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Mucho Mucho Amor, 2020

I was not familiar with Walter Mercado, a Puerto Rican astrologer who was uber famous from the 1970s to the 2000s, until a recent episode of RuPaul's Drag Race: All Stars where one of the queens played him as a character in a skit.

The documentary was really fascinating.

A quote from one of the interview subjects in the film maybe best sums up Mercado's mystery and appeal: "When I first saw him on TV, I wasn't sure if I was looking at a man, a woman, or a sorcerer."

Mercado has a striking appearance and an undeniable charisma. While I do not personally believe in psychics or astrology, I found myself nodding along to a lot of what Mercado had to say. I can see why he was so beloved by so many. As one person observes--nothing negative ever comes out of Walter's mouth. When he says that he hopes for peace and love for others, it seems completely authentic. While Mercado's work is wrapped in outlandish costumes and sets and intense performance, at its core it is a message of love that feels like it comes from a very real place.

The documentary is split into basically two parts. The first part gives a history of Mercado's life, and especially his years of fame. The second part documents Mercado's preparation for a respective of his work being hosted in Miami. While some attention is paid to a falling out that Mercado had with his business manager, the bulk of the film is focused on helping the viewer to understand the scope of Mercado's career and popularity.

Another fascinating aspect of the film is how Mercado navigated being part of a strongly homophobic community while at the same time exuding what one interview subject calls "a strong feminine energy." Mercado deftly waves away any questions--direct or indirect--about his sexuality or sex life. His declarations that he makes love "to life" is so in line with his overall personality that it doesn't feel disingenuous. At the same time, several testimonies from interview subjects show that, despite Mercado never being "out", the visibility of a unabashedly feminine man on television was very important to many people who often felt "other" because of their sexuality or mannerisms. It's fascinating to watch someone embrace many elements that would be consider a bad thing or taboo and just totally own them. At one point Mercado says, "I never have to rehearse to be myself." As much as he is over the top--wearing chunky jewelry and a cape that weighs 20 pounds--you do get the sense that he is being himself.

This was a very enjoyable documentary. It's really wonderful to see someone who puts out good vibes into the universe, and the impact that this had on so many people. Watching Mercado talk just made me happy.

Maybe my only complaint would be that the filmmakers are clearly in Mercado's corner, meaning that they do not press him on the one unsavory aspect of his career (his involvement in 1-900 psychic phone lines that many people considered predatory or exploitative). But honestly, I see why you'd be in his corner. This was an utterly delightful film and I'd certainly recommend it.





The Mutilator (originally titled Fall Break) (1984)
One of the more substandard slasher efforts but what the hell, I enjoyed it.
Entertaining for all the wrong reasons.



The Informer 2019 Directed by Andrea Di Stefano
A very skippable crime, drama, action, thriller. But if you're into Ana de Armas then it's a must see.



Turkey Shoot (1982)

An Australian the most dangerous game, prison camp exploitation, and 1984 mashup with almost Sadean villains. For an exploitation film, the violence is quite tame and the action is hilariously bad. I guess one of the hunters best defines the movie; a smug sadistic dude driving around in a mini tractor (with a machine gun attached, of course) and assisted by a cannibalistic wolfman circus freak. How awesomely stupid is that?

It's quite dull and repetitive, but it's bad enough not to be actually bad.

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Color Out of Space (2019, Richard Stanley)

Somewhat reminiscent of Annihilation, only way worse.



The Exterminator (1980)

Remember wanting to see this so much when I was a nipper with family browsing in the video store (think it was the cover)...Hmmm, it's not bad but not worth the wait. Pretty standard vigilante stuff that tries a wee bit of extra nastiness in the violence. There is a back story too of a friendship torn apart from coming home from 'nam and finding it hard to function. Not awful...just average.






Four Weddings and a Funeral, 1994

Another classic romantic comedy, though this one's kind of a "meh" with a single important sidenote.

Charles (Hugh Grant) despairs of ever finding the "perfect girl" and so takes the cynical view that he will never marry. After he meets an American woman, Carrie (Andy McDowell) at a friend's wedding, he begins to reconsider his notions of love and happiness.

So everything that I said about Sleepless in Seattle I wish had been true about this movie. There is so little development of the main characters that even by the end of the film they mostly felt like strangers to me. What's more--everyone in the movie was kind of awful? There's one side of Charles that's the "Oh, he says the wrong thing at the wrong time" that's meant to be charming. And it sort of is (Hugh Grant excels at a sort of charismatic blustering). But Charles and his friends are also mean. Like, really mean. They have cruel nicknames for people just outside their immediate social circle, and especially women. "Duckface", "Vomiting Veronica", "Miss Piggy" and so on. And we are shown precious little kindness from them to redeem this cruelty. It seems like when the writers came up with a funny line of dialogue they put it in the film, no matter how bad it made the characters look who spoke them.

