Movies I watched over the course of this year. My thoughts might contain spoilers, so, proceed at your own risk.
1. A Quiet Place Day One - The 3rd installment in the Quiet Place movies is a prequel set in New York City, one of the loudest places on earth. The film focused on Sam - a young woman who has terminal cancer, and a young British man who has no family in the city at all. Oh, and Sam's cat, Frodo, who, part way thru the film I said, "I think the cat might be an alien". Because Frodo, while super adorable and clever does SO many 'out of character for a cat' things. Anyway, overall, pretty enjoyable thriller. There was a jumpscare that probably aged me a good 10 years because I was NOT expecting it. And the characters were compelling enough that I enjoyed watching them traverse this crazy apocalypse. If they make any more Quiet Places, I'm in.
2. The Warriors - I knew the line everyone knows from this ("Warriors! Come out and plaaaaayy!!") but I'd never actually seen this. Since Free With Ads (the only podcast I listen to) was covering it this week, I decided to finally remedy that. :) It was fun, although maybe a little overhyped. The Baseball Furies, and the Mimes had me cackling. I'm glad that I've finally seen it, and can't wait for the FWA ep tomorrow to see what they thought of it.
3. Labyrinth - obviously a rewatch. Decided to start attending the library's monthly Film Club, and the January flick is Labyrinth. This is truly a WEIRD movie, a mishmash of all sorts of things that shouldn't work, but...somehow do. The puppetry throughout is simply AMAZING. A lot of this is nostalgia, of course, but, even taking off the rose-colored glasses, I still had a pretty good time with this. David Bowie chews pretty much all of his scenery, and it's marvelous to behold. And "Dance Magic" is just a freaking classic. It'll be interesting to see what the movie club is like, and what the discussion around this holds.
4. Knock at the Cabin - the M. Night movie based on the Tremblay book (Cabin at the End of the World). I went back and looked at what I said about that book, and I mentioned that this would probably make a "very tense" movie. Uh....yes and no? The premise is still a pretty good one - a home invasion where the invaders claim that the family (Andrew, Eric, and their young adopted daughter Wen) must choose to sacrifice one of their own in order to prevent the apocalypse... The problem with both the book and the film was the ambiguity factor. In the book, Tremblay wants to eat his cake and have it too. He never decides whether the invaders are telling the truth, or just flat out insane. I felt like this was to the novel's detriment. The movie DOES decide, and ...that's...not exactly satisfying either? Sigh. I will say that the performances - particularly Dave Bautista (I think that's his name. The big huge guy who plays Leonard, and is one of the Guardians of the Galaxy folk) are the best part of this. Overall... this felt like it was just...sort of there? Like...it wasn't really entertaining, but it wasn't boring. It was just... a movie. I guarantee I'll have forgotten I watched it by the time the end of the year rolls around and I'm rereading these entries.
5. The Kid - A Charlie Chaplin flick. Charlie plays a Tramp who, thru wacky circumstances, ends up with an orphaned baby. He raises him for 5 years, and then most of the movie is focused on The Kid and The Tramp making their way thru the trials of the city. I laughed several times at some of the gags (not bad for a 104 year old movie!). I did think the ending seemed a little weak, but this was extremely short (it's only 53 minutes long) and there wasn't a lot of meat on it to begin with, so I can't really fault it for crumbling a bit near the end. Overall, though, it was enjoyable enough. There are worse ways to spend an hour.
6. The Last Voyage of the Demeter - Dracula takes out the passengers of the Demeter one by one. Decent enough performances, but, I mean, we kinda know exactly how things are gonna play out. The kills weren't really inventive or scary, and this was probably about 20 minutes longer than it *really* needed to be. And, ugggh. The freaking sequel bait. Please stop doing crap like that! This could've been really great, instead it was slightly better than mediocre.
7. The Brothers Grimsby - Over the top, and vulgar as hell, but there were some bits that made me laugh out loud in this spy comedy with Sasha Baron Cohen playing a yokel idiot who lost his brother 30 years previously, only to be reunited with him and discover that he's a James Bond type. (Two of the things I LOLed at, from memory: "This is Luke. We call him that because he has leukemia." "My god, I'm so sorry." "Oh, he doesn't really, we just say that to get the charity money." .... and, "I could have had your life?" "Yes, and you could have had mine!!")
8. Law Abiding Citizen - Gerard Butler is apparently freaking Batman on steroids. After his family gets killed in a home invasion, he spends ten years planning revenge and taking EVERY contingency into account. This was firmly "Okay". Not bad at all, but nothing spectacular either. There's no real reason to seek this out if you've not seen it before. (And if you have seen it before... you probably don't really remember much about it. But no need to re-watch it. I mean, unless you want to. Like I said, it's certainly enjoyable enough while watching it.)
9. The Gold Rush - Another Chaplin film. And it's delightful, just like the others have been. This time The Tramp goes to the Yukon, searching for gold, but finding all sorts of mishaps along the way. The Oceana Roll had me grinning ear to ear the entire time, and the faces Chaplin made while eating his shoe were LOL worthy. This movie is 100 years old this year, but, honestly, it's timeless.
10. Godzilla Minus One - hell yes!! Shikishima was a kamikaze pilot at the end of WWII, but his cowardice had him unable to complete the suicide mission. As he's dealing with the guilt of surviving the war when he feels that he SHOULD have died, his base is attacked by Godzilla. He survives this as well, which just adds to his feelings of shame. Fortunately, his found family - a young woman named Noriko and the young orphan baby Akiko - help him find reasons to be happy to be alive. He gets a job destroying mines left over from the war on a boat of other misfits (Doc, Kid, and the Captain) who help Shikishima feel that life ain't all that bad. But, then Godzilla returns. This movie did a nice balance of post-war drama and, you know, giant bad-ass lizard attacks. (The bad-ass lizard attacks are fucking BAD. ASS.) Anyway, good stuff this. Go, go, Godzilla!
11. The Grand Budapest Hotel - This took me a bit to warm up to, but by 20 minutes in or so, I was all in, and glad I went on this wild ride. This was watched for the Film Club I'm attending now each month. Wes Anderson films are definitely an acquired taste, some work for me (Rushmore, Royal Tenenbaums) and some don't (Life Aquatic, Isle of Dogs) but this one was a good one. I liked the nesting situation, and the coloring and the characters really worked. I did notice (and brought up in the film club!) that it doesn't pass the Bechtel Test, and really COULD have used some more drawn out female characters, but that wasn't a deal breaker, and the film was still quite enjoyable.
12. The Killing - 1956 noir movie that Stanley Kubrick directed. It's about a gang of guys who plan a heist of a horserace track. It's nonlinear, in that it keeps jumping back and forth showing each of the main characters doing their section of the heist. You'd think maybe seeing the same part of the horserace start five or six times would get repetitive, but, it works! Slight spoiler - crime doesn't pay for anyone involved in the operation.
13. Kids vs. Aliens - blaaaah. What a bunch of predictable garbage this turned out to be. Boring, unfunny, flat or annoying characters, not scary aliens... it was like Attack the Block dumbed down and garbage-ified. And it wasn't even HORRIBLE bad, it was just....not entertaining. Like, I wouldn't rate this a 1 or a 0, it was more like a 3 (out of 10), but that somehow makes it WORSE.
14. Beverly Hills Cop - one of two Eddie Murphy vehicles I watched for March's film club. This has some "jokes" that have aged poorly (the 'gay' jokes) and it's overflowing with cop tropes (loose cannons, angry police chiefs, etc), which... may have been fresh at the time this was released, but, you know, are now just ...tired. But, Eddie's charm definitely does a LOT of heavy lifting in this. Will be interesting to see what all is brought up at the club about this.
15. Coming to America - SO quotable!! Holds up pretty well, too. The barbershop scenes are probably my absolute favorites out of the movie, but the whole thing is pretty great.
