I haven’t seen the movie, but its trailers make it look like a bunch of recycled 1990s alien invasion tropes. I mean, crop circles? Who has even thought about crop circles since the 4th season of X-Files? All that stuff was a joke by the time the first Men in Black came out in '97.
It just seems so out of touch with the zeitgeist.
We watched Disclosure Day last night.
As far as I can tell, it’s Spielberg remaking Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
A couple of “civilians” are selected by aliens and gifted with psychic powers that will make communication easier.
They’re chased by inexplicable hostile forces as they are trying to rendezvous with the aliens (although they don’t know that)
There are a lot of white-knuckle chase scenes
. At last they manage to beat or bypass the Hostile Powers against them and make contact with the aliens, at which point the movie abruptly ends.
My comment on this is the same as it was for CE3K – it ends right when it gets interesting, and at the important part. Ce3K ends when the saucer lands. The old classic The Day the Earth Stood Still BEGINS at that point. I’ll take DtESS over CE3K any time.
Don’t tell me that the alien speaking in its own language to the guy, who translates for the weather girl, and then the movie stops before she repeats the message is Spielberg leaving it pen to our imaginations. To me it’s a cop-out. Either tell us what this important message is, or don’t make the damned movie.
The only memorable parts to me are the media reactions at the end. Real life anchor women Courtney Grace acted circles around anyone else in the cast.
I’ve left this thread many times because of spoilers, and foolishly come back thinking maybe things will change. Evidently not.
Whichever movie it is, I’m on Team Duckie.
As for First Man, I hated it. One of my favorite quotes is from Gerry Anderson about the inscrutableness of Space 1999 episodes: How much understated can something be before it becomes unstated? Armstrong was already a quiet, inscrutable person, and the film did not help at all to break through that. Armstrong looks thoughtful. Armstrong looks pensive. Armstrong looks neutral. Armstrong nearly dies in the flying bedstead. Armstrong looks the same every time. He never even shared his thoughts with his wife. What’s the point of the film?
Oh well, the soundtrack was nice.
The Judge 2014 Robert Downey Jr., Robert Duvall, Vera Farmiga, Vincent D’Onofrio, Billy Bob Thornton
I’ve always been a sucker for films that feature an estranged sibling that returns home to a frosty reception by his family.
There are many similarities to On Golden Pond with Jane Fonda.
There is a very difficult scene after a Chemo treatment where Robert Duvall collapses in the bathroom. It’s one of the bravest and deeply personal scenes that I’ve ever seen an actor portray. It can’t be easy to open oneself up and be that vulnerable on camera.
Downey is the perfect acting partner in supporting Duval’s performance.
8 out of 10 Only because it’s familiar ground for this type of movie.
In almost that genre, but also starring RDJ, you should check out 1995’s Home for the Holidays,
I’ll check it out. Thanks 
Od you think Armstrong was too understated in real life?
Anatomy of a Fall (2023) HBO.
A rare reaction: disappointed. But only because of expectations.
It is presented as murder/suspicious death mystery, and we watched it for that reason. Surprisingly, it isn’t that kind of film; the death is just the hook, the framework on which to hang a relationship story.
At that, it excels, with fantastic performances by all characters, including the dog. But after sitting through 150 minutes…
we still don’t know what happened
My apologies for not blurring the spoilers for Disclosure Day. I got carried away.
It’s true
that they don’t tell you, which is a little coy…when the movie premiered in the US they had a website where you could vote on whether she did it, and IIRC the total at the time was 2/3 = no.
I did watch a fun video where it tied together an interesting argument, based on how the director edited the film plus some admittedly idiosyncratic audio from the movie, that the dog left his ball at the bottom of the window and the dude had stepped on it and gone over.
I loved that French prosecutor, that guy was on fire, and apparently that was realistic.
You Should Have Left - Horror(ish) film starring Kevin Bacon and Amanda Seifried. Mom, dad and young daughter rent a house in a secluded town in Wales. He has some baggage from his first marriage and is several years older than his young, actress wife.
It’s not the most original of plots but it has enough of its own creepy spin that I didn’t guess what was happening. KB is one of my favorites so he was able to make the mediocre script work. I usually like AS and I think her character wasn’t quite fleshed out enough so the viewer starts off with a natural bias. I had never heard of it (apparently it was released in 2020 straight to digital) so it was a nice surprise for me. Nothing earth shattering but definitely worth a look if you like haunted dwelling type horror.
Hoppers
The latest Pixar effort. Quite a few chuckles but just didn’t have the magic that Pixar used to almost guarantee. Very silly in places - definitely one aimed at the kids more than the adults.
6/10
Yeah, Hoppers has a very convoluted plot that jumps all over the place. It never really settles into itself. If you want a different-but-similar body swap animated movie, Netflix has Swapped, which is an extremely colourful and funny adventure.
Personally I thought Hoppers was the best pixar movie I’d seen for years. I laughed a lot at it and it made its points well, watched it four times now. Every single other Pixar movie from Up onwards has been dull to me (pretty much post Disney takeover), I don’t think I’ve missed any apart from Inside Out 2 (and that was mainly because I thought the tale of a small kid having a nervous breakdown not as appealing as others did with the first one, and had no interest in more).
But we can’t all be the same. Just an alternate viewpoint. This was closer in spirit to old pixar than anything recently.
Finally watched Hamnet. For most of the film, I thought it was enjoyable, but underwhelming given the praise and nominations it received, but I found the ending much more emotional than I expected.
Imagine seeing it in a theater full of people trying not to sob!
That was my experience when I saw Schindler’s List in the theater.
Yeah, I can’t imagine. I wouldn’t want to see Hamnet or Graveyard of the Fireflies, or God forbid something like Dear Zachary…in a theater.
I’d rather keep my tears at my house.