Night of the Creeps (1986)

Director: Fred Dekker

Cast: Jason Lively, Tom Atkins, Steve Marshall, Jill Whitlow

Have I Seen it Before: Never, indeed.

Did I Like It: There’s a through line between this film and Night of the Comet (1984), and not just because I’m watching them both in quick succession for Beyond the Cabin in the Woods, and not just because they’re both irreverent, youth-oriented zombie movies of the 1980s, although it’s probably a little bit that.

No, I’m struck by the fact that these are both two films which I enjoy far more in the first quarter than I do in the rest of the following film.

Now, that might read as a fairly damning statement, as I ultimately didn’t think much of Comet by the time the end credits rolled. Instead, I’m more struck by how much I was absolutely thoroughly enchanted by the section of this film which takes place in the 1950s, and I only merely really liked the larger meat of the film taking place in the “present” (1986).

That opening is pretty stellar, with a true embrace of the space operatic elements of B movies of the era brought me into the film singularly. I even made a note for the eventual Cabin episode where I hoped the whole thing would be in black and white.

But alas, it wasn’t meant to be.

And yet, I can’t dismiss the 80s sections of the films entirely. Chris (Lively) and Hooper (Marshall) are believable as nerds neither entirely hapless nor completely angelic. Atkins brings exactly what one expects from a Tom Atkins, and I’m pretty sure he is incapable of not understanding the assignment at hand. I enjoyed how the film largely eschews any sort of impulse to make Cynthia (Whitlow) neither a preternatural hero* nor a damsel in distress. Neither she nor Chris would make it out of that sorority house without the help of the other.

It all makes one lament the fact that director Fred Dekker largely couldn’t get ahead of the stink  of Robocop 3 (1993) to keep making feature length films.

*For the record, I have no trouble whatsoever with preternatural lady heroes. This counter-note is pleasantly unusual, is all.

Some Like It Hot (1959)

Director: Billy Wilder

Cast: Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, George Raft

Have I Seen it Before: Yes. Do people still take in movies for the first time on Turner Classic Movies? Do I still have TCM in my cable package? These are all depressing questions I’m not prepared to wrestle with yet.

Did I Like It: A modern audience who hasn’t seen this film might not have any patience for it. A litany of comedies have followed it with nearly identical structures. Some number of benign charlatans run afoul of truly bad characters, go into a an unusual situation* (there will often be costumes—although a nun’s habit seems to be a recurring trend), try to extend the scheme to comedic results, to only then re-run afoul of the badniks, after which all of the misunderstandings are aired. One of minimum experience might be forgiven for being unimpressed.

None of those subsequent movies has Marilyn Monroe in them, however. Beautiful, certainly, and a gifted enough comedian (although the real laughs in the movie come from Lemmon, a little bit Curtis, and most consistently the guileless Joe E. Brown) but how many people are drawn to the film after all these years without the draw of Monroe.

And if the Monroe’s legend was one of a perpetually troubled, ultimately tragic icon, would we be that drawn to the film? Had Monroe lived longer and indeed possibly live long enough to survive her most potent fame, would the film be as iconic? Is Monroe the only thing that keeps the film relevant?

Here’s the thing: during the entire runtime of the film, I didn’t at all dwell on the sadness that inevitably comes with Monroe’s magnetism. The film just works, and she’s good enough to surpass her own legend. If that’s not a recommendation, I don’t know what is.

*Positively Campbellian, when one thinks about it. No wonder so many screenwriters without any other ideas keep going back to the well.

Romancing the Stone (1984)

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Cast: Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, Danny DeVito, Alfonso Arau

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure, but it’s probably been twenty years or more. Before motion capture carried the day, I was a Zemeckis completist.

Did I Like It: There’s a unique pleasure in not keeping a movie generally beloved—and, indeed, I remember liking—in regular rotation. I would give almost anything to see something like Back to the Future (1985)* with new eyes. Thankfully, I took to this film with only the dimmest of memories, and it was essentially like I was taking it in for the first time.

The story unfurls with such a breathless confidence that I’m surprised it isn’t taught as an example in screenwriting books, and it’s a real bummer that more work from Diane Thomas—including a supposedly lost draft of a haunted house-centric third Indiana Jones film—didn’t see the light of day before her untimely death.

The screenplay could blow away in the wind if the chemistry between Douglas and Turner wasn’t enough to sell entire movies on their own. There are few pairings on screen who are more fun to kind of/sort of hate each other. Don’t believe me? Just take a look at The War of the Roses (1989).

