Movies I Watched October 2023 - Greenfield Writes

K-On! The Movie - dir. Naoko Yamada

Slice-of-Life

So sappy and sweet that I think I’m gonna have to book an appointment with my dentist to get a cavity filled in. 2/10.

Rocky - dir. John G. Avildsen

Sports/Coming-of-Age

The undertones of class and masculinity are right there. Maybe it’s just because I’m primed to notice that stuff in media, but to me, this isn’t really a sports movie as much as it is a movie about a man trying to survive, to prove that he is more than his poverty. It’s a scathing critique of the American dream–made ever more poignant by the fact that the happy ending is NOT Rocky Balboa winning the fight for his life, but instead him saying “I love you” to his girlfriend for the first time. It is a journey of a callused and lonely man towards love and vulnerability. Rocky is an exceptionally beautiful portrayal of masculinity in its hardships and beauty, and I love how raw and heartfelt it is all the way through.

Oh, and sidenote: if you think Sylvester Stallone’s acting sucks, you don’t know the first thing about acting. His performance here is terrific. The way he’s able to live in the character, to embody who Rocky is, with these small details, just shows how committed he was to bringing this guy to life. This isn’t a sports movie, man. This is a COMING-OF-AGE character study. And for it to work as well it did (as evidenced by its classic status), it had to have a rock solid lead to carry it. Which Stallone ABSOLUTELY did here. Phenomenal movie. 9/10.

Rocky II - dir. Sylvester Stallone

Sports/Drama

It just keeps going back to the American dream, doesn’t it? In the previous installment, Rocky got his happy ending, but Rocky 2 aims to explore what that means for his character. And in doing so, we get a pretty incredible examination of why the American dream fundamentally does not work.

Because Rocky comes from poverty, because he’s uneducated, and because all he knows how to do is fight, he can’t hold down a job. He can’t take advantage of any of the lucrative commercial work that’s being offered to him. He can’t make smart financial decisions. As Dr. Dre said on Wesley’s Theory by Kendrick Lamar–“anybody can get it, the hard part is keepin’ it, motherfucker.”

Rocky got it, he pulled himself up by his bootstraps, took advantage of a miracle, and made a small fortune. But because of capitalism’s systemic barriers, it’s not enough to keep him and his new family afloat, and soon enough, he’s forced to turn back to boxing. It’s all he knows how to do.

This ties into the other core theme of Rocky as a whole–the trappings of masculinity. Rocky feels this intense pressure to provide for his wife and child. He feels emasculated when Adrian is forced to work to support them. What I love about Rocky is that he’s not a perfect guy. He’s not a paragon of ideal masculinity, in neither the eyes of the ‘left’ or the ‘right.’ He’s just a guy trying to figure his shit out, really, and doing his best. It’s what makes him such a compelling character to follow.

Sadly, this movie does have a couple of flaws that I feel the need to point out. For one, the pace of the film grinds to a halt when Adrian slips into a coma. Secondly, that one sequence with all the kids running with Rocky? It’s cute, and the music sells the cheese well, but in my opinion, it’s a very immersion-breaking moment. The first Rocky film had its cheesy moments, for sure, but they were grounded in realism.

Any doubts I may have had about the film were firmly put to rest by the time the match between Creed and Rocky started. I was on the edge of my fucking seat, I was yelling at my screen, I just wanted to see Rocky WIN, man! I wanted to see the little guy come out on top! I wanted to see him stick to the rich, man! And that ending? With Rocky breaking down yelling triumphantly to Adrian? Man. For the life of me I will never understand how anyone could think Sylvester Stallone is a bad actor. Can’t believe the sequel is almost as good as the first. Let’s see if the rest of the franchise holds up (probably won’t). 8/10.

Rocky III - dir. Sylvester Stallone

Sports/Drama

Don’t have nearly as much to say about Rocky 3 as I did about the previous two. It has awesome boxing sequences, but it doesn’t do nearly as much for me emotionally. 7/10.

The Witch - dir. Robert Eggers

Folk Horror

The Witch is the second film by Robert Eggers that I’ve seen, and similar to The Northman, it has strong aesthetic direction and brutal imagery. My biggest takeaway from this film was an in-depth look at the totally whacked nature of Orthodox Christian thought. Truly some of the most deranged psychology out there. The Witch is able to horrifically cast a light on some of it, but the real strength of the film is in how visually disturbing it is. I do not recommend watching this if you have a sensitive stomach. Also, phenomenal child actor performances! 7/10.

