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I was just looking through this month's movies and I had already forgotten I watched Ne Zha specifically so I could wawtch Ne Zha 2.
Is it still in theaters?
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| THEATER Cinemark Century Hilltop 16 |
Loved it.
Yes, it's a ghost story, but it plays more like a murder mystery. We don't know what's going to happen, but the clues are being laid out for us. We just have to pick them up. And there are stellar red herrings (SO MANY windows that don't open!), but the revelation arrives just before the revelation, if you know what I mean. And it was a deeply satisfying answer. The more it settles, the more I think it was excellent.
And since I won't get to see Nickel Boys in theaters, glad to see something else from perspective. Even if it's not getting as much chatter.
At least on first viewing, I liked it better than A Ghost Story—although as this one two settles into memory, it'll be a battle.
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| HOME my parents' dvd |
First, after seeing this movie and how a simple pair of glasses transforms James Stewart into Glenn Miller, I will never listen to another crackpot theory about Clark Kent's insufficient disguise ever again.
I understand this movie is "loosely based" on truth so I have no idea how much I just learned versus how much I am now wrong about, but it's a fun movie. Plus, the crammed SO MUCH music into it. I kept saying, "They've now played all the Glenn Miller songs I know," and I kept being wrong.
History regardless, I liked the performances and I was moved by the ending.
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| ELSEWHERE Hoopla |
Showing it to another class. Sometimes it works well. Sometimes it doesn't. I thought this was mostly doesn't but, someone came into class the next day telling me they loved it and they cried when he was among the clouds.
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| HOME our dvd |
We let Sons Two and Three watch and they both loved it and want to read King's original novella. And I think that's great.
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| HOME Disney+ |
I haven't really been willing to watch this film since first seeing in in theaters back in 2007 (!). Why? Because I didn't love it. And for so many people, it's a pantheon-level film. Not just a good movie, but a deeply important classic with few if any peers. Many bigshots consider it the finest Pixar film. Lots of people born after it came out consider it the best of all time. I have this one assignment I've been giving for years where each student needs to provide an example from the narrative artform of their choice. I think I've heard "Ratatouille is my favorite movie" more than I've heard something similar about anything else, movie, novel, or otherwise. And I've liked being able to say, "Gee whiz, you know what, believe it or not, I haven't seen it since theaters, so . . . ."
But the littles child's been asking to watch it for a couple weeks now (it's her friends favorite movie, natch) and my pleasure in not being forced to say Ratatouille ain't that great is a terrible excuse not to show it to a child who wants to see it.
(Incidentally, this never happened with the boys because, again, natch, this film appears to be among the most-shown-to-kids-in-school films going. So they'd already seen it.)
And I'm relieved (and delighted?) to tell you I loved it. Every scene worked for me. Every development made sense. The character beats and the plot beats were playing the same melody. The film had the good sense to leave out some of the most important moment because, actually, they weren't necessary. And the complexity of Anton Ego drawn from so few strokes is a masterclass in restraint and clarity. It's astonishing stuff. A really good movie. I'm so happy you were all right.
Though it's still not my favorite Pixar movie.
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| HOME Link+ dvd |
A bright-eyed young housewife gets her radio-drama script picked up and watches and the various egos and lackeys putting it on slowly destroy it on air. The movie starts mildly amusing but gets funnier and funnier as it goes along.
Not a surprise it started life as a stage play. It would be uproarious live theater. I think that's probably its ideal form, but the movie was delightful.
The only actor I recognized was the last one credited—a young Ken Watanabe as a truck driver listening to the show in his truck and always juuuust about to change the station. Only six years from being second banana on The Last Samurai! Amazing.
But I think my favorite character was the young writer. Her journey from humble joy to horror to fighting back and back to innocent joy is fabulous. I'd certainly watch her in something else.
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| THEATER Cinemark Century Hilltop 16 |
I first became aware of Dav Pilkey circa 2001 when I checked out copies of his 1993 picture books Kat Kong and Dogzilla from the Orem Library. These books are hilarious. I have no idea why Lady Steed and I found them at the library, but we read them many times before we had kids and laughed every time. I am not the least surprised they are still in print. I'm only sad we never bought our own copies. Since our post-Utah local libraries never had them I foolishly assumed they were just out of print until just now. What a fool I've been.
I don't think it should be controversial to say Pilkey is one of the most important American comedic writers of the last thirty years. And if we're measuring by comics of the last thirty years who's influence will be felt for the next sixty, he might be #1. I'm not joking. It's possible all the young Millennial / Gen Z / Gen Alpha / Gen Beta comedy-craftors of the coming decades won't realize it consciously, but on a bone-deep level, they will owe a lot to Pilkey—to Captain Underpants, to Dog Man. You know it's true. His books have been read and reread more than Harry Potter by kids at their most tractable. And the two movies are solid.
All of which is to say this is a very fun movie and dumb as all get out and thus respectful to the source material. Pilkey has the good sense to let the books be the main driver and to keep the movies limited. But I'm sure we'll see more eventually. And rightly so.
He's the best we've got.
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| HOME Link+ dvd |
One month after The Matrix came out, Canada gave us this film, very different and very alike.
People are within the game. Then they go a layer deeper. Then they come out. Or maybe they don't. It's as much like Inception as it is The Matrix.
This is somehow only my second Cronenberg film and it wasn't as gross as I know they get. But I did think it captured '90s gaming very well and it raised the kinds of questions Mark Zuckerberg really thinks are about to be relevant. But in a way, if you get less relevent, they're already hella relevant.
Is this still the game?
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| HOME YouTube |
The sequel is currently making the most money a single movie has ever made in a single market, and it's just become the highest grossing animated film of all time. Scott Mendelson liked it (although his taste is sometimes questionable). And the original's on YouTube and I have some time to kill so why not?
It's good. Dreamworks quality. I did like how different (foreign) it is compared to an American movie. But it's just fine. Can the sequel really be that much better?
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