The film is probably a little less ageless than Zemeckis’ other epics of the 80s, and I can’t understand why/how Alan Silvestri was talked into a sax and synth-heavy score. Honest to God, the whole film sounds like the opening titles for an episode of Siskel & Ebert. I’m not even opposed to that in these circumstances, I just know that a different approach might have moved the film from merely charming to truly timeless. I know all the principals involved can ultimately do better.

That is a minor complaint, when so much of the film works so thoroughly, but it might just keep me from re-watching it too soon. Maybe in twenty years or so I can take it the movie in again as if it was almost new.

*Which would not exist without this film, as Zemeckis’ main claim to fame prior to ‘84 was being at least partly responsible for the only flops with which Steven Spielberg was associated.

Pennywise: The Story of It (2022)

Director: Chris Griffiths

Cast: Tim Curry, Seth Green, Richard Thomas, Tim Reid

Have I Seen it Before: No. Normally wouldn’t have been interested, but it happened to be the right price on iTunes as I enjoyed a glass of wine on Christmas Eve, You might be in for a few strange reviews over the next several months.

Did I Like It: The greatest behind-the-scenes documentary of all time is undoubtedly Hearts of Darkness (1991). To compare this film with that film would be to compare its subject—It (1990)—with something like Citizen Kane (1941). They aren’t in the same league.

This film ultimately runs like a DVD special feature. There’s nothing wrong with that. There are plenty of fascinating special features to watch on DVDs and Blu Rays. The Beginning, the fly-on-the-wall, but still Lucas-approved look at the production of Star Wars - Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999) feels comprehensive, even if it may be largely staged.

There’s a fundamental standard of criticism of documentaries as a whole in those examples. Do they have an unusual level of access to its subject, so much so that something candid might rise to the surface? On that level, Pennywise doesn’t even feel the need compete on this level. There probably isn’t that much to reach for in that arena, though. The film itself was only controversial in the context of its airing on prime-time broadcast television. It itself has always been a four hour movie with a few good performances, one great performance, and about five non-consecutive minutes of real terror.

So then we must move on to another criteria. Does this film have anything unique to say about its subject, without blindly drifting into the territory of criticism of the film? No, unfortunately. There are a few anecdotes of note, plenty of earned deference to Curry—without whom there would scarcely be a reason to have a documentary in the first place—and Jonathan Brandis’ early demise, and more than enough talking heads.

Ultimately, though that makes for a completely average DVD special feature. I’m willing to give the affair a pass, as the disc special feature is becoming something of an endangered species, but I can’t imagine I’ll come back to it at any point. I’d probably just listen to the commentary on the DVD itself. If memory serves, both Harry Anderson and John Ritter are on that one, and as one might imagine, not present for the proceedings here.

The Mummy Returns (2001)

Director: Stephen Sommers

Cast: Brendan Fraser, Rachel Weisz, Arnold Vosloo, Dwayne Johnson

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure. But we’ll get to that in a minute.

Did I Like It: I don’t think I’m being excessively controversial by saying the special effects of The Mummy (1999) don’t really hold up nearly twenty-five years later*. Every time a scarab or a group scene large than fifteen appears on screen, the film begins to resemble a cut scene from an era of video games that might have worked then, but feels quaint now. And yet, that film acquitted itself better than average by being just charming enough in a desert of Indiana Jones films**, that it’s flaws could forgiven, if not completely ignored in service of a good time.

The same cannot be said for The Mummy Returns. The film is rather infamous—if only in my own memory—nearly to a level of Superman IV: The Quest For Peace (1987) for having special effects that could not hold up even at the time of initial viewing. The final battle with the Scorpion King (Rock, in his film debut) was such a clunky master’s class in running afoul of the uncanny valley, that it looked—at best—like a cut scene from a Playstation 1 game at a time where we had all moved on to our Playstations 2. Now, nearly ever special effect appears to be a work in progress which subsequently ran out of money.

Are the film’s effects so obnoxious that the film sputters from distraction to distraction? Or are the charms contained within diminished so that the film cannot surpass its flaws?Indeed, in those sequences which don’t use CGI, there might be just enough charm for me to try and relax. But Fraser’s impishness is on the wane and Weisz’s delightful nerd waif of the first film shifts into a far more standard and less surprising heroine. The effects might be bad enough, or the charm might be lacking, but I tend to think its both.

