Your review is well and good, but what about the prosthetic butthole?
My review from earlier:
But is there a butthole? Was it realistic?
The Godfather Part II.
Ok, so I recently posted about finally watching Part I and I just finished Part II. I think I liked Part II better (particularly the young Vito parts,) but…
I honestly think they are both over-rated. Many, many people have them ranked among the best movies ever. I just don’t see it. Now, I fully understand that watching them in 2026 is very different than when they came out. I just feel that they were both meandering movies that expected you to know the source material. Maybe that was common then? The editing leaves a lot to be desired. By what happens in the movies alone I don’t buy the transition Michael goes through. I’m sure it was explored more in the book, but I didn’t read the book.
I’m not saying they are “bad” by any means, but I was honestly a bit disappointed.
Spoilers for the film along this line:
There is a clever internet theory that the character “The Brain” exists only in Brendon’s head and is his analytical side. There are several “clues” that can easily point in that direction, like how he only ever interacts with Brendon and how he is framed oddly in a couple of spots in those interactions. Whether that framing was just the director being arty rather than leaving clues is an open question. But is does fit into the unreliable narrator idea.
There were a lot of prosthetic body parts during the pregnancy-related sequence. I did not pay particular attention to the butthole per se.
I’d add that there are four doomed births in TToAL, so they also kinda blur together.
I’ll spoiler-blur as well, although in my case, it may be unnecessary:
That character nagged at me a wee bit because he was too obviously (in my view) sort of shoehorned in just because he was needed for storytelling. But I was willing to shrug it off because in the general world of fiction where someone is investigating something, the character who more or less sits off to the side with an odd-if-you-really-think-about-it ability and willingness to help the main character in convenient ways is pretty much a standard feature. I might be inclined to think of him as, in a loose sense, an example of the Mysterious Informant listed on TV Tropes. Or maybe a variation of Starsky and Hutch’s Huggy Bear, who was always able to fill the guys in on what the “word on the street” might be. How did he always know the info they needed? Well, he was just out there, hustling and networking. It was his world. No need to question it. But no, I’m not proposing that S&H were unreliable narrators. That idea about the Brain has some appeal, though. 
)
Those are rarely actually “clever”.
I’m a huge McDonagh fan. I also love Seven Psychopaths. I avoided it for a long time mainly due to the title. Coincidentally, I also avoided In Bruges for quite a while because the synopsis – two hired killers in Belgium – didn’t grab me. I think these are my two favs of his movies, too.
Seven Psychopaths contains one of my favorite scenes. Chris Walken, near the end:
Bad Guy: “Put your hands up!”
Walken: “Ah, no.”
Just finished Predator: Badlands and it is excellent. It ranks up there with Predator and Prey. This is a solid trilogy and are the movies I’ll definitely revisit.
The Bluff
Recommended.
A very fun and well done pirate movie. My wife and I liked the whole thing. Not a huge budget, but they do a great job finding ways to be creative without having to do anything too elaborate.
Shame this did not get a theatrical release. It’s a lot of fun.
The Sum of All Fears 2002 Ben Affleck, Morgan Freeman, James Cromwell, Liev Schreiber
Why haven’t I heard about this film? Paramount+ suggested it after I rewatched Hunt for Red October.
I don’t want to spoil too many details. I can say a third party wants to trigger a war between Russia and America. Weakening the worlds two strongest nuclear powers.
The CIA and Jack Ryan rush to avoid all out war. Morgan Freeman is very good as the Director of the CIA.
I enjoyed the film. The plot starts slowly and is a bit hard to follow. I want to watch it again and will appreciate the smaller details.
The ending is a little too dramatic and stretches what I consider is believable.
But, that’s what these spy movies do. 
8 out of 10 rating
Predator: Killer of Killers is also a pretty decent addition too, though I’m not sure why the American qualified for being a greatest killer. Animated though.
Focus (2015) (Netflix) It appeared on this week’s NY Times “50 Best Movies on Netflix” list. I’d never heard of it but my wife thought it sounded intriguing, and she was right.
Will Smith and Margo Robbie as con artists/pickpockets. If you like cons and heists, there are lots of twists and “who’s conning who” moments. Fun.
The Secret Agent (2025). Highly acclaimed political thriller from Brazil and one of this year’s Best Picture nominees, but let me start by quoting a noted critic: “cohesiveness or coherence are not high on [the film’s] list of attributes”, “but [the film’s] messiness is part of its charm”.
I don’t know that I find this particularly charming. The plot is hugely over-complex and the challenge is exacerbated by having to follow along with English-language subtitles, as the film is in Portuguese. Look away for a moment and you may miss some crucial dialog. And you have to keep fixated on the subtitles for two hours and 40 minutes.
All of that said, it tells a compelling story even if opaque in its expository qualities.-- indeed, I admit I had to read a few paragraphs from the Wikipedia plot description to orient myself as to what the hell was going on.
The film is set in 1977 during the military dictarorship in Brazil. Wagner Moura, who is up for Best Actor for his role, plays Armando, a former university professor who flees Sao Paulo for the coastal town of Recife to escape political persecution. His young son has been living in Recife with Armando’s in-laws since the death of his wife. Armando changes his name to Marcello and becomes involved with figures in the resistance movement, later finding out that several thuggish characters have been sent to kill him.
The film is divided into three chapters, and the final chapter is quite powerful and emotional as it suddenly switches to the present day and is a sort of retrospective on everything that we’ve seen, as now seen by a university historian and Armando’s now adult son.
Despite some of my above objections, I just have to give this a “Recommended” rating as it’s very well made and has many positive qualities. Just be aware that it can be hard to follow.
I forgot about that one, I’ll need to check it out.
Exit 8
Recommended.
Wow, this was a cool movie. A guy goes into the subway in Japan and…well, it becomes an endless loop of the same hallways/tunnels over and over. Even if he turns back, it repeats.
He learns that he must look for anomalies and if he sees one, go back. If he doesn’t, continue forward. Do this until you reach Exit 8 and you get out.
That’s the premise, but the whole thing is very well done. Great acting, great story.
I kind of loved it. Check it out.