The Electric Horseman (Sydney Pollack, 1979): 2/5

A confrontation between Redford’s scruffy and soulful 70s and Fonda’s buttoned-up and self-satisfied 80s. Radically, the 80s win.

The Squid and the Whale, rw (Noah Baumbach, 2005): 4.5/5

My father wasn’t an intellectual, but he certainly was a narcissist. I recognized a lot here and laughed more than a couple of times.

The Meyerowitz Stories (Noah Baumbach, 2017): 4/5

My father wasn’t an artist, but he certainly was a narcissist. I recognized a lot here and laughed more than a couple of times.

Sinister (Scott Derrickson, 2012): 3/5

Delivers some Halloween-appropriate chills before its overblown last act.

Nocturama (Bertrand Bonello, 2016): 2/5

A beautiful and boring critique of late capitalism.

Raw (Julia Ducournau, 2016): 2/5

A beautiful and boring critique of late adolescence.

Le Cercle Rouge, rw (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1970): 4/5

Tarantino naming his production company after Godard is certainly an obfuscation of the fact that the French movies he really borrows from the most are Melville’s elaborate, tri-focused gangster movies: this one, plus Le Deuxieme Souffle and Army of Shadows (freedom fighters acting like gangsters). Granted, they are likely both indebted to The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

Brawl in Cell Block 99 (S. Craig Zahler, 2017): 3/5

Never over-reaches its authentic B-movie ambitions. As such I give it the compliment of rating it a B.

Stranger Things, Season 2 (The Duffer brothers, 2017): 2/5

More action and fewer character moments and Spielberg quotes.

Atomic Blonde (David Leitch, 2017): 2.5/5

I certainly enjoyed watching Theron knee people in the face and get kneed in the face by people (who wouldn’t), but the one thing her character can’t defeat is the absurdly complicated plotting.

This is Us, Season 1 (Dan Fogelman, 2016): 4.5/5

Expert middlebrow.