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Spring Season: Weeks 17/18
Alright, fuck it, I'm formally committing to my new shiftwork lifestyle and moving my update schedule to every other Monday instead of half-assing one midway through the week once I'm sufficiently caught up on all my warranty bullshit and then another baby one a few days later. You know, quality* over quantity! Although you know, if I take my time and pick at this thing all weekend (weekends are mega quiet), it'll probably end up being far more long and rambly, too. So there!
Honestly, it's not like anything interesting ever happens in my life to warrant frequent updates, I'm really just here to maintain the habit, anyway.
I'm been going to the movies a lot! That's new! Because the theatre is open again! I'm real happy about it! It's all old movies and a few things that were playing when the world shut down, and that'll probably be the case for a while as things continue to fall apart Stateside, but tickets are $5 a pop and I'm genuinely loving getting to see all these movies on the big screen for the first time?? I feel kinda bad that I'm so enjoying something that's only happening because of awful, awful reasons, but I suppose that's just part of the perverse magic that is 2020.
On a related note, our 'rona numbers are... steady for the time being. A few new cases and recoveries both every day, so we've been hovering between 15 and 20 active cases all week. Life goes on.
Canada Day was nice, since it meant I got eight days off instead of seven, and also I saw Ghostbusters. Such luxury! A weird amount of children in their pajamas were there? A very unsettling vibe when combined with masks, tbh.
Not sure that I like how satisfying I find it to be able to listen to podcasts at work now? Because it's REAL satisfying. Maybe it's just because I follow too many and was getting stressed out seeing them pile up without my office time (I'm still working through the backlog, but it's going fast), but combined with how many movies I watch and comics I read (which I have no ragrets about), it feels a little... 'must consume media constantly, dead air is wasted air, just permanently hook me up to the content tube please' which doesn't feel great?? But at the same time, fuck the man, I may as well get paid to be mildly entertained, right?
I'm on a diet! I hate it! I love food! I love eating! It's a very enjoyable thing that I like to do a lot of! Thankfully, I've still got a pretty solid metabolism that's kept my weight gain to a slow creep over the last decade or so, which hasn't bothered me too much. And then my schedule changed and I started being severely sleep deprived 50% of the time and I started stress eating a lot of junk and my weight SHOT up disconcertingly quickly, to a point where I felt really... idk, dysmorphic? Just feeling wrong in my own skin in a way that poking and frowning in displeasure at my belly fat has never done before. So I put myself on a diet! And I hate it! I just want to eat everything in the world! I'm not doing anything complicated, just paying attention to calorie counts, bringing them down, and spreading my meals out enough that I'm never finding myself particularly hungry, it's fine. It's supremely fine and do-able (even if constantly going out to the movies at the moment makes me fudge the lines I've drawn somewhat MUST HAVE POPCORN OBVS), and I hate it because I'm a baby with money and that's how I eat and that's how I LIKE IT. But it's only been three weeks and I've already tipped below 150 for the first time in years, so I guess I'll stick it out for a little while yet. Gonna whine about it a lot, though! I can't wait to get back to my worryingly large burritos.
The only big issue with updating every other week? The movie spoiler zone gets... a li'l beefy.
Phase IV (1974): Can you believe Saul Bass (the credits guy) only ever made one movie of his own and it was THIS?? What a ride.
The Ex-Mrs. Bradford (1936): Coasts by on a whole lot of chemistry and not much else; the murder mystery bogs things down a bit in the back half, but this was very cute and had a few genuinely funny moments.
The Sniper (1952): Poor sad incel just can't stop murdering women. :( If only somebody had paid him more attention. :'((( An uncomfortable watch, skillfully done. So glad these guys can find each other on reddit now!
Public Hero Number 1 (1935): Chester Morris is so committed to his pointy, scowling mug for the first half hour, that by the time Jean Arthur finally gets him to start smiling it actually ends up being really striking?? Fun little gangster number, but MAN I needed way more resolution than that on the central romance, what the fuck. He killed her brother! That shit needs to be dealt with!
