Movies you've seen recently (Part 2)

Cafe Society
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Justice League, the Zach Snyder Cut, on HBO. Gee whiz, 4 hours of Justice League! Also available in Black and White!

I watched it in pieces, it’s actually broken up into something like 6 chapters for us.

It’s different, for sure, than the theatrical cut. Significant changes to plot, big addition of Darkseid as an on screen enemy, but more of setting up future movies that didn’t happen. More backstory / different backstory for Cyclops, more post conflict resolution and setting up of a bigger conflict.

My favorite change, though was the reasoning behind resurrecting Superman. IIRC, the theatrical cut made it out to be kind of a “we need hope, we need help, we aren’t good enough without him”. Snyder’s version changes the lore a bit, it says “the mother boxes awakened because ‘The Kryptonian’ isn’t alive anymore to protect Earth” I like that a lot better.

I think the changes were for the good, none of the additions were exactly bad, but it is a long ride, it takes its sweet time getting from place to place. Not a bad way to spend 4 hours, but I wouldn’t feel the need to watch it again.

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I woke up way too early yesterday morning, so I took the opportunity to watch a couple movies on Prime.

Good Fortune (2025)

Aziz Ansari wrote, directed, and stars as Arj, a struggling man hustling through his day with several different jobs, Seth Rogan is Jeff, a wealthy man who hires Arj for a job, takes him on as an assistant, then fires him after he uses the company card on a date, Keanu Reeves is Gabriel, an angel who is not very good at his job who tries to help out Arj and switches Arj and Jeff’s lives. Keke Palmer plays Ansari’s love interest who is trying to organize a union at her big box hardware store, and Sandra Oh is an angel supervising Gabriel.

The movie is kind of funny and kind of sweet at times. There’s an interesting bit where Rogan’s character talks about how he’s a self-made millionaire until he mentions his parents are a surgeon and lawyer, Ansari does a pretty good job of showing how down on his luck his character is and how his situation leads to more problems compared to the wealthy Jeff. Jeff isn’t an a-hole rich guy either, he’s a little clueless at times but he is a decent guy. The movie gets a little lost, I think, when Gabriel is turned into a human as well and experiences both the greatness of pleasures like tacos and hallucinogenic mushrooms as well as the frustration of working a menial job and seeing everything taken out of the paycheck. It’s fun to see Reeves in these scenes but it also takes away from the main story and it feels like it could be its own movie.

Things come together at the end and Arj and Jeff switch back to their original lives. Jeff is so moved by his experiences that he solves the lower class gig economy worker issue by declaring in a board room that they’ll provide better pay and benefits to their gig workers. The movie does have some depth but I feel like that ending was a bit of a cheap fix. Nonetheless, I liked everyone in it and I enjoyed the movie.

Rad (1986)

This is a perfect example of a poorly done 80s “teen wins the big event” movie with BMX bike racing being the genre of the big event. Cru is a great BMX trick rider, which he shows us early on when he cuts through lawns, jumps over fences, hops obstacles, and hitches a ride on a garbage truck while on his paper route. Meanwhile, the Mongoose bike racing team (I am a bit impressed that they had a real bike sponsorship in this) plans to build Helltrack in the small town, which will bring BMX racers from all over to compete for $100,000 and a corvette. Cru meets Lori Loughlin, who is a part of the Mongoose team and they hit it off. Meanwhile, it seems that the guy bringing the bike race to town and the owner of the Mongoose team is a real heal who keeps adjusting the rules to keep Cru out of the race. Cru and Loughlin do bike stunts at senior prom together, Cru’s mom doesn’t want him in the race because he’ll miss his make up SAT test, but the townspeople rally around Cru, including grumpy Ray Walston and the motorcycle cop that Cru outran in a lumberyard earlier. Cru wins the big race, the lead biker of the Mongoose team who seemed like a jerk turns out OK after, and we get a freezeframe of everyone cheering. It was fun to watch how terrible of a movie this was. There seems to be a cult following for this movie but the whole thing – the story, actors, and music is all dripping in gooey 80s cheese. Still, the bike stunts are kind of fun.

