characters who does all the wrong things for all the right reasons...when the Brown daughter complains because he kept her out of the bathroom, making it impossible for her to wash her face, he does it thoroughly for her, using his tongue. Also loved when he saw a pickpocket drop a wallet and chased him all over the streets of London to retun it to him.
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/proxy/6H7xgvR5X4OUNu7NieL-uRPil1JZ7hlnKLc8d9vU1A-ugGBGfIP_oo0o8f82RmuSWATRX0mONsDGpsuGqVa8qYAqbQg4lPht7pYFVUbvnuW26j77e75eO5WZyGJvllAldrMcGtjzE2glCrq E6KJLzXuhe8-rTq1gTj4A1kf0DRn5SAZ3wQc
Kidman makes a perfect villainess, sort of a contemporary live action Cruella DuVille (rarely looking so breathtaking) and I have to admit the reveal of her agenda with Paddington I did not see coming. Sally Hawkins is wonderful as Mrs Brown and I also loved Peyer Capaldi as the Browns' nosy upstairs neighbor. Breezy, entertaining fun that has inspired two sequels (so far). 4

[Gideon58]

Emilia Perez
Still collecting my thoughts after watching 2024's Emilia Perez, a sweeping, emotionally charged, cringy and undeniably original musical drama from France that has earned thirteen Oscar nominations this year, more than any other film this season. This film ran roughshod over my emotions and had me talking back to the screen, not to mention after it was over, I had to google to find out whether or not it was a true story, which it is not. Will attempt to review without spoilers.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNjBhMWVmYjQtYmI2NC00NjdiLTliMjQtODliYjI5OTZmMzczXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
This is the story of the leader of a dangerous Mexican drug cartel named Manitos who hires a brilliant but unfulfilled attorney named Rita for her assistance in finding a surgeon who will perform the final operation in order for him to trans into a woman. During his first meeting with Rita, he reveals to her that he has already been in treatment for transition for two years without anyone's knowledge, including his wife Jessi and his two children. After an ugly meeting with a top surgeon who is curious about Manitos' motives, the operation if performed and Manitos and Rita part ways before Rita actually sees Manitos as a woman. Four years later, Rita is reunited with Manitos, who now calls himself Emilia Perez and is trying to start her life over, attempting to make amends for all the damage her cartel caused and to reunite with her family.
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/11/15/multimedia/13emiliaperez-review-lqkz/13emiliaperez-review-lqkz-videoSixteenByNine3000.jpg
Director and co-screenwriter Jacques Audiard, whose previous credits include a 2018 fim I really liked called The Sisters Brothers has crafted a story that is centered around a character intended to evoke sympathy from the viewer, as someone who really seems to want to make up for the crimes of her past, and somewhere deep in her gut, believes transitioning is the answer, but as she was warned by the surgeon who performed the operation, this is not true. Emilia is observed to be very content in her new life, but the doctor's warnings come to fruition as Emilia begins to take steps to get her family back and this is where my sympathy for the character wanes. In order for the transition to work, Emilia went to elaborate lengths to keep this secret from everyone, including his family and the only way he could do that was to fake Manitos' death, which try as I might, I just couldn't justify him doing that to his children.
https://i.abcnewsfe.com/a/9d95aa7e-82e0-4db5-b458-2d41ddd62cad/Zoe-Saldana-still-ht-gmh-240826_1724693170525_hpMain_2.jpg
On the other hand, I liked the positive changes that transitioning brought o Emilia and her community. And it might not be the way everyone who sees this movie will see it, I don't think Emilia's motive for transition was purely in the name of self-preservation. Before transitioning, Manitos sings a song to Rita explaining why she wanted to do this and this viewer believes that Manitos truly felt he was a woman trapped in a man's body.
https://virginiafilmfestival.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Emilia-Perez-Final-scaled.jpg
The film features extravagant location photography and expensive production values. I was apprehensive as the film began because I couldn't figure out how this was going to work as a musical, but it totally does. The songs connect to the narrative and don't pause the story for musical interludes...you never see the songs coming and when they do, they made this reviewer smile. It should be mentioned that the film was made in Spanish, but like 2019 Best Picture Parasite, it is available in English. I watched it in Spanish with English subtitles, it felt more realistic that way.
https://www.usmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Why-Is-Emilia-Perez-Controversial-The-Biggest-Criticisms-of-the-Oscar-Nominated-Film-169.jpg?crop=117px%2C78px%2C1785px%2C1008px&resize=1200%2C675&quality=86&strip=all
Karla Sofía Gascón has become the first transitioned actor to receive an Oscar nomination for Outstanding Lead Actress, and I understand the nomination in the world we live in, but I definitely don't see her winning. On the other hand, I think Zoe Saldana is going to win Best Supporting Actress for her dazzling performance as Rita, which I was thrilled allowed her to utilize her dance skills, which have been dormant since Center Stage. This might also be a case of category fraud, because Rita is clearly a leading role, but I think submitting her as supporting actress will guarantee her the win. Selena Gomez also impressed as Jessi, but it is this one of a kind story that keeps this movie on sizzle. 4.5

[Gideon58]

Mystic Pizza
A 1988 coming of age drama called Mystic Pizza doesn't offer anything unconventional in terms of storytelling or film technique, but it is the film that made moviegoers sit up and take notice of an actress named Julia Roberts and her performance alone makes this one worth a look.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91T8MIzMUNL._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
This is the story of three female besties who grew up together in the tiny hamlet of Mystic, Connecticut (I google it, it's a real place) and now all work together in the same pizza parlor.
The bookish and virginal Kat (Annabeth Gish) has recently accepted a job as babysitter to a cute kid and finds herself crushing on the girl's hunky single dad (Billy Moses); Daisy (Roberts) is a sexual free spirit who finds herself drawn to wealthy college student (Adam Storke); JoJo (Lilli Taylor) is trying to repair her relationship with her fiancee, Bill (Vincent D'Onofrio) after passing out at the altar at the beginning of their wedding.
https://www.thirteen.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/62/2021/10/ViewerGuide_MysticPizza.jpg
I was a little surprised that it took three screenwriters to come up with this paper thin story, that is about as predictable as they come. We have the three girls stuck in dead end jobs that they all hate; however, none of them are really doing anything about it. They seem more concerned about getting laid than getting ahead and their constant whining about it makes you want to do a Loretta in Moonstruck and tell them to "snap out of it!" We've seen a million movies with stories like this where the main characters are guys, but for some reason, having the same kind of characters female, makes them seem a little more pathetic and unsympathetic.
https://i0.wp.com/filmotomy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Mystic-Pizza.jpg?ssl=1
But the problems with the film seem to fall to the wayside whenever Julia Roberts is center stage, luminous in only her third feature film appearance. Her Daisy is a fiercely sexual creation of the actress and director that rings true every time the camera comes her way. I was also impressed that Daisy uses sex as a weapon and admits it free and openly,. The chemistry she creates with Storke is pretty strong, It was a little sad to learn, via IMDB, that Storke hasn't worked since 2018 in the television series Westworld.
https://i.redd.it/eraxviwbd9u91.gif
The direction by Donald Petrie (Miss Congeniality) is static and makes the film seem longer than it really is. Lilli Taylor provides her accustomed charismatic turn as the hot mess JoJo and I was shocked by the sex on legs performance by D'Onofrio as Bill...yes, Vincent D'Onofrio, sexy as hell looking like a young Tim Robbins, but this is Roberts' movie and hardcore fans will not be disappointed. 3.5

[Gideon58]

