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Angel Face, 1952
Ambulance driver Frank (Robert Mitchum) responds to an emergency call where he meets the lovely Diane (Jean Simmons). Diane hustles her way into Frank’s heart, and a torn Frank alienates his girlfriend, Mary (Mona Freeman). But when Diane’s parents are involved in a mysterious accident, Frank gets embroiled in all kinds of legal trouble and finds himself being tied closer and closer to Diane.
I’ve had this film on my watchlist for ages, but I found it kind of weak. Learning that it was a rush job and that there was behind-the-scenes nastiness between Simmons, producer Hughes, and director Preminger adds some context to it all.
Watchable, but it lacks sizzle.
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The Lair of the White Worm (1988)
A great and sensual (and humerous) re-telling of the Bram Stoker story by the master of such, Ken Russell. Seriously, the scenes go from the undoubtedly erotic to the comical within seconds.
The cast of Hugh Grant, Catherine Oxenberg, Peter Capaldi and Sammi Davis all contribute to this romp. The standout though is the louche Amanda Donohoe as Lady Marsh. I don't really know what Russell was attempting to make with this film but that's half the fun! The dream/trance sequences are fantastic
A great and sensual (and humerous) re-telling of the Bram Stoker story by the master of such, Ken Russell. Seriously, the scenes go from the undoubtedly erotic to the comical within seconds.
The cast of Hugh Grant, Catherine Oxenberg, Peter Capaldi and Sammi Davis all contribute to this romp. The standout though is the louche Amanda Donohoe as Lady Marsh. I don't really know what Russell was attempting to make with this film but that's half the fun! The dream/trance sequences are fantastic
Ammonite, 2020
Mary (Kate Winslet) is a fossil hunter living near the beach with her elderly mother, Molly (Gemma Jones). Mary ekes out a living finding and selling small ammonites, but one day she is offered a nice sum of money by amateur fossil-hunter Roderick (James McArdle) to keep his ailing wife Charlotte (Saoirse Ronan) company while he is away on work for a few weeks. As the women spend more time together, they begin to develop a romantic relationship.
Overall this movie left me with that very distinct despair that I feel when a movie has all of the elements of a great movie RIGHT THERE, and yet somehow can’t manage to assemble them into something coherent or compelling.
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Funny Face, 1957
Jo (Audrey Hepburn) is a young woman who works in a bookstore and is interested in philosophy. When fashion editor Maggie (Kay Thompson) and her chief photographer Dick (Fred Astaire) take over the bookstore for a photo shoot, they “discover” Jo and decide to make her the face of their new campaign. Jo’s reluctance to get involved in the fashion industry is complicated by her growing feelings for Dick and the opportunity to travel abroad.
Maybe my expectations were too high for this one. I did get Hepburn in some swanky clothes, after all.
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Priscilla (2023)
Sofia Coppola
I use to like Sofia Coppola as a director, but I'm going to have to rethink that after watching her ode to Priscilla Presley...The film is based on Priscilla Presley's memoirs 'Elvis and Me' 1985. Priscilla herself is listed as executive producer of the film and I'm guessing had some input into Coppola's direction.
Let me get into my complaints: Priscilla (the movie, not the person) lacks character development, lacks story telling and and is very light on insight into one of the world's most famous couples. The movie is a pictorial visual of short scenes without weight. The scenes say little about the people, they start and end abruptly. We see stuff happening from a distance without any real involvement and that's about it. You have to make up your own story with this movie.
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The real Elvis and Priscilla.
I gotta believe the casting of actors with an unusual height difference between them: Elvis (Jacob Elordi) 6'5" and 5'1" Priscilla (Cailee Spaeny) was a deliberate attempt by Coppola to make Elvis look all the more creepy. Priscilla in the movie looks like a 12 year old girl. Yes we know the real Priscilla met Elvis when she was 14 but they weren't married until she was 2 weeks shy of her 22nd birthday.
Neither actor was all that great and I didn't buy 'Elvis' at all as the King, I had a hard time believing Priscilla wasn't still in grade school. If that's the only thing Coppola has to say with her movie, she needs to rethink her film making techniques. Lots of missed opportunities here. Oh, I hated the temporal inappropriate score.
Neither actor was all that great and I didn't buy 'Elvis' at all as the King, I had a hard time believing Priscilla wasn't still in grade school. If that's the only thing Coppola has to say with her movie, she needs to rethink her film making techniques. Lots of missed opportunities here. Oh, I hated the temporal inappropriate score.