*I may have made this reference, and forgive my increasingly aging mind if I had, but excuse me while I realize I must have drunk from the wrong Grail. I know, wrong movie.

**We’re arguably still in the middle of that desert, but back then even the prospect of another Indy movie after Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) was far from guaranteed. I know, I know. Wrong movie.

Monty Python’s Life of Brian (1979)

Director: Terry Jones

Cast: Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle

Have I Seen It Before: Ok, confession time: No. I know, I know. For some reason, my adolescence was not tied to any sort of Python obsession.

Did I Like It: Is it weird to say that there is a certain malevolence that exists at the core of the Pythons? This isn’t even remotely a complaint, but I honestly didn’t laugh any louder than I did when one of the wisemen (several days after the viewing I’m thinking it was Cleese, but gun to my head, I couldn’t be sure; he was tall, and that feels good enough for me) is so thoroughly annoyed that he wasted his time with Mandy (Terry Jones; definitely, unassailably Terry Jones) that he just shoves her to the ground on the way over to the correct manger. It’s just such a needless moment of cartoonish violence, how could one not laugh? You can have all of the absurdity, wordplay, and dead parrots you want, but when it comes right down to it, I want to see new mothers being pushed to the ground.

It had to be Cleese, right? It was such a Basil Fawlty thing to do. What else does one dwell on in a Python film? The filmmaking? It’s all cheeky fun, wrapped up in the sheep’s clothing of a biblical epic. Honestly, the moment the Wise Men leave Brian’s barn, and find out where they were supposed to go, might be one of the best shots ever produced in a comedy film. Throw in an imitation Shirley Bassey theme song so good I thought until I looked it up that it was the real thing, and that’s, *chef’s kiss*, pure cinema.

That nearly perfect moment of nihilism is completely obliterated by the ending musical number—“Always Look on the Bright Side of Life”—which may be one of the happiest songs ever to be created, and certainly to come out of the United Kingdom…

Then again, when one considers the context of the ending, it might be the final push to the floor of the barn.

Night of the Comet (1984)

Director: Thom Eberhardt

Cast: Robert Beltran*, Catherine Mary Stewart, Kelli Maroney, Sharon Farrell

Have I Ever Seen It Before: Never. It always felt like a movie that was bopping around there in my peripheral vision, but never quite came in for a landing. If it weren’t for <Beyond the Cabin in the Woods>, I might never get to some of these.

Oddly enough, it took a bit of doing to even get my eyes on the film now. Forget any of the array of streaming services I already foolishly subscribe to, I couldn’t even get Prime or Apple TV to rent me the movie. It was starting to feel like I might be doomed to pay out-of-print prices for physical media.

And then there was Tubi. Ah, Tubi. It doesn’t seem like the damn thing should work, and yet, it is there. Sure, I was inexplicably barraged with commercials a few times, but even Hulu does that, and apparently, I’m paying for the privilege.

Did I like it: You know, I really started to. If the whole movie was Dawn of the Dead (1978) in a movie two screen movie theater run by employees varying from the disinterested to shiftless**, I might have loved the whole thing. But the movie absolutely runs out of steam right about the time Robert Beltran shows up*** and by the time things are concluded I’m not sure what the story was supposed to be about, but it was definitely not about red dust as an ongoing threat for the human population (the dust clears with an errant Los Angeles rain), it’s not about young people coming to grips—if even in a humorous way—with the end of the world (because they all turn on a dime to be hyper-domesticated by the time the closing credits roll around), and it certainly isn’t about anyone’s ongoing feud with DMK, because that couldn’t possible have mattered less.

*Yes, that Robert Beltran.

**Yes, I’ve seen <Demons (1985)>, in case you’re in a recommendation mood.

***Insert your own joke about the Star Trek franchise here.

Glass Onion (2022)

Director: Rian Johnson

Cast: Daniel Craig, Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Kathryn Hahn

Have I Seen it Before: Sadly, I missed it in the theater, and I feel badly (or perhaps even guilty) about that.

Did I Like It: A viewer goes into Knives Out (2019) knowing that its a whodunit, but even so there’s a certain amount of surprise to the whole affair. Can Johnson pull something like this off? Is Craig able to shake of Bond more than any of his predecessors in the role and slide into character work in his later years?

The answer was yes to both, and the plot of the mystery itself kept one guessing.