Rocky IV - dir. Sylvester Stallone

Sports/Drama

Just a big mess. You’d think the biggest issue I’d have with this film is just how dated its politics are, but nah, the biggest issue I have with the film is just how much time is spent on drawn-out montages with cheeseball rock music blaring in the background. What I liked about the soundtrack of the first couple of Rocky films was how stripped back it was. It had a soulful quality to it that this all-American dad rock just doesn’t. Beyond that, though, the storyline as a whole is just very silly.

I know people are gonna be like–Rocky is supposed to be cheesy. It’s 80’s cheese! But no, fuck you, the first two Rocky movies were extremely grounded and down-to-Earth. Rocky 3’s corniness works in its favor because Clubber Lang is a way more intimidating villain than Ivan Drago. Neither are very compelling, but Clubber gets under Rocky’s skin in a way that Drago just never does, so even though Mr. T is sort of a mediocre actor at best, you still cannot wait for Rocky to punch the lights out of him. Drago is just kinda there. Being a big imposing wall of flesh.

Meh. 3/10.

Dazed and Confused - dir. Richard Linklater

Coming-of-Age/Comedy

Exactly the kind of movie I would want to make. Richard Linklater is someone who really appreciates the minutiae of life. Boyhood, Dazed and Confused, Waking Life. These are all movies about the in-between, the transitory. Dazed and Confused has no plotline. It’s just a bunch of high schoolers in the 70’s doing their thing. Going through the motions. I watched this and thought “man, I wish I was there” but like, I AM there. We’ve ALL been there. Maybe we weren’t smoking pot in the forest and partying, but we’ve all been in that transitory space between moment to moment. And movies like Dazed and Confused help me appreciate those moments a lot more. 8/10.

Rocky V - dir. John G. Avildsen

Sports/Drama

The fact that people seem to love Rocky 4 but hate Rocky 5 is baffling to me. They’re both pretty cheesy, but Rocky 5 has a way more interesting and personal antagonist, better commentary on wealth and capitalism, and just better performances from everybody. Hell, even Rocky’s kid gets a storyline here. Rocky 5 actually feels like it belongs in the Rocky franchise. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Fuck the haters. Y’all a bunch of losers. 7/10.

Run Rabbit Run - dir. Daina Reid

Psychological Horror

Very well shot! Too bad it’s boring. 2/10.

Rocky Balboa - dir. Sylvester Stallone

Sports/Drama

The sixth and final installment in the core Rocky franchise is about as warm a sendoff as I could want for who has now become one of my favorite protagonists of all time. I found it kind of boring, though, unfortunately. It’s not an awful movie by any means, it features some of Sylvester Stallone’s best acting in the entire franchise. But I probably won’t remember a single scene of this film in about two months. 5/10.

Bronson - dir. Nicolas Winding Refn

Black Comedy/Biographical

Finished the rest of this movie with my dad and my little brother. A lot more compelling than I remember. I watched this about a year ago and got bored within the first twenty minutes, but I think that’s because I wasn’t entirely understanding what the film was going for. It’s not a character arc, it’s just a character study. It’s an art exhibit about a real guy who just is not cut out to be human alongside the rest of society, but still winds up being demonized and/or fetishized by society at large. 7/10.

See the Sea - dir. François Ozon

Slow-Burn Thriller

Fate decided this month that the director whose filmography I would explore next would be none other than François Ozon. By pure coincidence this comes after François Truffaut, but I don’t question the whims of fate. I absolutely adored Ozon’s film Young and Beautiful, and with this film, I have reason to believe he may wind up becoming one of my all-time favorite directors.

See the Sea is a slow film. It takes its time, constricting you slowly with its quiet dark beauty. The cinematography here is ridiculously pretty but it never feels comforting or inviting. In fact, sometimes it’s just straight-up fucking repulsive.

Kind of like the sea, there’s a lot going on underneath the surface. I’m still processing this movie as I write about it, but I reckon there’s some real interesting commentary here about the nature of female sacrifice, and the way women might suppress their more hedonistic inclinations for the sake of the traditional feminine ideal. But hey what do I know I’m just some schmuck. 8/10.

Sitcom - dir. François Ozon

Black Comedy

Family sitcoms are supposed to be fun for the whole family. You see a bunch of quirky and misguided (yet still loving) people work out their dysfunctions in a thirty-minute TV slot, tripping over secrets and lies without losing sight of their familial love.

