4v291o
Watched on Sunday June 8, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Friday June 6, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday June 1, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday May 31, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Tuesday May 27, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Monday May 26, 2025.
]]>
"Put an end to this farce!"
"Which one, your lordship?"
Watched on Wednesday May 21, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday May 18, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday May 17, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday May 17, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Friday May 16, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Thursday May 15, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Monday May 12, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Monday May 12, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Monday May 12, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday May 4, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday May 3, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday May 3, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday April 26, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Thursday April 24, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Monday April 28, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday April 26, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday April 26, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Friday April 25, 2025.
]]>
Some complaints hold up. The tone is all over the place, trying to reconcile a bright kid-friendly adventure with the authoritarian doom creeping in on the edges. The CGI elements aren't always well integrated; Lucas' imagination was still far ahead of the technology. But that imagination is what made me love Phantom Menace as a kid and keeps me loving it now. The Gungan city spilling into view, a whole bioluminescent world just beneath the surface; the circles within circles of Coruscant; every costume Pe wears. The action setpieces still pop, of course: the speed and sound of the Podrace, the light and color ballet of the lightsaber duel, these put contemporary blockbusters to shame. It's funny that these movies were received as overdone visual nightmares, given how quaint they look compared to most Marvel ts. Lucas' unerring sense of composition allows the prequels to age better than the technology itself; you can't fake his instinct for line, shape, perspective, movement in the frame. It also helps that I'm not allergic to this writing and performance style as so many are. Finally, I just find the politics of these things endlessly fascinating. A senator rising to power by sacrificing his own people to take advantage of the sympathy vote: that's the plot, but it takes place mostly off screen or in subtle details and implications. Long before we get to Coruscant, where the actual plot happens, Lucas weaves in evidence of the Republic's stagnation and impotence in the face of both corporate power (the Trade Federation) and gangster lawlessness (everything on Tattooine). What connects the two is greed, the major theme of the movie, extending even to Anakin's all-too-human desire to hold onto both his mother and his dreams. That conflation of political and personal collapse is what makes these movies interesting in spite of their flaws.
]]>
Watched on Saturday April 12, 2025.
]]>
What happened to the American Dream? It came true! You're looking at it.
]]>
Watched on Saturday April 12, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday April 12, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday April 13, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Thursday April 10, 2025.
]]>
Something I thought about on this, my millionth watch of a movie so obviously great it's easy to undervalue, is that we never see Paulie's boss. But that person exists. Paul Vario, the real-life inspiration for Paulie Cicero, was a caporegime in the Lucchese crime family. He has bosses he reported to, higher up the ladder. But not only do we not see these guys in Goodfellas, we don't even hear about them. Paulie runs the world, as far as Henry is concerned, and anything outside the neighborhood may as well not exist.
That absence (so different from Casino, in which we repeatedly cut back to the Midwest bosses running things) helps define Goodfellas' shape and tone. It is simultaneously expansive and claustrophobic, a life where everything is allowed within the space of a handful of blocks. So much of the movie is about suggesting an infinite playpen kingdom rather than actually showing it in full. That's movie magic, of course, as old as Melies, but it's also thematically apt. Henry's life is about the pursuit of pleasure, and many of those pleasures are small, fitting snugly into this little fief. The first thing he says about the gangsters whose life he wants, who he watches out his window like movie characters, is that they get to park in front of hydrants without getting a ticket. And the last thing he says, the epitome of what it feels like to leave that life behind, is that he can't get good spaghetti these days. That's it! That's all it was. It was enough, and now it's all over.
]]>
Watched on Sunday April 6, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday April 6, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Friday April 4, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday March 30, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday March 30, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday March 30, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Friday March 28, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Monday March 24, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday March 23, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday March 22, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday March 22, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday March 16, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday March 16, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Tuesday March 18, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Saturday March 15, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Friday March 14, 2025.
]]>
Watched on Sunday March 9, 2025.
]]>Movies (other than Inherent Vice) with that Thomas Pynchon vibe.
- JFK
- Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
- The Long Goodbye
- Nashville
- Southland Tales
- Walker
- The Matrix Reloaded
- Speed Racer
- Apocalypse Now
- Da 5 Bloods
...plus 15 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Eyes Wide Shut
- Beau Travail
- Flowers of Shanghai
- The Thin Red Line
- A Brighter Summer Day
- Cure
- Satantango
- Chungking Express
- The Long Day Closes
- Close-Up
...plus 5 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Eyes Wide Shut
- In the Mood for Love
- PlayTime
- Nashville
- Beau Travail
- The Puppetmaster
- The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
- Do the Right Thing
- House
- A Touch of Zen
...plus 2 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Rio Bravo
- Sansho the Bailiff
- Lola Montès
- The Night of the Hunter
- Seven Samurai
- Johnny Guitar
- All That Heaven Allows
- Paths of Glory
- Sweet Smell of Success
- The Tales of Hoffmann
...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Holy Motors
- Under the Skin
- The Assassin
- Stray Dogs
- Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
- The Tree of Life
- Almayer's Folly
- Once Upon a Time in Anatolia
- House of Tolerance
- The Irishman
...plus 10 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Eyes Wide Shut
- In the Mood for Love
- PlayTime
- Nashville
- Beau Travail
- Flowers of Shanghai
- The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
- Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters
- The Leopard
- High and Low
...plus 6 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Eyes Wide Shut
- Barry Lyndon
- 2001: A Space Odyssey
- The Shining
- Paths of Glory
- Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
- The Killing
- A Clockwork Orange
- Full Metal Jacket
- Lolita
...plus 3 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Eyes Wide Shut
- In the Mood for Love
- Nashville
- PlayTime
- Beau Travail
- A Brighter Summer Day
- Flowers of Shanghai
- Malcolm X
- Persona
- Vertigo
...plus 6 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Werckmeister Harmonies
- In the Mood for Love
- Yi Yi
- The Intruder
- The New World
- Three Times
- The House of Mirth
- Tropical Malady
- Mulholland Drive
- Femme Fatale
...plus 40 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>- Holy Motors
- Certified Copy
- Under the Skin
- Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
- The Tree of Life
- High Life
- Zama
- The Grand Budapest Hotel
- Toni Erdmann
- Mysteries of Lisbon
...plus 40 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>