There’s no way they could all pull this off again, with a completely different case, no less, right?

Even if Johnson and Craig were able to recapture the charm of the original film, I’m bound to find myself not having any fun at all, as I’m looking around every corner trying to unravel the mystery before Blanc (Craig) can. It’s like I’m sitting in the middle of the fourth season of Sherlock, and I’m into the second hour before I realize I’m not having any fun anymore.

Not so here, I’m happy to report. The larger mystery itself is a misdirect, sure, as some bad faith reviewers are noting with such vehemency that it’s as if the movie stole their lunch money. Honestly, who cares? For my money, that kept things lively, and the comedy that the mayhem and disaster exploding around these characters is entirely self-inflicted so thoroughly encompasses the stupid moment of history we’re all desperately stuck in. Will Glass Onion age as well as Knives Out? Maybe not. A mystery’s shelf life hits a half life pretty quickly after the mystery itself is revealed, so I’m imagining both of these—and any future Blanc adventures—have a better shot than anything else in the genre.

Blast from the Past (1999)

Director: Hugh Wilson

Cast: Brendan Fraser, Alicia Silverstone, Christopher Walken, Sissy Spacek

Have I Seen it Before: I remember liking the film a great deal, and I can oddly enough point precisely to when I saw it. One of the last days of Spring Break, 1999. And just about the only thing that could distract one’s mind from the reality that there really was another stretch of eighth grade yet to complete was an impromptu movie. It was between this and something else, and for the life of me, I can’t remember what that other movie would have been. Back then, I was thoroughly amused by the movie.

But a movie can’t possibly hold up for that long, right?

Did I Like It: Mostly, yes. I remember laughing more frequently somehow then, but then again I suppose if you asked me honestly, I probably remember laughing a lot more in general in the late 90s.

If there were a couple of comedy stars more charming than Fraser and Silverstone in their 90s prime*, then they’d likely be just a little too precious for their own good. Here, they are exactly as delightful as they need to be. The concept is just clever enough to hold interest throughout. Only the smallest percentage of jokes age like hot milk, and most of those have to do with an absolutely slumming Dave Foley prancing through a caricature that wouldn’t pass the smell test on a Kids in the Hall sketch.

That’s not a bad batting average. If only we could find the movie that turned back the clock twenty-five years or so.

*Sort of wild to think not so much about how much Silverstone needed a hit after Batman & Robin (1997) forced us all to forget how much we all liked her in Clueless (1995), and that Fraser would just maybe (so far) peak a few months later with The Mummy (1999).

The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)

Director: Brian Henson

Cast: Michael Caine, Dave Goelz, Steve Whitmire, Jerry Nelson

Have I Seen it Before: Let’s put it this way: the frequency of the phrase “who did not die” is uttered in my house would annoy everyone that isn’t my wife or I. It certainly annoys the cat, who, by the way, stepped on me as I wrote this sentence.

Did I Like It: What is the role of a movie? Is cinema the only predominantly American export, shifting hundreds of millions of dollars around for the sake of the shift? Are they the only endurable cultural time capsule we are capable of creating in the modern age, even when the contemporary ones mostly smack of insincerity? Or am I overthinking the whole exercise, and they are just another kind of entertainment, no different at their core than Gregorian chants or paintings of cherubs?

Na, I think it’s a third thing. We watched the movie on Christmas Eve, with a holiday season nearly behind us that threatened to bring any reasonable person I’m related to the brink of madness. I could have searched the entirety of human experience for something to turn the mood around, and would have come up short. I even bought British Christmas crackers to give it a shot, but it turns out low-grade explosives only work on the fourth of July, even when they come with fun paper hats.

But you want to know something? Caine’s perfectly calibrated, straight-faced performance, combined with a surprisingly faithful adaptation of the Dickens story, infused throughout with just the right amount of Muppets zaniness caused or hearts to grow, if not two sizes, than just enough to get to sleep and face another day of needless familial acrimony.

That’s what the movies are. Escape is too tidy a word, I think. They are a vehicle for transcending anguish, if even temporarily. One might think that the Muppets lost something after Jim Henson’s death, but I would say—at least at this point—the original magic was certainly still present.

Sleepless in Seattle (1993)

Director: Nora Ephron

Cast: Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Bill Pullman, Ross Malinger

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure. Not as many times as You’ve Got Mail (1998), certainly, and I have to admit the moment that sticks in my head more completely than any others is the exchange about one of the letter writers is Sam’s (Hanks) third grade teacher, but that’s only because that scene is in The Cable Guy (1996), and I’ve seen that film quite a bit.