16. The 400 Blows - French film from 1959 that had gotten onto my radar, and is one of those Super Important Movies, so decided to give it a go. It's good, and I'm glad that I watched it. It's awfully depressing, though. Documents the way that the system and adults fail children time and time again. Antoine is bullied by his teachers and despised by his mother. He makes bad decisions, in obvious cries out for attention, only to have the response repeatedly be "perhaps some more discipline is in order". There are a few moments of joy for Antoine - the time with his friend, who truly seems to care for him, and the night out at the movies with his parents, which is just a brief reprieve before they inevitably return to treating him like garbage.
17.The 4:30 Movie - Latest Kevin Smith flick. Coming of age movie about a Kevin Smith-stand-in who asks his crush to go see a rated R movie, back in the summer of '85. It wasn't funny, and it was severely by the numbers, but...I mean, it was Kevin Smith. I WILL say that it was his most competently made film I've seen. And I'm sure it meant a lot to him, as it was *obviously* autobiographical, but, it was just ... largely forgettable?
18. Lisa Frankenstein - set in the 80s, this is about a girl named Lisa who is obsessed with death after her mother was murdered a year prior. She ends up befriending (and eventually falling in love with) a re-animated corpse, who helps her murder people for body parts. It's a comedy, but very dark. Lots of Heathers vibes, although Heathers is absolutely a better movie. This was fine, and had a few bits that were funny, but didn't quite gel completely for me.
19. Chinatown - watched for Film Club. Was...not wowed. Heh. I don't know. I think I'm sort of over movies where the bad guys win. We have enough of that in reality. Movies can be a reflection of real life, sure, but, they can/should also be an escape from it. No need to watch 2 hours of a guy fail repeatedly at his tasks, to learn nothing, to not grow, to end up in, essentially, a worse situation then when he started. Sigh. Really good performances by Jack Nicholson and John Huston and Faye Dunaway, but this just ...didn't connect for me. I'm intrigued/worried to see how my opinion meshes with everyone else's in a couple of weeks... Maybe I'll add more notes here after film club if anything of note happens.
20. Beverly Hills Cop II - I'm sure I'd seen this before, but had forgotten most of it. (Turns out, there's a reason for that. It's largely unmemorable.) It was one of those "let's try to repeat the exact same beats as the first movie" sequels. I've got 3 queued up ...but I've heard/remember (?) that the third one is pretty awful, so if I'm watching it and it turns out to be completely awful, I may stop.
21. Beverly Hills Cop III - it ....was pretty bad. But I did watch the whole thing.I didn't laugh at any of the "jokes", but I did get an unintentional chuckle. The majority of the movie takes place in "Wonder World" which is an obvious Disney Land stand-in. The ticket to get into the theme park was 35 dollars, which everyone acts like is an inordinate amount of money. So THAT was funny. (In a very sad sort of way.) The rest of the movie though... oof. I also found out that the same guy who wrote this garbage wrote Die Hard!! (And Die Hard 2!) ...But also The Running Man and Hudson Hawk and The Flintstones. Wild.
22. Carnival of Souls - 1962 (I think?) flick about a young woman in a car accident who moves to a small town, where strange things are afoot. People seem to ignore her, and she keeps seeing visions of a man who ...looks like he's seen better days. The "twist" ending is one that has been done a gabillion times in other things, so it's not exactly shocking, and the performances are stilted and awkward, but ...if you allow yourself to, this can be a pretty engrossing experience. (Although, her neighbor. Oh my GOD. He's absolutely the definition of "creep". Man, you'll want to take a shower just watching him talk to her for five minutes.)
23. The Man with Two Brains - Steve Martin and Kathleen Turner comedy from the early 80s that holds up fairly well. It never quite reaches 'laugh out loud' levels of funny, but there are a number of gags that were amusing enough. Steve Martin plays Dr. Hfurhuhuhr, the world's most brilliant neurosurgeon (or, "brain guy", as the movie consistently refers to him. heh.) After his wife dies, he falls in love with Kathleen Turner's character - a femme fatale who takes joy in angering her husbands and denying them sex. Things get even more complicated when the doctor falls in love with a disembodied brain in a jar. (And, after reading that sentence right there, should tell you whether you're going to enjoy this movie or not.)
24. Longlegs - Garbage. Nicolas Cage plays a serial killer who started in the late 60s, murdering families thru...some sort of magic influence orbs? I don't know. There's an FBI agent tracking him down who has slightly psychic powers, and there were definitely some IDEAS in this that could have worked, but what we got was utterly boring garbage that I am genuinely angry about having wasted my time. Sigh.
25. The Birds - Somehow I'd never actually seen this all the way- just bits and pieces occasionally. Decided to remedy that by finally watching it. And, it's really really good!! Holds up amazingly well for a sixty-plus year old movie. I mean, yes, some of the effects are ...dodgy. And the tropes that are cliched now were probably a lot fresher back then (and, you know, maybe they're tropes because they're TRUE). But, yeah, overall, this was a heck of a ride. Basic plot - Melanie follows Mitch to his weekend getaway on Bodega Island. (And, um. Her whole stalking thing is both hilarious and creepy in and of itself.) While she's there, the birds that inhabit the area start deciding, "eh. Enough living peacefully among humans. Let's fuck things up." And ...that's pretty much it. Humans react in the ways that they basically can - which consists mostly of trying to get in shelter that is bird-proof. (which isn't always super effective, lol) Anyway. Awesome scenes include:
Melanie waiting outside the school (smoking, of course, because holy crap, everyone up until about 1987 or so smoked ALL THE TIME, apparently) while the crows begin to ....just congregate behind her. So cool and tension building.
The diner scene. (This is where the cliches I mentioned earlier wrack up, but, it's fine.) The drunk turning to religion. The guy who wants to annihilate every bird on the planet (LMFAO). The bird expert. The scared mom who decides to take her chances with a lecherous drunk driver.
The kids running from the bird attacks.
The near end, with Mitch making his way SLOWLY to the car while TONS of birds just...watch him.
Anyway. Yes. Classic film is classic. So glad I've finally seen it.
26. Companion - Josh, and his girlfriend, Iris, head up to a remote cabin weekend with their friends: Kat and Sergey, and Eli and Patrick. Things get pretty bad when Sergey makes an unwanted move on Iris. This was a fun sci-fi thriller comedy that had some obvious twists (the Iris twist is more or less spelled out from the beginning. And by the movie poster.) but also enough non-obvious ones that made the ride really fun. That, and, while none of the characters are exactly...good ...they're all still engaging enough that I was onboard with seeing how it all ended up.
27. Seven Days in May - A conspiracy of a bloodless coup is discovered. Took a while to get going (the pacing in the 60s was ...weird sometimes) but eventually it picked up, and while this was very philosophical, it didn't seem to feel like anyone would really ACT the way the characters did. (I dunno, maybe they would have back then. The past, as they say, is a foreign country.)
28. 36 Hours - The Nazis capture an American spy, and set up an elaborate ruse where they build a fake hospital, and make him believe six years have passed and the war is over, all in an attempt to get him to reveal secret plans. It's ridiculous in a pretty amusing way, at least for about half way thru. Both this and Seven Days in May were watched for Film Club.
29. MacGruber - underrated brilliance. (And a lot of stupidity, sure.)
30. Maxxxine - the third in the trilogy (X, Pearl, Maxxxine) from Ti West and Mia Goth. This one's set in the 80s, and ...kinda bored me? There were a few decent kills in it, but overall... this was just not as compelling as Pearl was.
