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Ghostbusters II (1989, Ivan Reitman)
About the only compliment I can pay Ghostbusters II is the first half or so doesn’t reveal how terrible the movie’s going to get. The film had a troubled production, which might explain the special effects looking rough for the third act. II’s third act apes the third act from the first movie, only without… 📖
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Polite Society (2023, Nida Manzoor)
Polite Society is the story of British-Pakistani teenager Priya Kansara. She goes to an expensive London private girl’s school, where she’s got two best buds—Seraphina Beh and Ella Bruccoleri—and a nemesis—Shona Babayemi. Complicating matters is Kansara’s passion for martial arts stunt work. It leads to lots of fighting, which quickly reveals Polite’s major conceit: Kansara’s… 📖
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Black Mirror (2011) s03e01 – Nosedive
If Nosedive is any indication, “Black Mirror” having guest writers isn’t going to help things. Rashida Jones and Michael Schur wrote the teleplay (they’d previously written “Parks and Recreation” together) from a story by “Mirror” creator Charlie Brooker. The episode also kicks off the show’s Netflix run; it had been on Channel 4, but Netflix… 📖
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Gangnam Zombie (2023, Lee Soo-sung)
For a micro-budget horror movie, Gangnam Zombie isn’t unsuccessful, but it also isn’t much of a success. The setting is decent—locked in a trendy office building on Christmas Eve, except Zombie doesn’t have the money for Christmas decorations. It also doesn’t have money for zombie special effects, so it’s more like they’re rabid vampires (complete… 📖
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Silkwood (1983, Mike Nichols)
I wholeheartedly recommend Silkwood. It’s beautifully made, with a singular performance from Meryl Streep and great performances from its astounding ensemble. I need to remember to list all the supporting actors in the film. But I caution against reading up on the actual history. The film’s very accurate; the problem isn’t with veracity; it’s with… 📖
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Ghostbusters (1984, Ivan Reitman)
In the almost forty years since Ghostbusters’s release, the film remains unparalleled in terms of present-day, urban sci-fi action. The film’s a mix of crisp action comedy and a special effects spectacular, with Reitman’s direction toggling as needed and Elmer Bernstein’s score tying a beautiful knot. With the special effects, the film never isn’t grasping… 📖
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A Matter of Life and Death (1945, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger)
A Matter of Life and Death suffers the unusual condition of being too good for its own good. Writing, directing, and producing team Powell and Pressburger (The Archers), along with their crew and much of their cast, do singular work on Matter. Jack Cardiff’s Technicolor is so breathtaking a character can get away with commenting… 📖
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Black Mirror (2011) s02e03 – The Waldo Moment
“Black Mirror” creator and episode writer Charlie Brooker really loves mentioning Twitter in episodes. It’s practically a drinking game, and it at least makes some sense time-wise because most of this episode takes place in the present. During the end credits, just like last episode, we get a flash forward to show how our new… 📖
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The Watermelon Woman (1996, Cheryl Dunye)
The Watermelon Woman is the story of video store clerk slash filmmaker Cheryl Dunye making a film about a 1930s Black female actor known only as “The Watermelon Woman.” At least initially. Dunye, in character, will spend the film discovering more and more about her subject, culminating in a documentary short. Surrounding Dunye dans le… 📖
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The Giant Gila Monster (1959, Ray Kellogg)
I thought this one was called The Great Gila Monster, not The Giant Gila Monster. During the first act, I kept thinking how Great was one heck of a flex given the content, but it’s not Great; it’s Giant, which is technically correct. The film is about a giant Gila monster terrorizing a bunch of… 📖
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Black Mirror (2011) s02e02 – White Bear
White Bear feels contractually obligated, which is strange since it’s got a script credit to series creator Charlie Brooker. Maybe it just fell apart in production, too; Bear crumbles about halfway through, and it’s a short episode already—around forty-one minutes. It begins with Lenora Crichlow waking up in an empty house, apparently having just survived… 📖
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War Story: Archangel (2003)
Sometimes the snow comes down in June, and all that business because out of nowhere… Archangel is really good. It’s not the best of writer Garth Ennis’s War Story: Volume Two, which is only not a joke award because of that David Lloyd story, but Archangel definitely makes up for the previous couple entries. Now,… 📖
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Saratoga Trunk (1945, Sam Wood)
