Movie Night Roundup: Episode 1
I’ve started organizing a weekly movie night with my friends on Discord. I’d rather be found dead than on Letterboxd, so I wanted to compile my short thoughts about movies on my blog instead, but I forgot to do so for this first round right up until the now-approaching end of the second round. Oops!
I’m not really a guy very well-versed in talking about movies in general, so these lame little spoutings will have to do. Perhaps I do belong on a site where most people seem content doing the same… but when the devil comes knocking you should absolutely not answer.
Baby Assassins
A very fun flick with genuinely incredible fight choreography and some actual humor to boot. The terrible CGI blood effects and exaggerated mannerisms give it this air of sincerity which ties the whole thing together. Perhaps the most sympathetic movie towards zoomers that I have ever seen.
Challengers
Somehow a movie about two men and their fujoshi mutual friend is simultaneously more and less gay than you would expect, yet never quite the right amount to keep me all that interested in a sports movie. That’s just my taste, so I can’t say it’s the movie’s fault, though I do feel like it was holding back on itself for most of the runtime. Trent Reznor is a paid actor.
Heathers
Finally, a high school movie for my personal tastes and sensibilities. This is infinitely more quotable than anything dominating the popular page on Tenor, though admittedly I’m still looking for an opportunity to quote “Fuck me gently with a chainsaw” in an otherwise polite group chat. If JD was allowed access to 4chan this movie would have ended a lot differently.
Hundreds of Beavers
Genuinely the funniest movie I’ve seen in years. I was surprised at how strongly these age-old principles of comedy manage to endure, and how much I managed to get invested in its absurdist world. You really wish they’d make more of ‘em like this these days.
Shin Kamen Rider
The first tokusatsu work I ever watched (sorry). My impression of this movie is that it gives me what I always wished I could get out of Marvel capeshit. Perhaps it’s my existing penchant for absurdly exaggerated mannerisms in these hero vs. villain stories, but whatever floats your boat, right? While I don’t have a familiarity with the genre that makes me feel like I could judge where this movie stands therein, the (undeniably Covid-mandated) lack of extras lends a certain loneliness to the movie, and I’m not sure if this helps the idea that humanity at large is at stake here.
Summer Wars
Still one of my favorite animated movies. The abstract representation of OZ is filled with creativity and a visual treat, I never get enough of it. Out of any work that’s about the ‘metaverse’ and its influence on real life relationships and the world as a whole, this is still the one that I think actually resonates the most. The family drama doesn’t quite hit the same for me, but I always felt that the movie balanced the two with a surprising amount of tact.
Uma Musume: Pretty Derby - Beginning of a New Era
Unfortunately, the insane horsegirls can’t get me too invested in a sports movie either. It just ain’t for me, I’m afraid. The animation in this is absolutely absurd however, I’d almost say it’s worth watching just for that alone, a true visual spectacle. As far as horsegirls seem to go, Jungle Pocket is pretty great, I hope she wins more races or whatever else they do in Uma Musume.
Velvet Goldmine
I absolutely do not have the cultural knowledge necessary to enjoy any biopic about musicians, really. If I had to go and sit through one of them anyway, though, this certainly isn’t a bad one. The people in this movie actually talk like how gay people might in real life, which is refreshing to one whose hobby is losing chess to dogs. These are not the gay people I personally talk to, perhaps, but it’ll do until the first movie about visual novel queers comes out.