This weekend I gave myself a new treat I’m trying to do monthly - a whole day of no responsibilities except watching movies. So far it’s been a lot of fun and reminiscent of summer days past, when I had no school, no job, no worries, and could just stay inside and beat the heat inside all day long.
NEW EPISODE ALERT!
We just dropped a new episode about our top movies of the year so far. It was a fun discussion and hopefully will get you to finally watch that movie you’ve been meaning to. Listen and let me know what you think!
FILM
Highlight: Twister | Jan de Bont | 1996 | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
TV weatherman Bill Harding is trying to get his tornado-hunter wife, Jo, to sign divorce papers so he can marry his girlfriend Melissa. But Mother Nature, in the form of a series of intense storms sweeping across Oklahoma, has other plans. Soon the three have joined the team of stormchasers as they attempt to insert a revolutionary measuring device into the very heart of several extremely violent tornados.
I hadn’t watched this movie in a long time and remember really liking it, but I didn’t remember how hard it went. It belongs to a small handful of movies I’ve tagged on Letterboxd with the “Fuck It…Five Stars” tag. Is it actually a five-star movie? Probably not. But I love this goofy movie. It feels indicative of the 90s blockbuster and just captures the magic of filmmaking of that era. As I was watching I was flooded with memories of the bonus features and my love of the now-defunct ride at Universal Studios Orlando. Also, the score might now be one of my all-time favorites. It’s a certified banger of an album.
Chinatown | 1974 | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Happy 50th Anniversary!
An actually perfect movie, aside from the taint of the director. This is a masterpiece of storytelling, acting, and mood. I think a lot of the strength of this movie comes from the stunning script by Robert Towne. It’s airtight and about as perfect as you can get. Faye Dunaway, John Huston, and Jack Nicholson are breathtaking in their roles. I also loved seeing Diane Ladd and James Hong!
Deadpool | 2016 | ⭐⭐⭐
It’s been a moment since I last saw the Deadpool movies and wanted to catch up before the new one. It’s good, but I think I’ve outgrown some of the humor because it wasn’t quite as funny as I remember. It’s still fun and I appreciate what it was doing in the superhero movie landscape. Also, the villain is so bland.…
Thelma | 2024 | ⭐⭐⭐⭐½
This was an absolute delight. A comedic homage to the action movie, specifically Mission: Impossible series, Thelma has June Squibb as a grandmother who falls victim to a scam call and sends $10k to the scammers. It then becomes an adventure as she tries to get the money back but also prove her independence as an elderly woman. It’s very emotional and lovely and best of all, really funny. I can’t recommend it enough.
Deadpool 2 | 2018 | ⭐⭐⭐½
This has a better story and characters than the first one, which was an issue there. I loved the addition of Zazie Beats as Domino and the inclusion of the Juggernaut, a favorite of mine. The jokes still lean a little too 13-year-old edge lord for me now, but they are bad.
Fancy Dance | 2023 | ⭐⭐⭐½
This was a potential pick for an Agree to Disagree episode but we both ended up liking it enough. This drama stars Lilly Gladstone, who is doing a good job here, but the script is not quite up to her skill level.
Twisters | 2024 | ⭐⭐⭐⭐
I was worried this was going to be slop, but it was fun as hell! Everyone knew what they were making - except maybe Anthony Ramos. I feel bad for him because his whole subplot was not that good, and also unnecessary. However, Daisy Edgar-Jones and Glen Powell more than makeup for that. I also wish the score and needle drops were a little better, they both feel too generic. Overall though, I think was a huge success.
SCAM Girls Movie Club
The Red White & Blue Scare
Invasion, U.S.A. | 1952 | ½
Multiple times in this movie there are Capcut level edits of nuclear bombs dropping on U.S. cities and it was never not the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. A family is also drowned in the water of a collapsed damn and to show that they cut to the dad’s hat and then the daughter’s stuffed animal and it was also so funny. It’s horrifying knowing that the actual wart footage captured was used for this hokey propaganda trash.
The Whip Hand | 1951 | ⭐⭐⭐
Wait…this was actually kind of good? I think it’s begging for a remake. Except instead of Communist members being the enemy, we get a Cthulu-level monstrosity. I liked the acting and the filmmaking was more than competent.
TV
In Progress
House of the Dragon, Season 2 - Episodes 5, 6
Invincible, Season 2 - Episodes 2, 3
Books
Highlight: Dungeon Crawler Carl | Matt Dinniman ⭐⭐⭐
You know what’s worse than breaking up with your girlfriend? Being stuck with her prize-winning show cat. And you know what’s worse than that? An alien invasion, the destruction of all man-made structures on Earth, and the systematic exploitation of all the survivors for a sadistic intergalactic game show. That’s what.
Join Coast Guard vet Carl and his ex-girlfriend’s cat, Princess Donut, as they try to survive the end of the world—or just get to the next level—in a video game–like, trap-filled fantasy dungeon. A dungeon that’s actually the set of a reality television show with countless viewers across the galaxy. Exploding goblins. Magical potions. Deadly, drug-dealing llamas. This ain’t your ordinary game show.
An attorney I work with recommended this, so I got the audiobook through the library and tore through it at work. It was fine. It’s a newer genre that is being called lit-rpg. It follows the logic of TTRPGs and CRPGs. The humor reminds me of Deadpool in that it’s very crass and targeted towards a younger audience. I probably won’t continue this series, but it was fun enough to listen to. I will be surprised if a TV show adaptation doesn’t happen sooner or later.
In Progress
Murtagh | Christopher Paolini — 32%
The Weathered Tome Society
A Prayer for the Crown Shy | Becky Chambers — 39%
Games
Highlight: Dante’s Inferno | PS3 | Visceral Games ⭐⭐⭐½
In Dante's Inferno, players assume the role of Dante as he travels on an epic descent through Dante Alighieri's nine circles of Hell -- limbo, lust, gluttony, greed, anger, heresy, violence, fraud and treachery.
I played this in high school and remember liking it, but mostly being so oddly grossed out by it that I couldn’t stop thinking about it. You play through the circles of hell as Dante. As an example of the weirdness of the game, I’ll describe the lust level: You play up a veiny phallic tower, killing demons who use their genitals to attack you, all while Cleopatra throws babies at you from her hollow breasts. It’s insane. The gameplay is fun enough but gets very easy and repetitive by the end. It’s a fun action game but is so derivative of other games that I don’t think I could easily recommend it. I mostly enjoyed it for the nostalgia bomb it dropped.
In Progress
Persona 4 Golden | PS Vita | Atlus
Elden Ring: The Shadow of the Erdtree | PS5 | FromSoftware
YouTube
Surf’s Up seems to be a forgotten animation gem from the 2000s. I loved it it when it came out, I listened to the soundtrack and score so much. This was a recommended video from a podcast I like and it was very good. Short and sweet, it speaks to why I still love this movie so many years later.
Thanks for reading, I appreciate it!
Til next time!
— Colton