The Apprentice (2024)
Despite some melodramatic and difficult to swallow plotting and storyline moves (a real issue with a docudrama), the 2024 film The Apprentice remains watchable thanks to the Oscar-nominated performances from the two leads.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61X8agcdRxL._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
This is a look at President Donald Trump back when he was a Manhattan real estate mogul, who was actually in a lot of legal trouble at the time and found almost magical assistance and a role model in infamous attorney Roy Cohn, known best for his roles in the McCarthy Hearings and in the prosecution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. We watch as Cohn magically gets Trump out of his legal hassles and is then tossed aside by Trump utilizing everything he learned from Cohn, even his romancing of high fashion model Ivana, who he threw enough money at that he eventually did marry her.
https://roxie.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/202442Film.jpg
This reviewer had definite issues with the screenplay where, like Best Picture nominee Emilia Perez, initially attempts to paint Trump in a sympathetic light, which was futile. Luckily around a third of the way through the film, the story forgets all of that and begins to show Trump for the sexist, lying, egotistical, hypocritical, bigot that he is who is so quick here to announce that everything he is doing is for the good of the country. All this Trump cares about is power and keeping his own pockets lined. The film actually opens with Trump entering one of his buildings and knocking on apartment doors, personally collecting the rent. I can't picture Trump actually doing that, but I can see him having anyone late or short with the rent evicted without blinking an eye.
https://static1.moviewebimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/maria-bakalova-and-sebastian-stan-in-the-apprentice.jpg
Not really down with the presentation of Donald's relationship with Ivana either. The relationship begins with Donald throwing his money at her, which I do believe. What I don't believe is the way the film tries to perpetrate Ivana having no interest in Trump's money, but then it gets real during the best scene in the film where Trump has proposed to Ivana and he and Cohn meet with Ivana to have her sign the prenup. I also totally believe the scene after they're married when Ivana tells him he's fat and bald and what it leads to.
https://media.newyorker.com/photos/6707f814050f79eba0e91a08/16:9/w_1280,c_limit/Brody-The-Apprentice.jpg
Director Ali Abbasi displays some skill here and makes the most of his big budget. Sebastian Stan, who I loved in I Tonya completely invests in this unflattering portrait of Trump, making the guy really hard to like. I definitely understand the nomination. Jeremy Strong is absolutely bone-chilling as Roy Cohn, a performance that would have nailed him the statuette in another season, but I still think Supporting Actor is going to Strong's Succession co-star, Kieran Culkin. Also have to give a shout out to Maria Bakalova, who received a Supporting Actress nomination for Borat Subsequent Moviefilm, who is surprisingly effective as Ivana. Stan and Strong do make this film worth sitting through, despite slight overlength. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Conclave
Men and women of great religious faith are often forgotten to be flawed and human and feel emotions like jealousy, resentment, ambition, and inadequacy. For this reviewer, these are the underlying themes of 2024's Conclave, a biting and intense experience of political-like mystery of such anger and sincerity that has captivated audiences and reviewers alike, earning eight Oscar nominations including Best Picture.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71BipU-HQZL._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
The story opens at the deathbed of the current Holy Father, where we meet the Dean of Cardinals, Father Lawrence (Ralph Feinnes), who is expected to become the new pope; however, Lawrence is having a crisis of faith and is really not interested in becoming the new pope. Father Bellini (Stanley Tucci), who was closer to the Holy Father than anyone, is very interested in the position, but has no support behind. Father Tremblay (John Lithgow) has as much interest in the position than Bellini, but possesses a lot more ambition. It's also revealed that one of the Cardinals in contention for the position is black, which would, of course, be historical, and that's the just the beginning of the cinematic onion that gets peeled here.
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Conclave-Movie.jpg
The brilliant screenplay by Peter Straughan and Robert Harris have constructed a screenplay rich with characters of great faith, but also people with great ambition, resentment, and unworthy of where they are now. The treatment of the election of a new pope, which is called a conclave, makes up the meat of this story as we watch fear, jealousy, ambition raise their collective heads and enter the souls of all of the characters.
https://media.gq.com/photos/674e2108e3cbb0b177336e2b/16:9/w_2560%2Cc_limit/1202-conclave-2.jpg
I began to see what was going on with the introduction of Father Tremblay, a character whose stench came right through the screen where we first begin to suspect that nothing is as it seems and watch the story get uglier and uglier. We are totally thrown with the actual introduction of a sex scandal is thrown in and completely knocks the story off its feet.
https://thetigercu.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Untitled-1200-x-675-px-1.webp
Director Edward Berger, who received an Oscar nomination for co-writing 2023's All Quiet On the Western Front, has mounted this story on a gorgeous canvas, utilizing first rate production values. I think the screenplay is a dead lock for the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar and I think it has a shot at Best Picture as well. Ralph Feinnes, Stanley Tucci, and John Lithgow deliver powerhouse performances that drive the narrative and I also loved Volker Bertelmann's music, also Oscar nominated. A gripping story that takes a moment to get going but then offers constant surprises once it does. 4

[Gideon58]

A COMPLETE UNKNOWN
A dazzling performance by Timothee Chalamet that has earned him a second Oscar nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor is at the center of a unique and riveting musical biopic of musical icon Bob Dylan called a Complete Unknown that doesn't travel the typical biopic route because Dylan was not your typical musician.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYTA2NTA5NDYtMzlkOC00MTQxLWI0NDQtMzk2M2YzMGE4MTkxXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
The 2024 film opens in the 1960's where we see Dylan travel to a hospital to visit his musical idol, Woody Guthrie, who is now bedridden and unable to speak. He also meets Pete Seegar there who becomes his musical mentor and leading him to an eventual level of superstardom as a singer and songwriter that I don't think Dylan was actually interested in.
https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56047552e4b00047c4e83900/de0db2cb-d71f-422a-9c33-90a5b15d5166/ACompleteUnknown_1.jpg
Director and co-screenwriter James Mangold, who directed Reese Witherspoon to an Oscar in Walk the Line gets a lot of credit for a screenplay that doesn't follow the typical biopic path, providing varied surprises along the cinematic journey. The Dylan presented in this story is a guy who is passionate about his music, but had very little interest in the glamorous trappings that accompany success in show business. There's a scene where he opens up a royalty check for $10,000 and doesn't bat an eye. We never see big changes in his lifestyle and unlike a lot of movie musicians, his guitar is not an appendage that never leaves his chest. There are no scenes of him getting hooked on drugs and alcohol or passing out onstage. His reaction to being expected to sing at a fundraiser where he didn't even bring his guitar or a theater full of people who demand he sing "Blowin with the Wind" when it wasn't on his play list ring totally true. He loves music but we never really see it consume him or he get consumed by the business. He also never forgets Pete Seegar and Woody Guthrie and the impact they made on his music.
https://hollywoodlife.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/GettyImages-2157237178_48cc1a-e1721828370326.jpeg
As for his personal life, romance is implied between Dylan and a young hippie named Sylvia Russo, but a romantic tension is also presented between Dylan and Joan Baez that isn't directly addressed until the final third of the film and when it is, it seems that Dylan is completely unaware of what Baez means to him. But romance is not what this movie is about. It's about a musician who, according to this screenplay, cared about his music and nothing else...not really.
https://images.seattletimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/202412111210MCT_____PHOTO____ENTER-COMPLETE-UNKNOWN-MOVIE-REVIEW-MCT.jpg?d=2040x1360
The film has received 8 Oscar nominations including Best Picture, Best Actor for Chalamet, who once again effortlessly disappears inside a character and could finally earn him the Oscar he's been chasing. Edward Norton has received a Supporting Actor nomination for his Pete Seegar, and Monica Barbaro as Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Joan Baez that provides quiet chills and some lovely vocals. Fans of Dylan and Chalamet will have a ball here. 4

[Gideon58]