Vera Cruz (1954): I hate how much I'm into everything Lancaster is doing here. He's so grimy and awful and every times he smiles it's a threat and BECAUSE he's so grimy it's like his bright white teeth just fucking GLOW and it's all just
so hot
Field Niggas (2015): am i allowed to type that
Experiment in Terror (1962): That opening is still fucking terrifying, also lol the street is called Twin Peaks.
Around the World in Eighty Days (1956): Very long and very racist (Indian princess Shirley MacLaine was particularly Yikes), and about 90% of the eight million celebrity cameos went right over my head, but this is pretty cool as far as big ridiculous eye-popping spectacles go. Sometimes you don't need a story. Sometimes you just need to go on a trip. Anyway, the closing credits are the best part, go watch those.
Slightly French (1949): A fun, fluffy little Pygmalion riff, with a few real sharp moments scattered throughout, although I kept wishing I was watching the over-the-top, shadow-soaked musical they were filming instead?
Two Friends (1986): The backwards format kinda robbed me of any engagement I might have had with the story? Not bad, but I wish the whole thing could have been as dynamic as the last ten minutes. Also it's a thirty-year-old Australian made-for-TV movie, so I should probably not be too harsh.
The Talk of the Town (1942): The best part of this movie is how poly the love triangle is, they easily spend just as much of this focused on Ronald Colman and Cary Grant falling in love with each other as they do on the two of them falling for Jean Arthur and it's GREAT.
The More the Merrier (1943): HOLY SHIT, there is this one scene here where Joel McCrea turns into a fucking OCTOPUS, being super handsy all up in Jean Arthur's shit and it's the hottest goddamn thing I've ever seen in a golden age movie, it's CRAZY. LOOK AT THIS SHIT and watch his hands the whole time, they just. don't. stop.
Drive a Crooked Road (1954): This one still hits me so hard, if only because I've worked with so many guys exactly like Mickey Rooney's character over the years. Also, it's apparently been bothering me for like seven months, not knowing where I knew the dude from Invasion of the Body Snatchers from TURNS OUT IT'S THIS.
Le notti di Cabiria (1957): Still quite good. STILL QUITE SHOUTY. BRING IT DOWN A FEW NOTCHES, ITALIAN PEOPLE.
The Big Heat (1953): Manic pixie dream moll Gloria Grahame remains e v e r y t h i n g, and even knowing it was coming this time around, the wife getting blown the fuck up out of nowhere is still BRUTAL.
The Westerner (1940): I didn't pay a TON of attention to this when I watched it last month, but I enjoyed it, so I gave it another pass and I'm glad I did! I never really understood how Walter Brennan won three fucking Oscars for just being 'stereotypical old coot from all of the westerns', but after plowing through a whole ton of Gary Cooper movies this month (he was in a LOT of them), I fully get it now! He's real good at what he does, even if that includes a lot of coots! Like here, Roy Bean is SUCH an unapologetic asshole and the movie NEVER pretends otherwise, but he still manages to be really endearing in the process? Like, when he dies at the end you're like GOOD, it's satisfying, he deserves it, but then he gets to meet Lily Langtree and she's the last thing he sees and THAT IS ALSO JUST AS SATISFYING SOMEHOW???
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939): MORE CAPRA-CORN, OM NOM NOM NOM NOM DELICIOUS FEEL GOOD FLUFF. Goddamn, that filibuster is one of the all-time great performances. I felt like I had lost my voice in sympathy by the end.
The Harder They Fall (1956): Boxing noir? Is that a thing? Brutal little downer, Bogey is so good and Steiger is infuriating.
Le journal d'une femme de chambre (1964): I watched a lot of Bunuel this month, so I went back and revisited the FIRST one of his I saw to see if it hits differently, and it kinda does! I'm much more desensitized to the constant onslaught of awful people and weird, confusing asides now! I really do love the boots that foot fetish grandpa gives her, though.
Tight Spot (1955): Ginger Rogers feels a little miscast here, but this is a fun little bottle episode of a movie, and her dynamic with Brian Keith really pops in a lot of weird ways that I dug a lot.