Did I Like It: Here’s a statement that I didn’t think I was going to write when I started rewatching the movie, but it is a conclusion I can’t escape:

Sleepless in Seattle is the Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) of romantic comedies.

Wait, don’t go. Let me explain.

This isn’t necessarily a measure of quality. Sleepless is fine, I have no complaints, but if we remember from earlier, I’m more of a You’ve Got Mail man, myself, and it isn’t just because of the typewriters, because there’s more than a little typewriter porn to be found here. It’s more of a measure of the film’s construction.

Much has been made of the chemistry between Ryan and Hanks. It made Mail one of my absolute favorites, and made Joe Versus the Volcano (1990) a mainstream movie and not one of the weirdest thing to get a wide release.

But they barely share a scene together in this film. They look at each other across a highway, and I wouldn’t be shocked if neither of them where on that stretch of road on the same day. They exchange a few words on the roof of the Empire State Building, and that’s the whole show. Just like Montalbán and Shatner in Khan, when you think about it. Maybe I’m the only one thinking about it. I can acknowledge that.

Modern Times (1936)

Director: Charlie Chaplin

Cast: Charlie Chaplin, Paulette Goddard, Henry Bergman, Chester Conklin

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure.

Did I Like It: It’s probably fair to admit at this point that I’m one of those guys that’s never been 100% convinced that the advent of synchronized sound in motion pictures was an unassailably good idea. Sure, you can get an occasional Godfather or a Marx Brothers picture, but Dracula (1931) is essentially a 75-minute-long sleeping pill, and we all would collectively be doing a lot better in the twenty-first century if the Transformers pictures somehow even had less to say.

So, yes, Modern Times has a special place in my heart as the last hurrah for the silent comedy*. The moment the Tramp speaks, he begins** to disappear from us. But he’s going to go through some of his best hits before he irises out forever.

One might be bothered by the episodic nature of the film’s plot, and indeed much of the film’s runtime could have been cut up into one-reeler shorts, but considering live action shorts would eventually become a thing of the past***, it has a double dose of quaintness working for it. I’d say that anyone terribly hung up on that quality is missing the point that most of those shorts are great. The Tramp’s odyssey with factory work is one of his more iconic works, and I’ve seen this movie a dozen times over the last twenty years, and I still don’t know how he didn’t kill himself on those roller skates when he was working as a night watchmen****. This doesn’t even cover his trouble in jail, various types of adventures with Ellen (Goddard, truly the best of the Chaplin leading ladies), and his final floor show.

You may think of Chaplin amongst the gears, if you give Modern Times any thought at all. You should really take the whole thing in, and maybe, just maybe you’ll join me and the rest of the cool kids in our assessment that this whole talky fad will eventually pass.

*Characters do speak on occasion in the film, but only through technological intermediaries, in case any of us were unclear of how Chaplin felt about the talkies which were taking the foundation of his power out from under him.

**Chaplin insists that the Barber character in The Great Dictator (1940)—his first sound film after caving to the churning forces working against him—isn’t the Tramp, and we all have accepted that at face value. The man’s been dead for nearly fifty years. I think it’s time to admit  that the Tramp had one last ride. We must do this for no other reason that if the Barber isn’t the Tramp, then Adenoid Hynkel is what the Tramp eventually became, and that’s more than a little depressing. That all should probably be reserved for my eventual review of Dictator, which I am dismayed to learn I have, at this moment, not written yet.

***Would Chaplin be making Youtube videos and eschew features all together if he were working today. One wonders…

****Which, incidentally, is a scenario that has—occasionally purposefully, and just as frequently by accident—drifted into my own work.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (2005)

Director: Garth Jennings

Cast: Martin Freeman, Mos Def, Sam Rockwell, Zooey Deschanel

Have I Seen it Before: I’m fairly sure I had? Although, as  the ending of this version of the story plays out, my memory felt a little fuzzy. That might have more to do with me having read the novel a few times over the years, and that version remains solid in my head.

Did I Like It: At the time of release, a number of sources questioned the casting of Mos Def as Ford Prefect, despite Adams himself saying that Arthur Dent (Freeman) was the only character who needed to be British. I don’t need to guess as to people’s objection to Mos Def, because it’s pretty obvious on the face of it, and I think he’s perfectly cast in the role, channeling a being of pure eccentricities through the film.