Lady Be Good
When I sit down to watch a classic movie musical and I see the names Eleanor Powell and Busby Berkley in the credits, I have certain immediate expectations. They were not met with a 1941 MGM musical called Lady Be Good, but I did get a surprisingly entertaining movie musical.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/Poster_-_Lady_Be_Good_%281941%29_03.jpg
This is the story of a composer named Eddie Donegan (Robert Young) who writes Broadway music while his wife, Dixie (Ann Southern) writes the lyrics. They do achieve a modicum of success, but they find that working together puts a strain on their marriage leading to, not one, but two, divorces. After the first divorce, they get together and write a smash hit song that sends their careers soaring again and Eddie wants to give their marriage a second try, but Dixie has decided that she likes things the way they are.
https://cometoverhollywood.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/lady-be-good4.png?w=430&h=565
The screenplay for this film is rather clever, with the film opening up with the Donegans in divorce court and the majority of the story unfolding in flashback. It's a little corny the ay Eddie sits at the piano and plays music and then Dixie just tells him to stop for a minute she instantly comes up with words for the last 16 bars that he played, but we accept it because we are supposed to understand that Eddie and Dixie belong together and we are willing to accept the slightly longer than necessary journey to their reconciliation.
https://play-lh.googleusercontent.com/proxy/pFRZc9hTlfQ_r87Pa0AZFAMFVjqP71nXphHzUM3P5-40X_80EZtLU8hrhuejbTe3yOR-lvD5V4SzMAAz4O4TNnlSWmlhVM1QB7rJx4Fbb6OFTwk=s1920-w1920-h1080
What surprised me here was the thankless role assigned to Eleanor Powell, who plays a Broadway dancer who starred in several of the shows that the Donegans wrote and even appears on the stand during the opening courtroom scenes. For some reason, Powell's role as Dixie's best friend is rather thankless, playing Dixie's wisecracking best friend, the kind of role you would expect Eve Arden, Mary Wickes, or Thelma Ritter to play, but this was definitely not Powell's forte. She doesn't dance until the final third of a film and in only two numbers: She does a compact number in her apartment with a dog as a partner and, then with the aide of Busby Berkley, provides a sparkling finale with "Fascinating Rhythm", a number that was featured at the opening of That's Entertainment III.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMjIxNTU4NjA3MF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNjYzMTMyNw@@._V1_.jpg
Young and Southern make a smooth musical couple (Young actually does some pretty convincing faking at the keyboard) and the film also features an appearance by the Berry Brothers, a dance specialty trio who were just as talented as the Nicholas Brothers but never quite achieved the fame than Harold and Fayard did. The film features some terrific songs, especially the title tune and "The Last Tim I Saw Paris", which won the Oscar for Best Song of 1941. It's not top tier MGM, but it certainly held my attention. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Anora
Sean Baker, the creative force behind films I really liked such as Red Rocket and The Florida Project, has triumphed with a blazing and ferocious black comedy called Anora that often strains credibility and features some outrageous characters doing ridiculous things, but kept this reviewer glued to the screen with a story that recalls some of the finest work of Quentin Tarantino, and has received six Oscar nominations, including Best Picture.
https://resizing.flixster.com/FTHBGq9jCInQsKBj9dhfLIVIxrM=/ems.cHJkLWVtcy1hc3NldHMvbW92aWVzLzg2NWVmODUwLWIzMDAtNGVkMC1iODgwLWZmZDAyOTVkODkwYS5qcGc=
The 2024 film centers on a sex worker named Anora, who prefers to be called Ani, who works out of a Los Angeles strip club. One night she connects with a young man named Ivan who speaks broken English, but whose first language is Russian, who spends a whole lot of money on her. With dollar signs in her eyes, Ani gently begins pushing Ivan into a relationship and after a week or so, he suggests they fly to Vegas and get married. The honeymoon is over pretty quickly though when it's revealed that Ivan is the son of some sort of Russian mobster and that his parents are on their way to the states to have this marriage annulled.
https://www.slugmag.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Brody-Anora.jpg.webp
To reveal anymore of the story would ruin it, but Baker's screenplay is richly complex and requires complete attention as well as closed-captioning. Closed captioning isn't an initial issue because Ivan does speak some English and Ani conveniently understands Russian, but as more characters arrive on the canvas, most of them do speak Russian, and unlike Parasite where the fact that it is in Korean becomes a non-issue, it is not here and if I hadn't turned on the closed captioning there was a whole lot that I would have not understood here, especially where certain characters' loyalties lied.
https://img.rasset.ie/00213bcf-614.jpg?ratio=1.5
There were certain elements of this over the top story that were a bit hard to swallow. It was hard to believe that Ani actually thought this kid Ivan owned that house and that all that money was his. It was also hard to believe that after everything about Ivan and his family put her through, Ani fought so hard to stay married to the guy. There were plot moves I loved though like upon his family's arrival, the first thing they did was obtain a copy of the marriage license. I also loved that we don't meet Ivan's parents until the final third of the film and that Mom apparently wears the pants in the family. I was also impressed with a sexual dance that develops near the finale that reminded me of the sexual dance at the finale of the 2016 Best Picture Moonlight.
https://hips.hearstapps.com/hmg-prod/images/yura-borisov-as-igor-671a98a6e2038.jpg?crop=1xw:0.8438861985472155xh;center,top
Baker's direction is raw and unapologetic in its concepts of sex and violence, and though it runs a little longer than necessary, never felt the need to check my watch. The screenplay is absolutely Oscar-worthy. Mikey Madison has earned a Best Actress Oscar nomination for her bad-ass title character who fights everything that happens to her here with an intensity I couldn't believe. Yuri Borisov has earned a supporting actor nomination for his smoldering performance as Igor and Mark Eydelshteyn stole every scene he was in as the pathetically childish Ivan. A nightmarish comic thriller that will stay with you long after the credits roll. 4

[Gideon58]

Flow
A 2025 Oscar nominee for Outstanding Animated Feature and Outstanding International Feature, Flow is a haunting and harrowing post Apocalyptic animated adventure that I didn't completely understand, but found myself riveted to the screen for the economic running time.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BOTM5ODBlOTAtYjcwZi00YzkzLWIzODEtMTM2MTZlNDFmMWU2XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
As the film opens, we find a cat in the wilderness trying to avoid a pack of dogs and an avalanche of deer when a flood hits the forest carrying the cat onto a ragged abandoned boat where the cat finds temporary safety along with one of the dogs who was chasing him, a lemur, a capybara, and a large white bird who, as the water continues to rise, indicating nothing but a possible end to the world, this disparate group of animals must work together to survive, despite the fact that none of the animals take charge of the situation.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZGU4OTU4NzEtYTA1Yi00MWM4LWEwZjMtNjFkNzA3NGQ5ZTI5XkEyXkFqcGdeQWFkcmllY2xh._V1_.jpg
A product of Latvia, Belgium, and France, this beautifully unique story contains no dialogue, no actors, and no human characters. The only time in the movie that a human body is observed is at one point when the boat passes by a submerged body where all we see is the head and one of his hands. It begins rather innocently as the dogs start chasing the cat, as nature intended, but an eventual challenge of all of these animals' place in the balance of nature begins to float to the surface as the water rises.
https://static0.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/flow-11.jpg
There was one moment that I definitely didn't see coming where the boat actually encounters another boat which has nothing but lemurs on it. They briefly inspect their fellow travelers and then re-board their own vessel shooting daggers at our animal friends. It reminded me of that brief moment in The Poseidon Adventure where the survivors briefly encounter a group of passengers who are going the opposite way they are. We expect the lemurs on the second boat to help or join our heroes but they just go on their merry way, which I found to be very strange. Loved when the cat dove in the water to catch fish to eat and shared them with his fellow travelers.
https://resizing.flixster.com/c0YEvKwzhJLyFuTRVJLt17znWqM=/fit-in/705x460/v2/https://resizing.flixster.com/ePqWhniZiyk_F6pmcFh43bXRcNs=/ems.cHJkLWVtcy1hc3NldHMvbW92aWVzL2QzZjAwODQ1LTg5NDktNDIyZC1hN2VlLTJlMmZjMWIwNTZkMC5qcGc=
The animation here is computer-generated but not in the pursuit of realistic animals, but in the pursuit of a dream like state in which this kind of story could be legitimized. If director and co-screenwriter Gints Zilbalodis were looking for realism in terms of the look of the film, it wouldn't look the way it did. The film is gorgeous to look at, but not in a realistic vein. Yet, only genuine animal sounds were used for the animals. I loved the way the cat meow always sounded a million miles away. The moment where the cat gets snatched by the bird is being transported mid-air is genuinely terrifying. Won't be seeing anything like this anytime soon. 4

[Gideon58]

The Brutalist
The screenplay definitely could have used some tightening, but 2024's The Brutalist is a sweeping and disturbing epic that initially appears to be one man's pursuit of the American Dream but takes the viewer on a journey that leads to an ugly and disturbing climax that galvanizes the viewer, but it shouldn't have taken as long as it did to get where it went.
https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/571e7cc14c2f859b347c0167/1737326663504-5UMKFPSQO9MB1MBJ7NFH/brutalist_ver4_xlg.jpg?format=1000w
The story introduces the viewer to Lazlo Toth, a Jewish immigrant who escapes post war Europe in the 1940's looking to begin a new life with the help of his brother. Though he initially finds work in construction/contracting, he is eventually revealed to be a brilliant architect through his work on the remodeling of a library of a wealthy industrialist named Harrison Van Buren who has the power and influence of a mob boss and who is so impressed with Toth's work that he enlists his skills in building his own empire in 1947 Philadelphia. The bond between Toth and Van Buren appears to be unbreakable until the arrival of Toth's wife and niece.
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/12/20/multimedia/20brutalist-review-print2-bwct/20brutalist-review-print2-bwct-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale
Director and co-screenwriter Brady Corbet deserves major kudos for the scope and power they have brought to this story of one man's pursuit of a new life that, I'm not sure why, had me flashing back to films like Citizen Kane and There Will Be Blood as we watch a central character initially bathed in penniless obscurity but revealed to be man with his own vision and a passion for what he does and not willing to compromise said passion, even for this guy Van Buren. And it's a little jarring when Van Buren respects Toth's vision and is shockingly protective of the guy, even when Toth pisses off business associates. Something is off about his blind loyalty to Toth until Toth is behind a tragedy that is a PR nightmare for Van Burnett which we think is going to spell the end of their relationship but it definitely sends it in an ugly direction we don't see coming.
https://i0.wp.com/leonardmaltin.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Brutalist-Film-2174x1350-1.jpg?fit=2174%2C1350&ssl=1
The story takes a little too long to kick into gear, spending almost a half hour showing Toth's journey to America in the hull of a ship, with nothing to his name until he manages to unite with his brother Atilla, who gives him a job in his furniture store. But it's after Van Buren hires and fires Toth and discovers his past in Europe as an architect and that the film really begins to engage the viewer. Those opening scenes might have been better spent exploring Toth's backstory as an architect. Also loved the hate/hate relationship that develops between Toth and Van Buren's son, Harry, one of the slimiest characters I have seen in a movie in a long time. Harry's place in the finale is crucial to its power, though I did find the epilogue a little longer than necessary.
https://assets.vogue.com/photos/6793069780771d869f9c3357/master/w_2560%2Cc_limit/INTERNAL%2520STILL%2520REFERENCE.00_42_04_00.Still020.jpg
The film has been nominated for 10 Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director for Corbet, and Best Actor for Adrien Brody's riveting performance as Lazlo, that could definitely land this richly talented actor a second Best Actor Oscar. The incredibly versatile Guy Pearce has landed his first Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor as did Felicity Jones for her performance as Lazlo's sickly wife, Erzebet. I would love to see this one win the cinematography Oscar it has been nominated for. The images of storm clouds about to burst but never doing so perpetuate a lot of scenes and stayed with this reviewer. The ugliness of the climax could keep this film from winning Best Picture, not to mention the fact that it had no business being three hours and 21 minutes long, but this is still one journey worth taking. 4