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938): Ah, Gary Cooper and historical costume drama, truly the greatest pairing since toothpaste and orange juice. My favourite part was the subplot where Marco Polo got forced into being an indentured gigolo on pain of death?? Did... did that really happen? Wait, don't tell me. I want to believe.
Down to Earth (1947): I did not know that there was a sequel to Here Comes Mr. Jordan! I did not know that there was a sequel to Here Comes Mr. Jordan that is a MUSICAL FOR SOME REASON. I did not know that there was a sequel to Here Comes Mr. Jordan that is a MUSICAL FOR SOME REASON starring RITA HAYWORTH in GLORIOUS TECHNICOLOR that was eventually remade into fucking XANADU. WHAT. WHAT.
To be clear, this has a number in which two army buddies decide to enter into a polygamous triad with a Greek Muse (they were WAY too excited and handsy with each other to just be brotherhusbands). It's. Amazing.
Panique (1946): Fascinating characters and a brutally matter-of-fact, low-key bleakness make this a real winner. Also, it always kinda freaks me out how little carnival rides seem to have changed in so many years.
Shampoo (1975): I usually find movies all about fucking to be majorly tedious, but this managed to zip right along. Beatty's HAIR, though, my GOD. And 17-year-old Carrie Fisher aaaaaahhhhhh
Black Mother (2018): A little long for my taste (the preaching woman near the end and the racist conspiracy theories about Asian store owners got particularly grating), but I think I could watch Allah do his thing in every city in the world and not grow bored.
The Avengers (2012): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #1!! Oh man, getting to see this on the big screen again (in the new ULTRA LASER theatre they installed while they were closed; it looked real good, but not good enough for me to want to pay more for it once $5 tickets are done) made me SO HAPPY. It's so impressive that this movie still feels like such a big fucking deal when the MCU has only gotten so much bigger in the years since?? Also I hate that Nat had to die for me to start liking her so much!!
Jurassic Park (1993): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #2!! We did a double feature! DAHNOSAUERS!! Getting to see movies from before I was of movie-going age in a theatre is so fuckin' magical, y'all. This shit is almost thirty years old and the effects hold up so well!! Shirtless Goldblum but make him thirty feet tall!! YES.
God Told Me To (1976): Oh BOY am I glad I didn't know anything about THIS one going in. Starts out as kind of a facile take on the lone gunman genre, then pivots to a treatise on toxic religiosity, then pivots again to... well. All of That.
Affair in Trinidad (1952): It's no Gilda, and it kinda goes off the rails in the last twenty minutes, but Hayworth and Ford still sizzle. A weird little mish-mash of a lot of better films.
Dark Star (1974): This movie is a fucking masterpiece, don't @ me. Pinback vs. the beach ball, the forgetful frozen former captain, Talby getting yeeted right into space, it's all gold.
La mort en ce jardin (1956): Simone Signoret, gorgeous jungle landscapes, and a pleasant bite to this one. Yes, good. Also, the lead character's name was Chark (or possibly Shark?), which sounded a lot like Chak in French, which made me laugh.
That Obscure Object of Desire (1977): Rewatched with a terrible English dub for background noise while I balanced my budget for the week. Eh.
Beetlejuice (1988): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #3!! What's your favourite minor sight gag in this? Mine is Adam having to hold his glasses up to two of his finger-eyes to see what Barbara's doing.
L’Âge d’or (1930): I kinda wish Bunuel had leaned more heavily into his surrealist roots more often in his career, instead of just kinda sprinkling them in throughout, but this goes a long way towards satiating that particular hunger of mine for a while. Dali fuckin' co-wrote it (no eyes get sliced open this time thankfully), it's all about two people trying desperately to bone down and getting thwarted at every turn, and I want to release a cut where all the silent sections are replaced with Anchorman dialogue for some reason. Also, more movies should open with fun facts about scorpions.
