Category: Reviews of Movies

Captain America: The First Avenger: Directed by Joe Johnston. With Chris Evans, Hugo Weaving, Samuel L. Jackson, Hayley Atwell. Steve Rogers, a rejected military soldier, transforms into Captain America after taking a dose of a “Super-Soldier serum”. But being Captain America comes at a price as he attempts to take down a warmonger and a terrorist organization. My wife has demanded that we do a full MCU rewatch, sans television shows, so here we are, sorta at the beginning. Turns out that the order we’re watching them in is a “in universe” chronology. The First Avenger is still by far...

Dogma: Directed by Kevin Smith. With Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Linda Fiorentino, Bud Cort. An abortion clinic worker with a special heritage is called upon to save the existence of humanity from being negated by two renegade angels trying to exploit a loop-hole and reenter Heaven. Finally out on physical media again! It’s still one of Kevin Smith’s more solid films from a narrative perspective and the cast is just absolutely loaded with great actors giving great performances. Buy On Amazon!

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues: Directed by Adam McKay. With Will Ferrell, Christina Applegate, Paul Rudd, Steve Carell. With the 1970s behind him, Ron Burgundy, San Diego’s former top-rated newsreader, returns to take New York City’s first twenty-four-hour news channel by storm. Not as great as the first movie and hasn’t aged very well, but as a fan of the character and of the actors involved I still enjoy 60% of the time every time. Buy On Amazon!

Quasi: Directed by Kevin Heffernan. With Brian Cox, Steve Lemme, Jay Chandrasekhar, Kevin Heffernan. Follow a hapless hunchback who yearns for love… The team that brought us all the Broken Lizard movies is back, but this time they’ve brought some of their friends from the TV shows they’ve been on lately. This is a goofy, low budget, low brow, low effort film with a decidedly specific audience that I happen to comfortably self identify as. I enjoyed everything about it and would suggest it to anyone that has enjoyed Broken Lizard’s past projects. Buy On Amazon!

Former London constable Nicholas Angel finds it difficult to adapt to his new assignment in the sleepy British village of Sandford. Not only does he miss the excitement of the big city, but he also has a well-meaning oaf for a partner. However, when a series of grisly accidents rocks Sandford, Angel smells something rotten in the idyllic village. I discovered a whole box of hd-dvds and blurays that I had forgotten I owned, so I’m going back through them. This is a great example of the quality of the films in that forgotten archive, but I had forgotten how...

Notting Hill: Directed by Roger Michell. With Hugh Grant, Julia Roberts, Richard McCabe, Rhys Ifans. A set of circumstances makes Anna Scott, a famous actress, fall in love with William Thacker, owner of a bookstore in Notting Hill. But the paparazzi’s fascination with her complicates their bond. A lovely romantic comedy that I’ve always enjoyed, so I decided to show it to my wife who declared it to be one of the most boring movies she’s ever seen. oopsy daisy! Buy On Amazon!

Batman and Harley Quinn: Directed by Sam Liu. With Kevin Conroy, Melissa Rauch, Paget Brewster, Loren Lester. Batman and Nightwing are forced to team with the Joker’s sometimes-girlfriend Harley Quinn to stop a global threat brought about by Poison Ivy and Jason Woodrue, the Floronic Man. I watched this while putting together a LEGO Batmobile, I’ve seen it before and had a low opinion of it, none of the main characters are the versions that I prefer and none of them act the way that I like the characters to act. Having seen the recent DC output though, it’s a...

Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero: Directed by Boyd Kirkland. With Kevin Conroy, Michael Ansara, Loren Lester, Efrem Zimbalist Jr.. When Mr. Freeze, desperate to save his dying wife, kidnaps Barbara Gordon (Batgirl) as an involuntary organ donor, Batman and Robin must find her before the operation can begin. I got the HD version of this film back when I bought the complete Animated boxset a few years ago and am just now getting around to watching it and only watching it because I had an Animated Series LEGO batmobile. Mind you, I’ve seen this one a few times in the...

Howl’s Moving Castle: Directed by Hayao Miyazaki. With Chieko Baishô, Takuya Kimura, Tatsuya Gashûin, Akihiro Miwa. When an unconfident young woman is cursed with an old body by a spiteful witch, her only chance of breaking the spell lies with a self-indulgent yet insecure young wizard and his companions in his legged, walking castle. Such a dark but ultimately enjoyable film. Buy On Amazon!