[Gideon58]

The Wild Robot
The creative force behind Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon has come up with an engaging and slightly zany look at nature Vs technology called The Wild Robot that has earned three Oscar nominations including Outstanding Animated Feature.
https://www.peterbrownstudio.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/WRB_Teaser1Sheet12_1080x1350_3.jpg
This is the story of a robot who is being delivered somewhere by boat, but the boat is thrown off course and the robot, whose name is Rozzlun 7134, ends up stranded on a deserted island. Rozzlun manages to break out of his box and begins looking for the person who ordered him. He meets nothing but fear and terror as the animals on the island either fear or terrorize Rozzlun offering no help, except for a fox, who befriends Roz, when he finds himself the unwilling guarding of a baby gosling.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNGYyNmQwYjctN2RhZC00ZWY1LThmMTQtMTkyMDQ5MmM4MjM4XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Director and screenwriter Chris Sanders has concocted an initially engaging film that starts off as a look at science VS nature centered around a central character who kind of reminded me of Robin Williams' Mork...an invention who soaks up everything he learns about real life like a sponge, but his literal interpretation of creatures and events often comes up as callous and unfeeling, but Rozz has no emotions, he operates by mechanical commands, complicated by the fact that he has no one to command him. The closest display to emotion we get from Roz is the varied colors that light up in his exterior wiring during varied situations. This is why he spends the first twenty minutes of the film trying to locate who ordered him, but to no avail. Rozz' initial battle with a fox over the gosling doesn't have any emotional basis, but he fights with every circuit within him.
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/wild-robot-3.jpg
The story takes a different direction as the gosling, who has been named Brightbill, grows up and is surprised to find hostility from other geese, who reject him because he was raised by Roz. While Brightbill deals with racism from his own people, Rozz may have located who ordered him but cannot completely extricate himself from Brightbill's life.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ-ju0kaZ77RKdMnh7B8BF-9oBtBsC7E_Hws7hDCjB_p7kCv7h86YNowK1y-y7XO6WOqe0&usqp=CAU
The film features crisp and colorful animation and a first rate voice cast led by Oscar winner Lupia Nyongo as Rozzand Kit Conner as Brightbill. Catherine O'Hara, Bill Nighy, Ving Rhames, Mark Hamill and especially Pedro Pascal offer solid support in other roles, but it's the two central characters in this very offbeat story that makes this one sparkle and dance. 4.5

[Gideon58]

The Last Showgirl
Despite an eye-opening performance by Pamela Anderson in the title role, 2024's The Last Showgirl never really tugs heartstrings or ignites tear ducts as I think was intended, making for a slightly labored movie experience.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/hZDs_lLGrTU/maxresdefault.jpg
Anderson plays Shelley, a Las Vegas chorus girl who has been dancing in the same show for about 30 years. At the beginning of the film, we learn that the show is being closed in two weeks forever and being turned into a circus.
https://houston.culturemap.com/media-library/pamela-anderson-in-the-last-showgirl.jpg?id=55517112&width=2000&height=1500&quality=65&coordinates=0%2C0%2C0%2C0
Screenwriter Karen Gersten makes her full length feature debut as a screenwriter, having written for television shows like The Good Place and Mozart in the Jungle, but she may have bitten off a little more than she could chew with a story centered around the business of show business that features some interesting characters but featured a lot of stuff that was really hard to swallow.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/4AC0C1RMGYc/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLA3D2yKmZO6rHxN-CKwobPkTajXCg
I was a little troubled by the fact that a 42-year old Las Vegas showgirl who is going to be unemployed in two weeks never consider another kind of work. Though in the final 15 minutes, she does say she might consider becoming a cocktail waitress like her BFF Annette (Oscar winner Jamie Lee Curtis) who got aged out of dancing in Vegas years ago.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTZ4ltHgq5o1jz0eBbKewUtCaidXwmQikV95Q&s
Don't get me wrong, Anderson works very hard to make the character of Shelley viable and she is likable, even though she might be in denial about the bubble she's been in living in and doesn't realize that the business has changed a lot in the thirty years she's been dancing in the back of a Vegas chorus line.
https://i.abcnewsfe.com/a/aba0097d-ee88-4422-b5a4-09f505b9a189/last-show-girl-ht-lv-241230-2_1735609361006_hpMain_1x1.jpg?w=992
The subplot of Shelley's reunion with her daughter, Hannah, did ring true for the most part. Hannah's hostility and apparent embarrassment about her mother is instant and jarring and my jaw dropped when it was revealed that, in the last 30 years, she has never seen her mother's show. It feels like Anderson is depending a little too much on her lack of eye makeup to carry her performance. She still looks great though and there's a bravery in this performance. Curtis too, especially a scene where she dances on top of a casino table that never would have gone on that long in a real Vegas casino. It also bothered me that Shelley is made to look ridiculous in her audition at the climax of the film...everything that choreographer said to her was absolutely correct.
https://ticketing.phoenixmovies.net/CDN/media/entity/get/FilmBackdrop/f-HO00002162?width=1920&referenceScheme=Global&allowPlaceHolder=true&fallbackMediaType=FilmTitleGraphic
Anderson is surprisingly effective in a performance that actually earned her a Golden Globe nomination. Shout-outs to Dave Baustista as the show's stage manager and Keirnan Shipka, who played Sally Draper on Mad Men a much younger girl on Shelley's chorus line. The movie is a nice idea and there are solid performances, but I don't think it accomplishes what it was intended to accomplish. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Misunderstood
Another great performance by the late Gene Hackman raises the bar on a soapy 1984 melodrama called Misunderstood, which might try to cover a little too much territory in its exploration of topics like grief and the art of single parenting, but the story scatters in too many different to sustain viewer interest.
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/Dm0AAOSwRo9j0ZhI/s-l400.jpg
Hackman plays Ned, a wealthy American businessman who works in North Africa and has spent a lot of time away from his family, but is forced to step up when his wife dies and he must take care o his two sons, Andrew and Miles. He gets off to a very shaky start by being honest with Andrew about what happened to his mother,but deciding that Miles is too young to handle it, telling him that mom is "away."
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/3NFnrBD82U4/maxresdefault.jpg
The screenplay is kind of all over the place as it pretty much skips over Ned's grieving process and watches him trying to be the father to his sons that he needs to be. Sadly, Ned is rather clueless about what he's doing because he treats Andrew a lot older than he really is and treats Miles a lot younger than he really is. This has such a severe effect on the brothers that they find themselves drifting away from their father. He is especially rough on Andrew as he lays a lot of responsibility on Andrew regarding Miles that Andrew is just not up to. It's sad watching Andrew doing anything he can think of to get his father's attention while Miles does anything he can think of to get his brother's attention and we sadly watch this grieving family falling apart.
https://i0.wp.com/weegiemidget.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/misunderstood-e1627914112166.jpg?w=456&h=304&ssl=1
It's a little confusing because we watch Ned being completely devoted to his late wife (played in flashbacks by the late Sunsan Anspach) but there's little difference between the way he is observed with her and the way he is observed with his sons and we never really see the absentee father that he's supposed to be. We only get one scene early on in the film where Ned tries to talk about he's going through with his brother-in-law (Rip Torn), who is also have issues with the loss.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTI4MzMyNjM0N15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMjY1NDAxMw@@._V1_.jpg
However, Gene Hackman always had the ability to carry a film past its imperfections and Hackman does that in spades here. He brings a sensitivity to this performance that I hadn't seen since Twice in a Lifetime. Director Jerry Schatzberg, who directed Hackman in Scarecrow gets a beautifully understated performance from the actor that almost makes the film seem better than it is. Henry Thomas (ET) and Huckleberry Fox (Terms of Endearment are lovely as the young brothers trying to deal with the loss of their mother and the battle for their father's affection. Appointment viewing for Hackman fans. 3

