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This was a very cool and confident film that is undermined (perhaps only marginally) by moving in a genre direction that is pretty familiar in the second half. The first half of this movie just has lots of beautiful scenery, characters that are smartly not fully explained, and just a very strong quality. It comes to a head with what is sure to be the most memorable sequence of the year of music.

The rest of the movie still works - it does some creative things with a familiar genre but in so many ways I wished it did not have to do that. It would have been a different movie I suppose but one I would have liked even more.

I was not totally up to date on what this was when I started watching it. I knew it was kind of a 70s gritty movie and thought it would have some lightness with Elain May behind it. So I was write on one count - this might be the grittiest filthiest movie of the 70s (and they all seem that way - seriously how did people get through the 70s?). But this in some ways is hard to watch - perhaps more a factor of me looking for something a bit more light hearted. I am going to give it a high rating because I think there is lots of talent here and it is well made but I do not want to see this again.

Have had this on the list for a long time but traveling back from seemed like the right time. Although I have never seen any Varga film before this, I appreciate her as an important figure. This is a quiet movie that can seem small (just a bunch of posters of silliness). As it continues, the power of movie grows, looking at identify and relationships and permanence and becomes very moving at the end.

It is a shame that the Sam Waterson/OJ Simpson team never got another movie!

Seriously this is really cool fun - a nice mix between a sort of dark 70s conspiracy thing but then goes into some cool action stuff - and Telly Savalas comes in for the last 20 minutes like a bat out of hell with crazy flying and the the movie just ends.

There is some messiness with the early part (some character we spend lots of time talking about binoculars who don't seem to appear relevant) and I suppose more could happen. This always seemed like a fun concept but actually a really good execution too.

Watched on Sunday April 6, 2025.

I tend to prefer ape movies to music biopics - this didn't really engage with the ape as much as I liked

Watched on Saturday March 29, 2025.

Watched on Friday March 28, 2025.

I am counting this as having been seen even with the modern REM soundtrack because it didn't have a soundtrack at all when it came out. This is the kind of movie that you always want to say you've seen as a movie buff and never get around to. Then I find out it is 45 minutes and just a visual marvel - what have I been waiting for? Despite never having seen it, so many of the clips are familiar from the "magic of the movies" montage things that it still seemed familiar. The ability to do this in the context of a technology that had literally just been invented is astonishing.

Watched on Sunday March 16, 2025.

This movie does pretty well with a concept of multiple personalities that is being handled in a much more serious and cogent way in Severance at the moment. It hits some real broad notes of satire that I don't think are really awful but undercut what might be a more thoughtful investigation.

I kind of thought this would be very silly but it had more going on than expected - but this reminded of some other 2024 movies feautring women with sort of fantastic elements (e.g., The Substance and Babygirl). This is not a perfect execution of the concept but this is an interesting take.

Now Jeremy Irons is in the Beekeeper.

Although it ended up on my list because of the Oscar nomination of Colman Domingo, the most interesting thing about this movie is the acting of everyone else around him, who are almost entirely ex-prisoners who participated in the program that the movie is about. Their very natural performances and sort of verite camera look make this rise above what could be a kind of treacly story about art healing people.

A very restrained movie showing some real technical talent

Sean Baker had my favorite movie of 2017 The Florida Project. I somehow completely missed his film from 2021 (I was not really engaged with movies with the theaters totally closed). Hard to imagine where the times goes.

Anora is one of the best movies of the year and certainly one of the most fun to watch. The middle hour or so of this movie is non-stop action and comedy that goes by so quickly. It is well served by the preceding section, grounding us to a degree so that we are not just shot out of a cannon. Where I think it maybe misses the mark a bit is in final portions as Baker attempts not completely successfully to add more emotional weight to this. I don't think it quite sticks the landing but it does not detract enough to take this off the list of the best of the year.

A completely competent action thriller that would have been more fun in a theater (but that is on me). The actors playing the villains have some fun with their roles. To be honest I thought there would be more bee stuff.

Can't help but fall a little short of the masterpieces of the first two, but there is still so much heart and whimsy in this. I appreciate Paddington taking a trip but I think he really needs to be in England.

I don't know if I am reviewing a film so much as an experience, but this is a real show of the audio power of a movie theater vs whatever garbage you have at home. Seeing it in IMAX is not immersive exactly, but very cool. If I were to watch at home this would not feel like anything but works so well in the theater.