Sitcom, directed by Ozon, is not that. Because in Sitcom, everybody tells the truth. Everybody is fucked up, and they’re honest about it, and that’s just how it is. Pulling punches? Nope. Ozon wants you to squirm, he wants you to see the debauchery on full display, unflinching, uncomfortable, shocking, vile, subversive, all the adjectives.

It’s still funny, though. Like, really funny. In a very fucked-up way, maybe, but still funny, nonetheless. 8/10.

Under the Sand - dir. François Ozon

Psychological Drama

Charlotte Rampling is such a good actress. This whole movie probably doesn’t work if she isn’t absolutely bringing it every step of the way, committing fully to the fraught erotica of the main character, locked in denial, unable to process her loss and grief. I felt the movie was a little too tedious at points, but it’s still a really intelligent, well-made movie. 7/10.

Creed - dir. Ryan Coogler

Sports/Drama

Fun fact: I watched this in Spain back when it first came out, dubbed in Spanish. Upon rewatch, it’s obviously a hell of a lot better in English. It honestly doesn’t live up to the original Rocky, but I think it’s about as good of a reboot as you could possibly hope for. It continues Rocky’s story while also making Adonis a unique and developed character in his own right. He’s not Rocky, he’s not Apollo, he’s his own guy, trying to wrestle with the legacy and disappointment his father left behind. One thing this movie has over the original films is absurdly good fight choreography, so I will give it points for that. 7/10.

Creed II - dir. Steven Caple Jr.

Sports/Drama

Somehow, Creed 2 was even better than its predecessor. For starters, I think the setup of Creed vs Drago (REDUX) is inherently very compelling, as opposed to the first movie which is Adonis up against some random British dude. The premise lends a lot more weight to the story, and while this movie has a lot more melodrama than Coogler’s Creed (and worse cinematography overall), I felt a lot more emotional investment this time around. Donnie’s arc isn’t as well-defined here, he’s not really trying to prove anything specific or fight for his father’s legacy, it basically comes down to a grudge match between two kids who inherited their fathers’ demons. Viktor and his father are isolated, cold, alone, brutal, and furious. Donnie is prideful, he feels compelled on some level to prove his worth to the world as a successor to his father. It’s a fantastic follow-up and entry into the Rocky franchise. 8/10.

Scream - dir. Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett

Slasher/Comedy

Definitely a movie for Twitter users. 2/10.

Criminal Lovers - dir. François Ozon

Thriller/Erotic Horror

Not entirely sure what the point of this movie was. I’m not against ambiguity in art at all, mind you. Ozon’s bread and butter is disturbing, psycho-sexual ambiguity, and I’ve enjoyed all of the other movies of his I’ve seen, but Criminal Lovers feels uniquely hollow. I wasn’t sure what it was trying to say, what broader point it was trying to make. Alice is awful, sure, and she basically uses her white fragility to manipulate her boyfriend into killing a guy, which is bad, but like… what’s the point? Is that it? Luc is gay, I guess, which is cool, but it’s explored in the most baffling way possible. WHAT IS THIS MOVIE? 4/10.

Ouija: Origin of Evil - dir. Mike Flanagan

Supernatural Horror

Mike Flanagan is good at scares, for sure. And I like that he takes a more ‘in-between’ approach to horror, somewhere in the middle of schlocky/generic and ‘elevated’. The problem is that his work has really uninteresting dialogue, and generally lackluster performances. And Ouija is no exception. It gave my friend nightmares but I just thought it was sorta meh. 3/10.

Creed III - dir. Michael B. Jordan

Sports/Drama

Cannot believe how good this movie is, and how the Creed movies literally get better with each installment. What I love most about Creed 3 is the amount of empathy it has for its characters. It delves into Donnie’s trauma and survivor’s guilt, and sets him against someone who potentially could’ve had his spot had fate not intervened.

Creed 3 is, and perhaps more subtly (though not by much), really a deconstruction of institutionalized racism and brutality against Black people (specifically Black men, in this film) in the United States. The reason a teenage Dame was put in jail for almost TWENTY years was racism. Donnie benefitted from having a wealthy adoptive mom, Dame didn’t have that. The intersections of class and race are readily apparent.

So not only is this a battle against survivor’s guilt and trauma, it’s a battle between two very different kinds of masculinity, shaped by different societal forces, and the script is significantly elevated by some top-notch direction from Michael B Jordan. Jordan has come a seriously long way from Creed, where, in my opinion, his acting was at its weakest. Here, not only is Jordan’s performance an emotionally charged master class in hurt masculinity, he’s paired up with Jonathan Majors, who is fast proving himself to be one of the best actors in modern cinema. The tension and brotherly love between the two characters is thick and fraught, brought to life by their respective actors’ performances.

