Companion (Drew Hancock, 2025): 4/5

I really enjoyed the twists of this story, which ends up being pretty thought-provoking (and I think realistic) regarding the future of technology. This review is necessarily and blessedly spoiler free, unlike the preview, the poster, and half of the reviews on Letterboxd. 

 

Presence (Steven Soderbergh, 2025): 4/5

The camera is the POV of a haunted presence in a house. Dramatically this means there is always an additional “person” in any scene and formally it means that all scenes tend to be one-shots, more of a high-wire act while also being more like live theater. What’s more, the POV presence starts to feel like the representation of the audience itself—a creepy voyeur listening in on the weakness, doubt and crime within the family. A pretty satisfying little mystery, and at 1h24m a perfect little novella of a film. 

 

A Complete Unknown (James Mangold, 2024): 4/5

One of my favorite genres is “young person succeeding in fulfilling their musical dreams.” See my outsized love for Coda, Sing Street, School of Rock, and the four or five seasons of American Idol I watched. It just gets me, what can I say? This movie is that same story except the hopeful young kid is writing and singing some of the greatest songs ever written. I’m not proud of it, but tears of joy abounded.

 

The Apprentice (Ali Abbasi, 2024): 4/5

Sebastian Stan nails it—perfect lip- and hand-work. I forgot almost immediately that the main character was who we think of as Donald Trump, and just thought of him as a schlubby, awkward dude. Hard worker. Doesn’t drink. No moral center. Filmmakers do a good job of balancing the well-intentioned behavior with the bad, but his whole syndrome is here.

 

Nickel Boys (RaMell Ross, 2024): 3/5

Filmmaking of the highest order, but the focus on human suffering makes it hard to appreciate, much less enjoy or take pleasure in. At 2h20m, it’s a whole lot to put yourself through.  

 

Here (Robert Zemeckis, 2024): 3/5

Can a movie be middlebrow and cosmic at the same time? Eternity in a cup of weak tea. 

 

Goodrich (Hallie Meyers-Shyer, 2024): 3/5

Well-worn ground, but well-appointed and buoyed by good acting and a script that moves right along—just like all of (her mother) Nancy Meyers’ movies. Since it’s about a father whose career is stalled and is forced to be a better father to his kids (a situation that bears some superficial similarities to mine), I could have been unnerved or insulted, but instead I was lightly entertained.

 

Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point (Tyler Taormina, 2024): 3/5

Like all of Taormina’s hyper-specific movies, this is about the “feel” of a party. The feeling as it rises in intensity and emotion, and then the feeling as it wrapping up and people start to break off into their own parties until it’s the story to a whole scene or community. Like La Dolce Vita or Dazed and Confused, but much worse. 

 

Hard Truths (Mike Leigh, 2024): 2/5

A tough hang with a deeply unhappy, aggressive, and unpleasant character. I kept praying for it to turn, but damn if it’s not a film about NOT being able to turn. Never never never being able to turn. 

 

Wicked (Jon M. Chu, 2024): 2/5

Some fun musical sequences, namely What is This Feeling (Loathing) and Popular, but mostly candy-coated crap. Having recently seen the play at the Pantages, I can say there is no reason whatsoever for the second half to exist, dramatically or in terms of songcraft, so it will be interesting to see how this all plays out.

 

The Little Girl Who Sold the Sun, 42m (Djibril Diop Mambéty, 1999): 3/5

A plucky young girl in Dakar, Senegal—whose legs are horrendously wasted by polio (timely!)—sells newspapers. In most hands, this story would be tragic, but instead there’s a lot of life and community here. 

 

Hyenas (Djibril Diop Mambéty, 1992): 3/5

A woman who was exiled from a small village for having sex with a man returns as a rich older woman to take vengeance against the man, buying the whole village (literally) and all the people within (with fans, refrigerators, and fireworks). A parable of the evils of outside money on Africa (probably). Shot in Mambéty’s own home town. 

 

Smash Palace (Roger Donaldson, 1981): 3/5

Character disintegration, New Zealand edition. Man loses his wife, his daughter, and his mind, in that order. 

 

The In Laws (Arthur Hiller, 1979): 3.5/5

If you like Alan Arkin’s and Peter Falk’s schtick as much as I do, most of this is a delight. Lots of Bugs-Bunny-like undercutting of the “crime drama, shootouts and car chases” they are carried through.

 

La Ronde (Max Ophüls, 1950): 2.5/5

An elegant conceit, but its lofty point of view defies emotional engagement, making the whole thing a bit trying. Very frank about sex for 1950—these lovers ain’t just kissing. 

 

Queen of Earth (Alex Ross Perry, 2015): 3/5

From his entertaining and knowledgeable podcast appearances, I know Perry loves horror movies, and he has made one here in the Bergman/Polanski mode. Lots of direct confrontation, creeping dread, paranoid delusions, and Identity dissolution. Well-made, emotionally intense, mastery of music and sound, hard to watch. 

 

The Color Wheel (Alex Ross Perry, 2011): 3.5/5

Funny and mean comedy about a brother and sister on a road trip, full of humiliation and self-revelation. Entertaining. 