I cannot, in any conscience, recommend Saratoga Trunk. The list of caveats to work through is a “Choose Your Own Adventure” of racism, ableism, and low-key misogyny (though less of the third, what with the first two). If you’re a Flora Robson completist, you presumably know about the time she was Oscar-nominated for playing Blackface,… 📖
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Night Shift (1982, Ron Howard)
Night Shift distinguishes itself immediately. The opening sequence is magnificent, featuring two crooks (Richard Belzer and Badja Droll) chasing down pimp Julius LeFlore and inciting the incident for the film. Director Howard has three credited editors on Night Shift—Robert James Kern, Daniel P. Hanley, and Mike Hill—and their cutting is deft. Lowell Ganz and Babaloo… 📖
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Black Mirror (2011) s02e01 – Be Right Back
Okay, now I’m beginning to understand some of the “Black Mirror” hype. Despite its trying for too clever and not getting there title, Be Right Back is fantastic. It overcomes director Owen Harris having one shot and repeating it over and over again: lead Hayley Atwell is on one side of the frame, the other… 📖
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Black Mirror (2011) s01e03 – The Entire History of You
Not to get too Roman DeBeers, but The Entire History of You takes place in a universe where they create a cyborg technology to record your memories but never figure out how to get text-to-speech engines to sound better than they did in 1997. You provides an interesting finale for the first season of “Black… 📖
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Day of the Dead (1985, George A. Romero)
Day of the Dead is a nightmare. Occasionally literally, with writer and director Romero not afraid to rely on a recurring “it was just a nightmare” bit. But more symbolically… Day is about a group of scientists working in a secured location in the Florida Everglades, ostensibly protected by the U.S. Army; they’re on a… 📖
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Black Mirror (2011) s01e02 – Fifteen Million Merits
I’m understanding why the first episode of “Black Mirror” did a painful Lars von Trier namedrop… because the show’s just Lars von Trier-lite. This episode eventually involves a young woman being pressured into becoming a porn performer—don’t worry it’s just a terminal subplot and her experience is entirely besides the point—and it’s like, oh, what… 📖
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Mr. Mom (1983, Stan Dragoti)
Approximately three-quarters of the way through Mr. Mom (approximately because the movie is a series of sitcom set pieces, not necessarily in sound narrative order), I realized it wasn’t just about sitcom set pieces; the whole thing is a situation comedy. With very low stakes. When the third act has to gin up the big… 📖
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Chaw (2009, Shin Jeong-won)
Chaw tells the familiar tale of a man-eating wild boar and the brave villagers who confront it. The boar’s descended from the mutant boors the Japanese created when they invaded Korea. These abominations have been low-key terrorizing the countryside for decades and as the hipsters started doing weekend trips from Seoul into the countryside, things… 📖
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Black Mirror (2011) s01e01 – The National Anthem
I spent all of The National Anthem waiting for someone—anyone—to turn to the camera and say, “David William Donald Cameron.” Hell, they could’ve done an animated Peppa Pig saying it. But "Black Mirror" started in 2011, when the world was a much different place. Not just Cameron, but in the intervening years, the whole British… 📖
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Werewolf by Night (1972) #33
It’s a lackluster but not bad Werewolf by Night, which is one hell of a compliment, but what else are you going to do with this book. Writer Doug Moench finally resolves the mysterious Committee out to get Jack Russell since the first issue. Or at least by the third issue. They hired Moon Knight… 📖
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Mad Monster Party? (1967, Jules Bass)
Mad Monster Party? spends a solid portion of its runtime only slightly amusing. It’s technically competent stop-motion animation with a charming voice performance from Boris Karloff as Boris von Frankenstein. He’s just discovered the anti-life formula and has become destroyer of ravens, potentially worlds. Having run the gamut from creating life to creating anti-life, Karloff… 📖
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Sudden Impact (1983, Clint Eastwood)
At least a third of Sudden Impact is director, producer, and star Eastwood doing a Hitchcock homage starring Sondra Locke. Locke doesn’t speak during the Hitchcock homage sequences; she just walks silently, staring at various things, remembering her horrific origin story, then shooting some rapist in the balls and then the head. Now, Sudden Impact… 📖
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Dead Man’s Curve (1998, Dan Rosen)
Dead Man’s Curve’s opening titles are intercut with someone meeting with Dana Delany—playing a college campus therapist—and asking questions about signs of suicidal thoughts. Delany makes a joke about how first-time efforts from writer-directors might do it. Then the title card cuts to director Rosen’s writing and directing credit. All his other references are on… 📖