The problem is that Prefect is far too truncated in the context of a feature motion picture, so much so that he is delightfully daffy for the film’s opening minutes, and then is relegated to merely a passenger on board the Heart of Gold. It’s a real shame that the film felt the need to find some kind of restrictive structure for itself, and in doing so opted to be a romantic comedy film which could just as easily been titled When Arthur Met Trillian.

I’ve often thought that certain properties are best suited to certain formats. Batman is more at home in a monthly comic book. Star Trek is at its best on hour-long TV. Star Wars reaches its maximum potential in feature-length movies*. Hitchhiker’s is probably better off as either a radio series or in prose. Things are less limiting there.

*And can we be really honest? Only did so in its first two times at bat.

The Mark of Zorro (1940)

Director: Rouben Mamoulian

Cast: Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, Basil Rathbone, Robert Lowery

Have I Seen it Before: Never. I feel really bad about this. In my defense, I eschewed

Did I Like It: It’s impossible to dislike a movie that is universally accepted as the direct, non-gun related inciting incident to Bruce Wayne becoming Batman. Especially after the semi-recent Antonio Banderas films (or, at least, one of them), it would be entire understandable if a modern audience were not able to get on board with the film. The performances are highly mannered, the film is shot with the resources of a B-picture of the time, and I don’t think I’d be out of line to say that Johnston McCulley The Curse of Capistrano has the disadvantage of being weighed down both by the restrictions of the pulp process and the fact that the full idea of the character hadn’t yet come together.

So, here’s where I ask: So what?

Is there a bit too much time spent on Don Diego’s (Power) trying to negotiate finding a wife among the Spanish Californian nobility? Sure. Do neither Basil Rathbone nor Power not quite convincingly shed their respective Basil Rathbone-ness and Tyrone Power-ness to play a members of that Spanish noble class? Also, yes, but if you’re going to get bent out of shape at every actor—especially the British—miscast as some other nationality, you’re going to have a real bad time when Anthony Hopkins comes on the scene, and you’re going to have an absolute hell of a time any time Sean Connery shows up in a movie*. All of that may be true, but if you can’t have a good time here, it’s entirely possible movies may not be for you, even if the original 1920 version, and the subsequent Banderas film (again, not both of them) might do the Fox more justice than is seen here.

* Thought I remembered this, and sure enough, after looking it up, Connery was on the short list for Don Diego in The Mask of Zorro. Could have called that one…

The Fabelmans (2022)

Director: Steven Spielberg

Cast: Michelle Williams, Paul Dano, Seth Rogen, Gabriel LaBelle

Have I Seen it Before: Nope.

Did I Like It: I’ve been noticing a weird blowback against this movie since its release, and it’s worth a little bit of analysis before I get into my own feelings on it. Some of it is the natural knee jerk reaction—with a twist of schadenfreude—to a film from the once (and future?) king of the box office landing with a dull thud on its opening weekend. Then again, any media release is going to attract bad faith conservative grumblings, so it’s entirely possible that we’ll never again see a film which avoids the aforementioned blowback.

But do you want to hear why I think the movie rubs some people the wrong way? One might argue that the film’s story is far too episodic for a major American release. One might even argue that there is a degree of solipsism in Spielberg’s attempt to make himself the unassailable hero of one of his films. I don’t think any of that is the issue. I really think the issue is that nearly every cinephile labors—to varying levels of intensity—that given the right circumstances, they could have been Spielberg. That his ascendency to the highest order of popular culture was a product of circumstance or luck. The thing is, if this film has any degree of a sober view of who Sammy Fabelman (LaBelle)/Spielberg is, not one of has the ability to see through problems of filmmaking with such ingenious solutions. Not one of us loves movies so much that the only thing that will bring us comfort during times of extreme emotional strife is the clicking of an 8mm camera. Not one of us had any hope of becoming Spielberg.

Oddly enough, I find that comforting. I’ll do you one better: I have half a mind to go see the film again. Maybe we all should. I’m real worried about this Spielberg kid. If we don’t come out for his movies now, I’m not sure what will happen.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)

Director: Ryan Coogler

Cast: Letitia Wright, Lupita Nyong’o, Danai Guria, Danai Guria, Angela Bassett

Have I Seen it Before: Nope. Feel weirdly guilty coming to it so late, but holiday movies are a weird feast or famine schedule for me.