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Rental Family, a film set in Tokyo about an American ex-pat actor who can’t get reliable work, so he gets roped into being a “paid family”. (They need a ‘token American’.) It seems this is a real thing in Japan. Complications ensure when he starts to really care about the people he is pretending to like.

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Bring It On 2000 Kirsten Dunst, Eliza Dushku, Jesse Bradford, Gabrielle Union

I had never heard of this movie. It came up as a question on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire last night. Kimmel, Brad Paisley and the other guy all remarked it was a fun movie.

It’s on Peacock

They were right. It is a good movie, interesting story and pretty funnny.

Kirsten Dunst is the new captain of the cheer squad. Just as they’re prepping for competition, Kristen finds out her predecessor had stolen the routines from another school.

Lots of comedy as the cheer squad struggles to learn new routines in a short time.

Sometimes it’s nice to relax and watch a fluffy comedy. The gymnastics are pretty good and well choreographed.

8 out of 10

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Brr! It’s cold in here. I said there must be some Toros in the atmosphere.

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This was my son’s favorite movie when he was a kid. He was born in 1985, so it must have been on a cable channel at some point, and I recorded it for him (VCR). That movie was on a constant loop for a while at our house. He still talked about it when he was an adult. I wanted to give him the DVD as a gift, but had no luck in finding it.

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I thought that storyline and Reeves performance was the best thing in the film. They did nothing new with the tired old Prince and the Pauper trope.

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Normal 2025 Bob Odenkirk, Henry Winkler, Lena Headey

HBO/Max

I liked Bob’s two Nobody movies.

I was disappointed with this new one. He’s playing a interim sheriff in a small town. It’s another parody of action movies.

I’m curious about other people’s reactions.

I can’t say anything about the story without spoilers.

I think the film over reached from parody to just inane and stupid. It seemed to drag on and on, repeating itself.

I can’t recommend it.

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Odenkirk seems to have found a profitable lane and Normal is certainly in it. Yeah, it’s kinda dumb but also kinda amusing and I don’t regret watching it at all.

Stumbled across Seven Days in May on TCM the other day and got totally sucked into it again. Great cast. The fears of a fascist takeover have been with us for a long time.

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Coyote vs, Acme : I was absolutely blown away by this. The love for the original cartoons, the hilarious set pieces, the emotional heart of this movie, just WOW. Wile E Coyote sees an ad for a legal firm that represents toons and goes to the big city to sue ACME for all the shitty products and pain and suffering they have caused him. I’ve watched it twice already and it’s one of the best things I’ve seen in a very long while. Everyone clearly put their hearts and souls into making this.

And bizarrely this was made in 2023 and shelved by Warner Brothers as a tax write-off! Despite test audiences loving it. The idiots at WB must be heartless and soulless to fail to recognise what an absolute gem they had. Eventually the rights were acquired by what I believe is a relatively minor company, Ketchup Entertainment, who are now making a bundle out of it.

Love it SO much.

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I read a theory that the subject matter was basically against Corporate CEOs so they have a particular reason to resent it.

I’m looking forward to seeing it, the great reviews are very encouraging.

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Coyote vs ACME (2026). I know this has been mentioned before, sometimes in glowing terms, and it has a high rating on IMDb. Sorry, I beg to differ. No, I’m not a film snob – I love the old Looney Tunes cartoons featuring Bugs Bunny, Sylvester, Foghorn Leghorn, and all the others. They’re delightful silliness. I’m quite capable of regressing to childhood.

But not this. This is something entirely different.

For me, this was a badly done exploitation of a venerable cartoon tradition. The one moment of humour was the old hen sitting in the jury box knitting, who featured as the amorous target in some of the Foghorn Leghorn cartoons. But just about nothing else. The whole thing fell flat for me.