31. Mega Time Squad - Set in New Zealand, John is part of a gang of low-level thieves run by Shelton. John dreams of having his own gang and being his own man. When Shelton sends him on a mission to steal money from a Chinese gang, John takes the money for himself, and also steals a bracelet that allows him to go back in time two minutes each time he presses the button on it. Doing so results in a duplicate John being brought into existence.... which eventually leads to a gang of Johns working together to get what they all want. As with most time travel stories, the logic is probably faulty somewhere along the lines, but I didn't really pay attention or care. None of the jokes really reach laugh out loud level, but were mildly amusing enough. The story was fun enough that I just opted to go wherever it took me.
32. Mars Attacks! - Rewatch. This holds up ....fine. There's a few bits or pieces that haven't aged super well, and it's not nearly as funny as I thought it was 30 years ago, but there's still enough great bits in here sprinkled throughout that it's worth a rewatch every so often. The amount of famous people in this film is REMARKABLE. And the cheesiness is just ...something you either buy in and enjoy, or something that's going to make this a very long hour and forty minutes for you. Personally, I like a nice bit of cheese every once in a while, so I'm glad I got a chance to view this again. Ack ack ack! Ack ack, ACK ACK!!!
33. Civil War - It was like seeing a universe next door. America tears itself apart for.... reasons. Which, apparently don't matter. And, really, they DON'T. The message is clear - war is bad, stupid, pointless and should be avoided. But, also, apparently, something we're just pretty good at as a species, and so... Anyway. This was more about war photography than about the war itself. And I'd say it was a pretty good movie.
34. Dick Tracy - rewatched for Film Club. "Mom, I wanna see Batman." "We have Batman at home." This came out a year after Tim Burton's HUGE success and you can see that they thought mimicking it to some degree would pay off... It...um. Didn't. But, this still held up moderately well. I didn't really like it at the time back in 1990 when I watched it - and the pacing (especially at the beginning) is freaking frantic as hell - but once I got into this, it was an enjoyable enough ride. The Kid and Big Boy (Al Pacino hamming it the hell up) made it for me. Don't know that I'd ever want to watch this again, but ...you know, give me 5 years or so, and I'll probably have forgotten enough of it to warrant another go 'round.
35. Here - based on the graphic novel I read a while back, which was all about just one setting throughout the years - focusing mostly on the times that it happens to be part of a house, and all the occupants through the decades. But there were bits from when it was nature too (and in the graphic novel, I vaguely remember a panel or two that are supposed to be set in the far future...but I can't truly confirm that is in the book. It wasn't in the movie.). Anyway, there isn't *really* a plot for this, it's mostly slice(s) of life of the various people that passed through that particular area of space. We see some dinosaurs (and then, sigh, the asteroid, despite the fact that this is set in New England (because Benjamin Franklin (SIGH) lived next door. Or his nephew, did? It was a little unclear. But still. Point is that the asteroid shouldn't have been visible, but whatever.) And we touch in briefly on a Native American tribe. And the aforementioned Ben Franklin era. And then the "main" characters/settings:
A turn of the (20th) century pilot and his wife who doesn't want him to be in that contraption.
A man who invents the recliner, and his wife.
A soldier back from World War II who has PTSD (or is just a flawed dad who drinks a lot. Or maybe both.) who is the patriarch of the main family. He and his wife have Tom Hanks, and ...three other kids? Maybe 4? Hard to know, exactly. Tom Hanks is the oldest, and the one we focus on the most. Because we see him fall in love and marry his highschool sweetheart - and they have a daughter. The wife wants to move out of the house (which, yeah, living with Tom Hanks's parents... I can see how that would be stressful) but Tom Hanks always has excuses - usually money related. (And also, if they moved out, you wouldn't be able to follow their lives, so, no real surprise there.)
We also see after they moved out that a Black family moves in, and it follows their lives up to at least 2020 (because we get a scene of their housekeeper contracting (and dying from) Covid-19.)
This ....wasn't a great movie. It wasn't 100% awful, either, but it was not really one I could call "good". The acting was -aside from a few moments - pretty horrific, and the writing wasn't really anything worthy either. The set design was pretty cool, and it was sometimes neat how they would transition from one era to another to another (which, was, you know, the entire gist of the film) but it did ...kinda wear out its welcome. And after it was over, I told Steph that a lot of Robert Zemeckis films have a very "Boomer" vibe to them, and this movie is ABSOLUTELY a "Boomer" movie.
36. Modern Times - Another Chaplin film. Pretty freaking great. This was, apparently, the final "Little Tramp" movie. In this one, he struggles to remain employed and out of jail, while befriending a vagrant woman who is wanted by authorities. The factory scenes at the beginning were probably the highlight of this, but I laughed at several different bits throughout.
37. The Fog - a completely UNSCARY horror film from John Carpenter, about a little coastal town in California that gets visited by some killer fisherman ghosts on the 100 year anniversary of their shipwreck.
38. Elite Target - a cheesy as hell "action" movie that I watched only because one of the actors in it is in my film club. Michael told us about it at the last film club meeting, that it was currently on Tubi. He warned us that "it's not good"... and, yeah. It certainly isn't, lol. But it actually wasn't completely horrible. It was definitely one of those MST3K movies that had some amazing unintentional humor with it. (The "checking fishing licenses" park ranger scene had me chuckling, as did the "returning your purse" scene (although that was with a mix of "seriously???")) This was about Gable, a "vigilante" guy who rescues a woman who was being attacked by a random thug, and ends up (reluctantly) protecting her from "the Elite" who want to take her out because....her father went on a news program and talked about them once? LOL. Anyway, Gable also has two people who reside in his head and act as his conscience - a little girl and his father. Half the time the movie acts as though only Gable can see and hear them, but there's a number of times the girl says something and it's like....DID the other person in the room hear her? Anyway, very silly dumb movie, but it was only an hour and fifteen minutes long, and I've absolutely seen worse.
39. Flight Risk - Topher Grace is a nebbish witness who is going to bring down some mob type, but has to be brought in from Alaska. The US Marshall (Michelle Dockery) bringing him in is a by-the-book type who has an imperfect past. Their pilot is Marky Mark, who is chewing scenery like it's freaking gum. Most of the action takes place on their little private airplane. This is just one of those forgettable dumb popcorn movies that operates mostly on contrivances and idiot balls being juggled. Was fine for what it was. (Although at the END of the movie, seeing "Directed by Mel Gibson" pop up was like...."oh. Well. Hm. Maybe it wasn't as enjoyable as I thought." Heh.)
40. L.A. Confidential - This got mentioned in film club a few months back, and I finally got around to checking it out. Quite a good flick! Set in 1950s LA, it's about a handful of cops dealing with corruption in the city - and, probably not surprisingly - inside the force as well. Ed Exeley is the one with morals; Bud White is the brawn who does what needs to be done to protect the force; and Vincennes is mostly in it for the fame. None of them are perfect, and the way they each respond to various discoveries of corruption is intriguing. Neo noir isn't my favorite genre, but this was still a compelling movie that I'm glad I got around to watching.
41. Mickey 17 - Set in the future, where cloning is possible, but outlawed on Earth (but not in space!), a group of people opt to leave our planet to go colonize their own. Expendables are people who sign up, allowing themselves to be cloned so they can perform the dangerous menial jobs - like testing the atmosphere of the new planet for viruses, or repairing the outside of the ship when going through radiation fields. When Mickey 17 gets left for dead, but ends up returning to the base only to find that Mickey 18 has been printed... things go sideways pretty quickly. This was...entertaining, but also felt about 30 minutes longer than it needed to be - and like it was really two movies that could have been really awesome smushed into one movie that ended up being ...not quite as cool. I think if it had been trimmed a bit, and just tighter with the story it wanted to tell, it would have been more memorable. Still not too bad, though. Robert Pattinson as the Mickey(s), and Mark Ruffalo as the Trumpian political leader, and Toni Collette as his power-hungry wife, being the stand-out performances.