Did I Like It: It’s astonishingly difficult to make a good movie.

Things don’t get any easier when you’re trying to make a movie in the studio system, to say nothing of the largest and still growing studio conglomerate on earth.

It’s even more bordering on the improbable that someone can make a good movie out of a sequel (to say nothing of the thirtieth entry in a larger franchise).

Can a person possibly make a good movie when all of those things are swirling around him, and the star of his franchise died?

Apparently Ryan Coogler can*. Filled with all-time great performance on top of all-time great performance, and held together with a plot which actually holds up under it’s run time (for the most part; I’ll get to that in a minute), and enough spectacle to make me somehow less interested in what Avatar: The Way of Water has to offer (and completely disinterested in anything Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, should that film ever see the light of day). I’m almost tempted to give the film a pass on my usual criticism of most films, in that every film needs more Lupita Nyong’o*. The amount of Nakia we do get in the film is still time well spent.

Is the film too long? Almost certainly, and that is the only problem I have with the whole thing. Honestly, find a different way to introduce a few (hardly load-bearing) pieces of exposition, and Martin Freeman lifts right out of the movie. Right along with him you can remove Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and for that matter (and it pains me to say so) Richard Schiff. All of those scenes seem unenthusiastically interested in setting up more of the Dark Avengers stuff that was started in Disney+’s series, Falcon and the Winter Soldier. I know, I know… A Marvel movie is weighed down by the strange need to set up other films. I was surprised, too.

*Sorry, J.J. Abrams. I’m sure you have many other fine qualities.

**Except Us (2019). That one has precisely the correct amount of Nyong’o. Just barely…

Clerks III (2022)

Director: Kevin Smith

Cast: Brian O’Halloran, Jeff Anderson, Jason Mewes, Trevor Fehrman

Have I Seen it Before: Well…

Did I Like It: I remember after taking in Zack and Miri Make a Porno (2008) lamenting a bit that the occasionally promised evolution of Smith as a filmmaker was at best delayed—in favor of what felt like a thematic regression—and might never come to pass. Years later, as I took in Jay and Silent Bob Reboot (2019) I was mildly charmed by the prospect of a reunion with old friends who were, by all appearances, content in if not insistent on staying exactly as they were in those fabled good old days.

And here, with a (final?) return to the Quick Stop I’m stuck somewhere in the middle. If anything, this felt far more like what one might have expected from Clerks II (2006), in as much as it actually takes place in the aforementioned Quick Stop. But then again, I’m willing to die on the hill that the second movie is far funnier than what we’re treated to here. Although, I will admit one’s reactions to the films of Kevin Smith are different at 22 than they will be at 38*. Not for nothing, but the realization made nearly thirty years ago that a little convenience store in Jersey doesn’t photograph all that great in color still holds up. Hence, the second movie spending as little time there as possible.

But there’s something beyond these little quibbles that is not quite right about this movie, and it’s taken me a few days to put my finger on it.

It has absolutely no idea what it wants to say about death. Or, in the alternative, it knows what it wants to say about death, but can’t hold that thought for long without directly contradicting it. Dante (O’Halloran) and Randal (Anderson) facing their mortality is a fine enough (albeit not inherently comedic) premise, but the idea that life is for the living only works for precisely one half of our heroes. Randall makes his movie (which, since it isn’t 1994 couldn’t possibly exist in a market absolutely engorged on independent film, but whatever) and finds purpose where he resolutely avoided it in the past. Dante, on the other hand spends the entire movie trying and failing to move beyond his grief, before he just dies anyway? I suppose he just wasn’t supposed to be here (Earth) today, but Dante’s arc—such as it is—is absolutely inert by the time the movie is over.

Oh, and the movie wasn’t especially funny. There, I can be a near-forty grump again.

* In a row? See, I can still get in the spirit of things…

The Queen (2006)

Director: Stephen Frears

Cast: Helen Mirren, Michael Sheen, James Cromwell, Helen McCrory

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, yes. And yet, why revisit it now? I’ve slipped hard into a period of Anglophilia recently, and as long as Netflix stays stingy with seasons of The Crown, I have to find my fix elsewhere. Thankfully, there are any number of movies that can fill the gaps between seasons. Spencer (2021) filled in nicely between seasons 4 and 5. This one—also written by Crown primary writer Peter Morgan, picks up almost perfectly from the end of the recently released season 5. I suppose it’s only a matter of time before I feel the need to take in The King’s Speech (2010) again as some kind of prequel to the whole affair.