Beyond that, Creed 3 is able to continue Donnie’s growth into a more emotionally and psychologically mature man, capable of handling his hurt with words instead of violence. Though he of course still struggles, he is still able to communicate with his wife in a manner that I would consider way more developed than he was able to back in the first film, and reach out to Dame with empathy and kindness at the end of the movie.

One last thing I need to say is that I find a lot of these reviews weirdly dismissive and just… bad. I’m actually kind of shocked that people think the original Creed is the best one, because to me, it’s obviously the worst. Just goes to show how subjective cinema is, but I feel like if you think this movie is shallow, you’re really missing the point. This is one of the best movies in the entire Rocky franchise. 9/10.

Water Drops on Burning Rocks - dir. François Ozon

Black Comedy/Erotic Drama

Wildly uncomfortable and funny movie. Like most Ozon, it’s unsettling in the best way possible, and leaves you disturbed, speechless, and a little confused. Now, personally, I can’t testify to the ‘accuracy’ of the way this movie portrays its subject matter, but I can say that it moved me, even if I can’t exactly place why.

At its most rudimentary, the film is just beautiful. Visually stunning, with carefully curated colors that pop in every frame. So if nothing else, you will at least get an aesthetic treat out of watching this.

What I really think Water Drops is about is toxic relationships, but beyond that, people’s inability to escape from them. Extremely depressing, and extremely funny at the same time. 9/10.

Passages - dir. Ira Sachs

Drama

A movie about a bisexual guy making horrendous, selfish decisions that not only hurt those he loves but also ensure that he probably never finds any long-term happiness. This is one for the boys. 7/10.

8 Women - dir. François Ozon

Whodunit/Comedy

First Ozon movie I’ve seen where I’m like…. yeah this isn’t for me. Granted, I only got about halfway through it, so if there’s some classically weird fucked-up Ozon shit near the end, I have no idea. Nonetheless, I struggled to connect to any of the characters here. And when your film is literally an ensemble piece, that’s gonna make it hard to invest in the film, generally. 3/10.

Swimming Pool - dir. François Ozon

Erotic Thriller

Gales of wind mark the arrival of Ludivine Sagnier’s Julie, who interrupts the tranquil delirium of the curmudgeonly writer Sarah Morton (played terrifically by Charlotte Rampling). I clocked the weather change immediately, because up to that point, there was a real sense of stillness to Swimming Pool, a refusal to bend or compromise its form, much like its lead character.

When Julie first arrived, I was confident that Ozon was going for a romantic pairing between her and Sarah, but that’s not the direction this film goes in at all. Rather, similar to the ripples created in the unused swimming pool upon Julie’s arrival, it is the story of a suppressed older woman rediscovering herself, allowing the water inside of her to be disturbed, so to speak. Sarah must embrace the abstract and embrace the sensual to reignite her creative spark, which is why this film gradually seeps deeper into its own weirdness as it goes along.

Not only is this a very well-developed story, but its score is one of the best in Ozon’s filmography. 9/10.

Five Times Two - dir. François Ozon

Drama

I’m really conflicted about this movie. There are two very pointlessly cruel rape scenes that add nothing to the film that I can discern. Why am I conflicted? Because everything outside of these two scenes is brilliant, Ozon at his best, most subtle, and most profound.

Nowhere is it more evident how cynical Ozon is of heteronormative monogamy than in Fives Times Two, where the narrative choice to tell the story of Marion and Gilles’ relationship backwards immediately tells us how doomed it is from the start. The first thing we see is a divorce. The last thing we see is two bodies getting further and further into the sunset, with a BEAUTIFULLY melancholic score that only elevates the bittersweet tragedy of it all. Because, like, I just can’t be happy for these two, knowing what will inevitably happen to them and their relationship. The stains of a dying marriage are soaked with blood and tears.

You know what else is interesting about that last scene? Right before they swim out together, right before they begin their relationship, Marion mentions how she won’t swim because the undertow is too strong. What is Gilles’ response?

“It seems so peaceful.”

Commitment seems so peaceful. Until it drags you from underneath into its sad inevitability. 7/10.

Time to Leave - dir. François Ozon

Drama

Interesting on paper, but just executed too dry for me to get emotionally invested. 4/10.