Being Eddie: Directed by Angus Wall. With Eddie Murphy, Dave Chappelle, Jerry Seinfeld, Charlie Murphy. Follows a comprehensive look at Eddie Murphy’s life and career. Much more shallow than I thought it was going to be, but it does include something akin to a tour of his castle mansion that he’s been hiding in for the last 20 years. They do not go into any of his more racy or controversial content, this was obviously one of Netflix’s many documentaries done for political reasons and not for an honest look at a subject. Buy On Amazon!

Honey Don’t!: Directed by Ethan Coen. With Margaret Qualley, Aubrey Plaza, Chris Evans, Lera Abova. A small-town private investigator delves into a series of strange deaths tied to a mysterious church. One of those rare movies in which I love everything about it but don’t like the final product. I think it’s worth checking out if you like any of the actors or if you’re into pulp detective noir stories. Buy On Amazon!

Frankenstein: Directed by Guillermo del Toro. With Oscar Isaac, Jacob Elordi, Christoph Waltz, Mia Goth. Dr. Victor Frankenstein, a brilliant but egotistical scientist, brings a creature to life in a monstrous experiment that ultimately leads to the undoing of both the creator and his tragic creation. This is the best adaptation of the source novel that I’ve ever seen. Buy On Amazon!

The Thursday Murder Club: Directed by Chris Columbus. With Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, Ben Kingsley, Celia Imrie. Four irrepressible retirees spend their time solving cold case murders for fun, but their casual sleuthing takes a thrilling turn when they find themselves with a real whodunit on their hands. A fantastic story with some of the best actors in the business. Buy On Amazon!

Wake Up Dead Man: Directed by Rian Johnson. With Daniel Craig, Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin. Detective Benoit Blanc teams up with an earnest young priest to investigate a perfectly impossible crime at a small-town church with a dark history. Not as goofy as the second movie, but just as mediocre.  My wife enjoyed it though! Buy On Amazon!

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy: Directed by Adam McKay. With Will Ferrell, Christina Applegate, Steve Carell, Paul Rudd. In the 1970s, an anchorman’s stint as San Diego’s top-rated newsreader is challenged when an ambitious newswoman becomes his co-anchor. I got to view the unrated version of the film, which honestly doesn’t work as well as the theatrical version. Buy On Amazon!

Greenland: Directed by Ric Roman Waugh. With Gerard Butler, Morena Baccarin, Roger Dale Floyd, Scott Glenn. To save his family from a catastrophic end of times, a man embarks on a risky quest to locate the last hope for salvation and witness the worst of mankind in the battle for survival. There’s going to be a sequel, which my wife has told me that she will not be watching because of how terrible people are to each other in this first film. I’m happy to go by myself, but I disagree with her assessment of the film, as this is...

Avatar: Fire and Ash: Directed by James Cameron. With Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang. Jake and Neytiri’s family grapples with grief after Neteyam’s death, encountering a new, aggressive Na’vi tribe, the Ash People, who are led by the fiery Varang, as the conflict on Pandora escalates and a new moral focus emerges. The next entry in the Avatar television series that’s hilariously being shown in theaters, this time we get the same exact story from the second one, but this time with some really weird commentary on past American wars and some very tiny tiny world building....

Kumail Nanjiani: Night Thoughts: Directed by Bill Benz. With Kumail Nanjiani. After nearly a decade away, Kumail Nanjiani returns to Chicago, where he got his start in standup, in a special that tackles anxiety, the perils of buying drugs pre-legalization, and cat medication. A hilarious standup session with a mega movie star who decided to do stand up one day. This was a reference to a joke he made in this session. You see it’s funny because he was a stand up comedian before he was a big movie star and got all buff and muscled up. Worth your time...

The Cat Returns: Directed by Hiroyuki Morita. With Chizuru Ikewaki, Yoshihiko Hakamada, Aki Maeda, Takayuki Yamada. After helping a cat, a seventeen-year-old girl finds herself involuntarily engaged to a cat Prince in a magical world where her only hope of freedom lies with a dapper cat statuette come to life. Studio Ghibli released this back in 2002 and it hasn’t aged at all! The story is a fun and absolutely bonkers adventure that involves transdimensional travels to a cat kingdom and the journey a young woman goes through to find maturity. I’m very happy to have started this journey of...

The Muppet Christmas Carol: Directed by Brian Henson. With Michael Caine, Dave Goelz, Steve Whitmire, Jerry Nelson. The Muppets put their spin on the tale of an elder, Christmas-hating miser who is visited by spirits who foretell his future and share secrets from his past and present, which helps change his view on life. For your enjoyment: Buy On Amazon!