[Gideon58]

You’re Cordially Invited
My first viewing of a 2025 film is the brainchild of the director of films like Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Get Him to the Greek. You are Cordially Invited is an overblown and unoriginal comedy that features a lot of unseemly plot elements and a lot of stuff borrowed from other films.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMGM3MzQwMWItNjM2Ny00NTkwLThkZWMtZmNiYTlhMGZlN2JhXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
The film stars Will Ferrell as the father of one bride and Oscar winner Reese Witherspoon as the sister of another bride who have double-booked their weddings at the same venue and attempt to co-exist iand figure out a way for both weddings to happen.
https://dims.apnews.com/dims4/default/ae958e9/2147483647/strip/true/crop/3000x2000+0+0/resize/599x399!/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.apnews.com%2F00%2Fa8%2F803d888cf628b0df6417867f7781%2F2b4ead8a40164766a406 8bf6a33ade16
Director and screenwriter Nicholas Stoller has chosen a story that is more suited to be a sitcom episode than a feature length film. There's a little too much time spent on setting up the two families and the often bizarre characters on either side of this war. I found the relationship between Ferrell's Jim and his daughter, especially cringy...their karaoke rendition of "Islands in the Stream" was the most uncomfortable father/daughter relationship thing I’ve seen onscreen since Sasha Baron Cohen and Maria Barkalova in Borat Subsequent Moviefilm.
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2025/01/31/multimedia/30Youre-Cordially-Invited1-qbtp/30Youre-Cordially-Invited1-qbtp-googleFourByThree.jpg
There's a good ten minutes spent on a fictional game show that Witherspoon's character is the producer of called "Is it Dead" which features former SNL cast member Bobby Moynihan as the host. Of course, the idea that these two weddings could co-exist was ridiculous from jump and pretty much impossible to invest in from the moment Ferrell and Witherspoon arrive at the hotel and Ferrell pulls out a pencil and manages to shade his original reservation made by the recently deceased manager on the day she died. There's so much going on here and it becomes pretty much impossible to care about the seemingly endless plot elements that make the film seem 14 hours long.
https://s.abcnews.com/images/GMA/will-ferrell-reese-witherspoon-ht-lv-240514_1715710450234_hpMain_1x1_608.jpg
In addition to being the stars, Ferrell and Witherspoon are also the executive producers of this mess and their wearing of multiple production hats definitely shows in their over the top performances. Jack McBrayer tended to grate on the nerves as the hotel manager as did Keyla Monterroso Mejia, who was so annoying as Maria Sophia on Curb Your Enthusiasm, and equally annoying here. Celia Weston and Jimmy Tatro, who was so funny in Theater Camp, make the most of their roles as the mother and groom of one of the brides, but the laughs are pretty scattered here. 2.5

[Gideon58]

View From the Top
My complete disdain for Gwyneth Paltrow as an actress has been confirmed with a silly and pointless comedy from 2003 called View from the Top which even Paltrow appears to be embarrassed to be part of.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTg2MTk2MzkxNF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTYwNjg0NTk5._V1_.jpg
She plays Donna, the small town daughter of trailer trash who wants to make something out of her life and believes the way to do it is to become a flight attendant, but it's not an easy road, not to mention how Donna's career ambition continually interferes with her romance with a hunk named Ted (Mark Ruffalo).
https://www.pluggedin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/view-from-the-top-1024x628.jpg
The inexperience of screenwriter Eric Wald shines through in every frame of this film which is rich with cliched characters and plotting that has been ripped off from hundreds of films of the past. We watch Donna begin her career with a third rate airline that only flies drunk to Vegas and then gets separated from her bestie (the late Kelly Preston) while she and other bestie Christine (Christina Applegate) attend an elite flight training school run by a former flight attendant (Candice bergen) and a cross-eyed instructor (Mike Meyers) who has never gotten over the fact thiat his vision issues have kept him from getting his wings.
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/F6J94M/release-date-march-212003-movie-title-view-from-the-top-studio-bullshead-F6J94M.jpg
Director Bruno Barreto provides sluggish direction though he does manages to get sme interesting folks to popop in for cameos like Rob Lowe,Stacey Dash, Joshia Malina (in a role that seems to have been written for Sean Hayes), Jon Polito, and Marc Blucas, but if the truth be told, this movie has all the substance of a Frankie and Annette beach movie but isn't nearly as entertaining. Ruffalo is the only one who comes out of this one with his dignity intact. 2

[Gideon58]

Nickel Boys
It was one of the most acclaimed films of 2024, receiving Oscar nominations for Best Picture and for Adapted Screenplay, but for this reviewer, Nickel Boys was a stuffy and pretentious look at race relations in the 1960's with an Oscar-nominated screenplay that splits off in too many directions to determine exactly what the movie is supposed to be about.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMGRkMzIyY2QtMjc5My00NGRjLWE5ZGUtYjRiMDNjMzAwOTU0XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
The film opens in Florida during the 1960's where we meet an intelligent black teen named Elwood who is on his way to great things in his life when hitchhiking to his new school, the car he is riding in gets pulled over and in the very next scene, Elwood is observed being transported to a reform school called Nickel where he strikes up a friendship with another kid named Turner that is key to his survival.
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/12/13/multimedia/12nickelboys-blck/12nickelboys-blck-videoSixteenByNine3000-v2.jpg
The film begins very strangely with the viewer seeing everything from Elwood's point of view, as if he were making a home movie. As a matter of fact, it's 36 minutes into the laboriously overlong 2 hour and 19 minute running time that we see Elwood's face for the first time. Then there's a scene where Elwood and Turner are in the cafeteria with four other boys and we first see the scene from Elwood's point of view and then the exact same scene from the viewpoint of the other boys and it's not really made clear what the point of that was.
https://static1.colliderimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/nickel-boys-_-official-trailer-0-47-screenshot-1.jpeg
Though the film is based on a Pulitzer-Prize winning novel by Colson Whitehead, apparently Nickel is a real institution that was in operation until circa 2011 and the film eventually does reveal what the film is supposed to be about, but it takes way too long to get there. There are also several scenes with Elwood's grandmother, played by Oscar nominee Aunjanue Willis-Taylor (King Richard) that bring the film to complete halt. There is one particularly cringy scene between Grandma and Turner, shot from Turner's point of view, where Grandma has been told she can't see Elwood but takes this opportunity to flirt with Turner.
https://media2.firstshowing.net/firstshowing/img16/NickelBoysReleaseposterbigmain598.jpg?width=599
Director and co-screenwriter RaMell Ross gets a little too full of himself by employing artsy camera technique and deadening pacing that really requires a lot of patience from the viewer. This is another example of how weak the year 2024 was for film because this film didn't deserve either of the Oscar nominations it received or the acclaim it had. The performances by Ethan Herisse as Elwood and Brandon Wilson as Turner are superb, but I don'r get what all the fuss was about. 3

[Gideon58]

Joe Dirt
David Spade made a rather half-hearted attempt to become the next Adam Sandler with a silly 2001 comedy called Joe Dirt that does provide sporadic laughs, but just gets dumber and dumber as it progresses.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/69/Joe_dirt.jpg
The title character is a janitor who has a Billy Ray Cyrus wig attached to his head that was placed there when he was a child because he has a hole on the top of his head. Flashbacks reveal that Joe was left at the Grand Canyon by his parents and after being interviewed on the radio by a shock jock (Dennis Miller), Joe decides to make it his lmission to find his parents and find out why they left him at the grand canyon.
https://www.pluggedin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/joe-dirt.jpg
Spade co-wrote this comedy with Fred Wolf where Spade's character reminds a lot of the angry man-child charaacters that Adam Sandler played in films like Billy Madison, Happy Gilmore, and The Waterboy, but all of those characters are a lot brighter than Joe. The way Miller's shock jock treats him during his first radio interviiew is beyond rough, but for some reason, this guy actually attracts an audience and by the end of the movie, has actually become a folk hero.
https://www.reelingreviews.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/joedirtpic.jpg
The radio interviews with Joe are actually the frame upon which of the story comes to fruition, in the form of vignettes that are more stupid than funny. We actually see this guy ride in an air balloon shaped like a tooth that crashes into an oilfield where he gets a job where he is fired after a week, leading him to a carnival, a hate hate relationship with his girlfriend's father (Joe Don Baker), cnstantly dealing with a childhood bully (Kid Rock), and getting assistance in his mission from an Indian named Kicking Wing (Adam Beach), and a nutty janitor named Clem (Christopher Walken)
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/B6u32FkPGgg/maxresdefault.jpg
The movie had a pretty huge budget, evidenced in a lot of location filming from all over the country, but as we know, pretty scenery does not a movie make. Spade works very hard at providing laughs and gets a little assistance from Miller and Walken. Also loved Fred Ward and Caroline Aaron as Joe's parents, but if the truth be told, Spade is no Adam Sandler. The movie did decent box office, so it's not surprising that there is a sequel, which I am in no rush to see. 2.5

[Robert the List]

For some reason this thread doesn't seem to show up in the forum/reviews section?