Did I Like It:  There’s a delightful, understated quality to this, especially when compared with its episodic spiritual successor. TV imbues the House of Windsor with a bombast that necessitates a Hans Zimmer score, here moments—even, oddly, the moments leading up to Diana’s death—are given a quaint, pointedly British, almost comedic, feel of an independent movie. Mirren and the rest of the cast never so much as flirt with a natural inclination toward impersonation or self-parody. The juxtaposition of real footage with the fictionalized narrative also more easily leads me to suspend my disbelief. Everything about the film which could be controlled is executed at the highest level.

But, as with any historical drama, there’s a few limitations that lead the film not to age as well as one might hope. Moments of the infamous Panorama interview don’t ring true, because I have a devil of a time believing that the Queen (Mirren) ever watched the interview, and the fact that the interview was used at all (given what we know now about how the interview was originally obtained) feels a little gross. Additionally, the ominous dwelling on the fact that Blair’s (Sheen) popularity may not last forever seems a little beside the point, especially in an era where the idea that Blair was ever popular seems a little ridiculous, and the shelf life of a current Prime Ministers are negatively compared to produce.

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (2022)

Director: Tom Gormican

Cast: Nicolas Cage, Pedro Pascal, Sharon Horgan, Ike Barinholtz

Have I Seen it Before: Never! I know, it’s been a busy year.

Did I Like It: There are—generally—three types of Nicolas Cage movies. The first, like Face/Off (1997) and The Rock (1996) are big, blustery action movies. The second, are comprised of a series of roles which were available, and could help the actor pay off some of his mounting bills over the last twenty years. I’m chiefly looking in your direction, Left Behind (2014)*. The third are those films where Cage can let go of the ego that has to be an occupational hazard of being a movie star, and in the process become his most interesting work.

This film manages to be about the second Cage, wrapped in the trappings of the first, and ultimately winds up being a pretty good example of the third type. At first, I thought a slight tilt away from the cartoonish action movie might have helped the whole thing land a little bit more effectively, but if that had been the order of the day, all we would have gotten for our trouble was a—rather pointed—rehash of Adaptation (2002)**. Who needed that?

And there’s another layer here that Cage had yet to explore in any of his other work. In letting his ego go specifically when it pertains to himself. It may not be my favorite film of the year (or even my favorite film to have Cage get enveloped in a meta narrative), but as long as his Left Behind days are over, I think we can all breathe a sigh of relief.

*A film I’m mortified to admit that morbid curiosity forced me to watch at one point (thankfully before I started writing these reviews), and even more horrified to learn that Kevin Sorbo is currently hard at work directing and starring in a sequel.

**I was not prepared for that film to be twenty years old. Am I old now?

Malignant (2021)

Director: James Wan

Cast: Annabelle Wallis, Maddie Hasson, George Young, Michole Briana White

Have I Seen it Before: Many reading this will not be privy to the specifics of this answer, but: controversially, no.

Did I Like It: Certainly, if mega-bloody horror in the tradition of Dario Argento and giallo horror is not your thing, then Malignant is not going to be your thing.

If slasher movies whose plots are fueled by a far more pedestrian brand of human suffering (I’m looking in your direction, Rob Zombie) aren’t your thing*, then this movie might not be for you.

If you’re bothered by a film so gleefully willing to exist in a universe that treats medical science like its nothing more or less than a doormat, then maybe large swaths—perhaps even the underlying foundation—of the film will not work for you.

But it is impossible to say that the film is at all coy, ashamed, or otherwise uncertain about what kind of film it wants to be. Well, impossible if you’re interested in engaging with a movie from an even remotely genuine place. I’m sure there are no places in the internet harboring anyone with a bad faith take on the proceedings.

And God help me, by the time the film was done, I was actually wrapped up in the psychological drama encased in a body horror ensconced in a highly improbable martial arts action movie. It wastes no time getting started, never feels long (even in those sections for which I’m not 100% on board), and as an added bonus I get the sense from the end of the film that the film will naturally resist sequels, especially if star Annabelle Wallis isn’t along for the ride. It might be damning with faint praise, but the entire things is just fresh enough to recommend.

*I’m mainly looking in my own direction there, but we are grading on a curve here.