What started out as a personal challenge to watch more movies somehow turned into my 18 page return to writing about film. This is a much more casual return than I expected, but I was psyching myself out about it and this came about naturally. Admittedly, I severely underestimated how busy my work schedule would be and now I’m a month late with this! It’s also way longer than I thought it would be— Substack is telling me this will take 34 minutes to read, and I have no excuses for that. I promise the next thing I publish will be no longer than an episode of a network sitcom (without ads).
(Spoilers ahead! I try to not to give too much away for most of these movies, but I fully spoil the end of Companion.)
July 1st - Star Wars: A New Hope (1977)
Whenever people talk to me about Star Wars I always say something like: “yeah, I don’t really care about the movies, but the universe is cool.” Most of my exposure to this franchise was through video games so I generally write off the movies as something I’m not interested in (even though I’ve watched all of the main movies except The Rise of Skywalker). So, when I opened my blu-ray cabinet on July 1st looking for a movie to watch I was surprised to remember that I own a copy of A New Hope on blu-ray. And then I popped the disc into my PS5 and I remembered the reason I own a copy of A New Hope on blu-ray is because it’s sick as fuck. I don’t know why I pretend to be such a hater— this movie is obviously great!
There’s nothing to be said about A New Hope that hasn’t already been said hundreds of thousands of times, so I’ll just give a few of my hot takes.
I don’t care about Obi-Wan! He’s cool I guess. Sorry about what happened to him.
The trench run is boring! I’m sorry I know it’s iconic and whatever but it does nothing for me.
Not so much a hot take, but I’m a huge fan of C-3PO and his friend R2D2. They’re absolutely delightful! When 3PO and R2 are not on screen I’m always asking “where’s 3PO and R2?” There needs to be a The Lion King 1½ type movie dedicated to telling me everything that’s going on with those guys. And I’m not just talking backstory and more screentime, I want them to rip-off Timon and Pumba ripping-off Mystery Science Theater 3000. Hire me Disney! I have so many ideas for this one idea!
I would like to formally apologize for pretending to not like Star Wars for so long, it really wasn’t my intention to misrepresent my opinions. Admittedly, the only other entries in the series I have any affinity for are The Empire Strikes Back and The Last Jedi, but three out of nine isn’t bad. I wish the Jurassic Park franchise had a batting average that strong.
July 3rd - Night of the Coconut (2022)
Although I’ve been a fan of filmmaker and video essayist Patrick H. Willems for several years, I never got around to watching his feature film, Night of the Coconut when it was released in 2022. The film serves as the finale to “Season 1” of Patrick’s YouTube channel which features three years of longform storytelling weaved into the otherwise standard format of video essays. I never got around to watching this when it came out, but I decided to finally watch it after being reminded of the storyline through one of my favorite video essays. I don’t really have a lot to say about this, but I really liked this. Making movies with your friends might be the most fun thing you can do in life and I’m jealous of how much fun they clearly had making this.
July 4th - Thunderbolts* (2025)
Thunderbolts* is a solid outing for Marvel Studios, especially compared to their recent movies. Florence Pugh shines as Yelena Belova, and immediately proves herself capable of leading a big action movie like this by taking a Tom Cruise-esque dive off a building in the opening moments. As a big fan of Miracle Workers I was really excited to see Geraldine Viswanathan join the MCU, especially since her character is traditionally a superpowered member of the Marvel Comics version of the Thunderbolts. Leading up to this movie I had no real expectation to see her put on a supersuit and join the team, but I was still quite disappointed with how little she impacted the plot and other characters. It’s not all bad though, because the things that work here work well, and the third act fight is one of the most innovative and visually interesting things I’ve seen in a Marvel movie. I want more Marvel movies like this!
July 5th - Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009) (With Commentary)
This is one of my favorite movies! Tina and I bought this on blu-ray during Barnes and Noble’s Criterion Collection sale, which gave me the wonderful opportunity to watch this with her for her very first time. A few days later I decided to run it back and listen to the director’s commentary while I built some furniture.