The original Looney Tunes cartoons were wonderful. I wasn’t especially fond of the Coyote vs Road Runner ones, but they were fine. The original New Yorker article detailing the lawsuit of the Coyote against the ACME corporation was absolutely brilliant. But whoever thought this would be a basis for a good movie was mistaken.

I wondered why Warner Bros. would spend $70 million on a film and then decline to release it. Now I know why.

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A mostly Russian cast and crew loosely bring the Finnish national epic, the Kalevala, to life in this large-scale fantasy with some impressive production values, gorgeous landscapes, cheesy VFX, intrusive songs and abysmal acting. The hero, Lemminkäinen is a complete clod. He arranges for evil witch Louhi to get a Sampo (a magic mill which dispenses salt, grain and gold) so she’ll release his kidnapped girlfriend, only to decide as he and his beloved are sailing away to retake the Sampo because his village won’t be able to profit from it and “it is time that I too did some manly chores.”

The final battle comes soon after Louhi steals the sun, putting the region into perpetual darkness and pretty much bumming everyone’s trip. In the snow just outside Louhi’s island (where she lives with a bunch of troll-like wizards), the good guys assemble and…there’s no actual battle, only a bunch of dudes playing harps which puts the wizards to sleep. The sun is thusly freed!

I would not call this a good movie, though it was earnest in its intentions and had some interesting aspects and scenes (the print on IA was excellent). That said, I am sure it is better than the revised American version which cut out 24 minutes and was retitled The Day the Earth Froze, later achieving dubious renown on MST 3000.

For those interested, to make a Sampo, you need a tip from a white swan feather, the finest wool of lambkins, a single grain of barley (although a fistful is actually used) and the enchanted flame of the nave of the sky.

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It’s always that last ingredient that gets you.

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Valley of the Dead (original title: Malnazidos [2020])

If you need to see one more zombie film, this is the one. Spanish, English-dubbed; the dubbing is not great and the English sub-titles rarely match the dialogue. Beautifully photographed, the scenery is lovely. The plot: during the Spanish Civil War, Nazis are conducting experiments to raise the dead and are being very naughty about it. Two warring factions have to work together to survive the undead, the Nazis and their opposing armies. The SFX/make up are top notch, the story has fewer than usual plot holes/gaps, the music is serviceable, it has a great overall “look” to it and the acting is first rate; you actually start to care about these characters. Not quite Tremors good, but a pleasant surprise. 8.5/10.

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Surely not the Nazis? I can’t stand to watch Downfall anymore because, unlike when I first watched it ~15 years ago, I find that I *cannot even sympathize with the lead protagonist (one of Hitler’s secretaries, who stayed with him in the bunker to the end, for those who haven’t seen it). I find myself thinking I wish this would turn out to be some kind of alt-reality director’s cut where the bunker comes down on the lot of them—secretaries and all—and the screen just cuts to black at the 30-minute mark, with a short caption explaining that everyone in the bunker died and their remains were swiftly consigned to a literal dustbin. Seeing one’s own country taken over by fascists puts things in a different perspective, you know? It becomes much harder to accept that a grown ass adult could plead “youthful innocence” or whatever technicality she got off on despite her voluntary and enthusiastic participation in a fascist regime, let alone such an explicitly genocidal regime.

*I do still feel bad for the Goebbels children. Murdered by their own mother.

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Thanks for the suggestion, from one dog to another! It’s on my watchlist for tonight, for when I get tired of Perry Mason. I often enjoy some of these oddball foreign horror films. I intend to watch it in the original Castilian with English subtitles, certainly not the dubbed version.

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You go, dog!

I’m curious as to what differences there will be due to translation. One of the characters is named “Fuse,” but the subtitles call him “Match.” Stuff like that.

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YTMND!

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NICE! Had to look it up, but I’m impressed!

BTW, “care” was a poor choice of words on my part; the characters are believable would be better usage. The Nazis, of course, are total caricatures. It’s that kind of movie.