Rebels of the Neon God - dir. Tsai Ming-liang

Drama/Coming-of-Age

The Neon God not only watches the city, but IS the city. It punishes those who break its ironclad laws with what it deems karmic justice. But it is no loving God, nor a kind God. Rather, the Neon God is a God of merciless drudgery, of cold hedonism and listless isolation.

The two lead characters, Ah Tze and Hsiao-Kang, occupy the city of the Neon God, but they don’t own it, or prosper within it. Ah Tze, a smalltime crook, breaks its laws, and is punished with flooding, violence, and vandalism. He believes he is above the laws of the Neon God, but he is wrong.

Hsiao-Kang is the other side of the equation, a lonely teenage boy with no goals, no friends, and no joy. The only times he smiles are when he has these manic moments of seizing bliss, like when he gets revenge on Ah Tze for breaking his dad’s car window.

Above all else is a real sense that the city is an unkind deity, a cruel god without the interests of its residents at heart. It sets rules that make people miserable, and accentuates the misery when those rules are broken. There’s no happy ending, just lonely people offering small bits of solace in each other. 9/10.

Angel - dir. François Ozon

Period Piece/Satire

For about the first half hour, I thought this was really funny. Angel is a hilariously awful person, and I just laughed at how often she just came across like a completely self-absorbed jerk. The problem is, at a certain point, I feel like this movie actually wants me to take her emotions and story seriously, which made me think that Ozon was completely unaware of the kind of story he was telling. There’s an insipid strand of melodrama permeating what is very obviously BEGGING to be a black comedy, and it leads to a weirdly confused movie that feels totally off-brand for the usually intelligent Ozon. Somehow the strangest Ozon movie yet, purely for how UN-Ozon it feels. 4/10.

Summer of 85 - dir. François Ozon

Coming-of-Age

Stopped watching halfway through because there just wasn’t anything keeping me invested. The two leads had no chemistry, the cinematography was just kinda… meh, the dialogue wasn’t nearly as strong as Ozon’s other work. This movie kinda feels like an AI’s attempt to create an Ozon movie. 3/10.

Under the Skin - dir. Jonathan Glazer

Sci-Fi/Horror

Visually, there’s some pretty awesome stuff going on in this film. Glazer really knows how to frame things to maximize how unsettling they are, and I did think the intro sequence was exceptionally creepy. Likewise, the scene where Johansson seduces the guy with the deformed face was REALLY good. Sadly, there’s like an hour and a half of movie outside of this, and none of it left any impact on me. I nearly fell asleep a couple of times at the theater. 5/10.

What Have I Done to Deserve This? - dir. Pedro Almodóvar

Black Comedy

Really funny, really dark, really irreverent look at poverty. It’s a movie that feels like some of my favorite novels. Weird and eclectic. Almodóvar captures this incredibly specific vibe that is not only hilarious but also depressing as shit. I can’t even properly explain why I dug this movie so much. I just recommend seeing it for yourself. Super excited to check out the rest of Almodóvar’s filmography eventually. 8/10.

Ricky - dir. François Ozon

Drama/Fantasy

Though it ultimately doesn’t satisfy me as much as I hoped it would, this is still a pretty solid, off-beat entry into Ozon’s filmography, more fantastical and warm-hearted than his usual cynical affair. With its cheesy musical cues, it almost feels like a piece of American independent cinema, something that would get tossed around in film festivals. 6/10.

Love Actually - dir. Richard Curtis

RomCom

Richard Curtis made one of my favorite movies ever (About Time), so I went into this one expecting something equally cheesy and lovable. Sadly, it reads more like a middle school fanfiction, with painfully overexposed cinematography and a weak script.

Beauty and the Beast - dir. Gary Trousdale, Kirk Wise

Fantasy/Musical

It’s pretty solid but I think I just hate musicals, and this is no exception. Belle is a pretty dope character though! 4/10.

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre - dir. Tobe Hooper

Slasher

Up until the end, I thought this was a pretty good slasher flick. It’s not a genre I’m really a fan of, but I thought the cinematography and acting was solid enough. And then within about a minute the film just becomes unintentionally hilarious. Spoiler warning, the ending features possibly the stupidest decision I’ve ever seen a character make in a movie. I was watching it with some friends and we were fucking dying because it was so goddamn funny. 5/10.