Gaining insight on the production of this movie was fascinating. I was really enamored with the lack of romance in how Wes spoke about a movie I hold near and dear to my heart. There are so many creative decisions that were made out of convenience or as solutions to problems that came up during the filmmaking process. It’s humbling to remember how messy and unpredictable the artistic process can be, especially when you have so many people collaborating to make one project. Overall this was a really fun commentary; Wes is an extremely interesting filmmaker and I liked taking a peek into his brain for ninety minutes. There are definitely a few parts I missed, so I’m looking forward to revisiting this with my full attention.
July 5th - Ant-Man (2015)
This is another movie I watched while building furniture. I don’t know why I own this movie on blu-ray and I’ll probably be giving it away soon because I don’t think I’ll be watching it again. This was on in the background, so it doesn’t feel right to critique it, but I’ve never really liked this movie. While there's definitely some good bits, and the third act is surprisingly great, nothing besides Michael Peña’s scenes stick with me after the credits start rolling.
July 7th - True Grit (2010)
True Grit rocks. Tina had never seen this before, so it was really cool to watch her watch this for the first time. Unfortunately, we watched this on a DVD we borrowed from my mom and the quality was pretty bad! I forgot DVDs looked like that! It was so wild to revisit this movie after seeing Hailee Steinfeld in Sinners earlier this year because it almost feels like a full circle moment for her filmography. Everyone knows how great she is in this movie, but it cannot be understated just how great she is. There’s not one bad performance in this movie which includes award-winning actors Jeff Bridges and Matt Damon, yet this 13-year-old shows them all up! I don’t personally care for this movie as much as I do other other Coen brothers films, like A Serious Man, but that ultimately comes down to taste, not quality. This was a great watch; I really want to see this in 4K.
July 8th - Rear Window (1954)
Rear Window is one of my favorite movies of all time. Jimmy Stewart takes the lead as Jeff, a photojournalist who finds himself confined in his apartment on account of a leg injury he got on assignment. Itching to get back to work, Jeff starts spying on his neighbors through their open windows and notices the suspicious disappearance of his neighbor’s wife. Watching this during the COVID lockdown was a really unique experience; the themes of isolation and voyeurism resonated with me when I was stuck in my house scrolling through social media. Hitchcock has a lot to say about the shallowness of community, especially in cities where people are cramped together but don’t interact with their neighbors. One of my favorite scenes centers around Jeff voicing othe misogynistic narrative he’s weaved about one of his neighbors which prompts his girlfriend, Lisa, played by Grace Kelly, to interject with some much needed nuance and empathy. Lisa’s insight ends up being crucial to the building of their case and despite not believing Jeff’s theories at first, it’s not long before she’s digging up holes and climbing fire escapes. This movie is just so damn fun, I can’t see anyone having a bad time with this if they don’t have a debilitating aversion to old movies.
July 8th - My Old Ass (2024)
I almost always cry during coming of age movies, but holy shit this one did a number on me. The only thing I knew about this before throwing it on was that Aubrey Plaza was in it, playing the titular “old ass”. I realized pretty early on that Plaza wasn’t going to have as much screentime as I expected, and that was perfectly fine with me because the lead, Maisy Stella, was absolutely spectacular. Stella and Plaza both play Elliott at different points in the character’s life, somehow meeting during a psychedelic trip on her 18th birthday. Over the course of the next few weeks, “old-Elliott” and “young-Elliott” keep in touch through their phones which lets old-Elliott give her younger self some advice. Plaza is really funny in this role and bounces off Stella's young-Elliot with ease in the few moments they’re on screen together. At first I didn’t really buy that they were the same person until I realized old-Elliott acted more like her mom than she did her younger-self.
I was really touched by the way the writer and director, Megan Park, approached the complicated emotions of growing up and moving out. Young-Elliott is as stupidly confident as an 18-year-old can be and it’s simultaneously heartwarming and heartbreaking to see her come to terms with the inevitabilities of life.I seriously cannot overstate how much I love Maisy Stella in this movie; I really loved her and can’t wait to see her next project. Aubrey Plaza is also great, bringing it all home with a scene that made me cry so much I had to pause the movie. I’ve been thinking about this movie a lot since I watched it and it’s one of the best movies I watched in July.
