WEAPONS, I agree with the opinions here that the movie was excellent. I do have two self-important insights though.
Don’t view it on the in-flight movie screen. I swear it was completely dark for 20% of the time and had me squinting at shapes moving, maybe, another 10%.
I don’t believe that no one else, when first viewing the ‘aunt’ and her garish makeup, thought that Heath Ledger (Joker) had somehow been reanimated for the role. 
I don’t think that was in the original play (wrfitten by two ex-POWs) – they spiced thuings up a bit for the movie, but it’s mostly faithful to the play.
I just checked Tubi again to see if there any new additions of interest, figuring if a bunch of movies just expired then they probably just added a bunch of movies.
Turns out yes, but not in the way I was expecting. Of those 15 movies I did not get to in time, 13 have already been added back. I strained my eyes rolling them at all the “newly added” tags.
The Plague, another Independent Spirit nominee for best first feature. Produced by Joel Edgerton, I guess it could be best described as Lord of the Flies at a water polo camp. What makes this film really compelling is the kid actors, both the bullies and the victims, who are all terrific; and the decision to frame a lot of the shots in the same style and with the same music as a slow, creeping horror movie.
I was bullied quite a bit in school at that age, and so this was a little too intense for me. But it was quite well done.
The Fifth Element (1997)
I hadn’t seen this in many years and the Teen hadn’t seen it at all, so I queued it up off Tubi two nights ago. It’s a fun movie and say what you will about anything along the way but screenwriter and director Luc Besson clearly had a vision and it shows. The effects, the settings, and the aliens all look good and even if the overflowing traffic of flying cars in an overpopulated city is a sci fi staple, it looks great here.
Bruce Willis is a retired special forces major (if there isn’t a trope for a retired elite soldier getting called back into action, there should be) turned cab driver who encounters Milla Jovovich as she crashes through his cab. She’s the recreated ultimate weapon brought to Earth to stop the giant living space fireball that is heading towards the planet. Gary Oldman is Zorg, who is an evil industrialist working with the spaceball. There’s also Chris Tucker, Luke Perry, Ian Holm, and Tiny Lister (as Earth President). Probably my biggest criticism is that Zorg isn’t that great of a villain. He’s evil and does evil stuff but Oldman plays him with a weird accent and he comes off weak in a scene where he almost chokes but is saved by another character. I understand the point of it but the scene feels like a bit of a misfire.
The Fifth Element is one of my favorite films. There is an amusing bit at the beginning involving an archeologist and his assistant (played by Luke Perry).
I love the Fifth Element and watch it every few years. I saw it in the theatre twice and have owned it on tape, DVD, Blu-ray, and now 4K Blu-ray. A neat bit of trivia is that Bruce Willis and Gary Oldman are never on screen at the same time.
Fifth Element is a classic favorite of mine. From earlier in this topic:
And another thread about it:
I’ll be the dick. I can’t stand that movie. Every syllable screeched by Chris Tucker makes me want to rip my ears off the side of my head.
Well, yeah, but that is what fast forward or mute is for. Otherwise I think it was a pretty good film.
I think TFE is great, especially given when it came out in 1997. it was also great piece of world building. It’s neither a pristine Star Trekian Utopia or Blade Runner-esq cyberpunk nightmare. It’s an imperfect futuristic civilization that mostly kinda works, sort of like present day NYC. Like the working spaceport full of garbage from some union dispute or whatever it was.
I recall an interview with Luc Besson or one of the designers who said he didn’t want everything to be in shadows or at night like a lot of sci fi. He wanted to show an NYC in the year 3000 in the middle of broad daylight.
Some recent films I’ve seen:
Eden now streaming on Netflix. Basically Lord of the Flies with pretty adults, apparently based on a true story. Sydney Sweeney gets a lot of crap for being a sort of “Tits McGee” in most of her films, but she’s actually pretty good here.
One Battle After Another A very good remake of Terminator 2.
The Long Walk Something to pass the time between the annual Hunger Games and the next season of The Running Man.
The Phoenician Scheme Decent Wes Anderson entry. Not as good as Grand Budapest or some of his earlier work, but probably my favorite since GB.
As an aside, I think it would be fun if Wes Anderson, Paul Thomas Anderson, and Paul W. S. Anderson remade each other’s movies in their own style.
And each of them should remake one by Lindsay Anderson.
I loved The Fifth Element so much that I saw Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets in the theater just because it was similarly directed by Luc Besson. I was hoping it captured the same magic. Sadly it did not.
I appreciate the movie’s prescience, though. When it first came out I was baffled by what the hell Tucker’s character was supposed to be. Now I look at him and think “Oh… he’s an influencer.”
I figured that Chris Tucker’s character in The Fifth Element was just supposed to be an annoying radio show host.
True, but in retrospect, he acts much more like a 2020s YouTube personality.
Yes, I was going to say that when I first watched it I didn’t ‘get’ him at all, but nowadays he fits in far more seamlessly into a contemporary environment. Weirdos are all over the internet, so he’s more palatable than he once was.
Best place I could find to talk about this is here.
Jackass Forever is one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen. Even if you never saw a single moment of Jackass, you should go check this one out.
Jackass 5 is coming out in June. I really love that these guys film everything in secret and then just release the movie a few months(or year) after they film.
I may be a big child, but Jackass 5 is one of my most anticipated 2026 movies.
Whaaaat?! They’ve done a fifth one?! How much more punishment do the older ones want to take, or do you think it’ll be entirely the new ones now? Knoxville literally nearly died doing the last one.
A mix of new and old, I hope. The new guys in the last one were fun, but we want to see the main guys.
I don’t know if he nearly died. That bull absolutely flipped him around couple times, but I think he was fine.