[Gideon58]

The Only Girl in the Orchestra
It's definitely not for all tastes, but if you're a musician or have a desire to find out exactly what it takes to be a musician, you should definitely find some pleasure in The Only Girl in the Orchestra, a 2023 Netflix documentary that somehow won the 2025 Oscar for Outstanding Documentary Short.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMDVlNmEyMTQtYmJkMi00MDQ0LTljMGYtZDJkYzA0NDdiN2NkXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
Molly O'Brien, a television and documentary film producer who has been working steadily since the year 2000, decided to mount this documentary about her aunt, a legendary double bassist named Orin O'Brien who, in 1968, became the first woman to join the New York Philharmonic, under the direction of the late Leonard Bernstein.
https://dnm.nflximg.net/api/v6/BvVbc2Wxr2w6QuoANoSpJKEIWjQ/AAAAQUNhfiyQPXjN8cj5JwRVQrEQRKVErgVKXKK-hGDzgMur5236aTulXrTvz1lcWxlnGVEaJ4RF88fYfZ07zy8v1PUT59TIeIlUb6jGfhYWNLv1tnQj39B4hRYwcrtxNA8aVsbP0otM 90KhB1qtmaAcy_uxVfE.jpg?r=995
One of the first things we get to see that immediately legitimizes the necessity of this documentary is a closeup of a hand-written note from Bernstein describing Orin as a "miracle." The documentary is shot at a real turning point in Orin's life because she is not only retiring, but she is moving out of the Manhattan apartment where she has lived for about 50 years.
https://filmschoolradio.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Orin-9_A.jpeg
Molly cleverly interweaves footage of her aunt working with current students and talking to former students, but allows Orin a lot of time on the audio track to talk about the things that drive her a musician, and surprisingly, one of them is not to be a star. Orin makes it clear here that her desire was to be part of an ensemble, not a star. I love when she describes being part of an orchestra like being a part of a nuclear submarine that cannot operate without her presence.
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/The_Only_Girl_in_the_Orchestra_00_01_52_13.jpeg?w=1000&h=667&crop=1
The film also reveals that Orin is the daughter of a movie star named George O'Brien, whose credits include 1924's Iron Horse and 1927's Oscar-winning Sunrise. It was lovely watching her talk about her father and how sad it was for her to watch as his career began to fade. Not to mention a hectic childhood that included attending ten different schools before she was 18.
https://static1.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/the-only-girl-in-the-orchestra.jpg
The real joy in this film though was watching what drives this woman and it isn't always verbalized. If the truth be told, my favorite scene in the film is when the movers arrive to move her piano out of the apartment and she is watching with such intensity to make sure they don't damage it and at one point, she is even observed dabbing a tear from her eye as the piano legs are being removed. I also loved watching her attending a concert with Molly and all the musicians she is there to watch, get up to greet her. Really enjoyed this, but it could have been an hour and a half instead of 34 minutes. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Full of Life
My theory that Judy Holliday never made a bad movie is again confirmed with a sweet-natured 1956 family comedy called Full of Life, which would be the second to final film for Holliday.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNjJmNjQ4ODMtNzRjMy00NzNhLThiNTItZjU5YmIwMzBjYWFjXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
We are introduced to the Roccos, Nick (Richard Conte) who is a writer, who has just moved into a new home with his wife Emily (Holliday), who is eight months pregnant with their first child. Emily is driving Nick and everyone else in her orbit crazy because at this point in her pregnancy, her hormones are in overdrive and everything everyone does is driving her crazy. After an accident in the house for which the Roccos can't afford the repair costs, Emily convinces Nick to turn to her father, a master carpenter, to handle the repairs, but for some reason, Nick wants nothing to do with his father.
https://prod-images.tcm.com/Master-Profile-Images/fulloflife1957.75820.jpg
John Fante was allowed to adapt his own novel into a screenplay, an intimate look at family dynamics that finds a pregnant woman on the verge of insanity putting all of her energy into mending the relationship between her husband and her father-in-law no matter how much the two men fight it. Although, it is amusing that Emily goes ballistic every time Nick even glances at another woman. There's a great scene near the beginning of the film where Emily catches Nick in the back alley talking to a female neighbor and the camera zooms in on the woman's tiny waist.
https://assets.mubicdn.net/images/film/114361/image-w1504_overlaid.jpg?1445949500
Once again, Holliday is highlighted in another role that isn't another dumb blond like Billie Dawn. This character not only has strong opinions about religion and the way her children are raised but also shows off Holliday's underrated skill at physical comedy. Her moments of silliness are perfectly balanced with an intelligence we don't see coming. Richard Conte displays skill at light comedy that I've never seen before as Nick, and Salvatore Baccaloni steals every scene he's in as Nick's father. Holliday fans will be delighted. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Sing Sing
A 2024 Best Picture nominee, Sing Sing is an emotionally charged melodrama that takes place at the world's most famous prison, but provide a fact-based story that we really don't expect with some characters actually playing themselves.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSO731cZcyeAWWQFmxZ4zI_Tij2-_ezrp3B3SAZPoHf5LQwRidMNvwTgTAOMBcmSOphES4&usqp=CAU
This is the story of a Sing Sing inmate known as Divine G, who is in prison for a crime he did not commit who finds a passion and a purpose through a special program in the prison called RTA ,an acronym for Rehabilitation through the Arts, where prisoners actually put on theatrical productions. As the film opens, the group has just finished a production of King Lear and they are now preparing to do an original comedy that Brent Buell, the director has written about time travel and visiting various fictional and non-fictional characters along the way.
https://assets.apnews.com/9b/8f/2d5796203ed76fa8601bc11c702f/7166aabf226849cc95675234ecad7590
Director and co-screenwriter Greg Kwedar has stumbled upon a wonderful subject for a film about an actual program that has been in operation at Sing Sing since 1996. Kwedar has given the story a real air of authenticity by using some of the actual prisoners playing themselves. As a matter of fact, the scenes in the film where the prisoners are auditioning for parts in the time travel comedy are the scenes that Kweder used to decide which prisoners he actually wanted to use in the film. I have to admit I had a hard time accepting the fact that hardened prisoners at Sing Sing would be interested in acting, but as the film progresses, it was very acceptable.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNDQ1OTVhODUtNTJiZC00Y2JlLWJlNmEtNzc1MjFiZDA1MTY3XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
A lot of this acceptance comes from the Brent Buell character, who is deadly serious about this program and forces the participants to take it as seriously as he does. He is observed doing acting exercises that I have done in acting classes that made up for some of the best scenes in the film. There's a great scene where Brent asks the actors to close their eyes and go to the most special place in the world for them and then gets descriptions of the places, which, of course, were all very different.
https://www.pluggedin.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/sing-sing.png
Kweder also keeps the audience in a state of semi-fantasy as we see the actors rehearsing on this giant stage and then when the day is over, returning to their tiny cells. which are about the size of a bathroom. We also get to see the affect acting has on a lot of these guys who want to learn more about what they are doing, but also find it hard to take criticism about what they're doing. Love the scene where one actor is doing Hamlet and when Brent feels the prisoner is not feeling the character, he has him do it over, just using the subtext of the scene instead of the actual dialogue. Kweder's story never lets us forget we are in a prison either when one member of the company is murdered halfway through the film.
https://images.seattletimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/08052024_TZR_Movie-Sing_Sing-3_tzr_152628.jpg?d=1200x630
As much as I enjoyed this film, the whole time I was watching I couldn't help but think how much more effective it would have been as an actual documentary, with Kweder actually going inside the prison, talking to the prisoners one on one, filming rehearsals, getting a little more background on Divine G and his life before prison, and possible interviews with the executive staff at Sing Sing and get their thoughts on the program.*
https://e3.365dm.com/24/08/1600x900/skynews-sing-sing-clarence-maclin_6669962.jpg?20240829102952
Colman Domingo received his second Oscar nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor for his riveting work as Divine G. There are two scenes that I think nailed the nomination for Domingo: the one where he is in his parole hearing about early release and the one right after it during the dress rehearsal where G has a total meltdown. Mention must also be made of Clarence Macklin and Paul Raci, who received an Oscar nomination for Sound of Metal, as Brent. A rock solid docudrama that this reviewer thought would make an even more compelling documentary. 4

