Another month gone, another round of movies to reflect on! [*] entries were those that I picked.

Ghostworld, 2001. I…really don’t know what this is about. We follow two teenage girls (one is Scarlett Johanson, the other is the Hollywood-Ugly Enid) who graduate high school with no plans beyond getting an apartment together. Hollywood Ugly Enid is terrible at customer service, though, so she keeps getting fired and is getting into a weird relationship with a man old enough to be her father, Steve Buscemi. That’s really the movie. Main reason to watch would be if you’re a SJ fan and want to see her as developing actress. I just saw her and Steve Buscemi and figured, hey, that’s a winner.

Muriel’s Wedding, 1994. Australian….darkish comedy about a woman who’s honestly a little nutty.  Lots of ABBA music.  Caution: trailer may stick “Waterloo” in your head,

[*] Oppenheimer, 2023.   A dramatic rendering of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the development of the bomb, and some petty politics that followed in the fifties when someone Oppenheimer had offended wanted to strip him of his security clearance on suspicion of being a Soviet agent.  Good drama, though Harry Truman’s voice acting was bizarre: he sounds like he’s from down yonder in Mississippi, not Missouri,  There are literal recordings of Truman from this time, so it’s not as if they couldn’t  have gotten closer. 

[*] Dirty Harry, 1971.  A cop with no tolerance for political nonsense goes after a twisted serial killer.  Some seriously disturbing scenes, especially with the adult-on-child violence.  

[*] The Shape of Things to Come, 1979. I don’t know if this merits B-movie status.  It uses H.G. Wells title for future-casting but has NO connection to it otherwise. Enjoyed the costuming and props but that ….was about it. 

[*] The Philadelphia Story, 1940. Rewatch with the lady-friend. She hasn’t seen this, a grievous error I had to remedy.   Cary Grant, Kathryn Hepburn, and Jimmy Stewart all star in a funny comedy about the feud between divorcees (Grant and Hepburn)  resulting in two newspaper people (including Stewart) being brought in. Stewart falls for Hepburn and realizes that Grant still has feelings for her. So much good acting and comedy. 

The Third Man, 1949. British film set in postwar Vienna, based on screenplay-turned-novella by Graham Greene. Orson Welles means = interesting shots.  Fellow arrvies in Vienna at the invitation of a friend to find out that whoopsie, said friend is dead and  is suspected of being a racketeer. 

Only God Forgives, 2013. Ryan Gosling. Two brothers have a crime thing going on in Thailand, but Gosling’s brother is a pervert who gets himself killed after he violates the wrong man’s daughter. Gosling’s mama shows up in town to chide him for not avenging his godawful brother, and many people die. Not a fan.

Duck Soup, 1933. Political satire starring Groucho as newly-minted dictator of Fredonia. Can’t imagine it was meant as making fun of Hitler, since he only took power in ’33. Funny nontheless, especially the mirror scene. Later saw a bit from the Lucy show in which Lucille Ball and Harpo recreate the mirror scene.

Sherman’s March: “A Meditation on the Possibility of Romantic Love in the South During an Era of Nuclear Weapons Proliferation”, 1986.

The movie has very little to do with Sherman’s match. It’s more about a guy retracing Sherman’s march through Georgia and the Carolinas and getting involved in relationships with women who disappoint his hopes. Interesting to a mid-eighties baby, as it’s a look at the world as it was when I was born.

[*] The Young Messiah, 2016. Drama based on a Roman soldier played by Sean Bean having to hunt down Jesus of Nazareth, age 7. Bean’s character, Severus, was involved in the Bethlehem slaughter (Herod ordering all male babies killed on suspicion that they might be the Chosen One), and has to choose between duty to to orders and his own humanity. Enjoyable enough, but I only watched it for Sean Bean. Jesus speaks RP, naturally.

That Touch of Mink, 1962. Doris Day and Cary Grant star in a romantic comedy about a playboy who meets Doris Day, an out-of-work computer programmer, and falls for her completely. Unexpected cameos from Micky Mantle, Yogi Berra, and Roger Maris.  Some awkward film and editing work (lots of obvious, glitchy cuts), but the writing was fun and I found a lot to like, especially the “You librarians live it up pretty good!” line. 

Dog Day Afternoon, 1975. Al Pacino plays a bank robber who just wanted some money for his partner’s plastic surgery, but things go sideways. Evidently based on a true-ish story. The funny part was Pacino playing a character named “Sonny” besides the guy who played Fredo, making me wonder — my boy, what have they done to my boy?!

The Ruling Class, 1972. Peter O’Toole plays an absolutely insane scion of a prominent aristocratic family who inherits his father’s title after his father’s fake-suicide attempt accidentally turns into a real suicide.  O’Toole is uncomfortably good at portraying someone who is stark raving mad, and the film’s production aids to this: there’s random singing, and sometimes we get visuals as the schizophrenic O’Toole might see them.  Unequal amounts of funny/disturbing. 

The Sugarland Express,  1974. Big ol’ car chase.  Spielberg and John William’s first collab. 

The Boys Next Door, 1985.   Charlie Sheen and that guy from Grease 2 are two graduates with no real plan for their lives.  They decide to visit Los Angeles, and That Guy from Grease 2’s penchant for violence leads to increasingly anti-social behavior.