The Impatient Years (1944): I have real big issues with romances where the central premise hinges on no-fault divorce not being a thing yet, but this was nice enough. Coburn's character is the woooooorst, though, and it's SO blatantly meant to be a sequel to The More the Merrier, the lack of Joel McCrea is just too jarring.
Human Desire (1954): The OTHER Grahame/Ford noir Fritz Lang banger! This movie is so unrelentingly cruel to Gloria Grahame's character, and the cruelty is the point. Very upsettingly good.
The Fate of the Furious (2017): I'm definitely going to just rewatch all of these again next year before F9 comes out, aren't I?
The Short & Curlies (1987): How dare Mike Leigh film how sad and gross real people are, let us live in denial please sir.
Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941): Delightful; I will never get enough weird nitpicky afterlife bureaucracy comedy. I'm also now obsessed with this movie and its bonkers sequel/remakes. You've got the original play, Heaven Can Wait, made into this movie, which then received a TECHNICOLOR MUSICAL SEQUEL STARRING RITA HAYWORTH FOR SOME FUCKING REASON, then in the '70s, this movie got remade as Heaven Can Wait while the sequel (Down to Earth) was remade as Xanadu(!), and THEN we eventually got the Chris Rock remake which shares the NAME of the original's SEQUEL (Down to Earth). Also, Gene Kelly plays his character from Cover Girl (another Rita Hayworth musical I watched last month) in Xanadu. WHAT. JUST LET ROBERT MONTGOMERY FIND A NEW BODY TO BOX AND PLAY HIS SAXOPHONE IN.
A Boy and His Dog (1975): Rape-centric post-apocalypses are, uh... not my favourite, however tongue-in-cheek they may be. This movie just made me feel tired.
Shockproof (1949): Quick and dirty, a nice little slice of noir, even if it really falls apart in the last twenty minutes or so. What a garbage, tacked-on happy ending out of nowhere.
The Real Glory (1939): Rooted in a whole lot of really awful imperialism (thank goodness these brave white men are here to show these poor dumb Filipino natives how to defend themselves!), but the action really pops off at the end. Super cool to see three Best Actor winners of yore all just shooting the shit together. And how is Broderick Crawford of all people so cute??? Especially after I just rewatched Human Desire??
Arizona (1940): Jean Arthur western?? Jean Arthur western!! I loved so much about this, particular how she gets to be all tough independent woman who don't need no man and adorable girly girl who bakes pies and really likes a boooooy without either ever feeling like it's... compromising the other? SHE CONTAINS MULTITUDES, DAMN IT, and there's never a struggle with any of it, all of her problems come from without. Also she was 40 while William Holden was 22 here and it's NEVER even mentioned, I love it.
El náufrago de la Calle Providencia (1971): I wish there were more nice, gentle director profiles like this out there. Made me want to mix up some Bunuelonis.
The Short & Curlies (1987): Rewatched with director commentary. David Thewlis still v. ugly.
Friday the 13th (1980): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #4!! ch ch ch ch
ha ha ha ha
Ghostbusters (1984): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #5!! A forever fav. I wore my Stay Puft shirt and immediately read the last issue of the Year One miniseries and it was the Best Canada Day ever.
Jaws (1975): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #6!! Holy shit, this movie looked amazing on the big screen, just gorgeous, though ha ha ha all those 'close the beaches!' 'no!' scenes read REAL different this year ha ha ha ha
ha
Also, my mom had apparently not seen it before??? So watching her fall in love with all my dumb Orca boys one by one was gr8~
Bloodshot (2020): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #7!! Look, it may not have been quite as magical an experience, but it was nice to get to pretend I was going to see my first NEW movie since March, lol. This movie is VERY dumb, but honestly, now that I get great comic book movies on the regular, I'm kind of in favour of weird stupid schlocky ones making a bit of a comeback (as long as they keep fucky Venom far away from Tom Holland, anyway), I had fun! Also, not having seen any trailers and being wholly unfamiliar with the comics (because who reads Valiant, honestly) meant that the twist actually caught me entirely off guard, which I not expecting. Why was Winston from New Girl British, though???