July 9th - Saturday Night (2024)
As someone who grew up watching SNL with my parents every Saturday night, I was pretty excited for this movie based on what I saw in the trailer. By the time it hit theaters a mix of lukewarm reviews and a busy schedule led to me missing it entirely, so I was excited to finally sit down and watch it on streaming.
It was fine! I really liked Cory Michael Smith’s performance as Chevy Chase— he’s hilarious and arrogant, just as I expect Chevy to be. His scenes sort of felt like a prequel to a biopic on Chevy’s whole career, which felt a bit strange towards the end as they crammed so much into one night. That’s pretty representative of my feelings on the whole movie and it rubbed me the wrong way. There are so many character moments that feel like they exist to remind us of what happens to these celebrities later in their lives. That really worked for me during the Gilda Radner and John Belushi ice skating scene, but in other places it just felt a bit stuffed and unrealistic. I’m so curious as to how much of this actually happened on this night because it eventually got so hectic and disorganized, I caught myself agreeing with the NBC executives when they tried to cancel the show. Speaking of, Cooper Hoffman plays a young NBC exec who works with Lorne Michaels, and he was really good! I was pretty impressed with the overall performance of the cast, especially because I was worried it would feel like they were doing impressions and I didn’t have that problem at all. As the leader of the Shiva Baby fan club, I was pretty disappointed with how underutilized Rachel Sennott was here, but thems the breaks. Overall, I guess I was whelmed. This definitely wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t my thing.
July 10th - Superman (2025)
I have too much to say about this movie, so I’ll keep my thoughts to some key points:
Things I Loved:
David Corenswet, Rachel Brosnahan, and Nicholas Hoult are fantastic as Superman/Clark Kent, Lois Lane, and Lex Luthor.
Lois and Clark have a really great relationship and embody the couple in a way that hadn’t yet been adapted to the big screen.
Krypto The Superdog. He’s a flying dog, man.
The greater DC Universe established in this movie is really interesting and I want to see more from it. I’m feeling pretty impatient about it actually!
Mr. Terrific is so fucking cool.
Things I Liked:
All five minutes in the Daily Planet were really cool. Spinoff show?
Lex’s staff were a bunch of fanatic freaks and that was cool. I wish we knew more about them and why they hate Superman.
I disagree with a lot of people who say James Gunn intentionally made anti-Zionist art, but I really appreciate that that can even be a conversation.
Things I Didn’t Like:
The Jor-El twist.
The entire Baby Joey rescue sequence makes my brain turn off.
Jimmy Olsen’s storyline. I think he should die.
We don’t get enough Clark Kent as a reporter! I want to see him show up late to work and trip over chairs!
July 11th - Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018)
This was my third viewing in as many months, and I have no regrets. While I genuinely do love this movie and need no excuse to watch it, each of these viewings were opportunities to show one of the greatest action movies ever made to people who had never seen it before.
There’s definitely a lot to like about this movie as a normal person, but I’m obviously an absolute freak about it. Each time I was intentionally misleading my friends before a big twist is revealed and interrupting the movie to point out the scene in which Tom Cruise broke his ankle. I want to pump this movie into my fucking veins. While I’d argue that the two subsequent entries in this series have more impressive action set pieces, I’m impressed with how well this movie’s story and action flows from scene to scene. There’s not a single moment wasted and it’s impossible to look away from the action happening on screen, especially because we know that Cruise might just die one day doing these wild stunts.
No one asked but this is my Mission: Impossible ranking from best to worst:
M:I - Fallout (2018)
M:I - Dead Reckoning (2023)
M:I - Ghost Protocol (2011)
Mission: Impossible (1996)
M:I - Rogue Nation (2015)
M:I - The Final Reckoning (2025)
Mission: Impossible III (2006)
Mission: Impossible II (2000)
July 12th - 28 Days Later (2002)
I’m sorry, but I just don’t like this movie and I never have. I remember watching this and 28 Weeks Later with my siblings when I was way too young for them, and I don’t really remember being scared, I just remember being bummed out— and that’s exactly how I felt watching this as an adult. The script and visuals are so bleak that I struggle to appreciate the good filmmaking and acting on display. The third act especially frustrates me with how it doubles down on the movie’s cynical portrayal of humanity, which simply doesn’t vibe with me..
