Yojimbo (1968)
This was pretty great. I hadn’t made this a priority, because I saw the Clint Eastwood western remake (A Fistful of Dollars) first and found it underwhelming, but this Kurosawa original really pops.
The more I watch these Kurosawa collaborations with his go-to star, Toshiro Mifune, the more I think it must have been a fluke that Seven Samurai didn’t do a lot for me. Need to rewatch it.
I give Yojimbo a 4/5.
It’s been years since I’ve seen them, but from what I recall Seven Samurai is polar opposite from Yojimbo as far as samurai movies goes. Seven Samurai has the focus of samurai being on the ethos and the death of the samurai ideals, while the fighting serves as the backdrop.
Yojimbo very much has violence and the fighting at the forefront.
They’re both incredibly good and extremely enjoyable imo. If you want a more modern equivalent I recommend 13 Assassins (focused on the fighting) and Twilight Samurai (focused on the way of life).
Samurai movies aren’t high up my list of subgenres, but some do work for me. The Tale of Zatoichi was a good one. Lady Snowblood worked less for me, but it’s clear that movie heavily influenced Tarantino (particularly in Kill Bill - that movie borrows heavily from that Lady Snowblood - also somewhat in Django Unchained).
Have you seen Blue Eye Samurai yet?
I watched a couple of episodes of it. It was solid. Didn’t hook me and I fell off even though the show could have easily been good. I mostly just don’t glom onto TV series right now since they’re the greater time investment and I’d rather spend my time with movies.
In a not-so-distant future where parenthood is strictly controlled, a couple’s mysterious seven-day assessment for the right to have a child unravels into a nightmare, forcing them to question the very foundations of society.
I’m not going to lie to you. This is a fucked up movie. It’s not gross or violent. There’s no body horror or anything. It’s just that things happen and well.
Anyway, I really enjoyed it and would recommend it to most people.
It’s on Hulu, Disney+, and Hooplah.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/08/27/ne-zha-2-box-office-chinese-mythology/
Others blasted the film’s wild mood swings: “Ne Zha 2” shifts with little notice from intense action to high melodrama to body horror to, well, poop humor. As Robbie Collin, the Telegraph’s chief film critic, says in his one-star review, “Its plot comes from a fantastical Ming Dynasty novel that’s apparently roughly equivalent to Britain’s King Arthur legends. I can’t say I’ve personally read it, though I’d be interested to hear from scholars if the source text features quite as many incidents of a pig loudly flatulating in a blind man’s face (two), supporting characters unwittingly drinking Ne Zha’s urine (three), or Ne Zha beating up a tribe of marmots after vomiting in their soup (once, though frankly once is enough).”
LOL
Not sure if anyone else has, but Ive been waiting for Your Name to come out from behind a paywall for a while. It drops on HBO Max on Sep1
Even as someone who regards most anime as a tough hang, I did think Your Name was quite good. Would watch again.
This movie is so bad that I turned off the Filmcast episode discussing it. It just sounded awful and even the discussion was not enjoyable.
I just ran this one back myself. I come away amazed that Elliott Gould didn’t get a longer moment as a star. The balls it takes to take hold of a part previously played by Humphrey Bogart to strong acclaim and to own it this hard…man. Few people have ever been as cool in any movie as Gould is in this one.
Am I doing this right?
At the core of K Pop Demon Hunters is the a metaphor about the failure of South Korea to accept bi racial Koreans post war.
Not quite distilled enough.
At its core, KPop Demon Hunters is about how many South Koreans still prefer exclusion to inclusion.
In
The Wizard of Oz makes its groundbreaking debut at Las Vegas’ Sphere on Thursday night, and just before showtime, James Dolan is dropping quite the easter egg.
The Sphere Entertainment Co. executive chairman and CEO took part in a walkthrough of the experience with select press — alongside Sphere president and chief operating officer Jennifer Koester and visual effects specialist Ben Grossmann — and revealed that there is one specific A.I.-assisted change to keep an eye out for.
“I won’t tell you where, it’s only for like two seconds,” as he asked reporters if they were familiar with Warner Bros. Discovery head David Zaslav. After an affirmative, he said, “[They] replaced the faces of two very short, two-second characters in the movie with mine and David. I challenge you to find it.”
Thunderbolts
Surprisingly quite good!! I don’t like Sentry as a character though.
Final Destination: Bloodlines
It’s certainly the best made of any FD movie, but does that mean it’s the best?
If only they allowed themselves to tell 90% fewer attempted jokes.
I swear RDJ being funny as Tony Stark is something we’re STILL being punished for.
