I’ll give him visual style points. The first one had some great cinematography, costumes and set design. The new one seems to follow based on trailer and clips. It is just everywhere else he fails miserably.
It did look like it cost $200m.
But it didnt have any real style.
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FFC doing a Q&A on twitter
https://x.com/megalopolismov/status/1842258213850497188
Also got himself a Letterboxd account (so he could give Megalopolis 5 stars)
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I think you got the anti-communist thing reversed. If I remember correctly, it was supposed to be a commentary about the absurdity of McCarthyism.
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Okay, I could see that too. Tough to always tell what the impulses of the time were since the TV and film industry has its periods of greater and lesser embrace of government propaganda.
It looks like the creatives behind it denied any intentional political allegory, so if it was one then the intent was at least never admitted. Just as well.
They couldn’t admit that at the height of McCarthyism for obvious reasons and probably wanted to Nolan it later. It had very red panic themes in it, but was playing it in an interesting way. This kind of hidden theme happened sometimes in this era because it was such a scary time for creatives.
Update: it’s way better than I expected. Obviously it was made quickly on a made-for-TV budget, but John Carpenter doesn’t need a lot of money to pull of some great shots. Two weeks after finishing this, Carpenter started filming Halloween two weeks after finishing this, the man was cooking.
Yup.
I spent years checking the back of people’s necks for signs they’d been infected.
Audrey Fox for Looper said: “Even fans of Joker are unlikely to find much to redeem this chaotic, profoundly stupid mess.”
Kevin Maher for The Times called the film “messy, lifeless, derivative and exactly what you’d expect from a film that simply doesn’t want, or need, to exist”.
LMAO lol
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My Old Ass (2024)
I loved this. It’s a quiet film about reflection on the important things in life. Great performances all around. It has a subtly I relish in movies that is too often missing.
Made me tear up and few times and grin ear to ear at others.
A true gem. Skip joker and watch this. You are 100% guaranteed to love this much more.
Grade: A-
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It’s Muskoka Ontario Canada.
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An American Werewolf in London (1981)
This was a good one. Nice setting of the tone early, followed by a story that kept me off-balance and interested the whole way. Don’t think I’d actually seen David Naughton act before, but he worked really well as the lead in this. I thought the movie straddled the line between comedy and horror effectively, and where there were a few lulls in the action, the major set pieces absolutely worked and I liked the ending quite a bit. This is available a bunch of places: Tubi and Freevee for ad-supported, also on Prime and Criterion ad-free.
3.5/5
Poltergeist (1982)
Hot damn, I was not prepared for how much I was going to like this. Always having known very little about the film, I think I was expecting a more basic movie with cheap jump-scares and such, and it was clearly a lot more than that. Even as I acclimated to new expectations, I really enjoyed the ride the whole way. The major house sequence involving the medium was fantastic. And then the movie wrong-foots me with a significant tonal shift right after I thought we were winding down. I was thoroughly impressed with all the craft on display here, as well as how good all of the special effects still looked 42 years later. This is one I’ll come back to. It’s on Max.
4/5
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Oh yeah, Poltergeist is the shit. Thats the way to do a gore tame horror movie
I seriously can’t believe that the movie actually followed through with having the clown grab the kid after it teased like we were winding down. I felt so lied to after it lulled me into believing that it basically wasn’t even a jump-scare movie. I loved that whole last-gasp sequence though.
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Rounded out your review
Just realized My Old Ass is the second film from the writer director of The Fallout which was a great post school shooting film a couple years ago staring Jenna Ortega. I loved that film. If you have not seen it I can’t recommend it highly enough also.
This is quite a first two filmography. Can’t wait for her third film.
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Oooh, now you have to watch the 1997 “sequel” An American Werewolf in Paris, featuring Tom Everett Scott as one of three American action-sports adventurers doing stunts around Europe. When they arrive at The Eiffel Tower intending to bungee-jump off it they run into a distraught Julie Delpy and are drawn into a web of lycanthropy.
As always with my reviews and recommendations, consider the source.
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I am aware of this movie’s existence because I was rooting for Tom Everett Scott in the aftermath of That Thing You Do, and: no.
But it is good to hear that it’s cinematic canon that every American who travels to France will have a chance run-in with Julie Delpy.
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