Yesterday afternoon I watched a documentary on Netflix called “Becoming Led Zeppelin”, which is a mix of interviews with the band members (including a rare audio interview with John Bonham) and historic video and concert footage covering their formative years all the way through the release of Led Zeppelin II. Worth checking out if you are a Zeppelin fan.
You’re correct that Asperger’s (“AS”) is no longer officially used (it’s been merged into the generic ASD - “Autism Spectrum Disorder”) but its original meaning referred to a form of high-functioning autism. There’s nothing “circular” about the definition. Because AS is often associated with obsessive behaviour, when it’s coupled with high intelligence, it can result in a remarkable drive for perfection that motivates hard work with impressive results. The AS kid has no use for “good enough”; it must be perfect. That can be a very useful and productive trait.
The Alta Knights
The only thing that sets this apart from any other Mafia bio-pic is that Robert De Niro plays both leads. He plays Frank Costello the same way he has played gangsters in dozens of other films; smart, calculating, likable. As Vito Genovese, he’s just channeling Joe Pesci. I guess it might be worth seeing if you didn’t already know about the Albert Anastasia hit and the Apalachin Summit, otherwise it’s just a tired retread of stories anybody with an interest in the Mafia has already seen a million times.
You’re being kind (which I genuinely appreciate). This wasn’t very good at all.
Cliff Notes: Ambitious global businessman of dubious integrity has a new grandiose infrastructure project set in a fictionalised version of the 1950’s Middle East. He meets up with an assortment of similarly dubious and colorful characters in an attempt to secure funding for the project. Along the way are repeated assassination attempts including multiple plane crashes, an ongoing story of reconciliation(-ish) with his daughter the nun, some industrial espionage/sabotage, and general weird shit.
At the end we discover who was responsible for the assassination attempts and why(-ish), whether the project gets funding, and how the whole father-daughter thing works out.
Also, the main character either briefly dies a lot or imagines that he does as a result of the aforementioned assassination attempts, so there are various interludes set in the afterlife/hallucinations/dreams. For some reason Willem DaFoe looks like Terry Gilliam in these scenes.
My daughter and I watched this one last night. I liked the first two chapters, but the third one with the WWII era fighter pilots was a little too silly.
Overall, tho I would recommend it.
Agreed the first two segments were the best. Did you get the reference at the very, very end? Like, the last shot of the movie?
I’m definitely a Wes Anderson fan and bought a ticket for the new one for tomorrow afternoon. I remember the SNL parody of his movies, which was spot on. At one point there was a fake quote from a fake New York Times film critic, “You had me at Wes Anderson.”
Yeah, but does that make sense with how PREY ended?
Don’t Look Now (1973)
110 minutes of my life I won’t be getting back. Dull, pretentious; I’ve scrubbed scarier stuff out of my eyes first thing in the morning. Even the much touted sex scene was ho-hum. This is some kind of a classic? 
My memory is “sure”. I don’t see why not. Unfortunate for her, but sure.
Sticking this here for lack of a better place. True?
Vasquez was killed by an Alien, a Terminator, and by the Titanic.
I’m not totally sure about Paxton being killed by that Terminator. And Henriksen’s death is, at best, off screen in Terminator.
Michael Bein has died to all three as well, considering the new Predator movie that just came out.
Technically, Vasquez blew herself (and Gorman) up with a grenade.
I’ve seen it and it definitely one of the most Wes Anderson-ey of the Wes Anderson filmography. Recommended for fans, but not recommended as an entry film for the initiate.
It’s been a while since I dropped some the the recent movies I’ve seen (of course, I’ve seen the latest entries in the Accountant universe, the Marvel universe, MI universe, the Karate Kid universe, and the John Wick universe and they were all that I expected, fun rides that I won’t remember a month later).
Some notables that aren’t blockbusters:
Rust Surprisingly, a competent chase western, with good performances and really well shot. The villains a suitably evil and the good guys a suitably ambiguous, It’s not going to change the fact the the Western is dead, but if you are an aficionado of westerns, it a good watch.