42. Captain America: Brave New World - Oh, Marvel, how I wish I could quit you. This wasn't BAD, but it was nowhere near GOOD either. The new Captain America deals with politics (the new president is Col. Ross - the same Ross that was the antagonist in the Hulk flicks, and who caused the conflict in the "Civil War" MCU Avenger flick, apparently, although my memory of THAT is ...hazy.) and with some mind-control villain, and with feelings of inadequacy. This was largely filler, and I'm sure in a month or three I'll have forgotten all of it. (And probably be getting around to watching the newest Marvel movie...)
43. Grosse Pointe Blank - A rewatch. Absolute classic from the mid 90s, with John Cusack playing Martin Blank - a hitman who goes on a job that happens to be near his 10 year high school reunion. The soundtrack to this is BANGING, and it's funny and actiony and a god damn good movie.
44. High Fidelity - I don't THINK I'd seen this before. Or at least not all the way? Like PARTS of it were familiar-ish. But, either way, didn't care for it this time. Rob (John Cusack) is just... ugh. And so is Jack Black's character, and Dick (who I THOUGHT was somehow Tom Lenk, lol. Like, he reverse aged, or something.) But, yeah, all three of them are insufferable, and spending time with any of them was a chore. And none of the jokes were funny? Maybe they were back in the 90s, but...I don't think so. Mostly I just wanted to smack all of these people and find something better to do.
45. Predator: Killer of Killers - a new animated movie set in the Predator universe. I wasn't sure about the idea of that, but, this was surprisingly good. Starts with three vignettes of times a Predator encountered a person in history (a Viking queen in 821; Japanese brothers in 1620; and a fighter pilot in 1942.) which was cool enough, but then it ties them all together in a way I wasn't really expecting (basically taking all three "warriors" who defeated their Predator adversaries and forcing them to fight one another). The artwork was pretty awesome - reminded me of the Spiderverse animation, although not as ...diverse as that, I guess. But, still, this wasn't a bad way to spend an hour and twenty minutes, especially if you like Predator films.
46. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - the fuck is this shit? Had a chuckle or two, but this movie wore thin INCREDIBLY fast. An hour and a half of Johnny Depp (portraying Hunter S. Thompson) on various amounts of drugs. I guess it's got enough of a cult following to be considered "good" by a number of people, but I'm not one of them.
47. Election - Rewatch. Funny stuff. I appreciated the fact that Tammy ends up getting more votes than anyone else. (People truly don't want leaders, they want to just live a life where they aren't bothered by crap.) I remember thinking when I first watched this years ago that Tracy was the villain. And, sure, she's got flaws, but, my GOD, Mr. M is the real scumbag in this. (Although not nearly as much as Dave. And, yeeeeesh. The underage rape is just pretty much glossed over.) Also... Paul? ...Probably who I would have voted for (once Tammy became ineligible). Yeah, he's dim as hell, but he was also ...a decent guy? Anyway. Entertaining flick (heh. Unintentional humor!!) and I discovered this was an adaptation of a novel, which I'm planning on checking out.
48. Modern Problems - Rewatch. Chevy Chase is a loser air traffic controller who is overly controlling of his girlfriend, who breaks up with him. Later, some nuclear waste gets dumped on him, and he gets telekinetic powers. It goes pretty much as you'd predict it would. I know I watched this as a kid (maybe multiple times? Or at the very least, at an extremely impressionable moment, because it's stuck with me over the decades). This is not a very good movie, like, at all. But, you know, rewatching it, at least, cemented that proof into my mind.
49. Mission: Impossible - I've decided to finally get around to checking out this franchise, since it's been around for *checks notes*... 29 years!?!?! What the actual hell? Anyway, this... was fine? I guess. It seemed like I had ...somehow seen it before, but it was just...kind of thru osmosis, I guess. (Or maybe because it was just really predictable?) But, like, I knew who the true mole was, and the CIA vault break-in scene is one that I've just sort of ...seen parodies of, maybe? Or clips. Don't get me wrong - it was still a very good action sequence. It just seemed that, even though I'd never actually watched it, that I...had. Anyway. Got like 8 movies left to go in the series, so, we'll see how that shapes up.
50. Mission: Impossible 2 - Bahahaaha!! That motorcycle chase scene for the final 15 or 20 minutes of the movie was bonkers. And when Ethan and Sean jumped at each other midair, I had to pause the movie for a good two or three minutes to laugh. Oh, John Woo. Never change. (And, yay, pigeons!) Seriously, with the slow-mo, the pigeons, the facemasks, and the action... this was almost like a Face/Off DLC or something. And I'm fine with that. The "plot" of this one involved some genetically modified superflu that was created (by accident?) and the villains trying to put it on the market along with the cure for it. Plays a little different after covid, but, you know, 2000 was a VERY different world. Anyway, I had a fine enough time with this. Still on board with the franchise...
51. Mission: Impossible III - Heh. Leave it to JJ Abrams to introduce a complete macguffin plot line, that probably goes absolutely nowhere. Sigh. But, hey, Philip Seymour Hoffman is ABSOLUTELY the best villain in the series (so far, anyway). Interesting that Ethan gets married in this one, and tells Juila (his wife) about his true job... I wonder if that will carry over to the next movie(s) or not. (I'm guessing probably not. Continuity doesn't really seem to be a strong point with this series.)
52. Superman - We interrupt the Mission: Impossible marathon to go to the latest DC Universe reboot. And, man, am I glad that I saw this in the theater. SO much fun!! After years of the grim-dark Superman, we FINALLY get a Superman that is much MUCH more in line with the Reeves version, and, good god, it's like ointment for the soul. Was it perfect? No. But, I had a great time escaping the real world for 2 hours while I watched Kal-el and Krypto fly around and punch things real good. And, Superman... is just so freaking EARNEST and GOOD. It's ...inspiring. Like, you know, Superman is supposed to be. I didn't cry during it, but came awfully close. All in all, it looks like going with James Gunn might have been the best thing for DC to do.
53. Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol - The building/meeting/nuclear code exchange scene? I'd totally seen that before!! I guess I caught it on TV some random time years ago. It was STILL massively awesome and fun to watch. (And, arguably, better, having known more of the context. lol) I'd say that the action scenes ...might actually be getting better? And that this one might be my favorite of the batch so far, even though it was sort of ridiculous with the "Ethan's wife is dead...no, wait, she's not" storyline.
54. Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation - Followed by what is maybe the least exciting one so far. Maybe it's just watching the entire franchise back to back, but this just largely felt...borrowed? Like nothing exciting or new was really brought to it. It did have a TON of Simon Pegg in it, and he's probably my favorite recurring character, so it had that going for it, but overall, I was...semi bored during this, even during the heist scene (although, props to them for actually KILLING* Ethan Hunt during it!) in the crazy underwater computer thing.
*He got better.
55. Mission Impossible: Fallout - A little long (2.5 hours??) but pretty darn exciting nonetheless. They somehow have upped the stakes, and made it personal. I really do appreciate that they're increasing the continuity. Makes it feel like a bigger overall story. Two more to go...
56. Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One - Heh. It's like they heard my complaint about it being long and were all, "hold my beer". AND it's a two-parter!! But, I guess if they're finally wrapping this franchise up, it makes sense that they'd turn it up to 11. This was mostly just setting up for Part Two, so it was a LOT of "I've got the key, I lost the key, she's got the key, I've got the key". Despite that, it mostly worked for me. The Entity (and Gabriel) seem like a decent enough final boss. I'm mildly bummed that the second part isn't out on DVD yet for me to watch (it's maybe still in theaters at this point, but might be done with the theatrical run...which means it's gonna be a while before I get a chance to see how it ALL ends. (I'm guessing with a few face masks (I'm really hoping Luther gets to wear one), a lot of Cruise running, and the occasional 'go go go!!')