Toy Story: Directed by John Lasseter. With Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Don Rickles, Jim Varney. A cowboy doll is profoundly jealous when a new spaceman action figure supplants him as the top toy in a boy’s bedroom. When circumstances separate them from their owner, the duo have to put aside their differences to return to him. Every year the animation in this film looks more and more rough, but the story and soundtrack still hit just as deeply. Buy On Amazon!

Elio: Directed by Adrian Molina, Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi. With Yonas Kibreab, Zoe Saldaña, Remy Edgerly, Brandon Moon. Elio, a space fanatic with an active imagination, finds himself on a cosmic misadventure where he must form new bonds with alien lifeforms, navigate a crisis of intergalactic proportions and somehow discover who he is truly meant to be. The marketing that came my way for this film really made it feel like a generic movie about a kid going on a wacky space adventure, and while it’s true that’s a thing that happens in the film, much like other Pixar films,...

The Time Machine: Directed by Simon Wells. With Guy Pearce, Yancey Arias, Mark Addy, Phyllida Law. Hoping to alter the events of the past, a 19th century inventor instead travels 800,000 years into the future, where he finds humankind divided into two warring races. I feel victim to the TikTok algo again and this movie popped up enough times that I had to check it out…again. I know I saw it when it was released back in 2002, but I had forgotten how tightly packed this 90 minute long film is and how well it works. It has an unfortunate...

My Cousin Vinny: Directed by Jonathan Lynn. With Joe Pesci, Marisa Tomei, Ralph Macchio, Mitchell Whitfield. Two New Yorkers accused of murder in rural Alabama while on their way back to college call in the help of one of their cousins, a loudmouth lawyer with no trial experience. What a lovely turn of a script. Buy On Amazon!

The Running Man: Directed by Edgar Wright. With Glen Powell, Alyssa Benn, Sienna Benn, David Zayas. A man joins a game show in which contestants, allowed to go anywhere in the world, are pursued by “hunters” hired to kill them. A great reimagining of the story of a national show full of bloodlust, violence, and gratuitous nudity of Glen Powell. The plot itself gets pretty bad once the third act hits and it vaporized my suspension of disbelief when everyone kept assuming that the corporation that has never kept its word was going to keep its word when it made...

Wifelike: Directed by James Bird. With Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Elena Kampouris, Doron Bell, Agam Darshi. When artificial human Meredith is assigned as a companion to grieving widower William, she is designed to behave like his late wife. But in the fight to end AI exploitation, an organization attempts to sabotage her programming. This feels like an HBO movie, with near porn levels of nudity in the first act with an amazingly beautiful cast, which tapers off and refocuses into a story that has some fun elements that make the entire thing pretty recommendable. The robots’ acting is goofy as all...

Wing Commander: Directed by Chris Roberts. With Freddie Prinze Jr., Saffron Burrows, Matthew Lillard, Tchéky Karyo. Blair, a fighter pilot, joins an interstellar war to fight the evil Kilrathi who are trying to destroy the universe. Oh sure, I’ve seen this before, at least a dozen times according to my memories, but have I ever seen it in 2025? Yes, I have. Buy On Amazon!

Predator: Badlands: Directed by Dan Trachtenberg. With Reuben de Jong, Cameron Brown, Elle Fanning, Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi. A young Predator outcast from his clan finds an unlikely ally on his journey in search of the ultimate adversary. I’ve very happy with the direction that the Alien/Predator franchise(s?) are going and Predator: Badlands just re-enforces that opinion. There’re a very limited cast here, I think we see only maybe 4 or 5 actors in the entire film, but the surprisingly (sorta spoiler) thing is that there isn’t a single human in the whole film. All we see are Predators, Human Synths, and...

Spirited Away: Directed by Hayao Miyazaki. With Rumi Hiiragi, Miyu Irino, Mari Natsuki, Takashi Naitô. During her family’s move to the suburbs, a sullen 10-year-old girl wanders into a world ruled by gods, witches and spirits, and where humans are changed into beasts. Such a fantastic and fun story of a girl moving to the country and losing her parents to their own poor decisions. The music is of particular appeal to me, there were a few moments it had my full attention. Buy On Amazon!

Only Yesterday: Directed by Isao Takahata. With Miki Imai, Toshirô Yanagiba, Yoko Honna, Michie Terada. A twenty-seven-year-old office worker travels to the countryside while reminiscing about her childhood in Tokyo. As a retrospective of a life, this is a good one, if somewhat hindered by the fact that the lady is only 27 years old and hasn’t really lived her complete life yet. This is best thought of as “what was my life up to now and where will I go now that I know where I’ve been”, but boy I was disappointed that they left so many dangling threads...