Good movie. Don’t like it one bit.
July 14th - Companion (2025)
I went into this movie with tempered expectations and was still pretty disappointed by the time the credits rolled. My main highlight is Sophie Thatcher who delivers a strong performance as Iris, despite not being given all that much to do. Like everyone else who saw the trailer, I knew the twist before heading into this even though the writing and editing make it very clerk that I was not supposed to. It’s a really disappointing marketing strategy that made the first act quite the drag for me. There’s some strong stuff right after the big reveal when we cut to a flashback which wouldn’t feel out of place in an episode of Black Mirror. Unfortunately when we cut back to the present, the movie struggles to maintain a coherent tone, which left me struggling to attach to any of the characters outside of Iris.
Jack Quaid gets to have a little fun playing the villain when Josh’s “nice guy” persona starts to give way to the vindictive loser hiding beneath the surface. While I liked Quaid’s performance in this, the character of Josh left quite a bit to be desired. There doesn’t seem to be any real commitment to interrogating the ways misogyny and the patriarchy produce a person like Josh, and that’s a huge missed opportunity. One of the strangest moments of the movie comes toward the end when a technician gives Iris full autonomy in order to finally defeat Josh who fully revealed himself to be an insecure and abusive man. I just can’t believe everyone involved with this movie read the script and thought it was okay for a man to literally give Iris the autonomy and agency she needed to save herself! Such a sour note to end this movie on.
July 15th - Opus (2025)
I did not like this and I don’t want to write about it.
July 16th - Your Monster (2024)
This was perhaps the biggest bummer in this series of bummers. While I could list a series of reasons why the last three movies didn’t work for me, I simply didn’t vibe with Your Monster, no matter how strong its individual elements are. I will say Melissa Barrera is undeniably great in this; I never saw Scream (2022), so this was my first time seeing her act and I totally understand the hype. Barrera infuses so much humility into Laura, I couldn’t help but care for the character’s emotional wellbeing despite growing disinterested in her core relationships. Some of my explicit issues with this movie are with performances that didn’t work for me and unfortunately those performances took up a lot of screentime. There was one actor in particular who annoyed and frustrated me the whole time, even though I had liked him in other projects. I wanted to like this so bad because I appreciate a lot of what director and writer Caroline Lindy is doing here, especially the ending. This one didn’t quite work for me, but I’m excited to see what she does next!
July 17th - The Big Lebowski (1998)
I could have sworn I had watched The Big Lebowski before, but I realized that wasn’t fully true after the 40 minute mark when everything started to feel completely unfamiliar to me. I’m not sure if I fell asleep or got distracted the first time I tried to watch this; I just know that this was the first time I had ever seen Julianne Moore swinging from a ceiling naked. I had an absolute blast watching this movie— I can’t believe it’s taken me so long to finally get around to this, because it’s right up my alley. While there’s so much here that I’ve absorbed through cultural osmosis, none of it really came together in a way that highlighted just how good this movie really is. The dream and drug trip sequences in particular are moments I’ve seen out of context countless times, and yet they’re so much weirder and more impactful when viewed within the context of the movie. All the actors in this are great, but I was really struggling to contain myself over how funny John Goodman and the late Philip Seymour Hoffman are. They could barely move a muscle without making me bust out into laughter. This movie has some great verbal jokes but its real comedic strengths lie within the characters and the actors bringing them to life. It feels like almost every other character has the capacity to be the protagonist and it’s just dumb luck that we’re following The Dude, the one person who doesn’t want to be involved. I also feel the need to mention how gorgeous this movie is; if you tried to make a comedy look this good today they would draw and quarter you live on Netflix.
Rating this on my True Grit Scale, I would say this is above True Grit and below A Serious Man.