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Beau Is Afraid (Ari Aster, 2023)
When I watched Midsommar, there were certainly moments in the movie where it seemed that Aster was, more or less, taking the piss, moments where the film becomes so over-the-top and absurd that it must be intentional. But it was subtle enough that it was hard to be sure.
So Beau Is Afraid felt a little vindicating, so unambiguously over-the-top, so much taking the piss that it could only be intentional. And if I still had any doubts (I didn’t), Ari Aster was there to watch the screening and talk afterward, and confirm that it was in fact what it seemed to be. He knew the film would be alienating, conceding that in editing they would talk about “if we took this part out we’d keep 5 members of the audience"; the interviewer suggested that there was once an even longer cut of the film, though Aster didn’t directly confirm this. Still, Aster expressed his delight that the movie hits an emotional peak after about two hours (paraphrasing here) “and there’s still an hour to go … and it’s all downhill.”
Of course, three hours of a movie taking the piss is a lot. It’s not going to be worth it for everyone. Beau is a very Jewish movie–after all, it’s about a guy who’s disappointed his Mom, a neurotic wracked with anxiety. Aster called the movie a “nightmare” about “a life not lived.” The friend I went with wanted to ask Aster if his mom had seen the movie, but refrained, though someone else asked if the experience had been “cathartic.” (The answer seemed to be kind of, but not really, because there’s always something else to work through. Fair enough.) There are long (long) stories that end in a punchline. Indeed, the whole movie is arguably just a very long joke. Aster said that if you thought that one part was stupid, just wait. (This was specifically in reference to the part where
)
It’s weird, it’s uncomfortable, it’s funny, it’s dumb, it’s exasperating. Is it good? Well, the movie ends with
7/10
When I watched Midsommar, there were certainly moments in the movie where it seemed that Aster was, more or less, taking the piss, moments where the film becomes so over-the-top and absurd that it must be intentional. But it was subtle enough that it was hard to be sure.
So Beau Is Afraid felt a little vindicating, so unambiguously over-the-top, so much taking the piss that it could only be intentional. And if I still had any doubts (I didn’t), Ari Aster was there to watch the screening and talk afterward, and confirm that it was in fact what it seemed to be. He knew the film would be alienating, conceding that in editing they would talk about “if we took this part out we’d keep 5 members of the audience"; the interviewer suggested that there was once an even longer cut of the film, though Aster didn’t directly confirm this. Still, Aster expressed his delight that the movie hits an emotional peak after about two hours (paraphrasing here) “and there’s still an hour to go … and it’s all downhill.”
Of course, three hours of a movie taking the piss is a lot. It’s not going to be worth it for everyone. Beau is a very Jewish movie–after all, it’s about a guy who’s disappointed his Mom, a neurotic wracked with anxiety. Aster called the movie a “nightmare” about “a life not lived.” The friend I went with wanted to ask Aster if his mom had seen the movie, but refrained, though someone else asked if the experience had been “cathartic.” (The answer seemed to be kind of, but not really, because there’s always something else to work through. Fair enough.) There are long (long) stories that end in a punchline. Indeed, the whole movie is arguably just a very long joke. Aster said that if you thought that one part was stupid, just wait. (This was specifically in reference to the part where
WARNING: "big hairy spoiler" spoilers below
Beau finally enters the attic and learns that his father was in fact a literal giant penis. Definitely stupid!
It’s weird, it’s uncomfortable, it’s funny, it’s dumb, it’s exasperating. Is it good? Well, the movie ends with
WARNING: "ending spoiler here" spoilers below
an audience silently getting up and leaving. Our audience applauded. Maybe we were just being polite.
7/10
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So Beau Is Afraid felt a little vindicating, so unambiguously over-the-top, so much taking the piss that it could only be intentional. And if I still had any doubts (I didn’t), Ari Aster was there to watch the screening and talk afterward, and confirm that it was in fact what it seemed to be. He knew the film would be alienating, conceding that in editing they would talk about “if we took this part out we’d keep 5 members of the audience"; the interviewer suggested that there was once an even longer cut of the film, though Aster didn’t directly confirm this. Still, Aster expressed his delight that the movie hits an emotional peak after about two hours (paraphrasing here) “and there’s still an hour to go … and it’s all downhill.”
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I gotta believe the casting of actors with an unusual height difference between them: Elvis (Jacob Elordi) 6'5" and 5'1" Priscilla (Cailee Spaeny) was a deliberate attempt by Coppola to make Elvis look all the more creepy.
