Favorite films

Pinned reviews

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  Phoenix 2014

  ★★★★½ Rewatched 23 Jun 2021

  This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

  Nelly, a disfigured concentration camp survivor, unrecognizable after facial reconstruction surgery, searches ravaged postwar Berlin for the husband (Johnny) who might have betrayed her to the Nazis. - Letterbox summary

  While Christian Petzold's inspirations are easy to spot, it's important to note that he is not simply a talented impressionist like De Palma, nor a glorified clip artist (meaning, taking someone else's images or words and cutting and pasting them into their movie) like Tarantino. I don't feel like I'm…

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  Un Chien Andalou 1929

  ★★★★★ Rewatched 02 Feb 2021

  It's all about sex, or Freudian notions of sex, and interpretations of dream - where falling represents sexual anxiety, running on staircases indicates desire, being hit by a car symbolizes intercourse - or sexual violation. Stripes are not simply stripes, boxes are more than boxes, they signify the phallic or vaginal. Sexual inhibition and identity, emasculation, want, sexual aggression, sexual awakening is ever-present. And all of these seemingly random incidences follow this through-line, that all of our desires will ultimately…

Recent reviews

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  M3GAN 2022

  ★★½ Watched 29 Mar 2023

  Not a fan of James Wan - there's a paint by numbers quality to his productions - which is evident in the script he co-wrote here (see the clunky foreshadowing in the first act). On the other hand, I did enjoy director Gerard Johnstone's Housebound, so I gave it a go.

  While there's none of the deadpan humor here (aside from the opening toy commercial), what Johnstone did bring to the table was the memorable dance sequence - and the…

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  The Night Rider 1920

  ★★★½ Watched 19 Mar 2023

  I just adore Texas Guinan, she's a kick, one of the best early heroes, female or otherwise - She's rough and tumble, does what she wants and takes no guff from anyone. (If you cross her, watch out!)

  While it can be difficult tracking down her work, I've managed to find quite a few of them. Grapevine offered up a decent copy of The Stampede and I found a collection of her pictures (including the wonderful The Gun Woman) of…

Popular reviews

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  Lilith 1964

  ★★★ Watched 18 Jun 2016

  Oh if only Warren Beatty had been a stronger actor, and was able to bring some nuance to the part of Vincent - the war vet who takes a job at a sanitarium and gets too involved with a female patient. If he was able to convey the idea of a man going from point A to point B during the course of the film – and gradually falling to ruin after betraying his core principals - this movie might…

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  One-Eyed Jacks 1961

  ★★★★½ Rewatched 22 Nov 2016 1

  One-Eyed Jacks isn’t a universally hailed western like say a Stagecoach or High Noon. But it has its devoted fans, and I number myself among them. The film has been in a sorry state for decades, so I was elated when I found out that Criterion was releasing a restored version of Brando’s lone directorial effort. And when I hit play I was blown away. They did a beautiful job. Though I’ve seen the picture at least a half dozen…