The Fantastic Four: First Steps: Directed by Matt Shakman. With Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Joseph Quinn. Forced to balance their roles as heroes with the strength of their family bond, the Fantastic Four must defend Earth from a ravenous space god called Galactus and his enigmatic herald, the Silver Surfer. Now out on 4k/hdr disk, this film still feels like it was written for people having trouble with fertility who find themselves gifted with the blessing of a child, just for that blessing to be threatened by outside horrors. I haven’t experienced the second half of that, but...

A Walk in the Woods: Directed by Ken Kwapis. With Robert Redford, Nick Nolte, Emma Thompson, Mary Steenburgen. After spending two decades in England, Bill Bryson (Robert Redford) returns to the U.S., where he decides the best way to connect with his homeland is to hike the Appalachian Trail with one of his oldest friends, Stephen Katz (Nick Nolte). It’s a sad movie with some moments of levity, but it still made me sad to watch. Time comes for us all and we need to use it as best we can. Buy On Amazon!

Jurassic World: Rebirth: Directed by Gareth Edwards. With Scarlett Johansson, Mahershala Ali, Jonathan Bailey, Rupert Friend. Five years post-Jurassic World: Dominion (2022), an expedition braves isolated equatorial regions to extract DNA from three massive prehistoric creatures for a groundbreaking medical breakthrough. Hey look, it’s another Jurassic World movie! It’s like the Jurassic Park films, but not restricted to just a single island, now it’s the entire planet that’s being eaten by genetically altered monsters that humanity barely understands. The story is familiar, the action is familiar, the dinosaurs are familiar, and it all works as well as it did the...

Tron: Legacy: Directed by Joseph Kosinski. With Jeff Bridges, Garrett Hedlund, Olivia Wilde, Bruce Boxleitner. The son of a computer programmer goes looking for his father and ends up inside the digital world that his father designed. He meets his father’s corrupted creation and a unique ally who was born inside the digital world. It’s finally out on 4k/hdr and it’s just a good as I was hoping. That soundtrack is still one of the most emotive soundtracks that I’ve ever heard and the story still makes me cry like a baby. Buy On Amazon!

Tron: Directed by Steven Lisberger. With Jeff Bridges, Bruce Boxleitner, David Warner, Cindy Morgan. A computer hacker is abducted into a digital world and forced to participate in gladiatorial games where his only chance of escape is with the help of a heroic security program. I did this out of order, watching Tron: Ares first, then watching the first two films, but my house was a complete mess and I couldn’t find the 4k disks I just bought, but here we are! I found them! The first movie is simplistic, stylistic, and works on every level for me. I loved...

Tron: Ares: Directed by Joachim Rønning. With Jared Leto, Greta Lee, Jeff Bridges, Evan Peters. A highly sophisticated Program, Ares, is sent from the digital world into the real world on a dangerous mission. As good as we’re going to get, this is by no means a bad film, but it barely holds a candle to the prior movie or even Uprising, the often unknown television series that lasted two seasons on Disney XD. The music didn’t really capture me the same way Legacy did and the story mostly took place IRL, which is just silly when you have the...

The Muppets’ Wizard of Oz: Directed by Kirk R. Thatcher. With Ashanti, Jeffrey Tambor, Quentin Tarantino, David Alan Grier. This version of The Wizard of Oz is played by the Muppets. A remake of the 1939 film. I had no idea this was even a thing until I saw it come across a movies sale page. I do miss having Muppet adaptations of these classic stories and while this one starts off in a bumpy way that hasn’t aged very well, once they got to the Land of Oz the Muppets were as good as I’ve ever seen them. The...

Long Distance: Directed by Josh Gordon, Will Speck. With Anthony Ramos, Naomi Scott, Kristofer Hivju, Zachary Quinto. It follows an asteroid miner who, after crash-landing on an alien planet, must make his way across the harsh terrain, running out of oxygen, hunted by strange creatures, to the only other survivor. Other than some tik toks, I completely missed the marketing for “Long Distance”, which is a damned shame, this is a great movie! Anthony Ramos does great in a nearly single character story, there’s only one other face we see until the last 20 minutes of the film, and it...

Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult: Directed by Peter Segal. With Leslie Nielsen, Priscilla Presley, George Kennedy, O.J. Simpson. Frank Drebin comes out of retirement to help Police Squad infiltrate a gang of terrorists planning to detonate a bomb at the Academy Awards. The third movie in a series of extremely funny movies that never once overstayed their welcome. There’s a dance scene that I enjoyed. Buy On Amazon!

Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves: Directed by John Francis Daley, Jonathan Goldstein. With Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Regé-Jean Page, Justice Smith. A charming thief and a band of unlikely adventurers embark on an epic quest to retrieve a lost relic, but things go dangerously awry when they run afoul of the wrong people. I watched this again, but this time it was with my mother in law, so I got to explain a few of the jokes, she’s not aware of most of the D&D stuff. I found it comforting that she didn’t really need that explanation though, as...

The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear: Directed by David Zucker. With Leslie Nielsen, Priscilla Presley, George Kennedy, O.J. Simpson. Lieutenant Frank Drebin discovers that his ex-girlfriend’s new beau is involved in a plot to kidnap a scientist who advocates solar energy. So enjoyable, much funny. Buy On Amazon!

Johnny Eager: Directed by Mervyn LeRoy. With Robert Taylor, Lana Turner, Edward Arnold, Van Heflin. The step-daughter of a district attorney falls in love with a gangster on parole who her father originally imprisoned. They’re definitely dynamite in this story of a bad boy going to the races and getting even worse with an innocent young woman by his side. Glenda Farrell isn’t the main squeeze, much to my chagrin, but it was great to see her in the limited time she had on screen. The story of course is great with some really goofy but enjoyable twists and turns...

The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!: Directed by David Zucker. With Leslie Nielsen, Priscilla Presley, Ricardo Montalban, George Kennedy. Incompetent police Detective Frank Drebin must foil an attempt to assassinate Queen Elizabeth II. I watched all three of these in preparation for a date with my wife at the movies to see the most recent entry, it was in the theaters! We ended up falling asleep and missing the new one, but this first one was great and I had forgotten just how great it was. Buy On Amazon!

Ballerina: Directed by Len Wiseman. With Ana de Armas, Keanu Reeves, Ian McShane, Anjelica Huston. An assassin trained in the traditions of the Ruska Roma organization sets out to seek revenge after her father’s death. While the style of the movie fits pretty well into the existing John Wick films, I think they leaned a little too hard on John Wick themself to tell this story. I was still pretty happy with the end result! Buy On Amazon!

Civil War: Directed by Alex Garland. With Nick Offerman, Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, Jefferson White. In a dystopian future, four journalists travel across the United States during a nation-wide conflict. While trying to survive, they aim to reach the White House to interview the president before he is overthrown. Now that I own this on disk I can rewatch that final scene as often as I want. Buy On Amazon!

Heat Lightning: Directed by Mervyn LeRoy. With Aline MacMahon, Ann Dvorak, Preston Foster, Lyle Talbot. Two killers stop at Olga’s gas station alongside a California highway. A funny yet mature glimpse into the lives of multiple intersecting groups of people in a tiny rest stop in the middle of nowhere, set against the backdrop of a distant storm. It’s a great story with some fun interactions among people that aren’t all exactly as they present themselves. This was on my radar because of the amazing Glenda Farrell, who plays a rich sister that flaunts her riches and body a little...

Thunderbolts*: Directed by Jake Schreier. With Florence Pugh, Sebastian Stan, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Lewis Pullman. After finding themselves ensnared in a death trap, an unconventional team of antiheroes must go on a dangerous mission that will force them to confront the darkest corners of their pasts. Watching this at home means that I can re-view some of my favorite scenes over and over again, and boy howdy does this movie have a lot of them. There’s a ton of backstory for every character in the “Thunderbolts” team, with two tv shows and 3-4 movies as required viewing if you want to...

Outlander: Directed by Howard McCain. With Jim Caviezel, Sophia Myles, Jack Huston, John Hurt. During the reign of the Vikings, Kainan, a man from a far-off world, crash lands on Earth, bringing with him an alien predator known as the Moorwen. Though both man and monster are seeking revenge for violence committed against them, Kainan leads the alliance to kill the Moorwen by fusing his advanced technology with the Viking’s Iron Age weaponry. I think I watched this all the way back when it originally came out in 2008, I remembered a couple of the big set pieces, but I...

Heads of State: Directed by Ilya Naishuller. With Idris Elba, John Cena, Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Paddy Considine. When the U.K. Prime Minister and U.S. President become the targets of a foreign adversary, they’re forced to rely on one another to thwart a global conspiracy. Much more fun than I thought it was going to be, John Cena and Idris Elba are an odd pairing, but it works in every regard I care about. Buy On Amazon!

KPop Demon Hunters: Directed by Chris Appelhans, Maggie Kang. With Arden Cho, May Hong, Ji-young Yoo, Ahn Hyo-seop. A world-renowned K-Pop girl group balance their lives in the spotlight with their secret identities as demon hunters. I’ve heard great things about this movie and everything I heard turned out to be true. The character designs are inventive, the songs are catchy, and the demons were indeed hunted. Buy On Amazon!