[Gideon58]

Night Moves
The presence of the late Gene Hackman raises the bar on a pretty standard detective drama from 1975 called Night Moves.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/R5l9UXujx-s/sddefault.jpg
Hackman plays a private investigator named Harry Mosely who is hired by a woman to find her runaway teenage daughter who has been missing for two weeks. Harry may have stumbled into a lot more than expected when the trampy young woman seems to have a rather unnatural relationship with her stepfather.
https://itpworld.online/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/nightmoves1.jpg
Alan Sharp's screenplay is nothing groundbreaking with the exception of some colorful characters anchored by Hackman's Harry. His skill at what he does is displayed early on as he gets some vague help from his client, a former actress and seconds later Harry is observed driving in his car listening to all of the information he has obtained on her. It felt very state of the art for 1975. I liked the subplot of Harry discovering that his wife (Susan Clark) is having an affair and the unconventional way he deals with the fact that she doesn't even try to deny it, but seems to want to work things out with Harry. The mess that is Harry's marriage is vividly real and it seems like it might distract him from his job, but it does not.
https://filmfreedonia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/nightmoves17.jpg
I was also impressed that we didn't have to wait until the final scene for Harry to locate the girl and that locating her was just the tip of the iceberg. There's a rea ick factor in the relationship between this young girl and her stepfather, not to mention stepdad has a mistress named Paula who isn't working very hard to keep her man and the girl apart, but finds herself drawn to Harry. The unexpected appearance of a corpse in the water adds what is really an unnecessary element to the story.
https://www.cinematicpanic.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Night-Moves-1975-movie-review-jpg.webp
The direction by three time Oscar nominee Arthur Penn (Bonnie and Clyde) is surprisingly pedestrian, but the cast does keep it interesting for the most part. Jennifer Warren, who played Paul Newman's ex-wife in Slapshot manages to create some chemistry with Hackman as does Clark. A very young Melanie Griffith is an eye opener as the teenage tramp and a few other familiar faces pop up along the way, including Kenneth Mars, James Woods, Harris Yulin, Dennis Dugan, and if you don't blink, you'll catch a glimpse of Max Gail, who played Wojo on the ABC sitcom Barney Miller, but Hackman is the one who keeps the viewer invested. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
2024's Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl is actually the seventh film featuring these delightful stop animation characters that was so clever, so imaginative, and so freaking funny, it earned a 2025 Oscar nomination for Outstanding Animated Film. It also motivated me to go back and watch the first six films.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/87/Vengeance_Most_Fowl_poster.jpg
For those who are new to this franchise like myself, what I gathered from what I saw here, Wallace is an eccentric, slightly dim, but always well-intentioned inventor who lives in a secluded cabin somewhere in an English countryside with his dog Gromit, who doesn't speak, but actually seems to spend most of his time keeping Wallace out of trouble and learning deal with Wallace's constant inventions that are supposed to make their lives easier.
https://dnm.nflximg.net/api/v6/2DuQlx0fM4wd1nzqm5BFBi6ILa8/AAAAQWTS5IrBpgojG1n3qStIruUTqzdW2R3AQ5IXDOAqfgaN0ElmFiX1HL2mgTZvJ9RGoiNcS86WF6hMuu63kapUe0j5uBF6oeeB kcKk7oDUevYoHem6p5uXKzuIFqiTa254v8hq2fTnuVfbako8kUyOOXbs.jpg?r=d0f
This film opens with Wallace and Gromit being hailed as heroes for capturing a renowned jewel thief, a bird named Feathers McGraw, who is sentenced to life in a zoo. Meanwhile, in another attempt to make his and Gromit's lives easier, Wallace has invented a robot named Norbot, who Gromit feels Wallace is planning to replace him with. Unfortunately, Feathers figures out a way to reprogram Norbot for his own agenda, which includes Norbot cloning hundreds of himself.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTriI6SR7t2FOz-tDqVkZOMfALKmvgqYytL-A&s
The near brilliant screenplay by director Nick Park, Mark Burton, and Holly Walsh is a delicious blending of these eccentric characters with a lot of 2025 pop references and sensibilities that we don't see coming, as well as nods to films of the past without directly ripping them off. I loved when Feathers McGraw is first observed in his new zoo prison and he is observed doing chin-ups with newspaper clippings on the wall...it was so Robert De Niro in Cape Fear. And those Norbot duplicates were an uneasy combination between oompa loompas and those gremlins that popped out of Gizmo after feeding him chicken after midnight. Also LOVED when Feathers was reprogramming Norbot and beforre the computer would allow him to finish, it made him click on all images of cheese before going on. I was on the floor.

I loved the animation techniques employed to produce these characters. Can't even begin to explain how it's accomplished, but director Park and his animation crew nail it. Even though the characters of Gromit and Feathers McGraw don't have mouths and are unable to speak, the viewer is able to experience every mood or feeling their characters do, it's absolutely spooky.
https://deadline.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/W.jpg?w=681&h=383&crop=1
Park and company keep things moving at a nice pace and provide consistent surprises along the way. Love the voice work by Ben Whitehead as Wallace and Reece Shearsmith too. Smashing entertainment from start to finish, can't wait to go back and watch the first six films. 4.5

[Gideon58]

Real Genius
Since Val Kilmer's passing, I'm pretty sure movie buffs are all over the world were re-watching Tombstone, so I decided to go a different route in my homage to Kilmer by taking another look at the first film I ever saw with Kilmer, 1985's Real Genius, an outrageous and overly complex comedy that combines elements of several different genres with varying results.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81-SMhbOE+L._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg
The story follows a 15 year old science prodigy who gets early acceptance into one of the most prestigious engineering colleges run by a Professor Jerry Hathaway who recruits Mitch to be part of a team he has working on a special laser that is to be part of a nuclear weapon, that Hathaway has been commissioned by the government for very nefarious purposes. Mitch immediately bumps heads with Chris Knight (Kilmer), the last genius recruited to the college who has learned not to take school and himself too seriously and tries to teach Mitch the same.
https://a.ltrbxd.com/resized/sm/upload/sx/6q/s0/8c/Real-Genius-1985-featured-1200-1200-675-675-crop-000000.jpg?v=33ba426df0
The very intricate screenplay by Neil Israel, Pat Proft, who wrote the previous year's Bachelor Party, and PJ Torokvei combines several different kinds of movies, but the primary canvas, a college hijinks comedy, looks original here because the student population for this school is all at genius level, bringing about several kinds of college hijinks we're not accustomed to seeing in most college comedies...it's not every film where we see students with the ability to freeze a staircase in their dorm into ice suitable for skiing that turns to gas in a few hours. Mitch's discovery of Lazlo's underground lair has not been seen in a lot of college comedies either.
https://www.rollingstone.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/val-kilmer-real-genius.jpg?w=1000
There is a science fiction element to the story in that this project that Jerry, Chris, Mitch, and his crew are working on is part of a nuclear weapon that the government is apparently paying Jerry through the nose for, seems a little out of place with the rest of the story and kind of slows things down and takes focus away from the part of the story that really works...the meeting of the minds between Chris and Mitch where Chris tries to get Mitch to relax and Mitch tries to get Chris to take this project seriously, the combined efforts of which are used to combat Dr. Hathaway. Not to mention the Revenge of the Nerds finale, that will invoke cheers, even if it takes a little too long to get there.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRhHrtjWjT7SEFYzENjX8MISPtg-4eX1P4SG37bdUjrPtLqu5uXfOWZf87j-Y5HncSElGg&usqp=CAU
Director Martha Coolidge (Valley Girl) manages to find a balance of discipline and fun in her direction. Val Kilmer commands the screen in one of his funniest performances as Chris Knight and William Atherton, an actor who has made a career out of playing smarmy characters, has one of his smarmiest here as Jerry Hathaway. Robert Prescott, who so funny in the previous year's Bachelor Party, is equally funny in a similar character named Kent. Coolidge even found a small role for her Valley Girl leading lady, Deborah Foreman. And that's Jonathan Gries playing Lazlo, who fans of The White Lotus might recognize as Greg/Gary. The story is a little busy, but Kilmer keeps the viewer invested. RIP, Val. 3.5