And outside of not liking the characters very much, all they do is talk about relationships and marriage, but not in any kind of productive way. Charles literally gives a speech at a wedding in which he says "I don't think I could ever get married," then later complains that no one wants to marry him. It's annoying. Dude--if you explicitly tell women you don't want marriage, you can't turn around and cry about it when they don't want to marry you, right? There's just no growth from Charles or any of the other main characters. Yes, there are a few "people realizing they loved their friend the whole time" moments, but as a group they never really matured. And it's not a good look for characters in their late 20s/30s.

And to hearken back (again) to Sleepless in Seattle, this film does the old dirty trick of making the main characters partner with people who are awful so that we can be okay with the main characters treating them poorly. It's a crummy way to make selfish or inconsiderate actions from the main characters (like cheating on them or humiliating them) feel justified.

So here's my one important sidenote: I was really fascinated by the treatment of the film's lone gay couple. Two of Charles' friends, Matthew and Gareth are clearly in a long-term romantic relationship, yet characters in the film repeatedly refer to them as single. In a very emotional moment, Matthew is referred to as "Gareth's best friend" instead of as his partner or lover. Their relationship is somehow a surprise to all of their good friends which is . . . hmm. And there's no acknowledgement of what it must be like to attend wedding after wedding, knowing that they can never make their own union legal. But on the flip side, the only genuinely great sequence of the film (something I won't describe in detail because it's a big spoiler) comes from an emotional declaration of love from Matthew to Gareth. And I think it's also worth noting that this is the rare romantic comedy where the gay characters aren't screeching, flamboyant caricatures. It's almost the only thing in the film that makes me feel as if it's worth recommending.

Overall a big disappointment, but the treatment of the characters of Gareth and Matthew makes for an interesting time capsule moment of the treatment of gay characters in the genre of romantic comedies.




Papillon (2017)



I have no idea why they did a remake of this movie. The original is a classic and the performances by Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman are epic - nothing can hold a candle to it or to the performances. As a movie, the remake isn't bad, but it's not great either (the original is great!)

The original even had a level of humor (or perhaps situations of tragic irony) in a very bleak situation as delivered by McQueen & Hoffman that is completely absent from this new version.

Rami Malek was probably the only highlight of the movie and okay in the role of Louis Degas (but lackluster compared to the memorable performance of Dustin Hoffman). Malek never seemed quite as helpless or desperate as Hoffman's version - and therefore was less sympathetic for the audience. And we need not even mention the flat performance by the main character as no one can compare to the charisma of Steve McQueen.

Don't know which was closer to the factual story, but the only thing the remake had over the original was a brief photo during the end credits of the real-life Papillon.



Capernaum (2018)

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Somebody posted about this a few months ago and that's when I put it on my watchlist. It lost best foreign language film to Roma but I think this is better. In fact I think it's better than any of the best picture nominees that year. It's a Lebanese movie and there's a poor couple who have too many children and we just see a story that can happen. It's an emotional movie that very much makes you appreciate what you have. There's a great performance from a baby which is something I don't recall ever seeing before. It was kind of weird because the baby's character was a male but the real baby is a female. Before I moved from Chicago to Boston I lived with a Lebanese family for a few months not realizing what kind of place they came from. Now I understand why the mother used to hide the cookies from me.





Results, 2015

What a weird film.

Trevor (Guy Pearce) runs a gym and frequently butts heads with one of his trainers, Kat (Cobie Smulders). When a wealthy client, Danny, hires Kat to help him get in shape, his involvement in their lives causes a rift between them.

This movie was like putting bananas, tuna, and coffee grounds in a blender. The ingredients are good, but the recipe is garbage. I liked the film in parts, but as a whole I really didn't care for it.

I guess my problem with the film boils down to the "quirky reality" it pushes as an overall vibe. For me, these "quirks" were incredibly off-putting, specifically things like Kat's hot temper, which is clearly meant to be funny. But watching her berate a waitress at a diner over an extra $1 on a bill? Not fun, not funny. Watching her "hilariously" ambush a woman and berate her for being a deadbeat because she was behind on paying her bills? Not fun, not funny. And the character doesn't grow at all. Her berating the waitress happens almost at the end of the film. Kat never resolves her anger issues, they just get folded into the "aren't we an odd couple?!" romance that she has with Trevor.

I was similarly put off by the character of Danny. He has more money than he knows what to do with, and for a while you genuinely feel for his character as he tries to figure out how to be a man that his ex-wife will want back. But he's also . . . kind of a creep. And just like with Kat and her temper, the film kind of leans into this. At the end of the film (SPOILERS, SORT OF???) he bribes a bunch of college students (so to be clear 18-22 year old while he is very much middle aged) to his home with the promise of alcohol. And the film thinks that this is a good thing and a positive step for his character. The problem here is not just the creep element of a middle aged man plying literal teenage girls with alcohol, it's the fact that this man is more than happy to use his money to get what he wants. I found it pretty gross, and the more the film played it up as fun and sweet (complete with adorable music underneath him dancing with a room full of sorority sisters) the more I was repelled by it.