A Star Is Born - dir. Bradley Cooper

Music/Drama

Those first forty minutes are truly something else. When they sing Shallows together, even my cynical ass was just like… “wow.” Because it’s transcendental. It’s fucking unreal! Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga COMPLETELY carry this film on their backs. Their acting here is just ridiculous. Just fucking ridiculous. Cooper is one of the best actors of his generation, easily. Wouldn’t be surprised if I dubbed him one of my favorites. Just phenomenal.

I thought I disliked Lady Gaga because of House of Gucci but I was wrong, she’s awesome too. In a way, this is less a movie about rags to riches stardom and more so a movie about loving people who are irreparably wounded by addiction and loss.

I do wish Ally was given more time as a character to develop on her own, because the ending lacks the necessary oomf to push it over into greatness. Regardless, though–this is just phenomenal. 8/10.

Uptown Girls - dir. Boaz Yakin

Comedy

I honestly don’t know if I would’ve given this movie a shot if I didn’t know that Brittany Murphy was in it. She’s a next-level actress, and no shocker, she’s incredible here too. Her ability to balance the ditzy naivete of Molly’s character with her emotional warmth and kindness makes her not only a super easy character to get invested in, but also just very funny. Like she’s obviously having fun with the role, but she’s also playing it totally straight. She’s taking it seriously. This is a comedy, sure, but it’s a story that hinges on its characters. It’s really a coming-of-age story more than anything, which means we need to care about Molly’s growth as a person. We NEED to care about her arc, or the emotional beats just don’t work. Luckily, we do. The dialogue is funny, and Murphy’s performance is wildly charming.

However, Molly’s character is not the only one who needs to be backed by a strong, dynamic performance. Child actor Dakota Fanning (not a child anymore, of course) brings a dry wit to the stuck-up character of Ray, who would probably really annoying and unfunny in the wrong hands. She isn’t that–she’s super funny, and yeah, she’s a jerk, but we FEEL for her. At least, I did. I thought her dynamic with Molly was just fucking adorable. Really sweet, lovable stuff. They have this big-sister/little-sister dynamic that hits me right in the feels, and all the window-dressing around them is equally charming and funny, like Mu the pig, Gooey Huey, her yuppie friend Ingrid, etc. The weakest part of the movie is probably Molly’s charmless love interest/Elliott Smith wannabe Neal, but I think that was the point. I’m just glad they didn’t end up together in the end. 9/10.

Hideaway - dir. François Ozon

Drama

Solid little meditation on grief, death, and rebirth. It doesn’t overstay its welcome and it features some pretty great cinematography. I didn’t love it, but I didn’t hate it. 6/10.

Trophy Wife - dir. François Ozon

Comedy

Strangely, it feels apt to make the comparison to Wes Anderson. It’s way more stylized than any other Ozon movie I’ve seen, with its interesting framing choices, intricate set design, and dry comedy. The latter of which is a staple in Ozon’s oeuvre, but never to such a whimsical degree. Overall, I did enjoy the movie, and I would’ve rated it higher if it had committed to its own style.

Sadly, much of the movie’s charm wears off in the second half, which becomes burdened by boring melodrama and politics. I have nothing against politics in film, but I really don’t think this makes a coherent statement about feminism, or class struggle. I can’t really tell if it’s satirizing liberal feminism or idolizing it. I’m tempted to say it’s the former, but I don’t really know. And I wouldn’t have a problem with the ambiguity if it wasn’t mired in such a joyless second act, but since the movie clearly wants me to think about the politics instead of its aesthetic, that’s what I’ll do, and I came away pretty unsatisfied in that regard.

I do think that this is a fun movie, though, and a lot more entertaining than the last few Ozon films I’ve seen. 6/10.

Freddy vs Jason - dir. Ronny Yu

Slasher

Hilarious movie to sit around and roast with a bunch of friends. The whole premise is just so fucking goofy man. It’s hard for me to shit on it, but I can’t in full honesty pretend I loved this movie. If I had seen it alone I would never have watched it. 2/10.

M3GAN - dir. Gerard Johnstone

Sci-Fi/Slasher

Surprisingly a pretty fun movie. I was expecting this to be boring but it feels like a supremely cheesy Black Mirror episode. Where the movie feels flawed is in its execution of the sci-fi. I really feel the film misses out on its full potential by leaning into the slasher aspects of its story as opposed to the sci-fi. Like, it’d be way cooler if the story took a more psychological, existential approach instead of just making M3gan this apex killing machine. We’ve already got plenty of that, so I was hoping we’d get some technological horror. We SORT of did, and I enjoyed the movie (even if I was tipsy as fuuuuuck), but I still feel like there was unrealized potential. 7/10.

