Rate The Last Movie You Saw

Topaz (1969)

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[ J ] - [ S ] - [ F ]

Memoir of a Snail is without question the best stop-motion animated movie released this year, and one of the best animated movies of the year, period.

The film is reportedly loosely based on director Adam Elliot's own life - whether or not it really involved as many snails as he shows us here, I really don't know.

But in any case, it is a charming, bittersweet movie full of unforgettable moments that I just can't wait to watch again.

The very talented voice cast is headed by Sarah Snook, who plays the protagonist of the film, a young lady growing up in an Australian farm in the 1970s who was born with a cleft lip.

If you have young kids, remember that this is an R-rated movie!

Steve McQueen doesn't quite reinvent the WW2 genre with Blitz, but he certainly gives it a very timely update for the 21st century.

It's kind of a shame that Apple bought the movie, because it is receiving a minimal theatrical release ahead of its streaming debut later this month; like Wolfs, it is a movie that definitely needs to be watched on the biggest screen possible.

George is an 8-year-old living in London with his mother during the early years of the war, who decides he doesn't want to be sent away "for his safety" and bravely decides to head back to London to be with his family again.

McQueen uses little George's adventure to show just how much prejudice existed internally in Britain even as the country entered into one of its toughest wars ever to fight Nazi Germany.

Despite being technically American, Saoirse Ronan does a superb job as George's determined mom, who desperately tries to find her son amidst the chaos of wartime London.

The period detail and some sprawling vistas are absolutely riveting, I don't believe any contemporary movie has done such a good job showing what London was like during the Blitz.

As a WW2 movie, Blitz definitely covers a lot of familiar ground, but it is never less than fascinating.

Anora (2024)

Sean Baker loves bringing humanity to sex workers. Anora is the story of a stripper who falls for an Oligarchs son in Brooklyn New York. It's stars Mikey Madison who you'll remember from her pivotal roles in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and Scream 6. The stripper movie used to be a bigger thing in the 90's but they all kinda flopped critically and commercially.

Baker has finally figured out pacing in his films...I always feel like they drag but this one has three acts and they are all solid. The film also shifts from two male supporting performances Mark Edelstein who is in part one and Yuri Borosov who is in part two. You will never look at Russian thugs/goons again. Both characters are so good and play off Madison so well.

A lot is spoken about the anxiety of the film and Madison's physical athletic gifts are fully on display. Their is a scene in the middle of this movie in a room which is absolutely hilarious something out of a Cohen brothers classic. But the film also grounds itself...Madison's Anora isn't perfect but she's a lot more human than some of the other leads in Bakers films. She snarky but she also has a sweet side...it's a performance that lacks the vanity of previous strippers in these types of films. Because she acts more human and down to earth the events in the film hit much harder.

Visually it's not on the level of Bakers other films...its much more insular and doesn't have the tacky charms of Florida Project, Red Rocket, or Tangerines. Yet I think people will enjoy this one more for the character work.

Wolfs (2024)
Apple Plus

4/5



We start in pitch black, and hysterical profanity: District Attorney Margaret (Amy Ryan) is in a panic. She’s in a swanky New York City hotel room with a guy who is very young, and very dead. She happens to have a number, given to her by a friend, for a fixer who specializes in making all traces of career-ending messes like this disappear. The fixer (George Clooney) shows up and begins his process. But then a second fixer (Brad Pitt) shows up.

Clooney is the older veteran, proud of his status as the only guy in town who can fix this type of situation. Pitt is the cooler, younger version who also thinks he’s the only guy in town in this business. Clooney thinks Pitt must be an untalented pretender. Pitt is skeptical of what he figures is Clooney’s outdated, old school methods. Oil and water. Night and day. Fire and ice. They don’t like each other, but both are too professional, and proud, to back down and leave it to the other guy.

As you can imagine, this is just the start of the obstacles they’ll need to hurdle on this cold, snowy New York City night. Clooney and Pitt become reluctant partners as they try to cover their tracks, sort out through the complications, and slowly peel back the clues that reveal how they have more in common than they’d have liked.

Pure fun. Clooney and Pitt are charming and likable, each in his own way. We root for them, even though they’re bad guys who, in a perfectly moral universe, we should not admire. They’re comfortable in their characters, each sublimely calibrated to his own scruffy persona. As they finally puzzle through what really brought them together, writer/director Jon Watts had the good sense not to destroy the vibe by turning this into a mushy, all-out buddy movie.