July 18th - The Terminator (1984)
This is another classic I had never seen before and I don’t know why it took me so long to watch this. The police station scene is so unbelievably funny to me. They start by telling a scared woman that the building is filled with cops, people who are famously known for their respectful treatment of women, and follow it up by getting absolutely eviscerated by the Terminator. They were so useless and I was cackling the whole time! Very fun, very realistic. Linda Hamilton and Michael Biehn are good as Sarah and Kyle, but they don’t really get anything to do besides go through the motions of a paper thin love story. I really can’t vibe with the idea of Kyle falling in love with a photo of his boss’ mom no matter how bad the robot apocalypse is. Arnold Schwarzenegger definitely delivers the best performance out of the leads, but even he doesn’t get much to do especially when compared to his increased role in the sequel. It’s wild how long James Cameron has been making action movies at a level which far surpasses most of his peers. Missing the theatrical run of Avatar: The Way of Water is one of the biggest regrets of my adulthood and watching Terminator only strengthened that feeling. You better believe I’m gonna be in the theater for Avatar: Fire and Ash, releasing on December 19, exclusively in theaters (not sponsored).
July 18th - Fresh (2022)
I went into this movie with low expectations and I was pleasantly surprised with what this turned out to be. Daisy Edgar Jones and Sebastian Stan deliver strong lead performances as Noa and Brendan which humanize their characters and keep the movie from turning into a caricature of abuse. It would have been really easy for the extremity of the abuse Brendan inflicts upon Noa to overshadow the realistic portrayal of abuse tactics and manipulation, and I’m glad that didn’t happen here. While there’s a lot here that I like, including a fashionably late title card and a brutal move from Noa towards the end of the movie, there’s also quite a bit that left me wanting more. Some scenes and storylines remind me of 10 Cloverfield Lane and Get Out, and the comparisons do not land in this movie’s favor. There’s a scene towards the end where Paul, a black man, is coming to rescue Mollie, a black woman, and as soon as he gets there he gets scared and leaves. This was probably supposed to be a meta joke about how black people wouldn’t get into horror movie situations, but it felt mean-spirited and misogynoiristic in a way I’m not sure the creators intended. If that actually was the intention then there were some serious tonal issues. I mostly liked this!
July 19th - Frances Ha (2012)
Watching this as a 27-year-old with money problems was the most cursed 4DX experience ever. Frances Ha is one of Tina’s favorite movies and I had never seen it before, so we scooped up a copy during the Criterion Collection sale and watched it as soon as we both had free time. This was an absolute delight! It’s unbelievable how light and breezy the pacing feels despite how much is crammed into this 86 minute runtime. I found out they used a DSLR to film this and that makes sense because it feels like a hypercompetent student film. There is so much love for filmmaking, life, and love itself infused into the DNA of this movie, I can’t help but love it. Halfway through watching this I turned to Tina and said “I just realized both our favorite movies are written by Noah Baumbach” and I’m not sure if that says more about us or Baumbach’s writing ability. There’s an addictive rhythm to his dialogue which is only amplified by Gerwig’s brilliant comedic timing. At one point Frances makes a dinner scene so hilariously awkward my jaw was on the floor for about five minutes straight. My favorite movies are ones that highlight the beauties of life and describe them in ways I’ve never thought of before and Frances Ha is exactly that.
July 20th - Superman (2025)
I took my mom to see Superman! She really liked it!
July 21th - Blow Out (1981)
This is another movie I bought during the Criterion Collection sale. I watched this for the first time this past May and immediately fell in love with it, so I knew I had to get my hands on this 4K restoration and it was worth every penny. Blow Out is one of the most beautiful and stylish movies I’ve ever seen with director Brian DePalma pulling off split diopter shots that would make any film nerd smile. DePalma and cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond are so damn confident behind the camera; I just can’t keep my eyes off the screen while this is on. John Travolta delivers a great performance as Jack, a sound effects technician who incidentally records the audio of an attempted political assassination. This movie reminds me a lot of Rear Window, specifically how both protagonists use the tools of their artistry to uncover a criminal conspiracy the authorities can’t be bothered to care about. Watching these artists be so proficient at their crafts that they’re able to solve crimes feels so good; it's like wish fulfillment for me and other artists who grew up believing art could change the world. While Blow Out is markedly more cynical than Rear Window in this regard, it’s still an unbelievable amount of fun to watch Jack comb through his audio recordings to prove his theory right. There’s also a lot more cynicism when it comes to the female lead Sally, played by Nancy Allen, who is always being pushed around by the men in her life in order to further their own agendas. It was a bit frustrating to watch her storyline in this, but when the credits rolled my jaw was on the floor and I totally understood what DePalma was going for. It’s taking everything in me not to stop what I’m doing and watch this again right now. I cannot recommend this movie enough. Go watch this as soon as you can.