Killers of the Flower Moon - dir. Martin Scorsese

Drama/Historical

Easily the biggest disappointment of 2023 so far. I’ve seen 4 Scorsese movies in my life and they’ve all been excellent, so going into this, based on the trailers, I was expecting to really love this movie. I heard that it was 3 and a half hours long, but I was like, fuck it, I loved A Brighter Summer Day, I can handle this.

Nope. I could not. I nearly fell asleep a few times. Really had to force myself to keep my eyes open because there is no suspense here. At all. This film is predictable from the beginning, its characters are flat, its relationships are somehow underdeveloped, which is very funny when you consider just how much screentime there is.

The obvious emotional core of the movie was Ernest and Mollie’s relationship, but I never got a real good sense of their chemistry or love for each other, at all. How am I supposed to care about what happens if I don’t care about their relationship?

The movie is at its most interesting when we follow the Native American characters, and I really hoped that this would be the crux of the film, a story about wealthy Native Americans grappling with that wealth, or at least a story of how they got it. But the movie glosses over that completely in favor of telling a predictable story about predictable characters.

As much as I wish I could delude myself into enjoying this movie to justify the four hours of my life I wasted, I can’t. 4/10.

Strawberry Mansion - dir. Kentucker Audley, Albert Birney

Indie Sci-Fi

You have no idea how ready I was to give this movie 5 stars. Up until the halfway point, I was absolutely floored by everything Strawberry Mansion had to offer. The surrealism, the cinematography, the comedy, the soundtrack, it was as if the filmmakers had reached inside my brain and handcrafted a piece of art just for me.

But after the midpoint, things sort of fell off the wheels, and I couldn’t really justify a perfect score in my head anymore.

I don’t want to focus on that, though. I really don’t. Because I LOVE this movie. I love its weirdness and its colors and I love how its retrofuturistic aesthetic. I love the anti-capitalist message being delivered in just about the most batshit crazy way possible. It’s a human movie, it’s about our power to dream, to imagine, to find escape through our subconscious, and how corporations will pilfer even our escapist fantasies for a chance to make a buck.

Oh, and also, this movie will make you never want to eat fried chicken again. 8/10.

In the House - dir. François Ozon

Comedy/Drama

In the House is reminiscent of Ozon’s first feature (Sitcom), in that it really seems preoccupied and fixated on perfect families, and the nuclear household. Sharply satirical and meta, it’s always pulling back on the layers and artifice of its own story. There’s the intermediary Claude, who serves as Germain’s window into the “Rapha” family, but pulling back, Germain is himself in a story-cage of his own, being locked to the screen and governed by narrative forces beyond his control, much like the Rapha family is toyed with and manipulated. It’s an interesting movie, but it didn’t make me feel as much as it made me think. 7/10.

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind - dir. Hayao Miyazaki

Fantasy/Post-Apocalyptic

What I’m often endeared to in Miyazaki’s work is his uncanny ability to humanize the grotesque, to take a monster and make it beautiful. Frightening, maybe, but undeniably sympathetic. Think of the stink demon from Spirited Away, or Okkoto from Princess Mononke. These are characters that, on first glance, might appear horrifying. One of them is a smelly monster dripping muck and bile, and Okkoto is… a huge fucking boar. But obviously, if you’ve seen those movies, you know there’s far more than meets the eye to these hulking beasts.

You must know where I’m going with this. The Ohmu are EASILY my favorite part of this movie. Miyazaki plays with scale here from the very beginning, showing us first what a dead Ohm looks like, how just the shell of its eye alone requires explosives to remove. These are uncomfortably colossal arthropods, the dominant species of an Earth that is long past the age of humanity. Their stampedes (which are also fucking insane in scope) can wipe out entire civilizations.

But the Ohmu, as Miyazaki makes painfully clear, are NOT monsters. They may appear gigantic, and terrifying, but they’re really gentle giants in nature. They care for life, they care for the Earth, and their anger is never out of spite but out of response, out of a sense of hurt and responsibility.

Point is, humanity could learn a thing or two from the monsters of Miyazaki. 8/10.

