Finally saw Civil War and thought it was really good. I mean, it’s no Hundreds of Beavers, but still one of the best films of the year.
Just saw Ponyo, the most recent theater screening in Studio Ghibli Fest 2024. It reinforced my general impression that Studio Ghibli animations are all (a) more or less baffling on some level and (b) visually entrancing. Looking forward to the rest of this year’s screenings.
Does any fellow non-Japanese speaker have an opinion on the subtitled vs. dubbed options for these films? I generally prefer to watch non-English-language films with subtitles rather than dubbing, but I have gone with dubbed so far for Studio Ghibli Fest 2024, given that:
- I have zero understanding of Japanese
- I’m so unfamiliar with Japanese that even nonverbal aspects of Japanese speech, like how different vocal tones indicate different kinds of emotion, tend to be lost on me
- The visual mismatch between characters’ facial movements and dubbed speech isn’t as intrusive in animation as in live-action films
Moreover, the voice actors on the English dubs are quite accomplished at expressing the characters’ feelings in ways I wouldn’t necessarily infer just from the script and the visuals. Still, if anybody has advice about reasons to watch the subtitled versions instead, I’ll listen.
Also saw a Summer Encore screening of the Metropolitan Opera Live in HD 2016 Zeffirelli production of Puccini’s Turandot with Nina Stemme in the title role. Good golly. Usually I can ignore plot and character problems in grand opera to concentrate on the production and the music, but that was just strange. Heaven help (mythical) China with that pair of psychopaths ruling it, I say.
Puccini died before completing that opera, and I can’t help feeling that otherwise he would have ended up killing off both Calaf and Turandot at the finale (and richly deserved IMO).
However, that’s not exactly move-specific, is it? Never mind…
Finally watched “The Many Saints of Newark”. What a mess that was. And it took me forever to figure out why it was called that. Moltisanti in Italian means “many saints”. Duh.
I just re-watched Logan’s run, quite a fave of it’s time (1976). However, I now realize that the ending was really bad-Logan's Run (film) - Wikipedia
Once outside, the citizens see the old man, the first human they have met who is older than thirty, proving that they can, indeed, live their lives much longer.
But they cant and wont. There is no food (the “Old man” says all the fish have died, apparently he eats nuts). They have no tools. They have no medicine. They have less than zero survival skills. They are in Washington DC, and it gets cold in the winter, and they are wearing inadequate clothes.
They will have short, nasty, miserable lives. Likely none will live past 30 either.
I haven’t seen that movie since it came out (plus maybe a subsequent TV airing or two), but I lived a short distance from the Fort Worth Water Gardens (where they meet the old man), and always thought it was a strange place to film. But I guess it does look futuristic, if not outright brutalist.
You want to get really depressed about the outcome of the Logan’s Run bio-complex’s destruction, just think of
the babies in the incubators and the fetuses in the artificial wombs.
Oww, never thought of that. Not to mention the feral children down in the “Cathedral” who likely all dies when the city was destroyed.
Ironically, the older I get the more I think Carrousel was a good idea.
Novel (age 21) or movie (age 30, because they wanted better casting choices) 
?
Maybe one year after you start voting Republican.
Predator 2 1990 Danny Glover, Gary Busey
One of my favorite science fiction/action films.
Its always enjoyable to rewatch.
One of the rare sequels that’s as good as the original film.
Life on Netflix. Space opera with Gyllenhaal, Ryan Reynolds, four others and an alien on board. A more modern version of “Alien”, sorta. Not bad.
I liked it when I saw it and have never thought much of it since.
Backstory: We recently watch a two part episode of Dr. Kildare which guest starred Angie Dickinson and Leslie Nielsen. (They had already appeared in the same roles once before.) So we got talking about how Nielsen used to be such a serious actor and that got into Airplane!. Mrs. FtG said she thought that was a really funny movie.
So Airplane! became our movie of the week.
Still holds up in some ways, not so much in others. (Some racist, etc. stuff wouldn’t fly today.)
I was surprised that the “… and stop calling me Shirley.” bit was hardly used. I thought it was more often. Kareem was great for an non-actor. Bridges was limited but great. He and :Nielsen expanded their careers because of this. Stack not so much. I loved the Barbara Billingsley jive bit.
The biggest letdown: The disco dance scene just dragged.
Of course, we got all the references like the beach scene to From Here to Eternity. But you wonder if any youngish folks would get that, or know who Ethel Merman was, or that the man in the cab was Howard Jarvis of CA Prop. 13 infamy.
Still, give it 4 Ottos.
Does anybody else remember Peter Graves and Fury?
Despicable Me 4 (2024). Light fare movie that is not as fun as the other films in the franchise. It has its funny moments but on the whole it was just OK. Nothing major to complain about with nothing major to make it stand out either.
//i\\
Apache Territory 1958. Rory Calhoun
One of his better Westerns. Shot entirely in Red Rock Canyon. No town or farm sets. There’s a interesting character study as the people anticipate an Apache attack.
Most of Rory’s westerns are pretty good.
I also like his camp horror film Motel Hell 1980. I watch it every year around Halloween. I always wondered how they got Rory to play a farmer that uses people in his delicious sausage. 
Hot Tub Time Machine 2
I didn’t even know they’d made a Hot Tub Time Machine 2. (Turns out it came out 9 years ago.)
The wife and I enjoyed the first one so we queued it up. There are a few laughs buried in a stupid and incomprehensible plot. Not surprisingly, it’s nowhere near as good as the original, but not a terrible way to mindlessly waste an hour and a half.
I am watching a movie right now that I haven’t seen since 1976-The Ritz, with Jack Weston, F. Murray Abraham, Treat Williams and Rita Moreno doing the worst (and the funniest) Rita Moreno imitation I have ever seen.
The person who’s always standing and walking!
Florence Foster Jenkins (2016)
Meryl Streep, Hugh Grant, Simon Helberg (“Wolowicz”), with a nice appearance by David Haig whom I’ve not seen in a while.
From the title I wasn’t expecting to like it, but I was sucked right in by the great comedic performances. Not just Streep, who is always great, but by the often-stifled reactions of those around her.
Some amateur reviewers will scorn how Jenkins was treated in the film, and they have valid points. But this is a true story, and from reading the Wikipedia article I’d say the film follows the actual events pretty tightly. In watching, it is easy to disbelieve, but all these things actually happened (with the allowance that the lead characters weren’t actually legally married).
I loved Helberg’s portrayal.
Given its biographical task, I find no fault in the film. And I’m no fan of “cringe”, but this film for me skirts the edge just right.