July 22nd - Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
This is so much better than the first movie because they doubled down on everything that worked and cut what didn’t. Sarah Connor is cooler than Kyle Reese ever was, and now Sarah’s old role is filled with her son, John, who adapts to the situation with relative ease allowing the story to get moving almost immediately. Schwarzenegger's best scenes in the first movie were focused on him interacting with and bouncing off of other people, so seeing the Terminatore paired up with John in this one was a lot of fun. Linda Hamilton is so damn good playing this badass version of Sarah Connor that it's a bit baffling Cameron had resigned her to the damsel role before. I also have to take back what I said about Kyle Reese being weird for falling in love with Sarah without knowing her because I totally get it now. Her interpersonal skills are a bit worse now that she’s been traumatized by robots from the apocalypse, but she’s so cool and gorgeous! What a woman! I really liked this movie— it’s way better than the first one.
July 23rd - I Like Movies (2022)
I Like Movies is the best new movie I watched this month. This brilliant debut from writer and director Chandler Levack follows a socially awkward 17-year-old named Lawrence who starts working at a video rental store in Toronto circa 2003. Isaiah Lehtinen does a great job portraying Lawrence as an asshole teenager that I really struggled to connect with this movie at first. Honestly, he reminds me a lot of myself at that age if you got rid of all my positive character traits. Despite his rough edges, I quickly found myself caring about him, especially during later scenes with his mom, played by Krista Bridges. Bridges is fantastic in this and my heart broke watching her react to some of the things Lawrence says to her. The standout performance for me was Romina D’Ugo as Alana, Lawrence’s boss, whose final scene made me unexpectedly burst into tears. I don’t mean to focus on how sad and frustrated this movie made me, because it’s also a lot of fun. Not a day has gone by without me thinking about this movie; I cannot overstate how much I enjoyed this.
July 24th - WALL-E (2008)
Yet another great movie I felt compelled to buy during the Criterion Collection sale! This is one of my favorite Pixar movies and has been for a long time, although I didn’t love it when I watched it as a kid because of the human characters. As an adult, I really like the Captain and find the other two human characters to be inoffensive, especially because of how little screentime they take up. I get why other people still don’t like it though: when everything else is basically perfect, a few inoffensive scenes can be really jarring. WALL-E might be the prettiest animated movie ever made. Even though technology has improved to allow for better 3D models and higher visual fidelity, this movie’s visual design and cinematography stand the test of time and beat out most of its successors. Every frame of this movie is filled with so much depth and detail— if they made a movie that looked this good today everybody would lose their minds! I know this won an oscar, but I feel like we, as a society, need to be talking about how good this movie is way more than we currently are! Everybody keeps telling me to watch Ice Cube’s War of the Worlds and I can’t rationalize doing that when WALL-E is only seven minutes longer than that (allegedly) terrible movie! What the hell are we doing as a society? Go watch WALL-E!
July 25th - Knives Out (2019)
This was such a blast to rewatch with friends, several of whom had never seen it before. I remember leaving the theater after watching this for the first time knowing it was a classic. Revisiting this six years later, I’m both impressed and concerned with how culturally timeless this movie feels. Filled with references to the politics of the first Trump administration, Knives Out unfortunately feels like it could be released today and hit the same. The “dirty anchor baby” line was the only thing that aged— thankfully that term hasn’t weaseled its way back into the lexicon— although it’s still one of my favorite line deliveries because of Jaeden Martell’s hesitatition before saying it. Cultural and political stagnation aside, this movie is perfect! Rian Johnson’s subversion of mystery tropes has been talked to death, but that’s only because of how good he is at doing it. The people I watched it with were questioning every intentional loose end that Johnson left for people to pull and it was a delight to watch them think they were outsmarting the movie. “Oh my God, I said that!” was exclaimed no less than six times during the big explanation scene and I was laughing the whole time.