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #8!! Thrilling adventure!!! God, Harrison Ford was just, like... cartoonishly handsome, wasn't he?
Farewell and adieu to you, fair Spanish ladies, farewell and adieu, you ladies of Spain...
*Quality not guaranteed.
Honestly, it's not like anything interesting ever happens in my life to warrant frequent updates, I'm really just here to maintain the habit, anyway.
I'm been going to the movies a lot! That's new! Because the theatre is open again! I'm real happy about it! It's all old movies and a few things that were playing when the world shut down, and that'll probably be the case for a while as things continue to fall apart Stateside, but tickets are $5 a pop and I'm genuinely loving getting to see all these movies on the big screen for the first time?? I feel kinda bad that I'm so enjoying something that's only happening because of awful, awful reasons, but I suppose that's just part of the perverse magic that is 2020.
On a related note, our 'rona numbers are... steady for the time being. A few new cases and recoveries both every day, so we've been hovering between 15 and 20 active cases all week. Life goes on.
Canada Day was nice, since it meant I got eight days off instead of seven, and also I saw Ghostbusters. Such luxury! A weird amount of children in their pajamas were there? A very unsettling vibe when combined with masks, tbh.
Not sure that I like how satisfying I find it to be able to listen to podcasts at work now? Because it's REAL satisfying. Maybe it's just because I follow too many and was getting stressed out seeing them pile up without my office time (I'm still working through the backlog, but it's going fast), but combined with how many movies I watch and comics I read (which I have no ragrets about), it feels a little... 'must consume media constantly, dead air is wasted air, just permanently hook me up to the content tube please' which doesn't feel great?? But at the same time, fuck the man, I may as well get paid to be mildly entertained, right?
I'm on a diet! I hate it! I love food! I love eating! It's a very enjoyable thing that I like to do a lot of! Thankfully, I've still got a pretty solid metabolism that's kept my weight gain to a slow creep over the last decade or so, which hasn't bothered me too much. And then my schedule changed and I started being severely sleep deprived 50% of the time and I started stress eating a lot of junk and my weight SHOT up disconcertingly quickly, to a point where I felt really... idk, dysmorphic? Just feeling wrong in my own skin in a way that poking and frowning in displeasure at my belly fat has never done before. So I put myself on a diet! And I hate it! I just want to eat everything in the world! I'm not doing anything complicated, just paying attention to calorie counts, bringing them down, and spreading my meals out enough that I'm never finding myself particularly hungry, it's fine. It's supremely fine and do-able (even if constantly going out to the movies at the moment makes me fudge the lines I've drawn somewhat MUST HAVE POPCORN OBVS), and I hate it because I'm a baby with money and that's how I eat and that's how I LIKE IT. But it's only been three weeks and I've already tipped below 150 for the first time in years, so I guess I'll stick it out for a little while yet. Gonna whine about it a lot, though! I can't wait to get back to my worryingly large burritos.
The only big issue with updating every other week? The movie spoiler zone gets... a li'l beefy.
Phase IV (1974): Can you believe Saul Bass (the credits guy) only ever made one movie of his own and it was THIS?? What a ride.
The Ex-Mrs. Bradford (1936): Coasts by on a whole lot of chemistry and not much else; the murder mystery bogs things down a bit in the back half, but this was very cute and had a few genuinely funny moments.
The Sniper (1952): Poor sad incel just can't stop murdering women. :( If only somebody had paid him more attention. :'((( An uncomfortable watch, skillfully done. So glad these guys can find each other on reddit now!
Public Hero Number 1 (1935): Chester Morris is so committed to his pointy, scowling mug for the first half hour, that by the time Jean Arthur finally gets him to start smiling it actually ends up being really striking?? Fun little gangster number, but MAN I needed way more resolution than that on the central romance, what the fuck. He killed her brother! That shit needs to be dealt with!
Vera Cruz (1954): I hate how much I'm into everything Lancaster is doing here. He's so grimy and awful and every times he smiles it's a threat and BECAUSE he's so grimy it's like his bright white teeth just fucking GLOW and it's all just
so hot
Field Niggas (2015): am i allowed to type that
Experiment in Terror (1962): That opening is still fucking terrifying, also lol the street is called Twin Peaks.