 

Herschel Gordon Lewis: Godfather of Gore, 17m (Sean Baker, 2019): 3/5

A brief interview with the director. Mostly interesting to note how much Baker likes the guy.

 

Blood Feast (Herschell Gordon Lewis, 1963): 3/5

Of historic value, introducing a new kind of exploitation. Scrappy, campy, and basically harmless. One of John Waters’ favorites. 

 

Place Beyond the Pines (Derek Cianfrance, 2012): 3/5

Love the cross-generational storytelling and three-part, three-drama structure. Very 19^th-century novel, and I’m here for it. Unfortunately, it doesn’t get around to relating the different stories to one another in an emotionally coherent way—like maybe saying something/anything about the relationship among generations?

 

Limitless, rw (Neil Burger, 2011): 3/5

A dumb but easy-to-enjoy thriller. It’s the ultimate fantasy to just be really, really smart suddenly and understand how everything works, gaining money and power along the way (or am I revealing too much). 

 

 

Robert Aldrich Film Fest

A varied career.

 

Attack (Robert Aldrich, 1956): 3/5

Cowardly officer Eddie Arnold sends hatchet-faced company Captain Jack Palance and his men to capture a small town, which turns out to be packed with Germans. Some good action, but the dialogue and melodrama are overwritten and over-emoted. Palance makes a three-course meal of every syllable. 

 

The Flight of the Phoenix (Robert Aldrich, 1965): 3.5/5

A plane filled with some of the great character actors of the 60s crashes in the Sahara, setting up a sort of 12 Thirsty Men chamber piece. James Stewart, Richard Attenborough, Peter Finch, Ernest Borgnine, and George Kennedy are all a pleasure to watch—although at 2h22m, it’s third act feels unnecessarily drawn out. 

 

Emperor of the North (Robert Aldrich, 1973): 2.5/5

A lightly comic and very shaggy action/adventure with a bizarre premise: Lee Marvin is the world-champion hobo on a Quixotic quest to ride a train lorded over by vicious guard Ernest Borgnine. A couple of good action scenes and even more head-scratching ones.

 

…All the Marbles (Robert Aldrich, 1981): 3/5

Aldrich’s final film, and proof that 1981 is, in many ways, still the 1970s. Expert naturalistic acting from Peter Falk, Burt Young, and the Godfather’s Luca Brasi himself, just hanging out realistically in the cheap motels of lowest levels of show biz, traveling around the cold and industrial Northeast. The choice of obviously fake-ass women’s wrestling as the milieu is inexplicable but doesn’t ruin the movie.  

 

 

John Waters Film Fest

No new Waters films in the last 20 years, but IMDB says he’s in pre-production on movie called Liarmouth, to star Aubrey Plaza. Shrug emoji.

 

Desperate Living (John Waters, 1977): 3.5/5

Funny and disgusting behavior abounds. Does someone cut his own penis off with scissors? Is there rat-eating, cockroach eating, and cannibalism? Bien sur. 

 

Polyester (John Waters, 1981): 3.5/5

Waters begins his series of perverse and filthy parodies of film genres he grew up loving—here family melodramas of the ‘60s starring people like, well, Tab Hunter. Waters has a relatively large budget here, and spends most of it on garish home furnishings. Divine is (still) great as the long-suffering housewife.  

 

Cry Baby (John Waters, 1990): 3/5

Broad and mildly amusing celebration of greaser and square culture as well as juvenile delinquent films. Lots of lovingly presented costumes, songs, and other cultural artifacts from the era. 

 

Serial Mom (John Waters, 1994): 2/5

Barely amusing, the stuff I had seen from this movie turned me off Waters for the rest of his career (a mistake). Tries and fails to coast on the frisson of seeing a normal, middle-aged woman hit people with her car, etc. But our main character is so judgmental (usually anathema in a Waters film) that she kills people for offenses like wearing white after Labor Day. Ha? The last third swerves into a satire of criminals-as-celebrity culture. 

 

Pecker (John Waters, 1998): 3.5/5

Waters’ breeziest, most sincere, least ironic movie (since Female Trouble?), and the movie where the characters seem most happy and self-actualized. My favorite bit is when (THE) Cindy Sherman offers a five-year-old girl downers. 

 

Cecil B. Demented (John Waters, 2000): 2.5/5

Basically, it’s just one joke—reviling mainstream cinema. The most interesting bit is where each person in the filmmaking group reveals tattoos of their favorite filmmakers, including Otto Preminger, Sam Peckinpah, Sam Fuller, Kenneth Anger, Andy Warhol, David Lynch, Fassbinder, Almodovar, Spike Lee, Herschel Gordon Lewis, and William Castle—all provocateurs with questionable taste.

 

A Dirty Shame (John Waters, 2004) 3.5/5

A real return to filthy form. Waters’ horniest movie—an exaggerated “nudie.” Sex-positive, pervert-positive, kink-positive, and head-injury-positive. Waters gives all the best lines to the anti-sex brigade: “He has no right to be so hard!” “My daughter’s a good girl. She hates sex!” “Tolerance went too far, and we all know it! No more tolerance!”