Watching Knives Out with other people is so much fun and I’m really thankful I got to see this and its sequel, Glass Onion, in theaters, no matter how hard Netflix tried to make the latter impossible. While I hope I get the chance to see the third film, Wake Up Dead Man, in theaters as well, I seriously doubt it because Netflix values their business model over the success of their movies.
(Because it took me so long to edit this it’s already been announced that Wake Up Dead Man will have a two week theatrical run!)
July 26th - The Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025)
This was fine. I’m a big fan of Jack Kirby and Stan Lee’s work on their original run of Fantastic Four, especially the “Coming of Galactus” storyline which this movie adapts, so it had a lot to live up to in my eyes. The trailers did nothing to ease my concerns and left me with really low expectations heading into this. With that in mind, I was impressed with a lot of this movie! The set design was beautiful, and I really enjoyed being in a universe that felt more similar to the one I know from the comics. There was a huge smile on my face when they acknowledged the existence of Subterranea! One of my main issues with the world of the MCU is how much “realism” has drained the imaginative elements of the comics from their big screen adaptations, and this mostly breaks free from that. The cast is great as well, although I wish they let Vanessa Kirby keep her English accent, because her American accent just wasn’t working for me. Her acting was great though, I just know what she usually sounds and like and it bugged me at times.
The movie peaks for me in the second act, particularly with the scene involving a black hole that had me on the edge of my seat. While the breakneck pace of the first half of the movie kept my attention, the slower parts before the finale started to expose some of my issues. With this movie taking place four years after the formation of the FF, most of the team has already gone through some of the character development they’re most well known for in the comics. The Thing suffers the most with him explicitly telling Reed that he’s not upset about being turned into a big disgusting rock monster and only being given a short moment to visualize his internal struggles. I don’t really know how these guys feel about themselves or each other besides love and that doesn’t feel very realistic or interesting. Even when there’s conflict between the four of them, I just don’t buy that anything will happen other than reconciliation. Just like with the threat of Galactus in the big finale, I knew how it was all going to end because I’ve seen these Marvel movies before and they aren’t in the business of surprising me. I had a good enough time with this, I’m just tired of the best Fantastic Four movie being about a guy named Mr. Incredible.
July 27th - Malibu’s Most Wanted (2003)
LMAO. Pass.
July 28th - The Iron Giant (1999)
This was the day Tina and I were driving down to San Diego, so I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to keep up with my daily movie schedule. After a late start to our drive and quite a few technical issues once we got to the hotel, I was eventually able to lay down and revisit and old favorite. The Iron Giant was one of those movies my elementary school teachers loved to throw on when they didn’t feel like teaching for the day. If you had asked me the plot of this movie twenty minutes before I threw this on, I probably would have been able to give you a rough outline, but as soon as this started up all my memories rushed to the front of my mind. I spent the entire third act bracing myself for the emotional impact of the ending and it didn’t work at all, although I completely forgot the movie’s final scene so that was a nice surprise! The characters in this are a lot of fun and the voice acting is really good— I kept looking up the cast and being shocked by who played each character (except Jennifer Aniston). It’s amazing how gorgeous this movie looks, with the animators’ ambitious blend of 2D and CGI animation still holding up to today’s standards. Unfortunately, I had to watch this in standard definition because of all my tech issues and that was pretty disappointing. I can’t believe it took them until this year to release a 4K restoration of this movie and it’s not even widely available! When will the injustices end?
July 29th - The Incredibles (2004)
It’s pretty wild that Disney hasn’t tapped Brad Bird to direct a Marvel movie despite him having directed the best superhero movie ever made. As soon as that Michael Giacchino score kicked in, a smile grew across my face that wouldn’t go away for the next two hours. The opening sequence is a fun and hilarious homage to the Marvel universe and creates a “superhuman registration act” better than either Marvel comics or the MCU. I’ve only watched this movie a couple times as an adult and both times I couldn’t believe just how brutal Mr. Incredible is to Buddy (and his development from loser nerd to loser supervillain was incredibly prescient). I was also impressed with how seriously the relationship between Bob and Helen is treated, especially when she starts to suspect him of being unfaithful. Swapping in Helen as the protagonist halfway through the movie wouldn’t have worked if we didn’t spend so much time focusing on their relationship.