I haven't seen Priscilla but had a similar feeling about some scenes in Saltburn in which the height difference between Jacob Elordi and Barry Keoghan seemed emphasized to illustrate the class/wealth/power difference between them.
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I haven't seen Priscilla but had a similar feeling about some scenes in Saltburn in which the height difference between Jacob Elordi and Barry Keoghan seemed emphasized to illustrate the class/wealth/power difference between them.
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Rustin (2023)
A good performance from Colman Domingo that's bigger than the film it's in. Maybe I've watched one too many biopics recently (Oppenheimer, Napoleon, Maestro...) or maybe these films are made for actors more than they're made for audiences. A few flashbacks aside, the film focuses on activist Bayard Rustin's efforts to coordinate a march on Washington as part of the 1960s US civil rights movement. It's difficult to make organizing an event look exciting. I was not surprised to learn that one of the writers of this also wrote Milk. It's fine, but Domingo's performance is the only notable thing about it (he makes Aml Ameen's Martin Luther King look dull and I'm not sure that's ultimately to the film's benefit).
A good performance from Colman Domingo that's bigger than the film it's in. Maybe I've watched one too many biopics recently (Oppenheimer, Napoleon, Maestro...) or maybe these films are made for actors more than they're made for audiences. A few flashbacks aside, the film focuses on activist Bayard Rustin's efforts to coordinate a march on Washington as part of the 1960s US civil rights movement. It's difficult to make organizing an event look exciting. I was not surprised to learn that one of the writers of this also wrote Milk. It's fine, but Domingo's performance is the only notable thing about it (he makes Aml Ameen's Martin Luther King look dull and I'm not sure that's ultimately to the film's benefit).
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Rustin (2023)
A good performance from Colman Domingo that's bigger than the film it's in. Maybe I've watched one too many biopics recently (Oppenheimer, Napoleon, Maestro...) or maybe these films are made for actors more than they're made for audiences. A few flashbacks aside, the film focuses on activist Bayard Rustin's efforts to coordinate a march on Washington as part of the 1960s US civil rights movement. It's difficult to make organizing an event look exciting. I was not surprised to learn that one of the writers of this also wrote Milk. It's fine, but Domingo's performance is the only notable thing about it (he makes Aml Ameen's Martin Luther King look dull and I'm not sure that's ultimately to the film's benefit).
A good performance from Colman Domingo that's bigger than the film it's in. Maybe I've watched one too many biopics recently (Oppenheimer, Napoleon, Maestro...) or maybe these films are made for actors more than they're made for audiences. A few flashbacks aside, the film focuses on activist Bayard Rustin's efforts to coordinate a march on Washington as part of the 1960s US civil rights movement. It's difficult to make organizing an event look exciting. I was not surprised to learn that one of the writers of this also wrote Milk. It's fine, but Domingo's performance is the only notable thing about it (he makes Aml Ameen's Martin Luther King look dull and I'm not sure that's ultimately to the film's benefit).
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Blue beetle
5/10.
I've never watched Power Rangers, but I imagine it would be a lot like this.
5/10.
I've never watched Power Rangers, but I imagine it would be a lot like this.
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Boldly going.
Boldly going.
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I guess if he was pleased that the movie peaks and then declines for a solid hour . . . good for him. It wasn't the content of the film that was alienating, but more the fact that it's just treading water for the last third. It felt like my time was being wasted. My initial reaction was that it was an editing issue, but knowing it was intentional makes me think even less of that final act.
WARNING: "lot of stuff about the end of the movie" spoilers below
The emotional "peak" of the movie comes at the end of the long story within a story (within, IIRC, another story) when "Beau" finally finds his three sons and has a bittersweet emotional reunion with them. The punchline, of course, is that he has never had sex (because it might kill him) and so ... how did he have them? Big laughs. But then of course none of this happened anyway. It's just a story. Aster is very much signposting the artifice of the film. But at the same time, it still matters. The feelings matter. Beau has to finish his journey, and so do you, the audience. Well, you don't have to. You can leave, or turn it off, or fall asleep. There are ways out of the movie, but just one way out of life. So Beau has to confront the life he's had--the woman he wanted but could never have (until he does and it turns into a new trauma), his mother, his brother, his father. And finally, a reckoning of himself. This is the life he really had, and this is the end. It's a dark, dark joke.
I mean, I don't want to try to convince you that this could or should work for you. Clearly it did not! But I do understand why he did it this way. It's kind of sadistic, but I suppose I'm the right kind of masochist.