57. White Men Can't Jump - watched for Film Club. This was okay... WHOLE lotta 'smack talk' (which reads to me a machismo, which REALLY irks me, but, was ...mostly tolerable during this). Rosie Perez was a delight and a half. The Jeopardy! scene had me filled with joy, and I was absolutely floored that she a) left Billy and b) that it STUCK. I've been so conditioned by movies that the guy always "gets the girl" that I kept expecting her to come back to him. But, nope. Good on her. The rest of the film... eh. No real *laughs* from the smack-talk, and since that's where most of the film's humor is supposed to come from, it was just sort of ...there for me.
58. Role Models - Watched this for Film Club. Plot wise it was predictable as all get out, but, the jokes were top notch. Oh my god. So vulgar, but, SO funny. Paul Rudd and um... Wheeler was his name, and if you see him, you're like, "Yeah. that guy is named Wheeler"... he's from those American Pie movies, maybe? And other Seth Rogan type comedies, which, typically aren't my jam, but this one just worked. (Oh, "Wheeler" is Seann William Scott, apparently. So, there ya go.) ANYWAY. Paul Rudd (Danny) and Wheeler work at a place selling energy drinks to high schoolers. Danny is in a rut and hates his job. His longtime girlfriend, Beth (Elizabeth Banks), wants him to get out of his rut too. When he proposes marriage to shake things up, she breaks up with him (this aspect felt the most 'plotty' part of it in the beginning.), and he takes it ...poorly. He ends up driving his monster truck all over a school, damaging property, and getting in trouble with the law. As a result, he and Wheeler (he was with him at the time) have to do community service, serving as foster adults/mentors to kids in a program called "Sturdy Wings" which is run by Jane Lynch, who is hilarious. Anyway, Danny gets paired with Augie, a socially awkward teen obsessed with LARPing, and Wheeler gets Ronnie, a ten year old Black kid who says the most politically incorrect, sexist, racist, hilarious shit imaginable. Lessons learned, growth happens, blah blah blah. Everyone knows exactly how THAT part is gonna go, it's the jokes that make this movie worth watching. Absolutely glad this was in the film club, I wouldn't have ever picked it up on my own.
59. Monstrous - yawn fest. The "twist" is telegraphed from the first freaking scene. I like Christina Ricci, but, oof. This was about her being a mom in the 1950s with her son 10 year old son fleeing her abusive husband. They retreat to a home on the outskirts of the city, which may be haunted. It was only 90 minutes long, but still felt longer due to how by the numbers and predictable this was. I think I had only added it to my library queue because the trailer made it look WAY better than it turned out to be. To spare anyone thinking about seeing this - the twist is that Cody is, and always has been, dead. The secondary twist is that it's actually taking place in modern day, not the 1950s.
60. Vertigo - Scotty (Jimmy Stewart) is kind of a dick, yo. I guess he might be a decent person if he wasn't absolutely obsessed with Judy, and got all controlling at the end. And poor Judy, being controlled by both Scotty and the husband guy (I forget his name). I don't know. This was ...okay, but I wasn't WOWED by it. Except for Midge. Midge is the best, everyone agrees with that.
61. Locked - I mean, I went in with low expectations on this thriller about a down-on-his luck dad (played by ...Bill Skarsgard, i think?) who attempts to steal an SUV, only to have the tables turned and he gets locked inside of it, and it's controlled remotely by Anthony Hopkins. It was pure dumb, as expected. There were ......messages that were being thrown out there (about class, crime, privilege) but... I'm not feeling smart enough to know what they were, and if they were even worth investigating.
62. The Autopsy of Jane Doe - creepy as hell horror flick about a father and son coroner team who investigate a mysterious corpse of an unidentified young woman who was found at the scene of a grisly murder. The tension as this ticks by builds pretty darn well. The ending-ending didn't QUITE land, but overall, this was a pretty entertaining little gem of a horror flick.
63. Crank - Ehhhh. This came out in 2006 and had an EXTREMELY 2006 feel, if that makes sense. It's an action "comedy" with Jason Statham as a hitman who gets injected with a drug that will kill him if he doesn't keep his heartbeat going. Dumb actiony stuff happens, and I'd PROBABLY be along for the ride if his character wasn't one of the least likable people ever put to film. Not great when you're rooting for the poison.
64. Crank 2: High Voltage - more of the same, just.... more. More gore, more nudity, more action, more stupid "jokes" that are really just racist and homophobic crap. And Chev is STILL an unlikable dickhead. So, yeah. I will give them credit that the "story" had a slightly more entertaining spin to it, but that ain't saying much. At an hour and 25 minutes, this still felt WAAAY too long.
65. Death of a Unicorn - Paul Rudd doesn't age, and this movie explained why - he's evidently eating unicorn flesh. Anyway. Paul Rudd is a dad going up to a billionaire's resort (he wants to get on the committee that controls drug prices, or something? I dunno, it was generic boring stuff that didn't really matter anyway) with his teenage (?) daughter, and on the way up there, they hit a unicorn with their car. The other unicorns in the area do NOT take kindly to this. This was a horror/comedy that was pretty stupid and cheesy as hell, but not the worst thing I've ever seen. The billionaires all got what was coming to them, the family lived happily (sorta) ever after, and the unicorns also lived happily ever after, so, all is right with the world.
66. Harvey - Jimmy Stewart is Elwood P. Dowd, a rich, lovable alcoholic who has a friend named Harvey that he likes to introduce to people. Harvey is a six foot tall rabbit who happens to be invisible. So, most people think Elwood is off-kilter, mentally. His sister, Veta, and niece, Myrtle, decide to have him committed. Through a series of miscommunications that would make Three's Company be like, "Oh, come ON!!!", Veta ends up committed instead. (Honestly, while this was played for laughs, the entire scene where Veta ends up institutionalized against her will, and nobody listening to her was ...sort of terrifying!) Anyway, aside from THAT brief horrific happening, this was ...decent. Everything is over-exaggerated and over-the-top, to make it more comical and it works on occasion.
67. Final Destination: Bloodlines - Hey, if this is the absolute end of the franchise, I'm cool with that. If this sparked some new life into the series and they want to keep making these ridiculous films, I'm cool with that too. But, honestly, this one might be hard to top. The way that they tied all of the other films together (by having Stefani's grandmother becoming obsessed with Death killing all the people she originally saved back in 1968) was clever, and I liked almost all the characters, and the dark comedy was funny. This was dumb, but a lot of fun, which is all you can ask for from a Final Destination movie, and it delivered.
68. The Martian- rewatch. When I watched this back in 2016 (!!!!!) I said that it was a faithful adaptation of the book, which was a fun popcorn read, making this a fun popcorn flick. I stand by that.
69. Anchorman - rewatch. A good portion of the jokes just aren't funny anymore, but the ones that still work work EXTREMELY well. (Jack Black's whole scene with the burrito and the bridge ("That's how I roll."), about 70% of Brick's stuff, the two teleprompter jokes - "I'm Ron Burgundy?" is making me giggle just typing it out.) There's a handful of others that are still very funny, so overall this still gets a high grade, and I'm sure in like 5 or 6 years I'll rewatch it again, and appreciate the jokes again.
70. Raiders of the Lost Ark - rewatch, obviously. Watched for Film Club. Holds up pretty well! I liked this better than Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom that I rewatched a few years back. Indy's actually not that great a guy (my god, the way he treats Marion is shitty as hell) but if you overlook that (as we did back in the day) the action is top notch, and the music, of course, is iconic as hell. Plus, Nazis getting what they fucking deserve (face melting!!) is always good to see. All in all, pretty good times.
71. Saving Private Ryan - another rewatch, although I'd only ever seen this one other time. It's an INTENSE (and lengthy) movie, so not one that most people want to sit down and watch multiple times. But, man, this is good. Tears were definitely shed. I think Schindler's List might be Spielberg's best movie, but this one is probably a very close second. Also, rewatching it, I was amazed at HOW MANY actors were in this that have gone on to do so many other things! But, anyway, this (fictional) story of a group of 7 or 8 soldiers ordered to go find a missing Private (because his 3 other brothers were all killed in action, and the US Government isn't *completely* monstrous (at least back in the 40s it wasn't)) to bring him home is filled with some REMARKABLE action and some fantastic acting. War is hell, and this captures that truth amazingly well.
