El Conde
Not recommended.
This movie and Cocaine Bear are the worst 2023 releases I’ve seen. Careful, this one is on Netflix and even has a decent RT score. I thought it was boring, unoriginal, and lame. Don’t waste your two hours on this one.
Gran Torino (2008). Stars Clint Eastwood as a cranky old bigot (this movie may have introduced “get off my lawn!” into pop culture 
). The movie is 15 years old and Eastwood already looks really old in it. He also directed and produced.
This is a movie that takes patience. One could argue that a great deal of it is really just establishing character relationships, but once it heats up it’s dramatic and poignant. RT calls it a relatively “minor” entry in Eastwood’s considerable body of work while also giving it high ratings, and I definitely concur with the critical praise. With a thoughtful script and excellent production, this is a film that shouldn’t be overlooked.
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967) Nice liberal white couple deal with the engagement of their daughter to a black man. Spencer Tracy, Katherine Hepburn (their last pairing), Sydney Poitier.
I was wondering how well the film has aged since the core dilemma was cutting edge social drama in 1967 but is something that no longer raises an eyebrow. It still works as a (light) family drama and exercise in problem resolution, the performances are mostly excellent, and the moral of Love Conquers All is timeless. The film ends with Tracy giving a long and moving speech explaining his position…all the more moving when you consider it’s the capstone on his career. He died soon after filming (you wouldn’t know by looking at him) and received a posthumous Oscar nomination.
I do have a few notes…
They bend over backward to make it palatable to white audiences: everyone is so polite and well-dressed, addressing each other as “Mrs Drayton” and “Mr Prentiss” and always in a suit and a tie. (Sydney’s parents – he’s a retired mailman – get off a plane wearing a suit and tie, pearls and gloves. I was alive in 1967 and yes, people did dress up a bit to travel but geez, c’mon.) And Sydney is the Second Coming of Jesus Christ Himself, and any parent in any age would be delighted to marry off their daughter to him.
It’s a bit jarring to hear “negro” and “colored” in the dialog. The depiction of 1960’s youth culture is cringe-worthy but mercifully brief. Cecil Kellaway plays a family friend Catholic priest, with an Irish accent. Of course. (Note: not all Catholic priests are Irish.)
The daughter is played by Katherine Houghton who’s famous for 2 things: this role, and being Katharine Hepburn’s niece. Her character is a complete cipher. She is 100% assured that she’s doing the right thing and life will be sunshine and lollipops, and never wavers one iota from that position.
The Toxic Avenger
Barely recommended.
A cute movie made on a thin budget, but honestly not all that interesting or great. They have a 2023 remake coming out, but this original has almost no appeal aside from the fact that it was Troma pictures first mild hit.
I guess it was violent for the time, but the whole movie is quite tame by 2023 standards.
Shot very flat and with no interesting cinematography. Could have been shot for television.
Dial “M” for Murder (1954). A fine rip-roarin’ murder mystery of the kind that only Hitchcock could do. Just oozes early-50s nostalgia in every way – movie-making style, decor, clothing … everything, complete with an intermission screen at about the 55-minute mark so you can go to the lobby and get popcorn! I’m definitely going to be delving into more Hitchcock in the coming weeks. Smug and ruthless husband tries to have his wife murdered, but things go wrong and a mild-mannered police inspector tries to unravel the case.
Cocaine Bear. A zombie movie, or maybe an Asylum movie, masquerading as a mainstream insane bear movie. I laughed about a half a dozen times, and enjoyed seeing all those actors. 5/10.
This and El Conde are on my “worst of 2023” list.
The Rapture, 1991. Mimi Rodgers, David Duchovny, and a host of 90s-era “that guy’s” star in a film which is either emotionally draining (my take) or complete horse-hockey (other’s takes).
Ebert gave it 4 stars:
Love that movie. Had to buy the DVD.
The animated (2019) version of, “The Addams Family,” was spot on. Same macabre humor as (most of) the predecessors – maybe taken up a notch. Voice work = excellent, particularly Chloë Grace Moretz as Wednesday (Christina Ricci is some tough shoes to fill.). My only gripe is the end credits music and, of course, I can mute that.
I always thought I’d seen this one, but I saw it for the first time about six months ago. Good movie! Not as precious as some Hitchcocks can be. Moves quickly and builds the suspense smoothly. Bob Cummings had almost nothing to do though.
I’m still lusting after Grace Kelly’s handbag.
“Filmed in 3-D, which explains the prevalence of low-angle shots with lamps and other objects between the audience and the cast members. There was only a brief original release in 3-D, followed by a conventional, “flat” release. The New York Times review mentioned it opened with the “flat” release at the Paramount Theater in New York City. The 3-D version was re-issued in 1980.” - Dial M for Murder (1954) - Trivia - IMDb
I got to see Dial “M” for Murder in 3D at the Castro Theatre in San Francisco back in the last century. Big Wurlitzer organ coming up for the orchestra pit and everything. It was pretty cool. I remember the experience more than the movie, but I do remember all those lines of bottles and things in the foreground to make it 3D.
It surprised me that HItchcock would have any interest in a gimmick like 3D, but according to the trivia notes, it was the Warner Bros studio that insisted on it. Hitchcock himself thought it would end up being released in a conventional format and undoubtedly would have preferred that. As it turned out, he was mostly right.
Incidentally, I guess technically this isn’t a murder “mystery” as there is no mystery about what happened or why. The tension and intrigue and plot twists are all about the subsequent police investigation, considerably enhanced by the fact that there’s every indication that the bad guy is going to get away with it. His ultimate undoing is a fine moment of cinematic suspense.
The first movie I ever saw in 3D (and actually I think still the only one) was Gravity, which was a great experience because modern 3D is fantastic and the content was perfectly suited for it. It was also one of those new “Ultra AVX” theaters with a super-big screen. It absolutely looked like various space objects were coming right out of the screen into the theater.
The last movie I saw in 3D, and in IMAX, was the first Avatar movie. I admit, it was pretty friggin’ cool, visually, but when I ended up seeing the movie on the TeeVee later, I didn’t like it as much.
It’s like COLUMBO: instead of a whodunit, it’s a howcatchem!
I’ve been on an old kungfu kick recently and I don’t know why. Last night was “Come Drink With Me,” a classic starring 19-year-old Cheng Pei-pei. Allegedly the first female action star, she does an excellent job with the fights. Pretty fun!
The Skin I Live In (2011), Antonio Banderas, directed by Pedro Almodóvar. A weird, disjointed, creepy film about a doctor who seeks (a) revenge for his daughter’s rape (a scene I fast-forwarded through) and (b) his wife’s death. There are actually two rapes in this film (yes, I ff’ed through both) and I’m not too sure I recommend it…
In Spanish, so close-captioning is likely needed.
Toxic Avenger 2 - worse than the first movie, not recommended.
Toxic Avenger 3 - worse than the first movie, not recommended.
Toxic Avenger 4 - This was unforgettable, but bizarre and almost mean spirited at times. I will admit this movie made an impact, but I would never watch it again. The only real sequel to Toxic Avenger(the movie apologizes for the first two) and a very disgusting and at times, mean-spirited movie. Lloyd Kaufman has some real issues.