I mean, I don't want to try to convince you that this could or should work for you. Clearly it did not! But I do understand why he did it this way. It's kind of sadistic, but I suppose I'm the right kind of masochist.
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WARNING: spoilers below
So Beau has to confront the life he's had--the woman he wanted but could never have (until he does and it turns into a new trauma), his mother, his brother, his father. And finally, a reckoning of himself. This is the life he really had, and this is the end. It's a dark, dark joke.
I mean, I don't want to try to convince you that this could or should work for you. Clearly it did not! But I do understand why he did it this way. It's kind of sadistic, but I suppose I'm the right kind of masochist.
I mean, I don't want to try to convince you that this could or should work for you. Clearly it did not! But I do understand why he did it this way. It's kind of sadistic, but I suppose I'm the right kind of masochist.
WARNING: spoilers below
I would have been fine with the idea of making us "feel" the long, slow end of his life. I don't mind movies that make you feel time, like a more twisted version of Jeanne Dielman.
But at the same time, the last act is packed with things that are trying to get a rise out of you: a woman dying during sex, a giant penis, a painfully allegorical "trial".
So my problem is really that Aster seems to want to have things both ways. He wants the joke to be the sad decline of this man, but at the same time pack in a bunch of visual gags.
I think that one or the other could have worked, but as a combination it just ends up feeling muddled and overlong.
But at the same time, the last act is packed with things that are trying to get a rise out of you: a woman dying during sex, a giant penis, a painfully allegorical "trial".
So my problem is really that Aster seems to want to have things both ways. He wants the joke to be the sad decline of this man, but at the same time pack in a bunch of visual gags.
I think that one or the other could have worked, but as a combination it just ends up feeling muddled and overlong.
And why I think that this is really a shame is that the first act DOES show how you can combine both the sense of the mundane/pathetic and some fantastic visual gags/setpieces.
I honestly can't imagine ever watching this film in its entirety again, though I will definitely at some point revisit the 90 minutes or so.
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Angel Face, 1952
Ambulance driver Frank (Robert Mitchum) responds to an emergency call where he meets the lovely Diane (Jean Simmons). Diane hustles her way into Frank’s heart, and a torn Frank alienates his girlfriend, Mary (Mona Freeman). But when Diane’s parents are involved in a mysterious accident, Frank gets embroiled in all kinds of legal trouble and finds himself being tied closer and closer to Diane.
I’ve had this film on my watchlist for ages, but I found it kind of weak. Learning that it was a rush job and that there was behind-the-scenes nastiness between Simmons, producer Hughes, and director Preminger adds some context to it all.
Watchable, but it lacks sizzle.
FULL REVIEW
Ambulance driver Frank (Robert Mitchum) responds to an emergency call where he meets the lovely Diane (Jean Simmons). Diane hustles her way into Frank’s heart, and a torn Frank alienates his girlfriend, Mary (Mona Freeman). But when Diane’s parents are involved in a mysterious accident, Frank gets embroiled in all kinds of legal trouble and finds himself being tied closer and closer to Diane.
I’ve had this film on my watchlist for ages, but I found it kind of weak. Learning that it was a rush job and that there was behind-the-scenes nastiness between Simmons, producer Hughes, and director Preminger adds some context to it all.
Watchable, but it lacks sizzle.
FULL REVIEW
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Fool Me Once, 2024 (Miniseries)
Maya (Michelle Keegan) is a disgraced military veteran who has just lost her husband to a violent attack. Struggling to find some normalcy, Maya’s world is turned upside down again when she sees her dead husband, Joe (Richard Armitage) on her nanny cam. As Maya searches for answers to this impossible event, the detective investigating Joe’s murder, Sam Kierce (Adeel Akhtar), learns that the case is far more complex than he could ever imagine.
I did enjoy the first episode or two of this series, but the majority of it was a bloated mess. I’m not exaggerating when I say that the writers here added about twice as much plot as was in the original novel. And I can tell you that the events of that original novel were already straining some of the bounds of credulity. At one point in the miniseries, a character lectures Maya about the mathematical probability of two events being a coincidence, and it honestly feels like a middle finger to the audience. I will give the series credit for keeping the novel’s original ending, which is a bit daring and also does manage to close the book on a key subplot.
This was okay for a snow day binge, but it was a real slog to finish the last three episodes.
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When I first saw it I'll never forget how shocked I was at the ending. The picture sure ticked all the noir boxes though..
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