Around the World in Eighty Days (1956): Very long and very racist (Indian princess Shirley MacLaine was particularly Yikes), and about 90% of the eight million celebrity cameos went right over my head, but this is pretty cool as far as big ridiculous eye-popping spectacles go. Sometimes you don't need a story. Sometimes you just need to go on a trip. Anyway, the closing credits are the best part, go watch those.
Slightly French (1949): A fun, fluffy little Pygmalion riff, with a few real sharp moments scattered throughout, although I kept wishing I was watching the over-the-top, shadow-soaked musical they were filming instead?
Two Friends (1986): The backwards format kinda robbed me of any engagement I might have had with the story? Not bad, but I wish the whole thing could have been as dynamic as the last ten minutes. Also it's a thirty-year-old Australian made-for-TV movie, so I should probably not be too harsh.
The Talk of the Town (1942): The best part of this movie is how poly the love triangle is, they easily spend just as much of this focused on Ronald Colman and Cary Grant falling in love with each other as they do on the two of them falling for Jean Arthur and it's GREAT.
The More the Merrier (1943): HOLY SHIT, there is this one scene here where Joel McCrea turns into a fucking OCTOPUS, being super handsy all up in Jean Arthur's shit and it's the hottest goddamn thing I've ever seen in a golden age movie, it's CRAZY. LOOK AT THIS SHIT and watch his hands the whole time, they just. don't. stop.
Drive a Crooked Road (1954): This one still hits me so hard, if only because I've worked with so many guys exactly like Mickey Rooney's character over the years. Also, it's apparently been bothering me for like seven months, not knowing where I knew the dude from Invasion of the Body Snatchers from TURNS OUT IT'S THIS.
Le notti di Cabiria (1957): Still quite good. STILL QUITE SHOUTY. BRING IT DOWN A FEW NOTCHES, ITALIAN PEOPLE.
The Big Heat (1953): Manic pixie dream moll Gloria Grahame remains e v e r y t h i n g, and even knowing it was coming this time around, the wife getting blown the fuck up out of nowhere is still BRUTAL.
The Westerner (1940): I didn't pay a TON of attention to this when I watched it last month, but I enjoyed it, so I gave it another pass and I'm glad I did! I never really understood how Walter Brennan won three fucking Oscars for just being 'stereotypical old coot from all of the westerns', but after plowing through a whole ton of Gary Cooper movies this month (he was in a LOT of them), I fully get it now! He's real good at what he does, even if that includes a lot of coots! Like here, Roy Bean is SUCH an unapologetic asshole and the movie NEVER pretends otherwise, but he still manages to be really endearing in the process? Like, when he dies at the end you're like GOOD, it's satisfying, he deserves it, but then he gets to meet Lily Langtree and she's the last thing he sees and THAT IS ALSO JUST AS SATISFYING SOMEHOW???
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939): MORE CAPRA-CORN, OM NOM NOM NOM NOM DELICIOUS FEEL GOOD FLUFF. Goddamn, that filibuster is one of the all-time great performances. I felt like I had lost my voice in sympathy by the end.
The Harder They Fall (1956): Boxing noir? Is that a thing? Brutal little downer, Bogey is so good and Steiger is infuriating.
Le journal d'une femme de chambre (1964): I watched a lot of Bunuel this month, so I went back and revisited the FIRST one of his I saw to see if it hits differently, and it kinda does! I'm much more desensitized to the constant onslaught of awful people and weird, confusing asides now! I really do love the boots that foot fetish grandpa gives her, though.
Tight Spot (1955): Ginger Rogers feels a little miscast here, but this is a fun little bottle episode of a movie, and her dynamic with Brian Keith really pops in a lot of weird ways that I dug a lot.
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938): Ah, Gary Cooper and historical costume drama, truly the greatest pairing since toothpaste and orange juice. My favourite part was the subplot where Marco Polo got forced into being an indentured gigolo on pain of death?? Did... did that really happen? Wait, don't tell me. I want to believe.