72. Brigsby Bear - an off-beat comedy/drama about a 25 year old named James (played by Kyle Mooney) who is OBSESSED with a children's show called "Brigsby Bear". His parents - especially his father (played by Mark Hamill!!) - encourage this, until one day, the police show up, and it's revealed to the audience (and James) that his parents ...actually kidnapped him as a baby, and were keeping him in a bunker away from the rest of the world. James gets re-united with his actual family and introduced to the larger outside world. His fish out of water naivety and obsession with Brigsby Bear (which was a show his kidnapers produced) are actually quite endearing, and it's kinda nice seeing how he adapts to the world - and how they adapt to him as well. I don't think this had any "laugh out loud" moments, exactly, but it did provide a few chuckles along the way, and I was engaged with the characters throughout.
73. The Hudsucker Proxy - Somehow I had never seen this before. What a wonderfully fun movie this was! The plot: Corporation CEO commits suicide by jumping out of the 44th floor (not counting the mezzanine, lol!!). The rest of the board decides to tank the company's stock over the next month, and to do that, opt to hire a newb that will run the company into the ground. They pick Norville Barnes - a guy who just got hired in the mailroom (where they'll dock ya!!) to become their new president. But, it turns out, Norville has a fantastic idea up his sleeve (you know, for kids!) that makes everything work out in the end. Meanwhile, Amy Archer is a Pulitzer winning journalist investigating Norville's rapid rise in the company (and, yeah, falling in love with him at the same time.) I really enjoyed this, and will definitely want to watch it again at some point.
74. Thunderbolts* - Latest Marvel movie. It being an "Avengers-like" story about a team-up - this one more or less taking a page from the Suicide Squad - I found this pretty enjoyable. Uh...not a whole lot to SAY about it, though. Had some good action pieces, there was just enough humor that it didn't get obnoxious, and having all of the characters basically dealing with mental health issues kinda made them all more relatable (not necessarily *likeable*, but relatable). Also, Julia Louis-Dreyfus is absolutely a treasure that the Marvel movies need to hold onto as long as possible.
75. Joker: Folie à Deux - I was no fan of the first one, and I had heard that this was widely panned, but, figured I'd give it a shot, and see for myself. Hey, the masses were right this time! This is a boring prison movie mixed with a boring courtroom drama with a boring romance AND a boring musical all in one!! I like musicals - although when they're the kind like this where it's covers....not so much. Give me original songs, please. - but ...there was no ...emotion to this. There was also no real reason to MAKE it a musical. Anyway. Story - Arthur Fleck, after having killed people - on live tv! - in the first movie, is being held in Arkham prison, awaiting trial. He meets Harley Quinzel, a fellow inmate who is infatuated with him. They fall in love, and boring songs take place in their minds, while the court (and various psychologists, guards, and the public at large) debate whether Arthur is crazy or not. Arthur dies at the end (spoiler, but, trust me, if I've spoiled it for you, I've done you a favor) where it's revealed that, oh, maybe the REAL Joker was some random other inmate this whole time. Jesus, what a crap movie.
76. Insidious - Decided to finally check out the Insidious franchise. 5 movies to sift thru... This first one.....was fine, I guess. It did NOT scare me. There was ONE jump scare - out of about a few hundred. Holy god, so. many. jump. scares. - that startled me, but overall, this story of a young kid who gets his soul lost while astral projecting (!???) was ....just kinda mediocre. Not ready to throw in the towel just yet, as maybe it gets better as it goes (although the IMDB scores on each movie decrease throughout the series, so...that's not promising) but, for now, I'm still on board this dumb ghost train.
77. Insidious Chapter 2 - Just a smidge better than the first one, in my opinion. The opening up of the lore felt like it was done well enough that it kept me mostly intrigued, and I'm almost always on board with sequels that tie back into previous installments to make things be looked at in a different way, so, yeah. I mean, this still wasn't a GREAT movie, but, fun enough. (And, ironically, the DVD froze with about 5 minutes left, so I was spared the (most likely inevitable) sequel bait ending. Which...fine by me, dude. Not every horror movie HAS to end with a hook to watch the next one, you know. That being said...time to watch the 3rd chapter....
78. Insidious Chapter 3 - Okay...so, decide to just do a prequel. I mean, yeah, Elise is great - although, you would think she'd stay AWAY from the Further after all the crap she's seen... - but whatever. This was just... largely forgettable stuff. I'm not going to remember this in a week, if that. The absolute FINAL jumpscare DID get me, although the 50 others sprinkled throughout were just boring. I'm not loving this franchise, but, sunk-time fallacy is hard at work, so I'll watch the remaining two.
79. Insidious The Last Key - ooof. These were never great, but this one was just ....bad. The backstory for Elise with her abusive father was ...probably not necessary? And, absolutely difficult to watch. But, then, having there also be a guy keeping a kidnapped woman hostage, and just...I don't know. The demon was slightly more frightening looking, but the storyline was more boring. I've only got one more - and supposedly, it cycles back to the original family to tie it all together, so... I'll force myself through it, but, MAN, am I glad that that'll be the end of it.
80. Insidious The Red Door - okay, this was weirdly, maybe the best one? I mean, it wasn't good or anything, but, especially after coming off of The Last Key, this was a VAST improvement. Overall, though, I'm just glad that the franchise is done. I'm not glad that I watched it, because, truly, it didn't have anything that made it anything I'd recommend, or will remember beyond the next month or so, but...whatever.
81. Se7en - rewatch, for film club. Man, this really is one cynical fucking film. It's good - not great, like I had thought (sigh) 30 years ago when watching it - but it's quite good. But, absolutely cynical. Um. I don't really have much else to say about it.
82. Sunset Blvd. - I'd never seen this before (I know), but Free With Ads is covering it next week, and so I decided to remedy that. It's pretty darn good. Norma was sympathetic and creepy at the same time, and it's fascinating watching Max and Joe (probably others, too) get drawn into her black hole of ruin as she simply can't accept time changing and her fame having fleeted away. The film is a little slow - it WAS made in 1950, after all - and sometimes veers toward soap opera levels of melodrama, but, overall, still a pretty great flick.
83. Drive-Away Dolls - In 1999, two lesbian friends - one uptight, one a freewheeling spirit - go on a road trip driving a car that was meant to be driven by some ...unsavory types. Because inside the trunk of the car is a package containing some pretty damning objects that some high-powered individuals don't want the public to know about. This was made by one of the Coen brothers, and it feels like an imitation of a great Coen brothers movie. Like, it wants to be one - full of quirky characters and situations - but it just doesn't have the same punch as most of their work.
84. Young Frankenstein - rewatched for Film Club. This has gotten to the point where it's more comfort comedy than laugh out loud - for the most part. There are still a handful of bits that will, apparently, always make me laugh. "Roll, roll, roll in ze hay!", "Abby Normal", the blink and you miss it gag of when the monster first comes on stage and does his first "trick" where Frederick feeds him a treat, and of course, "Puttin' on the Ritz" will never NOT be hilarious to me. But I noticed this time around there is a LOT of mugging for the camera, and a good portion of the jokes are just not nearly as funny anymore. But, definitely a classic for a reason.
85. Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde - watched this for Film Club. I'd never seen it before. Was kinda interesting; it didn't really seem to have a message about gender, which, in 2025, when fucking EVERYTHING is politicized, is rather refreshing. Or, hell, maybe it DID have a message, and I just completely missed it. Who knows. But, the way I saw it, this was just largely done for the 'shock value' of having the Jekyll and Hyde story be switched up by having the protagonist turn into a woman, rather than a hideous monster-like beast. Anyway, I went into this with rather low expectations, so was pleasantly surprised at how enjoyable it turned out to be.