I was prepared for a kind of quirky comedy with some warmth, but this really sures my expectations. This is a very subtle movie about the experience of dealing with family and yourself - it smartly avoids revealing all that much about the characters in favor of settling in emotionally. Naturally Culkin gets the kudos as the big out there performance but I think Jesse Eisenberg shines here as well - there is some irony in all of the shine going on Culkin when Eisenberg wrote and directed the movie and stars in at as well - it very much fits the feel of the movie and the relationship at play.

It is so hard to watch these movies that have so much discourse with an open mind. I convince myself that I won't be influenced - that I will come to a conclusion on my own. And the only way to really prove that is to have an opinion that is not consistent with the conventional wisdom.

In this case, I have not been able to prove that. This movie gets points for being different - the movie from this year it most resembled in style is Megalopolis - a similar failure with some interesting moments. This one is I guess kind of a Mexican soap opera feel with an emphasis on the opera - I don't really know opera but I think the songs are not so shitty in that space.

The most interesting element and perhaps the one that attracted the attention for everyone in the first place was the trans gender element. Everything about this makes me think this was a different script at some point, in which this transition was not sincere or would be played for laughs - and while we have appropriately moved past that time, it does make it sort of inert. I can imagine this as some kind of Mrs. Doubtfire type farce more than this high emotion sort of operation they end up with.

So I guess I give them one point for a solid swing but no points for anything else. Sorry to be the same as everyone.

Still showing in the 22 screen theater - still amazing

Seeing this again before rewatching Dune 2 in theaters was pretty cool. Definitely not aa amazing as the theatrical viewing experience (which was enhanced by being among the few experiences like it in years) - the second one is superior but both are really cool

A villain origin story prequel except the main movie is our real lives. I have to ire the boldness of taking on something as third rail divisive as Trump and sort of kind of applying a human lens to it. I am sure this is discomforting to see but Trump is and presumably still is a human - this largely avoids the cartoonish stuff that you might except. So I ire the boldness here.

Where it lands for me is similarity to so many other biopics, most with less problematic main characters. Stuck in reality and with people who have been involved in so many things, you either isolate in a moment or speed run through a bunch of stuff so we can reexperience familiar things. This movie is most successful during the times it slows down, which are the beginning and end, focusing on the Roy Cohn relationship. On the technical side, the acting and the look of this is pretty great.

This movie completely succeeds in scale and technical precision - it is absolutely gorgeous to look at and listen to and I recommend seeing it your most impressive cinema experience. The length, with the intermission, is not noticeable - it feels very much like a novel covering multiple generations. What holds me back from calling this movie a masterpiece is a little lack of emotional resonance - perhaps that is by design, and the choice to include an epilogue that seems designed to make you think this was a real person, but offers a talky explanation for things that were never apparent in the film (at least to me). Still one of the top movies of the year.

Every discussion about this movie is going to be about the POV aspect, which of course is thing that makes it stand out from a large but not overwhelming movies of children in abusive situations and how it affected them. I'm mixed on the POV - it sets the movie apart - at some times make it more immersive but at other times distracting - but after a while they kind of ease out of it here and there and those breaks make it more meaningful. Where I think this really works is the decision to ease a bit away from the abuse porn that this could have been - just watching someone be brutalized and being sad about it. There is more humanity here and the restraint makes it work that much better - especially as what is an exceptionally slow-paced movie (in the best sense) moves towards a rapid conclusion that is really very affecting.

Watched on Friday January 3, 2025.

This movie really sits on the edge between serious Oscar stuff and kind of silly genre movie - I really prefer the silly genre stuff here - this is a plot movie deepened somewhat but it works more as a little mystery than any kind of character piece. The acting is strong, and the movie looks really cool, so that can distract you but would have loved this had they gone all in on funny and wild (Death of Stalin comes to mind). Still enjoyable.

Watched on Saturday June 13, 2020.

Not artistically ambitious at all but fun to see how yacht rock came to be

Could have been so much more if it stuck with things as a kind of psychological thriller where we stick with the machine the whole time. The action scenes are kind of boring and the characters don't have much depth or interest. Perhaps I would have appreciated it more as a big screen experience but I think the flaws might even be more glaring in that setting.

Convinced myself I was clever queueing this up for New Year's Eve with some shrimp cocktail

Movie still great

This was fine but if I never see another biopic again, I guess that would be ok.

Seeing this movie so soon after first experiencing Eyes Wide Shut is interesting - Nicole Kidman has moved from this young professional to this aging boss (somehow looking the exact same as in 1999), dealing with some of the same issues. This does not have the precision or the audacity of that movie but shares some of the same uneasiness.