I’m also just so obsessed with Syndrome’s island and everything that happens on it— not just in the movie, as this is where the best action and character moments happen, but everything that presumably happened before the movie takes place. I love that Syndrome was able to buy an island with a seemingly active volcano and then built a missile silo inside of that volcano. I love that Syndrome definitely didn’t kill all the birds to replace them with robot ones that snitch on trespassers. I love that Syndrome’s henchmen didn’t hesitate when trying to kill kids. Are they just super dedicated jobbers or are they fully down for the cause? Either way they gotta relax. The Syndrome organization deserves a spinoff; I want to know what makes these guys tick.
I would love to see Brad Bird direct a Marvel or DC comic book adaptation one day if that’s something he’d be interested in. He has a really good eye for superhero action that I haven’t seen rivalled outside of the “Spider-Verse” movies. Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, which was directed by Bird, was also really great and features some of the best action in the series, proving he’s not limited to a single medium. Please, Marvel Studios, do the right thing and hire the person who hung Tom Cruise off the side of the Burj Khalifa.
There wasn't a natural place to put this but I really like when Syndrome says “AND GOT BUSY”. I giggle thinking about it.
July 30th - Incredibles 2 (2018)
I put this movie off for a long time because I thought it would be a soulless cashgrab and I’m happy to say it’s certainly not soulless. While the family elements here lack the humor and heart of the first movie, the action scenes are bigger and better than ever. It’s so clear that Brad Bird had ideas for stunts in Mission: Impossible that weren’t possible for any human to perform and I’m glad he was able to realize them through animation. Making Elastigirl the lead of this one was a great choice because her powers are the most visually interesting of the entire cast and Holly Hunter is still great as Helen. Unfortunately the same can’t be said of Craig T. Nelson as Bob, who understandably sounds like a 70-year-old man. Despite my issues with the plot while watching it unfold, all I remember now are the cool action scenes and fun character moments.. Admittedly I already knew the main villain's plot, which was my biggest issue, so that quickly melted away into a silly scheme I could laugh at. This feels like a three episode arc of a cartoon show based on The Incredibles, and that sounds pretty great to me. I would certainly take three more episodes of this over any of the live-action remakes Disney is making right now.
July 31st - Magic Mike’s Last Dance (2023)
I wanted to end this month with something special and I couldn’t think of anything more special than sharing the last dance with my good friend Mike Lane. I’m a big fan of Magic Mike and Magic Mike XXL, the latter of which I consider to be a near-perfect movie, so I was really excited to finally finish out the trilogy. It is with a heavy heart I must report that Magic Mike’s Last Dance is just okay. The first scene between Salma Hayek and Channing Tatum was so fucking wild I was convinced we had another hit on our hands, but unfortunately that was where this movie peaked. I liked Mike storyline well enough, and I really appreciate how the creative teams behind these movies have always treated what Mike does as a serious art that takes talent and hard work. The recruitment montage was one of my favorite scenes because it showcased the individual capabilities of the dancers and why they deserved a spot on the cast. Unfortunately, this also showcased this movie’s misunderstanding of what made the first two so great: highlighting the personalities of the dancers and treating them like real people. I don’t even think the dancers in this movie have names! This could’ve been a huge bummer to end my month on, but the movie is just too competent for me to dislike it. It’s a really gorgeous movie, with an argument scene between Halmek and Tatum having better lighting than the entirety of Wicked. As I said in my Letterboxd review: “the worst Magic Mike movie is still pretty good”.
This was really fun! I haven’t watched this many movies since I was in high school and I haven’t written about movies in about three years, so this whole experience was a nice return to form. Admittedly, I didn’t realize how little time I would have for reading books and watching TV when two hours of my day are dedicated to watching a movie. As time has gone on I’ve gotten a lot better at managing my time— I’ve even done a few double features just for the fun of it. Getting out of the month of July was really exciting because I thought I would feel free of my obligation to watch a movie everyday, but it hasn’t gone away at all and now I’m more committed than ever.
Thank you to everyone who took the time to read this. I don’t know if I’ll do another one of these, but I’m still logging everything on my Letterboxd.