86. Airplane! - DEFINITELY got a lot of jokes that haven't aged well or just weren't that great to begin with. But, there's still enough in here that made me chuckle that this can't be completely dismissed.
87. Airplane II: The Sequel - Pretty much same as above.
88. Dumb and Dumber - rewatch. Still has a couple of good laughs in it.
89. The Naked Gun - 2025 sequelish type movie to the original 90s spoofs. Liam Neeson is Frank Drebin Jr. It wasn't fall down hilarious, but had enough gags and puns and weirdness to keep me entertained for an hour and 25 minutes, so, take that as a win.
90. Face/Off - rewatch. God, this movie is so damn ridiculous, but I love it. Nicolas Cage and John Travolta as Castor Troy and Sean Archer (and, uh, vice versa) are over the top and insane, but, it's just so stupid fun.
91. Clone Cops - This wanted so badly to be funny or biting satire, and ....it just wasn't. It's got a halfway decent premise - set in a near-future where a company (Nefari US) that specializes in soft serve ice cream AND cloning police officers has a streaming show where their officers attmept to thwart known criminals from various crimes. I feel like if this had had SLIGHTLY better writers that it might have been more enjoyable. As it is, I just felt ....bland.
92. Harlem Nights - I'm sure that Eddie Murphy and Richard Pryor and Redd Foxx and Vivica A. Fox and the rest of the big stars in this (there were quite a few!) had a great time making this. However, it just ...didn't do anything for me. All the jokes and tropes felt VERY borrowed and tired and, aside from the menace I felt from the mobster, overall this was a bit meh.
93. Drop - pure dumb, but it's fun enough, if you just roll with it. Violet is a mom who hasn't been out on a date in years (she's understandably gunshy, as her ex was abusive and ended up committing suicide after nearly killing her). She goes on a date with Henry, and starts receiving threatening texts ordering her to murder her date, or her son will get killed. Like I said, it's dumb AF, but I've seen MUCH worse, and had a decent time.
94. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang - Comedy with Robert Downey Jr solving a crazy case as he pretends to be a detective in LA. Perhaps a SMIDGE too much homophobic-adjacent jokes. For the most part, though, this was a pretty fun popcorn flick.
95. Money Train - Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson team up again; this time as cops who prowl around the subway, while their corrupt boss is just greedy. Woody has a gambling problem and decides (eventually, like 4 hours into this slog) to rob the "money train". This whole thing felt like a contractual obligation - nobody seemed into it, and it was just way too boring.
96. Looking Glass - Nicolas Cage is Ray, who, along with his wife, Maggie, become owners of a motel out in the middle of the desert. (Oh, this is after they lost their child in some tragedy that ...I don't know why that part of the story was there, really. To give their characters depth, or something?) Anyway. Ray discovers that room 10 has a secret room behind the one way mirror, so that pervy spying can happen. And it does. But then, there's a murder in that room!! Ray is trying to figure out whodunnit. Was it the previous owner, Ben? Was it the over-friendly sheriff (played by Marc "Riley Finn" Blucas)? Was it the truck driver who invites prostitutes into his room each time he's there? Or perhaps the shop-keeper across the street? Or was it Ray himself? The biggest question is - will you manage to stay awake long enough to find out? And if you do, will you care? There are slow burns, and then there are slow burns that are so slow, there's not even really any heat....
97. Johnny Dangerously - rewatch. Holds up. Immensely quotable and still quite funny flick about Johnny Dangerously, his brother Tommy, Lil Sheridan, Jocko Dundee, Roman "Fargin Bastigages" Moronie, and Danny Vermin ("You shouldn't list me last. My father listed me last once. Once."). I think I probably watched this movie like 30 times as a kid, so it didn't make me laugh out loud during this rewatch, but it absolutely felt like comfort food.
98. 15 Things You Didn't Know About Bigfoot (#1 Will Blow Your Mind!) - A low budget comedy about a video journalist and his cameraman who get sent on clickbait "journalism" assignments, and wind up on an adventure in backwoods Georgia with a self-proclaimed Bigfoot expert. Bits of this were funnier than I was expecting, but it didn't *quite* sustain itself thru the entire hour twenty. Still, it had enough decent jokes/parodies of internet culture that it wasn't a complete waste of time.
99. Gangs of New York - Violent. Long. Well acted. Don't know how historically accurate it is, but. Anyway, watched this for Film Club. (Didn't get to attend September or October, so I'm hoping that I'll get to go this month) It's a decent enough film. The acting is top notch. The story ...kinda basic. Kid sees his dad get murdered by an anti-immigrant leader, vows revenge, years later, gets in his inner circle so he can do it. It truly is the acting that elevates this. Biggest takeaway is that I would NOT want to live in 1860s New York. (Or, well, anywhere, most likely. SO much of the past was garbage, yo.)
100. The Man Who Knew Too Much - Continuing to sporadically catch up on seeing Hitchcock stuff; gotta say this wasn't as good as The Birds or Psycho or even Vertigo. Still had moments, of course, but, this was a bit on the unbelievable side too often. Jimmy Stewart (always great!) is Ben, a doctor, husband, and father, who gets involved in an assassination plot after the world's worst spy befriends him and his family, and then gets killed. With his dying words, the spy tells Ben some of the info in hopes that he'll be able to prevent the would-be assassins. Normally, a dude would just tell the authorities, and be done with it. But when his son gets kidnapped by the assassin group, they've got leverage, so it's up to Ben and his wife, Jo (Doris Day) to more or less stop it on their own. So, yeah. Glad I've seen it, as it's another Hitchcock-notch to cross of the list, but, wouldn't rank it in his top tier.
101. Megan is Missing - A "found footage" style movie, about two 14 year old girls who disappear, a few weeks apart. It's supposedly "based on actual events". This movie made me sad in parts - when Megan is talking to her friend about the first time she had oral sex (at age 10!!!), and when Amy considered herself "princess pudgy"... but neither of those were the focus of the movie, or the parts that were supposed to be the "horror" aspect. But, yes, while abductions DO happen, the way they were presented in the film were ...kinda boring. The other parts (while also portrayed poorly - my god, the writing and acting in this is atrociously bad) were the only real things that got emotional reactions out of me. This might have been a better, more horrifying movie in the hands of a better writer/director. As it is, the realism factor is too low to have it have any real impact.
102. Jurassic World: Rebirth - Rebooting the franchise, again, but, MAN, the predictability of it all. It's not anywhere near as bad as Dominion was, but if they DO make another installment with these characters, I'd put it as a coin-flip as to whether I'd bother watching it, whereas every other turd they've crapped out I've been like, "Okay, I'm definitely going to see that at some point."
103. Hot Shots! - rewatch. A LOT more slapstick than I remember this being. It's just a very silly movie, not supremely funny unless you turn your brain off, really.
104. Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning - Well, finally topped off the franchise (or, at least, the ones with Tom Cruise. Cuz you know they'll try to move it on without him, and most likely fail) and ...it was okay. VERY nostalgia heavy and indulgent, although, you know, 35 years ...kinda earned it, I guess. The submarine sequence was nonsensical (like most MI action pieces are) but was impressive nonetheless. It's not often a movie decides to just have a half hour of NO dialogue. Bummed at the token "got to lose a member of the team" choice that was made (although also not surprised at who it was.) I think possibly 3 or Fallout were the best of the series. This absolutely needed more masks. (There were only two instances of it happening, and they were just like "eh, okay, we got the required mask part out of the way") ...I also don't think there was any "Go! Go! Go!" lines, so that was disappointing. I liked the MESSAGE of the movie - the optimism that it was reaching for - but ...yeah, overall, a little bit just sorta ...fine.