Down to Earth (1947): I did not know that there was a sequel to Here Comes Mr. Jordan! I did not know that there was a sequel to Here Comes Mr. Jordan that is a MUSICAL FOR SOME REASON. I did not know that there was a sequel to Here Comes Mr. Jordan that is a MUSICAL FOR SOME REASON starring RITA HAYWORTH in GLORIOUS TECHNICOLOR that was eventually remade into fucking XANADU. WHAT. WHAT.
To be clear, this has a number in which two army buddies decide to enter into a polygamous triad with a Greek Muse (they were WAY too excited and handsy with each other to just be brotherhusbands). It's. Amazing.
Panique (1946): Fascinating characters and a brutally matter-of-fact, low-key bleakness make this a real winner. Also, it always kinda freaks me out how little carnival rides seem to have changed in so many years.
Shampoo (1975): I usually find movies all about fucking to be majorly tedious, but this managed to zip right along. Beatty's HAIR, though, my GOD. And 17-year-old Carrie Fisher aaaaaahhhhhh
Black Mother (2018): A little long for my taste (the preaching woman near the end and the racist conspiracy theories about Asian store owners got particularly grating), but I think I could watch Allah do his thing in every city in the world and not grow bored.
The Avengers (2012): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #1!! Oh man, getting to see this on the big screen again (in the new ULTRA LASER theatre they installed while they were closed; it looked real good, but not good enough for me to want to pay more for it once $5 tickets are done) made me SO HAPPY. It's so impressive that this movie still feels like such a big fucking deal when the MCU has only gotten so much bigger in the years since?? Also I hate that Nat had to die for me to start liking her so much!!
Jurassic Park (1993): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #2!! We did a double feature! DAHNOSAUERS!! Getting to see movies from before I was of movie-going age in a theatre is so fuckin' magical, y'all. This shit is almost thirty years old and the effects hold up so well!! Shirtless Goldblum but make him thirty feet tall!! YES.
God Told Me To (1976): Oh BOY am I glad I didn't know anything about THIS one going in. Starts out as kind of a facile take on the lone gunman genre, then pivots to a treatise on toxic religiosity, then pivots again to... well. All of That.
Affair in Trinidad (1952): It's no Gilda, and it kinda goes off the rails in the last twenty minutes, but Hayworth and Ford still sizzle. A weird little mish-mash of a lot of better films.
Dark Star (1974): This movie is a fucking masterpiece, don't @ me. Pinback vs. the beach ball, the forgetful frozen former captain, Talby getting yeeted right into space, it's all gold.
La mort en ce jardin (1956): Simone Signoret, gorgeous jungle landscapes, and a pleasant bite to this one. Yes, good. Also, the lead character's name was Chark (or possibly Shark?), which sounded a lot like Chak in French, which made me laugh.
That Obscure Object of Desire (1977): Rewatched with a terrible English dub for background noise while I balanced my budget for the week. Eh.
Beetlejuice (1988): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #3!! What's your favourite minor sight gag in this? Mine is Adam having to hold his glasses up to two of his finger-eyes to see what Barbara's doing.
L’Âge d’or (1930): I kinda wish Bunuel had leaned more heavily into his surrealist roots more often in his career, instead of just kinda sprinkling them in throughout, but this goes a long way towards satiating that particular hunger of mine for a while. Dali fuckin' co-wrote it (no eyes get sliced open this time thankfully), it's all about two people trying desperately to bone down and getting thwarted at every turn, and I want to release a cut where all the silent sections are replaced with Anchorman dialogue for some reason. Also, more movies should open with fun facts about scorpions.
The Impatient Years (1944): I have real big issues with romances where the central premise hinges on no-fault divorce not being a thing yet, but this was nice enough. Coburn's character is the woooooorst, though, and it's SO blatantly meant to be a sequel to The More the Merrier, the lack of Joel McCrea is just too jarring.