[Gideon58]

Babygirl
Despite an eye-opening performance by Oscar winner Nicole Kidman in the starring role, 2024's Babygirl doesn't really succeed in its attempt at being a 21st century Fatal Attraction due to leaden direction and a confusing screenplay sending all kinds of mixed messages.
https://www.dvdsreleasedates.com/posters/800/B/Babygirl-2024-movie-poster.jpg
Kidman plays Romy, the CEO of a state of the art shipping company a la Amazon Prime, who is married to a theater director (Antonio Banderas) and the mother of two daughters, who finds herself drifting into an unconventional affair with one her company's new interns.
https://statcdn.fandango.com/MPX/image/NBCU_Fandango/670/683/thumb_FFAF6D11-3394-4422-8224-51A62A3C3A14.jpg
Director/screenwriter Halina Reijn has offered us an overly complex rending of a very simple story that takes way too long to get where it's going, keeping the viewer on the outside looking in. The story takes way too obvious a route in establishing how unhappy Romy is with her marriage in order to make it easy for us to accept why Romy is drawn to this guy. the attraction between Romy and this guy feels forced and unnatural and it's not helped by the fact that this guy wants to play by his rules. I mentioned Fatal Attraction but the relationship between Romy and this guy reminds me more of Mickey Roarke and Kim Basinger in 9 1/2 Weeks .
https://i0.wp.com/aftercredits.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/BabygirlFeat.jpg?fit=1500%2C844&ssl=1
There's something really annoying about the way the story establishes that Romy is looking for a little something more in her sex life and when it comes to her, the guy spends a lot of time pushing her way. Watch the superb scene of their first kiss or the first time she gives herself to him sexually and he just pushes her away. Maybe because of the "Me Too" era we live in today, it was uncomfortable watching a man treating a woman like this and don't get me started on what happens when the guy shows up at her house.
https://www.simbasible.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/1.gif
Reign's static direction makes the film seem a lot longer than it really is and audience attention is definitely challenged. The glamorously aging Banderas makes the most of his thankless role as the husband and, as pretty as he is, Harris Dickinson (Triangle of Sadness), doesn't bring a lot of heat to the intern either. Kidman got some Oscar buzz for this performance and she is great, but the movie, not so much. 2.5

[Gideon58]

Inside Moves
The late Richard Donner, whose directorial resume includes Superman, Scrooged, The Omen, and all four Lethal Weapon movies was in the director's chair for 1980's Inside Moves, a quietly claustrophobic and often achingly real look at a small circle of dysfunctional misfits who have found their own solace in a world that has pushed them aside.
https://cinesavant.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/6217move.png
The film stars John Savage as Roary, a depressed young man who tries to commit suicide by jumping out of a ten story window. He survives the jump and after a long recovery, starts hanging out at a dive bar that seems to cater specifically to the handicapped where he strikes up a friendship with Jerry (David Morse), an ex-basketball player sidelined by an injury but saving up for an operation that might get him back on the courts. The bumpy friendship that develops between Roary and Jerry is the crux of the drama.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BZjEwNjkyNTQtNWIyMS00YzkxLThmNzMtZjE5MjQzZTUyMDA1XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Donner has a cringy but effective screenplay to work with, supplied by Oscar winner Barry Levenson and former wife Valerie Curtin, that brings such a diverse group of characters together who display such genuine affection for each other that the viewer can't help get wrapped up in the "where everybody knows your name" atmosphere at this bar, filled to the rim with people who are blind, wheelchair bound, or have lost limbs among others. It's interesting how the friendship between Roary and Jerry never affects their feelings about the rest of their friends at the bar and these friends never desert Jerry even though at a point they feel forgotten or when Roary feels betrayed by Jerry, the guys at the bar never take sides.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYThiNzYyZTMtMTlkOS00NDM4LWE5MzUtYzQ1ODEzZGVlZjI4XkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
What was particularly impressive about this film was the attention Donner and his cast pay to the physicality of the characters. It's never forgotten that Roary jumped out of a ten story window. When he leaves the hospital, he is not walking properly and doesn't walk properly for the remainder of the running time. There's one scene with Roary where the way he moves his head during a conversation you can tell there is permanent damage to his neck and cannot turn his head normally. Or watch Jerry when he's getting dressed to challenge a pro basketball player to a one on one...Morse never forgets that Jerry is unable to bend one knee and neither does Donner who gets in up close and shows us this guy can't bend his knee.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BY2I0OWY0MGUtOGFjOC00N2VhLThiYTAtZDc2MjMzOTU2OTExXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_.jpg
Savage's work as Roary rivals his previous performance in The Deer Hunter, disciplined and yet quite moving. Morse, best known for playing the tortured Dr Jack Morrison on NBC;s St Elsewhere, lights up the screen as the equally tortured Jerry. There are some terrific character actors in the supporting cast including Bert Remsen as the blind Stinky and Bill Henderson as wheelchair-bound Blue. Diana Scarwid's sensitive waitress Louise earned her a Best Supporting Actress nomination and the film also marked a return to the big screen for the first time in 34 years for Harold Russell, the handless war veteran who won the Best Supporting Actor of 1946 Oscar for The Best Years of our Lives. Never seen anything quite like this and the lion's share of the credit has to go to Donner. 4

[Gideon58]

Snow White (2025)
2025 in film continues to be a disappointment thus far. From the "if it Ain't Broke Don't Fix It" school of filmmaking comes 2025's Snow White, an overblown and overly complicated reimagining of the Disney classic that suffers from an overstuffed screenplay that steals from other fairytales, and over the top musical sequences, making a one hour and 39 minute film seem fourteen hours long.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BY2UwOGUxMzEtMzEyZi00NjEwLTkxOTMtYTljOWEzYjYyMWNjXkEyXkFqcGc@._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg
In this version of the story, Snow is actually living with the wicked queen when the queen learns that she is no longer the fairest of them of all. Instead of sending the huntsman into the forest to find Snow White to kill her, she sends him and Snow out to the wilderness on a pretense and then orders her death and the return of Snow's heart in a box. He, of course, can't do it and tells Snow White to disappear where she eventually encounters a cottage that turns out to be occupied by seven little guys who work in their own mine.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/NsqFFOpwPm8/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLDRNKRTvLDt_D31p9bvvhhC9Jx5Xg
I'd like to start out by saying that when I went online to watch this movie, I put in the title character's name and seven other movies came up along with this one. Did we really need another version of Snow White?. We needed another version of Snow White like we need another version of A Christmas Carol. Erin Cressida Wilson's screenplay combines too many elements from other films and fairytales. In this version of the story, Snow White is being held captive by the Wicked Queen and a big scene is devoted to Snow's hair being cut off that smacked of Rapunzel. Snow's journey into the woods on her way to the Dwarves reminded me of the perils that Westley and Princess Buttercup face in The Princess Bride, a little too intense for this story. That nightmarish vision as she runs into the woods was just a little over the top, making the segue into her Wizard of Oz-like entrance into the dwarves cabin greeted by thousands of CGI animals just a little hard to swallow. It looks like she travelled through time.
https://9meters.com/wp-content/uploads/image-875.png
There was also a big plot point that I couldn't get past. When the Queen sends the huntsman into the woods with Snow White, he gives her the box to put her heart in after she's dead so that the queen can reward the huntsman with anything he desires. When the huntsman returns, the Queen encounters the mirror about her beauty first before looking in the box and learning that Snow was still alive. Why wouldn't she have looked in the box first? And upon discovering the box had an apple in it, why didn't she kill the huntsman instantly?
https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/MCDSNWH_WD031.jpg?crop=519px%2C0px%2C1851px%2C1234px&resize=1000%2C667
Someone decided that the film needed some new songs supplied by the composers of The Greatest Showman and Dear Evan Hansen and none of them are even in the territory of memorable and the songs we know and love like "Heigh Ho" and "Whistle While You Work" are blown completely out of proportion and go on much too long. And what happened to "I'm Wishing", which would have been a perfect fit for Rachel Zegler's voice.
https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/74oxFAu.Bg_1bEnuowdpnA--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjt3PTEyNDI7aD02OTk-/https://media.zenfs.com/en/comingsoon_net_477/7eb4ea9d2aa0b8e51d011280f1c0b941
I loved Zegler in Spielberg's remake of West Side Story but she's kind of one note here. And if you're going to CGI the dwarves, why not use A-list actors for their voices? If the truth be known, they should have gone with real litt6le people for the dwarves too. Four of the actors voicing dwarves I've never even heard of. The only completely satisfying performance in this film came from Gal Gadot as the Wicked Queen, but even her performance doesn't make this film worth the trouble it was. 1.5