I had the week off from work, thanks to the Thanksgiving holiday (but also a dentist appointment right before that), so I ended up watching 9 movies:
- It’s a little strange, watching Love Affair without ever having seen the much better known remake An Affair to Remember. Still, Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer are charming enough together.
- The Last Dragon is cheesy but fun.
- Invaders from Mars is pure ’50s-era science fiction: more than a little corny, bordering on camp but never aware that it’s doing so, but still pretty fun.
- The first twenty minutes of Alien: Romulus, before the movie really lets on that it’s a legacy sequel, are kind of interesting, suggesting an originality that the rest of the movie seems to be actively fighting against. But if the remainder was just another stale Alien knockoff, I think I could have still handled that—even after the unnecessary AI deepfake of Ian Holm shows up, and even after the movie starts directly (and nonsensically) quoting previous films in the franchise. But when the movie reveals itself to be a Prometheus sequel as well, and insists on unconvincingly tying every last bit of continuity together, that’s when my waning interest turned into active annoyance. There are still some things to like about the film, some able direction and a couple of decent performances, but it feels more like a wasted opportunity to bring anything new or interesting to the table.
- You won’t learn much from Too Funny to Fail: The Life & Death of The Dana Carvey Show if you weren’t already familiar with its history. But it’s also hard to imagine why you would watch it if you weren’t already familiar with it. There are some interesting, if not revelatory, interviews with nearly all of the principals involved—head writer Louis CK being the notable exception. (It’s easy to imagine interviews with him having been filmed, but then scrapped in the wake of the allegations around him.) This soft doc doesn’t necessarily make a case that the show should have lasted, or that there’s even something to learn from its failure, but it’s an entertaining enough.
- Almost everything that works about Drive-Away Dolls is thanks to the actors, who give every weird line reading and wink-wink-isn’t-this-kooky plot twist their all. (Margaret Qualley in particular is a lot of fun.) But it’s all a bit too much, really. Even if you didn’t already know this was directed and co-written by one of the Coen Brothers, the movie would feel like one of their collaborations but warmed over and therefore half-baked. There’s a lot going on here—too much, honestly—and it never comes together in a particularly satisfying way.
- Sorry, Wrong Number is a little convoluted, and Stanwyck’s performance teeters almost constantly on the edge of silly hysteria, but there’s a lot to like here.
- They Call Me Mister Tibbs! is no In the Heat of the Night. I appreciate the attempt to give Poitier’s character more life, and both he and Landau are pretty good, but the movie itself is a little dull.
- Troll Hunter does exactly what it says on the tin. Unfortunately, that’s kind of all it does. The workmanlike CGI has aged well enough, likely because it’s mostly hidden in shadow, but the truth is the movie just doesn’t do a whole lot and then kind of peters out. A late attempt at a surprise reveal can’t really change the fact that this feels like a short film padded unnecessarily. There’s a good short film inside it, but that’s kind of all there is.
I also re-watched Double Indemnity, which I hadn’t seen since my college film class, and which is just a pitch-perfect film noir.