Human Desire (1954): The OTHER Grahame/Ford noir Fritz Lang banger! This movie is so unrelentingly cruel to Gloria Grahame's character, and the cruelty is the point. Very upsettingly good.
The Fate of the Furious (2017): I'm definitely going to just rewatch all of these again next year before F9 comes out, aren't I?
The Short & Curlies (1987): How dare Mike Leigh film how sad and gross real people are, let us live in denial please sir.
Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941): Delightful; I will never get enough weird nitpicky afterlife bureaucracy comedy. I'm also now obsessed with this movie and its bonkers sequel/remakes. You've got the original play, Heaven Can Wait, made into this movie, which then received a TECHNICOLOR MUSICAL SEQUEL STARRING RITA HAYWORTH FOR SOME FUCKING REASON, then in the '70s, this movie got remade as Heaven Can Wait while the sequel (Down to Earth) was remade as Xanadu(!), and THEN we eventually got the Chris Rock remake which shares the NAME of the original's SEQUEL (Down to Earth). Also, Gene Kelly plays his character from Cover Girl (another Rita Hayworth musical I watched last month) in Xanadu. WHAT. JUST LET ROBERT MONTGOMERY FIND A NEW BODY TO BOX AND PLAY HIS SAXOPHONE IN.
A Boy and His Dog (1975): Rape-centric post-apocalypses are, uh... not my favourite, however tongue-in-cheek they may be. This movie just made me feel tired.
Shockproof (1949): Quick and dirty, a nice little slice of noir, even if it really falls apart in the last twenty minutes or so. What a garbage, tacked-on happy ending out of nowhere.
The Real Glory (1939): Rooted in a whole lot of really awful imperialism (thank goodness these brave white men are here to show these poor dumb Filipino natives how to defend themselves!), but the action really pops off at the end. Super cool to see three Best Actor winners of yore all just shooting the shit together. And how is Broderick Crawford of all people so cute??? Especially after I just rewatched Human Desire??
Arizona (1940): Jean Arthur western?? Jean Arthur western!! I loved so much about this, particular how she gets to be all tough independent woman who don't need no man and adorable girly girl who bakes pies and really likes a boooooy without either ever feeling like it's... compromising the other? SHE CONTAINS MULTITUDES, DAMN IT, and there's never a struggle with any of it, all of her problems come from without. Also she was 40 while William Holden was 22 here and it's NEVER even mentioned, I love it.
El náufrago de la Calle Providencia (1971): I wish there were more nice, gentle director profiles like this out there. Made me want to mix up some Bunuelonis.
The Short & Curlies (1987): Rewatched with director commentary. David Thewlis still v. ugly.
Friday the 13th (1980): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #4!! ch ch ch ch
ha ha ha ha
Ghostbusters (1984): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #5!! A forever fav. I wore my Stay Puft shirt and immediately read the last issue of the Year One miniseries and it was the Best Canada Day ever.
Jaws (1975): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #6!! Holy shit, this movie looked amazing on the big screen, just gorgeous, though ha ha ha all those 'close the beaches!' 'no!' scenes read REAL different this year ha ha ha ha
ha
Also, my mom had apparently not seen it before??? So watching her fall in love with all my dumb Orca boys one by one was gr8~
Bloodshot (2020): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #7!! Look, it may not have been quite as magical an experience, but it was nice to get to pretend I was going to see my first NEW movie since March, lol. This movie is VERY dumb, but honestly, now that I get great comic book movies on the regular, I'm kind of in favour of weird stupid schlocky ones making a bit of a comeback (as long as they keep fucky Venom far away from Tom Holland, anyway), I had fun! Also, not having seen any trailers and being wholly unfamiliar with the comics (because who reads Valiant, honestly) meant that the twist actually caught me entirely off guard, which I not expecting. Why was Winston from New Girl British, though???
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981): RETURN TO THE THEATRE #8!! Thrilling adventure!!! God, Harrison Ford was just, like... cartoonishly handsome, wasn't he?
Farewell and adieu to you, fair Spanish ladies, farewell and adieu, you ladies of Spain...
*Quality not guaranteed.
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