Judas and the Black Messiah (Shaka King, 2021): 2/5

LaKeith, Kaluuya and Plemons (channeling Phillip Hoffman) are really good in a cracking real-life story. Yet the screenwriters still don’t seem to know how to raise the stakes or the tension. Serpico or Prince in the City are obvious touchstones, but Shaka King is no Lumet, obviously. The movie fails to summon the necessary gravitas and authenticity, and just comes off as high schoolers wearing cool berets. 

The Cars That Ate Paris (Peter Weir, 1974): 2/5

It is a first feature, but even so, this offers a surprisingly amateurish and boorish mix of tones, mostly dumb. Obviously blew the mind of a pre-adolescent George Miller. Have now watched all 13 of Weir’s features.

I Care a Lot (J. Blakeson, 2021): 1/5

Our protagonist spends the first 30 minutes joyfully robbing 100s of humans of their will, imprisoning and drugging them. So I really couldn’t ever get over the fact that she is a horrible, horrible monster—basically worse than a mass murderer. And I resented being made to supposedly root for someone I hated and whom I wanted to die. If she was stealing or dealing drugs or something, ok. But this? I just couldn’t have fun with it. I was hung up! haha

Every Man for Himself (Jean-Luc Godard, 1980): 2/5

A couple of funny bits here, but I honestly don’t know what Godard is up to. It seems to be a broken love story, then suddenly Isabelle Huppert shows up as a prostitute, and now we’re just watching scenes where men order prostitutes to do stuff and everyone is degraded. Godard’s multi-film prostitution obsession is challenging. I guess it lays bare our social games of power and sex? At least for Bunuel, the need is more deep-seated, psychedelic and unknowable.

Cronenberg Film Fest

Have now watched all 21 features.

Fast Company (David Cronenberg, 1979): 2/5

Cronenberg makes an unsuccessful play for normal professionalism. I think this story about stock car racers was supposed to be a bro-ish hang-out movie (like Hooper, the year before), but the film lacks humor, the characters lack charisma, and the movie never achieves the necessary level of ease and relaxation. 

Videodrome, rw (David Cronenberg, 1983): 4.5/5

One of the rare movies that I can remember possibly even my dad turning off to shield my brother and I from the heinous quality of the images and ideas herein. He was right. This is a disgusting, greasy, nihilistic, perverted, sweaty, nonsensical mess of a masterpiece. A real vomit that surely should have seen Cronenberg locked up 

M. Butterfly (David Cronenberg, 1993): 2/5

Cronenberg’s Age of Innocence. A parlor drama that begins with sadomasochistic power trips during which the protagonist realizes himself to be powerless. Finally, it yada yada yadas over some pretty crucial action. Like he lives with the John Lone character for two years and never discovers he is a man. Worst lover of the century or of all time? Actually, in the end, I find this movie a bit racist and definitely anti-trans, anti-gay and anti-penis. So there’s that. 

Map to the stars (David Cronenberg, 2014): 2/5

An overly broad Hollywood satire full of dumb, rigid, miserable, narcissistic people. I fully stan Cronenberg’s body horror stuff, but I confess that I really don’t dig Crash and Naked Lunch that much and this is in the same airless and lugubrious style—but a comedy! The great Julianne Moore sits on the toilet and then wipes her ass. The characters have no psychological depth but, robots that they are, they do manage to do a lot of crazy and subversive shit before it’s all said and done 

Cronenberg shorts: Transfer (1966), Camera (2000), The Nest (2013): 2.5/5

This 6-minute short is not as good as The Fly or Dead Ringers!!!! Actually, The Nest (about a woman who believes there is a nest of wasps in her breast) is worth watching on YouTube.

Billy Wilder Film Fest

Life is a series of ironic and bitter lies, rip-offs and self-deceptions. Now watched half of his 26 features, and I have my doubts as to whether I will ever watch any more.

Ace in the Hole, rw (Billy Wilder, 1951): 5/5

“For all I know there’s not even a Leo down there.” One guy stuck down a hole, and every last person in the community profits. It’s a movie version of The Lottery, where one figure must suffer and die to keep the rest safe, Kirk Douglas serving as Pontius Pilate. Upon reflection, this guy embodies everything I was taught when earning an MBA at USC: growing economies profit everyone. 

Witness for the Prosecution (Billy Wilder, 1957): 2.5/5

“He’s chipper isn’t he? An hour ago he had one foot on the gallows and the other on a banana peel.” Courtroom dramas are not at all my bag, and this is no exception, and this was adapted from a play (by Agatha Christie) with all of the static nature that implies. Laughton is terrific of course, and the movie is about as peppy and efficient as can be. Features a warning at the end asking viewers to not reveal the shocking ending of the movie, which does present as quite a series of twists, although dramatically it’s a bit late. 