105. M3GAN 2.0 - The killer AI robot doll is back, but this time it's WAY more "action" movie than horror. It's entertaining enough, but you're not missing anything if you skip this. It really didn't need to be 2 hours long.
106. The Man in the White Suit - Black and white flick from 1951. Alec Guiness (Yep, Obi-Wan himself) plays Sidney Stratton, a lowly janitor in a textile factory who is actually brilliant and invents a fabric that never wears out and never gets dirty. Which seems like a great idea, but, capitalism dictates that things MUST wear out to be replaced, so the higher ups want to suppress it. This was a nice undiscovered gem.
107. Emily the Criminal - Aubrey Plaza is consistently great in everything I've seen her in. Here, she plays Emily, a young woman who has a criminal record (assault charges) and student loan debt that have put her into a life that feels hopeless. When she gets drawn into the seedy world of credit card fraud, she discovers she's got a knack for the life of crime. This isn't a life changingly great movie, but it's absolutely entertaining and enthralling for the runtime.
108. Terrifier 3 - More antics with Art the Clown versus Sienna, the magical final girl. The first two were fine, this was essentially more of the same. And while the lore/supernatural backstory is somewhat intriguing (much more interesting than the kills, which have just gotten cartoon level of stupid), even that has worn off enough that if they make a 4th one, I'm not gonna see it. (I do predict that when Dead Meat does the Kill Count for this, that the "dull machete" for worst kill will have to go Johnathan. One of the more interesting characters, and you kill him offscreen??? What the hell, movie. Oh, lol. I just went and looked, and the Kill Count for this was posted 9 months ago... I'll have to watch it and see if my prediction was accurate. (it was.)
109. Santa Jaws - Okay, the title is pretty great. And this sounds good (or entertaining enough, I guess) on paper, but, ooof. I only watched this on Tubi because the Free With Ads podcast was going to be covering it. I'm hoping they eviscerate it. Oh. The plot - angsty comic drawing teen gets a magic pen from his uncle. The pen makes his drawing of a santa-themed shark come to life. Said shark then starts to eat his family members one by one. It's a low budget sci-fi (or, sigh, SyFy) movie that looks like they spent all of 12 dollars on the effects. And the acting. And the writing.
109. The Life of Chuck - Simply amazing. I remember when I read the short story this was bsed on that I didn't particularly like it. But, this adaptation is really quite incredible. It's told in 3 acts of Chuck Krantz's life, in reverse, and ....it's just really, REALLY good. The dance sequence in act 2? Tears were streaming down my face. And the ending - which is, of course, the beginning - just amazingly brought it all full circle and ...man. This was, without a doubt, one of the best movies I've seen this year. And ...as I can't stop thinking about it several days later, I think it could possibly be up there as one of the best I've seen ever. Certain films, I think, sometimes, come into your life at the right moment. And this one just hit in the exact right way. EXCELLENT movie that I can't recommend highly enough.
110. A Christmas Carol (aka Scrooge) - the 1951 version of the Charles Dickens story. The black and white one with Alistair Sim as Ebenezer. I'm sure I've seen this version before, it's a classic, and considered one of the gold standards. It's decent, but I think I prefer the version with George C. Scott instead. Or the Muppet's. Still, for a filck that is over 70 years old, it got the job done. I (re)watched this for Film Club, for December. (There's a whopping 5 movies for this month's session!)
111. Die Hard - I know the last time I rewatched this - back in 2020 - that I was a little bit harsh on it, saying that I didn't really know if it was worthy of being in my top 10 movies. That being said, it IS a supremely enjoyable action flick. (And, Christmas movie, definitively.) Rewatched it for Film Club's December discussion (which is one week away at this point, and I still have 3 more movies to get thru: Feast of Seven Fishes, Gremlins, and Lehal Weapon) ANYWAY. My take away from this particular viewing is that Hans Gruber is the quintessential movie villain. Benefits of a classical education, I suppose. :)
112. Feast of the Seven Fishes - Christmas romcom set in the early 80s focusing on an Italian-American family and their tradition of having a giant meal for Christmas. It was fine. Not anything I'm likely to remember or recommend, really, but it was fine. Got a few smiles out of me, and it was interesting seeing some representation of cultures I'm not overly familiar with.
113. Gremlins - rewatch for Film Club. I know that this is included because it's a "Christmas movie", and yeah, it takes place at Christmas, but....this is a horror movie, yo. It's a CHRISTMAS horror movie, but it's a horror movie. I did notice that the silliness that Gremlins 2 ratchets up WAS actually here in this one, laying the groundwork. (All the scenes in the bar, the watching of Snow White) This is still just a good fun movie about a bunch of mischievous (and, occasionally lethal) monsters.
114. Lethal Weapon - rewatch, but it's been SO long, that it was essentially like watching it for the first time. So much of this has been parodied and become cliche, that the 'serious' parts were almost comical in and of itself. Riggs (Mel Gibson) is a fucking LUNATIC, and he plays that remarkably well. (hmmm.) Danny Glover is just the "old" (man, *I'm* 50!! Like...seriously???) cop who is world-weary and, honestly, seems like a pretty good guy. The villains in this were pretty cold-blooded, and, somehow managed to out-crazy Gibson. (I mean, it's Gary Busey... so, you know, coin toss there.) Anyway. The world they live in is absolutely fucking crazy - a sniper shooting at 9 year olds? Heroin runners blowing up houses and shooting people from helicopters??? Holy cow, man. Anyway. Yet another "Christmas movie" that .....sorta really isn't one? This one, I think, is really borderline. If you use the defintion that Christmas is essential to the plot, then....yeah. This one doesn't exactly fit. If the film were set at any other time of year, it woudln't be any different. Gremlins, I suppose, is borderline too, in that, Gizmo could have been a birthday gift instead of a christmas present, and wouldn't have been any different.
115. Mystery Team - Group of friends Jason ("master of disguise"), Duncan ("boy genius"), and Duncan ("the strong one") formed the Mystery Team when they were 7, going around solving mysteries around the neighborhood. Now they're 18... and still attempting to solve child mysteries. When they get hired by an 8 year old girl to solve the murder of her parents, they eventually sort of stumble into an ACTUAL mystery. This started off somewhat questionable, but, as it went on, enough of the jokes landed that I got into it, and ultimately ended up enjoying this silly farce. Donald Glover is Jason, and the only one of the trio I recognize, but it also had Aubrey Plaza, Bobby Moyinhan and Ellie Kemper in supporting roles. This was enjoyable enough. I'd recommend it. Not every joke works - and there's probably quite a LOT that are just plain DUMB - but it wasn't a total waste of time.
116. The Apprentice - This semi-biopic shows how Donald Trump rose to prominence in the late 70s and early 80s. It tries and sorta succeeds, I guess, in humanizing Trump, but mostly by showing how Roy Cohn was fucking slime. And then, ultimately, got discarded by Trump as well. A lot (maybe too much) of Trump's life is just already KNOWN, so it wasn't really like any of this provided any insight into how he came to be. (And, I mean, it's a fictionalized telling of events, anyway. So.) I dunno. It wasn't a bad movie, despite being about absolute AWFUL human beings, but I can 100% see why it wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea.
117. The Monkey - I liked this a lot. It was a horror comedy that didn't really make me laugh out loud - I think I may have chuckled a time or two - but it was still fun. Based on a short story by Stephen King, this is about a cursed toy monkey that kills people when you wind it up. That premise is rather ridiculous, and the movie plays into that ridiculous in some pretty gory and silly ways. I was keeping track of the kills at first - for the inevitable Kill Count video on this - but, after 10, I stopped counting and just decided to watch the film.
118. The Life of Chuck - rewatched this with Steph and Silas. It wasn't AS magical or as tear inducing as the first time, but it's still a good movie. (And I DID tear up when I was talking about it with Steph the next day. That bit in Act Two is just REALLY moving, apparently.)