At the expense of spoiling what is actually not much of a surprise, mention must also be made of Austin Abrams as The Kid. Oh gosh, that scene where he explains how he got into that mess: just an amazing, breathless, full-throttle one-take. And then there’s all the running through hallways, a closed mall, and snowy NYC streets. In his undies.

Extra points if you get the homage in the final frame to an even more exuberant and unabashed buddy movie.

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Scarecrow: I haven't got a brain ... only straw. Dorothy: How can you talk if you haven't got a brain? Scarecrow: I don't know. But some people without brains do an awful lot of talking, don't they? Dorothy: Yes, I guess you're right.

The Tommyknockers


"The Tommyknockers, Tommyknocker, knocking at your door... or something"


I remembered this one as a child but it never really captured my imagination and I could only remember fragments of it.


Everything is on display here of why King is not scary a lot of the time from a homicidal drink dispenser to a mainacal typewriter that prints your thoughts


There is also the slooshiness and at times unreal dialogue and interactions that come with the king territory which is perfectly coupled with the less self aware tv film making sensibilities of the early 90s


I quite like it although it's not "Needful Things"

Lee (2023-2024)

Am I Racist? (2024)

My Old Ass (2024)

The Outrun (2024)

First of all- subject of alcoholism is close to my heart. More importantly of all- the movie is made the way I like movies to be made. It is phenomenologically immersive, almost transcendental. It's non linear, just like thoughts and memories aren't linear.

High Sierra - A

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Member since Fall 2002
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Small Things Like These (2024)

Really bummed they wouldn't play this film in the evening. I mean the options for me to watch this film week one are at 11 or 2 so you leave the theater and you are blasted with sunlight. Anyways this is what happens when studios pack and stack films in short periods of time. This is one of those films most people would skip I don't know if it's meant for a US release. This is an adaptation of an Irish novel from 1985 about an Irish father of five women is confronted by things in his town.

It's a dark film without being exploitative, most of the bad stuff happens in the perifphery. The subtly of the film hits you hard, it's also a very realistic view of 80's you hear the music but it's still a small Irish town. This is very much a catholic town that times forgotten. One of the more remarkable things about the film is how women are treated in this film.

Everything is just under the surface and open for interpretation with Murphy giving a powerhouse performance of subtle desperation. If you get the chance to catch this one go for it.

5th Rewatch...One of the top five worst translations of a Broadway musical to the screen. This black version of The Wizard of Oz suffers from overblown direction by Sidney Lumet (one of the few missteps in his distinguished career), the butchering of Charles Smalls wonderful score by the late Quincy Jones, and the dreadful performance by Diana Ross as Dorothy. This movie is just as terrible as I remembered.

I'm a mite confused. If you hate it, why do you keep watching it?

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I destroyed the dastardly dairy dame! I made mad milk maid mulch!

I hate insomnia. Oh yeah. Last year I had four cases of it, and each time it lasted three months.

Just ran into it accidentally and wanted to see if I had been too hard on it

And you found out you were as hard on it as you figure you should be?

3rd Rwatch...One of Woody Allen's funniest and most unpredictable comedies that actually tells two stories at the same time without the viewer realizing it for a minute. Larry (Allen) and Carol (Diane Keaton) are a happily married couple who have just spent an evening being bored to death by their new elderly neighbors, Paul (Jerry Adler) and Lillian (Lynn Cohen). Larry and Carol learn 24 hours later that Lillian has dropped dead of a heart attack, but Carol finds herself obsessed as circumstntial evidence keeps popping up that implies Paul might have murdered Lillian and sets out to solve the mystery, dragging Larry kicking and screaming the whole way. Throw in the mix Ted (Alan Alda) Larry and Carol's recently divorced friend who has been crushing on Carol for years and Marcia (Anjelica Huston) a client of Larry's who makes no bones about her attraction to him and you have a dual story of an alleged murder mystery and some typical Allen dysfunctional relationships . The story takes several unexpected twists and turns along the way demands complete viewer attention which is definitely rewarded. Woody knocks it out the park here, a way better film than Annie Hall. Carol was originally going to be played by Mia Farrow but then the whole Soon-Yi thing came out, Farrow didn't want to work with Woody anymore and Woody's old pal Keaton stepped in. Love the scene with Woody and Diane stuck in the elevator and the multiple edited audio tapes they use to try and gaslight Paul.