One, Two, Three (Billy Wilder, 1961): 2/5

“’I spit on your money. I spit on Fort Knox. I spit on Wall Street.’ ‘Unsanitary little jerk, isn’t he?’” Fast-moving screwball satire where everyone yells and is wound so tight it’s tiresome. A joke about taking Benzedrine gives us some insight into what is driving this bus. Many lines that are clearly clever, if not funny. Still, comedy is subjective. I don’t like Some Like it Hot, either. I would say it boldly satirizes boorish American culture, but in truth everyone is boorish and stupid here regardless of party affiliation. 

Kiss me, Stupid (Billy Wilder, 1964): 3/5

“I have an amazing mother. She is 85 years old and she don't need no glasses. [pauses] She drinks right out of the bottle.” Nervous Songwriter Ray Winston hires prostitute Kim Novak to pretend to be his wife and entertain singer Dean Martin for the evening so Ray can pitch Dino his songs. Much prolonged ogling of Novak’s butt ensues. One can almost see Three’s Company being invented (a compliment), yet surprisingly the final act pivots to more frank sexual politics and adult emotions. 

Avanti! (Billy Wilder, 1972): 3.5/5

“A coroner, he eats very well. He knows all the widows.” A broad, Local Hero-ish tale of a city slicker seduced by an Italian island. But it can never really settle down its satiric tendency, and the main character is quite a hung-up asshole for more than two hours, ensuring cinema’s most misanthropic rom-com. 

Preston Sturges Film Fest

These Sturges movies remind me of the Saturday Afternoon movies I watched over and over on Channel 5 as a kid. The Abbott and Costello movies, the Road pictures, Danny Kaye. Despite the WW2 jokes they always had a gag-a-minute sensibility and rich secondary character universe that just felt entertaining. Here there’s a cartoony sense of bigness, eyebrow waggling, and pratfalling exaggeration, fading into a smart alec-y Coen-ish condescension. William Demarest is in all of these films and makes each better. Anyone out there seen The Great Moment (1944), The Sin of Harold Diddlebock (1947), The Beautiful Blonde from Bashful Bend (1949), or The Diary of Major Thompson/The French, They are a Funny Race (1955)?

The Great McGinty (Preston Sturges, 1940): 4/5

An urtext for ironic rags-to-riches stories like Lancomb Lucien and The Godfather, with the goofy humor and insouciance of Goodfellows and Miller’s Crossing. Prefigures the political careers of George Bush, Bill & Hillary Clinton and Trump. Brian Donlevy in a wide and expressive selection of mustaches.

Christmas in July (Preston Sturges, 1940): 4/5

A cross between Hudsucker Proxy’s go getter-Ism and It’s a Wonderful Life collectivism. Expert character actors. Dick Powell looks like he’s about to break out in song. 67 minutes. 

The Lady Eve, rw (Preston Sturges, 1941): 4.5/5

This may well be the best movie Surges made, but I would argue it’s not the best “Sturges movie.” Fonda and Stanwyck bring a lot of their own personas to these characters, creating a different feel from the ensemble nature of his typical work. Tonally, this seems more like a classic Hollywood star-driven vehicle, and the pace of dialogue is more traditional. As with Morgan Creek, though, everything in the plot happens a little earlier than you expect it to, saving us from having to wait for the next beat to play slowly out. Which makes it possible for Sturges to play out a fun and brilliant formal trick of final act, where the first half is permitted/compelled by both parties to be replayed, Vertigo-style. 

Sullivan’s Travels, rw (Preston Sturges, 1941): 4/5

Folks do love their movies about movies, and it’s easy to see this (surely incorrectly) as Stuges' most autobiographical work. The great opening scene ((“Ants in your Plants of 1939” “….but with a little sex in it”) is an unbroken 4-minute scene with 5 minutes of dialogue stuffed in it. Ironically this movie about the value of comedy contains no virtually no levity for most of its final half hour. 

The Palm Beach Story (Preston Sturges, 1942): 3/5

A comedy of remarriage. Joel McCray, a dreamer and idealist, can’t afford his Park Avenue life and wife. Wife Claudette Colbert leaves for Palm Beach and hooks up with a befuddled billionaire, a pretty thin supposed husband alternative/foil. Rich eccentrics shoot up a train car with shotguns.

The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek, rw (Preston Sturges, 1943): 4/5

Astounding, 2-3 minute unbroken shots, often tracking Eddie Bracken and Betty Hutton as they are walking and talking, give a great spontaneity and feeling of live performance. Tells enough story for three movies. In a fun bit of continuity, The Great McGinty himself and his sleazy boss/sidekick show up. 

Hail the conquering hero, rw (Preston Sturges, 1944): 3/5

Nervous young man is afraid to return home because he was discharged from the Marines for hay fever. He runs into a bunch of Marines in a bar, and they force him back home and tell everyone of his heroism. Much anxious cover-up and spin control ensues. One of the longest, most frenetic and linear of all of Sturges’ work. Great to see all the usual faces, but this is a bit of an anxiety dream.