Five Nights at Freddy’s - dir. Emma Tammi

Supernatural Horror

Way back in middle school, I was a pretty big fan of Five Nights at Freddy’s. My parents wouldn’t let me buy games, so I figured out a way to pirate it on my own, after seeing about a billion videos on youtube about it. And yeah, it really did have a vicegrip on my imagination as an eleven year old. Looking back on it now, FNAF is probably a precursor to the love I have for indie horror, even if the ‘horror’ aspect of FNAF is mostly tied into cheap jumpscares. It was more so the vibe of the game that I fell for, the old school, kinda analog vibes that the camera system conveyed.

So when I saw the trailer for this movie, I was reaaaaaaaaalllly skeptical. Because what it seemed like was not a faithful attempt to capture the vibe of FNAF, but a conversion of the weird indie horror of FNAF into basic corporate horror schlock. Nonetheless, I went into the film hoping to be proven wrong.

I was not proven wrong.

This fails as an adaptation of FNAF, and fails even greater at being a scary movie at all. Any sense of horror is drained by middling (and often bad) performances, a weak script, and pallid, bland cinematography. The film totally failed to capture the setting in any real way. I never felt connected to the location at all, or invested in any of the stories external to it.

Additionally, the fan service here was just hilariously bad. Like I had a hunch that there’d be some dumb meta-reference to the FNAF community, but I really didn’t expect them to actually feature a MatPat cameo, right down to his fucking catchphrase. Is this really what movies are now? A cynical attempt to prey on the nostalgia of depressed people?

I don’t believe this movie is a genuine attempt at making art. I don’t even think there was much care in making it FEEL like Five Nights at Freddy’s, which is the bare minimum. I can’t respect it, sorry. 2/10.

The New Girlfriend - dir. François Ozon

Drama

Something I find refreshing about Ozon’s oeuvre is his near chronic insistence on keeping sexuality as deliberately ambiguous as possible. Sometimes, this can result in confusing, unrelatable characters, but in the case of The New Girlfriend (and a few of his other standout films) you get something really vivid and lovely.

Trite as its beginning may be, this film picks up in intrigue right around the moment the needle drops, and the inciting incident is reached. As it turns out, Laura’s widower, David–likes to cross-dress. At first, we are given cover-ups and projections. Claire is turned on by David’s femininity, but feigns repulsion out of sheer force of habit. David’s reasons are a lot more personal than he (she) lets on, but we won’t get to uncover them until later. For now, he insists on the notion that his cross-dressing is nothing but a shallow attempt at giving his daughter a motherly figure.

Mostly, that’s what a good Ozon movie does. It takes a fascinating premise, builds on it with masks, and then slyly pulls those masks down, never quite revealing what’s underneath but trusting the audience to figure it out on their own. Here, I believe the artifice conceals two lesbians not in touch with their own sexuality until the very, very end. Virginia’s trans-ness is wholly denied up to a certain point, until she can no longer suppress her internal truth. Likewise, Claire plays the role of a traditional housewife, but loves Laura–and now, Virginia–more than she’s ever loved her husband. We can see this in her desire to make her husband more feminine, in her disdain for his cis-straight-man-isms, in her genuine joy of her time spent with Virginia.

One last thing I want to touch on is in this film’s similarities to some of Ozon’s other works, namely Under the Sand, Hideaway, and Time to Leave. These are all stories that deal heavily with death and the human response to its tragedy. The New Girlfriend operates the same way, but instead shows death’s empowerment of two lesbians, a stark contrast from the aforementioned trio of movies that more so aim to capture the madness of death and the mania of the grieving process. That’s not to say those films are inferior, but I found The New Girlfriend a lot more… soulful. If that makes sense.

Suffice it to say, this film is a real reminder of WHY I decided to binge Ozon’s filmography in the first place. 8/10.

By the Grace of God - dir. François Ozon

Stiff and by the numbers, Ozon at what I think is his least interesting movie to date. I get that it’s impossible to inject satire into a movie with this subject matter, but seriously? This is so painfully generic. The most oscar-bait movie I’ve seen from the director. I find it super funny how this is one of his highest rated movies. Personally, when I watch Ozon, I want Ozon’s style to actually come through in the movie. 5/10.

White Noise - dir. Noah Baumbach

Baumbach’s dialogue shouldn’t appeal to me as much as it does. It’s inhuman, unnatural, and just plain pretentious most of the time. But similar to a Riley Stearns movie, where the stilted, cold dialogue adds to the sense of unease I feel watching his work, the whimsical dialogue of White Noise adds to the surrealism of the story. Plus, I can’t lie, it’s just well-written. It’s just a very fun movie to watch, and the theatrical, whimsical dialogue adds to the experience. 8/10.