Bad Blood (1981)

New Zealand true story about a farmer that goes on a killing spree. Stanley Graham works on his own farm and lives in a self-built house with his waspish wife and 2 kids. Things start going wrong when they get into debt. Both are gun enthusiasts with a trenchant mentality against their neighbours and society as a whole. From feeling looked down upon to feeling downright victimised. All things come to a head when the local plod come to take Stanley's .303 rifle for "the war effort" and it is seen as a personal slight. Following that stand-offs ensue ending up in one final attempt to disarm him resulting in a killing spree. This is good, the acting is good and the scenery is great. Depicts the downbeat of the Graham's existence well.

4th Rewatch...Believe it or not, this film features my favorite Meryl Streep performance. Robert Zemckis directed this deliciously black comedy which finds Streep playing an arrogant actress in a battle of wills and a search for eternal youth with her childhood BFF Helen Sharp (Goldie Hawn) while battling over the same man, Dr Ernest Manville (Bruce Willis). Sparkling direction, a witty screenplay, stars at the top of their form, and Oscar-winning visual effects make this one a winner.

SF = Zzz

Viewed: Amazon Prime



[Snooze Factor Ratings]:
Z = didn't nod off at all
Zz = nearly nodded off but managed to stay alert
Zzz = nodded off and missed some of the film but went back to watch what I missed
Zzzz = nodded off and missed some of the film but went back to watch what I missed but nodded off again at the same point and therefore needed to go back a number of times before I got through it...
Zzzzz = nodded off and missed some or the rest of the film but was not interested enough to go back over it

I watched The Killers '46. I was disappointed. I'm not a big fan of flashback stories. It feels like a cheap way to write a plot. I want stories to go forward and not bounce back and forth in this vein. Sometimes it works based on how it's done, most often in TV shows when there's enough time to go over individual story-arcs and not get restricted to a single story that just jumps between itself.

I did enjoy the first ten minutes a lot, up to where Burt Lancaster is murdered. That's hardly a spoiler; the whole point of the film is finding out why he is murdered. The spoiler would be to explain the progression.

Faster (2010)

The Hit (1984) -

If you also like philosophy in your crime movies, this one is for you. We're lucky enough to get a movie featuring just Terence Stamp, John Hurt or Tim Roth, but here, they're together figuratively and literally in that they spend most of the movie in the same car. Despite most of the runtime occurring in this car, it manages to be as complete an examination of our relationship with death I can remember seeing. Stamp's Willie Parker, who went into hiding in Spain after ratting out his cohorts, but who can hide no longer, is the portrait of acceptance. A scene where he explains his philosophy is so well-acted, he could sway you regardless of your belief system. On the other end of the spectrum is Roth's Myron, who believes he is impervious to death and who likely got into contract killing because he gets high on inflicting pain and causing destruction. Even though I wanted to punch him whenever he spoke, he gives my favorite performance. In between are Hurt's hardened veteran criminal - a type-defying role that scares like Kingsley's one in Sexy Beast does - and del Sol's hostage who, like we would in her shoes, tries every which way to get the heck out of there. On that note, this movie is definitely not just a series of ruminations. While I love movies like this that generate suspense via editing, camera trickery, special effects, etc., I approve of how director Frears does this via acting only and for how long he manages to prolong it. Mike Molloy's cinematography makes Spain out to be a sun-bleached and beautiful expanse, which contrasts well with the much less optimistic vibe in the automobile. Paco de Lucia guitar-laden score also adds just the right vibe of fatalism.

Like many other great movies in this genre, it has a simple and elegant story you could describe in two sentences yet manages to make every action speak volumes. While life and death are oft explored in all genres, there is something special about how it reminds you that we all end up in that car and for how it makes you wonder who you would be in it. I discovered this movie because it's in the Criterion Collection, and like my favorite ones in it, you start by wondering why - after all, it was not a great success - and end up understanding exactly why when it's over. Granted, Roth was a newcomer, but I know...a movie with Terence Stamp and John Hurt was not a great success? Get out of here!