Bumping this up a half star just due to sheer amazement at the technical achievement of the effects and puppetry. Someday they will make some kind of new Gremlins where they look like shit and it will be sad, but 1984 Gremlins will still be with us.

Trying to put this over the top as the new Christmas classic - this is legitimately funny stuff

All of the same elements are pretty much there but everything is weaker.

Seeing this in a theater is so awesome - so fun and funny and great - just the perfect action movie

I have walked out of only a few movies in my life and Eyes Wide Shut was one of them. Not this time but back when it came out in 1999 and I was in college working the college theater and seeing every damn movie in what I have to come learn was the best movie year ever. I didn't walk out because I was repulsed but because I was bored.

Not my finest moment - this is not a perfect movie but it is really good. However, thematically I am not sure how well it works for someone when they are 19. Now that I am far older than the characters in the movie, I can feel it more deeply. This movie is mysterious and strange and disturbing and beautiful. It functions better as a feeling than a thriller.

Seeing this made me think of Megalopolis which may not be Coppola's last movie but very well could be - something about this old masters delving into abject weirdness because they cannot be stopped is appealing even when it does not totally work as in Megalopolis. But this one works and is a nice capper on Kubrick's filmography.

Sorry for the walk out - won't do it again!

Having recently seen the 50th anniversary edition of The Conversation, it was interesting to see this one from the same year. This is like The Conversation without the ambition or the moodiness - if it was just an action thriller. It is so 70s - everyone smoking and swearing and complaining about women and it is so awesome to watch.

The letterboxd watchlist feature is an interesting kind of memory hole. At some point in my life I heard about a movie called Buttrcrack and it turns out it is the shortest movie in my watchlist, so let's check out Buttrcrack. While I have the same nostalgia for Blockbuster as so many of my generation, I don't think I'm walking out with a copy of Buttcrack in 1998 (when this came out).

And well I guess that would be ok - this has some fun elements but diminished by some pretty amateruish acting. Sorry buttrcrack creators!

It had been long enough since I put this on the watchlist that I couldn't if it was supposed to be good fun or bad fun - and it turns out it is really good fun. This is maybe half step shy of being a really good movie but the action scenes are cool, the actors are really bringing their personas to some very thin roles, and it gets in and out real quick.

Somehow missed this during the initial theatrical run and it just seemed like something you had to see on the big screen. So a 10 year anniversary run in IMAX was a real winner for me. I am glad I waited to see this on the big screen. Nolan is clearly the master of IMAX but this movie probably ties Tenet for being the biggest and loudest movie in this filmography. And parts that could probably play a little boring on a TV or a phone or whatever are crazy spectacles that work so well. The movie is a pretty deft combo of spectacle and emotion - does not hit the highs of some of my favorite sci fi movies but almost there. If it comes back to IMAX again, I will be there.

Such a great movie and so amazing to see it and hear it in a theatrical experience. There is an ongoing culture war of the notion of phones in a theater which really comes down to whether you should pay full attention to thing you are experiencing. I think I am prone to distraction which is where the theatrical experience makes a difference. And this movie of course demands obsessive attention - as we hear more and more with different intonations. The look of this is top notch, so deeply 70s and yet so timeless. I can imagine a movie like this leaning into the mystery or forgetting the mystery and just focusing on the personal struggle, but this hits both sides so well. Perfect movie.

They may have had a notion of one time of making something more substantial, made a perfectly fine genre movie. The 1999/2000 goes a little hot at the beginning but eases out as the movie progresses.

Watched on Saturday December 7, 2024.

This still holds up

The AFI Silver theater is at a location so close yet so far away - in the same area as me but far enough away that I need to really want to see something and honestly dedicate the day to it. This is a shame because there are so many repertory offerings here that I would want to see if I were closer.

Amadeus might not have been the top of my list before this - I had seen it once and thought it was pretty good. But this is a movie made for a big screen - huge sets and lighting and orchestras and operas. This movie needs this theater.

I had sort of filed it away as a serious movie (it is about a composer who dies young, so you know) but this is actually a super fun movie - it is funny and wild and crazy. Great stuff!

Yeah I watched it again - it is not really a movie exactly but it has some fun moments.

There are at times movies created that you know exactly what you are going to get and even though you know there are better things out there, you can't resist them. So that was my approach to Red One, which is of course not a good movie, and is pretty predictable, but I enjoyed the experience of walking a block away to a theater and kicking off the Christmas season.