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Wilson (2017, Craig Johnson)
From the start, Wilson’s got two problems it can’t possibly overcome. First, director Johnson. He’s never got a decent idea. Not with the actors, not with the composition, not with the pacing. He does seem to understand Laura Dern’s far and away the best thing in the movie, but he doesn’t address compensating for her… 📖
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The Amazing Spider-Man (1977) s02e01 – The Captive Tower
Stop me if you’ve heard this one. A group of highly trained men takes over a state-of-the-art skyscraper. They are led by an enigmatic leader whose primary contact on the team is the computer wizard. They have rigged the roof to explode. They have thirty or so hostages on the thirtieth floor, and they are… 📖
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The Missing (2003, Ron Howard), the extended cut
There’s a moment in The Missing when Tommy Lee Jones appears to be dead-panning at the camera, clearly as exasperated being in the film as the people watching him in the film. He’s tired because The Missing makes sure to keep him busy, but he easily soldiers on because Jones is in Missing to soldier… 📖
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The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934, Alfred Hitchcock)
The Man Who Knew Too Much is an action thriller. It doesn’t start as an action thriller—it begins with an English family (dad Leslie Banks, mom Edna Best, daughter Nova Pilbeam) vacationing in Switzerland. Their vacation has almost come to an end, and they’re saying goodbye to some of their trip friends. Their good trip… 📖
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The Trial of the Incredible Hulk (1989, Bill Bixby)
Spoiler: there’s no trial in Trial of the Incredible Hulk. Except maybe the viewer’s difficulty getting through the TV movie. Or producer, director, and star Bixby doing a special effects heavy (but not for Hulk Lou Ferrigno) backdoor pilot for a “Daredevil” TV show starring very special guest star Rex Smith. Ferrigno’s so shoe-horned into… 📖
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The Terminator (1988) #7
Despite The Terminator not offering much (if anything) in the way of entertainment, much less artistry, I’m still intrigued by the series. Like, where’s the bottom? This issue has a guest penciler, Robin Ator, who’s probably the series worst (so far). The script’s from Jack Herman, who’s written more issues than anyone else at this… 📖
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Hit! (1973, Sidney J. Furie)
Hit! is multiple movies all at once. It’s a heist procedural, with Billy Dee Williams putting together an unlikely crew of experts to take out the Marseille heroin syndicate. It’s a rogue secret agent movie—Williams’s boss, a profoundly under-cast Norman Burton, doesn’t want him showing up the U.S. government by taking out the bad guys.… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e10 – Outside
“Silo” ends its first season on a massive cliffhanger. Massive in terms of physical scale. In many ways, it’s a soft cliffhanger. People may be in immediate danger, but it’s unclear how much they know about it. The show also manages to low-key tie into the Apple Vision Pro, which is kind of cool, though… 📖
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Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023, James Mangold)
Dial of Destiny opens with a very long prologue flashback to 1945, setting up Harrison Ford (a CGI-de-aged Ford) having Toby Jones as a best buddy in the forties during the war and running afoul of Nazi scientist Mads Mikkelsen. The flashback’s technically successful; de-aged Ford looks pretty good (the eyes are off, and the… 📖
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A Yank in the R.A.F. (1941, Henry King)
Betty Grable has a rough time in A Yank in the R.A.F. through no fault of her own. Her love triangle arc is the only thing going on for long stretches of the film. Despite being about brash narcissist Tyrone Power (the Yank) going over to England and joining the R.A.F.—while the U.S. was still… 📖
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Catwoman (2002) #12
Ah, the days when the first part of an arc was really the first part of an arc. This issue opens with Selina—as Catwoman—chasing a kid through the streets of Gotham. He’s in Alleytown, a frankly gorgeous but rundown and dangerous neighborhood in Gotham. Artist Cameron Stewart busts ass on the scenery, so much so… 📖
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Silo (2023) s01e09 – The Getaway
Did they somehow convince Rick Gomez he would have a more significant part in “Silo,” or did his agent just do an excellent job getting him into most of the episodes even though he really doesn’t have anything to do. He’s the guy with the beard who owes Rebecca Ferguson a favor from episode three… 📖
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Black Panther (1998) #7
It’s a good but unfortunate issue of Black Panther. Writer Priest is firing on all cylinders, while the art is a Many Hands mishmash of styles—the issue credits Jimmy Palmiotti and Vince Evans (washes for Evans). But there’s also additional help from Alitha Martinez and Nelson DeCastro. So the art never looks consistent for more… 📖