Watch The Skies A Swedish sci-fi. It holds up, mainly because the plot of obsessive alien hunting that pays off spectacularly is populated by phlegmatic Swedes (cops and hunters both). The deadpan humor makes this worth watching.
Jane Austen Wrecked My Life A nice rom-com that has echoes of Austen (besides its setting, which is a fictional British Jane Austen Institute run by distant relatives of Jane) but is not a re-imagining of any of Austen’s work (which has to be among the most re-imagined set of novels ever written). As a fan of Jane Austen, I found it engaging. YMMV
Desert of Namibia Advertised as the tale of a free-spirited Japanese girl dealing with the strictures of society, it has received glowing reviews. It is actually a tale of a young woman dealing with some serious mental problems and entangled with the absolutely worst choice of boyfriend. While it was sometimes hard to watch, I can’t say I regretted it, as the two lead actors turn in engrossing examples of a mismatched couple. Definitely not your typical Japanese romantic drama. Recommended for the performances and as a peek into a different view of Japan.
The Life of Chuck The trailer for this does not do it justice. Superbly acted all around (there a lot of characters), it is an examination of fate, mortality, and the heat death of the universe. Ever imagined that you might be the only “real” being in the universe and when you die, the universe stops existing? Well here is an example of how this might play out. Highly recommended.
Bad Shabbos I haven’t laughed out loud as much in a movie in a long time. A black comedy about a Shabbos (Sabbath) dinner hosted by a Jewish family to meet the soon-to-be in-laws of the Gentile girl (who is converting) engaged to their son. Something goes terribly wrong and, of course, all machinations to cope make it worse. There is a stand out performance by Method Man as the friendly doorman who gets sucked into the antics, but I have to say, all of the performances are dead on and the convoluted attempts mount and mount, culminating in a version of Shabbos dinner that almost no one that has experienced one will recognize. Another highly recommended movie.
Saw The Phoenician Scheme tonight. Went in totally blind. I really liked it. Yes, I am a fan, but this movie seemed among his most coherent to me in terms of storytelling. Although, my husband asked me to explain it to him afterwards, so maybe not universally understood.
We both agreed that if Wes Anderson himself is not autistic, his movies are super autistic. I love that about them. I love how candid his characters are with one another, the way he makes subtext explicit, and how he’s always examining some esoteric thing in minute detail. And in all honesty, I don’t “get” some of his films - “The French Dispatch” confused the hell out of me until someone told me it’s a parody of specific editors in The New Yorker. I still don’t get it, but at least now I know why I don’t get.
I picked up some of the themes of Asteroid City but didn’t really get the meta of it all. (I liked that one too.)
I’d probably rank The Phoenician Scheme #3 after The Royal Tennenbaums and The Grand Budapest Hotel. I liked it that much.
A-
I really want to see this. Where can I watch it?
Hitting theaters near me this Thursday.
I’m pleasantly surprised to hear it! I read the short story today and can’t imagine what they did with it.
Yeah, only in theaters right now. I saw it at an AMC on the Westside that gets a lot of ambitious films a week before general release There are usually a fair number of industry folks at the screenings.
This AMC had Anora at least a week before its release and it played without interruption into 2025. That’s when I knew it was a serious contender for the Oscars.
In the Line of Fire Clint Eastwood, John Malkovich 1993
Made shortly after Unforgiven. Clint didn’t direct Line of Fire.
I don’t remember watching this movie. It’s an interesting psychological battle between Secret Service Agent and killer. John Malkovich is great at taunting Eastwood.
I’m not sure running along side the Presidential limousine is Eastwoods best move. He’s more effective tracking down the potential killer.
Good movie. Not Eastwood’s best but acceptable.
Its nice seeing John Mahoney in something beside Fraiser.
Clint (at 63) seemed too old for Renee Russo.