1. Sinners
2. Novocaine
3. Paddington in Peru
4. Mickey 17
5. Becoming Led Zeppelin

• The Warriors
• Blue Collar
• Spaceballs
• Roxanne
• Top Secret!
• Clue
• Ordinary People
• American Gigolo
• Unbreakable
• Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

...plus 63 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

1. Civil War
2. Dune: Part Two
3. The Substance
4. Challengers
5. Anora
6. A Real Pain
7. The Brutalist
8. Heretic
9. Nickel Boys
10. Juror #2

...plus 32 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

I have been doing a ranked list of movies for years with the exception of the COVID years. To keep things fresh this year, I am stealing an idea from someone else and doing it in real time. These are movies that came out in the US in 2023.

1. Killers of the Flower Moon
2. May December
3. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
4. Oppenheimer
5. Barbie
6. Past Lives
7. The Holdovers
8. American Fiction
9. Anatomy of a Fall
10. The Creator

...plus 34 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

1. TÁR
2. Nope
3. Barbarian
4. The Banshees of Inisherin
5. The Fabelmans
6. Top Gun: Maverick
7. Everything Everywhere All at Once
8. Puss in Boots: The Last Wish
9. The Menu
10. Glass Onion

...plus 21 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

These are the 50 films I saw that came out in 2019, ranked in order of preference. Despite falling down on the reviewing of movies, I still saw quite a few. Regal Unlimited keeps me going.

1. Parasite
2. Marriage Story
3. The Irishman
4. Uncut Gems
5. Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
6. Ad Astra
7. Little Women
8. Knives Out
9. Honey Boy
10. Midsommar

...plus 40 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

I spent so much time in video stores in the late 80s and 90s. Before Blockbuster took off, stores stocked the same movies forever with some modest updates. Most of these movies were too mature for me, but I the covers and the posters well. I will keep adding to this list as I .

• Jaws: The Revenge
• School Daze
• Transylvania 6-5000
• Cheech & Chong's The Corsican Brothers
• Attack of the Killer Tomatoes!
• Out of Africa
• Porky's
• Armed and Dangerous
• Hot to Trot
• How to Get Ahead in Advertising

...plus 13 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Ranked list of all 2018 releases that I saw as of February 11 - a little late this year

1. Minding the Gap
2. First Reformed
3. Annihilation
4. Sorry to Bother You
5. Paddington 2
6. Eighth Grade
7. BlacKkKlansman
8. Mission: Impossible – Fallout
9. Searching
10. Wild Wild Country

...plus 45 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Ranking of all films that I saw that that were released in 2017. Gave myself 2 months into 2018 this year

1. The Florida Project
2. Phantom Thread
3. mother!
4. A Ghost Story
5. Blade Runner 2049
6. Dunkirk
7. Get Out
8. I Don't Feel at Home in This World Anymore
9. Okja
10. Lady Bird

...plus 38 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

A list of the movies where I had the esteemed honor of being the first person to review on Letterboxd. The truly forgotten films.

• Carpool
• The Money Jungle
• Paramedics
• Where is Robert Fisher?
• Put the Camera on Me

I gave myself a month to catch up with 2016 and managed to make it through 51 movies that were released in 2016 . Good year for movies as even the worst movie on here wasn't that bad. The star ratings were at the time I saw them and some of them move up and down over time.

1. Moonlight
2. O.J.: Made in America
3. 10 Cloverfield Lane
4. The Lobster
5. Cameraperson
6. Green Room
7. Loving
8. The Witch
9. Arrival
10. Love & Friendship

...plus 41 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

This is my ranking of 2015 movies that I have seen. I included the Look of Silence as this wasn't released in the US until deep into 2015.

1. Ex Machina

   I really need to rewatch this - stuck with me more than any movie this year

2. The Look of Silence

   My highest initial ranking of the year but perhaps more influenced by my love for The Act of Killing

3. 45 Years
4. Mad Max: Fury Road
5. Room
6. Spy

   This movie was so fun and great - I hope people see that

7. The Hateful Eight
8. It Follows
9. Inside Out
10. Spotlight

...plus 17 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

The West End Cinema opened in Washington DC about a block from my office. In March of 2015, they announced they were closing. I have seen many movies at this theater, which was small and quirky and personal and in the bottom of an office building. I will miss it.

• Two Days, One Night
• You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
• Force Majeure
• The Social Network
• Tiny Furniture
• Crime After Crime
• Rear Window
• Arbitrage
• Inside Job
• The Act of Killing

...plus 6 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.