The character of Trevor escapes mostly unscathed, and I felt as if the film never totally got a read on him. The problem (as stated repeatedly) is supposedly that he's too in his own head and not in touch with his emotions. But the film's proposed solution to this--pushing him toward romance with the over-emotional Kat--feels wrong-headed.

I will give credit for incredibly strong performances across the board. And I will admit that despite generally disliking the story and the beats it was trying to hit, it did have many unpredictable moments.




But Charles and his friends are also mean. Like, really mean. They have cruel nicknames for people just outside their immediate social circle, and especially women. "Duckface", "Vomiting Veronica", "Miss Piggy" and so on. And we are shown precious little kindness from them to redeem this cruelty. It seems like when the writers came up with a funny line of dialogue they put it in the film, no matter how bad it made the characters look who spoke them.
Now, I've not seen this since the 90's and I only watched it the once, I think, but that's not being mean. That's being British. Especially for the middle and upper classes. It's very difficult to make a romantic comedy based around characters who'd rather drill their own teeth than express a feeling.
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5-time MoFo Award winner.



Since Monday

Because there's so much good movie i can't rate all good movie 7 et more out of 10 so Keep in mind i rate movie like this.

bad movie it's 1 to 3 out of 10, (don't loose your time)
ok movie are 4 to 5 out of 10, (watchable)
good movie are 6 to 7 out of 10, (enjoyable)
exellent movie 8-9 on 10, (realy had fun)
chef d'oeuvre 10/10 (it's change my life)

Frankenstein's Army
Great effort, interesting kind of Robotic Nazi Clive Barker's tortured souls creature, lots of gore but still a lost of time 3/10



Battledogs
Sometime no comment is the best comment 2/10



Willy Wonka and the chocolate factory
Great classic (i thought) kids get bored very quick and me to i guess. Don't get me wrong still a good movie but you know even some wine don't get better with age. A generous 6/10




Snowtimes (la guerre des tuques)
French animated remake of a 80's kid movie. During the winter school break a buch of children playing snowballs war will learn things of life and they will all grow a little. Very well done movie. Kids appreciated so do I. Remind me my childhood 7/10


Escape room
Rare movie night with my teen daughter. It Keeped her without cell phone and out of her room for 90 min or so. So i'll guess it's a win. She liked it. I found it good to but to quick i could appreciate more suspence. 6/10




Phantasm V
I'm a fan of phantasm franchise so i was ready to be disappointed and guess what... i was... Anyways it's not like i didn't know every 2000's sequel of the 80's are bad... 4/10


Paul
Not the best Simon Pegg but same kind of humour found it enjoyable 7/10




Now, I've not seen this since the 90's and I only watched it the once, I think, but that's not being mean. That's being British. Especially for the middle and upper classes. It's very difficult to make a romantic comedy based around characters who'd rather drill their own teeth than express a feeling.
I've loved many a droll, snarky, buttoned-up British character. But these characters were obnoxious. And, honestly, I didn't find them very funny.

Calling someone "Miss Piggy" because she's fat is something a 5 year old could think of. I expected more wit and was disappointed that most the dialogue felt like cheap one-liners.

Also, the contempt was mostly directed at the woman Charles was dating or had dated. Why should I care about Charles finding love when it's clear that he's really nasty about the women he's with? Multiple jokes were about perfectly nice women discovering that they are being mocked behind their back. That's funny why?

The whole thing was shallow and basic. For a romantic comedy I found it neither romantic (Matthew and Gareth's subplot aside) nor funny. If I'd laughed more, I might cut it more slack. But I literally can't think of a single part that genuinely made me laugh.



Кома (2019)
aka Coma

A Russian SciFi film that loans heavily from Matrix and Inception with a touch of Ink. Like so often with modern Russian movies, the writing is weak. Characters are caricatures and the plot combined from multiple Hollywood blockbusters is rushed. The visual effects are really good, though, especially considering the estimated budget of $4M. Not boring but forgettable.



Dolan's Cadillac (2009)

Direct revenge thriller from the pen of Stephen King. This was actually very enjoyable in how its constructed. The tale of Toms (Wes Bentley) quest for vengeance for his hood murdered wife scanned well. The denouement between the 2 protagonists is written so well and depicted with real skill. Liked this.




Lucky Luciano 1973 Directed by Francesco Rosi (VHS)



We Were Soldiers 2002 Directed by Randall Wallace



Geronimo: An American Legend 1993 Directed by Walter Hill