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A miscellany of completely unrelated thoughts...
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Renfield

This was amusing, and for what it was (Hollywood, Comedy/Horror starring Nicholas Cage) quite good.

Mindless, but the "John Wick" of the Vampire Genre. And Nicholas Cage is always amusing.

Details
Category: Film
Created: 20 August 2023

Wes Anderson - Asteroid City

His inimitable style, taken to it's logical extreme. Masterful color palette, direction, sets, stellar cast (all of Hollywood by now is begging the most trifling of cameos), clever story, witty dialogue.

5/5 stars. He's nothing profound to say, but he says it with such charm...

Details
Category: Film
Created: 14 July 2023

Indiana Jones & The Dial of Destiny

OK, I went into this with really low expectations. Really, really low. 

This was a movie seen more to escape the evening heat & humidity, and to postpone seeing "Asteroid City", which I am rather looking forward to.

Anyways, it conforms to every other film in the franchise - formulaic in the extreme, it gives the audience everything it wants. A smoking Nazi Villain (What's worse nowadays, smoking or being a Nazi?, Hell, let's give 'em both), an archeological treasure that has some hidden "magical" properties, a child with unrealized talents, a god-daughter with unrealized sentiment, bugs, snake-ish creatures, skeletons, etc, etc.

The opening scene, fantastic, a marvelously de-aged Harrison Ford, and in the stunt scenes I have to imagine a marvelously reconstructed Harrison Ford onto the stunt double.

This is impressive, this is the future. It's already here.

It recalls a few years ago when they introduced a de-aged Luke Skywalker into the Mandalorian - badly done, as it were, and computer-savvy fans were quick to redo a much better version of it - now, the CGI is indistinguishable. When Harrison Ford is long dead they'll be making Indiana Jones movies...

...back to the film. I left during the tuk-tuk chase scene in Tangiers, returned after some debating and a cigarette, the chase scene was still going on, I missed nothing. 

And so I stuck it through to the end. 

It was fine, the same schlock that I swallowed hook-line-and sinker when I was a kid, quite possibly better even, only - well, I've seen it all before, and while the quest is different the template, the characters, the film was the same. 

I need something a little more challenging - even for my "dumb-ass-movie" time. 

That said, a lot of the audience were guffawing at the jokes, and making all the right noises at the right times, it hit it's mark with it's target audience - I don't think many were disappointed. Predictable, yes, but that's what they all wanted. Predictable familiarity.

So, in the end, all in all, if you weren't familiar with Indiana Jones this probably wouldn't disappoint. The fault, I suspect, is less with the film than myself. 

Details
Category: Film
Created: 13 July 2023

Come and See

The last movie downloaded on my phone, but an absolute Masterpiece. 

A Soviet "Anti-War" film it follows a young conscript after he joins the resistance against German Occupation in Belarus.

Visually spectacular, amazing choreography, casting, acting, cinematography - it takes an entirely different view on war than most Western films - there are no heroes, only victims standing in the midst of surreal and horrifying circumstance. While I've read abundant descriptions and books that take the same tack, I've yet to see it realized as successfully as this in film. 

6/5 Stars, a "Must-See". 

Link: Wikipedia on "Come and See"

Details
Category: Film
Created: 30 June 2023
  1. Paris, Texas - Wim Wenders
  2. Garden State
  3. The Master - Paul Thomas Anderson
  4. The Booksellers (2019, Documentary)

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